Before the Dawn (8 page)

For a moment I am speechless... stunned, and filled with hope. “I’d be honored.”

We smile at each other, foolishly. We’ve lost so much, so many years.  But I’m not going to think about them anymore.  I’m not going to look back.  There’s a way forward now, a chance.  Perhaps now Annabel will be a real daughter to me... and I’ll be a real father to her.

“Fancy an ice cream?”  I ask and Annabel smiles almost shyly.

“Why not?”

As we walk down the promenade I see the father with the little red headed girl.  She is dancing around him, chattering.  He falls back, exhausted from their antics.  Our gazes meet and he rolls his eyes in the universal expression of the shared joys and trials of fatherhood.

I smile back and nod.  He thinks I’m Annabel’s father, I realize.  I look at Annabel, walking beside me, and I know that’s what I’ve always been... even if she hasn’t treated me as such, even if I haven’t acted as one.  I’m still her dad. Nothing can change that.

BLUEBERRIES FOR BREAKFAST

I hate blueberries.  Actually, that’s not true.  I love eating them, or I used to anyway, but I can’t stand picking them.  Every summer me and Jimmy--that’s my brother--spend the mornings and some of the afternoons picking pails full of the things.  Blueberries.

Once upon a time, when I was little--I’m thirteen now--I loved blueberries.  Mum used to make blueberry pancakes for breakfast, dripping with butter and our own maple syrup that Dad made in the spring.  That was back before Dad died, and we still lived on the farm, instead of this falling down place on the edge of town.

Back then, I loved going out picking with Mum.  We’d swing our metal pails and sing songs, just the two of us, our voices echoing in the woods.  We’d race to see who could find the biggest and best patch, and we’d tease each other about who could fill her pail first. We’d sneak mouthfuls of berries when the other wasn’t looking, and dissolve into giggles when we were found out.

That was back when picking berries was fun, because the pails we brought home were used for pancakes and pies and jam.

Now the berries are carefully emptied into little white cardboard containers, the kind Dad and I used to buy chips in, with gravy.  Mum lines the cartons up on her roadside stall, underneath the big sign Jimmy and I painted: “Wild Blueberries for Sale, $12 for 1 pint, $24 for 1 quart.”

The blueberries you see in the supermarket don’t look anything like the fruit we pick.  They’re what Mum calls domesticated, and they’re big and fat but taste like the carton they come in... or so Mum says.  The wild blueberries--the ones we pick on our knees--are tiny and dark and bursting with the taste of sunshine. They’re sweet and tart at the same time, and I used to love to roll them on my tongue before biting through the smooth, dusky skin and savoring the little explosion of flavor.

It takes a whole lot of these little berries to fill a big pail.  At least that’s what I’m thinking now as I kneel in one of the biggest patches.  The sun is hot and the mosquitoes buzz around my head.  My fingers are stained blue, the tips sore from picking among the briars.  My pail is only half full, and this patch is almost picked out.  In a few minutes, I’ll have to find a new picking place, and I’m not looking forward to it.  I want to go home.  I want to dump these berries out and forget about them.

Since Dad died, summers have been for work.  Mum picks with us to start, and then when the cottage season starts and the tourists drive through in their flashy cars from Toronto, she mans the stall.  She’s offered to let me do it, but I always say no.  It’s an easy job, and I want Mum to have the easy job.

For the last few years she’s worked all kinds of jobs, none of them easy.  There isn’t much work to be had in this little town, halfway between nowhere and Toronto.  We’re not quite cottage country, but we’re not close enough to the city either.  We’re nothing.

Anyway, Mum does all kinds... cleans the church and the supermarket, sometimes picks up work on the till as well, when one of the regular cashiers calls in sick.  Nothing permanent or stable, or so she says when she’s too tired to hide her worry. 

That’s why Jimmy and I help her in the summer, when we can.  I wish I could help her more.  I wish I could wipe the worry and sadness from her face.  I wish Dad hadn’t died.

Jimmy and I pick berries in the mornings, and if the picking’s good we’ll come back after lunch.  Sometimes we get a ride with our neighbors to other patches farther down, because everybody round here picks berries and the patches can get picked out pretty quick.

Jimmy and I have our secret patches of course, deep in the woods that no one knows about.  I’m always careful about going to those, because I don’t want someone following me, like the nosy Girton twins.

We don’t actually eat blueberries anymore.  Sometimes, if they haven’t been sold and they’re getting kind of mushy and old, Mum will make some jam.  But the fresh, plump ones always go to the stall, never for pancakes or pies, or to have out on the porch after dinner, with ice cream.  We don’t even have a porch anymore.

I don’t care, though. Not really. Like I said, I hate blueberries now.

It is almost dinnertime when I finally return home, my pail only three quarters full.  It’s nearing the end of the season, and it takes a full day’s work or more to pick to the top of pail. 

The house is strangely quiet, and the screen door slaps against the wood frame with a lonely echo.  I know Jimmy’s gone down the street to Will’s house, but I thought Mum would be home.

I put the pail in the pantry, with the empty cardboard containers and dusty jars of jam.  Outside the sun is starting to drop and I can feel the first cool breeze off the river. 

I’m thinking Mum must be at the stall, even though she closes up round this time so we can have dinner together. It’s a Friday night, though, and sometimes she stays up late since the cottagers come down for the weekend, after work.

The stall is empty when I reach it, the folding chair tucked inside the little shelter that Jimmy made.  It looks like a bad carpentry project, but I know Jimmy was proud of it.  I wonder where Mum is.

Since Mum’s not home, it’s up to me to get dinner, and I go for easy, frozen chicken nuggets and chips.  Not exactly health food, but I can’t escape the little seed of bitterness that this shouldn’t be my job.  I shouldn’t have to make Jimmy eat his peas, should I? Then I feel badly that I’m thinking such things at all.

Jimmy comes home from Will’s and we eat in mostly silence.  I tell him he can watch T.V. for twenty minutes before bed, and I begin to wash the dishes.

Just then the screen door slams again, but this time it’s a welcome sound.  “Honey, I’m sorry I was so late.  I missed the bus back from town, and had to wait for the next one.”

“Why were you in town?” I ask uneasily, and Mum smiles, all mischief and happiness.  “I can’t tell you yet... tomorrow maybe, if I get the call.”

What call, I want to ask, but Mum is in the pantry.  “Great job picking, Emily!  These berries will be put to a good use, I’m sure of it.”

I don’t understand what she means, or the happiness that surrounds her like a bubble.  I can’t even say why I don’t like it. I’ve always wanted to see Mum happy, but for some reason I can’t share in it.

The next morning I wake up to the smell of pancakes.  That alone makes me lie still, because breakfasts are usually cold cereal and maybe toast. When I venture downstairs, I stop in surprise at the plate of fluffy, blue-dotted pancakes on the table.

Mum looks up and smiles at me.  “Jimmy’s still asleep, but why don’t we make a start? Blueberry pancakes!  I haven’t made those in awhile, have I?”

“Why?” I manage, thinking strangely, unreasonably I know, my blueberries.

“I got the call today.”  Mum’s face is shining. “I got a job, Em--working in town for the doctor’s office.  It’s not much, maybe, but it means we can live in town, in a nice apartment, and stop picking these darn blueberries!”  She scoops up a fat blueberry from the bowl and eats it from the tip of her finger.

“You mean we’re going to move?”

“Things are going to change,” Mum promises me.  “We’ll live in a better place, not this wreck.  You’ll go to a new school, and so will Jimmy.  It’s a chance for all of us to start again.” Something in my face stops her because she looks uncertain all of a sudden.  “Aren’t you happy?”

I can’t answer, my throat is too tight.  And suddenly I need to get out of that hot kitchen, with the sickly sweet smell of blueberry pancakes. 

Before I even realize it, I’m running, running as fast as I can to the secret patch that only Jimmy and me know about it.  I must be crazy, because I start picking blueberries. I’m not even thinking about what I’m doing, my fingers scrabbling blindly among the bushes.

I don’t have a pail, so I gather them in my tee-shirt which is soon stained purple with juice.  My fingers are sore and scratched as I grab for the berries and I don’t even realize I’m crying till the tears drip from my chin.

“Em.  Em, please.”  Mum kneels beside me, her hand on my shoulder.

“How did you know I was here?” I ask with a sniff.  This patch is pretty secret. I cradle my shirt full of blueberries protectively, like a baby.

“I know you, and I know blueberries.”  Mum smiles a little bit sadly.  “I didn’t handle that very well, did I?  I’m sorry, Em.  I was just so excited.  We’ve been stuck here since Dad died, and it’s seemed like there’s no way out, no way ahead.  But now... I’m finally seeing above the water line.  I want more for you, and for Jimmy.  I want more for me.”  Her voice is quiet.  “But I know change is hard.”

The tears I thought I’d sniffed back trickle down my cheeks and while I try to gulp them back in, I can’t.  Suddenly I’m crying, loud, noisy crying, like a child who’s been hurt.  Mum puts her arms around me and rocks me.

“I miss him too, Em.  I miss him so much.”

And I know why I’m crying, and that Mum understands.

We stay like that for awhile, and I’m not even embarrassed.  Finally I get hold of myself, wipe my blueberry-stained hands across my damp cheeks.  Mum smiles but says nothing.  I’m glad, because I don’t know what I want her to say.

“I hate blueberries,” I blurt.

“Me too.”

I smile, and Mum smiles back.  We even laugh a little bit, sort of quietly.  I take a deep breath.  It’s going to be okay, I can see that now.  Maybe it will be hard, but it will be all right in the end.  Together, we’ll make it all right.

I look down at my stained tee shirt, and see the blueberries I’ve been hoarding not just now, but for years. Slowly I empty out my tee-shirt, let the berries tumble into the grass and weeds, lost forever. Some things you need to let go, when it’s time.

“Come on,” I say with a wobbly smile, and Mum smiles back at me, full of love.  “Let’s go home.”  She helps me up and we begin to walk through the woods, the sunlight filtering through trees in a pattern of light.  “You know,” I say after a moment, “I’m kind of hungry.”

A PIECE OF CAKE

“Chocolate.”

The man in front of me shrugged, smiling sheepishly. “Chocolate,” I repeated encouragingly.  “Would that be milk chocolate, dark chocolate...? Chocolate icing or chocolate cake?” I love to talk about chocolate.

“Er... I don’t know.  I don’t know that much about cakes. I just thought it would be nice, you know, for her birthday.”

Her?  I couldn’t help but wonder.  Had this man with the hazel eyes and boyish smile come into my bakery for a cake for his aging mum or his sexy girlfriend?  Perhaps his younger sister.

“Why don’t I show you the book.”  And put away these flights of fancy.  Who did it matter who he was buying the cake for?  I was only baking it.

I pushed a heavy binder, all the sheets covered in plastic, towards him.  “Here are some examples of the cakes I’ve made.”

“Wow.”  He looked admiringly at a particularly stunning chocolate gateau with a coffee mousse layer and dark chocolate flakes scattered across the top. “These are amazing.”

I couldn’t help but preen just a little bit.  Making cakes is my thing.  I loved it as a child, getting out measuring cups and bowls, covering myself with flour and sugar, and best of all, ending up with something good to eat at the end.  My mum wasn’t so pleased about the state of her kitchen, and eventually she also noticed my, well, nicely rounded figure.

“Perhaps you should cut back on the cakes, Sherry.” 

I remember feeling my face go hot as my stick-thin sister Karen smirked. Was it my fault that I was on the curvy side, or that I’d rather take a German chocolate cake to bed than a man?

Maybe not this one, I thought as I snuck another look at my customer.  He could easily beat German chocolate cake.  Triple fudge cake was another matter entirely, of course.

“What about this one?”

I glanced down at the photograph.  “Chocolate tiramisu.  One of my favourites.”

“It looks fancy, and she’s a bit of a gourmet, I think.”  He flashed that sheepish smile once more.  “We’ve only been dating for two months, but I wanted to do something special.”

That answered that question.  No aging mum or younger sister.  Just a girlfriend, probably sexy.  Sexier than me. In my tee-shirt, jeans, and white apron I suddenly felt about as sexy and sophisticated as a slug.  Never mind, I told myself, I was just the cake baker.