Life, Love, and a Polar Bear Tattoo

by Heather Wardell

  I didn't lie to Ian, though, or to Larissa. Not much to Larissa, anyhow, and only because knowing about Kegan would upset her. So none of this stuff was a big deal. Nobody got hurt by my little tiny miniscule lies. Nobody cried or lost their jobs or missed a deadline.

  So wasn't it okay?

  My reverie was interrupted by the arrival of a beautiful Swedish girl. She didn't have to say she was Swedish, it was written all over her. Long blonde braids, perfect peaches-and-cream skin.

  "Candice?" she asked, with just a trace of an accent.

  "That's me."

  "I'm Annika. I'll be doing your treatment today."

  I scrambled out of the whirlpool and wrapped myself quickly in a towel, not wanting to have to compare myself to her sleek sexy body.

  "Chocolate wrap, right?"

  "Yes."

  "Have you had a wrap before?"

  "No," I admitted, feeling strangely guilty about this lapse in my beauty education.

  "You'll love it," she enthused. "I'll be smoothing chocolate and essential oils all over your skin, and then wrapping you up in warm linens to rest and relax."

  She sounded as though she was quoting right out of the brochure. "Sounds great."

  "Oh, it is."

  We arrived in a small treatment room. There was a small bed and a stool in front of a tiny table laden with more oils and potions than I'd ever seen in one place, and that was it. There wasn't room in there for much more, really. Annika dimmed the lights and gestured to the bed. I perched on the edge, not sure what I was supposed to do.

  "Now," she announced grandly, "for your journey of the senses."

  I was a little bit taken aback, but soon found out that she simply meant for me to sniff an endless array of oils and choose three to put into my wrap.

  Ten minutes later, with peppermint, satsuma orange and strawberry selected (an odd combination, but they went together well) Annika instructed me to take off all my clothes and slip under the sheet on the bed.

  "All?" I asked, trying to pretend I was just confirming. Being naked in front of a stranger didn't strike me as the best way to relax.

  "Yes, all," she said. "Otherwise your clothes will be ruined with the chocolate, and we don't want that, do we?"

  We sure did, if it meant we wouldn't have to be naked.

  "I just got a tattoo yesterday," I said. "Should I keep my clothes on to cover it?"

  Annika demanded, and got, a showing of my lovely little bear, then smoothed a piece of plastic wrap over it and secured it with some medical tape.

  "Happens all the time," she said. "That'll protect it. Now, strip!" She smiled at me and left the room.

  So I stripped and tucked myself into the bed. It was actually quite comfortable.

  Annika returned, bringing with her a large bowl from which the scent of chocolate drifted. She went to her little table and added the oils. Mixing it together with a big wooden spoon, she gave me a quick rundown on what would be happening.

  "I spread this all over you, and then wrap you up nice and comfy in the sheets. Then you just rest here for twenty minutes or so, and then I come and unwrap you. You take a nice warm shower to get the chocolate off, and you're all done."

  Twenty minutes of lying there. I figured she would probably give me a magazine or two to pass the time.

  I struggled mightily not to be embarrassed as she brushed the chocolate mixture all over me, front and back, reasoning that she'd seen many naked people before and it was just part of her job.

  Once I was covered, she wrapped me up, mummy-like, in the sheets, trapping my arms against my sides. Flipping me over onto my back, she patted me gently on the top of my head, pretty much the only thing not covered in chocolate.

  "Have a nice rest. I'll see you in a while."

  She dimmed the lights and closed the door behind her as I was trying to figure out whether it'd be worthwhile to ask her to drape a magazine over my face so I'd at least have one page to read.

  I was alone.

  Alone with nothing to do but marinate in chocolate and think.

  Sunday, August 14th

  I am standing by the side of a long country road. I know that I am in Italy, even though I've never been there before. A funeral passes by. An old lady, small and wrinkled and somehow inherently Italian, stands near me, crying and wailing with more misery than I would have thought one person could express. Clearly someone very important has died.

  I find myself rising away from the road, but the wailing continues, and grows steadily louder. Louder and more pathetic...

  My eyes still closed, I realized that I was snuggled down deep in my bed. The wailing, though, was even louder than it had been before. The pain, the absolute desperation in it, was overwhelming.

  The hurt... the sadness...

  The cat!

  It was Ninja, crying out his agony and devastation. Over what, I had no idea, since his life seemed to be just about perfect. My eyes drifted open and I managed to focus them on the alarm clock.

  4:44 in the morning.

  On a Sunday.

  I rolled onto my side so that I could get out of bed, and found myself face to face with the cat. The wailing, which had stopped briefly while I was trying to return to the land of the living, started again when he realized I was aware of his presence.

  I put my hand under his chin and stared into his eyes.

  "I thought someone had died. If you don't hush up right now, someone is going to die."

  I glared at him for another moment, and then he pulled away from me and walked to the end of the bed. He stared back at me for a moment, with the kind of disdain that only a cat can really pull off, and then haughtily jumped from the bed. The effect was somewhat spoiled by the grunt he made when he hit the ground. Fat cats can't jump.

  I heard Ninja's claws clicking away on the hardwood, and drifted slowly back to sleep, the last thought in my head, "Why didn't I just get a hamster?"

  *****

  At a more civilized hour, I got up and surveyed the house. Things were coming along quite well. I had a bit of time to kill before my lunch with Larissa, which she'd asked to have later than usual since she was getting her hair colored, so I looked around for a nice easy job to do to make the house better.

  Wandering up to our bedroom, I found the job. When we looked at the house before we bought it, I had dreams of sitting outside on the balcony outside the bedroom with a drink and a good book. Unfortunately, the previous owners had covered the balcony's floor with a very unattractive carpet, of a color that reminded me of the place where brown and puke-green go to die, which didn't make it a nice place to sit and relax.

  Ian and I weren't innocent either. On the balcony as well were our window screens (which we took off once when we were feeling particularly energetic and decided to wash the windows; the windows never got washed and we never replaced the screens), a suitcase that Ninja had mistaken for his litter box, a bathmat that Ninja had mistaken for his litter box, and the old headboard for our bed. We'd bought a nicer one but never quite got around to throwing out the old one. Needless to say, we hadn't sat outside on the balcony since we moved in over a year ago.

  I bundled up the accidental litter boxes in garbage bags and hauled them out of the bedroom, down the stairs and out the back door. After I stashed them near our garbage can, I went back inside, up the stairs and into the bedroom. A lovely twenty minutes of attempted screen installation ensued, but I did eventually win out and the screens were returned to their former resting places. By this point, I needed a rest myself, but I pressed on.

  The headboard presented an enormous challenge. It was made of very heavy plywood with a cheap-looking wood veneer over top, and I had no idea how to get the beast out of the bedroom, never mind down the stairs.

  I poked and prodded it assessingly, and realized that part of it was actually rotting away due to having been outside on the balcony through a Canadian winter. I pulled at the wood and heard a slight splintering sound. Off I went to
the basement, returning with a hammer and a crow bar.

  It took me nearly half an hour, but I managed to reduce the headboard to a collection of cheap-looking-wood-veneer-covered-very-heavy-plywood boards. These I stuffed into several garbage bags. I put them by the garbage can with the previous load, and returned to the balcony to face my nemesis.

  I gingerly caught hold of a corner of the revolting carpet and began to pull it upwards. I'd expected it to be glued down, but it moved easily and I was able to pull it all off, revealing the dustiest gray concrete I'd ever seen and what appeared to be the world's entire population of dead ladybugs. I swept the floor five times and eventually managed to get rid of all the ladybugs and most of the dust. Ecstatic, I wanted to rest on my laurels, or at least on a lawn chair, but we'd never bought furniture for the balcony since it had always been such a mess. Now that it was clean, it was time to go shopping.

  A flash of brilliance hit me. Ikea! I would just pop into Ikea, grab some funky European chairs, and come home. Ikea was only fifteen minutes away; I could be done in an hour round-trip.

  Those who do not learn from past shopping trips are doomed to repeat them.

  One hour later I was dragging a cart filled to the top with Ikea bits and pieces, and I was only halfway through the store. I had yet to see any outdoor furniture and I'd already collected at least two hundred dollars worth of stuff. There should be signs posted at the doors of Ikea stores: "Abandon hope and solvency, all ye who enter here". However they say that in Swedish.

  I eventually found myself some very neat chairs and footstools to match, along with several pots of strawberry plants and petunias, paid the exorbitant bill, and hauled my cart out to the car.

  Back home, I made several trips to get everything upstairs and laid it all out ceremoniously on the balcony. It looked good. Really good. I was a genius.

  I checked my watch and realized in horror that I was about to be a late genius, late for lunch with Larissa. Glancing into the mirror, I discovered that I was filthy after my wrestling with the balcony and plants.

  One lightning-fast shower later, I threw on a red top with beaded fringe on the hem and a short white flared skirt, swiped my soggy hair back into a french twist, and took off for the restaurant.

  Larissa wasn't there when I arrived. I was terrified. If she'd arrived, and left because I was so late, I would be unlikely to survive the fallout. I would indeed be late. The late Candice Warburton.

  As I sat at our table with my martini, shuddering inside, Larissa suddenly rushed in, her hair even more perfect than usual and a rich shimmering blonde. "I'm so sorry I'm so late! Have you been waiting long?"

  I smiled, trying to hide my relief. "No, not really. Don't worry about it. Your hair looks great."

  She smiled back and sat down across from me. "Thanks. So," she said casually, "What's new?"

  I couldn't help the smirk creeping across my face.

  "What? What's going on?"

  I leaned in towards her and whispered, "I got a tattoo."

  She laughed. "Oh, you did not."

  I sat back, raised my eyebrows, and waited.

  Her eyes widened. "You did? Oh my God, let me see."

  "I can't show you here."

  "Why not, where'd you put it? Am I about to be traumatized? Okay, fine, let's go to the bathroom."

  In the bathroom, I lifted the back of my shirt with great ceremony. Larissa gave a low whistle.

  "Wow. That is cool."

  "Isn't it?" I said with glee, twisting around to take a look at it in the mirror.

  "How much did it hurt?"

  "Honestly, it wasn't all that bad."

  Larissa looked at me disbelievingly.

  "Really, it wasn't. The fear of getting it done was actually a lot worse than actually getting it done."

  "If you say so. Hey, can I touch it?"

  "Yeah, it doesn't really hurt now. Wait, are your hands clean?"

  Larissa rolled her eyes at me, then stretched out a cautious finger and touched the outline of the bear. Snapping her finger away, she said, "I can feel it. Is it supposed to be raised up like that?"

  "It's still healing. When it's done, it'll be smooth."

  Shaking her head, Larissa followed me back to our table.

  "I didn't think you had it in you," she said as we got settled again. "Do you think Ian'll like it?"

  "I don't know. Hope so."

  "Well, it's Ian. He won't be a jerk about it even if he doesn't. Oh, hey, speaking of jerks, you won't believe this."

  I just might.

  "Kegan never called Fiona, so she finally called him herself. She hates calling guys. Figures they should be chasing her."

  She laughed, then added, "They usually do, actually. If he's trying to make her want him more, he's doing a great job."

  "So what happened?"

  "They talked for a little while then she told him she had to go. She didn't want him thinking she had all the time in the world to spend on him."

  "When are they going out?" I did my best to make my voice sound only mildly interested.

  "They're not. He called her back on Friday and said he's too busy right now to have time for a new relationship."

  I looked into my martini glass, trying to hide my relief. Fiona wouldn't be good for him, I was sure of it. I'd told him he should go out with her, but I was glad he'd decided not to. When I thought I wouldn't show Larissa my feelings, I looked up. "Poor Fiona. How'd she react?"

  Larissa looked at me, and her eyes widened. "You already knew."

  I froze.

  "You did! What did he tell you?"

  I gave in. "We talked about it on Friday at work. He said he didn't know what to do. I told him he should ask her out."

  Larissa said, "But he didn't."

  "Apparently not. But I told him to."

  I was telling the truth, and Larissa seemed to realize it. She wasn't completely satisfied, though. "You wouldn't have been upset if he had gone out with her, would you?"

  I shook my head. "Nothing to do with me." I wouldn't have been upset, at least, if he'd dated someone who wasn't Fiona. She wasn't good enough for him.

  "How much are you seeing him?"

  "Daily. Not always all day, but daily."

  "And he's behaving himself?"

  I nodded. "We spend the whole day talking about tiles and paint and that sort of thing."

  "Never outside of work, right? Other than that coffee shop thing."

  "Why would I?"

  Larissa raised her eyebrows. "That doesn't answer the question."

  I couldn't tell her about the Wonderland visit; she'd skin me alive. Her eyes narrowed and I had to say something. "He does want to take me out for dinner next week to thank me for my work."

  "But you're not going, right?"

  "I'm not sure yet. Probably not."

  "Probably not? Are you crazy?"

  "It's rude not to go, isn't it?"

  "Is it just you two?"

  That was a good question. I'd assumed it was, but it might not be. "I don't know. I doubt it, now that you mention it."

  Clearly tiring of talking about Kegan, Larissa said, "That's not so bad then. Hey, you didn't tell me about the spa trip. How'd it go?"

  "I may not be cut out to be a lady of leisure. I was all wrapped up and bored out of my mind. Couldn't even read."

  "Nothing to do at all?"

  "Not a thing. Well, I guess I could have counted the ceiling tiles."

  "Could have or did?"

  Larissa knew me too well.

  "I did count them," I admitted. "Seven times, I believe. And then I tried to figure out how big the tiles were so I could figure out how big the room was."

  Larissa laughed. "And then what?"

  "When the cloths and the chocolate started to cool, I got itchy."

  "Itchy?"

  "Like all the mosquitoes on the planet were in there with me. Itchy and cold and clammy and oh, so terribly itchy."

  "What did you do?" />
  "I wiggled around trying to scratch myself, but there was no way to scratch most of the itchy spots that way. I nearly fell off the table."

  Larissa was laughing now, but trying to smother it. "Sounds terrible."

  "Indeed it was, so quit that giggling."

  "I'm sorry, it's just... "

  "I know, it's funny now. At the time it was nasty."

  I'd started calling Annika, quietly at first and then eventually at the top of my lungs. No response.

  "Then I started wondering what would happen if I had a heart attack or something in there. There was obviously nobody around to hear me, so nobody would be able to save me. I could be dead, there on the table, covered in chocolate, and nobody would even know."

  Larissa was now laughing so hard that the tears were rolling down her cheeks. "I can see the headline now," she choked out. "'Woman found dead, covered in chocolate.'"

  "'Police are baffled'," I joined in, "'but did say she smelled delicious'."

  "So, don't keep me in suspense. How'd you escape the dread chocolate wrap?"

  "I shut my eyes tight and tried to imagine myself sitting on the couch at home with a book. I made the whole thing as real as I could, so that I could manage at least some sort of an escape."

  "Good plan," said Larissa, still snickering.

  "When Annika came back, she said that I'd only gotten itchy because I was fighting the relaxation. I said, 'No, I think it's because I'm covered in cold wet cloths', and she got mad."

  "So, no more wraps?"

  "No more wraps," I confirmed. "I'll probably go to the spa again, but only to do something where I can still read at the same time. Or watch TV, or talk to someone. Anything but just sitting there trying to relax."

  "Do you even know how?" Larissa asked. "I'm not sure I've ever seen you relaxed."

  "What do you mean? I'm relaxed now."

  Larissa raised an eyebrow and grabbed my hand. I looked at her in surprise. "Quit tapping your fingers on the table, then."

  "I wasn't."

  "Oh, really. Sure sounded like it. And looked like it. And was it."

  I pulled my hand away and wrapped it around my coffee cup.

  "I don't know," I said slowly. "I guess I read, and I take baths sometimes, as long as I have a book that can go in with me, and I watch TV. I crochet then too, though. I get bored just watching."