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The arts festival was a massive success. After Friday’s dinner, Trevor introduced the bonfire. “Purely voluntary,” he said, announcing the use of ganja, rather let it go unmentioned, which is what Brian expected. “Part of the ceremony includes the littlest bit of herb. To lift us up. So if it you want, take a hit and pass it to the person next to you.” He held up a spliff. “One hit is enough. But only if you feel like it.”
From what Brian saw, everybody felt like it. Chief Clay and Chancellor Harris included. Everyone swayed to the drum beat and chanted as called upon. Angelina sat with Chief Clay who—it was news to Brian—had separated from his wife during the summer. Lauren swayed beside them. Trevor was entertaining a bright-eyed girl Brian hadn’t seen before, her hair covered by a hat knitted to a point and decorated with a pompom. Farther back, he saw Kaya take a hit and pass a pipe to Alec Olsen, her erstwhile lover. She caught Brian’s eye and he walked over. “I know,” she said. “Sorry I was such a bitch.”
The next morning, after Kaya and Angelina’s joint lecture about the original Black Mountain College, the tension between the couple lifted like pre-dawn fog. The women wrapped their arms around each other, giggling and meandering toward the geodesic dome for Trevor’s message. Except now he was calling it a “sit down.”
The space was packed with people: All Trevor’s fans from the Avalon, from all of Asheville, thronged the giant dome. Everyone sat on the insulated, polished floor or else on mats or pillows. Brian slipped quietly around the periphery until he stood, he hoped unnoticed, behind a partition that was pulled back.
“Since I was little,” Trevor said, “I’ve seen direction inside people.” His braids in a crocheted tam, he sat cross-legged and strummed his guitar. “But during the summer, when the art college first started, I’ve started seeing light instead. I can see the light in each of you. Everyone possesses divine radiance and life and you must bring it out to make it real. Don’t ask me how. I don’t know how. Just that it’s true.
“All of us people must find the illumination inside us and bring it out. Into the present moment. You see? Go your own way. Don’t follow.
“The Lord said, seek and you will find. So, I am seeking, which is strange and hard. I see such bright light that I have to move yahso. Move and look into the light again. Move and rest, and rest but stay awake so that the brightest light does not hide what’s real. Nuh true? Stay still in the blinding light until you can see again.
“When the light first astonished me, it knocked me out. I prayed and read because if I made a mistake, I got hurt. My friends saw it. Rocks fell on me. Animals jumped on me. So hear what the Lord said: Don’t lie. Don’t do things you hate. Whoever has ears, let him hear. Do not worry about what clothes you wear. The Lord said that.”
Then Trevor played his guitar and sang “One Drop,” by Bob Marley.
Feel it in the one drop and we still have time to rap…
Before anyone clapped or whistled, almost before anyone realized it, Trevor said, “Blessings, people,” and disappeared. Brian watched the crowd stand in silence and file past the place Trevor had been. One after another left some personal item beside Trevor’s guitar: keys, small notebooks, bracelets, business cards, pebbles, buttons, rings, coins, mittens, scarves…just anything that they had with them.
Frightened at what he’d felt coming for a while, he found Hailey and pushed through one of several exits. Outside she asked, “What did you—” But Brian whispered, “No words, okay? Let’s go home where I can hold you.”
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