Prairie Ostrich (16 page)

The bell rings and her stomach is jello.

As the class tumbles in, Egg peeks through her sleeve. She sees Martin take his seat. When Mrs. Syms strolls into the classroom and faces the blackboard, Egg slips to her desk.

At the end of the class, Martin stands and it is Glenda who points and says, “Eww, cheese butt!”

The class bursts out laughing. Egg watches as the tips of his ears turn red, burning down like a fuse until his face is flush in anger.

Martin catches her smiling.

His teeth are bared and Egg thinks, oh no.

At recess, Egg runs to the parking lot, quick-quack-quick, ahead of Martin. She hides behind the stunted bushes, tucks, makes herself small, her teeth chattering.

At the parking lot exit, Mrs. Ayslin and her husband push out the big doors that slap so heavy behind you. Mrs. Ayslin looks about to cry, her face crumbling behind her dark glasses. Mr. Ayslin's burly hand grips Mrs. Ayslin's arm too tight, pushing her to the car. Egg can see his teeth when he speaks, his lips curling as if he is about to swallow her whole, his whole body
shove shove shove
, his whole body
wrong
. Something is pressing at the back of Egg's eyes, a roar that fills up her ears. Mr. Ayslin's hand is up, threatening, but Mrs. Ayslin is broken already, her glasses knocked to the ground. Roughly, he grabs her thin wrist and pulls, as if to snap her in two. Egg can see Martin coming up from beside the parking lot wall but all the scaredy sweat has run out of her. Her tongue clings to the roof of her mouth and her chest itches but Egg runs between the cars and darts in front of Mr. Ayslin. He towers above her, the smell of musk, all bully beef and ham-fisted. Egg points her finger at him and shouts, “Bad dog, bad dog! Go pick on someone your own size!”

Mr. Ayslin looks surprised, that's for sure.

Mrs. Ayslin blinks, her mouth a silent
O
. She blinks as if the light is too bright, a sudden dazzle, like the wind barrelling down the foothills and Rockies, like the flash of spider thunder crackling up the dark summer sky.

She closes her mouth.

“I'll take you in, Egg,” Mrs. Ayslin says.

And so Mrs. Ayslin takes Egg inside for cookies, her hand gripping too hard on Egg's shoulder but Egg doesn't mind. Chocolate chip cookies and a glass of milk too and there's no way Martin can catch her now.

Egg tells Mrs. Ayslin of the blue whales, their mysterious migration, of bumblebee bats in the jungles of Thailand. The biggest mammal and the smallest mammal, they all fit in the world. It's in the
National Geographic
. Egg tells her so.

March

It is the ultimate double bill:
Earthquake
and
The Towering Inferno
, playing for a limited engagement, and Egg can barely stand it. Chinook Ridge, squatting at the tail end of Calgary, is a beacon for all the southern towns, two strip malls that were slapped together, united under aluminum. But Chinook Ridge has a bowling alley at one end and the cinema at the other, along with Sears, Zellers, and $1.49 day Woodward's. The food court is new, along with the office tower. Chinook Ridge and everyone comes to the March Break double bill, ever since anyone can remember.

Egg rides in with Kathy, bouncing on the edge of the front seat, humming along with bands like Electric Light Orchestra and Bachman Turner Overdrive. She knows that three is a magical number. She taps her feet, squirming with excitement. Winter crisp, the snapping freeze after a lulling Chinook. Kathy is cautious at the wheel but Egg doesn't have a care. Last year at the Chinook Ridge she saw the world upside down in
The Poseidon Adventure
and she survived it. Rattling in the rusted truck, Egg sees the barren fields fall away to the first dribbles of strip malls and gas stations as they ride up Highway Two. She can see the Chinook marquee:

Now Playing

Earthquake
and
The Towering Inferno

The Shake and Bake Combo!

At the cinema Egg steps under the canopy of glittering lights and slaps down her fifty cents at the counter. Even sourpuss Kathy has to smile. They walk through the double-mirrored hall. The foyer is cavernous, enveloped by flowing curtains and faded posters of
Cat People
and
I Walked with a Zombie
. Giant kettles disgorge eruptions of popcorn and there is a gallon of soda pop bigger than her head! Milk Duds! Wigwags! Twizzlers! The pings and whistles of pinball machines! But Egg rushes forward, up the stairs, then down the hall, this maze of tunnels, the release of vaulted ceilings, the dizzying curve of the spiral staircase. Egg tugs Kathy's hand, pulling her over the threshold, into the theatre. At the front, there are big box speakers for the Sensurround effects. They scramble into their seats (“Not too close to the screen,” Kathy says), Egg bouncing on her springy cushion just as the lights fade, the curtains open and — hush — down into the dark.

…

The lights come up and Kathy isn't beside her. Egg goes through the stuttering lights, the clatter and clang of the hall. She catches the whiff of stale buttered popcorn, that edge of rancid sweetness. Too many people and Egg is lost, it's all elbows and stomachs with big brass buckles and Egg pushed to the wall because she can't even stop. Finally Egg edges through to the doors and opens them with a heave.

The last light of the day glows in a torrent of red behind a band of low-lying clouds.

The parking lot is so big and all the cars look the same.

Egg runs to the side of the building.

Kathy stands in the middle of the parking lot, the light pole beside her. The snow is falling gently, giving the air a hush, a stillness that muffles the city sounds — the cars on MacLeod, the chatter of people leaving the mall. Egg can see the sign on the pole, the letter
M
, almost floating in the play of shadows, the swirl of snowflakes as they burst from the heavy grey of dusk into the halo of light.

Kathy is surrounded by Jonathan Heap, Doug Fisken, and some boy Egg doesn't know. Pet and Stacey stand outside the circle.

Kathy is trying to talk to Stacey, but everyone is in the way, like some kind of Red Rover Red Rover I call Kathy over, except this is not a game. The air prickles Egg's skin. Her chest tightens.

Egg doesn't know what's happening but it's a mess. The boys are all around Kathy now, and Pet is stepping in front of Stacey. Why is snotty-nosed Petunia acting like she has to protect Stacey? Kathy would never hurt Stacey. The world is upside down. Stacey cries, her face crumbled like an old piece of newspaper. The air is cold and heavy and the boys are puffed up big and their words are nasty. Doug pushes Kathy and Egg knows she'll push back and then it'll be bad because she never backs down.

Time stretches, like an elastic just ready to snap.

“Kathy, I want some jujubes, do you have any money for jujubes?” Egg bursts into the circle and everybody's all around her.

It is so quiet.

Egg looks around, to their faces, and she can see their surprise. She is so small and in the middle. She says to the boy she doesn't know, “You got a jacket just like Evel Knievel. Do you know Evel Knievel? He tried to jump the Snake River Canyon. He would have made it too, but his parachute came out early, he would have.”

The light is so brittle and the quiet is unsettling. The stillness stretches, straining.

Jonathan shuffles, coughs into his hand. “Come on, let's get going.”

Doug Fisken leans, over Egg toward Kathy. “Fucking dyke,” he spits through his teeth. His eyes glint with ice as he struts away.

Egg lets out her breath, feels the mist against her lips, her nose.

Kathy picks up Egg. She squeezes too hard and she doesn't let Egg go until they get to the truck. Kathy's shaking but Egg knows not to say anything. They drive out of Calgary, taking the Mill Road to the Badlands, past the hoodoos and the flat plain drop. On the radio Ground Control is calling Major Tom as the moon drifts over the prairie but Egg is thinking of the Rocket Man, burning up his fuel up there alone.

…

That night, out of her window, Egg looks over the long grass edged with frost. Brilliant in the moonlight, the blades are a crisp silver, sparkling like a field of perfect daggers. The crystalline pattern on her window makes her think of mountains and the Yeti, all alone in the Himalayas. Egg would like to know what makes the Yeti abominable. It's hairy but then all mammals are hairy. Except for dolphins. And whales. And manatees. Manatees are gentle; they are the cows of the aquatic world. Floating cows. Not everyone knows that dolphins and whales and manatees are mammals.

The Yeti and the Abominable Snowman are the same thing but just different names. Abominations are serious things.

In the Bible there is no extinction, only smoting and stoning. Mrs. MacDonnell is strangely silent on the subject of dinosaurs. She says that God is all things but then if that is true that means God is evil too. Kathy does not believe in God. Kathy will not go to Heaven. Mrs. MacDonnell says that only those who have accepted Jesus in their hearts will be allowed entrance into the Kingdom of Heaven. There are gates and everything.

Egg wonders about that. She wonders about the cicadas in her
Young Reader's Guide to Science
, the seventeen years burrowing in the dark, the cicadas, who were once mortals who became so enraptured that they sang until their bodies withered away, becoming what they loved — a song. You see, if you love it enough, it will happen. All you need is love.

She thinks of Raymond, of Leviticus and Romans. It gets all mixed up in her head, abdominal abominable and sasquatch Saskatchewan, all jumbled together like Indians and India. She knows that the world must make sense, that there's a reason to it. Mrs. MacDonnell talks of God's great plan. Egg wants to believe but she is not so sure anymore.

She thinks of that one time, at the drive-in, not
Wizard of Oz
, but before, when Egg was little, dressed in her pjs, bundled in the car for
Where the Red Fern Grows
. Mama and Papa in the front, and Kathy, Albert, and Egg in the back. Egg fell asleep before the end of the movie. She never did learn what happened to Billy and his two dogs.

The Moral of the Story, Egg thinks. Do lives have a moral? Or is it just an accident on the railway trestle over the slow flowing river?

Stacey is gone too. Is there a moral to that?

She pads to Kathy's room in her slippery socks and opens the door a peek. The hall light slices into the darkness of Kathy's room, over a corner of the bed, to the desk.

The picture of Noel MacDonald, ripped in two, lies on the floor. Kathy's books are flung into the corners, strewn on the floor. Half of the map of the world has been torn. A pin holds a corner — not land but sea. The Siberian Sea. Egg didn't know that there was a Siberian Sea.

“Kathy?”

The room is empty. Egg thinks of Raymond, chased off by Doug Fisken and his beer bottles on Main Street. Everybody knows and nobody says anything.

Moral is the meaning. The story tells you what is good and what is evil.

But Raymond, what harm did he ever do?

The night shadows dance across the ceiling as the wind howls the moon across the sky.

…

Egg lies in the field behind the barn, her snow pants bunching on her calves. Her legs stick straight up in the air, her body forming the letter
L
. Her hips are solid against the earth and she holds the claw bone in her hand, scratching at the snow.

It's the flying ones she loves: Bellerophon, or Icarus who flew too close to the sun. Perseus, with his winged sandals of gold but what wrong did Medusa do?

It's the uglies, Egg thinks, everyone hates the uglies.

She tries to blow her breath into a cloud but the air is mild, a snow-blindingly bright day. She unzips the front of her jacket.

Kathy walks up beside her. She looks up to the sky. Egg can see the bags under her sister's eyes, the slump of her shoulders.

“Your pants are going to get soaked through,” Kathy says grudgingly.

“They'll dry.”

Kathy nods. She lies down beside her. “What are you doing?” she asks.

“Holding up the sky.”

“Heavy work?”

“It's air, silly.”

Kathy can't find fault with that so she lifts her legs up as well.

Not a cloud.

Egg turns to her. “Is it true if you swallow chewing gum, does it get stuck in your butt and you explode?”

“Nah.”

“Martin says tapioca is full of boogers.”

“Martin's full of boogers.”

Hawk. Or kestrel.

Egg curls up to her. “I got fifty-seven dollars in my piggy bank. You can have it.”

Kathy looks at her.

“Just so you know.”

“Thanks, Egg.”

“Could you tell me that story again, about the girl with the little wings on her feet —”

“On her ankles —”

“She tried to cut them off with nail clippers but they grew back, they kept on growing back.”

“Yeah.”

“And they came back on her shoulders, and she had to wrap them up, pin them down because when the wind blew they'd puff up like an umbrella an' she'd fall over.”

“They were like bat's wings, so she had to hide them.”

“But they were wings, Kathy.”

“They were ugly.”

“I'd want wings even if they were ugly.”

Kathy gives her a look, as if to say,
of course you would
. She reaches out and ruffles Egg's hair. “Come on, you sack-a-potatoes.” She kicks off her shoes and lifts Egg onto her legs, an old game of airplane. Egg balances her belly on Kathy's feet and her arms stretch out against the endless blue.

“Pegasus!” Egg shouts.

“Falkor!” Kathy adds.

They laugh as the Chinook wind stirs up the early spring sky in Bittercreek, Alberta.