by Barb Howard
“Crosswords! You won’t be so cavalier about memory when you’re my age,” Mrs. Waznyk says.
“There are new medications that help. We’ve talked about them in previous visits. I’ve got that marked here.” He pats his laptop. “But since you don’t want to be on any supportive prescriptions…”
“I don’t want to be an overmedicated old woman.”
“You wouldn’t be overmedicated. You would be appropriately medicated.”
“That’s how it starts,” Mrs. Waznyk says. “Yes, that’s how it always starts. And in no time at all I’ll be on a drooler bus from a nursing home, heading out on a day trips for ice cream.”
The doctor sharply hits one key on his laptop, then closes the lid.
“All right then,” he says. “I guess that’s everything. See you in a year.” He leans forward, shakes Mrs. Waznyk’s hand, shakes my hand, and leaves the room.
While Mrs. Waznyk pulls her cardigan back on, I calculate that the time spent with the doctor is about five percent of the time I will spend transporting Mrs. Waznyk to and from his office.
“I should have mentioned a little pain I’m having,” she says.
“Why didn’t you?”
“These doctors,” she says. “They’re all on the pharmacy payroll. It’s best not to give them any information.”
“But you should tell the doctor if you have pain. That’s the whole point.”
“He’s a man. What does he know about pain?”
“Maybe you should try a woman doctor,” I say.
“No,” Mrs. Waznyk says. “Women shouldn’t be doctors.”
This is one of Mrs. Waznyk’s bizarre opinions, all the more bizarre since she, in many ways, has been a trailblazer for equality in the workplace, having worked her way to the position of manager at an all-male trucking company before she retired. And yet, at the same time, even though she never married, she adopted the title “Mrs.” because she felt it gave her legitimacy. And there are certain jobs, doctor, minister, and math teacher included, that she believes should be the exclusive bailiwick of men.
“We’ll just book another appointment and come back again if the pain worsens,” she says.
Sure, I think. I’ve got nothing else to do, nothing but chauffeur time on my hands.
“Where shall we go for lunch?” Mrs. Waznyk asks as we leave the doctor’s office.
Lunch? I hadn’t thought about lunch. I check my watch.
“Oh, I suppose you haven’t got time. You’re in a rush,” she says.
“No no,” I say. “Not at all.” I don’t like to be known as a person in a rush. Not one of those out-of-breath women who feel the need to be involved in everything from the office steering committee to the Christmas party planning team to the next 10k charity run for the next illness or newest children’s helpline. But I think it’s important to volunteer, to help others. That’s pretty much why I’m here. That, and the fact that Mrs. Waznyk doesn’t have anyone else to drive her around, so I’m stuck with it. But old people take forever to eat a meal and I do have a few other tasks to accomplish today. Groceries, library book return, and I’d hoped to go for a workout on the elliptical machine. It’s my day off work and I don’t want to waste it.
“How about a coffee?” I suggest as a compromise. “At Tim Hortons. There’s one next door.”
“Do they have soup? I want hot soup.”
“They have soup.”
I’m excited by my own genius. Tim Hortons is next door, mere steps away. We won’t have to add an extra in-and-out of the car episode, we won’t have a two-hour meal, and I can get one of those honey crullers that I like.
Tim Hortons is crowded. Because the service line is long, likely too much standing for Mrs. Waznyk, I settle us into a table for two before ordering. Her eyesight isn’t great, even with her saucer-size bifocals, so I read her the items from the menu board, skipping those that seem inappropriate. I’ll lose her if I read off everything. Besides, she couldn’t possibly want a Chili Combo or a Chocolate Brownie Iced Capp. She said she wanted soup so that’s my main pitch. It works.
I leave Mrs. Waznyk at the table and line up to place our orders. In front of me is a woman in knee-high black boots and a slim-skirted business suit. She has a lilac scarf around her neck, casual, and yet just so. On her hip she holds a darling child, a toddler. His hair is a bundle of loopy black curls, like hers, framing big-lashed eyes.
“Jeremy, how about a maple donut?” she asks him.
Jeremy shakes his head, no.
I love that name. Jeremy.
“Now a maple donut would be best,” she says. “Mommy wants a taste.”
“No,” Jeremy says.
He lays his chubby hand on her cheek. She gently takes his wrist and puts his hand back on his chest. She sways and hums a tune, something from a children’s entertainer, probably. I don’t have kids so I don’t know any of those chipper ditties. Thank goodness.
I glance over at Mrs. Waznyk. She has opened her purse on her lap and is click-snapping for something. Even from this distance I feel the urge to rip the purse out of her hands.
The line inches forward. When the attractive woman reaches the counter she orders a coffee and a maple donut.
“No,” little Jeremy says, and tries to squirm out of her grasp. Wouldn’t he just like to take a roaring trip around the tables, or maybe trot right out the door and onto the street? She has to hang onto him.
“Sweetie,” she says, tightening her hold. “Please don’t. Mommy will set you down when we get to the table.”
A man sitting nearby, noticing her trouble with a wriggling child and a hot coffee and a maple donut, and no doubt noticing her looks, jumps up—and I do mean jumps, like a complete jackass-in-the-box—and carries her order to the empty table right beside ours. He’s in an expensive dark suit, the fabric not unlike hers, and he dotes on her for a few minutes, getting her a napkin, sliding a chair up beside her for Jeremy. The man winks and waves at Jeremy several times before returning to his colleague. Jeremy, his lip jutting out in the sulk of all sulks, sends the man a couple of eye daggers.
As I carry my tray with my order back to our table, I see Mrs. Waznyk has sunk into her chair as though her back is a wet noodle. Her legs are spread apart, one orthopedically-clad foot on either side of her chair. She has pulled out the note from her pocket. The 9:30 note. I hate that note.
“Want me to throw that out?” I ask, setting the tray in front of her and reaching for the note.
“No thank you,” she says, stuffing the paper back in her pocket. She looks at the tray. “Took long enough. Isn’t there a bun?”
“I guess not,” I say. I pull my cruller from the tray, settle into my chair.
“I’m sure you said the soup came with a bun.”
I’m watching the woman in the suit. She is reaching out her arm and making gootchy-goo sounds and gestures to Jeremy. Well, I think, if anyone can pull him out of his funk, that mother can.
“If we paid for a bun, we should get it,” Mrs. Waznyk says.
“I’ll get your bun,” I say, and then I smile so fiercely my upper lip might split open like a fighter’s. I’ll get her goddam bun, all right.
The line has gotten longer. Forget it. I walk to the end of the counter where the Tim Hortons employees are putting together orders. I pluck a bun off one of the trays prepared for another customer.
“There,” I say, slapping the bun down beside Mrs. Waznyk’s soup. “There’s your bun.” I know she will be offended that it isn’t on a plate, that I have used my fingers, but it all makes me feel more satisfied than rude.
Mrs. Waznyk picks her purse off her lap and sets it on the table.
“I want to give you some money for this,” she says.
“Oh no,” I say, “My treat.”
She reaches for the first latch. I don’t think I can bear another purse search.
“You buy next time,” I say, putting my hand on top of her purse.
She p
auses, looks at me steadily, then jerks the purse out from under my hand and sets it back on her lap. She picks up her spoon and tastes her soup.
“Could be hotter,” she says.
Jeremy’s mother tears off a piece of the maple donut and pops it into her mouth. Jeremy starts to cry. His mother tears off another piece of donut and holds it out to him. His chest rises as he sucks in a colossal amount of air, his face screws up in a pre-wail. Oh no, I think, a screamer. Luckily, before he makes a sound, his mother picks him up and sets him on her lap. She whispers in his ear. The screwed-up face collapses, the crying stops, Jeremy hangs his head. Wow, I think, she’s good at this.
“How’s your job?” Mrs. Waznyk asks.
“Fine,” I say. I’m eating my cruller, watching Jeremy and his mother.
“What is it you do again?” Mrs. Waznyk asks. “I can never seem to retain that.”
I’m thinking, do we need to discuss this again, now? I glance away from Jeremy and his mom to look at Mrs. Waznyk. She is looking at me expectantly.
“Consult. I’m an oil and gas consultant,” I say, with a good measure of finality, returning my attention to Jeremy and his mother. But Mrs. Waznyk charges on, determined to make a conversation.
“I thought you were an engineer.”
“I am an engineer.”
“My, isn’t that something. Two jobs.”
Jeremy’s mother puts the piece of donut, the one she tried to feed and cajole him with, into her own mouth. Good move, I think. If the little stinker won’t eat the donut, eat it yourself.
“You must work long hours,” Mrs. Waznyk says.
Jeremy twists, quick, and slaps his mother’s face. She takes his hand, firmly bringing it to his side. She takes a sip of her coffee and then says, “Please don’t hit mommy.”
I’m impressed. Her brow doesn’t wrinkle. Her jaw doesn’t clench. The two businessmen at the table beside her have stopped talking. The jackass-in-the-box looks ready to spring to her assistance again. There’s a full table of women nearby who have switched from animated chatting to whispering.
“Here,” the mother says. She tears off another piece of the donut and holds it in front of his mouth. Forget it, I think, he doesn’t want the donut.
Jeremy seals his lips, kicks his legs. To my relief, probably to the relief of everyone in Tim Hortons, since most of us are watching, the mother sets the piece of donut neatly back on the plate. Who, after all, wants to be force-fed a donut? The mother turns Jeremy on her lap, so he is facing her directly. And then, as my thoughts are turning to Mrs. Waznyk’s comment about my long hours, thump, just like that, Jeremy’s mother punches him in the chest. Not a playful punch. The real deal.
Mrs. Waznyk, who I thought was focused on her soup, says loudly, “Something’s not right at that table,” and nods at Jeremy and his mother. I wish Mrs. Waznyk knew how to whisper. Of course something is not right at the next table. That mother punched her kid.
“I take every third Friday off,” I say. “It’s one of the perks of consulting.”
“I said,” Mrs. Waznyk practically yells, “something’s not right over there.”
“There, how do you like being hit?” the mother asks Jeremy. She’s talking in a low, soothing voice. “Do you want to know how I feel?” She winds up and punches him again.
“Do you like it? Do you?”
Tim Hortons is so quiet you can hear the jingle of the zipper on Jeremy’s hoodie after the second punch.
“Now,” his mother says, “you can sit back on your own chair and we can share our maple donut.”
Jeremy sniffles. His mother sets him in the chair beside her. She looks around at the other customers, at first demurely, then flashing her perfect teeth like a celebrity working the paparazzi. The two men in suits stand up. On their way out of the restaurant one of them, the one who had paid attention to Jeremy’s mother, crumples his napkin and tosses it into the garbage bin. Two points, he says. The other man laughs.
“Shameful,” Mrs. Waznyk says. “People are shameful.”
As the regular hum of the coffee shop returns, I walk to the service counter, stand in line, ask for a small plate. I take the plate to our table and slip it under Mrs. Waznyk’s bun.
“Thank you,” she says. “That’s service with a smile.”
I look over at the table where Jeremy’s mother is lightly adjusting her scarf, gathering up Jeremy and her purse, getting ready to leave.
“Bon appétit,” I say.
MARKING TERRITORY
Paul slid his hands down the railings towards the basement and then jumped half the stairs. He turned to look at Louie, the Dachshund, who shivered at the top of the stairs. Paul climbed back up, tugged at the dog’s collar.
“Come on. What’s the matter?” Paul started to drag Louie over the first step. Louie nipped at Paul’s wrist and scuttled across the linoleum to a corner behind the kitchen table.
“Crazy dog,” Paul said, thumping down the stairs by himself. On the bottom step he picked up a large flashlight. He remembered the flashlight from his walk-through prior to buying the house and was glad the realtor had left it behind. The emptiness of the basement made Paul feel uncomfortable, exposed. He ran the circle of light around the empty room and windowless walls. The foundation was wood rather than cement, and the room had been framed and wired, but not drywalled. Two bundles of wires hung from the ceiling.
Paul walked across the gravel floor and knelt to examine one of the electrical outlets. The wiring was fine, sufficient to support his beer fridge. He had expected much worse, since the realtor had rushed him through this part of the house. Possibly, Paul thought, the realtor was rushing so Paul wouldn’t notice the rancid, yeasty smell in the basement. Paul had noticed it right away—who wouldn’t? But he figured the smell was insignificant in his grand scheme of country home ownership.
Indeed, before the realtor had even opened the front door of this house, Paul had pictured himself on the deck, with a beer, cooling down after dropping a few trees for the winter wood supply. The surrounding foothills gave him the warm fuzzy feeling of big property, big personalities, and big toys. Of course, Louie, his wiener dog, didn’t exactly fit in. Paul would have preferred a Shepherd or a cattle dog that would travel in the box of his truck rather than on his lap. But he was stuck with Louie since the dog belonged to his daughter Cassandra. When Cassandra was just a toddler, Paul bought her the dog. It was beyond him why, at the SPCA, she picked the most pathetic male to adopt.
Paul shone the flashlight along the corner where the floor met the wall, illuminating a small pile of dirt and twigs and old leaves where the odour seemed to be coming from. He walked quickly around the perimeter of the room and, with his light and his nose, discovered several more rank piles. He’d clean them later. No sense dealing with them today. He should go back upstairs to check on the dog, shovel the spring snow, make a cup of coffee, floss.
“Lots of land,” the realtor had said when Paul was looking at the property. “You keep horses?”
“No, just a dog.”
“Family?”
“Divorced. One teenage daughter.”
Cassandra lived in the city with Paul’s ex-wife. In addition to excelling at her job as a writer of parenting books, Paul’s ex-wife cooked gourmet meals, coached community sports, did her own tax returns, and was a competitive triathlete. At forty-five, she was still a hottie. But even so, when she asked Paul to move out, he felt the relief of a second-string player, forever in the shadow of a healthy and talented front runner, being released from the pressures of competition.
Paul hustled up the stairs and returned to the kitchen. Louie trembled under the table. Paul coaxed the dog out with a Cheezie. When Cassandra was around, Paul hid the Cheezies bag. “No snacks,” Cassandra insisted. “Dogs should eat dog food.” Paul liked the secret Cheezies. He felt they gave him an edge, if not complete control, over Louie.
“Scared of the basement?” Paul asked. He threw the dog another Cheez
ie and ate one himself. “You big sissy.”
“Louie, I’m home!” Paul called, a few days later, as he entered the house and set down two cases of Big Rock beer—the first supplies for his newly connected fridge. Louie whimpered into the hallway.
“What’s the matter?”
One of Louie’s long ears was flipped back, exposing the soft pink interior. Paul glanced around the room. On the landing, just in front of the stairs to the basement, he saw several wet heaps of dog diarrhea.
“What the hell’s the matter with you?”
“Hardly need to build a dog run for a wiener dog.”
Paul turned from digging a post hole to see a man on an enormous black horse. The bottom of a military-style haircut was visible between the man’s cowboy hat and the upturned collar of his jacket. His horse exhaled plumes of frosty spring air from coaster-sized nostrils.
“Ought to just stick him in a shoebox,” the man said, and pointed at Louie, sleeping soundly in a soft bed of needles under a spruce tree.
“I like to know he’s got lots of room.” Paul tried to sound light-hearted. With only half a hole dug, he was already discouraged by the effort it was taking to break through the cold ground. There was no way he would admit to this new guy that he’d been cleaning up dog diarrhea every day—that’s why he was building the run. He couldn’t leave Louie alone inside anymore.
“Hal Ward. Third right on Range Road 54, just before your turnoff. This here’s the General.” Hal walloped the horse on the neck before extending his hand to Paul.
He continued to talk while shaking hands. “Nice to have someone regular move in here. The last owner of this place was that woman with the mountain lion. Fancied herself an animal trainer. A real fat-assed Jane of the Jungle.”
“I haven’t heard anything about it.”
“Ask around. She was a piece of work.”
“The woman or the mountain lion?” Paul asked.
“They were both nuts. Typical.” Hal maneuvered the General around and took a last look at the sleeping Dachshund. “Does quite a job guarding your place, eh? Is he drugged or something?”
