Sundry Days

by Donna Callea

  I take Willa with me when I go to the clinic. Marjorie is not thrilled. But of all the people she doesn’t like, she probably doesn’t like Willa the least. Willa is impossible not to like. And she’s still a child, really.

  Marjorie grumbles through the day. I have no idea what her story is. She doesn’t talk about herself. She doesn’t talk much period. But she’s a very good doctor. I’m learning a lot from her.

  Today, Dora comes to the clinic while I’m there. She needs to talk to Marjorie about her anti-depression pills. She’s thinking of tapering off. She doesn’t seem to care that I’m there and can hear.

  “I’ve been taking them most of my adult life.”

  “Yep,” says Marjorie.

  “But maybe I don’t really need them anymore. Maybe I’m better. What do you think?”

  “I can’t see into your brain, Dora. It probably doesn’t do you any harm to keep taking them. Doesn’t do you any good, either, if you don’t need them.”

  “So what should I do?”

  Grumpy Marjorie is somewhat less grumpy with Dora than she is with her other patients. She tells Dora how to go about reducing the dosage, and makes sure she knows the signs to look for that would indicate she shouldn’t stop taking the pills.

  Afterwards, Dora looks at me and asks me if I’ll please go for a walk with her.

  I nod. I don’t know why, but I walk with her. It’s a nice day. The weather is pleasant. Spring is coming.

  “Thank you, Rebekah,” she says as we start out. Then she doesn’t say anything for a long time. Neither of us do.

  “I’ve talked recently to some of the business people who trade with the New Eden monogamists,” she says finally. “No one really knows a lot about them, except that they seem friendly, and the women have as much to say as the men when they negotiate. They’re never here for very long. I’ve never met any of them.”

  “You think it’s a good sign, though, that the women come with them to Winnipeg and they don’t seem to be intimidated by the men?” I ask. It’s the first time I’ve said this many words to my mother.

  “Yes. That’s what I think. And they’re evidently a very peaceable people. A few years ago, two women from a not-so-reputable pleasure house around here approached the New Eden monogamists when they were trading at the Ready to Wear Emporium. The women said they were tired of being pleasure women and wanted to become monogamists. Then the two of them got into a fight about who would be the better fit in New Eden. They started shoving each other, saying nasty things.

  “The monogamists told them in no uncertain terms that they don’t tolerate violence of any kind. That’s what I heard. So that’s probably a good sign, too.”

  We walk some more, not saying anything.

  “I want you to be safe, Rebekah,” she tells me after a while. “I want you and David to be safe and happy. I know how you feel about me. I understand why you don’t want to think of me as your mother, why you don’t even want to talk to me. I can’t blame you. But having you here has been one of the best things to ever happen to me. Just seeing you has been wonderful.”

  I nod. She sees me nod. That’s about all I can do right now.

  “I think Susannah must have been a very good substitute mother for you. She’s quite a capable person. A good person. Always has been.”

  “I gave her a lot of trouble. I was never very nice to her. And now she must hate me for stealing away her son, putting him in danger.”

  Dora smiles at me.

  “It was all your idea to run away from Seneca Falls? You twisted David’s arm and forced him to go with you?”

  “No.”

  “You’re a strong-willed young woman, Rebekah. Brave. Daring enough to pose convincingly as a boy for a long time. Passionate enough to do what you want, to be with the one you love, even if it’s forbidden. I like that about you. I like the way you’ve turned out.”

  “You did what you wanted to do, too.”

  “I never wanted to desert my baby, Rebekah. But I had to. You’re my daughter. I love you. I’ll always love you. But it wouldn’t have been good for you to have me as your mother. Not then. Not the way I was. I know that I was right to do what I did. You were better off without me. It doesn’t matter that you hate me now. What matters is that you’ve become what you were meant to be.”

  “I don’t hate you.”

  I can’t believe I’ve said those words, but somehow saying them makes them true. I don’t hate Dora. I don’t hate my mother. She’s not so different from me. I’m not so different from her.

  We walk back to the clinic.

  Marjorie is showing Willa how to bandage a wound. A boy from the school nearby is sitting on the examination table, looking very pale and probably in some pain after having a big gash in his arm stitched up by Marjorie.

  “Didn’t flinch at all,” Marjorie says of Willa, not the injured boy. “Good job assisting.”

  It’s the most praise I’ve ever heard the crotchety doctor give to anyone.

  Willa smiles widely—so wide I can see the gap where Jacob knocked out two of her bottom teeth.

  In bed, I tell David about the walk I took with Dora.

  “It’s a good thing,” he says. “Hating takes up a lot of energy—energy that can be better spent pleasuring me.” He grabs my bottom, nuzzles my neck, then rolls me on top of him.

  “Oh, it’s a pleasure woman you want?” I tease. “I think that maybe you should be a pleasure man. I think maybe I need to be pleasured first.”

  “Hmm. That can be arranged. In fact, it’s my pleasure.”

  Sex is a silly business, when you think about it. Putting body parts together every which way. Touching, kissing, groaning, coming. But very necessary. If I had to, I could give up a lot of things and still be happy. But not sex.

  The worst thing about Eden Falls was being separated from David. The best thing about not-so-great situations—like having to pretend to be his husband in Kitchener—was still being able to have lots of sex. But there are more things in life than just sex. Things we have to consider.

  “What’s next for us, David?” I ask, after we’re both sated and he’s already nodding off.

  “Next is sleep,” he mumbles.

  “No. Talk to me.”

  “I love you,” he says, and rolls over. He’s hoping that’s enough talking.

  “I love you, too, but I’m not going to let you sleep. Not yet.”

  “Okay,” he sighs. “Talk.”

  “I’m thinking maybe we’re foolish to try to become part of another monogamist settlement. Maybe we should just stay here. We’d be accepted. We have been so far. But then I wonder what kind of a life we would have here. What kind of future.”

  “It might not be so bad. I like Winnipeg well enough,” he says. “I guess I can stay in this room forever. I can be your pleasure man forever. And do other things in my spare time. This is a place where people make things, provide services, sell things. There aren’t lots of rules and ordinances like in the Coalition. Which is good. But I don’t think we fit here. Mostly people just pass through here or else stay put because they have nowhere else to go.”

  “We have someplace else to go,” I say. “Maybe.”

  “Yeah,” he agrees. “I think we ought to at least give someplace else a try.”

  “Dora says the New Eden people are obsessively peaceful. Well, she didn’t say obsessively. Being peaceful is good. But what if they’re odd in other ways? What if they’re not like us at all?”

  “No one is like us,” says David. “No one’s like you.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “We left home because we wanted to be together,” he says, yawning. “We’re together.”

  “But we can’t be the only two people in the world who want to live in pairs. Equal pairs. Not with one dominant and the other just a body like in Eden Falls.”

  “Yeah,” he says. “Equal pairs.”

  “Most people don’t think it’s natural to live
in pairs,” I point out. “It’s not practical, either. Not the way things are. It’s not a natural or practical way to be. But maybe the monogamists in New Eden have figured out how to do it.”

  “Maybe” he says.

  “I don’t think Winnipeg is the right place for us. We need to do what we set out to do and find a monogamist settlement where we can belong.”

  “Yeah,” he says. “That’s what we need to do. That’s what I’ve been saying.”

  We just lie there for a few seconds thinking our own thoughts.

  “Is that enough talking for now?” he asks, and then pretends to start snoring.”

  I elbow him in the ribs, we laugh, and then we both fall asleep.

  Chapter 38

  Susannah

  Letters Home

  A packet of letters. Could there be a greater gift?

  We all sit around the table sorting them out. Most of them are from Rebekah. One for John. One for Danny—we’ll have to get it to him in Rochester. He’ll be so happy. One for me.

  David has written only one letter. It’s to all of us.

  And Dora has written one to me.

  When weathered but well-dressed Iain Blinn came to our door, it was Simon who let him in.

  Simon. He knows better than to let in strangers. Especially these days, when no one feels safe. No women, anyway. There’ve been uprisings. Even here in Seneca Falls. Protest marches. Reports of abductions. The Easter-Esther festival had to be cancelled this year.

  But Simon somehow correctly and immediately sensed that this self-possessed, middle-age man was no threat. Quite the contrary.

  “I’m the captain of a schooner,” he tells us, “that sails the Great Lakes—Huron and Superior. Your David and Rebekah have voyaged with me. I’ve been asked to let you know they’re safe, and to give you these letters. It’s the least I can do.”

  I nearly hug him with joy. And then we all excitedly pummel the man with questions. He says he sailed to Thunder Bay with David and Rebekah more than a year ago. They were posing as brothers at the time, although he was aware they were a heterosexual couple determined to become monogamists. Both were well when he last saw them in Winnipeg, he assures us.

  “But I’m afraid I let them down,” he says. “I’d promised to point them in the direction of a monogamist settlement that might not be too bad. But before I could arrange to do that, they met one of the leaders of a pretty nasty place, and he tricked them into going with him.”

  He can see the panic on my face and quickly assures us that they managed to escape and are now in a much better settlement, as far as he knows.

  “I’m sure it’s all there in their letters,” he says. “I didn’t see them when I was last in Winnipeg. I just picked up this packet of letters they left. Their settlement is quite a distance from the city.”

  It’s been so long. I’ve reconciled myself to never hearing from David, never knowing what’s become of him and Rebekah. It’s unbelievable to me that now, after all this time, we have news.

  We urge Iain Blinn to stay a while. Seth, especially. He wants to hear all about his adventures, if you can call them that. Simon, too. They’re fascinated with this sailing man. Who’s also a Lost Boy. I know that. He’s taking a huge risk coming here. I wonder if he knows that my mother is Anna Gardener—the powerful, pushy Anna Gardener whose political mission is to rid our world of Lost Boys. Probably he does.

  He politely refuses our hospitality. He says he must get back. But he gives us the name of a doctor in Kitchener.

  Captain Blinn says if we’d like to send letters to Winnipeg, he can likely deliver them. He sails there regularly, several times a year. If we direct our letters to Kitchener, to a doctor whose name is Elizabeth Guettel, he’ll eventually get them to Winnipeg—a place called the Birch and Bay. Traders from David’s settlement typically go to Winnipeg twice a year, and can retrieve any letters we send. Maybe we’ll also be able to receive more letters from David and Rebekah that way.

  It’s not much, but it’s more than I could hope for, and I cry when I thank Blinn for the hundredth time.

  “Glad to be of help,” he says. “I’m fond of your David and Rebekah. I called her Rob, you know.”

  John smiles, conjuring in his mind, no doubt, the short-haired girl dressed as a boy that he dubbed Beks.

  And then the captain is on his way.

  Now we all sit at the table, sorting out, reading and re-reading aloud what we’ve been sent.

  I’m holding in my hand a letter in from David in his scrawling, still-boyish script. He’s alive. He’s well. At least he was, the last time Iain Blinn saw him. And he’s written to tell us not to worry.

  Most of the news, though, comes from Rebekah. Her letters are much thicker with details. She’s clearly more at ease writing. But it’s the single sheet from my son, to all of us, that wrenches my heart, makes me unbelievably happy and inconsolably sad at the same time. What a gift.

  I nurse baby Aaron at the table. He doesn’t mind that I pay no attention to his sucking, and forget to switch him from one side to the other. I’ll be lopsided until his next feeding.

  Ethan is playing by himself on the floor. Poor little one. He’s used to keeping himself amused.

  Simon sits with us. He was devastated when David left. He misses his brother and was very angry at him for leaving. But he’s as anxious for news as the rest of us.

  “Tell Simon that I’m sorry I wasn’t a better brother to him,” writes David.

  “I know that we’ve made everyone worry, and I’m sorry for that, too. We were young and stupid when we left, especially me. But Rebekah and I are meant to be together. We really are. And it’s worked out. Well, it’s working out now. The first monogamist settlement we joined was a nightmare. Twelve crazy old men had all the power and controlled the women and everyone else.

  “We’re pretty sure the new settlement we’re joining will be a lot better. We’ve met some of their members—men and women—here in Winnipeg, and I feel confident we’re doing the right thing now. Rebekah, too. I know the whole idea of monogamy must sound strange and kind of perverted to everyone back home.”

  “He’s got that right,” interjects Andy. “How the hell does he think monogamy can work? It’s a simple matter of mathematics. If there’s only one female for every five or six males, there’s no way there can be happy little pair-bonds. They should have figured that out after joining the settlement with the crazy old men.”

  Maybe they’ll eventually come to their senses and return home. Captain Blinn could bring them home. I don’t say this aloud. I just think it in my head. It’s what I hope, even though I know there could be terrible repercussions. They’re criminals, after all—David, anyway—for doing what they did. There’s no use even thinking about it, I suppose. They’re not coming home.

  We all discuss the impossibility of monogamy before we get back to reading. Except John. I look over at him, across the table, and see that tears are streaming down his cheeks as he holds the letter Rebekah has addressed to him.

  “What does she write to you, John?” I ask him gently. “Why are you crying, my love?”

  I use endearments from time to time with all of my husbands. Darling. Sweet one. Big man, for Seth. Lover, for Sam. Ryan is baby. They’re all used to hearing them. They’re happy that I’ve recovered enough from my depression to use endearments. I do feel better. Giving birth to Aaron has helped. I’m more like myself.

  None of the others raises an eyebrow when I say “my love” to John. They don’t know, or maybe don’t care, that it’s more than an endearment with him. It hurts my heart to see him cry.

  “Sorry,” he says, clearing his throat. “I guess I just miss her too much. I keep picturing, when I read this, how she used to cuddle in my lap sometimes when she was very little, and call me Papa.”

  “Dear Papa,” she writes.

  “I hope you can forgive me for leaving. I’ve always known how much you love me, and care for me, though I’v
e been a selfish and self-centered and very difficult girl.

  “You’ll be glad to know—I hope—that I’m now comfortably and openly female. No more horrible short haircuts, no more dressing like a boy. For a long time, after we left, I pretended to be David’s brother, and then his husband (we posed as a homosexual couple in Kitchener) and then as his brother again (on the ship to Thunder Bay).

  Now, if all goes well, I’ll be David’s wife in New Eden, the monogamist settlement where we’re headed. He’ll be my only husband. I couldn’t live by the rules in Seneca Falls. I suppose I’m not a normal girl, by Coalition standards. But I’m happy, and I think this way of life will work for us. We made a terrible mistake joining the first monogamist settlement we heard about, and we were lucky to escape. But we’re confident New Eden will be a good place for us.”

  “What makes her think that?” grumbles Ryan. “I hope the group they’re joining isn’t one of those cults that kills all the surplus boy babies or castrates the extra males.”

  “I think the powers-that-be in the Coalition probably started those rumors,” says Seth. “Anyway, David and Rebekah must have investigated this New Eden more thoroughly than they did the first place. They aren’t stupid enough to make the same mistake twice.”

  That’s what we all hope.

  “I don’t understand,” says Simon. “Why couldn’t David and Rebekah just do what they were supposed to do right here? I know that Rebekah liked David better than anyone else, better than any husbands she’d have to marry. But why couldn’t she just have sex with David in addition to her husbands after she got married?”

  Wow. This is the first time Simon has ever asked a question like that. It’s probably good that we’re all sitting here together.

  He knows all about sex. He can’t wait to go to a pleasure house for the first time. But he really doesn’t understand about love. Who does?

  “Sometimes women do take lovers, Simon, even though they have more husbands than they know what to do with,” Tom tells him.

  That’s true enough. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if handsome Iain Blinn is the lover of this doctor in Kitchener named Elizabeth.