by Derek Hayes
This is my favourite time of the year. Every spring the Municipality of Toronto allows people to set out old and unwanted furniture, so under cover of the night I explore the neighbourhood stealthily, taking anything attractive that I can fit into my apartment. Just a while ago, I built a wall of furniture in my living area. The tangle of sofas, end tables and lamps proved a challenge for Kim, who is sixty-five years old, but after encouragement from me on the other side of the pile, she managed to climb on top of a sofa, which acted as the foundation. She looked disoriented at this point, so I took a lumpy mattress off the chairs and night tables, which let her through. I didn’t want her taking too long and complaining too much.
Last week I made a maze with accumulated shelves, desks and kitchenware. I’m learning which pieces fit best with others to create passageways and dark entrances to confuse her. A large pool tarp and a few musty blankets give the whole thing a cover. When she arrived last Tuesday she dropped to her knees to contemplate the maze. She’s quite fit for her age, but even so, she surged ahead clumsily. She made her way through with a smile on her face, but eventually called out for my help. She was breathing heavily, struggling through a tunnel between a coffee table and three end tables.
“Come on Kim,” I said. “Just a little farther. Almost there.”
At the end of my maze waited a cup of mud, as I call it. I’m an ardent coffee drinker. I use my own machine. Smiling, Kim declined, like she always does, telling me that it was too strong. I set up a chessboard and we played late into the night. I beat her for the first time. She asked me if I wanted to go down to the local chess club to play with other people. I told her I didn’t. She’s still pressuring me, despite the maze.
She’s married and has four grown children. Her husband retired a long time ago. She remains on staff part-time at WOLT so she can spend time with me. Her client list has dwindled, and yet she always comes to my place on Tuesday afternoons.
The temperature’s dropped. I go inside and put on a hat and mittens and cover myself with a blanket. I’m reading the note my psychiatrist transcribed last Wednesday. He wants me to examine it for any distortions of thought.
In the grocery store everybody immediately is looking at me. They think my fedora looks ridiculous. It takes me two hours to buy only a few groceries. I keep on walking down the aisles looking for canned tomatoes but I can’t find them. I’m a little dizzy and I must look funny. I take off my fancy hat but my scalp feels naked and my hair is really greasy, so I put it back on, but then I look ridiculous again. Two older ladies talk about me in the aisle but stop as soon as I walk close to them. One says something like, “He doesn’t do anything on the weekend.” I give the cashier four twenty-dollar bills to buy thirty-nine dollars worth of groceries. She gives me back two of the twenties and is laughing at me. I tell her I have a mental illness. She says that she is sorry. When I’m leaving she says, “Take care.” Now everybody knows that I’m a nut.
My psychiatrist and Kim have been talking about me, but as Kim has pointed out, this isn’t illegal or unethical because they inform me of everything they discuss. They’ve put together a “Get-Mike-out-into-the-world plan.” It’s all very wordy and convoluted, but from what I understand it should unfold like this. First step: Kim and I go to the local chess club by bus, look at the entrance, and then return. Second step: I enter the chess club and check out the interior to get a feel for the place. Third step: Kim and I go with our own chessboard and sit down to play together and then depart. Fourth step: I play a game of chess with another player.
We’ve torturously accomplished the first three. Tomorrow I’m going to strike up a mind-numbing game with someone other than Kim. I need to get some shuteye. If I eat too much pizza I won’t sleep at all, but even knowing this I eat three more slices without chewing much. My stomach gives in to the dough, bloating more than usual. I don’t have to check my movement now because Ben’s nowhere to be seen and his lights are off anyway. I can’t sleep due to an inability to surrender to oblivion, so I drag a sleeping bag out here on the fire escape to get some rest. A streetcar rumbles off in the distance. I don’t believe in Heaven, or Last Judgment or even an afterlife. I believe this is all we have. So if you think about it, and I have, that makes every second of existence vital, so we can either lead an idle, hedonistic life, or we can help others, or we can do something interesting. I’ve wasted a lot of time, and knowing this makes me even more incapable of helping people or doing interesting things, which makes me more anxious. It’s an irony that provokes a gentle laugh from both my psychiatrist and Kim; but their reaction makes me curl in anguish — I mean literally to curl over on my side. I feel a tingling surging from my neck, to my shoulders, and to my hands. I feel lonely, like I’m going to die alone. Everyone knows that anxiety causes cancer, but I think for about the five millionth time that at least I’m not Ben, and I have Kim for a friend.
It’s now six o’clock. There are only seven more hours until step four. Six o’clock am is a nice time of the day for me. I have some serene thoughts. Take, for example, my impact on the environment. I read in the Globe and Mail a study about the sustainability of the earth. According to U.N. calculations, in order for the earth to sustain itself, each person can only inflict 300 units of damage to the earth in a year (many factors go into this). People in Bangladesh do the least harm, with each Bangladeshi averaging about 200 units. North Americans on the other hand average one thousand units. My sustainability quotient is probably even less than 200. I live in a small, cramped apartment. I have saved space in landfill sites by hoarding used furniture. The amount of toxic waste that I have released into the atmosphere is negligible. I emit some flatulence that pollutes the ozone, but I travel on buses and refuse to get into Kim’s car. I’ve tried drinking rain to save water. I only flush my toilet on Wednesday, Friday and Monday nights (before Kim comes on Tuesday). Pizza is my only indulgence, and since the ovens are fuelled by natural gas, even this isn’t so bad. They’re vegetarian and so no animals have died unnecessarily. It has crossed my mind to cut out cheese but it tastes too good. I read day-old newspapers, taken from the superintendent’s blue bin. (He’s also a jerk, but that’s a whole other story.) I haven’t hurt anyone’s feelings in three years. I’m exceedingly polite and honest. So, in other words, if the world were populated by six billion Mikes (me) — a Kantian thought experiment, a derivative of the categorical imperative that might be useful for anyone to try — there wouldn’t be any global warming, or war, or traffic accidents. Everyone would say hello to everyone else. There’d just be an abundance of needless worry and smothering anxiety.
At last I’m stirring in my damp sleeping bag, and then glancing at my watch. It’s one o’clock in the afternoon. Kim’s going to be here any second so I need to have a shower and eat some more pizza, which I do.
Someone’s knocking. I choose not to answer.
Then, Kim is standing in my doorway, sighing and looking at her watch. “Sorry,” I say. “I was reluctant to get the door.”
“How are you feeling, Mike?” she says.
“I didn’t sleep well,” I say. I have resisted calling her “Mom”, an urge that I’ve had ever since I first called her that. She’s never told me not to call her “Mom”, although she did remind me once that I already had a mother and that she lives in North York. I know what she’s going to say next.
“Then you’ll sleep well tonight,” she says. “We should get there early so that we can find someone to play.”
This is the one difference between her and me. She worries about small earthly matters, my finances, being on time, getting me to put on a clean shirt, whereas I have more existential concerns. I can’t imagine having her concerns, but, on the other hand, I can’t imagine that she fully understands what goes on in my brain.
The bus is crowded and darn hot. I’m sticky and am dangerously close to a full-blown panic attack. At our stop we get out quickly, and I tell her that my new-found briskness of step has nothin
g to do with any desire to get in the Chess Hut, but with the extreme heat.
With understandable trepidation Kim and I enter the club, me carrying my own board. We stand on the fringe of the playing area, looking awkwardly for an opening. I want to sit down and play a game with Kim, but she refuses. I stare at each person — at the Korean man with the spiky hair, at the overweight lady with the glasses and chin hair and at the man with the grey sweat pants. I should be staring at the boards, curious as to how each game is unfolding, but instead I stare into people’s faces. This makes them uncomfortable but I can’t stop myself. There is some quiet chatter, spoken in a language only understood by people who understand chess.
“Who wants to play?” I say. Everyone looks at me.
Just as we are about to give up and set up our own board, a man, about thirty-five years old, crosses the room and asks if I want to play. This man is clearly an angel (if angels exist). I inform him that we’re probably mismatched, and then realize that he might take this as a sign of arrogance, so I say, “What I mean is that I’m the weaker player, not you.” He shushes me and guides me to a table and shows me my side of the board. Kim stays in the room but watches from a distance. She feigns interest in a couple of games while keeping an eye on me.
I tell him I have a mental illness.
“Do you hear voices?”
“No, but sometimes I feel a bit maladjusted.”
“Do you hallucinate?”
“I don’t think so. I once was convinced that the ozone layer was going to rupture and that everybody would die. I’ve since read that the ozone layer is starting to heal itself. So I feel better.”
“I hear voices,” he says, matter-of-factly. “If I can concentrate on my moves I can drown them out. Do you know what I’m talking about?”
“I think so.”
“Let’s play chess.”
“All right.”
I play my first couple of moves quickly. I play white and lead with my king’s pawn. I set up a Guico Piano. I also castle on my king’s side. My opponent castles queen’s side and pushes up two pawns in attack. His knight supports one of the pawns. His rook runs a line straight through to my king. This prevents me from taking one of the pawns. I remain quiet. I slow down on my moves and I stop rubbing the bit of stubble under my nose. I also stop looking over to Kim. Eventually, my opponent checkmates me with a formidable combination queen, pawn and knight. He tells me I’ve extended myself too much. “Never attack into my area until you have the middle of the board secured, with your pieces supporting each other.” I listen intently, only interrupting the man once, before running over to Kim. I ask her for a piece of paper and a pen. With a sheet torn out of her daily schedule and a pen, I return and say, “I want to get this down. This stuff is really good. Would you mind saying it again?”
I’ve been distracted for thirty minutes, without metacognitive awareness. It’s a pleasant respite, really. Kim and I leave together. On the way out I pass a couple of people, who are in the middle of a long and drawn-out battle, and say, “I’ll see you guys next time.” They are concentrating heavily on their game. I don’t think they hear me.
When we get on the bus, I turn to Kim. “I’d like to go back there again tonight, if it’s okay with you.”
“I’m busy tonight but we can do it another day.”
“Maybe I’ll go back there by myself.”
I might not go, I know, but I want to go home and think about it. I want to put together a plan.
THAT’S VERY OBSERVANT OF YOU
ON A COOL SPRING DAY, MELANIE TRUDGED into the Lucky Dragon Restaurant with a videocassette tucked under her arm. She ordered two portions of dumplings and pork fried rice and sat down at a small table. The place was empty until a group of people came in and sat at one of the big round tables. A waiter, newly hired, appeared with her dinner on a plate. Melanie sprung from her seat, and said, “No, I’m not eating here. I always get takeout.” She smiled nervously and said, “My friend is waiting for me outside. I’m sorry. This is my fault, but I need it wrapped for take-out.”
The waiter obediently put the rice and dumplings in a Styrofoam container. As he was handing it over, Melanie, her hand instinctively flattening a stray mousy clump of hair sprung awry, and then shielding three tiny craters to the right of her thin lips, said, “My friend really likes extra peanut sauce if you don’t mind.”
Outside, she stood on the sidewalk and peered through the window, staring at the waiter. Loose change in his pockets pulled his belt down so she could see the shape of his hipbone through his jockey shorts. His dark-brown, neatly trimmed beard complimented his handsome, Slavic-looking face. He deftly balanced a tray of squid and broccoli with one hand and with the other carried a pitcher of water. Melanie thought that it was the nicest thing for them to have hired a Caucasian man. She didn’t speak Mandarin after all, and although when ordering she could indicate her dish of choice by writing down the corresponding item number on a pad, she felt more comfortable now that she could communicate verbally with someone, with this nice man. What can I say to him?
After getting off the streetcar near her apartment, she dropped the video clumsily beneath the exhaust pipe of a red ’98 Pontiac. This was her designated spot. Oh dear, I’ve got to speak to them about this. They can’t park here. It’s completely unacceptable!
Melanie ran into her neighbour and her ponytailed boyfriend in the hallway. The boyfriend fumbled with his keys at the door, most likely the keys to his red Pontiac, and hauled a bag of groceries into apartment B. Her neighbour, a friendly lady, about thirty, asked Melanie what movie she was going to watch.
“Romancing the Stone,” Melanie said, staring at the boyfriend.
“We’re having friends over,” the woman said. “After you’re finished eating and watching your movie, would you like to come over for a drink?”
“I can’t. I’m not even watching this. I’m going out with my sister. I’ve just got to drop this off and then I’m leaving. We’re going dancing.” She smiled, rushed into her apartment and shut the door.
Melanie killed all the lights, removed her spring jacket and tiptoed around her apartment. She lowered the volume of the movie, so that it was barely audible, and sat on her knees a few inches in front of the television. One of her hands moved mechanically from the potato-chip bag to her mouth. Her fingers rubbed grease into the folds of her flabby belly and legs. She imagined she was in her parents’ home in Maplehorn, thinking up another hiding position, her chin on the ground adjacent to the baseboard and the accumulated grime, suppressing a sneeze so as not to give her sister a clue as to where she was, then moving to the next hideout, her sister unfairly discontinuing the count at seventeen when she was supposed to count to twenty-five. Now she was crying inconsolably. Thoughts of her sister — the only person in the world who loved her — made her cry, but then she stopped, thinking that the lovely, bearded, Slavic-looking waiter probably didn’t like women who excessively cried. But then, on second thought, it was nice to think about her sister, so she continued to quietly sob — God it felt good! — and waiter be screwed if he didn’t like sensitive women. Ponytailed man also be screwed. How dare he park in her spot! He probably assumed she wouldn’t mind. Well, of course she cared. She can’t get carried away, though. Her neighbours might hear her, and, oh God, that would be awful! She carried a flashlight so she could find her barrette and so she could read her R.T. Williams mystery book. She lay on her carpet, reading and intermittently using the binding of her book to scratch the large folds of her mid-section.
Towards midnight, just as the party next door was winding down, Melanie sat in her shower with the hot water streaming on her head. She held her R.T. Williams mystery novel away from the water and read until the hot water ran out. She lay in a way she believed made her more attractive — her bottom on the bathroom floor, flattened and no longer sagging, her belly, concave at the rib cage, her hair and face wet. She wished that the lovely waiter could see her like t
his. She was optimistic for a moment that one day he would see her in this sensual position. Why not? Becky Charles had a husband. What could she say to him? It had to be a casual remark, yet intimate enough for him to notice her.
Before sleep, Melanie was tucked under her covers with the phone cradled against her neck. “He’s the nicest man. You should see him, Nicole . . . ” “Oh, I could never do that . . . ” “What? All alone? No, I never eat alone . . . ” “No, it’s simply a bad idea. You’ve got to come here so that we can go there together.”
Melanie spread out her lunch on the floor as if she were on a picnic: a tub of cottage cheese, four slices of pizza, two cartons of milk and a muffin. Anyone passing by would not be able to see her through the tiny window at the top of the door. When Becky Charles walked into the boardroom with an urn of coffee on a cart, Melanie shuddered in fear, and backed herself into a corner. She felt like a trapped squirrel. Despite assurances from Becky to go on eating, she gathered the cottage cheese and pizza into her purse. Pieces of cheese and sauce spilled, and she had a fleeting, distorted thought — that Becky might confiscate her lunch. On the way out she mentioned that her friends from accounting usually ate with her, though she didn’t know why she’d lied to Becky — Becky, the one nice salesperson in the company, Becky, the sweet middle-aged lady who always offered her a ride home, and who always wished her a nice weekend.
Melanie ran back into the room. In a hushed voice, she said, “Actually, I’ve been eating alone in this room every day, Becky. Can we keep this between the two of us?”
Melanie walked slowly behind her sister down the hallway of the apartment building, hoping that she might get to introduce Nicole to the neighbours, not to the man with the ponytail, but to his girlfriend, the woman who’d invited her to the party. They probably don’t think I even have a sister. Well, they can see with their own eyes not only that I have a sister, but that we have the same bouncy, red curls and unaffected smile and grace, a gift from daddy and that she’s about the best sister anyone in this world could have and that the two of us together are a team.
