Heartache and Other Natural Shocks (22 page)

School gets out early, and I meet Geoff in the parking lot. It’s a raw, bleak day, but Geoff wants to go for a drive. I want to go home and pack, but Geoff says, “Come on, one more spin for 1971. After all, I’m not going to see you for almost two weeks.”

I relent. I’m hoping to go somewhere close by, but Geoff insists that we drive to The Beaches. It takes forever. Baby Blue keeps stalling in the cold. The roads are a mess, and Geoff makes detours along side streets trying to avoid the knots of traffic.

By the time we park in front of the stone house, the temperature has dropped and a thin, pellet-like snow is falling. We trudge through the “inclement weather,” as Geoff calls it. Today, Lake Ontario is the color of gunboat metal. The grass is crunchy with frost, and a sideways wind blows into our faces. Geoff marches glumly down the path and I trot alongside. When we reach the big oak tree where we usually turn around, the light is already fading. There is no horizon. Lake and sky have merged into a soggy, gray haze. It feels like
we’re standing at the edge of the earth. Anything could be on the other side. Anything, or nothing.

Geoff tightens his scarf. “God, I hate Christmas,” he says.

“You love Christmas,” I remind him.

“I always start by loving it, but it never lives up to its hype.”

I stare at Geoff. “What’s up?” I ask.

“It’s just the time of year. Dark days. Long nights. The whole happy family thing. You know, a lot of people commit suicide on Christmas.”

“Geoff, I hope you’re not going to stick your finger into an electric socket while I’m in Montreal, ’cause you’re the only real friend I have here,” I say.

Geoff gives me a spare smile, but I was hoping for better, so I cajole. “You know, if Christmas is too depressing, you could always convert,” I tell him. “Hanukkah is pretty low-key. No stress, no commercialism. All we do is light the menorah and exchange a couple of token presents, so the Jewish kids don’t get jealous of the Christian kids. And of course, we eat latkes. Potato latkes with sour cream. Mmm. What Jewish holiday would be complete without a fattening food component?”

Geoff stares across the leaden water and doesn’t reply. I link my arm through his and tug. “Come on. My toes are frozen,” I say. We tuck our chins into our coats and hurry back along the path of black slippery leaves. All around us, skeletal trees rattle their bony limbs. In the playground, swings creak and sway as if ghost children are riding them.

Baby Blue’s doors squeak with cold as we climb in, and Geoff cranks the heater to full blast. As we wait for the motor to warm up, a black Oldsmobile pulls up in front of us and four people get out: a man, his wife and their two children. They carry large parcels wrapped in Christmas paper, the kind that comes from fancy stores. The man has a handsome face, and his wife wears a black mink. The two kids, a boy and girl, race up the steps of the stone house, and they all hurry inside.

The indoor lights flick on, and for a moment, Geoff and I can see directly into their living room, with its tasteful oil paintings and classic Christmas tree. The children, in private-school uniforms, put their parcels under the tree. The man crosses the room toward the back of the house. His slender blonde wife, in a soft pink sweater, pulls the drapes shut. And that’s it.
And … scene
, as Mr. Gabor would say.

Geoff and I stare at the multicolored Christmas lights strung across their wide veranda. “Isn’t that the perfect family,” he says in a hushed voice.

“Yeah,” I say. “They’re like a Christmas picture postcard. The only thing missing is snow. If we had snow, we could stuff them into a snow globe and shake it. That’s how perfect those people are.” Geoff doesn’t laugh. I nudge his shoulder with my damp mitt. “Hey, they’re probably having a big fight in there right now, yelling and flinging popcorn strings at each other.”

Geoff shakes his head. “No, they’re not. The children will be changing for dinner, their mother will be checking on the roast that the maid put in the oven this afternoon, and their father will be pouring himself a gin and tonic and popping in a tape of Rosemary Clooney singing ‘White Christmas.’ ”

“You don’t know that,” I say. “Maybe it only looks good from the outside.”

Geoff puts the car into gear and says, “Don’t you ever wonder what it feels like to be normal?”

I bristle. I may not be the model of “normal,” but I’m not one of Diane Arbus’s circus freaks either. And why does normal have to be pot roasts and cashmere sweaters? Why should I be envious of that? “Do you really want to be like them?” I ask.

“Sometimes I do.”

“Well, I don’t. It looks pretty boring to me.”

The wipers scrape across the windshield. Geoff says, “Maybe it’s boring to you because you have a big family.”

“So, you have Clarissa, who is much more fun than any parent I’ve ever met.”

“Yeah, but sometimes I’d just like to know what it feels like to belong to brothers and sisters, cousins and grandparents, a mother and a father …” Geoff stares into the traffic, and I picture him and Clarissa on Christmas morning, opening each other’s presents and then facing the long hours until they can get dressed and go to a restaurant to eat turkey dinner in the company of strangers.

I sigh. “Why is it that we always want what we don’t have?”

“Because we don’t have it,” Geoff says wryly.

“Well, I’ll tell you something,” I say. “I don’t aspire to that kind of normal. When I finish school, I’m going to go live in Paris or in a little whitewashed house on a Greek island, with olive trees and a view of the Mediterranean. You might want to come along.”

“And what will we do when we get there?” Geoff asks.

“Drink wine and throw fabulous parties. You can be the new Richard Avedon and take portraits of the locals and the famous artists who visit us. And I will paint, and write novels, and have affairs with mysterious men who will probably break my heart.”

“Maybe you’ll break their hearts,” Geoff says.

“Not likely,” I say, thinking of Ian.

When we get to my house, Geoff parks. Then he reaches into the backseat and pulls out a present wrapped in azure foil. “Merry Christmas,” he says.

I gawk. It hasn’t even occurred to me to buy something for Geoff. Mollie and I never exchange presents for Hanukkah. “Geoff, I don’t have anything for you,” I say.

“That’s okay,” he says. “Go ahead and open it.”

I peel back the wrapping paper and there, in a pewter frame, is a black-and-white photograph of me. It’s from Halloween. I’m wearing Clarissa’s Audrey Hepburn dress and black elbow-length gloves. My hair is pinned into a French
knot. The expression on my face is wide-eyed and expectant, as if I’ve just spun around to catch a glimpse of something.

“Do you like it?” Geoff asks.

“It’s beautiful,” I say. “I look so …”

“Striking?”

“Did you airbrush this or something?”

Geoff smiles. “In most of the shots, you were mugging, but in this one, you’re actually yourself.”

“How unusual for me,” I quip.

“I know,” Geoff says. We lean together, peering at the photo. “I like the way you’re glamorous and innocent at the same time. It’s like I caught you in a moment of transition, where you’re just about to discover something wonderful but you can’t quite see what it is. Do you know what I mean?”

I nod. “I know exactly what you mean.” I smile at Geoff. Most of the time, he’s so funny that I forget that underneath his glitzy song-and-dance routine is the soul of a poet. “Too bad I don’t look like that all the time,” I say.

“Well, if you lost the turtleneck sweaters and the macramé vests, we might have something to work with,” Geoff replies.

I give him a shot in the arm and then a hug. “Merry Christmas.”

“Have fun in Montreal,” he says. “And call me as soon as you’re back.”

“Hot Love”

Two days into the holidays, I’m ready to tear out my hair. I am so
bored
! Debbie is in Mexico, Marlene is skiing with her family, and no one else is around, except for Nonna Cabrielli, who’s visiting from St. Catharines for Christmas and sharing my bedroom. Nonna dresses in black and isn’t exactly a barrel of laughs. Ma says that I should be more respectful of my grandmother. I tell her that maybe I’d be in a better mood if I didn’t have to lie awake all night listening to Nonna snore and fart.

Over breakfast, Nonna looks at my long face.
“Cosa c’è?”
she asks me. What’s the matter?

“Everything.”

Nonna nods slowly. She pours sugar in her espresso. She says, “
Chi troppo vuole, nulla stringe
”—he who wants too much doesn’t get anything. Great.

The whole week is like that. I don’t know what to do with myself. I walk past Ian’s house three times, but I never see anyone. I watch
White Christmas
on
TV
, and I feel totally bummed out because everyone in that movie ends
up happy and in love and I’m stuck here with no friends and no boyfriend.

Finally, I’m so desperate, I phone Sherrie Cumberland and ask if she wants to do some last-minute Christmas shopping. We go to Yorkdale Mall, which is a zoo. Sherrie needs to pick up a present for her latest boyfriend, Paul McCormick, who is in grade thirteen at Vanier. Sherrie says he’s going to U of T next year because he wants to be a dentist. I can’t imagine wanting to be a dentist. Who would want to spend their entire life staring into people’s mouths and torturing them with sharp metal objects? Of course, I don’t tell Sherrie that. Instead, I say, “He must be smart.”

“Yeah,” Sherrie says, twirling her long blonde hair between her fingers. “And he’s good in the sack.”

“Really?” I ask, interested.

“Uh-huh.” Sherrie gives me a sly smile, and I follow her into Eaton’s, to the women’s lingerie department. Sherrie flips through the 34D bras and picks out a lacy black one and a red satin one, with matching panties. They look like something a stripper would wear, minus the tassels.

I gulp. “You’re getting him
that
for Christmas?”

Sherrie laughs. “Every guy’s fantasy, right?” She leans over and whispers, “Paul’s bedroom is in his parents’ basement, and they never go down there, so we do it all the time. I’m on the pill.”

“Wow,” I say. “Where did you get it?”

“The women’s health clinic downtown on Wellesley. My sister told me about it. She says all the girls at U of T go there because it’s confidential. I told the doctor that I was already having sex using condoms—and they don’t like that because they don’t want you to get pregnant and have an abortion—so she wrote me a prescription for the pill. Sherrie opens her purse, and there, next to her wallet, is a green disk full of little white pills. “I keep them with me so my mom won’t find them.” She grins. “And now we fuck like bunnies. Last night, we did it three times, in three different positions.”

“Wow,” I say, truly amazed, mulling over the possibilities. I wonder how long it took, and if they had to take breathers between each time, or if they just did it—bam, bam, bam—all in a row. If Sherrie’s trying to shock me, she’s doing a really great job.

“Come on,” Sherrie says. “I want your opinion on these bras.” I wait outside the change room while Sherrie models bras and negligees. I have to admire the way she’s so uninhibited. “You should try some on too,” she says.

“What’s the point?” I say. “Ian and I are history.”

Sherrie pulls me into the change room and sits me down. “Do you still like him?” she asks. “I mean, I know you broke his nose and everything, but I see the way you watch him in drama.”

I don’t even try to lie. “He’s such a jerk, but I can’t stop thinking about him.”

“Was he good in bed?” she asks. I squirm. Sherrie’s eyes go wide. “Don’t tell me you’re still a virgin!” she gasps. “Carla! With a guy like that? Guys like that aren’t going to wait around.” She squishes onto the bench beside me. “Look, sleeping with your boyfriend doesn’t make you a slut. It’s just part of growing up. I mean, sooner or later we’re all going to have sex, right? So why wait?”

“Well, that’s what Ian says,” I mumble.

“Of course he does. Because guys are totally obsessed with sex. Paul says that the average guy thinks about sex about every three minutes.”

“Get out,” I say.

“It’s true,” Sherrie says. “Paul is very open with me about stuff like that. He says that whenever a guy looks at a girl, no matter who she is, even if she’s a real dog, he’s thinking about what it would be like to fuck her.”

“Get out!” I say.

“It’s true,” Sherrie says. “Even if he’s already getting laid. Even if he’s walking down the street with his girlfriend. It’s just something they can’t control. So, if you really like a guy, why fight it? I mean, it’s fun. It gives you something to do together. And afterward, the guy is always sooo grateful.”

“So, you think that if I was having sex with Ian—”

“He’d still be with you,” Sherrie says. “The way I see it, life is give and take. If you keep your man happy, he’ll keep you happy. And if he wants a bit of tits and ass,” Sherrie wiggles
her boobs, “I don’t have a problem with that.” The two of us burst out laughing. Sherrie buys the red satin bra and panties and asks the saleslady to wrap them up with a bow.