If Clara

by Martha Baillie

  Are kindness and respect particularly rare in a psychiatrist? I’m not prepared to say. Ask your aunt or your brother. I’m sure someone in your family has an opinion based on personal experience of the sort they avoid discussing. They freed me from the hospital. But before they opened the door and let me go, the shrink in charge sat down on my bed. I felt the warmth of his breath on my cheek and smelled the mint of his mouthwash. I froze. I wanted to move but couldn’t. He asked what sort of support I had in place for when I was released. I didn’t answer. He repeated his question, in the tone of someone with meetings to attend and reports to fill out, someone who’s had his patience tried to the limit by clumsy people who attempt to kill themselves but survive, people who are fascinating on paper but difficult in person, and so I nodded, I gave him the answer he wanted, the quickest one, as if I were completing a multiple-choice exam and not about to be raped. Yes, I nodded. Yes, a psychiatrist is waiting for me in the outside world. Good, he said, and looked pleased, and got up off my bed, and I could breathe again. He smoothed his hair, checked his watch to reassure himself that he belonged to a different world than I did, wished me luck, and walked out of my room. They released me and I had no doctor, no source of medication. Julia started making phone calls. She likes making phone calls. The shrink who’d sat on my bed did not return Julia’s calls until at last he grew tired of her panic-stricken messages. He informed Julia that he could not discuss me with her, and asked if she had ever heard of the word confidentiality. He would be happy to speak to me, and only me. Julia must never call again. ‘Your calls will not be returned.’ He was an articulate man, a clear thinker. It was me he wanted. I refused. I couldn’t. I wouldn’t. ‘Tell him to come sit on my bed, I’ll tie the sheets around his neck,’ whispered Kevin, and I put on my headphones and played Arcade Fire so I couldn’t hear Kevin. It was Alice who came up with the name, Dr. Burns. The last thing I wanted was her fingering my life, checking for signs. But Alice is smart and I needed a name, so I wrote it down. Dr. Fiona Burns. And here we are, ten years later, Dr. Burns and I still meeting once a week. Of course she’s got lots of others and I have only her. But I try to make sure the equation’s not that simple.

  Julia

  She will sharpen her insults and attack whenever threatened. I will continue to threaten. I am neither dense nor cruel. I threaten because of the news I bring. I am Everyday Reality’s unwanted emissary, bearing with me Alice’s finances, Alice’s medical conditions. I am a reminder that Clara depends upon Alice. I threaten because of a chronic confusion on my part as to who my sister has become. I fail to see her illness as continuously present. There are moments when she seems as before, the sister I once knew. For hours at a time she performs with grace and humour an act entitled Well-being and Happiness. Except for the trembling of her hands, her performance is flawless. One afternoon, I raised the subject of income tax. Decades have passed since she last filed with Revenue Canada. Every year they send a letter of warning.

  ‘I really think we should get your income tax done,’ I told her, as I stuffed into an envelope the documents I’d spent all day gathering for the accountant I’d hired for Alice. ‘For them I don’t really exist,’ replied Clara, stirring her tea. ‘No,’ I argued, ‘you do. And, in my experience, Revenue Canada can be quite merciless.’ She fell silent. She’d dropped by Alice’s house, cheerful, talking of poetry and art. Her afternoon in the library, spent leafing through books on Christian Boltanski and Louise Bourgeois, had filled her with energy. Her layered outfit consisted of several skirts of contrasting textures, and two or three tops torn judiciously, safety pins arranged as ornamentation, a striking line of them crossing her hip on the bias. As always, she possessed and displayed an offbeat, inimitable elegance, which I admired and envied. In that moment, in our mother’s kitchen, Clara sipping her tea and talking with insight and enthusiasm about art, I mistook her for my sister, a person inhabited by a single, rational self, a person adept at forming opinions, yet open to exploring contradictions. How did I allow myself to forget that my sister, the person sipping tea in my mother’s kitchen, smiling, while inquiring what books I’d recently read, was being devoured by an illness of the mind, which caused her to believe that all government organizations were fronts, shielding those whose mission it was to capture and torture her? Was it laziness or disregard, jealousy perhaps, that prevented me from recalling the truth of her condition? What stopped me from behaving with appropriate delicacy and caution? Surely I could have guessed how cruel it was to tell someone with a persecution complex that an arm of the government is ‘merciless’ and unlikely to overlook them?

  To know what you are saying, you must know to whom you are saying it. To whom was I speaking? In that moment, standing in our mother’s kitchen, listening to Clara describe a work by Boltanski, a work I knew well and found fascinating, consisting of 686 boxes made of white lead, each box hiding and preserving a portion of the photos, letters, articles, drawings, and other documents collected by Boltanski in his studio over a period of twenty-three years, boxes stacked in rows, forming a wall three metres high and illuminated from above by black desk lamps, whose wires dangle as if to suggest haste, flight, or negligence, and the whole titled The Archives of C.B. 1965–1988, in that moment of conversation, I forgot my sister’s illness. Or did I?

  Perhaps what I am saying is untrue, and I was conscious of her illness in that moment of conversation. Possibly I was concentrating upon her illness, and her wellness, and felt, and judged, that if she was well enough to spend the day reading about art, while I laboured, preparing Alice’s documents for the accountant, then she was well enough to contemplate other realities besides art, including the presence in all of our lives of Revenue Canada.

  What I felt and thought, why I spoke the words I spoke, in that moment in our mother’s kitchen, I cannot say with certainty. Too much time has passed. A few minutes is sufficient time to doubt one’s own motives, and months can bring clarity or greater confusion when one’s unstated goals are the subject of contention. Clara accused me of cruelty, and for the next six months refused all contact. I wished she’d chosen a softer word than cruelty, just as she wished that I had chosen a softer word than merciless.

  Clara

  Only by pretending to be Julia was I able to write a novel. It is my novel, not hers. She does not know it exists. Language is not at odds with Julia. For her it does not break apart midway through a sentence. By telling myself, ‘You are Julia,’ repeatedly, ‘You are Julia,’ I tied the many strands together, used knots to create a narrative in the shape of a net. See Kamar thrashing, caught in my plot? I am a loaf that tastes of fish. When Julia tells a story, other voices do not subvert her enterprise. I will not write another novel. It was Dr. Burns who urged me to aim for coherence. Don’t Get Me Wrong, that’s all, that’s it, already Kevin’s whispering in my ear, ‘You little shit,’ while pinching Annabel, whose only defence is to wail. Fucking proliferation of emotion. Everyone’s desire keeps poking in, pretending to be a thought. The dialogue spews. Don’t stop writing, stick to the page, ink scratch on paper, dry as can be, pattern begetting pattern until the voices, crushed under the weight of the written, can do no more than whisper. ‘Kill yourself,’ they whisper. ‘Use the knife in the kitchen.’ Instead, I remain seated at my typewriter, pounding. They slide their soft insistence. ‘Pills you’ve already tried. Let’s see you succeed this time. Surprise us, use a rope.’ Each key is marked with a letter. I AM MADE OF WAX. Capitals must not be overused or the paper goes deaf. I’m not writing to be heard by anyone but this sheet of paper. Let Kamar pursue the thankless task of being understood. I’m happier when my sentences shut themselves tight. I dream of lids, not liftoff. The raw, unspeakable world unwinds. For each dream, paper takes the hit.

  Daisy

  ‘Clara?’

  It was her nervousness that made me guess who she was, also her eyes. Eyes of an oceanic intensity, weather-station eyes – they matched my idea of her. I smiled.


  ‘Daisy?’

  ‘Yes, I am Daisy. And you must be Clara? You already have some coffee?’

  ‘I’m sorry.’ Her face filled with apology. ‘I went ahead. I was feeling sleepy. Coffee usually keeps me awake for a bit.’

  ‘I’ll go get a tea. I’ll just be a minute.’

  But the young man behind the counter, perhaps because of my crutches, came over and took my order. I leaned my crutches against the wall and lowered myself into the chair, facing the small table at which Clara sat. I manoeuvred the penniless pirate leg attached to my hip. It just fit under the table. Next I pulled Clara’s manuscript out of my bag. The sight of her manuscript made her look away. She gazed at the floor, where nothing particular was happening. I followed her eyes. Brilliant light in the shape of two rectangles twitched on the floorboards. The boards had been painted blue long ago.

  ‘I’ve read it twice,’ I told her, and paused. As she said nothing, I continued. ‘I think it’s brilliant. Why not become F. H. Homsi yourself, or F. H. Holmes, not necessarily a Syrian, and send it off?’

  From her look of panic, I thought she might shove back her chair and rush out of the café.

  I assured her, ‘I read your letter: the author must be F. H. Homsi. I’m not disagreeing, just curious to know why.’

  Already she’d been sitting very straight in her chair, now she pulled herself even taller.

  ‘If it weren’t for Kamar, you wouldn’t be here talking to me. I invented her and you believed in her enough to come here. If Kamar weren’t a Syrian refugee, you wouldn’t have cared about her. People have decided that Syrian refugees exist. In a while they’ll tire of them, and move on to their next cause, and Syrian refugees will cease to exist in the news and on the lips of Canadians between mouthfuls of breakfast. Nobody believes what has happened to me. But they’ll believe Kamar. You did. The mentally ill, we’re all refugees.’ Clara lifted her coffee cup, but set it back down without taking a sip, her hand trembling. She slipped her hands out of sight, under the table, swallowed air, and continued speaking, addressing the surface of the table. ‘We’re frightening, we don’t contribute because we don’t have jobs, we’re scared, and angry, unpredictable, and landlords don’t want us. Kamar and I have certain things in common. But I want her to have an author who speaks her language, who grew up hearing the same folk tales, eating her favourite foods. She’ll be less lonely if F. H. Homsi wrote her.’ She raised her eyes and stared into mine. Her inner weather had shifted. With a look of confidence bordering on disdain, she informed me, ‘If I’d written about me, you wouldn’t have cared. But a Syrian refugee? That’ll sell, you thought.’

  The waiter brought me my tea and I found his presence reassuring. I was no longer a child and no longer accustomed to being told what I felt, what I cared or didn’t care about, and what my motives were. Even as a child I’d intensely disliked it when anyone tried to inform me of my own thoughts and feelings.

  ‘If Kamar had not been Syrian, I would have believed in her suffering, and cared. I didn’t need her to be a refugee. But she is a refugee, and the country she’s fled is Syria, and you might not have been able to write the way you did if she hadn’t been from Syria. There are the folk tales, which you’ve made inseparable from her. It feels right. That’s why I’m here. I’m here because this manuscript feels true. I’ve no idea if it will sell. I want people to have a chance to read what you’ve written. How many people, I can’t say.’

  ‘Excuse me,’ she said, snatching her shoulder bag from the floor, yanking the strap up over her shoulder, while pressing the bag to her chest as if its cloth and bulk might shield her, and she headed for the bathroom at the back of the café.

  Apart from the waiter I remained alone. It was a tiny room. Outside, clouds heavy with rain carried their dark cargo across the sky above the park, and trees swayed in the wind. On the sidewalk, pedestrians were leaning forward, stepping more quickly, pressing their coats shut and pulling their hats down. The flow of cars proceeded uninterrupted. On the café floor, Clara’s rectangles of sunlight were no longer twitching, they were gone. I reached under the table to reposition the stiff limb attached to my hip. The young man behind the counter, dishtowel and glass in hand, looked over and smiled.

  ‘Tell me it wasn’t a bicycle accident.’

  ‘It was.’

  ‘Oh, Christ. Not another.’

  I told him the circumstances of my fall, the comforting absurdity of it, that I’d been moving very slowly when my bicycle’s right handlebar caught on a city garbage bin, that the weight of too many books, pounds and pounds of them in the basket above the rear tire, caused the bicycle to topple violently and my leg to twist as I tried to catch my balance, the bicycle’s front bar smashing my tibia. It was ‘my’ leg back then, a loyal part of me, dependable, hard-working, mine. ‘Another few weeks,’ I explained to the waiter, ‘and the surgeon may allow me to put a first bit of weight on it. Meanwhile, I’m trying to get it to bend, using no extra force, only the pull of gravity.’

  Just as the waiter was wishing me luck, Clara reappeared and he turned to the task of putting away glasses, bowls, and plates. The china and glass produced a pattern of pleasing clicking sounds, which I hoped Clara would find as soothing as I did. Clara sat down opposite me, as before.

  ‘I can’t know about any changes you make. You can’t tell me. Not under any circumstances. Your role, as F. H. Homsi, will be to protect Kamar, to allow only the smallest changes required, and to inform me of none of them. If I knew you were editing my words, I’d want to do something to make you stop. I wouldn’t hurt you but possibly me. Even if I can’t protect myself, I can defend Kamar through you. I’m not rewriting her, nobody is. She must be respected and heard. But if I keep her at home with me, she won’t be heard. If I let her out, changes will be demanded. That’s why you’re important. As F. H. Homsi, you can agree to a minimum of editing, and not tell me. I’ve read your books. I trust you to make good decisions.’

  ‘May I think this over?’

  In my nervousness, my gaze slid away from her.

  ‘Could we meet again, in two weeks? Same time, same place, exactly two weeks from today, and I’ll have an answer for you?’ I said, and to calm myself I rested my hand on the penniless leg. Its message was: You are not in control. You understand little. Allow for the unexpected.

  ‘It is a novel that should be read. You’ve written a difficult, beautiful novel. If I do send it out for you, I’ll make sure the text is respected. But you’ll have to continue trusting me over a period of months, even years, and accept the results of doing so. As I’ve said, I love it as it is. But any good publisher will want to edit. At a certain point, there won’t be any going back. It will go to press, approved of by F. H. Homsi. Homsi could involve you, when there’s still time. Homsi could consult with you. But that’s the opposite of what you’re asking. I have to think this through before agreeing to be Homsi.’

  Clara Hodgkins promised to meet with me in two weeks’ time, then hurried out of the café. I watched as she walked west along Queen, head held high, straight into the driving wind and rain.

  Maurice

  ‘Not bad,’ I offered, with a shrug.

  ‘That’s it?’

  ‘It’s not my thing. Too much going on at once. How many videos? Six in one room? I knew it would feel horrible, being in there with the binoculars gone. Ease my anguish, Julia. Bring back the binoculars. Aim my gaze at two doors: one blue, one black. Only one needs to open. His blue door.’

  Julia offered me one of her wry smiles as she slid the upper drawer of her desk shut.

  ‘Maurice, you knew it couldn’t last forever. You can buy your own binoculars and watch his door from the sidewalk.’

  ‘We’ve met,’ I said, with as much restraint as I could manage. ‘It feels like ages ago, and no time at all,’ I added, casual as a stripper.

  She’d lowered her gaze and was logging off her computer. Then, pulling her purse out of a deeper drawer, s
he told me in a soft voice, ‘Yes, we’ve met, Maurice, and it was ages ago. In high school. You’re the only person I still want to know from back then.’

  ‘Not you, Julia.’ I couldn’t help grinning. ‘Mr. Fancy Shoes. He and I. We’ve met.’

  Her arms dropped to her sides.

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Oh! You got that right.’

  ‘You went over?’

  ‘I did. I’m famished.’

  I guided her out of the office and into the foyer.

  ‘And?’

  ‘He’s divine. The divine Bruce Mammadov. His grandparents left Azerbaijan for Australia. They bought land stolen from the Aboriginals, thousands of acres of it, and flourished, grazing and breeding unimaginable numbers of sheep and cattle that munched up all the indigenous plants, the plants so adept at keeping the rain from rushing away, from carving great gullies en route. They are as guilty as it gets, the Mammadovs of South Western Australia; they are as criminal as you and I are, ambling over stolen land in the direction of Queen Street.’

  The light turned red and we had to wait.

  ‘The Divine Bruce Mammadov knows no red lights! He grew up in a fly-infested hamlet, a cluster of stone houses with tin roofs, erected in the middle of somewhere (if you’re Aboriginal) or nowhere (if you’re not Aboriginal), and from there he escaped to Milan, where he sold his taste and charm, working as a fashion consultant, and opened a high-end clothing store. But he missed the taste and colour of the soil into which he’d spat as a child, a child running on long legs, kicking stones, and stopping now and again to draw in the dirt with a stick. He would pause in his running just long enough to draw all the fancy clothes he saw on TV, and even fancier outfits that only he and the dust and the flies knew of. In Milan, he’d dreamed of the orange and ochre dust that had coated his skinny child limbs, and he’d missed the gullies with sides so straight they could only have been carved by a knife-wielding giant but instead were made, and extended yearly, by torrents of rain. He missed the months of suffocating heat when he never put his foot down without checking for a snake. He missed the airborne arrival of clouds of parrots, who weighed down the branches of slender trees, ravenous white parrots called cockies, who sharpened their bright yellow beaks on the leaves of the eucalyptus, killing the venerable trees, the wretches. Because of missing home so much, Bruce gave up Milan. Toronto can’t hold him, Julia. Not if Milan couldn’t. What do I do to keep him here? What will become of me when he goes?’