Simple Recipes (12 page)

Harold

w
hen Harold was a boy, he drowned his sorrow by flying kites. In the mornings, he pedaled his bike out along the residential
streets where the winter drizzle made the asphalt shine. He biked under the streetlamps, through the rain puddles, all the
way to the lake. On the grass, he slid off and left the bike lying on its side, the front wheel still spinning.

Harold unraveled the line. He ran and looked backwards. He was good at keeping it up, good at angling it over the lake. The
kite shouldered left then straightened out. Harold put some slack on the line, then pulled it taut. And all the time he thought
about
the rain, or when the lake would freeze over, or how his mother kept spare change in a red metal box. He wondered how far
down in the ocean he’d have to swim to see phosphorescence with his own two eyes. He could swim forever, he thought. From
this side of Trout Lake to the other, and back again. His dad was a fine swimmer too; he always mentioned how he used to swim
competitively, back in his university days. But that was long ago, too long to count. Donkeys years, his dad would say.

After half an hour, he let the kite down, watched it fall in slow motion to the lake. Then he reeled it in fast, just like
fishing. Watched it tear across the surface of the water. Right until it bumped against Harold’s shoes. He gathered it up
and held it in his arms, the bright yellow fabric still damp.

On the way home, he dodged between cars, pedaling so fast little droplets of water shot off the handlebars and off the wet
tires. Right up the alley to the front door, where he dropped his bike in the grass and pounded up the steps, the kite in
his hands, right into the coffee-smelling kitchen and his dad’s Famous Breakfast. Famous, his dad said, because it was as
dull as dull could be. Two pieces of toast each, and a bowl of lumpy oatmeal.

His dad leaned down to pat his head and then they sat across the table from each other, gulping
breakfast down before his dad hurried out the door and off to work.

Harold was nine years old and he felt he was living life on his tiptoes. One morning, he crept downstairs to put the coffee
on. He tried to move as softly as he could past his mother’s bedroom. The door was slightly ajar and he could see the narrow
outline of her body beneath the blankets. In the kitchen, he stepped over his dad, who was lying on his back, head and torso
under the sink, taking the pipes apart. Harold made coffee and his dad yelled out, “Don’t make it so damn weak this time!”

And Harold thought of his grandmother, her soft, wrinkled arms and watery eyes. He thought of snow falling on Trout Lake,
how it melted on the surface of the water. He thought of elephants in the
National Geographic,
their sad, baggy eyes.

“Get me a glass of water, will you?” His dad’s voice echoed from underneath the sink.

Harold walked to the bathroom and turned on the tap. He thought of dream-catchers, the netting and the beads woven together,
holding his most secret wishes.

Sooner or later on the weekends, his father would make him climb the ladder onto the roof. It was a
kind of punishment. If Harold forgot to put away the dishes in the dish rack, or if he fell asleep on the couch, as he often
did in the afternoons, his dad would lose his temper. He would point his hand towards the roof. “Go think about things. Go
sit where I can’t see you.”

This morning, a Saturday, Harold had forgotten to buy milk for the coffee. When his father asked for the money back, Harold
couldn’t find it. His father pulled him by the arm onto the back lawn and shoved him up the wooden ladder onto the rooftop.
Harold was afraid of heights. He was too terrified to stand so he crouched on all fours. Down below, he could see the neighborhood
boys flocking to the back alley, circling the house on their bikes. They turned wheelies in the soft gravel road. “Hey, Harold!
You stuck up on the roof again? Can’t get down, can you?” They laughed, tilting their bikes up, hopping them gracefully on
the back tires. “Hey, when can I go up on the roof? Is it my turn yet?”

Harold’s father, weeding the garden, laughed out loud. “Only Harold,” he told them, crouched down, his hands full of soil.
“Harold’s the one who doesn’t want to be there.”

Harold looked out over the back lawn, at the solid figure of his father pulling up the ground. Nine years old, and all his
life he’d been afraid of heights. What he wanted more than anything was to ride his bike up
and down the alley, to stand side-by-side in the yard with his father, their four hands full of weeds. On his stomach, he
straddled the roof, cheek pressed to the shingles, and thought about the bullet train in Japan, speeding across the country.
Cherry blossoms bursting on the street out front. How people described hearts lodged in their throats and he knew that feeling.
He missed his mother, missed her like crazy even though she was right there, inside the house. She had a thick braid that
swung when she walked. Now, she barely came out of her bedroom at all.

Last week, he had wandered through the house, from room to room, with a pain in his chest. He had gone to his dresser and
taken out his clothes, three pairs of pants, a stack of T-shirts, sweaters, socks, and underwear, and laid them in neat piles
on the bed. One book, his well-worn encyclopedia. His father came to check on him, and when he saw the piles of clothing,
he said, “What’s all this for?”

Harold said, “I’m running away.”

His father leaned against the door frame.

Harold sat beside his clothes. “These are for me to take. I’ll leave the rest in the dresser.”

“Will you be gone long?”

Harold nodded.

“I’ll tell you what,” his father said, clearing a space to sit. “Why don’t you give it a few days? See what happens. I think,
maybe, things will get better.”
Harold sat tight-lipped. His dad turned around to look at the items of clothing. “Why don’t you put these back in the drawers
for now?” He looked at Harold, his expression pained.

Harold did as he was told. When all the lights went out he lay very still in bed, listening for change. Hoping that by morning,
she’d be up and about again.

Now, sitting on the roof, watching the neighborhood boys, he stared down at his father leaning forward into the vegetables.
Harold thought of all the chance moments, his mother’s car accident, the weakness in her chest, and how she had a cancer there.
He always thought that if they let him go free, if he had all the time in the world, he would make himself into a great runner.
The kind that ran long marathons, through New York or Chicago, who came to Heartbreak Hill and just kept going. All skin and
bones, like his mother said. The kind of boy who, try as he might, could never eat enough to keep himself running.

When it started to rain, Harold’s dad climbed up on the ladder. He leaned forward on the rooftop, chin in his hands. “I know
you hate it up here,” his dad said, “but it will make you stronger. No matter what happens to you from now on, you’ll always
have this well of strength to draw on.”

Will I,
Harold thought. He let his father help him down.

In silence, they made ham sandwiches for lunch. Then they carried them into the living room and ate, plates balanced on their
knees. He saw the slope of his father’s shoulders and the stiffness in his knees, and Harold mirrored it back, curving his
spine just so, holding his feet slightly apart. If his mother came down the stairs, she would see the two of them and it would
make her laugh. Trying to hide it at first, then letting it burst out. “Look at the both of you,” she might say. How he missed
her voice. When she walked with him at Trout Lake, when she said to him, “It’s the details, you see. Once you get the details
right, it will fly all on its own.” She adjusted his wrist and looked up high, away to the kite he was pulling in. And she
threw rocks in the water. And she said he was doing “fine, just fine.” When she died, he would take her red metal box, the
one that held her spare change. It was filled to the top and he would always keep it that way, he would never remove a single
penny.

When he was ten, Harold experienced what he would come to think of as the turning point of his life. There he was, face-down
on the roof. It was months after his mother’s funeral. She had told him that nothing would ever be the same again, saying
this in a voice that was like her voice if it had been left outside
in the cold all night. It wavered and it was exhausted, but she still smiled at him and told him he was going to be a fine
man. Harold had nodded his head, afraid to look at hen He had closed his eyes and pictured his mother walking along beside
him at Trout Lake, the two of them holding hands. He looked her straight in the face and said, “I will never forget you.”

Nothing was the same, except here he was again on the roof. It was summer and he could see the waves of heat. They blurred
the ground. Down below, his dad sat on a lawn chair, sipping water from a plastic bottle. The shingles on the roof burned
Harold’s arms and legs. He felt a wave of sickness passing through his body. He turned over, gingerly, so that he was spreadeagled
and facing the sky. An airplane was lowering itself through the clouds. He thought it could see him. It could drop a line
and he would catch it, like James Bond. Hold on and swing low across the city. He pictured a flower of skydivers billowing
from the plane, the wind pressing their faces into stunned amazement.

Harold turned over and pushed himself up on all fours. He crawled slowly down the slant of the roof. He could no longer see
the ground so he kept his eyes on his hands. Nobody was watching him. He crawled backwards, each moment expecting the roof
to end. When his body began to slide down, he wasn’t afraid. Even when his elbows bruised off the rain gutter and
his arms darted away from his body as if he was coming apart, he wasn’t afraid. This was the end of it, he thought, all the
weight of his body left on the roof and the lightest, strongest part of himself tumbling through the air.

Harold opened his eyes and saw the yard and the house. He heard footsteps in the grass. He sat up and saw people running towards
him.

For most of his life, Harold will be shy with women. After he moves out of his father’s house, he will keep to himself, making
a living by doing repair work and caretaker jobs. Every night for two decades Harold will do one of three things: read, watch
television, or listen to the radio. He will take pleasure in the ritual of his day-to-day tasks. Then one day he’ll meet Thea
and everything will change.

One day he’ll wake up beside her, in their apartment on the seventeenth floor. He’ll find his mouth open against her neck
and he will remind himself of a small animal, dreaming, feeding. In the bedroom, Thea’s daughter Josephine will be listening
to music and he’ll listen to her heavy steps back and forth to the kitchen. Harold will surprise even himself. He’ll think,
I’ve woken up into a dream. I’ve dreamt up an entire family.

At first, when Thea and her daughter argue, as they often do, Harold will try to remain unobtrusive. He will pretend to read
a book. One night, he will sneak a glance at them: Thea, tough as nails, Josephine, emotional and sarcastic. Both of them
yelling to kingdom come. Slouched on the Chesterfield, he’ll feel a pang of regret that he hadn’t met Thea fifteen years earlier.
Josephine will be the closest thing to his own child he will ever have.

This fight will be worse than the others. Josephine’s eyes will be red and swollen. “I hate it, I hate it here.”

“What has gotten into you? You hardly know this boy.”

“We want to move back east!”

“Over my dead body.”

“Let me go,” Josephine will say, cradling her body in her arms. “Harold, tell her. You understand. Tell her I want to move
to Toronto.”

“No! Not with that boy. Listen to me. I know what I’m talking about. I was just as impulsive as you once.”

“We want to get married.”

“It’s ridiculous! The two of you are still children.”