For Dr. Kate
The Wasko boys
And the late, great Mr. Q
Who’s going to ride that chrome three-wheeler?
Who’s going to make that first mistake?
Who wants to wear gypsy leather?
All the way to Fire Lake?
These pages were written under the influence of many things, including Bob Seger’s “Fire Lake.” And I recommend you read them in much the same way—a little high, a little low, with “Fire Lake” playing in the background, or at least strumming through your head: the scratch of the grooves in the record, then piano and acoustic guitar, that strong steady back beat, those first haunting lines …
For my money that’s the best song ever about going to hell. In fact, Bob Seger—long may he run—should get me to write his epitaph:
“Here lies a man who wrote the best song ever about going to hell. So let him rise.”
THAT FIRST MISTAKE
INTRODUCING:
Mason, Chaz
Warren
And a little bit of Fishy.
1
Mason Dubisee dodged a booze-propelled bullet on the day he was born.
His father came in to the hospital room smiling—a bottle of champagne cradled in his arms. He looked at his wife and newborn son, tore off the foil and cranked the wire. Angling the bottle heavenward, he pushed with his thumbs.
The cork shot out with incredible force. It ricocheted off the ceiling, a wall, then rocketed into the pillow an inch from Mason’s infant cranium.
His father told the story for years to come. Grinning with pride, he’d pass around the infamous cork: “I swear to God, he dodged the fucking thing.”
It was a feat that would prove more difficult as Mason’s life went on.
On his thirtieth birthday, Mason opened his eyes—and saw water pipes. They were painted white, against a white ceiling. It took him a moment to realize he was somewhere comfortable and quiet. There was nobody kicking him, or trying to grab his stuff or banging on the door. He wasn’t too cold and he was barely hung over. There was a pillow beneath his head and when he rolled onto his side, it smelled like a new stuffed animal.
He looked at the far wall: exposed brick, power-washed clean. There were silver and bronze specks in the bricks and in the grouting, and they sparkled beneath a skylight. Against the wall was an ancient curlicued radiator, painted deep chestnut. The floor beneath it was hardwood, also dark, giving way to ceramic tiles—midnight blue and mottled—demarcating the kitchen area.
It was a thousand square-foot loft. According to Chaz it used to be a belly dance studio. If he kept turning around in bed like this he could see every corner of it.
After a while Mason was ready to get up. Or rather, down. The bed was fairly high—not so much that you’d injure yourself if you fell out, but enough that it would hurt to land. There was a three-step ladder, with storage space beneath. A captain’s bed, it was called. Mason kind of liked that. He kind of liked everything right now. It was his thirtieth birthday and here he was: waking up in a captain’s bed. He had an open concept, a skylight and hardwood floors darkened by the sweat of amateur belly dancers. The day was full of possibility.
He climbed down and pulled on a pair of boxers. They were green, with penguins on them. He stood in the middle of the room, light spilling in from all directions. There were two large windows at the front, looking down onto Spadina Avenue—and one at the back that opened onto a flat tarmac roof. He surveyed the apartment, flecks of gold dust in the air.
By one of the front windows stood a simple oak desk, by the other a seating area with a burgundy couch, two easy chairs and a TV, then a shelving unit, a cabinet and a dresser, all empty. Mason’s to fill.
Other than the duffle bag by the door, the only proof of habitation was on the table in the centre of the room. Mason pulled up a chair and studied it: Johnnie Walker Black—almost empty—two glasses, a rolled-up twenty, an ashtray surrounded by ashes, white residue, playing cards, poker chips …
How much did you lose?
He wasn’t sure, but he knew he hadn’t won—Chaz was better at poker than he used to be.
Mason picked up one of the glasses and walked into the kitchen area. The icy ceramic felt good on the soles of his feet. There was a coffee maker on the counter. He looked at it for a while, but there were too many buttons. He opened the fridge: beer and an open box of baking soda. He poured himself a glass of water, dug into his duffle bag for paper and a pen, then crossed the room and sat down on the sunlit couch. He wrote:
To-Do List—Monday
He wouldn’t usually have known the day of the week, but today was a day for cognizance, for new beginnings. He underlined To-Do List. Then Monday. Then he looked out the window.
He was sitting on the couch in his underwear staring out the window when Chaz came in. “What’s the headline, pigeon?”
“So what? You don’t knock?”
“Not till you start paying rent.” He walked over to the table in the centre of the room, slung his jacket over a chair, then started gathering up the cards. Chaz was sort of a neat freak.
“How much did I lose last night?”
“Two and a half.”
Mason’s heart rate doubled, his skin got cold. “Thousand?”
“Don’t worry,” said Chaz, stacking up the chips. “I know where you live.” He went into the kitchen area to get a dishcloth.
Until yesterday it had been five years since they’d seen each other, but Chaz looked much the same. He was wiry and there was a slickness to him, like shiny leather. Mason was well-worn suede—barrel-chested, beaten in, rough around the edges.
They’d been friends since they were kids. And now, as adults, they came on like men who’d gotten away with something, tough guys who liked to dance. Both were handsome in certain lights—dim ones mostly—which fit their lives just fine.
Chaz was wiping up the ashes. “You got some rhino coming, right?”
Other than being better at poker, this was another way he’d changed. It used to be Chaz only talked like a whacked-out gangster when he was drunk, but now he was like Jimmy Cagney on Ritalin. “I’m in a good mood,” he’d said the day before, by way of explanation. But Chaz’s mood was often good. He was the least haunted smart guy Mason had ever met.
“Rhino?” said Mason.
“You might have called it something else.” Chaz threw the dishcloth into the sink. “But if it’s a problem …”
“No. No. You’re right, I’ve got magazine money owing, from like three different stories. I just got to give them an address.”
“Well, you got one now.” Chaz spread his arms, indicating opulence as he walked across the floor. Then he sat down in one of the easy chairs.
“Yeah. Thanks for this.”
“I was just going to say, if it’s ever a problem—I mean, I don’t know what it’s like in this town, as far as the writing biz goes and all … but if you’re short, I can set you up.”
“No thanks, Chaz.”
Chaz shot him a sharp glance, then rubbed his hands together and looked around at the apartment, surveying the reno job that he himself had done. “I wasn’t talking about dealing—not a bindle-stiff like you.”
“Then what are you talking about?”
“Hotdogs,” he said, as if he’d burned himself happily—the emphasis on hot.
Mason waited.
“Uncle Fishy, he’s got this Dogfather thing.”
“Do me a favour.” Mason stood up. “A moratorium on the Chazspeak. I’ve got no clue what you’re trying to say.” He went to find a shirt.
Chaz called after him. “It’s just what I said: my Uncle Fishy has a Dogfather thing.”
“What’s a dogfather thing?” M
ason dug into his duffle bag. “And since when do you have an uncle named Fishy?”
“That’s what they call him. He’s a bit simple, but he’s family. Got all sorts of family I never met out here…”
Mason tossed clothes in all directions.
“Anyway—Fishy’s got these ideas: one of them’s the Dogfather Hotdog Company. It’s a theme thing, right? And the cart would reflect that—the ‘Dogmobile.’ It’s like a state-of-the-art, pseudomafioso hotdog-stand kind of thing.”
“That’s a terrible idea.”
“Well, either way, I gave him money for a prototype.”
“You’re kidding me.” Mason pulled on a T-shirt.
“What can I say? It’s his dream. All he needs now is a Dogfather.”
“You mean a hotdog salesman.”
“Think of it as research on the human condition.”
“There’s no way I’m selling hotdogs, Chaz.”
“Then I hope your game gets better.”
“Fuck you.”
Chaz held up his hands in surrender. Mason sat back down.
“What about that book you were writing?”
“Almost finished,” said Mason.
“Hasn’t it been like six years now?”
“Five.”
Chaz looked at him. “So what do you plan to do?
Mason reached for his to-do list. He turned it so Chaz could see. “Any ideas?”
“Number one: shave.”
Mason scraped his fingers down his bearded cheek. Chaz walked to the chair where he’d slung his jacket and took an envelope from the pocket. “Here,” he said, tossing it to Mason.
It was full of twenties. “What’s this for?” For a moment he thought Chaz had remembered his birthday.
“Basics, buddy: food, stuff for the apartment, razors … I’m strapping on jets to Montana. See a guy about a can-opener.”
“You’re cracking safes now?”
Chaz just grinned. “I’ll be back on Wednesday. And by the way, the liquor store is …,” but Mason wasn’t really listening. He knew where the liquor store was. Chaz was under the impression he’d just arrived in Toronto. After all, why would your best friend come to your town then wait a month to look you up?
“Oh, here.” Chaz reached into the other pocket, pulled out a cellphone and tossed it to Mason. “I’ll get you a landline when I’m back.”
“Thanks,” said Mason. He suddenly felt embarrassed. “I’ll have the rent together soon.”
“Good to see you, kid,” said Chaz.
Mason just nodded. That’s what Tenner used to say—he’d called them both “kid.”
This side of Spadina was Chinatown, but on the other side of the road was Kensington Market—six square blocks of mom-and-pop shops from every culture you could think of (Portuguese butchers, Korean grocers, Jamaican candlestick-makers)—the smell of barbecued sardines, mangos and pig’s blood mixing in the air.
He picked up a dozen disposable razors, ten oranges, five T-shirts, four pairs of underwear, a coffee, an empañada, and when he got back to the apartment he still had almost $480 left over. He disrobed and took the razors into the bathroom. As the steam rose he looked in the mirror. When Chaz had opened the door, what would he have seen? A world traveller? A drifter? A vagrant with a thrice-broken nose?
One more and it’ll be back in place.
He plugged the sink, made a lather with the soap, and turned off the taps. “Out of the cold just in time,” he said. But a voice inside him muttered something else.
He soaked his beard then realized he had no scissors. With this kind of scruff, a dozen razors and you still couldn’t find your face. He went to get his knife.
An hour later he was sitting on the couch eating an orange and watching Judge Judy, the first item on his to-do list done, cheeks still stinging.
He hadn’t watched TV for a while and nothing made sense. Judy was cool but everyone else in the courtroom made him sad or angry. At a quarter to three he turned off the TV. The world was quiet. He was thirty now.
He began to shuffle cards, looking at the wall. It had all been mirrors, Chaz had said, floor to ceiling for the belly dancers. He’d agonized for days, then stripped it down to the brick. Mason could picture them—all those Toronto girls in sweatpants and sports bras, undulating towards him. He shuffled the deck for a long, long time. Eventually he got up, intending to eat another orange, but instead he left the apartment.
It was after five when he got back, and he’d acquired a few more of the basics: mid-range champagne, a ghetto blaster and a stack of used CDs, a steel sword—somewhere between a cutlass and a sabre—with a dog-faced dragon on the blade, a sharpening stone and scissors, toilet paper, a cheeseburger combo from the Harvey’s right there on the corner, a pack of Camel Lights. There was $280 left in his pocket.
He took a beer from the fridge, plugged the ghetto blaster in, put on The Best of the Animals and finished his fries. He opened one of the windows. The bottom pane slid up high enough that he could sit on the ledge drinking his beer, looking at Spadina.
His was the top of a three-storey red-brick. The apartment on the second floor was still being renovated. On the street level was an electronics store and a porno shop, then a narrow alley, Harvey’s and the Lucky Save Convenience on the corner.
The neighbourhood used to be Jewish, Chaz had told him, but they sold most of it to the Chinese—and soon thereafter the city decided to turn Spadina into an expressway, which only made it halfway down its planned route from the superhighway at the top of the city before it stopped, killed in its tracks by an enlightened group of urban activists, political academics, artists, hippies, Chinese businessmen and Jewish gangsters.
Across the street from his window were bars and Cantonese restaurants and then, on the corner, the new MHAD building: the Mental Health, Alcohol and Drug Centre. It no doubt added a little something—not that the neighbourhood needed much. The original saviours of Spadina were still out there, showing their stuff: marching down the street with placards protesting shark fin soup—“Sharks are great! But not on your plate! Sharks are great! But not on your plate!”—past blankets on the sidewalk covered with DVDs, restaurant managers throwing fortune cookies, deals going down in the doorways.
On the median, conceptual art loomed: Corinthian columns rising from the concrete. Atop each column was a figure: a chicken made out of chicken wire, a steel horse, a plastic dog, and so on. Beneath the plastic dog stood a flesh-and-blood man—eyes focused on the sky, hands circling in the air, tugging—flying a kite that wasn’t there. A woman weaved out of the Palm Tree Tavern into the line of shark supporters. There was yelling and laughing. A cop car pulled onto the sidewalk. His siren gave a squawk—anyone’s guess as to who was in trouble.
Mason got another beer from the fridge. Through the back window he could see the green roof of the library. He poured himself a glass of Scotch. Sure, it was new-leaf-turning time and all that, but it was also his birthday. Just because Chaz wasn’t here didn’t mean he couldn’t celebrate. He’d never remembered Chaz’s birthday either. He walked from the back windows to the front ones. The Best of the Animals was over. He put on Billy Idol. The sun was going down. He lit a cigarette.
Soon everything glowed—the ember and the smoke, the violet exhaust rising from the street, twilight refracting off windowpanes. Through the music and the traffic he could hear his heartbeat. He picked up the cellphone and looked at it. He knew quite a few people in this city by now, but only one number.
It’s your birthday, bub. Go on—dial.
2
Mason awoke to find that his body had stopped working.
He tried to breathe but the air only got halfway to his lungs. He tried to swallow and choked. It felt like there was a block of dry wood in his mouth. He tried to raise himself off the mattress, but his arms shook and he fell back.
Water.
People had told him this would happen—that one day he’d turn thirty and wouldn’t b
e able to do the kind of things he’d always done, but he tended not to listen to people who said things like that. And even if he had, he wouldn’t have taken them so literally.
Water!
He managed to scootch to the edge of the bed. He saw the word scootch in his head, then the scales on a viper’s belly, his mean dry tongue. And now he was falling, like a snake from the bough of a tree.
When he woke again, he was lying on the floor beside the captain’s bed. There was something beneath his head: a piece of lined steno paper. He pulled at it—his to-do list, streaked with spittle and blood. On the back it read: Thanks for the party, chump.
There seemed to be a wind blowing. Slowly, he rose to his knees. It looked as if a meteor had hit the apartment. The window by the desk had been shattered—in the frame, a circle of shards like teeth in a tiger’s mouth. The floor was strewn with broken glass, underwear, cigarette butts. The TV was gone. One of the chairs had been smashed to kindling. It looked as if someone had tried to light it.
And now, as if punishing him for not getting water, something inside Mason had started playing a reel of the night before.
Clicks, flashes: faces. He knows some of them, but barely, from shelters, soup kitchens, alleyways, the shantytown down by the lake—others he doesn’t recognize.
A pile of cocaine. Someone laughs. It billows up in a cloud.
Mason beheading champagne bottles with his dog-dragon sword—running the blade up the seam in the glass—the tops, cork intact, shooting across the room, the neck cut cleanly, champagne everywhere, golden and bubbling.
“And now … the Five Gallon Bottle Dance!” Mason grabs a hat off someone’s head. People gasp, but Mason has already begun—mixing five kinds of booze in the stranger’s hat. He begins to glug it down.
The stranger grabs the hat. His face contorts. Booze spilling over both of them.
Mason hits Play on the ghetto blaster. He steadies a wine bottle on his head, his arms stretched out for poise and glory, then bends his legs and begins to kick in time to the music, dropping to his knees for the finale.
Ghosted Page 1
