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Addict
Join Date: Oct 2003
Location: Australia, the Sunshine State
Posts: 174
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The Apostles, a true story
This is a true story, but it is actually about my sister, Rhia, who helped me write this. I just wrote in the first person as it was easier. (especially with Rhia telling me what happened in first person, she may be crazy but she doesn’t refer to herself in third person, yet…)
The car’s headlights lit up the road in front, transforming the wet black asphalt into a silver lake. I sat, perhaps a little uncomfortably, in my new skirt and best top in the passenger seat in my father’s car. Maybe I should have got the size 14 skirt, it certainly wasn’t as tight as the 12, but the 12 looked so good on me. I shifted my position to stop the waistband cutting into me as I continued to chew my nail.
“You all right, hun?” my father asked.
‘Yeah, just fine.”
In truth I was more than a little nervous. I had never met any of Luke’s family before and was worried about how they would respond to me. I knew Luke had four brothers and two sisters, that and the entire family were devout Catholics.
It was not that their religion worried me, more that I was afraid that mine would worry them. It had not taken me much to convince Luke that all Pagans weren’t ‘evil Satanists’, but then again, he had been so charmed with me at the time he probably would have agreed with anything I said. Now he had gotten to know me better, he knew me to be anything but evil, but his family had never met me. What would I say if the topic of religion came up? What was I to do in grace? What would they think?
“You’ll be fine” I heard my father say.
“Thank’s pa.” I said looking up. It was then I realised the car had just pulled into a drive.
“You’ll be alright going in on your own? You don’t want me to come meet his parents?”
I had to smile. I knew that in most situations kids weren’t meant to want their parents to walk them to the door and introduce themselves, and in most situations parents wanted to. However, I knew how much my father could not abide large numbers of people, and much as I would have liked him to come I did not know if Luke’s parents would take kindly to his attire (brown leather jacket, complete with tassels, feathers and beads. There were also several feathers plaited into a lock of his long wild hair).
“It’s alright dad,” I answered. “I’ll be fine.”
Waving good-bye I stepped out of the car and made my way up the path as my father drove off. I paused at the door to tuck my pent’ under my top and rang the doorbell.
“She’s here” I heard a young voice call and feet scamper towards the door.
“Jo! Let me get that!” Luke’s voice carried through the door. There was a crash as Jo apparently beat his older brother to the door, crashing into it and attempting to open it at the same time. Jo managed to open the door just as Luke came running up.
“Uh, hi!” He said, attempting to catch his breath. “Jo!” Jo scampered away from the door. “Do you want to come in?”
“Sure!” I smiled, and entered.
My first view upon entering was of a holy picture featuring a person, arms raised and flooded with light. Luke lead me into the lounge and I averted my eyes from the crucifix hanging on the wall, I hated to see dead people.
The lounge was a neat, large uncluttered room. This surprised me, I would have thought that such a large family would create a lot of mess, but apparently not. Maybe they had just tidied it for my sake.
In the corner a woman in her twenties sat with a large book on her lap and a girl a few years younger than me sat on a stool at her feet. Three boys around Luke’s age sat on a couch. His mother say on a sofa with some cross-stitch in her hands. Little Jo was still running about, and I could not spy Luke’s Father.
Luke’s mother looked up upon our entrance.
“Ah, you must be Rhiannon” she said by way of greeting.
“Yes Mrs Lemuel” I answered her
“Well, come in, Sit down!” she invited.
As Luke and I approached the remaining couch one of the boys said something in an undertone. I did not catch it, but Luke’s mother frowned at him and Luke punched him in the shoulder when his mother was not looking. After we had sat Luke proceeded to introduce me to everybody. Mary was the one with the book, she was 25 and a primary school teacher. The girl at her feet was Sarah, and she was 13. Of the three boys, one was Mathew, who was 20 and attending law school, mark was 18 and John was 15. The youngest, Jo, was 6 and his full name was Joseph.
And so the introductions followed, and I told Mrs Lemuel about my rather extended family that lived with me, not mentioning that most of the people I referred to, brothers, sisters, uncles and such were not actually related to me by blood. I think Mrs Lemuel was surprised to learn that many of my aunt’s and uncles lived with us, and more so to learn that we had several fiancés living with their intendeds. That’s why I decided not to mention that one third of my household were ‘illegitimate’, the other third friends we had come to call family, and the other third actually related to me by blood or marriage. That would probably have scandalised her.
Presently the women (and Sarah) moved into the kitchen to see to the dinner, and as I did a large proportion of the cooking at home, along with my sister and her brother, I offered to help. Mrs Lemuel graciously accepted (‘Oh, you don’t need to feel obliged…’) So I gave Luke a quick peck on the cheek once the women folk were out of sight, scoring a chuckle from John and Luke scored a nudge from mark and hastened to go to the Kitchen.
“So, Rhiannon, Luke tells me you’re a vegetarian. You do eat fish, don’t you?”
“I love it!” I responded
“Good.” Mrs Lemuel said, “We’ve prepared a fish pie for mains, we’ll put that in the oven now, it should be ready by the time we’ve finished the soup.” Wow, was this a proper three-course meal? At home we just put everything on the table at once and it was sort of help yourself, and if you wanted seconds yo better eat fast, or someone else would finish off all the food first.
“Put the baking tray under that,” Mrs Lemuel was saying to Sarah. “Last time we had fish pie the oil bubbled over.”
“Have you put bred-crumbs on top?” I asked as Sarah slid in the baking tray.
“Bread crumbs? No, why?” Mrs Lemuel asked.
“They absorb the oil, that’s all”
“Do they?”
and so the bread crumbs were fetched, and the pie put in the oven.
“You seem to be quite a cook.” Mrs lemuel observed as I sliced the carrots into even slices.
“I took over the kitchen at home following the death of my mother.” I replied, “Though the bread crumbs were my sisters invention.”
“I’m sorry, I did not know you had lost your mother. Did your father remarry?”
“No” I answered, and observing Mrs Lemuel’s confused frown I realised I had already mentioned ‘mother’ in a living context several times this evening.
“Jen lives with us now.” I explained. “She only moved in last year, but I sort of referrer to her as mother. She’s actually my brother’s mother.” I could tell Mrs Lemuel disapproved of that, so I expanded more, hoping I wouldn’t dig myself further into the hole. “She’s not his real mother, my brother lived away from us until quite recently, and she sort of became his mother, in a way…” I hoped I hadn’t disclosed the fact that my ‘brother’ was of no blood relation to me, and was only my brother because my sister (really my cousin, but we were as close as sisters) saw him as a brother… Mrs Lemuel nodded, she was still a little confused but did not follow the matter any further.
The soup was readied and served without a hitch. Lukes father was already seated at the dinner table and introduced to me. I found I didn’t have to do or say anything during the grace, just sit there and look reverend. I forgot top say ‘amen’ at the end (Luke could have reminded me!) but no one noticed. I was seated opposite Luke, and on my left was Mary, and on her left was young Jo (who I really could not think of as Joseph, what a name, where did his parents get that one from, the Bible or something?) Mary was really good to both of us during dinner, she made sure we used the right fork for the right dish (Jo was too young to know, and I had never been faced by so many before) and managed to keep Jo quiet and still so he wasn’t scolded by his father, for dinner was a formal affair and little boys were to speak when they were spoken to. I couldn’t help comparing the meal to the ones at home, which were full of fun and laughter and the occasional food fight, usually started by the more ‘mature’ members of the family.
After dinner I offered to help clear up, but Mrs Lemuel insisted that I relax in the lounge. So I did so. I had been hoping that Luke and I might be able to sneak off to his room with no one the wiser, but that proved impossible. Mr Lemuel decided to talk to me, and I felt like I was going through Mrs Lemuel’s ‘interview’ all over again. As Mr Lemuel seemed to frown upon Luke and I holding hands, I wasn’t even able to steal a Kiss.
“I understand you father is a doctor.” Mr Lemuel was saying. “Does he have his own practice?”
“Sort of.” I answered, referring to both the statement and the question. My father was a healer, both physically and spiritually. “He runs it from our home, though he will go see people just as readily.”
“And I thought that no doctors did house calls in this day and age.” Mr Lemuel commented. I smiled, no point telling him that some of my father’s ‘house calls’ involved the casting of magick circle on properties, calling upon the otherworld and helping his clients set up permanent alters.
After a time Mr Lemuel retreated back to his study and Jo climbed up onto my lap.
“Tell me a story!” he requested, his small hand taking mine.
”I don’t know any stories.” I answered, not quite true, I didn’t know any that would be suitable to tell, now was not the time to be telling Pagan creation myths.
“Aw, stop pestering her Jo!” Mathew saved me.
“It’s alright.” I said.
At this point Mrs Lemuel and her daughters entered the room, so any hopes I had had with Luke were dashed, yet again. I decided this was worse that how my father embarrassed Luke the first time he came to tea. He had simply said to him (very seriously, I might add) “Now, I don’t mind what you two get up to, though I you insist on having sex, please keep it down, the meditation room is directly under Rhia’s, and please use protection. I do not wish my daughter to become pregnant before she has left school.” Needles to say, nothing happened beyond a few kisses.
But the evening passed, as all evenings do, and I was a little supposed that when my father came to pick me up Mary and Jo ‘helped’ Luke walk me to the door.
Mary hugged me goodbye, while Luke waited behind her, a little put out.
“Until we meet again, little Witchling.” I lifted my head in surprise and put my hand to my breast. The necklace was still hidden. Mary smiled and I saw the cross that hung from her neck was actually an equal armed cross. Jo gave me a hug good bye, and then Luke approached. We were about to say goodbye (and I hoped I would finally receive my kiss) when Mr lemuel came out of his study. Luke was unable to see his father, but fortunately Mr Lemuel announced his presence to us by scolding Jo.
“Joseph! What are you still doing up. You should be abed.”
Jo scampered off to bed, and Luke said goodbye (the presence of his father forced us to forgo the kiss).
In the car on the way home, my father asked me how my evening had been.
“Strange.” I answered. “You know what? I think Mary, and maybe Jo, two of Luke’s siblings, might just be Pagan.”
“Oh yes, I has forgotten about that.” My father answered. I lifted an eyebrow.
“How do you…”
“Jo and Cailan are in the same class at school, Mary and I met one day when I was picking Cai up from school.”
“Oh.” I was surprised. “But isn’t that a little unusual? Them coming from a devout Catholic family, and all?”
“Not really.” My father answered. “Paganism seems to collect ex-Catholics, and as Mary’s a Pagan, it makes sense her son is too…”
“Her son! I thought he was their brother!”
My father smiled. “The Lemuels are shocked that their daughter had a child out of wedlock, but being good people they helped raise him as a son, a fiction they like to encourage.”
I fell silent, and thought on this for the rest of our journey home.
__________________
)0( I do not understand,
For all the good that I do,
All the love that I give,
I am judged, hated, hurt,
For the name of my religion,
And a star upon my breast. )0(
Tiro narn nîn
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