“Why didn’t you tell my mother about that man in the car?” Steve asked now, his voice full, as though he was near to crying.
“I forgot,” Joe said.
“There you are,” Maryanne Lewis called out to Steve, her head and shoulders emerging into view below the balcony. Joe hung onto the railing as the walls suddenly began to move. His legs felt like they were melting.
“I wondered where you got to.” Maryanne followed Steve’s upward gaze to the balcony, and Joe.
The heat, the paint fumes from the silver chair were a force dragging him down to the floor. He pressed his forehead to his knees and wrapped his arms about them.
He was unaware of Maryanne as she climbed the stairs to the balcony and crouched beside him. Then he felt her hand on the small of his back.
“We’re so sorry, Joe. All of us. We know what happened
and we’ve been praying for you. You’re not alone. We’re here. And Jesus is here. Jesus promised that he’d never leave us or forsake us,” Maryanne said.
Soon Joe found himself kneeling at the chair on the balcony of the Salt & Light Company and admitting that he was like everyone else in the world. He had sinned and was lost. Like everyone who’d ever lived, he had fallen short of the glory of God. He hunched over on one side of the chair, while Maryanne knelt at the other, reading aloud from a small booklet she had taken from her skirt pocket. He was oblivious to her breath pouring over him.
“Listen to your heart, Joe. It will tell you your sins.”
The traffic streaming by on Portage Avenue was a dull rumble in the church balcony as Joe searched for something to own up to that would prove that, like all the people in the world, he needed to be saved.
He had often argued with his mother. He’d told her he had brushed his hair, when he hadn’t. He was sometimes mean. Only this morning, when he saw that Cecil had left the cap off his toothpaste, he’d squirted out some paste and written
Slob
on the bathroom mirror.
“I tell lies sometimes,” Joe said, his voice sounding shaky and high.
“Yes,” Maryanne whispered.
He confessed that he had once taken a bag of marshmallow puffs his mother had been saving for a special treat. He’d hid behind the TV console and stuffed his mouth with as many marshmallow puffs as he possibly could. He’d almost choked and had leapt out from his hiding place, his mouth foaming.
“Adam and Eve hid too, Joe. They tried to hide from God when they ate the forbidden fruit, after God had told them not to. They hid because they were afraid,” Maryanne said.
Because they didn’t want to get caught.
Maryanne rested her elbows on the chair as she knelt across from Joe on the balcony, clasped her forehead and closed her eyes. “God has a wonderful plan for your life,” she said.
“I hate Karen Rasmussen.” He realized it was true. It was Karen’s fault his mother had drowned. When the police came to the house, no one knew Karen was also gone. It wasn’t until the next day that Cecil heard on the radio that she’d been found dead after having given birth to a baby, and that a neighbour told Alfred he’d seen Karen leave the house looking angry and then Verna chasing after her. Joe’s aunts and Alfred had figured it out: Verna must have seen Karen jump from the bridge and had gone into the river to try and save her.
“I don’t need to know who Karen is, or why you think you hate her. But I do know
hate
is a pretty strong word,” Maryanne said. “I’m going to keep my eyes closed, but you open yours now.”
He saw her hand turned, palm up, on the edge of the chair. “Put how you feel about Karen, in my hand. And Jesus will take it away.”
The blinds rattled in the sanctuary below and Joe realized Steve was still down there, listening. But he didn’t care. The other kids had come into the church and gone to the basement classrooms and he heard them begin to sing.
Deep and wide, deep and wide, there’s a fountain flowing deep and wide
.
“Okay,” Joe said and he lifted his hand and dropped
Karen Rasmussen into her palm. His body began to hum, as though he was a wire that had just been plucked.
“Now close your eyes and repeat after me,” Maryanne said. “Dear God. Thank you for sending Jesus to take away my sins. Come into my heart, Lord Jesus.”
He heard himself repeat the words. And when he opened his eyes he saw the water stains on the ceiling, like cirrus clouds of iodine. He was lying near the balcony railing on his back without knowing how he’d got there, legs and arms spread wide, his palms turned up and buzzing. He felt a light growing around him, the colour of liquid honey, and his body swelled with it. He wanted to laugh. A fountain spurted up, and water gushed from his nose and eyes. When he turned his head he saw Maryanne Lewis, head bowed, kneeling by the chair.
As Joe nears Medicine Hat, the highway gives way to a corridor of fast-food restaurants, motels and gas stations, the light-trimmed facades and signs washed out by the setting sun. Keith spots a particular gas station and tells Joe to turn onto the service road.
He pulls up at the pumps, then turns off the engine and hands the keys to Keith. “This is where I leave you. Thanks for the ride.” Joe is relieved to be parting company.
“You betcha, take care, now,” Keith says.
Bryce gets out of the van and heads off toward the garage and Joe follows, leaving Keith at the gas pump. Bryce’s stride is long and energetic; he has the physique of a runner, Joe thinks, and he must hurry to catch the door before it closes behind him. He follows Bryce along an aisle toward the sign indicating the presence of washrooms.
He waits off to one side of the door in a corridor made even narrower by the stack of boxes along one wall. The gas station with its overstocked shelves and carousels of junk food and road trash, is an assault of colour after the hours spent staring at the beige horizon. Joe spots a rack of phone cards at the counter. He’ll buy time for his cell there, then he’ll grab something to eat and call Deere Lodge and talk to the supervisor before he talks to Alfred, and if he’s still awake around midnight, he’ll call Steve again.
He hears water running in the washroom and then a towel roller being unwound. The washroom door opens. “Wait,” Joe says as Bryce is about to go past him. The boy stops abruptly and takes him in, looking blue-faced cold in the harsh fluorescent lights. “I likely won’t be seeing you again,” Joe says, wanting to say more, but he doesn’t know what.
Bryce ducks his head, looks embarrassed, not knowing what Joe expects of him, while Joe feels a light pressure of warmth, like hands, come to rest on his shoulders.
“You be safe.” Joe goes still inside, listens for what to say now.
His light is shining all around you
. “Do you need anything?” he asks. The skin across his cheekbones feels drawn and tight.
“What?” Bryce asks. His Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows.
“Are you all right? Why don’t I give you my cellphone number? If something’s not right, call me,” Joe says.
Bryce backs away as though Joe’s threatened him, his face turning red with confusion. “Take off,” he mutters and pushes past Joe in the aisle, rushes over to the counter where Keith is now paying for the fuel.
Joe leaves the gas station and strikes out along the service road toward what looks to be a village of fast-food restaurants, their facades like sheets of polished bronze as the sunset reaches its apex. The western sky is layered with burning colours, like liquid glass spilling out from the corona.
In the twinkling of an eye
, Joe thinks. Some small part of him still hopes to be rescued.
Behind him, the eastern sky is a dark bruise, night already enclosing the land. He thinks of Laurie, and it occurs to him that perhaps he’s not so much leaving her as he’s being drawn away. He pushes aside the thought, feeling that he’s in danger of making a fool of himself. As he already had with the boy. Be safe, he should have only said that.
Nearly an hour later, the hot meal and the heated air pouring from a vent above the booth bring on weariness and the desire for four walls, a space he can enter, close the door and sleep. He doesn’t want to land on Steve’s doorstep flat broke, but if he gets a motel room, he’ll be close to it. He’s made a point of not borrowing money from anyone except those in the business of lending it, and he can’t imagine borrowing money from Steve. He pushes aside his empty plate, thinking that he could have eaten more. As the waitress passes by the booth he calls her over to refill his coffee. Then he wraps his hands about the mug, its heat steadying; reminds himself that he’ll need to call Deere Lodge soon.
The sound of the television above the bar rises, gaining his attention and that of the people around him. A newscast is in progress, an account of a police stakeout earlier in the day. The journalist’s voice is brittle with urgency as
she reports from a country road that the pedophile had been holed up in an abandoned farmhouse and surrendered when the boys with him broke free and fled. In the background is the green van. Joe senses the collective relief round him, and as the volume is turned down and the newscast continues, he recalls Bryce, slope-shouldered, already looking defeated.
As he calls Deere Lodge, beyond the window nightfall is almost complete, and the headlights of vehicles are pinpoints of light moving steadily along the highway and across his distorted reflection. A woman answers abruptly, identifying herself as Debbie Laurence, the supervisor. When she learns it’s Joe, her voice lightens.
“Your father says that you’re out of town right now. Will you be away for long?” she asks.
“Several weeks,” Joe replies although he’s no longer certain what, if anything, he might accomplish in such a short time.
“I was hoping we’d have a chance to talk face to face,” she says.
“About what?” Joe fears she wants to talk about money. Alfred’s pension doesn’t cover anything more than basic care, a haircut now and then, and his private phone line.
“Your father is ninety-five years old,” she says and Joe wants to laugh. He thinks, my father has always been ninety-five years old.
“I understand that you’re his only living relative.”
“Yes,” Joe replies.
“So you’ll need to let us know what your wishes are regarding your father’s health care.”
“I’m not sure what you mean.”
The line goes quiet, and for a moment Joe thinks they’ve been cut off, until she says, “What I mean to say is, the X-rays your father had this morning show that he’s developed pneumonia. We see this happen all the time with the residents. He
is
ninety-five,” she says again, as though Joe must face up to that fact. “Once this happens, it’s usually only a matter of time.”
When Joe doesn’t reply, she continues. “Our facilities are more than adequate to keep your father comfortable. We can do the usual things, such as suction him, for example. But if you want more proactive care he’ll have to be hospitalized.”
Joe is unable to breathe. The waitress approaches his booth with the carafe of coffee, and he shakes his head. “How soon do you need to know?”
“The sooner the better. Now would be best.”
“Let me talk to him,” Joe says, not knowing what else to say.
“I believe he’s already tucked in for the night,” she says.
“At eight o’clock?” Joe says.
“It’s half-past. We kept him up as long as we could, but I’m afraid he ran out of steam. Let me go and see if he’s still awake.”
A minute later she’s on the line again. “He’s here. I’ve given him a phone.”
“Dad?” Joe says.
“It’s me, Joe.”
“I understand you’re under the weather.”
“Who told you that?” Alfred’s words come out half formed, sounding wet.
“The supervisor,” Joe says.
“Just what did she say?”
“You’re not wearing your chompers, are you?”
“They make us take them out for the night.”
Alfred has seldom gone without his dentures; it’s a matter of pride for him not to be seen without them. Joe winces inwardly as he recalls his father’s suitcase falling open during their struggle, the hollow clatter of those flesh-coloured wedges when they skittered across the floor.
“The supervisor says you’ve got something on your chest,” Joe says.
“That’s true. I do have something on my chest.”
Joe hears a hollow sound, voices, a click, and then Alfred is back. “She’s gone,” he says. “We can talk now. So you’re in Regina then, and not Vancouver.”
“What makes you think that?” Joe asks, startled.
“Didn’t Laurie tell you she called?” Alfred says. “It was good to hear her voice.”
Joe holds his breath waiting for Alfred to continue. He both dreads and wants to know what she might have said, what she’s feeling. Headlights sweep across the window of the restaurant as a car pulls into the parking lot, the glare stinging his eyes.
“Laurie tells me you’ve got this temporary job. She sounded worried. When your man, Clayton, was here the other day, he said you’ve been bleeding money for years.”
“Things have been tough.” Joe is relieved that Laurie hasn’t said anything about him not being with her.
“Tough? I put two and two together. It’s not hard to figure that you’ve gone belly up,” Alfred interrupts.
Belly up, like a gutted fish, fingers slick with slime and blood. Belly up, an expression from the Depression era.
That’s Alfred. Way back there. Crude. Blunt as a hammer. His father.
When Joe doesn’t reply, Alfred says, “Let’s not talk about this, Joe. It’s no one’s business but ours. There are too many ears around here. Don’t go through the desk when you call tomorrow. Call me directly.”
In the moment of silence between them Joe hears the flutter of phlegm. “Dad? You still there? Everything okay?” he asks.
“Everything is not okay, Joe, and we both know it. What are you doing in Regina, there’s nothing there.” And then, with vehemence, he adds, “For God’s sake come back, Joe. I need to go home.”
“I know,” Joe says. “I know you do, Dad. I know. I’ll call you tomorrow.”
T
HE LITTLE SHITHEAD
, Alfred thinks as he hangs up the telephone. His private term of endearment for Joe fails to defuse his exasperation at having stayed awake waiting for his call. He expects he’ll do the same tomorrow, wait for Joe. Waiting is not something he does very well. Not since he came to understand that people who kept him waiting were often telling him he was no more worthy of consideration than a coop of brainless chickens.