“It’s frickin’ freezing,” Persephone butted in. “I know you think I was making excuses for not leaving the house, Dr. Carroll but I wasn’t. I work from home. I had no reason to leave the house. My boyfriend brings whatever groceries I need, so why should I leave the house?” She raised her giant albino batwinged arms above her head and adjusted her ponytail.
“We’re not talking about you right now,” Dr. Carroll said gently. “But we can return to you later. Amelia, I concur with Persephone. It’s not a pleasant day for a walk. It’s unseasonably windy and blustery.”
Amelia shook her head. “I don’t notice things like that. I’ve got a condition I inherited from my dad, although I don’t have it as badly as he does. He doesn’t feel the cold at all whereas I do a bit, but not much. I don’t mind being in the rain either. I love walking in the rain or going to the beach on wet and windy winter days. It’s much more beautiful than in the summer time.”
“Hmmm,” Dr. Carroll said. “Let’s backtrack. The thought occurred to you to go for a walk and then you lost track of time and the next thing you remember, you were late for the group and I drove past you in the car and saw you shouting at some poor old fellow.”
“I didn’t mean to shout,” Amelia said. “I just wanted to know which direction the hospital was in and he wouldn’t tell me.”
“Perhaps he was startled to have a young girl yelling and screaming in his face,” Dr. Carroll commented. “But let’s look into this more deeply. Do you often arrive that early for appointments?”
“Um, no,” Amelia admitted. “But I wanted to make sure I was on time for this one. I wanted to factor in any deviations but then my calculations failed anyway.”
“No,” Dr. Carroll said. “I think that you wanted to be here very much and you wanted to establish that here was still here. I believe there are levels of impermanence in your life that threaten the very foundations of your trust. You’re so deathly afraid of finding out that things have vanished, that you go out of your way to avoid looking at them. Does that make any sense?”
“I’m not sure I do understand,” Amelia admitted. “I admit that I don’t believe that this world is the way most people think it is. But more than that perplexing me, I am terrified that everything is so deathly boring. Most people are so bored and so boring. Their lives are prison cells and they don’t even know it.”
“Maybe they’re happy,” Dr. Carroll suggested.
“At what cost? They don’t even know the cost. Their freedom, their choice, their sense of adventure is destroyed daily and they don’t even know it.”
“Ah, now we’re getting somewhere,” Dr. Carroll said. “Freedom, choice, and sense of adventure. Tell me, did you take the wrong buses this week?”
“No, I took the right ones,” Amelia said in a small voice. “But it exhausted me.” Her voice dropped to a whisper and Mike looked at her in concern.
“Your knight in shining armour,” Dr. Carroll commented, catching the look and Amelia looked up in confusion.
“Him!” Dr. Carroll pointed. “He wants to protect you from yourself, from your fears. But he only wants to do it because it will make him feel good about himself. He wants to be the quarterback hero, saving the day on big screen TV, his hair blowing in the breeze, endorsements flooding in.”
“Not true,” Mike flushed.
“Is so,” Dr. Carroll countered. “That’s what you want in life: the cheerleaders and the accolades. And you’re afraid that if you express yourself, voice what you really think, then none of the fame and glory will happen and you’ll be crushed, so you’d rather sit on the sidelines in silence. But here, you have a perfect vessel for the validation of your fantasies of being Captain America. A tiny fragile girl, tremulous and vulnerable, waiting for you to rescue her. Only you aren’t any of those things, Amelia, are you? Fragile and tremulous and vulnerable. You’re a big adventurer, a warrior, and your biggest fear is that no adventures or battles await you. You fear that more than death.”
Amelia looked at him wide-eyed. “Yes, but so what? I mean it’s true but you say it like it’s wrong or irrational. Your way of looking at the world is wrong, if you ask me.”
“Wrong, right, right, wrong,” Dr. Carroll shook his head. “Everybody’s so hung up on right and wrong, good and bad. I say do what’s true for you. If you want adventure, don’t get on the wrong buses for god’s sake. Take an ocean liner to Alaska, go and live large, girl. Go and volunteer in Africa, look for exotic snakes in the Amazon, sail hot air balloons over Egypt.”
“None of that interests me.” Amelia was scornful. “I am talking about freedom of the mind. Something entirely different.”
“I see. So because you get on random buses, work strange hours of the day and night, have picnics in the snow and the rain, this makes you free? What’s the difference? Think about it. But we’re done for the moment, we need to move on. You’ve got lots of food for thought. Chew on it or spit it out, it’s up to you.” He looked carefully around the group.
“So, people!” He clapped his hands. “Mindfulness. We all need mindfulness in our lives! Why? Because then we become cognizant and fully present. As you know, I’m not a great fan of the meditation bit, but it’s a necessary evil. Studies have shown that it works. Today we are going to focus on sound. Close your eyes and focus on the sounds that you can hear. Don’t think ‘oh, there’s an announcement or a siren or a bird,’ just acknowledge whatever the sound is, and then return to your mindfulness. Meditation is not about making lists. It’s about finding the spaces between lists and thought. I will ring the bell and set the alarm.”
“Fabulous,” Joanne muttered and Gino grinned at her.
“One day you’ll look back on this and think that man saved my life,” Dr. Carroll commented. “And I accept your grateful thanks now. Okay, here we go.” He rang a bell and the group closed their eyes.
Amelia shut her eyes, grateful to escape for a moment. She wondered if there was any truth to what Dr. Carroll had said and whether her assumptions about freedom were indeed valid. She tried to recall how it had started. Could she have inherited this anomaly of thought from her father just as she had inherited her lack of sensitivity to temperature?
So when Mike ran his fingers along her leg and gently took her hand in his, she was caught utterly unaware. Her eyes flew open and she turned to him, her face close to his. He took a quick glance around and seeing that everyone else still had their eyes shut, he leaned in and kissed her. His lips touched hers gently and then his tongue probed hers and next thing they were kissing full on, trying not to make any noise.
Considering that it was her first real kiss, Amelia thought that she did pretty well. She was first to pull back, worried the others would see them. When she opened her eyes, she saw Angelina watching them, grinning, her chins wobbling. Amelia let go of Mike and tried to scoot away, but Angelina shook her head and gave a thumbs ups. Mike grinned at Amelia and rubbed his foot on her leg and then the alarm bell rang and Dr. Carroll woke up and straightened his pullover.
“How was that for everyone?” He asked and the group muttered an assembly of replies.
“I know. It sort of kills the mood,” Dr. Carroll said, yawning. “Meditation sucks the life right out of a person, if you ask me.” He looked at his watch. “Hmm, time flies, time flies. So, homework for this week, continue doing D.T.O.T. with regards to whatever your specific case is and try to find new ways in which to express your voices. I want to hear a list of the things you did, not what you thought about doing. Any questions? Persephone,” he said, “back to you for a moment. Next week, I want to hear that you left the house even if there was a snowstorm or a blizzard. Get out there and make a snowman or something, lemonade. You know, make lemonade. Are you with me?”
Persephone looked sulky and confused.
“Any questions?” There was silence. “We’ve done well today, group, well done! Off
you go then, get out there and Do The Opposite Thing!”
Almost as one, the group rushed for the door.
“Stairs,” Mike said to Amelia and they rushed down the seven flights of stairs and staggered out into the large lounge area adjoining the cafeteria.
They sank down into chairs, breathing hard, as if they had run a race.
Neither of them spoke for a while and Amelia wondered if Mike would say anything about their incredible kiss.
“What the fuck?” Mike eventually said, running his hand through his hair. “This shit is crazy. Excuse me, Amelia, I don’t usually swear so much but is this guy for real?”
Amelia shook her head. “He’s a genius or the devil,” she said.
“Or both,” Mike said.
They sat in silence for a bit. Amelia was trying to find a way to ask him something and he was trying to find a way to tell her.
“Amelia—” he began, and she knew the answer to her question.
“It’s okay,” she said, getting up, quickly. “I understand. I really do. See you next week?”
He nodded and she rushed out into the cold wind and she ran to the bus station, wishing she had asked Nana to fetch her instead.
“Concentrate,” she told herself. “Today is not the day for adventures, just get home to Nana, okay? Concentrate. No wrong buses, no wrong stops.” She talked herself onto the right bus and was surprised to find that her teeth were chattering. It couldn’t be from the cold, she didn’t feel the cold. No, it was the shock of everything that had happened. “Concentrate, where’s your stop? Look and listen. Don’t lose concentration.”
She got off at the right stop, ran home, and flung herself at Ethel in despair.
“Oh Nana, he’s got a girlfriend!” She looked despairing at her grandmother and ran upstairs to her bedroom.
Ethel waited for half an hour and then she followed Amelia upstairs, a cup of tea in hand. “Tell me what happened, dear.”
“Nothing happened,” Amelia said, her face in the pillow. She sat up and took the cup of tea. “Okay, not exactly nothing. He kissed me during the meditation and then, afterwards, when the group ended, he just said ‘Amelia’ and then I knew.”
Ethel knew better than to question Amelia’s intuition. If Amelia said that one word had carried the weight of a hundred words, then Ethel believed her.
“Oh, sweetie, I’m very sorry.”
“The whole group is so weird, Nana. There’s this big Russian guy and he got caught having sex with this fat old woman — she’s there for anxiety and he’s there because he’s got anger issues. And the doctor said it was good, what they were doing! And then he told a girl that her engagement was giving her panic attacks and she left. He’s very argumentative.”
“I’ve never heard of a therapist being so forthright,” Ethel mused. “But maybe that’s the secret to his success.”
“He can’t seem to figure me out,” Amelia was glum. “Oh, I wish I was normal. Maybe Mike would like me if I was normal.”
“Obviously he likes you, dear. He kissed you. Him having a girlfriend doesn’t mean that he doesn’t like you. And remember this, not that I should say it, but girlfriends can be broken up with. He just met you. Wait and see how things unfold.”
“But I’m too weird,” Amelia said. “And there are no benefits to my weirdness. Look at Dad. At least he’s contributing to the world with his poems. I don’t fit in and I don’t contribute either.”
“Sweetie, you’re twenty-two. When your father was twenty-two, he wasn’t contributing anything either. And there are different definitions to what contributing means. Look at your granddad. He didn’t do anything literary or spectacular but he contributed by being a good, honest, loving man. He made the world a better place when he was in it, and that’s not something you can say about most people. Besides, you’ve got Joan of Arc and your studies. You’re doing so well.”
“Yeah, but it’s not like I’m saying anything other people haven’t said before. I thought I was onto something unique but the research isn’t supporting me and I feel like that’s a dead end too. I want to matter, Nana. What’s the point if you don’t matter?”
Ethel was silent for a moment. “You have to do what matters in life to you, Amelia. And you’ll figure that out, I know you will because you’re too smart not to. In the meantime, don’t give up on Mike yet, because you don’t know. I’m going to lie down, I feel a bit tired, I don’t know why.”
Amelia was immediately concerned. “Oh Nana, I am sorry.” She put her cup down. “Do you need me to do anything, get you anything?”
“I’m fine, sweetie. I’m seventy, not exactly a spring chicken!”
“But you never get tired.”
“Everybody gets tired. I might have a bit of a flu. What are you going to do with yourself? I don’t like you to be up here, miserable.”
“I think I’ll go for a walk,” Amelia said. “Maybe walk to the gym and watch Mom do her weird body flexing stuff.”
“Take your phone with you, in case you get sidetracked and you need me to come and get you,” Ethel reminded her.
“I will, but I mustn’t get sidetracked. I must work on being normal. I want to be a normal person.”
“You’re perfect as you are,” Ethel said. “It’s the world that’s odd, but it’s the only world we’ve got.” She kissed Amelia on the head and went to her room.
Ethel wondered, as she lay down, if she should see a doctor but it seemed like too much effort. It was true that her stomach had been worrying her for a while and she didn’t really think she had the flu but she was too tired to get checked out. I’m sure it will get better, she thought. It just needs to work its way out of my system. She was soon asleep.
Amelia slipped out of the house and locked the door. Despite what she had said to Ethel, she was craving escape, her kind of escape. It was late evening and it had begun to rain and Amelia smiled and headed towards the bus stop.
It was a perfect day to go the beach.
The lake was black and blustery when she arrived. The wind was strong, causing the breakers to crash onto the rocks with a flourish of exuberant wild white spray. The rain was a film of fine drizzle and the trees were black skeletons that glistened under the lights that lined the deserted boardwalk. The clouds were layered, like thick charcoal batting that played heave-ho with chalk and thick granite. The lights were on in the washrooms even although they were locked for the season and the pumpkin-lantern warmth of the yellow windows made Amelia feel happy and cheered. She turned her face up towards the falling rain, loving the lit cones of raindrops that fanned out from the lamps.
She strolled along and thought about Mike. What a kiss! She relived the moment when he leaned in, that fraction of a second when she thought she knew what was about to happen but she couldn’t quite believe it. Then she thought he’d change his mind but there was the softness of his lips when he didn’t, and that electrical magic of his tongue greeting hers. The perfect angles of their faces, that locked moment of togetherness and the reluctant pulling apart. He was so beautiful, so perfect! She hoped Nana was right, that girlfriends could be broken up with.
She passed a man with a dog, a huge golden retriever. The dog wagged its tail and tried to reach Amelia’s outstretched hand but the man jerked the dog away, yanking the leash hard.
“Perfect night, wouldn’t you say?” Amelia said politely to the man and he lowered his umbrella and hurried along.
Amelia stretched her arms out wide and imagined that hordes of summer-time beach revelers were lining the boardwalk. She imagined their picnic tables loaded with hot dogs, drinks, and salads. Their children were throwing Frisbees and playing with the family dogs. Bicycles, coolers, barbecues, baskets, umbrellas, towels, and shoes were strewn about, like a haphazard summer blanket on the beach sand and green grass.
The rain continued to fall an
d the darkness thickened and the clouds obscured the moon but Amelia felt happy, surrounded by the ghosts of happy people that she could see so clearly, with everyone enjoying themselves.
It’s as if, she thought, those moments of joy are captured in time, and I’m the only one who can see them. And I get to play them over and over again, like a home movie except that I can step into the movie and become part of it. I don’t ever want to lose this, no matter how ‘normal’ I need to pretend to be. This is my special magic, when time and place and people come to me, and I can see them and they’re never lost.
She walked among hot dog vendors, and she watched sunbathers baking in bikinis while kids wheeled around on tricycles and old folks ate ice creams.
She walked through teams of little kids playing soccer in the central field, ringed by parents in camping chairs She walked past the tennis courts and heard the sound of balls being volleyed back and forth with that unmistakable and particular thuk thuk thuk.
She passed the lawn bowlers in their traditional whites, stooping to roll their balls. She entered the park and saw the immigrant families having their reunions, dressed in saris and clothes from home, firing up barbecues and chatting.
And finally, soaked to the bone, her thin T-shirt glued to her, her hair dripping, she caught the bus back home. She knew she was being stared at but she did not care. She was replete.
9. AMELIA AND HENRY
LATER THAT WEEK, AMELIA WENT to visit Henry in his mansion in Rosedale. She let herself into the house and found him in the living room, staring at the walls.
“Anything good happening, Dad?” she asked as he darted forward and corrected a line on a piece of paper tacked to the wall. He didn’t seem to hear her and she waited while he made his annotation.
“Amelia!” He turned to her once he was done, delighted to see her. “Come and give your dad a hug! How are you?”
She hugged him, feeling the sharp jut of his bones through the thin silk dressing gown he was wearing over a pair of brightly-coloured boxer shorts. “Dad, have you been eating?”
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