A History of Forgetting

by Adderson, Caroline

  ‘Pardon me?’ said Malcolm.

  Gesturing to Venus, he took a seat on the other couch.

  ‘Aren’t you dancing?’

  ‘Are you inviting me?’

  He looked so utterly stricken that Malcolm apologized instead of laughing. ‘Who brought you?’

  ‘My girlfriend. Ali.’

  Curious now, Malcolm looked at him more closely. He had a nice head of brown curls and was wearing the standard uniform of black jeans. In a confessional tone, Malcolm said, ‘Alison is a lovely girl.’

  He shrugged. ‘She’s okay. What’s he doing?’

  Malcolm looked over to where the boy was pointing and saw that Christian had abandoned the Senator and was now standing alone on the floor, utterly still, arms above his head, wrists crossed, head tilted up—à la Saint Sebastian. He was imitating the pose of one of the nudes in the mock fresco on the back wall.

  The boy said, ‘I study animal behaviour. That guy is weird.’

  ‘Are we animals?’ asked Malcolm.

  ‘I am,’ the boy said, getting up to leave. ‘I don’t know about you.’

  Billy had given her his peevish permission to go off with Thi and her husband to dance. ‘Just two songs, then I’ll be back,’ she had promised. Christian had been first on the floor, but now he was at the other end of the room pretending to be nude. ‘Have a Holly, Jolly Christmas’ segued into a disco version of ‘Little Drummer Boy’ and Alison and Thi wound up for a hip collision—pa rum pa pa PUM! On the periphery of the crowd, Robert was guiding John to one of the chairs beneath the hairdryers, tenderly easing him down, then wrapping his arms around him from behind. He swivelled the chair back and forth so they were dancing, too.

  Alison looked around for Billy and was surprised to see Malcolm instead, coming back from the sinks with a glass in his hand.

  Malcolm saw her, too. And now she was coming over. All at once he felt exposed without a book, unshielded. He would not be able to pick and choose his conversations, or duck in and out of them as he pleased. Backing into the corner, he gave the glass in his hand a nervous little swirl.

  ‘I asked about you earlier,’ Alison told him. ‘Thi said you never came.’ He could smell her perfumed hair when she leaned close to kiss his cheek. None of them had ever kissed him.

  ‘Last year Christian called me Scrooge until July.’

  She laughed. ‘That’s why you came? Are you alone?’

  ‘Quite alone,’ he said. Then he told her. He had not planned to. The words simply spilled out. ‘My partner is in the hospital. “A care facility”, they call it. He’s been there for a month.’

  ‘Oh! I’m sorry!’ She reached for his hand, ‘I had no idea!’ and for a long, astonishing moment they stood together in the dark, a rap version of ‘Joy to the World’ booming out. He felt the dry warmth of her hand around his icy, perspiring one. Then, close to weeping, he pulled his hand away.

  ‘It’s not the dread plague, if that’s what you’re thinking.’

  The girl blushed. ‘I wasn’t thinking anything.’

  Miserably, he wiped his palm against his blazer, as if he could not tolerate a sympathetic touch. He could see it offended her. ‘I’ll introduce you to Billy if l can find him,’ she said, but now she was avoiding looking at him.

  ‘I believe I’ve met him.’

  ‘Oh! Where did he get to?’

  Malcolm pointed to the reception area and watched her hurry off. Thi stopped her. ‘Ali,’ he heard her say, ‘Roxanne’s crying in the bathroom. She wants you.’

  After Alison and Thi had put Roxanne in a cab, Alison found Billy up front. He was talking with, of all people, Christian, leaning back so far that if she’d gone and got the broom he’d have started them all on the limbo. For an expert in reading motives in body postures, he was no great shakes at concealing his own. Then, drawing near, she heard that they were, in fact, discussing this very subject.

  ‘—what’s called, ah, the resident-intruder paradigm. A non-resident is introduced into a resident’s enclosure.’

  ‘Fascinating,’ said Christian.

  ‘We study different pair groupings—male on female, female on female, male on, ah, et cetera—as well as looking at how factors influence agonistic behaviours.’

  Alison rolled her eyes. But she liked how Billy was the one squirming for a change, could see he was even sweating under Christian’s baffling gaze. He had to look away. To his obvious relief, he saw Alison standing there laughing at him, Alison who wouldn’t even feign an interest in rats any more.

  Christian saw Alison, too, and slumped. Then, suddenly perking, he drew from the Senator’s tray a bottle of Black Bush. ‘What a tantalizing paradigm! Go on!’ He tempted with the bottle, paused with it poised above Billy’s empty glass.

  Billy glanced at Alison. ‘Well . . .’ He cleared his throat. ‘Things usually get started with an exploration of the enclosure by the intruder—’

  Smiling, Christian poured.

  ‘—which involves locomotion, rearing, sniffing, marking—’

  Christian nodded. ‘Checking out the art work, the titles on the bookshelf, lifting the lid off the pot, spilling the wine . . .’

  ‘Exactly. Cheers.’ He clinked his glass against the bottle. ‘Sometime during this exploration, the resident rat approaches the intruder.’

  Christian lit up. ‘So soon?’

  ‘Circles him and when they’re close enough, both rats usually exhibit what’s called “recognition sniffing”.’

  ‘Ha-ha-ha!’ trilled Christian. He leaned into Alison, snuffling her neck until she playfully slapped him off.

  ‘At this point dominance is usually established.’ He threw Alison a plotting smirk just in case she hadn’t figured out who was dominant in this conversation now. ‘In most cases the resident is dominant and so exhibits certain characteristic behaviours. Standing over the intruder, for example. Walking over him.’

  ‘Not chez moi. They walk all over me.’

  ‘So long as the intruder stays in a submissive crouch, everything’s cool.’

  ‘My favourite position.’

  ‘If he tries to assert himself, the resident will snap to what we call “the aggressive upright posture”.’ Billy looked at Alison again, wickedly. ‘This is usually accompanied by a piloerection,’ and Christian stepped back with a gasp.

  Billy added, ‘In other words, his fur stands up.’

  Letting go of the Senator, Christian pushed up his green sleeve. ‘Look! My fur is standing up just listening to you.’

  Alison interrupted. ‘I think we’ve heard enough about Ratland.’ She would hear about this conversation after­ward, she was sure, and not like what Billy would have to say.

  Billy protested, ‘But I haven’t even got to genital sniffing!’

  A delighted shriek from Christian, so, to change the subject, Alison asked what his plans for Christmas were. For a long moment he didn’t answer, just stood staring at Billy with one eye, then, tilting his head slightly, the other. Billy squirmed. She had to wave her hand in front of Christian’s stalled face before he came to. Leaning into her, he slurred, ‘Oh, Ali. I just love him. I really do.’

  ‘Me too.’ She helped him position his hands on the Senator’s plaster shoulders again, then sent him back through the columns.

  ‘Can we go now?’ Billy asked.

  She took the whisky out of his hand and set it on the desk. ‘Can you drive all right?’

  All the way home, Alison stared out of the rain-washed window, thinking that hardly anyone put up Christmas lights any more. There seemed to be, year by year, measurably less light in the world. They didn’t speak, Alison sitting inside her sadness. Billy, it turned out, was formulating a stupid joke.

  He looked over at her and ho-ho-hoed in a Santa bass. ‘On, Prancer, on, Mincer!’

  Weary, A
lison leaned her head into the window. ‘Oh, shut up.’

  8

  In November Denis had finally been placed in care. November, a sodden month, that synonym for grey. Malcolm left him on the ward, Denis oblivious to his parting, and went back home alone. That very day his centre disappeared. The core of him went and he knew himself to be drifting, as if he were made of smoke or vapour. He couldn’t act; he had no substance. Anything he touched, surely his hand would go right through. Yet when he arrived back at the apartment, he was somehow able to get in and lock the door. He locked it and fastened the chain, then went around to all the rooms and made sure the windows were shut up tight, the curtains drawn, the blinds lowered. He was sealing the apartment up, with himself inside, and the dog. From now on he would roll the stone away only to go to work or walk Grace or visit Denis. Until the end of the year, when the lease was up and he had to vacate, the apartment, dim and airless, was going to be his tomb.

  He went out with Grace, not for the dog’s sake, but for the sake of Mrs. Parker, Mrs. Rodeck and Miss Velve, whom he would not let down. Apart from each afternoon’s brief hyper-animated walk, and his one unfortunate excursion into society—the Vitae Christmas party—he sank quickly into dormancy. Amazing how easy it was to shut his mind off. Hours he spent sleeping or sitting in the dark. If he had a thought it was this: that maybe he wasn’t suffering because of Denis, maybe he was suffering because he was thinking about Denis. In the blank moments, he felt at peace. He felt this was the blissful nothingness that death promised.

  One morning just before Christmas the buzzer rang and ruined everything. When he had ascertained what day it was, Sunday, and seen the time, just past ten, he sat up, bewildered. On the second buzz, he got up. Grace was in paroxysms, leaking everywhere, so he put on Albert Parker’s dressing gown and headed down the hall. Who was at the door? Yvette? No, she always rang with her signature three blasts and, besides, she was no longer in his life. It had to be a client—Mrs. Rodeck, perhaps? She had hinted during walkies yesterday about a spare opera ticket, but surely she would bring it to him that afternoon, at the park, not here.

  In a flash it came to him that Denis was at the door. Denis had come back. Somehow he had got out, escaped and found his way, but how could it have happened? Malcolm was the one entombed here. Malcolm was the ghost, yet Denis, so offensively alive, so maniacal with vigour, he had come to haunt. Now he was buzzing like a trapped wasp, demanding to be let up. Furious. He was furious with Malcolm and there was going to be a scene: objects, priceless in sentiment, hurled, fisticuffs, the shriek of ugly names. The names were the worst. It was as if the cap on his unconscious had been eaten through by its acid contents. Give me sticks and stones, thought Malcolm, pressing the intercom button with trepidation.

  ‘llo?’

  ‘I’ve got the croissants. You supply the coffee.’

  It was a familiar voice, cocky and nasal, the pause filled with noisy breath, yet Malcolm, stunned, drew a blank.

  ‘It’s me, Christian. The homunculus you work with.’

  At first he was relieved. Then he was annoyed. ‘I’m not dressed. You got me out of bed.’

  ‘I’m not dressed either. I’m standing down here stark naked. Quick! Buzz me up!’

  Christian was a madman and this only confirmed it.

  ‘Never mind,’ said Christian. ‘Your kind neighbour has just arrived.’

  Malcolm heard Christian introduce himself and the startled woman agree to admit him. The door slammed closed behind them. In the time it took Christian to climb the stairs and find the apartment, Malcolm seemed unable to move except to knock his head a few times against the wall. When Christian rapped his arpeggio out on the door, Grace joined in the racket, scratching where she’d already taken off a patch of paint. ‘Stop that,’ Malcolm told her, hooking her with his foot. ‘Haven’t I lectured you enough about our damage deposit?’

  He opened the door. There, grinning in the hall, was Christian, one eye rolling back and to the side, a manikin. He wore an outrageous get-up, as usual, and held out a paper bag. ‘A dog!’ he exclaimed as Grace lunged for him. ‘Can I pick her up?’

  ‘At your peril.’

  Instead he squatted. Amazing he could get down that low. His jeans were very tight and very torn and for a belt he wore a length of chain padlocked at his fly, the key hanging on a string at his throat. Grace, rapturous, washed his unfortunate face, hoping to be rescued, but Christian didn’t know that. ‘I knew you had a secret love,’ he said.

  Since Christian was there and could not politely be made to go, Malcolm went to the kitchen to make coffee, leaving the dog and the little man alone.

  ‘Where did you get all these things?’ Christian exclaimed from the living room.

  ‘The nineteenth century,’ Malcolm called back, adding wryly, ‘Make yourself at home.’ Numbly, he knocked yesterday’s grounds out of the espresso maker. He was fumbling through the motions.

  ‘So many books!’

  He took the croissants out of the bag and when the coffee was ready, brought it all to the living room on a tray. Christian was wandering the room examining the objets d’art and the paintings, Grace at his heel, her tongue out, smiling, confident she was going to be delivered. Christian stopped at the sideboard and opened the middle cupboard, gasping when the panel on the top slid back. ‘Nifty!’ The open door made a shelf to mix drinks on. He stooped and looked past all the near-empty bottles at his own image in the discoloured mirror at the back of the cupboard, the only undraped mirror in the apartment. He straightened with his tongue out, too, and casually picked up the picture of Denis that was sitting there on the sideboard in an old ecclesiastical frame.

  ‘Here’s your coffee,’ Malcolm said.

  Christian set the picture down, thankfully without comment, and sashayed over to the sofa. Helping himself to one of the little cups, spooning in sugar from the bowl, he said, ‘It’s dark in here. Can we open the curtains?’

  ‘I’d rather not.’ Malcolm tugged the dressing gown over his bare knee. ‘So what brings you on this unexpected visit?’ he asked, hoping to speed it along.

  Christian sipped the coffee, his little finger jutting, affecting the stereotype. ‘We kissed. Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten.’

  ‘We what?’ said a flabbergasted Malcolm.

  ‘At the Christmas party. Only a week ago.’

  Malcolm vaguely recalled Christian ambushing him with a sprig of mistletoe. ‘Oh, that. As far as I could tell, you kissed everyone.’

  ‘After we kissed, I assure you, I abstained.’ Setting the coffee cup down, he looked at Malcolm with that peculiar gaze of his. ‘Malcolm! I have been trying unsuccessfully to corner you all week. Here we’ve worked together for over a year, but until now you have steadfastly resisted my charms. That kiss could be the start of a beautiful friendship. What do you say?’

  Malcolm didn’t know what to say. Was Christian just having him on, or was he in earnest? He couldn’t tell, just as he couldn’t tell which of Christian’s eyes to look back into. Then Christian helped himself to a croissant and, biting into it, showed Malcolm the chocolate filling.

  ‘Poo!’ High-pitched, his laugh. He expelled a gust of pastry flakes.

  Malcolm stared at him, unamused.

  ‘Tell me about Paris,’ Christian said.

  Malcolm frowned. ‘I never liked it,’ and when Christian looked incredulous, he asked, ‘Have you ever been there?’

  ‘In my dreams.’

  ‘I always felt out of place, particularly in the language. They are very fussy. Even after I had learned French, perfect strangers would correct me or snicker at my accent. Certain national pastimes I abhorred—the affairs and the endless talk of them, and how everyone seemed to own a revolting little dog—’ They both glanced at Grace licking pastry flakes off the carpet and Christian trilled a laugh again.

  ‘And speakin
g of poo,’ Malcolm added. ‘It’s everywhere on the sidewalks.’

  Over the years the streets had come to oppress him more and more, and it was not just the excrement. In their own neighbourhood heretics had been burned during the Inquisition; Jews had been rounded up during the war and, in the eighties, bombed in delicatessens. Lately, this last bit of history had begun to weigh on him particularly. Home, meanwhile, became burnished in his memory. Except for the separatist movement, Canada was rarely mentioned in the papers. Nothing ever happened there, and he saw that as idyllic.

  ‘Affairs a national pastime? That sounds swell,’ said Christian.

  ‘And the desecrated Jewish cemeteries? The little Muslim girls barred from school for wearing headscarves? The Algerians bound and thrown into the Seine? You are familiar with the increasingly popular Front National of M. Le Pen? How about the government minister, Jewish, whose name Le Pen made to rhyme with crématoire? Or how “sidiques”—persons with AIDS—strangely echoes “judaïques’’?’

  Christian turned his head, seemingly to look at Malcolm with the straying eye. ‘I’m not political.’

  ‘Neither am I,’ said Malcolm sternly.

  It was France that had corrupted Denis. Malcolm blamed France. The country was full of anti-Semites and racists of all denominations such as you would never find here. Denis had been an adolescent during the war and seen his country collaborate. No wonder, Malcolm thought. No wonder! Then: Christ! He was thinking again. He had opened the apartment door and the next thing he knew he was exonerating Denis.

  Christian wiped the corners of his mouth and, to change the subject, pointed to the Egyptian head on the coffee table. ‘Who is she?’

  Malcolm shrugged, irritable now, sarcastic. ‘Nefertiti.’

  ‘You have connections.’ He gestured across the room. ‘Is that a hi-fi? Are those records?’

  ‘It’s a veritable museum, isn’t it?’

  ‘Is that your lover?’ Christian asked.

  In the picture on the sideboard, he meant. Instantly, Malcolm’s eyes teared up, but he pressed them quickly and turned away. ‘Yes,’ he answered in what he hoped was a steady voice. It was no lie. That picture had been taken twenty years before.