Zed

by Jason McIntyre

  “You want to help Tom do good at school, don’t you?” Tom asked. It was an earnest question from a mostly-earnest boy. But he realized in a cold flash that it didn’t sound sincere. It sounded a bit like how Karen Banatyne might have phrased a question to one of her ‘retards’.

  “Oh, sure I do, Mr. Tom. Sure-shootin.”

  “Okay then. Will you ask Mary to come with us to the hot pool tomorrow? I’ll be there at four. You two can meet me. Nurse Karen will be downtown at her city council meetings all afternoon. You can take Mary in your truck and tell her I’ll be there to snap-snap glamour shots of her in her swimsuit.”

  Zeke let out a big laugh. “Like in dem ladies magazines?”

  “Like in the ladies’ magazines, that’s right, Zee,” Tom confirmed. “That’s just exactly right.” Tom got up and let out a breath. “I gotta get going or I’m going to miss my boat. Then I’d have no camera!” He said this with mock enthusiasm, like a person does when they’re drumming up excitement from a group of children who think that balloon animals are beneath them.

  “Oh no!” Zeke said, and meant it. “You go to the ferry, Mr. Tom. You go now!”

  “Will do, Zee.”

  “Mr. Tom?”

  “Yuh,” Tom said, as he hoisted his lighter than normal duffle. The wad of hundreds Nurse Karen had given him bulged in his shorts pocket.

  “Why you call me ‘Zee’ alla time?”

  “You don’t like it?”

  “It’s okay. Mary, she’s from way up north and they pronounce my letter like this, like zed, not zee.”

  “You do like Mary, don’t you, Zeke?” Tom said as Zeke got up and followed him through the furnace room door. They started up the stairs. The sound of the TV from the living room grew. It sounded like Johnny Olson announcing The Price is Right.

  “You wouldn’t tell no one, would you, Mr. Tom? Not my daddy, not Nurse Karen?”

  “I never would, cross my heart.”

  “Then yah, I like her. She’s about the most purty girl in the whole world. I like her smile.”

  “Me too buddy. Tell you what. I won’t call you Zee anymore. And you can have your special name from Mary. M-kay?”

  “Oh-kay, Mr. Tom. You know what else?” Zeke asked as they ascended into the light of the back porch of Ocean View Manor.

  “What else, bud?” he said, again as though he was talking to a child of four or five.

  “You know them girls at the hot pool today?”

  “Not really,” Tom said, opening the back porch door with a whiny yawn. “Just met em. Why?” Tom thought of Zeke standing up to his waist in the hot spring water silently watching him chat with the three girls he now thought of as the Lennon Sisters, even though they had shown a lot more skin than the Lennons ever had.

  “You made them do it, Mr. Tom. I liked it when you do it. That’s about thee best sound in the world and I love to make Mary do it,” Zeke said.

  “Oh yeah? What sound is that, champ?” Tom asked, now distracted and instead of thinking about the Lennon Sisters, about how on earth he would make it on time for the 3:15. He was thinking about the wad of money too and about how he would manage both Ms. Banatyne’s errand plus his own, and still be back here by late afternoon tomorrow. He left Zeke at the porch and trod across the overgrown lawn while Zeke collected his thoughts around his answer.

  “Best sound in the world is... purty girls laughing.”

  7

  Tom made it to the ferry on time. It was just boarding. This being a Tuesday afternoon in August, two weeks before school started and vacation season not yet ready to wrap-up, the departing ferry was next to empty. He intended to sit by the window and after the island disappeared from view, he’d get out his western and read that. It was a long ferry ride back to land, but being a kid originally from farm country, it was fascinating to see the island float by as the ferry wound its way to the south side and then off to the churning ocean.

  He heard his name called and was surprised to see Mr. Roundtree waving him over. Aw, shit, Tom thought. Now I have to make small talk. And for hours. He went over to the man who had finally shed his overly hot suit coat. “It is Tom, right?”

  “Yuh, sure is. Did you have a nice visit at Ocean View today, sir?” he sounded overly formal, he knew he did, but he thought it would be better than the opposite. Someone Roundtree’s age maybe already had a bad opinion of punks Tom’s age.

  “Sure, sure,” Roundtree said absently. “Hey, join me, siddown. I need to ask you something.” Only he said ask like axe, a weird mistake that Tom thought a lot of people made. It made Roundtree sound dumb but Tom thought Roundtree had to be pretty high up to be giving rich people like the Banatynes a high time. Then he thought, gee, maybe the Banatynes aren’t as rich as they let on.

  “It’s not ‘Ford or Carter’ is it?” Tom said and joined him on the wide vinyl seat. Like everything else under the sun today, the seat was hot.

  Roundtree let out a laugh. “Ha! No, son, no.” Then he did a kind of Walter Cronkite voice. “You vote your conscience, young man, and all that.” He paused, letting how corny that sounded sink in for both of them. Then he switched gears. “Anything about Mr. Banatyne strike you as odd, son?” Roundtree said.

  “Not really,” Tom said, seriously considering the question even after he answered it. “How come?”

  “Dunno,” Roundtree said. “Just got me thinking. Nothing at all odd?”

  “Hard to really say,” Tom said.

  Roundtree put his arm up on the vinyl seat back behind Tom’s head, not a forward gesture but one that said he was listening intently. “Hard to say... because?”

  “I’ve never met Mr. Banatyne,” Tom said.

  8

  The next day was Wednesday, Tom’s day off when Fidela traditionally looked after the Ocean View tribe during the day and Nurse Karen took one turn at spending the night. Tom arrived back on the ferry in Dovetail Cove around 3:30. It was another scorcher and someone in the disembarking throng had a transistor radio picking up a station from Seattle. The announcer said they were seeing huge numbers of heatstroke. Hospitals were filled to brimming and the elderly were popping off in the heat. Tom could believe it, even though it was marginally cooler as he trod his way down the wide plank with everyone else island-bound from the ferry terminal.

  The trip back reminded him of his conversation with James Roundtree, who had seemed beyond irritated with Karen Banatyne. After Tom had confessed he had never met Karen’s husband, Chris, in the months he’d been in their employ, Roundtree had nodded. He had worn a strange, distant look, like either he was having a bowel movement or finally dropping the last pieces of Dar’s world map puzzle into place.

  He had confessed that Karen had taken him back to the Banatyne’s sizeable home at the far south-west end of town but had left him on the verandah with a big glass of iced tea while she went inside to fetch Chris, apparently still fighting a bad bug.

  When she’d returned to the front of the house, Roundtree told Tom, she’d been alone and out of breath, but had all the check registers Roundtree needed to see. Chris, she’d said, was still unfortunately too sick for a visitor but had asked Karen to give his regards.

  Tom had made small talk about the new ball team coming to Seattle next season, about the hot weather and about school in the fall. Roundtree asked him about his quick visit so close to the end of his work with Ocean View. “Why not wait a couple weeks and pick up your camera when you’re back home for good?” he’d asked and Tom had said it was on sale and he needed to get his portfolio rounded out before school started. The island had some of the best scenery he’d ever seen. That seemed like a solid enough answer for a perpetually curious Roundtree and they’d left it at that. A bit more small talk, and then Tom said he’d had to visit the restroom. When he came back, Roundtree had vacated that window seat and Tom never saw him again.

  Now, Tom walked with his heavy duffle up Main and saw Mikey Dean coming out of Harlow’s with a bottle of Coke that
looked frosted with condensation. Tom licked his lips.

  Mikey saw him and walked over to meet him. “Hey,” he said and took a swig. “If you want one, you better hurry. I think Harlow’s gonna sell out.”

  Tom wiped his brow with the back of his hand. It was soaked, but suddenly felt cool in the breeze coming up Main from the west end where it opened to the inner harbour. “Naw, I think we have some back home. Gimme a lift?”

  “Not on your life,” Mikey said. He smiled and Tom smiled too, nervously. He was never sure when kids around here were joking or serious. “My ex sees me with you, she’s gonna think I’m taking you outta town or up the bluffs to hang you by your ankles.”

  Tom hesitated. What do you say to that?

  “Come on. I just met her yesterday at the hot spring. I don’t even know her last name.”

  “I’m just messing with you, man.” He reached out with his bottle of Coke and hit Tom on the shoulder gently, in a just-joshing-you gesture. “Come on, let’s go. You prolly have air conditioning in that big house of yours.”

  “I think they do,” Tom said, following Mikey back to the truck and then going to the passenger side. “But the Banatynes hardly ever turn it on...”

  “Hey!” Mikey said. “Where you going? Dogs who steal my girlfriend ride in the back!” He looked dead serious and so did Tom for a split second until Mikey’s face broke to a smile and he laughed. “So serious, college boy,” he said. “Truth is, she’s been yakking about you to Jamie and the other girls. If you’re not interested, you better watch out.”

  “Why’s that?” Tom asked. He took the weight of the duffle off his shoulder, raw with its heft and the strap digging into his skin. He heaved it into the back, then got into the passenger side and slammed the door.

  “It’s why we broke up,” Mikey said. “If she wants something, she usually gets it.”

  9

  Mikey pulled in to the generous turnaround behind Ocean View’s new bus and made a crack about how the Banatynes could afford to buy the whole town if they’d wanted. Trying to play along, Tom said, “But instead they settled for payments on a creaky old bus.” Tom laughed but Mikey didn’t join him. He was nervous with Mikey, and was never sure what was going to come out of the guy’s mouth or what he thought was funny. Farrah had made him feel that way too and he guessed it was just a different sense of humour because he was what locals called a tourist or an off-islander.

  Thinking about Farrah, he suddenly thought to ask Mikey what that girl’s last name was, but he clammed up instead and they sat in the idling truck for a minute or two, silence between them. This was odd. Tom Mason was usually able to talk to just about anyone. He thought that if he was ever to photograph Mikey, it would be tough to get him moving where the camera needed him. Tom made a mental note. He’d have to work on his people skills, for all kinds of subjects, even the ones difficult to read.

  He thanked Mikey for the lift and asked that Mikey thank his mom again for the fudgy brownies and tell her how much everyone at Ocean View loved them. Mikey said he would, but Tom suspected he’d forget.

  Mikey drove off and pulled into his own place a few doors down. Then Tom went around back and squeaked into the back door where he set his duffle down in the porch. He unzipped it and pulled out his new camera case, rubbing it like some men caress the dashboards of their prized cars.

  He snatched a set of keys off a hook around the corner and did it quietly before Fidela or the others heard him and noticed he was back. He was supposed to have the whole day off but if he was around the house, he always got roped into looking after the gang while Fidela disappeared.

  Today, it was Tom’s turn to disappear.

  After fussing to finally get the driver’s window rolled down, he took the new bus up north on King’s Road, past Neckline Beach which was crowded with people and cars and scents of coconut oil and food. Happy seagulls cried out and the surf crashed. Children shouted. In a moment, he was by himself on the road again and felt utterly alone in the universe under a brilliant blue panel of cloudless sky hovering silently above the crisp green treetops. He went just shy of the bluffs and turned down the hardly-used trail which took him into the thicket and just to the edge of the hot springs.

  There was Zeke’s municipal truck, on loan from the town. Zeke had a part time job there, picking up trash at the beach, the ferry terminal and what little downtown there was to speak of in Dovetail Cove. Tom thought he also weeded and dead-headed the municipal gardens and flower pots in the summer. For being the town retard, Zeke really was independent.

  I have money, Mr. Tom, Zeke had said with all the innocence of a boy dumping out his piggy bank on the bedspread. Tom wondered if he spent any of that money on his own room and board or if his old father covered it all with his pension income. Wouldn’t that be something if Zeke had as much money stashed away as Karen and Chris Banatyne?

  Tom shook his head, and with it, shook such an absurd idea out of it. Everyone except James Roundtree treated the Banatynes like God’s gift to the Dovetail Cove. He was sure they had a ridiculous sum of money. He’d heard they own a stake in lots of different businesses and rented some of the farmland north of town out to the farmers who managed it.

  As he got out of the van, he thought, I better lock it. Karen’s at her town council meeting and she doesn’t need to know he used it. But if some townies were out here and decided to play a prank, it would be his ass. He’d been yelled at by Karen a few times. She had a way of erupting like a volcano, a far cry from the face she’d held when she hired him and for the first month of work. She was good at the facade. But when it cracked, it broke open and everything poured out.

  “Screw it,” he said under his breath and left it unlocked and the windows down. He didn’t want to come back to a sweat box.

  He walked past Zeke’s truck but couldn’t see Zeke or Mary. Part of him was surprised that Zeke had remembered. I know you have a teeny crush on Mary, he had said to Zeke yesterday down in the cool furnace room. You’re so good about keeping your hands to yourself. That’s not a worry at all.

  These words rang through his head as he walked down the thin path to the clearing where they’d had the picnic yesterday afternoon and where the three multi-level hot pools and the orange-tan pedestal of rock stood. A big grouping of white pines, at least a hundred years old, obscured the clearing from view for a moment. He still couldn’t see Zeke or Mary.

  Then Tom remembered Karen going through a short bio on all the houseguests at the start of the summer, Zeke last of all. Zeke, Karen had told him, was the smartest of them all. He was at Ocean View to keep him from harming anyone, or himself.

  Tom’s pace turned to a trot. He rounded the brotherhood of white pines, losing his breath with a thought. Mary and Zeke might have been alone out here all afternoon. With Karen at Town Hall, Fidela wouldn’t have fussed much with them missing.

  Tom heard a scream.

  He came into the clearing and saw the back of Zeke, his round white middle and his nearly bald head. He was in the deep pool, facing away from the clearing, away from Tom.

  Tom broke into a run and let his camera case tumble into the weeds and grass and scrub brush.

  When he got to the edge of the pool, he was running so fast he nearly fell in. He put on his brakes and halted to a stop, throwing dust up from under his sandals. “Zeke!” he shouted.

  Calmly, Zeke turned around to see what the ruckus was. Behind him, Mary was down low in the water, her jet black hair just above the surface. Zeke looked unconcerned. Mary was blowing bubbles on the surface, her black eyes in tight knots. Another large one filled up with air and floated away from her. She raised her mouth out of the water and screamed again. This time, Tom realized it was a scream of absolute delight at what she’d created. Her scream faded to a squeal and then to laughter.

  Purty girls laughing, Zeke had said. Thee best sound in the world.

  Smiling himself now, Zeke said, “Hiya Mr. Tom. We’s waitin for you. I brough
t Mary. Say hullo Mary.”

  Mary pulled her hands out of the water and jumped up and down. “Hi Tommy-Tommy!” She squealed and waved both her hands so frantic she could have hailed a 747.

  Tom exhaled and leaned forward. He put his hands on his knees, like he’d just run the hundred metre dash and found nothing but defeat by the finish line. Zeke said, “You okay, Mr. Tom?”

  Tom raised his head to the duo who were having a blast playing in the hot pool all by themselves. He was laughing and as soon as he caught more breath, his laughter turned to a gale. This struck him as the most hilarious thing.

  What on earth had he thought Zeke was going to do?

  10

  Tom retrieved his camera from the scrub where he’d dropped it. He brushed it off and sat down in the clearing under the shade of the biggest tree, the spot where Karen had tried yesterday to convince James he didn’t need to see her husband.

  He opened it up and found everything intact. The padded case had been an extra twenty-five but worth it only a day later. He’d inherited prudence and forethought from his father.

  He moved around the clearing and snapped a few to get a feel for the settings. He mostly took shots of the bluffs at their distance and the outcrop of rocky surroundings that made up the hot pool. He marvelled at how the hot spring setup looked as though intelligent design was the only thing that could have built it. It looked natural, but managed. Planned.

  Some candids of Zeke and Mary splashing each other in the water would later turn out to be duds but at the moment, he thought they would be excellent shots.

  Then he managed to convince Mary to sit up on the top stone pedestal where the Lennon Sisters had sunbathed yesterday. “Come on. Mary. Remember the girls from yesterday? They weren’t scared up there. It’s not high at all.”