Notes Towards Recovery

by Louise Ells

  The elementary school, only three blocks away from the house where she and her brother, Philippe, had been raised and he now lived, happily ever after, with his wife, Claire, and daughter, Madison, who went to that same school.

  This was a new thing, repeating names. She shook her head to rid it of the echo and walked up the hill, past the row of new town homes, then one block over, to her niece’s school.

  Brigitte had booked off for the whole day but the process had been much faster than expected, so she’d called her sister-in-law. “Claire, I’m playing hooky from work and it’s such a gorgeous spring day. May I take Maddy out for lunch and the afternoon?”

  She had felt Claire’s reluctance over the phone.

  “Please?”

  “I’d really prefer some advance warning, Bree. I know she’s only in Grade One, but-”

  “I know. I’m sorry. My plans changed at the last moment.”

  “Nothing too extravagant? No expensive restaurants or shows?”

  “Just a picnic in the park,” promised Brigitte. “And I’ll have her home in time for gymnastics. When is that again, five o’clock?”

  “It’s skating, at five thirty, so home by four at the latest. And stay for supper yourself, stranger. Your brother and I haven’t seen you in weeks. I told him there must be a new man in your life.”

  Brigitte had laughed. No new man, no, but dinner would be lovely. She’d have Maddy home by four. After she hung up she’d signalled a taxi and sighed. Tonight then. No more putting it off. But first, a picnic in the park.

  “Auntie Brigitte!” Her niece was waiting on a tiny bench in front of the principal’s office, swinging her legs and chattering to the secretary. Jumping up, she leapt onto her Aunt and threw her arms around her neck, covering her cheeks with sticky, strawberry-jam scented kisses. “Where were you? I missed you when you were gone.”

  “I wasn’t gone, Maddy. Just super busy at work. But I’ve missed you too.”

  The girl slipped down. “Where are we going?”

  “First we’re going to buy some naughty treats and then we’re going to High Park.”

  “Can we go and see the llamas and bison? And go to the adventure playground? And will you tell me the story about the horses on the lake? Please?”

  “Yes, yes, and yes,” said Brigitte. Already her shoulders felt lighter; this had been a good decision, the right way to spend her afternoon.

  Madison skipped down the school’s front steps then reached her hand up into Brigitte’s and reminded her to hold on tight when they crossed the street.

  I’m holding on as tight as I can. You hold on tight too.

  “Is this going to be like our secret picnics, starting with dessert?”

  “It sure is. That’s our special tradition.”

  A tradition born of the day she’d bought ice cream sundaes which were already melting by the time they reached a lunch spot. Had that been a warning sign? It didn’t matter. What mattered was that in the future Madison might sometimes think of her childhood ‘secret picnics’ with her Aunt, and the joy of eating dessert first. There was an Italian Deli en route to the park. She made sure to toss the receipt so Claire wouldn’t accuse her of extravagance.

  “Look at those dancing people.” Maddy pointed as they entered the park.

  Brigitte followed her niece’s finger and saw a group of elderly women doing Tai Chi. Years ago she had taken Tai Chi classes and she realized her body was already in position. Parting the wild horse’s mane. White crane spreads its wings. Her body knew exactly what to do and she finished the set.

  “That was neat,” said her niece. “I didn’t know you could do that.”

  It was neat. Could muscle memory extend to more than just exercise? What about vocal chords?

  They walked down through the west ravine, kicking up last fall’s leftover leaves as Maddy talked non-stop until they came to a spot by the pond that she declared ‘perfect’ for their picnic. Over butter tarts and chocolate brownies, Brigitte told her about her picnics in this same park when she and Maddy’s Dad were her age.

  “With Granny and Grampa, right?” Maddy said. “I was Grampa’s favourite, wasn’t I?”

  “Oh, Honey. Grampa died a few months before you were born. But I know he would have loved you so much if he’d met you.”

  Madison shook her head. “I think you might be mistakened. I think he knew me when I was a baby.” She nodded, her face serious.

  “He knew you were on the way, and he already loved you,” said Brigitte. He hadn’t recognized any of them by then, but every day when Claire visited the nursing home he’d reached out to touch her belly. That was love, everyone had agreed. Maddy started telling a story about a new girl in her class, and Brigitte tried to follow it, in part to distract herself from the memory of that locked ward and her father’s blank stare. He’d been comfortable, warm and well-fed for the last years of his life, but that was little comfort to Brigitte then, even less now.

  “-and she has dark blue pencils with her name stamped on them. In gold!”

  Make a note to buy some name-stamped pencils for Maddy for Christmas. And maybe some for herself as well? Already she found herself needing to write down everything; her bathroom mirror and kitchen cupboards were papered with bright yellow sticky notes. “Would you like pencils with your name in gold?”

  “Yes please. My real name. Madison Rose.” She looked up at her Aunt. ‘Did you know that we don’t just share a middle name? Daddy told me that Brigitte and Madison both mean the same thing. Strong.” The little girl flexed her arm muscle. “I’m not that strong. I can’t even lift up your scuba tank.”

  “One day soon you’ll carry a scuba tank and a bag of gear,” said Brigitte, dividing a slice of quiche in half. “But there are other kinds of strong too.”

  “Once I heard Daddy call you strong. He said moving back to Toronto and starting over again at forty was strong.”

  The little ears of an only child.

  “Do you ever wish you still lived in Bermuda?”

  “No. I love living in the same city as you and your Mummy and Daddy.”

  Maddy grinned. “Me too. But do you ever miss Uncle Jackson?”

  She was surprised that her niece recalled her ex-husband’s name. “Do you remember him?”

  Madison shrugged. “A little tiny bit, from a long time ago. Mostly I remember the water where you lived. It was pretty.” She pointed at Grenadier Pond. “Please will you tell me about the horses now?”

  “Well,” said Brigitte. “In the winter of eighteen twelve there was a war on and some big soldiers on horseback, called grenadiers, were coming to defend the city. They crossed the pond but the ice had already started to melt and it was thinner than they thought.”

  “So there was a big crack and then the ice broke!” Madison took over the story at her favourite part. “It made a big, big hole in the middle of the pond and they couldn’t escape. And they all fell through and drowned. Horses and soldiers and all. And no sign of them was ever, ever found again.”

  Brigitte hugged her niece and smiled. “You know it word for word.” She looked out at the blue water, its surface sparkling in the afternoon sunshine.

  “But that’s not the end. Tell the bit about the mud.”

  “No one has ever been able to measure how deep the pond is, because the bottom is soft, squishy sediment. So maybe there are lots of things buried down there. Nobody knows what lies beneath.”

  Madison stared out at the water for a moment then turned her face to look up into Brigitte’s eyes. “Maybe if we went scuba diving we could find out for sure? There would be bones and treasures and we could take them to a museum to be put on display in a glass case with a big sign that says do not touch.”

  “Maybe we could. But right now how about we go and find the llamas and the peacocks? And then the adventure playground?”

  Madison wasn’t ready to change the subject. “I’m going to learn scuba diving when I’m eight years old, and
you’re going to teach me, right?”

  That was what she’d promised. Before. She said she hoped she wouldn’t be too old by then.

  “You won’t be too old, silly. I’m already six, so that’s only two years from now.” She held up six fingers then slowly unfurled two more. “Can we have ice cream later?”

  “Sure we can. How about a knickerbocker glory?”

  “A what?”

  “A knickerbocker glory. When I was your age my English grandmother used to take me out for a knickerbocker glory for a special treat. In a café in her favourite store which was pale green and kept honey bees on the roof.” She hated moments like this when she couldn’t find a name she’d always known. And too late, she remembered that was a London treat, not a Toronto treat. “Anyhow, we’ll find some ice cream and you can have any flavour you like.”

  “A chocolate dipped cone? From Dairy Queen?”

  “Sure!”

  They had the zoo almost to themselves and there were just a few mothers and nannies with preschool children at the adventure playground. Madison made up a game involving pirates and mermaids and a treasure chest full of gold doubloons and chased her Aunt up and down the ladders, and in and out of the castle turrets until Brigitte had to wave a white flag. “This pirate is pooped,” she said, flopping onto a bench and turning her face to catch the last of the afternoon sun on her cheeks. Already she could feel the heat fading and cooler hints of evening in the air. But the long, dark months were over and summer was on its way.

  Maddy sat beside her. “I like playing hooky with you. Do you think everyone else in my class is still in school?” She looked down at Brigitte’s wrist, rolling the heavy gold chain out of the way to look at her watch, as if she could read time.

  “Tell me the story about your bracelet.” Another favourite.

  “On the day that your Grampa died I was very, very sad. I cried and cried and I didn’t know if I’d ever be able to stop, but I knew I had to because it was upsetting your Mummy and Daddy. So I went into the bathroom and washed my face and then I fussed about a bit with makeup to try and hide the red blotches on my cheeks. I found this bracelet in my make-up bag and to give myself just a few more moments to compose myself, I put it on.”

  Maddy was running her fingers over the golden rope. “And you’ve never taken it off, not even once, since that day.”

  “Never,” Brigitte agreed. “Not when I have a manicure, not when I was in Rio at the carnival and someone tried to steal it, not when I went scuba diving.” For the MRI she’d had to take it off, but she pushed that thought aside.

  Madison kept playing with the bracelet. “And not every time, but often, when you feel it on your wrist, it reminds you of your Daddy.”

  “That’s right.” And that was the truth. She rarely connected it to Jackson, even though he had presented it to her with great fanfare after she’d forgiven him for one of his affairs. “But one day I will take it off to give it to you.”

  “When I’m a bit bigger so it doesn’t fall off.”

  “Yes. I hope that it will remind you of me in the same way. So you don’t forget me.”

  “I’ll never forget you. Not even if you moved back to Bermuda. Not even if you never give me your bracelet.” Madison snuggled closer, her fingers still entwined in the woven gold chain. “I love you.”

  “And I love you. But memory is a funny thing, Honey. Sometimes it plays tricks on us and we forget things we thought we could never forget.”

  “Like Grampa, when he got really old.”

  She nodded. Could stories of the past be enough of a bond to build a future? She looked down at the bracelet, tempted to give it to her niece right now, and noticed the time. “Yikes. It’s already ten past three. We’d better head home.” She stood and led the way up the nature trail, pausing when it divided into three paths.

  “You promised me ice cream.”

  So she had. She said they’d stop for ice cream on the way home. There was a Dairy Queen on the corner; they’d walk right by it on their way back. Their way back-

  Brigitte turned slowly, trying to get her bearings. The skyline didn’t help here, it was all maple, oak, birch, poplar, none in full leaf. Nothing stood out. That way, she thought. But she wasn’t sure. “This way,” she said, hoping her confusion was masked by the sound of confidence.

  They walked for fifteen minutes, though Brigitte tried not to keep looking at her watch. Wasn’t this the nature trail in the Spring Creek area, heading north? Or had she gone too far and ended up in the west ravine? She looked up through trees at the sky, trying to figure which way they were walking based on the sun, but she was too flustered to work it out. The ravine, whichever one it was, was starting to feel claustrophobic. The underbrush had the dank smell of rotting leaves and the wind had picked up, cracking twigs. Branches scratched at the sky, then bent down as if to reach for her. Brigitte shivered and picked up her pace, searching for steps up and out of the gorge. A field, relief.

  “Why did we come back here?” Maddy’s voice had a distinct whine to it.

  They’d returned to the zoo. Damn. Except, except that meant she just had to go in the opposite direction from last time, right? She looked at her watch. As soon as they got out of the park and on to a street, any street, she’d hail a taxi and they might still make it home on time.

  Brigitte gestured to the ground at their feet. “Did you know that there is an ancient river running underneath our feet that was only just discovered? It’s over a million years old and no one knew about it until two thousand and three.”

  “A million years old? I don’t even know how many zeros that is.”

  “A lot! And it was just a fluke. Two workers had just put a lid on a well and it blew off like a geyser. It shot water up into the air in a spout as high as your house. So they dug down underneath it and found the river which carries water all the way from Georgian Bay to Lake Ontario.”

  “I’m cold,” said Maddy. As a distraction, the new story hadn’t worked.

  “Let’s run then, and that will warm us up.”

  “I’m too tired to run.” The child sounded on the verge of tears.

  “Oh, Honey. I’m sorry. I just took the wrong path.” Brigitte knelt down. “Climb up and I’ll give you a piggy back.”

  She’d forgotten how heavy a six year old could be and she had to slow down. Next person we pass, she vowed, I’ll ask for directions. But the mothers, nannies and dog walkers had all gone home; it felt as if she and Maddy were all alone in the four hundred acres. They reached the lakeside and she took a deep breath. Okay. If she went south they’d reach the Queensway. So the water should be on her left? No, right hand side. She turned and went the opposite direction.

  “We’re almost home,” she said, hoping she sounded confident.

  Four oh four. Four twelve. No sign of any road. They must be going north, instead of south. She couldn’t hear any traffic, only her own pounding heart and the ghostly echo of soldiers and horses, skidding on ice, panicked screams as they fell into the freezing water below.

  Once before there had been a moment when she’d felt this disorientated. She and Jackson had been diving the Cayman Wall and the clarity had been like nothing she’d ever experienced before. Visibility for hundreds of feet. When she’d looked at her depth gauge she was already at a dangerous one hundred and fifty, but when she started swimming, still looking at her gauge, she found she was still heading down. One sixty. She did a half somersault. One seventy. She somersaulted again but had no way of knowing which direction was which. Only at one eighty did she get herself turned the right way and start going back up.

  It had been so peaceful, though. That thick blue silence. That’s how I’d choose to commit suicide, she’d decided then, as the silvery underside of the sea’s surface had come into view. To drift down through schools of fish and neon corals, pass out and know no more.

  “Auntie Brigitte, I’m scared.”

  “There’s nothing to be scared about.
”

  “But you don’t know where we are. And I’m going to be late for skating.”

  “We’re on the right path now. We’re almost home. I just need to put you down now, though.” She should have made this into a game, a continuation of the pirates and mermaids they’d been playing. A hunt for Atlantis. “Can you see the towers of the castle on your street?”

  “Not a castle. It’s a hospital. And they were smashing it down this morning when Mummy and I walked to school.”

  The pedestrian walkway past the demolition. Had that only been a few hours ago? She took a breath. “We’ll be home soon.”

  Claire and Philippe were running down their front steps before Brigitte had paid off the taxi. Her brother gathered Madison into his arms and she immediately burst into tears. “We got so lost Daddy and we had to walk forever.”

  “I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” said Brigitte.

  “Did I miss skating, Mummy?”

  Claire took Madison from Philippe and turned away. “You can go next week, Darling.”

  Philippe waited until his wife and daughter were in the house before he spoke. ‘What the hell Bree? We were worried sick. Claire wanted me to phone the police. Couldn’t you have called us to tell us you were delayed?”

  Called. She felt inside her handbag. She hadn’t once thought of her cell phone, not even when she needed a map. “I’m sorry,” she said again. “It started out as a great day. Really. We had a great day. I hope Maddy will remember it as a great day. Her little hand kept reaching for mine and we both felt the first of the summer sun on our faces and-” For the first time since that morning she felt tears.

  “You can’t dictate what people will remember.” He sounded exhausted.

  “Philippe. I have to tell you. I saw a neuropsychologist this morning.”

  Her brother looked at her. “What? What are you talking about?”

  “An Alzheimer’s specialist.”