by Maaja Wentz
When a short, hard-bodied girl cut in ahead of her it was a relief, until the girl smirked back in Tonya’s face.
“You? In a swimsuit? Try not to belly flop, Freak.”
Tonya placed her hands over her stomach. It was Marta, Donna Ashton’s daughter. Donna and her beef-shouldered brothers thought the Trads foolish for concealing magic from the Mundanes, but Marta was worse. She called Pures like Tonya freaks for denying their supernatural abilities.
With bullies like Marta, offense was the best defense. “How do I know you’re not going to cheat?”
“I don’t need magic to beat you, Freak.” Marta climbed to the top of the board and stepped gracefully to the edge.
Tonya watched Marta execute two and a half reverse somersaults with two and a half twists in pike position. Perfectly, of course. Tonya’s best dive was two somersaults with a twist. Would that be good enough to make the team? She wiped her palms on the front of her swimsuit. If she failed, Marta would tell every Mod in town.
Legs trembling, she mounted the ten-meter ladder. At the top, she tried not to look down. Somehow, practicing her spins on the trampoline never gave her the same vertigo standing on the platform did. It was a long way down and Marta’s stupid comments had activated a chorus of internal doubts.
She couldn’t do it, not with everyone staring at her. The pool below seemed to move to the left while the diving platform felt like it tilted beneath her feet. Her toes tensed on the emery board surface of the platform, and she fought the urge to retreat. Tonya couldn’t look down. Were the chlorine fumes making her dizzy?
Unwilling to face the drop, she turned her back to the pool and launched into unrehearsed reverse somersaults. She spun two, three times, then stretched out to enter the water, catching it at a harsh angle that sent her off to the side. She touched bottom meters from the center.
When she surfaced, Tonya imagined all eyes on her as she performed a slow front crawl to the ladder. Head down, she got out and crossed the deck to retrieve her swim bag, too rattled to make a second attempt. On her way to the change room, one person applauded behind her.
“Nice try! Good job.”
Tonya recognized Marta’s voice but didn’t look back.
In the showers, Tonya stretched out her shoulders under the hot spray. She toweled off and retreated to the side of the change room farthest from the girls wearing Varsity swimsuits. Clearly, she would not be joining them. Once dressed, she grabbed her bag and went to the bathroom mirror to brush her hair.
She was about to leave when she heard retching coming from the toilets behind her. She hoped the girl inside was okay. Tonya looked under the stall door and saw a pair of knees on the floor. Somebody was throwing up. Maybe somebody even more nervous about the tryouts than she was.
“Are you alright?”
“I’m fine!” The voice was sharp and harsh.
“Can I help?”
“No.”
The heaving resumed. Tonya stood between the sink and stalls of the cramped bathroom. What was the etiquette for a situation like this? Should she walk away? What if the girl passed out?
“Do you want me to call someone to drive you home?” Tonya was head-down, fumbling in her bag for her phone, when the bathroom stall door flew open, knocking her back. She staggered and grabbed the sink for balance. When she opened her eyes, a slightly green face glared at her. Marta.
“Seriously, can I help?”
“What made you think you can dive?” Marta pushed past Tonya and went back to the change room where the rest of the team was dressing.
Tonya had to walk past them to reach the exit. As she followed Marta, the other girls went quiet.
Marta turned on her. “If you can’t dive, why did you come out?”
“At least I tried.”
“Why? You can barely swim. I mean, look at you.” Marta was staring at Tonya’s plump belly.
“Screw yourself.” Tonya loved swimming and she wasn’t going to let Marta ruin it for her.
“You dive like my granny.”
“I’m a lifeguard. I can save your granny.”
The girls murmured.
Marta laughed. “Lifeguards. You’re so proud you can do two lengths of the pool, towing a rubber dummy.” She looked around at her teammates. Some smiled, but others stared at Marta, which gave Tonya courage.
“Take care of that tummy now, Marta. Wouldn’t want you to miss your next practice.” Tonya rushed for the door, but Marta stepped into her way. Tonya tried to step left, then right, but Marta blocked the doorway like an enraged imp, her chin jutted up at Tonya.
“My stomach is fine. Don’t spread rumors.”
“Why, are you pregnant?”
Marta’s eyes widened, then her face relaxed. “Don’t worry about me, worry about you.” The corners of her mouth curved upwards as she stepped back to let Tonya go.
Outside the Athletic Center, chilly October wind whipped wet hair into Tonya’s face. She hoped nobody noticed her hands were still trembling as she hoisted her bag onto her shoulder. At the edge of the road, guys from the team were waiting for the girls. She recognized Shin immediately from team photos in the foyer. The tallest in every picture, he usually had his arm around Marta. Tonya thought of telling him Marta was sick, and about the weird way she’d gone after Tonya for noticing, but why? Maybe it didn’t mean anything, except that he had terrible taste in girlfriends.
She wished she had come by bike, so she could leave. Tonya took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Priya would get here soon. The move into residence had been so rushed in September that Priya was helping her collect her last boxes.
Tonya’s house was in the new part of town, on the opposite side of Loon Lake as the university. Her parents had put it up for sale the same day Tonya moved into residence. It was weird, and she tried not to feel hurt about it, but it still stung. First, her parents wouldn’t let her go to school out of town “for her own protection,” and now they had left town themselves? They said it was because Aunt Helen would be in and out of hospital for tests in Toronto, and they wanted to get a condo nearby. It would make sense, if they didn’t hate the big city.
Tonya couldn’t imagine Aunt Helen abandoning the Herbal Healing Shop. This illness was serious, no matter how many times her mother downplayed it. Tonya wanted to see for herself, but every time she emailed, asking to visit her aunt in Toronto, her parents refused to tell her which hospital she was in. “You’re safer close to home,” they replied. “Aunt Helen will get better and then she’ll visit you.”
If her parents weren’t so blind, she would be going to U of T and be able to see Aunt Helen any time she liked.
The sound of a car horn startled her out of her reverie. Tonya dashed to her friend’s rusty Toyota and got in.
“Sorry I’m late. Baby didn’t want to start.” Priya patted the old car’s dashboard. “Aren’t you cold?”
“Like a wet cat.”
“How was the tryout?”
“A lot like high school.”
“Boring, stupid, and full of pimples?’
“You must have gone to a good high school.”
“Uh oh. Somebody needs to escape the past, fast.” She cranked the radio and opened the windows as they pulled onto the highway. “Let’s speed dry it outta your hair.”
CONSPIRATORS
Donna sat at the kitchen table with her brother, Marvin, who was doing their accounts on a laptop.
“He won by a landslide, again.” Marvin pushed silver specs up on his nose. He was tall and broad-shouldered in a white polo, accessorized by a pencil over his ear.
Donna shrugged. “People like Mayor Thornton. He never does anything.” From her bag, she extracted a mirror, and a crimson lipstick which she applied precisely. “Things will change when we’re in charge.” She shut the mirror with a snap.
“Between his Trad cronies and gray power, the Mundanes might as well be running the town.” Marvin ran a hand through his brush cut, knocking the pen
cil to the kitchen floor. “He’s approved another nursing home. Doesn’t he understand what that does to us?”
“Our day’s coming.”
A man strode in, Paul Bunyan with a cell phone. He waved it at his siblings. “Have you seen the election results?”
“Where have you been?” Donna stood, hands on hips. “Marvin’s been redoing our projections for hours.”
Junior slammed his brother’s laptop shut. “You can’t fix this with accounting. Time to think big.”
“Please, expand our little minds.” Donna rolled her eyes at Marvin who reopened his computer and resumed typing.
“Len’s coming.” Junior glared at Marta. “Play nice.”
Without lifting his eyes from his spreadsheet, Marvin said, “You can’t trust him.”
“At least he doesn’t sit on his ass while the Trads run things.” Junior dropped into a chair next to his brother, his comic book muscles straining to escape his red checked shirt. “He’s a Mod, and he’s got Waldock.”
“You’re a genius! Why didn’t I think of asking for Waldock’s help? Oh wait, maybe because he’s dead.” Marvin shook his head.
Junior stood to face Donna. “What about you? Will you help Len?”
“That depends on what he’s offering.”
“Waldock, in total control.”
“I’ll believe that when I see it,” she said.
“But he needs your support . . .”
Donna palm-blocked Junior and returned to helping Marvin with the accounts.
When Junior tried to object, she turned her back on him. Pouting, he went to stand behind the kitchen counter and started drumming his hands on the marble surface. Next, he picked up a pair of spoons and drummed louder. Marvin kept typing. Junior walked over and tried to catch his brother’s eye. Marvin didn’t look up. Donna smirked but kept her eyes on the laptop as well. Junior cleared his throat to no avail, then pulled out his phone and started playing a game.
There was a knock at the door and it swung open. A chill breeze reached the kitchen. Limping steps sounded in the hall which Donna strode to intercept.
“This is a pleasant surprise.” She brought Len into the open-concept living room adjacent to the kitchen.
“You mean because I’m not dead?” Len lowered himself into a leather chair. His knees wound up higher than his waist, the drape of his loose pants clinging to his skeletal leg. Cancerous growths marred his white-stubbled chin. Against a black leather jacket, his face looked ghostly.
“Can I get you a drink?” asked Donna.
“Ginger ale.”
“Sorry. Coffee?”
“My stomach can’t take the hard stuff anymore. Tea.”
Donna looked up at Junior, standing behind the counter. “You making the tea?”
Junior shook his head.
She strode into the kitchen. “Then shoo!”
Len appeared to shrink as Junior sat next to him on the couch.
“Why are you here?” Marvin hadn’t moved from the kitchen table. “We’re busy.”
Len sighed. “Jack knew things would end in a showdown. As Helen got weaker, she couldn’t control him, but the hag wouldn’t admit defeat. When she realized she was dying, she was desperate to kill him first.”
Junior caressed the knuckles of his left fist. “She won.”
“No, we have. I know how to eliminate her, once and for all.” The lids drooped over Len’s rheumy eyes. “But my strength is failing too.”
Marvin’s chair scraped as he got to his feet. “I don’t understand. You want to kill Helen for revenge?”
“Better. Jack expected her to kill him, so he made a backup plan.”
“Which obviously didn’t work,” said Marvin.
“A plan to bring himself back.” Len showed his teeth.
“That’s Waldock for you, too tough to take death lying down.” Junior knocked his fists together.
Donna crossed her arms. “You’re lying.”
“He figured out a way to manipulate gravedigger fungus.”
Junior quirked his head. “What?”
“An underground fungus that grows into the neural pathways of the dead.”
“The nurr—huh?”
“Junior’s taken a lot of headshots,” said Donna. “Let me translate.” She turned to Junior.
“You know, those gray mushrooms that sometimes come up in graveyards.”
Junior made a face. “I hate those things, whispering at you and creeping you out.”
“To protect burial sites,” said Len.
“I don’t see the connection,” said Donna. “They’re harmless—and rare.”
“Tell me about it.”
Junior shrugged shoulders like mountains in an earthquake. “So, Gravediggers make people hear creepy voices in cemeteries. That’s not exactly a weapon.”
When Len showed his teeth this time it was almost a smile. “That was before Jack Waldock.”
HOME?
Priya drove Tonya away from the Athletic Center. “So, where to?”
“Stay on Lakeshore and keep going west.” Wind from Priya’s window tossed damp hair into her eyes.
Loon Lake City stood on the northern shore, directly across the lake from campus. Like a pig in a python, Loon River widened into the lake on the western end and shrunk back down to river size to the east.
“How far is it?” asked Priya.
“Imagine Loon Lake is in four quadrants, with the x and y-axes meeting in the center of the lake. My parents live almost straight up the y-axes. I’ll tell you when to turn north.”
Looking at it that way, campus filled the southeastern and most of the southwestern quadrant, with the cemetery to the west, and Aunt Helen’s shop just west of that. Riding her bike through campus from east to west, sometimes Tonya took the southern drive, which passed between the Athletic center lakeside, and the arena to the south. Next, she would pass between the various science buildings, below the stadium and the library, continuing off campus to Kenny Road.
Most of the time, however, she took the northern drive along the lakeshore which passed between the lake and the Rowing Clubhouse, the DNA lab, Environmental Sciences Buildings, and the college residences. It was cooler along the lakeshore and gave her a view across the water to downtown.
Downtown, which wasn’t huge, had started to develop along the northern shore of the lake a hundred years ago, then continued north with the construction of the city’s first concrete-and-glass buildings in the 1940s.
Lakeshore Drive North followed the north shore, which was flanked by city parks, the farmer’s market grounds, and out toward the east and west limits, lakefront estates.
As if anticipating a need for quarantine, Loon Lake hospital was built on cheap land northeast of city limits.
Priya continued west through campus, passing the residences.
As they exited campus and entered the tiny, three-hundred-year-old Village of Loon Lake, Tonya’s scalp tingled with a change like air pressure. At university, she was an anonymous student, but to the Old Families of Loon Lake, she would always be her aunt’s niece.
“Turn right.”
Priya cut north on Kenny Road, and drove between the cemetery on the southwest shore of Loon Lake and Tonya’s aunt’s store to their west.
“My parents live on David, just north of downtown.”
Priya drove them north over River Bridge, then turned east onto David, slowing as they reached Tonya’s childhood home. Maple leaves covered the lawn, but her father wasn’t out raking them.
Priya pulled into the driveway.
“Hey! The porch swing is gone. Wait here.” Tonya got out and went to the front door.
The porch was crowded with liquor boxes labelled “Tonya,” in her Aunt Helen’s wavering hand. She had packed Tonya’s stuff and left it in front of the house. Why?
She tried the front door, but her key didn’t fit.
Picking up a box, Tonya walked back to the car. “I can’t believe this. The
y changed the locks without warning me.”
“Your parents moved out already?” Priya got out and opened the hatchback.
“Looks like.” So Priya wouldn’t see her face flush, she went back to the porch. Her hands trembled as she called Dad’s mobile.
It went straight to voicemail. Mom didn’t carry a phone. Without optimism, she left him another message and grabbed a box.
When she returned, Priya had the back seats folded down. Tonya slipped the box in and, together, they went for more. She could hardly look Priya in the eye for fear she would tear up. Something was wrong. Her parents had been acting weird, ever since they had talked her out of U of T. If they wanted her to stay here for safety, why had they left so fast? It was a question that preoccupied her until they loaded the last box.
“Well?” Priya stood behind the car, drumming her fingers on the glass. “Are you going to tell me why you haven’t said a word since we started moving boxes?”
“I never thought my parents would leave this place. I should say goodbye to it.” Tonya would miss the plant-filled kitchen and her bedroom with its second-story view. “It would be easy to go around the back and get in through the kitchen window. The lock’s broken.”
“But you won’t.”
“Of course not.”
Priya crossed her arms but didn’t say anything. Was she disappointed?
Since Tonya met Priya, they’d eaten dozens of meals together in the Mackenzie College cafeteria, but she still wasn’t sure what it meant when Priya frowned like that. Tonya slotted the last box into the back.
The motor was running when she got in beside Priya who said, “Come to the pub tonight?”
“I don’t know . . .”
Priya batted her eyelashes. “They have nachos.”
“I can have nachos anywhere.” Eating always made her feel better, but she didn’t share Priya’s enthusiasm for Hub Pub food. Besides, she should stay in her room and call Dad.
“You have to come with me and meet Duck.”
“Duck?”
“Well, Drake, but not Drake the Hip Hop star. He’s runs the Digital Ninjas.”
