Proof I was Here

by Becky Blake

  “There’s an old bomb shelter down there,” she said. “One of the parking attendants will give you a key if you ever want to take a look.”

  Walking around with Annika felt totally different than moving through the city with Manu. Instead of trying to be inconspicuous, she seemed to want us to be seen. She had a loud voice, and gestures that were slightly oversized. Many people who passed us took an extra moment to check out her bright clothes and mismatched socks.

  In one of the public squares a group of drummers was rehearsing. We sat in the sun to listen. When I glanced over, Annika had her face lifted to the sky, her eyes closed. All day, I’d been expecting her to ask me a bunch of questions, but she hadn’t. Maybe it was a Dutch thing not to pry. Whatever the reason, I was happy to just sit with her in silence, even if it felt a little strange. Manu had never asked about my past because he didn’t want to talk about his own. With Annika, it felt more like she just wasn’t interested.

  We returned to the squat at the end of the afternoon to prepare some food for dinner: a salad of multicoloured vegetables, and a soup made with carrots, onion and ginger. I wasn’t sure how to help, so Annika gave me instructions, and I did what she said, chopping the vegetables once, and then cutting them again when she suggested I make them smaller.

  As we cooked, the other squatters turned up, telling us loud funny stories about their days and emptying their pockets and bags to show us the items they’d collected. At one point, Enzo came running up the stairs to grab Sylvain, then the two of them returned more slowly, lugging an old washing machine into the room.

  Pau flirted with me a little over dinner, but I wasn’t interested. Even if I had been, I wouldn’t have wanted to do anything to put my living situation with the freegans at risk. The squat felt like a perfect place to live for a while: a place where all my basic needs could be met without too much trouble and where I might even have a bit of time to finally explore the city or make some art.

  “Hey, what do you guys think about me painting a mural for the Free Store?” I asked. It was a way I could thank them for letting me stay.

  “Jane, I love that idea!” Annika said. “We’re planning to set up the store on the ground floor. Maybe you could paint a wall of flowers or something?” She made an arc with one arm like she was imagining a rainbow of colourful blooms.

  “Yeah, something like that.”

  The other squatters chimed in, offering suggestions. I didn’t want their ideas cluttering up my head, but I smiled and nodded, only half-listening.

  After dinner, I rummaged in the recycling bin looking for some paper to draw on. I found a few good scraps and was smoothing them out on the floor when Pau came over and crouched beside me. He passed me a notebook, and I flipped it open. On the first few pages were drawings for simple tattoos: wheels with cogs, ninja throwing stars, molecules.

  “You can just rip those out,” he said.

  “Oh no. I don’t want to take your sketchbook.” I handed it back. “Don’t worry. I’ll find one of my own.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes. Thanks though.”

  He sat down on the floor. “So, what are you going to paint?”

  “I don’t know yet. I usually paint people.”

  He looked serious for a moment. “Are you asking me to be your model?” He placed a hand under his chin and gazed off into the distance.

  I laughed. “Um, let me think about it. I’ll let you know.”

  The next afternoon my stitches were itching, and I decided to go to the park to see if I could find Yaya and Malik. Annika and I were already done with the shopping and she didn’t need my help again until dinner. When I told her I was going out, she tilted her head and gave me a blank look, like I didn’t need to tell her what I was doing – like it was no business of hers.

  “I should be back in an hour or two,” I said.

  “Okay.”

  I hesitated. I hadn’t been separated from her yet, and I didn’t know how I was going to get back in. “When I come back, should I just knock, or …”

  “Oh, that’s right. You don’t have a phone.” Annika walked over to the door and pulled a phone card from a basket tacked to the wall. There was a piece of tape on the card that had a number written on it in black Magic Marker.

  “Here. Just go to the locutorio on your way back and call this number. It’s for the mobile that stays here.” She pulled a flip phone out of the basket and waggled it in my direction. “If you just let it ring three times and hang up, then you don’t have to pay, and whoever’s here will come downstairs and let you in.”

  “And there’s always someone here?”

  “Yes.” Annika smiled. “I’ll come down with you now and lock you out.”

  On the ground floor, she opened the front door, then looked both ways up and down the street. “If a Mosso tries to talk to you when you’re coming or going, just say you’re a visitor. Don’t say that you live here. It’ll be better for you that way.”

  “Okay.” I stepped out onto the sidewalk, and she immediately closed the door behind me. As I headed down the street, I reached into the pocket of my skirt to make sure the phone card was safe.

  The park was further away than I remembered. I checked Manu’s watch, then picked up my pace. It was already 3:25 p.m. and Yaya’s crew was usually only there for an hour or so, mid-afternoon while the stores were closed and people were busy eating lunch.

  When I arrived, Yaya was sitting on his usual bench, tearing off pieces from a baguette and tossing them to a wide circle of pigeons and wild parrots. The wild parrots were small, but they were bullies. They strutted through the pigeon ranks like compact green dictators, hoarding all the bread crumbs for themselves.

  Malik pointed at a patch of grass, and I sat down and turned my face toward him. He opened his pocket knife, then passed the blade back and forth several times through the flame of a lighter. When the blade cooled a bit, he started to work on my face, picking at the stitches with small quick movements. My stomach flipped over, and I held onto the edge of the park bench. Yaya was watching. I’d been telling him about the squat.

  “They call themselves freegans,” I said. I had to speak slowly, trying not to move too much. “They get their furniture and clothes and food from the garbage. Annika says there’s so much waste, you can just live on that.”

  “Where are these people from?” Yaya asked.

  “Um, the Netherlands, France, Italy, Ireland. One guy is from Spain.”

  Yaya was looking at me like I was missing something.

  “I guess they’re all European,” I added. I felt Malik’s fingers bracing against my cheek, and then a tug that reached under my skin, as if something deeply rooted was being coaxed from the ground.

  Yaya nodded. “Me, I like capitalism. If everyone was – How do you say? Freeganiste? – no one would have any shoes.” He stretched his feet in my direction. He was wearing a new pair of sneakers. They looked like they’d be good for running away from the Mossos.

  Malik threw a strand of black wiry thread into the dirt, then wiped off the blade of his knife and folded it away. “C’est tout.”

  “Thanks.” I wished I had a mirror. Yaya’s expression was serious; there was definitely going to be a scar. I lightly touched my cheek, but Malik brushed my hand away.

  “Ne touche pas. Nous n’avons pas d’antiseptique.”

  One of the other purse sellers said something I couldn’t understand, and I asked Yaya to translate.

  “He said that in his village they also make a scar like this on the face – to show which community they belong to.”

  All the other purse sellers were staring at me then, and I didn’t know what to say. Without thinking, I tried to touch the scar again. Malik flicked me hard on the back of the hand.

  In Gràcia, I went to the locutorio like Annika had said, and di
aled the freegans’ number. After letting the phone ring three times, I left the shop and hurried to the squat, then waited out front for ten minutes. Nobody came downstairs.

  I tried calling again, double-checking each digit against the ones printed on the phone card. This time when I returned, there was a cluster of old ladies chatting out front on the sidewalk, but no sign of Annika. I considered yelling up to the balcony, but the squatters had told me to be careful not to disturb the neighbours.

  I stood across the street from the front door trying not to panic, but it was suddenly obvious: the squatters had been waiting for a chance to get rid of me. Now they were pretending they weren’t home. I was just about to leave when the door opened and Sylvain came out carrying two plastic bags.

  “Jane!” he said. He looked at my face. “What’s happened?”

  “Nothing. I was just calling to get back in.”

  “Ah, sorry. Annika and I were busy.” He smiled. “We don’t have too much time alone these days.” He pushed the door wide so I could pass. “I’m just taking out the garbage.”

  “Do you want me to wait and let you back in?”

  “No, that’s okay. I brought the key. You can leave the deadbolt off. I’ll be back in a minute.”

  Upstairs, Annika was sitting on a chair in a patch of sunlight reading. Barefoot and relaxed, she looked like she was on vacation.

  “Hey,” she said, getting up. “Were you calling?”

  “Yeah, but it’s okay. I ran into Sylvain downstairs.”

  “Let me see your face.” She squinted at my cheek. “You know what it looks like? It looks like – what do you call that thing? That thing on the communist flag?” She traced a crescent shape in the air.

  “A sickle?”

  “A sickle? That’s what it’s called in English?”

  “I think so.”

  “Huh. I never heard that before. A sickle … Anyway, it kind of looks like that.”

  Maybe scars were like ink blots or clouds – people would see what they wanted to see.

  “Oh, guess what.” Annika went back to the chair and picked up her book. “Look what I found!” She turned to show me the cover. “It’s the second book in the trilogy. I just finished reading the first one this morning!”

  “Wow, that’s really lucky,” I said.

  “I know! It was just sitting in a box on Carrer Verdi. Can you believe it?”

  Actually, I could believe it. I had the feeling that lucky things were always happening to Annika. Since running into her, they were starting to happen to me as well. The whole time I was staying with Manu, no one had ever invited us to come indoors.

  14

  Living with the freegans, my gaze began to shift from open purses downward, travelling along curbs to the piles of unwanted items that accumulated every day next to the overflowing garbage bins. There were dishes, lamps, old computers, books, photographs, clothes. I seemed to have a knack for finding household items we needed for the squat: a cheese grater, a mirror, a bath mat, a laundry basket.

  I was also collecting a little pile of found objects beside my bed: a pair of sandals, a ceramic cat, an old encyclopedia, a wooden comb, a painted hand fan. As the pile got bigger, I needed a bag, then a box to put everything into. Each time I added something new I’d lift the box to check its weight. I didn’t want it to get too heavy. Before leaving Toronto, I’d filled four closet-sized crates to ship, choosing only the things I’d felt Peter and I couldn’t live without. Now I barely remembered what they were.

  All of the items in the box beside my bed were things I liked but didn’t need, things I could easily leave behind. The squatters had explained what to do if the police ever came back – what to say, what our rights were. To me, it seemed almost certain we’d someday get evicted, although the squatters liked to pretend that wasn’t true. It was a strange way to live – working to build a home that could disappear at any moment. Each time I went out, I felt anxious, knowing there might be a padlock on the door when I returned. The others didn’t seem to be as worried, and I wondered if they all had backup plans I didn’t know about: escape routes, other homes or secret bank accounts.

  Whenever we needed money – mostly for wine or weed or gas for the camping stove – Enzo busked, John drove his bike-taxi and Pau gave tattoos at the shop around the corner. Annika and Sylvain didn’t have paying jobs; they tried to live completely outside of the conventional economy. In place of traditional work, they provided services for the others in the collective. Annika was in charge of supplying the squat with food and did most of the meal preparation and cleaning. Sylvain fixed things he found in the garbage and tried to make home improvements. He was building a solar panel to heat water for showers, and was also working on converting the old washing machine to bicycle-power. He’d taken over a corner of the living room for the project.

  “When I’m finished putting the washer back together,” Sylvain said to me one afternoon, “I am going to set it in front of the balcony, facing the mountain. That way the person who is doing the pedalling will have a nice view.”

  “Maybe that person could be me,” I said. I’d been spending most of my days helping Annika like an assistant, and I was getting tired of always doing what she asked. I wanted a job of my own.

  “Yes, that would be good,” Sylvain agreed. “If it’s not too much work for you?”

  “No, I don’t think so. It doesn’t sound like a bad job, really.”

  “It’s true. Me, I would much rather do work like this – ” He pushed on the bike pedal and the barrel of the washing machine spun around. “– than to be, for example, a lawyer.”

  I was mending a pair of Pau’s pants at the table. I pinched together the ripped edges of the hole and made a stitch. “I thought you liked legal stuff.” Sylvain had a large collection of pamphlets about freegans’ rights and squatters’ law, and he was always mentioning examples of cases and verdicts. Yesterday he’d explained the law of abandonment to me in way too much detail.

  Sylvain sighed. “I guess it’s just what I know. Both my parents are lawyers. Can you imagine? Two of them in one house?” He lifted his hands to his temples and made a gesture like his head was exploding.

  I stopped sewing for a moment, my needle straining against the thick cotton. I hadn’t pegged Sylvain for a rich kid, but now that I thought about it, it made sense. I pushed the needle a bit harder, and the sharp tip poked through to the other side of the fabric. His parental situation didn’t sound bad to me. If I had a lawyer-parent – even one of them – I’d have someone to give me advice on my court case, and how to get a visa to work in Spain, and what would happen if I overstayed without any papers. “Two lawyers, hey?”

  “Yes,” Sylvain said. “Always lots of stress in our house. But at least I know how to argue because of them. Most of the time, when I’m dealing with the police, this helps me, you know? Although sometimes the situations are impossible. Last year, for example, Annika and me, we were in Berlin and the police wanted to evict us. I tried to explain to them about the law, but they didn’t want to listen. So finally, when they came to throw us out, we decided – we have to use the Death Plank.”

  “What’s the Death Plank?”

  “It’s just a long piece of wood,” Sylvain said. “But very thick.” He opened his fingers into a wide C to show me the thickness. “We put one end out the window facing west and the other end out the window facing north. On the corner of the building, you know? It was on the third floor, so pretty high up. Then Annika, she goes out one window, and me, I go out the other. Then we just sit. Each on one end.”

  “Outside of the building?”

  “Yes.” Sylvain pushed up his glasses. “At first we had to move very slowly – at the exact same moment so we can balance, you know? So we don’t fall.”

  “Wow.” I bit off an extra length of thread. “What happened?”

&n
bsp; “The police they were all the time yelling, ‘Hey! You must come inside! You must leave the building!’” Sylvain laughed. “But we didn’t come in. We just sat for a long time and there was nothing they could do. If they tried to grab one of us – Annika or me – then the other one was going to fall.” He made a sudden slanting teeter-totter motion with his arm. “You understand?”

  “Yes.” If living without money was a game to Sylvain and Annika, it was a game they took seriously. “So how long did you stay outside?”

  “Mmm …” Sylvain looked to the ceiling, remembering. “Sixteen hours?”

  “Sixteen hours?”

  “Yes. The police they were all the time leaving one man inside the building. But in the end they decided, okay, this is enough.”

  “That sounds terrible.”

  “No, actually it was all right. We each had a backpack with a long rope, so when we were having a bad moment, we could lower the pack down to the street and our friends would send food or messages back up to us. For me, it was a little bit of fun. Not so much for Annika. She has some fear, you know, of being up high. So when the wind was blowing, sometimes she was feeling really scared.” Sylvain wiped his hands on a rag and gave the washing machine a pat. “I think this is almost ready.”

  I tried to imagine sitting mid-air on the end of a plank, nothing to hold onto on either side. “I don’t think I could do that – what you and Annika did.”

  Sylvain walked over to the table. “Don’t worry. We only need two people. If we have to do it again, we choose someone else.”

  We heard Annika coming up the stairs, and Sylvain went over to the curtained doorway to meet her. When she appeared, she greeted him in a singsong voice. “Bonjour, mon amour!” She leaned over the basket she was carrying, and they kissed for a long moment like I wasn’t in the room.