And now it turned out that I had three of them. Two sisters and a brother. What would they expect from me? Anything? I wondered whether they would be interested in meeting me, or just annoyed at me barging in on their family. Would we get along? Would we even have anything in common? We certainly had very different childhood experiences. I couldn’t stop thinking about what they would be like.
An angry car horn shocked me out of my musings and I realized that I’d been going sixty in an eighty zone as a U-Haul truck sped past me. I wasn’t paying any attention to the road and that was a recipe for a crash. I shook my head, turned up the stereo and tried to focus on driving.
I DON’T KNOW WHAT I WAS EXPECTING. I think I had some kind of idea of a sixties-era free-for-all, with camper vans and tents scattered willy-nilly on overgrown brush. I pictured animals of all kinds running free alongside dirty, feral children. I had the phrase white trash in my mind and with it an embarrassed feeling of combined superiority and guilt. I guess it was the combination of the word camping along with prejudices about unmarried women having children that I hadn’t known I’d fully formed. I knew I was being unfair and offensive, but I couldn’t seem to shake it. It made for an uncomfortable feeling.
So, of course, I was surprised to find a tidy ranch house on a large lot, with a couple of tents pitched in an orderly fashion among a grove of trees. There was a single large RV parked near the house and a bunch of people hanging out in the yard by a picnic table. It reminded me most of my own parents’ house on a Sunday afternoon when they’d invite some of the neighbours over. Shame washed over me like hot waves of nausea.
It took me a moment to get out of the car, and a young woman about my age managed to notice me before I could get myself together. She had very short dark hair and was dressed in what I called Mountain Equipment Co-op chic: tan quick-dry trousers made of some space-age material and a light-coloured, short-sleeved plaid button-up shirt. I couldn’t see her feet, but I guessed that her shoes would be either hiking sandals or chunky walking shoes.
“Mom,” she bellowed toward the knot of people in the yard. “The new kid’s here!”
SHE TURNED OUT TO BE CHARLOTTE, and I was right about the footwear: she wore a sturdy pair of surprisingly bright red shoes. I introduced myself when I got disentangled from my seat belt and out of the Civic.
“Hi,” I said, hoping my voice wasn’t wavering too noticeably. “I’m Brian.” I stuck out my hand and she took it in a firm grasp. “People call me Gumbo.”
She gave a short, clipped laugh. “Nice,” she said, pointedly not asking for an explanation. “I’m Charlotte. Folks call me Chuck.” She jerked her head toward the mass of people by the picnic table. “Come on,” she said. “I’ll introduce you to the mob. They’re all pretty harmless, at least at this time of day.” She grinned and I followed her quick walk back to the group.
I recognized Kim sitting at the table with a tall glass of something cool-looking in her hand, and she said, “I’m so glad you could make it.” She turned to the group and raised her voice above the din of eight conversations. “Everyone, this is Brian. Brian Guillemot. Say hi.” Then she sat down again and took a sip of her drink.
I was overwhelmed. Of course I was. But once I got over the initial shock of all those people, it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. Rob and Jeannette introduced themselves to me right away, and I could see the resemblance between them and Chuck. I wondered if they saw something of themselves in me — I looked for it but didn’t really find anything. Maybe something in Rob’s freckles. Maybe not.
“You must need a beer,” Rob said, flinging his arm over my shoulder. He was a little taller than me and had the rangy athletic build of a high school runner who still kept it up.
I grinned at him. “That would probably help,” I said and let him steer me toward a huge cooler sitting on a bench near the door to the house. He opened it and fished around in the ice, pulling out a pair of Piper’s Pale Ales. He held the bottles up for my approval and I nodded. He twisted off the tops with practised ease, handed one to me and clinked his bottle to mine.
“Cheers, buddy.” He drank.
“Cheers,” I replied, taking a sip.
“It looks bad,” he said, gesturing to the crowd of a dozen or more people. “But don’t worry about remembering names. It’ll come eventually and until it does we’ll forgive you.” He took another sip of his beer. “We should’ve worn name tags or something.” He pointed to an older man and woman talking to Kim.
“That’s Uncle Wolf and his wife Barbara.” He pointed his beer toward a large knot of people around my age. “Over there are their kids, June and Michael. Their other kid, Sandra, will be here later.” More beer pointing. “That’s June’s husband Chris and Michael’s wife Marita. She’s from El Salvador. Great cook, makes these corn meal and beans things that are to die for. There’s some on the table, you gotta try them. And they’ve got a pair of little ones, Isabela and Ramón. June and Chris have a baby, Suzanne. I don’t know where she is — probably in the house with Michael’s two. They love the new baby.”
“Wow,” I said. “I’m never going to remember that.”
“No problem,” Rob said, laughing. “Totally should have worn name tags, man.”
AFTER A COUPLE MORE BEERS and a bunch of Marita’s pupusas, I had about half the names down. I’d talked to all the adults by then, including Rob’s girlfriend Anna, who had been watching the kids in the house when he’d been making the introductions.
“I’m an only child, too,” she said when I’d finally met her and we found ourselves in a quiet corner of the kitchen. “So I kind of know how you feel.”
“It’s a bit overwhelming,” I said, and she laughed.
“Tell me about it,” she said. “The first, like, ten times I came to some family thing with Rob, I was a total wreck. There’s just, like, so many of them.”
I laughed. “It probably doesn’t even seem like a lot of people to them,” I said. “Plenty of families are a lot bigger.”
“I know,” Anna said. “But not mine. My parents came to Canada when I was one and I never knew any of my relatives. It was only ever the three of us. This —” she waved her hand to indicate the whole Heinz clan “— this was like meeting a bunch of space aliens. Crazy.” She shook her head. “But they are all great people and they get it. That it’s strange for us. They’ll be cool, just take your time.”
She smiled and I thanked her. I took a breath and the two of us walked back out into the yard and the melee.
“SO, ISN’T TERRY COMING, TOO?” someone, maybe Michael, maybe Chris, asked Chuck as we were all seated around the tables and tucking into an enormous barbecue dinner.
“After supper,” Chuck said through a mouthful of sausage. “Work.”
“Chuck got herself a librarian,” Jeannette told me as an explanation. I’d already guessed from overheard conversations that Terry was the other half of the upcoming wedding. “It’s a pretty good laugh for all of us,” Jeannette went on.
“Why’s that?” I asked.
“’Cause Chuck never read a single book in her life,” she said loudly enough for her sister to hear, grinning.
“I heard that,” Charlotte said from the other end of the table. “I have so read a book.”
“Oh yeah?” Jeannette said. “That wasn’t a mechanic’s manual?”
“Sure,” Chuck said, a big grin on her face. “I read a real book. Literature, even.” She paused for effect. “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.”
Everyone who was listening laughed, and I got the feeling that the joke had been told more than once in the past. I laughed along with everyone else and for a moment almost even felt like part of the group.
11
SEEDY P AND THE TECHNICOLOR SCREAM
I’D BEEN A BIT OF A LONER IN HIGH SCHOOL and just assumed the same would be true for my university years. It didn’t even occur to me that things might change, so it kind of snuck up on me to discover I
was actually part of a group.
The first few months of my freshman year of university were mostly a blur of homework, exams and studying. I’d heard all the stories, but first-year engineering was harder than I had even imagined it could be. It was the math. Finally, an answer to that ubiquitous question: when will I ever need algebra? And not just algebra — trig, conics, even the calculus. Though I actually liked it. It wasn’t hard for me to lose a couple of hours in the library studying and not even notice that the time had gone by. I had to come to terms with it: I was a big nerd.
I mean, come on. I even called it the calculus.
But by second term I’d discovered that nerds aren’t actually the social outcasts the movies make us out to be. Pretty soon a bunch of us from engineering were regularly hanging out together on campus and, when course load allowed, off campus. When we had some free time, the guys who were nineteen would boot for us on the weekends and we’d drink beer and talk about the structural integrity of the Johnson Street Bridge or the coming Y2K crisis until the wee hours. It was a small group, but it was mine.
It was one of these guys, Tom Spindle, who managed to talk me into going to this fundraiser for some campus group — Ski Club, Glee Club — I don’t remember. It was going to be a bunch of local bands with names like Aluminium Lizard and the Razorblade Roses. The thing was out in some warehouse, but the Tree Club had organized a bunch of busses from campus going out there. Tickets were twenty bucks, which I thought was kind of pricey for just local garage bands, but the drinks were supposed to be cheap and they didn’t ID anyone. For me, and the three other eighteen-year-olds in the group, this was worth the jumped-up cover price.
I’d arranged to stay with Spindle for the night, since his folks were decidedly not cops about underage drinking and their house was close enough to campus for a cheap cab ride back after the last bus. It was going to be epic.
We met up on campus and caught the fourth bus out to the warehouse, after waiting in line for over an hour. Ryan Devine, the guy we figured most likely to end up in Chem E and the biggest pothead in our group, passed around a massive joint while we hung out, which took the sting out of waiting.
By the time we got to the warehouse, the opening bands had been and gone and they were already out of the decent beer. We each grabbed a pair of Luckys from the bar and elbowed our way up to the stage.
It was hot as an oven in there. I guessed that there were probably five hundred people in the place, the majority of them packed onto the floor in front of the stage. After a few beers, though, it stopped feeling uncomfortable and got pretty fun. I’d been back to the bar about three times and somehow managed to snag one or two free drinks along the way. I was wearing someone’s beat-up sombrero and offering piggyback rides to all comers when the Scream came on stage.
It would be romantic to say that I was immediately transfixed as she walked up to the microphone, her torn lace dress and combat boots burning their image indelibly into my mind. I’d like to pretend that our eyes locked during the chorus of their first number and she picked me out of the crowd. But the reality was that I only barely noticed when her gruff alto filled the PA system with a guttural yell of “I’m Seedy P! And these motherfuckers behind me are the Technicolor Scream. And we’re here to fuck. You. UP!”
The band pumped out a wall of noise, not entirely unlike what the previous groups had done, but Seedy P’s rough but surprisingly melodious voice was a change of pace. I noticed her, sure. Who didn’t? She was the lead singer of the third-last band of the night. They had played a couple of the smaller punk venues in Victoria and they had their fans. I wasn’t one of them, but I thought they were okay. I stayed up by the stage until I lost the sombrero and wandered out of the crowd for some fresh air and another beer.
WE PROBABLY WOULD NEVER HAVE MET if I hadn’t been puking behind the bathrooms after the gig. Spindle and I almost missed the last bus because I was still dry heaving, but he finally manhandled me into the coach before the doors slammed shut. He chucked me into a seat, and I felt myself fall into a soft person-shaped pillow. I had just about nodded off when she elbowed me in the ribs.
Somehow it sobered me up enough that I looked over to my right to see Seedy P squished up between me and the window. “Hey,” she said, her voice whisky and cigarette rough.
“Hey,” I said, recognition crawling slowly into my mind. “You’re with that band ...”
“Yeah,” she said.
“You guys are really good,” I said with great originality.
“Thanks,” she said. “If you’re going to pass out, let’s switch places, okay? I don’t wanna get crushed by a drunk frat boy again.”
“Sure,” I said, getting up and nearly taking a header down the aisle of the bus while she slipped out. “I’m not a frat boy, though,” I added, sliding into the seat. “I’m an engineer.”
She laughed. “Good to meet you, Señor Engineer,” she said, sitting down again.
“Huh?” I grunted eloquently. She pointed at my lap, where at some point I’d apparently tied a pair of maracas to my belt. “Huh,” I said, again. “I guess they came with the sombrero.” Then blackness descended.
I DON’T KNOW WHAT EXACTLY SHE FOUND ENDEARING in that exchange, but I must have made an impression. A couple of weeks later, I was reading my Applied Mathematics textbook while sitting on the grass and eating a sandwich. I felt rather than saw someone sit down next to me, and then a hand reached out to grab my sandwich, which was sitting on a bit of wax paper on top of my backpack.
“What is this?” she said. “Chicken and cheese?” She took a bite of the sandwich and chewed slowly. After she swallowed, she said, “Not bad,” then took another giant bite. I still had yet to find my voice.
She wore a black tank top and a very, very short black-and-red plaid skirt, but was saved from looking even a tiny bit tarty by the thick, baggy, heavily holed black tights that filled the space between the tops of her Army surplus store boots and the hem of her skirt. She sat beside me cross-legged, grinning disarmingly, as she tried to take a third bite of my sandwich.
Hunger and indignation finally won out over shock and intimidation, and I grabbed my sandwich back from her. She laughed and picked up my textbook. “So, how’s it going, Señor Engineer? You seem a little more with it today.” She flipped though the textbook while I stuffed the last of my sandwich in my mouth in an attempt to take it out of circulation. “You understand any of this?” she asked, turning the book so I could see the lines of equations.
I nodded, chewing, and wondered if I was ever going to actually speak to her sober. “Cool,” she said, flipping through a few pages. I finally swallowed and said, “So what does it stand for?”
“What?” she asked.
“Seedy P,” I said. “That can’t be your real name.”
She frowned. “Uh-uh,” she said. “That puts me at a distinct disadvantage, Señor. You first. What’s your name?”
“Brian,” I said. “Brian Guillemot. People call me Gumbo.”
She grinned. “Awesome,” she said and leaned in toward me. “I love Southern food. Mmmm. Spicy.”
I felt my face get hot and realized that while she might just be playing with me, it was a game I was starting to enjoy. A lot. “Well,” I said. “Tit for tat.”
She arched an eyebrow, but didn’t comment. “Fair enough. My name’s Celia-Dee Pavane. Hence, Seedy P. Get it?”
“I got it,” I said.
“Good,” she said. “So, the Scream’s playing at the bar under the Sticky Wicket this Friday. If you want I could put you on the list.”
“That would be awesome,” I said. “Can I bring someone?”
“You got a girlfriend?” she asked, her face stone.
“No,” I said, an admission which usually embarrassed me but somehow now made me inordinately pleased. “I owe my buddy Spindle big time and I know he’d love to see the show.”
She grinned at me again and said, “He’s the guy nursemaided you home aft
er the warehouse gig?” I smiled and nodded, and she said, “Okay, yeah. You owe him, all right. So it’ll be Brian Gumbo plus one.” She stood up, making no concession whatsoever for the fact that she was wearing a skirt. “See you there?”
“You bet.”
SPINDLE DID NOT BELIEVE ME for a second when I told him that we were on the guest list for the Seedy P and the Technicolor Scream show, but he was perfectly willing to let me make myself look like an idiot. So Friday night, at nine o’clock, we were standing in the rain with about fifty other people on Government Street. When we got up to the front, I said, “Brian Gumbo?” to the monkey at the door and wished I’d had a camera for the look on Spindle’s face when we were summarily waved through and our hands stamped.
“What the hell did you do, Gumbo?” Spindle said over the sound from the PA as we walked down the steps into the club. “Write an exam for her or something?” I just shrugged. “Jesus,” he went on. “They didn’t even ID you or anything. Who the hell are you, man?”
“What can I say?” I said as we pushed our way into the crowd of people in the basement room. “She likes me.”
12
FAMILIAR ALIENS
I LIKED KIM AND HER KIDS, but after a couple of hours of in-jokes and multiple simultaneous conversations, I had to get away. “You don’t have to work,” Kim said when I offered to help with the cleaning up. “You’re still new — new people don’t have to clean. You get a free pass your first time.” She smiled and I returned the grin.
“I appreciate it,” I said, “but I didn’t contribute anything else.” I indicated the remains of the huge spread that had been potlucked by the group. “At least let me do this.”
The Home for Wayward Parrots Page 6
