In the Clear (4 page)

We celebrate Christmas on Christmas Eve. It is the only tradition my mother keeps from her childhood in Québec. But before gifts are opened in the early hours of the morning, my mother, Grand-mère and Tante Marie go to celebrate midnight mass at church.

My father and I stay home and play poker. He teaches me a new game, Fiery Cross, and I imagine a disaster.

“What if Grand-mère slips and falls and dies at church? Would Mom blame it on Tante Marie?”

Dad turns over a seven of clubs in the middle of the cross and shrugs his shoulders. “Probably.”

In my hand, I have two black fives, a jack of hearts, and the seven and eight of clubs. “Even after communion and she's filled with all that forgiveness stuff?”

“Yup. Even after that.”

“What's her problem?”

“What's yours? You got a bad hand?” He turns over another card, revealing a nine of clubs.

“I'd never forgive her if she wouldn't let me see Tante Marie. She wouldn't do that would she? Why doesn't she like Tante Marie?”

“Relax, Pauline. Leave that worrying stuff to your mother. She does enough for the three of us.”

He turns over a nine of hearts. I close up my cards and glare at him. Talk to me! He sighs and raises his bushy black eyebrows at me. “We've been through this, Pauline. Accept it. The sun sets in the west and your mother doesn't like her youngest sister. Never has, never will. It's pure sibling rivalry. Remember Joseph's brothers in the Bible? Some siblings sell each other into slavery. Whoa, Nelly,” he interrupts himself, beaming. “This is a winning hand. Any bets?”

He has to turn over one more card. If it's the six of clubs, I'll have a flush. Pretty good. Dad's probably right. I don't want to think anymore about this sibling thing. Shouldn't sisters and brothers love each other? I'm glad I don't have to worry about it.

“I'll bet the morning dishes.”

“You're on.” He turns over another card in the cross. It's the six of clubs.

“Flush!” I say, triumphantly, fanning out my hand. “I win.”

“That's good, Paulie. But not good enough to beat dear old Dad.” He fans out his hand. “Full house. Three nines and a pair of sixes. He, he, he, no dishes for me.”

“I know you cheat, Dad.” I pound him lightly on the arm.

“Ho, ho, ho, you'll never know.”

“Grow up, Dad,” I groan. “One more game. I deal.”

But they're home. We hear the sound of the door slamming and angry voices in the front hallway.

“I'll drive from now on,” my mother says as they enter the room. “If you're going to drive that fast, you might as well kill us all right here and now.” She's holding Grand-mère by the elbow, fussing over her. I know Grand-mère doesn't understand English. But she doesn't need to; she understands her daughters.

Grand-mère swats at my mother, telling her to stop complaining. She's glad Marie was driving because they got home faster. She can't wait to open her gifts. She smiles at me, then Dad. “Joyeux Noël.”

“Joyous Noel,” Dad says in his awful French. Then, with a mocking sternness, “Emphasis on joy, girls. So no fighting on Christmas. Sit down and I'll hand out your presents. They're great this year. Believe me, we know. Pauline opened and rewrapped everything while you were out.”

“Dad!” I laugh and pound him again on the arm.

“If you keep hitting me like that, I won't be able to hand out the presents.”

Tante Marie laughs and joins me on the window seat. “I know you wouldn't do that, chérie.” She arcs her arm around me and I relax against her, feeling the warm circle of happiness that I only feel with her.

Dad reads the names on the gifts, passing them out, one by one. Pretty soon I have a little pile. I start with the obvious: the hard, rectangular ones from my mother.

I groan inside but I find a way to thank her for the books. “Heidi. Looks good. I'll start it next week.” The second one, I really wonder about. “Presidents of the United States?”

I let the books slide, unwanted, to the floor as I open Grand-mère's gift. It's an album of her favorite singer, Edith Piaf, the songbird of Paris during the war years. At family gatherings, Grand-mère starts humming one favorite song, and then my mother and my aunts join in, united for once, dreamy eyes for the last phrase, something like mon coeur qui bat.

“Fantastique, Maman,” Tante Marie laughs, jumping off the window seat. She takes the record from me. “It's our tradition, Pauline. You'll have to learn her big song so you can sing with us.”

“That one you always sing?”

She walks to the record player, already humming it before she puts the needle down.

“What's the last line mean?” I ask.

“It means your heart is beating. It means love is alive in you. One of these days, some boy will come along … and you'll be singing it with the rest of us.”

I feel like saying, “A crippled heart? What boy would ever be interested in me?”

But it's Christmas. Tante Marie is here, arms linked with Grand-mère, who is singing in her sweet, warbly soprano. My mother is linked to Grand-mère's other side, singing alto harmony. I'm happy listening to them sing. When the song's over, I reach for Dad's present. I rip the paper off a big box. Inside it, there's a smaller one, and inside it, an even smaller one. Nesting boxes. In the very center are two tiny, incredible tickets. I scream with excitement.

“Oh, Dad. Two tickets for the Leafs game at the Gardens. January 28th. Wow!” I jiggle up and down on the window seat. I feel like jumping up and doing cartwheels to the front hall.

“Isn't it damp and cold in the Gardens?” my mother says nervously.

“You worry too much,” Dad says. “We'll dress warm and take a blanket.”

My mother bites her lip.

In a daze, I watch everybody open their gifts. I'm going to watch a Leafs game at the Gardens! What could be better?

I shake my head. This has to be because of Tante Marie. I love when she comes. I start to come out of my daze. But what about Tante Marie's gift? Has she forgotten about her promise?

Tante Marie is standing beside the Christmas tree. From a hidden place behind the tinsel-strewn branches she pulls out two hockey sticks, each tied with a red velvet ribbon. One she hands to my dad, the other, winking, to me.

My mother is holding the gift I've given her. The glass ball sits in the palm of her hand. A tiny nativity scene is encased in water, and she has just shaken it. Snow drifts through the water, falling on baby Jesus and the animals around him, while she asks faintly, “What will Pauline do with a hockey stick?”

Tante Marie laughs as if my mother has told a funny joke. “She'll play hockey on the new rink, of course. Don't you still have her old wheelchair?”

“You can't be serious. That wheelchair won't have any traction on the ice. She'll tip right out!”

But my father spins Tante Marie around, laughing. “That's a great idea. Why didn't I think of it? There's nothing I'd like better than to play hockey with Pauline.”

I've never held a hockey stick before. I take it in my hands. It feels big and strange. I swing my legs over the edge of the window seat and press the blade of the stick against the blue-and-red braided rug that covers our floor. The red velvet ribbon falls off and without thinking, I flick it with the blade.

How many hockey games have I watched on TV? Yet this is the first time I've held a hockey stick or tried to shoot like my idols. I feel a surge of power as I watch the ribbon sail through the air and land beside Tante Marie.

“You're a natural,” Dad beams at me. “You're going to have a great shot. You've already got your wrists into it.”

Without looking at my mother, Tante Marie picks up the red ribbons and begins to tie them together.

But I peek at my mother. A strand of straight, brown hair has fallen loose from the tight bun at the back of her head. It hangs like a limp, broken wing on one shoulder. She looks like she's at a funeral, not a Christmas party. Her face is creased with fear and it makes my stomach hurt to look at her. Why doesn't she ever believe in me?

Tante Marie saves the moment. Playfully, she finishes tying the red ribbons together and places them, a bright couronne, in Grand-mère's white curls. Grand-mère tisks as if Marie is being foolish. “Tisk, tisk.” But when Grand-mère stands and looks at herself in the large mirror over our sofa, she looks young and girlish, like a hopeful bride.

Grand-mère catches me looking at her in the mirror. Unexpectedly, her face unwraps with laughter.

6.
T
HE
H
OUSE OF
H
ORRORS
, J
ANUARY
1955

I left the Hospital for Sick Children soon after I could breathe without the iron lung. It was a wonderful day, and a terrible day. They took Henry from me and burned him. They were afraid he might carry the polio virus from the ward. No personal items were allowed out.

Alone, I was taken by ambulance to a big old house that had been converted into a rehabilitation hospital.

My parents met me briefly as I arrived. My mother showered me with kisses. She held my hand but I couldn't hug her back or hold onto her like I wanted. I still couldn't move. Dad had brought me my favorite drink, an Orange Crush in a little brown bottle. Where was a bottle opener? I was dying to taste it, the sweet orange liquid that would fizz down my throat.

But the new nurse, Nurse Wilson, quickly took over. She held out her hand to take my Orange Crush and in a sickly sweet voice she said, “Oh no, we can't have that. We'll save it for when she's better.”

Perplexed, Dad looked at me. My eyes were filling up. There was something about Nurse Wilson that reminded me of Nurse Toad. Her eyes were small, but they looked just as mean and uncaring as they flickered over my unmoving body.

Dad didn't give the bottle to her. “I don't see why she couldn't have a little sip. It's her favorite drink.”

Nurse Wilson looked sternly from my father to my mother. “I've worked in this hospital for ten years. I'm the head nurse. I've known some of these polios to choke on pop.”

My mother looked nervous. My heart sank. I knew Nurse Wilson would turn into a witch. Just like Nurse Toad, the moment my parents were gone, her fake syrupy voice would harden. I'd be just one more polio causing her too much work.

Nurse Wilson pressed her point. “You wouldn't want to do that to your daughter after she's survived so much, would you, Mom?”

Slowly, my mother shook her head … and Nurse Wilson took my Orange Crush.

How could my mother believe her? They burned Henry. I had nothing. All I wanted was my pop!

I'd lost half my body weight. I felt like Gretel, that skin-and-bones orphan, waiting to be fed to the fire by Witch Wilson. I could taste it; I wanted it so badly, one cool, sweet sip of my Orange Crush.

I never saw that Orange Crush again.

My parents said goodbye and I was carried on a stretcher into my new home. The ward held eight children, different ages, but all lying in cribs. My first impression was that I had come to a zoo, but I was immediately corrected. It was going to be something worse.

“Welcome to the House of Horrors,” the boy opposite me called as soon as Nurse Wilson left.

She'd installed me in a crib and pulled up the barred side. It would prevent me from falling out – or escaping – if I ever moved again.

I lifted my head and stared at the boy for a long moment. What did he mean? Whose side was he on?

“Don't you talk, or what?” he said.

I looked around the room. Everybody was watching us.

“That's okay,” he said. “I'll talk for you. I'm almost ten, though I'm so small you'd never know it. My name's Bernardo. You can call me B.”

As if on cue, they all called out their names, introducing themselves. On the boys' side were Frank, Philip and Stan. Beside me were Janet, Mary and Lorna. I looked over at B. He seemed to be the leader.

“That's Witch Wilson who brought you in. Head nurse. Everyone's afraid of her. The other nurses are nice, but you got to be careful of Witch Wilson. She's bad news. She's in with Nurse Fredericks in physio. They're like this –” He twisted two fingers together. “Mother Mary and the Holy Ghost help you if you get Nurse Fredericks for physio. If you scream in physio, Fredericks tells the Witch. Oh, mamma mia,” he moaned, shaking his head. “I don't know which witch is worse.”

Everybody laughed. A smile lifted the corners of B's mouth. “Get it? Which witch is worse?”

I smiled. There were no noisy iron lungs here. It felt so strange to be in a quiet room with kids talking to each other. Almost normal. Suddenly I realized … it felt great.

I thought about talking, about saying hello to the other kids. But hospitals were strange places. You never really knew if you were safe or not. Better to watch and wait.