Break Away

by Sylvain Hotte

  “No, I’m hooking up with Karine at the restaurant.”

  I had no comeback. He wanted to be with his girlfriend. What could I say ? That we’d have fun, just us guys, grilling meat patties and telling stupid jokes ? As if. Nothing beats passing time with a girl at a restaurant, hoping to touch hands or bump knees under the table and, if you should be so lucky, a little serious necking later parked on the side of the road.

  “Are you going to come ?” he asked me.

  “I don’t think so,” I answered. “I’m going up to the cabin.”

  “By yourself ?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Take a break, Alex, forget the cabin. You can always go some other time. It’s Saturday night. We’re grabbing a bite at the restaurant and then we’re going to the Centre to chill.”

  “It’s not my favorite thing, hanging out at the Centre.”

  All the kids go there to listen to music and play billiards. Tonight, there’ll be a DJ. For sure, some people will be dancing. Everybody doing their thing. And me, I’d be just moping around, not knowing what to do, hands in my pockets. There’s something about the forest. The more people are around me, the more I hear the woods calling.

  “Chloé’s gonna be there,” he said.

  “So ?”

  “Uh, Chloé…”

  “What ?”

  “Pfff… Go on, go up to the cabin, eat your old burgers.”

  I got on my quad, Tommy jumped on behind me. He was screwing around. He opened the cooler and asked me how were the hamburgers. I threw it in gear and popped a wheelie. He just about fell off, and gave me an ear-full.

  Chez Lisette is a favorite stop for truckers working up and down the Côte-Nord. Folks from around here like to go there to drink coffee and shoot the breeze. There’s a section of booths beside the windows. That’s where we like to eat and fool around until the waitress finally asks us to leave, seeing as how we’re not ordering any more. We like to push it until Gaëtan, Lisette’s big boyfriend, gets up from his stool at the end of the counter with his humungous beer belly hanging out of his tee shirt. Gross ! Without a word he looks over at us ; everybody knows that’s it—time to clear out.

  I stopped in front of the door to the restaurant. The bright blinking yellow sign that advertised the daily special — fish and chips — lit up our faces. Through the window, I could see Karine and her friends. I spotted Chloé too, with her round face and dark black hair.

  Karine, all excited, pointed us out to her friends. But I turned to look at Tommy.

  “So, come on,” he said.

  “Sorry, I don’t feel like it. I’m going up to the cabin.”

  “You know, Alex,” he added as he went up the restaurant steps, “maybe you should just forget about Jessie Pinchault.”

  I practically had to pick myself up off the ground. I wasn’t expecting that. Who had I even mentioned it to ? Nobody. Not a soul. Why was he saying it, like that ? As if it was so obvious. Like he had already thought it through before he brought it up.

  “What the hell are you talking about ?” I said.

  “Everyone knows you’re sweet on her. You should hear Sauvé cracking jokes about it.”

  Sauvé was a jerk, I said, then threw the quad in gear and angled off behind the restaurant to grab the mill road. My first thought was to take 3rd Side Road to act out my stupid little ritual in front of Robert Pinchault’s house, but I dropped the idea. Instead, I took the high trail that goes up to the lake. Any way you cut it, 3rd Side Road was out of my way. Everyone knew it’s a detour. And now everyone knew I’m sweet on Jessie and that I’m the biggest fool in the whole world.

  It was almost dark when I got up to Lake Matamek. I shut off the engine and sat totally still as night fell. The wind blew softly through the branches of the trees, swaying them to and fro. I walked down to the shore. The water was black and little waves, pushed by the breeze, lapped up against the pebbles at my feet. The dark mirror of the lake reflected the thick, wintery clouds. A long shiver ran up my spine and I went inside.

  The cabin is a one-room affair with a sleeping loft that has an old moth-eaten double mattress. There’s a rocking chair, too, and a picnic table with a bench on each side. And you can’t miss the black cast-iron stove — way too big for the cabin — that an old woman who Tommy’s mother knew gave us. We couldn’t really say no. But the thing is huge and incredibly heavy. You should have seen us trying to slide it on skis up to the cabin in the middle of winter. It’s so big it could heat a whole house. A handful of coals can warm up the space in no time and even at thirty below you have to open the cabin door to let in some cold air.

  Once the fire was going, I lit some candles and placed them around the room, then looked at the package of ground meat from the grocery store sitting on the table wrapped in brown paper. Next to it, in a flat Tupperware container, was some spread Sylvie had made for me out of ketchup and mayonnaise. I’d been looking forward to this night and I’d hoped all the guys would be here. But nobody had come. Tommy was with his new girlfriend. Félix and Samuel were playing NHL 2011 on their Xbox.

  I couldn’t be bothered to cook the meat so I toasted two hamburger buns instead, and spread yellow mustard all over them.

  The fire was crackling and I told myself I’d better stop feeding it if I wanted it to go out before it was time to go home. But, as if I didn’t really want to leave, I opened the stove door and added a huge birch log that immediately burst into flames.

  There I was, sitting in the rocking chair, feet propped up on a bench. It was hot as hell inside the cabin and I tore off my boots and coat. I went on rocking as the sweat poured off me. Shadows danced on the particleboard walls, flickering to the rhythm of the candlelight. Outside, the wind whistled in the stovepipe. Letting go of everything in spite of myself, I fell asleep.

  When I opened my eyes, it was dark and very cold. The candles had burnt down to their stubs and the fire had gone out in the stove. I didn’t know how many hours I ’d been asleep. It all seemed unreal. But there was no denying that it was night outside and I was chilled to the bone.

  I got up, shivering. It was all I could do to put on my boots my arms and legs were shaking so hard. I put on my coat and threw an old grey wool blanket over my head. I stirred the embers in the stove and added a log, blowing to get the fire started. My brain seemed numb, and I felt like a cave man, the way my thinking was slow and my ideas were confused. Twice, I tried saying something out loud, but all that came out were a couple of incomprehensible gurgles. I hopped to and fro in a squat watching the flames mount higher and higher as the pieces of bark I had slipped under the logs caught.

  Just then I heard a noise from outside and froze. The fire was crackling. But I could hear something else in the background, a strange continuous breathy sound. At first I thought the noise was coming from the chimney. But all at once it snapped into focus and became louder. I could hear it clearly now, a long inhale followed by a short and powerful exhale. My heart was beating fast and strong in my chest. The blanket still over my head, I edged to the door and opened it very slowly.

  The first thing that struck me was the pale blue morning sky. Dawn was breaking and the wind that had been blowing all night had completely died down ; all I could hear was that breathy sound that seemed so close. Something was moving in the lake. Through the trees I saw with amazement a dark mass gliding along the shore. It walked rapidly up to the big boulder and climbed ashore with astonishing agility. Then, seeing me on the cabin’s porch, it came to a dead stop and stared me right in the eye.

  I had seen plenty of moose before, while rambling through the woods or riding in the car with Louis and Sylvie on the 138. The big cervidae were quick to disappear into the bush. I had also seen and touched the bucks that my father and his friends brought back from hunting. But never in all my life had I seen one at such close range, alive. It seemed supernatural. Like a fantasy creature from another world : a gigantic moose with huge antlers.

  The s
ight of the moose staring me in the face brought me back to the night of the accident. It was as if I could hear Robert Pinchault’s big car and see the road lit up by its headlights. I remembered the railway crossing sign.

  And then, Pinchault’s scream and the huge animal emerging from the dark, right in front of us, forcing us off the road and into the ditch.

  The animal and I looked at each other for a long moment as if each of us expected something from the other. Our breath merged to form a cloud of morning mist around both of our heads. Before I knew it and without warning he lunged forward, almost touching me. Then, he crashed off into the woods and disappeared among the trees. The air was filled with his smell. I dropped my blanket and hit the ground running after him.

  I raced through the trees, my head thrown slightly back, chest thrust out, and body tilted forward, as though my weight alone was enough to keep me running. In spite of my strange posture, I dodged between the birches and the spruces with remarkable ease following the animal’s tracks. I ran like a wild man, a madman, without a thought in my mind, no longer able to see or hear the moose, but following a kind of imaginary trail that I couldn’t perceive, known only to him, but that I discovered as I went along. He was going around Lake Matamek in a westerly direction, which I had always thought impossible.

  In my headlong rush I came to a small bay where tall reeds were growing. Here, the water flows out of the lake and I could see the remains of a beaver dam, covered by grass and bushes, and a few ancient stumps.

  I stopped, gasping for breath, hands on my knees. Day had broken and I tried to catch sight of the moose. I ventured out onto the dam so that I could see farther away to the other side of the bay, in the direction of the inlet that had become a large peat bog.

  I could clearly see his tracks in the huge mossy carpet, with puddles of water oozing to the surface wherever he had stepped. There he stood, motionless, beside a pile of rotting wood at the edge of the forest showing me his back with his head turned toward me. From as far away as I was, I could still see him looking at me, as if waiting.

  I jumped off the dam and sank knee deep into the bog. Even though I could barely manage to extricate my feet from the muck I began walking towards the animal, sinking with every step into the dense mat of grass, mud and murky black water.

  It was rough going. My boots were full of water, coated with mud and slime, and getting heavier by the minute. In the middle of the bog I sank in up to my thighs ; it was all I could do to pull myself free. Exhausted, filthy, and soaked to the bone, I realized that the moose had disappeared.

  I stood there, mouth agape, for the longest time, looking in every direction, trying to find the easiest way back to solid ground. A light snow had begun to fall and three black birds swooped low over my head from a tall pine.

  Sylvie was in the garage cleaning up. She had definitely heard me, but didn’t turn around to greet me. She was in a bad mood, I could tell. I stepped into the doorway and stopped, motionless for a moment.

  “Hi,” I said.

  “Hi,” she replied.

  The garage was in an unbelievable mess, as usual. I’d never seen my aunt tidying up my tools before. She kept tripping over the skis of my father’s snowmobile, a Polaris 500 he’d totalled last spring when he went off the trail and hit a tree head-on. The engine was completely shot and had to be replaced. Even with all of Michel’s know-how and skill, you could tell it was going to cost an arm and a leg. And if my dad does lose all his contracts with the mill, he’s not going to be able to get the work done. How was I going to get up to the lake this winter without a snowmobile, I wondered.

  “Damn machine !” said Sylvie, tossing a handful of dirty rags onto the workbench. “When is this piece of crap going to the junkyard ?”

  “You’ll have to ask Louis.”

  “Speaking of which, Louis wants to talk to you. He’s waiting for you up at the house.”

  “He’s waiting for you up at the house.” The way she said it, I knew I was in for a rough ride. I hesitated for a moment, and thought about hopping back on the quad, popping a wheelie, and making straight for the woods to look for my moose. But sooner or later I was going to have to face him. The longer I put it off, the angrier he was sure to get. Better get it over with right away. Besides, he had heard me pull up. He was waiting for me ; that much was clear. And I was right. No sooner had I stepped inside than I saw him standing in front of me.

  “Look at you ! Where have you been ?” he said, giving me the once over.

  He was wearing jeans and a light blue shirt. His greying hair hung loose over his shoulders. Me, I was filthy, dripping slime all over the front hall carpet.

  “I fell asleep at the cabin.”

  “How come you’re so dirty ?”

  “I followed a bull moose into the bush this morning.”

  “You know what, my good man ? The way you talk, I’m starting to think I’d have better luck hunting moose in the woods out back, instead of trying my luck at the other end of the world !”

  “I’m not kidding,” I said.

  “And me, I’d like to know when you decide to spend the night up at the cabin.”

  I sighed : this was an argument I was never going to win. No matter what I said, it was going to be my fault. I flashed back to Sylvie, cleaning up the garage. She must have been up all night, worried sick and, to calm down, she’d started tidying up my stuff.

  I know that she loves me a lot and I hate to hurt her.

  I thought my father was finished, but I was caught up short when he unexpectedly began throwing accusations.

  “Alex, if you’re going to start getting smashed with your pals, you better hang up your skates right now.”

  I looked up ; couldn’t believe my ears. He wasn’t making any sense.

  “You got me perfectly well, son. If you want to drink, you’re coming off the team. Understand ? I’m not spending my money if that’s how serious you are.”

  “I wasn’t drinking !”

  “Just get a look at you, Alex. I was your age once. I know what it’s like. I know how things happen. You start off drinking a couple of beers with your buddies and before long you lose interest in everything. Obviously school, definitely sports.”

  “But P’pa…”

  Trying to find the right words, I explained how I’d gone up to the cabin alone, how none of my friends had wanted to go with me, how he could call Tommy’s mom and ask her, how I’d lit the stove and fallen asleep. And how when I woke up this morning, there’d been a moose right outside the door and I had followed it up to the beaver dam. And the whole time I was talking I could see the moose running deeper and deeper into the forest, between the dark black spruce branches, before vanishing.

  My father heaved a sigh and looked me up and down. He had his hands in his pockets, his shoulders slouched. I recalled seeing him like this before, as if it was all too much for him. He told me to wash up and change my clothes, that it was Sunday and he was making pancakes for breakfast.

  When I went up the stairs, he stuck his face in between the stair risers to add a final word :

  “You know, Alexandre, you’re my son and I trust you completely. I always will, no matter what. I just want us to understand each other and I thought this was a good time to set things straight… And you can stay at the cabin whenever you want.”

  I went upstairs to take a shower.

  The hot water flowing over my head felt really good after a morning of shivering. I leaned over, supported by both hands on the yellow ceramic tile, and let the water run down my neck and back. Normally, I wouldn’t have let something like this get to me. But right now, I had a big knot in my throat and there was still that damn fistful of sand that was disappearing like the water swirling down the drain.

  Monday morning when I got to school, I took a table close to the cafeteria entrance next to the big wall covered with a hippy-style mural of suns and flowers, where all the school’s “rejects” sit during lunch and recess. It w
as the first time I ever sat there since I began high school. Not because I had anything against those boys and girls. It was just that it wasn’t my spot. To tell the truth, I was afraid I might be rejected by everybody else, as if the way they were and the way they acted was catching, like an incurable illness you should avoid at all costs.

  But this morning, that’s where I was sitting, at one of the taboo tables, and I began thumbing through my new encyclopedia while I drank a carton of milk and munched a granola bar.

  From the corner of my eye I could tell that people were checking me out. But I didn’t look up. I didn’t want to meet their questioning glances, I didn’t want to know who was making fun of me, wondering if I’d lost my marbles. Anyway, I knew that they’d be buzzing about it in class and in the hallways. Even the outcasts whose territory I’d invaded — Emmanuel Léveillé, Léopold Durand Jr. and the three Carrier sisters — poorly dressed boys and girls with glasses as thick as the bottom of a bottle, were trying to figure out what I was doing there.

  Through the big, mesh-covered cafeteria windows, I saw the rural school bus pull up and the students pile out. I started reading a fantasy novel I’d already read once, while leaving the encyclopedia wide open in front of me to a page showing a giant wasp laying her eggs on a dying spider. The larvae would grow, bit by bit, feeding on the spider, before becoming wasps that would lay their eggs in another spider that would soon be dying in terrible pain. It was disgusting and I knew it would be effective.

  I heard the kids come down the stairs, then peel off in different directions to join their friends where they usually found them, in the specific places that they hung out in every day, their spots, like tribal territory that feels good to come home to. A place that felt safe in the overwhelming cacophony that was high school.