Traplines

by Eden Robinson

  She gasped, then pointed excitedly. “Spitting image of his father,” his mother said, clapping her hands. “Oh, isn’t he handsome!”

  Tom looked down to the street. Jeremy had stepped out of a silver convertible. Hands in his pockets, he stood at the curb looking bored and oozing cool. Tom’s mother pushed the window open and waved.

  “Jeremy! Up here! Yoo-hoo! Jer-e-my!”

  “Mom,” Tom said. “Please.”

  Jeremy smiled up at them and waved back.

  “Go down and meet your cousin,” his mother said, pushing him along. “You’ll be good friends, I just know it.”

  Tom stayed put. Uncle Richard looked up from his newspaper and scowled at him. What was Richard so pissed about? Tom pulled himself up to his full height and, pretending indifference, left the apartment quickly. He trudged down the three flights of stairs to the lobby.

  When Aunt Faith had called and asked if Jeremy could stay until he knew his way around, his mother had gladly agreed. She doesn’t have to share a room with him, Tom thought. He wished his cousin was staying somewhere else. His room was barely big enough for him, much less for a cousin who could afford a car like that.

  “You watch, he’ll be like a brother to you,” his mother had said yesterday morning when they moved the extra bed into his room.

  “Mom, he’s already got four brothers,” Tom had said, rolling the foldaway bed into the corner of the room, near the heater. “Besides, he’s twenty-one.”

  “So?”

  Someone snagged his shirt. “Do you remember me, Tommy?”

  He hadn’t seen Jeremy waiting at the bottom of the stairs. “It’s Tom,” he said. “Only Mom calls me Tommy.”

  Jeremy cocked an eyebrow. “N-O spells no problem. Know a decent place I can park my car?”

  Tom stood there for a moment. “We got a parkade. Want me to show you later?”

  “Please.” Jeremy held out his hand. “Looks like we’re going to be bunking together. Pleased to meet you, roomie. You know, I used to babysit you.”

  You and half a million other people. Tom reached for Jeremy’s suitcase but his cousin waved his hand away.

  “I can handle that.” Jeremy smiled down at him. “Ever driven a convertible?”

  Tom’s heart leapt. “No,” he said, trying to keep the hope from his voice.

  “You don’t know what you’re missing. Maybe I’ll show you sometime. How about a ride?”

  “Sure,” he said, still trying not to sound excited. “Mom’s waiting.”

  “We’ll take her too.”

  They made their way upstairs. Tom’s mother fluttered around Jeremy. Uncle Richard looked at him, then squinted, taking him in. Oh Lord, here it comes, Tom thought, waiting for them to break into arm wrestling or something equally moronic.

  But when Richard shook Jeremy’s hand he seemed satisfied. Jeremy hadn’t flinched. Tom hated shaking Richard’s hand. Yep, he thought, that’s the way macho ex-marine assholes like Ricky Ricardo test your manhood. One good squeeze.

  His mother danced when Jeremy asked her if she wanted to go for a ride. Uncle Richard grunted. They left him and went downstairs.

  The three of them got into the car, Jeremy and Tom’s mother in the front, with Tom squashed in the jump seat.

  “You’ve gotten bigger,” Jeremy said.

  Tom wrinkled his nose. “I hope so. I was seven the last time you saw me.”

  “Oh, don’t spoil it,” his mother said.

  Tom shut up.

  “You guys hungry?” Jeremy asked.

  “Oh yes,” his mother said breathlessly.

  “How about you?” Jeremy said.

  Tom shrugged.

  “What do you feel like, Aunt Christa?”

  “Oh, anything. Please, just call me Chrissy. Everyone does.”

  Tom stared at her. She was beaming at Jeremy.

  “How about some pizza?”

  “Oh, fine. Anything, really.”

  “Pizza it is.”

  Tom hated it when she acted like this, agreeable to anything, complete doormat mode.

  In the pizzeria, Tom tried to give Jeremy ten bucks.

  “Your money’s no good here,” Jeremy said.

  “I can pay my own way,” Tom said.

  “I know, big guy,” Jeremy said. “Let me treat you. Come on, Tom. Just once. Please.”

  “Be good,” his mother said. “Please, Tommy.”

  Things had already shifted so that it was Jeremy and his mom on one side and him on the other.

  They sat at a table by the window. Two tables away, a couple argued, their voices hushed and sharp. Tom listened to catch what they were saying. His mother nudged him.

  “Well?” Jeremy asked.

  They both looked at him expectantly. He tried to figure out what they’d been talking about. His mom’s eyes pleaded for him to pay attention. She’d be gone for days if he fucked up. “I guess,” he said.

  Jeremy leaned his elbows against the table, then rested his chin in his hands. “You guess,” he said slowly. “You don’t know if you’re in grade ten or not?”

  “He’s not usually this rude,” his mother said. “It’s probably the medication.”

  Tom stared at her, surprised. She dropped her eyes and turned to the window. Jeremy watched her, then Tom.

  “Relax,” Tom said. “She means my anticonvulsants.”

  “Oh, let’s talk about something else,” she said, too brightly.

  “You still have fits?” Jeremy said, ignoring her.

  Fits? Fits? Fuck, Tom thought. He smiled pleasantly. “You still thinking about a military career?”

  There was silence at the table.

  “Oh, no,” said Tom’s mother, gushing. “Tommy doesn’t have those anymore. Isn’t that right, Tommy? I wonder where our food is? You wonder why they call it fast food when it takes forever to get here, don’t you? I think it’s outrageous that they can charge what they do, why in some places it’s two dollars for a Pepsi! Isn’t that outrageous?” His mother took a breath and stared out the window again.

  When the pizza came she barely touched her slice. She kept her head down, squeezing her lips shut. Jeremy ate without stopping to talk.

  On the bright side, Tom thought, this’ll probably be a very short visit.

  That night Tom woke and rolled over. He’d been afraid Jeremy would snore or talk in his sleep. Jeremy was awake and gazing at the ceiling. He turned to face Tom and grinned. “Always takes time to get used to a new place.”

  “Takes me weeks,” Tom said. “Last time we moved, it took me four days to remember which way the bathroom was. I kept going into the kitchen.”

  Jeremy reached over to the night table for his cigarettes. “Just be glad you’re not an army brat. You’d really be screwed then. We’d get used to a place, then, bam! We’d be outta there.” Jeremy offered him the pack. “Want one?”

  “No thanks.” Tom wanted to ask his cousin why he’d been dishonorably discharged, but it was hard to think of a polite way to bring it up. “Hey, Jeremy, I heard you killed someone” didn’t seem like the right approach.

  “Richard doesn’t like me,” Jeremy said.

  “Show me one person he does like.” Tom snorted. “He always acts that way.”

  “Not like my dad. Easygoing. Talks to everyone. Wherever we go, it’s blah-blah-blah to anyone he can get hold of. An all-round nice guy.”

  “Richard’s not my dad.”

  Jeremy shook a cigarette out of the pack. “Well, don’t let me keep you awake. You’ve got school tomorrow.”

  “Yee-hah,” Tom muttered. “I wish I could quit.”

  “Why don’t you? Just take off. Travel the world.” Jeremy spread his arms wide.

  “I wish. Mom would kill me. She said she’d get someone to break my arms if I quit before I graduated.”

  Jeremy stared at him. “She said that to you?”

  “Well, duh. She was just joking.”

  “What a sense of humor.” />
  “How long are you staying?” Tom said.

  “Just until I find a place. Why? Want your room back?”

  “No, no. Just wondering.”

  “How long before school’s out?”

  “Months.” Tom groaned theatrically.

  “Got a girlfriend?”

  Tom looked at Jeremy, who seemed mildly interested.

  “No time,” Tom said.

  “But there’s someone you like,” Jeremy said, flicking his lighter open.

  “Maybe.” Tom was beginning to feel uncomfortable.

  “How old is she?”

  “Eighteen.”

  “Uh-oh. An older woman.” Jeremy closed the lighter. “I remember when I was fifteen. Her name was Michelle. Michelle Latournier. God, she was gorgeous. She’s married, got a kid, lives on welfare now, but back then …” He put his hands behind his neck and closed his eyes, an unlit cigarette dangling from the side of his mouth. “I would have died for her.”

  “Her name’s Paulina,” Tom said. “Redhead.”

  “Paulina Redhead. Weird name.”

  “No,” Tom said crossly. “Her hair is red.” The actual color was called strawberry-blond. Tom had heard one of the girls on the bus saying Paulina dyed her hair. Strawberry-blond. Sitting behind her at band practice, Tom had looked very carefully at her roots to see if they were really brown, but he couldn’t tell. “Paulina Mazenkowski.”

  Jeremy started to cough. “Excuse me. Gotta quit the smokes.”

  Tom turned his head. It sounded suspiciously like his cousin was trying to cover laughter.

  “So, have you asked her out yet?”

  “Me?”

  “Is there anyone else in the room?”

  “No. Not in a billion years.”

  “I thought you said you liked her.”

  “Yeah, but …” Tom stopped.

  Jeremy rolled over and leaned on one arm. “No hump,” he said, looking at Tom’s back. “Decent teeth. Okay complexion. Speaks English. Fairly intelligent—for a teenager. Infatuated. Willing. You’ve got Smurf hair, but I suppose that’s cool these days. Why not?”

  Tom imagined what would happen if he went up to Paulina Mazenkowski at school and asked her to go out with him. She’d laugh her head off or just sneer. Either way, he thought, closing his eyes, I’m never going to find out.

  In the dream everything was dark except the ring of fire around the sun. Only he could see it. He kept trying to tell people that there was an eclipse but they looked at him as if he were insane and he realized they couldn’t understand a word he was saying. What was he saying?

  As he was waking, he remembered the real eclipse. It had happened on his birthday. He’d been very, very young. When the sky was an eerie dark blue with a wispy ring of pearl-white light at its center, the birds had stopped singing, the bees had stopped droning, and the cows in the field had lined up and headed back to the barn. Everyone else was making spooky noises. He’d put his hand in Jeremy’s because Jeremy wasn’t afraid. He’d felt safe.

  Jeremy really was snoring now, but it was muffled because his head was under his pillow. Tom, to his surprise, didn’t mind the sound. He pulled his blankets over his head and went to sleep.

  Late in the morning, the aura started. He took a shower with the plastic curtain open and got the floor soaked. He knew it would drip into the apartment downstairs and Mrs. Tupper would complain to the manager, but he couldn’t close the curtain, couldn’t take the chance that someone would be there waiting for him. He tried extra medication, but it didn’t help. Something large and dark followed him all day. He kept turning around, fast, to catch it, but there was nothing. He knew it was just the aura, but his heart still trip-hammered at loud noises. His palms sweated as he waited for someone to put a knife through his back or drop a wire around his neck and strangle him.

  Later, at Chuckie Burgers, he watched the customers carefully as he did the till, half convinced that one of them was going to pull out a gun and shoot him. When a few customers looked at him strangely, he realized he was sweating hard, even though it was cold. After the dinner rush there was nothing to do. Tom mopped the men’s washroom and the aura began to fade like a headache. During his last break he snuck out to the alley and smoked a joint. Sometimes it helped, sometimes it made things worse. Tonight it mellowed him out, blurred and flattened the day until it didn’t bug him anymore. He squirted some Visine in his eyes and popped a few breath mints before he went back to finish his shift.

  After closing, Angie, the manager, brought in a big cake shaped like a hamburger. Everyone tried to smile, but it reminded Tom of a funeral.

  “Here’s to Chuckie Burgers,” she said.

  “To Chuckie’s,” Tom said.

  The other people muttered, drank their orange juice, grabbed their cake, and left. Tom took the letter of reference Angie gave him and carefully tucked it in his knapsack.

  “You’re a good worker,” Angie said. “You’ll find another job in no time.”

  Biking home, he wondered what they were going to do for next month’s rent. They could sell some stuff. The tape deck wasn’t half bad. The TV, well, it just wouldn’t go for much. He’d already pawned the VCR.

  The elevator was fixed but some joker had peed in one corner. Tom held his breath for as long as he could.

  “I’m home,” he said.

  “Hey, Tom!”

  Tom jumped, surprised at the voice until he remembered. Jeremy wandered into the living room. He looked like he’d just stepped out of GQ.

  “It’s eleven-thirty.” Jeremy sounded concerned. “You been in school all this time?”

  “I was at work.”

  “You have a job?”

  “Had a job.”

  “Fired?” Jeremy leaned against the wall.

  “Laid off. Business was slow.” Tom flopped on the couch, hoping Jeremy would just go back to bed. “We got anything to eat?”

  “Check the fridge.”

  Tom stayed on the couch, feeling his eyelids getting heavy. “In a bit.”

  “You okay?”

  “Yeah. Where’s Mom?”

  “You tell me.”

  Shit. On vacation already. He’d thought she’d last longer. “She must have a night shift,” he lied, wishing she really was starching tablecloths at the laundry plant.

  Jeremy was staring at him, so he forced himself off the couch. He opened the fridge, then stood back. “Whoa.”

  “I did a little shopping,” his cousin said, following him into the kitchen. “You guys were running low. Least I could do.”

  He’d never seen the fridge like this before. It was actually crowded. The food was squashed in. “So this is ours?”

  “Well, duh,” Jeremy said.

  Tom, annoyed, said, “I mean, you’re sharing?”

  “No, I’m going to eat it all myself.”

  “Oh,” Tom said, closing the fridge.

  After a pause, Jeremy said, “Sarcasm—ever heard of it?”

  Embarrassed, Tom tried to think of something clever to say back. He usually wasn’t so slow. “I’ll eat later.”

  Jeremy threw his hands up. “Whatever.”

  As his cousin left the kitchen, Tom decided that Jeremy had been trying to be nice. He sat down at the table. The kitchen was quiet except for the hum of the refrigerator. He got up and crossed to the window. He had an urge to go for a ride but instead went to find his English assignment.

  “No, no, no,” Mike said, kicking some garbage into the corner before sitting on the hallway floor. “Tattooing is out. Piercing is in, man.”

  “Uh-huh,” Tom said, kneeling down beside him.

  “No, look, man,” Mike said. “We got the hair, we got the clothes, we got the fucking attitude—why not go all the way?”

  “What’s this ‘we’ thing?” Tom said. He pulled out his sandwich.

  “Come on. If I do it, you have to do it.”

  “Screw you,” Tom said.

  Mike stopped unwrapp
ing his Twinkie. “I’m serious, man. What kind of experience is it going to be if we don’t do it together?”

  “Extremely painful. The key word being pain. Call me boring, call me dull, but sticking myself full of holes is not my idea of cool.”

  “Cool, schmool. This is about adrenaline, man. Fucking Nazis.” Mike handed him a yogurt-covered low-fat granola bar. “Man, they are trying to starve me. I don’t know how you can eat this shit.”

  Tom had wondered why Patricia kept packing granola bars when Mike never ate them. When he’d told her that Mike hated health food, she’d said he’d specifically requested it. After he thought about it for a while, he realized that Mike was giving him food in a way that wouldn’t embarrass him.

  “It’s good for you,” Tom said.

  Mike made gagging sounds. “It’s shit. One hundred percent organic, hand-picked, underprocessed shit.”

  “Unlike your Twinkie.”

  “Fuck off, this is manna.”

  Mike pushed his hair back but the bangs flopped down again, covering half his face. He handed Tom a tofu dog and an underripe papaya. They ate in silence.

  His mom had come back from vacation that morning. He’d snapped awake when he’d heard the key in the lock. He’d heard her giggle, then the sound of a man’s voice. A man who wasn’t Uncle Richard. Yes! Tom thought as the front door closed. Her pumps clicked down the hallway to the bathroom. Usually she didn’t let men into the apartment until she’d known them for a few weeks. She’d been careful ever since one of them had taken her purse, her jewelry, and the good TV while she slept. “Screwed,” she’d said. “Literally and figuratively.” She’d looked tough for a few seconds before she’d burst out crying and put her head in her hands.

  “Think about it,” Mike said.

  It took Tom a few moments to realize that he was back on body piercing. “Like anyone’s going to hire me with a pierced nose.”

  “Fuck,” Mike said. “Look at you, man. Your hair’s enough to scare off respectable people.”

  “I tie it back,” Tom said.

  Mike rolled his eyes. “Hel-lo! Which one of us has blueberry fucking Kool-Aid hair? What’s a fucking nose ring to that?”

  “You first.”

  “Wuss,” Mike said.

  The buzzer rang. Mike kicked the last of his lunch into the corner. “What you got?”