She choked off the logical response: “How can you compare your life with his?” Once upon a time she would have said it, spontaneously. But she also knew that she would quickly have regretted saying it, and that the injury inflicted by her words would far exceed the insult that she felt.
She asked if he’d be coming by before he left. He didn’t think it would be wise, he said, to risk passing on whatever bug he had.
“I was out of line the other night,” he mumbled.
“I understand,” she said.
“Sometimes I’m a bit—I don’t know.”
“It’ll be okay.”
Saturday night she attended the symphony. She wasn’t particularly fond of classical music but found a deep resonance in the musical themes and rhythms of certain serious performers and composers. The program on Saturday featured violin concertos by Antonio Vivaldi, and he was one of those composers who, at times, evoked a rare serenity and memories of her father seemingly transported to a place of harmony as he listened to the local fiddle players.
The invitation had come from a history professor whose husband was down with the flu and who didn’t want to waste expensive tickets. After the performance, they had a quiet drink on King Street, not far from the concert hall, then she dropped her colleague at her condo near St. Lawrence Market.
Driving up Jarvis on her way home, Effie noticed a man standing at the corner of Carlton, waiting for the light to change. Even before his face confirmed it, she knew it was JC. He’d said he was preparing to leave town, to go to Texas. He wasn’t well. Why was he there on a seedy part of Jarvis? He was a long walk from where he lived, but maybe not for a man who was working through the challenge of a mid-life crisis. She decided not to think about it any further.
But at home she felt restless. The post-concert glass of wine sat like a sour scum upon her tongue. She plugged in the kettle to boil water for a cup of tea, resolving to cut back on the alcohol intake, at least until Easter.
Suddenly she ached for Easter and the springtime. As she waited for the kettle, her gaze shifted to a calendar on the kitchen wall. December. Long gone, she thought. She removed the page and stared at January 1999, trying to remember why there was a circle drawn in ink around the sixth, a Wednesday. What about the sixth? Then it came to her. Duncan had made that mark in May. The Epiphany, he said, a benchmark of some kind, a reference to her and JC Campbell.
They had made it through the summer, the ecstasy of summer, and through the blissful fall all the way to the Epiphany and then beyond. There were challenges, of course, but the basics were intact. She found great comfort in the small gestures, his sorrowful apologies, all the signals that he needed her.
She felt reassured, but she couldn’t shake a feeling that was close to dread, and she remembered Duncan’s words when he briefly visited in September—epiphany or catharsis, and that sometimes it’s easy to confuse them. The kettle squealed.
The mug was hot, the fragrance of the tea refreshing, but she couldn’t get the sight of JC Campbell off her mind. It was how forlorn he seemed. She was well aware of how defeat reshapes a man, restructures neck and shoulders, tips the face. And she saw it in the lonely-looking man on Jarvis Street, only slightly less pathetic than the spectacle she’d seen just south of there, moments earlier: a woman, or maybe just a girl, huddled in a cheap imitation leather jacket, thighs and knees pressed together below a foolishly short skirt, a hungry face lit briefly by the futile ember of a cigarette.
She listened to the silence of her home. She told herself again that there was comfort in the silence. The nurturing silence of a hard-won solitude. Autonomy. She raised the slowly cooling mug.
two
But to what purpose
Disturbing the dust on a bowl of rose-leaves
I do not know.
T.S. ELIOT, “BURNT NORTON,”
FOUR QUARTETS
5
Monday morning she was up with the dawn, quickly lost in essays, once again lamenting how the carelessness of language can devalue creative insights and original ideas. She found the sloppy spelling, the lazy syntax, to be deeply irritating. But it was, she acknowledged, an improvement over when she also had to deal with almost indecipherable handwriting.
She stared out a window, momentarily transported back to a shabby little schoolhouse, felt the ache of isolation, the craving for escape, and reminded herself: This is it, this is the escape.
“Huh???” she underlined with three firm strokes of the red pen. She scratched another cryptic marginal comment and then reviewed it guiltily, wondering how much of her criticism was a projection of a mood that had nothing to do with students, scholarship or literacy.
Her workspace was a small bedroom that overlooked the street, and she was accustomed to early-morning traffic, especially on a Monday. But the taxi slowing down as it approached was unusual. She watched as the driver studied numbers on the houses. Then the taxi stopped at her front step and a rear door swung wide. There was a long pause before JC emerged. He stood as if briefly unsure, carrying the travel case they’d purchased for the cat.
When she opened the door, she smiled bleakly. “Oh. You.” The taxi was idling at the curb, vapour swirling in the frosty air.
“I know,” he said. “I should have phoned. There was half a plan that Duncan would look after him, but he called late to say he didn’t think it would be such a good idea where he’s living now. With the street people. A bit rough there for a well-bred cat.”
He smiled. “To be truthful, I didn’t have the guts to call. Me all over, right?”
This diffidence was new, she thought, and disconcerting, as was the long scratch running down his cheek, starting just below his eye.
“What happened to your face?”
“Ah,” he said. “Mr. Sorley got me. I was taking out some tangles. I trimmed his claws … I guess I should have done it sooner.” He was blushing, uncomfortably.
“You should put something …”
“I did. A smear of Mecca. The miracle balm, you claim.”
He held out the cat case. “You don’t mind?” Through air holes she could see two intense blue eyes.
“No,” she said. “He’s mine anyway. He’ll be company.”
“I hope he doesn’t cause an allergic reaction.”
“I’m over that,” she said. “How long will you be gone?”
“The week,” he said. “I fly to Houston this morning. I’ll pick up a rental and drive to Huntsville.”
“Is this a good idea?”
“I don’t know. Maybe not. I didn’t tell anyone in Huntsville that I’m coming. I can always change my mind. In which case, I’ll be back tomorrow night.”
“I’ll be here,” she said.
“I hope.”
“I have coffee on.”
“I’d better carry on. You know how the Americans can be at immigration. I’ll call or email. Or something.”
“If you get a chance.” Then she said, “I saw you Saturday night. Out walking. I’d have stopped, but I was by before I noticed.”
“Saw me?” He seemed confused.
“Yes. On Jarvis.”
“It couldn’t have been me. I never left the house all weekend.”
He produced a can of cat food from the pocket of his overcoat and presented it to her. Something about the gesture almost made her sob. He leaned close, kissed her cheek, held the contact for a moment. His cheek was warm and smooth. Under a strong aroma of shaving lotion and a sharp undertone of Listerine, there were traces of stale whisky. A fading musk of old cigarette smoke on the overcoat.
After he was gone, she retrieved a plastic pan from a storage closet, lined it with a garbage bag and half filled it with cat litter, then placed it in a discreet but accessible alcove. Then she released Sorley from the cage. He stepped out stiffly, blinking, stretched and yawned and wandered off, but returned shortly, stepped into the litter and, studying her with what she imagined was distaste, vigorously pissed.
&nbs
p; In the kitchen she opened the tin and spooned food into a dish. She felt him at her ankles, and when she picked him up, he purred in fond appreciation. She scratched his ears and he closed his eyes. When she fluffed his fur, she realized that it was seriously matted, had been neglected for quite some time. She examined his paws, pressing back the furry flesh buds to reveal long, curved talons that were razor sharp, untrimmed. She lifted him, held his punched-in pug face close to her own, looked into the glacial eyes. He yawned again. His breath was foul.
“Dear, dear,” she said quietly. “Why is Daddy lying to us?”
Her eyes were watery.
Cassie called just before she left for class. They’d picked a date, decided to get married on April 10, the Saturday just after Easter. They planned to keep it small, but she was open to suggestions regarding guests.
“You’ll have to help me with the Cape Breton crowd,” Cassie said. “The only one that’s obvious to me is Uncle John. Dad, of course. I’m not sure about that girlfriend.”
Before hanging up, Cassie told her that Ray had been putting together some information on concussions, how people with even mild head injuries react over the short and the long term. “It isn’t his specialty, exactly, but he’s asked some colleagues for input.”
Effie said that she was looking forward to reading anything he came up with, and she meant it.
At four thirty Tuesday afternoon, as she prepared to leave for home, she noticed the blue call slip in her mailbox.
“Mr. Gillis, 3:45. Your ex again?”
There was a telephone number, with the 902 area code.
“Shit,” she said. She balled up the paper, dropped it in a waste-basket and turned out the lights.
When the phone rang late that night, she ran to answer it, surprised by the instant wave of joy it caused.
“Effie?”
There was a long pause, filled by a babble of voices.
“Effie? It’s John Gillis here.”
Oh God. “John—this is a surprise.”
“Yes,” he said. “Drove in today.”
John was in a bar, she guessed, judging from the voices and the clatter.
“So where are you, for God’s sake?”
“Haven’t got a clue,” he said. He could see the CN Tower through a window, though, which didn’t tell her anything except that he was in Toronto.
“Walk outside and check for a street sign,” she instructed.
“I was just leaving anyway,” he said.
“Were you calling this afternoon?” she asked. “At the office?”
“I spoke to someone there. Said I was your ex. Hope you didn’t mind.”
She laughed. “I thought …” but caught herself. “They didn’t get your name.”
“Looks like I’m on King Street. And … the other one is Simcoe.”
“Can you see Roy Thomson Hall?”
“Is that the round thing?”
“Yes. Where are you parked?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Well, get in a taxi, then.”
And she gave him her street address. Then she dressed quickly and poured a large drink. And sat back, mind racing.
John was standing, watching the taxi drive away, when she opened the door.
He turned, removed his hat.
“Well, this is a nice area.”
He seemed to stiffen when, thoughtlessly, she kissed his cheek. The alcohol aroma was overwhelming. She fanned it away, theatrically.
“Whew,” she said.
“I’ve had a few, but don’t you worry.”
“I’m having one myself,” she said. “Would you join me?”
“Well. I suppose.”
Over his drink he said he’d started driving Monday morning without a plan but with the remote idea that he might end up in Sudbury. He’d been there once, years before, with Uncle Jack. She vaguely remembered. It was back in the sixties, just after his father’s death. They could never forget the date. November 22, 1963. Sandy Gillis killed himself the day they killed the president of the United States. John and his uncle Jack wound up wandering Ontario, in search of work. In Sudbury John was offered a job, but they turned Jack down. Something about his lungs they didn’t like. Probably the beginning of the cancer that brought him down a few years later. All in all it had been a great trip, though. Released him from the fog of horror that imprisoned him after his father shot himself.
“You’d remember all that, though you were pretty young. Me going away with Uncle Jack.”
“I’m the same age as yourself,” she said.
“You always seemed younger. You seem younger now.”
“You’re obviously looking for something, with the compliments.”
He blushed. “You don’t have to worry about that.”
There was a long silence.
“Your mother, Mrs. Gillis … how is she, anyway?” she asked, knowing the likely response.
“Ah well,” he said, then sipped. “You know she’s in the nursing home?”
“I heard that. But she’s well?”
“Good days, bad days. Most days she doesn’t know who or where she is.”
After Sudbury, he and Jack had spent a couple of days in Toronto. Met a lot of guys from home at some little bar they all hung out in.
“The Rondun, probably,” Effie said.
“I think that was it,” he said. “A queer name like that.”
On a whim he’d tried to relocate the bar. Just for old time’s sake. He’d been thinking a lot about Jack recently. No special reason, just that it was creeping up to thirty years since he passed away, poor Jack. He drove all over the west end. Didn’t recognize a thing.
“Haven’t you been here since then?” she asked. “Since the sixties?”
“Managed not to have a reason,” he said. He had almost visited in ’93, when Toronto still had a decent ball team. But there was something that prevented it. There was always something.
But now there was something in particular motivating him, he said. He needed time alone, time to think about life changes. And he also thought best in a car, behind the wheel. No phones, except the mobile, which he kept turned off. Figured he’d revisit the places he and Uncle Jack had toured through all those years before. Get perspective on his life, or what passed for life.
He’d come as far as Ottawa, and it was while sitting in a Tim Hortons there that he remembered the little bar from years ago in Toronto and decided on the spot that driving all the way to Sudbury in the wintertime was probably a bad idea. So he changed course.
“A roundabout trip, but here you are,” she said. “So you slept in Ottawa?”
“No. Just carried on.”
“You haven’t slept?”
“I have a lot on my mind.”
And suddenly the call on New Year’s Eve came back to her. The pauses and unfinished sentences. The nervous laughter. And now he sat in front of her.
“You don’t mind me having a few drinks?” he said.
“You know yourself,” she said. “You’ll have to be the judge.”
“Ahhh. But you didn’t know the way I was, after you … back in the bad old days. When I was on my own. Not too proud of what I can remember about that.”
“I feel bad,” she said. It was spontaneous, as was the sudden grief.
“No, no, no,” he said. “It all worked out for the best. Don’t you go …” And he laughed again and tilted back. “Your man, who was down with you last summer. I was sorry afterwards I didn’t get to meet him.”
“There’ll be another time,” she said. “He’s away just now.”
“You didn’t say what line of work he’s in.”
“He works in television.”
“Interesting.”
“I was worried about you, at New Year’s, when you called. It was great hearing from you. But phone calls out of the blue at this point in life often bring bad news.”
“There was news, all right. But I couldn’t get the words out. I c
an’t imagine what you thought, so.”
“You’re okay, are you, John? There’s nothing wrong?”
“Ah yes,” he said. He turned and studied the kitchen counter. “Do you have any more of that good stuff?”
“Help yourself,” she said.
He was pouring with his back to her. “The news, such as it is … is that I’m getting married.”
“Jesus,” she said. “Bring that bottle over here.”
The story emerged in fragments. He’d met someone at his AA meetings. She was in her thirties. Struggling with drugs as he struggled with alcohol. Something between them seemed to make the struggle easier. He’d actually fallen off the wagon once or twice since he met her, with no permanent consequences. Like now. He’d be fine in the morning. No more binges.
“When?” she asked.
“Could be any day,” he said. “We’re just going to go off and see a judge. Have a few people, mostly from the program. Real low-key. She’s a lovely woman. You’d like her.”
“Well, that’s just wonderful. What’s her name?”
“Janice, but you wouldn’t have known her. She came to the area with her family after you were gone. The family eventually moved on, but Janice stayed behind.”
Janice had a good job at the mill but lost it after missing work for days on end. Now she had a job at the Superstore. Worked her way up to managing a department. Solid woman. Never a slip.
She raised her glass. “I wish you both all the happiness in the world. I mean that, John. I really do.”
“I know you do,” he said, staring at the table. “And the same to yourself and … what’s his name?”
“Campbell. JC Campbell.”
“Here’s to yourself and JC Campbell. But you haven’t asked me why I’m getting married, after all this time.”
“It seems like a pretty normal thing to do when you love somebody. And, oh yes, you’ll probably be getting an invitation to another wedding before long.”
“Not …”
“No, no. Not me. No fear. Cassie is getting married. Maybe at Easter.”
“Little Cassie?”
Why Men Lie Page 9
