My Temporary Life (6 page)

“
Well,” Mr Allister stretches out the
well
, while finishing his fruit and winking at us both before returning to his office in the showroom, “you be sure and let me know when it’s done, son. I’m looking forward to seeing it. You boys have a good afternoon.”

I never ask what
it
is and they never offer. After hearing the conversation a few times, I begin to wonder if there really is a secret project or if it’s just some kind of an inside joke that Canadian fathers play with their sons. I always nod politely and smile when they have their conversation just in case I’m supposed to know what
it
is, and that somehow, with all the new information that I’m learning, I’ve managed to forget.

We always wait right until the end of our lunch break before resuming work. It’s not because we want to maximize our break before getting back to car washing and moving and loading supplies. It’s because at three minutes before our break ends, Gloria and Sylvia, with her assets, sneak out the back door of the office and smoke their cigarettes. Gloria wears large, dark rimmed glasses that she’s constantly taking off and cleaning. She’s small and dark haired and seems to almost cower against the wall as she smokes, while Sylvia is exactly the opposite. Sylvia has large, wild, red hair and cannot talk without excitedly waving her arms in the air. With every movement that she makes, her tremendous assets fly up in the air, before gravity takes them back to their resting place.

“
Red, she’s wearing red again. Shit. Why does it always have to be red? Red drives me mental. It really does. And look at the cleavage, Malcolm. I’ll bet you don’t see cleavage like that in Scotland, do you?”

From our spots in front of the shed, peering between the rows of parked cars that await our attention, we watch her, but of course we’re not really watching
her
at all. She seems to be almost twirling around, cigarette in one hand, and her free arm waving, while talking to Gloria. “I don’t think so, Terry. I can’t remember ever seeing cleavage like that in Scotland.”

As though she’s been listening, she immediately turns, and her bright, make-upped face is staring directly towards us. “Whatcha starin’ at, Scottie? You never seen a couple of girls having a smoke before?” When she says the word
Scottie
, she poorly imitates my accent, drawing the word out, mocking me.

I can feel my face redden and my insides shrink all at the same time. I try to move, to speak, to do anything, but I’m glued to the bucket that I’m sitting on. Sylvia shows no mercy as she continues to stare us down across the parking lot, her arms raised, as though she’s waiting for an answer. Her assets are still there, and are every bit as prominent, but it’s her look and the way she called me
Scottie,
that have rendered me speechless.

Minutes pass in my head, as she continues to stare me down before Terry rescues me. “Just enjoying the day, ladies. Just enjoying the day.” He’s on his feet, and has his lunch kit inside the shed; before it occurs to me that I can actually stand up and don’t have to keep staring at the woman across the parking lot, whose arms are still up in the air as her cigarette smokes from her hand.

“
You boys be careful in that shed back there. You never know what’s going on in a cute little hiding place like that.” I daren’t look back, but I hear her laughing and know that she’s turned away and is looking at Gloria. I decide that I like Gloria and am sorry that she has to witness my humiliation. I can’t imagine that she’s laughing too. I can’t tell though, as I do everything in my power to ignore my burning face and try to completely concentrate on pouring one and a half scoops of green powdered soap into the full bucket of water that Terry has mercifully placed in front of me.

CHAPTER 7

I’ve become a master at identifying the differences between the rains of Kilmarnock and the rains of Vancouver. In Kilmarnock, the rain is cold and often horizontal. It comes at you from the strangest of angles and instantly feels as though it’s soaked, not just through your clothes, but through you entire body. Vancouver’s rain is warmer and friendlier. Both can be constant and aggravating. And although I experience Vancouver’s only in the summer, it’s still often relentless.

Terry and I wash cars between rainstorms, and in the times in between, we busy ourselves tidying our shed, or helping George and the other mechanics in the shop. I love the physical nature of the work. Even on weekends, when I’m trying to stay out of my mother’s way, I think about the feeling of carrying the heavy hose around, or lifting boxes of supplies from the truck to the loading area at the rear of the office.

My body begins to feel different. As I drive home in the evenings, with George singing along to the radio, or as the three of us are eating dinner, I can feel differences in the oddest places. My shoulders go from being stiff and sore to being solid. I run the palm of my hand along my shoulder blades and notice how hard they’ve become. My hands and forearms and wrists change too. Instead of being firm and functional, they are now solid and strong. Even when I tie my shoelaces, my fingers feel different, bigger, tougher. And of course I am growing. My mother and I were able to stand shoulder to shoulder the previous summer but now I feel taller and certainly broader than her small frame.

We settle into a routine of jovial drives to work and evenings eating my mother’s special casserole. Occasionally, she’ll have Chinese take-out ready for us, laid out in large styrofoam containers. When George asks her about her day she tells him that she’s busy, working on herself. Neither of us understand what this means, but we still gratefully eat her casseroles or take-out food.

Every Friday, on payday, we pay her. George takes some of his money and puts it into the jar on the top of the fridge, then slips some bills into her hands, or when he thinks that I’m not watching, down the front of her blouse. I can’t remember my father ever giving her money in quite the same way, but I like George, and I appreciate the fact that he waits until he thinks that I’m not watching before he does it. I wait until he’s in the other room, turning on the television, and then sign my own paycheque over to her. It’s for room and board and to help pay for my airline flights, she tells me. Then she takes one of the bills that George has given her and hands it over to me for pocket money. It’s more money than I ever have in Kilmarnock, and I’m glad to have it, so I don’t feel the need to remind her that it’s my father’s overtime hours that pay for my flights back and forth.

On weekends, it’s George’s job to cook, and he barbecues hamburgers and hotdogs, or sometimes even salmon in the backyard. The salmon is cooked in a foil and covered in pieces of onion and lemon, then sprinkled with lots of salt and pepper. It’s unlike any fish that I’ve ever tasted, and my appetite for it is almost insatiable.

“
If you don’t stop eating all that salmon you’re going to bust your gut through that tee-shirt, Malcolm. Slow down for heaven’s sake.” My mother is reclining in a lawn chair, her oversized sunglasses jiggling as she laughs, and scolds me at the same time.

George has placed another piece of fish on the barbecue and the sweet smell mixed with the odour of the charcoal is making me salivate. He’s trying to watch the hockey game on the living room television through the patio doors while re-arranging the fish on the grill. “Grab me some of them there briquettes that are in the hallway cupboard, Mal. Hurry, we don’t want your fish going cold.”

My mother and I share a strange moment as we glance at each other, knowing that George doesn’t seem to be in need of briquettes, and that they certainly aren’t kept in the hallway cupboard. It isn’t until she nods at me with a puzzled look on her face, that I get up from my place at the outdoor table and shuffle my way into the house.

There are no briquettes in the cupboard. In fact, there is very little in there other than a pile of clothing folded and sitting neatly in the middle of the floor. George’s voice comes booming from the backyard as I stand motionless in front of the open door, “Pick them up, Mal. Pick them up and bring them out here.”

With the exception of my school uniforms I can’t remember ever having worn new clothes, but these ones are certainly new. They have labels and pins in them and some of them are covered in plastic wrapping. Twice a year, my father and I scour the local church jumble sale to find the best hardly worn work clothes for him and casual clothes for me. These are different though. They have a smell about them, a smell that says they’ve never been worn.

I come back to the table with the pile of jeans and t-shirts, and long-sleeved shirts, held in my outstretched arms, afraid to acknowledge that they are indeed meant for me. My mother is sitting up now, her sunglasses in her hands and she too, keeps her eyes fixed on the clothes.

“
Thought you might like to freshen up that look of yours, Mal. And besides, you lean over that hose one more time in those ratty old shorts, you’re gonna split them wide open. And that isn’t something that any of us want to see, Mal, believe me.” He’s watching me and smiling as he says it, barely paying attention to the fish at all.

I put my hand on top of the pile of clothes and hold them tight. The smell is even better than the smell of the salmon. I want to rub the new fabric against my face but make do with just feeling it touch my hand.

“
It’s his father’s responsibility, George. I told you that. It’s the agreement that I have with his father. We should not be buying him clothes. That wasn’t agreed to, not at all.” She’s not really angry with him, I can tell. She has her angry face on, but her voice isn’t raised and her expression remains steady as she reclines back into her lawn chair.

For once George ignores her and turning from the grill, he looks straight at me as though she isn’t even there. “Go on, go try them on, or you’re gonna drop them all over my absolutely perfectly barbecued salmon fillet.”

He ruffles my hair and pushes me away when I thank him. It’s not until I’m in my room that I hear pieces of their conversation. I can’t hear what my mother says but George’s response is loud and forceful enough that it can’t be missed.

“
The boy works hard for the little money that he gets, Agnes. Let him enjoy his new clothes. God knows, he deserves it.”

I don’t want to hear anymore. I want that to be the last thing said about me and my clothes for the night, so I do what I’ve learnt to do. I hum. I lay out the clothes on my bed and quietly hum to myself, concentrating on the words from the Bruce Springsteen song that is playing in my head. It works; I can’t hear any more of the conversation outside. My imagination takes me to the world that he sings about mixed up with my own world. It’s a world of fast cars, and washing cars, and girls, and of course new clothes that smell like they’ve never been worn. The cars in my mind are always sparkling clean and never really need to be washed, and the girls always look the same. I’ve tried to change my mental image of them when I’ve performed this exercise before, but it never works. It’s always the same girl. She always has flaming red hair and tremendous assets and she’s smoking. She’s always smoking that cigarette and waving her arm around while her assets bounce up and down, over and over again.

CHAPTER 8

The weeks turn into months and as July becomes August, summer finally begins to appear. The days of rain and wet change to warm days, and the cars at Mr. Allister’s car lot get dusty instead of grimy. The salesmen get grouchier in the heat, and a certain secretary wears less and less clothing. Terry and I continue to monitor Marvin and her whenever we’re able, and of course inspect our shed for any signs of illicit activity. Terry is a year older than I am and seems to know what he’s looking for as he checks whether our boxes of rags or buckets of chemicals have been disturbed. I only lift things up and put them back down, pretending that I know what would be involved with their secret encounter.

“
Try to be careful with that stuff, Malcolm. It’s still not done.”

It takes me a moment as I hold in my hand a crudely fashioned length of pipe that seems to have pinholes all through it before I realize that I am holding the “it” that Mr Allister asks his son about every day. I place the pipe back on a pile beside the other pieces that have the same holes in them and the same odd shaped fittings attached to their ends, and realize that Terry is almost holding his breath while watching me.

I don’t need to ask the question; somehow I know that he’ll tell me. We’ve washed enough cars together and spied on enough salesmen and secretaries for some kind of a bond to have been formed, so I pick the piping back up and hold it carefully, waiting for an answer.

“
You can’t tell anyone, Malcolm, not George, not Marvin, not any of the asshole salesmen, no one.”