Darkness at the Edge of Town (Iris Ballard #2)(35)
“Just around Grey County or—”
“No. Some went as far as Cleveland and Philly.”
“I can’t see people driving hundreds of miles to attend a seminar,” I said. “And I thought only Helen ran them.”
“She ran the ones around here, but there are others, I think, who do them too sometimes. I know Billy was over the fucking moon when he told me he’d been chosen for seminar training. I think there were four others trained as journey healers like Helen.”
“Journey healers?” I asked.
“Yeah. Technically anyone who helps spread New Morningism or its ideas is a journey person, but there are different kinds. Healing, ambassadors, helpers.”
“And this Mathias is the Grand Journeyman, according to the website.”
“Yeah. And anyone else just ‘being,’?” he said with air quotes, “is a voyager.”
“And here I was calling them Morningstars,” I said with a smirk. “So pretty girl flirts with you, you go to a seminar to see her, what happened next?”
“It was a lot like NA, just with less personal blame and guilt. According to the Movement, our life choices were never really choices. The universe made us shoot up or drink as a part of a journey toward true happiness and enlightenment. I mean, come on. What junkie doesn’t want to hear it ain’t their fault? That it was out of our control?” Kevin rolled his eyes. “Plus, Megan was giving me the eye. We went out for tea after, and she invited me to a party at The Temple a few days later. Once again I figured, what the hell?”
“Was it always the same people acting as ambassadors?” I asked. “Megan, Paul, the other attractive members?”
He thought for a second. “I guess so. Considering I found out Megan was fucking like four other people while she strung me along for months, it would make sense.” He scoffed. “I’m all for free love, and I enjoyed that aspect of my time there, but four people at once is still a lot.”
“Yeah, Gia mentioned orgies,” I said.
Kevin’s face turned red. “Yeah. Part of the philosophy is that sex is one of the most natural acts in the universe. That there should be no shame in it. I mean, not everyone participated. Monogamy was just as accepted, but most of us were single, so why the hell not?”
“No judgments here. Whatever floats your boat. But if Megan hadn’t been so free with her affections do you think you would have kept going back?”
“I mean, at first, yeah, I was just there for the…affection, but everyone was just so fucking nice. We’d all been through similar shit and didn’t judge each other. We all actually listened and cared, or at least pretended to. If someone needed help moving or with bills, other voyagers stepped up.”
“People gave each other money?” I asked with a raised eyebrow.
“Not like a lot, but yeah, a few bucks here and there. Of course those people who couldn’t pay their bills usually moved into The Temple the next month. Then I think whatever cash they had went to the Temple pool. That’s one of the reasons I never moved in. That and no privacy.”
“Do most people at The Temple have jobs?”
“Yeah. We all shared leads on jobs and stuff.”
“Were those the only circumstances where they asked you for money?” I asked.
“I mean besides donations for parties and seminars, pretty much. But looking back on it, some of the people living at The Temple and The Apex were pulling down like twenty-five grand a year or more and there are how many people living there? The Movement’s only been around for a year and a half. That ain’t bad.”
“So you were drawn in by sex, community, and acceptance. Is that why you became an ambassador and recruited Billy?” I asked.
“Shit, when you say it like that…” He scoffed. “I did the ambassador thing because they needed more people and they asked. And I didn’t mean to recruit your brother, okay? He was going through a shit time, and I really thought they could help him. I always felt good after the seminars—I did. I saw my buddy in pain and figured it could help him too.”
“So they never put pressure on you to recruit?”
“Nothing in your face, no. When you did bring recruits in, though, everyone, including Mathias, treated you like king shit, especially the women. Megan and Nessa were very appreciative when Billy came to his first Temple gathering. And the second,” he said with a smirk.
I suppressed a grimace. “Did you recruit anyone else?”
“No one that stuck around as long. But Billy, man, he was into it right away. He stayed after the first seminar with Helen for two hours and went to every seminar they had for almost a month straight. He never missed a Temple party, neither.”
“What made you change your mind about them?” I asked.
“Shit. Lots of things. They kept pressing me to move into The Temple. The new-age shit got annoying. Meditation and tea and reincarnation just ain’t for me. Megan stopped paying attention to me when I refused to be an ambassador anymore and wouldn’t move in. They wanted more and more of my time. It just got to be too much. Plus my other friends kept calling me ‘Waco’—you know, after that cult—and I finally realized they had a point. So I just stopped going.” Kevin shook his head. “Megan called me and shit, but it was Billy who went full court press trying to get me back into the collective. He wouldn’t shut up about how great it was and how much I was missing out. It was fucking constant. I finally had to ask to move down the line to get the hell away from his badgering.”