The Melting Queen

by Bruce Cinnamon

  I dream that my new, glorious self will be born on the first day of spring. When the ice breaks and the river is freed, the whole city will celebrate Melting Day, Edmonton’s most important holiday. The sun will boil off the snow and the city will rise from its slumber. The people will flood into the streets and ascend into revelry. Everyone will laugh and drink and feast and dance and cry with joy that the Long Winter has finally ended after all these horrible months. And I will be made new again.

  I’m staring at a poster of the Trevi Fountain when the travel agent clears her throat. I jump—it sounds like a shotgun blast—and she seems almost amused.

  “Found the tape.”

  She walks over to me, holding a thick roll of duct tape.

  “Did you know that they collect over three thousand euros from the Trevi Fountain every day?” I say, gesturing at the poster. “They have police guard it so nobody steals the money and they give it all to charity.”

  “Neat,” says the travel agent.

  “And did you know that it’s illegal to chase stray cats out of their habitats in Rome? The city council passed a law saying that they were part of Rome’s cultural heritage and couldn’t be moved. Now there are over two hundred feral cats living in the Colosseum.”

  “Wow. You know a lot about Rome,” she says. “Have you been there?”

  “No,” I say, studying the posters to avoid her stare. “I haven’t been anywhere. I just like to read about other cities. There are so many interesting places in the world, aren’t there? Like Seattle—they have a famous wall covered in gum and people make pilgrimages there to stick on their own pieces. Or Tokyo—they have a spa resort where you can soak in pools of wine and coffee and green tea. Or Uyuni, Bolivia—they have a Great Train Graveyard of abandoned locomotives at the edge of the world’s largest salt desert.”

  “What about Edmonton?”

  The travel agent’s words cut through my fantasies of these faraway places. They pull me back to her coffee-stained carpets and the snow-choked street outside.

  “What about Edmonton?”

  My words come out with a sharper edge than I intended. She looks at me with something verging on desperation.

  “Do you know any stories about Edmonton? About the High Level Bridge or the Muttart Conservatory or West Edmonton Mall?”

  “Edmonton isn’t that kind of city,” I say.

  “Why not?”

  I stare at her. Surely she must understand, if she lives here.

  “The High Level Bridge is just a bridge.”

  She nods slowly.

  “I heard that twelve people throw themselves off every year,” she says.

  “Really? I thought it’d be more than that.”

  “Yeah, about one a month.”

  “Not in the winter though,” I say. “They wouldn’t want to hit the ice. They wouldn’t want anyone to have to see that.”

  “No. I guess not.”

  “And even in the summer, the river is shallow there. You’d hit the bottom for sure. But maybe that’s a good thing. Maybe you’d just get absorbed into the silt of the riverbed, and no one would ever find you.”

  “Maybe.”

  She stares out the window distractedly. I study her creased face, but I can’t imagine what she’s thinking. After a moment she looks back at me and says nothing.

  “Well, I should go,” I say.

  I start to stand up from my chair.

  “You didn’t get any tape,” she says.

  “Oh yeah.”

  I sit back down. Rather than handing me the tape as I expect, the travel agent kneels next to me. She lifts up my heel and proceeds to wrap the roll of duct tape around and around, looping up and down my calf.

  “Are these women’s boots?” she asks.

  “No. They’re mine.”

  The travel agent raises her eyebrows but says nothing. She tapes up my other boot and then gives it a pat.

  “Should be good to go.”

  “Thanks,” I say, standing up and walking to the door.

  I look around the desolate shop. Everything here makes me sad: the broken coffee maker, the faded posters, the dusty brochures. I can feel all the energy draining out of my body just from being here. No wonder the travel agent seems so exhausted.

  “Have you ever been to Rome?” I ask, hoping to lift her spirits a little. “I’d love to hear what it’s really like. If you know about any hidden gems, or anything like that.”

  The woman looks irritated by my question, but her voice is sad.

  “No,” she says, lifting herself off the floor with a grunt. “I’ve never been to Rome. I’ve never been anywhere.”

  She looks down at a shoebox on her desktop, then back at me.

  “You said you like postcards?”

  I nod. She picks up the box and brings it over to me.

  “Here. I have some old ones you might like. You seem like you could give them a better home than I can. Or just throw them out. I don’t care.”

  I take the surprisingly heavy box from her—she held it like it weighed nothing. My hand touches hers for a second as she passes it to me. Her fingers are warm.

  “Thank you.”

  The travel agent nods. She seems uncomfortable and I don’t know how to say goodbye. But she clears her throat again and turns back toward her desk and I guess our interaction is over.

  I look outside and see that the sun has come out. Not the pale white sun of winter, but the rich golden sun of summer. It visits us sometimes in the depths of winter—peeking through the ice-particle clouds, spreading its yellow radiance across the city. The people walking by are all standing up straighter. It’s amazing how the right kind of sunlight can change your whole day.

  I look over at the travel agent, packing up her failed business. I wonder how long she’s been waiting for spring, whether she’s been watching the river like I have. I wonder how many people in this city have been huddled in their homes, taking shelter in their dreams, cursing the calendar for its betrayal. Waiting.

  “Happy Melting Day.”

  I say it without thinking, surprising myself.

  The travel agent looks up from her desk, startled.

  “It’s not Melting Day, is it?”

  “No,” I say. “Not quite yet. But it will be soon.”

  She stares straight into me, and for a moment I feel like she might flip over her desk, break into a rage, charge at me. But instead a small, reluctant smile appears on her face.

  “Happy Melting Day,” she says.

  {2}

  Far from the world, here at this bend in the river

  The sun has sunk below the horizon by the time I get home. Not that I can ever see the sun from my room. I live in a basement bachelor suite in a prewar bungalow, perched on the border between Little Italy and Chinatown. At night, the red neon light from the Gate of Happy Arrival spills through the tiny window beside my front door. But other than that, it’s a dark little cave.

  I’ve plugged in half a dozen lamps around the room, probably too many for the old wiring to handle. I never turn on all the lamps at once because I’m sure it will start an electrical fire. And I have plenty of kindling.

  Over the last six months, I’ve covered every last inch of my walls with postcards. Every day, after the sun sets, when I’m making my way home after inspecting the river ice, I steal another postcard from the convenience store down the street. They’re only ten cents apiece and I buy overpriced yoghurt there every once in a while, so ethically it all comes out even. I can’t resist the bright, colourful scenes of famous landmarks and tropical beaches and crowded streets.

  When I moved into this place, the walls were decorated with a dozen artsy, black-and-white photos of Edmonton: the palm trees in the Legislature dome, the tangle of waterslides at the West Edmonton Mall waterpark, the high hedges of the Infinite Maze in the Sky Harbour Gardens. I tried to take them down, but the previous tenant had hot-glue-gunned them to the drywall. So instead I just plastered my w
alls with scenes of the world’s great cities, surrounding these Edmonton landscapes like the hungry sea eroding an archipelago. I’ve been waiting all winter to cover them up. And now, with the travel agent’s gift, I finally can.

  I sit on the corner of my bed and open the box of postcards. There are hundreds of them. Enough to finish my project, and wipe out the Edmonton scenes for good. I lift a handful of them out of the box and they slip through my fingers and scatter across the floor—all face down, like peanut-buttered toast. I notice that they’ve all been written on. They’ve all travelled from across the world, back here to Edmonton. I pick one up, an Amsterdam canal scene:

  Dear Clodagh,

  Thanks for arranging our trip.

  Wish you were here!

  I pick up another, the Carnaval in Rio:

  Dear Clodagh,

  I can’t believe how much fun we’re having.

  Wish you were here!

  A big pink palace in Hungary:

  Dear Clodagh,

  You were right! We love Budapest.

  Wish you were here!

  And on and on, dozens of them, hundreds. Messages from around the world. From satisfied customers. To a travel agent who never travelled.

  I feel my heart breaking for her. Is that what I’m going to become? Just another beaten-down Edmontonian, snowed in and miserable? Hating my life but too exhausted to escape?

  I look from the travel agent’s box to my walls of postcards, this weird shrine which has brought me so much comfort throughout the winter, and something inside of me shifts. Some load-bearing beam collapses, and I finally see my postcards for what they really are: a lie. A false promise. They’re not airline tickets. They’re not even memories. They’re just a sad consolation prize. They’re trapping me here, giving me just enough false hope to keep me alive, just enough solace to stop me from leaving.

  I feel my cheeks burning with shame. Poor, pitiful creature. Stupid, naïve child. I can’t believe I ever loved these pictures. Now, I hate them with a burning, all-consuming fury.

  I rush to the closest wall and tear down as many postcards as I can. The Eiffel Tower. The Burj Khalifa. The Tokyo Skytree. They all go tumbling down.

  I try to rip one of the Edmonton photos off the wall but it’s still stuck there completely. I pull and I pull and I claw at its edges but the picture isn’t going anywhere.

  Just like you.

  I collapse in a heap on the floor, in a dirty little nest of the world’s great cities. I want to burn them all. I want to scream and cry and wail. But nothing comes. My eyes are dry. My heart is hammering, my breath heaving. I start to crawl toward my bed, so I can at least escape into sleep.

  No. Not today. Not anymore.

  No more mopey bullshit. No more sleeping. No more dreaming. I’m done with waiting. I’m done with praying for the world to change. It’s time someone took matters into their own hands.

  Before I doubt myself, before the spark inside me dies, I head for the door. I’m tired of overthinking it. I know what I have to do. What I should’ve done weeks, months ago.

  I go to the river. I don’t stop at the top of the stairs this time. I don’t say a prayer. I thunder down the wooden steps, through the empty park, deserted at this hour of the night. I race up to the promenade along the river’s edge, heave myself over the railing, down onto the snow-covered stones they’ve used to shore up the crumbling riverbank.

  I grab the nearest stone, ripping it out of the frozen soil, and I hurl it at the ice.

  “Come on!” I shout.

  The stone smacks the ice and skitters across the river, barely leaving a mark. It slides towards the big white hull of The Edmonton Queen. The indolent riverboat stands trapped in the ice, moored on the far bank.

  I grab another stone—bigger, heavier, more jagged—and throw it as high and far as I can.

  “Come on! Break goddammit! Fucking break already!”

  The stone hits the ice and tumbles away. The ice shines, immaculate in the moonlight.

  I try to grab a larger stone but I’m too weak to lift anything else. Fine. Fuck it. There’s only one way to do this and I’m going to fucking do it.

  I walk out onto the ice, to the middle of the river. I pick up the jagged stone and slam it down, over and over.

  “COME ON. COME ON!”

  I abandon the stone and start jumping up and down, throwing my full weight onto the ice. It’s as hard and resistant to me as it was to the rocks. I hammer down on the river with the heels of my taped-up boots.

  “COME ON YOU PIECE OF SHIT, BREAK! BREAK!”

  I slam my feet down one more time and the ice gives way beneath me.

  I scream and twist around but it’s too late. The last thing I see is the glittering image of downtown Edmonton, perched smugly up on the high riverbank like a useless lifeguard. And then I’m under, in the darkness of the river.

  Every cell of my body is set on fire. My skin is peeled off. My muscles are ripped apart. My bones are ground to dust. I’m colder than I’ve ever been, and I burn.

  Everything slows down. Everything fades away except for me. I’m in this wet, dark place and I’m alone in the universe. I’m holding my breath. My lungs are going to explode. I start to breathe out, getting ready to breathe in and flood myself with icy cold water.

  This is it. This is okay. This is how you leave.

  No.

  No. Fuck that shit. I’m not fucking dying here, in a shallow silty river in fucking Edmonton. I kick and pull myself in what I hope is an upwards direction, until I can feel the irregular underside of the ice above my head. My lungs are on fire, but I resist the urge to breathe in with every ounce of willpower I have left. I grasp at the ice until my hand finds an edge, sharp as a knife. I feel like I’m slicing deep into my palms, down to the bone, but I pull my way up through the hole and my head breaks the surface of the water.

  I gasp in the dry winter air and I cough and cough. I claw myself out of the hole and crawl on my stomach across the infinite desert of ice before me. Finally I reach the riverbank. I pull myself up onto the rocks. I’m trapped in soggy, freezing clothes that weigh a thousand tons. I tear them off until I’m naked, standing on the riverbank, steam rising from my skin. I don’t feel cold at all. I feel as warm as a blazing pyre. I blink at the blurry world before me, where a big black pool of ink seeps out across a white piece of paper. I takes me a second to understand what I’m seeing.

  The ice is breaking. Cracks are spreading out from the hole I created. I hear the crunching sound, and see the stress-lines forming—titanic force being released, stasis giving way to motion. As I watch, the river begins to run.

  {3}

  The first day of spring

  Finally.

  Finally, winter is over. Finally, spring is here.

  My face aches from smiling, but I can’t help myself. The ice is broken. It’s Melting Day. I started the spring, and now I can finally leave. And I know just how I’m going to celebrate my last day in Edmonton.

  Over its long history, Melting Day has shamelessly absorbed the customs of a hundred other holidays. At first it just stole its traditions from spring festivals around the world: dancing around the Maypole, blowing up the Böögg, rolling giant wheels of cheese down the hills in the river valley, tying Martenitsi yarn dolls to trees to welcome Baba Marta, eating eggs in every possible configuration. But now there are Santas and leprechauns, cupids and calaveras, firework displays and lanterns released into the sky.

  One of the first non-spring traditions that Melting Day absorbed into its grand pastiche was Hallowe’en costumes. Not everyone dresses up on Melting Day—some people are too busy kissing under mistletoe or searching for chocolate eggs or drinking shamrock beer—but a significant number of Edmontonians seize the opportunity. You can be scary. You can be sexy. You can be whatever you want to be. And I want to be a brand new self, resplendent and glorious.

  So as the sun rises over Edmonton, revealing the shattered river to an overjo
yed city, I sit at the centre of my room and build a paper gown. I pick the postcards off my floor, connecting them with tape, staples, safety pins—anything I can find. I’ve never made a dress before. I’ve never worn a dress before. But that doesn’t matter. It’s Melting Day. I can do anything. I can tame these postcards and take on the power of the places they represent. The whole world will cover me, stretching out in a grand flowing train behind me.

  When the gown is done, I lower it over my body and look at myself in the mirror. My eyes travel from my feet to my face, sweeping across a dozen landscapes: the Ganges and the Nile, the Danube and the Rio de la Plata. I look truly magnificent, the Angel of a Thousand Worlds. I rein in my wild red hair with a regiment of strategically placed barrettes. I pull on my last pair of back-up boots. And then I’m ready to go.

  The sun has risen, but it doesn’t shine. It spills pale yellow light down onto the mounds of snow, the denuded trees, and the grey patches of grass. The impotent sun cannot melt the snow. This is an artificial spring.

  But it doesn’t matter. The Bacchanalia has begun.

  The streets are packed with people, each living out their pent-up fantasies and personal traditions. Cars have been banned on Melting Day for as long as I can remember, except for the police officers who patrol the city and try to maintain some semblance of order. Melting Day is uncontainable chaos—hundreds of festivals happening all at once, everywhere. There are vanilla Melting Days happening in church parking lots and kink Melting Days happening in nightclub dungeons. There are family-friendly zones with face-painting and three-legged races, and adult-only areas with orgies and fight clubs. Melting Day is a grand buffet, an elaborate smorgasbord. All you have to do is choose your feast.

  Thousands of people flood the streets, marching from far-flung suburbs into the city’s core. I join the great parade, a bright speck in a tumbling kaleidoscope. Under the Chinatown Gate I see a group of revellers dressed in nineteenth-century naval uniforms. They’re loading an historical cannon—a relic of old Fort Edmonton—with confetti, firing it off to cries of glee from the crowd. Little pieces of paper settle in my hair like technicolour snowflakes, land in the snow and dissolve into mush.