No Call Too Small

by Oscar Martens

  Now she fiddles with the wrapping on a ham-and-cheese sandwich, squishing against the sides of the plastic container, making it crackle. The seal ruptures and she holds it to her nose. She draws in the moisture and the tangy smell—mayonnaise mixed with mustard? She peels back the tinfoil cover on the chocolate pudding and spoons in a great dollop of it, forcing it from one cheek to the other, swooshing it around her mouth. Leona’s tiny gift basket falls to the floor as Bella moves up in her bed, sitting higher to keep the food off her gown. She likes to eat during the nature show, ripping apart her ham sandwich the same way wolves rip flesh off a deer.

  SOMEONE SHOULD GO TO THE hospital. But who should it be, and how can the others be trusted not to continue? They usually go together, so it isn’t really anyone’s turn. But someone should go. It would take awhile to get ready, and by then it would be close to 7:30 p.m., and visiting hours are over at 8:00. Is it really worth it? The siblings all seem to agree. Tomorrow would be better.

  DR. PHIBBS TELLS BELLA THAT she’ll be sleeping in her own bed tonight. It feels like some sort of graduation. The children won’t be happy with this false alarm. Susan was in pre-trial preparation for her firm’s most important client when she received Bella’s call. Veronica came all the way from Nova Scotia, leaving her husband behind to care for two flu-stricken children. She can’t bring herself to call them, and the hospital won’t let her take a cab home alone. Someone has to pick her up.

  She looks through her suddenly sparse address book. X through Z have no entries, and many other addresses are for dead people she can’t cross out. She has Leona’s number from their time together on the fundraising committee, but Bella’s stubborn insistence on survival would confuse the poor woman. Leona is probably thinking ahead to Sunday’s announcement: Bella’s passing, how beautiful, how moving.

  Ed Schmidt would read something into it if she called him. It would be awkward and embarrassing. He seemed so kind and gentle with her, offering his support even as the soil was being shovelled onto Jake’s coffin. She enjoyed going with him to choir practice, but he had to ruin it with his grand proposal, deflating Bella’s thoughts of simple friendship.

  Verna Holloway, dead. Bernie Pasternak, dead. Candace Williams, living in Summerland now. She flips through her book again and finds Matt Donner all alone in the Ds. He isn’t family. She can’t really call him a friend but he’s dependable, coming every two weeks to cut the grass, clean out the gutters and do whatever jobs need doing.

  —Hello? Is Matt there?

  —Ms. Cowper? Yes, he’s here but he’s working on a school project tonight.

  Bella’s tempted to say good-bye and hang up.

  —I wonder if I could bother … Do you think it’d be too much trouble if … I’m sorry. I need Matt to pick me up from the hospital.

  —Just a moment.

  —I’ll pay him.

  Mrs. Donner doesn’t hear that last part. She’s already on her way to get Matt. Bella waits for him with her hands folded in her lap, her bag neatly packed. She’ll miss looking out onto the snow-covered fields, the silent stream of cars on Pembina Highway ebbing and flowing between downtown and the suburbs, the traffic quiet and peaceful from this distance.

  ROBERT HOLDS SOME DOILIES IN the air, out of reach of his two sisters. Susan feigns disinterest until Robert lowers his arm, and then she lunges at him again. He thinks he should have them, considering that his sisters already received their fair share. Susan laughs at him.

  —That’s because doilies are for girls, Robert. Everybody knows that. She didn’t give any to you because she didn’t know you were a pansy.

  Veronica curses and throws down one of the Folio books she got in trade from Susan.

  —She put her name in all of them. Can you believe that? That’s just going to kill the resale value.

  On her way to the upstairs washroom Susan can’t stop herself from taking a sneak preview of her mother’s bedroom. The jewellery box doesn’t have a false bottom. There’s no safe in the closet or under a loose board. But there is a rip in the fabric that covers the underside of the box spring. Quite thin, but big enough for a hand to reach through and touch an envelope.

  In the bathroom she fumbles with the zipper of her purse. It won’t close easily with the cash crammed inside. She persists until she breaks the zipper and one of her nails. She stares at her blushing face in the mirror. Breathe deep, stop smiling, look normal. There’s probably enough to renovate the kitchen. Or take a vacation somewhere hot. The wad felt very thick and it looked liked mostly hundreds. Maybe she’ll be able to do both.

  AT FACE VALUE IT’S JUST a ride home, but Matt approaches Bella’s bed wary of what else might be involved. Will she want to pay him for this? Will she want to hire him as a part-time caregiv-er? There are a few graceful ways to decline the offer. Schoolwork is a solid excuse. No one could argue with that. He’s still willing to help her, but he prefers the simplicity of yard work. He doesn’t mind her watching him from the window but he tries to avoid the inside of her house, usually receiving his pay on the front steps.

  Bella snugs down into the quiet warmth of Matt’s car. They drive past the St. Vital shopping centre. She notices heavy frost on the windshields of cars, one very cold cat staring back at her with minimal interest, a street-hockey game just as someone scores a goal, the boy’s arms shooting up in the air.

  Forty-two years ago there was no mall along this street, and their new house backed onto a farmer’s field. There was a slough nearby and bushes that lined the river. Often she saw foxes and rabbits from the kitchen window.

  Matt opens her door and offers his arm. She notices him as a full-grown man for the first time, so different from the small boy she first instructed years ago. Now she’s embarrassed for having bothered him with this.

  Forty-two years ago a taxi dropped her here, and she stood at the foot of the driveway with Susan, her first child, fresh from the hospital. Bella’s breath hung in the cold morning air. The sky was still dark blue. Jake had turned the heat down to save fuel, and it was freezing inside. She cranked it up right away, worried about her baby. It seemed colder inside than out. She brought out spare blankets, layered them on the bed and pulled in Susan after her, using her arm to keep the blanket off the baby’s face. The bed was pregnant, their breath heating the artificial womb.

  Someone has swiped her doormat again but never mind, her kids are home, together for the first time in a long time. Every light in the house is on and it cheers her to think of her children in the house again, as it was so many years ago, the noise of games and laughter. Maybe they will stay a few more days, even though the danger has passed.

  First Rob then Susan appears at the living-room window. They seem shocked to see her and it makes her proud of her good health, her mysterious recovery. Matt slowly pulls away, tapping the horn. Susan opens the door and stands there dumbly, blocking the way. Bella finally edges her way past Susan into the warm house.

  IMAGINING MILAN

  IT’S TOO EARLY IN OUR RELATIONSHIP for you to leave Benni with me. I realize this now that you’re thousands of kilometres away. I know your postcard was meant to please me, but it’s no comfort thinking of you thinking of me while you’re in Milan. Briefly, I was honoured that you would trust me with your only child. Were you counting on that?

  Perhaps you’ve never been here because it’s more than half an hour from a large city. As a concerned parent, you might want to know where I’m housing your daughter. I live on a ridge on Salt Spring, the largest of the Gulf Islands in the Strait of Georgia. My house is surrounded by very large, very tall trees, typical of this province. I’m ignorant of the Latin, or even the common names for any of this wild, green growth, but that doesn’t diminish my love of this place as my lungs fill with rain-scrubbed forest air on morning walks.

  My nearest neighbour is a three-minute drive away, but he’s not the kind of neighbour you drop in on. I don’t know his name, how he got his money, or if he’s married. I d
o know what the back end of his yellow Hummer looks like, as it sits in the driveway most days. He might just as easily be in Milan this weekend. Perhaps you shared a row on the plane.

  Forgive me for spying on your daughter from the kitchen as a hunter might scope out a wild cat from a blind. She likes TV, or more specifically, Judge Mathis dealing out pseudo-wisdom. She enjoys the Cheetos, orange powder ground into leather a small price to pay for subduing the beast, but the Coke is ignored, its perfect layer of cold sweat untouched.

  —I’m not doing anything.

  She must have caught my scent in a draft.

  —I noticed you haven’t touched your Coke? Can I get you some other drink? Mountain Dew? 7UP?

  —No, thanks.

  —I also have diet versions of those drinks.

  —Why would I want a diet drink?

  —No reason. I’m not saying that you should take a diet drink, I mean, it’s not that you’re—no, I’m not trying to … Some people drink it even though they don’t need to. I mean, no one really needs to. The taste is different. Some people just like the taste. Better than the non-diet version. There’s also water. Evian? Perrier?

  —I’m not thirsty.

  Are you a careful student of your daughter? Do you notice small things? Big things? Did you know that she does not drink water? She hates the taste of it. Can you imagine hating the taste of something that’s critical to your survival?

  PAST MIDNIGHT I THINK OF the last line of your card again. I wish you were here, a sentiment so cliché it almost breaks out the other side into originality. I wish you were here, too. I know you would constrict every time a gust pounded the sliding doors. Your heart would also pound, but for a different reason. You would hate and fear it. I fear and love it, the invisible burden on these trees, the terminal crack when one of them succumbs. Since you’re missing this, I want to describe everything. That’s how you like your danger, isn’t it? Described by someone else?

  I’m on the edge of a cliff in slippers and a robe. Okay, maybe that’s a little overdramatic. I’m standing about three metres from a cliff, but it’s not sheer; I wouldn’t fall straight to the bottom. There would be plenty of thumps and bumps on the way down. Some gusts seem strong enough to blast me off this ledge. My robe billows and flaps like a flag. You know how I’m always talking about being closer to nature? Well, I don’t want to get much closer than this.

  Even in this sheltered area the ridiculous wind makes wires howl, breaks arms off swaying giants. My house asserts a few small squares of light against black fury. Don’t worry. The structure is solid, and it warms me to think of Benni in the guest room, sleeping through this.

  NO, I’M SORRY, I’M WRONG. She’s awake. I see the sliver of light under the bathroom door.

  —Did the storm wake you?

  —Leave me alone.

  —I’ll be in the kitchen making a snack if you want some company.

  Why is your child angry with me? Do you tell her about our fights? Please don’t. Let’s not be two lawyers trying to win over a jury of one.

  I watch from the kitchen, hoping to catch her if she comes out quietly. Had I kept Louis, maybe I’d be enjoying a smoked salmon omelette, but no, tonight it’s gluey white bread and cheese. As you have said before, having help is great, but then they’re always … around. Bite after joyless bite, I think about Benni’s first nine years, and what follows the next nine, bouncing between pleasure and pain on her own, like the rest of us. I listen through the door.

  —It’s alright to be afraid of the wind. It frightens me too sometimes.

  There’s no flushing, no running water, not even drops falling into a hot, calm bath. No crinkle of plastic, no rip of a match, no zipper from a tote bag, no rustling of fabric.

  —What’s wrong?

  —I’ll be out in a minute.

  The toilet flushes once, then two more times. Is she old enough to be doing drugs? What could she be flushing down the toilet? She comes out of the bathroom with a dark red smear on a wad of Kleenex.

  —I’m bleeding to death.

  I wish you were here. You could take your daughter by the hand, guide her to a quiet room with soft lighting, and explain that she is not bleeding to death. In fact, the blood coming from between her legs is something that should—believe it or not—please her. But I can’t take your daughter’s hand.

  —I don’t want to die.

  —You’re not going to die.

  —How do you know? You don’t even know what’s wrong with me.

  —There’s nothing wrong with you.

  —I’m dying.

  —Stop saying that.

  —I’m bleeding from the inside and it won’t stop.

  —The bleeding will stop in a few days.

  —A few days?!? I’ll be dead by then.

  I take her to the hospital but it’s closed for the night, or permanently. I was hoping for a gentle nurse in the emergency ward. Instead, I’ve got a girl with half a roll of toilet paper stuffed in her pants, begging for her mother who is somewhere in Milan. She wants to see a doctor and the only doctor I can think of right now is Celia, on South Pender Island. Yes, her doctorate is in English, but maybe she has a good bedside manner.

  Benni waits in the car while I use a phone at the Co-op to call about a water taxi. Rick is not pleased that I have called after midnight. He says no. I remind him that his ad in the directory says, Anywhere, anytime.

  —It’s blowing forty out there. No one is going anywhere. And don’t bother calling Island Taxi. They’re not crazy either.

  —What’s your regular rate? I’ll pay you triple your regular rate.

  —Hang on a second.

  Rick walks to another part of the house and I can hear him knocking on a door. I only hear the swears between what the other guy is saying. Rick tells him it’s triple rate. They discuss borrowing Dennis’s boat, which is apparently bigger. Do you like the way I am being assertive on behalf of your child? Rick comes back to me.

  —It’s not going to be a comfortable ride.

  Do you remember the time we sailed to Catalina Island with Don and his friends? This is nothing like that. It’s an aluminum workboat, ugly inside and out. I’m on an old school-bus bench, and Benni’s reasonably happy on the driver’s seat of an old Jeep. The radar display looks like a child’s handheld video game. Rick sits behind a tiny wheel and fires up the diesel. He seems very young and uninterested in conversation, but I try anyway over the drumming of the engine.

  —This isn’t so bad. I don’t see what the big fuss is about?

  —Wait till we get outside the harbour.

  Soon I see bigger, meaner waves at the entrance. It would be nothing to ask him to take us back to the marina. He’d probably be relieved. But no, I stare through the wind at the rollers, spray blown off the tops. Rick shifts in his seat and looks back at me one last time, as if to say, Speak now. I say nothing. The boat moves forward, because the prop is spinning and you can only pull the throttles back so far before you’re in neutral.

  Slammed sideways by the first big wave, I’m suddenly angry at Rick for taking us into this. Doesn’t he know there’s a child involved? But maybe he is a child, not used to considering the safety of another. He takes the waves at all kinds of angles, fiddling with the throttles. I try to understand his technique but there’s no pattern to his actions; he’s learning as we go, at our expense. Tonight is his practicum in bad weather. Waves sneak up on us, rearing violently before smashing their steep faces against the back of the boat. The lights of the marina have disappeared.

  With enough money, you can silence better judgement. That’s how wannabe mountaineers end up on Everest and how landlubbers end up in Pacific storms.

  Rick says he’s going to slow the boat to prevent us from diving into the back of a wave. He changes our course and we settle into a new pattern. Now we’re lifted up slightly at the back, and then there’s a sickening roll as the wave passes underneath. My head is knocked against the wi
ndow, and the skipper almost comes off his seat. Some water trickles through the door. A mop bucket comes loose from its tie-down, tumbled by sloshing water on the back deck.

  Benni seems wide-eyed but calm. What is she thinking? I know you could tell me. Do you think she’s losing interest in her old problem as spray covers the boat and visibility is now less than a mile? What would you do if you were here? Is Benni relaxed because she doesn’t realize the danger? If you were here, would you summon magical parental powers? Would you stare down the waves, flatten them with your glare? You’d have a plan, wouldn’t you? You wouldn’t just sit here with your butt cheeks clenched tight. And so, with you in mind, I scream at Rick.

  —Where are the life jackets?

  —What?

  —Where are the life jackets?

  —We’re fine. We’re going to be fine. Only a few more hours to go.

  —Where are the life jackets?

  He looks at me as if I have insulted him.

  —They’re in the locker.

  —What about flares?

  Another look.

  —We’re not going to need flares.

  —Good. But do you have any?

  —They’re also in the locker.

  I’m not going to stare at the greasy fingerprints on the locker door for too long. For now, I’m just going to accept that inside that tiny space there are three life jackets and a bucket of flares, because that’s what the kid said. There’s no sign on the door, not even a red cross for a first-aid kit. When we drop between the waves, all I can see is streaked water, higher than the boat. Wind sings off sharp edges and antennas as I look past the froth into the black hole where South Pender used to be. Rick tells me the island is blacked out because of downed lines but assures me we’re getting closer, pointing out a red smudge on the radar.

  I call Celia’s number but when my elbow hits the seat, the phone drops to the deck, lighting up a small section of the metal plate. When I stand up, I’m thrown back into my chair. I try again, get on my knees, and slide headfirst into the sharp metal edge of the seat. Celia’s there; I hear her faintly through the noise. I talk as loud as I can while shielding myself from the others.