Mystical Rose

by Richard Scrimger

  The young man in the gown frowned sympathetically. How brave of you, he said.

  Me? I choked on a sip of tea. Brave of me?

  He took my hand. Alone, in wartime, he said. Just you and your daughter. Both of you wondering where your husband was. Wondering how he died.

  Oh, we knew that, I said. We buried him out of the home.

  Mother? Mother? Harriet running up. She ran smoothly, good wind — maybe from all that oboe playing. Not like me. I used to run with a curious knock-kneed grace, melting hearts and losing footraces. I can’t run at all now, of course, with my broadloom. Damn it, what is it called? It aches like a train going up and down your leg. Mother? called Harriet.

  I open my eyes. Are you still here? I say. She doesn’t say anything. Or is this another visit? I say. I can’t remember her saying goodbye.

  Are you all right, Mother? You were moaning.

  The pain in my leg, I say.

  What was that? she says. She can’t hear me.

  The pain, I say.

  Poor Mother.

  Harriet has a scarf on her head. She didn’t have a scarf last time, did she? Maybe it’s another visit.

  And your father, I say. I was remembering the time the staircase came down and we were stranded at the top. And your father rescued us with a ladder from the house next door with the two widow ladies.

  She isn’t paying attention.

  I try to swallow and can’t. My throat sucks together like the inside of a bag with no air. I fumble for a drink. Harriet holds it for me, and I sip. Actually, I don’t. I don’t seem to get anything at all. But I feel wet. I look down.

  Oh, Mother, she says.

  I’m wet down my front. Isn’t that drinking, when you do that with your mouth? Damn it all, you’d think a skill like drinking would be there whenever you wanted it.

  Sorry, I say. She brings the drink back. Concentrate, concentrate. Got it. That’s not bad. A word drifts across my memory, like the clouds that used to drift past my apartment window. Orange.

  Good for you, she says, taking my glass. Then she says something else.

  I beg your pardon, I say.

  She bends down. Don’t worry, she says. They’ll come for us soon.

  She’s very close to me. I can smell orange on her breath too. The bells are loud, she says. Aren’t they?

  You can hear them? I say.

  Of course, she says. Can’t you?

  That’s a relief, I say.

  She sits up.

  There aren’t always bells. This must be the same visit.

  Will you be going soon? I ask.

  What? Sorry, Mother, I can’t hear.

  I repeat my question. I speak slowly and loudly, so she will understand.

  A bran muffin, she says. And juice. You had some Jell-O.

  I lie back against the propped pillows.

  I was talking to Dr. Wilson today, said Robbie.

  Oh yes?

  Odd topic to bring up, I thought, and an odd time too. Ten o’clock at night, the two of us lying on my bed in the dark. Oh yes? I said.

  I talked about us wanting to have a child. Another one, I mean. The doctor was very understanding. He talked about cycles — that is, uh, your cycles.

  I didn’t say anything.

  And then the doctor said a lot of couples have this problem, but we had one child, and we were just to keep trying. And I made a joke — you know, about …

  His voice trailed off. I looked down towards the bottom of the bed. My bare knee was very white, almost ghostlike, against the dark-coloured cotton of my nightdress. I turned my head and peered down at my other knee. It looked ghostlike too, only the nightdress was hiked farther up on that side. Robbie’s face inches from mine. His body on mine, between my outspread knees. He peered down at me. Are you okay, Rose? Am I hurting you?

  Oh no, I said.

  When I was leaving the doctor’s I made a joke about … well, about this, what we’re doing, said Robbie, moving against me. The bed groaned, and my nightdress rode up a little more.

  He stopped moving. His face inches from mine.

  We’re doing it wrong, Rose, he said.

  The automatic doors of Warden Grace Villa opened slowly. The lobby was bright, with lots of windows and a white floor with little coloured chips in the smooth stone. Everyone seemed to be in a wheelchair. I felt athletic, leaning on my walker.

  The door swished shut behind me, leaving me in a pleasantly warm atmosphere, a nice change. Lots of places were making me cold. I smiled at the man nearest me. Staring at nothing through the thickest lenses I’ve ever seen. With lenses like that a normal person would be able to see Pluto, or angels dancing. An old man in a cardigan and slippers. Hello, there, I said, giving him my very best smile. He ignored me. Maybe I wasn’t far enough away.

  Come on, Mother, said Harriet.

  I’m coming, dear, I said.

  My room — the first room I had — was painted green. The curtains were filmy. They fluttered in the draft from the heat vent. I watched them fluttering all night long, and in the morning Dr. Sylvester had forgotten my name.

  Mrs. — he said, and then stopped, his fresh smiling face momentarily clouded by an unusual doubt. Well, I know how he felt. I’m like that all the time. How are you, he said, sincerely. He was really interested.

  The nurse with him was the evil one — black hair and marks all over her face. She held a fresh yellow folder with me inside it.

  She was crying, said the nurse. All through the night.

  I’m so sorry, said the doctor, and he meant it. Didn’t he? The folder was in his hand now, and he looked at it for a moment and called me by name. Rose, he said, sitting beside me, taking my hand in his. Cold hands they were, I remember.

  Where’s my daughter? I said.

  You mustn’t cry, Rose. You’re here for a while, you might as well get used to it. Joan here wants you to be happy. She’s your friend.

  I wondered what he meant by a while.

  Will I go home, I asked, and then forgot the word for the day after this day. Will I go home … Wednesday?

  The doctor stood up with a long flowing movement, and the curtains followed him, swirling. Behind them the sun was bright and there were those mare’s-tail clouds swishing across the sky. Oh, Robbie, I thought, as I always do when I see them. Take warning, my dear. Which didn’t make much sense in 1941, when he was a thousand miles away from me, and even less sense now that he was dead.

  Who sleeps there? I asked, pointing across the room.

  No one, just yet. Someone new will be coming in tomorrow, said Joan. Smiling at the doctor. Then at me. Just think, you’ll have a roommate, dear.

  They think you’re blind.

  Then whose slippers are those? I asked. Pointing at the floor under the other bed.

  Joan picked them up hurriedly.

  Would you like something to drink? asked Dr. Sylvester.

  Then I heard the announcement. Good morning. Today is Thursday, June the seventh, a pause, and the voice continued, 1997. Exercise classes begin in ten minutes in the lounge.

  Mornings were the worst. Cold and tired from the night, with a day to get through before I could be cold and tired again. Daddy snoring in the other bedroom, Uncle Brian snoring on the daybed. I haven’t thought about that daybed in a long time. It was a nightbed too. My uncle lived with us for years and never had a proper place to sleep. I wonder where he put his clothes. And Mama and I tiptoeing around, careful not to wake the men, lighting the stove, shivering while the wood caught, coughing into our sleeves. I seemed always to have a dripping nose and soiled handkerchiefs. Usually I would get out of the house before Daddy woke up, groaning and retching and moving slowly through the kitchen, waiting for Mama to find him a bowl to throw up in. He never shivered; I don’t know if he even felt the cold. His feet would be bare, sometimes, the toenails thick and yellow and curling. Gert’s house was only a mile away. They had hot water. By the time the two of us left for school I would be
feeling cleaner.

  I don’t open my eyes. They’re open all the time. But I see Harriet now. Hello, I say.

  Mother, how are you feeling?

  Mornings are the worst, I say. She smiles that smile that says I’ve got it wrong again. I guess it isn’t morning. Not that I give a shit.

  Where were you that night? I ask.

  Which night, Mother?

  When I first came to this land. I mean this place. Warden Grace Villa. I cried all night long. When I first came to this land — that’s a song, isn’t it. When I … damn.

  There there, Mother.

  I close my mouth. Didn’t realize I was talking out loud. So much of my life seems to take place inside my head these days. I must have really said the words then, instead of just thinking them. Sorry. Unshit. Undamn.

  I was all alone, I say, in a strange place with a dead person. No wonder I was crying.

  Mother?

  The doctor was nice, but he didn’t come until the next morning. All night by myself, left like an old drunk at the luggage office.

  There there, Mother.

  I mean trunk, I say. Not drunk.

  Yes, Mother dear.

  You don’t know what I’m talking about do you?

  Yes, Mother. That’s right.

  Poor Harriet.

  Hey, I want some roses, she said. I’d seen her around the neighbourhood.

  What colour? I asked.

  Red — what other colours are there?

  Some people are so ignorant. This was a grown woman, just about my height, well dressed, long hair wound uncomfortably around her head, with a little hat perched on top.

  I was just starting out in the business, so I started to explain. The difference between full red and deep red and burgundy, between buds and blooms and pink and yellow and Marechal niel and Montiflora. She listened hard. Her face was a good one for listening, didn’t move around much. Little pointed chin and hard eyes.

  Which one would you pick as a gift for me? she said.

  For you? A musk rose, I said, without hesitating. See? I showed her some. In the language of flowers, a musk rose signifies capricious beauty, I said. Her little closed face opened wide suddenly, and she laughed out loud. I found myself smiling. I’d been open a week and hadn’t had a lot of smiles.

  Capricious beauty? I’ll take a dozen, she said. Hey, do you smoke?

  She offered a pack. I shook my head. She lit one, stared around the store.

  How long you been open? Not long, right?

  I nodded. Her eyes narrowed suspiciously.

  How many different kinds of rose you got?

  I answered truthfully. Two kinds, I said.

  Capricious Beauty and what else?

  I’m the other — my name is Rose, I said.

  She laughed and laughed. And stuck out her hand.

  I’m Ruby. She blew smoke at me, laughing.

  Robbie hardly drank at all. He’d shake his head when I offered him some more wine at dinner. I nearly fell off my park bench when he slid down beside me and said, Let’s go for a drink.

  I have never known much about the places I’ve lived. I hardly knew Cobourg at all, even though I lived right outside it. The only part of Toronto I ever knew was the eastern Beaches, where our house was, and my store. And, much later, my apartment. I heard about other parts of the city: Rosedale, Sunnyside, Hogg’s Hollow. They weren’t too far away — a tram ride or two, an hour or two — but I never visited. They might as well have been movie places, Babylon or Shangri-La. I remember frowning into the darkness of the movie theatre, watching Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn in Philadelphia. I’d been there too — in fact I’d worked in a house a lot like the one in the movie, only downtown instead of out in the country. But I didn’t know the city well. I lived there for two winters and I don’t think I ever went farther north than New Street, where the butcher Lady Margaret used — the one whose lamb wasn’t as good as Cobourg’s — had his shop. On my half-day off I walked to the Independence Hall bus depot, paid a nickel to ride the Number 4 tram to Harbor Park. I watched the boats, then rode the bus back. I didn’t expect to see anyone I knew, and I never did. Not until Robbie, anyway.

  What? I said. Oh, hello, sir.

  A drink, Rose. Come on, it’s your day off. And you can call me Robbie.

  I nearly fell off the bench, I tell You.

  Five nines are forty-five. Six nines are fifty-six. No, they aren’t, but damned if I know what they are right now. Mind you, I didn’t know what they were then.

  Mother?

  There are strange things done ’neath the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold, I say. The Arctic trails have their secret tales that … that would make fifty-four.

  Oh, dear, she says. Poor Mother.

  I used to know that. We all had to recite it in school. Did you have to learn the poem, Harriet? I ask. There are strange things done ‘neath the midnight sun by the men who —

  Mother? Are you feeling all right?

  I struggle up to a sitting position. Of course I’m all right, I say. Seven nines are sixty-three. Eight nines are … I feel pretty good, I say. Mind you, you look kind of tired, Harriet. Should you take a nap or something?

  A very grey afternoon seen through the windows of this little room with the two beds and the two old ladies in it — three old ladies if you count Harriet, who is sitting by my bedside holding a magazine with a picture of a princess on it.

  Are you sure you’re all right? I say.

  Yes, Mother.

  She’s a little irritated with me harping on her like that. She folds the magazine. The princess’ face is cut off above the smile and she looks suddenly sad.

  Do you know what eight nines are? I ask.

  The bells stop ringing at last. The loudspeaker comes on, says … something. Harriet’s head snaps up, and she drops the sad princess.

  The old lady in the other bed sits bolt upright and opens her mouth to shriek, you’d think she’d never heard an announcement before. She’s short of breath, can’t get much volume for her scream of terror. Someone tapes a piece of yellow paper to our room door, then rushes off. People have been rushing up and down the corridor all day. The loudspeaker tells us not to — not to something, worry probably, they usually tell us not to worry. I remember listening to a lecture in the lounge my first week here, an earnest young woman telling us all not to worry, that worrying was dangerous all by itself. Enough to make you worry even if you were healthy.

  We wandered around Harbor Park all afternoon, Robbie and I. The first of two half-days off in a row that week, it was time away from my real self. Maybe for him too; maybe he didn’t have many half-days off. He held my arm, pointed out ships on their way to England and South America that were loading, getting ready to head across three thousand miles of ocean with nothing in it but grey water and a few floating shells full of human hopes.

  His car was parked on the street. He confessed that he’d followed my tram to the park. By then I would have been used to his presence, his affection. I remember thinking, I could have saved a nickel.

  And tomorrow’s your birthday? Really? Happy birthday, Rose. Let me buy you something, he said. Let me buy you another drink.

  I didn’t say no. I didn’t say no when the boys at school gave me sweets or apples, or sticks whittled into the shape of long thin dogs or long thin horses. I said, Thank you.

  I should give you a real gift, he said. Maybe I’ll get you something nice to wear. If I remember, he said.

  He drove me home, walked me right up to the servants’ door and said, Hello there, Parker. Who smiled a strange, sickly smile. I went upstairs to change and that night — that very night it would have been — I heard a knock at my door. A faint scratching, like a mouse behind the wainscotting.

  What’s wrong, I asked my husband, with what we’ve been doing?

  It isn’t any good for making babies, whispered Robbie from between my naked knees.

  Why not?

  Dr. W
ilson says so.

  You told him about us? Robbie! I’m mortified!

  Would I have said mortified? Maybe embarrassed is what I said. I’m pretty sure I would have been both mortified and embarrassed.

  I couldn’t feel Robbie any more. Not in the usual way against me, a garter snake in the warm summer grass, inquisitive and then cautious. He was fumbling around with his hand.

  What are you doing now? I asked.

  Do you remember the blood just before Harriet was born? he said, shifting against me on the bed so that his face was right by my ear. The blood on the … um … sheets, he said.

  I nodded without speaking. I could feel his unshaven chin against my cheek.

  The doctor asked what we … did together. And when I told him, he … he said that we’ve been doing it wrong, Rose. All wrong.

  I didn’t say anything. Inside I felt horrified. He knows, I thought. Dr. Wilson knows what we do together. Perspiration on my forehead. Also I was ashamed for doing it wrong.

  Rose?

  Yes, I whispered back.

  Can you feel it when I do — this?

  Harriet is sitting me up in my bed, an unusual vantage point. I feel clothesline. That’s not it. I try to take in what’s going on while I comb the tip of my tongue to find the word. Not clothesline. Nurses drop blankets on the two beds, disappear. The loudspeaker warns us not to worry. Are you worried? I ask Harriet. She shakes her head.

  It’s just a drill, she says. Nothing to worry about.

  Sounds like my dentist.

  Fire! Fire! Help, Mike. Help!

  That’s the sad lady from across the hall. Poor sad lady, she asks after Mike every goddamn day. Did I say that to You? Imagine — ungoddamn, then. Every single day. Mike is her son, and he died last year, some kind of car accident. He lived through the operation, and then died in the recovery room. The day after I found this out she came to our room and asked if we’d heard any news about her son’s operation. She had such a hopeful look on her face I didn’t know what to tell her. Such a strong boy, she said. Always in trouble on the playground. Stitches, we wouldn’t believe. But what was a mother to do, a man was a man, you couldn’t hold them back. He’s a hawk, he should soar, she told us, and we nodded. One of the doctors led her away. A few seconds later a shriek of pure grief echoed through the wing. She knew. Once again, and with all the grief of first loss, she knew that her son was dead.