No Call Too Small

by Oscar Martens

  They begin to part the long grass around me, and it takes me a minute to realize they’re looking for my long-lost nose, the little nub of flesh long since passed through the tract of a pit bull. I pull the bloody pad away to show them.

  —This is his blood. I’m fine.

  At intake, my interviewer feebly danced around questions both obvious and forbidden. I had my bachelor’s, criminology courses out of the Justice Institute, and three years doing volunteer security work at the Jazz Fest. I buried everyone else on the POPAT with the fastest run in my group. He praised my achievements, but I could tell there was more he wanted to ask.

  —Do you think you would be comfortable here?

  I took my time answering, rooting through my pockets for a Kleenex to wipe my leaky nose hole.

  —Do you think I’d be comfortable anywhere?

  The class photo was fantastic, all the pretty boys and girls, then me, the monster at the end of the row, showing more teeth than usual.

  I sit in the mud with a bloody gauze pad in my hand, two paramedics standing on either side of me. Flashing lights imply urgency, but with the biker gone, there’s no reason to move quickly, no reason to move at all.

  —So, hit-and-run?

  I look up at her, angry that she’s tipped the balance of silence with her question. Darren drapes a red fleece blanket around me while they both wait for my words, truth from an officer of the law. Clearly there was some hitting and some running. Darren has a bright-orange fauxhawk and I wonder how many times he’s been asked by supervisors to switch to a more conventional look. Would it be implied, hinted at, to avoid a harassment issue? How many unconscious people would come to, see his head, and wonder if they were hallucinating? I have no obligation to answer their questions, no reason to feel uncomfortable. It doesn’t really matter what happened here, because I’ll be the one asking the questions.

  —I’ll be the one asking the questions.

  —Okay, chief, can we help you up at least?

  —I’m good.

  She looks at her partner, shrugs, and starts to pack up her gear. When they’re gone, I call for the CSU, and turn up the heat in the car. Another cruiser with flashers on comes roaring over the crest of the hill. Arnot slows, then pulls alongside, our cars almost touching.

  —Angelo called my cell. He wanted me to come around and make sure you were okay. You’re okay, right? He said you guys stumbled onto a pretty nasty hit-and-run. It was a hit-and-run, right? You gonna say anything, Face?

  I stare at him for a few seconds, then roll up the window. Arnot yells at the glass while I shield my face with my hand.

  —Clement has a family, you know!

  Arnot turns his car around and speeds off. In all this time there hasn’t been a single civilian car in or out of the park, as if the universe is shutting out any distractions or contaminants at the scene. The crow is screeching again. I don’t know what he’s saying, but I’m pretty sure that later in the day he’ll share it with one or two thousand of his friends as they start their daily migration west over Burnaby. Perhaps it will be a simple story about a man putting a yellow marker next to a bottle in the bush.

  THE SCHADENFREUDE RAIL

  YOU DON’T NEED 350 HORSE TO TOW A SKI boat, but Reynold still enjoys the show of excess, the big Dodge Ram roaring up the ramp, the matching boat and trailer sucked from the water in seconds. Farah turns away from his explanation of Hemi technology, tracking a passing gull. They both look back to the truck when the door opens and the young sunburnt owner swings down from the cab and swaggers down the slope to inspect the dripping rig, barely glancing at the gawkers on the Schadenfreude Rail. At 40K for the truck and more for the boat, Reynold wonders where a guy like that finds the money. Sure, you can make forty bucks an hour swinging a hammer but this kid looks like he’s barely out of high school. More likely he’s a smug little gangster growing weed in a mould-filled basement, or running a few phone-sex lines, drawing out middle-aged ejaculate in dark rooms across the city. If the shiny ski boat is Dad’s, it’s an odd choice for an old man. The truck has those ram stencils over the taillights, and it looks like the winch wire’s never been off the drum. Swagger’s the type who will brag about max payload but won’t help a friend move because it might scratch the box. Farah used to giggle as Reynold gutted sheeple, but once again he is staring at the back of her head. She shrugs off his hand when he lays it lightly on her shoulder.

  Reynold and Farah watch with twenty others as More Money Than Brains attempts to back up his trailer. He overshoots to each side, taking it too fast, skidding to a stop, then pulling forward to straighten the trailer before his next botched attempt. He weaves like a drunk down to the waterline, his wife calling out directions and flashing a baffling collection of hand signals that he ignores, until the trailer rests at forty-five degrees to the water’s edge. The rail crowd responds with murmured criticism and shaking heads. Farah once enjoyed Reynold’s low, running commentary on the undeserving rich, the toys they can barely operate, their failure to live magazine dreams. The boaters may see envy when they look up, but the rail crowd is here to watch things go wrong, just like NASCAR.

  Tattoo entertains his girlfriends in a sleek white Four Winns cruiser. He wears a catalogue of body-ink clichés: barbed wire, tribal signs, dragons, and an eagle with a hint of Third Reich. A Harley blasts out the mouth of a flaming skull. It’s not actually written on his body, but it’s clear he would like people to believe he’s a fierce young rebel who lives to ride and rides to live. The engine is off, and they don’t seem hurried or impatient. Reynold had assumed they were waiting for another, but maybe the plan is to spend their time tied to the dock, looking good and being envied from a distance by gawking fools. Tiny triangles of fabric cover the female parts that must be covered, but everything else is on display. Delusions about the local climate can be indulged at the dock, but out on the water, at speed, they’ll be cold. California is still a thousand klicks to the south.

  It isn’t hard to spot the straggler crossing the parking lot, lookin’ so gangsta, straight from the rough, gritty streets of Burnaby. Cap turned backwards, heavy gold chain, baggy pants, crisp Timberlands—buddy missed it by a decade, yo. He packs beer onto the boat, inexplicably proud of his beverages, how many will be consumed, how quickly, the likely results. They cast off their lines and idle out into the bay, oblivious to the posts that mark the edge of the channel. Tattoo wants to go where there are no other boats, taking a sharp turn to starboard without considering why there are no other boats. With the bow stuck in the mud, he gives it full throttle, as though that will somehow save them, push them through this. The prop dredges mud, and the rail crowd ponders his thought process, what little there may be. It’s a few minutes of angry confusion before Tattoo realizes he can simply put it in reverse and back out the way he came. He wanted to go east very badly, right over the mud flats, but the mud didn’t care where he wanted to go. In the interest of keeping the body count down, someone should idle alongside and pull the keys from his dash. He’s just too dumb to run a boat. Couples chatter, point, and smirk, cheered that new heights in stupid have been reached so early in the day, with hours of fun to go.

  Farah pulls back slightly and studies the people on the rail now, not just the boaters. Someone took a wrong turn and got stuck in the mud, an easy mistake, especially for someone not familiar with the area. Everything east of the markers goes dry in low tide, but if you were inexperienced you might not know this. Full throttle was the wrong reaction, but there was no damage to the boat or the passengers, and the situation was quickly resolved. You’d never guess that from the reaction on the rail. A drop of blood falls in the water and sharks circle. Reynold makes her face sag. Close to him she feels extreme gravity, a black hole that breaks her down. The light spirit that is sucked into his vortex has no effect on his mood. Positive energy is simply destroyed. She cringes as he stakes out the next target in his teardown universe.

  Farah spends too much time t
hinking about men who aren’t Reynold, specifically Amalio, her olive-skinned, curly-haired coworker, who lacks any of the resentment one might find appropriate or understandable coming from an under-moneyed, over-educated, thirty-nine-year-old barista. Every day he faces Jabba, a giant, ranting complaint dispenser, with no other thought than the alleviation of her suffering. Even as she drones on about coffee that is too hot or not hot enough, and flecks of spittle alight on the counter, someone else’s beverage, and Amalio from head to waist, there is nothing that looks like anger or impatience on his face. Only he can see inside, past her folds of fat, to the hurt that makes her what she is, and calm her with a look that says, This isn’t really about coffee, is it? It’s about you. The compassionate Buddha smiles even as his eyes, nose and mouth are potentially infected with whatever might travel on Jabba’s spit.

  When Amalio cleans the espresso machine, nothing else exists. Every two hours he scrubs old oils out of the porta-filter, cleans the steam wand, and wipes down the entire unit with the gentle grace of a Japanese tea ceremony. The wonky bottom drawer that she must jerk, twist, and pummel, easily complies with his touch, his hands that feel what the drawer needs in order to open.

  Farah prays for every customer to leave. In the afternoons, and sometimes midmorning, the place clears out, and Amalio’s focus turns to her in a surge of energy that runs up and down her spine, making her feel lighter and taller. The first time he touched her she was bent over, wrestling with the filter drawer, and he tapped the small of her back to let her know he was passing behind her. Sometimes at the punch line of a joke, he’ll touch her forearm. Last week he didn’t predict that Reynold would forget her birthday, but he was ready with a paper crown and a cupcake with an inch of pink icing. He stood behind her, adjusting the size of the crown, close enough to kiss the back of her neck. Then he spent three minutes fussing over her latte, brushing her portrait into the surface.

  The accident told Farah exactly nothing. Three months ago, bright lights lit up the right side of her car as she passed through the intersection of Austin and Schoolhouse, just before a drunk driver T-boned her. Post-accident, post-airbag, she expected a brief window of clarity regarding the direction of her life. A sudden death avoided was supposed to transform your thinking, so she waited patiently for her revelation while the traffic light cycled through its colours and the drunk made a slow-speed getaway with his caved front end and wobbly wheel.

  She started to feel the abrasions on her face from the airbag about the same time she realized she was alone and no traffic was coming from either direction. Her teeth hurt as if they had been slammed together. She had learned how jarring it could be when expected direction did not match actual direction, but nothing was revealed other than the indifference of her fellow man. She was waiting for a message, but she already knew what she wanted it to be: leave Reynold. She needed a good reason, and a ground-shaking shift in all her assumptions should have resulted from the crash, but leaving Reynold was no revelation. It was an item on a to-do list, another chore she had avoided for over a year.

  Reynold must go because Amalio never tells her not to use her hands so much when she’s telling a story. Because Amalio doesn’t caution her against telling strangers too much personal information. Because Amalio does not insist on approving her wardrobe before she leaves the house for a drink with friends, or criticize the way she stacks dirty dishes, or belittle her job. Once, there was a list of things she liked about Reynold, but now, watching him in profile as he sneers at another hapless boater, she can’t remember one.

  Reynold resents how Farah’s fluctuating blood-sugar levels transform her from fluffy kitten to claws-out street cat. She begins to tow him toward Larry’s Fish and Chips because food intake must happen now, but apparently there’s still time to bend down and pet a mini-Labradoodle. The owner has dreads halfway down his back and wears mismatched athletic clothes and a pair of stinking Jesus sandals. Dogs suck. They’re stupid, loud, and smelly. People buy them to get the protection, loyalty, and obedience they can’t get from other people. Reynold wonders what kind of man has a dog the size of a rat. If a man has to have a dog, it better be higher than knee level. Farah seems to be flirting with this loser, sweet with him when she’d be blood-sugar grumpy if it were just Reynold.

  Farah would love a dog like this, but of course that wouldn’t be allowed by He Who Controls Everything. And the dog loves Farah, licking salt off her hands, wagging his tail, putting his paws up on her knees. Dogs just love, that’s what they do, and if you ran into a bear on the trail your dog would go after it, defend you to the death. Nothing brings strangers together faster than a friendly, happy dog. The hippy is not her type, but it’s interesting how anyone picked at random from the crowd is usually a lot nicer than her boyfriend.

  Reynold sees Dreads glance down at Farah’s chest, the two of them acting as if he isn’t even there, as if he doesn’t exist. He grabs her arm and drags her away, Dreads concerned but rooted. She shakes off his grip and checks for bruises as they silently walk to Larry’s. He wishes she’d stop being so dramatic.

  Larry’s is packed. Why don’t they hire more cooks? Was he surprised by a crowd showing up at the park on a hot, sunny Saturday? With twenty numbers to go before Reynold’s comes up, it’s obvious Larry has enough business to hire another person or two, unless he’s too greedy, anxious to squeeze every dime out of the place. Farah won’t stop examining her bruise, oblivious to everything else. She seems reluctant to pay, pulling out her purse only when Reynold stuffs his hands in his pockets and stares at her. Being cheap seems odd for someone who’s getting a big fat insurance cheque. No doubt she thinks she earned that money. Reynold takes a sip of his drink and sets it back down on the counter.

  —This is Pepsi. I ordered Coke.

  —Coke, Pepsi, same difference, right?

  —Pepsi is not Coke.

  Farah should have seen this coming, because it happens often enough. A dozen hungry people in line behind them will no doubt appreciate this age-old conflict between the duelling colas. Reynold lectures, building his rage as Larry appears at the takeout window. Farah takes a half step away from them, then another, each step feeling better than the last. Away from the window she is able to detach from this as Reynold raises his arms and Larry starts jabbing the air with his finger. Reynold eventually rejoins Farah at the rail without any food from Larry’s. He’s taken a principled stand, and she’s ready to collapse from hunger.

  —Thanks for your support back there.

  —Black holes don’t need support.

  —What?

  —Nothing.

  Amalio ascended to god-like status for three reasons. First, he noticed right away, from Farah’s posture at the counter, that the accident had knocked her out of alignment, twisted and torqued her joints and muscles, disrupting her equilibrium. Second, he was willing to do something about it. Third, what he did was extremely effective. Minutes after Farah complained about her stiff neck, he pressed his thumb hard into the muscle knot, making her cry out. No customers were there to hear, so he dug in a second time and she nearly fell to her knees. The relief that followed the initial pain proved he was hitting the spot. He thought it might be better if he could get her up against the wall to give her more support, so she leaned against the doorframe of the washroom as he took another run at it. He didn’t have to look or fumble around. He knew exactly where the tension was and he laid into it. Every few hours, for the next few days, they waited for the café to empty.

  A brain-dead woman is waiting for her husband to position their launched boat next to where she stands on the dock. The engine won’t start because the mixture’s too rich, and he’s drifting down on an unoccupied boat. Brain Dead doesn’t seem to realize how things are coming together. All she needs to do is step onto the empty boat and fend off their boat so the hulls won’t get scratched. He can’t do it because he’s at the controls, trying to get the engine started. Brain Dead could save the day, fending off the
boat and guiding it to an empty spot, but she just stands there, as useful as a post—less useful … at least you can tie something to a post. Sure, not everyone has nautical skills, but this one fails at the lowest level of common sense.

  Now Speedy’s coming in too fast, trying to impress the crowd with his approach, but the breeze pushes him off course and he hits the rollers of his trailer at a bad angle. The boat flies up the trailer right to the winch, but it’s off-centre with a ten-degree list. The boat is hooked on the trailer at the stern, so he can’t power it off using the engine, and his helpers seem unable to push it off. All three of them stare at it as if their combined concentration could form some kind of mental tractor beam that would move their boat into position. Meanwhile, on the crest of the slope, others wait to launch. It gets better. The driver of the truck backs up to refloat the boat, dropping the trailer off the cement ridge at the end of the ramp. He moves forward again, and the ridge acts like a set of tire chocks. He guns it and the wheels start spinning, more gas, more spinning. It says 4WD on the side of the truck, but he must not have thought to engage it. He can’t back up and take a run at it, because that will launch the boat into the air when it pops up over the ridge and possibly damage the trailer. Another lengthy stand-and-stare session for Speedy and the gang.

  Farah has hope for the North River workboat that’s heading for the ramp. Crab traps and mounted fishing-rod holders suggest competence. The wife backed the trailer down earlier with minimum fuss, slow but straight down to the water. He comes in at a steady speed, crabs his approach angle to adjust for the wind, straightens at the last second, and slides smoothly up the rollers, stopping about a foot from the winch. The wife’s ready with the hook, snapping it in before the boat can backslide and winching it to the rubber stopper. A converted cynic on the rail claps. Reynold is silenced while he searches for the error, hoping the guy will forget to tilt the motor forward before dragging the boat out of the water. It’s a ten-out-of-ten operation and Reynold has nothing to say.