by André Babyn
On the way to school he decides that it’s only that his friend makes him feel safe. It’s that they spend so much time together. It’s that he’s never kissed anyone before. But he can’t shake the feeling of the other boy’s lips and when he sees him at school it is hard not to wonder what it would be like. He imagines that his friend is equally wary of him, like they shared or share the same dream.
At lunch their hands will graze each other’s and he’ll feel an electric shock. Jesus Christ, he will think, it’s just like my dream. But his friend hasn’t noticed and will continue talking about the idea that he had the night before: of a planet that is aware of itself and resents everything living on its surface. A planet that does everything in its power to eradicate the many species which depend on it for survival.
“Okay.”
“I think it’s a good idea.”
“It’s a good idea,” the boy who had the dream will say, totally disinterested.
Then the bell will ring and the two will head to their respective classrooms. The boy who was describing his idea will walk to math slowly, almost cautiously, wondering whether something is wrong with his friend, wondering whether he has done something irrevocable that will mean the end of their friendship. It’s a constant worry he has to push away: that he isn’t even enough for this one friend he’s not even sure he likes. In math he will imagine the parabolas on the surface of the chalkboard multiplied around a central point, like a spirograph twisting into infinity. Then he’ll notice that the way the sunlight is hitting the neck of a ponytailed girl in front of him is like something out of a Renaissance painting. He tries to will her to tuck a loose strand of hair behind an ear. Tuck the hair, he thinks. Tuck the hair. The hair is frozen in mid-air, auburn turned radiant gold in the sun.
She never tucks it. The teacher interrupts her lecture and tells the class to break into groups. The boy looks left and right and isn’t able to find a partner. In front of him someone sitting by the window is lowering the shade, and he watches the shadow descend in halting jumps along the far wall.
Acknowledgements
I did not write this book alone. Thank you to everyone who looked at early drafts of Evie of the Deepthorn — especially to Laura Dosky, who gave it so much attention, care, and counselling. There are many others I cannot name here, but not because I am not grateful for the help and the support you offered.
I was lucky to get the time and space to work on Evie through the M.A. in creative writing program at the University of Toronto — thank you to Bob McGill, Rick Greene, and everyone else there, and to the very generous family of Adam Penn Gilders, who helped me through a timely gift when I was starting on this book. But special thanks to Neil Surkan, Noor Naga, Ali Caufton, Joseph Thomas, Sam White, and Shannon Page, for so quickly building a community of extremely talented writers I did not want to leave.
Thank you also to Miriam Toews for such kind and careful guidance while I was making my first way through Evie. It was a joy and a privilege to talk about art and writing with you.
Thanks to my Saturday writing group — many of these pages were written, or rewritten, or at least probed, in your company. Thanks to the Holy Oak, which I still miss every week.
Thank you to my friends, and family, now and then.
And finally, thanks to Shannon Whibbs for paying such close attention, and Rachel Spence, Kathryn Lane, Jenny McWha, and everyone else at Dundurn.