Authors: C. K. Kelly Martin
“A place in Yorkville—the Bellair Café.” Doctor Byrne smiles and launches into a series of questions about my fainting spell and how I’ve been feeling lately.
I admit that I have a headache (which I downplay the intensity of) and tell him it mostly happens when I don’t sleep well, that school’s been a big change from my old one in New Zealand and that I’m feeling a little stressed. The fainting I explain away by emphasizing that I was grossed out by the grasshopper even before my lab partner began
slicing it open. I laugh and tell Doctor Byrne that I guess I won’t be going to medical school.
“Well, let’s have a look at you then,” he says. Doctor Byrne listens to my heart, checks my glands, shines a light inside my ears and then whips out a tongue depressor and peers down my throat.
“I can feel the slight fever,” he says, directing his comments at my mother. “It could be that she’s fighting something off but since there are no other persistent symptoms for the moment I’m just going to suggest that she try to get more rest and drink plenty of fluids. You can give her acetaminophen for the fever if that’s bothering her.”
“It’s not,” I tell him.
“And of course if she develops other symptoms, I’d like to see her back here.”
“What about the headaches?” my mother asks.
Doctor Byrne plants his palms on his thighs and looks me directly in the eye the way few people can sustain for long. It reminds me of how Nancy stared at me in the restaurant last Sunday. “Any confusion, Freya?” he asks. “Any dizziness—apart from today, that is?”
“What do you mean by confusion?” As soon as I’ve said it I wish I could take it back. I should’ve just told him no.
Doctor Byrne adjusts his glasses. “Disorientation. Memory problems. Word-finding difficulty. Hallucinations.”
Hallucinations
. Like thinking I’m someplace else. I see my mother scrunch up her shoulders at the word and I quickly shake my head. “Nothing like that. More like
confusion over the difference between the metathorax and mesothorax.” Two terms Derrick used in relation to the grasshopper earlier.
“I wouldn’t worry about that unduly.” Doctor Byrne’s eyes twinkle briefly. “And I can hardly tell you to study harder when you’re already under stress from changing schools and everything else, can I?”
The unnamed everything else is my father’s death. People don’t like to mention it unless there’s no way around it, as though saying it will make it true all over again and send me into shock.
Doctor Byrne asks if I would mind waiting outside for a moment while he speaks to my mother. This must be the part of the visit when he and my mother confer over my stress and grief levels. I leave them alone, relieved to have made it through the examination without giving away too much but fixating on the other symptoms Doctor Byrne asked me about. The only one I’m not actively suffering from is word-finding difficulty.
I wish he’d explained what kind of condition all the other symptoms could indicate. On the other hand, even if he had I wouldn’t have admitted to the symptoms. No matter what Doctor Byrne—or anyone—says I don’t trust them the way I trust myself. It’s how someone who is paranoid would feel but if I can’t trust my gut I can’t trust anything.
Back in the waiting room I skim through the same copy of
Life
magazine that my mom was looking at before we were called into Doctor Byrne’s office. A girl named Brooke
Shields is in a skimpy swimsuit on the cover, striking an uncomfortable-looking pose that’s probably supposed to be sexy. Minutes later my mother joins me and we walk out to the car together. “I want you to take it easy tonight, all right?” she says. “No homework. No going out. Lie down and relax.
“Humor me,” she adds before I have a chance to reply.
“Okay, okay.” I climb into the car and belt myself in while my mother, on the driver’s side, does the same. “What did Doctor Byrne say after I left?”
My mother’s face is weary. “Nothing new. He thinks you’re a little worn out emotionally and that it’s been taking a physical toll.”
Exactly what I want him and everyone else to think, but I don’t know how much longer I can keep up the pretense. At home I pop acetaminophen for my head and do as my mother suggests. Curled up on the couch with a glass of chocolate milk beside me on the coffee table and a mixture of music videos and soap operas playing out on the TV, my brain’s on a rampage, alternately running over the details of the bizarre dreams I’ve had in recent weeks and racking my mind for a way to get through to Garren.
There must be a record of what happened to my father on file with the Canadian government. It could take a while to get my hands on it but it’s possible my mother clipped one of the newspaper articles about the explosion from the
Herald
. If she did, they’re likely somewhere in her bedroom, which I won’t be able to ransack until she leaves for work tomorrow morning. The more I think about it, the clearer it becomes
that I can’t put off seeing Garren for long. I’ve covered for myself so far but that can’t last. The dreams have begun to break through to my conscious mind.
Aside from the deaths of our fathers, all I have to offer Garren is visions and vague feelings. Without evidence he’s not any more likely to listen to me than he was the last time but I have to try anyway. It’s either that or end up locked in a rubber room.
The day feels endless and finally, around six o’clock, while my mother’s cooking dinner and Olivia’s parked safely in front of the TV watching a
Gilligan’s Island
repeat, I scurry up to my mother’s room and ease open each of her dresser drawers. The right-hand drawers are full of her things—underwear, hosiery, pajamas—and the left side contains a selection of my father’s clothes that she couldn’t bear to throw away—a Star Wars T-shirt, a navy cashmere sweater, jogging pants and an entire drawer of black socks.
I stare at the Star Wars T-shirt, an illustration of Luke Skywalker wielding a lightsaber emblazoned across its front. This was one of the T-shirts my dad liked to throw on for doing yard work or other household tasks. He was wearing it with his Adidas running shoes and faded blue jeans the day before he died, mowing the lawn while my mom planted lettuce, ginger and turnips in the garden. I glanced through the kitchen window at the two of them, Mom wrapped up in her seeds and Dad catching sight of me at the window. He paused to wave and I waved back, never dreaming that I’d only have him in my life for another day.
The memory of that moment feels as solid as yesterday, unlike many of my memories from before we arrived in Canada. I still can’t believe he’s gone and I lay my hand on the T-shirt and silently vow,
I’m going to find out what happened to you. I won’t let the truth stay buried
. With my eyes smarting I continue scouring the bedroom. There’s a squat filing cabinet stored within the walk-in closet and my heart quickens at the sight of it. I slide open the top drawer, sink my shaking fingers inside and discover copies of various financial statements, receipts and contracts, as well as my family’s medical and education records. Disappointingly, the bottom drawer is completely empty. There are other parts of the closet left to search but I’ve taken too long already. Dinner will be ready any minute now and Mom will be sending Olivia up to look for me.
I’ve put my mother through enough today and don’t want to have to scramble for a lie she might not believe. I grind my teeth together as I slip reluctantly out of the room, counting the hours until I can return to finish the job.
I
n the morning I don’t remember my dreams but I feel profoundly unsettled, like I’m standing on a fault line while balancing on one foot. No one needs to come upstairs to urge me to get ready for school. I’m wide awake and moving long before my alarm goes off. Freshly showered and with my makeup done I watch Olivia crunch sleepily on her cereal and my mother brew coffee.
“How are you feeling, Freya?” my mother asks, tapping her nails on her coffee mug.
“Better,” I tell her. “More rested.” Truthfully, the headache’s gone too.
“And the fever?” My mother coasts over to touch my forehead.
“You could just wait for me to answer, you know.” I try to swat her away but she’s already made contact. “I’m old enough to know whether I have a fever or not.”
“You do feel cooler,” she notes.
“I know,” I chirp with only a dash of sarcasm.
My mother’s front teeth peek out from under her top lip in an expression that’s part smile and part grimace. “Try not to faint today.”
I laugh, despite the tension whirring underneath my skin and once my mom and Olivia have gotten into the car and driven off I race back up to my mother’s closet. Overnight I’ve grown more desperate and impatient and I make a mess, pulling things like spare blankets and shoe boxes from their shelves and leaving them abandoned on the carpet. I revisit the filing cabinet—and then the dresser and bedside tables—in case I missed the articles the first time around. But maybe she didn’t keep them in the first place and there’s nothing to find.
Just to be thorough, I search my own room in case I’m the one who kept the articles. With my memory full of holes that’s a distinct possibility. However, there’s no sign of them in my room either and as I’m slamming drawers shut it occurs to me that Olivia would have been just as likely to keep any record of the explosion as I would have. I rush into her bedroom, heading straight for her desk where I find the original December 18, 1984, clipping about my father’s death in the top drawer.
GAS EXPLOSION CLAIMS LIFE OF CANADIAN DIPLOMAT AND LOCAL WOMAN
Daniel Morris
Staff Reporter
A Canadian diplomat and a local employee of the Canadian High Commission were killed in an afternoon gas explosion late yesterday afternoon. Firefighters were called to the house at 37 Coventry Terrace in Howick at approximately 5:30 p.m. after witnesses reported that property had been leveled by a blast and was engulfed in flames.
Marcy Cooper, who lives directly across the street from the destroyed home, said, “The sky lit up and the whole house collapsed in an instant, taking a car that had just pulled into the driveway with it. I couldn’t believe my eyes. It was like something out of a nightmare.”
The incident claimed the lives of Luca Kallas, a senior finance officer with the Canadian High Commission, and Brenda O’Callaghan, one of the owners of the Coventry Terrace home who had been locally employed by the High Commission as a property assistant. Two other residents of the Howick neighborhood were injured by flying glass and debris and were taken to Auckland Hospital for treatment.
Fire officials believe a natural gas leak caused the explosion. Investigators are continuing to probe the cause of the incident.
I slip the article into my biology binder to protect it from the elements and decide to leave two notes on the kitchen table in case I’m not home before Olivia or my mother arrives back at the house. The note to Olivia says I might be a few minutes late again. I apologize and tell her that something came up but that I’ll be home as soon as I can. My mother’s note is more difficult because I know she’ll feel I’m letting her down. If I’m home in time I’ll destroy both notes, but if I’m not my mother will be as angry with me as Garren was when I see her later. With that in mind I jot down:
Mom
,
There’s something very important that I had to do after school, which is why I’m not home with Olivia. I’m sorry I can’t tell you more than that I’m helping a friend in trouble but I’ve made a promise. I know I’ll probably be grounded and won’t argue
.
Freya
I fold the note into thirds and shove it into one of the envelopes my mother keeps to mail off bills, scrawling “Mom” across the front of it and then sealing it so that Olivia won’t be able to cheat and read my words. Since most of what I’ve written is a lie it wouldn’t really matter whether she reads my mother’s note but if I
were
telling the truth I’m sure I’d be secretive.
With the notes finished I dart into the family room and
pull a 4 × 6 snap of my family (my mother in the center of the frame with her left arm sloped around my father and her right around my grandfather, Olivia and me standing in front of the trio, me hunching down so I don’t block my dad’s face) out of its mantelpiece frame. I hide the empty metallic frame underneath the TV stand and hope that no one will have a chance to notice it missing.
There’s no photograph of my father in the
Herald
article so technically the family photo doesn’t prove anything but it can’t hurt for Garren to see me with my parents and little sister when he’s been thinking of me as someone who’s toying with him. The blond version of myself in the photograph doesn’t look evil or conniving; she looks happy and loved.
I drop the photo into my binder along with the news clipping and troop out to the nearest bus stop to begin the journey to Toronto. My head’s surprisingly clear but I’m nauseous with nerves that worsen when I reach Garren’s house on Walmer Road and he fails to answer the door. I knew he might not be here—that he likely has school, work or something else to keep him busy—but I also know that I can’t leave without speaking to him a second time.
At first I circle his neighborhood, intermittently ringing the doorbell in case he arrived home while the house was out of my view. After an hour it’s too cold to continue loitering on his street—even for me—and I give in to the bitter arctic wind and walk down to Bloor Street where I dip into a coffee shop and order hot chocolate and a honey-glazed donut.
The radio’s playing and the same Simple Minds song I heard yesterday comes on as I’m finishing my donut. The DJ says it’s from a new movie called
The Breakfast Club
. He sounds excited about it and I wonder if I’ll ever in my life be able to enjoy anything as ordinary as a movie.
It’s only 1:10 in the afternoon but I’m already picturing my mother reading my note. I’d rather she be angry than anxious but I want to beat her home so she won’t be either. If I left now I’d only be a little later than usual. Olivia wouldn’t rat me out and my mother wouldn’t need to know a thing.