Blasted (53 page)

“Ach, your praise will go to my head.”

Tina was red faced on the floor amidst a cloud of lace, struggling with my wrapping job to get at the present beneath. “It's certainly thoroughly wrapped, Ruby, dear,” Queenie observed.

“Queenie,” said Grandpa quietly, “whose dress is that?”

There were red warning flashes around him. I didn't see colour around everyone any more, but sometimes it would still come on, like now. “What dress?” Queenie answered him, still fascinated by Tina's struggles.

“The one Tina's wearing, woman!” He'd been remarkably silent all through our performance and I'd been afraid I'd offended him by wearing Gramma's dress. But that wasn't it at all. Suddenly I felt cold. “That one, that one there!” he said.

“It's great-great-grandma's dress, Uncle John,” Tina's ringing voice dropped into the silence.

Everyone, except Tina at her present, went still. Grandpa sat there, a thunder-cloud. Then he got out of his seat in a rush and stumbled to the kitchen.

“What's wrong with
him
?” Doreen asked, staring.

“Old fool,” Queenie shook her head.

A crashing kick against a wall from the kitchen shook me. I looked at the others. Queenie rocked in the rocking chair, staring at the Christmas tree. “Is he all right?” Doreen asked.

“It's how he works off bad temper.”

Another kick from Grandpa sent pots and pans sliding and crashing down in a clatter. Doreen held her body with an I'm-not-listening expression on her face, keeping her eyes on the still oblivious Tina. “Here, darling, let me try…” She took the present from Tina, threw me a disbelieving look, and went at the tape with a pair of scissors. “There… there you are.” She handed the present back to Tina so she could tear the last bit of wrapping from it. Grandpa kicked at something else.

Tina sat over the present, silent. Then she raised her eyes to mine. “They're
wings
,” she said.

“Uh…”

“And a
magic wand
!”

“Do you like it?” It was a sort of Tinkerbell outfit. I'd never bought a kid a present before, and I was scared she'd hate it.

“It's beautiful!” She ran over to hug me. Then she began struggling with the packaging on the wings, wanting to get them on immediately.

Crash, bang from the kitchen. Queenie and I surged to our feet. “That man…” she said, with a thundercloud look of her own, ready to fly down the hall to do battle. We could hear him kick and kick; he sounded so angry, and then something in the clatter betrayed a sort of anguish. Fear and shame and grief.

“I'll talk to him, Queenie,” I said.

Bang, slam.

“Good luck to you,” she replied, and sat back down.

I stepped out into the hall, Tina's voice peeping behind me, “Mom, can you help me?” The walls of the house encircled me, the blood-red carpet trailed before my feet. I summoned the memory of Gramma, solid and immovable, her arms folded, “you look so foolish, me son!” and her long white dress swirled around me. But I wasn't immovable, I wasn't her; he couldn't listen to me that way. I stepped into the kitchen. One cupboard door stood open, a cascade of pots across the floor. Grandpa's back was to me. The back door flew open with a bang. The icy December night gusted into the room, and the wind sent my skirt flapping, tore the lacy veil from my head. My grandfather didn't move, shoulders rigid. I stood there looking at him, unsure if he knew I was there or not. I knew how Gramma would quell the situation, but what would I do? What would I do? Neither of us moved.

And then I found myself crossing the kitchen linoleum in two strides, my hand on his shoulder, spinning him around to face me. And he did, his dark eyes glittering with rage. I looked up at him, an answering rage leaping into life in my heart, and with it, fierce love. “Look at me!” I took his lined face between my palms, forcing him to look me in the eyes, and he let me do it. “Look at me.”

He did not speak. We stayed like that for a space of several heartbeats, my hands gentle despite my anger, our eyes locked. Then I dropped my hands. He backed away from me like I burned him.

“I'm here, Grandpa. I'm through.” The full force of my body was in the words as I said them, the warmth of my breath, my love, the heat of the blood between us. “I'm here.”

His face twisted yet he stood still now, the dark cold of near the longest night of the year framed behind him. He looked so old my breath caught in my throat. The room was icy; I shivered, his face blurring through tears. And then, with a hollow roar, a great rush of wind came gusting down over the Hill. The unseen trees swept the air and moaned, the night-stars flickered with cloud. Grandpa's hair stood, a nimbus of silver, and my own hair rose on my neck, my arms, and the fingers of the wind took the door and slammed it shut. The bang shook the room, and then, quiet. With one step to my two, he came forward. He took me in his arms, and stroked my head where I laid it on his shoulder. I reached up and touched his face, wet with tears.

“There, there,” I whispered.

Acknowledgements

No book gets written without help. I have been fortunate enough to receive support and critical feedback from many wonderful people. It is with a full heart that I send out thanks to each and every one of you.

The writing group: Prim Pemberton, with Peter Sanders, Pippa Domville, Annie Jacobsen, Ilene Cummings, Guy Ratchford, Dianne Flacks, Deborah Root, Jessica Ruth Harris.
Joanne Corbeil, for her unflagging enthusiasm, insight, and support.
My brothers, Lachlan and Simon.
My father and my mother.
Janet Story
James Reaney and ColleenThibaudeau
Writers Ursula Pflug, Robin McGrath, and Michelle Berry, for advice and support.
Bernice Morgan, Anne Hart and Michael Crummey.
My lovely friends for feedback and encouragement, particularly Em Glasspool,
Martha Cockshutt, Peg Town, Leah Buck, Caroline Langill, Melanie McCall,
Andrea Barrett, Catalina Mott, and Derek Bell.

And those who were kind enough to share stories with me and give permission for me to use them in the book:
Joseph Naytohow, Em Glasspool, Caron Garside, Laurel Paluck, Barbara Dametto,
Doug Cannon, Cathy Petch, and Lester Alfonso

Donna and Janine at Killick Press
– and to my editor, Marnie Parsons: thank you, thank you!

Brendan's paintings are inspired by works by Erik Loder
Thank you to Jill Staveley for permitting me to use lyrics from her song “really good.”

I owe a debt to the following works:
Ingeborg Marshall –
A History and Ethnography of the Beothuk
James P. Howley
-The Beothucks or Red Indians
Barbara Rieti –
Strange Terrain: the Fairy World in Newfoundland
Helen Fogwill Porter –
Below the Bridge
(Note that
Below the Bridge
is being released in CD form by Rattling Books, and also by Boulder Publications this year.)

Some readers may notice that Ruby recalls events that would have taken place before she was born; for example, she experiences both the construction of the Arterial Road and that of the sewage treatment plant. I've done this because for me, the changes wrought on that landscape and that community (from the loss of the Southside community “below the bridge” remembered by Ruby's grandfather, to the latest changes on that side of the St. John's harbour) have thematic resonances that outweigh chronological fidelity.