Chapter 3

Last I'd seen my mother, she was big. Big in every way: big mouth, overweight and she had these massive expectations on what I should do with my life. She sat on the edge of the bed, her skin drooped and she was finally silent.
"You're not my son."
I closed my eyes again. It was easier that way. It was easier to not be her son. It was easier to blind one's self to the fact that I had never been her son.
"Not any more. I can't take it. I can't take your friends. I can't take your drugs. I can't take the way in which you kill yourself."
"I don't do drugs. I have no friends. Other people kill me."
"You were drunk."
I stared at her back. Her body was half in the room, half was out. She would never see me again.

***

Life had been twisted. Perverted even. They were family friends. Family fiends. Just a group of sad old people coming together for some satanic ritual. Old and conservative. Satanic ritual. I heard the chant, the dead animals. I saw my mother change over. Dead. Alive. Dead. Somebody else. Ten old people. In their forties, fifties, sixties. Old people high on something. No drugs apparently. No alcohol. No emotion. It made the ceremony real. There could be no mistaking its power.

I was invited when I was nineteen. I joined the circle. Joined hands with a seventy-three-year-old baker and a forty-year-old housewife. It was light. Like day. There were no strange smells. There was no swaying. No chanting. There was nothing of which to be afraid.

Then came the scream. Nobody screamed. The circle was getting pushed outwards, like a magnet in the middle repelling. The constriction. Lack of oxygen. I began to babble, to foam at the mouth, to see through people, to see people inside people. Talking. Lusting. Hating. Cursing. Always cursing. I saw what I wanted. Through our hands passed a desire to have what the other had. I pulled away and tried to take what I saw. And I fell. There was no warning. I grabbed at the people that I saw. I was being pulled away. The repulsion from my own body. Sensing everything, seeing my body lying on the ground. Seeing it get up and leaving the room. Seeing it grab at the dog, ripping at its throat, spreading blood across the verandah, into the garden. I could hear the howling. The scream and the howling. I saw my body wander back sedately, and return to where it had collapsed. And then I heard the chant. That was where it fitted. I became a part of the body again. Normal. I pulled my head up. Old people drinking cups of tea and coffee.

Nothing had happened. Had I been asleep on the couch? I got up, packed some clothes and never returned.

***

A nurse gave me dinner. I couldn't see through her.
"How long til I can leave?"
"We'll discuss it in the morning."