The Peacock 501

 "Carol", says Sarah, "What were you playing this morning.  It was just incandescent!"

Carol looks up from the wide slice of fresh apple pie almost completely concealed in a heap of white chocolate ice cream, and hesitates, as though caught off guard by the question.

"Oh, it was just nothing, dear.  Nothing", Carol says, returning her focus on her pie and ice cream, which with a spoon she is mechanically shovelling into her mouth.

"I've never heard that piece of music before", Sarah says, apparently more interested in getting information from Carol than in eating her pie and ice cream.  She places the plate on the coffee table in front of her and reaches for her coffee, since Melissa has just made a couple of fresh pots for everyone.  I am only hoping that this time it's decaf.  

"Was it an improvisation?" asks Carl.

"Yes, I suppose that it was", Carol replies in a thread of a voice, almost perfunctorily.   Then she looks up, her eyes hardening somewhat, and says, "Please, could we leave off the subject of music for the time being, and let's just enjoy our pie and ice cream."

"The pie is perfection", says George.  "Who made it?"

"Carol did", Melissa says.

"We did", Carol says, glancing at her with a smile not exactly conspiratorial, but rather looks like it could be almost a plea...

The Peacock 500

 We begin the meeting with silence.  Carl's suggestion.  Apparently this has not been done here before.  This is a surprisingly comfortable and deep silence, and it is clear that the divine presence is indeed with us, and very present.  It is like we have all become members, or parts of one single living being, breathing, feeling and thinking, together...as one.  I am thinking suddenly of Eric, and of Greta, and of how long will I be staying here, and perhaps I should just stay here and let Eric have the apartment, or perhaps he isn't going to come at all.  They have just stepped up the restrictions on international travel.  This pandemic shows no sign of ebbing.  And now, as though a warm, fragrant breeze is passing over me, taking with it this thought and the worry, and again I am left silent, empty, yet full, so full of what I cannot possibly contain, and the silence returns and I appear to be hearing as from a great distance the voice of Sarah as she invokes: "Oh God, may the words of our mouths, and the meditations of our hearts, be acceptable in thy sight."

"Lord, guide us, we ask you, Lord Jesus", prays Maureen.

"Give us wisdom, and fill our hearts with your love", says Jennifer.

Then, there is more silence.  There is the sound of a robin singing in the garden, and on the music of its warble sounds Carl, as he says, "Thank you Lord Jesus.  Amen."

"Now we are together", says Glen, a slight smile flickering on his lips.

"Today, the community is born", says Carl.

All eyes are open, and we glance at one another.  Melissa leaves the room, saying something about the pies.

"Do we have ice cream?" asks Carol.

"Tonnes of ice cream", murmurs Carl, "Mountains of ice cream.  A whole Mount Everest of ice cream."

"Vanilla?" whispers Carol, wistfully.

"Better", says Carl.  "White chocolate."

"Ah", she says, "White chocolate ice cream melting atop a warm apple pie..."

The Peacock 499

 It seems now that everyone, for the first time, is present, all of us, in the same room.  Aaron and Jesús have finally arrived.  They don't seem forthcoming about where they were were, but naturally it is going to be assumed they were out on a walk together.  Francois has not bothered to bandage his face, but the cut is so miniscule that only anyone who knows what happened would trouble to notice.  And now we are about to all find out, because Carl is just asking about Tristan.

"He ran off", says Francois.

"What happened exactly?" asks Carl.

"He made some very derogatory comments about people of colour, we got into a scuffle, and when he saw I was capable of defending myself, the little chicken ran away."

"You hit him?" Carl says.

"Self defense.  When he was going to try to throw a second punch, I blocked it and knocked him to the floor.  I know, hardly in keeping with turning the other cheek..."

"You needn't blame yourself", says Carl. "I'm sure there are times when God cuts us slack for having to deal with certain kinds of idiots."

"Well", says Carol, "I say hurrah for you Francois, and three cheers too.  It's about time someone started showing a little testosterone around here."

"Besides my sister", says Carl, snickering.

"And don't you forget it", says Melissa...

The Peacock 498

 "I just hope he's okay", Sarah says.

"Dear Sarah", says Francois, "If there is anyone whose life, words and example can always hold me accountable to the Lamb of God, you would be the one with the winning resume."

"I'm not judging you", she says, "In fact, I don't blame you.  You put up with an awful lot from both him and Doug."

"His repulsive little deputy", says Francois.

"It must have been pretty bad", I say, not knowing why I don't just stay quiet.

"Oh, you don't know the half of it", says Jennifer.  "We were living under one holy dictatorship.  George and Jeff really got the worst of it.  Doug would give the orders and Tristan would run around enforcing them.  It turned out that they didn't care much for their sense of humour.  They didn't get humour at all.  And George and Jeff are both funny.  They love making and telling jokes.  They are hilarious.  And Doug would try to impose fasts and house confinements in their own rooms on them, and at first they obeyed, and then they began to rebel.  So the little weasel would threaten to beat them, and one day, they both took him on, roughed him up and he never bothered them again.  In fact, that is when things finally started to turn against their holy dictatorship.  There was a core of us who never cooperated, just the women I'm afraid, but none of us would stand for it, and Doug and his little acolyte were such entrenched misogynists, well, we simply just ignored them, and did everything we could to undermine them.  

"With Tristan gone now" , says Francois, dabbing lightly the slightly stained cloth on his wound, "We can now finally all come together as a community.  The last obstacle is gone now..."

The Peacock 497

 We appear to be walking in on rather a serious conversation  With difficulty they all pull away from their topic of interest in order to give us their attention.

"The meeting is just starting", says Sarah.  "Are you all coming?  Francois!  What happened?"

He is holding a facecloth against a lightly bleeding cut under his right eye.

"A bit of a scuffle with Tristan, I'm afraid."

"Where is he?" says Sarah.

"He's gone", says Jenn.  "Apparently, he hit Francois, who delivered him in return a punch in the mouth.  He fell on the floor.  Then, got up and ran away."

"You actually hit him?" Sarah says, incredulous.

"I probably should have held myself in check", says Francois.  "But I just couldn't let the little bastard get away with it.  I know, hardly turning the other cheek, and now he's gone."

"Are you sure he's gone?" says Sarah.

"We saw him leave from the window.  He must have picked up his things without any of you seeing him.  It appears he left through one of the side doors."

"What happened?" says Sarah.

"Just as we were starting to do the floor, he launched into some very racist language", says Francois.  "I challenged him.  He hit me, I hit him back, and he ran away."

"What are we going to do now?" says Sarah.

Francois emits a wicked little grin and says, "Does Carl have champagne in the wine cellar?..."  

The Peacock 496

 "We should be ready to start soon", says Carl, looking at his watch.  "But where are the others.  We are still missing Francois and What's his face, along with Maureen and Jenn."

"I can check", say I, really wanting to get out of the room for a few minutes, and not even knowing why.

"Better let me come with you, says Sarah.  "They'll be in a part of the house you don't know very well,

She leads me along a corridor, past the kitchen to the other wing of the house,  which I have not seen yet.  It is like a distinct reality.  The rooms are every bit as elegant and expansive, but different furniture, rather worn and not quite at its best.    Rather cheap looking, and simply funcional, I should imagine.   If at all.  There is a sense of sad neglect here, I would imagine from the three years of Doug's presence here.  It would be very difficult to maintain a cheery home while living in a state of constant siege, I would think.  But I can also tell from the design of the rooms that Carl and Melissa have the more attractive half of the house    We are going up a staircase, as expansive, but not as elegant as the one in the main part of the house.  We can hear voices, not very loud, women and one man, likely Maureen and Jenn and Francois.

Neither are there any paintings adorning the walls here, perhaps a couple of religious themed posters, but little else.  "Hello", says Sarah.

"We're in my room", responds the voice of Jennifer

"It is a bright and spacious dormer room with slanting walls, two embedded windows and lots of light.  Jenn is seated on top of her bed, and the other two are in chairs.  The room looks and feels very different from the rest of the house.  Clean, well ordered, bright, colourful, and cheery, with paintings of flowers and landscapes adorning the walls and colours of sky blue, apple green and golden yellow predominating...

The Peacock 495

 Adam says, after some hesitation, "I think I'm forty-six."

"You think you are forty-six", says Carol.

"But", and looking a little unsettled, decides to play with the idea, "I could be mistaken."

"Are you being serious?" she says.

"Thing is, am I ever being serious", Adam quips, "But, no, I do not know my correct age.  Some time ago, before I came to the Place of the Transfiguration, I had forgotten my past, and had to invent one, but then that soon fell through...kind of."  And now he looks up at everyone, now authentically perplexed and vulnerable, as though knowing that he cannot easily play his way out of this one.

"Where is your family", Carol asks.

"I imagine they're all dead.  I believe my mother was a ballerina, the Kirov in Russia, but everything is pretty vague.  I somehow ended up with about a half dozen vintage Faberge eggs in my possession, which I sold to various dealers, including Matthew here, when he had his antique business, and then I brought him with me to the Place of the Transfiguration."

"On Vancouver Island", Carl says.  "How did you arrive there."

"I was just there.  I showed up one day, and didn't have a clue how I got there  But they all welcomed me, and I was already a believing Christian, so everything fell into place, except, I can't remember.  Anything.

"How very extraordinary", Carol says.  "I am so very sorry that I probed so much."

"It's okay", says Adam, smiling and maintaining composure, "It's been common knowledge here for a while.  At least to my closest friends here..."