Trouble in Nirvana by Elisabeth Rose

the men should do more of the household chores,” said Primrose. “Brendan helped wash up but he’s the only one who’s done anything.”
    “I don’t mind cleaning,” he said with an eager smile. “I worked as a cleaner once.”
    “I don’t think you have the right attitude,” Kurt said to Primrose with a vast sigh. Patient and all knowing.
    “Because I don’t agree with everything you say? You know what I think, Kurt? I think you run this commune like a dictatorship and from what I’ve seen you don’t contribute much at all. Nirvana? It’s more like Animal Farm and you’re Napoleon.”
    Kurt gave her a pitying smirk and shook his head.
    “I think Rosie is doing her best to fit in,” said Danny. “It’s hard for her, remember. She has to adapt.”
    Kurt growled, “She’s brainwashed by society. They get inside your head like worms. The money men. Everything money. Money, money, money.” He shook his shaggy head again. “Stupid bastards.”
    “Any other complaints?” asked Danny.
    “Kurt, why are you so upset about the price Danny and Tom agreed on for his land?” Primrose demanded. “You weren’t even here at the time.”
    “I can’t stand a man who cheats his friend.”
    “It’s in the past, Rosie,” said Danny with unexpected strength. “Leave it. You too, Kurt.”
    Two maniacal eyes bored into her head. She bored right back with what she hoped was a laser beam of dislike. How could she have doubted Tom’s honesty, taken this lunatic’s word over his?
    “If that’s everything, we’ll do a mantra to finish,” said Fern brightly into the pulsating, overheated air. “We need to cleanse our thoughts and minds of negative energies.”
    The thoughts whirling about would need a good dose of industrial strength bleach to cleanse them.
    Jason took incense burners and candles from the cupboard and lit them. Everyone stood up, pushed the furniture back, and sat crosslegged in a circle on the worn carpet. Fern turned the light off. She took her place and began to intone something.
    Primrose glanced around. Everyone had their eyes shut, even little Mojo. Brendan, next to her, wore an expression of complete tranquillity and acceptance and he’d only just arrived. Either he was unaffected by the negative vibes or he’d drifted blissfully into his own hazy world. They all had their hands clasped in their laps so she did the same. Fern’s voice became quite hypnotic. Peaceful. Tom’s angry face flashed into her mind as her knees began to ache.
    ****
    Despite the energy cleansing meditation session, tension hovered in the air the next morning. Primrose cleaned the house in a purely physical way and left the spiritual and metaphysical side to Fern. Nirupam was incapable and no-body else cared about the layers of grit lining the bookshelves, or the dust bunnies having group meetings in the corners behind the chairs.
    Kurt ignored her. Fern and Jason were polite but seemed to take it as a personal insult that she refused to give Mojo music lessons. Mojo gave her baleful looks when their paths crossed which wasn’t often because he spent most of the time either swinging listlessly on the tyre swing or sprawled on the old couch in the living room reading a tattered Harry Potter book. Brendan cleaned the bathroom and toilet in a flurry of activity then trailed around after Danny, but late on Friday afternoon, announced he was leaving. Jason drove him to the main road where he intended hitching a lift north.
    At least one of them had moved on voluntarily. The wrong one but better than none.
    Primrose went to her room straight after dinner, exhausted from cleaning in the heat and the strain of pretending the tense atmosphere wasn’t bothering her. Far from a haven of peace and tranquillity, this place was worse than the orchestra pit in the last show she’d done. The show which had put the finishing touches on her disillusionment with an orchestral career. Unbearable as Kurt was he didn’t have the