This River Awakens (36 page)

‘This is Jennifer.’

He nodded. ‘G’evening.’

‘Hi.’

Father set his cup down on the step. ‘Um, I suggest you two brush yourselves off before you head inside.’

I looked over at Jennifer. In the porch light’s bright glow I saw that her t-shirt and hair were covered in twigs, dried-up leaves and moss. I looked down at myself and saw the same. ‘Oh,’ I said.

‘Take a few minutes,’ Dad said, straightening. ‘I’ll be inside.’

‘Uh, yeah.’

He closed the screen door behind him. I started brushing the stuff from Jennifer’s back. ‘I gotta get to the bathroom right away,’ she said.

‘Sure.’

‘That’s your dad, huh?’

‘Yeah.’

‘He’s all right.’

‘Yeah, he’s a mechanic.’

*   *   *

They ate alone in the dining room. Sort of, Jennifer corrected herself. His mother kept finding reasons to come into the room.
More bread? Would you two like another glass of milk?
Jennifer thought she was pretty, in a drawn-out kind of way.

All the usual questions had been asked.
Do you live close by? Have you two been friends long?
Jennifer was surprised at herself for feeling shy – she usually reacted to any grown-up giving her attention with nasty sarcasm, and contempt. But with Owen’s mother, she felt vulnerable, lost.

The twins, Tanya and William, briefly showed up to giggle, then went back to the living room where they’d set up a train set on the rug, William driving the trains and Tanya being a mother living in a farmhouse near the station. Jennifer could hear them arguing over turf, there on the living-room rug.

Debbie had said hello, then went up to her room to play records. Owen’s father had gone back outside to work in his garage, which left Owen’s mother. She cleared the dishes away then came back in and sat down, cigarettes and ashtray in hand.

Jennifer thought to relieve one concern right away. She took her own cigarettes out from where the pack sat tucked in her jeans just behind the clasp. ‘Owen’s not one for peer pressure,’ she said. ‘Which is good, since he’s surrounded right now.’

‘What she means—’

‘I know what Jennifer means, Owen,’ his mother cut in lightly.

‘I’m almost a year older than Owen,’ Jennifer said. ‘I’ll be repeating Grade Six because my attendance last year wasn’t good. My mother’s been sick.’

‘I’m sorry to hear that. Is she better now?’

‘Getting. She’s not going to die or anything.’

William crashed the train in the living room. Tanya screamed.

Owen’s mother said, ‘Debbie almost had to repeat this year.’

‘She went to summer school, didn’t she?’

‘You’ve met.’

‘There’s not many kids around here. We met a couple of times in the playground. I live right beside it.’

‘The house with the dogs?’

Jennifer nodded. Owen sat in his chair, his head turning from his girlfriend to his mother as the conversation went along. His face was expressionless, but his eyes moved sharply, as if comparing them.
Taking pictures like he always does.
Jennifer cleared her throat. ‘I’m hoping Owen can help me with homework and stuff. He’s pretty smart. He knows lots of words, reads lots of books.’

His mother was nodding. ‘I’d been worrying that that was all he did. Books, books and more books. He came back from the library yesterday with a whole armful.’

‘Owen can do lots more than just read,’ Jennifer said. The words hung there and she felt a blush rise to her face.

Owen jumped off his seat. ‘Sounds like trouble in the living room. I’ll go calm them down.’

Jennifer glared at him, but the look was lost as he hurried out.

‘I never thought Owen would have a girlfriend so soon,’ his mother said. ‘Debbie didn’t show any real interest in boys until she was, oh, at least fifteen. Of course, Owen always was precocious.’

Precocious. So that’s who he gets it from.
‘It’s different out of the city, I guess,’ Jennifer said. ‘Like, Roland drives a tractor all by himself. That’s one of Owen’s friends.’

‘Yes, we’ve met. And Lynk, and Carl. Would you like some tea?’

‘Do you have coffee?’

She rose, smiling. ‘Coming right up.’ She paused. ‘Why don’t you hunt down my son. He’ll hide for ever if he can.’ She turned and entered the kitchen.

Jennifer stared after her a moment, then laughed. Her amusement fell away as she stubbed out her cigarette and pushed back the chair.
Why them and not us? Is it because there’s more kids? Is it because they wanted them in the first place?
She drew a deep breath. Tanya and William yelled at each other, moments away from a scrap. Jennifer pictured Owen sitting there, saying nothing, watching them, his eyes missing nothing.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

I

The ringing phone woke him up. He climbed out of bed, wearing nothing, and made his way through the sultry air. It was 8 a.m.

‘Hello?’ he croaked, the day’s first word.

‘Hodgson? It’s Bill. You awake?’

Fisk sat down in the easy chair, the fabric feeling like sandpaper under him. ‘What’s up?’

‘Well, I heard what happened, eh?’

‘Maybe you did and maybe you didn’t.’

‘Huh?’

‘There’s more than one version, you know.’ Fisk looked down the length of his body. He’d begun to sag, he noticed.

‘Yeah,’ Bill said, ‘well, which one do you think I believe? Louper’s a drunk. He’s capable of anything. Peters couldn’t be sure enough to swear it, but he thinks the girl’s pants were down.’

‘But he didn’t want to get involved. I know. So who pulled the strings, Bill? I figured the police had enough to charge me on their own, and all they did was give me the riot act – as if I’ll show up there again.’

‘So they saw your service record. So they know enough to know what to respect. Besides, they’ve had run-ins with Sten before. He’s got a half-dozen drunk driving charges as it is. Nobody wanted trouble, not in this day and age – the wrong kind of trouble, if you know what I mean. Sten got what he deserved for trying to do what he tried to do, eh? The Hodgson Fisk I know wouldn’t just stand by and let that happen. And he wouldn’t jump the gun, either.’

Fisk scratched a thigh. The damn chair was agony. A thousand biting ants.
The Hodgson Fisk you know, eh, Bill?
‘Thanks, Bill. For everything.’

‘No problem. Listen, no money changed hands with that dog food deal, did it?’

‘No.’

‘Well, there’s probably violations of the code, but I’m not going to bother looking them up. I’m just amazed the dogs actually eat that stuff.’

‘It’s ground up. Cut with regular food.’

‘That what he told you?’

‘Yeah. Why?’

‘He’s got jars of the stuff. It isn’t cut with anything.’

Fisk sighed. ‘Christ, that’s one nasty nest he’s keeping. Look, that girl’s in trouble living there. The wife, too. They’re scared. That’s why they lied. Can’t you do something?’

‘There’s a doctor in there now. He’s intervened, I think they call it. And Family Services is involved now, too. I guess things are in the works. Listen, Hodgson, I just want you to know, you come by the Legion and a lot of people will come up and shake your hand.’

‘Kind of you. I’ll think about it.’

‘Great. Okay, see you, then. Go have breakfast, eh?’

Once he had hung up the phone, Fisk got out of the chair as fast as he could. A part of his mind had become convinced it’d turned into an ant-hill under him. He went back into the bedroom and dressed, thinking about what Bill had said.

He wasn’t looking for handshakes. He didn’t need them to justify what he’d done. But he appreciated that strings had been pulled on his behalf. Maybe it was time to … wake up again, step back outside. A shave, a bath, clean clothes. Not the Legion Hall, though. He wasn’t the kind of man who needed to tell stories to stay alive inside and out. The past was done, dead and over with. None of it made any difference, and it was stupid and pathetic to pretend otherwise, to keep going back to the sandbox, which once seemed so big but was now tiny, overcrowded with old men in ill-fitting clothes.

He entered the kitchen and put water on for coffee, then stood, motionless, waiting for it to boil.

Three boys in the basement. School’s started. Maybe I’ll let them go. Clean things up. Maybe I’ll do it one thing at a time. Make the slow walk back, step, then step, then step. The boys coming last of all. That Louper bastard – what happened that night – it’s shaken me. Not a weakness, admitting that. There’s a world out there. I’d forgotten. It’s ugly and mean, and there’s people who need help.

The war was about that. But nothing’s really changed. The shit’s flying all over the place. Never again, we all said. We’d felt like giants when we said it, because we meant it, because we’d seen enough. But it wasn’t up to us. They fooled us, made us think we were important, made us think we’d done something, changed things for the better. Then, slow and sure, they resumed business as usual. The promise got compromised, just a little at first, then more and more. And all we did was get into our outdated uniforms once a year and tell each other stories over beers all the other days.

An ugly world. Old men with the scars fucked right over. Fool us and the rest are just puppies. No problem getting them to cower.

The kettle whistled. He found the instant coffee and a cup that was more or less clean.

People out there needed help. Of course, there were others, ready to step in, to intervene. They’d do the job, clean things up. Hell, who am I to think I’m important to anyone? Shouldn’t be all worried like this. They’ll get the girl out. She’ll stop being afraid and she’ll tell the truth then, and that’ll be that. Sten will do time and what he did will mean he won’t get out alive. Everybody’s got rules, and some of those people are meaner than others when it comes time for punishing the ones that break them. Good enough. Here I thought I’d be useful again. No need. None at all. The boys below can rot a while longer. Bill and his buddies are raising me a toast. Good enough. I wish I’d killed that bastard. Christ, he wouldn’t fall down. I’ve never seen anything like it.

His feet were getting tired, standing there. Fisk rubbed the bristle on his jaw. He’d shave, get cleaned up.
Nothing wrong with that. No special meaning. None at all.
He swallowed a mouthful of coffee.

The cage rows wavered in the heat beyond the kitchen window. He’d have to hose them down again. He’d lost six already to the heat, and too many stillborns. If the weather didn’t break soon it’d be a tight winter. Might even go in the hole.

Maybe I’ll shave tomorrow.

II

Elouise remembered a rabbit. It had probably been someone’s pet, tentative as it made its way into her garden. Jennifer had been a child then. Though Elouise knew the rabbit would eat into her vegetables, she didn’t have the heart to let Sten loose his dogs on it. And Jennifer had been so excited, crouching on the lawn in her frilly summer dress, her white socks pulled right up to her knees. The rabbit knew she was there. It heard the girl cooing, calling it forward with a celery stick in one hand.

The rabbit had escaped from somewhere, and now the world opened to it. It was both frightened and bold, far too confident for what was waiting out there. Dogs, cats, an owl, a hawk. Its fur was white, and it looked fat and slow – one day soon it would meet its end.

The little girl, had she known, would have cried her heart out.

Elouise decided that there were some things it was better for a child never to learn about, at least until she had to. Life was hard enough.

The rabbit ate its fill among the lettuces and endives. One of the dogs in the kennel saw it then and started barking, which set off the others. The rabbit cocked an ear, then padded away.

They never saw it again.

Elouise had found the memory alive in her mind as soon as she woke. It haunted her, as if the rabbit had calmly jumped out of a nightmare into her waking life.

But the garden was dead. For this summer at least. Whatever had seeded itself from last season had withered in the drought. There’d be no rabbits this year. They remained in their cages, unable to escape, unable to see what lay beyond the wire mesh. They didn’t know it, but they were safe in there. Cared for and protected. As much as they might claw at the latch, they lived in a perfect world.

She stood silent and motionless at the kitchen window and watched Jennifer head up the road. The first day of school. The house behind her was quiet. Sleeping, sleeping all through the long days.

Poor rabbit.
Elouise wanted to cry.
Poor thing.

III

Jennifer left a quiet house. Her father had taken to lying in bed most of each day, venturing out when the sun set, when he’d feed the dogs and wander in the darkness through the yard, drinking the beer he’d hidden in the car – beer that had spent the day heating up and must have tasted hot as piss.

Her mother puttered around in the house, voiceless, something less than a ghost. The garden was a weed-twisted mess. The crab-apples had fallen uncollected from the trees, rotting on the ground and filling the air with a sickly smell that would have been worse if there’d been rain. Her mother seemed to have shrivelled up and died inside. She looked old, walked old, lived old.

When Jennifer was home – as little as possible – she stayed in her room playing records continuously to keep the silence away, and to keep herself from straining to hear anything that might break that silence. She was sick of being tense, coiled tight inside, sick of that kind of exhaustion. Better just to shut it out.

Though the morning was warm, promising a sweltering day, she wore her jean jacket. It had an inside pocket, where she kept her cigarettes. She’d broken the rule of no smoking on school grounds enough times to make getting caught a tried, familiar and harmless ritual. Principal Thompson hadn’t even bothered calling her into his office towards the end of last year.

But there was a new teacher, Miss Rhide, who’d already sent a letter to their house – expressing concern over Jennifer’s difficult circumstances at home, promising support and understanding and that things would be different now, because she took her class very seriously, and felt very responsible to them, to their needs and to their individual circumstances. She was so very looking forward to the coming school year. She and her class were embarking on a wonderful and challenging journey together, and she was very pleased to have Jennifer joining in that journey.