Nothing Looks Familiar

by Shawn Syms

  Fucking gross. I slam the locker door shut with all my strength. It bounces back open, impelling the raunchy odour back in my face. With the force of the jolt, the calf’s head bounces and tips forward. It topples out of the locker and heaves onto my yellow rubber boot. With a fearful bolt of adrenaline, I kick it down the row of lockers. It comes to a stop at the other end of the hall, where a group of women are coming out of the showers. They stop en masse, emitting yelps and grunts of disgust, looking over at me, and swearing. The calf’s tongue fell out of the head when I kicked it; it lies on the ground a few feet away. I crumple to the bench and find myself crying for the first time in years. I wish I were anywhere but here.

  I step out of the women’s locker room an eternity later. As I head for the exit, a deep voice calls out to me.

  “Hey, slut.” Karl Willson stomps my way with a crooked sneer on his lips.

  I cross my arms in front of my chest. “What the fuck do you want?”

  He answers in sing-song. “Is Princess having a bad day?” Karl reaches forward suddenly and shoves my crossed arms so hard I fall backward to the floor. He leans in, and I cover my face quickly. He’s yelling in my ear. “What? That black bitch show you what a fucking cow you are?”

  I kick him in the shin, a glancing blow, and he steps back. I scramble to my feet. A dozen passersby have slowed or stopped. “What the fuck, Karl!”

  “Kevin told me what you did last night, you fucking whore.”

  The crowd begins to filter away. Another lover’s spat. Happens all the time.

  “Those people believe in revenge. You better watch out.”

  “Karl, you’re full of shit … ”

  He spits in my face and walks away. Two women approach, not speaking English. I climb to my feet, recognizing Agnes’s voice.

  She wears a white blouse, acid-wash jeans, and a faded denim jacket. Next to her stands a tall woman with a pretty face marred by dark circles under her eyes. A dark-green, patterned scarf covers her hair and drapes across her shoulders. She wears a simple white dress. I notice the slight curve of her belly. Makok’s wife.

  “Wanda, this is my friend, Mende.”

  I glance downward, then look up at her, my face flushed. “How are you, Mende?” I manage.

  “It is nice to meet you.” Her heavily accented English is stilted and formal.

  Agnes turns to me. “We’re going to church. There are things we need to speak to the pastor about. Maybe you’d like to come with us.”

  “I’m sorry, Agnes. I need to go make dinner for my father.” I look at my feet and back at the two of them. Mende appraises me.

  “I heard what happened, Wanda. I thought some spiritual guidance might be a help.”

  I pause. “You know what happened?”

  “At your locker.”

  I exhale. “A stupid prank. Some joker from the kill floor.”

  “I believe things happen for a reason, Wanda. If you don’t want to come now, you could attend our Sunday-morning service.” She touches Mende’s arm before adding, “It can help when troubling things happen.”

  I decide something. “Agnes, I’d join you, but I’ll be packing. Dad and I are moving to Vancouver. We leave Monday.”

  Agnes breaks into a sudden grin. “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me!”

  “No one knows.”

  “It’s time you saw the world.” Agnes came from Africa and had lived in Newfoundland for years before coming here. “What are you going to do in the big city—work in a butcher shop?”

  “I’m going to be an apprentice to a dressmaker.” I realize this by saying it aloud for the first time.

  Mende appears distracted, but offers Agnes a confused look. Agnes speaks to her quickly, pointing to me several times. I realize she’s translating the conversation we just had. Karl lied—I doubt he could have said anything to Mende. He must’ve snuck in when the locker room was empty and busted into my locker himself. Whatever.

  I embrace Agnes. Mende turns to me and says, “Good luck.” The two of them walk away. Men and women stream past in the opposite direction by the dozens, on their way into the plant for B shift.

  Better get home and tell Dad, I think. I leave the building and walk alongside the chain-link fence that leads from the plant to the parking lot. I can’t remember where I parked my Civic. I scan the sea of parked cars, and nothing looks familiar.

  Four Pills

  “I’m gonna have a good time tonight,” Adam announced to the empty park. Even if I only have five bucks to my name. Once Shaggy shows up, we’ll get everything sorted.

  Adam perched on the swing in a desolated children’s play set behind the towering, unlit greenhouse at Allan Gardens. His broad frame fit snugly between the two sets of chains. He stroked his stubbly chin and wiped the sweat off his forehead. A dirt-speckled Canada Coach bus sped past, leaving purple exhaust to hang in the humid air.

  The play set was a rusty shambles. Adam had never seen kids in this park. Even during the day, few parents would consider it a safe space. Instead, it was a nighttime playground for crack heads, whores, and homos. And me too, Adam appended, kicking at the moist near-muck at his feet, unleashing its sticky earthen odour. Where the fuck is Shaggy? he asked himself.

  He’d started hanging out in the park a couple months ago, after losing his last warehouse job. The welfare cheque stretched to meet his costs, but barely. After rent, he was left with $123 to get through the month. It was a week till cheque day, but Adam wasn’t worried. He could rustle up extra cash. He wasn’t even thinking about the rest of the week. Just tonight. It was Sunday night, the ragged edge of the weekend, and Adam had no reason to get up early the next day.

  He’d never been good at keeping friends and didn’t know why Shaggy liked him. They’d met in Allan Gardens. Adam had been moping on a bench along one of the tree-lined paths that ran through the park. It was better than sitting alone in his basement apartment in the rooming house down the street.

  The night they met was the first time Adam tried to buy some rock in the park. Scared shitless, he approached a guy he’d seen dealing crack along the park’s pathways. The man laughed in Adam’s face but still did the deal. “Did you assume I would have it because I’m black?” he asked, voice dripping with sarcasm. Before Adam could get home with his twenty-dollar piece, he was jumped by two skinny white dudes with shaved heads and scarred faces. Shaggy showed up and got them to lay off. The two brothers, Adam later learned, ran a scam with the first guy to rip off anyone they knew was green.

  A lot of people had made Shaggy’s acquaintance. He was usually holding drugs of one sort or another; he wasn’t a full-on dealer, but he sold on the side. He knew all the hookers on the stroll and most of the crackheads in the park. Once they walked past Filmores strip club together, and Adam was sure he saw a cop sitting in a cruiser nod at Shaggy as they passed.

  Shaggy was mysterious; Adam didn’t even know where he lived. Shaggy could be a rich kid from Forest Hill slumming in the park. When they hung out, anything felt possible—if only for that moment. Adam decided from the outset not to ask any questions. As long as Shaggy brought the party, he would be there. He didn’t mind being a follower.

  A nearby echoing boom was followed by a slow creaking sound. Adam looked up and saw a man with slender eyebrows and an even thinner moustache prop open the enormous wooden door of the nearby church. The man looked in his direction and frowned. Adam spat on the ground. The minister turned around, disappearing into the hole left by the arched doorframe. The church, fashioned of worn, blackened stones, had a medieval air. A single lean spire thrust upward like a wagging finger.

  Beyond Jarvis Street Baptist, Adam saw a woman in a skimpy, shocking-pink outfit emerge from Hooker Harvey’s and begin a jittery stroll north. The first working girl of the evening was out. She looked pretty compared to the crack whore from Adam’s building. Once he found that skank screwing a burly, greasy guy in the back alley up against his own apartment door—at ten in
the morning. At least the girl outside Harvey’s was wearing makeup.

  Adam glanced left and saw a shrunken old woman with tobacco-stained hair make her stooped way along the asphalt path surrounding the playground. She had a wooden cane in one hand, an oversized canvas bag in the other. He could already detect her BO. He knew her by sight; maybe in her fifties but ground down by life, the woman was a decrepit fixture around here.

  A muffler-less Volkswagen sputtered down Gerrard. Then the park was quiet again, except for the rasp of a breeze through its thick oaks, filling the air with hoarse whispers. All that would change in an hour, as the sun sank and the moon rose.

  Traffic would grow dense and slow. Windows rolled down, the air would fill with music from Euro-disco to Led Zeppelin blaring from car stereos. People would be looking for action, summer stir-crazy. The dealers would be out. Loose handfuls of people would languidly migrate through the park. Those from Adam’s shit neighbourhood would cross from south to north, looking for greener pastures. Those slumming for the weekend would pass them heading from north to south, looking for a chunk of crack or bag of smack to take back to their chichi Bay Street apartments. Those people were likely to take the same journey to Queen and Sherbourne more than once before the sun came up.

  The lopsided shrew had stopped on the other side of the wrought-iron fence separating the playground from the rest of the park. She stared at him. The old bitch opened her mouth, and a child’s singsong came out—a child on barbiturates. “Can you spare any change?” She dragged each word out, making it last over several seconds. Adam ignored her. She sounded like a clown but looked like Methuselah in a stinky green sweater.

  “Can you spare a cigarette?” Adam grimaced, looking away.

  “Cocksucker.” She spat from a toothless mouth and limped back in the other direction.

  Behind her, a short, stocky man with a precise military haircut trudged through the park. He knew the guy, who wore a bus-driver’s TTC uniform. The man nodded and smiled at Adam. He nodded back but quickly looked away.

  Smack in the middle of it all was the bulky greenhouse, mostly ignored by the park’s night-time inhabitants. Dense, leafy trees lined its western wall. That made it popular with fags, who began to stream toward the park from a nearby gay bar around midnight on the weekends. Some diehards showed up every night, marching a hypnotized circle around the length of the greenhouse with two lingering stops: the tree cover along the west wall and a nearby darkened alcove.

  Adam had let a faggot or two suck his cock here, on nights when he couldn’t sleep and needed to get off. These guys are a public convenience, he told himself, like a urinal to piss in. Just a place to put his load. He’d braced himself against a gnarled tree trunk and kept his eyes closed the few times it had happened. He’d been high, and it was a way to get rid of something his body wanted out. That’s all. He could never imagine telling Shaggy.

  A bell chimed from the nearby steeple. Adam watched a trickle of grey-haired men in decomposing suits escort elderly women in faded dresses and oversized hats into the church for the seven p.m. service. The wrought-iron gate behind him squeaked.

  “Hey, dude, sucked off any horse dongs here lately?” With an impish giggle, Shaggy ran toward Adam and tried to push him off the swing. Adam leapt to his feet. Still laughing, Shaggy pushed the swing to one side and tried to tackle him. Longhaired Shaggy was tall but lean and not very strong; Adam lifted him off the ground from behind and easily tossed him into the dirt. Then he squatted down and farted in his face. He smiled, happy he wasn’t alone anymore.

  “Aw, that reeks. Fuck you!” Shaggy grasped at a pile of dirt and tossed it at Adam’s face before hauling himself to his feet. Shaggy waved his hands in the air to clear away Adam’s fart, but he was still grinning.

  “Let’s go for a walk,” he said.

  Adam followed. They left the playground and walked away from the busy churchyard to the deserted eastern end of the park. It looked deserted at first glance, but as they walked the asphalt path, tiny movements became visible. By a far-off tree, a woman lay on top of a man and kissed him passionately. Both looked fully clothed. From another path, they heard laughter. Three men sat on a bench passing a bottle of Jack Daniel’s. Behind them, a fourth faced away and pissed in the grass, steadying himself with effort.

  “I need to take my mind off things tonight. Feel like having some fun?”

  “Yeah.” Adam paused. “What’s wrong, though?”

  Shaggy ran one hand through his bangs before answering. “My brother.”

  When he and Shaggy partied, they talked more about their childhoods than the present. Shaggy had mentioned his older brother a couple times lately. Bladder cancer.

  “Oh.” Adam nodded, but didn’t say more. He’d learned to leave it up to Shaggy to decide when he wanted to talk about something.

  “I’ve got some fun lined up for tonight,” Shaggy said, all smiles again.

  “Rock?” Adam got excited. It was weeks since he’d smoked any crack. He loved the intense, uplifting high. He tried to control the electrified butterflies flitting in his stomach.

  “Maybe. Depends if we can line up some cash. In the meantime … ” He reached into his pocket and put his hand into the glow of a streetlight.

  In his palm were four tablets, marked with the word “Roche” and a number two surrounded by a circle. The moon above them was barely a sliver, and each pill reminded Adam of a star. They were a constellation in Shaggy’s hand.

  Four roofies. Hyped on the TV news as a “date rape” drug, they were strong downers. Shaggy sometimes sold them for five bucks apiece to guys in the park or spun-out dudes wandering around the John Innes Centre. They brought on sleep after too much crack. Adam guessed the presence of Shaggy’s “little helpers” might indeed mean there would be some rock to be smoked tonight. Adam’s pocket held his asthma-inhaler crack pipe, which he’d brought out with him, just in case.

  He smiled. “Think we might need those pills later on?”

  “Or … ” Shaggy paused. “We could save them for someone else. If we met some chicks … ”

  Adam let the words sink in. He wasn’t keen on challenging Shaggy, but didn’t know how to respond. “Really?”

  “Hey, bro, it’s not so bad.” Shaggy replied. “I’ve only done it with ladies who were into me anyway. For some girls, it’s the only way they can come; they’re too self-conscious. I can tell by the smile I leave on their faces.” A stoner kid in a green lumber jacket rode past them on a motocross, scattering pebbles as his tires skidded by.

  “Or,” Shaggy said, “we might need them ourselves later. That depends on money. I don’t have anything. We’d need to go see Jamie.” The guy Adam had bought crack from the first time. Adam bristled at the mention of his name. Shaggy noticed and laughed loudly, then stopped.

  “Here’s a chance for some cash,” he said in a quieter tone.

  Up ahead on another path that merged into their own, a man walked briskly, alone. Adam recognized his squat frame; that fag bus driver from earlier. He’d changed from his blue-and-grey uniform into a typical gay-bar outfit: a red-and-black plaid shirt, too-tight Levis, and maroon cowboy boots. The pants and shirt looked neatly pressed. You didn’t need to guess twice what kind of place he was headed to. Maybe it was country-and-western night.

  Shaggy dropped his voice to a whisper. “I’ll distract him, you get him.” He sprinted forward until he’d passed the guy by a dozen feet, then stopped and turned to face him.

  Adam froze. Shaggy wanted to roll the fag. He just wished it wasn’t that particular guy. This could get embarrassing. Shaggy approached the man. At least a decade their senior, he looked in his mid-thirties. “Hey, sir, excuse me. Do you know what time it is?”

  Totally lame—but all he was doing was stalling him so Adam could sneak up without being noticed. They’d done this before. Adam watched from behind. The man’s reply sounded wary.

  “No … I don’t have a watch on.”

&nb
sp; “Are you serious, man? I’m late to meet my girlfriend. What time was it when you left home? I think I’m in big shit. Come on.”

  He faced the fag the whole time, walking backward as the guy inched forward, Shaggy doing a subtle dance in front of him, slowing him down. His words were really intended for Adam, to urge him forward.

  Adam glanced around. A few feet away he saw a discarded ginger-ale bottle. He grabbed it and ran toward the man from behind, raising his arm in the air. The guy turned just as Adam was about to strike him. “Hey, what’s going on, Ad—?”

  Before he could finish, Adam brought the bottle down on the man’s skull as hard as he could.

  He didn’t fall to the ground or cry out. At best he seemed dazed. Adam took another look at the large bottle in his hand. It was made of plastic, not glass. Christ, I’m stupid, he thought. For a surreal second, no one moved. Then the guy bolted past Shaggy and ran toward the park’s edge. The guys took off after him, but the fat little queer had a head start—and their hearts weren’t in it anyway. After ten seconds or so, they both trailed off. Adam leaned against a huge oak and caught his breath.

  Shaggy gave him a curious look, and didn’t say anything. Then he picked up an imaginary plastic pop bottle in his right hand, raised it over Adam’s head, and brought it back down. And yelled “Bonk!” He burst out laughing. Adam blushed. Soon he was laughing too. “At this rate,” Shaggy said, “we won’t be partying till next weekend.”

  Shaggy stopped and peered across the street. “Hey, lookit,” he said. She wore a pink latex top that was little more than brassiere and slinky black short shorts. It was the hooker Adam had seen earlier. Shaggy donned an on-the-make smile, said, “Follow me,” and zipped across the street. Adam followed him.

  Shaggy sauntered over to where the hooker stood as Adam tried to catch up.

  “How you doing, Shauna?” he said, all feigned nonchalance.