Ray Vs the Meaning of Life

by Michael F Stewart

  “Taste groups then.”

  “Didn’t you once have scurvy?”

  “How do you know everything?”

  “This is only the beginning,” Dalen says, and I can’t tell if it’s a promise, or a threat.

  Chapter 27

  After Dalen leaves, I stare for a minute at the oatmeal, shake my head, and start the chores. I’m already halfway through the women’s bathroom when he catches back up with me.

  “A good breakfast is a mission accomplished,” he says. “Don’t fail with your first mission of the day.”

  Shooka-shooka-shooka-splash. I pretend to be meditating. He’s right. I am hungry, but I’m also energized.

  Shook-shook-shook-shook-dip. Shooka-shook-shook-splash.

  “Ray, it has to be consistent. Like ‘om.’”

  I pause with my hand on the brush, wishing he’d disappear, and then I try again.

  Shooka-shooka-shooka-splash.

  I sense his smiling.

  In the mirror, I search for Better-Ray and then go back to the floor.

  I rip through the cleaning of the washroom. For a couple of moments in the men’s washroom, I swear my mind goes blank and there is nothing in it—and not in a dork way—in a way that opens me up to the scents, the polished tile, the echoes of my cleaning, and the ache of my knees.

  Dalen winks at me. He knows. “Imagine a life where all moments were like that. How alive you’d feel,” he says.

  Scraping goo from the shower ceiling, I don’t even gag. It’s as though I’m on autopilot and separate from my mind. When I finish, Dalen’s gone. Campfires winkle in the early morning and wood smoke melts the gut-berg a bit—a bit. The mud’s phenomenal. With the steady rains, ruts brim with milky puddles as deep as my knee.

  Dark gray skies hang low. The morning feels longer as I stand beside the pool. The berg floats, still and stubborn in the center. Two bergs really, a smaller one that has fused to the larger, both wreathed in a crown of leaves. I scrape the leaves from the surface but I’m wasting time. In two hours my shift at Pulled Beef starts, a double shift so that Tina can be with Salminder for his new treatment. I promise myself that I won’t be late.

  I brought a shovel with me and fight a sudden urge to start filling ruts. I see the ruts for what they are. They’re a waste, an excuse to break my promises. I realize I’ve been making these excuses for some time now. I hook the top of the berg with the leaf skimmer, and slowly, ever so slowly, like a freighter turning at sea, the berg inches toward me. The ice crunches as it reaches the side, removing a strip of greenish-yellow algae from the liner. The shovel pierces the bridge between the two bergs, and the smaller bit bobs free. This piece is one-twentieth the size of the larger and, even so, it takes all my strength to roll it out of the pool. My arms are soaked, hands frozen and pants drenched. Sharp angles of ice have scraped my forearms. But a small goal’s been achieved.

  With the shovel, I jab the remaining berg. The pointed shovel tip skips off, leaving only a white nick. I jab again, and another chip flies. This method might work if I had all week. I reach into the frigid water, find a lip of ice to grab and haul. The berg floats up an inch and then settles back down when I release. What can I do? It’s still too big. I have to let it melt. It’ll be another few days at least.

  I turn around. There at the fence, fingers threaded through the chain link, stands the little girl. Her eyes are big and not even looking at me; they’re on the pool. What kind of hell has she fled from? She’s used to disappointment—that I can tell. Those wrinkles at her brow are not from me, not only from me, but also from scrunching her face in fear.

  I kick off my muddy shoes and pull my shirt over my head. This will hurt. I don’t think it’ll work, but at least I’ll have showed her that I tried.

  There’s a tradition in some places where they jump into water through an ice hole. To be honest, I always felt that to be stupid. They call it the “polar bear dip” because only polar bears would enjoy something like that. But no one has ever accused me of being smart. I hesitate with my toes over the pool edge.

  “Go on,” the little girl calls through the chain link.

  I brush the water with my foot. This was a mistake. Jumping into cold water is not something you do slowly.

  “Just jump,” she says. “What’s stopping you?”

  “Quit talking to Dalen.” I swing my arms and jump. My lungs collapse. My heart stops. My brain blanks. It’s pain. It’s stupid. And then it’s as if an electrical current runs through me because my lungs, my heart, and my brain surge back into action at a billion times their normal rates. I shout in short tortured gasps. A tiny fraction of my thoughts is devoted to the reason why I made the leap. Or perhaps it’s just the glee of a certain little girl I make out through the blood screaming in my ears.

  I claw and sputter at the pool-berg, ice cutting at my palms. I get low, ducking beneath the surface, and shoulder it. It only floats into deeper water. I still can’t catch my breath, but the initial panic’s gone. I manage shallow pants that keep the encroaching fringe of darkness at bay. I slowly begin to . . . warm. It’s the strangest feeling, but the longer I stay, the more deadened my limbs go, the warmer the sensation.

  Which, of course, means I’m probably dying.

  I glance at the girl; she’s clapping. I gasp another breath. And I know I have to do this.

  I dive down and swim below the blurred edge of the berg. It’s big with great divots where some parts of the ice have melted faster than others. My lungs begin to spasm even as warmth floods me, and the darkness creeps tighter. Something hard presses at the base of my skull.

  Crouched beneath the ice, I push up on the berg with my palms. Ice rises, and the higher it goes, the more it weighs. It’s not far enough out of the water for me to heave it out. I ease it back down and, neck bent, rest the burning ice on my back and push again. The frigid muscles in my thighs twang with the effort. A sense of peace settles over me. As the darkness closes in, I give up and breaststroke for the surface.

  I reach air and wheeze. My hands are clubby with cold and bounce off the pool ledge. A hard thing knifes into my head—the worst brain freeze ever. I climb the slimy bottom to a shallower area, until I’m out of the water to my waist. Body red with cold, goose fleshed and shuddering.

  I roll onto the pool side and rub blood back into my limbs. The pain in my head subsides.

  “Sorry,” I chatter.

  The girl gives me a wry smile.

  “It’s too heavy,” she says. “You need help.”

  Chapter 28

  I lie on the edge of the pool for a few minutes, letting a brief pocket of sun warm me.

  “Don’t be afraid of failure.” I open my eyes. Dalen leans over the fence. “Every event has a lesson. They are essential. Have you cheated? Done something you’re ashamed of, like a hit and run?”

  “What? No,” I say. “Have you?”

  He flushes before adding, “You’ll never be remembered for how many times you fell down, only for the one time that you didn’t.”

  “You going to help me?” I ask.

  “I’m not here for long, Ray, not long,” he replies and walks away.

  I shut my eyes again. The sun’s baking. It sends prickling fire through my limbs. All I want to do is drift off to sleep.

  “So you getting up, or what?” the little girl asks.

  I sigh and sit forward. The clouds have rushed back in. “Okay,” I say. “Give me a bit.”

  Her neck bends so far forward, it’s like it’s broken. She starts away.

  “I’ll be back,” I say, but she doesn’t turn around as I head to my trailer. I need a new plan.

  On YouTube I watch an explanation of pulley systems and generally bone up on some physics. I don’t have any pulleys, but I do have the climbing carabiners and rope; maybe they’ll come in handy after all. If I hook them to two points on the fence, I will have a pulley system. The only trouble is how to attach it all to the pool-berg.

&nb
sp; I have rope, two carabiners, one strap, and a determination to prove to myself that I can do this.

  Back at the pool, the girl’s eating a bag of chips and drinking from a can of Coke. “Is it cold?” she asks.

  “Yes,” I say.

  “Are you going to get the ice out?” she asks.

  “Yes,” I say.

  “My mom says you should just turn the heat on in the pool.”

  “If only the pool had a heater,” I say. The girl squints and I hold up my hands. “It’s a good idea. But this pool is heated by the sun.” She crunches on a chip. “And summer, you know, warmth in general does it,” I add. “But it’s been cold at night.”

  She hunts in the foil bag. “I’m watching.”

  I thread the rope through the carabiners on the fence and then eye the cold water again. I’m dry, in warm clothes, but I know what I have to do. Knowing what to expect makes it worse, but I have to get the strap around the center of the berg or risk having it slip out. I hold one end with the other tied to the loop of rope and jump. The air in my lungs forces its way out, but I manage to keep half and swim under the berg to toss the strap over to the far side.

  “I got it!” comes the shout and I hop out to see the little girl, all of forty pounds, struggling to hold the strap, while reaching out over the water on tippy-toes.

  “Hey, careful,” I say, but it’s too late. She’s overbalanced on her flipflops and topples into the water. She slips beneath the surface. The iceberg shifts to grind against the pool side. Her body is a blur beneath the ice.

  I don’t think. I dive, scrape my chin on the bottom, and hammer my shoulder into the berg. In the haze of water, the girl claws at the ice until the iceberg moves. She shoves off the bottom to gasp for air at the wall.

  Tears well in her eyes, and she grips the side.

  “You okay?” I ask.

  She gives these tiny nods. “I hate the iceberg.”

  I glance back. The strap’s still hanging over the middle.

  “What d’you say we get it out of here?”

  Her smile warms me more than the sun as I haul her out.

  “What’s your name?” I ask.

  “Penny.”

  “Well, thanks, Penny. I couldn’t have got the strap around it without you.”

  She beams.

  I’m careful to keep the strap taut as I knot the ends together and hook on a third carabiner, which I snap to the loop of rope. “Can you pull on that end?” I motion to the end of the rope, which she pulls on until the whole system is tight. I join her. “Hey, you’re really good at this. Ready to help me get it out?”

  If she nods her head any faster, it’s going to fly off.

  By pulling on one end of the rope, the mass of the berg is now distributed between the two carabiners, cutting the weight in half.

  She grips the rope behind me. “On three,” I say.

  She shrieks, “One-two-three!”

  I dig my heels in and lean back as the berg slides to the side of the pool and then begins to angle up. But our combined weight and strength isn’t enough. The berg settles back in the water.

  Penny doesn’t seem disheartened. If anything, her smile has broadened. “Now what?” she asks.

  I spot the fence post. “I know,” I say, and I hook the rope around the post, cutting the weight of the berg into thirds. “Again.”

  “One-two-three,” she says, and we heave.

  When the ice rises as far as we can get it, I tighten the loop on the post so that the berg can’t slip back into the water. Then we heave again. Bit by bit, the berg lifts from the pool depths. Patterns of pocks are revealed as we unearth it, but even with the clouds, all I can think of is what a beautiful shade of blue. With a sudden release, the ice crunches onto the pool deck.

  “We did it!” Penny screams. “We did it!”

  I laugh as Penny dances, drenched and with hair plastered to her forehead and cheeks. It feels great. This must be how the meaning of life feels.

  It’s as fleeting as a dream.

  Chapter 29

  I arrive late for shift, but I spring up to the counter and smile. I’m fifty-fifty on promises for the day, which is a hundred percent better than usual. On the menu board are now written two items. Burger and Swami Burger. The Swami Burger costs two dollars more. Tina doesn’t look over—she’s chopping something.

  “You said you’d be here,” Tina accuses before I open the door.

  “Once I started on the pool I couldn’t stop,” I say. “The little girl—Penny was there and—”

  “You’re blaming a little girl?” Tina asks.

  “No, but—”

  “I couldn’t go,” Tina says. “To my dad’s treatment.”

  I made her miss her dad’s cancer treatment.

  “No, really?” I say. “You could have kept Pulled Beef closed. People would have understood.” But of course Salminder doesn’t want anyone to know. Yet, at this point, if I know and Dalen knows, I’m wondering who doesn’t know. “You can almost see the pool from here, you could have just yelled.”

  “You’re blaming me?” she asks.

  Her lip curls in where she’s biting it. The knife slowly slices a tomato. The bin is already overflowing. In the distance, I hear a chainsaw run. I wonder what my mother’s up to.

  “I can borrow a car, drive you in,” I say.

  “And this new Swami Burger, it takes twice as long to make. Dad says you were losing money with every one of them you sold yesterday.”

  I hesitate, not sure how we got on to Swami Burgers. “Salminder wanted you to stay because I was losing him money?” I try to understand.

  “No,” she says and then slams the knife down so that the tomato splits, pulp spurting over the cutting board. “He doesn’t want me there.”

  “Oh,” I say. “Then . . . you didn’t need me on time.”

  “What?” Her eyes widen.

  “Just saying, because I thought my being late had made it so you couldn’t go, and I think you wanted me to feel that way.”

  “You’re not a dork, you’re a jerk,” she says.

  Tears pool at the corner of her eyes, and her hands ball into fists.

  “Sorry,” I whisper. “I’m sorry I was late. And I’m sorry you couldn’t go with your dad.”

  Her fists unfurl, and I take her hands into mine.

  “Didn’t want me to come. Said someone has to take care of you.” She looks up to the ceiling, chin jutted.

  “Wow, he’s really pushing me into your arms,” I joke. “I’m not sure how comfortable I am with that.”

  She cocks her head and is straight-faced for a moment and then turns back to the chopping table, shaking her hands free from mine. “Yeah, right.” But I caught the smirk.

  “I am sorry, Tina. It must be hard for him, too.”

  She nods as she weeps and my heart breaks a little because I’m making her do it, but she hurts and there’s nothing I can do to fix that pain.

  The grill ignites, and soon the sounds and smells of sizzling burgers overwhelm her sniffles and even the chainsaw. Blue smoke pumps from near the pool. Even with the pool-berg out, the pool will take a few days to warm enough for swimming. Between now and then, I’ll clean the sides and start the pump circulating.

  “One burger and one Swami Raymond fortune.” I turn at the voice. I know the sarcasm all too well.

  “Mother,” I reply.

  “I see the ruts are still ruts.” She glowers, smelling of oil and gasoline.

  “Fixing them this week,” I say, “All of them after the rain’s done.”

  “Won’t write a check for a grader, not while you have two arms and a shovel,” she says.

  “Not using a grader,” I reply.

  She eyes me as if searching for something else to accuse me of. “Crystal’s off after that grandma-killer again,” she says. “The bear. Says it’s hanging around. I think she’s gone crazy.”

  I make a show of looking up at the dark sky. “How’s th
e suntan coming?”

  “Bad for the skin,” she says. “Listen . . . uh.” She sighs. “I’m willing to go back to the way it was. I’ll do the office work, Crystal can do the cleaning.”

  “Why would you do that?” I ask.

  She’s looking everywhere except at me.

  “I hate the phone ringing and having to write down messages for you. How’s that sound? Back to normal.” She glances down at her hands. They look like they’re wrestling one another.

  Tina’s stopped chopping.

  “Sounds like you want me to give up,” I say. I can still hear her and Crystal’s laughter.

  “Not saying so. I’m just saying I’m willing to help out . . . a bit. So? What d’you say?”

  I glance at Tina, who gives me an encouraging nod. I’m not so easily fooled. What’s my mom up to?

  Today I fulfilled a major stepping stone. I removed the berg. I did all the chores except the office chores and then some. I’m on track. Happy Camper Happy Camp.

  “No, I don’t think so,” I say.

  My mom peers at me. “Why the heck not?”

  “Yeah, why not?” Tina asks.

  “No one thought I could do it. I’m going to prove I can.” And I don’t trust you.

  “Fine . . . I believe you, then.” The admission comes through clenched teeth. “That better?”

  I shrug.

  “Can’t you see your mama’s bored?” Tina says. “Crystal’s gone, there’s nothing for her to do.”

  The tips of my mother’s ears go bright red.

  But if she’s bored, it’s her fault. I wonder now if taking away the camp will also take away the tools I need to figure everything out.

  “You need a hobby,” I say.

  “There’s only so many blocks of ice around, Swami Ray.” My mom walks, head down and burger-less, back toward her trailer.

  Tina gives me a look that says oh-come-on, but I’m not having it. This is my show now. Control your thoughts. Control your actions. Etcetera. Destiny.

  Later that day, on the way to set up the bonfire, I pass the pool. Someone’s turned the pool-berg into a rough-cut bear and the small bergy bit into what could be two bear cubs.