Not Without My Sister Read Online Free PDF

eyes closed during the long prayers, and I would cover my eyes with my hands and peek through my fingers so no one would catch me.
Once Faithy had established the running of the camp, she turned over the leadership of Loveville to a married couple, Paul Peloquin—a French Canadian from Quebec—and his wife Marianne, and departed on her next mission, to set up a Spanish version of the show,
Musica Con Vida
, in Puerto Rico.

Paul and Marianne took their task seriously—too seriously. They were a childless couple and had been desperately praying for a son for many years. Paul had jet-black hair and brown eyes and spoke English with a heavy French accent. He was a real charmer, but also had a fierce temper that could flare up unexpectedly. Marianne was French—a well-built woman, big boned, nearly six feet tall with deep-set eyes and a pronounced nose. Part of their responsibility was to draw up the daily schedule and assign everyone their jobs for the following day.
    Reveille was at 7.30 a.m., and after breakfast, I'd go to a nearby house which we named the Blue House because it was a pretty shade of faded blue—the same color as many of the fishermen's boats. This was our communal school, where we had Word Time and Scholastics, taught by our regular teachers, Johnny Appleseed, Fiona—Jeremy Spencer's wife—and Patience, Nicki's mother. We were shown flannelgraphs and read True Komix—illustrated Mo Letters for kids. An endless river of these Letters and books from Mo and Maria would come in the post, usually once every two weeks. Every Home had to open a mail box and the leader in each Home was the only one who knew that address and had the key. It was run like a military espionage service, with secrecy the code word.

On sunny days Word Time would take place under the shady umbrella pines in the campsite. Sunday-school teachers in the outside world would have swooned if they'd opened up a True Komix. Many of them showed scenes of explicit sex, nudity, or gruesome demons and bizarre dreams that Mo believed /Always had some meaning—they were God's messages. "Mo is God's prophet for today, His mouthpiece to give us His new Word," our teachers would tell us. "System Christians don't have the Spirit; they are 'old bottles' who can't receive the new wine."

God, Jesus, the angels, and the Devil were real and part of our everyday lives. Jesus would reward us when we were good, or the Devil would punish us when were bad. Our indoctrination was constant, and questioning anything opened our minds up to the Devil's doubts. A picture from one of the True Komix sticks in my mind. There's a little table with a tea set, and the Devil is depicted as a little elf with horns and a pitchfork. A little girl is sitting in the chair next to him and four little "doubtlets," and the Devil is pouring her a cup of tea. The next scene shows her trapped in quicksand, sinking back into the System, because the Devil and his doubtlets had got to her. "It's dangerous to have a tea party with the Devil and his doubts," the comic said.
    Some of the True Komix stories we read were based on the Royal Familys children, Davidito, Davida, and Techi. We already knew them from the "Davidito Letters" as examples of how to raise "revolutionary" children in God's way Mo's secretary and second "wife," Maria, had two children, Davidito and Techi. Davidito was born in 1975 from a Flirty Fishing encounter with a hotel waiter in Tenerife. He was only three days older than me, and I was very proud of that fact. Maria's lover and Mo's right-hand man, Timothy, was Techi's father. Mo wrote that Timothy was "just hired for his seed" and that Techi was his. He claimed that he'd received Techi's unusual name in a vision, when a spirit of a little girl had come to him when he was sick (and just before she was born, in 1979). He decided that Techi was a reincarnation and tried to fit this Buddhist doctrine in alongside Christian doctrines.
    Davida was the daughter of Sarah