Heather packed a small carry-on bag for the plane trip. I empty it out and pack some bare necessities in it, my identification, some clothing, toiletries, only the things that won’t weigh me down. Then, I zip it closed. I want it to look like I’m coming back to the room. I pile the bedding to one side of the bed, and push a couple of pillows under the sheets. It almost looks like someone is sleeping in there, and in the dark, it might gain me a minute or two. Somewhere in my mind, my plan continues to take shape.
I stand at the bottom of the bed, enjoying the heat and letting the sweat from my walk run down my face. I think of the lake at the end of the world. I think of a scared girl, carefully placing all of her little figurines on the shelves around my bed. I think of the way she looked at me when she did it, the way she looked at me for my approval. I don’t think of the lies, or the betrayal. I think of a girl with a half dimple, sitting at the lake at the end of the world, afraid to tell me who the father of her child really is. I open up the small bag once again, and go around the room, picking up some of her things, and adding them to mine.
Thornside, is listed in the telephone directory that’s in the drawer of the small bedside table. The listing shows an address and some basic directions. Michael was right; I’ll have to change from the main highway to another one, and then to a road whose name I don’t recognize, but I’m fairly sure that I can find it. I dry the sweat off my face and find some leftover fruit and granola bars amongst our things. I eat silently, sitting by the window, waiting for the darkness to come.
The snow subsides for a moment, then starts again, falling even harder, and faster than it was before. I look across the parking lot, at the closed door of the laundry room, feeling the key, still in my pocket. I wait until I see the lights from the motel office go off. I picture Claude, retiring to the back, a glass of whisky in his hand. I wait, watching for any movement, but there is none. The main highway is quiet with just the odd car every few minutes, struggling along slowly, through the snowy night. I listen, hoping to hear the rumble of a snowplough, but it’s quiet, almost serene.
I close the curtains, and unscrew the bulbs from the overhead light and the bedside lamps. Quietly, I open the front door, still looking, listening, for any activity. I lock the door behind me, watching the dark office, and the laundry room door. As fast as I can, I make my way across the snowy parking lot, carrying the small, bag that’s packed with our things. The laundry room door lock turns just as easily and silently as it did earlier, and I enter the dark room.
There are no rumblings of washing machines this time. Fortunately though, it’s still warm inside, and I can hear the faint humming noise from the electrical panels in the back utility room. I feel my way around in the dark, getting my bearings. I look in the back room, to see that it’s just as I left it, earlier in the day. I suspect that the key I took was a spare, and that Claude, or his lady friend, automatically locks the laundry room door at a designated time each day with their own set of keys. There is a small window at the front. I tilt the venetian blinds on it and can look directly across the parking lot at my idle rental car, parked in front of my room, right where it should be.
My breathing returns to normal. I hadn’t noticed how tense I’d been as I stole my way across the parking lot, watching for any sign of movement from the road or the office. I can see the snow, falling lazily now, not with the force it had earlier, filling the footprints that I left. There is no noise. The highway remains eerily quiet, and the weather drops a muffled blanket over any outside sound. There is a room with a light coming from it at the far side of the motel; another overnight traveller I suppose. After a while, it goes out and the darkness quickly settles over everything. I’ve rarely seen Canadian snow during my mild Vancouver winters, but I have seen Scottish snow. I’ve experienced that.
I went back to Scotland for a month after I graduated from college and travelled around the country. I took my dad, and my girlfriend of the day to all of the places that we never visited growing up. My dad gave us a running commentary on the battle of Culloden when we reached Inverness. He told us about William Wallace when we visited a monument in Stirling. We reached the gateway to the highlands; I drove us through the snow, even farther. I took us as far north as we could, all the way to John O’ Groats. I was born farther south, in Kilmarnock, but this still felt like my country, all of it.
My mother met my father when she took a trip to Scotland as a young twenty-something year old girl. My father charmed her as the Scottish gentleman that he is, and she charmed him into thinking that she could be a good faithful partner. When she tired of what she called his ‘dour Scottish moods and the gloomy climate’, she took me back to the motels of Vancouver. My father never did recover from her leaving, but he was always glad to have me back in Scotland.
He talked to me during that trip, talked to me as an adult. We drove through the early winter snow in the north of the country, over roads that tourists never make it to, and he talked to me about the past. I drove carefully along the twisting highland curves, as my girlfriend slept in the back seat, with my dad beside me, reminiscing. He told me how I had kept his life complete, even though he didn’t know anything about raising a child. He told me how I’d intimidated him with my knowledge and the ease with which it took me to acquire it. I looked straight ahead at the road as he talked, not wanting interrupt the emotions that were finally coming from him. He tried to turn me into him for a while, he said, a brawling, football playing, man’s man, but it didn’t work. I became me. He said that he loved me and smiled, saying that he liked what I’d become.
The snow continues to fall outside the laundry room, as the night gets later and later. I’m tired and let out a yawn. I wonder if I should try to sleep. I wonder if I’ll hear his vehicle outside if I just lay my head down on the floor, and sleep for a few moments. I think for a moment that I might be wrong. He might not come. He might be at the hospital. He might not be thinking about me, worrying that I might know what he’s done, and what happened in his home ten years earlier. I might be wrong.
I barely hear the vehicle, as it creeps into the parking lot. At first, I think it might not be him. It’s not a police car, but then I recognize it. I remember the big sports utility vehicle, sitting in his driveway. The snow is still soft, and there’s little noise, as it slowly makes its way towards my room. He sits there for a minute; then two minutes; then five. I strain my eyes and can see Heather’s father, sitting inside the car. I can make out his head, the greyness of his hair. He turns around and looks at the office, then over to where I’m crouched by the window. He pauses, looking in my direction for a moment too long, but then he returns his attention to my room. I exhale, realizing I’ve been holding my breath in again, just like back at the barn.
He slowly makes his way out of his vehicle, and reaching down below his seat, pulls out a small bat or baton. Quietly, almost gently, he pushes the car door closed behind him. He looks over his shoulder to the office and the parking lot one more time as he walks to my room door, and tries opening the handle. He stands for a moment, and I ready myself. I grab the bag, and put my hand on the inside of the laundry room door. I hold onto the door handle tightly, and wait as he returns to his vehicle, and once again opens the car door. His head ducks down into the back seat, and he comes out with a tool. His back is to me. I bend open one of the bottom slats in the blind just in time to see him walking back to my door. I have a clear picture of him now. I almost feel as though I’m standing right behind him. He’s working the tool on the door, quietly, efficiently, trying to pry it open at the lock. His body doesn’t bend the way a weaker man’s would. He stands erect, using the strength in his arms to force it open.
He jumps slightly as it pops open, but he still doesn’t move, waiting. I can see him so well now that I feel like I can hear him breathing. The motel room door opens in his hands, yet still he doesn’t move. He waits. His back to me. I can see him watching, waiting for some movement from inside the room.
Slowly, gradually, he moves into the room, and I reach for the laundry room door and open it.
I move with a speed I didn’t realize I had and bolt from the laundry room, out into the parking lot. I only cover a few steps when I have a change of heart, and go back towards his vehicle. He didn’t take the keys. They’re still hanging from the ignition. I imagine him in my room, trying the light switch that won’t work as I quietly open his door, then reach over and grab the keys that he left there. I quickly pull them and close the car door behind me, as quietly as I can. I look once to the room and the door that he closed behind him.
I run. I run with a panicked, frantic pace. My legs slide and I right them, trying to move forward. I run in the snow, along the side of the highway. I focus on the road in front of me and nothing else, as I try to make my way back to the parked truck. I hold the small bag in one hand, and his car keys in the other, forcing my legs to move quickly through the snow. I listen as I run, trying to hear any noises, over the sounds of my heavy breathing. I hear what sounds like a car, slowly, methodically, coming down the highway behind me, pursuing me. I feel his keys in my hand. He might have spare keys for his vehicle, but it isn’t likely that he has them with him. It can’t be him, not so quickly. But still the sound gets closer. I can’t look back. I continue moving towards where I parked the truck. I keep moving forward. I can feel the weight of the snow, as my feet keep moving with all the speed that I can muster, but still I hear the vehicle. The sound gets closer. I feel like he’s watching me, but still, it stays back. I run frantically now, along the side of the snowy highway.
As the lights from the vehicles headlights shine on my back, and light up the ground in front of me, I desperately jump to the side of the highway. I stay clear of the ditch, still trying to move forward, still not wanting to look back and see him. I stumble, but catch myself before I fall. I stop, clutching the small bag in one hand, holding it, ready to swing it like a weapon, as I turn my head back towards the vehicle.
There’s a large, dark, van with a young bearded man, rolling down his window, laughing at me. “Out jogging?” He turns to the driver, another young man, involving him in the joke.
I stop, looking behind them, down the road, searching for another vehicle. I’m out of breath, sweating. “No, I’m sorry. I thought you were someone else.” I wonder if they see the relief that I’m feeling. They let their vehicle idle on the deserted road, looking at me incredulously. “My truck, it’s just down the highway. I’m just getting back to it.” I can see the truck now, just off in the distance, where I left it.
“We’d drive you, but you look like you’re gonna make it okay.” The passenger smiles at me, and I can hear the driver telling him to roll up the window. “You are going to be okay aren’t you?” I can’t tell if he means it, or if it’s the beginning of another sarcastic remark.
I nod, and before I can answer him, the van drives away, and I continue quickly towards the truck.
Even as I sit in the pickup truck, I feel as though I’m still running through the snow. I turn on the engine, and just as Michael promised, it quickly turns over and fires. The sweat from my run rolls down my forehead, and stings my eyes. I let the defrost fans unthaw the windshield, keeping a watch on the road, checking to see if there’s anyone following me. I pull the old truck out onto the snow-covered highway, barely giving it enough time to warm up. I gently touch the brakes and the back wheels slide immediately. I right the vehicle by turning the steering wheel in the same direction. I follow the tracks in the road, from the van with the young men, and continue along their path, trying to find some traction in the flattened snow.
The highway has two lanes, but with the fallen snow it looks like one extra wide track. They drove right down the centre, far from the shoulders. I hold the steering wheel tightly, gingerly trying to accelerate more, then, fall back to a slow steady speed, as I try to stay straight on the slippery ground below me. I look in the rear view mirror, searching for other cars, looking for him. I wait until I’m some miles up the road, then I roll down the window, and throw Chief Inspector Postman’s car keys as far as I can out into the snowy night.
I memorized the directions from the phone book that was in the room. After what seems like hours, I finally see the entrance for the next highway. The van that was in front of me stayed on. It didn’t take the exit. So, I need to break new ground on my own now. The entrance sits on an incline, and then slopes back down again once it reaches the other highway. I need to maintain some speed in order to take the curve, to make the entrance. I let the truck hit the tilt of the road as fast as I can safely push it, and then allow it to slide down the other side. Again, I swing the wheels the same way to correct myself. The snow has stopped falling and it feels like there’s no one else alive, as the old truck silently, solidly, hugs the highway and straightens out. I can feel the cold from outside coming in the truck. I turn the heat up, glad of the noise of the fan.
The minutes pass by and turn to hours, and as the monotony of the slick, snow covered road passes me by, I think of Vancouver and home and how it’s never going to be the same again. I think of Heather, stuck in a hospital. And, I think of Emily, a little girl that I don’t know. What happened to make Heather come for her now? How had she managed to get her to go with her back in the library? And, I have the same question as Michael, why me? Why did Heather bring me along? Why did she let me come? And, why had she not trusted me with the truth, with her truths?
I hear a noise ahead of me. I turn the fan down to listen, and as I drive forward I see it coming towards me, on the other side of the highway. I let out a laugh, and hold tightly to the wheel, as I see the snowplough, working its way down the other side of the freeway, clearing a lane for any drivers that might be going in the other direction.
The sky is lighter now. Daybreak is coming. It’ll be morning when I reach the hospital. Still, there are no cars behind me. It’s a surreal experience, being the only vehicle, driving slowly on the snow-covered highway. I think of Heather’s father, creeping around my room, trying the light switches that won’t work, poking at the pillows with his baton. Then, realizing that I’m not there, getting to his car to find no keys. I wondered if he’ll waken Claude, and enlist his help in finding me, finding his keys. I wonder what Postman had intended to do to me. What would he have done in order to make sure that I don’t reveal his secret? I can’t go back to the motel now. There’s no amount of money that Claude will take as a bribe. I laugh at the image of him, out there in the parking lot, with the furious, crazy cop, telling him that he doesn’t know where I am.
I’m tired, but have to go on. I open the window a crack, and let the cold air blow on my face. The snow is crustier now, giving me better traction. I drive on, faster, as the old truck holds solidly onto the road. There’s a bank of signs ahead, just as the sun appears and starts shining. The light from it seems to illuminate the road sign, allowing me to read it. I’m almost there. The sign reads that I’m five miles from Thornside Hospital.
I pull onto the exit and take the road for the hospital. The snow is easier to handle now, as though it was cleared, and then fell again. I push the truck forward, increasing my speed, still trying to keep it straight on the road. I take a look in the rear view mirror again, and still can’t see another vehicle. The panic from earlier is gone now. Maybe it’s from being too tired, or maybe I’ve just stopped caring whether he catches up to me or not. I’m there now, closer, almost to Heather.
Within minutes, I see the big grey building up ahead. I pull the truck into the hospital parking lot, confident that it won’t be recognized by Heather’s father, even if he has found a way to follow me. I back into a parking spot and look around, still seeing no one.
Sitting there, I try to remind myself that I’m not under arrest. I’m not under suspicion, in fact I haven’t even been charged. And, more importantly, I haven’t done anything wrong. I’ve stolen some car keys, and thrown them away on a highway, and if they can prove that,
then I’ll gladly accept their punishment. I stiffly pull myself from the truck, and close the door behind me. My muscles ache from the hours spent driving along the treacherous road, and my leg is still sore and bandaged from the fall that I took back at the barn. I take a handful of snow, and use it to wash the sweat and tiredness from my face, then walk towards the large entranceway to the hospital.
CHAPTER 28
I decide on the truth. I’ve always tried to live that way, and more importantly, I have nothing to hide. So, I tell the man at the information counter the truth. I’m there to visit a patient who was admitted a few days ago. I’m sorry for the early hour, but if it isn’t too inconvenient I’d like to see her. The young man sleepily gives me the room number, and directs me to the third floor, suggesting I take the elevator. Much to my relief, he doesn’t ask who I am or what my business is. He just gives me directions. It’s easy, much easier than I imagined.
I take the stairs, remembering that Ellison told Michael on the phone, that she was under guard, and not wanting to announce my arrival with the noise of the elevator. I carefully open the door to the third floor, and see the police officer, sleeping in the patient’s lounge. His breathing is heavy and he’s sleeping soundly. There’s a nurse, with her back to me, sitting in an open office behind a counter, a few feet away from the lounge. I stand there looking at the policeman for a moment. He looks like he might be one of the officers from the station, but I can’t be sure. I slowly make my way past the lounge, and then quietly past the nurse, who still doesn’t turn around. I look at the room numbers. I can smell the same, industrial type smell that all hospitals have. I can feel the emptiness of the early morning. There’s no one there, no one at all. I find the room and gently turn the door handle.
My Temporary Life Page 22
