When I told her this, she gently corrected me. That’s her through and through—if I only I listened, I’d know now it can’t have been anyone else who turned me in. No one but the one who told me, “No, not silly at all.”
She should be here now, standing in this room, bathed in sunlight, saying something to me, giving me a slap in the face for nodding to the guidance counsellor, nodding and saying yes.
But she isn’t.
Jennifer
(Name Withdrawn)
Friday, 5 p.m.
The first chime of the doorbell resonates through our ground-floor apartment. The second chime has me on my feet on an autopilot dash through the passage.
I slide the latch back and yank the door open.
Sunlight pools in. I raise my eyes and squint. Auntie Jane towers over me as she stands in the doorframe. A teased mane of black curls frames her smiling face.
“Hi, (Name)!” she gushes.
I hang on to the door handle. I look down from her face to the gold cross at her neck. I drop my eyes to the square carpet patterns at my feet.
“Hi?” she repeats.
I drag my head up. “Hi, Auntie,” I croak.
“Can I ... come in?”
Still holding the door handle, I step aside.
Down the passage, the hall door swings open.
I glance.
“Hi, Jane,” Mom greets her. Mom breathes out slowly as she clasps Jennifer by the shoulders.
Jennifer fiddles with a strap on her baby pink overalls. Her lips tremble. Her dark fringe doesn’t hide the redness in her eyes. Her quick blinks don’t disguise her puffy eyelids.
“Hi, Christie?” Janet’s voice trails off.
Friday, 4:40 p.m.
In the bedroom, Matt, Jennifer, and I place Lego bricks on thin Lego ground.
Matt—dressed neatly in an ironed plaid shirt and new jeans—looks up and scans the hands of the wall clock. He mouths numbers, then checks his wristwatch. He shrugs, then roots through a cardboard box of toys.
Jennifer’s Barbie sits by Jennifer’s side, eternal pink lipstick smile aglow. Jennifer pushes a Lego man’s yellow feet into flat Lego grass. She wedges a hat onto the Lego man’s head. She picks up a completed skyscraper.
The doorbell chimes.
Matt speaks into his fist. “Chshhhhhhht. Coming in for a landing. Chht.” He drives a camouflage pattern plane along a line in the carpet. He leaves the plane on the floor, scrambles to his feet, and dashes out of the room. “Bye guys!” he yells over a shoulder. We hear hinges whine, then the front door shuts with a firm thud.
Jennifer crawls to the cardboard box a few feet away. She paws through. I hear the clicks of plastic against metal, the scrape of marble against marble. Jennifer leans in.
“He’s your boyfriend, no?” The box covers her face, but I hear a smirk in her voice. “You should kiss him goodbye!”
I clench my jaw. “He is not my boyfriend!” I growl.
Jennifer giggles. She draws herself out and drops her butt to the floor. She smacks lips and turns her eyes to the ceiling. “Ooh, I love you, Matt!” Smack-smack-smack. “I love you more, (Name)!” Smack-smack-smack.
I grit my teeth.
She giggles and reaches back into the box.
I glare at the box for a few seconds, then grab Barbie. I look up and see Jennifer still buried deep in the box of toys.
Heart pounding, I walk to my bed and lift the flower patterned mattress. I lean against the wooden bed frame and turn my head to Jennifer.
“Whoa! Check this out. It’s so cool. Barbie’s trapped in a cave! Come inside here!” I plant an elbow into the bed box. Space forms and the mattress arches above my fist. I push my head and shoulders into the darkness. I sit Barbie deep within the mattress. I feel my eyes narrow and my lips stretch into a thin smile.
“Whaaaat? Whaaat?”
I hear padded footsteps behind me. I pull myself out. The mattress stays arched, supported by Barbie’s high coiffed head.
Jennifer pushes her head into the cave. I grab her arms and push her entire body into the mattress.
A deep laugh escapes from my lungs. I press down on the mattress. Jennifer screams.
Friday, 5 p.m.
Auntie Jane gazes at Jennifer and bites her lip.
I look at my feet, then up at everyone.
The mothers look at each other. Jennifer rubs her fists into her eyes. I turn away and tiptoe past, into my bedroom.
“(Name) did something today...” I hear from Mom before I quietly shut the bedroom door.
I walk to my bed and lift the mattress. I pull out Jennifer’s Barbie. I sit Barbie on the floor. I clamber onto the bed. I pull my pillow close and weep.
Cancerous Cyst
(Name Withdrawn)
In August 2012, my friend Adam was accepted for graduate studies in experimental oncology at McGill. Cancer. He was going to study cancer in Montreal. To celebrate, Adam and three friends of mine planned a weekend trip to that aged city. Adam was going to sign a lease on a new home, Melia was going to drink coffee on a bench, Robin was going to meet a saucy French lady and Marnie and I would have a swell romance by the St. Lawrence River. I was planning happiness.
Adam went east a few days before the rest of us. We packed at 2 a.m. the night before our departure. I was on my summer sleep schedule, getting up well past noon. The idea of leaving at 8 a.m. made me shake. I swallowed some gin to calm down. The medicine made packing bearable and I fell asleep somewhere around three in the morning.
The alarm call rudely shook me out of comfort. My brain kicked in and I downed some coffee in the kitchen. Robin had slept over. He came out of the living room with his bag of stuff. Marnie washed her face in the bathroom. Half-awake, the three of us got in the car. I checked the engine oil and it was a little on the low side. A neighbourhood kid biked up to me.
He said, “Do you even know what you’re doing?”
I was shocked by his open hostility and his sharp perception.
“Not really,” I said.
“My dad’s a racecar driver! He works on cars all the time,” he said.
I thought that was pretty neat. I dumped some engine oil in the prescribed hole and dropped the hood.
“Thanks, but we’re okay, kid,” I said.
He biked off and we drove away. We picked up Melia from her place down the block and coasted down the 401. We stopped in little towns along the way. The highway exits were fenced off with Burger Kings and Wendy’s. We ate food we could find at home and continued driving. We drifted by Kingston and the Thousand Islands. As we got closer to our destination, the signs turned French. I filled up the tank and did not know which language to say thank you in. We drove further.
As we neared Montreal, the traffic froze. The blue sky blanketed about fifteen lanes of grey. It seemed like four different highways converged at one spot. Curled roads rose around us and dropped beneath. My fifteen-year-old clunker of a car beeped at me. The turbos were overheating. I thought of that kid and what he said before we left. He wasn’t exactly a Shakespearean omen, but the words were dark enough. I didn’t really know what I was doing. I had been out of school for a year with no results. I was working for my parents in a failing business. I wasn’t an adult but I wasn’t a kid.
We pulled off the streets and waited half an hour to cool the car off. I fell for the city. It had just enough mystery to seem like a new country. I couldn’t read the signs but we eventually made it to the hotel.
We went up the elevator and knocked on a door.
“Hey y’all,” said Adam.
He had settled in to the borrowed room. I congratulated him on making it to the next level in adult life. We all found corners to put our stuff in and headed out to walk the streets.
The fine weather continued, and now, with the stress of a flaming car removed, I soaked everything in. Political posters lined too many streets. Walking was harder because of all the hills. All the foods of my dreams sat waiting on every s
treet. We walked a few blocks and went into a convenience store. This blue-lit little box of a store was not unfamiliar. I had taken a long weekend away from my parents’ failing convenience store business but found myself there again. I saw the guy behind the counter and hoped he was doing better than myself. I picked a six-pack of some local beer and we all went back to the hotel room.
“What are we going to do tonight?” Melia asked.
“I’m looking up cool places to check out,” I said.
I looked up a list of bars to check out. One posting seemed particularly endearing and so far from the shit at home. The place was called Biftek and they served all the popcorn you could eat while you were there. The $2 whisky shots did not hurt Biftek’s case either.
“Okay, there’s a place called Biftek and they give you bags of popcorn while you’re there,” I said.
“That sounds okay. I looked up shows and stuff but there’s nothing interesting,” Melia said.
All of us broke into our liquid friends: beer, wine, and whisky.
There’s something perfectly beautiful about going on a trip to a different city and then staying in your hotel room. There’s something amazingly indifferent about who I am and what I planned for the trip. We watched TLC for what felt like a week. We sad-laughed at Honey Boo Boo’s pig and the openly horrible people on Dr. Phil. We switched to CNN and drank to revolts in the Middle East. Hours passed and booze flooded my brain.
We put our shoes on and headed out into the world. The street was unlike home. Hundreds of drunks swayed in the street. There was barely room for cars on the pavement. Cops watched over all of us. It felt like a sixteen-year-old’s party with mom’s supervision. We hobbled through the crowd until we got to Biftek. We walked in and the night outside continued inside. It was just as dark and just as dense.
I grabbed a beer from the bar. I played pool table with Melia, us taking bets on who’d win. Loser would have to down a whiskey shot. I didn’t particularly care for pool table but I didn’t want to do what I always did at home. I didn’t want to just sit at a table and drink until I started falling.
I won a game and then I won another game. The popcorn turned out to not be as attractive as I thought. The $2 shots of Canadian club kept coming and I was a fish in boozy waters. As much as I tried ditching my usual ways, I could not become someone new. I couldn’t talk to strangers. I couldn’t manage a sober smile. I couldn’t take a vacation even away from home.
We walked out a couple of hours later. The streets were worse now. The cars had disappeared. The streets were packed with drunken walkers. The cops weren’t parental watchdogs anymore. They actively enforced the law. A beauty queen in high heels stepped on Marnie’s foot.
“Ow,” Marnie screamed.
“Whatever,” the girl said.
I wasn’t surprised by the lack of empathy. The tourist romance of the afternoon left my head. Groggy, short-fused anger replaced my manners. I huffed off towards one of the many food options. I stood inside a greasy place. That’s all I really wanted at the time. I watched the line cooks slice and fry toast and beef patties. Fries came out of hot oil. People cut past me in line but I was too boozed to react. I mumbled my order to a man with a paper hat. He nodded and went to work. I pulled away from the line and watched what was basically a zoo. People dropped their hotdogs on the floor. Others threw their food at each other.
“YOUR ORDER,” the hatted man said.
“Thanks,” I said.
I walked out eating my hot dog inside toasted bread. I stood on the sidewalk chewing.
My phone buzzed out of my pocket. I balanced the junk in my hands and answered.
“Hey, where are you! You just left me!” Marnie screamed.
“Oh man, I’m sorry,” I said. “Just getting some food.”
“Okay, well, we’re going back to the hotel. When are you going to meet us there?” she asked.
“I’ll start walking right now,” I said.
I walked to the nearest quiet street. It was hard to find direction in the fuzzy dark. I walked along moss-covered red brick buildings. The crowd thinned instantly. I guess it was just that one street that was a party. The smaller streets seemed more like home. I just wanted to sleep. I continued walking, following the tip of the hotel in the sky like a beacon. Around ten minutes later, maybe more, I found myself outside the lobby. The place was deserted. I walked past the concierge, shamefaced.
I knocked on the door to find Marnie hysterical. I must have done something wrong.
“I’m sorry I left without you,” I said.
“You can’t just leave like that! You do this all the time!” she screamed.
I realized I wasn’t the only one under the water.
“I’m sorry, really. I thought you were getting food too!” I said.
“It upsets me that you do it over and over again,” she said.
She wasn’t wrong and I wasn’t right.
“Can we talk about this tomorrow? You’re upset and I’m pretty drunk,” I said.
“No!” she said.
A hotel bedroom scene is not what I planned for this trip.
“Leave me alone!” I screamed.
I locked myself in the bathroom and took a piss. I waited for Marnie to disappear but she wouldn’t. I took a shower. The sound of water against the tub was a bandage to my ears. I took a long shower. When I got out, I heard the pounding again.
“Marnie, just talk to him tomorrow. You’re both very upset right now,” Adam said.
“Thank you!” I yelled from inside the bathroom.
She kept pounding and I heard the others try to calm her down. I screamed back from behind the door. This vacation had become a minor tragedy. I couldn’t take it anymore. I opened the door and Marnie rushed in. I began to cry. There’s only so much human physiology can handle. Multiple quarts of whisky make handling routine chats unbearable. I was in the middle of a biological meltdown I had caused for myself.
“Why can’t you just leave me alone!” I screamed. I didn’t care that I was making a scene anymore. It was too late for common courtesy. My friends would have to see me at my worst.
Adam came by singing Britney Spears. He was smiling. I guess he was trying to deflate the bullshit but I couldn’t bear joy around me when I was in the sewers.
“You think this is a joke!” I yelled at him.
His smile disappeared.
“You know, you’re not the only one dealing with problems. My grandma is in the hospital,” he said.
“Good! I hope she dies!” I screamed. I fled the scene and walked to a party room on the floor. At 3 a.m., it was empty. I curled up next to a window and cried and cried and cried. I watched the sea of drunks still swaying outside. An hour must have passed by when Marnie came by to see me.
“This city is a fucking cancerous cyst!” I said.
She seemed to have calmed down. I felt bad but okay enough to say sorry.
“I’m sorry about tonight,” I said.
“It’s okay. I’m sorry too. You should say sorry to Adam though,” she said.
“No, fuck him. Singing Britney and shit,” I said.
“You wished that his grandma died,” she said.
“Whatever,” I said.
I passed out by the bed. I almost slept under the bed. Sobering up, shame bombarded my head. What had I done? I was sharing a room with Adam. I really liked Adam. Why had I wished that his grandma die? Why didn’t I say sorry?
*
As I woke with a headache, I realized Adam had left. I texted him to say sorry but I did not get an answer back. I couldn’t forgive myself and I was too embarrassed to be around my friends. I put my shoes on as quick as possible and went for a long walk. As I walked down the streets of last night, the romantic craze did not return. All I could think of was what I had done. I walked downhill, towards the water. I walked past McGill and I walked past a bunch of banks. As I got further from my friends, I got closer to missing them. With each passing repetition of l
ast night, I felt down. I texted Adam again. He didn’t reply. I reached the Latin Quarter and sat down by the St Lawrence River. Instead of a romantic walk with Marnie, I chain-smoked a pack of cigarettes on a bench alone. I watched couples and friends enjoy lunch by the water. I was in the water. I decided to call Marnie.
“Hey, Marnie, I need to see you. I’m by the river. Can you come see me?” I asked.
Marnie, in her basically infinite kindness, said yes.
“Yeah, okay. You should know, Adam left. He went back to Toronto,” she said.
“Oh God. I texted him saying sorry but he didn’t reply,” I said.
“Yeah, I think he’s mad at you,” she said.
“I think so too,” I said.
I think I had lost a friend.
The Closet Kafir
(Name Withdrawn)
“It sucks because I don’t really get to be me,” I tell Jared, my friend of twelve years. We sit on a Starbucks patio on a clear, breezy August evening. “I want to tell my dad and my family that I’ve felt this way for years, but I don’t want to deal with the backlash.”
“How do you know there’d be a backlash?” asks Jared before taking a sip from his coffee.
“Trust me, there would be. I imagine my family members holding some sort of intervention for me where they would try to convince me I have a problem that needs fixing. Okay… okay… I doubt there’d be an intervention, but I know people would be upset, especially my dad.”