Attention

“His mere presence demands attention,” the woman next to me whispered.  I looked back to the robed man pacing on the stage and wondered what I had gotten myself into. 

I had signed up for a youth retreat, but it seemed a little more like a brainwashing than a yoga retreat.  It was fascinating and I couldn’t get enough.  The people around me were obsessed.  Obsessed with the man on the stage.  When I had first arrived, I had been horrified and thought about leaving, but was too enthralled with the other attendees. 

I had wondered how I could have missed the fact that this was a retreat for a cult and not for actual yoga.  But now I couldn’t get away.  I couldn’t miss anything.  I knew if I continued on with the ruse that I believed everything the other attendees did, they would tell me all of their secrets. 

I had to know why they loved him.  I needed to know why.  I had to know.  I watched and I waited.  I listened, wrote and slept.  I completely forgot about the yoga part of the retreat when I became so immersed in my writing.  But if I didn’t report back everything exactly how it happened, I would be killed.  I couldn’t believe my life depended on a man who was completely out of his mind, but I couldn’t decide which one was worse.  The one on the stage or the one I was going home to.