Читать книгу Our Collective Life - JD Kennedy - Страница 26

As with many multiples, the Collective had an area within where the members could go when they were not out front. For the Collective this was a house and, as hard as it is for non-multiples to fathom, it was as real to them as Jo’s house out front. Most of the Collective could describe the house down to fine details and David was one of the few who had been allowed to hear about the house and how it functioned. It was a source of fascination for him, not only that they had this inner house but also how elaborate in detail it was and what they could do when they were there.

The inner house design is one from a bygone era, one that would have been built around the early 1900s. It has a wide hallway down the middle, with rather threadbare and worn carpet throughout that would probably be called a dusky pink. There are faded images of large white roses and green leaves scattered over in an almost sporadic fashion.

The first room on the right is a library/reading room with floor to ceiling bookshelves and comfy seats placed around the room. Just past this doorway, but on the left side of the hall is the dining room which has a large wooden table down the centre with bench seats. There is also a seat under a bay window which seems to be permanently bathed in sunlight. Off this is the kitchen, a fairly small space yet containing plenty of cupboards, which are a faded yellow with blue trim.

Farther down the hall on the left was a meeting room with plenty of seats for them all, and on the other side another hall which led to the teens and the littles area.

Linda, Jordan and Toni were seated at the table in the dining room within, sipping a cup of tea each. Sam arrived after the doctor’s appointment and made a coffee for herself, before plonking herself down opposite them.

“What I don’t get is why Demise didn’t step in before it got that far. At the very least she should have been aware and grabbed Jo and fucking reefed her inside. I mean, she’s done it before, so why the fuck didn’t she do it this time?” Sam wasted no time in getting to the heart of the matter.

The protectors of the Collective worked in levels of defence. Firstly there was Jordan, who was often called upon to set an outsider straight, to make it clear that ‘she’ would stand up for the Collective, but (hopefully) without antagonising the outsider too much.

If more was needed, then Sam would come to the fore, where her aggressive attitude (including her language) was usually enough to force the threat to back down.

Finally there was Demise. Demise was the ultimate protector of the Collective and was the enforcer. She rarely took control of the body anymore, except in extreme circumstances when the Collective needed physical protection from very real external threats. The Collective had been in physical confrontations with outsiders before and it was Demise who did the physical damage at those times.

However she also kept the Collective in line. Like any group of people who live together, there were disagreements and arguing. If it got out of hand, Demise would arrive to ‘smash heads together’ as Sam would say.

This threat of violence was one that held most of them in fear of Demise for a long time. She had made it quite clear to each and every member that she could kill any of them if she chose to do so, and also destroy the body which they all realised would, ultimately, end their existence. It was the doctor who, after a year or so of working with them, made them aware that her threat of violence and subsequent death was the ultimate form of protection. If she did actually attempt to kill them or the body, it was merely her way of protecting them from any more pain. So, some of them had come to grudgingly accept that perhaps Demise had an incredibly vital role and that maybe she wasn’t out to hurt them but more to protect them, using any means necessary.

When it came to this situation with Jo, they knew (even without direct knowledge of what happened) that she would have paid a hefty price for threatening their survival in the way she did and Demise would have certainly dished out some form of physical punishment.

“Let’s face it,” Sam continued, still pissed off. “The stupid bitch put us all at risk!” Sam drained her coffee in a couple of mouthfuls and then went into the kitchen to make another one. She slammed her cup down on the bench so hard, it cracked. “Fuck!” she cursed. “I loved that mug.” Angrily, she threw it in the bin, before reaching into the cupboard and grabbing another one.

“We should have shares in Wedgewood, with the amount of china she goes through.” Jordan said, running her finger absently over the top of her own chipped mug. Linda gave a quiet snigger, before quickly silencing it with a sip of tea. It wouldn’t help things if Sam knew she was being talked about, even in jest.

“Without the cursing, I agree with Sam. It baffles me how this happened. We have more awareness of what is happening out here than some of the others. Yet we had no inkling something was wrong until we saw Demise running out the door.” Toni said thoughtfully.

Linda agreed. “I feel like we dropped the ball, don’t you?”

Sam plonked herself back down in the chair opposite them, before adding “So, how the fuck did it happen?”

Linda and Jordan both looked troubled, and Toni looked impassive.

“And if we don’t know how it happened, how do we stop it happening again?” Jordan finally asked.

“It’s like watching a fucking train wreck. You can see it happening, you know what is gonna be the end result, but fucked if you can do anything to stop it.”

They sat in silence, agreeing with Sam. How could they stop something if they didn’t know how it happened in the first place?