by Darren Hynes
“It’s leaving, Mommy,” Lynette says.
Jeremy says, “It is, Mom.”
She’s so positive of it too that she feels her whole body falter, as if she might crumble into pieces. Condemned and on the cusp of demolition – that’s how she feels, the heavy ball about to smash into her centre.
She doesn’t even notice Donny waving at her. Can’t hear his shouts either.
Lynette’s tugging at her coat, she thinks.
What’s Jeremy saying?
It’s the lowering of the gangway that brings her back. All this time she’d thought it was the ferry moving away.
Donny’s beside her now. “Didn’t hear me calling?”
She turns to him.
“It’s not gonna wait all morning,” he says.
She’s got her arms around him now even though she doesn’t remember having gone to him.
“You’re welcome,” he says, gently extricating himself. “Come on.”
He takes up the suitcase and heads towards the ferry.
They follow him, Emily just behind, and the youngsters at her heels, the gangway extending towards them like an unfurled carpet. Passage into another life.
Donny steps aside and hands over the suitcase as they pass. “All the best.”
“Thank you,” she says, not looking back.
Jeremy and Lynette are waiting for her on the other end of the gangway, the sun now high in the sky behind them. Not a cloud.
She forges ahead, sensing her old life fall away with each step, a new one just beginning. Scared, yes, but excited too. Not about to make the same mistakes.
Only a few minutes after eight but already the sun is warm against her face. The lightest of breezes. The perfect day for leaving.
She stops in front of them. Looks at their faces for a moment. Already she can see the beginnings of definition around Jeremy’s cheekbones and jawline, like his dad. The thick hair that Kent had had in high school too. He’ll be even bigger she thinks, taller, broader across the shoulders, bigger hands and feet.
There’s more of her mother in Lynette than herself. Nose wider than her own, skin smoother, that elegant neck, and fuller lips. Emily’s eyes though, deep green with flecks of grey. Cat’s eyes, she’s been told. Greener than July grass, Kent had said to her once.
They walk up the steel steps to the upper level and then to the stern. Lay down their suitcases, their hands holding onto the railing, faces outward towards the wharf, the marina, St. Paul’s, the parish hall, the dying fish plant, the playground, the makeshift soccer field where an ownerless border collie runs free. She tries to imagine the place cleared out, boarded-up windows and empty streets, no boats in the harbour and no ATV engines roaring in the night, no dirtmarked children running in the road and no plant whistle to tell the stinking workers to go home for the day. No more Lightning Cove. No more for her anyway, one way or the other.
“We’re moving, Mommy,” Lynette says.
“Yes we are. Do you like the boat ride?”
Lynette nods.
Silence for a while. Then Jeremy says, “We’ll see Dad soon, right?”
She doesn’t look at him, preferring instead to focus on the receding land, everything that she’s leaving. Another moment before she says, “Soon, baby. Soon.”
4
FROM THE STERN OF THE BOAT, LIGHTNING COVE is indistinguishable in the distance, a thin line on the horizon. Irrelevant almost. Easy to stuff in a box and forget.
Jeremy and Lynette are on either side of her, sipping hot chocolates. Whipped cream on the corners of Jeremy’s mouth; a cute moustache over Lynette’s.
She’s working on her Styrofoam cup of coffee. At least that’s what the girl behind the canteen counter had called it. She isn’t so sure. Thick like syrup, coffee grinds on her tongue, a yet to be named colour that’s blacker than black.
It’s harder to move the fingers of her hand now. Her pinky, the one she’d burned last night, despite its blister, is the only one she can bend. She holds the wrist across her chest as if in an invisible sling. Thinks she can see it swelling, throbbing, stabbing pain like hundreds of needle pricks. How will she be able to sit on a plane for four or five hours like this? Something for the smarting, she thinks – extra strength Tylenol or Advil. Morphine.
“Watch out for your sister,” she says. “Mom has to go inside for a minute.”
She walks along the deck, throwing her coffee into the garbage en route, then pulls open the heavy door.
Apart from a few people playing cards at a table near the back, and an old man lying across three chairs, the lounge is empty.
She continues across the room to the small canteen adjacent the women’s washroom. Stands in front of the counter while the chubby cashier piles a handful of ketchup chips into her mouth, and then holds up a red-stained finger as if to say, “Give me a second so I can swallow these.”
Emily waits. Then waits some more while the girl sucks some Pineapple Crush through a straw.
“Sorry about that,” the cashier says, smiling, pieces of soggy chips trapped in her front teeth, “but I’m starved. Left the house without so much as a Pop Tart this morning.” She licks her fingers one at a time, then says, “Another coffee?”
Emily shakes her head.
The cashier leans forward, resting her elbows on the counter. “You don’t remember me, do ya?”
Emily takes a half step back. Studies the face.
“I’ve been away for a long time, that’s probably why. And I’m heavier too. Used to be a rake like yourself.”
“Melissa?”
“In the flesh.”
“You’re all grown up.”
“The spitting image of Mom, everyone says. You know my mom, Sonya, I suppose. Works at the Royal Bank.”
Emily nods, wondering how she could have overlooked the resemblance. The same thick fingers and heaving bosom, the same lips 177 and puffy cheeks.
“Yeah, well I’m back living with her now. Couldn’t stand my father’s boyfriend, you know. Control freak. Treated me like hired help or something.”
“Oh.”
“It’s too bad really, I loved Victoria.”
Emily edges closer to the counter. “Victoria?”
“Yeah.” She takes another sip of her pop.
“As in Victoria, BC?”
“Yeah.”
“What’s it like?”
“A lot better than this shit hole, let me tell yah. Big trees and it hardly ever snows. More to do besides smoke and drink like everyone around here. No one’s into your business either.” She looks down at Emily’s hand as if discovering it for the first time. “You just do that?”
“What?”
“Your hand?”
“Just before I boarded actually.”
“It looks like someone scrubbed it with sandpaper.”
“Gross isn’t it?”
“It hurt?”
Emily nods.
“It looks like it does.” Then, “Do you think it’s broken?”
“Don’t know. You wouldn’t happen to have some Tylenol back there would yah?”
“Sorry, nothing but hotdogs and ketchup chips behind here.”
“Okay,” Emily says, starting to walk away. “Thanks anyway.”
“Wait,” Melissa says, bending down and grabbing her purse. “I’ve got something a lot better than that.” She plops the purse down on the counter. “Make you forget you even got a hand this stuff will.”
Emily just looks at her.
The girl smiles a beet-red tooth grin. “Don’t worry, it’s nothing illegal.” She rummages in her purse. “Smile the whole night on this stuff, you will. Wake up the same way. Here.” She pulls out a prescription bottle. Holds it beside her face as if she were doing a Trident commercial. Hardly likely with all that ketchup on her teeth.
Emily comes closer. “What is it?”
“Morphine’s slutty girlfriend. The pharmacist calls it codeine.”
“That’s a prescr
iption.”
“So?”
“I can’t take that.”
“Why not? Mom does, whenever she can’t sleep. I’m constantly having to refill the bottle.”
Emily imagines Sonya sitting on the edge of her bed, a glass of Johnny Walker Red in one hand and a palm-full of her daughter’s pills in the other. Mascara tears blackening each cheek. Probably still hurt by her husband’s leaving.
“What’ll they do to me?”
“Help with the pain. At least until you can get it seen to.” She pushes down, then twists off the cap. Holds the bottle out to Emily.
Emily holds out her palm.
“I’ll give you four.”
“Isn’t that a lot?”
“Not at all. Take two now and then another two in twelve hours.”
Emily looks at the pills in her hand. Looks up at Melissa. “What do you take them for?”
“Irritable bowel.”
“Oh.”
“I can eat a whole pack of bacon if I take a couple of these beforehand.” Melissa goes to the sink and pours some water into a Styrofoam cup. Hands it to Emily.
“Thank you.” She pops two in her mouth and takes a sip of water. Hands the cup back and slips the other two pills into her pocket.
Melissa throws the rest of the water down the sink, then drops the cup into the garbage. Goes back to Emily. “Where you headed anyway?”
“Gander.”
“Then where?”
She pauses, then says, “What makes you think I’m going any farther?”
Melissa grabs a few more chips. Chews with her mouth open. “I don’t know.” Washes them down with a sip of Crush.
Emily doesn’t say where she’s going.
Melissa holds out the bag.
Emily shakes her head. “I should get back to the youngsters.”
“Okay.”
“Thanks so much.”
“You’re welcome.”
She starts to walk away.
“See you on the way back, probably,” Melissa says.
Emily lifts her good hand in a wave, but doesn’t turn around. “Probably.”
* * *
SHE SLIPS HER BAD HAND INTO HER SWEATER POCKET, her fingers on fire from the pain, eyes watering. How long before the codeine kicks in, she wonders?
She retraces her steps through the seating area. The card players are laughing and sipping coffees and rapping their knuckles against the table with each laid ace or queen. Heavy parkas for weather so mild. Unfamiliar to her. Tourists, she bets. Mainlanders. Americans.
The old man lying down has turned onto his side now, his back to her, butt sticking out. Because the three chairs he’s taking up are not enough to accommodate his whole length, his feet and ankles hang over.
She freezes in midstride. Holds her breath. Although she can’t see for herself, she imagines the colour draining from her face. “Jesus,” she whispers. “No ride to Gander.” Goddamn it. In all the panic earlier it had completely slipped her mind to call ahead and have a taxi waiting.
8:35. Flight’s at eleven. Over an hour to get to Gander from where the boat lets them off. Longer if the road’s bad. So bloody careless. Even if she calls now they’ll have to wait an hour. Maybe more. They’ll miss their flight.
She scans the room. Looks once more at the group playing cards, thinking that they must be heading Gander way. Where else? She moves towards them, then stops. How, especially if they’re all travel- ing in the same vehicle, will they be able to fit three more people? Not to mention their suitcases.
Melissa’s brewing more coffee when Emily turns to her. She’ll ask to use the cashier’s cell phone and call that cab. That’s if there’s any reception in the middle of the bay. No. There’s no time. They won’t make it. She imagines clawing at her hair or screaming or banging her fists against the windows. Lashing out at her stupidity, her complete heedlessness at having gotten them this far only to have it all fall apart because she forgot to make a phone call. A Jesus phone call.
She wonders how long it will take to walk to the highway? Start hitching then. What vehicles will be on the road so early? Mostly transport trucks, she figures. Burly men in ball caps listening to the country station and trying to break into the police frequency on their CBs in order to know where the highway patrol might be lurking.
She’ll have Lynette stand in front, and Jeremy a few steps behind his sister. She’ll stand at the back. Who’ll dare pass a sweet-faced thing like Lynette? A face like hers would probably get them a ride right to the airport’s terminal.
Someone’s calling her name. A voice too deep to be one of the children. Or Melissa. She turns and is shocked to see that the old man lying across the three chairs is not so old after all. “Myles?” she says. “That you?”
“Hope so.” He rubs the corners of his eyes, then does his best to flatten his stuck-up hair.
Perhaps it was the way he’d had his chin tucked towards his chest that made him look three times his age. That and the dark bags she now notices beneath his eyes. She’d only seen him the other day, but she swears his face looks more shrunken, the skin around his cheekbones tighter.
She looks once more through the window at her two children, wondering how she’ll explain this to Myles.
She moves to him. “What are you doing here?”
“Same as you, I suspect.” He sits up, resting his palms on his knees. Pumps up his chest and arches his back. Lets his breath out slowly.
How tired he looks. More than her even, she thinks. “Where are you headed?”
“The James Paton.” He rubs his eyes again, then coughs a cigarette cough, the thick sludge in his chest moving upward towards the back of his throat. He swallows it back down.
Kent’s in the James Paton.
She takes another step nearer.
“It’s Irene.”
She goes all the way to him.
He slides over.
She sits. “What’s happened?”
“Some complication or other.”
His breath is stale. She tries not to breathe through her nose. “What kind of complication?”
“I was all ready to take her home yesterday, then she got these pains. Like someone was cutting her open without anesthetic, she said. She was screeching. The baby screeching and she screeching.” He puts his face into his palms for a second. Takes his hands away. “Afterbirth it was. Stupid fuckers left a whole wad of it inside her.”
“No.”
“Yes they did. I half thought there was another baby in there.” He laughs but there’s no happiness in it.
“When will they discharge her?”
“Sunday. If she’s doing all right, maybe tomorrow.”
“Thank God it’s nothing serious.”
He nods, his face on the floor.
“Where’s your boy?” she asks.
“School. He can’t afford to be missing any as bad as he’s doing. I should throw that goddamn Xbox out the window. Like someone addicted that boy is.” He lifts his eyes from the floor and looks at her. “Your boy got one?”
“Hmm?”
“Xbox?”
She shakes her head. “PlayStation. He’s not too bad though. Would rather be lifting weights in the garage.”
“That’s good. Healthy at least, weights.”
She looks once again at her children. Then back at Myles. A ride to Gander fallen right in her lap.
“Where are you going?” he asks.
He’ll know something’s up when he sees the suitcases. That and the fact that neither Lynette nor Jeremy are in school.
“Gander too,” she says. “The airport.”
“Oh. Where to?”
“St. John’s.”
“The big city. Without the hubby?”
“He’s meeting us later.”
“Us?”
She points to the window behind him.
He turns around. “The whole family, eh? That’s nice.” He pauses. “I don’t remember the last tim
e me and Irene went anywhere.”
“Thing is, we need a ride.”
“A ride?”
“To the airport.”
“You don’t have one?”
She shakes her head.
“It’s your lucky day then, isn’t it?”
“So you will?”
“Of course. Although I’m surprised that Kent hadn’t figured that out in advance, him being so organized and all. Mr. Union and everything.” Although he says this with a smile, she thinks there’s bitterness there, a tinge of resentment.
“What time’s the flight?”
She looks at her watch: 8:42. “Eleven.”
“Have you there in plenty of time,” he says.
“Thank you so much.”
“Nothing to it, my dear. A bit of company never hurt anybody.”
She stands up. I’ll let the children know. She turns and walks away but his voice stops her. “No word yet on the plant then? Kent’s said nothing?”
It’s finished. Three months, tops. She turns back to him. Shakes her head. “Not a thing.”
She continues towards the door, realizing that the pain in her hand is almost gone. A light throbbing now. She’d kept it in her pocket the whole time so Myles wouldn’t ask questions. So he wouldn’t insist on taking her to have it looked at. She can just imagine Kent and Irene and herself all in the same hospital.
Melissa was right about the codeine though: Make you forget you got a hand.
* * *
SHE WALKS ALONG THE DECK TOWARDS THEM, pausing momentarily to look in the other direction. Nothing of Lightning Cove. Vanished. Had it ever existed?
The sun is higher, but small amidst so much blueness – a birthmark on a desert of flawless skin.
She’ll have to tell them eventually. Perhaps at the airport. After take-off. That would be better – after take-off. No place to run. Who’s she kidding? There’s no place more suitable than another, no hour that’s more appropriate. He’s their dad and they have a right to know. Sooner rather than later. Allowing time to pass makes the things we have to say harder.
The smell of saltwater and gasoline. A breeze she knows will be warmer on land against her face. The rocking of the boat so gentle she wonders if it’s rocking at all.
