by Derek Hayes
Late on this hot July evening, with everybody dancing and with his girl at his side, some of the derisiveness washed away. On his way out the scarred arena doors Tom said, “This town’s kinda nice.”
Two years later Tom waited long after his parents had left the party, this time a winter festival, and then walked down the slushy streets with Sammy Belinski. “I’m going to strap a bomb to myself,” he said, “and climb the water tower and light myself up, and drown the middle of this piss-ass town.” Belinski thought this was funny so he told Shauna Maples.
Wilkie was shoveling his driveway when Shauna and her friends came by, her pert seventeen-year-old figure illuminated in the dark. They may have been smoking dope because they were giggling a lot. “Hey Wilkie,” she said. “You’d better fill your sink with water. Tom’s going to blow the tower up.”
Wilkie went to Tom’s father’s kitchen door the next morning and told him what he’d heard, and later that week Jim arranged for Tom to spend a week in Toronto. Tom stayed at an apartment owned by one of Jim’s customers who had flown west for the March break. When he returned after four days he had wounded eyes, and seemed a softer version of himself. His family took him and Sammy Belinski to O’Brien’s. Sammy Belinski listened with rapt attention as Tom cowered in the booth, recalling his stay in Toronto.
After everyone had eaten, Tom cleared the table of dirty dishes and carried them into the kitchen. “Thanks a lot, Wilkie,” he said. Outside in the falling snow, he grabbed his mother’s arm to prevent her from falling on the ice. His mother, who had never been an affectionate lady, looked puzzled.
The next day he came back to O’Brien’s, sat in a booth, put his face in his hands, and said, “Toronto is filthy. Nobody there is like you or me. No one speaks English. At first I loved to take the subway and bus around the city, but after a while I hated it because I had to sit beside people who stank. It was like I was the freak. Just cause I was tidy and normal! Apartments there have thousands of people in them and not one person says hello to anybody. I stayed on the tenth floor of a large building and it wasn’t until the third day that I saw anyone. You know what? For all the people there, it’s a building full of ghosts. People live there but they don’t come out, you know what I mean?”
Wilkie poured him a cup of coffee. “When I was there,” he said. “I saw a homeless man in a tent on the sidewalk. I woke up one morning and I saw the guy behind a building — get this — he was taking a shit. It was the strangest thing I ever saw.” He slapped the bar and laughed.
“It is impossible to have any type of true friendship there,” Tom said. “You go out for a walk and then you come home alone. There’s no sense of community. Everybody there is shallow. They judge you by how much money you have.”
Tom’s car dealership — the business he took over after his father retired — thrived and Tom purchased a two-story house just south of Main Street. Sammy Belinski played pickup hockey on Saturday evenings. He tried to recruit Tom, now slightly balding and with a four-year old, a three-year old, and a two-month old, to play with them, but Tom refused. He was too important to play a child’s game, after all. Who wears hockey equipment? Shin pads, garter belts, hockey socks and jock-cups were all things from his childhood. Tom ballooned in weight and his face reddened. He enrolled his children in the local league.
One January day, while in the canteen with his oldest son’s team and the rest of the parents, he refused to buy a second hot-dog for his son. He watched in admiration as his son made the rounds of three of the more vulnerable kids on the team, convincing each of them to relinquish fifty cents. He watched his kid strut to the canteen window to buy the hotdog and Coke. His kid bit off part of the hotdog, doused the cross-section with ketchup and then tore into another piece. He recognized the smirk on his son’s face as he ate his hot-dog and drank his Coke.
His son’s talent on the ice was less obvious than Tom’s had been. The boy wasn’t particularly fast or large. Tom, however, claimed that his son’s hockey prowess, while not supported by statistics, was nevertheless evident in an intangible way.
Tom and his friends bought tickets to a Saturday evening Leafs game in Toronto — the Penguins were paying a visit. Tom noticed Wilkie in the back seat, and snarled at Sammy, who’d invited him at the last minute. On Highway 401, Tom talked incessantly of the week he’d spent as a youth in Toronto. He peppered Sammy with questions about present-day Toronto, combining his questions with comments that seemed to disparage the city and yet also hold it in awe.
At O’Brien’s the next evening, he was quiet. It was busy, so Wilkie couldn’t talk with the guys that much but made a point of being nice to Tom, looking for a return to the honesty that had connected them that one moment forty years earlier. Tom’s wife, Melinda said, “Why are you so strange around Wilkie?”
His large body slouched.
Now with a bulbous nose and grey-speckled moustache, Tom walked into the community centre. A group of five teenagers sat in the stands surreptitiously smoking dope. Tom said to Belinski, “I got a bitch of a sunburn on my back last Sunday, Sam. Todd got three runs. One was in the ninth that tied the score. I had to take off my shirt to wave the boy in on his second and forgot to put it back on. Where were you? You could have come over for my steaks. I just got some from St. Mary’s my very self. They’re ‘bout the tenderest pieces of meat you ever tasted.”
“We just had our second grandkid, Tom,” Sam said. “We were down in Ilderton waiting for baby Stephanie to come. She arrived just past ten o’clock. She’s got a little birthmark on her neck. You should see her.”
“Next time bring her for the steaks. We’ll cut one up small. She can watch Todd play this Thursday and, tell you what, I’ll put some of that meat in a blender and give her a straw so she can start off proper. You hear that CEB, that tobacco company, is coming to town — gonna transform our place . . . ”
“You know, Tom,” Sam said. “Wilkie’s representing the Harriers. Wilkie invited CEB here to open their branch warehouse.”
When the CEB businessmen came to town in a limousine, Tom wore his best checkered suit, and loitered on Main Street.
Wilkie and his brother escorted the CEB officials to O’Brien’s for lunch. On the way into the restaurant his brother said, “Should we introduce Tom to these guys? There aren’t too many businesses still around, and Tom’s dealership is still operational, barely.”
“Can’t do that,” Wilkie said. “Tom might open his mouth.”
He was desperately hoping CEB would plant their seed in the small town, but his hopes were off by 300 km. Their decision to set up elsewhere precipitated the relocation of two other tobacco-related businesses. Sammy Belinski took a job in a big company and moved to Kitchener-Waterloo. Tom’s wife died of cancer. Today was the funeral.
Afterwards, Tom came to O’Brien’s and sat in a booth.
“You used to be the Knight’s best player,” Wilkie said. “You had a knack for scoring goals that I don’t see in any of the kids these days.”
Tom drawled, “They don’t even play hockey much anymore. Summer dances are gone. Yard sales have replaced them and even then only once in a blue moon. This town’s got no more young people. What’s left for old guys like us, Wilkie?”
“Do you feel like joining the Harriers, Tom? We need members.”
“I don’t know. That’s not really my interest,” he said.
“I kinda feel like me and the Harriers have let the town down,” said Wilkie. “We haven’t realized our potential, have we?”
“Not your fault, Wilkie. You’ve done your bit. It’s a losing cause.”
“Whatever happened in Toronto, Tom? When you went there all those years ago?”
“Oh, that,” said Tom. “Yeah, I was young and stupid then. It was nothing really. I went into this coffee shop and there was this girl and this boy and they looked nice enough so I told them about how I’d scored all those goals in bantam league and about how I was a star hockey player, and then
I told them I was feeling left out in Toronto and how I was looking for fun and so at some point I noticed that this guy, this city guy, was just talking to this girl and he wasn’t listening to anything I was saying. So I went back to my table and sat there and stared at them for a while but they didn’t even try to talk to me, you know, to smooth things over and so I left and came back here because people there seemed so unfriendly. That was all.”
Tom left O’Brien’s. He walked past the water tower and shuddered. He walked past the decrepit arena and had an inclination to get a hot chocolate, but the arena was empty and would be torn down soon. The winter snow had been too much for the rafters to support and the building was considered dangerous. He entered and walked over to the concrete stands. As a child he’d looked for bottles and loose change. He sat in the stands and looked at the rink paved with cement. He left the building and walked to the front of the rotted barbecue hut.
He’s still thinking about his dead wife. He’s also thinking about Mr. James and the tractor he drove to town, about all the hot-dogs consumed by old Mr. Wilson, and Karen Porter’s sharp tongue. The countless burgers he ate as a child. He looks out across the interminable fields of tobacco. His eyes rest on the graveyard north of the arena. He looks at the town graveyard, and comes to the realization that he along with Wilkie and the rest of the geriatric population will soon be buried there.
THE REVISIONIST
JIM STEPPED ONTO THE SUBWAY CAR, BRIEFLY looked at the TTC map above the doors and then, to no one in particular, he said, “Is this going to Pape?” The only passengers within hearing distance were two elderly Chinese women, who stared ahead and continued to speak in Mandarin. Jim looked at them grumpily and made his way to the rear of the subway car. He felt tense. His neck was so rigid he had to swivel his entire body to look right or left.
He spotted an attractive woman who was wearing a business suit and sidled up to her. The woman, in her mid-twenties, held an Elle magazine in front of her face. “This is the first time that I’ve ever worn a tie,” he said. He rubbed the white bone-hard scar on his cheek.
The woman winced. “Oh,” she said, returning her gaze back to the magazine she was reading.
“This is the first time that I’ve ever worn a tie.”
“What did you say?”
He wagged his bony index finger at her. “God-awful thing feels weird. I own my own roofing business, so obviously I don’t wear it while I’m on the roof, though I don’t get up there much anymore because we’ve expanded and I’m mostly in the office these days.”
The woman frowned and looked anxiously at the other passengers. She put her magazine down and stared straight ahead.
“I like to get up there sometimes just to show the men that I can still haul tiles with the best of them.”
“Excuse me, I have to get off.”
“My wife is waiting for me back home. I mean — she’s waiting to see how things go for me at the bank. I have to go to the bank first and then I’m going to call her and tell her how things went.” Jim held a yellow document up and was about to explain further when the woman got up and walked to the doors at the other end.
“I’ve got three of the Leafs. Anybody need a card? I’ve got just about every card. I’ll trade for gobstoppers.” I turned to one of the shorter boys in line and said, “Hey big guy, do you want Daryl Sittler? I’ve got two of him.”
Lanny, a really big guy, walked to the front of the line. He had dark, straight hair that was feathered at the sides. I was waiting with everyone else to get onto the court. He barged past us like we were third-graders. “I was king at the end of last recess,” he said, “and so I get to be it again.” He grabbed the large rubber ball from a shy little guy, who looked pissed but didn’t say anything.
Patricia, a cute girl with cheeks like hamburger buns and blue eyes the same colour as the marker we used in art, watched us from the baseball diamond.
Lanny had a lot of nerve to think he could be king two recesses in a row. “Who does he think he is?” I said. “Does he think he’s in charge of us? How can he just butt in like that?”
Inside the bank Jim was bewildered. He didn’t know what to do. He walked cautiously to the back of a line and asked, “Does anyone here know where I can get a mortgage?”
A lady in line pointed at some chairs in the corner near some plants and said, “Over there, I think.”
“Thank you, ma’am.”
As he neared the chairs he brushed the stringy blond hair out of his eyes. Once seated in front of a potted fern, he wagged his finger at a man next to him. “What rate are you getting, boss?”
The balding man had a touch of auburn hair around his ears. His face was swollen and red. He said, “What do you mean?”
“What’s the bank giving you? What interest rate are they offering?” Jim tapped the balding man on the shoulder with his knuckles. “Banks make all this money by doing nothing. They don’t build anything. They don’t help anyone. At least doctors and cops are around to serve the public. Bankers have it nice. It’s easy money for them. They just sit back and take it all in.”
“Yeah, look at these people,” the man said, pointing to a clerk. “Sitting on their stools — counting their money.”
“You don’t know a lot about anything, do you?” Jim said gruffly. He addressed the woman next to the balding man. “Big guy, here, has no idea of the workings of big banks. I’ve got no beef with the front line staff. These folks at the counters are busy. They’re counting money. Actually doing something. But do you think these folks get any of the money they count?No way. They make a pittance. It’s the fat cats lolling about behind those doors over there that do all the damage. Well, I’ve got something in store for them. They think they’ve got my business all sewn up, but I’ve got a card up my sleeve.” The woman had turned her back and was ignoring him.
“I hear interest rates are going up soon,” the balding man said, in a way to redeem himself.
Jim slapped him on the shoulder and said, “Tell you what, boss — you let me go before you and when I’m finished getting my deal, I’ll hook you up with a decent rate. After today they’ll have had their fill of me, that’s for certain.”
The snow had melted. There was a lot of gravel on the ground. Lanny grabbed the red ball, walked over to me and said, “What are you going to do about it?” He pushed me with the ball. “You think you’re a businessman because you trade hockey cards. That’s a laugh! You’re a loser.” Lanny took a step closer and bumped me again with the rubber ball. The ground was slippery because of all the gravel. If I fell I might seriously hurt myself. The pebbles might get under my skin and cause an infection. The doctors at Scarborough General would have to do surgery on my cheek and I didn’t want that, right?
I started to push back. Lanny shifted his weight and pulled hard on the ball. I tripped over his foot and fell. I was going to fall face first on the ground. I was about to scrape my face on the gravel. Time slowed and I was suspended in air. My body shuddered. My limbs strained and my skin was being stretched for an alien takeover. At the last second I stuck out my skinny arm, which was suddenly strong, strong enough, in fact, to bench press four plates at Gold’s. When I got to my feet, my arm was scraped and bleeding, but it wasn’t broken.
“Are you okay, Jimmy?” Patricia yelled from the diamond.
The bank manager extended his hand to Jim, who was staring blankly ahead. They shook hands. “You can come with me, sir.”
“It’s my pleasure,” Jim said.
The bank manager led him into a room and said, “Have a seat. How can I help you?”
“I thought you people would have plush leather sofas in your offices. And those flat-screen TVs.”
“Well, I might not get much done then, right?” The bank manager laughed good-naturedly. “How can I help you?”
The bank manager’s navy suit hung perfectly from his broad shoulders. Jim felt inadequate in his shirt and tie. “Look boss, I want to know what your
best rate is.” He lightly touched his scar.
The manager told him.
“You can do better than that, boss.” He smiled coyly. “Give me something we can work with. You’re not even trying.”
“That’s all I can offer. Our rates are competitive.”
“The sensible thing would be to consult with your boss. Can you talk to him about getting me a better rate?”
“It’s pretty much a standard rate. We have some room for negotiations for larger properties, but this is the best offer that I can give you today.”
Jim noticed the absence of a wedding ring. “Are you married, boss? Do you have a wife and kids?” He felt his face quiver. “I’ve got a wife and kids.”
The bank manager’s phone rang. “I have to take this call,” he said.
Jim stared at the crumpled yellow sheet that he held in his hand.
“You sure you want to do that, big guy?” I took a step toward Lanny and placed my hand on his forearm. “The good Lord,” I said, “has made it clear that one of us is going to be scarred today. May as well be you and not me.”
Because my arms and legs were bulging under my skin and because my voice had changed, Patricia and the other little guys were looking at me strangely. My frame had the power of someone who’d hauled over a thousand kilos of tile. I grabbed Lanny’s arm and whipped him around like a rag doll. His legs buckled and he dropped. I pinned his wrist to the ground with my left knee. I grabbed the back of his head and jammed his face remorselessly into the gravel, grating his cheek on the pebbles. Lanny howled in pain but I continued to grate his face like cheese. Blood spurted, shaking in large droplets from his shredded cheek. Blood was staining the gravel surface when I finally released my grip. Lanny coiled into a fetal position and blubbered like the little coward that he was.