Broken Man on a Halifax Pier

by Choyce, Lesley;

  The third punch made the very concrete shake and I heard boards groaning. The next blow was much the same, but the fifth hit created an ominous, unearthly crack, an explosion of some sort. A splintering and banging, and I knew that at least half of the roof had been torn from the house and lifted away. I was pretty sure I could hear it slam into the trees behind the house.

  I think we all bent over then into a kind of huddle. I was leaning over Ramona, Stanley had tucked himself over Brenda, and Rolf was on his hands and knees over top of Mackenzie. We had pushed ourselves together like a single living organism. A living thing trying to survive.

  We heard more glass breaking, boards jetting about above and crashing into walls. As the cellar door was ripped from its hinges, wind poured into the basement and we were once again in total darkness. Rainwater began to stream down on us, penetrating the floorboards above.

  It seemed to last forever. Wind. Rain. Darkness. All of us now wet and cold on a concrete floor, wondering how long this could possibly last. I wondered if the floor above us might come crashing down at this point. Was there more I should do? No, there wasn’t. There was nowhere to go. I’d been wise to get us down there, but this was it. We would either live through it or all die together.

  But my father was with me again. Stay put. Keep your wits. Tough it out.

  Eventually, the wind began to subside. The rain continued beyond the wind. It seemed like it would never end. I left the huddle to find an old tarp to put over us, but we were all soaked and cold.

  And then it was over. At the top of the stairs I could see a dim, grey light. When I tried to stand up, every bone in my body ached, every muscle was cramped. But as I straightened myself, I lifted Ramona to her feet. We all groaned as we tried to find strength in our limbs again.

  I checked the stairs to be sure they were safe, then Ramona and I guided her parents, Rolf, and Mackenzie up to the first floor. Mackenzie was still clinging to the box of Brody’s ashes I had given her.

  As we ascended back into the world of light, I kept thinking that all of us who had just endured this had discovered we were much stronger than we realized. Self-reliant. Resilient. What would my father’s expression be? Stubborn and strong. That’s all you need to be to survive in this world.

  44

  The sun was still rising to the east and the sky above was perfectly clear. Gulls flew overhead. You could see all this looking up from inside the first floor of the house. The entire roof was gone. Not fully secured, the wind had pushed up under the eaves on the south side and literally ripped it off. None of us said a word. It was the strangest sensation, standing there in the shell of what was left of the house looking up at the most benign sky I could imagine.

  Plywood and other pieces of lumber were scattered around on the floor. A couple of windows were broken. The roof was in the field and most of the vinyl siding had been ripped from the house. Everything was soaked by rain. Stanley kept his arm firmly around his wife. She was looking up at the sky above smiling. Then she laughed. Stanley tried to shush her, fearing perhaps that it was not a moment for laughter. But Ramona walked over to them, hugged them both, and laughed as well.

  Mackenzie didn’t seem to share the joke. Still holding Brody’s ashes, she sat down on the wet plywood subfloor and began to cry. I sat down beside her and put my arm around her. “Rough night,” I offered, not really knowing what to say.

  “I have nowhere to go,” she said.

  “Stay with us,” I said. “We’ll figure something out.”

  “Here?” she asked, still sobbing, looking around at the wreckage of what once was a half-built house.

  “Yes,” I said. “It will be like camping.”

  “I don’t like camping,” she said, sounding like an unhappy little kid.

  “We’ll make it work,” I told her.

  Ramona was watching us and she knew what we were talking about. She nodded her approval.

  Stanley was the first go outside, leading his wife through the open doorway. Rolf, Ramona, and I followed. Mackenzie was not far behind, wobbling over the debris.

  Everything had changed. Trees had been uprooted and were lying jumbled in crazy patterns around the perimeter of the yard. Power lines were down along the road. The road itself looked like it had been a river during the storm. It was covered with wet earth and stones, and in places the water had carved gullies out of the pavement.

  Stanley’s car was still intact, although a large branch had fallen and dented his trunk.

  Despite the carnage, the world appeared bright and shiny, if somewhat wet. It had a feeling of renewal and rebirth. Maybe it was just because we were so happy to be alive.

  Rolf’s jaw had dropped from the second he had reached the top of the stairs. He’d followed us outside and took in the sight of disaster. I could tell from the look on his face that the once-familiar landscape must have been unrecognizable to him. “It’s over, Rolf,” I said. “We made it.”

  “Wasn’t much of a storm, was it?” he said.

  “Bit of wind. Rain. What’s the big deal?”

  “Guess the party’s over. I should get going.”

  “Not yet,” I said, nodding toward the causeway that was still underwater. I could just barely make out Ramona’s black car, which had been washed off the road and was nose down in the harbour. “Give it an hour and the tide will drop.” Rolf nodded and walked off behind the house to have a pee.

  I was thinking about what it must have been like out at the fish shacks and the wharf last night. I hoped that every one of the fishermen had had enough sense to stay away.

  Ramona came to me and I put my arm around her. I pointed to the Lexus in the distance. “Sorry about your car,” I said.

  “I have insurance,” she said. “Don’t worry about that.”

  I looked back at the shambles of what once had been a beautiful house under construction. “I’m also sorry about your house.”

  “Our house,” she corrected me. “Besides, I took out insurance on that too.”

  I was shocked. She’d never told me. “You rich people like insurance, don’t you?”

  “Yeah, we do. It’s all about protecting your assets.”

  “I love you, babe. You protect my assets and I’ll protect you, how about that?” I gave her a big squeeze.

  “Deal,” she said.

  I went in the house and brought out some bottled water. Big Carl and his guys had left a case of it on the worksite and it had come in handy over the night. I handed everyone a bottle as we stood in a little circle. “Cheers,” I said. “Here’s to one hell of a party.”

  Stanley said he wanted to get Brenda back to the city, but I told him to hang back for a couple of hours until the roads would be cleaned up and safer. He seemed to appreciate my advice.

  I had this crazy desire to make love to Ramona just then and wondered what that was about. “I’m horny,” I told her.

  “Me too,” she said. “Disasters always make me horny.”

  “Guess we’ll have to wait,” I said.

  “No problem,” she said. “We have the rest of our lives.”

  A few cars were driving by on the road now. Drivers stopped and gawked at us and the roofless house. “Everybody all right?” one man asked.

  I yelled back that we were all okay and he drove on.

  Soon, I saw the first pickup truck cross the causeway. The water had receded some, but the road was still underwater.

  Then Joe arrived, gingerly driving up our washed-out driveway. Beth Ann was in the cab with him. When they got out, she went over to Mackenzie and spoke to her. Joe approached Ramona and me, looked up at the roof that wasn’t there. “How bad was it?” he asked.

  “Bad,” I said. “Real bad. But we’re all okay. Might need a new roof.”

  “Sorry for your loss,” he said, the classic line usually reserved for consolation when someone dies. Joe studied the carnage for a few seconds. “Beth Ann’s place took a real beating — flooded basement and water
damage in through the roof. My old shithole didn’t do much better. I’m gonna go out and see what’s left at the wharf. Wanna come?”

  “Sure. Rolf’s itching to go home too. Looks like the boys’ll be back in town.”

  “Somethin’ like that.”

  Beth Ann stayed with Mackenzie. Ramona told me to be careful and hurry back as Rolf and I got into Joe’s cab and he backed down out of the driveway.

  I recalled the hellish drive to the mainland last night as we had made the crossing on the narrow ribbon of land. On the peninsula, the water was still ankle deep. What few trees had been standing yesterday were knocked down and piled atop each other in odd angles. Several of the fish shacks had been battered by the waves; they looked like bulldozers had smashed into them. I noticed at once that my father’s beloved fish shack was simply gone. Nothing but rock and rubble beneath a skim of seawater where it once stood.

  Miraculously, Rolf’s shack was still standing. The door was mostly knocked off its hinges and the glass in the window was out, but it looked perfectly okay, aside from the fact that it probably still had a foot and half of water inside.

  “See,” Rolf said. “I told you. You didn’t need to worry about me. Could have kept my feet up and just rode the storm out as usual.”

  “Fuck you, old man,” Joe said, but there was no venom in his voice. Joe was looking toward the wharf, wondering what he would find.

  We left Rolf to inspect his waterlogged home and walked toward the battered wharf. There were about eight other fishermen there. They all looked stunned and pale. As we approached, we could see a dozen boats that had sunk to the bottom, including Beth Ann’s. Some were completely below the waterline on their sides, hulls smashed by the killer waves that had driven them into the wharf. Joe’s boat lay on its side up on the rocky shoreline. The cabin had been crushed and there was a gaping hole in its hull like it had been blasted by terrorist’s bomb. Like a lot of the others out here, I knew he didn’t have insurance. Just too damn expensive.

  We left the wharf and walked over to Joe’s boat. It was even worse than it had appeared at first. “Guess that’s that,” he said. “Now what?” It wasn’t really a question.

  Sheer Delight wasn’t anywhere to be seen.

  Gus Barton walked over to us just then. He looked at Joe’s boat. “Motherfucking storm,” he said. “The goddamn mother-fucking storm.”

  “You find your boat?” Joe asked.

  “Found what’s left of it,” Gus said. “No better than yours.”

  There was a flat, lifeless tone to the way he spoke. Same as Joe’s. Men in defeat. Hurricane Greta had just sucked the life out of this little fishing community.

  Gus turned to me. “Charles, somebody said they saw your old man’s boat way up the harbour. Guess you didn’t have her tied proper.”

  “Guess not,” I said. “Where’d they say it was?”

  “Up near Kendell’s Marsh. Storm drove her right ashore. Doubt if there’s much left of her. We’re all fucked. That’s the way she goes.” And he walked off.

  Joe just stood there looking at his wrecked boat, his ruined livelihood. “Nothing to do but walk away from it. That’ll be the end of fishing for me. Have to find a real job.”

  But I knew there was very little in the way of “real jobs” on this part of the Eastern Shore. What he meant was he’d have to move in to Halifax or go out west. A lot of the men who had lost boats the night before were probably already thinking they’d have to go somewhere else if they wanted to make a living. On this day, I knew many a dark thought was passing through the skulls of the fishermen of Stewart Harbour.

  Joe was in a sullen mood as he drove me back across the causeway. The water had receded some more, but the roadway was littered with rocks, sand, kelp, and driftwood. As we approached the mainland, Joe suddenly pulled off the road and got out of the truck. He was looking up harbour toward the uninhabited marshes where Kendell Creek drained itself into the harbour.

  “What do you see?” I asked.

  “Not sure. You up for a little walk?”

  “I should get back,” I said.

  “I think I see your ole man’s boat,” Joe said.

  “I’ll go check it tomorrow. I’m sure it’s like all the rest.” I could not envision that anything that had been floating at the wharf could have survived the storm.

  “Take the truck, then. I’ll catch up with you later,” he said, tossing me his keys and heading out into the marsh.

  When I returned to the house, Big Carl’s crew was already there. They had a generator going and I could see that Ramona had some kind of hotplate plugged into it and was boiling water in the coffee pot. Beth Ann and Mackenzie were sitting on a couple of plastic milk crates chatting. When I walked toward them, Beth Ann looked up at me. “You don’t have to say it. I knew it last night. I lost the boat. Joe’s too, right?”

  “Yes. I’m sorry.”

  “Like I say, it’s old news.”

  Wade and Bernie were picking up boards that had been tossed around and trying to create some order at the worksite in the wake of the storm’s destruction.

  Big Carl walked up to me as I got out of the truck. “My fault, Charles. Ran out of those hangers and let it go, thinking it was no big deal. Meant to finish it later. Now this. When the winds started, I tried to call but the lines were already down and the cellphones weren’t working. Hit me if you want to.”

  “I’m not gonna hit you.”

  “You should. I deserve it. In fact, I’d feel a little better if you did.”

  I shook my head.

  “What was it like when she let go?”

  “Like the world was coming to an end.”

  “I lay awake last night thinking about that roof. I even thought of coming over, try to jury-rig something, but the wife told me she’d ask for a divorce if I did.”

  “Didn’t know anyone went in for divorce along the Shore here.”

  “Not that popular, it’s true. Still, I stayed put and look what happened.”

  “They call it an act of God. Something like that.”

  “Gonna sue me?”

  “Fuck, no.”

  “Wouldn’t get much anyway.”

  “Waste of money on lawyers,” I told him.

  “Tell me about it.”

  “What you gonna do? Tear it down and start over?”

  We both stared at the sad-looking remnant of a house. Though the vinyl siding was ripped mostly off, some of it was still attached and dangling in places, making it look like the house had skinny, useless arms and legs.

  Big Carl scratched his jaw. “Here’s the thing,” he said. “Here’s the good news.”

  “I could use some good news.”

  “Foundation and basement are perfectly good, right?”

  “Kept us alive down there.”

  “Well, I say, we rip off all the siding, strip the Tyvek off and let her dry. There was no insulation, no gyprock, no plumbing that’s in. Let the whole shebang dry and see what we got.” And then he paused and looked up at the sky. “Think of it as a baptism.” He gave me a wink and a sly smile.

  “Blessed by a hurricane. Gift from Greta.”

  “Now, you’re talkin’,” he said. And he let go the loudest whistle I’d ever heard from a human being. “Wade, Bernie, get your scrawny asses over here and listen to this plan Charles has.”

  Of course, it wasn’t my plan at all. But Big Carl was right. Houses under construction could take weather, lots of it, as long as the wood could dry before closing them up.

  45

  Big Carl and his two-man crew also seemed to have found religion. Maybe the place had been baptized. Or maybe it had been crucified and now was about to be resurrected. Wade plugged an old boom box into the generator and began blasting some old tunes by Rush. Bernie let out a whoop, tossed his hammer high into the air, spun around once, and then caught it behind his back. He and Wade started ripping off the vinyl siding like they were having the time of their lives.<
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  Ramona made more coffee for everyone, and Big Carl passed around a pile of sandwiches. “The wife thought you all might have needed some nourishment. She said it was all she could do now that we weren’t getting a divorce.”

  By noon, Ramona’s parents had left, but not before everyone hugged. It was hard to believe Stanley was the man she had hated so fervently just months before.

  Mackenzie had curled up for a nap in Joe’s truck, snuggled beside Beth Ann, who sat behind the steering wheel reading a book.

  “Let’s go for a walk,” Ramona said.

  I told her what Big Carl had explained about salvaging the house.

  “I would have been okay if we’d lost the whole thing. As long as I had you.”

  “We’ve been through a lot in a short time,” I said.

  “That’s what I was thinking. Your life always this … chaotic?”

  “Not till you came along.”

  “Then this is all my fault?” Ramona asked.

  “Well, I wouldn’t put it that way. But things were pretty dull before you came along.”

  “But we made it this far. You think that’s some kind of commitment?”

  “It would appear so to the casual observer,” I concurred.

  “The casual observer. How third person.”

  “It would appear so to me too,” I said.

  “That’s pretty wimpy, but it sounds like a commitment of some sort.”

  “Of some sort.”

  A Nova Scotia Power truck went by then. We were walking toward the causeway and the truck stopped by three power poles that had snapped in half. Two men got out and studied them. We nodded as we walked on by.

  The water on both sides of the causeway was still brown and turgid. It would take a while before it settled back and grew clear again. We noticed some dead seagulls and ducks along the shoreline. And there was Ramona’s car, half buried in mud and seaweed and flooded with water.