by Anne Simpson
Ingrid. Listen –
Was there someone else? You said there wasn’t another woman, but was there?
No. I told you.
There was Erika.
That came later. I was with Erika; you were with Joel. Let’s not talk about this.
You left us. You left your kids. She sat down heavily in the armchair, apart from him. And here you are again, back for the funeral of one of those kids. Ironic, don’t you think?
We’re tired, he said. We’ve been through hell.
One hell leads to another, she said.
Don’t do this.
How could I have loved you? she said. I don’t think I ever loved you.
Ingrid, it’s not the time –
It might not be the time, but it does me good.
Does it?
No. No, of course not.
She went to the window and parted the curtains so he wouldn’t see her crying. There was only blackness, rain slipping down the glass.
Nothing does any good, she cried. Why go on?
You have to. We have to. There’s Damian.
Yes, there’s Damian.
He needs you.
Sometimes I can’t think about Damian. I just want to swallow a whole bottle of pills and go to sleep once and for all.
No, you don’t.
He went to her, but she didn’t want him.
It’s despair, he said. That’s what it is.
What do you know about despair? She twisted herself into the curtains so the sheer white material covered her head, her shoulders, her back.
I know about it, he said. She was my daughter too.
Ingrid was still wrapped in the curtains, so her head was swathed in white. She unwound herself.
I wish it had been me.
It’s what I wish too – that it had been me – but you can’t think that way.
I do think that way.
Just don’t talk about doing yourself in, he told her. It’s bad enough losing Lisa.
I don’t want to live.
Yes, you do. You were always tough-minded. Of the two of us, you were the strongest.
Why are you being kind to me?
You know why.
No, why?
Because it’s what we need. You need it, I need it, Damian needs it, or we’ll never get through.
She stood still, looking at him.
I wasn’t telling you the truth before, she said. About us, about – I did love you, you know.
I know. We loved each other, Ingrid.
She stacked the photos carefully in several piles and rose from the desk, going back to the kitchen where she scrubbed out the saucepan in which she’d heated the milk. Her scrubbing was fierce, more than the saucepan needed. She wasn’t safe in the living room; she wasn’t safe in the kitchen. She wasn’t safe from herself anywhere in the house.
In the game of Prisoner’s Dilemma, prisoners didn’t have to stay silent, betray each other, or suffer punishment. They could co-operate. But what if, thought Ingrid, her thoughts apparently swimming from one side of her head to the other, what if Prisoner A was also Prisoner B?
What if the game was played against the self?
It was impossible to sleep; it was too hot. She went back into the living room and lay down on the chesterfield. She must have dozed for a while, because when she woke it was dawn.
She wondered, confusedly, whether Damian had come home. Maybe she hadn’t heard him. She went down the hall and opened the screened door, where she saw Damian cutting across the front lawn, large as life. But when she stepped outside to look around the corner of the porch, there was no car parked in the driveway. He continued walking across the soft grass of the lawn, with an easy, confident way of carrying himself. It was as if he didn’t have a care in the world.
Ingrid had spent the night worrying. Damian had been with some girl.
She watched as he crossed the street and stood by the stone wall next to the gorge. A man on a bicycle zipped by, and a plump woman jogged slowly along the sidewalk, but he didn’t notice them. Finally he sauntered back to the house, stooping to pick something when he got to the porch steps. He sniffed it. When he came into the kitchen, Ingrid saw that what he’d picked wasn’t grass; it was a bunch of clover, with rounded purple blossoms that nodded in his hand. He looked like someone who’d opened a door at the beginning of the world.
DAMIAN HAD FOUND HIMSELF in Jasmine’s bedroom. She’d invited him in, first to the kitchen, where they’d talked, and then to the bedroom, where she lit a candle and loosened the tie-dyed curtains, drawing them across the window. There was a mattress on the floor, neatly covered with a thin quilt, and, beside it, a girlish lamp with a china ballerina holding her arms up to the lacy shade. Jasmine had invited him into her room, but the mattress on the floor hadn’t invited him. The tie-dyed curtains and the china ballerina hadn’t invited him.
She stood near the window, shyly, her hair falling around her face.
Scared? he asked.
She unbuttoned her pale green dress.
I’ve never done this. She didn’t lift her head as she spoke. I mean, I have done this, but not as fast as –
We don’t have to sleep together. Not if you’re scared.
I know.
He kissed her bare shoulder, where the dress had slipped. She shifted a little and let the dress drop to her waist. She looked at him squarely, naked to her hips. Her breasts were not large, but they were full. Her ribs showed under the skin, and he was aware of the rapid way her chest rose and fell. She was frightened; he was frightened. She stepped out of her dress.
There, she said.
You’re sure you’re all right with this?
She nodded.
He took off his shirt, his jeans. Come here, he said gently, holding her close so he wouldn’t be nervous.
She pulled him down to the mattress with her.
You’re so smooth, he whispered. Your skin is smooth. You taste – he ran his tongue over the lobe of her ear – sweet. You taste like clover.
Clover? She laughed.
Haven’t you ever eaten clover?
No.
It’s sweet. You can taste the honey in it.
She blew out the candle. When they made love, he came, but she didn’t, or at least he didn’t think she had. They lay close together, entwined in each other. He didn’t speak for a long time and neither did she. Words would make it smaller.
He drew a finger along her neck.
Are you okay? he asked.
Yes.
No, you’re not.
What did we just do? she asked.
I don’t know, he said. It was like lightning.
She kissed his arm, she kissed his shoulder and lay back, stretching her arms.
You taste of salt, she said.
He stroked his hand along her rib cage, along the pale brown skin of her stomach. The hair between her legs was a triangle of blue-black. Her thighs were strong. And her knees – he circled his finger around the cap of one knee and then the other – her knees were perfect. He kissed the left one, the right one. He kissed her flat belly, her breasts, her neck.
You’re beautiful.
You don’t even know me.
I know enough to want you.
When he kissed her, she kissed him back. She put her tongue inside his mouth, her eyes half-closed.
He gave himself up to it.
She’d been sleeping when he woke, early. The sky was already light, and he could hear a robin outside the window. She was turned away from him, dark hair against soft skin, and he wanted to kiss the place where her hair sloped over her neck, but he’d wake her if he did. He got up and dressed, but he couldn’t help himself, and knelt to kiss her neck.
You’re going? she asked, turning, her eyes fluttering open and then closing.
Yes.
It can’t be six o’clock yet.
It’s just after five.
And you’re going?
He combed
his hand through her hair.
Don’t go yet, she said, her eyes still closed.
You have to go to work later.
But you don’t have to work. You could just stay here.
I’ll come back tonight, he told her, tucking her hair behind her ear. He bent down and kissed her earlobe.
Mmmm, she murmured. Come here. You can’t go just yet.
He took off his jeans quickly and lay down with her again. She wrapped herself around him.
I could stay like this all day, she said. With you inside me.
I couldn’t last the whole day.
She laughed. I’d wear you out. Then she grew serious.
What?
What if you don’t show up tonight? Would that make it a one-night stand?
I’ll show up, he said.
He’d show up.
When he got to his uncle’s, he didn’t go inside the house; he walked across the road to look at the Niagara Gorge. He’d left her. Why had he left her? Her body had been soft against the sheets. She’d been warm. When he kissed her, he felt her open up to him, as if their bodies already knew each other.
He could have made her coffee and taken it to her in bed.
His mind was racing. He stopped and leaned against the stone wall, looking down at the swift river far below. It was hot and hazy already, but the trees were thick with light, and overlaid against the darker clusters of leaves were pale green ones, tissue-fine. There was nothing on the road yet, except for a man on a bicycle. Damian could hear the roar of the Falls, even though they were a long way off and partly obscured by mist. A jogger went past, slowly, so he could hear the heavy sound of her breathing. Her hair was grey; she was overweight. She plodded by him.
He didn’t want anyone to come into it: not this woman or the man on the bicycle. He wanted to be alone with the thought of Jasmine lying on the bed with her back to him, so he could see the curve of her spine, and, under the sheet, the swell of her hip.
Where’s the car? asked Ingrid. She was in the kitchen when he got back, furiously washing out a mug. The water was running hard in the sink.
The car?
She turned off the tap and put down the wet mug on the counter with a bang.
You took the car last night, she said. If you remember. You wanted to see some girl, and you took the car and stayed out all night and I was sick to death worrying about you. You stayed out all night.
He didn’t look at her. He’d forgotten all about the car. He must have walked right past it in the driveway when he left Jasmine’s.
I have the keys, he said, taking them out of his pocket and staring at them. There was the pink elephant attached to the key ring. There was the white plastic Eiffel Tower that always caught on the zipper when Ingrid was trying to get the keys out of her purse.
Where the hell were you, Damian? she cried. I’ve been up all night, sitting on the porch until the bugs ate me alive. Then I came inside and – where were you? I almost called the police, but I didn’t. But you know, you’re as bad as Elvis, you’re just as bad as Elvis. Someone has to watch out for you.
You don’t have to watch out for me. I’ll go back and get the car, he said, realizing he was very tired. I’m sorry, he added.
You’re sorry. You’re sorry, but there’s no car. Damian, there’s no car.
I know, he said. I’ll get it.
Her face was pale and there were dark shadows under her eyes. He looked at the floor instead, but the nails of her bare feet were curiously yellow. The hem of her cotton bathrobe was frayed and a few threads hung down.
It’s six-thirty in the morning, she said wearily. I can see that you didn’t give a thought to any of this, did you? I’m going to bed, and when I get up I’d like to see the car back in the driveway.
I said I’d get it.
Yes, you get it. It’s not my business if you’re with some girl, but at least you could have some consideration.
I didn’t know. I mean, I didn’t know I’d be with her.
You’ve been here less than two weeks, so that means you’ve known her about five minutes.
It’s not like that.
No?
No, it’s not like that.
Well, I hope you have a few condoms in your wallet when you’re with whoever she is. I hope you know what you’re doing. That’s all.
She went down the hall; he could hear her bare feet against the floor.
I’ll be with her tonight, he said, with a harsh edge to his voice. Maybe I’ll be with her the night after that.
Suit yourself, she said, quite calmly. I thought you had a reason for coming here, but I see I was wrong.
He heard her on the steps. He wanted to go to the bottom of the steps and shout after her not to wait up for him, never to wait up for him.
Fuck. He banged the screened door behind him when he went out. He didn’t care if it woke his uncle.
It was only when he was walking beside the gorge ten minutes later, pitching pebbles over the stone wall, that he allowed himself to think of his mother, lying on the bed in her frayed cotton bathrobe, her eyes shut tightly, the way people do when they’re trying not to cry.
He stayed with Jasmine that night, and the night after that. The third night, they smoked a joint and ate a large bag of chips at the kitchen table.
You never talk about your family, she said.
There’s not much to say.
But –
But what?
I saw you one night. You were with a man in pyjamas.
You saw me?
Yes.
I was with Elvis. He’s my cousin.
You were watching me, she said, drawing a little circle on the table with her index finger. The two of you. And then you tracked me down the next day. Why did you do that?
When I saw you, I don’t know – I wanted to know who you were.
And now you know me?
I know you come from Saskatchewan. Lanigan, Saskatchewan. I know you have a sister called Shirl, and that once you had a dog named Queenie. You’re smart and talented, and God, every time I look at you I get weak in the knees.
Weak in the knees?
Yes, he laughed. I can’t stand up. I have to lie down.
He leaned back in his chair.
You’re right, he went on.
About what?
I know a little about you; you know a little about me. We don’t know a lot about each other. I’m just going on instinct here. Aren’t you?
Yes.
She took him by the hand into her bedroom, lit the candle in the butter dish, and blew out the match.
Okay, just one thing, she said. I want to know whether you’re going to go back home and leave me in the lurch.
He lay down beside her, breathing the acrid smell of the match. She put her leg over his.
I have to go home at some point, he said. But I don’t plan on leaving you in the lurch.
She was quiet, looking at him.
Don’t you trust me? he asked.
Yes.
I trust you. Everything about you. You’re so – I’m so –?
She shifted herself on top of him. She sat astride his body, bending down and kissing him. He felt himself coming apart, as if she were taking him out of a skin he’d always been inside. She pulled him out of one skin and then another; he felt her lifting him out of each one. When she leaned back and rocked him, slowly at first and then faster, he came too soon, all in a rush.
Sorry, he said. I –
Shhh.
She lay next to him and he ran his hand over her belly. Her body was lovely in the half-light of the candle: her legs were long and slender. How dark they seemed against the white, rumpled sheets.
You were going to tell me about the daredevils, she said, kissing him again. She kissed his body, all over, tasting his skin. You were going to tell me about the woman who went across the Falls on a tightrope.
How can I tell you when you’re doing that?
There, she said.
I stopped. She leaned over and picked up the dish with the candle, holding it between them so the glow of the flame made their faces luminous.
She traced the side of his face with her finger. Your eyes are sort of grey, aren’t they? They’ve got a dark rim and then they get lighter toward the pupil.
She put the candle down, in its blue and white dish, on the floor near the bed.
You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me, he said.
You’d say anything. Do you say that to every woman?
No. Mostly I don’t know what to say. I start to stutter.
You start to stutter.
He liked it when she laughed. Her teeth were very white.
I’ve been with two women, he said. That’s it. One of them thought I was an economic risk. The other was put off by the stuttering. What about you?
She looked up at the ceiling. I had a boyfriend in high school. His name was Jared – he liked dirt bike racing. And cream soda; he was the only guy I ever knew who liked cream soda. He could drink five or six at a sitting. Once he drank thirteen and then he threw up on my black capris. I had a lap full of pink vomit.
He must have really liked you. I hate to think what he’d do if someone gave him beer.
She hit him with the pillow, but he caught it, laughing, and kissed her. He kissed her eyes.
It feels like butterflies, she said.
She stroked his braid and sat up so she could undo it.
It’s weird when you do that, he said, his eyes shut. Lisa used to –
Lisa? said Jasmine, dropping her hands.
Fuck, he murmured, without opening his eyes.
He’d done it. He’d let Lisa come into it and already he could feel the brief, sharp joy slipping away from him. Away it slipped, through the upturned fingers of a hand, under a four-wheeler, down to the ocean.
My sister, he said. Lisa.
Your sister? But you said you didn’t have sisters. Or brothers.
You asked me, but I didn’t go into it.
So you have a sister.
I had a sister, he said. He sat up and undid the rest of the braid.
What do you mean?
I had a sister, but she’s dead. Her name was Lisa. She was seventeen when she died.
Oh, said Jasmine in a small voice. I’m sorry.
It was an accident – she drowned in just a few inches of water.
God, whispered Jasmine again. She lay down and pulled the sheet up to her neck. When?
