by Anne Simpson
The woman had put the comb and mirror into her purse, and now she put up a hand to fluff her hair in the back. A thread of hair detached itself and floated away.
I’m sorry, Jasmine, he said again.
This time she met his gaze. You said that already.
What else can I say?
I don’t know.
If you asked me to go to Montreal and get a – I don’t know – a hat, he said, I’d go to Montreal and get you a hat. If you asked me to go to the Gobi Desert, I’d go.
The woman glanced at him.
I wouldn’t ask you to do that, said Jasmine, concentrating on her scuffed shoe. Anyway, I don’t want a hat.
What do you want?
I want you to tell me what happened.
I don’t know what happened. I had to get out of here, so I did.
That’s it?
I wanted to get so far away –
Far from me.
No. I wanted to get so far away that I couldn’t feel anything any more.
There’s no place you could have gone. There’s no place like that.
I know.
Oh, she murmured. Oh, Damian.
You’ve been to hell and back – I realize that, he said. That’s why I’m here. I thought – I guess I thought if I showed up, the words would come to me.
I don’t think words would help. She couldn’t stop moving; one hand was swinging back and forth. I don’t think anything would help. You and I – we can’t go on.
Her eyelashes seemed darker than before, fringing her eyes. Green, so green. He had to hold her gaze without looking away.
Don’t, she said.
He had to lean forward to hear what she was saying.
Don’t make it harder.
She’s going to Buffalo, said Elvis. She’s going to Buffalo, then Rochester, then Syracuse, then – I forget what’s after Syracuse. And after that, New York City. She’s going to be an artist in New York City.
Damian fiddled with a toggle before he hefted his knapsack up.
Well, he said. I guess there’s nothing left to say.
He couldn’t talk to her in this place. He could feel his eyes stinging.
There was no way to stop things from going forward. It made him feel desperate, and he walked away from her, pushing the door open. When he got outside he couldn’t see because of his tears. A woman brushed past him on her way inside the terminal, and he moved away from the door. He started down the street without knowing where he was going, but it heartened him, when he glanced over his shoulder, to see that Elvis had come out after him.
Jasmine’s leaving, said Elvis.
I know.
Damian, called Jasmine.
She’d come outside the building, where she’d put down her suitcase. She kept her knapsack on her back, but wrapped her arms around herself, around her sweater, as she waited for Elvis and Damian to retrace their steps.
A tree nearby had turned pale yellow, and it was almost the same colour as her sweater. She seemed to be examining the way the bright leaves overlapped one another, but she shifted her gaze and looked directly at Damian when he approached.
My bus is here, she said. But I can’t keep this – Elvis, I can’t keep this.
It’s for you, said Elvis.
They stood together, awkwardly. She held out a photograph, but Elvis didn’t take it.
Damian leaned forward and spoke quietly in her ear. She looked at him.
Please don’t go, he said again.
I have to. She dropped her eyes.
Jasmine.
Inside, they heard the final call for her bus.
She looked up and met his eyes, and he knew something had softened in her. He saw how she would look when she was old.
With stops in Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, Schenectady, Albany –
Elvis, she said. I can’t take something like this from you. I’m honoured you wanted me to have it, but I have to give it back.
Elvis took the photograph and held it with both hands, looking down at it.
It belongs to you, she said. It’s precious. She bent and turned her head so he would look at her. That baby is you. And he’s named after the greatest star in all of music history.
Elvis smiled when she kissed him on the cheek.
She turned to Damian and threw her arms around him. She held him tightly.
Oh, Damian.
It was only for a moment, and then she let go and wiped her eyes. She picked up her suitcase, which she held with both arms, and the light flashed on the door as Elvis held it open for her.
The river spilled past the Control Dam and descended in a series of rapids toward the rusted hulk of the Old Scow and the scrawny, bent poplars on scattered islands, and kept tumbling around Goat Island, pouring over stacked layers of dolomite as it fell over the edge, offering up a great, feathery veil of mist as it roared to the river below. It was all wild, noisy turbulence below the Falls, but the Maid of the Mist plied the water: one boat pushed upstream, before slipping into a curtain of white, and another followed, with its hooded cargo of humanity. It strained against the rush of water, and then, like something sprung from a trap, it turned and vanished. As soon as one boat departed, another appeared.
In the distance, a line of figures descended the stairs to the base of the American Falls, miniature people disappearing into a dark maw that swallowed them whole. But then they reappeared, ascending to the top, keeping their video cameras hidden under plastic ponchos. They came from every corner of the globe: women in tunics, wearing veils, men with turbans, girls speaking German, tourists led by someone who spoke mutilated high-school Spanish, an elderly couple from Tokyo, a school band from the American Midwest, and four sisters from Weslaco, Texas, who went on a trip together every year. The ponchos were dry when people began the trek down to the base of the Falls and wet when they came back up.
They all came to look at the great Niagara. But the water rushed away from them, sweeping chaotically through the gorge, under the Rainbow Bridge, where the Honeymoon Bridge had collapsed, in 1938, because of an ice jam. It flowed downstream to the Whirlpool, pulling everything into it: part of a boat fender, a stick, a shredded piece of tire, a Coke bottle that bobbled, dipped, and shot free, only to plunge back down. On the observation decks, people watched the jet boats packed with tourists skidding out to the edges of the Whirlpool. Above them, the Spanish Aero Car moved along its cable and drew back again, a bright red spider making a filament in its web, venturing out and then returning. From there, the river shot through a confined channel, past the Devil’s Hole Rapids, with the Niagara Parks Botanical Gardens to the west and the Devil’s Hole State Park to the east. It tumbled under the Queenston-Lewiston Bridge, until it opened out below Queenston Heights Park, topped by the monumental, unblinking gaze of General Brock on his high column.
It was still a powerful river, but it had less vigour as it flowed toward Lake Ontario. It was here, rounding the last corner, unheeded by the golfers at the Niagara-on-the-Lake Golf Club, that it spent itself in an ease of blue, or the Shining Water, as it had been called by the Iroquois. The river became a lake, and the water moved east, around the many islands and islets of the Thousand Islands, before it was channelled into the St. Lawrence River. Northeast of Quebec City, long before it reached the Gaspé, the river broadened into a vast expanse that moved ceaselessly, losing all the names by which it had been known, as it opened out, opened wide.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Thanks to the people at McClelland & Stewart – Jennifer Lambert and Ellen Seligman, in particular – for giving this novel a home. It was my great pleasure to work with Jennifer Lambert so closely during the editing process. Deepest thanks, as well, to the wonderful Anita Chong for helping so much, and to Heather Sangster, for her fine work.
To Jackie Kaiser, of Westwood Creative Artists – my thanks for such clear-eyed insights.
I am also indebted to Jennifer Glossop, whose assistance came at a crucial time.
A Nova Scotia Arts Council grant helped give this novel the start it needed.
I was able to spend brief periods of time at the Abbaye Notre-Dame de l’Assomption in Rogersville, New Brunswick, where several chapters of this novel were written. Warmest thanks to the community there, especially Sister Kate Waters.
Dr. Rod Michalko was an enormous help to me.
I am also grateful to the late Dr. George Sanderson.
For medical advice, I am deeply indebted to Dr. Leone Steele, Dr. Imogen Fox, and Dr. Patty Menard. Many thanks, as well, to Brian Kelly, a paramedic based in Guysborough, N.S., whose help was invaluable.
Special thanks to Chief Tim Berndt of the Niagara Parks Police for his patience with my questions. I am also grateful for the help I received at both the Niagara Falls Public Library and at the Lundy’s Lane Historical Museum.
As always, heartfelt thanks to Janet Simpson, and my sisters, Jennifer and Sue. Loving thanks to Paul, David, and Sarah, who give me such encouragement. I could not have written this without you.
Anne Simpson is the author of two acclaimed novels: Canterbury Beach, a finalist for the Thomas Head Raddall Atlantic Fiction Award, and Falling, a national bestseller. She is also the author of three books of poetry: Light Falls Through You, winner of the Gerald Lampert Memorial Award and the Atlantic Poetry Prize; Loop, winner of the Griffin Poetry Prize and a finalist for the Governor General’s Award for Poetry; and, most recently, Quick, winner of the Pat Lowther Memorial Award and a finalist for the Atlantic Poetry Prize. Winner of the prestigious Journey Prize for short fiction, Simpson has also been shortlisted for the Pushcart Prize.
Anne Simpson lives in Antigonish, Nova Scotia.