And Paul. She hasn’t seen him for nearly twenty years, although she calls him from time to time, just to hear his voice. Their father never forgave him for the accident that took Patrick’s life and Paul finally gave up trying to make amends.
“I don’t mind taking care of Dad,” Sarah says, taking the afghan from the chair and tucking it around her father. “I’ve never minded.” She watches the slight rise and fall of his chest. “Isn’t that what daughters are supposed to do?”
“Monica Marley doesn’t seem to think so. And what about our old pal Becca?” Addie says, motioning to the closed door across the hall. “I wonder if we’ll see any sign of her now that Caroline’s here, or if she’ll be like Monica, too wrapped up in her own life to spare any time for her mother.”
Becca. There. Addie’s said it. Becca, who’s been on Sarah’s mind ever since she heard Caroline was moving in. She’s been thinking about what she’ll do the first time she sees her after all these years. Imagining how awkward it will be sitting in the same dining room for the holiday dinners the kitchen prepares for the residents’ families. Wondering if Jack will come if he knows Becca might be there.
“I’ve been thinking the same thing. What’ll I say to her? And God only knows how Jack will react. I haven’t even told him Caroline’s in here yet.”
“It’s been two weeks. Don’t you think it’s time you did? And sooner, rather than later, I’d say. You don’t need Jack showing up and finding either one of those two here.”
“How’s she doing, anyway? Did she come out for the party?” Sarah asks, tipping her head toward Caroline’s door.
Addie nods. “She tries to act like she isn’t interested in what’s going on, but it’s impossible to slip anything past her. She’s as sharp as a tack.”
“I’m not sure she knows who I am. I’ve stopped at her door a few times and looked in but I don’t think she recognizes me.”
Addie takes off her glasses, puffs then wipes the lenses with the hem of her uniform.
“I don’t think she sees very well but she’s too stubborn to admit it.”
From the hallway, Cara pokes her head into the room. “Can you help me get Melvin settled? He wants to get into his pyjamas. Because of the birthday cake, he thinks he’s had his supper and now he wants to go to bed.”
Addie heads to the door. “Don’t forget what I said. You need to tell Jack that she’s here. You can’t put it off forever.”
Her father has fallen asleep in the recliner, his eyelids relaxed, fluttering lightly. Sarah sighs and sits down on his bed. She knows she should tell Jack about Caroline. She just can’t imagine what his reaction will be when he finds out there’s a chance he might come face to face with Rebecca Webb again. Sarah was so close to her once, the kind of friend she thought she might have forever.
Becca came into Sarah’s life just as unexpectedly as she left it. It had been a hot day in July, much like this one. Sarah was twelve, standing alone in the midway at the Ross Prairie summer fair, mad at Addie’s father for taking her friend home because she had chores to do. She was fingering the last ticket in her pocket, trying to decide if she should use it to ride by herself, when Becca appeared, grabbing her hand and pulling her through the gate of the Ferris wheel to where a skinny young man in grubby jeans was loading the cars. Before Sarah knew it, they were jerking to the top of the wheel.
“Cady didn’t want to come up again. Sometimes she’s such a pain,” Becca said, pointing at the small group of girls who were standing close to the gate. “Don’t you just love it up here? I think this is what a bird must feel like every time it leaves its nest.”
Sarah had never thought about it although she supposed it must be; birds could see the tops of leafy trees and brick chimneys and the spire of St. Paul’s tiny stone church any time they wanted to. They just had to lift their wings, flap, and set off. “It would be nice to be a bird,” she agreed.
After the ride, Becca marched up to Cady and announced they were off to watch the chuck-wagon races. Cady’s eyes grew wide when Becca linked her arm through Sarah’s and pulled her off toward the bleachers. Sarah didn’t know what to make of it; she’d seen the way Cady and her little group operated at school, casting one girl out while the others whispered and pointed at the poor girl standing alone on the playground. She knew she’d have to pay for Becca’s unexpected attention when they got back to school in September.
Sarah was used to long, lonely summers on her own. Addie lived on a farm and her mother always had so many jobs for Addie to do — picking vegetables and berries and helping with her little brother — that it was a welcome distraction when Sarah was invited to Becca’s house. Caroline drove into town to pick her up, chatting all the way back to the Webb farm, telling her how wonderful it was for Becca to have a new friend.
Over that summer, Becca and Sarah’s improbable friendship grew. Sarah spent many afternoons at the Webbs’, listening to records in Becca’s pretty room. Even though it wasn’t her birthday and for no apparent reason that Sarah could see, Becca’s parents bought her a brand new two-wheeled bicycle, which meant that Sarah could use Becca’s old one whenever she came. They biked down long country roads, and sometimes took a grass trail to a pasture near the river. The river was low that summer and there was a little sand ridge jutting into the water where they could walk and skip rocks or sit and splash their feet. Sometimes they brought a picnic — Kool-Aid and cookies, apples and cheese.
Her father is snoring lightly now and, down the hall, a television comes on. Caroline’s door opens and Neil Lewis, a lawyer from Locklin, walks out, carrying a briefcase. When he sees Sarah, he nods. Caroline is sitting in her wheelchair, head turned away, looking out the window. A crocheted shawl, the same crisp white as her hair, is draped around her shoulders, her thin legs and long feet visible in pantyhose and flat-heeled black patent shoes.
Sarah’s phone buzzes in her purse, a text message from Jack.
You still in town? Stop at Agro Centre.
She still has groceries to buy so she gets up, kisses her father’s forehead, and steps into the hallway. Just then, Caroline turns and looks at her. The skin of her once graceful neck hangs in loose folds and her deeply lined face, so pale and white, looks as though she’s over-dusted it with powder, the fragrant kind that used to sit on her dressing table. She squints then turns away with a look of resignation, realizing, perhaps, Sarah isn’t one of the nurses or aides.
She doesn’t recognize me, Sarah thinks. She has no idea who I am. Hesitantly, she walks into Caroline’s room and extends her hand. “Caroline? I thought I’d stop and say hello.”
Caroline’s looks at her blankly and blinks.
“It’s Sarah Bilyk. Sarah Coyle?”
Caroline peers at her more closely. A satisfied look slides over her face in the same way a child’s might when he receives his mother’s praise; there is a spark that brightens her eyes. “It is you! Sarah Coyle. Addie told me your father’s room was across the hall. I was wondering when I’d see you.”
Caroline reaches for her hand and gives Sarah a faint squeeze. Her hand is as dry as paper, her bony wrist so thin Sarah could easily circle it with her thumb and forefinger. And in that touch, there is something else. Sarah feels her heart well up as she senses the old connection, the feeling she used to get when she was around Caroline — that she was safe. That she mattered. That Caroline cared. That she was worthy of a mother’s love.
After she’s been to Family Foods, Sarah stops at the Co-op. She backs up through the gate and waits while young Matt Bewski throws open the tailgate and loads the mineral tub for the yearlings into the box. “Stay cool, Mrs. B.,” he says, swiping at a bead of sweat over his brow.
Sarah opens her window, letting in air only slightly less humid than the scorching heat inside her truck. “Thanks, Matt. Let’s hope this heat wave breaks soon and we get some rain.” There is a deafening squeal from a reluctant belt when she cranks the air to high and heads out of town.
/> Once she’s on the road, heading home, she remembers Addie’s parting words. She can’t put off telling Jack about Caroline forever. Addie is right. Of course, she is. She seems to have a sixth sense when it comes to knowing and doing the right thing. She’s always been that way.
Over the years, Sarah has tried to soften Jack’s opinion, hoping time might have changed his mind about Caroline, but whenever she mentions the Webbs he turns and walks away, refusing to talk about it. He can be incredibly pigheaded, as stubborn as his father sometimes, and all the talking in the world can’t convince him to change his mind. He can’t seem to let it go, blaming Caroline in every way for what happened that summer.
When Sarah gets home, Jack isn’t there, so she puts the milk and eggs in the fridge and takes a walk to the river with Misty. Talking about Rebecca has made her remember a particular April day, nearly forty-five years ago, when they were both thirteen years old.
As happened so often, Sarah was spending a lazy Saturday with Becca at the Webbs’ farm. They were biking and had stopped to tie their jackets around their waists, the midday sun beating down. Nearby, they could hear the rumble of the Makwa river. Before Sarah knew it, Becca was pedalling away and she raced to catch up with her, down the grass trail along the fence line toward the meadow, past the big elm tree with the stone pile beside it. Sarah called for Becca to wait up, but she just kept pedalling as though she didn’t hear her until, finally, she stopped at the top of the rise and waited until Sarah caught up.
Chunks of ice, some as big as pickup trucks, battered tree branches, and the splintered roof of a small shed churned by on the swollen river beyond the meadow. The sound was as deafening as the trains that rolled past Sarah’s house a couple times a day.
“I don’t think we should get any closer,” Sarah said. “Your mom just told us to stay away from the runoff water, even in the ditches. We’d be in big trouble if she even knew we were out here.”
“My mother worries about everything. What’s it going to hurt to take a look?” Becca ran across the meadow without looking back until she reached the top of the ravine and turned around to wave.
Sarah cupped her hands around her mouth and yelled, “Come back!”
The river was high, just behind her, and Becca took a small step backward. Before Sarah could call out again, Becca slipped and disappeared. Gone.
Sarah barrelled toward the river. One of Becca’s red rubber boots swirled by and she saw Becca’s head — that wet, fairy-tale hair — shooting down the river. If Becca screamed, Sarah didn’t hear her. At the bend, the river made a sharp turn where the meadow ended and a thick wall of maple trees began. There was no chance of following the river after that. If Becca didn’t get out of the water by then, she would be carried out to the lake, her body trapped under two feet of winter ice.
Sarah raced for the bend. Becca flailed her arms, struggling to keep her head above water. A tree trunk as big as a canoe shot past her and she tried to grab hold, but the current was too strong and too fast, and Becca’s head went under again.
Sarah reached the bank, slick with muck, panting now but not slowing down, jumping over branches and sticks and dodging a busted five-gallon pail. She stumbled over a black and rotting fence post lying in her path, reached for it, picked it up in one fluid motion, and kept running. Becca’s head again, her body churning around the bend, the angry current tossing her toward the riverbank where a large, gnarled oak branch was stuck against the twiggy maples.
“Becca! See there! Grab the branch!” Becca — her wide, staring eyes, her hair like a cape floating around her shoulders — battled against the current that threatened to suck her back toward the middle of the river. She was exhausted, Sarah could tell, yet she reached for the branch, trying to grab hold, hands grasping at air until she finally caught it and hung on.
When Sarah got close enough, she fell to her knees, dragging the post along under her arm, and flung herself close to the edge. Sarah grabbed the post with both hands and reached out over the edge of the bank as far as she could, plunging the post into the bone-numbingly cold water. “Hang on to the post. I’ll pull you in.”
Becca clung to the branch, eyes closed, body heaving. “I can’t.”
“You have to.” She was so close, just a few feet away, Sarah couldn’t lose her now.
Becca lunged for the post and caught it. Her sudden weight yanked Sarah in deeper and her arms seemed to twist in their sockets. Hand over hand, she hauled Becca in, both of them spitting icy, grey water. Sarah reached out a hand but Becca was too far away to grab hold and her hand slipped from the post. She thrashed, kicking and splashing, and was about to go under again. Sarah lurched forward and grabbed hold of the wide cape of her hair. With one mighty heave, she toppled backward, dragging Becca with her, up and out of the water.
They lay panting on the grass, Becca coughing up water, her lips the same metal grey as the river. Sarah untied her hooded jacket from her waist, slightly damp but not soaked, and draped it around Becca’s trembling shoulders. She wrapped her arms around her, cradling her head to her chest, their hearts thumping in tandem. “You’re all right now,” she whispered.
The sun was as high as it would be in the sky that day and it warmed them as they lay there awhile. Overhead, Sarah heard the melancholy honk of Canada geese and she looked up as a small flock flew by, headed north, a V like the black tip of an arrow against the clear and cloudless sky. The geese followed their leader, trusting in his judgment, as he fearlessly shouldered the wind, taking them home.
Sarah closes her eyes. She can almost hear the call of the geese, smell the fruity scent of Becca’s hair, feel it in her fist — the heft and weight of it — in that last desperate heave. She remembers every detail of that day, including the aftermath. Becca’s altered version of the truth when they were questioned about it: that it was Sarah’s idea to go. The blame that was laid at her feet. Eldon Webb’s fury and the doubt that lingered in Caroline’s eyes. She wonders now why she didn’t recognize that first bald-faced lie as a clue to Becca’s true nature. Becca hadn’t given a second thought to implicating Sarah and saving herself. Why was I so trusting, so easily manipulated into forgiving her?
And now, a thought she’d once harboured comes to mind. What if she hadn’t grabbed hold of Becca’s golden hair? What if she’d let the river sweep her away? How much different would their life — hers and Jack’s — have been if Becca had drowned in the river that day? Her bloated body found downriver, tangled among the twisted arms of the silver willows or discovered, months later, washed up on the shore of the lake.
That awful thought is something she’s kept all these years in the back of her mind, dangling there to torment her whenever she allowed herself to think about it. She used to imagine herself in a story where Jack was hers first and Becca hadn’t betrayed her. She knew it was wrong, wishing someone out of this world, but she can’t deny she used to think about it. Thinks it still, sometimes.
As much as she loved Becca, there were times she hated her, too.
Jack is in the office, at the computer, when she comes in. She’s surprised to find him in the house. Maybe it’s the heat. She’s noticed since he turned sixty he’s been coming in early more and more often, sometimes well before dark, and after he’s showered up he often asks her if she’d like to go for a drive, check the crops. Now, he swivels around in the office chair, pinches the bridge of his nose, as if to staunch whatever worry is creasing his brow, and leans back in the chair. He stretches out his legs, long and lean and nicely muscled in blue jeans the same size he wore when she married him, his stomach hard and tight, shoulders broad and strong. Except for his hair, which has gone completely grey, he hasn’t changed a bit. Her heart tilts a little at the sight of him.
“You get it?” he asks, referring to the mineral.
“It’s in the box.”
“How was the party?”
“I missed it. There was a head-on between a van and a motor home on the highw
ay. I was held up over an hour. Allison and Connor were gone before I got there.”
“She called. Thought you’d be home by now.”
“I had a few stops after I left Dad. What are you doing in the office at this time of day?”
“Checking the market. Thinking of selling the calves this fall. Might not be enough hay and the prices are decent.” He clicked the mouse, then stood up and sighed. “Sooner I move those young calves, the better. Found the second one. Shorty and me were out on the quads and we came across it, and another of his, both of them torn apart worse than the one you found. We figured coyotes, but talking to Natural Resources, they say it’s more likely a wolf. A lone male, cast out of the pack. Not usual for it to come this far out of the mountain, though.”
“What are you going to do?”
“We had our rifles, but we didn’t see it.”
Sarah shudders. She is afraid of Jack’s rifle, with good reason. If her father hadn’t taught her brothers to shoot, Patrick would still be alive. When Sarah and Jack were first married, she told him she didn’t want a gun in the house. He promised to keep it locked safely away in the gun cabinet, explaining he used it only to shoot animals that threatened their livelihood in some way. He took her out to the pasture once to show her how to use it in the event there was ever a time he might not be around to protect her or the girls. She cocked it and loaded it the way he explained and then pulled the trigger reluctantly, firing off in the distance at nothing in particular, hoping she never needed to aim it at any living thing.
They walk to the kitchen and Sarah pulls a can of coffee from a grocery bag and puts it in the pantry. “I hate to think there’s a wolf nearby, prowling around.”
Jack piles four boxes of apple juice next to the coffee. “Better not be walking alone. Misty would try to protect you, but she’d be no match. Stay in the yard until we hunt him down.”
A Strange Kind of Comfort Page 7