Botero's Beautiful Horses

by Jan Conn

  The doctors want to try your dad living at home. If it doesn’t work out, they will find somewhere else for him, but that will cost money. If he stays here, a nurse will pop in three days a week to check on things and help your dad out. That’s what they’ve decided.

  Stacey was lying on the fake Persian rug in the living room, scratching Lucky’s belly with one hand. If she stopped for a minute, the dog would poke her with his paw until the scratching resumed. For the last two months, the dynamic of the household had changed significantly. Stacey felt much closer to her mother, closer than she could remember, and now with Lucky also part of the family, their way of living suited her. She had been mean, at times, to her mother, and she realized, only after Sage was out of the picture, that she had lumped her mother in with the rejection of family, a poison she needed to purge. Her mother wanted the best for her and most of the time would do whatever she could to see she was happy. Twice, since they’d returned from their short Christmas getaway, Della had taken her on short driving stints and promised they would do more in the spring once the roads had cleared. Stacey had the driving licence manual memorized in anticipation. She spent as much time with her friend Amber as always, but now Amber wanted to come to her house. She liked Stacey’s mother, she said, because Della differed from most of the moms in town. They got together one night for a hair dyeing session, and all three of them had their hair treated. Stacey and Amber convinced Della she was too young to go with silver, so she opted for a light blonde that suited her, just as the girls said it would. Stacey had dyed her hair red like she wanted, a startling red, and now she wore her toque as much as possible. Amber’s hair looked the most spectacular: Della and Stacey had worked hard at separating strands of her hair which, streaked in blue, gave her the look of someone with attitude who’d had moved to Fernie from Haight-Ashbury.

  Della carried on as if she had memorized a speech. He’ll sit in a wheelchair most of the day. I’ll need to keep an eye on him and help him to the washroom and help him get in and out of bed, but that’s about all we can do for him. The nurse is trained to handle helpless people and will bathe him when she comes. He’s unable to talk in any way we can understand, but we can talk to him. You don’t have to if you don’t want to, but he’d like it if you did.

  How are you supposed to do all that and look after three kids?

  I’m not sure yet, but I’ll manage. Like I said, this will be a trial period. If it doesn’t work out, we’ll explore other options.

  Stacey tried to imagine the scenario. She wanted things as they were now. She couldn’t imagine Amber wanting to come over with a zombie sitting in the middle of the living room. If she talked to her dad while he sat in his wheelchair, it would be when her mom was out of the house, and he would not like what she had to say.

  Before spring comes, Della said, Hart has agreed to build a ramp out the back. I’ll wheel him out into the yard when the weather is good. I know what you’re thinking. It’s not the way you wanted it to work out. I can’t say I wanted this either, but for now there’s no other choice. There will be a different dynamic around here starting next week, and I know you’ve talked about getting a part-time job, but I’d like you to focus on school, so I’m going to double your allowance so you’ll have more freedom to do the things you like.

  We can afford it?

  We’ll afford whatever it takes to keep this family together.

  Sage wasn’t the man he had been. You could see the fear in his one good eye and hear it in his slurred speech that rose and fell, loaded with incomprehensible emotion. With no ramp to the house, the nurse and Della situated the wheelchair on the front porch, then maneuvered Sage up the steps to the main floor, as if he were an injured football player heading to the sidelines. It soon became obvious that Belle was a no-nonsense woman, serious about her profession. Della tried her best to reassure Sage, but when she did, Belle overlapped her words with her own, suggesting that this was Sage’s life now and he would have to get used to it. Della had been worried about this day but had given little thought to where Sage would find himself once inside. Belle took command immediately, leaving Sage and his wheelchair by the door while she moved a chair off to the side and moved a lamp toward the corner of the living room. Then she backed the wheelchair into the newly designated spot.

  From there, Belle said, he can see what’s going on in the living room, and there will be nothing going on behind his back, so to speak. He can see the TV if you turn it on for him, and if you want to have him in the kitchen with you when you’re cooking and cleaning, you can wheel it there. If there’s nothing on TV and you have the drapes opened, he can look out on the street from here and watch the kids trying hard to grow up. I think this might work out after all.

  Belle inspected the bathroom and then demonstrated the proper procedure for helping Sage use the facilities. Sage squealed in a manner that suggested he didn’t want to go to the bathroom right now, but Belle ignored him, grabbed the handles on the wheelchair and told Della to follow her. His left hand is somewhat serviceable and getting stronger day by day, so he’ll help you by balancing himself while he’s still standing. Sage, grab hold of the counter there. That’s it. Now he won’t topple over, and you can down his trousers like so. He’s wearing a large diaper as you can see, but that’s just like a pair of underwear. If nothing goes wrong, he can wear them all week if he wants to, but if things go sideways, this will make cleanup more manageable. Once you get them in, the best thing to do is plunk them down and then leave them be for five minutes. He sits just like so whether it’s number one or number two. That’s important.

  Belle signalled for Della to leave with her, and they pushed the bathroom door almost closed for privacy. Leaving it open a tad allows you to hear him if he’s having trouble. Or he’ll mumble grumble when he’s finished.

  Maybe he’s done now, Della said. He shook his head when you took him in there.

  I know, I know. Best to leave them for a few minutes. They think they don’t need to go, but once they get seated, things happen. I wish your tub wasn’t so low, but we’ll manage.

  The nurse volunteered to take an unguided tour of the rest of the house. She looked out onto the backyard, and Della explained where the ramp would be installed. Unless Belle was issuing instructions, she didn’t say much. She said h-m-m-m as if most of what she saw was workable but not ideal.

  Will the dog be a problem? Della asked.

  Not unless he doesn’t like dogs. Dogs always add more than they take away.

  Belle retrieved Sage from the washroom and wheeled him back to his new place in the world. She said she didn’t normally work Saturdays, this was an exception. She would arrive in the morning every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and she left her card and a card belonging to the call service if something urgent came up on the off days. She pointed to a seven-digit number on the back of both cards, which referred to Sage Howard and no one else. If everything worked out like she hoped it would, a month from now, an appointment would be arranged with Dr. Harris for a reassessment. That’s the kind of doctor he is. He likes to know how his patients are making out.

  Belle left and Della sank into a kitchen chair, exhausted. Stacey had left early in the morning for an Environmental Club meeting, and Della was glad she hadn’t been home when Sage arrived. She would have felt like Della did now, that this whole thing was more than she could manage. She lit a cigarette. Smoking in front of Sage might make him antsy for the chance to smoke dope, and he had enough to cope with for now. When she returned to the living room, Sage sat like a mime who had perfected his job.

  Well, you’re home after all this time. I’ll turn the TV on if you like. There might be a movie starting at one.

  She turned on the TV, and someone knocked at the door. Molly the Nose had flowers in hand as an excuse to get the lowdown. Della thanked her and went to fetch a vase.

  Well, look who’s home and looking bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. Sage looked up and moved his head in cir
cles, a compromise between yes and no by the look of it. I brought you some flowers. Carnations. They don’t give off much pollen, and they last two weeks if you keep them wet. Hart said hi. He’ll be over tonight for a visit.

  Sage didn’t move his head up and down, sideways or in circles at Molly’s announcement. Della figured he must be tired, and it was too much to take in.

  Della made tea and served her guest in the kitchen. She made a small pot so Molly wouldn’t have an excuse to stay long.

  How will you cope with all of this? Molly said.

  I don’t know. I’ll try. That’s all I can do.

  Della didn’t want to explain that she pretty much had to make it work. If Sage went into assisted living, it would take all the money he had coming in from his disability to fund it, and it would be impossible for Della and Stacey to carry on. It wouldn’t do to have Sage knowing the situation, though it was possible, she realized, that he’d already figured that out.

  Molly left and Della checked on Sage, then lay down on her bed. She drifted off to sleep and woke because Stacey had climbed into bed and wrapped an arm over her shoulder. Stacey had seen her dad sitting there, seen how age had cast a shadow over his face. I’m scared, Stacey said.

  I know, Della said. I’m scared too.

  23

  Stacey wasn’t able to put into words the reason she felt compelled to earn high marks in school. Her Aunt Sadie hadn’t gone past high school, technically hadn’t graduated, and she seemed to find a life full of adventure and excitement. But Amber planned to go on to university somewhere and, in her mother’s words, make something of herself. A social worker maybe. Stacey couldn’t easily keep pace with Amber because everything she did had to be perfect, and sometimes Amber would dash off an assignment in one evening while Stacey would hone her work over an entire week. Rarely did either one of them miss a class. If a session bored them, they knew to get a head start on homework from their other courses, so they kept busy most of the time and socialized during Environmental Club meetings and sometimes on a weekend.

  Amber and Stacey liked to carve out a few hours for themselves and pretend they didn’t have a care in the world. One Saturday they hiked all the way to Coal Creek and back just to see the remnants of what had once been a bustling coal town; another time they hitchhiked to Cranbrook to buy clothes. They spent most of their time together in the town of Fernie, sauntering down the railroad tracks until a train forced them off or hanging out at a coffee shop. Such days, flirting with an imbecile world, felt liberating.

  One Saturday night, they saw Back to the Future at the theater, where they sat six rows behind Hugh, who was sharing popcorn with the girl beside him. Amber said it was his cousin from Revelstoke, and Stacey had no reason to believe it wasn’t true. Cousin or not, she had no problem earning Hugh’s attention.

  Most nights after a movie, they went somewhere to talk, and they had plenty to discuss after Back to the Future, but Amber had promised her mother she’d be home early because the family was driving to Calgary first thing in the morning. Stacey didn’t feel like going straight home. She watched Hugh and the girl that might have been his cousin heading down 2nd Avenue, so she walked the other way, then turned down 5th Street toward the highway. In the dark, a train ripped through town then faded into the wilderness. Shortly after, she had a sense she was being followed. She turned toward the Elk River, walking faster than she wanted, and every time she glanced over her shoulder, she could see a man following in the shadows. Realizing that there would be little light by the river, she turned back toward downtown. The last place she wanted a man to follow her was into the woods where there would be no one else this time of night. She went down 2nd Avenue and wedged herself between brick buildings at the side of The Grand Central Hotel, crouched down and waited. It wasn’t long before Angus Bland loped past her hiding spot. There was something not quite right about Angus Bland. Almost forty, he lived with his mother in the oldest part of Fernie, a stretch of houses that had miraculously avoided the fire of 1908 that vanquished the town to smoldering ashes in a few hours. Angus’s aberrant behaviour was well-known in town, and a court order allowed him out in public only under the supervision of his mother in the daytime. Angus favoured children and girls. He would walk up close to people chatting on the street and watch them without saying a word. Often he urinated in public, if his mother wasn’t beside him, with picket fences and privet hedges his favourite targets. Some in town saw him as a harmless cretin to be ignored, but some with children battled the authorities, eager that something be done. Angus’s aging mother did the best she could, and rarely did Angus appear about town without her, but she often fell asleep at odd times, and when that happened, Angus took advantage of his freedom.

  Stacey waited until he went a ways down the street, then watched from her brick hiding place and saw him head for 5th Street, the street she had been on earlier, no doubt thinking she might have followed the same route as before. She wondered if he knew where she lived. Probably not, but she didn’t want him to find out. She crossed 2nd Avenue toward the railway tracks then walked north toward the old railway station. She sat on a bench and listened to the frenzy of patrons drinking at the Fernie Hotel who spilled onto the sidewalk. She imagined Angus following the same route he had before, and that he might follow this route two or three times before he would give up and go home.

  An elderly man walked south from the Fernie Hotel, and the way he walked, he’d been inside drinking most of the night. Morning Missy, he said and sat at the opposite end of the bench. His hands fumbled inside his coat pockets and extracted a pouch of tobacco and some papers. It took several minutes to roll a cigarette, and then he couldn’t find his matches, which had fallen under the bench when he’d searched for his tobacco. Stacey picked up the matches and offered to help light his cigarette, and the man accepted. It looks like it will be a beautiful day, he said, then stood up unsteadily and made his way across the tracks to home.

  Stacey waited by herself until she calculated it had been the better part of an hour since she’d seen Angus Bland. Her mother would expect her to phone from Amber’s house unless she got home soon. She wandered down the main street, but few people were about and it was quiet. She stopped in an alcove to focus on some artwork on display in the window, and in the reflection of the glass, she saw someone standing behind her. Angus Bland, standing on the sidewalk, three feet from where she was cornered, his hands fishing inside his open fly. Hi, he said with confidence, as if they were acquaintances familiar with meeting under such circumstances. Stacey moved to the left to walk out onto the street, and Angus moved to block her. She tried moving the other way, but Angus was not about to let her get away until he was ready. I’ll scream if you don’t get out of my way, Stacey said, and Angus, with the hand that wasn’t busy fishing in his pants, raised a finger to his lips and said, Shush. Angus found what he was looking for and pulled his penis out into the cool air for her to see. Stacey screamed, and soon Hugh appeared in the alcove. He shoved Angus out of the way, and the man cowered against the door and whimpered.

  You okay? Hugh asked.

  I am now.

  Angus is nuts, Hugh said. He doesn’t know what he’s doing. Do you want me to walk you home?

  No. I’ll be fine. Thanks for being here.

  I saw you walking down from the station. I wanted to catch up to you. If I had, none of this would have happened.

  Well, thanks anyway. I have to get home now. They’re expecting me.

  Fair enough. Every town has an Angus. I’ll take him home before the police do.

  Hart didn’t show up the first night like he promised. Della figured Molly had told him Sage was too tired. He showed up the next night about seven and checked his watch as he walked in, as if he had an appointment and was determined to be punctual. Molly had told him to check the carnations had water, so he did that.

  Potholes, Hart said. Life is filled with them, but I’ve yet to find a road riddled with potholes I
couldn’t travel down. What do you say I wheel you over to Fort Whoop for an hour? Change of scenery. Sage said nothing, but his left eye looked interested. Very well, then. Sound good to you, Della?

  If he wants to go.

  Oh, he wants to go. I know what this guy wants.

  Before they left, Della explained about the clipboard and pen and told him to take it along to make things easier. Hart looked at what she had and tucked it under his arm.

  Be careful, Della said. There’s no ramp out there.

  I know, I’ll get on that tomorrow.

  And there’s a lot of snow.

  I’ve already shovelled a path to Fort Whoop. We’ve got everything covered.

  Hart showing up like the good fairy caused Della and Stacey to look at one another like they’d just discovered a mountain of gold in the living room. Della could use the time to clean up and put her thoughts in order after a hectic day, and Stacey could watch any of the TV shows she liked without Sage sitting in the corner like an overseer. Della had told Stacey she could pick out one or two shows she wanted to watch every week and they would tell Sage that’s the way things worked, but now she didn’t need her mother to negotiate on her behalf. They both knew Hart wouldn’t have Sage back in an hour. The two of them would soon be mellow and oblivious to time.