Authors: Nicholson Gunn
He ate his dinners on the couch while watching
television. When he’d moved into his last place, he hadn’t bothered getting
cable, partly because he had wanted to save money and partly to avoid the
distraction. But Natacha liked to see what was on after work, and had them
signed up for a full package.
One day while channel surfing he happened upon Mishal
Husein reading the day’s news on the BBC World Service. A new Iraqi government
had just been elected, and the newscast that night featured an extended recap
of the two-year interregnum between George W. Bush’s declaration of an end to
major combat operations and this hopeful milestone. The failure to find weapons
of mass destruction, the Battle of Falluja, the Abu Ghraib torture revelations.
There were shots of wounded civilians lining up outside a hospital, of GIs
firing large machine guns into the seemingly empty desert, and of a press
conference a year earlier: “I hope I ... I don’t want to sound like I’ve made
no mistakes,” Bush said, looking confused. “I’m confident I have. I just
haven’t ... you just put me under the spot here.”
Stephan shut off the television and tossed aside the
remote in disgust. Enough wallowing in someone else’s nightmare. He had errands
to run, chores to take care of. They were running low on cat food, and there
was a growing tower of dirty dishes in the sink.
Then there was the other, more significant, errand.
The jeweler reached under the glass and lifted the ring
from the velvet-lined display.
“Fourteen carat gold, antique. The diamond is cut in the
old Mazarin style. See how clean and unaffected the geometry is? A surprisingly
modern look when you consider it’s a nineteenth century cut.”
He handed the ring across the counter, and Stephan took
it nervously between his thumb and forefinger. He held it up to his eyes, the
facets glinting under the shop’s fluorescent lights. It suited her personality,
he thought. Straightforward and unpretentious, yet undeniably gorgeous. She’d
love it.
“Could you put it aside for me?”
“The deposit is 25 percent.”
Stephan hesitated – thinking wistfully of the beautiful
new wide-angle lens he’d have to put off buying – then reached for his wallet.
As if sensing some disturbance in the force, Natacha
called him a few hours later, sounding tired but happy. The conference had been
going well. She’d already learned a ton, met dozens of great people.
“I got you something, like we talked about,” she said. “I
personally think it’s silly, but I’m pretty sure you’re going to be pleased.”
“I got you something too,” he said. “But I’m not sure if
you’ll like it or not. Hopefully you will.”
“What? What is it?” She was like a little kid when it
came to surprises.
“You’ll have to wait and find out.”
She was all giggles. “See you Saturday!”
* * * * *
It had always been Pete’s practice to arrive early when
they went out for drinks, as if he needed to perform advance reconnaissance,
sweep The Olde Trout for IEDs. He was usually well into his second pint by the
time Stephan sauntered in, more or less on time. But now their roles were
reversed, and Stephan had been seated for a good twenty minutes when Pete
finally arrived at their longtime haunt. He had dark circles under his eyes,
and his breath seemed shallow, as if he wasn’t long for this world.
“Everything okay?” Stephan asked.
“Oh yeah, sure. Everything is superb, my childless
friend.” He tumbled into the booth, foregoing their once-customary secret
handshake.
Stephan stuck to their old routine anyway. “So?” he
asked.
“So yourself.”
It was good to be back at the Trout, notwithstanding
Pete’s crankiness, and had given Stephan a feeling of coziness and nostalgia
the moment he’d stepped inside. He’d called Pete at the beginning the week to
set something up, but his friend had at first been reluctant. Pete and Sally
had announced their pregnancy just a few weeks after Stephan and Natacha’s
informal housewarming dinner the previous spring, and their little girl, Emily,
had been born just three months ago. She was beautiful to behold, which was odd
because in Stephan’s opinion she also looked a lot like her father, and Pete
wasn’t exactly what you’d call a cutie-pie.
Stephan had been forced to bring out the big guns in
order to get his friend to come out. He’d mentioned how lonely he was with
Natacha away, and Pete’s resolve had cracked just a little. Then he’d let slip
that he’d recently had cause to purchase a certain engagement ring. That had
sealed the deal, with the caveat that Stephan would need to bring the ring to
their meeting to prove he wasn’t making the whole thing up. Pete hadn’t been
able to meet until Friday. Natacha would be back from Chicago the following
afternoon. Stephan couldn’t wait to see her – based on how lonely he’d grown
over the last couple of days, it felt as if she’d been gone much longer than a
week.
“Let’s see this ring, then,” Pete grumbled.
With a shy shrug, Stephan took the velvet box from his
pocket and slid it across the table. Pete picked it up, snapped it open and
looked inside. He narrowed his eyes and pursed his lips, which made him look a
little like a pensive monkey. Then he nodded.
“Very classy, dude. She’s going to absolutely love it.”
“So you’re satisfied?” Stephan asked. “Willing to give
this whole engagement idea your blessing?”
“I just wanted to be sure you weren’t making the whole
thing up.”
“I’m glad you hold my word in such high esteem.”
“Trust, but verify.” Pete snapped the lid of the box shut
and slid it back across the table. “I’m so happy for you, Steph – she’s such a
cool person. You done good, son.”
“Careful, now. She still has to say yes.”
“She will, don’t worry. She’s crazy about you. I suppose
you do have your subtle charms.”
“Thank you for that.”
“So how does it feel?”
“It feels great, but normal. In a way, it doesn’t seem
like a big deal.”
“That’s good,” Pete said, nodding again. “It means you’re
ready.”
“Huh – I hadn’t thought of it that way. Maybe you’re
right.”
“Wedding plans?”
The question was strangely daunting. Of course there
would be a wedding: with guests and gifts and a ceremony, the whole nine yards.
Her parents were quite religious. They would want a church wedding, no doubt,
aisles lined with relatives and friends. His own parents would just be happy
that he was finally making a move. They wouldn’t bat an eye at a nudist or SCUBA
ceremony, provided there was a certified marriage certificate to show for it.
“One step at a time, Peter,” he said, evenly. “I should
probably get Nat’s input, for starters.”
“Am I invited?”
“Yes, of course you’re invited, idiot.”
Pete grinned. “I can’t wait,” he said. “It’s going to be
a fucking blast.”
They clinked glasses, drank. Stephan noticed with
pleasure that Pete had almost finished his beer. Despite his initial reluctance
to come out, he did not seem to regret having done so.
Dinner arrived, heaping plates of artery-clogging pub
food. Marge, their waiter of yore, was nowhere to be seen, and Stephan wondered
what had become of her – she might have moved on, or it could simply have been
her night off. At least tonight’s waiter, Betty, had a good surly way about
her, hurling their plates down on the table as if they were a couple of curling
rocks.
Pete was now a responsible adult in most respects, but
his appetite was as unfettered as ever, not that this seemed to be an issue. He
ate like a firefighter, never exercised, and yet never put on weight. Someday
geneticists would patent his genes, make millions.
“So enough about me, how’s fatherhood treating you?”
Stephan asked.
“Oh god, I was hoping you wouldn’t go there,” Pete said.
“I don’t want to put you off your decision to move your life in that
direction.”
“Is it really that bad?”
“It’s a grind. I don’t mean to be a righteous ass, but
you don’t understand how much free time you have, Steph. God, how I hate you
for it. Now that I’m a dad, every waking moment of my life is taken up with
either work or the baby.”
“But it’s worth it, right?”
“Completely worth it. I can’t even describe to you how
intense my feelings are for the little poop machine. It’s frightening. I’d do
anything for her. Sorry for the cliche, but it makes you feel truly alive.”
“Sounds like a drug.”
“A little bit,” Pete said. “It definitely makes you feel
strung out a lot of the time.”
“But it’s a fair price to pay?”
“Most definitely.”
Twenty minutes later, Betty was clearing away their
plates, nearly dumping the leftovers into their laps in the process.
“You should’ve tried the chop steak, dude,” Pete said.
“One of the best specimens of chop steak I’ve had in a long time. The ground
beef was spectacularly greasy.”
“Next time, for sure. I promise.” Stephan took a last sip
of his beer and put the empty glass on the table. “Next time.”
He wanted another drink. It had been ages since he’d been
out like this with Pete, and who knew when they’d be able to get out again? It
made him want to savor every moment as if it were a fine whiskey. It wasn’t
that he felt regret about their old lives coming to an end. They were moving
forward in the most positive way imaginable. There were new games to be played,
new prizes won. It was a cause for celebration.
“Another drink?” he asked.
Pete glanced at his watch.
“One more wouldn’t hurt, I guess,” he said, after a brief
hesitation.
“Excellent.”
When their drinks arrived, they clinked their glasses
together and sipped in unison.
“Congratulations again, Steph,” Pete said. “I was
beginning to despair for you for a year or so there, but you’re finally getting
it done.”
Out on the sidewalk at the end of the evening, they
lingered over their goodbyes.
“We’ll have to do this again some time, with Sally and
Natacha in tow,” Pete said.
“We will.”
A cab was coming up the road, and Pete went to flag it
down. “You want a lift up to Bloor?” he called over his shoulder.
“Think I’ll walk a bit,” Stephan replied. He wasn’t quite
ready for silent streets and dark lawns.
“Suit yourself, amigo. I’ll see you when I see you, then.
Congratulations again on taking the plunge.”
Pete stepped into the taxi and yanked the door shut after
him. It closed with a heavy thunk, like the sound from one of their old hand
slaps, and the cab pulled away from the curb.
Stephan watched its red tail-lights recede into the
darkness, then turned and set off on his own way, heading west. The night was
warm, almost muggy, although the clammy breeze that welled up now and again
carried a faint reminder that slush had lingered in the gutters barely a month
before. Despite the late hour, the sky at his back was still luminous with
faint grey light, the last afterglow of the setting sun.
The street wasn’t thronging yet, as it would be in a
month or two, but it was hardly abandoned. There was a small line-up at the
gelato shop, and a matching one at the falafel stand across the street.
A memory of the neighbourhood came to him with sudden
clarity: when he’d been out walking here one night a few weeks after first
moving to the city, two young women, in their early twenties (if that), had
stopped him to ask for directions. They were on their way to the Golden Egg, a
nearby café that was popular at the time. As he was walking away, having
explained to them how to get there, he’d heard one of them say to the other,
“see, I told you he’d know.” He’d nearly burst into song, hearing that.
Somehow, he had already acquired the aura of a bona fide local.
There was a cab up ahead, and he was about to flag it
down, but at the last moment changed his mind, decided a second time against
heading home. He was still awake and fully alert, notwithstanding that last
drink after dinner, and if he went home now he’d spend all night tossing and
turning. Instead, he would walk a little longer, really tire himself out, so
that when he got back to the apartment he could fall into bed and, with a
little luck, go straight to sleep. Upon waking the next morning, he’d be
refreshed and ready for Natacha’s return later in the day. He could feel the
box that held the ring deep in his pocket, a small unyielding lump against his
thigh.
He put his head down and let his feet guide him. Walking
without thought or plan, he was a wind-up toy soldier on the march, making his
way through the network of side streets and little parks south of College.
Garrison Creek, an ancient waterway long since entombed beneath the roads, was
down below him somewhere, trickling invisibly in its concrete sewer bed. When
he traversed an unlit park and saw shrouded figures smoking on a bench in the
darkness, he did not tighten his breath or quicken his pace. When he passed
through the hubbub of a house party that had spilled out onto the sidewalk –
university students, by the looks of them – he dodged around the clusters of
bodies without breaking stride.
He stopped, stood still. Somehow, he realized, his feet
had led him to the Balfour. He had been half-aware that he had made his way
down to Queen, had in fact passed the building that housed his studio a few
minutes before, but he’d been so lost in thought that he hadn’t even noticed
he’d come this far down. He looked up at the front window of the Balfour’s main
bar. Through the frosted glass, he could make out the bodies of customers
within lurching this way and that, like shadow puppets. Their forms were
elongated and distorted in the glass, giving them a vaguely sinister aspect.
He was walked out now, finally. The muscles in his arms
and legs were on fire, throbbing under a film of sweat. It was a good feeling,
in a way, satisfying, as if he’d just given his all in a track meet. He would
go inside, just for a minute, have a drink in the café, something cold and
non-alcoholic, then catch a taxi back uptown. The heavy oak door swung open and
a man and woman came out, the woman laughing softly at something the man had
just said, their faces veiled in darkness. He caught the door as it swung shut
behind them and stepped inside.
It was quieter than he’d expected. A single group
standing near the front window had been responsible for the shadow puppets he’d
seen outside. Deeper within the room the crowd was thinner, many of the tables
unoccupied. Here and there couples and small groups bent close in murmured
conversation. The room’s small stage was in darkness, bare except for a single,
unlit microphone stand.
Maybe the night’s crowd had yet to arrive. Perhaps in
recent months people had begun coming out later than before. Or maybe the scene
had moved on to some new place du jour. Most likely it was just an off night.
He lingered in the doorway between the front hall and the
main bar, surveying the room. It made no sense, but something about the place
seemed off to him. It was as if in the course of his recent absence the Balfour
had been destroyed and then lovingly replicated, brick by brick, beam by beam,
by a race of perverse aliens. But while the new version looked and felt much
like the old one, it wasn’t the real thing. Stephan had always been content on
the sidelines of the scene. Even so, it was to that old, other Balfour that he
belonged.
There was a rustle of fabric at his back, accompanied by
the click of heels on hardwood.
“Well look who’s here,” a voice said, softly.
His mouth formed the contours of a bitter smile. He
wasn’t even surprised.
“I knew your shape in the doorway as soon as I looked
over,” she said. “Haven’t seen you around much lately.”
He turned to face her – saw eyes, hair, mouth, flesh, all
just as he remembered. If she, too, was a copy, then she was a perfect one,
every eyelash exactly to spec.
“Been a while,” he said. “I had no idea you were still
coming to this place.”
Ignoring this comment, she leaned in, wordlessly, and
encircled his waist with her white arms, pulling him in close. She smiled up at
him, the corners of her mouth twisting in ornate curlicues.
“I thought you went away,” he said.
“I did for a little while, but I’m back now.”
He chuckled to himself, not moving. He wanted to say
something brutal, something unforgivable.
“Unless you’re here with someone,” she said, hesitating.
For an instant, she seemed almost vulnerable, and probably that was what
stopped him.
“No,” he admitted. The opening for cruelty passed in
silence. Now they were just having a conversation again, as they’d done however
many times in the past. “I was out walking. I just came in for a drink.”
She brightened. “Well, then, let me stand you one, for
old time’s sake. I’ve got friends here, but they can spare me.”
He followed her up the main staircase to the second floor
and on through a warren of small rooms – lounges, gallery spaces, hallways hung
with kitschy oil paintings of sad clowns, aristocratic hunting parties.
The renovations to the building had progressed rapidly
since he’d last been here, and a number of new spaces had now been opened to
the public. Stephan soon lost his bearings, but Jenny seemed to know exactly
where she was going. That was the thing about Jenny Wynne, he thought to
himself: she always did.
They made their way in silence, as if engaged in matters
of such gravity that small talk was inappropriate. He realized that he was
tired from his evening out with Pete and from his long walk. He should have
been on his way home by now.
They arrived at a cramped, attic-like lounge with just a
few tables and a small bar, where they ordered a couple of drinks – a glass of
red wine for her, some kind of artisanal pilsner for him. There was a tiny
table near the back of the room. It was so small that he felt as if he were
sandwiching himself into an old-fashioned child’s school desk, the kind with a
folding top, a divot for pencils, and a circular hole on one side for a cup of
juice.
“So, have you missed me?” she asked, with sudden
intensity, her eyes boring into him.
“Of course. Everyone’s missed you,” he said, riffing.
Irritation had always made him articulate. “The flags were at half mast while
you were gone, everyone in black mourning clothes the whole time.”
“You always had a way of putting things, Steph. Maybe you
should have been the writer, not me. Maybe we’ve had our roles mixed up all
along.”
He felt embarrassment, confusion, outrage. Despite
everything, he was also enormously flattered.
“I don’t... think so,” he said.
“Oh, but I do.” She let out a low chuckle and looked at
him again. “You’ve got little crow’s feet now around the corners of your eyes.
You never had them before. They look nice. Distinguished.”
“Thanks.”
“You’re going to be one of those people who get better
looking as they age, I can see that now. You’ll look like Samuel Beckett in an
old book jacket photo. All tweedy masculinity in black and white.”
He raised his glass of beer and took a sip. The beer was
cold and bitter in his mouth. He placed the glass back down on its green felted
coaster and stared at it. It was beaded on the outside with droplets of water
that made it slippery to the touch.
He felt a powerful sense of déjà vu, sitting there across
from her. They had been here before, so many times that he couldn’t even bear
to think about it. Except that this time was different. All of the other times
were just rehearsals for the real event, he now saw, test prints made to
experiment with different exposure levels.
“Ever since I came back to this city I’ve been thinking
about leaving it again,” she said. “Going to Asia or Latin America. I hear
Uruguay is just incredible. Perfect beaches, virgin and untouched, stretching
to the horizon. I’d get a little apartment in a village by the ocean and live a
quiet life there. Working on my novel, eating simply, going for long walks up
the coast.”
Her face lit up, as if a new thought had just occurred to
her. “You could come with me,” she said, her voice hushed. “We’d be the perfect
companions. I’d write for the travel magazines to pay the bills, you’d do the
photography. Like that time we did that story together, at that lovely inn out
in wine country. That was so nice, wasn’t it?”
“Sure it was, while it lasted.”
It was a teenager’s fantasy. The bohemian travelers,
living the dream. It had been a cliché long before he or Jenny Wynne came
around. And yet in addition to disgust he felt a ripple of anticipation.
He chuckled to himself at the sheer idiocy of it.
“Maybe you think I’m just talking,” she said, catching
his tone. “But I’m not.”
“Okay.”
“I really felt it, coming back here to the strip tonight.
It’s all so contrived now, like a theme park. Did you see that new condo
they’re building up the street? That godawful billboard, the model with a gold
ribbon across her breasts? There’s marketing for you.”
“It’s not as if what you and I do is all that different,
in the end.”
“Well, okay, but maybe that’s what I’m saying. It’s over
now. It’s time to find something new.”
Stephan shook his head.
“Oh, fine then,” she said, rolling her eyes. “I can see you’ve
already moved on to bigger and better things without me. I hear you’ve got some
new lady friend to curl up with in front of the TV.”
“Where we were concerned, you were never the one who
seemed to have a problem ‘moving on,’ Jenny.”
“But apparently I haven’t moved on, Stephan, after all
this time. That’s what I’m trying to tell you.”
Was she serious? Or had she simply gone back to her old
game, her show of ‘honesty’ merely another card to be played against him? He
hesitated, not believing her but feeling as if he was being forced by the
situation into behaving as if did.
“I’ve missed you,” she said. “I want to be with you
again. For real this time. No more games.”
“You’re not serious.”
“You’re wrong.”
He was certain now that she was lying to him, same as
ever. It was an amazing thing to watch, like a sleight-of-hand card trick that
seemed real no matter how many times you saw it.
She took a last sip of her drink, set down the empty
glass on the table in front of her.
“Let’s get out of here,” she said.
She slid back her chair and stood. He found himself doing
the same, her mirror. Then he was following her through the labyrinth of rooms
and hallways that led to the building’s front doors. She moved with speed and
agility, and it was all he could do to keep up.
Their taxi whizzed down College Street, weaving around
cars and stray pedestrians. The driver was silent and detached, his eyes in the
rearview mirror fixed firmly on the road ahead. Their privacy was total.
Jenny in the seat next to him, her body pressed up
against his, cool and firm. She was wearing a faint perfume, something light
and vaguely citric. He could feel her breath against his neck as she leaned in
to whisper sentiments of gratitude. He had to work hard to remain still. Everything
that had happened to him in the last three years now seemed to have been part
of a dark conspiracy that had led him inexorably to this place – like the plot
of an old fairy tale, like fate.
Again, the desire welled up in him to make some kind of a
getaway. It still wasn’t too late, was it? At the next stoplight, he could open
the door and step out of the cab, bid her a good evening and disappear into the
night. There was no reason he couldn’t do such a thing.