Even Weirder Than Before

by Susie Taylor

  “Did she brush her teeth?” Cold creeps into my chest, and then I realize he is teasing me.

  “Carmen’s waiting for you at the front door. Didn’t want to be bothered taking her shoes off, but she’ll give you a lift home.”

  Cora is coming up the stairs to the house when I step outside. She looks like she might cry. Mrs. Jones asks her if she’s alright, but Cora just pushes wordlessly past us. I see the car she just got out of pulling away. The driver is Mr. Dean.

  ten

  “Daisy, could you just try? He is your father. I’d like you to see him. I don’t want him thinking I’m stopping you from going. Of course, it is up to you, dear.”

  He picks me up at the house. I feel queasy, like when I was younger and Mum made me go to the birthday party of a kid I didn’t like. When the car pulls in, I’m ready and out the door before he’s parked. I get in, and Dad gets out and heads up to the house. Mum steps outside, and they hug and he kisses her on the cheek. Watching this makes my stomach flip. Let’s go, let’s go, I think. His hair is shorter than it used to be, and he is wearing a pair of runners instead of his usual brown leather shoes that Mum used to polish for him every Sunday night.

  I don’t wait for him to come back and hug me. I strap myself into the passenger seat. As Dad backs out, I see Mum peeking at us leaving from behind the curtain in the front window. I imagine myself undoing my seatbelt, flinging open the door, rolling away from the car, and running.

  “How’s school?’

  “Fine.”

  “How’s your friend? Catherine?”

  “Fine.” I think about telling him I hardly see Cathy anymore. When we do, our conversations are like this one with Dad, awkward. It’s like being in a dream when things look normal, but they aren’t quite right. Your dead great-uncle is sitting at the table, and you’re wearing a dress that hasn’t fit you in three years.

  Someone cuts Dad off at the intersection.

  “Women drivers…” he mutters. He thinks this is funny. The news comes on the car radio, and we both pretend to listen.

  Pat and Dad’s apartment is in a small four-storey building. As we’re walking up the inside stairs, a man is coming down.

  “Hi, Dr. Radcliffe, how’s it going?” he says, when we meet at the landing. He looks quizzically at me.

  “Good. This is my daughter, Daisy. Daisy, this is Jeff, he lives upstairs.”

  “I didn’t know you had a daughter, Dr. Radcliffe.” This statement hits the shiny industrial tiles and echoes up to the tall ceiling of the stairwell. “So, are you a young biologist in the making?”

  “No,” I say. I don’t elaborate.

  “See ya.” He hurries away, his attempt at lightening the mood having failed. I see his vision of me, Dr. Radcliffe’s spoiled and rude teenage daughter dressed in ratty clothes with the roots showing in her rat’s nest of dyed black hair. Dad opens the door to the second-floor hallway and leads me to the apartment.

  “Pat, love, we’re here.”

  I’m bent over trying to undo my boot laces in the tight hallway when Pat comes to the door with a frilly apron on over her clothes. I look up from where I’m crouched over.

  “Hi, Daisy, it’s so nice to see you.” I am glad I’m in this position as there will be no attempt at physical contact. No handshake or hug.

  The rice is saturated with tasteless sauce. I am stirring pieces of translucent onion that look like the flaps of skin you pull from your feet once a blister has burst, along with pithy pieces of green pepper around my plate. I have eaten three strips of chicken, slowly putting the flavourless morsels in my mouth and chewing for a long time. Pat is talking about her sister who is getting married over Christmas. Dad and Pat are going to Vancouver. They don’t ask me about my holiday plans.

  “What do you think of the stir-fry?” Pat asks, noticing my still-full plate. “I’m trying to get your Dad to lose a few pounds,” she says.

  Dad rubs his stomach. “I think I’m fine how I am.”

  “Not according to your doctor.”

  “A few pounds. I could do with losing a few pounds, that’s all he said.”

  It is so weird watching them joke around this way. It’s just like when Dad used to tease Mum when she tried to serve us salad for dinner.

  Pat gets up to clear the table, and when she comes behind Dad, she squeezes his shoulders with both of her hands. She stands behind him for a moment, her fingers working into his muscles. In response my own shoulders stiffen.

  “Are you done, Daisy? You didn’t eat very much.”

  “I’m not very hungry. Thanks.”

  “How about some ice cream?” She is holding a box of No Name vanilla in her hand, offering it to me like the congealed contents will somehow soothe this situation.

  “How about a cup of tea?” Dad says. Pat puts the kettle on.

  “So,” Dad says. “How’s school?”

  We take our tea into the living room. It’s a small room with a love seat and a rocking chair. I sit on one corner of the love seat and Dad sits on the other, forcing Pat into the uncomfortable-looking rocker. She has to move three teddy bears from it first. She has lots of cutesy little figurines up on shelves—ceramic things, girls wearing bonnets and carrying baskets of flowers. An angel mouse. What’s weirder than Pat’s girly ornaments is seeing things that I know so well in this strange room: a picture of my dad’s parents, the mantel clock that he was given when he graduated and that used to be in our living room. There is a box of records that he packed up one day and took from the house. Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, he likes all those weird old men who can’t actually sing.

  At the door, as I’m leaving, Pat hands me a gift. It’s a wooden bracelet.

  “I got this for you in Africa. It’s not much, but I thought you might like it.”

  I look in my hands. Dad has never got me anything like this from his trips. Sometimes he’d bring Mum perfume he purchased duty free on the airplane.

  “Say thanks, Daisy,” Dad says, while I’m still staring down at my hands.

  “Thank you, Pat,” I say quietly.

  “No problem. See you soon.” She glances up at Dad and I see him shrug. I want to stamp my feet and scream.

  At home as soon as I’m through the door, “How was it?” There is a glass of wine in her hand and an empty bottle next to the sink. No sign that Mum has eaten anything for dinner.

  “Awful.” I stomp up the stairs to my room, still wearing my boots.

  I put the wooden bracelet on the floor and grind my heel into it, and it cracks with satisfying sounds. Then I brush my teeth for ten minutes trying to get the taste of undercooked onion out of my mouth.

  I brush my hair in the morning so it hangs straight.

  “Daisy? You alright?” Mum says suspiciously when she sees me.

  “Mmmhmm.” I grab my bag and I’m out the door.

  At lunchtime, Wanda, Jude, and I meet at our lockers. Jude produces the shavers.

  “Are you sure you know what you’re doing?” I ask her.

  Jude looks around, sees an outlet in between two sets of lockers, and heads over and plugs in the shavers.

  “Here? We can’t do it here,” I say.

  “Why not?” Jude says.

  I sit cross-legged on the floor and Jude sits behind me. “How much?” she asks, conferring with Wanda.

  “I’m here,” I say.

  “Shhh, I’m thinking,” Wanda says. She comes over and grabs my hair into a ponytail. “Here.” Wanda puts a finger on the back of my head. “Not over her ears, but level with them.”

  “Yep, I think you’re right. Okay, Daisy, hold your hair up for me.” I feel the trimmer buzzing against the back of my skull; a long wisp of hair falls down onto my lap, and then another.

  I hear teacher footsteps coming down the hall. They have the click of authority.

  “Girls.” It’s Ms. Chandra. I see one of her feet, shod in a brown, heeled ankle boot, stir the hair on the floor in front of me.

  “
We’re just doing the back,” Jude tells her.

  “Just sweep up the hair when you’re done. Okay?”

  “Okay, thanks,” we say in unison.

  I can’t stop rubbing the back of my head. It feels like the bristles on a soft brush. It’s the haircut Cora had when I first saw her. If I put my hair up, it exposes the shaved back, but when it’s down you can’t see it. My head feels lighter.

  I show Mum as soon as she comes home. She doesn’t say anything, just rubs the back of my head with her hand.

  eleven

  I’m looking after Millie when the news comes on that a man has shot a bunch of women at a university in Montreal. Cora listens to the news in the kitchen, and I play with Millie in the living room, trying not to let her hear too many details. Mrs. Jones has already put up their tree. It’s peach, like all the decorations on it. Mrs. Jones’s Christmas village is set up on the coffee table.

  Cora brings in hot chocolate and sits with Millie and me.

  “I don’t feel like being alone,” she says.

  When I get home, Mum is talking to Elizabeth on the phone. “I needed to hear your voice,” I hear her say.

  Ms. Chandra talks to our English class about what happened; she sits on top of her desk and tells us how upset she is. Richard whispers, “Fucking feminist,” and Ms. Chandra calls him out.

  “Why don’t you share your thoughts with the whole class, Richard?”

  “It’s the feminists’ fault. They take jobs that men should have got, because of equal-opportunity crap, and then guys like that get screwed. That’s why he went crazy.”

  Ms. Chandra shakes her head, but the bell rings and the class ends. Jude and I are the last to leave, and Ms. Chandra puts her hands on each of our shoulders for a second as she ushers us out the door.

  I walk over to Mum’s office after school. “This is my daughter,” she says, introducing me to the women in the office.

  “You can tell that easily,” one of the women says. A man comes out of another office.

  “Grahame, this is my youngest daughter, Daisy.”

  “Hi,” says Grahame, and he smiles at me. He’s short and husky with a beard. He doesn’t do anything weird like try and shake my hand, and his smile is nice.

  “We’re off to choose a Christmas tree,” Mum says.

  “Christmas-tree farming is a sign of the excesses of Western capitalism,” Grahame says.

  “Well, the only employment Roy Carter has all year is selling trees at the plaza, so at least I’m supporting him.” Mum is flirting.

  “Point taken, have fun.”

  He waves goodbye, and I catch him wink at Mum.

  Roy’s trees are all tied up. We can’t see them, but we discuss options for a while; it’s a tradition to consider a few. Roy wears fingerless gloves, and his nails are yellow and ridged. When he takes our money, he smiles, and I notice he only has a few teeth.

  The tree stand is rusty. I hold it straight, and Mum tightens the stiff bolts. She crawls out; I shake it a few times, and it doesn’t fall over. Decorated with lights, balls, and the toilet-paper-roll angel Elizabeth made in grade one, it doesn’t look too bad. Underneath are presents from my aunts; they are wrapped in paper decorated with robins wearing Santa hats and plum puddings adorned with sprigs of holly. Mum puts three cylindrical packets from Dad under the tree, one for each of us. They look ominously like umbrellas. “They can’t be. Can they?” I ask Mum, and she sighs.

  “Hey, I have good news to tell you. I was going wait until Elizabeth gets home tomorrow, but we need some cheer, I think.”

  “What?”

  “I am no longer the front-desk clerk, but an Assistant Administrative Officer. It’s not much different. But I get a little raise, and my desk has a view. And no more dog licences.”

  I cheer.

  “There’s something else too. Grahame, the archeologist.”

  “With the beard.”

  “With the beard. He asked me out. I’m going to have dinner with him sometime next week.”

  “Mum!”

  “It’s just dinner.”

  Christmas Day is better than last year. It’s the normal combination of eating, gift opening, and the phone being passed around so Elizabeth and I can thank relatives we hardly know for strange socks and mysterious Marks & Spencer bath products. Dad calls, but, luckily, it’s just as we are taking the turkey out of the oven, so no one feels bad for getting off the phone with him. We saved half the present opening for after dinner; this way, we have something to occupy us in the evening.

  I take the soft package Mum hands me and unwrap it. I’m determined to be grateful for whatever she has chosen for me. It’s a black roll-neck sweater made out of the softest wool I have ever felt, and it has sleeves that come down over my hands. I pull it on. I can hide my face in the neck and disappear into it.

  “It’s fantastic and it’s even black.”

  “I thought you might like it.” Mum smiles.

  She hands out the last three gifts, the ones from Dad, and the three of us simultaneously unwrap our umbrellas. Mine is pink.

  It’s the end of January and cold. The trip to the Ontario Provincial Parliament is supposed to start at 7 a.m. The snow compacted on the sidewalk is squeaky. I haven’t slept well. I’m waiting for Jude to show up. I don’t want to get stuck next to Gary on the bus. He sits in front of me in class. Wanda says I’m too nice to Gary, and she’s probably right. He’s always telling me stories about the model airplanes he puts together on the weekend, and once suggested I could come over and look at them.

  At seven the doors of the school are still locked. Mr. Jackman, our teacher, waves to me from the warmth of his car where he is drinking a coffee. I can’t feel my feet. I’m wearing a pair of thin gloves that aren’t doing anything to keep me warm, and I don’t have a hat. Mum tried to get me to wear a toque this morning, but I blew her off. Now I regret it. The back of my head is particularly freezing. I bury my chin in the neck of my black sweater. Flakes of snow are either coming from the sky or being picked up by the wind from the roof of the school and swirling around me and the others waiting. I know my nose is red.

  Jackie and Terry-Lee are jumping up and down with their arms wrapped around each other, trying to stay warm. I will myself to look unaffected by the elements, and simply curl and uncurl my toes inside my freezing boots. Jude is walking up the street towards me. When she is close enough to hear the music coming from Mr. Jackman’s vehicle, she makes a gagging gesture, pretending to jam her finger down her throat.

  A bus comes around the corner of the school. It emits smoke and a grinding noise as it turns, then shudders to a stop at the curb just in front of me.

  The driver gets out and lights up a smoke. He and Mr. Jackman stand outside the bus and point up at the sky and the increasing number of snowflakes falling out of it as the students climb aboard.

  I wedge myself into a window seat three back from the front, and Jude sits beside me. We both get out our Walkmans. It’s too early to talk. The driver has a battery-operated portable radio playing at the front of the bus. He is playing the same station as Mr. Jackman. Ozzy Osbourne and a weather report that includes a lot of snowfall warnings leak in through my headphones. I stare out the window and put my backpack on my lap for warmth. It isn’t much warmer in the bus than outside, and I can see my breath.

  I slip my headphones down, irritated by the outside interference.

  “Oh my God, it’s cold,” I say to Jude.

  “Is there any heating on this bus?” She exposes her own ears.

  “I heard the driver tell Mr. Jackman it’s not working.”

  We can hear Mr. Jackman and the driver discussing the weather.

  “No sign of snow yesterday,” says Mr. Jackman.

  “Well, I’m here now. And it’s only an hour-long drive. But it’s your call, buddy. I get paid either way.” The driver smokes another cigarette leaning against the open door of the school bus, and the scent of cheap tobacco wafts in.
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  Every time the bus turns, the tires screech, and Jude and I slide back and forth across our seat. The driver keeps a running commentary with Mr. Jackman about the flaws of other drivers, interspersed with problems he is having with his girlfriend. She wants him to move out of his mother’s house.

  “I keep telling her, man, I got a good thing going. Housekeeper, cook, accommodation, and all I have to do is shovel in the winter and mow the lawn in the summer. Got the whole basement to myself, with a separate door. And Mom’s deaf, it’s not like she can hear when Michelle comes over.”

  Mr. Jackman is trying to steer him onto safer ground.

  “You see the game last night? I’m an Oilers fan, myself.”

  Jude and I are eavesdropping.

  “Ohhh, Michelle,” Jude moans slowly.

  “Don’t worry, Mother can’t hear.”

  “Ohhhh, ohhhh, ohhhh,” Jude flutters her eyes. Mr. Jackman catches the drift of our conversation and shakes his head at us.

  “How about them Oilers?” I say loudly to Jude, and I see the corners of Mr. Jackman’s mouth twitch up.

  The driver is oblivious and now telling Mr. Jackman about his preference for women who already have children.

  “That way they just want some company. Not looking for commitment or wanting to get married. That costs a fortune. I have a buddy spent two thousand bucks on an engagement ring, and the girl dumped him the night before the wedding. Never gave the ring back either. You married?”

  Jude and I nudge each other. Mr. Jackman is not as old as most of our other teachers, and he still has hair. He never talks about his personal life.

  Smoke comes pouring from a vent at the front of the bus. Jude and I watch as the black stinking stuff streams out of the vent like a mushroom cloud. It engulfs us first and then travels back, filling the rest of the bus.

  “Crap!” the driver shouts; the bus shudders, and we grip the back of the seat in front of us as he steers to the side of the highway and hammers on the brakes.

  The doors of the bus are opened, and Jude and I are the first two in the cold air on the side of the highway. Mr. Jackman is making sure everyone is off. The driver has gotten out a stool from somewhere that he stands on while smoking over the smoking engine and shaking his head.