Blasted (9 page)

The spring I turned twelve my parents gave me a copy of
The Beothucks or Red Indians: The Aboriginal Inhabitants of Newfoundland
. Almost a hundred years after Shanawdithit died, James Howley had collected every scrap of writing about the Beothuks – letters, reports, newspaper articles, journal entries, the works – and compiled a fat book. It was all a bit much for a twelve-year-old but I drank it in. Again and again I looked at the reproductions of drawings that Shanawdithit had made. She'd drawn them for the man Cormack who took care of her for a while. Symbols, boats, mamateeks and houses, people. She drew events: the catastrophic last encounters between the remnants of her people and the whites who tried, too late, to contact them with friendly intention. The notes said that she drew her people in red lead, the whites in black ink. I had to imagine the red lead because the book didn't have any colour plates. People of the Red Ochre, they covered themselves in it, their babies, it was who they were. I read about consumption, knowing it meant tuberculosis, although inevitably in my mind it evoked the sterile sweep of a shopping mall. I read with longing and wonder – back then, you could have walked into the woods and actually have
seen
them – they were really there. One military man, Buchan, wrote of meeting with the tribe and seeing a woman with “light sandy hair, and features strongly similar to the French.” God knows who she was, but I clung to the hope that somehow that woman proved they'd take whites to live with them. Once I stole my mother's lipstick and mixed it with dirt and cooking oil, covering myself in red paste.

I devoured the fragments about
her
.

Shanawdithit had two children. She missed them.

Once she was shot at by a Mi'kmaq hunter named Noel Boss; in my mind he looked just like Eddy.

In the white households where she lived after being taken, she didn't seem to consider herself a servant; she'd do household tasks more to be helpful than out of any sense of duty, and was often “saucy” with the mistress of the house.

She was very modest, and tolerated no unwanted attentions from men.

When she was first taken, the women had quite a job washing off the red ochre.

My parents gave me that book the year before they died, though of course none of us knew it at the time. Afterwards this became part of the thick, heavy mat of emotions around the book, this sadness, wishing for small things, like that they'd written something on the fly-leaf. Shanawdithit – the whites re-named her Nancy – believed you could talk to the dead. Death and sleep were pretty much the same to her.
All gone widdun
, she said when the desperate mood came over her. She'd go off into the woods for days, come back saying she'd been talking to her family.
Nance go widdun too, no more come Nance, run away, no more come.

It grew dark, night fell. When I was sure it was after restaurant closing time, I got up, drank a can of beer I found in my derelict fridge, put my pilfered uniform and shoes in a plastic bag and drove my bike to the restaurant. When I walked in the door, all the reasons I had hated working there swept over me. I could feel every shift, every miserable customer, every nasty power-tripping mind game Jim had ever played.

“Well. Well, well, well, look who's here.” The Slug came out from behind the bar, wiping his hands on his dirty apron. He was trying to sound menacing. I put my helmet on the bar and took a few steps forward. “Hi,” I said. “I brought back the uniform.”

The Slug kept his eyes on me, calling out, “Hey, Jim!
Ruby's
here. She says she's brought back the
uniform
.”

Jim bustled out of the back room, his face all-over frowns. “You've got a lot of explaining to do!” he snapped.

“Look, I'm sorry I left like I did…”

“And don't think you can come crawling back. You're fired!”

“Jim, I think that's a moot point…”

“I could have you up on charges! Breach of contract!”

I raised my voice. “Listen, moron, just take your goddamn uniform, give me my clothes and I'll be leaving.” I tossed the bag with the uniform in it at The Slug, but he made no move to catch it. It hit his stomach and fell to the floor.

“Let's not get violent here, Ruby,” said Jim.

“Violent?!” I shouted, then controlled myself. “Do you still have my clothes? Just let me have them.”

“I threw them in the trash,” said The Slug.

I fixed him with a glare. “You have the social skills of Javex, you pasty, corrosive, poisonous little worm.” Trembling, I turned to go.

“You still owe me money. You owe me for those walk-outs.” I turned around, very slowly, at Jim's voice.

“Don't push it.”

“Push it? I'll have you in court so fast your head will spin.”

“Try it,” I said. Jim started laughing. “Don't you still owe me for a couple of shifts?”

Jim just kept laughing. The Slug walked to the door and opened it, gesturing for me to leave. I turned, and I think I meant to go. But suddenly I had one of the bar stools in my hands and I was smashing it into firewood on the bar.

“Suck my cock!” I was screaming. I grabbed another stool and threw it at The Slug's gaping mouth. He ducked with unexpected dexterity; the stool hit the floor and skidded, bouncing into the mirrors that lined the opposite wall, smashing a section. I lobbed another stool at the bottles lined up behind the bar and they came down in an impressive cascade of liquor and glass. I started crying as yet another stool came into my hands and I went for Jim, stool whirling over my head, Boudicca against the Romans. Jim turned tail and ran, shutting himself into the back room. I threw myself against the door, sobbing. It didn't feel like me any more, not like me. I was drowning, rough hands forcing me down into cold water, a crash. Old rage flickered through me and took, the way flames take an old house, it reminded me of my grandfather but I didn't have time to wonder why, not here, for a strange, hoarse voice came out of the depths of me.

“Don't you walk away from me.” My throat felt like it was being torn apart. “You come back here. Come back. Don't go.” Hands gripped, the shock of black cold water drowned me. I had to get out, get out. I grabbed my helmet and staggered towards the door, past The Slug huddled against the wall. I burst outside, and began to run. Some part of me expected that they would call the cops, so I ran careening through a park, my chest burning, my legs almost giving way beneath me, and out onto the dark and deserted streets again. I ran until I puked, retching beneath a street lamp, circled around to my bike, and went home.

I woke in daylight, immobilized by the sun that streamed onto my bed through the open curtains. It took me half an hour to get out of bed, retching the while. Once in the shower, I stayed there crying for what seemed like hours, sitting in the tub while cool water sluiced over me. I almost fell asleep. Turned the water off, fell soggy back on the bed, and lay like a dead thing some more. The sun was starting to set. I made myself get up, made myself put on a kettle, made myself take the water off when the kettle screamed, made myself a cup of tea. I drank it, and felt a little better. I found some bread in the fridge and ate a couple of slices, and felt even better. I looked at myself in the mirror. Eyes like two pissholes in the snow, as Dad would've said.

I fished around until I found my cell under a dirty shirt. I turned it on and listened to my messages. Endless ones from work: Jim getting meaner, and at last firing me. One from a guy I'd met a few nights ago, whose very voice now made me shudder – what had possessed me to give him my number? One from the hydro people – oh, yeah, I'd forgotten about that bill. And if my vague calculations were correct I'd have to keep forgetting that bill, because the few hundred dollars I'd saved in the bank would probably be gone by now, drunk up by the past few days of debauchery.

Nothing from Clyde.

I hesitated, then left the phone on. I went back to bed, stomach churning. Through the window I watched stars start to poke out in the sky. I lay sleepless.

My phone rang.

Was it him? Should I answer it? I should tell him to take a hike. That's what I'd do – tell him “piss off, buddy.” I grabbed the phone.

“Hello.”

“Is this Ruby?”

Oh, my God. It was Grandpa. He always did that. He knew he was calling my cell phone, but not trusting new technology always asked
Ruby?
in these suspicious tones.

“Yeah, hi, Grandpa.”

He didn't say anything. I waited with mounting impatience. Finally I said, “What's on the go? You wouldn't call unless something was up.” He hated phones. It was a money thing; when I'd left home, his farewell words were not to phone home too often.
Those calls can really add up,
he'd said.

“It's about your grandmother.”

For a moment, nothing moved.

“What? Is she sick?” Fear twisted a cold hand in my guts.

“She was.”

“But… she's better now.”

He paused again. “No, she's dead.”

It was my turn to be silent. Finally I said, “She's what?”

“She's dead.” A pause. He cleared his throat. “You heard me.”

“When?”

“Just now.”

“What, like, five minutes ago?”

“Maybe an hour ago. Around suppertime.”

“She… has she been sick?”

“Those TIAs.”

“She had another one?” TIAs are mini-strokes, a blood vessel that twists in the brain. The first time she'd had one, Grandpa had called me in Toronto but I'd missed the call. He'd left a message, almost panicked.

“Your grandmother seems… She felt weak, and now she can't find her words. I… I guess I'll call Queenie…” I heard him saying something with his hand over the receiver, then he came back clearly in the message. “…So, yes, I'll… Goodbye.” An agonizing pause as he fumbled with the phone, then,
click
. I'd called back as soon as I'd heard that, but no one answered, and I'd sat at home with my phone in my hand, calling every three minutes until finally he answered. They were back from the hospital, Gramma was fine, she'd had a T-I… What were they called, Maddie?

Oh, yes, a TIA. I'd gone around in a sort of daze for a week, but then she didn't have another one, and I'd put it from my mind.

Until now.

“She started having them almost every day a couple of weeks ago. She had a big one on Friday, and I took her into the hospital.”

“Are you there now?”

“No, I'm home.”

“She's been sick for… Jesus Christ, Grandpa! Why didn't you fucking
call
me?”

“You know I won't listen to language, Ruby.”
Click
. He hung up on me. He actually hung up on me. I stared at the phone, then dialed his number, praying he'd pick up, and he did.

“Sorry. I didn't mean to swear.”

“The funeral's in two days.”

“I'll… I'll be there.”

And that was that. I felt my knees go weak, and sat down on the floor.

Then I stood up. Then I sat down on the floor again. The apartment grew dark.

I'd always thought I'd end up looking after the grandparents. The plan was they'd get older and feeble, they'd shrink, get doddery and
nice
. A little forgetful, maybe, and my time would come; I'd move back in with them, only this time
I
was the one being so generous, paying them back for having taken me in: the troubled kid, the ingrate.

The only child of two only children, my family consisted of legions of great-aunts and uncles, some cousins – “removed” – whom I hardly knew, and Gramma and Grandpa. Part of me had kept my bags packed, so to speak, ever since I'd left, ready to go home. I still called it that: home.

CHAPTER 7

I came in on a daytime flight, in a window seat, nose pressed to glass. As we descended, circling out to sea for the landing, I could make out waves like wrinkles, see where they raged and foamed onto the rocky cliffs rising abruptly from the depths. The cliffs opened up, and I recognized the harbour – the fort, Signal Hill, downtown. Could I even see the house? But the Southside swung out of sight as we dropped into Torbay Airport.

The plane was full: men in cowboy boots and hats, home from out West; a few business guys in suits; young pretty mothers, eyes ringed with black in white faces, bringing the kids home from Brampton to see Grandma. I knew it was a plane full of Newfs when they all applauded as we hit the runway. I joined in, sardonically, and noticed that during the flight I'd bitten my nails to their quicks. A couple of my fingers seeped blood.

When they'd heard the news of my Gramma, Blue and Brendan had come to my apartment looking for all the world like a couple of ambassadors from some alien planet where everyone is nice, brandishing the plane ticket to Newfoundland they'd bought for me. I'd been horrified, but had to accept; I had no other means to get home. Besides, they were so goddamn nice about it. Blue hugged me, saying, “Oh, my sweet honey, I'm so sorry. I'll store your bike in my friend's garage for you. Give me the keys, no arguing, there's a girl.”