Free Bitch Slap by Michael Craft Page B

either lesbians or feminists, this gal had taken both concepts over the top and had attempted, through legal channels, to steal my nephew Thad from his home with Neil and me.

    She had failed in that endeavor, and eventually her school had failed as well. Last I heard, she had moved to Washington state, which seems to hold some odd allure for her Wiccan ilk.
    Today, turning into the driveway that led from the road, I felt a twinge of anxiety well up from these sore memories, but my overwhelming emotion was the sheer relief of knowing that Miriam had left town. As the trees lining the drive parted and I pulled into the gravel-paved clearing that served as a parking lot, I saw at a glance that things had indeed changed.
    Everything was now white. The house, the barn, and the old outbuildings that still dotted the original farm property, as well as several newer buildings of spare, utilitarian design, had formerly been painted by Miriam and her cohorts a horrific shade of screaming green, the color of the eco-movement. Now the only green to be seen was that of the surrounding pines. All the buildings—in fact, anything man-made—was purest white (suggestive, I presumed, of inner peace). The paint job was fresh, barely dry, and I wondered wryly how pure it would look after the stormy rigors of a Wisconsin winter.
    Clearly, the institute was not yet up and running, as there were only two vehicles other than mine in the clearing—Esmond’s car, which was white, and an SUV, also white, doubtless Tamra’s. Both were parked near the entrance of the main building. Cutting the engine and leaving my car, I crossed the clearing, checking my pockets for pen and notebook. My shoes ground the dusty gravel as I approached the building; then my footfalls fell silent as I stepped up to the concrete stoop and opened the front door.
    Pausing inside a small vestibule, I first noticed the smell of paint—it was fresh—then noticed quiet music drifting through the main hall. Vaguely Eastern, the droning, minimalist melody created a woozy mood reminiscent of the psychedelic days of my college years, like something I’d heard beyond distant, closed doors of anonymous dorm rooms. All that was missing was the smell of pot.
    Following the music in search of its source, I walked the hall softly and turned down an adjoining corridor, feeling decidedly stealthy. But I wasn’t trying to sneak up on anyone; rather, the aura of the setting,
reinforced by the music, seemed to demand a respectful silence, as in a church. It would have been unthinkably boorish to call out, Anybody home?
    Passing several rooms, I looked inside and saw that each was still in disarray, with books, supplies, and whatnot heaped in corrugated boxes. Shabby furnishings shoved against the walls suggested a library in one room, an office in another, a classroom in a third. Other rooms, however, were clean, stark, and bare of furnishings, with no apparent purpose.
    It was such a room wherein the music played. Stopping in the hall outside the open doorway, I was tempted to rap on the jamb or clear my throat to discreetly announce my presence. Glancing inside, however, I abandoned this notion as too intrusive.
    The music was playing from a boom box in the corner of the room. In the middle of the bare floor, Esmond lay on a small rubber mat, faceup, with his left knee contorted to touch the floor on his right side. He wore stretchy gray pajamas similar to the suit he had worn that morning in Neil’s office; the workout togs were only slightly less flattering than the suit. Next to him crouched a woman in white leotards. With her back to me, she reached to help Esmond stretch his limbs into various positions, all of which looked plenty painful, but Esmond looked downright serene. What was next, I wondered, a bed of nails?
    No, next Esmond rolled away from me, facedown, and pointed his butt upward until he had formed a perfect inverted V, with hands and