Island Girl

by Lynda Simmons

  The waitress brought apple pie and more hot water. Dinner was almost over. Night would soon be upon us, bringing music and dancing and enough alcohol to keep any woman happy. Suddenly I was so thirsty I couldn’t wait a moment longer.

  Another streetcar rumbled to a stop behind me. Ding, ding. All aboard for the Mucky Duck. Ding, ding. Ding, ding. I yanked off the hairnet and lowered the zipper at the front of my uniform. Then I walked across the road to the streetcar and climbed the stairs. Dropped my token into the box and went straight to the back door, ready to hop off when the moment was right. Car Bombs awaited. Men were out in force. And I had no intention of spending tonight alone.

  GRACE

  My mom would have a fit if she knew I was here. I don’t do it to make her life miserable, I just like to watch the planes. Love to see them charging down the runway like they’re going to fall in the water for sure, and then suddenly whoosh, they’re up in the air and gone to Halifax or Montreal or even New York City. When I was little, I asked my mother where they were going and she said, “Straight to hell, Grace, straight to hell,” but I knew she was lying. Even then, I knew those planes were taking people someplace good. And one day I could be on one.

  Of course, my mother would be happy if no one ever got on those planes. And she’d be even happier if one of them did fall into the water because like most people on the Island, she hates the airport. She’s what Liz calls a diehard and she still goes to the protests all the time.

  I know enough to keep quiet when she starts going on about noise levels and bird sanctuaries and all the other reasons why the airport should be closed. I just listen and nod because I never could talk the way she does. Never could explain properly why I think she’s wrong. And when she asks me for a cogent argument, I get confused and say stupid things like “Oh yeah?” and “That’s just dumb” and she tells me that isn’t a cogent argument, that’s just yelling. “You need to know what you’re talking about, Grace. You need a cogent argument if you’re going to take a stand like that.”

  So I keep my mouth shut because I probably don’t know what I’m talking about. I just like to watch the planes. And if they were to suddenly stop flying, I’d probably cry because it would mean the ferries are the only way out of here, and I’ll never get to the city again.

  I used to live over there with Liz. She had a condominium at Bloor and St. George. A really small place. My mom never saw it, but she said she could imagine it. “Those places are all the same, Grace. Just shoe boxes. Cramped and tacky shoe boxes.”

  But Liz called her condo a jewel box and it was. A little jewel box with a ruby red sofa and black tables. I missed that place when I moved in with Bobby Daniels. Missed the Downy-fresh smell of Liz’s sheets and the way my head would sink into her pillows that were too soft to be good for me. I missed Liz when I was with Bobby, and I missed my mom all the time. And even though it’s been two years since I came back to the Island, I still miss the baby.

  But I’m seeing Liz this very morning. She’s coming on the 10:00 A.M. ferry to Hanlan’s Point. And I’m going to meet her here by the statue of Ned Hanlan, the rower who beat everyone in the world, even the smug Americans and the well-trained British.

  Most people don’t know it, but there was this one time when Ned was rowing against this big American champion and the gun went off, and Ned rowed out so fast he left the champion way behind. So he came back and rowed with him for a while, then he took off again. Then he stopped and waited for the American to catch up, and he still beat him by three lengths. Drove the other guy crazy.

  He was really something, that Ned Hanlan. Just a little guy, but he was a genuine hero here on the Island. That’s why when I had to come back home two years ago, Liz made me promise that as soon as I could ride my bike again, we’d meet at Ned’s statue every Thursday from April to October and she would always bring a bucket of KFC.

  I really like KFC, but my mother won’t have it in the house. “That stuff will kill you, Grace.” But like Liz says, “We’re all gonna die someday. Might as well go with eleven different herbs and spices in your belly.”

  The ferry docked, the ramp came down, and there was my sister at the front of the line like always, strutting down the ramp in a short skirt and platform shoes, picnic basket in one hand, beach bag and chicken in the other. People flowed around her like water. Men laughing and walking close together. Mothers with little kids in strollers and bigger kids running ahead. But Liz never once took her eyes off me.

  “How’s my baby sister?” she called once her shoes hit dry land.

  My mother always tells people I’m the pretty one, but I don’t know how she can say that. For as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted to look like Liz. Wanted to be a beautiful gypsy with black, black hair and eyes to match. Wanted to wear red lipstick and throw my head back and laugh the way she did, and give my mother the finger every time she said “You do realize you sound like a hyena.” I never thought Liz sounded like a hyena. I thought she sounded happy. But sometimes she was just drunk.

  “I’m fine,” I called, and jammed my bike into the rack and started running because Liz was going to need a hand. Not only does she bring the chicken, she also brings the blanket and the salads and the drinks because I can never bring anything. If I left the house with more than my binoculars and my bird book, my mom would know I was up to something. And if she found out that something was Liz, she wouldn’t let me have Thursdays off anymore.

  She thinks I spend the day bird-watching. That was Liz’s idea. When I was finally allowed to ride my bike again, she told me to tell my mom I wanted to try bird-watching. Called it the perfect excuse for spending Thursday’s on my own. My mom was happy I was taking up a hobby, and when she handed me The ROM Field Guide to Birds of Ontario and a pair of binoculars, I felt a little guilty. But Liz said, “Don’t be ridiculous. She brought this on herself.”

  I started riding my bike on the first day of July—exactly one year ago today. And that very afternoon, Liz and I sat on the beach together for the first time in years, laughing and eating chicken and deciding which bird I’d seen that day.

  It was the same every Thursday after that. “How about the green-winged teal?” Liz might say. Or “The black vulture sounds good to me.” Then I’d write down the name of our bird of the day in my notebook and tell my mom all about my adventure when I got home.

  At first I was nervous because she liked to ask questions, liked to make me think. “Are you sure, Grace, because I don’t think the yellow-throated swallow comes this far north.”

  Of course I wasn’t sure so I started reading that book. Every day and every night, I read about birds. Then I found these websites where you can listen to what they sound like and see videos of them walking around and sitting in their nests. I spent so much time reading and listening that soon my mom stopped questioning me because we both knew she couldn’t make a cogent argument about whether or not I’d seen a blackpoll warbler, even if she wanted to.

  And that fall, when the ferry stopped running and Liz couldn’t get to Hanlan’s anymore, I started to really look for the birds, and now I find them all the time. Big ones, little ones, some that only come in the spring, and some that hardly come at all. You just never know what’s out there!

  Like this morning, when I was passing the lighthouse on my way to the airport and I heard a bird I’d never heard before singing and singing and singing I knew the 6:55 A.M. to Montreal would be taking off soon, but that bird was so loud I had to have a look. So I hopped off my bike and grabbed my binoculars.

  I spotted a couple of phoebes and a nuthatch, and even a Lincoln sparrow I’d been looking for since Monday, but no matter how hard I searched, I could not spot that one noisy bird. So I wrote Lincoln sparrow in my notebook—because it’s not a find until you see it—then I got back on my bike and made it to the fence just in time to see the Montreal flight lifting off.

  That noisy bird was still singing when I was on my way home and again when I wa
s coming back to meet Liz. I couldn’t stop then, so I was hoping I could talk her into having a look with me after our picnic.

  “Nice T-shirt,” she said, setting down her beach bag and pulling me in for a one-armed hug. She smelled of coconut sunscreen and fried chicken—the two scents that mean summer to me now. She stepped back and studied my shirt, that big smile returning to her face. “Looks like vintage Greenpeace. Is it new?”

  “New for me,” I said, pulling the shirt away to look down at the baby seals lined up across the front. I only shop at the Bridge Boutique, the little wagon at the foot of the Algonquin Island Bridge. All the clothes are donated, so I don’t have to pay for them and people like to see their Tshirts walking around again. I always loved that one, they’ll say. Or Grace, you do me proud in that, and I like that they’re still smiling when I leave.

  “I found this one last night,” I told Liz. “It’s the first time I’ve had anything like it. I can keep an eye out for one for you if you like.”

  “I don’t do seals. But if you see a skull and crossbones, be sure to grab it.” She picked up her bag, handed the basket to me. “Did Ruby tell you she tried to meet with me the other day?”

  Liz tried for a long time to get me to call my mom Ruby too, but I think it would make her unhappy, so I don’t. It makes me sad that they’re still fighting, and that it’s all because of me, but I can’t make them stop. I’ve tried, but they both say the same thing, ‘It’s not your fault, Grace, it’s hers,’ and they won’t hear anything else.

  “Did you talk to her?” I asked, not surprised that my mom hadn’t told me about her plans. She tells me all the old stories, the tales about Great-Grandma Lucy from Edinburgh and how she met my great-grandfather when she was only sixteen and told her family she was going to marry him no matter what and didn’t care when they disowned her. And then, after he died in a coal mining accident and she was only seventeen and pregnant and all alone, she still didn’t go home. She came to Canada and found her way to Ward’s Island and built a house and stayed here the rest of her life, just like every Donaldson woman since. My mom says that we are strong and capable women, just like Great-Grandma Lucy, and I am never ever to forget that.

  My mom also talks to me about the customers and the perms and the roller sets that the seniors always want. Or the airport and the city and how lucky we are to live on the Island and how we must always be vigilant because there are still those who want to see us gone. But she never talks about where she’s heading when she gets on the ferry or what she does when she’s on the other side of the bay, even though I know there’s usually a man involved.

  “Why would I talk to her?” Liz said. “She’s an idiot. I just thought she’d tell you. Anything to make me look bad, after all.” She grabbed my elbow and pulled me along to the bike rack. “Get your stuff quick. It’s going to be hot today, which means the crowds will be huge, the naked men will be out in droves, and we will need a good spot on the beach.”

  She wiggled her eyebrows at me and I laughed and took my stuff out of the basket on my bike; looping the binoculars around my neck and jamming the field guide and notebook into the beach bag. We walked along the main road, talking about everything except why my mom wanted to see her, until we reached the cutoff for the nude beaches. Then Liz said, “Okay, go!” and we started running, racing each other to the first path that would take us down to the lake. I never go to the nude beaches on my own, but I love to go with Liz.

  At the end of the path, we stopped and kicked off our shoes. The sky was clear, the sun sparkled on the water and the sand was warm under my feet. Liz was right. This was a perfect beach day and we weren’t the first to arrive. Six other groups had already marked their territory with blankets, coolers, and umbrellas attached to folding chairs. No children here. Just adults, mostly men, a few of them already naked and strolling along the water’s edge, displaying what God gave them and eager to share.

  While Liz searched for a spot of our own, I finally asked. “Do you know what mom wanted to talk to you about?”

  “Who cares?” she said, shading her eyes with a hand, surveying the possibilities. “Look at that one,” she whispered, and sighed. “Why do gay men always look better than the straight ones?” She pointed farther along the beach. “I see it. The perfect spot. Right there.”

  I hurried to keep up. “But didn’t you wonder why she wanted to see you?”

  “I know why. Mark told me. He says hi, by the way. Wants to know if you’ll do lunch with him on Centre Island on Sunday.”

  I smiled. “I love lunch on Centre, especially with Mark.”

  “That’s why I told him you’d meet him at the Swan Ride.” We slapped hands above our heads because I also love the Swan Ride and she knows it. “He’ll be there at eleven. Probably best not to tell Ruby.”

  As if I didn’t already know.

  My mom always said it was silly for us to see Mark. He wasn’t either of our real fathers after all. She says our real dads were both jerks, and we wouldn’t want to see them even if we could, but Mark wasn’t a jerk. And he was like a real dad for so long that I never did understand why she wanted to keep us apart after he left. But like the airport, I don’t say anything. I just keep my mouth shut, and meet Mark whenever he can come to the Island.

  “Speaking of Mark,” Liz said, claiming our spot by setting the basket down. “Did you hear the news this morning? The court overturned another wrongful conviction. Another miscarriage of justice made right.”

  “That’s nice.” I reached into the beach bag and pulled out my field guide and notebook. “I heard a strange bird by the lighthouse, and I thought we could look for it after lunch.”

  She set our bucket of chicken in the sand—something that would have made my mom crazy—and came toward me. “Grace, this is important.”

  I kept my head down and flipped through the field guide. “But in case you don’t want to, we can use the Lincoln sparrow for our bird of the day.”

  “You need to think about launching an appeal of your own.”

  I held out the book. “See? This is the sparrow. He’s not really exciting. Kind of drab—”

  “Will you stop? We need to talk about this.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.” I closed the book and turned away. “There’s no point dredging up the past when the future is all we have.”

  “Listen to yourself! You sound just like Ruby.”

  “Well, maybe she’s right.”

  “Grace, honey, trust me.” Liz took hold of my shoulders and turned me around to face her. “She’s not right. She never was. You know Mark will handle everything for you. All you need to do is say yes.”

  And that was just one more thing I couldn’t do.

  “Maybe we could go to the lighthouse after lunch,” I said, and squeezed my eyes shut so I wouldn’t have to see the disappointment in hers. “Maybe we can find that other bird together.”

  “Maybe we can,” she said softly, and rubbed her hands up and down my arms before letting me go. “But right now, let’s get this party started.”

  I opened my eyes. She winked at me, letting me know it was over, we were on safe ground again. Then she opened the picnic basket and hauled out the blanket. “Take this end.”

  I felt my shoulders start to relax as I walked backward with my end, slowly unfolding the red and black plaid that has seen more picnics than I could count. “Did Mark tell you what Mom wanted to talk to you about?” I asked as we gave the blanket a shake.

  “Nothing we all haven’t heard before.” The blanket lifted into the air between us, once, twice, three times—a secret signal that the Donaldson girls were together again. “She wanted me to come back. Take my rightful place in the family home, blah, blah, blah.”

  We let the blanket down slowly, spreading it over the sand and marking our territory. Then Liz took off her shirt, revealing breasts that are bigger than mine by a country mile and a belly button with a diamond in it. I don’t have piercings anym
ore. I took out all the plugs and rings when I found out I was pregnant. It didn’t seem right, somehow, for a mother to have so many holes in her body.

  “You going to join me today? Add some color to that porcelain skin?”

  I shook my head. She shrugged and pulled sunglasses, a straw hat, and a tube of sunscreen from her beach bag. “You never used to be a prude.”

  “I never used to have stretch marks.”

  She laughed and pulled another pair of sunglasses from her Mary Poppins bag. Handed them to me, then shucked off her skirt but left her underwear on. Good manners dictated that she wear them until after lunch. She stretched out on the blanket and closed her eyes while I applied sunscreen to my face and arms then went about setting up our picnic. Taking the bucket of chicken out of the sand and placing it squarely in the center of the blanket. Following it up with a tub of potato salad, rolls already buttered, and two cans of iced tea. I weighed down the paper plates with the cans, set out plastic forks, and said, “Lunch is ready,” after positioning myself close to the potato salad.

  Liz went straight for the bucket. Tore off the lid and shoved a hand inside, searching for the biggest piece as usual. “I am starving. Haven’t eaten since lunch yesterday.”

  I didn’t want to know what she did last night besides not eat, so I dug into the potato salad and shook a forkful of the sticky yellow mush onto my plate.

  “Maybe Mom didn’t tell Mark everything,” I said, because just like Liz, there were some things I can’t let go of. I wanted to know what my mother had been up to in the city, why she’d been making more and more trips lately and why she’d think Liz would talk to her after all this time. “Maybe if you’d seen her, you would have found out more.”

  “I found out enough. She wants me to come home because she’s sick.” Her hand stilled in the bucket. “You knew that, didn’t you?”

  I said no and tried to ignore the sudden buzzing inside my brain. “How sick?”