“How was bowling?” Mom asked.
“Fine.”
“Did you have fun?” Dad asked.
“Yep. Goodnight.” Then I ran upstairs to my room.
What the hell was wrong with me? Why didn’t I kiss him? I must be developmentally disabled. I stared at my reflection in the mirror and gave myself a stage slap upside the head like people do in the movies when they’ve done something totally idiotic. Then I got ready for bed and fell asleep thinking about what it would be like when I finally got up the nerve to make my first kiss happen.
I went to work the next day with a better attitude. I’d decided to accept my fate as a Cruisy Chicken employee. At least I would be making money and wouldn’t have to rely on the parents for everything. At least I could bring Dad home some chicken, and maybe that would cheer him up a bit. At least I had gotten one call back from all those stupid job applications I had filled out.
It was busy, and I didn’t even get to go to the washroom until my break. I guess no one wants to make dinner on Sundays because it’s supposed to be a day of rest or something. Mike wasn’t there and no one really talked to me except to yell orders at me. I noticed that all the workers had mild to severe acne. Excessively oily skin must be a workplace hazard. Well, that was something to look forward to.
I brought Dad home two drumsticks, a couple of wings and a bag of fries. I had to wash my wig again as soon as I got home because it had absorbed all the smells and oils from a thousand frying chicken parts.
That night the parents and I had dinner together at the kitchen table, which we hadn’t done in a long time. Dad ate the chicken and Mom picked at the fries and I ate some spinach salad.
“David, Tamar,” Mom said, her palms together, “I want to tell you something important.”
We looked at her as we chewed our food under the harsh light of the fluorescent kitchen bulb.
“I’ve been accepted to go study yoga and meditation at a retreat center on an island in British Columbia.”
Dad and I stopped eating.
“Stellar’s Island.”
We stared at her, unable to swallow the food still sitting in our mouths.
“I’ll be leaving on Friday and I’ll be away for six weeks.”
Dad crushed his napkin and threw it on top of his plate. He scraped his chair back from the table and dragged himself to the garbage can on his crutches. He dumped the chicken bones and let his plate clatter into the sink.
I stared at her, unbelieving. She sat with her hands in her lap and a look on her face that I can only describe as hopeful. I looked at my dad. He stood in front of the sink, staring out the window into the dark, cold night. The room was silent except for the metallic tick of the clock on the wall. Then my mother cleared her throat delicately.
“Are you serious?” I said.
“I am.”
“How can you leave us now? With everything…”
She looked over her shoulder at my dad. “I know it’s hard for you to understand, but I really think it’s best for all of us that I take this time for myself right now, to walk my own path to healing.”
“Dad’s a freaking invalid right now. You can’t leave.”
“You’ll be here.”
“What? Why are you even doing this?”
“Because I don’t know what else to do.” She sighed and ran her hand through her hair. “I need a change of perspective. I just want to feel like myself again. And I think this will help me get there. I really do.”
“You know we can’t afford this, Sheila,” Dad said.
“That’s the great thing—it’s a work-trade program. They grow all their own organic food and raise animals, too. Goats, cows, chickens, llamas, rabbits. I’ll be helping in the gardens, mostly. It’s community living. It’s called The Yoga Farm.”
A coarse, dry laugh came from my dad.
“Jesus. Are you sure it’s not a cult?” I said.
“Look, I realize you guys must think I’m really selfish for doing this—”
“Yep,” I said.
“But I’ve been trying so hard to get it together, so we can all get back to normal—”
“Mom, this is the new normal.”
Dad turned the kitchen tap on and stared at the water rushing down the drain.
Mom put her head in her hands, and her shoulders shook with sobs. “I just don’t know what else to do. I have to try. I have to at least try.”
“What about—”
“I’ve left you a ton of lasagnas, casseroles and other goodies in the deep freeze.”
I stared at her.
She wiped the tears from her face. “It’s only forty-two days!”
“What about me, Mom?”
“You’re doing fine, honey. You’re doing better than all of us. You have a new job, you have a nice boyfriend—”
“He’s not—”
“You’re in the school play, your grades are excellent. Look at you. You don’t need me.”
“Yes. I. Do.”
“I’ll be back in time to see you in your play.”
I folded my arms on the table, put my head down on them and closed my eyes. A commune? Was this a joke?
She came over to me and rubbed her hand in small circles over my back. “Don’t cry, Tamar. Please don’t cry.”
“Why not? Everyone else is.”
She walked to the sink and stood beside my dad. She turned off the tap and looked up at him. “I’m sorry, David, but I need to do this. I really do. I didn’t tell you before because I didn’t think I would be accepted into the program, and then your leg…” She reached for his hand, and he pulled it away. They stood motionless with their backs to me. Inside, I felt hollow and cold. I quietly left the table and tiptoed up to my room. I crawled into bed and squeezed my eyes shut as tight as I could. The tears came anyway.
nine
Friday came too fast. Mom said goodbye and have fun and be good, and she hugged and kissed us. Then she got into a taxi and left me alone with a crippled dad I barely recognized and certainly couldn’t talk to. I still couldn’t believe that she would leave us.
Dad and I stood on the front step in the frosty morning air and watched the cab roll away until we couldn’t see its taillights anymore. Then we turned to each other, and I wondered if I looked as sad as he did. I gave him a hug.
We went inside and Dad hit a pile of his beer-can pieces with his crutch, and they flew across the living room. Squares and circles and ovals and rectangles and long thin strips of metal lay scattered across the carpet. Then he stretched out on the couch and closed his eyes as if he was in terrible pain. For a minute I watched him lie there, drowning in the quicksand of his own grief. Then I carefully stepped around the pieces and went into the kitchen. I scrambled three eggs and made four slices of toast. I divided everything between two plates and gave one to my dad. We ate on the couch together in silence.
I had decided to start eating breakfast.
As I walked to school through the gray, icy morning, it occurred to me that Mom might never come back. She might have just left us for good.
But no, she wouldn’t do that.
She couldn’t do that.
Could she?
I kept walking, trying not to slip on patches of black ice.
I was on my way to my first class, carrying my textbooks and binder, when—BANG!—somebody slammed into me, and I dropped everything and fell on the floor. My binder rings snapped open, and a hundred pages of notes fluttered through the hall. People trampled all over them, not caring. I rubbed my shoulder where I’d been smacked. I didn’t see who had pushed me. No one said sorry. Nobody helped me up. It was going to be a long day.
The only good part of the day was rehearsal, where I got to pretend to be someone els
e for a few hours. And Friday was my favorite rehearsal day because we always stayed longer—it always felt like we got more done. The theater was so different than the rest of the school. The stage was black with black curtains, and the seats and floor were black too, so it felt like you were entering a secret cave. There were no windows. Somehow it made me feel safe.
Ms. Jane had us begin with some trust exercises.
“Light as a feather, stiff as a board.” She clapped her hands. “In character! Auntie Em, you’re up.”
“I’m okay.”
“Come on, let’s go.”
“No, really, I…”
“We won’t drop you,” said Cole. “Not on purpose anyway.”
Everyone laughed. Even me. I lay down on the stage and crossed my arms over my chest. Tin Man and Lion kneeled on my left side, Scarecrow and the Wicked Witch of the West on my right. They each slipped two fingers of each hand beneath me and began to chant, “Light as a feather, stiff as a board. Light as a feather, stiff as a board.” I trembled and closed my eyes. “Light as a feather, stiff as a board.” I felt myself rise off the stage, but I couldn’t feel their fingers anymore. My body felt suspended in the thickness of the air. I was floating. I was weightless. “Light as a feather, stiff as a board! LIGHT AS A FEATHER, STIFF AS A BOARD!” My eyes popped open. I was high above the stage, above their heads. I panicked and began to flail. The black stage rushed up to meet me. Before I crashed into it Scott caught me and set me gently on my feet.
“You all right, Auntie Em?” he said.
“Yes, yes, I believe I am.” I brushed myself off and ran my hands over my wig to make sure it was still in place. My heart was racing.
“Good thing I was just oiled this morning, or I would never have been able to catch you.” He smiled.
Beth Dewitt rolled her eyes and lay down between us to be lifted. “I’ll show you losers how it’s done,” she hissed.
I don’t know why they cast Yeti as the wicked witch; Beth would have been perfect for it.
When I got home, I found Dad on the couch in the exact same position he had been in when I left. Leg propped on three pillows, beer-can parts still strewn across the room. I wondered if he had moved at all during the day.
“What’s up, Dad?”
“The ceiling.”
“Good one.”
He grunted.
“Need anything?”
“Yeah, a new roof.”
“Oh yeah, the hailstorm.”
“I didn’t get the insurance that covers hail damage.”
“Really?”
“Yeah.” He looked down at his stained jogging pants.
“Shit.”
“I thought if anything happened, I could just fix it myself. Save us the money.”
“So…now what are you going to do?”
He slowly shook his head back and forth and continued to stare at the ceiling. I looked up. A hairline fissure unfurled above us like a baby vine, but I could swear it had always been there.
“I don’t know,” he said. “Beg, borrow or steal it. Hope it doesn’t rain anytime soon.”
“Well”—I patted him on the shoulder, trying to sound cheerful—“I think it’ll be okay, Dad. The forecast calls for clear skies. Let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.”
“Can you bring me the phone and the phone book?”
“Sure.” I walked into the kitchen.
“And another beer?”
After carefully inspecting the upstairs ceiling for cracks and leaks and finding neither, I went into my room, put on the radio and combed out my wig with the special wig comb. I took it off and felt my head for any new growth. Then I examined my legs and arms under a magnifying glass. Not a whisper of hair to be found anywhere. Smooth as a baby’s ass.
I heard Abby’s voice in my head. “Hey, look on the bright side. At least you don’t have to shave your legs anymore.”
I don’t know what happens when you die. But once in awhile I get this strange feeling that my sisters are watching me from somewhere else, like another planet or something. And sometimes I hear them speak inside my head, clear as a bell. It’s weird, I know. It’s crazy.
After their accident I went to see a grief therapist, aka a shrink, a few times. I still had all my hair then. The grief therapist had short gray hair and looked like an elf. Her name was Nina. I couldn’t stand Nina and her nasally questions and her surreptitious note-taking and her stinky vanilla perfume. Talking to her made me even more depressed about the whole double death situation, so I quit after three sessions.
She did get one thing right though: she said that life is a series of painful, tragic, unbearable events, and the best we can do is fumble through it with our chins up.
Nina wanted to load me up on antidepressants so I could be another placid zombie success story. I told her exactly where she could shove her antidepressants.
I rubbed some cream that I had bought at the drugstore into my head. It claimed to renew hair growth and had a man with an afro on the bottle. It smelled horrible and made my eyes sting. I sat down on my bed. There was a DVD on my pillow. I picked it up. On the cover was a beautiful blond woman in a hot-pink leotard. She was standing on one leg and had the other one wrapped around her ear. She was smiling as if she had just won a million bucks. The title said Yoga for Happiness. I flipped the case over. On the back was a yellow Post-it note.
Tamar, I hope you will try this video. It could be just the thing you need. Please look after yourself. See you soon. Love you forever.
Mom
I looked at the woman on the cover again. I laughed. There was no way. There was just no way. I shoved the DVD into the back of my closet and decided to forget about it.
Just who did my mother think she was? Flaking off like this, abandoning us in our time of need? And for what? So she could sit under a gigantic tree in the middle of the Pacific Ocean and pick her nose with her toes? It was obscene.
I put on a toque and went downstairs. I ate a spoonful of peanut butter and then heated up a can of tomato soup and made two grilled-cheese sandwiches. I poured the soup into two bowls and put them and the sandwiches onto plates, with pickles on the side. I went to the living room, careful not to step on any of the scrap metal, and handed a plate to my dad. He looked right through me. He was watching a rerun of Star Trek: The Next Generation.
“Thanks.” He started eating without even looking at his food.
I sat down at the end of the couch. “What’s going on?”
“Did you know that Vulcans are incapable of experiencing emotion?”
“Yeah, they’re the sociopaths of the universe.”
“Wouldn’t that be nice? To have all logic and no emotion?”
“I don’t know.”
“I think it would be great.” He crunched down on his pickle, then took a swig of beer.
“Did you call the roofers?”
“Yeah, they’ll be here Monday. ”
“That’s good.”
“They’ll let me pay it off in installments.”
“Great.”
“Yeah.” He sighed and turned back to Captain Jean-Luc Picard, who I have to admit, was a man who wore his baldness well.
I had homework I should have been doing, but I decided to let my mind take a backseat and let the crew of the starship Enterprise drive.
I went to bed when Letterman came on, leaving my dad snoring on the couch, bathed in flickering blue light.
I dreamed that I was the captain of the Enterprise and we visited an alien planet that was bright purple with massive fluorescent-pink palm trees and a black ocean. All the aliens on the planet looked like Abby and Alia, but none of them had any hair. They were a violent, bald race. They tried to kill me and my crew with their mind-warping powers. Th
ey made our brains bleed. They reached through our rib cages into our chests and squished our hearts. We zapped them with our phasers and fled to the safety of our ship.
ten
On Monday in gym class, we were separated from the boys while they started their wrestling unit. The girls in our class were put with the grade-twelve girls to play basketball. Beth Dewitt, aka Demonic Dorothy, was on my team. She was a pretty decent player. Even though she was the shortest one in the gym, she was fast. But she kept fouling, and she didn’t pass the ball to me once, even when I was wide open and standing under the net flapping my arms, yelling her name.
Afterward in the girls’ change room, I overheard Lana Thompson telling Jess Kazinski that Beth was going to have to bind her breasts for the play because they were too big to fit into her Dorothy costume.
“Is that true?” I asked.
And then Beth was there. She stood in front of me with her hands on her hips while I tried to change covertly behind a locker door.
“Is what true?”
Jess and Lana said nothing. They closed their lockers and went to the mirror to redo their makeup.
“Tamar,” Beth said loudly, “I asked you a question. What were you talking about? I heard my name.”
“It’s nothing,” I stammered. “Never mind.”
“Tell me!”
“Um…”
All the girls in the change room turned to look at us.
“You never do what you’re told, do you?”
“I don’t know…”
“Are you spreading rumors about me, Tamar?”
I looked at Jess and Lana for help. They were suddenly fascinated with their mascara.
“Because rumors can really hurt people.” Beth looked at her friend Madison, who had come up behind me. Madison probably had fifty pounds on me. She had red hair and four fat brothers and was tough as a rusty nail. Madison sneered at me and smacked her fist into her palm.
The New Normal Page 8