by Jan Redford
Ted had always been lean and tough, but now he was gaunt. Everything about him was dark—his straight dark hair, the shadows under his hollowed-out cheekbones, the sagging bags under his eyes. He’d grown a bulky moustache that made him look like a little boy disguised as a man. Technically, because of where the break was in his neck, Ted was a quadriplegic, but he could push himself along in a wheelchair with his wrists and was able to drive a modified van.
“It’s American. You’d need a car compactor to stop that engine.” Ted seemed to be trying to sell me something he was giving away for free.
“I know American cars,” I told him. “My first two cars were Dodge Darts.” I wanted something less than ten years old, like the ’84 Toyota Corolla I’d circled with grape-scented marker in the classifieds of the Golden Star. But spring break-up had come early this year, so all logging was shut down until the ground firmed up enough to haul. Possibly as long as two months. Last year we hadn’t received an unemployment cheque for six weeks.
I turned my back to Ted and tried to glare at Grant hard enough that he’d look at me but he was oblivious. He kicked the tires, saying, “Tires are a bit worn, but we can get new ones.”
I peered in the back window. Garbage bags were stacked to the ceiling. I did not want to drive home in this big, ugly heap of metal. I was tired of feeling like a welfare mom.
“We’ve been using it as storage till Diane can get to the dump.”
“Can you help me here, Jan?” Grant said.
I resigned myself and lowered Jenna to the edge of the muck beside Chaba so I could help hook up the car to Ted’s tractor. Ted yelled instructions to Grant and the blue beast slid easily out from under the snow.
I stood guard over the patch of black left behind so that Jenna and Chaba wouldn’t wade through it. “I think it might be leaking oil,” I said.
“Why don’t you pull the garbage out, Jan? I’ll come back tomorrow with the truck and haul it off to the dump for you, Ted.”
While Grant hooked up the jumper cables from one of the tractor batteries to the car, I opened the door to the back seat and covered my face with my hands against the stench of soft banana, mould and rotten meat. I started to haul out the bags.
“Sorry. It didn’t smell as bad when they were frozen.” Ted backed his chair away from the bags.
“Shit, I’m not complaining. Free’s free.” Grant slid behind the wheel, stuck his head out the window and added, “Too bad it doesn’t have that fake wood panelling.” His laugh unleashed like a foghorn.
I crossed my fingers. Please, please don’t start.
It blasted to life with the first turn of the key. It spluttered and then it roared. I clamped my hands over my ears. Ted yelled over the noise that there was a small hole in the muffler, but he knew someone who might be able to weld it. His moustache quivered on top of his smile and I wondered for a second if this car was his revenge for my lending his wife my “feminist” books and feeding into her fantasy of going back to school.
I grabbed Jenna’s hand and pulled her away from the clouds of blue smoke. “I’ll be up at the house with Diane.”
With Jenna on my hip and Chaba at my heels, I trudged up the long driveway toward the double-wide trailer. I slowed near the top of the hill, more exhausted than I should have been.
Diane was pulling cookies out of the oven when I stepped into the kitchen. Jenna ran over to the table to join Lee and Katie who were bent over colouring books. Two dark mops of hair contrasted with my pale blond Jenna. I looked more like their mother than my own daughter’s. Jenna looked so much like Grant. The hair, the strong jaw, the light skin.
“How’re you surviving, Diane?”
“You know, same old same old.” A tired smile.
That was as close to complaining as I’d ever seen her come since the accident.
Diane scraped the cookies off the pan with a spatula and placed them on a wire rack to cool. Her face was pale and there were streaks of grey in her hair that I hadn’t noticed before. Until their Workmen’s Compensation claim came through, she had to do all of Ted’s care—he couldn’t feed himself or take care of any of his bodily functions.
“Jesus! How the hell do you find time to bake?” I said, trying to be cheerful. “That gives the rest of us a bad name.”
Diane rolled her eyes. “So, did you get it yet?”
“Nope, not yet. But the pee test came back negative.” Diane knew my period was a week late.
“That doesn’t mean much. Too early. You have to get a blood test.” She looked up from the cookies and smiled. “You have that pregnant look about you.”
“Does it resemble The Scream?”
It was rewarding to hear her laugh. I hadn’t heard that for a while.
We bundled up the three kids, filled their hands with cookies, poured coffee into a thermos, and headed down the driveway toward the rumbling noise.
* * *
—
I was close to tears on the drive home. The Skylark stank of garbage and it sounded like there was a Harley in the back seat with Jenna and Chaba. I hadn’t wanted to put her back there but the seat belts up front didn’t work.
Grant was driving too fast, playing chicken with the ditch at every curve. He’d crank the wheel and nothing would happen till he’d gone a quarter of a turn, then the car, as an afterthought, decided to do as it was told.
As we approached another curve, I pulled a sharp, hissing breath through my teeth.
“Jesus, would you quit doing that?” Grant’s forearms bulged as he tightened his grip on the steering wheel. I realized I’d probably been hissing through each turn.
“I can’t help it. And it’s better than screaming.” I braced myself for the next curve.
“I’m going the speed limit. It just feels faster in a bigger car.”
“I had that much play in the steering wheel of my ’73 Dart—then found out the steering was about to go.”
“Quit being so negative. It’s not the steering, it’s the tires. They’re bald. I’ll get new ones put on. This car’ll last for years.” He patted the dashboard.
“Oh, joy.” Those were my mother’s words coming out of my mouth. It was happening more and more often.
I peeled my eyes off the road to check on Jenna. She was trying to suck her special blanket but it kept popping out of her mouth as her head ricocheted back and forth.
As we careened around the curves toward our turnoff north of town, my mind filled with scenes of me dying in a heap of twisted metal, leaving Jenna motherless. Or worse, Jenna flying through the windshield like in a horror movie I’d seen, and me surviving. I gripped the dashboard again. “Grant, would you just slow down?”
Grant turned his whole body toward me and roared, “Shut the fuck up!”
I clenched my teeth and stared out the window. I wanted to crawl over the seat and curl up with Jenna.
We turned off the highway, not saying a word. Drove past the Magnussens’ farm, then Anne and Burl’s, and up our driveway. Grant cut the engine in front of our house. We listened as the last of the exhaust rumbled through the hole in the muffler, both of us staring at our little cedar house over the crack that ran the whole length of the windshield.
With his hands still on the steering wheel, Grant, sounding defeated, finally said, “I know you won’t believe me, but I’m doing the best I can.”
26
DIE YOUNG, STAY PRETTY
When the phone rang in the middle of the night, I was awake instantly. I glanced at the red glowing numbers of the clock. Midnight. If someone was calling this late, it was probably with news I didn’t want to hear.
Grant lay unmoving like a plank of wood beside me. I pushed away my extra pillows and heaved myself from my back onto my side with the grace of a turtle flipping itself over. I would have suspected triplets if I hadn’t heard the single heartbeat with my own ears, or seen the ultrasound with only two little hands and feet. There was a good chance I’d surpass the forty-five po
unds I’d gained with Jenna. At seven and a half months I’d gained thirty. I was so big I’d grown right out of my new job.
For four months I’d been working as a silviculture technician with the Ministry of Forests. It was my dream job, tromping up and down steep logging blocks in the bush with a bunch of women, but I’d only been three months pregnant when I started. The bigger I got, the harder the job became. One day I fell over in the middle of a plot on flat ground and punctured my butt on a stick. I’d just been holding the end of the measuring tape. Another day, I rolled down an embankment into a ditch. When word got back to the big boss, he’d suggested I finish up, go home and look after my family. I didn’t like his tone, but was secretly relieved. I was ready to knit, drink tea and play Barbies with Jenna. The season was almost over till next year anyway.
The din of the phone pierced the air and bounced off the vaulted ceiling.
Grant groaned. “Just ignore it. They’ll go away.”
The phone kept ringing.
“What if it’s one of our parents?” My father had fallen off a ladder a couple of weeks ago. He had broken some ribs and ended up in the hospital. I’d panicked when I got that call, realizing how much I didn’t want anything to happen to him.
Grant pulled his pillow over his head.
The air was cold on my bare legs as I swung them over the side of the bed. It was only October and we were already burning through our stash of firewood. With a flannel blanket draped over my extra-large T-shirt, I padded along the wood floors in bare feet, down the stairs toward the phone. At least I didn’t have to get up early for work anymore.
It was Dave, my friend from Canmore, who’d been my fellow Canadian at NOLS in Wyoming. I didn’t see him often these days. Our lives had careened off in opposite directions. He was a mountain guide and the director of the Yamnuska Mountain School, and I was a logger’s wife and mother in the wilds of BC.
His voice was husky, like he’d been shouting too much. Or crying.
My hand settled on my belly as though that would steady me. Dave wouldn’t call from Canmore at midnight unless someone was dead. I wanted to set the phone back on the cradle. Go back to sleep. Pretend I’d never answered it.
“Who?” I said.
“Niccy. Niccy’s dead. I’m so sorry, Jan.”
I sank into the sofa, crushed the receiver into my ear against his words. I couldn’t speak.
“It happened this afternoon, in Leavenworth. She was guiding. It’s been a nightmare here. Her parents…” His voice broke. “She fell right past her students.”
I couldn’t breathe. But I had to breathe for my baby. I groaned and tried to put my head between my legs but my belly was in the way. Grant appeared at the railing above me in his underwear. I looked up at him, gasping.
“Who?” he said. He sounded resigned.
“It’s Niccy!”
He lowered his forehead to the railing. “Oh, Christ.”
* * *
—
The memorial service was at Camp Chief Hector, near Canmore, where Niccy and I had met ten years before. The dining area in the huge post-and-beam lodge was full, mostly of climbers. Many of them had been at Dan’s memorial in Banff four and a half years earlier. And Ian Bult’s, John Lauchlan’s, Alan Deane’s, Dave Cheesmond’s, Steve Devine’s, BJ’s. The same ones who would come to Grant’s if he fell off a mountain.
I saw James’s long red ponytail and moved toward the group of guides he was with. James had been the head guide on the trip to Leavenworth with Niccy. He’d been one of our mentors when we’d started out. One of the mountain gods. He’d taught me how to ice climb. Now he looked small, defeated. He put his arm around me when I slipped in beside him.
“That’s a pretty big belly you’ve got there.” He smiled. His eyes were bloodshot. I smoothed Diane’s maternity dress over my bulge.
“When are you due?”
“Month and a half. A Christmas baby.”
He was staring at my belly the way the guys at the Forestry office did. As if he were terrified that something was going to erupt from me, like in Alien.
James and I talked about everything except what we were here for. Everyone in the room seemed to be doing the same. The laughter and chatter disguised the fact that this was a memorial service for a woman who’d loved life and had only managed to hang on to hers for thirty years.
“I’m so sorry you had to go through that.” My voice cracked.
James’s pale blue eyes glazed over. He’d been the first to reach Niccy’s body. She’d fallen three hundred feet. His last image of her was a shattered one, while the rest of us got to remember her as our strong and bold Niccy.
“Yeah. Hasn’t been a good week.” He forced a smile.
Bruce—the original director of the Yamnuska Mountain School back in the early days when it broke off from Camp Chief Hector—stood in front of the stone fireplace, waiting to start the eulogy, so we all moved toward him. Grant and I leaned against a wood railing.
“Niccy and I used to sit in my cabin, or on the porch, right here at Camp Chief Hector, drinking red wine and talking about life.”
As Bruce talked about Niccy, my fists clenched and unclenched at my sides and I realized I wasn’t just sad, I was pissed off. At Niccy. Because she’d fucked up. She’d been climbing an easy route beside her students as they learned to lead and she hadn’t roped up. She’d been too fucking cocky, just like when we’d worked at the cadet camp together.
One of the students had told Dave that just before she fell, Niccy had said, “Shit.” Her last word. She hit the ledge headfirst, right in front of the other students, before she continued her fall to the ground.
It was so quiet in the huge dining room I could hear someone clear his throat on the other side. My own throat was aching from holding everything in.
Now Niccy would never meet my new baby. And she wouldn’t meet Wendy’s new baby, Zac, who’d arrived prematurely, twelve hours after Niccy’s death. Wendy was still in the hospital with him.
Bruce swiped at his cheek. “I shared with her my own philosophy: ‘Life is short. Do what makes you happy.’ And she ended up practising it much better than I do.” Bruce smiled, then looked down at his feet for a few very long moments. “In the end, she followed her heart. She was finally on her way, her dreams all coming true. She was a mountain guide.”
Grant handed me a Kleenex. My anger was no longer able to act as a dam.
Students came up to the front, one after another, sharing their Niccy stories. She’d been such a good teacher. She’d made them feel brave, capable. I wanted to get up and tell everyone I’d felt the same way when I climbed with Niccy. She’d brought out the climber in me. Helped me get out of my own way. But my voice wouldn’t work.
Niccy’s father took his place in front of the fire. “My daughter was stubborn.” Laughter and murmurs of agreement rippled through the room. “I’ll tell you how stubborn she was,” and he described how her mother had forced her to eat her peas, so she stored the entire serving in her cheek and got rid of them later. He told us how he’d wanted her to go to university to become a forester. “But Niccy wanted to be a mountain guide,” he said. “So that’s what Niccy did. We eventually worked things out.” He chuckled and lifted the edges of his mouth in some semblance of a smile.
That was Niccy. She didn’t let anything get in her way: not the sexism in guiding, not fear, not failure. Definitely not a man, including her father.
Niccy’s mother spoke next. Niccy had been this woman’s little girl. It didn’t matter that Niccy was thirty. I suddenly wanted to phone my neighbour, make sure Jenna was okay. I wanted to go home. Please. I can survive anything but that….
A sob erupted from me. Grant put his hands on my shoulders. I wanted my anger back. Anger was easier than this.
“If you could write me stories, any of your memories of Niccy, all the stories you’ve told tonight, please, I would treasure them.”
What would Niccy have want
ed me to tell her mother? We’d made some stupid, cocky mistakes together. And we’d laughed. Like on the way out from Aberdeen, miles and miles of empty trails in mountain boots and Niccy, a profuse sweater, had whipped off her shirt and bra and hiked topless. Her uninhibitedness surprised me. It had usually been me letting it all hang out. Then a bunch of guys came around the corner. I’d never heard her scream so loud. That would be a good story to write to her mother.
I looked over at Sharon. She wasn’t alpine climbing anymore. Not since her son was born. Even though she’d climbed Everest. Three other women I used to climb with had kids, and none of them took big risks in the mountains now. Maybe a baby would have saved Niccy.
Niccy’s mother ended by telling us how proud she was of her strong daughter, of her integrity. Of everything she’d achieved in a short, intensely lived lifetime. She spoke of Niccy in present tense.
At Dan’s memorial so many people had said the worn-out, “He died doing what he loved.” I hoped people were telling Niccy’s parents she’d lived doing what she loved. She went after her dream and never gave up.
27
GRANT’S LUNCH
As Sam nursed, he clenched and unclenched fistfuls of my skin. His body was heavy and compact in my arms, already a little bundle of muscle at three months. He pulled back to watch me, smiled a milky smile. Thick, dark eyelashes ringed his huge, round, blue eyes—the whites so clear, so unblemished. I gave him my exaggerated mommy-smile back, then breast milk spewed like a geyser, spraying him in the face until he latched back on.
