by Matt Moore
He didn’t understand, but he let her go. He got a part-time job, which he quit as he built his portfolio and gained more clients. Every week, he wrote her, telling her about each new job.
His letters went unanswered.
So he asked what he’d done wrong. Why she’d left and didn’t answer him.
Letters came back “NOT AT THIS ADDRESS.”
It had been a Saturday. The end of November. The dark hours past midnight. The last of the bar crowd had gone home. The neighbourhood still and dark except for the streetlights. The TV just static. He couldn’t afford the cable bill. That’s when he’d accepted it. His new life was starting. Janice wasn’t coming back.
—Did you know—
Brian blinked. The Camp McDonald picture gone. A police evidence photo of Janice’s mangled car in its place.
“I’m sorry,” he sobbed, collapsing forward. Nearly spilling out of the chair.
A free spirit. That’s what he’d told himself. Had helped him find his passion in photography and moved on. Or maybe afraid she’d up the corporate wife of a company man.
He let the photo fall. It tumbled end over end and was gone.
Like Janice.
He blinked away tears.
His vision cleared. The photos were gone. Like they’d never been there. The white lace tablecloth—one of their few indulgences—lay smoothly over the small table, covering its gouged surface. Four second-hand chairs positioned around it. Four place settings from a set his parents had bought them. His photography equipment, usually scattered across the table, stacked on the shelves.
Just how he and Shelly had left it after preparing the room for dinner with Brian’s parents. But the fight—
—make you happy?—
—you know what?—
Right here. This room. The epicentre of it all. Maybe it was the booze, but he could swear he felt that vibration in his chest. Could see the ripples of the shattered air. Like reminders demanding he—
—must respect—
—face what he’d done.
Brian stood. Unsteady legs heaved him toward the door.
This was on Shelly. He’d always been up front about it. He wanted kids. And she’d never said no. Even when he proposed. Right there in the airport after a year away. Snapped the pic and waited until she turned to grab her bags so he could drop to one knee. She’d said yes. No conditions. Nothing about not wanting kids. Never talked about what they’d have to—
—balance—
—trade-off to be together. But when he’d talk about kids, she’d start some fight. Turn it back on him.
Stumbling out of the room. Nausea spinning his head. That déjà vu of doing this a thousand times already. He slammed the dining room door. A cloud of flies buzzed into the air from the reeking pizza boxes and Chinese food cartons littering the small kitchen’s counter. Under his feet, paperwork slid across the peeling linoleum floor. Forms from the hospital—green from legal, pink from administration, yellow from finance. Receipts from the funeral home. Copies of police reports.
—did you know—
He didn’t know why the detective who’d told him Shelly had been killed wanted him to come to the station again. A few more questions, she’d said.
An hour later, Brian had entered a small storage room. Haphazard piles of photo albums, clothing, books, toys, envelopes yellow with age covered a desk and spilled onto the floor. He recognized the handwriting on some of the envelopes.
His handwriting.
An instant of confusion. Then panic.
The detective put it together. “Did you know the driver of the other car?” she asked. “Her name was Janice Wheeler.”
A nine-year-old memory slammed forward in his mind: One night at Camp McDonald, out in that shack where everyone not a cabin duty gathered to drink some beer or smoke a little weed. Chrissy, who claimed to be Wiccan, performing some “magic love binding” spell. It had been Janice’s idea. Janice said Chrissy had read her palm and tarot. Been right about so many things. Nonsense, Brian knew, but he wanted into Janice’s pants.
Chrissy had cut small slices in his and Janice’s left palms. They pressed them together. He’d been too young and dumb to worry about disease. Too stoned to feel pain. Then Chrissy said some gibberish, made them repeat it, and announced: “You are bound for life and for love. You can fulfill each other’s happiness. Just make the wish.” They’d giggled at that, knowing they’d be naked together in ten minutes. But Chrissy added: “Just remember, there is a price and balance for everything. And if you believe in the love that binds you, you must respect the magic that binds your love.”
The detective pulled Brian from his memories. Told him Vancouver PD had had a hard time finding Ms. Wheeler’s next of kin. A few officers had gone through the car looking for anything to help. They’d found his name in an address book in her luggage, a photo of him in her wallet, a few letters from about eight years ago. They’d run his background. Confirmed he used to live at the address in her book. Did he know the driver? Did he know why Ms. Wheeler was on the same road as his wife that night?
—bet you wish I was gone—
—flaky bitch would come back—
—must respect—
—make you happy—
—just make the wish—
—it would—
It couldn’t be. To blame it on magic. Nonsense. Bullshit. But how to make sense of it? Of all the cars Shelly had passed, the chances that—
And, the detective also wanted to know, did Brian know the little boy in Janice’s car who’d been killed? She’d passed Brian a handful of photos. Then an evidence bag containing a British Columbia birth certificate. The father’s name a blank. But John Brian Wheeler had been born six months after Janice had moved out.
The boy had been premature, Brian told himself. Or Janice cheated on him—that’s why she left. But in those photos he saw his chin, his mom’s eyes, his dad’s ears. And a day later, the detective had called with the DNA results. He wasn’t just a widower, but had been a father for the last seven years.
And Shelly had killed him. Killed herself, killed Janice—
—there is a price and balance for everything—
The pantry. The bottle of rye on its side, dry and empty. He hurled it into a corner. It shattered. Jagged pieces joined the remains of other bottles. He grabbed the half-full bottle of Shelly’s favourite rum, poured it to the rim, downed a swallow.
He killed the kitchen lights and headed for the den. He couldn’t go to bed. Not their bed. Tomorrow, he had to meet with the funeral home director. Again. Two more burials. At least the director was cooperative. Told Brian that yes indeed Ms. Wheeler did have a nasty scar on her left palm. Looked recent, too.
Remains of picture frames he’d ripped from the walls cracked under his shoes. The best shots of his portfolio. Portraits of wealthy clients who’d paid well. Photos from the few vacations to Toronto or Mont Tremblant he and Shelly could afford. He couldn’t stand seeing them.
Outside, hookers lit by the neon tattoo parlour signs strolled.
Why didn’t Janice tell him she was pregnant? He would have supported her. He’d wanted to marry her. They would have—
“No,” he said, putting the heel of his hand against his forehead. Why did he continue thinking about the convoluted situation contained within that dream? He didn’t know a woman named Shelly, let alone having been married to her for several years. And yes of course he remembered Janice Wheeler. Quite fondly, in fact. Yet their relationship had begun and ended at Camp McDonald that one summer. He’d found her flights of fancy and laissez-faire attitude somehow endearing, an amusing—
—balance—
—counterpoint to his structured, career-focused life. As amazing as their sexual encounters had been, he’d drawn the line when she’d insisted that they engage in some kind of Wiccan magic nonsense. After a particularly heated fight, he had ended their relationship right then. It had made the reminder of the summe
r at Camp McDonald awkward, but he remained convinced it was for the best.
That fall, she must have transferred because he never saw her again on campus.
Since then, he had had a few promising relationships, but for a busy man like him maintaining a relationship proved to be one challenge too many. Soon, he hoped. Perhaps after this meeting tomorrow there would be the time to devote toward finding a woman he could love and raise children with.
Hoping that Janice—wherever she was—was living a good life since he honestly wished her no malice, he let a sip of the aged scotch—warm and smoky—slide down his throat.
Just one more drink, he told himself, to steady his nerves before turning in for the evening.
He punched the remote’s power button, but each channel showed black-white snow. It reminded him of some night. Some realization from when he’d been younger. Giving up, he placed the remote and the tumbler on the table beside him. Such an important meeting tomorrow. Perhaps the most important of his life.
The white-noise roar of static lulled him, causing him to drift . . .
It occurred to him that he couldn’t recall if he’d turned off the dining room light, but he was so comfortable . . .
Did you know the driver of the other car?
But It’s Not the End
Local police cars escorting it front and back, the battered white bus pulled into the school’s small parking lot. Once the trailing car was through, Hooper and Chen slid the razor wire-topped gate closed, shouting warnings in French and memorized Creole for the protestors to keep back.
Either the protestors’ screams and chanted slogans drowned out the officers’ words, or they didn’t care. They gripped the chain link, shaking it, yet with a half-hearted effort. Like they wanted to show anger, but not get any closer to what was on the bus.
And it was just one bus. In yesterday’s briefing, Hooper and the other officers had been told to expect several, maybe even ten. Word of the protesters must have reached the fenced-off ghetto at the edge of the city. So much for all that hype about making a statement.
The two police cars parked on the other side of the cracked, uneven lot, the cops staying inside the shade of their vehicles. Almost like they were also keeping their distance, letting the Canadians handle it. But now they’re Canadian, too, Hooper thought, locking the gate.
“Okay, this is it,” Captain Dorfeuille shouted over the bus’s sputtering engine. Standing at the doors to the school, he removed his helmet and began to tuck it under his right arm, then switched to his left. After brushing off the front of his uniform, Dorfeuille readjusted the strap of his prod, hanging from his left shoulder rather than in hand and at the ready. In the briefing, he’d said he wanted to appear non-threatening.
If he wanted to do that, Hooper had thought, he should wear a UN baby blue helmet—a sure sign you held no real power.
“Let’s look alive,” Dorfeuille said to Chen and Hooper as they moved to join the other dozen tactical gear-clad officers.
Hooper saw Chen grin. Their new captain probably didn’t realize some of the more sensitive bureaucrats back in Ottawa might consider it an insensitive remark.
The two men readied their own prods and joined one of the two lines of officers that formed a corridor from the bus to the school where Dorfeuille waited in front of an open set of double doors. The captain ran a hand across the stubble on his head, wiping away a sheen of sweat reflecting the hot tropical sun.
Outside the fence, the protesters had started to shout down each other. Taunts and insults in English, French, Creole, and Spanish. Catholics blamed Voodoo sects. Political groups denounced their rivals as American puppets. Rural groups claimed city dwellers were stealing relief supplies. And they all blamed the UN for something—the virus, the lack of aid in the first months, the occupiers and imperialists on their land. At least no one had set a car on fire.
Yet. It was only mid-morning. And in a couple of hours, this detail would be over and the squad would be back out there, trying to maintain some kind of order.
The door to the bus squeaked open and Hooper’s thumb moved to his prod’s safety. He hadn’t been this close since that summer two years ago.
The first of the things shambled down the steps to the black top and lurched forward, dressed in a clean blue polo shirt and black slacks. Make-up tried to make its flat, ashen skin seem more natural.
Hooper’s heart skipped and his vision narrowed—dark at the edges, colours vibrant at the centre. Ringing in his ears. Despite the tropical sun baking him in his dark blue fatigues, a chill gripped him.
Instincts screamed for him to run. Find a defensible position. Clear lines of fire. Multiple escape—
A bottle shattered somewhere behind him. One of the local cops yelled something in Creole.
More things followed the first off the bus.
On the other side of the fence, the shouts grew louder.
Hooper lifted his face shield a few inches and drew in slow, deeps breaths.
Next to Hooper, Chen asked: “You okay, Hoop?”
“Goddamned heat,” Hooper replied, lowering the shield as the first things passed him on their way to the doors. He’d rather have his own warm, stale breath reflected back at him than gag on their stink—formaldehyde, the greasy smell of stage make-up, rancid meat.
“Good morning,” Dorfeuille said in Caribbean-accented French once the things—about thirty—had exited the bus. “On behalf of the Canadian government, we welcome you. Today is an important day in the lives— Uh, important day for all Canadians, which you now are. The Prime Minister has asked—”
From somewhere in the crowd, a voice wheezed: “Can we move inside?” Deep and rich, with the accent of someone well educated, it was a voice Hooper recognized.
“Um, yes, of course.” Dorfeuille turned and led the things through the doors, flanked by the two lines of Special Response Officers.
The interior was cooler and it took Hooper a second for his eyes to adjust. Most of the lights didn’t work, the wall were in desperate need of a new coat of paint and only a handful of ceiling tiles remained. Just one of thousands of buildings in the newest Canadian province needing repair.
“Please remain within the yellow lines,” Dorfeuille said, walking backwards. A few of the things gawked at the yellow tape local cops had laid down on the floor earlier that morning. It gave Hooper and the other officers a metre-wide space between the tape and the wall. “We’re authorized to use force if you step outside them or disobey a command, but we do not want to do that.” Dorfeuille stopped about ten steps from another set of doors and held up his hands. The shambling group came to a halt.
“Before you go in, I remind you to have your identification cards ready. Also, an officer will accompany you at all times. Unfortunately, that includes when you are completing your ballot.”
To Hooper’s left, the same deep voice groaned: “No. That is unacceptable.” It was the living corpse of a short, pudgy man wearing a blue suit and red tie. Though Hooper had trouble telling the things apart, it seemed familiar.
A few of the things grunted their agreement. Some clapped.
“We have the same rights as . . .”—it drew in a wheezing breath—“everyone else.” It took a defiant step toward the doors. Others followed.
“Arrêtes!” Hooper said—Stop!—flicking off the safety and raising the prod. His heart thudded under his body armor.
Some things flinched away, but others followed what seemed like their leader.
“Hooper, don’t—” Dorfeuille sputtered. “Take it easy.” He addressed the thing. “Monsieur—”
“We will enter now,” it said. Almost all of the things were moving forward, forcing Dorfeuille back. “Our rights—”
One of the things—right in front of Hooper—stepped on the yellow tape. Hooper pulled the trigger.
Compressed air thudded as the spike flashed from the muzzle at the end of the prod, piercing the thing’s head. It collapsed, brittle bones
snapping as it struck the hard, tiled floor.
“Hooper! Damn it—!” Dorfeuille yelled, but moans and shrieks drowned him out. Wrecked bodies jostled in confusion and fear, colliding, some falling. The hall filled with clicks of disengaging safeties. Hooper—heart a jackhammer, mind tracking exit paths and the location of the other officers—considered dropping his prod and going for the submachine gun slung around his back. It got the job done two summers ago in Montreal when everyone thought it was the end. Back when you could shoot on sight. Back before they started talking, begging for their existence, demanding rights.
A few of the things broke away from the crowd and shuffled back down the hall, moving as quickly as their decayed limbs could carry them. Hooper had an instant to hope they’d go back to the fenced-in ghetto they’d been relocated to and stay there. But others were shuffling toward the officers, right up to the tape but not crossing it, curses coming in moans and croaks. Anger outweighed fear in their ruined features.
“Stay inside the lines! Please!” Dorfeuille shouted above the din. “Squad: back down.”
Hooper felt it all falling apart. Dorfeuille couldn’t control the situation. His skin colour and accent got him this command. He’d never done a tour here. And he’d been locked up safe and sound at police HQ during that summer.
The deep voice emerged from the crowd. “Be calm,” it said in French. “Don’t give them . . .”—it wheezed—“an excuse. Be calm.”
Tension drained from the things, but Hooper remained focused.
“Squad,” Dorfeuille repeated, “settle down.”
Prods lowered. Safeties clicked back on. Hooper, keeping his safety off, silently cursed the other dozen officers. Of all of them, only he and Chen had survived that summer. The abattoir stench that filled the streets on searing-hot days. The welcome sounds of gunfire meant support was nearby. Chewing and slurping and ripping from darkened store fronts. Checking your buddies for bite marks or the telltale black-green discolouration around a wound. They’d made it through by taking the fight to the things.
Until some coward like Dorfeuille at HQ said to hold fire; the situation had changed.