No Call Too Small

by Oscar Martens

  Gibson stares at the belt full of gadgets while the cop looks at the licence and registration and rambles on about the complaints. Local residents are upset about a red car of this make spewing blue smoke and spilling gas on the road. His partner gets on his knees to check for a leak but finds nothing. They want to verify the exhaust pipe discharge, but despite ten seconds of cranking, Gibson’s car will not start.

  Gibson points to the cooler as the most likely source of the “leak.” When the ice melted, the water leaked out through the drainage cap onto the rug, through rusted holes, then onto the road. The police seem satisfied and happy to clear up the misunderstanding in a way that will not involve paperwork. They have responded to a concern, stopped a suspect, investigated complaints, and now it’s time to move on. Gibson stares at the cracked section of curb between his feet. The fender takes his weight without falling off. The police car, back to drab running lights, rolls slowly away toward some other area of crisis.

  He walks down to the beach, toward a group of women playing volleyball. The blonde one fails to block a spike and the ball rolls to him. He picks it up and notices sand sticking to the ball where it glanced against her sweaty arm. He stares at it until the powerfully beautiful player asks for the ball. She gives him an amused once-over and he wonders what she must think of him, but it doesn’t really matter. Razi lives nearby. She’ll take him in and kiss him, or she’ll take a peek through the peephole and wait for him to leave, or she’ll look dumbly at the shabby-looking stranger on her doorstep. She owes him nothing, having taken him this far.

  Gibson takes his socks and shoes off and works his feet into the sand. He watches the game, propped up on his elbows. He wills the blonde to turn so he can see her face again, beaming the command through the back of her head. She leaps up, arches her back, and spikes the ball just inside the line. She turns then, but only to check if someone, anyone, has seen it.

  BREAKING ON THE WHEEL

  AT NIGHT DANA CAN SEE WINNIPEG FROM the top of the Ferris wheel, not the actual buildings but light reflected off a ceiling of clouds. During the day she can see for miles, and each time she reaches the top, she strains to delay her descent toward the mediocrity of ground level, the gas station, her father standing at the controls, yelling at her to smile.

  Smiling is important, because if people see her smiling and realize how much fun it is, everyone will want to take a ride. Dana is the only one riding, just like yesterday and the day before. When this thing gets going she can give up her seat to a paying customer. She doesn’t mind helping, but she wonders how long it will be before people realize how much fun it is.

  There’s a brown crust of burned corn forming on the bottom of the pot. Dana can’t smell it, but she knows she forgot to turn the heat down before she came out to help her father. It would take two minutes to run back to the house, turn it down, and run back, but Bob’s not interested.

  —Let it burn. We have a business to run.

  She’s slung to the top again, while her mother sits in the kitchen, every curtain in the house drawn closed.

  ON SATURDAY, A SILVER BMW came in for gas and an oil check. The mother seemed so uncomfortable touching anything that was dirty or had the potential to be dirty that Bob did it all for her, even though his was a self-serve station. Her child shyly approached the Ferris wheel and Dana could tell, even from a distance, that the girl was about her age. If she had been on the ground, she might have been able to make a new friend.

  Her tank full, the mother went to retrieve her child with Bob close behind. She looked at the wheel the same way she had looked at the gas pump: dirty or potentially dirty. Bob noticed the sharp crease in her pants and thought how strange it was that some clothes looked expensive and others didn’t, even though they were often made of the same stuff.

  —Five bucks.

  The mother was startled. She grabbed her girl by the shoulder and directed her toward the car.

  —No, two fifty. Five bucks for you and the kid.

  He stood directly between them and the car, his body stiff, but did not pursue her when she guided her child around him. From her seat, Dana saw them group together briefly, then split apart. The girl glanced back at Dana, following the circle she cut in the air.

  BOB THOUGHT HE KNEW WHAT he needed to know about business, but over the past eight months he’s been learning a whole lot more. Most people would rather pull over for gas at the intersection of 332 and the Trans-Canada. Most people would rather do that than turn right on a service-road exit and follow that for half a mile until they got to Bob Hascall’s gas station, locally owned and operated. They’d rather go to the Esso and duck into Tim Hortons to get a couple of maple-dipped donuts, or maybe a soup and sandwich, on their way to hell and gone.

  The Esso hasn’t been there long, but it sure has been a punch in the guts for Bob. He’s taken to advertising as a way of regaining lost business. There’s a spray-painted banner that reads CHEAP GAS on a plywood sheet, propped up in the ditch just before the turnoff. For the past three weeks, just after closing, he’s been edging the sign closer to the road. It’s halfway into the shoulder now, almost close enough to make contact with traffic. Below CHEAP GAS, in slightly smaller letters, Bob has added FUN FARE.

  ON SUNDAY, A GREEN VAN skidded to a stop and when the sliding door opened, a bunch of teenagers jumped out. They were dressed in shorts, and Dana could see an inflated inner tube in the back along with a couple of coolers. Lake Winnipeg, she guessed, or maybe a party on the riverbank.

  The loud one, red-haired and skinny, was chasing the fat one with a can that squirted dry chemical goo. The driver blasted the horn while the two were in front, wrestling for control of the can. It looked like the same kind of fun promised in beer commercials. Not everyone was beautiful, but there was a lot of laughing and screaming and everyone was in on it. The skinny one became winded from his pursuit and bent over with his hands on his knees, gasping for air. In a sideways glance he caught sight of Dana on her metal bench. She was smiling as instructed but he didn’t smile back. He shielded his eyes with his hand to see her more clearly. Her smile was now on maximum voltage, her teeth hurting from the pressure, her cheeks beginning to ache.

  Silently she was thinking, FUN, FUN, FUN, FUN, hoping the kids would pick up her vibe. Everyone looked at her and fell silent. The sight of her had broken their fun. Dana smiled harder. One of the girls tugged the arm of the skinny one, who eventually turned back to the van. As they drove away, Dana looked down between her feet and felt slightly ill. She had power but it was a horrible power, the power to drive people away. She wished the mounts of the wheel would break so she could roll out of the yard, over the road, into the wheat field, the wheel acting like a giant swather, stalks of grain pulled up and sent flying.

  THE CORN BURNS WHILE DORIS sits at the table in a darkened kitchen, using up oxygen, taking up space, being crushed by the weight of everyday events. She scrapes together the strength to stand, walks over to the cupboard and grabs two cans, two possible directions for dessert: a can of peaches or a can of pineapple. Peaches or pineapple. Peaches are nice. Pineapple is also nice. They’re both nice. They’re both in cans. And the cans are the same size.

  The horrid smell of the corn is noted but not connected to herself or any action she might take. After lunch Dana used “supper” as many times as she could in her monologue to Doris, hoping her mother would not try to serve Rice Krispies again.

  The old Mom is held in the yellow plastic recipe box. When Dana wants to visit her mother as she used to be, she reads the notes written next to recipes: “Double this if Bill is coming over!!” or “Don’t serve if Susan is coming. She can’t digest raw cucumbers!” Every comment came with a joy that could not be expressed in mere words. Exclamation marks and smiley faces marked every instance of superfluous glee.

  IT ARRIVED ON THE BACK of a flatbed truck. Someone was going to throw it away. Bob thought throwing away working machinery was like throwing away money. Some lo
w-life operator couldn’t make a go of it, but being a lowlife, he probably lacked the necessary work ethic.

  The driver paused after he had laid down the last beam and secured the hiab on the back of his truck. The area where the picnic bench used to be was covered in metal frames and girders.

  —You want some help putting this thing together? I’ve got a buddy who’s done stuff like this a couple of times before.

  —No. You’ve been paid. You can go.

  After the driver left, Bob explained to Dana that organization was the key to success in any project. They spent hours flipping beams end for end, looking at the joints, rearranging the frames, before he located a good starting point. By that time Dana’s school shirt had a band of grease smeared across it, but luckily Bob was focused on other things.

  The first joint turned out to be “sticky.” Bob started with a socket wrench and some Liquid Wrench, noodling around for almost half an hour, spraying the joint, testing it with the wrench. He sent Dana for the vise grip and a pry bar. Later he asked for the sledgehammer. He hammered on the pin while Dana held it straight, using all her strength, the vibrations from each blow working their way through her hands, to her elbows and shoulders.

  The scientific method finally blew apart and he began to rage on the joint, beating it to death with the sledge. Sparks flew off the metal as Dana backed away from Bob’s sweat and swears. All she wanted to do was go back inside, away from him, away from the mosquitoes that seemed to be frenzied by his heavy breathing. Toward nine p.m. she thought she could edge away, back to the comfort of the house in time for Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but he spotted her going AWOL and ordered her back, if only to be witness to his misery.

  A full night’s sleep didn’t make him any smarter. He needed Bill.

  THEY TAKE THEIR FIRST CUSTOMERS on Monday. The boy’s out of the pickup before it stops. His grandfather trails behind. He runs to Bob’s side and watches Dana go round and round. Bob, sensing a sale, pushes the throttle down on the coughing engine, and a trail of black smoke comes out the stack. The wheel is now turning at top speed. Grandpa returns to the truck and wipes splattered bugs from the windshield with a very dirty squeegee, expecting the boy to follow, but sometimes it’s easier to give in to the child’s demands, and how could he not, after seeing the boy’s face.

  They ride in the car just ahead of Dana. After a couple of turns the boy looks back, and once he has started he can’t stop. She smiles at the back of his head, ready for the next chance to show him how much fun she is having. Her power takes away a little joy every time he turns around. First he looks uncertain, then concerned. After a few more turns he looks like he is going to cry. Grandpa doesn’t notice the boy’s rigid grip on the handlebar. Bob props his cheeks up with his index fingers to remind Dana, but it’s too late for charms. Her power has broken the boy. They’ll soon go, and they won’t be back.

  BILL CAME OVER THE MORNING after Bob’s tantrum. It was early, before Dana had even started breakfast, and she came out to greet him. There was still dew on the grass, but the birds had been singing for hours. He smiled and put his hand on her shoulder as they walked around the pile of beams and girders. She showed him the joint that had finished off Bob’s patience. Bill clucked his disapproval as his fingers traced over stripped threads, dents, bright metal exposed where paint had chipped off. He winced at the bent struts that led to the hub. His voice was only loud enough to be heard above the birds. She leaned closer to catch every soft word.

  Bill coaxed and jiggled, welded and greased until the thing started to take shape. Bob came out after breakfast and they worked silently until they ran out of sun. They stopped briefly for the food trays Dana brought, then continued working by the headlights of Bill’s truck.

  The next morning, Bob tied one of the stays to his trailer hook and slowly pulled the thing up. He left the truck in park and walked to where Bill was adjusting the far stay.

  —You can go now, Bill.

  —Why don’t I stick around until we’re sure she runs?

  —You’re not getting a cut. Just ’cause you helped put a few joints together doesn’t mean you’re entitled to anything.

  —I don’t …

  —Don’t think you’re going to worm in on my business. I knew you were going to pull something like this. Just go.

  Bill shook his head as he hefted his tools and his welder into the back of the truck. He winked at Dana and cocked his head for her to follow. He had something for her in the glove compartment.

  —And don’t be giving her any more stuff. She has enough stuff.

  Bill wheeled around and nodded to Bob while he held his cupped hand behind his back. Dana took the carved wooden bird and slipped it into her pocket before her father could approach. Bill drove off and winked at Dana as she waved.

  THE MAN WHO STARED AT her on Tuesday had a careful, deliberate manner. He grasped the nozzle firmly, grounded the metal against the edge of the fill pipe and pushed it in slowly until the rubber spill stopper was snug. He noticed Dana as the tank filled, and after he paid Bob he walked to the foot of the wheel to watch her. She smiled but thought it was doomed. Why would a grown man want to go on a Ferris wheel? She smiled anyway. She wondered if she was too ugly to make other people smile. Why else would no one smile back when they looked up at her, having so much fun, all through the skin-frying day and into the mosquito-ridden night?

  When she was close to the ground he mouthed the words, Are you okay? She nodded enthusiastically. It seemed possible that her classmates were enduring hellish summers of their own, shovelling mountains of pig manure or stringing barbed wire along fence posts. Possible but not likely. She wanted him to go so he could remember her as the fun-loving smiling girl. She wanted him to go because she couldn’t hold back the tears much longer.

  LIGHTNING STRIKES AND SHE COUNTS off the miles. Six, seven, eight, nine … it’s still a long way off. After an hour of watching the sky grow dark, her father will no longer be able to ignore the storm. In the next two turns or so, the wheel will slow and he will let her off. By the end of five turns, that will be it. Ten turns. Twenty-five turns and another lightning strike, six seconds away. At forty-seven turns her count drifts off, but then the wheel slows and stops just short of the point where she can easily get off. Bob runs to the house and comes back with her clear plastic rain cape. He throws it up to her and starts up the wheel again.

  Hard rain turns to hail. The engine cuts out, runs for a bit, then dies completely. Bob runs to the station for a bucket of diesel. Inevitably, the wheel stops with Dana at the highest point. Without the noise and vibration from the engine, she can feel the whole thing twist in the gusts. Rickety. The stays look thin as they go tight then slack with the wind. She considers two deaths: one quick and hot, the other involving a friend from school seeing this.

  If she could scream loud enough, maybe Mom would get off the chair. Maybe she’d make the trip a hundred miles from the chair to the window to lift her hundred-pound arms and part the curtain. The sight of her girl on a giant lightning magnet might compel her to grab a coat from the hook and come outside to scream at Bob. Would he listen to her? Would he see her? Would he even understand what was wrong?

  Dana closes her eyes. She knows she wouldn’t see or hear the strike, but she would see the charge leader, the tiny but inevitable prelude to a strike. Her head bowed, the hood of the raincoat sticks to the clammy skin on the back of her neck.

  ILONA LAYS THE MAP ON the hood of the car, using her forearms to pin it down against the wind. The ground is still wet but she’s glad; the farmers could use the rain. Dark clouds clear as fast as they came on, and the sun picks up where it left off. Bob Hascall’s Gas Bar is the only address given. She wonders if the house is part of the gas station or located nearby.

  The man who called from the pay phone told her a confusing story about an amusement park ride but wouldn’t leave his name. She doesn’t like starting files on the basis of anonymous sources calling from pay
phones. Raymond is silent on the passenger’s side. He’s not what she’d call athletic, but he’s a two-hundred-pound guy. He’ll do.

  Ilona does not like dealing with suspicion and fear. Or standing at the screen door and waiting for someone to come. Ilona does not like the way farms always have a range of lethal weapons at hand. She thinks of a single rifle bullet popping through the aluminum frame of the screen door, entering her liquid-filled guts, deforming into a mushroom shape, then splattering out her back and into Raymond. But mostly, Ilona does not like the way her vision is obscured by the screen door, looking into the dark room behind it, straining to see what’s there.

  CAPTURE AND RELEASE

  ON MONDAY MORNING A HOBO STANDS at the bottom of the driveway. He says something as Mike’s Lexus lumbers slowly down from the house on the hill. On Tuesday the hobo is there again. Mike rolls the window down an inch to hear the hobo say, Hey Shithead. The hobo does not touch or pursue the car. Mike doesn’t look back until he gets to the stop sign at Arbutus Road. He angles the mirror to take in his drive but can’t see what must be the only hobo in Ten Mile Point. He imagines a capture-and-release program involving a barrel trap and a ham sandwich for bait. The hobo would be released onto the Yates Street sidewalk to be among its kind.

  Mike’s house, set on the rocks high above the town in rarefied air, presents the outward appearance of success. Every week, one or two birds are fooled by a wall of glass as wide as the sky. Its blended architecture yields to rock outcrops instead of displacing them, the exterior matching the greyish-green tones of lichen, the red-brown hue of the Arbutus tree. The real-estate agent claimed it was the highest property in Victoria, and for weeks after they moved in, Mike would amuse Maria by proudly proclaiming that there was no one above them. In the mornings, deer nibble at the gardener’s carefully managed vegetation. Mountain mist hangs in air so clean it causes hunger. The ocean is always calm from this distance, and on a sunny day you can see Mount Baker.