Free from Fear

While the music could not be described as funereal, it was not the usual uptempo rendering so common to the services.

The four of us returned home in a sombre mood. None of us felt like eating so we sat around trying to think of something to say that would lighten the mood. Any attempt seemed so out of place that this was soon abandoned. Rebekkah and I sat on the sofa holding each other tightly, finding comfort in the closeness. Mother and Miles walked in the back garden, pausing now and then to hold each other.

The evening meal was not much better and the mood hung on well into the night. We went to bed, but sleep was denied, as was any thoughts of making love. Eventually, sleep crept over us and it was well into the new day when we woke. Mother and Miles were seated at the kitchen table, uneaten toast and lukewarm coffee in front of them. We didn't like the look of either. "We're going for a walk." I announced.

"Okay, don't stay out too long, we've work to do and problems to solve."

Rebekkah and I were surprised at the support that we received as we walked, hand in hand, through the streets. It was the first uplifting thing to happen to us since Father tried to have sex with her. We were feeling a little better when we arrived home to find a dozen or so people seated around chatting with Mother and Miles. It was almost as if the fear that they had lived under for years had been lifted from them and a new vitality had come back into their lives.

Things went from bad to worse for Father, the police investigation was ongoing and, while charges were yet to be laid, he was probably wishing that he was in custody. He had received several death threats, anonymous, from men claiming to be fathers or husbands of women that he had defiled.

Three weeks after he had left the commune he was due to appear in court to face twenty charges of unlawful sexual intercourse with a girl under the age of consent. He did not appear and a warrant was issued for his arrest. His body was discovered by a group of bush-walkers floating in a creek. The body had been beaten so badly that it could only be identified by dental records.

The police questioned all of the men in the commune but each of them could account for his whereabouts for the time that the Medical Examiner estimated that death occurred, and each of them had corroborative witnesses.

Life slowly returned to some form of normalcy, and six months later, both mother and I were married, not to each other, that would be wrong. It was a joint wedding, Mother to Miles and me to Rebekkah,

The next major celebration will be a double christening, Rebekkah and I will be welcoming our first child in six months while Mother has just announced that the window of opportunity had opened long enough for her to conceive.

Mother has moved in with Miles and Rebekkah and I will stay in the family home. As people from outside have now been welcomed into the community, we have sold the house, destined to be ours, to the first family to arrive.

One of the rules made by the committee was that people could leave the commune if they wished and sell their houses to outsiders. Surprisingly, the newcomers have joined the community church that is now being led by Miles and supported by a group of preachers who all preach the Christian ethos of inclusion and acceptance. The laws espoused by my father regarding marriage and pre-marital sex have been relaxed, chastity is encouraged but not forced.

Life is much more relaxed now that we no longer lived in fear.