On the Edge

Every Friday night, the four of us met at Buck’s. We got the booth in the back corner that had the words “Randy is a taint liker” etched deeply into the wooden table. We’d had many debates over the years if Randy liked taints or if the writer had intended to write “licker”. I liked to think that the author was intentionally vague for just this purpose. Pitchers of beer were $2 until 7:00 p.m. and there was a lot of binge drinking before binge drinking had a name. A big popcorn machine sat next to the toilets, and you could fill up a basket as often as you’d like, if you could ignore the slightly off smell of the old oil. It was still possible to smoke in those days, and a waitress came around every so often with an old Folger’s can and an eyeroll at the ashtray overfilled with butts, unpopped kernels, and Mandy’s chewed gum.

We hated Mandy’s gum in the ashtray but we knew it meant that she’d given up on giving up smoking at that point and we could go about puffing without too much guilt. She was the baby of the group and we were usually fiercely protective of her. She had giant, wounded brown eyes and slightly bucked teeth from having sucked her thumb well into adulthood. Her smile was infectious and she could mimic anybody, which made her the favourite class clown all four years of high school. She could keep her dark side at bay long enough to spend eight hours entertaining children at the local day care but we knew how much effort it took for her to get out of bed sometimes.

I was a waitress at a diner about two miles down the highway from Buck’s. Rather than go to university and learn what a lot of other fusspots had to say about the written word, I’d thought that the salt of the earth people of my hometown would be my portal to creative expression. I’d planned to do my 7:00—3:00 shift and then spend the late afternoon transcribing the day’s overheard human dramas into the next great Midwestern novel.  Instead of getting material, I got bunions, and the most I wrote was a variation of “Have a nice day!” on the bottom of their bills.

Trish and Tammy, “TNT” as we called them in high school, worked together on a production line in the factory on the other side of town. They were an inseparable double act and told stories about confrontations between their floor supervisor and the less intelligent members of the crew, which left us gasping for breath. I thought for a long time that one of those nights, they’d put their joined hands on the table and make an announcement but they eventually found men and were each other’s bridesmaids a few years later.

Though we inevitably ended the night singing too loudly with the jukebox, crying over some recent hurt or injustice, and hugging each other tightly, we never went home together. Trish and Tammy used the battered phonebooth outside to call John, who owned a towing service and made a bit of extra money as the town taxi driver. I always stubbornly stumbled the 20 minutes to the center of town to my upstairs apartment with fantastic windows and shitty carpet, where the rooms still smelled of the original owners when they held a growing family and hadn’t been nipped and tucked into four rentals.

Mandy usually ended up on the porch of her ex, who depending on his mood and her state, either put her on his sofa or brought her to his bedroom. We were fiercely protective of her but at 2:00 am were often too hammered to take care of ourselves.

Buck’s was on the street that turned into a highway out of town. Once we exited the bar, we all turned left to get home. Turning right would lead you out to the highway where there was no other town for 23 miles and where there were off shoot gravel roads that lead to shacks, lakes, and sometimes nowhere.

Nowhere is exactly where Mandy was found two days later by a hunter looking for a duck blind. She seemed to be sleeping peacefully, the sleeves of her sweater pulled over her hands which were curled tightly to her chest. But under her head was a large pool of blood and next to it, a large stone.

The entire town was in shock and the police were dumbfounded. Mandy’s pants were down around her ankles but there was no evidence of a sexual assault. There were only two possibilities of what happened. One, that she got lost, needed to relieve herself, stumbled and hit her head on the rock. Or two, someone hit her over the head with a rock before or after failing to rape her. One, senseless the other, heartless. Neither made losing her any easier.

After the three of us told the police how we failed to make sure our friend turned left instead of right, we went to Buck’s, as if maybe we could sense the breadcrumb trail that the investigators failed to pick up on. We only managed to get drunk and resentful.

Trish and Tammy stopped going to Buck’s and stopped talking to me altogether. I’d taken to drinking alone at Buck’s and then retracing Mandy’s steps, more than once being brought back to town by a local or the police. When it was the latter, I berated them for determining Mandy’s death was an accident, shouting again and again, “She wouldn’t turn right!! She wouldn’t be so stupid!”

One night, after another fit behind the cage in the cruiser, Tom who was on patrol, screeched the car to a halt. He turned and fixed his eyes on me until I calmed down.

“Have you thought that maybe she was trying to do what you desperately need to do?

“What?”

“Escape.”

 

The Blackberry Jam

When Helen’s shirt became tangled and ripped by the blackberry vines, it wasn’t her mother’s wrath she feared but that of Mrs. M., who despite her flowered shirt and orthopaedic shoes, was more terrifying than bogey monsters, clowns, and snakes combined. The children of the blocks south of Wilbur Street had for years, used a complicated and treacherous path of alleyways to get home from school. There were holes in fences to be climbed through and fallen trees to scale. But the most spinetingling leg of the journey was past the Doberman whose chain allowed him to run across the alley, meaning a short-legged human had to run quickly into Mrs. M’s yard, lest be mauled by the sad and angry creature. Just on the edge of Mrs M’s yard was a garden full of thorny rosebushes and a scratchy web of blackberry vines. The children usually ended up precariously stuck between frothing canine jaws and prickly foliage. While waiting for the animal to get bored and trot back to his spot in the shade next to his owner’s house, they sampled a few berries and looked nervously at the windows of Mrs. M’s house. Eventually, she exploded out the door, wooden spoon in hand, shouting “Bugger off, ye nasty devils!”. The only positive outcome when this happened was that the dog ran away too though not with a purple-smeared face.

The year Helen entered 4^th grade, her mother decided the best way to soften her rebellious and sullen child was to make her join the local Junior Girl Scout troupe. Having read a pamphlet about it from the library, she was sold on the laws of “A Girl Scout obeys rules” and “A Girl Scout is cheerful.” Helen suffered through the meetings in her scratchy uniform, humming through the songs and trying to become invisible. Soon it was cookie-selling season and everyone was in a frenzy to sell the most boxes to win the coveted prize of a Miami Miss BMX bike.

Helen allowed herself to be dragged door to door by her mother, knocking softly and mumbling a “Excuse me, Ma’am would you like to buy some Girl Scout cookies,” in a small voice, eyes downcast. Her mother usually mouthed the request again, pointing at the order form and shrugging as if to say, “What can I do with this one?”

When one woman answered the door, Helen turned to flee, smacking right into her mother whose face turned bright red. It was none other than Mrs. M, looming taller and meaner close up. Having never seen the front of her house, Helen didn’t realise where she was. When Mrs. M invited them in, Helen thought she sounded a bit like Mary Poppins and the Wicked Witch mixed together.

As they sat at a table in a sunny room, Helen felt sure they would never be allowed to escape. Something was stabbing in her stomach trying to get out and a lump was forming in her throat.

“These are scones dear, what you probably call a biscuit. Try it with some blackberry jam. I made it myself.” Her mother tore open the lopsided round bread and spread some jam on it and smiled tightly as she gave it to her. Her look told Helen to eat or else. Helen took a bite, forcing the sweet, bready bite down past the lump and found that it was much better than the toast and grape jelly she was used to.

Mrs. M told her mom that her husband had brought the vines all the way from a tiny village south of Birmingham in England, which confused Helen as she thought villages were places like she saw in National Geographic where women didn’t wear any shirts. She wondered if Mrs. M took off her cardigan and flowered blouse when no one was around. When Helen’s mother asked, “What does your husband do?” Mrs. M voice got a bit shaky and she said he died of cancer a few years ago. She looked at Helen for a long time before adding, “I like to think he’s out there watching over the roses and berries for me.”

A few weeks later it was time to make the cookie deliveries. The money had long ago been turned over and the bicycle awarded to Christy Malone, who everyone called “a ray of sunshine” and “a lovely young lady”. Helen’s mom decided to wait in the car, hoping that Helen might be forced to have more confidence when dealing with her customers. Luckily, she wasn’t there to witness the “Here” as she thrust boxes into hands, before turning and running down the porch steps.

At Mrs. M’s house, as Helen turned to escape, the woman told her to “wait right there” and she came back, holding a bag, eyes blazing above a tight smile.

“I made this jar especially for you, Dear. You needn’t share it with anybody. All right?”

Skin burning with adrenaline and heart racing, Helen tried to say, “Ok” but nothing came out. She’d had the same sensation in a nightmare where someone was chasing her and she couldn’t scream. She tried several times to open the car door before scrambling inside. She wouldn’t move, so her mother delivered the rest of the cookies.

The next morning when she came downstairs, a piece of toast was waiting for her.

“I don’t want it!”

“What’s the matter with you? You eat toast every day.”

“What’s the purple stuff?”

“Jam. From Mrs. McGuire. Somehow it ended up in the trash, but we’re not going to waste it.”

“No! It’s poison!”

“Don’t be ridiculous. You’re not going anywhere until you eat that toast.”

Several hours later, Helen had a realisation. She’d been a brat and a troublemaker her entire life. She’d tried to control herself but the bad kid always won. Bad kids deserve punishment and this was hers.

Sighing with profound regret and remorse, she lifted the toast to her lips and took a bite.

 

 

 

 

Bailing Out

Despite Jamie’s missing tooth—two over from the front—and his love of country music, he was ridiculously handsome. Tall, ropy, with young Richard Gere hair. And the first time he kissed me, right on the grimy dance floor, I felt myself go liquid. Though that might have been the two-for-one Long Island ice teas. He lived with his ‘mama’ and they did everything together—cook, slow dance, and argue. They always seemed to be three fist shakes short of a domestic violence incident.

I had two things that earned my position wedged into the corner of their sofa next to the slumbering German Shepherd: a truck and an ATM card. I had about $1000 left in the account and I was feeling kind of itchy to just get it spent, so I would be forced out of the limbo I’d malaised myself into. I’d been fired from the bookshop I worked in (apparently, you can’t borrow books from there or show up drunk) and I didn’t know if it was worth it to pay the $600 rent due in four days because I surely wouldn’t have my shit together to survive the month on $400.

I brought over drive-thru barbecue dinners; the Styrofoam containers squeaked as I hit the potholes on the gravel road which led to their tiny house. I distributed the food, cutlery and napkins. They didn’t thank me, but they didn’t mind when I helped myself to a beer either. The room soon filled with the smell of grease and tang and the sounds of meat ripped from bones. The dogs whined and the air-conditioner rattled just slightly louder than the motors of whatever vehicles were going around in circles on the TV.

I could go home for $365, exit the square tube of the airplane into my mother’s waiting arms, sleep on a real bed, and watch crime-dramas like a civilised person. How did I get here on a battered sofa in the middle of nowhere in Texas? Oh yeah, I got fired for drunkenly stealing a book that I already had stowed away in my mother’s attic, went to a bar alone, and met a guy who said I was cute when I bought him a bottle of Coors. Jamie was a man of limited words and in general, didn’t look in my direction. Which suited me. If he didn’t look, he didn’t see and if he didn’t see, I didn’t exist. And I didn’t want to exist.

Jamie borrowed my truck to help his friend move something or maybe to go to Mexico or maybe to rob a bank. I don’t really know because as I continued to drink their cheap beer, I couldn’t really hear. I sat and pet the dog who looked at me with one eye open, head on paws, ears folded back, us both wary but lazy. I could have changed the channel on the giant TV but I didn’t. The cars continued to go round and round, the crowd hungry for a crash or a win; they were happy either way.

When I woke up, Jamie’s mother and another woman were looking at me. “You ready to keep the party going, Princess?” She hated me because of my college degree and flat Midwestern accent. But she knew I’d buy the rounds.

“Where y’all going?” my attempt at Southern drawl sounded drunk, which I realised I still was. The ladies looked like they were going to a rodeo.

“The Wrangler. But you ain’t goin’ dressed like that.” I was in all black save bright feather rainbow earrings that tickled my chin.

“No. I’m all right. I’m going home in a bit. Where’s Jamie?”

“He’s already there. He’s expecting you.” Translation: “He’s expecting your wallet.”

“I’ll meet up with him later. Y’all go on without me.”

“Lock the door when you go and stay away from the booze.” Thinking she was concerned about my drinking and driving, I smiled until she added:

“It’s for when we get back.”

They left a cloud of perfume as the door slammed shut.

The bottle of vodka sat on the countertop like a vase full of flowers, brightening the effect of the entire room. I had a headache and too many thoughts so I poured a plastic cup full of orange juice and the centrepiece and sat back down in my spot, which the dog had not stolen from me. I decided I was going to drink the bottle and leave it propped up in the paws of the dog before I left.

Three hours later, a collect call startled me and the dog awake. It was from the Harris County jail and the voice on the other side was begging me sweetly to come and post bond at the jail. Jamie had had an “alteration” at the bar when a fellow got a little too friendly with his mama.

“What about your mom?”

“She’s here too. We ain’t got that kind of money right now.”

“Ok, I’ll be there soon.”

Three things happened in the next ten minutes: I couldn’t find my keys anywhere. Second, while looking for my keys, I realised I could barely see straight and knew I wouldn’t be able to find my way to the highway. And three, I knew if I made it the highway, I would purposefully drive my truck right into the path of an oncoming semi. I played the scene out in my head like it was an upside-down bizzaro world car race show. I imagined the crowd cheering upon impact, my fist in the air for the victory, the sweet oblivion that would follow.

With only a purse and a book, I entered the mild Midwest 15 hours later with $400 and bad breath. My mother gave me a hug and a grimace. What we didn’t know then and for a long time after was that a bail out is only temporary. It gets you out of the holding cell, but not the prison.

 

Do Me a Flavour

On that first morning, the bacon and Swiss crepes tasted like the smell of an old sock. Normally, after a night of bar hopping, the trifecta was the only thing to raise Jess from the deadweight of a hangover. Jess spat out the rubbery contents onto the plate and shuffled back to the kitchen to check the expiration dates. Finding nothing past its prime, she tried to remember what swill she’d downed at the last club but could only remember walking down a long hall to the toilet, her right shoulder pressed against a red wall and keeping her from falling.

She grabbed a cracker and lavished it with a creamy dill spread but it tasted of sawdust and turpentine. The Fox’s chocolate chip cookies which were meant to get through the afternoon until she could order Chinese delivery tasted like cardboard laced with shoe polish. Unable to problem solve on an empty stomach and with a throbbing skull, she told the kitchen to “fuck off” and crawled under the crumpled bedding and went back to sleep.

That night she greedily grabbed the brown paper bags from the bewildered delivery driver and inhaled its oily sweet and spicy fumes before paying and sending him on his way. When she impaled a piece of General Tsao’s chicken and stuffed it into her mouth, she was horrified to taste vomit. She tried another piece with more of the sticky sauce and found the bile flavour intensified. The accompanying spring rolls tasted like plastic teething rings before they’re stuck in the freezer.

She jammed the cartons into the fridge and consulted the only expert she knew—the internet—which promptly told her she could be pregnant, have mouth disease, a cold, diabetes, anxiety, or cancer. After two hours spent in the on-line medical wormhole and deciding she would drop dead in two weeks, she went back to the kitchen. Within minutes the contents of the fridge and pantry were on the counter in a makeshift buffet. But the Serrano ham tasted like nylon; the expensive parmesan ham crumbled like chalk in her mouth; cheesecake had turned to urine, and Smarties were coal. Celery, Granny Smiths, and smoked salmon were flavourless and so edible. She stood in the kitchen, staring into space, saddened that the loves of her life had betrayed her.

For the next two weeks, the only foods she could stomach were celery, apples, fish, berries, and rocket. The internet continued to be 50/50 on whether she was going to live. Something started to happen in the third week. Compliments were accompanied by smiles and thumbs up and her ever faithful muffin top was shrinking. As she sat and forced down a “superfood” salad, minus the nail polish remover flavoured dressing, thank you, she realised she didn’t feel tired and her head was frighteningly clear. Though her synapses fired in the most pleasurable of ways, she longed for just one bite of a chicken wing dipped in bleu cheese or an onion ring.

At the end of the month, Jess was doing her usual on-line banking and noticed she had a charge from a place called “Hip-no Café” from the beginning of the month, around the time she and some mates had gone bar-hopping. But it wasn’t their style to go to a café after a night on the lash. She texted Sarah who replied that she’d never heard of the place and had she been doing drunken on-line shopping again?

Jess sighed and looked up the number, surprised to find it pop up first on her google search.

“Yeah. Hi. This is going to sound weird, but I spent 75 quid here at the beginning of the month and I’d like to know what the hell I got.”

“You a smoker?”

“No”

“Gambler?”

“No”

“Sex addict? Stalker?”

“What the fuck? NO!”

“Ah you musta got the ‘Slime to Slim’ special.”

“Huh?”

“You know we do hypnotherapy here, right? Have you lost weight recently?”

“Yeah, some.”

“Food tastes like ass?”

“Yes!”

“Dr. John convinced your brain that bad foods taste like shit and then you can’t eat those and voila, the weight comes off. Same method for smoking. Porn’s a little trickier.”

“Jesus. Can you reverse it?”

“So you WANT to go back to stuffing your face with cheese fries?”

“Well….”

“It only works about 10% of the time, if even that. You should be thankful and just get on with your life.”

“Is this legal?”

“You signed a waiver.”

“But I can reverse it, right?”

The man sighed. “Yeah, it’s a tenner, though. I can book you in for next week.”

“Ok.”

For the next week, Jess noticed how many surfaces reflected her image—windows, puddles, bus mirrors, and the weird globe sculpture outside the bank. She barely recognized the person gaping back. She found herself staring more than once at women who fell in the “slightly plump” category, trying to objectively gauge if they possessed the right amount of femininity. Weren’t they just normal beautiful women going about their day? But how far would they go to have this gift that unceremoniously dropped into her lap on a night on the piss?

But a lifetime of salad?! She was already bored out of her skull with every meal. Sure, the food didn’t taste like vomit or cleaning supplies, but there was a distinct absence of flavour. Even bright fresh blueberries tasted like little spheres of water. She touched the new curve of her waist, and rubbed the flatness of her tummy, but it was the sense of lightness and radiance, that made her want to run with arms flung wide.

A week later, Jess shifted anxiously on the slick vinyl of the diner booth. A cheeseburger the size of a tower was placed before her, cheese oozing down the sides and onto a wall of chips below. She could hear a faint sizzle and a meaty steam wafted towards her.

She closed her eyes, knowing exactly what she should do.

The Dangers

It was the kind of autumn day that always made Marna think of “Scarborough Fair”. The world had tipped into cold, and the grey skies seemed lonely without the sun, and the trees, without their leaves. Marna trudged through the large brown piles, her legs kicking up like wooden toy soldiers. Despite being well into middle-age, she could never resist a pile of leaves or a puddle. As the nest of suburban ranches disappeared from view, her nerves began to tingle and spark as once again, she felt danger lurking.

Though the rational part of her knew she was more likely to be part of a fiery head-on collision within a three-mile radius of her home, she could never quite escape the voice in her head belonging to an over-protective and fearful mother.

She was told to never play in piles of leaves because people both careless and evil, left (or planted) things in there like broken bottles, deep holes, or worse yet, bear traps. “You could get a bad cut or lose a leg and if it’s a trap, you may be kidnapped and made a slave. I’d never be able to find you to bring you home.”

Marna stopped kicking as she couldn’t help but see those tiny possibilities and the fear rippled through her like standing on the platform to jump off the high dive. That primal rush to prevent harm.

Today the childhood warnings were louder than usual, making her feel both nostalgic and queasy.

“Don’t play on that playground equipment! You can ruin your lady parts and not be able to have babies or if you fall off that one thing, your head will break open like a melon. Then what will we do?”

“Don’t jump on the bed! You’ll land on the corner and poke your eye out. Do you want to be blind like Mary on Little House on the Prairie?”

“Don’t go outside without gloves. If your fingers get too cold, the doctor will have to amputate them. That means he chops them off with a big knife. You can’t do anything without fingers!”

“See that mitten there on the ground? That could mean a girl was taken by somebody. She probably struggled and dropped it. Never go anywhere alone. Especially in the woods.”

She still couldn’t see a lone shoe or glove on the sidewalk without thinking “someone must have been kidnapped”. It didn’t occur to her until her 20s that the owners of lost clothing probably didn’t realise they’d dropped something until they were safely at home.

As Marna went deeper into the woods, the trees sometimes started to feel a bit menacing despite their familiarity. Though it took a few minutes, she was usually successful at banishing the fear. This ritual was her way of repairing the damage caused by a somewhat deranged parent.

Usually, she walked straight through the park, staying on the main trails until she’d made the circuit back to her neighbourhood. But as she came to a fork in the path, she noticed something shiny a few feet away on the path that led to the pond. “Murderers like to kill near water because the police dogs can’t smell you!”

She bent down and picked up a small dime and to the left noticed a trail of coins. “Oh come on Marn, this is so obvious! Someone is trying to lure you.” Her mother’s voice held a hint of exasperation.

Marna replied in her head, “It’s probably just Candid Camera or some stupid prank.” She began picking up the coins, feeling rebellious and hoping that she wouldn’t in fact be murdered because of $.78.

As she emerged from the trees into the clearing with the pond, she saw a girl maybe 8 years old standing about a foot deep in the water. “Don’t go in! You’ll get stuck in the mud and can’t get out. You’ll starve to death before someone finds you or fall asleep and fall in and drown!”

“Whatchadoin’?” Marna tried to be friendly and casual, but seeing the child alone made her skin feel prickly. The girl was holding a plastic bag and taking one coin out at a time and throwing it in the water, closing her eyes until she heard the “plonk”.

“Makin’ wishes.” The girl didn’t seem startled and didn’t turn to look at Marna as she answered.

“What for?”

“Can’t tell you or they won’t come true.”

Marna looked around, hoping that a parent would emerge from one of the many trails that led here, smiling and scolding with a “there you are” and a hug.

“Don’t you have any gloves? It’s cold out here. You’ll— “she stopped herself from bringing up amputation.

The girl shook her head.

“I think you dropped these.” She showed the girl her handful of coins.

“Thanks. Can you make a wish? If we both do some, maybe it’s got more power.”

“Sure, but what for?”

The girl hesitated and her eyes became watery and her lip trembled.

“Mom’s in the hospital.”

“Well then, let’s wish real hard for her.” She took a coin, closed her eyes and threw it far. It made a satisfying ploink and she threw another, this time making sure, “Let this girl’s mother be ok” came out before the metal hit the water. She imagined all the horrible things that might have happened but didn’t ask.

When all the coins had been released to do their magic, Marna lifted the girl out of the mud as her shoes were stuck but they came out attached to her feet with a loud slurping noise.

Marna offered to walk the girl home. For the first time, the girl looked frightened.

“I can’t. Dad says I can’t go anywhere with a stranger.” She ran to a path, towards the east, where the trees swallowed her in the inky darkness.

Marna felt the darkness coming for her and started walking quickly, believing more than ever her mother’s mantra.

“Danger is everywhere.”

 

Live to Share, Share to Live

As the small crowd huddled around Amber, Mel could only hear soothing whispers, the occasional gasp, and the wail, “Why is he always like this?” Mel knew that “he” could be Amber’s boyfriend, father, or brother as they’d all been the source of her misery at one time or another. Her boyfriend for being passionate about his various causes but cold to her; her father for being snide and dismissive about her boyfriend; and her brother for getting the best version of their mother’s affection.

Mel didn’t want to know any of this information about her colleague but given the small compressed space they’d been given for lunch and breaks, it was impossible to avoid what Mel had secretly begun to call, “Amber’s in-person facebook status updates”. Because of Amber’s need to over-share, Mel was in the know about stubbed toes, cheating neighbours, perfect crème brulee, lazy naps, sex mishaps, and recently formed ass dimples.

Amber with her permanently rosy cheeks, big innocent brown eyes, and naturally pouty mouth got away with overcrowding the staff room with her day to day tribulations. She was part woman, part toddler and her co-workers wanted to protect her from the sharp edges of adult life. Except for Mel who inwardly winced whenever hearing her vocal fry and squealing at anything “adorbs”. Mel imagined holding a fist in front of Amber’s face 70s Dad style and sputtering, “I’ll give you something to cry about”.

Though the moment Amber let out her usual “Lads, get this one” Mel imagined jet-packing through the ceiling and into space in order to escape the anecdote, Mel was mostly jealous. Not of the attention—she’d hate to have the constant concerned eyes of the staff posse focused on her, the older women tucking strands of hair behind her ear. No, that’d be much worse than being a silent audience to a one-woman melodrama. She wished she could just do the simple act of sharing, whether it be a rant, observation, or as she wished most of all, relief of breaking open to let out whatever was simmering just below the surface. She feared that all that lie supressed would slither and wind its way around the cells of her body, suffocating and mutating them into incurable blocks, which would kill her days after being discovered. At least that’s what the women’s magazines and self-help books said would happen if she didn’t open up more to the world.

So, on New Year’s Day Mel decided as her only resolution to “share my mind and open my soul to others.”

She figured that talking about Christmas would be an easy opener for the first day back to work. But her recounting of how her creepy Uncle Peter grabbed her ass as she put away the leftovers of the big family dinner and said, “That’s some fine ham right here” didn’t have the jovial ring she was going for, mostly because she forgot to explain that he was the husband of her mother’s sister and not a blood relative. The staff just stared at her awkwardly which made her laugh and turn red. When she added that the only presents she received were five pairs of socks, they nodded as if this made perfect sense.

In the following days, she chewed on and spit out at least one random thing that had been in her thoughts. “I had my recurring dream last night that I had a baby and kept forgetting to feed it or change it for days. The tiny thing was scrawny as hell but didn’t even cry. At least last night I didn’t dream I was drunk, like I usually do.” She could see some of the women give each other the almost imperceptible sideways glance before saying benignly, “Probably your subconscious trying to soothe itself for you not having any.” She hadn’t thought of this and wished she could stuff that share that felt like a big balloon back down her throat.

She tried the trick of grousing, which she noticed was a sure way to get out pent up rage. After one colleague lamented that he could have slept for five more hours, she said, “Today when I woke up, I fantasized for about five minutes stabbing a fork into my forehead just above my nose. I often have this fantasy.” They laughed nervously and one made the joke, “We better hide the cutlery!” before all suddenly found something fascinating on their mobiles.

Health was another common worry maker so she shared that she had a constellation of moles getting all funky looking on her back. This resulted in a round of “ewwws”; “TMIs” and “you oughta tell a professional about that” but none looked in her eye or rubbed her shoulder as they said it. In fact, they seemed to back away. Which made her try harder, “Lads, I feel numb every day. I feel like I’m wading in wet cement just to get through life. I feel like I’m losing myself.” They stared at her in a silence for so long, that for the one and only time, the sound of the refrigerator humming could be heard during a work day. “Mel, you really oughta see a professional. That’s all outside our wheelhouse.” They backed away even more, so she said brightly and with a laugh, “Yeah, you’re probably right.” She ate her apple in silence.

After that day, she stopped sharing anecdotes about sitting on benches for hours to watch the pigeons. She kept to herself the joy and fear of being followed by a fox on a morning run. And she didn’t tell anyone she successfully made a pavlova.

Because she no longer had the floor and avoided the floor at all costs, she started to notice that Amber had become quiet in the New Year. When one day a colleague asked her if everything was ok, she nervously looked over at Mel and replied, “Nobody wants to hear about my silly life.”

 

 

Family Fortunes

Aunt Mary’s apartment always smelled of strawberry incense, cigarettes, cat shit, and the cabbage she boiled as part of her “weekly detox”. The windows were permanently fogged up and the once white walls were covered in a sticky browny-yellow film. Every space not occupied by a cat, held a brightly printed pillow, antique lamp, stack of books, or porcelain figurines of wolves and fairies.

It was Vanessa’s favourite place in the world.

On that winter day, Vanessa walked along the creek behind the cul-de-sac all the way to the river on the north side and then to the part of town where the houses were tiny but the streets were straight and logical. In her pocket, she carried Aunt Mary’s gift from her mother, Ruth, who was Mary’s sister.

When Mary opened the door, she gave a raspy, “Come here, girl!” and enveloped Vanessa with her plump arms and soft bosom. She smelled of vanilla and earth and laughed as the two of them rocked back and forth. She was dressed in the red velvet robe, the one she wore on “special occasions”.  Her others—one for each day of the week—were only “a sorry woman’s sari” a joke Vanessa didn’t get until many years later.

Mary quickly ushered her into her favourite chair in the living room—a plush recliner that could only be described as “burnt orange”. Soon, she had a cat in her lap, a pillow under one arm, and a cup of mulled wine that warmed her inside and out in the chilly room. She chatted excitedly about her upcoming early graduation and starting college the next month.

Vanessa watched carefully as Mary opened the envelope with a perfectly manicured nail the colour of the wine she squeezed from a box throughout the day. She smiled and raised an eyebrow as if to say, “Well, well. What have we got here?” Usually, Ruth bought Mary candles or bubble bath.

As a rule, Ruth never went to Mary’s house, claiming an allergy to smoke. But Vanessa once overheard her mother tell a friend “I had to hose myself down with disinfectant. Absolutely vile. How can she live like that?”

Vanessa never understood why people said her mother and aunt were “chalk and cheese”. Chalk and cheese are both white, soft, and break easily. They were more like chiffon and chutney.  In high school, Mary derided Ruth’s “white suburban Stepford wife dream”, and Ruth sneered at Mary’s penchant for “hitchhiking god-knows-where, mixing with all sorts of low-lifes.”

Mary stared at the paper as if doing so would change the words. Her eyes were slightly narrowed and Vanessa could see the lines above her lips which her mother always referred to as “smoker’s wrinkles”. The voucher for a manicure was cruel on three levels—it was the type of impersonal gift you might get from a boss; Mary did her own manicures impeccably; and Mary rarely left the house.

Though Ruth was a housewife, it was Mary who spent the most time at home. In her 30s, the endless highways and unexplored towns that had been her freedom had become giant mouths threatening to swallow her whole. If she walked past the barrier of her sidewalk, she heard a deafening static like a broken TV. The first time it happened she thought she was having a heart attack or stroke. But after all the MRI scans and several more attacks, she was diagnosed with anxiety disorder and agoraphobia.

To supplement her disability income, she read palms. She predicted enough adulterous affairs, twins, heart attacks, and job offers to be considered “the real deal” and through word of mouth, often had as many as five clients in a week. Ruth had once said, “Clients? More like suckers. She takes their money for a lie and then takes their tax money to pay for her invisible illness.”

Mary put the voucher on a tall pile of magazines and smiled warmly at Vanessa. “Cash would have been better. I could have treated us to a pizza! Ah well, it’s the thought that counts, right? How about a refill of Christmas juice and then we’ll do that reading you’re always bugging me for. Consider it your Christmas and graduation gift.”

Vanessa jumped up, cat and pillow falling to the floor, and rushed over to give Mary a hug. She’d been begging for Mary to read her palm for years, but Mary had always said, “In the long run, it’s best not to know what’s going to happen.”

As she entered The Room, a spare bedroom whose walls had been painted with tree murals so realistic, Vanessa could almost smell the pine needles and hear the wind in the leaves. The only furniture was a table covered with a maroon velvet cloth and four chairs, all different sizes and styles. A cd player sat in the corner, playing “Rain Forest Meditation”. The heavy curtains were tied back and the bright winter sunlight made the room less creepy than usual.

Vanessa never told a soul her aunt saw that she’d have to search many corners of the earth before she found her true love. After graduating, much to the dismay of her parents, she joined the Peace Corps and was away for several years.

When Mary and Ruth’s mother died, Vanessa came home for the funeral, a man black as night on her arm. When she saw Mary, she gushed, “You were right all those years ago. Look, I found him. Best gift ever.” Zeke, having heard many a time that he was Vanessa’s destiny, smiled and thanked Mary. Ruth, who overheard the exchange, demanded to know what they were talking about.

After Vanessa recounted the entire romantic tale, the sisters locked eyes, on Mary’s face the slightest triumphant smirk. It was a look borne from a lifetime of the tug of war of hurt and payback.

Mary leaned and whispered in Ruth’s ear. “Maybe I should have just given her a voucher, eh?”