Extreme Vinyl Café (3 page)

It wasn’t his mother, of course. And the wheels of the night ground on. Sam lay in bed working through all the possibilities. What if it wasn’t fatal? What if it was worse than that? Exactly
how
green could he turn
without
dying? What if he was as green as a frog by the time he got to high school? And what about university, when he didn’t know anyone? Would they hold it against him if he was green?

Maybe they wouldn’t even let him into university, even if his marks were good enough. What would happen at the interview when they saw he was as green as a broccoli? They had done a unit on the civil rights movement in school. He knew you weren’t allowed to discriminate against people because of the colour of their skin—white, brown, black or yellow. But the books never mentioned green.

And even if he got into university, would he ever get a job? Or a girlfriend? What girl would want to take him home to meet her parents if he was green?

He fell into a fitful sleep around midnight. But he didn’t sleep well. He kept waking up.

Murphy phoned in the morning, all excited.

“You don’t have to worry. It’s okay. You’re not the only one. I just heard that the prime minister is going green. And he wants other people to turn green too.”

Sam said, “Did they say how you do it? Is it a voluntary thing?”

He clung to that for an hour. Maybe
he
was one of the first. Maybe he would go down in history as a trailblazer. Maybe in two hundred years he would be a folk hero. Like Jackie Robinson. Maybe he would be the first green boy to go to university. The first green Olympian. Like that.

Or maybe it wasn’t that at all. Maybe his hormones were messed up. Maybe he would keep getting greener the older he got. Or worse. Maybe this was just the beginning. Maybe as he got older, his skin would keep changing colour. First green, then blue, then … oh this would be bad … what if he turned purple? It was bad enough being green, but purple would be pure torture. Or what if he was both? What would life be like if you were multicoloured?

He fell asleep at noon wishing that he could just worry about pimples like a normal kid.

Dr. Keen called in the afternoon and said the test results were normal. But
he
wasn’t. He was still green.

“I am not sure what to think,” said Dr. Keen. “If it continues for a few more days, you should come back in.”

“Can I go to school?” Sam asked.

“I think so,” said Dr. Keen.

It was obvious Dr. Keen didn’t have a clue what was going on.

But Sam was certain about one thing. When his mom and dad called at supper, he was going to tell them. His mother, that is.

It was his father who called.

Sam said, “Can I speak to Mom?”

Dave said, “Mom is right here. There are just a couple of things I want to go over first.”

“I want to speak to Mom,” said Sam.

“Tonight is garbage night,” said Dave. “I want you to empty the garbage cans in the upstairs and downstairs bathroom and take everything out
before
you go to bed. And make sure the lid is on tight so nothing can get in.

“Also, make sure the milk is still good. If it’s off, Stephanie should buy some new stuff tomorrow.”

Sam said, “Please can I speak to Mom?”

Dave said, “One more thing. If you want to use your new sheets, make sure you wash them first.”

“Pardon?” said Sam.

“The Ninja Turtle sheets,” said Dave. “Make sure you wash them before you use them. ’Cause if you don’t …”

Sam interrupted his father. He was talking on the portable phone. He was sitting in his bed. He was beginning to feel a wave of relief descend on him. “If I don’t wash them first …” said Sam. He was looking down at the Ninja Turtle on his pillow, at the
green
Ninja Turtles on his sheets. “If I don’t wash them … I’ll turn green, right?”

“Right,” said Dave. “Now do you want to speak to Mom? She’s right here.”

“Naw,” said Sam, “it’s okay. I’ll talk to her tomorrow.”

Sam had already hung up.

He jumped out of bed. He grabbed his robe on his way out of his room. He was heading for the bathroom. He was heading for the bathtub, about to have the first bath he had ever really wanted in his life.

Dear Stuart,

Last Sunday night we went over to my mother’s house for dinner and, as usual, before the night was done, she brought up the time someone demolished her entire stash of homemade jerky. This was like twenty years ago.

She used to keep the jerky in a tin on the counter in plain view and I was only sixteen at the time and starving, so I don’t think I am to blame.

But I feel guilty and wonder if it is time to fess up. Everyone I ask tells me that I should totally tell, but they don’t know my mother, or at least they don’t know her when it comes to jerky. Anyway I know you used to date her when you were at camp, and I thought you might have an idea.

Sincerely,
Elizabeth Watson

Dear Elizabeth,

How nice to hear from you. I remember your mother well, or rather, I’ve had some trouble forgetting. I had an unfortunate incident with her jerky too. If I were you, I wouldn’t approach her. Not in person, anyway. If you really feel strongly, I would suggest you have a third party there. People can be very prickly about food. I have attached a cautionary tale you might find interesting.

T
hey say love is blind. We all know they’re right. And there is no end to the mischief a myopic heart can hatch, no end at all. But you don’t have to be lovestruck to stir up trouble. Those lesser emotions can be just as dangerous.

No one would ever say Bert Turlington loves Dave. But Bert wouldn’t deny that he feels a certain fondness, he might even say affection, for his neighbour. It is not love—more the accumulation of feelings that bind people together when they live side by side for many years, the small kindnesses and courtesies of their “arranged marriage.”

So you could forgive Bert his neighbourly heart when he blurted out his invitation to Dave that night in the park.

You might. But Bert’s wife, Mary, didn’t.

“You what!?” said Mary.

Bert had invited Dave and Morley to drive with them to Montreal for Harold Buskirk’s sixty-fifth birthday.

“And to stay with us?” added Mary. “In Rene’s house?”

“It just came out,” said Bert. “Unexpectedly.”

Dave had said something about how he and Morley weren’t sure if they were going to make it to the party. They hadn’t made hotel reservations and … you know.

And Bert thought.…

“No,” said Mary. “Don’t use that word. You
didn’t
think. There wasn’t any
thought
involved.”

Harold Buskirk, who used to live up by the park, was turning sixty-five. Pretty much the whole neighbourhood was going to Montreal for the party. People had been working on sketches and speeches and songs.

Mary had been working on the cake. And not just any cake. For Harold, she was creating a masterpiece—a Frangelicosoaked chocolate fudge cake with white chocolate fondant and an orange buttercream and truffle ganache filling. It was Harold’s retirement as well as his birthday. Mary was going to decorate her cake so it looked like a golf course—complete with little buttercream golf balls and a marzipan foursome standing triumphantly on the ninth tee.

Bert and Mary were driving to Montreal. They were staying at Rene Gallivan’s house. Rene Gallivan is Mary’s boss. Rene was in Florida, or Palm Springs. One of those places.

“You said it was a mansion,” said Bert. “I thought there would be plenty of room.” There was that word again. Bert was talking to himself. Mary had stormed off.

T
hey left on Saturday morning, just after breakfast. Not that anyone actually
ate
breakfast. They were supposed to leave before breakfast and take a break on the road for brunch, but Mary had a moment with the fondant, and amid the last-minute cake flurry, brunch was lost.

There they were, on the road, two in the afternoon and only halfway to Kingston, two hours behind schedule. The four of them were in Bert’s Volvo, their luggage in the trunk, Dave and Morley in the backseat and Mary in a state.

The cooler, with the cake, was wedged onto the armrest between Dave and Morley. They could barely see each other.

As they roared past Kingston, Dave said, “There’s a great burger joint up ahead. If anyone felt like—”

“No stopping,” snapped Mary. “There’s no time for stopping.”

At Iroquois, Dave, who was completely famished, made a lame joke that if he could have his cake
now
, he wouldn’t
eat
any at the party. Mary whirled around and said if Dave as much as breathed on her cake, he could start walking.

There is no doubt Mary was wound up. The cake was iced with the fondant, but she still had to add the decorations, and it had to chill after that. And Mary had told Harold they would be at the club early, to help with the set-up.

They were two and a half hours behind schedule when they pulled up in front of Rene Gallivan’s limestone house on Upper Walnut Crescent, a little-known cul-de-sac near the top of Westmount Mountain.

“Holy crow,” said Dave as he unfolded himself from the backseat.

He was staring at the huge red oak doors, at the mahogany fluting around the lintel and the maple rosettes on the door’s frame, at the lead-paned windows, at the thick stone walls.

“My,” said Mary. They were all standing on the sidewalk staring now.

“Wow,” said Bert.

“Oh dear,” said Morley.

“Remember everyone,” said Mary. “We have to leave everything
exactly
the way we found it.”

She was staring at Dave.

“Oh dear,” said Morley, again.

As Dave stepped through the threshold and into the marble foyer, Morley put her arm on his elbow and whispered, “
Don’ttouch-anything
.”

T
he kitchen turned out to be in the basement. It was the kind of a kitchen where help, rather than family, worked.

It had a fireplace.

“Holy crow,” said Dave. “You could roast an ox in there.”

It also had a walk-in cooler.

“Look at this,” said Dave.

Mary was decorating her cake, sticking little marzipan flags carefully into the centre of the little greens. Morley was standing beside her, holding a bowl of brown icing for the sand traps. Bert was wiping down the counters.

Everyone was tiptoeing around—trying not to disturb a thing, trying not to make a mess. And no one was trying harder than Dave.

“I’ll take the luggage to the bedrooms,” said Dave.

S
oon enough the cake was decorated and in the fridge, and everyone was ready to go. The cake, however, was not. The cake had to chill for at least an hour, or better, two. “As long as possible,” said Mary.

But Mary was already supposed to be at the party.

Dave said, “You guys should go.”

Dave said, “I’ll stay here. I’ll bring the cake when it’s ready.”

Someone had to.

Morley wrote down the address of the banquet hall so Dave could take a taxi. Beneath the address she wrote:
Please don’t
touch anything
. Then Morley and Bert and Mary left in Bert’s car. Once they were gone, Dave set off to see if he could find something to eat.

O
n any other day he might have slid down the majestically curving banister from the second floor to the foyer. Or gone for a dip in the indoor saltwater pool. He might have had a steam or toured the wine cellar. But this wasn’t any other day. He peeked in the wine cellar and stuck a finger in the pool. He touched one of the decanters of whisky and then fetched a towel and rubbed off his fingerprints. Dave was trying his best. Really.

The house had everything. Everything, that is, except a morsel of food. It was while he was looking for anything even remotely edible that Dave found the most amazing feature of the mansion: a wood-panelled elevator. It was the kind you might see in an old British hotel, about the size of a phone booth.

He opened what he thought was a cupboard door and there it was. It had brass fittings and a brass needle over the door to show which floor you were on.

He would have taken a ride, but he didn’t have time to waste. They were waiting for him at the hall.

He went downstairs and fetched the cake from the cooler. It was rather touching: the icing golf course, with the greens and flags, the marzipan golfers and the little buttercream shrubs all around the edge. He carried it carefully over to the counter.

He wasn’t going to mess this up.

Okay. He had everything. Wait a minute. No he didn’t. The
address for the party was upstairs in his bedroom. He started up the stairs. Then he stopped dead. He shouldn’t leave the cake unattended. The house was so vast; there might be dogs or cats or any number of things wandering around that could get into it. He fetched the cake and started up again. Four floors. Wait a minute—the elevator. He should take the elevator. The elevator would be safer.

He went in backwards. The brass door accordioned behind him. It was like stepping back in time. To a dimmer time—just before electricity.

He stood there, in the dimness, the cake safely beside him on the floor. He grabbed the elevator handle and plunged it to the right. Nothing happened.

He brought the handle back to the centre, opened the door and shut it and tried again. This time there was a bang, and a shudder, and a sudden lurch. Then the elevator started to move. He could almost feel the chains hauling him up, as if there were two or three men at the top of this elevator, and not strong men either, huffing and puffing as they turned some rusty crank.

“Come on,” said Dave.

The elevator was moving in small, jerky increments. The shaft seemed to be too loose for the car. There was a lot of wobble.

And then there was no wobble at all. There was nothing. Absolutely nothing.

“Are we moving?” said Dave.

T
hey weren’t moving—they being Dave and the cake. Not up, that is. But that didn’t mean there was no movement—there
was still plenty of movement. The little car felt as if it were swinging back and forth, like a bucket on the end of a rope.