Mee took off her sneakers and scrunched fresh grass between her toes.
"He did this for five or six years before his death," said Diane. "His followers simply kept up his work. As each community grew, one or two would feel called to move on. They did as our founder did, camped outside town limits and waited."
She waved an arm in front of her, indicating the garden and trailers.
"That's how this community began," she said, "back in 1953."
"So people come to you?" said Mee.
"Yes," said Diane. "Searchers of a certain kind always find us in the end. Some stay, some move on."
"How many of you are there?" said Bob. Diane seemed to consider for a moment. Whether it was a question she didn't want to answer or just one she didn't have a ready figure for wasn't clear.
"There are small communities near about 50 towns or cities in the US," she said. "I'd imagine there are a few thousand of us in this country." She hesitated for a moment, as if unsure how much information she could divulge. Then she took a short breath and continued. "As far as I'm aware, every country in the world has at least one community," she said. "Europe has many more members of the Order than we do in the States. But we've always been a very small organization."
Mee stood up, stretching like a cat. A low bell rang outside one of the trailers.
"Meditation," said Diane. "Thirty minutes. Please join us if you wish."
The others had started to emerge from the trailers, all carrying either a small cushion or what looked like a wooden step. They walked up the path and sat down. The wooden steps turned out to be seats designed to help you kneel comfortably for a long period, your legs tucked underneath. A couple of people had brought spare cushions or seats, offering them to Bob and Meera. Mee hesitated, then - to Bob's surprise - nodded and accepted a wooden stool. Bob stood and winced, rubbing his knee ruefully.
"I'll take a rain check," he said. Lo, settling on a cushion, looked up at him.
"Try a walking meditation," she said. "Walk as slowly as you can, aware of each step. Breath normally."
Bob shook his head. "Think I'm a bit old for this kind of thing," he said, "and you're not gonna catch me chanting. Sorry."
Lo held his gaze. "No chanting," she said, "no ritual. Think of it as a scientific experiment. Your only job is to observe."
"Observe what?" said Bob. "The garden?"
"Of course," said Lo, chuckling, "but not just that. Your thoughts, too. Just be aware of them. Don't judge them, don't push them away. Just acknowledge each thought when you become aware of it, then gently go back to walking. And breathing."
"No mumbo-jumbo?" said Bob.
"No mumbo-jumbo," said Lo.
"Ok," said Bob. "30 minutes walking meditation. More like limping meditation, though."
He walked away from the seated group until he got to the perimeter of the garden. A narrower grass path ran around the entire space. He looked back at the seated group. Some had eyes shut, some open. The silence had deepened quickly and perceptibly. He heard the distant cry of some kind of mountain cat, the call of a bird and an answer from its mate, the chirp of insects and the whisper of wind through scrub and across dust. He put his right foot forward. Slowly. Then his left. Then the right again. He felt a bit of a fool for the first five minutes, then decided to try it properly. In amongst this Eden-like lushness, in the presence of members of an ancient religious organization who'd probably been doing this for thousands of years, he walked slowly around their garden. At first, it was physically and mentally difficult. His knee was still sending jabs of pain back to his brain and his brain was slotting those regular jabs into a cycling nightmare cluster of uncontrollable thoughts, memories, images. Marcie in a pool of blood...the moment in Iraq when he had realized he was lying down when a second before he'd been standing...his daughter Kim slamming the door...Marcie as a puppy...Seb lying dead in a clearing...calling Kim's number and listening to the phone ring and ring...looking down at his ruined knee and not knowing which shreds of skin and bone were his and which were Tom's...Seb running like a deer on steroids...Marcie.
Bob stopped on the path and shook his head, trying to clear it. He looked at his watch. Four minutes had passed. It had seemed like forty. Bob took a couple of deep breaths. He wasn't a quitter. He put his right foot onto the grass, then slowly brought the left in front of it. Before his foot had touched the grass, he saw Marcie again, dead. This time, he didn't flinch away, he just silently acknowledged the thought currently lodged in his brain. Emotions flickered through him - rage, guilt, despair, hope, love, rage again. He started to fantasize about tracking Marcie's killer, trapping him up in the mountains. Putting a bullet through his leg, then following the trail of blood so he could finish him. With a hunting knife. He recoiled with horror from the images welling up inside him, then he remembered not to judge his thoughts. And he tried. It was pretty much impossible. But - finally - he managed to return his attention to the walk. Left foot. Right foot. The images kept coming, the thoughts kept swirling. Left foot. Right foot. Eventually he found a rhythm. The thoughts started to seem less important. Still there, just without the fullscreen, surround sound treatment. He walked on.
The bell sounded again. Bob stood still and looked toward the center of the garden where people were stirring, picking up cushions and stools, returning them to the trailers. He realized he had lost track of time completely - it could have been sixty seconds or sixty minutes since he'd looked at his watch. Perhaps there was something in this stuff after all. He wasn't sure what, exactly, but something.
Mee sat still for a few more minutes before getting up. For her, the only shock about the last thirty minutes was how natural it seemed. Like coming home. She thought she might begin to understand what Auntie Anita was talking about. Then again, Auntie Anita wasn't as screwed up as her. And she didn't have a dope habit. And she didn't sing rock music. So, Auntie could be the nun of the family - Mee would do what she was best at.
They spent the afternoon catching up on some sleep. Mee closed her eyes as soon as her head hit the pillow. In the next trailer, Bob lay awake for nearly an hour, going over the last few days in his mind. None of it made much sense. The guys who threatened them - and killed Marcie - were obviously extremely dangerous. Still, Bob had to admit he felt more alive than he had at any point during the last 20 years. The last thought in his mind before he finally succumbed to sleep was, "No stove in this trailer either."
That evening, after a simple but delicious vegetable stew, Diane and Lo took them back into the garden. This time they went into a corner, where the lush grass was replaced by the native earth of the desert. Before anyone spoke, Diane and Lo exchanged a long look, as if they were still weighing the consequences of what they were thinking of doing. Finally, Lo nodded slightly, the two of them smiled and Diane sighed before turning to Bob and Meera.
"What I'm about to tell you rarely gets spoken about outside the Order," she said. "When someone joins us, they have usually reached a developmental stage which means they are open to understanding what we do. And why we do it. We would usually only share this information with members of our community." She stopped, seemed unsure how best to continue, then sat in the dirt and invited Lo, Bob and Meera to do the same. The women sat beside her but Bob shook his head.
"Bad knee," he said, "and today's been tough on it. Sorry."
"I understand," said Diane. "Before I go on, it might be easier if I show you something." She looked at them soberly. Bob nodded, Mee said nothing.
Diane put the palm of her hand on the ground. Her breath was slow and deep. Bringing her other hand forward, she dug her fingers into the earth, scooping a handful of soil between her palms. Bob was impressed by what he assumed was the sheer physical strength of the woman - the dirt was hard-packed, solid. Then she molded the earth slightly as if it was clay. Mee moved closer, her eyes widening. Where there had been browns, grays, yellow, suddenly there was a luscious polished red and a little deep green. Something
was taking shape in Diane's hands. Mee couldn't find a way to process what was happening in front of her. Bob, having grown up in the 50s and 60s, was reminded immediately of the TV his father had kept in the den. It never had a clear picture when first turned on. Saturday mornings Bob had to tune the dial to find The Lone Ranger. At first it seemed nothing was there in the snowstorm of swirling pixels, then within a second or two, a picture would emerge; just a hint at first, then blacks and whites, some definition, then - suddenly - there was the mask, the hat, the horse as if they had been hiding in there the whole time. It was the same now. First, dirt - unformed, then a hint of something different, swirling pixels then suddenly this. An apple. As if it had always been there. Juicy, red and green, shining, like it had just been plucked from a branch. Diane held it toward Bob.
"Try it," she said.
He took the apple, half expecting it to have no more solidity than smoke. He hadn't taken his eyes off Diane's hands. He knew this was no magic trick. It felt like a apple. He sniffed it. It smelled like an apple. He took a bite and chewed the crisp juicy flesh, a burst of freshness on his tongue.
"Best damn apple I ever tasted," he said and handed it to Meera. She didn't hesitate, just took a huge bite and chewed contentedly.
"Not half bad," she said. "You know that town you're camped outside? The big shiny place with a sign saying Las Vegas? Well, they have shows. Big shows. With a bit of work, you could have a residency and a TV special. Might have to work on the act a little, though. Apples won't cut it. I'm thinking tigers. Maybe elephants."
Diane laughed. "I wouldn't be the first to turn it into a parlor trick," she said.
"OK, spill. How did you do that?" said Bob. He crouched beside them then regretted it as a jab of pain speared his knee. "Shit," he said, which suddenly felt weirdly inappropriate. Like swearing in church. "Sorry," he said. "Like I said, tough day."
Lo took his hand and looked at him. He started to say something then stopped. She reached forward with her other hand and held her palm over his knee. Almost immediately he felt a wave of heat, as if he had spilled hot soup on his pants. Lo didn't look away from him. He looked back at her, a slight, pretty, Asian woman who appeared to be about thirty but seemed much older. The heat in his knee flared briefly then was gone. As was the pain. Completely. As if it had never been. He stood up again. Flexed his knee. Walked a few steps, then broke into a jog for the sheer hell of it. Pain-free for the first time in more than a decade. When he got back to the seated group of women, he was laughing. He sat down beside them.
"If you didn't have my attention before, you know you do now," he said. "What just happened? Why did you rescue us? And what's your interest in Seb?"
Chapter 29
Diane looked at Meera and Bob, hesitating. Her reluctance to speak was unfeigned. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
"The Order is based on orthopraxy rather than orthodoxy," she said.
"Woah," said Meera. "Small words. I'm from Brixton."
"Orthodoxy means 'right teaching', orthopraxy means 'right practice'. Our founder had already seen the way religious traditions inevitably became corrupted. Even if their followers had the best intentions, arguments would break out over interpretations...look at Christianity. Started to fracture around the time of Constantine, officially divided in the eleventh century, then the Roman church split again in the Reformation. Now there are around 40,000 denominations. And they all believe they are right, or - at the very least - closer to the truth than the rest. Our founder foresaw this inevitability and decided there would be no belief system, nothing written down. Well, almost nothing. You've already read our equivalent of the Bible."
"We have?" said Bob.
"Three greek words," said Lo, pointing to the center of the garden. "Not written in stone. Written in stones, though." Mee thought this might be an attempt at a joke, but, as she wasn't sure, she kept her mouth shut.
"Learn, teach, wait," said Diane, "in that order. When we join the Order, we learn. Not by reading a book or listening to sermons, but by meditating. And meditation is just a grand word for 'paying attention' or 'being awake'. That's all it is. But practice is a lifetime's work and it's never finished. There's no goal, just what's in front of you here, now."
Lo leaned forward. Bob noticed that no one seemed to interrupt or speak over anyone else. Considering they were silent the majority of the time, when they did speak, it was with a surprising accomplished rhythm.
"Teaching is the easy part," said Lo. "We just pass on the practice of meditation and as newer members start to develop a more unitive consciousness, we teach them how to use Manna."
"Which is what, exactly?" said Bob.
"The world is full of places of power" said Lo. "Have you heard of ley lines? Thin places?"
"Nope," said Mee. "Well ley lines, yes. New-agey bullshit. I should warn you, I'm a cynic. The apple thing was cool, and Bob seems as happy as a dog with two dicks - "
Bob started to say something, but Mee held up her hand to stop him.
"I'm sure your knee feels better," she said, "but it's probably psychosomatic, sorry." She turned toward Diane and Lo. "Look," she said, "I'm just saying if you start on that tarot cards, reiki and cosmic ordering horseshit, I'm outta here. JESUS!"
Bob jumped as Mee sprang to her feet and backed away a few steps, staring open-mouthed at Lo. Bob looked too and felt his mouth go dry. Lo had gone. In her place was - seemingly - Meera's twin sister. But whereas a twin is always subtly different, this verso of Mee was a perfect replica, down to the hint of mockery always perceptible in those deep brown eyes.
"Sit down," said Lo and as Bob and Mee both stared, her features melted back to become her own again. Mee swallowed hard and sat down heavily.
"I'm sorry to have to scare you like that," said Lo, "but we need you to listen and believe us. It's not horseshit, Meera."
Meera nodded, dumbly. "Yeah yeah," she said. "Ok. I kinda got that."
Once Meera was breathing normally, Diane spoke again.
" 'Thin places' is how the ancient Celts described places where God seemed closest," she said. "And when I say the word God, feel free to substitute 'reality', 'the ground of all being', 'great spirit' or 'emptiness', whatever feels right. We don't use the word 'God' because the amount of cultural baggage it caries makes it next to useless. Our experience of reality means we just don't recognize the concept a theist believes in or an atheist dismisses. We prefer to acknowledge Mystery with silence."
"Clever way to avoid arguments," said Mee.
"Perhaps," said Diane. "But most people have felt Mystery somewhere. Often in nature - forests or mountains, sometimes in very old buildings given over to prayer or meditation. In some European countries, druids built stone circles around the thinnest places and tried to soak up or use the power they felt buried there. Our founder told us to seek out these places, he taught us that Manna can be found there. There is a thin place only a few miles from here. We visit it regularly. All users of Manna have to. It's as important as food, water, or sleep to us."
She turned to Mee. "What Lo did to Bob's leg wasn't psychosomatic," she said. "Could you show us, Bob?"
Bob rolled up his pant leg and stared down at his knee. No scarring, just smooth skin. No hint of the land mine damage that had given him pain and a limp since Iraq in the early nineties. He grinned. "If I hadn't seen it myself..." he said.
Mee grunted. "It's really healed?" she said. Bob just nodded, tears suddenly and unexpectedly in his eyes.
"It's part of what we do," said Diane. "We use Manna to heal. We also use it to feed the hungry. Every night we supply soup kitchens with hot, healthy food. The garden supplies most of the vegetables - a little help from Manna keeps it producing healthy crops all year round. Everything else we supply in the same way I produced the apple."
Meera thought back. "So, the food you've served us here? The pancakes?"
"That's right," said Diane. "No eggs, no milk. Nothing but dirt and Manna."
>
"Guess that explains the thing with the stoves," said Bob. "I kept wondering why you didn't have any."
"Decent tasting dirt," said Meera. "So, you can grow magic food and heal the sick. Why don't you do something with that? Plenty of hungry, sick people in the world. Why are you sitting here on your arse when you could be doing some good?" She sat back on her heels and glared - a facial expression that had rattled people twice her size in the past. It didn't seem to have any discernible effect on the two annoyingly calm women seated in front of her. She snorted in an attempt to disguise her surprise at their composure, then stood up and paced restlessly.
Lo stood up and spoke gently.
"That's exactly what we do do, Meera," she said. Every night, one of us makes the run around the soup kitchens and shelters in Las Vegas, delivering food to those who need it most."
"We help the sick, too," said Diane. "We visit hospitals, or sometimes just sit in Emergency Rooms for a shift. We do what we can, but we do it without drawing attention. We wouldn't ordinarily do anything as obvious as removing microscopic particles of shrapnel from a knee, then growing new, healthy tissue to mend the damage. Questions would be asked. The media would love a story like that. Occasionally, we've been careless and a healing story gets out."
"All those miraculous cancer remissions? Disappearing tumors?" said Bob.
"Yes," said Lo, taking Meera's hand and gently pulling her down to sit with them. "Luckily, the human brain is hard-wired to provide explanations when presented with insufficient data, so no one has ever come looking for us."
"Carrot juice every morning?" said Mee.
World Walker 1: The World Walker Page 22