Never Hug a Mugger on Quadra Island

by Sandy Frances Duncan

  Here you go, baby, Kyra thought. Drinking juice for nine months. Already you’re changing my life.

  A couple of blocks off Dogwood they located the hospital and a parking space. Lots of green space. Splendid setting for the sick. They entered the hospital, a three-storey building of far greater antiquity than the highway. At Emergency they asked for directions to Intensive Care. Elevator to the third floor. At a nurses’ station Kyra said, “We’re here to see Derek Cooper.”

  A plump middle-aged nurse asked, “Are you relatives?”

  “Yes,” lied Kyra without hesitation.

  “He’s in 311.”

  “Not ICU?” Noel asked. He hated hospitals. He knew them too well.

  “Telemetry. Just outside ICU.”

  The three headed down the hall and into a room. In the bed a bundle of body lay under a sheet. Wires and tubes stuck out of it, connecting to bags and monitors. The scalp was bandaged. The skin of the face was deeply bruised, some of it still purple, much of it gone yellow. No one else there, but seconds later three men entered the room, one after the other. Jason and the two brothers, Kyra figured.

  Noel confirmed it by grabbing the older one’s upper arms and holding them tight. “Jason, I’m so sorry.” He glanced toward the lump.

  One son had gone around the foot of the bed to the other side. He picked up Derek’s hand. “Hi Dee, it’s Tim here. Your favorite pest.” His voice choked, he cleared his throat, he blinked hard. “You’re gonna come out okay.”

  The other boy must be Shane, confirmed for Kyra first from Alana’s intense gaze, then immediately by Jason’s introduction. Noel introduced her and Alana to the men.

  “I’ve been following all your successes,” Alana said to Shane.

  “Right.” He sounded deeply uninterested. He stared down at Derek.

  The family resemblance was strong. The three were about the same height. The two sons had dark brown straight hair, one day likely morphing to Jason’s brown-grey. The three faces were long, with firm chins and narrow noses; pleasant faces. Kyra glanced at Derek. His nose was blunter and his lips fuller. No way to tell anything about his hair with his head bandaged.

  Many bodies in the room. Then another body arrived, in a nurse’s uniform.

  “Hi Hon,” Jason said. Linda, the boys’ mother, Kyra realized.

  “Hi.” Linda smiled at them all quickly, then looked to Derek.

  “The doctor saying anything new?” asked Shane.

  “Nothing different.”

  Jason asked, “They should do another brain scan.”

  Linda shrugged. “They’re waiting for an indication of some change.”

  “People come out of comas even after years,” said Tim. “We’ve got to keep him in touch with us. He’s got to hear family voices.”

  Noel introduced Kyra and Alana to Linda, whose smile was tight.

  Another person entered the room, a young pretty auburn-haired woman carrying a big purse. “Oh, hi, guys. I just went for coffee.”

  “Good to take some time away,” said Linda evenly.

  “Yeah, I’ve been here since ten. Talking to Derek. Playing his music.” She put down her purse and pushed to the bed. “Hi Derek, I’m back.”

  “This is Cindy,” Jason said. “Derek’s girlfriend.”

  Kyra noted the irritation on Tim’s face. Shane remained expressionless.

  Linda said, “People in comas don’t need to be stimulated all the time.” Her tone was mildly admonitory.

  “Derek likes his music,” Cindy defended.

  “You checking in with the nurses’ station?” Linda’s tone was still mild but Kyra caught a fleeting sense of glee from Tim.

  “Sure,” Cindy mumbled.

  Linda pushed by Jason and stroked Derek’s forehead. “Too many people in this room. It’s just after staff change. There’ll be rounds.”

  “We’ll be in the waiting area until you’re free,” Kyra announced as she motioned Noel and Alana out. Shane came too. After a minute, so did Tim.

  “I’m really sorry about your brother,” Alana said to Shane.

  “Thanks.”

  Tim slumped on the orange plastic sofa. He took off his cap, put it on backwards.

  “How long’s he been in a coma?” Alana asked Shane.

  Shane sat too. “A few weeks.”

  “Twenty-three days.” Tim pulled the bill of his cap around again, and down so his eyes were shaded. Alana’s concern was only for Shane. Kyra, coming to stand beside Noel, said quietly, “What now?”

  “We need to see where Derek was attacked.”

  “And talk to his doctor.”

  “And go to Quadra?”

  “We’ll find a motel or a B&B for the night.” Kyra looked at Alana, still trying to talk to Shane. He’d crossed his legs and was flipping his foot up and down. Tim’s cap sat halfway down his face.

  Noel said. “Kyra, find out who Derek’s doctor is and when we can see him. I’ll go to the car and look up bed and breakfasts. I bet there’s a wireless leak around here.”

  Kyra crinkled one side of her mouth. “I’m your social secretary?”

  “Please.” He’d learned to despise hospitals when Brendan was dying. “If you don’t mind?” He had to get out of here. Her face appeared resigned. He left.

  She sat down in a hard lumpy chair and picked up a magazine. Over it, she studied the three teens. Alana, limpid eyes still on Shane. Had she been wrong casting Alana their teen detective? Tim, under his ball cap, aware of anything in the room? Shane, all but immobile.

  Linda came in, followed by Cindy with her large purse. Linda looked tired—and though a generation younger than Noel’s parents, nearly as grey. Cindy looked what? defiant? sulky? chastised? What had Linda said to her?

  Jason arrived last. Kyra said quietly, “Noel and I would like to talk to Derek’s doctor.”

  Jason glanced at Linda. “Doctor Pierce.”

  “He’ll have the reports from Victoria?”

  “Yes, he does.”

  “Where could we find him?”

  “Do you have a—?” Linda made scribbling motions.

  Kyra pulled out her iPhone. Linda gave her the number. Kyra punched it in. “Thanks.” In the hall she pressed Talk. The receptionist said, “The doctor could see you for a few minutes—” she stressed few—“in about an hour.”

  Back in the waiting area she said, “We’d like to see where Derek was attacked.”

  “A dead-end road.” Jason pursed his lips. “I better come with you. Linda,” he put his arm around his wife’s shoulder, “why don’t you take the kids and go home. I’ll show them the attack site. We’ll come over later.”

  “We’re to talk with Dr. Pierce in about an hour,” Kyra reminded him.

  “Oh. Okay.”

  To Alana, Linda said, “You can come to Quadra with us if you’d rather.” And to Kyra, “I’ve got a place for you on Quadra. A friend with a B&B had cancellations. Won’t you have to be on the island too?”

  Yes, they needed to interview whatever friends and maybe enemies Derek had on Quadra. In the morning. “That’s very nice. Thank you.”

  On Alana’s lips, a confused scowl. She glanced over at Shane; he stared beyond her. To Kyra she said, “If Noel doesn’t mind, I’ll go over with Linda.” Linda nodded. “You’ll tell me what you find out?”

  “That’s okay?” Kyra said to Linda, who nodded. Then to Alana, “Sure.”

  “Come on, everyone. Cindy, take some time for yourself, dear.” Linda’s tone just wanted to go home. “Derek’s getting the best care he can have.”

  Cindy played with her purse strap. Fear, grief, anxiety, confusion flitted across her face.

  “If you do something for yourself this evening, you’ll have more to report to Derek tomorrow,” Linda stated.

  Cindy’s eyes teared. “I just want him back again.”

  “We all do, Hon.” Linda patted Cindy’s shoulder. “Do you have your car?”

  “No, I walked.”


  Linda smiled. “Jason and the others can give you a ride home.”

  In the elevator Linda told Kyra that her friend, Barb, had cancellations because she’d informed her bookings that the attic had been invaded by carpenter ants. She only needed the people away for a few hours but they spooked and cancelled. “City people don’t know, in the bush you live with lots of critters. If you want I’ll confirm the rooms from the ferry. The ants are gone.”

  “Great.” Ants?

  • • •

  A couple of years ago Harold Arensen decided the weather in Victoria far outranked humid Ottawa summers and ice-laced winter streets, so decided to move his base. In Victoria, too, the skating community treated him with appropriate respect. Not that he’d lacked respect in the east, simply that the natural rivalry between the BC skating world and that in the Hamilton-Toronto-Ottawa-Montreal stretch had the west believing they’d brilliantly won Harold away from his haunts for the last thirty-plus years.

  Though he preferred Victoria to Vancouver, sometimes it was necessary to spend time on the mainland, especially this year leading up to the Olympics. He’d been a proud supporter of the Canadian faction that had won the 2010 Olympics for Vancouver; if he’d been living on the west coast then he would’ve been a leading partner in the effort. Now, since many of Canada’s superior young skaters trained in and around Vancouver, he’d been following a select few through their coaches, offering advice, sometimes even wisdom, as best he could. To the very best he would offer his unique expertise. They would profit from it, and their success would reflect with burnished grandeur Harold’s own place in Skate Canada.

  He held out a great deal of promise for several of them, Miranda Steele and Tak Lee in Calgary, Dan MacAdoo and Graham Pauley in Toronto, Danielle Dubois on Montreal’s West Island, and especially Shane Cooper from Vancouver, an extraordinary performer. As well he might be, considering Carl Certane had selected the boy, as much for his natural abilities as for his imagination. That faun sequence he’d performed had been remarkable. And with each competition his routines became increasingly polished—in fact, they sparkled.

  Today Arensen would watch Shane skate. His preferred manner of observing was from a distance, without announcing his presence. So this morning found Harold driving his vintage Lincoln Continental onto the ferry from the Swartz Bay terminal at the tip of the Saanich Peninsula, heading across Georgia Strait. Ferry time was, he had discovered, a good time to be out of time. An hour and a half of giving himself, like his couple of thousand fellow passengers, over to the good guidance of the ship’s captain. He always tried to get a place at the very front of the boat. There he could look up from his book to follow the ship’s passage. Now they were passing between Portland Island and Salt Spring, the so-called Satellite Channel. Massive dark-green Douglas firs rose on the Salt Spring side. A sunny summer day and the sea sparkling brilliant blue, wind-blown breakers snow-white as they smashed against the shore on both sides.

  Excitement took him as he wondered how much Shane had progressed since his last competition—a fine performance until his dreadful fall. What could have distracted him? Shane had no answer. A bad placement? Possibly, but why? His mind wandering? Shane hadn’t thought so. A bad night’s sleep? Shane thought he’d slept okay. “Well, don’t worry about it,” Harold had told him. And added with a smile, “Just make sure it doesn’t happen again.”

  Approaching Harold Arensen’s favorite part of the trip across, a narrow boomerang-shaped passage between the southern tip of Galiano and northwest Mayne Islands, called Active Pass. Active it was as the sea roiled between the land masses, smashing against shale shoreline. Past Bellhouse Park, and the ferry was in the open Strait, the last leg before the flat drive from the terminal into the city.

  He and four-hundred and fifty other cars and trucks drove off, along a reinforced spit of land, past the Tsawwassen Band reserve, under the Fraser River, through Richmond and into the city. Along to Kerrisdale, home of the Cyclone Taylor Arena. Arensen had pushed Certane hard—get Shane ice time at one of the Olympic venues. But Certane had rejected the suggestion: Stop breaking your head over it, Harold. Wasn’t breaking his head, just making a logical suggestion. It took a couple of months arguing with Carl that Harold had learned Carl really was doing the best for Shane—ice time at an Olympic site, when it could be had, was strictly limited from 11:00 PM to 7:00 AM—the rest of day needed to prepare the rink for the Olympic events. Instead, Carl, who was a consultant to Cyclone Taylor Figure Skating Inc., purveyors of skates and costumes to champions, requested and was given prime time daily at the Kerrisdale Arena.

  Well, why the hell didn’t Carl say so in the first place? Dumb ass.

  But that was in the past. Long forgiven. Today Arensen pulled into a space reserved for the arena’s brass and parked. He strode through a side doorway. At the information desk he noted a woman in her forties with a strong chin and a mass of blonde hair. “Tell me when Shane Cooper is skating.”

  The woman checked her schedule. “Don’t see his name on for today.”

  She glanced backward in her schedule. “Don’t see his name for anywhere the last couple of days.” And forward. “Or later this week.”

  “That’s ridiculous. He has to be training.”

  “Maybe. But not here.”

  Arensen exploded a puff of irritated air, started to stride away, turned quickly. “Carl Certane in?”

  “Should be. Down the hall to—”

  “I know, I know.”

  To Carl’s office, then. Even had Carl’s name on it, black lettering. He grabbed the knob, turned it, pushed. A large cluttered desk, computer and papers. A tall man, broad in his hunched shoulders, sitting with his back to the desk, walls covered with photos and posters of skaters. One paper-filing cabinet. Couple of chairs. “Carl, where the hell is Shane?”

  The man turned—a frowning face, narrow nose, thick shock of white hair. “That’s a door there, Harold. They’re made to knock on.”

  “Sorry, sorry. But why don’t you have Shane in training?”

  “He is training.”

  “Where? I want to see what he’s doing.”

  “Well, head up to Campbell River.”

  “Campbell—? What the hell’s all this about?”

  “Sit down, Harold, before you explode.”

  Yeah, Harold could feel his face had gone red. Damn blood pressure. But not something to worry about now. He sat. He spoke slowly, deliberately. “Okay. Campbell River. Why Campbell River?”

  “Because that’s where he’s from. Quadra Island.”

  “So what, is he on vacation or something? There’s not much training time left and—”

  “He does have a bit of a personal life, Harold.”

  “Hey, what’s this? Some girl?”

  “He doesn’t know what a girl is, so just relax. He’s got a brother who’s in a coma. Shane’s spending some time there.”

  “Yeah, but what about his work?”

  “There’s a pretty good rink there. I got him excellent ice time.”

  “Pretty good rink? Gimme a break, Carl.”

  Carl shrugged. “It was used a couple of decades ago for a world’s finals—junior women’s hockey. He gets whatever time he needs, whenever. And he’s not far from his brother. Close by he worries less about what’s going on.”

  “Women’s hockey, for pissake! That’s no figure skating rink.” He got up, stared down at Carl. “You trying to ruin him?” He stormed out of the office.

  “Where you going?” called Carl.

  “Home. Where I should never have left.” Back to the Lincoln. Back to the ferry. The return trip began to soothe him. Then, in Active Pass, he thought: Shit on it! Campbell River, that’s right next to Quadra Island. Which, if he remembered right, was where Austin Osborne had a home. Osborne had been supporting Shane, Harold knew this. Goddamn Osborne! Always dangerous.

  THREE

  Jason and Kyra, Cindy trailing, walked downstairs. Jason pushed
open a side door. “Car’s parked in the next lot,” said Kyra.

  “We can cut through the garden.”

  The garden, a quiet green space that featured mown grass, scattered trees and benches, also held a number of sculpted pieces—a figure of a despairing woman in chiseled wood; a ten-foot metallic serpent rising from its coiled tail, called River Spirit; a hand rising from the ground that stood taller than Kyra, holding an enormous egg. Noel snapped pictures with his cell. “What’s with all these?”

  “No idea,” Jason said, and led the way.

  Kyra felt unclear regarding Jason Cooper. She granted him his distress—son in a coma with no end in sight would be upsetting. But if she and Noel were to learn anything about the comatose kid, Jason would have to be more forthcoming. “Noel said Derek was found by an old lady with a dog.”

  “She’s known up there, walks the dog at night, says she hardly ever sleeps,” said Jason, without turning around. “Got home and called 911.”

  They arrived at the car. Kyra told Noel about the B&B reservation. “Oh,” he said. After finger-dashing around a Campbell River lodging site he’d found them two possible B&Bs. Now Kyra—or Linda—had one-upped him. He closed his laptop.

  Jason got into the front seat, Kyra in back. Cindy slumped down beside her. Can’t be twenty yet, Kyra thought, but what a drawn, weary face. “He’s a strong young man, Cindy. Give him time to pull through.”

  Cindy nodded. “I hope.”

  The tension between Cindy and Linda still echoed in Kyra’s memory. “Being with him lends him your strength. But he needs time to find his own strength too.”

  “I know.” She sniffed. “I do know.”

  Jason turned to the back seat. “Which way, Cindy?”

  Cindy gave directions—back out to Dogwood, a left, pretty soon a right on Merecroft. Just before the end of the road Cindy said, “Over there.” They pulled up in front of a cedar-shingled house set back from the road. To one side stood a small cabin.

  “Nice place,” said Kyra.

  “Thanks,” said Cindy. She got out. “Thank you.” She started from the car, turned, said to Jason through the open window, “He’s going to be fine.” She nodded to herself. “Just fine.” Quickly she headed toward the house.