“Whatcha’ thinking about, T?” Tristan questioned as we made our way to the center where we’d leave our troubles and walk back out, refreshed and lighter.
“Honestly, I was thinking about how happy I am. How lucky I am to have you and this heavy baby. Did he gain weight?”
Tristan looked up to me and smiled. “I think you should let go of the anger you have with your parents. It’s weighing you down, T. It really is.”
Nope. Absolutely not thinking about them. “Will you stop with that? You don’t even talk to your mom. What’s the difference?”
Tristan took a deep breath, her eyes glancing around the rock maze. “A lot, Tobias. I don’t hate my mom, I have no anger for her, and I do love her. We just can’t have a relationship. She’s on a different journey than I am. I’ve tried to get her to wake up, but she’s not ready. Her journey is different than mine, just like your parent’s are different than theirs. You don’t have to hate them.”
“I don’t hate them. I just want them to leave me alone like your mom does.”
“My mom wants me to leave her alone. Yours doesn’t.”
“Yes she does. As long I stay out of her way, were good. Believe me, I learned that a long, long time ago. I know how to manipulate that situation.”
“Yeah? How’s that?”
“Well, for one thing, if I wanted something or want to do something, all I have to do is ask while she’s getting drunk with random dudes. This thing with my dad isn’t real, and I know that like you know there’s an afterlife.”
“There is. No question about it, and that’s pretty selfish of you. You don’t know your mom’s path, you don’t know your dad’s path, and it’s a little egotistic. Let that shit go, dude. It doesn’t support you. If your mom runs off with the mailman, it’s still her path. Not yours. You knew what you were going to face before you ever signed up for this. You agreed to it and every thing in your life is a lesson to get you to the next higher you. You might spend a lot more years here before you get it right, and you might not find me the next time, T. I’d hate to think I wasted all this time trying to get you to wake up from the illusion for nothing.”
I tried to joke it off, move away from her fairytale land, but it backfired. Of course it did. “We’re twin flames. We’ll find each other life after life after life.”
“That’s not how this works. You’re put on this earth knowing what you’re coming into. Whether you want to accept it or not, you picked them. Do you know why, T?”
I was the one to take the deep breath that time. “Why, Tristan?”
“Forget it.”
“What?” I exclaimed. Jesus Criminy. What did she expect?
“Nothing, Ty. You’re not ready for solid food yet. I’m just going to keep my mouth shut. Just know one thing. I’m an old soul. I’ve been here many, many times. I’m awake. Wide-awake, Ty. You better hope you find another soul mate your next life because I’m not sure how many more I’ll do. There will come a time where I decide to help from the other side and not transition back to this life.”
As whimsical and fair as her conviction sounded in my head, it was heard loud and clear in my heart. I didn’t want to think about any lives without her. “You’re not leaving me in any lifetimes on this earth or any other universes. If there’s something after this, you better be by my side.”
“Then wake the fuck up. Your parent’s have nothing to do with your happiness, Tobias. Let it go.”
“Ha! Are you serious right now? Let me give you a rundown of what I remember,” I said, one hand tapping my chest. “This is what I recall from Turkey Ridge. I remember making myself breakfast, lunch, and supper many times. I remember the drugs. I remember spending a lot of time in the woods where bears lived while my parents slept off a hangover. I remember being five years old and hanging from the seat of my pants from the loft in the barn when I was four for nine hours because nobody came looking for me. I remember my Uncle Coop coming to my house and telling me to go outside and play while he and my mom did whatever. Once on our kitchen table. That was the last time I tried to sneak in the backdoor for a drink. I remember getting off the school bus and into the cab of a pickup truck and a guy I didn’t even know. I’ll never forget her words. ‘We’re going to Miami’ like we were going to Disney or something. I remember watching her kiss him, and then they showered together at the hotel, and then they slept in the same bed. I didn’t get it. I didn’t understand it. I remember watching out the window for two years, waiting for my dad to come get me. I remember how it would be months before he even cared enough to call, and that was usually to fight with my mom, not to talk to me. That’s just the tip of the iceberg, Tristan. So don’t tell me how bad you had it at a six figure a year girl’s school.”
I hadn’t even noticed we’d stopped, ending in the big circle, front and center in our magnificent labyrinth. Tristan just stood there, her eyebrows raised, waiting.
“What?” I snapped, fast paced, angry adrenaline, pumping through my veins.
“Let it go, T. Right here. Let it go. I don’t need to tell you about all the shit I’ve been through. You know why? Because my daddy taught me about the power of a labyrinth, the power of my thoughts, and the power of unconditional love. Your parents didn’t do anything they did to hurt you, you just got tossed in the middle of their shit. It’s their life, their path, their journey. Not yours, Ty. This one is yours. This one right here. Do you want to carry that anger with you anymore? Don’t you think you’ve carried it long enough? When love is your only option, none of that matters. It’s gone.”
I watched Tristan with a sense of that, unconditional love. She was right and I don’t know why right there, why at that moment in the center of a puzzle, but I got it.
Tristan knew I got it, too. Her head tilted to the side, and she reached for my hand with a smile. “Let it go, Tobias. You don’t need to take it out of here. Stop looking at it like they did it to you. They did it for you for whatever lesson you wanted to come back here to learn this time. It’s all synchronized the way it’s supposed to be, T. Once you realize that, it gets a whole lot easier.”
Holding onto control a little longer, I assured her once again that she didn’t know everything. “You don’t know all the shit my mom has put me through.”
“And you don’t know the LESSON’S my mom has taught me. It doesn’t matter, Tobias. Look. You got two choices here. One, you can keep blaming your mom for everything that’s wrong in your life, and you might as well blame your dad for abandoning you while you’re at it. Two, you can let it go right here, right now.”
“It’s not that easy, Tristan.”
“Make it that easy, Ty. How about you stop with the pity party and just make it that easy.”
“How?”
Tristan shrugged, spewing wisdom like she really was the chosen one. “I don’t know, maybe think about something else when it comes up.”
“Yeah? Like what?”
“I don’t care. You can think about baby shit if you want. That’ll do it.”
Even though I smiled and that probably would cause me to stop thinking about anything; how shitty my life had been and whose fault it was, I wanted something else. I’m not sure what, but something. Maybe something a little more detailed. “Do you think about something else when you remember how shitty your childhood was?”
“I don’t think my childhood was shitty. Stop doing that. I think my childhood got me right here to this point in my life. I’m happy here, especially now. I’m way, way, awake, Tobias. I meditate daily and that makes it easier for me to not think about those things, but on the rare occasion that I do, I do think about something else. Whales and bald eagles. Close your eyes and watch an orca whale rise up out of the water. Notice his black, shiny, long body, going high into the air and coming back down. Watch how his body falls back into the ocean with so much grace you can feel it. The same goes for the bald eagle. I’ve had to use them both at times, but the point is, you can always think about
something else. It’s your choice. It all happened the way it was supposed to happen. It’s not only your lesson, Ty. It’s theirs, too. Synchronicity, T. Had your mom and dad not gotten back together, you’d be in California with some girl named after an elf. Would you rather be there, Ty?”
Just because I ignored the detected jealousy and the elf comment, it didn’t go unnoticed. “Hell no.”
That one got me a giggle and an amazing kiss. “Good answer.”
I did let it go. I let it go right there with my lips on hers, with Baby-T in my arms, alert and staring up to the beautiful clouds. Tristan was absolutely right and for the first time in my life, I realized that I did have a choice. I was the one that chose to dwell on it, think about it, and let it affect my life. Not them. They weren’t on my path and I didn’t have to think about all the shit I’d gone through growing up. No. Not shit. All the lessons. Had one of them been out of sync, I might not have been where I was, standing in the middle of a labyrinth with my real family. My soul family. I know for a fact me hanging by the seat of my pants for hours after dark in the barn as a little boy made me not afraid of the dark. I was terrified to go in there after dark before that.
The entire day was magical, but that was only the tip of the iceberg. It wasn’t until that evening that I really got to see who she was and how many people looked up to her. That was the magic. That was when I realized what a gem I’d found for the millionth time. No wonder I fell stupid in love with her.
I could go on for hours about all the events that took place on that first day, and never get bored telling them. Everyone there was unique in a way that you just don’t find every day. They were what a community was supposed to be about. A real community, not this superficial bullshit we see now.
Chapter Twenty
Around seven in the evening we made our way to a gathering in the middle of the field. I was in a straight up hippy fest, and I loved it. Three guys played the bongo drums and a girl played an instrument that I hadn’t seen before, but I loved the sound of it. It was sort of like a deep harmonica, only different. We stood off to the side and watched people donate dollar bills and change to a broken drum, and that’s when it dawned on me; the moment I realized Tristan was about to take their place and get paid to do something, too. But what? I sure as hell hoped she wasn’t planning to sing. She’d owe them money.
We sat on the ground like everyone else right in the middle like the spot was saved for us. “What’s she playing?” I questioned.
Like reading each other’s mind, I handed her Baby-T and she tossed a blanket over her. “That’s a DigiDoo. You ever hear one?”
“No, but I like it. These guys are good.”
“Right? The one on the left is Tommy Bishop. He’s got a huge following on YouTube.”
“Wait a minute. It’s cool that he has a channel, but not me?”
Tristan leaned over and kissed me. “He’s not chasing Pokémon’s with his.”
“I wasn’t either. It was skateboarding.”
“Same thing. Tommy Bishop spreads humanity. Ask him how many peanut butter and jelly sandwiches he has made. All that money that he’s getting, he’ll give it back with free meals. He gets to travel the states and hand out free lunches to homeless people. How cool is that job?”
Yeah, I couldn’t top that. Instead of even trying, I pulled a ten from my wallet and tossed it to the hollow drum.
“I love you, Mr. T.”
“I still love you more,” I admitted, a confession felt and not just spoken.
After about thirty minutes of playing, the music stopped and the crowd clapped. When I say crowd. I mean crowd. Everyone in the park had gathered to the slope in the middle of the field and the makeshift stage, a huge woven rug with some sort of Indian design and a microphone. This Tommy guy stood with the microphone and once again my eyebrows portrayed the confusion I felt, taking a noticeable dive to the bridge of my nose. As soon as he introduced her, my nerves stood on edge, but not her. Tristan was as relaxed and at home as she was when we were alone.
“Okay, guys. I know you’re all waiting for us to shut up so we can get to the real reason we’re all here. I just want to say that this is so awesome. We’ve been doing these gatherings for nearly four years now, and every time they grow. That makes it all worth it. I know I’m not George and my little drum here isn’t his guitar or his voice, but I hope you enjoyed it just the same. Tristan?”
I just sat there with my legs crossed, watching her stand and walk away with Baby-T. Her long skirt blew in the same direction as her hair, a light breeze fixating on her beauty. All I could do was stare. She truly was beautiful, and not elf Avery beautiful either. This was different. This beauty came from the inside out. It surrounded her like Mary Poppins, everything she touched turning into happy goo.
“Tommy’s right. When I woke up this morning I saw how many of you had driven through the night to get here, and how many were lined up to get in, I was overwhelmed. I feel like we’re doing something here, guys. This right here goes to show you that humanity isn’t lost, that we can still be a community and make this a better place. For us and for our families. I want to thank Toni for taking care of all the details. For those of you who don’t know me, I do zero social media, but we’ll get into that later. Maybe. I tend to get going and forget half of what I was going to say,” she teased, her eyes glancing up to the audience and then back. Everyone lightly laughed and then quieted. “That’s why my friend Toni takes care of all of it. She’s amazing. For those of you who are here for the first time…thank you for being here. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.” She repeated over and over, showing her appreciation with her fingers laced together and her head bowing. “Thank you everyone who pitched in and helped these kids leave behind the best Labyrinth we’ve ever built. Thank you for all the food you loaded in Grant’s trailer. Most of all, thank you for waking up. Thank you.”
“For those of you who don’t know how I like to things. I like to sit quietly and unwind while I connect with you all, but first, I wanted to introduce this little guy. I know some of you have been waiting to meet him, and yes I know I said he was a she, but that’s not my fault,” she smiled, following it up with a laugh when the crowd chuckled. “Here he is. The most precious thing I’ve ever had the pleasure of loving. This is Baby-T, guys. My whole world. Now, I’m going to hand him off to Papa-T and get started. If you need a break, now’s the time to do it.” Tristan had to clear her throat for me to snap out of my daze and take Baby-T. “He didn’t burp yet,” she said as her lips met mine.
“O-okay,” I stuttered, my lips puckering for the kiss I wasn’t expecting.
“Open your heart tonight, T.”
“Okay,” I said again, still confused as to what the hell was going on. This was the part where the burned feet and venomous snakes came out. I swear I was more nervous than she was, and I still didn’t know what she was about to do. I looked back when she told the awaiting crowd who I was.
“That’s my other whole world.”
My cheeks burned a little with the attention being placed on me, but my heart burst open, feeling the love. How could it not with an announcement like that? I took my main man back to my place and sat cross-legged on the ground, lightly patting his back for a burp without responding. My eyes stayed on her, watching her every move in a sense of awe. I swear everyone in the camp was there, and even the little ones sat quietly, the younger ones bathed and in pajama’s.
Tristan and Toni exchanged a few words and hugged before she turned and looked right at me. Our eyes stayed locked briefly until she took a deep breath, closing hers and breaking the contact. When she opened them, they weren’t on me. They were on someone else, and then someone else, and then someone else. Tristan spent at least ten minutes gazing into the eyes of random people, a small smile on her lips like she really was connecting with them, silently introducing herself. She was. Every time she moved her eyes, she glanced at me before moving to the next one. She was no doubt
connecting with me. Even though she confused the hell out of me, I felt her. All of her. Call it energy, call it magic, or call me crazy, it was there and it was real.
Baby-T burped twice while we waited for his mommy to continue. Like a calming lullaby, he closed his eyes as soon as she spoke. I wrapped his soft blanket around him and made him more comfortable, cradling him in my arms and swaying him lightly, back and forth. I’m not sure if my heart was open the way Tristan wanted, but my ears sure were. Wide open.
Finally she glanced down and then up. Tristan smiled the sneaky grin she used when she was being playful. And of course it confused me, too. Her lips twisted to the side, her eyes on her audience, and her mind searching for the words.
With a deep breath, Tristan spoke, beautiful, poetic words with ease. Like she’d been speaking to groups her entire life. “I’m like in shock here. Really. I can’t say thank you enough for being here. You have no idea how much that means to me. That being said, there’s a couple things you should know about me before we start. First, I don’t do social media and I’d rather stay off yours. You can plagiarize anything you hear me say here and I don’t need any of the credit. You spread this shit like wildfire, but please don’t record me or take my photo. I’m not really interested in being like the cool kids.
“There’s a lot of shit going on out there guys, and it’s hard not to see it, but I try like hell not to. That's what they want you to do. Stay scared and don't get out of line. Watch TB, respect your government, work eight hours a day, watch some football, sleep eight hours a day, chase some Pokémon, eat this poisoned fake food made in a factory, pay health insurance, pay taxes, grow old, and die, we're all good. Oh and consume. Good God, make sure you're buying more stuff. It sounds like such a depressing life, but as long as we all keep doing it, we're all going to keep getting what we're getting.”