Delusion Road (40 page)

“Nah,” said Russell now, “badasses don’t pay dues. They might, however, want to bring snacks to the meetings—”

He made an
oof
sound as Willa jabbed him in the ribs. Russell was into his second week of doughnut withdrawal and claimed
to be getting calls from Brookdale’s Tim Hortons complaining about a drastic drop in their revenue, but he was determined that this diet was going to last. He and Raven were dating now, and he’d confessed privately to Willa last week that he was already thinking ahead to prom and wanted her help in getting into a size 42 tux by then. Willa had happily agreed and, besides being his conscience when it came to calories, she’d started him on a daily exercise program that included him walking around the Memorial Park track while she ran the oval. He complained constantly, but she knew he was grateful for her support, and she’d gotten Greg to join them when he was available, which was quite often, given his suspension and the reduction of his part-time hours.

The cutback in shifts at the Bulk Barn was just another indicator of how tough times were in the valley. The town had decided not to go ahead with plans to replace its aging vehicles, choosing to keep the ones they had for at least another year, so it turned out that none of the dealerships had gotten the contract. But rather than lay off staff at Valley Motors, Willa’s parents had chosen to inject some personal capital into the business to keep it viable until they got over this hard patch, capital that was coming from the sale of their place on Delusion Road. After what had happened, none of them could see themselves ever spending time there again, so they’d put the house in the hands of a broker who had close ties to the European real estate market. Surprisingly, within twenty-four hours the broker received a solid offer from a wealthy German buyer who’d learned about the Bay of Fundy during the New Seven Wonders competition and was eager to
own such a large property on its tidal shoreline. The details were still being ironed out, but the broker was confident the sale would go through, and her parents planned to put the money into a contingency fund that would prop up the dealership for a few more months while offering them tax breaks on their personal incomes. They were confident that GM’s upcoming introduction of two affordable electric vehicles would turn things around for them, and Willa hoped they were right. For now, though, she was just glad to see them getting along again.

A young mother pushing a stroller smiled at the friends and said “Good morning” as she passed their bench, her response to the presence of three teenagers in the park on a school day definitely atypical—most people gave them wary glances, as if fearing a sudden swarming. All three offered a simultaneous “‘Morning” in return, watching in comfortable silence as the woman followed the path down to the water’s edge. The lengthy stretch of hot weather had lowered the level of the Annapolis River markedly, but it was still one of the nicest places to be in Brookdale. Seeing the water slide slowly by, a person could let her imagination go wherever it wanted, and today Willa’s was working overtime.

“What are you grinning about?” asked Russell.

“I’m not grinning,” said Willa, but her beaming expression said otherwise.

Greg turned to face her. “Okay, what’s up?” he asked.

She feigned innocence. “I don’t have the slightest idea what—”

“I’ve seen that look before,” said Greg.

“So have I,” offered Russell. “The day you told us you could get somebody to give our letters to Keegan.”

As always, Willa was surprised by their perceptiveness. In the few weeks they’d spent together, they’d come to know her better than Britney or Celia ever had.

“You’ve heard from him, haven’t you?” said Greg.

“He’s not allowed to contact me,” she said. “You know that.” Her repeated googling of Chicago businessman Pavel Morozov had brought news that he’d finally been arraigned on numerous charges, news that Willa had shared with the others.

“You didn’t answer my question,” said Greg. “You’ve heard from him, right?”

She tried to keep from smiling again. She really did. But she couldn’t stop thinking about the personal ad she’d read and reread during breakfast that morning:
WHERE THERE’S A WILLA, THERE’S A WAY.

She got to her feet. “C’mon, badasses,” she said. “We have work to do.”

I
’m often asked how long it takes to write a novel, and my answer to that question is always “It depends”—usually on how much research is required and what other projects I happen to be working on at the time.
Delusion Road
took more than four years to write, but it’s been percolating in the back of my mind for more than four decades.

When I was growing up, my parents never moved from the community where we lived, so I was fortunate to graduate with friends I’d known for many years. In fact, I attended a rural high school where everyone knew everyone else, so strangers in our midst were readily apparent. I recall sitting in an assembly during the first day of my senior year and seeing someone I didn’t recognize sitting alone a couple of rows ahead of me. Even all these years later, I vividly remember thinking how horrible it must have felt for that person to be “the new kid,” having had to leave all of his friends behind and start from scratch in what was supposed to be his best school year ever. That memory is one of the seeds that grew into
Delusion Road.

Often, of course, there is more than a single seed that results in a novel, and another that influenced and informed the writing of this one is my environment. I live on Nova Scotia’s Bay of
Fundy shoreline, and the study where I write is only a few metres from the water, which is an ever-changing landscape of incredible beauty. Twice each day, I watch the ocean rise and fall a vertical height of more than ten metres, a spectacle I never tire of. Not only is it an astonishing sight, but the force of those tides is nearly incomprehensible, possessing the kinetic potential to generate electricity for 100,000 homes once it is harnessed. No small feat, though—a few years ago, a test turbine costing ten million dollars was destroyed in a matter of weeks by the sheer force of the bay’s powerful currents. Having heard many accounts of people—usually tourists—trapped along this rocky shoreline by a rapidly incoming tide, I knew I would one day write about that experience. And so I have.

The third seed that gave rise to
Delusion Road
was, for me, the most compelling—the prevalence of violence against females, especially those of Aboriginal heritage. Statistics Canada tells us that half of all women in our country have reported at least one incident of physical or sexual violence since the age of sixteen. Just as staggering is the statistic that less than ten percent of all sexual assaults are reported to police. This societal problem simply cannot be ignored, and the more I encountered stories about it in the news, the more I realized I needed to address it in a story of my own imagining. If
Delusion Road
does nothing else, I hope it gets people talking about the victimization of women and what each of us can do to ensure a better world for our daughters, our partners, our mothers, and our friends.

As important as seeds are to a story, however, nothing beats the support an author receives during the actual writing of it, and I would never have completed this one without the encouragement
of my wife and my daughters. In addition, every writer should have the very good fortune to work with an editor as talented as mine, and I owe an enormous debt of gratitude to Hadley Dyer, who gently but unerringly guided me through this novel. As always, I am as grateful for her endless patience and her wonderful sense of humour as I am for her extraordinary understanding of story.

Finally, I offer my sincere thanks to the person reading this now for choosing
Delusion Road
from among the countless other novels beckoning from shelves and websites. You are, quite simply, the reason why I get to do the thing I love most—create characters and follow them wherever they choose to lead.

DON AKER
is the author of
The Space Between
, winner of the Canadian Library Association’s Honour Book Award;
One on One
, winner of the Canadian Authors Association Lilla Stirling Award;
The First Stone
, winner of the Ann Connor Brimer Award and the White Pine Award; and
The Fifth Rule
and
Running on Empty
, both White Pine Award finalists. A former teacher and the father of two daughters, Don lives with his wife on Nova Scotia’s Bay of Fundy shoreline. Visit him online at
donaker.com
.

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“Aker is a master at creating appealing characters and powerful relationships … and almost unbearable tension.”

—
CANADIAN CHILDREN’S BOOK NEWS

“Aker’s sure and swift style drives the story with vigour … before bringing it to a resounding climax.”
—
QUILL & QUIRE

“
Running on Empty
… really shines at showing how a boy reckons with ideals, and what he has to do when they slip out of his grasp by his own actions.”
—
NATIONAL POST

Also by Don Aker

Running on Empty

The Fifth Rule

The Space Between

One on One

The First Stone

Cover photos © Tim Robinson / Arcangel Images

Delusion Road

Copyright © 2015 by Don Aker

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

EPUB Edition April 2015 ISBN 9781443424189

Published by Harper
Trophy
Canada™, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

FIRST CANADIAN EDITION

No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.

The author is grateful for financial support from the Province of Nova Scotia through the Grants to Individuals Program of the Department of Communities, Culture & Heritage.

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ISBN 978-1-44342-416-5

RRD 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1