Safe Harbour

by Christina Kilbourne

  “Thanks for that,” she says eventually. “Even if you did just about give me a heart attack.”

  When we’re sure the coast is clear, Lise and I navigate our way back to camp. I left the tent in such a rush, I didn’t get a chance to set up the camouflage or even zip the flap. So I’m relieved when nothing has been disturbed. By the time we crawl into our sleeping bags, it’s past midnight and I’ve barely rolled onto my side before I’m pulled into a dream.

  My dream is part fiction and part memory. It’s a familiar dream and one I dread. I’m sleeping in my princess-pink bed in our house on Pelican Way. I’m little and everything towers above me. The desk hulks in the corner and the lamp arcs high above me like a giraffe. My stuffies are piled in the corner, but in the darkness the mound looks alive so I’m afraid. I’ve always been afraid of the dark and I want to creep across the hall into Mom and Dad’s bed, but I can’t move. I’m sure someone is in the room with me and I try not to breathe so whoever is there will be disappointed by the emptiness and go away. Then there’s an explosion. It’s so loud I cover my ears and slide deep under the covers. There’s yelling and screaming and I hear Mom pleading with someone in the next room, though I can’t make out the words. On the other side of the wall things crash and glass shatters. A gunshot rings out and I can tell by the muffled moans that someone has been hurt. I listen hard and pray that Mom and Dad are safe, but I don’t get to say “amen” because my bedroom door flies open and my father lifts me out of the bed. He wraps a sheet around me and hisses in a voice that scares me into absolute silence.

  “Keep your eyes closed. Don’t move. Don’t make a sound.”

  Then he covers my head and carries me out of the house.

  I don’t move or unwrap myself for hours. When I can’t keep still any longer, after I’ve wet myself and thirst drives me to test the limits of my bravery, I peek through an opening in the folds of the sheet. I see that I’m on Starlight. But I already knew that because I listened to waves smashing against the hull for hours before I finally fell asleep.

  I’m in the aft cabin alone, but light seeps from behind the curtains so I know it’s morning. I untangle myself and stand to peek out the porthole. There’s nothing but ocean and sunlight stretching as far as I can see. I climb off the bed and sneak over to the door. I turn the handle slowly, quietly, and look into the main cabin where Dad is sprawled, fast asleep on one of the benches. He is on his side facing the hull and his shirt is caked with dried blood. Before I know what’s happening, I’m screaming.

  “Harbour! Wake up! You’re having a bad dream.”

  Lise is shaking me and when I open my eyes all I can see is darkness. Tuff is whining and straining to get close to me. It’s a relief to realize I’m in the ravine again, although my pulse is racing and my shirt is soaked with sweat.

  CHAPTER 5

  WHEN I CRAWL out of the tent the next morning, Lise and Tuff are sitting by a campfire. Lise is breaking branches and Tuff is chewing a stick at her side. They both look up when I stumble into the sunshine, but Tuff doesn’t stop chewing.

  “What are you doing?” I ask. I don’t mean to sound alarmed, but I obviously don’t mask my anxiety well.

  “It’s just a little fire and I won’t let it burn long.” Lise uses my mother’s eat-your-broccoli tone of voice, the one she used when she wanted to cajole me into eating something I didn’t like: Just try one bite. If you don’t like it you don’t have to finish.

  Lise continues to feed the fire, so I try again to get my point across.

  “I just thought after last night, you know, we didn’t need to draw more attention to ourselves.”

  Lise ruffles Tuff behind the ears and speaks to him directly as if I’m invisible.

  “She’s a worrywart, don’t you think?” She stands up and sorts through a pile of sticks until she finds one she likes, then she breaks it in half.

  “It’s just that I’m pretty sure it’s illegal to camp down here,” I say, not trying to hide how annoyed I feel.

  Lise sighs and rolls her eyes. “Relax! If anyone comes down and complains we just apologize and move on. I’ve been kicked out of lots of places before. It’s no big deal. Anyway, come and sit down. I have something for you.”

  I want to tell her that I don’t want to move to a new camp. I can’t move. I want to tell her that my site was selected carefully, with Dad’s input. But I know this won’t make sense to her. It barely makes sense to me anymore. Instead of trying to explain, I sit reluctantly. That’s when I notice a large coffee can in the middle of the fire, and, inside it, boiling water.

  “Hot chocolate?” I ask.

  “Better.”

  “Coffee?”

  “Better.”

  Lise uses a stick to tip over the can of water and lift it from the fire. The embers sizzle and smoke spirals into the air. She sets the blackened can on the ground at my feet and, when it tips over, six eggs tumble out. Lise moves in on the eggs and picks one up, using the sleeve of her shirt for protection.

  “Let’s eat them while they’re still hot.”

  I pick up one of the eggs and juggle it from hand to hand until it is cool enough to peel.

  “Where’d these come from?”

  Lise eats her first egg in two quick bites. I’m surprised to discover they’re soft-boiled, which is my favourite kind of egg ever. If only I had some toast to dunk in the yolks.

  “I was bringing them down last night when that guy jumped me. I went and found them this morning. Only a couple were broken, but Tuff took care of them.”

  Lise peels her second egg and Tuff watches us hopefully, his head resting on his paws and his eyes flickering between me and her.

  “You bought them?”

  Lise nods and bites into her second egg.

  “We’ve got a busy day ahead of us. You’re going to need the energy.”

  “What busy day?”

  “Think of it as an outing.”

  “What kind of outing?”

  “You’ll see.”

  After breakfast Lise takes me and Tuff to a rundown area near the waterfront. At some point it had obviously been industrial because there are boarded-up factories and sprawling warehouses forgotten behind vine-covered fences. There are signs of revival, though. We pass a treed area where the grass has recently been mowed. There are picnic tables and benches and a paved bike path winding through. There’s also an old brick warehouse under renovation with glimpses of everyday life visible through the wide expanse of windows: white blinds, an oversized abstract painting, and minimalist light fixtures hanging from long wires. We skirt around a parking lot where there are half-a-dozen cars, and a coffee shop that has been created out of a narrow brick building. It has an outside patio lined with flowerpots and colourful umbrellas.

  Lise ducks behind a rundown cinder-block structure and squeezes through a hole cut in a tall mesh fence. The edges of the fencing have been peeled back, making it easier to go through one way than the other. We follow a trail through an overgrown lot.

  I ask several times where we’re going, but all she says is, “Wait and see.”

  Besides a web of footpaths, there are other signs of life around us. In a small clearing there’s a metal drum that looks like it serves as a fireplace, and cement blocks circling like chairs. There’s a pair of beat-up running shoes propped against a stack of bricks and a blanket draped over a pile of bald, cracked tires. Tuff trots ahead and sniffs around the fire barrel in a way that makes me think it’s used for cooking.

  “Franklin? Josh? You guys around?” Lise calls out.

  A man pokes his head out of a boarded-up building and looks cautiously around until he sees Lise, then his face breaks into a smile.

  “Lise Roberts! What’s up, girl?”

  He ducks to get through a hole in a sheet of weathered plywood that’s been nailed in place to keep people out. When he straightens up and walks toward us, I see how tall he is, and thin. He moves as if his limbs were loosely connecte
d by elastic bands and a leg or arm might fall off at any moment. He and Lise exchange some sort of secret handshake before Lise turns to me.

  “Frankie, I’d like you to meet my friend Harbour. Harbour, this is my man, Frankie.”

  Frankie needs a shave and looks like he could use a good night’s sleep, too, or maybe a week’s worth. It’s hard to tell how old he is. He could be Lise’s age or he could be Dad’s age. He looks weathered like Dad but acts twenty years younger. He’s wearing jeans and a baggy green T-shirt that proclaims Every Day is Earth Day. He wipes his hand on his jeans, then leans over to shake mine. Even his fingers are skeletal.

  “Harbour, eh? Nice meeting you.”

  Tuff, who has been sniffing around the periphery of the lot, returns when he hears an unfamiliar voice.

  “This is Tuff Stuff,” Lise says.

  Frankie leans down to introduce himself and Tuff is a perfect gentleman. He sits quietly and soaks up the attention so thoroughly that Frankie looks reluctant to stop rubbing his ears.

  “Awesome dog. I love his eyes.”

  Tuff does have great eyes. When you look into them it feels like looking into a human soul. Maybe it’s because they look like they are rimmed with black eyeliner. Or maybe it’s the pattern of black that frames his tan face, but Tuff always has a question in his eyes. Right now I’m sure he’s asking, Who’s the tall dude and is he safe to be around?

  “Where’s Josh?”

  Frankie jerks his head in the direction of downtown. From the overgrown lot we can see the tops of the tallest skyscrapers that line Bay Street, and beyond, the spike of the CN Tower.

  “He went to collect some cash and cocktails. You wanna hang around? We trapped a rabbit for dinner.”

  Up until this point I haven’t said much but now I can’t help myself.

  “Like a wild rabbit?”

  “A wild city rabbit, but it tastes just the same as any other rabbit.”

  The thought of eating some poor wild creature, like the kind I’ve been sharing the ravine with the past few weeks, turns my stomach. Lise must sense my reluctance because she interrupts Frankie’s explanation about how Josh trapped the rabbit.

  “There won’t be enough meat for all of us on one rabbit. But I got enough cash for a pack of hot dogs. What do you think, Harbour? Feel like a wiener roast tonight?”

  I nod, even though I’m not sure I want to hang around with two strangers all the way until dinner. I mean, it’s probably just past noon. But what can I say when Frankie is watching me with so much hopeful expectation?

  “Okay, it’s settled. Harbour and I will go get some wieners. We won’t be long. You can start working on the fire.”

  Lise and I follow a trail west, in the direction of downtown. We wind deeper into the industrial area, through shaggy, overgrown fields, past looming piles of dirt covered in tarps and tires, across empty parking lots where weeds push through aging tarmac, and even over a set of railroad tracks that don’t appear to be in use any longer. She seems to know where she’s going, so I don’t ask any questions. But while Tuff trots at my side on a slack leash, I try my best to track the top of the CN Tower. I always like to know where I am and how to leave, just in case.

  “So how do you know Frankie and Josh?”

  “Frankie was at the shelter when I first arrived. He knew Josh already.”

  “Are they from here?”

  “Frankie, I think, is from Windsor and Josh from somewhere up north.”

  The trail ends at an empty rubble-strewn lot and we have to scoot through an opening in a chain-link fence before we step onto a sidewalk where, despite the fact that I feel as though I’ve emerged from a post-apocalyptic world, people appear to be going about their regular lives. Across the street there’s a grocery store. It looks out of place next to a cluster of cement silos, but who I am to judge what belongs where?

  “When’s the last time you actually roasted hot dogs over an open fire?” Lise asks as we head for the entrance.

  “Maybe never?”

  “I guess fires don’t really mix with boat life, huh?”

  “We had a little barbecue off the cockpit that we cooked hot dogs on sometimes,” I suggest, remembering grilling fish more than wieners.

  I tie Tuff to a post near the entrance and we walk into the cool, bright store. Other shoppers glance our way, then look away too quickly. I know what this means and I control an impulse to flee. Lise leads us to the cold meats and grabs a pack of Red Hots.

  “These ones are always the cheapest,” she says, then grabs a second pack. I open my mouth to protest but she just shrugs. “Still only five bucks for both.”

  I grab two Snickers bars at the checkout — the extra-big ones. When Lise looks like she is about to protest, I shrug and say, “These are on me.”

  “Are you sure?”

  I nod.

  “But what about your credit card and food for Tuff?”

  “I think I’ll be okay.” I toss one of the bars at her as we leave the store. “Besides, I’m starving.”

  The walk back to Frankie and Josh’s feels faster than it did going to the grocery store. Maybe it’s because I already know where we’re headed or maybe because for the first ten minutes I’m occupied eating the chocolate bar.

  “So good,” I mutter as I swallow the last bite.

  “So good,” Lise agrees and licks her fingers.

  Frankie has a small fire going by the time we return and Josh is back from his cocktail run, sitting on an upturned cinder block, watching the rabbit carcass. It’s skewered on a metal rod and suspended across the opening of the metal barrel. He nods when we’re introduced, but doesn’t look at my face. Josh is Frankie’s opposite. He’s short and solid and he moves with efficiency. He watches the rabbit hungrily and I wonder if it will cook through before he starts tearing off the limbs.

  We spend the afternoon sitting around the barrel talking under a low, grey sky and watching the rabbit turn from dark red to brown. Apparently Frankie likes having someone new to talk to because he tells me about how they’ve been living in the office of the boarded-up garage for almost a year.

  “Never once went to a shelter last winter. Not once. Not even when there were extreme cold weather alerts.” Frankie says this proudly, like they survived Dieppe, or maybe the Holocaust.

  “One night it was so cold we sat up all night and kept the fire going,” Frankie says. “I wanted to sleep, but Josh wouldn’t let me. He was afraid if we did, we’d never wake up.”

  Finally Josh weighs in, as if he’s suddenly decided the conversation is worth joining. “It happened to an uncle of mine once, you know. He was on his three-day trap run and the fire went out in the middle of the night. For some reason he never woke up. My father found him the next week in his cabin, frozen through, solid as cement.”

  “At least he didn’t suffer, eh?” Frankie says kindly.

  “Yep, at least he didn’t suffer. Not like my grandfather when he got lung cancer. That was some nasty shit. I’d rather freeze.”

  Frankie and Josh pass a bottle back and forth all afternoon and into the evening. Twice it lands in Josh’s lap empty and he disappears into the boarded-up building, returning with a full bottle. The second time he returns and tosses it across the fire Frankie fumbles and drops it on the ground.

  “You got shit coordination,” Josh mumbles.

  Frankie takes a series of short nervous sips before defending himself. “It’s hard to see in the dark.”

  “It’s not that dark,” Josh says, looking suddenly up at the sky.

  I also look up at the sky and see it is, in fact, getting late. Darkness has fallen around the overgrown field and boarded-up building. The lights from downtown glow on the horizon.

  Frankie passes the bottle back to Josh, who throws back his head and takes a long drink. It’s a clear bottle filled with blue liquid, and when he’s finished, he offers it to me.

  “No, thanks,” I say. I try to sound polite, but it’s only been ten
minutes since I last explained I don’t drink.

  Josh stares me down. “You American or something? Your voice sounds funny.”

  “Uh, yeah. She grew up in Florida,” Lise interjects quickly. I can tell she’s wary of Josh.

  “My mother was Canadian, though,” I add, which kills Josh’s interest in my nationality.

  Lise and Frankie both relax and Josh gets up to fetch more wood. He paces around the fire and turns the rabbit every few minutes. The flames lick up at it hungrily. Every so often a drop of grease hits the fire and sizzles, which makes Tuff raise his head and sniff the air. I can tell he’s got plans of his own for that rabbit.

  “You girls don’t have to wait for us. Go ahead and break out your hot dogs if you want,” Frankie says.

  I look to Lise. I’m dying for a hot dog. It’s been ages since I ate the Snickers and my stomach has been pestering me steadily for two hours already. I’m hungry enough to think the rabbit looks appetizing, even though it looks like a prop from some bad sci-fi movie with bared yellow teeth and hollow eye sockets.

  Lise passes around the pack of wieners and we skewer them onto sticks. I hand one to Tuff and he goes through his regular routine of sniffing and inspecting it before he decides it’s safe to eat.

  “Lise says you have a camp in the ravine? Up by the cemetery,” Frankie says when the conversation stalls. “She says you’re gonna spend the winter on a boat with your dad?”

  “That’s right.” I nod, suddenly uneasy that anyone knows about my camp besides Lise.