—Well, Keith, I guess he knows what he’s doin’. You can’t expect to just walk in to a place like that and not give out anything about yourself—
—That’s another thing too. He’s always talkin’ in these fuckin’ tacky metaphors. We’re gonna walk you through the sewers of your life, but you’re gonna come out clean on the other side. Shit like that. And here I am, goin’ right along with him, thinkin’ yeah, my life really is a fuckin’ sewer.
—Keith. Come on. Maybe it’s too good to be true? Maybe you’re just pullin’ away ’cause you’re afraid. You can’t expect—
—Too good to be true? I have a few more pressing issues in my life right about now, ’Tash. He was s’pose to give me a hand with the cops and all that bullshit. Sure I don’t even speak to my family. I’m half the time sleepin’ in a parked car, or sneakin’ around your place when there’s no one home. Slept in the stable the other night. What’s that got to do with whether or not I experimented when I was a little fuckin’ youngster? It’s sick. And he wants to hug me then when I’m leavin’? Fuck. Tryin’ to make me feel like everything’s gonna be fine and dandy, that my world won’t come crumbling down, long as I makes my way back to see him every Friday. It’s like brainwashing.
He spent all the next week broodin’. I knew it was too good to last. He started readin’ up on cults and communes and that sort of stuff. Jim Jones. Charlie Manson. A book called Savage Messiah about some freak from Quebec. Another one called Cults: Is Your Child At Risk? He read some of it out loud to me. It was mostly just tabloid and propaganda, but I had to admit, the similarities were there. Most of them characters at least started off with a bit of respect from the towns they lived in. And they were oftentimes ordained ministers with a background in psychology or social work. Handsome, intelligent, charismatic fast talkers. But it was a bit much to think that Keith had gotten himself tangled up with that kind of fella. In St. John’s of all places. And that the courts had ordered him to go there.
So I convinced him to give it another go. It was only an hour a week and he’d get in more trouble if he just blew the guy off. Wow, that never came out quite right.
The next week when I pulled in to pick Keith up, he was already waitin’ for me on the sidewalk in front of Second Chance. His eyes were all red and his hand was bleedin’. Some heavy bouncer type was hangin’ around the front door. Shane Adams was nowhere to be seen.
If Keith’s story is anything to go by, things got pretty tense. Apparently, their get-together had been goin’ along fine, Keith relaying all his defects and problems while Adams sat there like a sponge, every now and then concocting just the right metaphor to keep Keith fuelled. Then, out of nowhere, he invites Keith to Montreal. Said he had a place up there where people could focus on straightening their lives out. That’s when Keith lost it, accused Adams of posin’ as some kind of guru lookin’ to brainwash him and stuff. And, just like that, the office door flew open and in burst this big burly chap who snapped his fingers and straight away ushered Keith to the front door. Like he’d been listening in the whole time. Adams shouted after Keith that he was more than welcome to come back whenever he felt ready to get his real life underway. But no hug, no handshake, not even a simple goodbye. Imagine. Keith hung around outside and took a few cracks at the side of the building while he was waitin’ for me. That’s how he messed up his hand. He was some vicious on the ride home.
The never-ending drama of Keith and Natasha. God help us.
We were expectin’ that Keith might get picked up by the cops then, for breakin’ his probation order. But, oddly enough, nothing came of it. Keith kept signin’ in at the station every Friday like clockwork. I made sure of that. And, as best I could, I tried to keep him clear of the beer. Wasn’t easy. So I mostly just hung around and made sure he never got too loud and wild. I felt bad for him. He was so miserable all the time, hangin’ around down by the wharf all hours in the night and half the time sleepin’ in the twine shed.
It got old pretty quick though. I got sick of babysitting, sick of spendin’ all my time worrying about what was gonna happen with poor old Keith when I hardly had a clue what I wanted to do with my own life. So, I started makin’ plans to move us into St. John’s.
Mom and Dad weren’t too keen on me and Keith shackin’ up together. For one thing we never had a cent to go about it. But I started savin’. Then I convinced Keith to put his name in on a scallop dragger in Cape Broyle.
—Go on, b’y. Sure you’re always talkin’ about gettin’ in shape. It’s only for two weeks. Fast money. When you comes back, you’ll have your own place to lay your head. Our place.
A few days later he was gone offshore. Two whole weeks. And let me tell you, I might have missed him a bit and worried about him, but them two weeks were the best I had in a long time. I went mad. The weather was warmin’ up, all kinds of parties on the go. I got so loaded one night I ended up neckin’ up a storm with Bobby! He called me up the next evening and asked me to go for a run down the Shore. I went. For a laugh. We drove down to Witless Bay and picked up some weed. On the way back we pulled in the track just outside Horse Chops and got wrecked. We shagged around a bit but I never screwed him or nothing. I’m not that bad.
I got two strange phone calls while Keith was offshore. The first was from Shane Adams. He was all concerned about Keith. I told him what I tells everyone, that Keith is doin’ the best kind, workin’ away, off the booze and maybe goin’ to school in the fall. But Adams didn’t seem to want to hear that. Something peculiar came into his voice, this weird urgency and he started askin’ me shit that was none of his business, like whether or not I was faithful to Keith, and suggesting that maybe we weren’t really right for each other.
—Who the fuck do you think you’re talkin’ to?
But he just barrelled right over me. And I let him. I don’t know what the problem was, if it was anyone else I’d just hang up. But it was like Keith said, he had this way of draggin’ things out of me to keep the conversation movin’ along. And even though I was pretty pissed, I realized I was hangin’ on his every word. I wound up spillin’ my guts about our plans to move into St. John’s, about what I wanted to do with my own life, about Keith’s drinkin’. When he let me off the phone I literally had to give my head a good shake. Like I was in a daze.
The second phone call was from R.N.C. headquarters in St. John’s. Lookin’ for Keith. It was a detective from New Brunswick. She was working with the R.N.C. on an investigation concerning none other than the Reverend-Doctor Shane Adams. They were lookin’ up all his former clients, lookin’ for statements in relation to Adams’ character. I asked what the investigation was about, but she wouldn’t tell me. Just left her name and number for Keith to get ahold of her as soon as possible. Christ, there was a movie in there somewhere. Or a book, at the very least.
Keith landed in St. John’s, skinny as a rake and hell-bent on a new tattoo. We found a little hole on the west end of Water Street called the Black Rose. Keith was lookin’ for a small tattoo of a scallop shell with the words never again underneath it. There was nothing even remotely like that available, so he settled for a little spider. He wanted it on his hand, between his thumb and index finger, but I talked him out of it and he got it on the inside of his wrist instead. Thank God. All bad enough. He told me to take my pick too. He’d gotten an advance of five hundred dollars off the boat and was expecting another twelve hundred the next day. I had a good look around while he was havin’ his tattoo done. Mostly just broken hearts and schooners and angry biker symbols though. Nothing there to suit me.
After that we went lookin’ at apartments. All the best ones were too expensive. Keith fell right in love with this hideous place above a bar called the Hatchet on Water Street. Whoever had just moved out were most likely checked into the mental. There was sick, demonic murals all over the walls. Everything was smashed to bits, holes in the ceiling. Something like spaghetti was splattered everywhere, dried onto the walls. The guy showin’ i
t to us also happened to own the bar beneath it, told Keith he’d make a fine bartender. Not exactly what I had in mind.
I called Mom and to see if I could keep the car overnight. After a good racket with her, me and Keith checked into the Captain’s Quarters on Kings Bridge Road. When we settled into our room I had him call R.N.C. headquarters. I was dyin’ to know what that was all about. But Ms. Nancy Drew was out of town. After that we watched a bit of pay-per-view and had a nice, sweaty night. Fish and chips, queen-sized bed. I hadn’t realized how much I was missin’ him. Next morning we found the place on Anderson Avenue, paid the damage deposit, and that was it. We went and got a couple of keys cut and then I drove up the Shore by myself. Keith stayed in town. I dropped him off on Water Street before I left. He said he was goin’ for a bite to eat. I knew he’d end up in the bars.
I made half a dozen trips back and forth to St. John’s that week. Aside from my own gear, I had to go all over the Cove trackin’ down Keith’s stuff for him. A hockey bag full of tapes at Gerald Careen’s place, a chest full of books down in the twine shed by the plant. A lot of his stuff was in my room. He asked me to go by his parents’ place and pick up the rest of his clothes, said they’d be packed up in garbage bags in the porch. But I couldn’t go there. Last time I’d been there his mother called me down to the dirt.
Mom brought me out with the last load of gear. We stopped at Value Village and I got a few things for the kitchen. Like I said, Mom wasn’t too keen on me movin’ in with Keith. He was in the black books at the Healy house ever since he brought the cops to the door. Mom got talkin’ about this summer job in Toronto. Dad had a friend in real estate that was lookin’ for a summer secretary. Two or three months. Good money. Dad wanted to pay for the whole lot. It sounded pretty decent, I must say. But I was determined to at least give it a try with Keith. Mom dropped me off in a huff and wouldn’t even come inside for a look around.
Keith was s’posed to meet me at the apartment for a little celebration. Of course he wasn’t there. I waited. I called around to a few bars. When I called the Hatchet, the bartender muffled the phone with her hand and I heard her say:
—Keith? Phone. Are you here?
She came back on the line to tell me that she hadn’t seen him all night.
I lugged all the gear down over the basement steps on my own. Then I got ready and went downtown to get Keith. I’d never set foot in the Hatchet before and I almost choked on the stench when I walked in. Smoke, sweat, piss, shit, fermented booze and vomit. Smelled almost like…like burnt flesh. Like the time Dad singed his hand on the stove. And what a crowd of wasters. I never saw the like in my life. Half past ten on a weeknight and no one with a leg to stand on. I walked through the whole bar, even checked the men’s toilet. The smell. I’d smelled it off Keith’s jacket before. On my way back through the bar I could feel all eyes on me, like I was a slab of meat or something. Or maybe they were just amazed that I could walk a straight line.
I was in the porch and just about to push the door open when I caught a glimpse, through a little grime-laden window, of a couple tucked away in the corner near the front windows. They were goin’ right to town, suckin’ the face off one another. I felt my knees go weak. I walked back into the bar and turned the corner behind the door. Sure enough it was Keith, face and eyes into some slut with a big shock of red hair and about twenty earrings in her ear. I grabbed him by the head of the hair and yanked him away from her. The slut looked up at me, all insulted, but she caught on quick enough. I was vicious. She jumped up and stumbled over to the bar, giggling and glancin’ over her shoulder at me. Keith tried to pull away from me, but I had a firm grip on his hair. I dragged him to his feet and out onto the street and gave him a good crack across the face. He fell down on the sidewalk, loaded. Didn’t even know who I was. I hailed a cab and the cabbie helped me load him in the car. We had to stop twice on the way uptown for him to throw up. I got him into the apartment and into bed. Somewhere along the way he’d gone out and bought himself a pair of leather pants. They didn’t look cheap either. They were tough-lookin’ biker pants. Nice to know he had his priorities straight.
He couldn’t remember anything the next morning. He was a mess. Shakin’ and bawlin’. I didn’t have the energy to bring up the incident with the slut at the bar.
Nancy Drew called that afternoon. I walked down to the police station with Keith, mostly to make sure he found his way home afterwards. On the way, we passed by the building where the Second Chance Society should have been. There was a chunky padlock on the front door and the big bright Second Chance sign was gone. We peeked in through the windows of the front office. The place was gutted, not a lick of furniture, nothing on the walls, like it’d been vacant for years.
Keith was still half-staggering when we walked through the front doors of the station. His breath reeked too. He was askin’ for it alright.
Turns out they were investigating Adams for his suspected involvement with some child pornography ring on the mainland! The good Reverend was on the missin’ list as well. Keith went and told the detective everything he knew, all about his own experience with Adams, his suspicions. Then of course he had to go and tell her that I’d been talkin’ to Adams. She called me in. Pumped me for information.
—Did he say anything, anything that might attest to his whereabouts, Ms. Healy?
There was nothing I could tell her.
Keith was some delighted with himself though. How he saw through the whole thing all along. He wouldn’t shut up. I felt like chokin’ him.
We spent the next while fixin’ up the apartment, scrubbin’, buyin’ groceries and all that happy domestic shit. My heart wasn’t in it. After Keith got through the initial stages of booze withdrawal, he lapsed into this dark, gloomy silence. I found myself bouncin’ around, grinnin’ like a proper fool, tryin’ to cheer him up. He’d look at me and grunt. Enough to sicken you. He told me one time that there was nothing, only silence, in his house for months on end when he was growin’ up. If that’s what I had to look forward to…
Anyhow, we’ve finally gotten around to our little house warmin’ celebration tonight. I bought some whole-wheat pasta and a pack of ground beef at Stockwoods. Stir-fried some veggies. Keith sat around in front of the little black and white TV ’til the table was all laid out. I put on a nice top and a bit of makeup and everything. He hasn’t changed them leather pants from the time he bought ’em. I s’pose he thinks he’s Jim Morrison now. Wouldn’t surprise me. He was Leonard Cohen last week.
Look at him, shovellin’ it aboard himself like a savage. That vicious scowl on his face. Swear he never saw a bit of ground beef in his life.
10. It’s Always Been You
SMASH!
Glass shattering on the bathroom floor.
I’m up out of bed in a flash.
I checks my bedside clock.
2:35 a.m.
I sleeps with a big piece of steel pipe at the foot of the bed. I grabs it and creeps out into the living room. I’m gonna be sick. I wish I had my boots on. It’s always easier with my boots on. What’s that? A rustle and a scuff from the bathroom. A low murmur. The light is on. I never left that light on.
I’m braced, legs spraddled for balance, pipe clenched in both hands. Mortified. Some of the most ear-piercing and nerve-racking sounds in the world are the ones made by someone, or something, tryin’ to keep quiet.
The familiar squeak of the bathroom doorknob pushes my heart up into my throat. The bathroom light falls across my face and I screams, chargin’ at the opening with the pipe up over my head, aimin’ to maim and maim for keeps. But my intruder screams too and slams the door shut just as I’m about to make contact with a face. The pipe digs into the first layer of wood on the bathroom door and something, maybe the mirror, falls from the wall and shatters onto the bathroom floor.
—Who’s here? C’mon then. You picked the wrong fella to—
From the bathroom, a quivering, choked-up voice:
�
�Keith? Keith, honey, it’s me. What’s wrong? Sleepwalking are you?
It’s Natasha. Up using the bathroom. I forgot she was back. Shit. Where does my head go? She regains herself and is not at all pleased when she inspects the hole in the bathroom door.
—Natasha. Jesus. I heard a noise. I thought it was the window and I’m half asleep girl. I had a horrible dream—
—The cat knocked a bottle into the bathtub, Keith. And the mirror is ruined now too. I got my period back. Be careful in the morning ’cause there’s glass.
The cat comes lumbering out of the bathroom, altogether oblivious to my life. I’m standin’ there with the pipe, feelin’ foolish and wantin’ the moment to pass. Natasha starin’ at me, shakin’ her head.
—You coulda killed me, Keith. I’m goin’ to bed.
She cut me off, that’s what happened. Nothing was gettin’ in the way of that job. There were greener pastures in Toronto for some reason. Greener pastures in Toronto. For the love of Christ. We’d been livin’ in St. John’s not two weeks and we were a long way from settled in. She cut me off. Just like that.
Her old man had set her up with a cozy office job for some fancy real-estate firm up there and she’d be gone all summer. The unspoken plan was that she’d meet some nice fella up there, get a taste for the good life, and leave me in the dust. By hookin’ her up with a place to stay, payin’ for her ticket and sendin’ her off with some cash in her hands, they had more or less obligated her to pay ’em back by never lookin’ back. Not in my direction anyway. She was cold as ice the days before she left, said it was a family thing.
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