A Year Less a Day

by James Hawkins

  It’s only a few weeks to Christmas, and Jordan seems to be responding well to the relentless regime of treatment. He’s away three or four days a week, and even appears somewhat rejuvenated on his return.

  “You’re looking good,” says Ruth and, burying her guilty conscience, she brings up the Los Angeles experiment. “I want you to go if you’re absolutely certain it will help,” she tells him, hoping to trigger a question mark. She certainly has reservations herself, particularly after the skeptical response she’d been given at the support group.

  “I’ve never heard of it,” Erica had admitted, “but there’s a lot of quackery out there.”

  However, Ruth’s hopes crash as Jordan announces that he is actually deteriorating, despite outward appearances, and his only remaining prospect is the experiment.

  Ruth immerses herself in work as she tries to blot out the future and, despite Trina’s encouragement, spends her days hiding in the kitchen and sinking under the weight of her loneliness and grief. But the loneliness is not confined to the days Jordan is absent; it is with her every day. Erica at the support group had warned her: “The problem with cancer is that you can lose the person long before they die.” And Ruth has lost Jordan. In-between his weekly treatment sessions, he hibernates in his smoke-filled room. Now she knocks and waits. Sometimes he’ll answer and call her in, but more often she is forced to creep quietly away.

  “Depression,” says Erica at the next meeting. “He’s trying to come to terms with it. You’ll just have to give him time.”

  “He doesn’t have time,” blubbers Ruth.

  Downstairs, in the café, Ruth smiles and makes light of inquiries about Jordan’s health as she tries to keep a sheen on their shattered life, while upstairs the chasm between them has become almost insurmountable. Only during Jordan’s weekly treatment sessions is Ruth able to enter his room to clean and change the linen, but it is becoming increasingly painful for her to look at his empty bed. Feeling like a visitor to a mausoleum, she tiptoes around, touching Jordan’s possessions with reverence—and she never pries.

  The accidental discovery of a box of pills doesn’t initially bother her, but as she goes to replace them in the drawer, she notices that the box is clearly date-stamped. “September the twenty-first,” she reads aloud and, intrigued, she opens the box, but finds nothing other than a full blister-pack.

  A few minutes later she is downstairs in the café’s kitchen, shoving the box in Trina’s face, yelling, “He’s not taking them! He thinks we can’t afford them and he’s trying to kill himself!”

  Trina takes a look, seeking the reference number on the label, but it has been torn off. “Give me his health card number and I’ll check,” she says. “Though don’t tell anyone, or I’ll lose my job.”

  Jordan phones that evening, his muffled voice sounding more distant than usual, and Ruth is taciturn as she fights to keep back news of her find.

  “I asked the doctor how I could avoid falling hair, and he told me to jump out of the way,” jokes Jordan, as he tries to cheer her up, but her mind is elsewhere and she forgets to laugh.

  “Well, I thought it was funny,” he says, but senses tension and cuts the call short. “You’d better get some sleep, Ruth. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

  Subconsciously, Ruth knows that sleep is just another nightmare waiting to torment her, and avoids the torture by staying awake in a chair. She succumbs eventually, and the nightmare morphs to reality when the phone rings and she leaps up, convinced that Jordan has died during treatment. But it’s Trina, whispering hoarsely, “Ruth, is that you?”

  “It’s nearly three o’clock,” Ruth groans.

  “I know,” says Trina excitedly, as if they are on a sleepover. “I’m on night shift at the old-folks’ place. I’m checking the ministry computer, but Jordan hasn’t bought any drugs in the past month.” She pauses to scroll down. “Hold on,” she whispers. “There has to be a mistake. He’s not on the system at all. This can’t be right ... Oh, gotta go. Someone’s coming.”

  Ruth makes some coffee and fights to stay awake as she tries to make sense of the information. Trina must be wrong, she thinks, but then has another thought. Maybe Jordan has used a nom-de-plume in his determination to prevent his mother from discovering his ailment and reclaiming her money.

  Cindy opens the door at seven, and Tom hits the washroom at full speed. Trina, in his wake, veers off and heads straight for the kitchen.

  “Then why didn’t he take the pills?” Trina wants to know, when Ruth lays out her suspicions about an alias.

  “He’s given up. I knew it,” says Ruth as the truth sinks in. “He’s so sure of this thing in Los Angeles that he’s just not trying anything else.”

  “But these pills are from September,” says Trina. “Jordan didn’t know about the Los Angeles experiment back then, did he?”

  Ruth takes a moment, then bursts into tears. “He’s worried about the money. It must be the money.”

  Ruth’s financial lows hit bottom when Tom finally corners her as she makes a crunchy-cashew salad. He has a dark look as he tells her, “My people need some money now, Ruth.”

  “But I can’t ... Not yet,” she says, dicing carrots and celery. “I’ll soon be able to pay. This place is making money. I’ve just got a few things ...”

  “Ruth ... When my people say ‘now,’ they kinda mean now.”

  “But, Tom. You said ...”

  Tom stops her with his hand. “Ruth. You don’t understand. Now means now.”

  “I can’t pay,” Ruth says boldly, as she fiercely attacks a cucumber. “What can they do, take me to court?”

  Tom laughs wryly. “Ruth. These people don’t use courts—they use bricks and razors.”

  Ruth freezes and weighs up the carving knife in her hand, wondering if it might be easier in the long run to slit Tom’s throat and plead insanity.

  “I thought they were in London,” she scoffs, but, in truth knows that semantics won’t help. “If I could do anything about it I would,” she says. “I just can’t give you any money.”

  “There might be something ...” says Tom, eyeing Ruth’s fulsome physique.

  “What? Anything,” she replies, throwing in the cashews and drizzling vinaigrette, though she could never have imagined what she was agreeing to.

  Ruth is back hiding in the kitchen again. She’s been there for three days with hardly a break, but this time she is avoiding Trina. “Tell her I’m at the cash and carry,” she warns Cindy. It’s nothing that Trina has done, she just has a way of wheedling the truth out of people, and Ruth doesn’t want to take the chance.

  Trina revolts eventually and slips past Cindy, calling, “Just checking the kitchen. I think I left my tampons there the other day.”

  Ruth is teasing her hair in the burnished stainless steel range hood as Trina hustles in.

  “Oh, you are here,” says Trina as Cindy breaks through on the intercom.

  “Sorry Ruth. Trina just ...”

  “I’m here,” shouts Trina, slamming her hand on the “Talk” button.

  Ruth turns from the mirror, guessing she’s been found out, and fluffs her lines. “I was just ... You know ... just ... um.”

  “You’ve got a date,” breathes Trina, taking in the heavy lipstick and indigo eye shadow. “Is it Mike, that nice policeman?”

  “No ...” starts Ruth, then changes her mind and apparently confesses. “Yes. All right. If you must know. But I don’t want you telling a soul. Absolutely no one, do you understand?”

  “Don’t worry, Ruth. I don’t blame you, really ... although others might.”

  “I was doing all right up ‘til now. I knew I should’ve locked that door. I knew you’d ruin it,” cries Ruth.

  “Sorry,” coos Trina, sweeping the tearful woman into her arms. “Come on upstairs. Let’s do that makeup properly. You look as though you’ve had an accident.”

  An hour later Trina stands Ruth in front of a mirror and proudly exclaims, “Ta-dah.”


  “Where’s my glasses?” says Ruth squinting.

  Trina picks up the glasses from the table, hesitates for a moment, then races for the door. “Don’t move,” she calls. “I’ll be back in a minute.”

  “I can’t move,” yells Ruth. “I can’t see without them.”

  Twenty minutes later Trina re-appears, out of breath.

  “You said a minute,” moans Ruth, still standing.

  “Sorry about that,” gushes Trina, “but look.”

  “What? I can’t see ...”

  “Oops, sorry,” says Trina, and she hands Ruth a funky pair of octagonal glasses with opal highlights.

  “Mine are special ...” begins Ruth, but Trina stops her.

  “Just try them.”

  The overall effect is magical and Ruth peers disbelievingly into the mirror. She even pokes out her tongue a little just to make sure it isn’t a trick. Silent tears slowly appear like dewdrops on rosebuds, and Trina dashes to mop them with a tissue. “Hey, stop that,” she says, “You’ll ruin the mascara.”

  “Sorry,” mumbles Ruth, but she takes off the glasses and hands them back. “Trina, I can’t afford these. How much do they cost, for chrissake?”

  “Nothing,” lies Trina. “A friend makes them.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yeah. It’s still your old glasses—it’s an optical illusion. He just puts new frames over the old ones. He’s a sweetheart.”

  Ruth’s “date” is still an hour away as she sits on Jordan’s empty bed trying to rationalize her planned exploit. You could’ve waited until he was in Los Angeles, she tries telling herself, though she knows that is just a delaying tactic. There’s got to be other ways ... Go on then—name one.

  Ruth switches on Jordan’s computer and pulls up his last few sites. It can’t be that bad, she’s convinced herself, but as she scrolls through page after page of pornography she has to force herself to watch, and her heart sinks as she thinks of the loss Jordan has endured, and his pathetic attempt to regain his manhood through images on the Internet.

  “You have thirty-seven new messages—Hard Drive,” pops up on the screen and she quickly turns it off, feeling she has already violated his final moments.

  Ruth’s edginess has her dancing around the apartment like a teen before the prom, inspecting her face and hair again and again, until, with a quick check to make sure the alley is clear, she slips out the back door and walks three blocks before picking up a cruising cab.

  The driver seems particularly familiar with the downtown address and drops Ruth at the side door. “Good luck,” he says, and gives her an appreciative whistle as he drives off.

  Ruth stands back, surveys the old industrial building, and takes a deep breath. Running is still an option. It’s nippy under the clear evening sky, but walking to the aquabus terminal might sharpen her mind and enable her to find a better solution.

  She inches forward. There’s a number on the door, but no name. She manages to ring the bell on her third attempt, and jumps at the sharp buzz of the intercom. The latch clicks open. “Come up—second floor,” says a man without query, and it takes her a second to spot the overhead security camera.

  Ruth’s footsteps are slow as she clangs her way up the bare metal staircase. It’s not too late, she tells herself at each landing. Going down is much easier than going up.

  “Ms. Jackson?” confirms the same man as she finally reaches the top. She nods and he waves her into a room with a couch and a couple of cameras on tripods. “I’m Dave,” he says, using his forefinger to click an imaginary camera in front of his face.

  “Ruth,” she responds as she sizes him up: early twenties, pimply, with straggly hair, and the start of a cameraman’s hunched-back. Her pulse is racing and her hands won’t stop, but Dave looks harmless and she takes some steadying breaths, fights back the feeling that she is going to vomit, and asks, “Have you been here long?”

  A door slams open and a tattooed English gorilla in studded leather ambles in.

  “Jessica,” he booms, giving Ruth a cursory sweep.

  “Jessica?” she echoes.

  “Yeah. You gotta have a name—know what I mean? You look like a Jessica. I’m Mort.”

  “Hi, Mort,” Ruth starts conversationally, holding out her hand, but he cuts her off, and she shrinks at the realization that he has nothing to shake with.

  “First time?”

  “Yes,” she mumbles, unable to take her mind off the shrivelled stump that should have been a right hand.

  “Thought so. Well, take off your clothes, Jessica. Time’s money—know what I mean?”

  Ruth is slow as she peels off her sweater and blouse, and Mort watches impatiently as he massages the truncated wrist with his good hand.

  “C’mon lady. We’re on a schedule—know what I mean?”

  “Yes. Sorry ... Should I take my bra off as well?”

  “Everything, lady. Dave ain’t in kindergarten, even if he looks like a kid.”

  Ruth stops with her bra in her hand, “I didn’t ...”

  “Look lady, excuse the pun, but jugs aren’t as big today as they used to be—know what I mean? Guys want the whole juice machine today. That’s the only thing that sells—know what I mean?”

  “Yes, but ...”

  “Did you bring something to work with?”

  “Tom didn’t say ...”

  Mort waves her to stop with the stump and calls to Dave. “Get out a couple of dildos for the lady, Dave.”

  Sweat’s running off her brow as Ruth starts to rise. “Tom only mentioned breasts.”

  Mort throws up his arms. “Lady, please. Listen to me. This ain’t a debating contest. Do you need the money or not?”

  “Yes, but ...”

  “Good girl. Now take ’em off, jump up on the bed and give Dave some smiley wide shots for your portfolio—know what I mean?”

  Two hours later Ruth is still trembling as she climbs the stairs to an empty apartment. Jordan will be back tomorrow and, while she would almost prefer to die than ask, she has no choice—he will have to get the money back from Los Angeles.

  Tom crashes through the door at seven the following morning and heads straight for the kitchen.

  “You screwed up, you silly bitch,” he hisses at Ruth, “Mort’s f’kin furious you wasted his time. All you had to do was take your f‘kin clothes off. What’s so hard about that?”

  Ruth still has a carving knife in her hand, but figures he’s not worth the effort; anyway, she has made up her mind. “Don’t worry, I’m getting the money back—well, ten thousand, anyway.”

  “My people don’t like being messed around, Ruth.”

  “Your people?” laughs Ruth as she peers into the weaselly little man’s eyes and sees right through him. “You don’t have people, Tom,” she spits. “You don’t even have a pot to crap in; that’s why you use ours every morning. And somebody’s been stealing the toilet paper. Is that you?”

  “No ...”

  Something snaps, and Ruth suddenly finds all her suffering, fears, and worries enveloped in a roll of toilet paper. “I said, ‘Is that you,’ Tom?” she shouts and backs him against a fridge with the knife. “Is that you?” she screams into his face.

  “Ruth,” he pleads as the knife presses at his throat.

  “I said, ‘Is that you’ taking the toilet paper?” she hisses as the knife starts to cut.

  “Ruth, please.”

  A bead of blood oozes from Tom’s neck. “Have you been stealing the toilet paper?” she demands.

  “You don’t know what they’re like,” Tom bleats, and Ruth realizes that his head is on the block alongside hers.

  “The toilet paper, Tom. What about the toilet paper?” she yells as the crimson welt begins a slow leak.

  “Yes ... Alright, alright. I took a roll of toilet paper.” “Rolls,” she hisses through clenched teeth. “Rolls of toilet paper.”

  “Yes. OK. Rolls of toilet paper.”

  “Thank you,�
�� she says calmly, and slowly withdraws the knife. Tom’s hand goes to his throat and he takes a breath of relief and starts to say, “Sorry,” when she slams her knee into his groin with enough force to lift him off the ground, and he drops to the floor with eyes full of tears.

  “That’s for the toilet paper, Tom. Now tell your people to wait a few days, OK?”

  “Oh, my balls!” Tom cries, writhing in agony on the kitchen floor, but she sneers, “You’re lucky I didn’t cut them off after what you set me up for. Now get up and get out.”

  Ruth is still pumped as she waits in the apartment to confront Jordan. She has disconnected the phone line to his computer and mentally practices her tactics for over an hour before she hears his footsteps up the back stairs.

  “I’m tired,” he says, his voice dragging the ground as he slumps into the room.

  “The computer’s not working at the moment,” she tells him firmly as he heads to bed. “I need to talk to you first.”

  He drops into a chair, asking, “What is it, Ruth?”

  Ruth brings out the box of pills and carefully places it on the table between them, like an exhibit. “Why haven’t you been taking your pills?” she inquires.

  “They’re expensive ...” he starts, but she’s ahead of him.

  “If you needed more money you could have asked, but that doesn’t answer the question. Why didn’t you take these? You’d paid for them.”

  “They upset me, so I got something else.”

  An alarm bell is ringing in the depths of Ruth’s mind, but she forges on. “I spoke to the support counsellor. She says that Los Angeles thing is probably a scam.”

  “What does she know? My doctor really thinks it will work.”

  Ruth brightens momentarily at the news, then folds as she sees her plan to repay the money coming apart. “Is he sure?”

  “Pretty sure. He wants me to go as soon as possible.”

  “Just before Christmas?”

  “Probably.”

  Ruth sits back, her future full of open-crotch photo shoots, and she hits on an idea. “Who’s your doctor?”

  “Benson ... Why?”