The Summer Is Ended and We Are Not Yet Saved

by Joey Comeau

  Tony could tell he had him now. The young counsellor was looking at him with admiration and sudden respect.

  “I’m thinking about studying psychology in university,” Quinn said. “I want to be a priest someday, like you. And I think that psychology has a lot of tools to offer to the church. It never hurts to try and understand people better, does it?”

  Tony was watching Quinn talk but not listening to him. He wondered what was inside that blond head of his. Not metaphorically. Tony didn’t care about Quinn’s hopes or psychological motivations. He wanted to know what the boy’s brain looked like. Did it pulse and twitch? If he could get the skull open while Quinn was still alive, could he jab his finger into different parts of the brain and make him bark like a dog?

  He almost laughed out loud at the idea of Quinn barking like a dog every time someone poked a finger into his exposed brain. Get it together, he told himself. But he didn’t want to get it together. Why did he have to explain his actions to this idiot teen? He should just take Quinn into the laundry room and slam his hand in the machine, too. Or his head. That would crack his skull open, maybe. If he did it hard enough.

  Nobody was talking, and now Father Tony couldn’t remember who had spoken last.

  “Psychology is very useful,” he said. “And I think we should talk more about this. You’re clearly very ambitious, Quinn. But right now I should take that camper up to my office and call his parents. He probably wants to get home before it’s dark and I don’t blame him. But come knock on my office door tomorrow morning. Maybe I can write you a letter of recommendation to the university.”

  “Oh you don’t have to do that!” Quinn grinned. “That would be so great. Thank you, sir.”

  Dear Martin,

  Hello again. It’s me, your mother. I am still in my hotel room, and my clothes are still sitting unpacked on the floor. It’s not my fault, though. They have thousands of channels on the television here. There’s a channel that is just a little girl’s nightmares. All night long, from when she goes to sleep ’til when she wakes up screaming, the station just broadcasts chewing gum stuck to teeth, and thread running down her throat as she tries frantically to pull it out. Parts of her body are made of insects. And men keep stopping on the street to look at her.

  Why would anyone watch that station? There’s another station that is just people eating cupcakes and smiling. I like that station better. Who knew there were so many different kinds of cupcakes? One for every kind of person I guess. That’s important, Martin. As your mother, it is my duty to make sure you know that the world is made up of all sorts of different people. And you can understand them, even if they aren’t like you. You can understand them just by trying to understand them. I’ve never liked butterscotch, but watching that old man’s smile as he eats his butterscotch cupcake? I understood. It didn’t change how I feel about butterscotch cupcakes, but I understood his pleasure. And that’s what life is about, Martin. It’s about connecting with and understanding other people.

  This hotel is very strange. There are three taps on the bathroom sink. One is for hot, and one is for cold, and they’re marked H and C respectively. But I’m afraid to try the third tap, which is marked B. Does it control the flow of blood? Of bugs? Of brain matter, or bile? Or butterscotch? It could be any of these disgusting sludges.

  The more I explore my room, the more weirded-out I get. So I’ve been trying to focus on work. The exploding kitten eyeball effect is going to be relatively simple. The eyeball is plastic. I found it in a cat doll at the dollar store. The cat doll had two plastic eyeballs, but I only really needed one. And if the doll comes to life later tonight, to have its revenge on me, I hope that it shows me a bit of mercy for leaving it with one eye at least.

  I stuck ragged bits of latex around the edges of the plastic eye, and they are supposed to look like fleshy eye gunk. Then I painted the fake flesh purple and red, and strung thin lines of it off the back of the eyeball. It’s much more garish than a real eyeball would be, I think, but that’s good. More garish is better. Real gore is so plain and uninteresting. It makes me sad to think that when I die my body will just be pale and unhorrifying. I want to shock people from beyond the grave, Martin. I want to make rookie policemen vomit. Maybe I should put that in my will. I want my body to horrify people. Will you strap me to animatronic machinery, so that at my funeral I burst out of the coffin hollering and splashing everyone with embalming fluid? Anyone who attends my funeral should be given one of those waterproof ponchos in case they sit in the splash zone.

  The actual mechanism to kick the gunky eyeball out of the socket is just a locking spring from a jack-in-the-box. It makes a click sound, but they’ll be able to edit that out. It’s a motherfucker to get set up, but I’m excited to show the director in the morning. I want to show you, too, but I can’t figure out how to send you a video.

  What else is new in the few hours since my last letter ? Oh, I got a phone call from that stupid actor kid’s mother. The boring kid who thought he was better than Linda Blair.

  Anyway, his mom called me just a while ago and said, “Are you Elizabeth? The makeup artist?”

  “Yes,” I told her.

  I didn’t know who it was, or I would have pretended she had the wrong number. Maybe. Or maybe I wouldn’t have. I like a good fight. It’s probably not the best way to go through life, but then, I’d rather be a fighter than a mother with an idiot son.

  “What can I do for you?” I asked her.

  “You can learn some manners,” the woman said. “You have no right to speak to Jim that way.” She cleared her throat. “You’re lucky you aren’t fired, is what I’m saying. I could have the director put you out on your ass in an instant.”

  Do you know that tone of voice people get, and you can tell that they are pointing their finger? That’s how this woman sounded. It sounded like she was at her house, holding the phone in one hand, and pointing her finger at nothing with the other. Why can’t people smile? You can tell people are smiling from the tone of their voice, too, and that’s much nicer. You should always try to smile Martin, even if you don’t feel happy. After a while, you get happy. You trick yourself into actually being happy. It’s much better than pointing your finger at people, which is impolite.

  Anyway, there’s a certain desperate smell to this kind of bluster. People who have nothing to back up their threats but don’t want to admit it to themselves. I’ve seen real anger and its consequences. This wasn’t frightening in the least. This was entitlement disguised as anger.

  “And who is Jim, exactly?” I said. It figures a boring kid would have a boring name.

  “You know exactly who I’m talking about,” the woman said. “Jim. My son. The boy you swore at just a few hours ago.”

  “I didn’t swear at your son,” I told her.

  “Are you calling me a liar?”

  She sounded so indignant that I laughed.

  “No,” I said. “I called your son ignorant. But I didn’t swear at him. I swore in front of him. You understand the difference, right? I swore while I was talking to him, because I don’t see any harm in that. I’m not going to tiptoe around a kid as though the word ‘fuck’ is somehow going to make him cry or stunt his growth, and I think you’re a fucking hypocrite for calling me up and acting like I’ve crossed some unforgivable line by cussing in front of your little boy who is about to star in a movie where you’re letting a grown man suck on his neck for money. If he can handle that, then he can handle me telling him that he’s wrong about Linda Blair, and he can sure as fuck handle a little cussing.”

  “You’re going to regret using that tone with me,” the woman said.

  “Lady, I regret talking to you at all,” I told her, but she had already hung up.

  And then, right away, the phone rang again. But this time it was an old man’s voice.

  “Hello?” he said. “Can you hear me, hello?”

  “I
can hear you,” I said. “Who is this?”

  “She can hear me, Mitchie,” the old man said away from the phone. Then he was back, talking into the receiver again. “Hello, miss? My name is Charles, and I think I might be dead. I don’t know where I am, or where this phone came from. But I’m happy here. It’s cold and strange, but I have my dog with me. We’re together. Mitchie is still dumb as a post, but we’re together. Can you tell my daughter that we’re together?”

  “Who’s your daughter?” I asked, but there was static on the line now. It was loud and clicking and hissing. “Who’s your daughter?” I said again.

  “Julia,” was all I could make out, and then he was gone. So, now I guess I have a mystery to solve, Martin. I have to find a ghost’s daughter and tell her that he’s happy. That is, if this hotel doesn’t devour me first. While I was in the bathroom, one of the chairs seems to have disappeared from the room. And the ceiling feels lower than it did before.

  I hope that camp is fun!

  Your loving mother,

  The Ghost Detective.

  “They put us in Cabin Three,” Melissa said when Courtney sat down at the picnic table.

  Martin slid over to give her room, and his arm brushed against Joan’s, skin on skin. It was an accident, but he felt his face go red. He tried to concentrate on not blushing. He didn’t want to make Joan feel weird. He didn’t want any of them to make fun of him. He liked them. They were going to make camp so much better.

  “Our counsellor just wants to talk about chess all day,” Melissa said. “Look at her.” She nodded her head toward Sherri-Lynn, who was standing beside a big outdoor chess board with a couple of the girls from their cabin.

  The chess pieces were black and white, and some of them were as tall as her knee. The counsellor was pointing at one piece, and then another, and gesturing wildly in the air. Martin had never learned how to play chess. He always just kind of assumed it was boring, but Sherri-Lynn looked genuinely excited.

  “Chess is better than hairstyling tips,” Courtney said, slumping down over the table with her head on her arms. “I got stuck with Cindy. There is no way I am ever going to put curlers in my hair, let alone stay up late having some kind of curler party. What kind of insanity is that? Let’s all stay up late and do our hair? Honestly, it’s like a bad dream. I think that our counsellor might be completely nuts. Or she’s fucking with us. Do you think she’s just fucking with us?” She turned to Melissa, but Melissa was staring at Sherri-Lynn still, and shaking her head in disbelief.

  “Is that what we’re like?” Melissa said to Martin. “When we were talking about our telescopes earlier, did we have that crazy look on our faces?”

  Martin shook his head, but Melissa had already turned to Joan.

  “I think it’s probably a good thing, though,” she said. “Maybe she’ll be willing to bend the rules for us. Maybe she’ll let us watch the comet tomorrow night.”

  “Did you ask her about letting me switch cabins?” Courtney said. “I don’t think I can handle Cindy being my counsellor. I’ll wind up pregnant by the end of the week. I am thirteen years old. I’m not ready to have a baby yet.”

  “I don’t think you can get pregnant from hair curlers,” Melissa said.

  “Well, that depends on how clean they are,” Joan said, and Martin burst out laughing.

  Everyone turned to look at him.

  He tried to catch his breath but the joke had taken him off guard. He couldn’t stop laughing. He closed his eyes and shook his head. He wanted them not to stare at him, but he knew they were going to. Joan was probably staring at him, too.

  “‘It depends on how clean they are,’” Martin said when he finally caught his breath.

  And Joan smiled.

  “We didn’t ask yet,” Melissa said, turning back to Courtney. “No. We were waiting for you.”

  “How are we going to do this?” Courtney said. “Do we just go right up and ask her if I can be in your cabin? Or do we make something up?”

  “What would we make up?” Melissa said. “I guess we could tell her that you get really homesick. Do you think you can cry when we get over there?”

  “I don’t know. I could cover my face and pretend that I’m crying,” she said.

  “What do you mean pretend that you’re crying?” Melissa said.

  Courtney covered her face with her hands and started shaking a bit, making quiet sort of sobbing sounds. She sounded exactly like a person who was pretending to cry. Watching her, Martin almost started laughing again.

  “No,” Melissa said. “Stop, don’t do that. That was terrible. Have you ever even seen somebody cry? Just try to look kind of sad, I guess.”

  “Okay,” Courtney said. “I can do that.”

  They stood up, and Martin stood with them, making sure not to bump into Joan again.

  “Why’s he coming?” Courtney said, looking at Martin.

  “What’s he going to do, sit here by himself?” Melissa sighed. “Just focus, Courtney. Get ready to look sad.”

  They went over to the chess board and stood watching Sherri-Lynn show a younger girl how to play. The girl had big thick glasses on, and she looked even younger than Martin. But it must have been the glasses that made her look younger. She had to be at least eleven. Eleven was the youngest age the camp accepted.

  “Hey girls,” Sherri-Lynn said. “I see you’ve made a couple friends already!” She smiled at Martin. “Do either of you play chess, by any chance?”

  Martin shook his head. Beside him, Courtney did the same.

  “We wanted to ask you a question,” Melissa said. “Do you have a minute?”

  “Sure,” the counsellor said. She turned to the younger girl. “I’ll be back in a bit, Margaret. Just practise moving the pieces the way I showed you.”

  The girl nodded, and picked up the knight. Sherri-Lynn led them away along the path toward the Flying Fox.

  “Our friend Courtney wants to be in our cabin,” Melissa said. “She gets homesick. It’s better for her if she’s with people that she knows. She feels more comfortable, you know?”

  Courtney was making a face, and it took Martin a second to realize that this was her “sad” face. He had to look away from her to keep from laughing. Sherri-Lynn didn’t look very convinced, either.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “I mean, that’s part of the camp experience. You get out on your own, and that’s how you make new friends! It’s a bit scary, but it’s also—”

  “—She wants to learn how to play chess,” Joan interrupted.

  Melissa and Courtney looked at their friend in surprise. But Sherri-Lynn was grinning now.

  “Oh,” she said. “You could have just said that!” She gave Courtney a playful push on the shoulder. “You didn’t have to pretend to be homesick. I’d be happy to teach you how to play chess. Who’s your counsellor? Let me go find her and tell her that you’re gonna change cabins.”

  Father Tony pointed to one of the chairs in front of his desk, and Mitchell sat down. His office always looked nice at this time of day, with the sun coming in the window. He kept meaning to look into stained glass for his window. That would be something.

  “My father is going to call the police on you,” Mitchell said. He had stopped crying, and now he was staring at Tony defiantly. “I’ll tell him what you did, and what you said, and he’s going to call the police.”

  “Sure,” the priest said. “He would be crazy not to.” He picked up the phone and offered it toward the boy. “Oh, don’t get up,” Tony said. He stood and started bringing the phone to where Mitchell was sitting. Part way there he reached the end of the cord, and stopped short. He looked down at the phone in his hand and smiled. “Hang on a second,” he said. He set the phone on the ground and dug around in his pocket for his utility knife. Mitchell watched in silence as he folded the blade open and cut through the phone cord. Then Tony closed his knife
and put it back in his pocket.

  “Have you ever been in love, Mitchell?” he said.

  “I love my dad,” Mitchell said. He looked down at the phone that Tony set in his lap, and the disconnected cord that dangled from it.

  “Don’t be slow,” Tony said. “I mean, have you ever been in love with someone and all you could think about was seeing them again? And you felt like nothing in the whole world mattered?”

  “No?” Mitchell picked the phone handset up, and then hung it back up uselessly.

  “It feels like you could do anything. It’s intoxicating, Mitchell. It feels like there are no rules in the whole world, as long as you are in love. Anything you do is justified, because you’re doing it for love. I feel that way today.” Tony walked to the window and looked out over the trees. He could see the roof of the chapel. “I feel that crazy-in-love feeling, but I’m not in love with anyone. The world just seems full of possibility and excitement.”

  “There are other phones,” Mitchell said. “You can’t stop me from calling my dad.”

  “I can’t, you’re right. I can’t stop you from calling your father. And I can’t break your fingers in a washing machine. This is all very true. I can’t tie you to that chair and duct tape your mouth, either, can I? I can’t put down a bunch of garbage bags and then cut your throat just because it seems funny.”

  Mitchell pushed the chair back and stood up. But Tony was right there, taking the phone out of his hands.

  “Just another minute,” he said. “Then you can go.”

  Mitchell shook his head, but Tony put a hand on his shoulder and sat him back down.

  “I’ve never tied anyone up before,” Tony said. “I don’t know how I would do it without you yelling or fighting back and escaping. So, I’m sorry about this.” He drew the phone back over his shoulder and then swung it hard into Mitchell’s face.