The Waiting Hours

by Shandi Mitchell

  There had been a call on this street last week, a heart attack. The man’s wife made the call. Sometimes there weren’t alternative routes to avoid her work. When this happened she looked for evidence of skid marks, shards of shattered taillights, indications of blood spilled, or a shoe overlooked on the sidewalk, but usually there weren’t any signs. This did not reassure her.

  She thought there should be colour-coded marks to warn and commemorate. Some houses would be completely covered in red or purple dots. Red for crimes and purple for sorrow. She recognized the house number. It was a well-kept bungalow painted a solid blue. She thought it would be white and she hadn’t imagined the pots of geraniums on the stairs. She added a purple dot to its white door.

  The public didn’t know that most emergency calls were from repeaters and most crimes weren’t random. Most were wars, criminal on criminal, or domestics that had been transpiring for years, or families with long histories of illegal activity. Houses that had made 911 calls when she started her career were still calling, but now the calls were coming from subsequent generations. The public didn’t know how much hurt there was behind closed doors.

  Her team was trained not to profile an area or a caller. But it was hard to ignore the facts. Some areas and people had red dots all over them…poor white people, poor black people, poor mad people. A disproportionate number of calls came from neighbourhoods that predominantly shared her own skin tone.

  Sometimes those calls made her angry, angry that so many lives were being wasted. Angry that people didn’t try to do better. Angry that people didn’t stand up and demand, Enough! She knew the reasons that led to them and us. She had lived the reasons. As a child she knew the degradation of being followed by security guards assuming she was shoplifting, and the burning shame of names hurled by little white girls in expensive store-bought dresses, and the judging eyes at the checkout when she was counting out dimes to buy a box of macaroni. And later, all the smiles she lied to assure everyone else it was okay when hers was the only backpack searched at the local bar, and all the times she deafened her ears, and all the silences she agreed to so as not to make others uncomfortable. She knew all the reasons. But that didn’t mean she accepted the alternatives.

  Choices made to be tough, because tough meant power and status, and sometimes money. Choices made, not realizing they were still powerless, because now they were warring each other and poisoning their veins with drugs, hurting brothers, fathers, husbands, while suppliers and profiteers from elsewhere were recruiting twelve-year-olds with candy crack and new sneakers.

  Angry probably wasn’t the right word. Perhaps it was disappointment that made her jaw clench when she heard a voice cadenced with street slang, or took yet another call about shots fired in the north end where she grew up, or when she pulled up a profile of a black man or woman with priors that filled her screen. She was disappointed that another life had been lost. Disappointed that the story in the next day’s news would only serve to fuel the ignorant, while disregarding all those who had succeeded and all the reasons why others had not.

  It was only a silverfish flash of emotion, and once she swallowed it was gone. But still there was a flash. She wondered if her white co-workers had a similar reaction when they saw white faces making headline news or if they even identified as being part of the same community. Skin colour didn’t seem to bond them. They appeared to congregate by economic class and interests. Perhaps because they were the majority, they didn’t have to acknowledge each other. They just were.

  On the job, her team was perceived as colourless. They were Integrated Emergency Services personnel, voices on the end of a line. They prided themselves on being family. But sometimes there were careless comments and jokes that forced her to paste on that smile. Her colleagues seemed to forget that she didn’t look like everyone else in the room, and there was an unspoken expectation that she should forget, too. And sometimes she almost could. But outside of work, she was a black woman. It startled her when someone looked at her braids or face for a moment too long. It reminded her that she didn’t look like them and they had noticed.

  Maybe it was anger. Maybe she was angry—angry that she had to work so damn hard not to be mistaken as poor, uneducated, and other.

  The cabbie smiled into the mirror. “Bridge,” he said.

  She took a deep breath. One, two, three, four. The cab slipped through the toll booth and onto the old suspension bridge that was being retrofitted. She clutched the door handle. According to legend a Mi’kmaw chief’s daughter or lover, depending on the storyteller, stole away to be with a soldier. The chief killed them both and cursed the bridge that had brought their worlds together. Three bridges would rise and fall—the first in wind, the second in silence, and the third in death. The first collapsed during a hurricane, the next floated silently away on a calm, sunny day, and the third…the third was still standing. A sacred ceremony supposedly lifted the curse when this bridge was opened, but she wasn’t convinced one chief’s words were more powerful than another’s.

  Her heart beat faster. She talked herself back into the now. Five things she could see: the seat, her skirt, the handle, the headrest, her shoes. Four things she could touch: the seat, her skirt, the handle, the headrest. She was cheating. Three things she could hear: the tires, her breathing, the click of the dashboard flowers against their vase. Two things she could smell: coconut and air freshener. One thing she could taste. She couldn’t taste.

  The taxi wheels hummed onto the bridge deck. She cast her gaze upward, following the strobe and arc of cables. It was like being inside a child’s game of cat’s cradle, except that she was being held aloft with steel string and iron fingers. Five things she could see…She checked the towers for signs of sway and scanned the aging cables and wondered whether she would see the unravelling or would the line just snap? There was corrosion on the girders and the paint was peeling.

  On a windy day or if the traffic was heavy, the platform bounced. Surely the vibration of forty thousand cars crossing daily, and the accumulated weight of two lanes of traffic stopped during rush hour, factored into its structural integrity. How could all the factors—the effects of salt air, spalling, stress fractures, engineers’ qualifications, the skill of the ironworkers—be accurately calculated? Four things she could touch: the headrest, the window, the seat, her skirt…

  The cab zipped over the centre span. She glanced to the water below and its 177-foot drop. Three things she could hear: the wind rushing past, the staccato of girders…The cab’s shocks bottomed out as it lurched over a deck-plate seam. She grabbed her seatbelt. She had read a book that said she should confront her fears. It was a shitty book.

  The cabbie said, “It’s going to be another beautiful day.” He glanced at her in the mirror and back to the road. “You should look at the water. It’s on fire with the sun.”

  She forced herself to look away from the bridge and out to the becalmed harbour. It was molten with light. A huddle of construction workers erecting the new barriers flashed past. She breathed through her mouth. A walking path and bike lane were also being added. Her heart beat faster. Engineers had always said the bridge couldn’t support additional weight, but a new engineer was hired when a claim was filed for damages incurred from “things being thrown or falling off the bridge.” When pushed by reporters to be more specific, the spokesperson had cited television sets, tools, car parts—anything that could be thrown from a high place. One, two, three, four…

  Tamara glimpsed a man’s head appear above the railing, straining to pull himself up in a tangle of harnesses. He looked young. Too young to have any experience.

  She had taken those calls of “things” falling off the bridge. Everyone at IES had. There had been an increase since the announcement of the barriers going up. Some things were never found, swept away by the current; some things landed in people’s backyards, on roofs, on parked vehicles; some got snagged on girders or pilings; some made it to the water. Left behind were cell
phones, shoes, socks, photographs, empty beer bottles, jewellery, and even a book with a highlighted passage. Tamara would like to tie a ribbon to mark each spot. She would leave the tails long to kite in the wind. Something beautiful to deter others from looking down.

  One of her calls had come from a construction worker welding a bottom deck plate. He called while still in his harness. She imagined him suspended in the air, swinging slowly beneath the bridge. He said a woman had fallen. He said she seemed surprised to see him there and had reached out. She was young and wearing a yellow dress. She was pretty. He said, maybe she wasn’t reaching out—maybe she was trying to keep her dress from billowing over her head. He said he could see her down below in the water and she looked like a flower. Just like a flower after a hard rain.

  The car hit a bump and Tamara grabbed the seat. The cabbie glanced up to the rear-view and tilted his chin so she could see his reassuring smile.

  6

  When he pulled into the driveway, Mike’s two boys were waiting for him at the bay window. Caleb had on his big-kid diaper and Daddy’s Boy T-shirt. Held fast was his stuffed green crocodile, Snappy, the subject of an ongoing laundry battle with his mother despite her insistence that crocodiles liked water.

  Baby Connor’s belly bopped-bopped against the window and his hands slapped smudge prints on the glass and his pudgy legs pumped froggy-style on Lori’s lap. She was pointing at Mike. He could see her enunciating “Da-da.” Each utterance sent Connor into spasms of shrill joy.

  Mike grabbed his kit from the trunk and waved to his boys. He tipped his police cap, tossed it in the air, and lithely caught it. For the finale, he swirled it on his fingertips, before tucking it under his arm. It was their signal: Daddy’s home!

  Caleb jumped from the window seat and disappeared from view. Lori watched Mike’s face closely. Her forehead was creased, the way it was when she was worried or serious. He smiled, and the tension softened around her mouth. He was back safe.

  He bent over to pick up the tricycle abandoned in the middle of the yard and pain stabbed his back. His friggin’ belt. His body was starting to feel the wear and tear. Christ, he was only thirty-eight. He straightened and redistributed the weight of his holster. It would feel good to get the belt off…and his boots. The soles of his feet were burning.

  He stepped into the foyer, avoiding the stroller, diaper bag, Caleb’s superhero backpack, swim noodles, cooler, and cookie crumbs. He had about fifteen minutes to change back into Daddy. They had a rule that the boys couldn’t see him until he had put the policeman away. Mike untied his laces and tugged off his boots. He had a hole in the big toe of his black sock. Another dead sock. The boots smelled rank. He’d have to spray them later. He tossed them outside onto the porch and headed down the hall to the bedroom, unbuttoning his shirt as he went.

  His vest was back at his locker. It was too filthy to bring home. The germs, the blood, the spit, the puke—god knows what else was on it. Lori hadn’t made the bed. His pillow was propped like a body alongside where she slept.

  He unholstered his Glock and removed the magazine. Make it safe. The mantra from basic training was still drilled into him after all these years. He racked the slide and ejected the cartridge. He checked the barrel and set the pistol on top of his dresser, with the muzzle pointed towards the wall. He retrieved the second magazine from his belt and set it beside the first. He counted the ammunition. He always counted it. Merely checking that the magazines appeared full wasn’t enough. When he got to thirty, he was halfway to returning to his family. He cleared the chamber of the plus-one round. Thirty-one. The gun went into the lock box in his sock drawer. Groaning, he reached for the ammo safe on the top shelf of the closet and secured the magazines.

  From front to back, he removed each item from his utility belt—always front to back—and laid them on his dresser in precise order.

  Right hip: weapon holster—check. Key—check. Cuffs, rubber gloves, CPR mask. Check.

  Left hip: Taser holster, baton, radio, flashlight, pepper spray. Check, check, check.

  His Taser, labelled No. 3, was back at headquarters charging. Everybody knew No. 3 was his. In a pinch, he would use No. 7, but he didn’t like it. He unclipped the keeper hooks of his utility belt, detaching them right to left. With the release of each hook, the weight tugging on his back lightened. He unclipped the fourth keeper and the belt slipped from his hips. His back slumped forward with relief.

  He considered whether he could wear the trousers another night, but tossed them aside along with his shorts. He sniffed his shirt’s armpits and balled it up. One black sock was tossed in the trash and the other in the laundry basket. He was almost home.

  He turned on the shower and held his hand under the soft downpour. He flipped the tap to cold, stepped in, and lifted his face to the spray.

  * * *

  —

  When he walked into the kitchen, Caleb threw himself around his legs. Lori had prepared a hungry man’s breakfast of pancakes, bacon, orange juice, and sliced strawberries. She had cut the boy’s pancakes into dinosaurs and trucks. There was no denying Lori could cook. She recapped the evening and night he had missed. Caleb had wanted to go swimming, so she made arrangements to go with so-and-so’s mother, and tomorrow there was a birthday party for some other name. Caleb chattered about a dream Snappy had, something about a dragon and a hotdog. Lori said someone was coming to repair something and something else about thirty-seven degrees. Maybe it was the air conditioner that was being repaired. She was thinking of a barbecue for supper or maybe she’d pick up something on the way, whichever he preferred. It didn’t matter to him. She talked, he smiled, and said yes yes yes.

  When he couldn’t talk anymore, she told the boys to kiss Daddy goodnight. Before leaving, she asked if he could take a look at the sprinkler because it had lost pressure. She kissed him on the mouth and told him there was lunch in the fridge and reminded him not to forget the sprinkler. She looked him in the eyes to make sure he was listening.

  * * *

  —

  Mike pulled down the roller blind and drew the blackout curtains. He turned on the television, hit mute, and eased into bed. His body relaxed into the cotton sheets. Lori’s shampoo perfumed his pillow. He kicked off the top sheet, and warm air cooled hot skin. His body was heavy and the bed seemed to float. He flicked the channels past the news and talk shows and settled on a rebroadcast of a community football game.

  The previous night’s calls flowed and ebbed: the house with towering stacks of empty cigarette packs and hundreds of lighters lining the windowsills, the man with the gangrene arm who said bugs had crawled up inside him, the ponytail girl who kicked her boyfriend’s car door and broke her foot, the gold-chained shit-head who spat at the safety divider from the back seat until they bagged his head, and the guy with the tattoos of his kids, who cried all the way to the hospital. Green and white shirts ping-ponged across the TV screen chasing a ball. After a while, it began to look like a constellation imploding, expanding, and imploding again.

  He thought about the steak he was going to have for dinner and hoped it would be a rib-eye. He thought about giving the boys their bedtime bath and tucking them in. He thought about the day after tomorrow being a day off and Lori asleep beside him, her arms embracing him, the lift of her breasts, the softness of her nipples. He thought about how beautiful she was, even after two Caesareans. He thought of nothing as his hand stroked his sleeping dick.

  Just before he dozed off, he reached over and turned his police radio on loud.

  7

  Kate accelerated to beat the yellow light and hung a sharp left through the intersection onto the main street. She shifted down to third gear. Her palms were sweating, her head pounded, and she was cranky from being overheated. The dashboard gauge read thirty-eight degrees outside. Ten minutes ago, she had been shivering. She glanced to Zeus’s crate and cranked the air conditioner back on high. He had slept the entire highway run.

  A car pulled sho
rt into her lane and she tapped the brakes. Zeus jostled against the crate and stood up. She hated driving in this town. She would check on her mother’s house and then straight home to sleep. First, she’d make herself a proper breakfast with fruit, if she had any in her fridge. Squinting into the glare of overtired, she lowered the visor. A jumble of Day-Glo signs zipped by shouting out fast-food joints, pawnshops, thrift stores, and good-enough used cars.

  The strip club had a new name, but the faded billboard displayed the same ageless girls from back when she was in high school. She changed the CD, hoping Van Morrison would carry her the last few miles. Zeus’s ears pricked back and forth with the traffic. She was cold again. She switched off the air conditioner and rolled down the window. Muggy, exhaust-tinged air wafted in. Zeus’s nose swung up.

  Reacting late to the brake lights of a Buick, she geared down. The vacant big-box store’s parking lot was empty. The remnants of yesterday’s flea market had been swept away. Somewhere on the asphalt grey was the spot where her mother had fallen. She gripped the wheel tighter and slowed to a full stop behind the lumbering car signalling left, stalled by a steady rush of traffic heading from the suburbs to work.

  A jacked-up truck with monster wheels roared up on her bumper. Its stereo thump-thumped. Gas and asphalt fumes leeched through her window. Without the benefit of a breeze, the temperature inside the jeep was climbing. Zeus was panting. She rolled up the window and switched on the air conditioner. Tapping the steering wheel, she waited for the car to turn. It had already missed two openings.

  She tried to conjure the harness racing track that had once stood where the parking lot was now, her favourite teenage spot for a toke. She used to sneak through the fence and sit against the stable’s weathered boards, listening to the bugle’s trill and the announcer’s tin voice calling—and they’re off! Captain Jaimie’s going for the lead. Noble Stuff along the rail, Inga’s Dream coming up the backstretch, Potato Butt a length behind, and Noble Stuff takes the lead…! She loved their names and the rumble of their hoofs thundering around the last bend and galloping for the wire. She loved the smell of hay and dirt, and the soft neighs and shuffle of the horses tethered in their stalls. It was her place of happy.