The Amazing Absorbing Boy

by Rabindranath Maharaj

  Every time I returned to our building, I would peep from the elevator at the door to our apartment before I headed for it. I pictured the murderer as a big fat man with a thick neck and curling whiskers. His head was shaved and there were rolls of muscles at the back of his neck. He might have a bag with knives and tongs and ice picks. Thankfully, I never spotted him at the door but two days after his threats, he called again. I don’t have any Spider sense or anything but when the phone rang, I instantly knew it was him. I was scared but curious.

  I picked up the phone. He said, “I am coming over.”

  I bolted out of the apartment and that morning for the first time, I went outside Regent Park.

  I expected the people would stare and know that I was new to this country but no one even glanced at me. I never suspected there were so many black people in Canada, some Mayaro-black but others light brown like my father and wearing long robes. They sometimes stood in little groups and spoke to each other in loud hacking accents. Each day I went a little further, to Sackville Street (which seemed such a sad name) eventually to Parliament Street where I took a bus that went to a place called Castle Frank. There I followed a group of boys down some steps. The boys, who were about my age, went through some shiny arms between two metal boxes but when I tried to follow, the arms wouldn’t let me through. A man inside some sort of glass cage tapped a sign just above a square mug filled with coins. The sign said two-fifty. I pushed three one-dollar coins into the box and waited for my change. The man looked at me above his glasses and then at two spongy women at my back. All three seemed vexed. I hurried away towards another row of steps.

  When I was a little boy I had seen this television show where a girl was sent into a room with magic doors, leading to her dead mother in a smoky garden, to her future husband with long wavy hair, and other people she would meet. The minute I walked down those steps I felt like I had entered a place with a different breed of people. A sort of Bizarro world with all the rules reversed. I always imagined these train places as filled with curly-hair women in old-fashioned clothes clutching at a grop of children and staring anxiously at the approaching smoke, but here nearly everybody standing before the track looked lost and lonely and worried. I wondered if they, too, were puzzled about why they were here in Canada. The first train pulled off too fast for me to jump aboard but I glimpsed a row of eyes that were either too tired to look away or didn’t care what they bounced up. About five minutes later, I rushed inside another train before the conductor could close the door and I almost sat on a woman who looked up at me like a big, lazy fish. She didn’t blink her eyes, as far as I could see, for the entire trip. Sitting next to her was another woman whose entire face was covered in a veil. Her hands were white, though, and for some reason she reminded me of these old television science fiction movies like Dune. I rode on the train for close to an hour, surprised there were no conductors asking to see my tickets. I was wondering how far the train would go when we arrived back at Castle Frank.

  This Canada was turning out to be an interesting place. Dangerous, yes, but filled with little surprises. When I got back I wished that my father would be home even though I knew he would quarrel about my trip. But neither he nor the murderer was around. Late that night I believed someone was knocking on the door but it may have been a dream. The next morning I headed for the subway train place, and the minute I landed there I was able to put aside all my worries. I felt this was the place to which trapped people came to spend their time. I boarded the train and sat next to a small man with a big funnel nose and two button eyes and hardly any chin. When he gave a little start and looked at me angrily, I realized I had mumbled aloud what was running through my mind. Mole people! I had come across them before in comic books and old movies, plotting and building bombs in underground places, but it was exciting to meet them face to face here.

  Don’t ask why I began to wonder where these mole people were going because this is the only answer I can come up with: it was another game to get my mind away from the murderer and the situation in my father’s apartment. Anyways, for a few evenings I followed them to long, flat buildings with signs advertising manufacturing and packaging goods. Just like the real mole people slaving away below the ground, making ray guns and laser beams for their masters! It was easy to spot them too: they were all dressed in oversized coats, had dirty knapsacks, usually seemed tired and sleepy and kept to themselves, and always headed for what I guessed were factories. I was sure they only came out at nights, too. I think it was a little under a month in Canada that a crazy thought hit me, just like that, without any warning: Was it possible that my father was a mole man too? I remembered his stupid “oompa loompa factory” talk and pictured the train suddenly stopping before a factory and all the molemen filing out in neat lines and singing as they made their way to a big underground factory.

  I began to go out earlier, in the mornings during rush time, where, in places like Broadview and Chester and Pape I made another interesting discovery: the mole people were just one of many different breeds. There were also pretty high-boot women who walked straight and stiff like men, and scarf and turtleneck young men who walked in the opposite manner, and Chinese boys who were always glancing through their modern glasses at their reflections in glass windows, and old spotted men who looked so angrily at everyone else I expected a snort to fling out from their fat, red noses at any minute. A couple times I pictured my mother sitting next to me and watching everyone and saying, “You see, Sam. I told you …” as if she knew our lives would turn in this direction.

  During my walks back to the apartment, I wondered what my friends in Mayaro might think of this place, which—in spite of my first impressions—was so different from what we had seen on television; and how I might describe it if I decided I had enough and took the next flight back to Trinidad. I felt they would not be surprised that I had tried to soften my problems with these stupid games because we regularly did the same thing at Mayaro School. Thinking of my old friends consoled me a bit but it also reminded me that I was trapped in a place with a father who barely spoke to me and a murderer who might pop up at any minute. One night I wrote a letter to Uncle Boysie. I thanked him for the money and said that it was very handy. I told him the Canadian business was not working out and I believed it was time to return. I lied and mentioned that I missed working in his old store stuffed with mechanical and gardening and plumbing tools.

  The next day, with the letter in my pocket, I was in an especially worried mood. I knew what Uncle Boysie would say. That I should stick with the plan and not allow these difficulties to downcourage me. He might make some reference to my father’s slackness. And he would also say that my mother, if she was alive, would have been so happy that I was in a place with plenty opportunities. I think it was this worry that caused me to get off at Coxwell station where I followed one of these molemen who was pushing out his lip as if he was stretching it to touch the tip of his hat. Tracking a single moleman in the broad daylight made me realize that the movies had given me a wrong idea of trailing for it was far more difficult than I expected. First of all, I had to keep a good distance between us because I didn’t want him to swing back and catch me. He also stopped a few times to light his cigarettes and to just stare quietly at the clothes set up inside shop windows so I had to stop too. I followed him to a coffee place, and from a little convenience store across the road, I saw him taking a paper cup to a small table near the wall. I don’t know how long he remained there reading his newspaper but eventually the store lady asked me impatiently if I was going to buy anything. Just then the moleman left and I stuck with him as he made his way to a church.

  He went inside and after a moment, I did too. It was packed with mole people and they were selecting cans of beans and soup and fruit juice from long tables. Nobody seemed to be paying and I joined a line and grabbed a bag of doughnuts. I felt a little ashamed when I noticed that I was younger than everyone there so I left with nothing else. It was only w
hen I was on the subway that I realized this might be the food bank I had called and asked about provisions and dry goods and whisky. I tried to hide the doughnuts inside my coat, next to the letter to Uncle Boysie, and when I reached our apartment complex, I hurried up the stairs instead of taking the elevator. As I reached to our floor, my doughnuts almost dropped out from my coat because I came face to face with a big shaved-head monster that looked exactly like Bane from the Batman comics. I walked straight past our apartment and only when I reached the end of the hallway, I turned around. The Bane man had taken the elevator.

  Inside, I double bolted the door and peeped over the balcony rail, but I could not see him. Was it possible that he was living in this apartment complex? I checked the front door again and went into the kitchen. There was a plate on the cupboard and next to it, a crumpled lottery ticket. After ten minutes or so I knocked on my father’s bedroom door but there was no reply. Maybe he had spotted Bane and had blazed away. I wondered if this hoodlum was carrying around a bag of sharpened teeth jangling like river conches.

  The next morning I was especially cautious as I made my way from Regent Park to the subway. I got off again at Coxwell and scanned around for groups of molemen before I went to the food bank. I felt I needed something solid to pelt at Bane in case he showed up so I took two cans of chickpeas. While I was walking home I remembered Uncle Boysie telling me, “The fella above does always balance out everything but is we who have to tip the scales.” I had felt it was his usual rumshop nonsense but here I was, with a murderer on my back at the same time I had more or less solved my food problem. I got home just before midday and immediately the phone rang. I figured that he knew I was here and would come over if I ignored his call so I picked up the phone. It was my father. “Anybody called?” he asked.

  “Somebody wanted back his teeth.”

  “I thought I told you not to pick up the blasted phone.” He hung up.

  Five minutes later the phone rang again and I rushed to it. “I have urgent need for my teeth.”

  “My father is not at home,” I blurted out.

  “You is son?”

  He had trapped me. “Yes, but we don’t talk to each other much.”

  “Now you talk. To give message. I am in a mood for many killings. You understand?”

  I tried to reason with him. “What is the point in killing him more than once?”

  “Because I am grandson of Cossacks. It is my hobby.”

  “I don’t know when he will return.”

  “Then it fall on you. You must come with brand new set of teeth.”

  “Where I will get teeth from?”

  “It is for you to decide. Teeth or money. You make choice.”

  “How much?”

  “I will calculate.” There was a screeching sound as if he was adding with his nail on a wall. “It is forty dollars. You bring it to me.”

  I thought it would be much more than forty dollars. “Where you want me to drop it off?”

  “Not drop off. Bring, bring. You understand? To same coffee shop where I give you.”

  “You didn’t give me anything.”

  “Father, son. Same thing. It is your duty.” He seemed angry so I did not interrupt him while he gave me the directions to his coffee shop in Parliament Street.

  I was to meet him at noon so I went early to the food bank and got the biggest tins I could find. It took a while to locate the coffee shop even though it was within walking distance from Regent Park and before I entered I scanned the customers. There were just a couple old-timers seated around a table, and sitting by himself, another old man with a Wilson hat and a greyish coat. I walked in, hoping that Bane had changed his mind. The group of old men glanced at me and returned to their staring at each other. I chose a table with my back safely against the wall. The man with the hat came across and pulled a chair next to me. He placed a tightly wound package on the table. I was about to tell him that I was waiting on someone when he asked if I had the money.

  I was astonished. I was expecting a murderer, a Cossack, Bane, but this slight old man seated next to me resembled a dry, dusty moth. He was wearing glasses big enough to be goggles and behind it his eyes seemed real squinty. His voice seemed different too—although this could be just because of how safe he looked. He told me his name, which was very long but ended in “-ski.” I wondered if I should hand over the money to this harmless Mothski man. He noticed me staring at his package and said, “Teeth. I make for woman from Sri Lanka. Big, long teeth.” He measured the size with his thumb and forefinger. “Some prefer big teeth. Sri Lanka, Somali people. Some prefer small. It is their choice. Big one, small one, same price.”

  “You are a dentist?”

  “What else you expect me to be? Zookeeper?

  I thought about mentioning a Cossack but instead I asked him, “You made some teeth for my father then?”

  “Not some. One. Some cost plenty money. One cost forty. You have?”

  When I gave him the money he took off his hat and pushed the bills into one of its inner folds. He replaced the hat on his head. “Now I buy you coffee.” He shouted to a pretty orangeish girl clearing a table. The girl came over, frowning, maybe at his rude voice. “Two coffee. One for me and one for my friend here.” She looked at me and I noticed how big and nice her eyes were. When she went to get the coffee he told me, “Very pretty. You like?”

  “Yes, she is pretty.”

  “She remind?” I didn’t know what he was saying until he repeated the sentence.

  I almost mentioned Rita from Mayaro Composite but didn’t want to get too friendly with this Mothski so I shook my head. He laughed, making a greasy, whirring sound, and revealed that when he was younger he had many girlfriends. He made teeth for their mothers and fathers back in Bulgaria. “I go to their house,” he told me. “And only when parents are dizzy on chair I make my move.” The girl brought across the coffee. He drank slowly with a slurping sound I always hated. “You make move on turkey girl?”

  She didn’t look like a turkey one bit. Just the opposite. Maybe a peacock girl. I remained quiet.

  “I tell you something.” He dragged his chair closer to me. “If you don’t try then you never know. Free advice.”

  I tried to change the subject. “So you make false teeth?”

  He looked at me sternly and I felt he was going to slip into his Cossack voice. “Open your mouth. Let me see.” I pulled away because he was clutching at my face with his nasty fingers but it was too late.

  I managed to force out, “Don’t do that.” His grasp was strong and I felt his thumb digging into my cheek. The old people from the other table were staring at us, but blankly, like cows.

  He twisted my mouth open. “Nothing spoil as yet.” He bent a bit to get a better view and I slapped away his hand. I could still feel the imprint of his thumb. I noticed the orangeish girl staring with her wide eyes and I felt ashamed for having submitted to this slight Mothski man. Maybe I should stand up and pelt some good curses on him. Insult him upside down. “Many people report me,” he said sadly. “They say I practise without licence. Not a real teeth-doctor.” He said something that sounded like “zebo-lekar.” “But it is … how do you say it … is service for poor people. People from different place who come here. I feel so happy when I see somebody from far away. Rotten teeth. Bleeding gum. Loose molars. Bad filling. Stinky breath. Like if bomb explode inside mouth. I want to fix everything and make new. Like artist. My wife was artist too. I proposed with her father strapped tight on my chair.” He took his package from the table and got up. “But that is past tense now. Now I live byself.” I saw him blinking behind his goggles as if he wanted me to feel sorry for him but I felt he deserved all his bad luck. “My sons, they all disappear.”

  “Maybe you treated them badly.” Don’t ask why this slipped out but Mothski glanced at me for a good minute or so. Finally he got up.

  “I go now. But one more free pound of advice. You must make move on girl soon. You are
good boy but if you not change in hurry then gifts just pass by, whoosh-whoosh.” As I watched him shuffling out from the coffee shop in his goggles and hat, his body bent, I realized he was a moleman. Mothski the moleman. I remained in the coffee shop for another half an hour, trying to digest how this situation had turned out and what it could teach me about my new country, Canada. Every now and again the group in the nearby table would glance in their unfocused old people manner to my direction but I felt that they were looking past me, maybe at the dirty wallpaper.

  My father showed up at the end of the week. That same night while he was watching MacGyver, I told him, “I paid the dentist for the teeth.”

  He remained silent but I saw his toes twitching, a sign he was thinking. MacGyver was building a beeping aerial so that he and a woman could escape from a booby-trapped field and when my father said, “Is this sort of assness that does cause problems in this place,” I wasn’t sure if he talking to them or to me.

  Chapter Four

  THE GOOD OLD DAYS

  Although I continued going to the Coffee Time at Parliament-Street I never saw Mothski again. Most likely, he was busy frightening some poor victim with his Cossack talk. I liked the coffee shop though, because it was usually empty except for the old-timers who mostly stared at each other and coughed and read the Toronto Sun. Every now and again they gazed sleepily at the tight-jeans girls who carried their purchases outside to chat and smoke in little groups. Once the orangeish girl caught me staring at a group and she looked a little angry, which gave me the idea that maybe she was jealous. Even though I never talked with her, just the idea that there was a pretty girl close-by, who was my age, gave me a nice feeling. Off and on, I would imagine that I was sitting on one of the wooden stools in Mrs. Bango’s parlour or the dry goods store that was hooked up to a rumshop, and that the old-timers were fishermen who had just returned with their catch of moonshine and kingfish and bonito, and instead of drinking coffee and staring at the Sun, they were sipping Puncheon rum and quarrelling about some alderman who never returned after the elections in spite of all the bribes they sent his way. Talking and listening and never removing the cigarette from their mouths.