White Light by Mark O'Flynn Read Free Book Online Page B

Hebrews 11 and 12.
    â€˜Choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season.’
    â€˜It’s all right, Elaine,’ said Troy, calming her. ‘It’s okay. You feel all right, don’t you?’
    â€˜I’m tainted,’ she wailed.
    Troy thought about this.
    â€˜But it’s a nice feeling, isn’t it? Taintedness. I haven’t heard you humming like that in ages.’
    Mum had to think about this.
    â€˜Yes… I suppose.’
    â€˜Then if you limit yourself to every three or four days, you’ll be fine.’
    â€˜Fine?’
    â€˜You’ll be tip-top. No worries.’
    â€˜I… yes… I… Can you get some more?’
    â€˜I’ll get you the best.’
    â€˜I… I’ve never enjoyed myself so much.’
    When eventually Troy came to bed, I said, ‘That wasn’t quite what I had in mind. I thought you’d be more… penitent.’
    â€˜I told you I’m not a Catholic.’
    â€˜I wonder what you really are, Troy Cole.’
    â€˜I’m the man of your dreams, babe. Get your gear off.’
    11.
    I guess that’s where Mum’s moral corruption began, unless you count all the gifts she received and accepted and her letting him sleep under our roof in the first place.
    As I said, she wasn’t a very good Witness. The bills got paid and we all had a great time in front of the plasma TV. Troy made us cocktails. But he was a bit erratic. Sometimes, if anything came on that he disapproved of, he would slam the TV off and send us to our rooms. It was kind of like he was running the house.
    One week, I was so tired from working in the blind and curtain shop that I didn’t go to The Kingdom Hall. Troy went instead. Later, he told me he received five job offers. The next day, three of the elders, all of them Pioneers, called around to the house to make sure I had not lapsed or drifted or whatever the phrase is. You couldn’t drift very far, even if you wanted to, with them keeping tabs on everyone.
    â€˜I’m just tired, that’s all,’ I said.
    â€˜You want to be part of the 144, don’t you, Sharon?’
    â€˜Of course I do.’
    â€˜Because if you lapse, we don’t need to remind you, when Armageddon comes Jesus will simply cast you down with the rest.’
    â€˜I don’t want to lapse.’
    â€˜Like a puff of smoke, the wicked shall cease to exist.’
    â€˜I’m not wicked.’
    â€˜In the Second Advent, for those who are wicked, death will mean total, absolute extinction. Do you know what that means?’
    â€˜I’ve got an idea.’
    â€˜Then we want you to commence Apologeticals next week.’
    â€˜Visiting? Who?’
    â€˜The Neighbourhood.’
    â€˜But what about the blind and curtain shop?’
    â€˜Sharon, we’re not asking you.’
    12.
    So, while my mother was being corrupted, I was out early Saturday mornings delivering copies of the
Watch Tower
and
Awake!
to people who slammed doors in my face. They paired me with a pimply boy called Denzil who did all the talking. He never said a single sentence that didn’t have the word Jesus in it somewhere. One hundred hours a month in religious service.
    Meanwhile, Troy lay in bed while Mum whizzed about on the vacuum cleaner. He slept during the day while she went to her new job at the haberdashers and later borrowed her car to go out, doing this and that, here and there. He didn’t even ask anymore. Just stamped about yelling,
Where are the bloody keys?
and going through her handbag.
    One Saturday afternoon, I returned early from doorstop preaching and unlocked our door. He was asleep on the bed, naked, dead to the world. He’d said he didn’t want to be disturbed and I could see what he meant. Underneath him, completely covering the bed was a thick blanket of cash. There must have been thousands. More. It was