LJ Idol Season 8: Week 35; Sins of Omission
"Sister Faith, why aren’t there any boys here? Other than Father, I mean?”
"I hear Father adopts them out to loving families who can’t have children of their own. It’s his gift to others.” She gently ran the brush through my wet hair, working through the knots in my unruly curls.
"Father is such a good man, isn’t he?” I felt her hands work through my hair some more, coming across a stubborn knot that she yanked a bit too hard at my question, I let out a soft yelp.
"Sorry, Melody... I didn’t mean to...” Her voice quieted and I didn’t really understand the stillness of the moment, "He’s very kind to the less fortunate, yes. Now hold still while I braid your hair. Don’t want it strangling you while you sleep, now do you?”
I shook my head a little too wildly, messing up my hair all over again causing Faith to heave a sigh while laughing, "I really don’t know what I’m going to do with you!”
Laughter erupted throughout the room, causing a few more girls to join in before the nannies hushed us down for the night.
Looking back, this may have been the last moment I spent with Faith as my sister.
"Melody, Father would like to see you now..."
Nodding my head, I stood up and whispered a goodnight to my sisters. A couple girls congratulated me quietly, others turned their backs as I walked by.
I was the chosen one; I'd see them in the morning.
There was something special about me. At least that's what he’d told me. Some of the others wanted to be chosen too... Only they had no idea what it meant to be the special one.
Kissing Sister Charity on her forehead, I asked one of the other girls to watch her for the night. She tended to crawl in bed with me because of night terrors and needed someone to watch over her for the night. I made my way down the hallway with Mother Faith. Her eyes stayed planted on the floor. Other than the nightly calls, which was to me more and more these days, we never saw or heard from her now that she was no longer our sister.
The cooks cooked our food, the maids cleaned up after us. We watched out for each other. Or at least we did the best we could. The Mothers were rarely seen until it was time to say goodbye.
Mother Faith would deliver me to Father’s chambers and be off to her own room where she would sit in solitude for reflection and prayer. She was always one of the kinder older sisters; I was sad to see her chosen as our next Mother. I wondered what her new life must be like? I glanced over at her, knowing she wouldn’t meet my eyes.
Her right eye runny with tears and swollen, she tried to shield that side of her face from me. The cheek closest to me was flushed and puffy.
I wondered to myself why anyone would be jealous of being chosen.
"It's Mother Faith's time..." Sister Grace spoke softly while laying in the bed beside me.
"But she's too young!” I thought for a moment, "She's only 19."
"Some of the older sisters told me that Father dreamt last night, and God asked for Mother Faith. She's the new provider for us."
"But Serenity is only a baby, she needs to nurse, doesn't she?"
Sister Grace leaned on her side to look at me closely "Melody, your baby is due any day now... He said you can nurse them both."
Shaken up, "But what if I can’t? I’ve never nursed one child before, much less two... What if I run out of milk? What if I can’t do it?”
"What choice do you have? Besides God will provide for us, don’t worry. It’s His plan for you after all.”
She was right about one thing, what choice did I have? My own faith wavered at the rest of that statement. Within moments, guilt flushed over me and I prayed to God for forgiveness.
Noah. I had wanted to name him after my favorite story from the Bible, but Father had other plans for my son.
Grace tried to comfort me, telling me that my son would be taken care of wherever he went, she just knew it. While Faith, who sat in the corner after helping me give birth chimed in that I should be grateful I didn’t have a daughter because she would just have ended up like us. I had asked her to clarify what she meant, but she remained silent, staring at bundle in her arms wrapped in a pink blanket.
I wanted to believe that my baby boy had gone to a better place. But how could I be sure?
Faith’s words were cemented in my mind as we said our goodbyes the next day. Being the next in line, I was asked to help Father in the duties.
Sitting in the gardening shed nearby, I played with Harmony, Faith’s oldest daughter who was almost two years old. I kept her calm and cared for her, as would be my duty from this day forward for both of Faith’s girls.
It seemed like hours had passed, and Harmony was fussing about, messing with the gardening tools and nearly pulled the hatchet down upon herself.
I waited until Father told me it was time.
Then I took Harmony out to the pond, dipped her into the icy water as she screamed, fighting against my hands and almost making me drop her. Cupping my hands with water, I soaked the girl’s hair, making her blonde curls lie flat.
I refused to look off to the other corner of the pond, and I wouldn’t let Harmony turn her head either. I couldn’t stop shaking, but I had to follow Father’s orders exactly. I wetted the baby down and made the call, just as Father had asked me to do.
"Hello? I’m afraid there’s been an accident... Yes, she fell in trying to save her daughter... No, the little girl is safe... But I don’t know about the mother...”
Heaving sobs and cradling Harmony, I waited for the EMT's to arrive.
Waiting until everyone was asleep, I crept down the hallway and out the front door. I had questions I needed answers to and I knew I needed to get into Father’s office. The only way to do that was to go up. Up on the porch roof and through the window he kept open at all times.
Us girls were never allowed in here and the door was securely locked. It’s where Father worked to provide us with the life we were given. The food on our table, the maids to help clean up after us and tend to our laundry. Everything was provided by the work he did on the other side of that door.
In his office, I found more than I bargained for. Life insurance policies for Faith and the other mothers, including the only other Mother I remembered. Mother Eve had swerved into oncoming traffic, hitting a semi head on. I was only a child at the time, and I assumed it had been an accident.
As I slipped the paperwork back in the file folder, I noticed a policy with my name on it.
A feeling like ice running up my spine hit me as my brain made sense of what I was seeing. The other Mother’s were all much older, but Faith was only 19. Only three years older than me.
In the very back of his file drawer, I saw several large files labeled “Adoption Records”, I found the file with my name on it, which gave me hope. Opening it up, there was a copy of a birth certificate with the names "Heath and Megan O’Reilly” listed as mother and father, dated for the date my baby was born.
Attached to it, a handwritten receipt for $10,000. "Transfer of property” was listed in the subject line.
"Charity, Father would like to see you now...” My voice felt heavy as I made my announcement into the bedroom, wide eyes stared back at me.
Charity let go of another girl’s hand before stepping to my side, her own eyes filled with fear. This was to be her first night with Father. Her tiny figure paled in comparison to mine, only about three feet tall and breasts that hadn’t even started forming. She was younger than I was when he first called me.
Delivering Charity, Father released me to my chambers to pray.
Walking back into my room, I quickly grabbed what I needed, said a quick prayer and headed back down the hallway.
Fear flooded my body as I purposefully disobeyed Father’s orders and pushed open his heavy bedroom door.
Stepping back inside the room, I caught a glimpse of Charity with her dress thrown to the side, naked, but still without a hand upon her. Father looked up with hunger still in his eyes, but a mask of rage quickly took over as he looked at me across the room.
"Why are you bothering me with your presence after I sent you away?” Father stood up from where he was kneeling before Charity, using his body to loom over me.
"How would Christ feel about everything you’re doing, Father?” The words slipped from my mouth and hit Father like a slap to the face. His eyes grew wide for a second before they grew dark and heavy with anger, "The way you hurt us, killing our sisters and selling our babies. How would Jesus feel about all this?”
Shoving the tiny girl onto the bed and out of his way, he made his way in my direction, his heavy footsteps making the floor shake beneath him.
"I’m nothing but a man who’s providing for my family the only way I know how. As Jesus has said 'Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.’” He stepped toward me, his face flushed and breathing heavily as he reached for his belt.
Keeping my hands firmly behind my back in a submissive pose even as I spoke against Father. My hands felt heavy behind me, but I tried to remain as neutral as possible as my heart sped up and my knees threatened to give out from under me. He stopped within inches of me, belt firmly in hand.
"Oh but I'm not Jesus" I spoke up as loudly as I could while staring him straight in the eyes, "I will not forgive"
Pulling the hatchet from behind my back, I swung it as hard as I could before he could react. The blade bit into his face making him fall to his knees with an agonizing shriek. Clamoring for the hatchet blindly with his hands, I reached over and grabbed the handle myself. Wrenching it free, a fountain of blood splattered the walls around us.
Father continued to shriek and calling on Jesus to save him, he tried pulling himself up from the floor as I brought the hatchet down on the top of his head. The skull crunched beneath the blade. I yanked it out once more, bits of tissue and blood saturated my shoes. The room fell silent except for Charity’s sobbing in the corner of the bed.
As I glanced in her direction, I noticed her covering her head and whimpering to herself, bits of blood and matter soiling her hair and naked body. Charity briefly looked in my direction, I saw the fear in her eyes and I lost it. Memories flooded back of the abuse, of Mother Faith, of all the other girls who came before me.
I took up the hatchet once more and brought it down on his head again. And again. And again. Until there was nothing left of that horrifying face that I’d grown to hate.
It was in that moment that I realized that maybe I was the chosen one. The one chosen to protect my family from the evil we had known for far too long.
(This is my entry for Week 35 of
therealljidol. My Champion is the infamous 
joeymichaels who went much lighter this week than I did, so please check out his entry as well. I also need to give credit for one line in this piece, it comes from one of my favorite songs which is what inspired this piece for me. I was also inspired by a news story of a commune in Kansas. As always, thank you for reading!)