Wake

by Abria Mattina

  “Do you want a push?”

  Willa gives me a look that reads, ‘What do you think?’ That’s a no. I grab the chains and halt her motion.

  “What the hell?”

  I climb on with her and she makes a little squeak of surprise as the swing tips with my added weight. I’m slightly heavier than she is, and the swing lists to my side so she has to lean back to keep from falling into me.

  “Lower your hands on the chain,” she says with a laugh. “Your center of gravity is too high.” I slide my hands down half a foot and our balance evens out a little more.

  “Happy?”

  Willa shifts her right foot forward and pulls her left one back, deliberately jolting the seat so I have to scramble to readjust. I jolt her right back but she bends her knees to stay on. She gives the left chain a tug, and we’re both destabilized by the side-to-side rock. An equally hard tug on both chains stops the rock and shakes the seat.

  Willa is laughing. She loves this. I lower my hands on the chains and bend my knees, angling the seat so far that she gives another squeak of surprise. Her feet are practically on the edge, trying to stay balanced. Her arms shake with the effort of trying to hold herself up on flimsy chains. If she let go right now she would fall forward on me.

  I hold it for a few seconds, and then let up. The swing moves back and forth with proper balance while Willa catches her breath.

  “You are such a shit.”

  “You enjoyed that.” She did. She’s still smiling. Willa just rolls her eyes at me. Standing upright and balanced like this, our fronts are almost touching. She’s right there, and it occurs to me that I could just bend down and kiss her right now.

  What?

  Nothing.

  That’s what I thought.

  Maybe just her cheek…

  Willa steps off the swing and adjusts her sweater around her shoulders.

  “Come with me on Sunday?”

  “What?” I step off the swing.

  “Frank wants to drive me. I’m not looking forward a long, silent car ride with him on top of therapy. Please come with me.”

  “You want, like, moral support or something?”

  You should support her getting help.

  It won’t change anything.

  She’ll be happier.

  And what’ll I be?

  Willa gives me the eye and says, “You’re pretty screwed up yourself. You might fit in to Group better than you’d think.”

  “I’m not going to gush to a bunch of strangers.”

  “Pfft. Neither am I.”

  If she’s going to lie again what’s the point?

  Help her. Encourage her.

  She did it for you.

  “One condition.”

  “What?”

  “You come with me to dialysis again.”

  “That’s it?”

  “You come to my unpleasant stuff, I’ll go to yours.”

  Willa considers that for a moment before holding out her hand. “Deal.” We shake on it and her blue glove feels soft against my palm.

  “Let’s walk,” she says. We head down the sidewalk with no specified destination in mind, in the direction of what constitutes ‘downtown’ Smiths Falls. Almost every business is already closing up for the night.

  “You really like working for Chris’s family?”

  “It’s a paycheck. Better than bagging groceries.”

  I tell her my sister is thinking of doing just that and Willa tells me to offer Elise her condolences.

  “So has Elwood molested you in the back room yet?”

  Willa laughs out loud, and I get the sense that I’m missing part of the joke. “Other way around,” she says. I’m definitely missing part of the joke, but I play along and smile anyway.

  “What happened?”

  Willa shakes her head. I can’t help but wonder if she did fool around with him, and the thought disgusts me. Why would she even joke about it? Does she like him? Unlikely, considering how often she speaks condescendingly of him. But she talks to me that way too… and she liked me. Has she moved on to Chris I-don’t-know-basic-anatomy Elwood?

  You say ‘moved on’ like there was something to move from.

  There was.

  Well, that was quick of her.

  Maybe she’s only fooling around with him because we went nowhere.

  Right. Because Chris Elwood is an obvious second choice to Cancer Boy.

  I’m beginning to think she just felt sorry for me and mistook it for affection.

  “Didn’t he and Paige break up?”

  “Again.”

  “Was it because of something you did?” I give her a sideways look and Willa rolls her eyes.

  “Calling me a home-wrecker now? I didn’t do anything with Chris. If Paige isn’t just talking out her ass, he’s not worth it.” She makes an obvious hand gesture. So she just casually talked to Paige about the size of Chris’s dick?

  “Is that what girls talk about in the locker room?”

  “No, we compare breast size and help each other shower.” She elbows me teasingly. I elbow her back. “Change of subject,” she announces. “I got an interesting call earlier this week.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Ava said to tell you to answer her messages. Been dodging an old friend from Ottawa?”

  Oh shit. How did Ava get Willa’s number?

  “You talked to Ava?”

  “She left a message. She’s quite charming.”

  “What did she say?”

  “Well,” Willa begins dramatically. “She called you a dumbfuck and invited me to a show in Ottawa.”

  “No.”

  “What do you mean ‘no’? You are a dumbfuck.”

  “You’re not going.”

  “I hadn’t decided,” she replies stiffly. I put a hand on her arm and try to make her see reason.

  “It’s a metal band. You don’t even listen to metal.”

  “Alright, now I just want to go because you don’t want me to.”

  “Willa.”

  “Are you going?”

  I wasn’t planning on it. “Yes. We’d have to put up with each other all night and—”

  “Good. We can carpool.” Damn it all to hell.

  “You’re being deliberately difficult.”

  “Duh.” Goddamn it she drives me crazy. She can’t just trust me when I say it’s not a good idea and do what she’s told?

  “You’re not gonna try and act like my dad all night, are you?”

  “Blow me.”

  Willa stops on the sidewalk and drops to her knees. Sweet Jesus. She looks up at me expectantly, challenging. “Well? Whip it out, Harper.”

  Part of me wants to do it, just to be a smartass and call her bluff. But the saner half of me thinks this is a horrible idea. So I stand there.

  After a few seconds of nothing, Willa stands up and smirks smugly. “That tiny, is it?”

  Crap, there is absolutely no good comeback to that. What am I supposed to say? Actually, it’s so massive that were I to bludgeon you across the face with it, you would lose teeth. Right, that’ll go over well.

  I stand there for a few seconds after she walks away, working on that whole inner peace thing so I’m not tempted to strangle her.

  I wonder if she’d be any good at—

  Shut the hell up.

  I follow Willa. She doesn’t slow down to wait for me. When I catch up with her I throw my arms around her shoulders in a restraining bear hug and make her promise to be careful if I agree to go to Ottawa with her.

  “Fine.”

  “Good.”

  “You can let go now.”

  “Nah.” She annoys me, I annoy her. That’s just how this works. Willa turns her head to look up at me over her shoulder.

  “Ava knows we’re not…right?” The gap in her sentence is loud.

  “Did she say something?”

  “Does she think that?”

  “I’ll talk to her.”

  “Okay. Than
ks. ‘Cause this isn’t a date.”

  “Clearly.”

  “Good.”

  “Good.”

  I resist the sudden urge to kiss her temple. How can she annoy me this bad and still be so appealing?

  “What’s that look?”

  “What look?”

  “That look you just had.”

  “No idea what you’re talking about.” I let her out of my arms. She’s about to round on me when I change the subject, “So what time is this sob-fest on Sunday?”

  Willa huffs. “We leave at eight.” I regret my deal with her already. Who wants to get up early on the weekend?

  Saturday

  I wake up from a nap to find that it’s two o’clock. My phone is still in my hand and the alert for a new message is flashing. I tried to call Willa all morning and texted when she didn’t answer. All her replies were vague and deferential. Later. Not now. Can’t talk atm. Her latest message isn’t any more comforting: Crazy busy. Having fun. And my mood takes a nosedive. She’s having fun, is she? And it was too much trouble to invite me along?

  I get out of bed and shuffle downstairs. Eric has the afternoon off work. Maybe I can talk him into a few rounds of Call of Duty. At the very least I think I can get Elise to hang out with me.

  I enter the kitchen to find that the house is a lot more crowded than I first suspected. Elise is at the island counter with Willa, who is teaching my sister how to carve a chicken. The bird smells fantastic and is roasted to that perfectly golden color. At the table, Eric sits with Elise’s jackass crush and his really hot girlfriend. The girlfriend’s name escapes me, but she’s telling Eric a story about a great Mexican restaurant in Kanata.

  Elise takes her freshly carved, extremely juicy slices of hot chicken and prepares sandwiches for everyone. Willa sets a small morsel of dark meat aside and puts the rest of the chicken carcass in a large pot. I think she’s going to make soup from that. The prospect of fresh chicken soup excites me, but then I remember that it takes hours to make, and everyone is just sitting down to lunch now.

  I walk around the island and congratulate Elise on the chicken. “Did Willa show you how to do that?”

  “Yup.” Elise nods vigorously. “Trussed it and everything.” She carries plates over to Eric and her guests—hot chicken sandwiches on rye with cheese, lettuce and tomato. God, I wish I could eat that.

  I approach Willa at the stove where she’s loosening as much meat as she can off the bones with her fingers. “Hey.”

  “Sleep well?”

  “I didn’t know you were coming over.”

  Willa winks. “I was down here the whole time, you hermit.” Behind me, Eric makes an inarticulate sound of pleasure and says that Elise’s sandwiches are awesome. Damn it.

  I lean in to speak quietly, “Did you make anything I can eat?” It’s cool if she didn’t; I have leftover soup in the fridge and yogurt too.

  “Of course I did.”

  Willa opens the fridge and takes out a cereal bowl with a layer of cling wrap on top. I don’t recognize the contents, but it’s pretty chunky. Willa gets two plates down from the cupboard and reaches past me to grab a foil-wrapped package from the side counter. The foil package turns out to be a round loaf of very pale bread. It’s still warm. Willa cuts off four slices and sets them up to make sandwiches.

  “What’s in that?” I ask when she uncovers the cereal bowl.

  “Mostly chickpeas, with some carrots and other things.” Then she does something very strange—she takes off her gloves. Willa takes the small amount of dark meat she set aside from the chicken and begins to shred it between her fingertips. She drops it in with the chickpea mess and mixes the whole thing together with a fork. A serving of chickpea salad goes onto each of the plates, and she closes it to make sandwiches. Willa cuts the crusts off one.

  She can see I’m worried.

  “It’s rice bread; very easy on the stomach. I made it this morning,” she says. “You’ve handled chickpeas before, and you’re okay with semi-solids now. And the chicken is in small chunks. Chew it slowly.”

  She picks up her sandwich and takes a bite. “Let me know if I made the relish mild enough.”

  “What?”

  “I made extra-mild relish to go with the chickpeas.”

  She made relish? What is she, eighty? Willa smiles and tells me she left a jar of it in the fridge, in case I like it. I can’t believe she remembered. I only mentioned relish in passing, weeks ago.

  I pick up one half of my crustless sandwich and inspect it. It looks reasonably edible, except that it’s solid. I hate getting sick, but it’s even worse in front of company, and there are three guests in the house.

  Willa picks up our plates and carries them into the living room, away from the others. How did she know?

  She sets the food down on the coffee table and takes another bite of her sandwich.

  “Just try it,” she says. “If you don’t like it, don’t swallow.”

  I suck it up and try a small bite. The bread is soft and bland, which is perfect for me. The chickpeas fall apart easily as I chew, and I don’t even notice the shreds of chicken. I can see the relish in the mix—little flecks of orange and green—but its taste is nothing more than a sweet kick to balance the richness of the chickpeas. I can chew it thoroughly without being overwhelmed by the taste.

  “It’s good.” Willa beams at the compliment. I hear an unfamiliar laugh in the kitchen that must be from Elise’s crush, but it doesn’t bother me so much at the moment. I keep enjoying my sandwich—the simple fact that I can eat a sandwich again, and that it sits comfortably in my stomach without making me sick. It takes me thirty minutes to eat it at my slow pace, but at the end I’m pretty damn proud of myself.

  “Thank you.”

  “I’ll leave you the rest of the rice loaf. It makes pretty good toast. There’s some low-sugar jam in the fridge with the relish.”

  “When did you make all this?”

  Willa shrugs. “When I had the time.” She stacks our empty plates and says, “I was going to give them to you Wednesday before last, but…I sort of blew it.”

  “Oh.”

  She shrugs again. “You have it now.”

  Willa looks uncomfortable with this line of conversation. It makes her vulnerable. So I take a turn, because I owe her: “I’m weaning off Oxy.” My stomach is feeling better, but it’s a tough process. I haven’t even told my siblings. I don’t want to worry them, in case I have to go back on the drug.

  “You’re ready for that?”

  “We’ll see.”

  Willa nods understandingly. She gets it. She always gets it. “Let me know if you need anything.”

  “I’ve been trying that, uh, heartbeat thing…to fall asleep.”

  “Is the pain worse then?”

  “At the end of the day. And when I first wake up. Lying still for so long…”

  Willa nods, but I’m not sure she’s really listening. She’s got that very thoughtful expression in place. The fingers on her right hand absentmindedly trace the long scar on the back of her left. Maybe it’s a sign of trust that she’s kept her gloves off around me for the better part of an hour.

  “Have you tried rosemary tea?” she says.

  “What?”

  “It’s good for joint pain and circulation.”

  “Did you make that for…her? When she wouldn’t take painkillers?”

  Willa nods. “Lots and lots of tea. My Oma knows a lot about herbals.” She stands up suddenly to clear away the plates. “I’ll write down how to make it. Maybe your mom will help you with it.”

  She leaves before I can say anything else. I sigh and wait a few seconds before getting up to follow. Willa must have told some wild lies to her old therapists, because even a touch of the truth is enough to upset her. Tomorrow is going to be…interesting.

  Sunday

  Mom drops me off at the Kirk house bright and early. Frank is polite, if not exactly friendly, and I have a feeling he would
be a lot less welcoming if my mom wasn’t with me. Willa is wearing a skirt ‘because it’s church.’ She looks pretty but miserable, and Frank is wearing a nice jacket, which makes me think that the skirt wasn’t her idea.

  We take Frank’s car to Perth. It’s a long drive and we don’t even have the benefit of music to make it go by faster, since conversation is out of the question. Frank keeps the tuner on the local news and traffic station the whole time.

  I can’t wait to get out of the car when we get to St. Paul’s church. It’s an older church, built from chunky gray stones. A steeple stands at the head of the nave, and the heavy wooden doors are open to welcome parishioners. Then I see the sign beside the door welcoming us on behalf of the Catholic Diocese of Perth.

  “I didn’t know you were Catholic,” I whisper to Willa.

  “We’re not,” she answers without bothering to lower her voice. “Mom is, sort of, but Frank and I are heathens.”

  I’ve only been to a Catholic church once before, when Morgan and Ava had their confirmation ceremony and invited a few friends to the party. Every church is different, but the bones are much the same: the columns, the elaborate altarpiece, the stained glass windows and carvings of saints along the walls. As we enter the foyer the lady ahead of us dips her fingers in a bowl of water and makes the shape of a cross in front of her chest. Frank doesn’t imitate the gesture on his way past the water bowl, but Willa shrugs and gives it a try.

  We find a pew and Frank takes a moment to inspect the kneeler curiously. I guess it’s been awhile since he was in a church.

  I’m not sure what to expect. In the back of my head I think of when the pope’s funeral was broadcast on TV, and there were a lot of old white guys in robes burning incense and wearing funny hats while chanting. I wonder if there will be any of that here.

  As it happens, there is. The organ in the balcony starts up with an opening hymn and a guy dressed in black comes down the aisle swinging a thurible. The smoke smells nice at first, until it’s everywhere, and then it’s suffocating. He’s followed by four altar servers and a priest in a green robe, carrying a fat leather bound bible.

  There’s a lot of ritual at the front before we’re allowed to sit down. It seems pompous and excessive, and when it’s all done they still keep us on our feet. The opening prayer is in Latin. Why did I agree to come to this?