For the Love of Meat

by Jenny Jaeckel

They got on right away, despite the fact that Dara accidentally stepped on the cat’s tail while Molly showed her around.

  Molly was not from Vancouver originally, but rather Toronto. Her parents had emigrated from a village in southern Italy. She laughed easily and was delighted with the chocolate.

  “That settles it,” she said. “When are you moving in?”

  * * *

  Dara walked much of the way back to the hostel that night. It was eight or nine and the sky was full of sunset colors. She whispered, “Thanks,” to whom she wasn’t sure. Everything was falling into place.

  But then the job fell through.

  It was a Monday morning when she telephoned the high school. The secretary seemed flustered. They’d been trying to contact her during her days in transit but had been unable, she regretted it sincerely. They’d had to accept a different candidate at the last minute, a Canadian. There was an issue with Immigration.

  “But I’m here,” Dara said pointlessly, “here in Vancouver.”

  “We’ll keep you informed of any other openings,” the secretary said. “Really sorry.”

  Dara put down the receiver and stared at the phone a few minutes.

  She knew what Elsie would say, that it wasn’t meant to be, that she should just come back where she belonged. She’d meet another Jeremy, get married, get a job, have two kids eventually and die of sheer boredom. She imagined a long line of Jeremys, each one more nondescript than the next, the Jeremys who, despite a momentary interest in a foreign language and music, never wanted to go anywhere and never left anything to chance.

  Maybe Elsie wouldn’t have said it quite that way. She always said you had to have a vision of what you wanted. Dara admitted there was nothing wrong with that. And Elsie was happy in London. There was nothing wrong with that either. Dara had had some kind of vision, or a plan at least, now there was nothing. She picked up her passport and examined the work permit stapled inside. It was still good. She’d just have to find another job.

  * * *

  Molly knew of a decent temp agency. “You’ll get to know the city,” she said.

  In this way, Dara found herself in numerous offices, generally populated by immigrants. Everyone seemed to be from somewhere else. It was curiously dissonant. Disorienting. Refreshing. And she earned enough to cover the bills. Evenings she went with Molly to a yoga class at a studio run by some Jews gone Hindu. She wrote to Elsie that she’d just got back from trapping beaver and sighting Sasquatch. Oh, and she was doing yoga.

  “Maybe yoga will help with your little problem,” Elsie wrote in a letter.

  Dara hoped it would.

  It was something that had emerged upon her return home from Brazil, a sudden clumsiness that popped out whenever she felt in some way on display. This was certainly not an unusual phenomenon, but it bothered her just the same. Naturally, the clumsiness grew in inverse proportion to how much, in a given instance, she wanted to appear cool and collected. The more she wanted to control it the more out of control it became. This was also not unusual, it was simple psychology, but understanding that did absolutely nothing to help. It seemed she didn’t fit into the shapes or places she once had.

  On her first date with Jeremy, for example, she’d walked straight into the door frame of the restaurant. And once, during an oral exam at her university, she managed to knock the professor’s coffee onto his lap. She’d drawn back the chair to sit down and at the same time leaned her other hand on a file folder on the table, which slipped, causing the folder to shoot across the table and hit a binder, which then flipped the cup off the edge. Dara had been quite relieved that the interview with the Canadian school was conducted over the phone.

  * * *

  In mid-September a curtain of rain drew in and stayed. Molly was extremely nice, inviting her to all kinds of places and introducing her to friends, although Dara sometimes declined so as not to seem overly pathetic. She took her books in Portuguese to cafés, or she stayed in. She thought she ought to brush up on her French. Once in a while she thought of Jeremy. Excellent career you’ve landed, Dare, he would have said, Really living up to your potential. He probably already had a new girlfriend too. Someone more compatible. Someone who liked cinnamon buns.

  Dara still had no “vision” to speak of, but it wasn’t all bad. What she liked best about Vancouver were the mountains, sometimes invisible in the mist, usually dark, and occasionally green and illuminated with the now vestigial sunlight. She liked the lanes of the neighborhood from which you could peek into the wildly cultivated or decorated back gardens. Her room was nicely, if minimally, furnished now. A little menagerie of photographs and a few pretty or sentimental items, like the bracelet of crystal beads Elsie had given her when she left, lay on a silk scarf on the windowsill. She and Molly had a competition going, to see who could bring home the funniest rented film on Thursday nights.

  * * *

  Dara saw the advert on the board at the employment center. It was a typical wet winter morning and she had a paper cup of strong tea in her hand. An administrative assistant position with an agency in the neighborhood that served immigrant communities. Those with foreign languages and an interest in education were encouraged to apply.

  She got a call back the following week and was interviewed by two women and one man, a mustachioed Syrian, who gave her a short tour of the facility. Radi had a pleasant voice and familiar manner. She liked the set of his elbows on the table. And she didn’t do too badly, except for the fact that when leaving she dropped her bag and then hit her forehead on the back of a chair when she bent to pick it up.

  Dara was a good candidate in all respects and she was hopeful. But she didn’t get it. They said the decision had been a difficult one, with many qualified applicants. They would keep her résumé on file, if anything else opened up.

  This is getting old, Dara thought after hanging up. The fumble at the end probably hadn’t helped. She was most surprised at the pang she felt when she realized she would not have occasion to get to know Radi. He’d seemed like a friend. Luckily it was Thursday and Molly’s turn on the film.

  * * *

  “Six months later,” Dara wrote, “and still ungainfully unemployed.” She was sitting in a café near her flat, having something in a tortilla and finishing a postcard to Elsie. A few weeks had passed since the interview and there were no new prospects.

  She heard her name spoken.

  “Dara?”

  She looked up, it was Radi.

  “Oh, hello,” she said brightly.

  “Radi,” he said, indicating himself.

  “Yes, I remember,” she said.

  “How is the job search?” He asked. “Have you found something?”

  “Oh,” she said, still working off her surprise, “not yet. Still at it.”

  He said not to be discouraged. They both smiled and there was a bit of a silence. Then he lifted the white paper bag he was holding in his hand along with a pair of reading glasses, and said, “Well, I’ll let you get back to your writing. Nice to see you.”

  “Nice to see you too,” she said.

  * * *

  She decided to go back to the café a few days later. It was a decent place to read, she told herself. Good light. So she read, or pretended to, until she accidentally got interested in a passage and then had to search for a word in her dictionary. When she next looked up, he was there, at the counter paying for his order, collecting the white paper bag again and turning around, and then coming closer.

  “Anything good?” he asked, glancing at her book.

  She told him she’d gotten it to practice her French, but that it wasn’t half bad. He liked to read, he said, and knew a number of French authors. Somehow twenty minutes went by. Then he glanced at his watch, sliding the cuff of his sweater up past his wrist.

  “I’m late,” he said. He did have a lovely smile.

  * * *

  The next time Dara went to the café Radi was there already. It was crowded and they sa
t together. Embarrassed, she was suddenly aware of the smooth curve of his cheekbone, the angle of his jaw, his warm brown eyes. Dara placed her elbow on her sandwich, and then quickly removed it. Radi didn’t seem to notice.

  He’d been in Canada almost ten years, he said, letting into the conversation that he’d been divorced for two. He had a four year old son. And what part of London was she from? He knew London. And how did she like Vancouver?

  Her heart fell a little when they said goodbye in the usual way. He was probably just being friendly, she told herself. She never was a good judge of these things.

  * * *

  But the next time he was waiting for her outside.

  “We’ve got to go somewhere else,” he said. “I’m getting sick of this place.”

  She laughed. They walked.

  Now Radi was saying he had a cousin staying with him temporarily, a student at university. It was going to be his birthday, he was turning twenty and they were having a small party. She realized he was inviting her.

  “If you’re not busy,” he said.

  * * *

  Back at the flat, she set the scrap of paper he’d given her with his number and the other details on the silk scarf on the windowsill. Radi. He was an Arab, obviously. And what of it? She wasn’t out to prove anything. She liked him. She liked him a lot.

  She told Molly that evening.

  “Do you want to come with me?” she asked.

  “Um, Dara,” Molly said, stroking Lucia who was melted onto the sofa between them, “are you out of your mind?”

  * * *

  Dara checked the mirror in the washroom. She had on a short, sleeveless dress, of a silvery material that hugged her curves, and this over a pair of slim trousers. She slipped her opal pendant around her neck, found some hoop earrings that went with the dress, and some tinted gloss that made her lips rosy. Under present weather conditions her wavy hair had assumed a satisfactory shape; loose it reached just below her shoulders. She rubbed a few drops of jasmine oil on her throat and wrists, and last put on Elsie’s bracelet of crystal beads.

  She had a small drink of water, coughed when it went down the wrong way, then grabbed her coat and umbrella, and the box of dates she’d picked up. The ten or twelve blocks walk to his flat would be perfect for settling these butterflies.

  * * *

  Radi came to the door wearing a sleek wine-colored shirt and pressed black trousers. Muffled voices and music came from behind him inside.

  “Come in, come in,” he said, taking her coat, and introduced her around. Dara gave the box of dates to the aunt who seemed most in charge, a matronly lady with expressive features, who must have been very beautiful as a young woman.

  More guests arrived. Food was piled out onto plates, someone turned up the music. Votives glowed on all the surfaces, there were toasts and congratulations to the guest of honor. At urging from the crowd Radi and his cousin sang along to a duet in Arabic playing on the stereo. Radi as the man, on his knees declaring his love, while his cousin --who’d had a few-- sang in a bashful falsetto as the would-be bride, the guests crying with laughter. After that Dara was pulled into a dance everyone seemed to know. Radi slipped an arm around her waist. She was conscious of his fingertips pressed gently against her hip. She felt the smooth material of his shirt under her palm, and beneath it the warmth of his body, the supple movements of his shoulder muscles, the arc of a rib.

  The night deepened. More of the cousin’s university friends tumbled in, changed the music to something clubbier and soon began some kind of drinking game on the floor around the coffee table. Dara and Radi were seated behind on the sofa.

  “You can see we aren’t very religious,” he said, rolling his eyes.

  She asked him about Syria. It was all about family, he said, then grabbed a small framed photograph from a side table, of a sweet-faced boy with water-combed hair, clutching a soccer ball. “That’s Jumah,” he said tenderly, “I have him half the week.”

  “One is freer here,” Radi said, meaning Canada, “but more alone.”

  “You don’t seem lonely,” Dara said.

  “Sometimes,” he said.

  * * *

  Soon the aunt was saying goodbye, guests were departing, and then it was just them, except for the cousin who appeared to be out cold in the armchair. Radi bent over him, shaking his shoulders, saying what must have been “time for bed.” The cousin woke, barely, and stumbled off down the hall to the tiny second bedroom.

  Radi sat down again beside her, asked if she liked the music that was now playing softly. She did. He asked what else did she like. What came to her was a trip from Lisbon to Malaga, Spain, the Mediterranean’s green glass waves. He was turned toward her, listening, the candle glow illuminating his skin, his collar bones. He looked at her a long moment, then said, “You’re really beautiful, Dara.” And then, “I’m so happy you’re here.”

  “I’m happy too,” she managed to say back.

  He took her hand. He kissed her. His lips were warm and soft. It was a luxury to touch him.

  “Is it alright?” he asked gently.

  She gave a small nod. The kissing went gloriously on, the small spaces between them disappearing all the while, breath quickening. Suddenly she said, “I have to make a confession.”

  He blinked,“A confession?”

  “I can’t make love to a man with a mustache,” she said, “I’m reminded of my dad.”

  He sat back, clearly surprised, his mouth slightly open. His cheeks were flushed, and his collar askew. He broke into a smile. “I’ll be right back,” he said jumping up, and disappeared around the corner and down the hall.

  Dara heard a door close. She thought maybe she heard water running, but she was rather absorbed in the rushing of her own blood. A pulse beat in her neck where he’d kissed her.

  She heard him coming back, and then he dropped down beside her again. He’d shaved. She burst out laughing.

  “Do I look funny?” He was laughing too. She wasn’t exactly surprised, but it took a minute to adjust. He looked younger, his lips more full.

  “Not funny,” she said.

  He stood again and held out his hand to her.

  “Come on,” he said.

  * * *

  They made their way down the hall and into the bedroom. Somehow she didn’t trip over anything. A remnant of streetlight made visible the outlines of a closet, a chair, the bed, a night table. They were kissing again and now undressing. What was she doing? She tried for a second to locate her reason. It was off on holiday…

  The bed was smooth and wide, covered with some kind of patterned spread. She didn’t think she’d ever seen such an inviting place. It was cool and silky against her skin. Radi sat on the edge of the bed opening the drawer of the night table. She could make out the subtle roll of his shoulders. The phrase “prophylactic gymnastic” randomly popped into her mind. “I am nuts,” she thought, but then he was alongside her, his hand smoothing her thigh.

  “Is it alright?” he asked again, and she answered by tasting the salt skin of his throat. Then his mouth again, the entwined limbs. Walking, working, these seemed trivial activities for the human body, whose real design was for this. She slid the back of her knee over his hip and he shifted closer.

  She opened to him, he pushed inside her.

  The rush.

  Wave after wave of green glass, sweat and jasmine, the rocking of the sea and pull of the moon. He was like honey.

  She reached climax first, nearly biting his shoulder to keep quiet, quaking, gripping him fiercely. Two or three movements more and now he was shuddering, with a low, sustained moan.

  * * *

  They lay for a long time in a loose embrace, breathing quieted, gently kissing. He smoothed the damp hair back from her face. She touched his upper lip where he’d shaved and they laughed again. At last she said, “I should go.”

  “Oh, stay,” he murmured, pulling her nearer.

  “Your cousin,” she said. She
wasn’t ready for that. And she needed her own bed if she was to get any sleep at all.

  “I’ll take you,” he relented, and kissed her in such a way that she almost changed her mind.

  * * *

  He had a small car that had seen better days. The rain had stopped and it was cold. He stroked her knee, kissed her again at a stop sign.

  There was a long, almost chaste embrace outside the gate to her building.

  “Thank you,” he said, “for tonight.”

  “It was lovely,” she said.

  “Let’s talk tomorrow,” he said.

  “All right,” she said.

  He took a few steps toward the car, lifted up his hand in a wave and slipped off the curb. Dara blinked, had he fallen down? Radi was up again, brushing wet leaves off his trousers. “Oops,” He said, smiling. “Don’t mind me,” he opened the door of the car, “it’s just a little problem I have.”

  Four

  For the Love of Meat

  Los Angeles, 1981

  You see this? This is a piece of meat.

  A nice one. See how it falls apart? Tender. A nice boiled brisket with potatoes, carrots, onions… Meat is good for you, it makes you strong, puts red in your cheeks. You want to try some? Wait a minute while I get my good knife. Here, take some oranges too, and lemons from out back, I have too many. Take them with you. Even when I take them in for the girls at the store, too many.

  That’s right, Mondays and Thursdays I work at the store. Wednesday is my card game, Tuesday laundry, Friday shopping, then there’s my shows. Monday is a good day to come, afternoon, because we get a lot of donations over the weekend, and some very nice things come through, I will tell you. Good quality. You need anything? How about a pants suit for work? What do you wear, linen? Permanent press? I’ll keep my eye out for you.