Plain Jane

by Kim Hood

  The only problem was, once I started, I couldn’t seem to stop. It had been five o’clock this morning when I went to bed. But now, at 7:30 am I was wide awake.

  I didn’t bother going to classes at all on Wednesday. I just went straight to The Good Earth to meet Farley.

  ‘Hello, world traveller,’ I said, as I slid into the seat opposite him. It seemed like it had been years, not days, since I had last seen him.

  There weren’t any books at his table today. And he didn’t have on his familiar hoodie. It had been replaced by a checked, button-down shirt. I wasn’t sure I liked it.

  But the big difference was his smile. Usually, he had this bemused look to him. Today his smile was flat. Not even his eyes were smiling.

  I had things to share with him though, so I decided to ignore it. Besides, it wasn’t my job to read people’s expressions. I wasn’t some kind of fortune teller.

  He didn’t give me a chance to share anything though.

  ‘Can you do something for me?’ He wasn’t kidding about not liking small talk.

  ‘I doubt it,’ I said. ‘The last time I was useful to anyone was … I don’t remember it ever happening.’

  ‘Today is the day then,’ he said. ‘I need a side kick. Moral support. Maybe an excuse to leave in a hurry if it comes to it.’

  ‘Sounds more interesting than going back to school for P.E. Sure, I’ll do my best.’

  Farley had borrowed Kaitlin’s car, which had a couple of glitches. The main one being that it had to be parked on a hill because it wouldn’t start until it was rolling in neutral. The other glitch was a very big hole in the passenger side floor. I spent the first few minutes watching the road spin under my feet, until I felt a bit dizzy. Plus I thought I should probably pay attention to where we were going, since Farley had talked about the possible need to make a getaway.

  He hadn’t actually told me where we were going, but it seemed to be out of town since we were on the highway heading south. I thought of how pleased Mom would be to hear of me getting in the car – especially one with a hole in the floor – with some guy I had only known for less than two weeks, to go to some undisclosed destination. She would have killed me before he had a chance to.

  I didn’t care. I didn’t care about much. What I mean is, this was the first week of my life that I didn’t want to care. I’d shifted my frame of reference and suddenly the blank nothingness had switched to endless possibility. I didn’t want that marred by worry. It turns out it was pretty easy to just stop it.

  ‘I know you don’t feel the need to tell me where we are going,’ I said. ‘But perhaps you could share the purpose of this journey? You did mention something about moral support. I feel I should get ready for that.’

  ‘Grandparents,’ he said. ‘We are going to see my grandparents.’

  My grandfather had been the reason my family had moved back here from Vancouver. Maybe it was because all of their other parents had died young and he was the only one left. They probably felt a bit like orphans. Maybe that was why Mom was so forgiving of how her dad had abandoned her when she was a kid.

  I don’t remember much about my life in the city. When you’re little, who cares where you live? Your world isn’t much bigger than your house and your parents anyway.

  I do remember meeting my grandfather for the first time though. Everyone I knew had grandparents when I was five of course. At least one of them. So I’d been a bit of an oddball without any. Until Mom told me that I did have one.

  I only got to talk to him on the phone once a week for the longest time though. And you can keep up any persona on the phone if the conversations are fairly short, which I’m sure they were, since I was five and not exactly great with conversation skills. He seemed wonderful on the phone. I’m sure I embellished the grandparent-like aspects of him in my mind. I remember talking about him all of the time. I’m sure bragging rights came into it, finally having a grandparent to talk about to other kids.

  So even if it was a falsehood, I had this specific picture of him, which was completely shattered when I actually got to meet him. I had expected an old man, with maybe a big yellow dog at his feet – the dog being a very important part, because I wanted one so badly, and Emma was allergic. On the drive to his house I just knew he would have presents for us, and every sort of cake on the table, which he would offer out freely.

  He was nothing like that. In fact, when he opened the door to his big, old house on the hill behind Kendal, I thought he was someone else and my grandfather was inside, sitting in his rocking chair of course, ready to tell me stories. Instead, he was an ordinary man. Worse really. A stern, older man, who liked children to be seen and not heard.

  I think I spent most of that first visit sneaking around the big, old house just to avoid him.

  Emma loved him straight away though. She was almost a baby still, and she loved everyone. He loved her straight back.

  It wasn’t like that with me and Grandad. It took us a long time to even get used to each other, slowly, and I’m not sure he ever really liked me. I don’t know how much I liked him either if I’m honest, even though, over the years, I did end up loving him.

  Do you know how that is, when you love someone even though you don’t like them? You would think the two things, like and love, had to go together, but they don’t necessarily. Maybe that is what makes everything so complicated. If I loved Dell, or if I didn’t like him so much, things would be easy. If I didn’t love Emma so, so much, or if I could just get to like her better, maybe things would be easier with us. It’s when there’s a dichotomy between like and love that there’s a problem.

  For never having been to his grandparents’ house, Dell had a very easy time finding it. That didn’t surprise me. He was pretty smart, probably had the google map printed on his brain. Anyway, it was hardly out of Kendal. I’d had this idea in my head of a road trip – maybe I had watched too many movies. Life wasn’t really like that.

  We had enough time for him to fill me in on the story though.

  ‘Right. Here is the thing. My grandparents blamed my dad for my mom dying. They never liked him. And they especially hated him when my mom moved to the commune and stopped talking to them. They wouldn’t have anything to do with him, or by extension, me, when I showed up in the world. But now my dad has told them I’m here and they have found it in their hearts to want to meet their only grandson.’ I think Dell would tell you anything if you asked. He wasn’t afraid of sharing.

  ‘And, was it your dad’s fault?’ I asked, ‘I mean, her dying?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  That was not what I expected. I wondered if murder ran in the family.

  ‘Yes. No,’ he went on, and then paused, frowning. ‘I guess that is what I came to find out.’

  ‘That didn’t really answer my question, but I’m taking it he didn’t stab her to death or anything.’ It was only after I said it that I thought about how highly inappropriate a thing that was to say. Luckily, it was Farley I had said it to. He just laughed, which made his face look much more like him again.

  ‘No, I’m not on some sort of murder mystery tour,’ he said. ‘She had epilepsy. She wanted to breastfeed me and didn’t like the thought of me ingesting the medication she had to take. Going off it didn’t go well. Unfortunately, Dad wasn’t home when it didn’t go well.’

  ‘Wow. Didn’t see that one coming. You don’t really soften the blows do you?’

  ‘You asked.’

  ‘I thought my mom had the ultimate power to instil guilt, but your mom tops mine. It’s like she killed herself for you. Do you feel guilty forever?’

  ‘Jane! You can’t go around saying things like that!’ he exclaimed, but he had a genuine smile on his face when he said it.

  I was going to take my camera in, just in case there was some sort of big fight that made for interesting photography, but Farley was in a particularly conformist mood and wouldn’t let me. That meant there was really nothing for me to do but follow
along like a dog. For once I wasn’t in the middle of the drama though, and it was a lot warmer than walking the streets would be.

  There wasn’t anything to distinguish their house from any around them. One in a row of bungalows, with wide tarmac drives and precise, perfect flower beds placed strategically in the front lawn. At least my grandfather’s house had been kind of a statement – a big Victorian affair, complete with one of those round, tower-like rooms. It’s one of the only things that my grandfather and I shared, our love for that house. You would expect that people who completely shut family members out of their life would stand out in some way. If Farley’s grandparents stood out in any way though, then they were hiding it well from the outside.

  And on the inside. Two sweet looking old people ushered us in to their tidy, neutrally decorated kitchen. They were exactly what my six-year-old self thought grandparents should be. Okay, they didn’t have a big yellow dog, but they had an orange cat that weaved in and out of our legs the whole time we were there.

  ‘Come in out the cold, Farley,’ the woman greeted, taking his hand in both of hers as if they had known each other all of their lives. ‘And who is this?’ The question was also warm.

  ‘This is my friend Jane, Ma’am.’

  God, he was so American! I hadn’t noticed it before. Nobody around here would say Ma’am – especially to their grandmother, estranged or not. Not only that, but that cocky, surety that I had come to almost like was gone. His shoulders had dropped just that little and he held his hands clasped in front of him.

  She just smiled at his faux pas, but the man who came in to shake his hand and mine didn’t let it go.

  ‘Around here, there are no Ma’ams or Misters. If you’re not comfortable with Grandma and Grandpa, then it’s Bill and Helen.’

  ‘How about Grandpa Bill and Grandma Helen?’ I couldn’t seem to keep my mouth shut. I concentrated hard on shutting it now and determined to keep it that way. This was none of my business.

  Somehow, instead of offending people like I usually did though, however inappropriate it was, everything I said was the right thing. They all laughed. All of them. Even though Farley did not look comfortable.

  ‘So, your dad says that you are a concert violist, one of the best in Washington State,’ Helen said, while she got a tin of biscuits out of the cupboard to go with the hot chocolate she had already poured us. She was doing proper grandmother stuff, and talking to Farley like they were catching up on the latest news, not his whole entire life.

  ‘I like to play,’ was all he said. He could have perhaps filled me in on this fact. I wondered what else he had kept.

  ‘We like a spot of music here too,’ said Bill, and he went to put the radio on, tuning it to the classical station for Farley.

  The conversation pretty much went on like that. It was nice, polite talk. Friendly even. I got a little bored, but like I said at least it was warm, and the biscuits and hot chocolate were great.

  Plus, I was learning a bit more about Farley too, stuff he probably wouldn’t have shared with me. He had graduated from high school early – skipping grades apparently. No wonder the titles on his textbooks were practically Greek to me. They were probably something like third-year college books. Maybe it was good that I hadn’t known these things before. I probably would have avoided him like the plague. It was bad enough having a child prodigy in the house, without having one as a friend as well.

  About an hour had gone by when the phone rang and Bill went to answer it.

  ‘That will be Joe,’ Helen said, like we knew who Joe was. Sure enough Bill was back in a minute or so with, ‘That was Joe. He needs us to drive him in for his groceries.’

  ‘Joe is our neighbour,’ Helen enlightened us. ‘He broke his ankle a few weeks ago, falling on the ice during that bad cold snap. He says he doesn’t need any help – except to drive him everywhere!’

  Bill was already putting on his coat that was at the ready on the back of his chair.

  ‘Well, we better get a move on. Joe will have us driving all over town before the afternoon is finished.’

  ‘Do you need a ride in, loves?’ asked Helen.

  ‘No, we borrowed a car M—’ Farley stopped himself in time.

  ‘We are so sorry to have to rush off like this, but Joe has us run off our feet,’ she said. I noticed that Bill didn’t add to the apology.

  ‘Oh, we understand,’ I said, yet again opening my mouth. I kind of had to, because Farley was deflating in front of me. I don’t think the grandparents noticed though.

  ‘We would love to have you back any time at all,’ Helen continued.

  ‘Great to meet you, Son,’ Bill said, gripping Farley’s hand once again.

  ‘You too,’ Farley managed.

  And then we were kind of ushered out the door. They stood on the steps waving as we got into the car, their door locked behind them. I thought that Farley would want to get away as fast as he could, but he sat behind the wheel, shoulders hunched forward.

  ‘We can’t go, Jane.’

  ‘Listen, it was a first meeting. They aren’t going anywhere. You can go back another time. Have a proper talk with them,’ I tried to rationalise. He was right though. It was how I would feel if they had been my grandparents. He was leaving before barely even meeting them. He didn’t even have solid plans to come back again. They were nice, but too nice – and the worst part was he didn’t know one more thing about his mom.

  There had not been a single mention of her, which was weird. I hadn’t even seen a picture of her on any wall or shelf. It was like they were pretending that everything had always been fine, that she had never existed, which I pretty much doubted was how they really felt. If that was Mom and Dad twenty years from now, if Emma …? I didn’t want to think about that.

  And this Joe story? I didn’t believe one word of their excuse to leave. I think if it were me, I would have told Joe his groceries could wait; I was meeting my grandson for the first time.

  ‘Hey, here I am for the moral support,’ I tried, since he still hadn’t moved. ‘Let’s get out of here before Bill and Helens’ smiles freeze on their faces.’

  ‘No, really, we can’t go,’ Farley insisted. ‘I forgot to park on a hill, and there’s no way I am pushing the car with those two watching.’

  ‘Take out your phone,’ I said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Just take out your phone and pretend that you are talking to someone. Trust me.’

  Farley took out his phone and looked at it helplessly. Bill and Helen were still standing on their front steps. ‘Hello, Dad. Oh, you really need to talk to me right now?’ I prompted him. He lifted the phone to his ear and started to move his lips silently, while I hopped out of the car and marched back up to the house.

  ‘Farley just got a call from his dad, so he has to take it,’ I lied. ‘You may as well head off, because it’s a call that might take a little while.’

  Helen looked at Bill, and I could see the questions playing in his head. What, did he think his own grandson was going to rob him if they left before us?

  ‘Look, I know it’s going to be a long call, because his dad was really worried about him coming here. Farley has this complex about rejection. You know, having his mom die on him, and then having grandparents who didn’t want anything to do with him. He’s been in therapy for years over it. His dad is going to want to talk to him for a while to make sure he is okay.’

  I kind of knew I had gone a bit overboard because both of their mouths were wide open. It worked though. When I stopped talking, they both just nodded and walked to their car as quickly as they could. They had driven down the drive before I even got back to the car.

  ‘What did you say to them?’ Farley asked, putting his phone down.

  ‘Oh, nothing much,’ I said. ‘How is your dad anyway?’

  ‘You really are nuts, you know that don’t you?’

  ‘You are the one talking to the stars, Farley. I am grounded in practical, every day g
randparent-scaring techniques.’

  He still looked a bit shell shocked.

  ‘It could be worse. They could have invited us along to ferry Joe around.’

  You know when you look at someone, and you just know that you are thinking the same thoughts and feeling the same feelings? When Farley looked at me, when our eyes met, I knew that we were on the same wavelength. And there was a spark. If we had been in a cheesy movie, I suppose this would have been when we kissed – but we weren’t and so we ended up in a fit of hysteric laughing instead, which, for now, was just as good.

  Kaitlin wasn’t expecting the car back for a while, but once we finally stopped laughing, and had the car running, which took quite a few attempts, pushing it until we could find some sort of a slant on the tarmac drive, I couldn’t think of anywhere we could go.

  ‘There isn’t exactly much to do around here,’ I said, stating the obvious. I’ve pretty much told you what Kendal is like – picture any small town, with a little park and a river and your usual shops. Okay, there’s a skating rink if you’re into that, or the cinema – but it’s only open on weekends. And then you’ve got the outskirts, like this, with nothing but houses with half-acre lawns – and nothing but the highway to connect them.

  ‘What do you mean?’ Farley countered. ‘Look out that window. You have whole mountains as playgrounds.’ He swept his arm in a slow-motion arc, and my eyes were drawn to the mountains behind the houses, that he obviously wanted me to see. Okay sure; they were probably spectacular to look at – if you hadn’t spent most of your life seeing them. I didn’t see what there was to do, even if you went that far though.

  ‘Just supposing tromping through the woods was my thing – and it isn’t – November is not exactly the month to do it,’ I said. We were getting close to town, and even though the morning had been a bit weird, I didn’t want it to end. I tried to think of somewhere we could go, something we could do.