“Grandpa?”
“Allo, Daniel! Comment ça va?” In the background, I could hear The Guess Who’s “American Woman” playing loudly, along with some kind of motor grinding.
“I’m good. Grandpa, what’s that noise?”
“It’s a blender, Daniel. I’m making drinks.”
“I didn’t know you owned a blender.”
“I don’t,” Grandpa said, laughing, “or I didn’t. I own one now! I am making piña coladas. Now what the hell a piña colada is, I have no idea. But there’s a first for everything, eh? Is everything good?”
“Definitely. Everything’s fine.” I scratched my head. “Grandpa, about this weekend.”
“We’re looking forward to all you kids coming up. We’re going to have some good times. Don’t forget your swim trunks.”
“No Grandpa, we won’t. Who’s we?”
“Oh, I’m bringing a lady friend. It’s someone I’ve been wanting you kids to meet for a while.”
“A lady friend?”
“I’ll introduce you when you arrive. How’s David, by the way?”
“David’s fine.” I glanced at David who was wearing his boardshorts slung low over his hips. His T-shirt kept riding up as he worked with the roller. “He’s kind of why I called.”
“You didn’t break up, did you?”
“What?”
“You’re still boyfriends, right?”
“Yeah.” I leaned back against the door. “Yeah, Grandpa, we’re still boyfriends.”
“Good. We look forward to meeting him. Say allo. We’ve got some tourtières in the freezer for all of you to take home. You’ll be able to swing through Sudbury on the way back, won’t you?”
“Um, Pat and Blonde Dawn are driving.” Still painting, David pulled down his shorts with one hand and mooned me. “But I’m sure we can do that.”
“C’est bon. We’ll see you Friday, then.”
“Yes sir.”
“Au revoir.”
“Bye, Grandpa.”
Grandpa hung up. I set the phone down. “He says hi.”
“Is everything okay?”
“Yeah. Yeah, he was really cheerful. He’s looking forward to meeting you.” I stuck my legs straight out in front of me. “He’s bringing a friend.”
“You mean Frank?”
“No. A lady friend.”
“A lady friend? Who would that be?”
“I have no idea. He knew you and I were boyfriends.”
“So I heard.”
“It’s weird.”
“How are you feeling?”
“Relieved, I guess? He made it all seem so normal.”
David nodded contemplatively. “Should I thank him for your grandma’s douche kits when I see him?”
“No, David, you won’t.”
“No?” David smiled. “You sure?”
“No.”
David came over and straddled me. “Merci beaucoup, Monsieur Garneau,” he growled like René Lévesque, “pour touts les douche kits.”
“I will beat you with this brush.”
“Oooh, mister.” David leaned on my shoulders and ground his crotch against mine. “That might sound fun.”
“What do you think he meant by a ‘lady friend’?”
“Dude. C’mon. What do you think he meant? It sounds like your grandpa’s seeing someone. You should be happy for him.”
“We’re scattering Grandma’s ashes this weekend.”
“Yeah, and?” He took the brush from my hand and set it aside.
“Don’t you think it’s a little inappropriate for Grandpa to be bringing a date? I didn’t even know he was seeing anyone at all.”
“Whoa there, cowboy. It’s been, what, eight months since your grandma died.”
“They were married fifty-nine years.”
“Okay. And what’s your point?”
“You know what my point is.” I pushed David off me and stood up. “I don’t think it’s right.”
“Daniel, your grandpa has a right to keep on living. He took care of your grandma for, what, like the last twenty years of his life. That man has a right to move on.”
“Moving on, okay.” I paced the room. “But this is Grandma’s ash scattering.”
“Yeah, you keep saying that. But it’s not a funeral. You had the funeral already. Your grandpa wants this to be a family celebration. Isn’t that what you keep telling me?”
“I suppose.” I stood in front of the open fridge, a vision in my head of Grandpa in a Hawaiian shirt, slurping piña coladas, overmedicated and dishevelled, bouncing Playboy Bunnies in his lap.
“Then consider what family means.” David sat back. “It’s the people we love, and who love us. He knows what Karen and Blonde Dawn mean to Liam and Pat. He knows what I mean to you. He’s gathering us all together to celebrate family, to celebrate life. Wouldn’t your grandma want that?”
I thought of the photograph of Grandma on the swing. The book in her hands was the same book Grandpa had passed on to me last Christmas, Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass. Grandma had loved her poetry.
“I wish I’d known her,” I said.
“By the way,” David said, picking dried paint from his shins, “I’ve been meaning to mention something.”
“What is it?” I rummaged out two Creamsicles from the freezer.
“My ma, she wants to go back home next year. Her parents are getting older and she wants to spend a summer with them, while they’re still well. She wants me and my sister to come with her. It’s important.”
“To Italy?”
“It’ll be for two months. Don’t worry about subletting the place. I’ll cover my half of the rent. You’ll just have to cook for yourself.”
“I can cook for myself, David. I won’t starve.”
“You won’t miss me, then?”
“You’ll be gone all next summer?”
“We’re just talking about it now, but yeah, that’s the plan. She’ll pay for our tickets. We’ve got relatives all over Italy.”
“Italy.” It was just starting to sink in. “Wow.”
“The last time I met my grandparents, my sister and I were little kids. I barely remember them.”
“How old were you?”
“I was five. She would’ve been ten. I remember Nonna letting me sip some beer, and Nonno carrying me on his shoulders in their olive grove. It was nice.”
“How’s your Italian?”
“It sucks.”
“Right.” I handed David a Creamsicle and sat myself down next to him. Of course I would miss David, but at this point, next summer still seemed so far away. “Well.” I wiped away a drop of paint on his cheek. “You better start brushing up then.”
Road trips with Pat were an exercise in patience. With all our gear, we barely managed to fit into Blonde Dawn’s car. During the five-hour drive up the 400, we played Twenty Questions, the License Plate Game, and our own version of punch buggy based on spotting inuksuit along the side of the highway. When we were kids up at the cottage, we’d spend whole afternoons building inuksuit, hauling rocks right out of the lake if we had to. The four of us took turns playing our favourite tunes. At one point, Pat stuck himself out the window for an air guitar version of BNL’s “Wind It Up.” He agreed to come back inside only after we all sang “One Week” with him. When we stopped for gas in Parry Sound, we ordered homeburgers, sloppy joes and poutines, extra-large Timmy’s coffees and a dozen assorted donuts. In the parking lot, after Pat wouldn’t stop begging, Blonde Dawn threw him the keys and let him drive the rest of the way. It was late in the afternoon by the time we pulled off the highway onto our family property. The cottage itself was accessed by a twokilometre stretch of private road. I jumped out and unhitched the rusted chain at the top of the drive. A PRIVATE NO TRESPASSING sign had been freshly painted and nailed to a maple tree that I remembered being a whole lot smaller. Pat drove through and I re-hitched the chain. Liam had been coming up regularly over the years. The last time I�
��d visited, Grandpa had piled us kids into the back of his pick-up, and we’d driven up with Mom and Dad.
Our property lay just inside the Sudbury Basin, a 1.85 billion-year-old asteroid impact crater, forty acres of oldgrowth east of the airport. On a clear day, you could spot the plume from the Inco Superstack, sitting on top of the largest nickel smelting operation in the world. The closest town was Skead, a sawmill community half an hour away. It wasn’t what you’d call deep bush, but it was good enough for us. Pat swerved around potholes on the narrow dirt road, low hanging branches whipping past. When we rounded the final bend, the cottage came into view. Today, the sun blazed in a cloudless sky, and the lake sparkled in the breeze. Liam’s Jeep and Grandpa’s truck were parked out front, so I knew we’d come to the right place. But the cottage itself was almost unrecognizable to me. A two-storied A-frame extension had been built onto the original single-room structure. A brand new cedar porch wrapped around the whole cottage. By the time Pat parked the car, Karen had appeared on the front stoop with four beers in hand. As we piled out, Jackson bounded around the cottage barking and pushing his nose into our hands, his tail thrashing. Blue jays shrieked their alarm call overhead: Jayer! Jayer!
“Welcome to the Good Medicine Cabin,” Karen said, handing out bottles like they were keys to the city.
I drew in a lungful of air fragrant with pine, fresh sawdust, and wood smoke. “Karen, did you know about this?” I demanded, scanning the new addition.
“Mm-hm,” Karen nodded. She wore a black bikini top and an ankle-length, rust-coloured skirt that showed off her silver toe-rings. “I’ve come up with Liam a bunch of times in the last few years.”
I turned to Pat and Blonde Dawn. “And what about you guys?”
“Yeah, we helped your grandpa put down the stonework for the new fireplace,” Blonde Dawn said, hauling our gear out of the trunk.
I was flabbergasted. “Am I the only one who didn’t know about this?”
“Surprise,” Karen said.
Liam emerged barefoot from the cottage wearing khaki shorts and a tool belt, wiping his hands on a greasy rag. He was tanned and looking more fit than he had in years. “Hey, guys,” he called out, “you made it. So.” He grinned and flipped the rag over his shoulder. “What do you think?”
“It’s brilliant,” Pat exclaimed. “Bloody brilliant. It’s exactly how I pictured it. Bloody fucking brilliant.” He high-fived Liam. “Congratulations, man.”
“I finished the deck last week.”
“Yeah,” I said, “congratulations. Why didn’t anyone tell me about this?”
Liam squinted at me. “I did tell you, Daniel. Lots of times. Like I said, Pépère’s had a few projects on the go. That’s why he’s been spending so much time up here. I’ve been driving up from Manitoulin to help out when I can. Check it out.” He backed away and pointed. “I just put up the weather vane this morning.”
“Sweet,” Pat said.
“It’s a cock,” David said, elbowing me in the side.
Liam folded his arms in satisfaction. “So it is.”
“I could’ve helped out,” I said.
“Daniel, you’ve been in Toronto. You’ve been busy with school. It’s all good. The main thing is, we’ve put in a septic system and a tankless water heater. The outhouse is still there, but we’ve got a working washroom now. We’ve kept the wood stove, but we’ve also got a gas generator out back, mainly for the heater and the fridge.”
“Holy shit,” I said. “And I thought you’ve been coming up here and roughing it.”
“It is pretty luxurious,” Karen said, “compared to what it was like before. Some of us might still want to camp outside this weekend. But you can take hot showers now.”
“Who needs a shower when you got a lake?” Pat said, laughing. “I’m going in! Who’s coming with me?” Without waiting for an answer, he ran hollering around the cottage, stripping off his T-shirt and shorts along the way. Blonde Dawn and David followed after him.
“Where’s Grandpa?” I asked.
“He’s out getting dinner with Betty.”
“Betty?”
“You’ve met Betty,” Karen said. “She’s the nursing manager at the home.” When I stared blankly at her, she poked me in the chest. “The redhead, Daniel. The nurse you always said you liked.”
“Grandpa and Betty?”
Liam slapped my shoulder. “Come on.” He led the way down a flagstone path. When I didn’t move, Karen took my hand. Out back, a spacious two-level deck enclosed three towering pines. Red squirrels chased each other along their gnarled branches and leapt onto the cottage roof. A tablecloth covered a table set with placemats and cloth napkins, silver cutlery, gleaming wine glasses, and white plates. Nine settings in all. A glazed vase in the centre spilled over with colourful wildflowers. Pat, Blonde Dawn and David scrambled down the dock and cannonballed into the lake, splashing and shouting. Beyond them, far in the distance, I could make out two people approaching in a canoe.
Liam shaded his eyes. “They’ll be here in ten minutes. I better get the grill going.” He padded back into the cottage through a sliding screen door.
“You want to see the inside?” Karen asked.
“What?”
“You won’t guess where Liam put that moose skull of his.”
“Yeah, in a minute,” I murmured. “I just want to take this all in.”
“When was the last time you were up here?”
“Thirteen years ago. It was just this old shack back then. This is unbelievable.”
“Yeah, well, Liam and your grandpa, they’ve been working hard these last few years to restore this place. It was important, Daniel, for both of them.”
“I had no idea.”
Liam emerged hefting a bag of charcoal and a spice rack. He descended to the lower deck, Jackson at his heels, where he began to prepare the barbeque.
“We’ve got some sweet potatoes roasting,” Karen said, “and there’s a pasta salad in the fridge already. We’ll make a baby greens salad. Your grandpa seemed pretty confident he could catch enough fish for the eight of us. They’ve been gone all afternoon.”
“There’s nine settings.”
“That chair’s for your grandma. It was Betty’s idea.” I drew a deep breath. Karen plucked a milkweed seed from my hair. “Daniel, you’ll like her.”
“I hope so.”
“Trust me. You will.”
I bowed my head. “I’ve been staying away.”
“What?”
“I’ve been staying away. Grandpa’s been inviting me back up here for years, but I’ve been avoiding this place. I always had some excuse: hockey practice, school, work in Toronto.” I lowered my voice. “But he truth is, I just couldn’t ...”
“What do you mean?”
“I loved this cottage. We’d spend weekends and holidays up here, the whole family, packed into this one-room cabin. Grandpa and Grandma would take us kids out hiking. Dad would stay back and chop firewood. Liam, Pat and me, we’d hunt crayfish and frogs by these logs across the cove. We used to play for hours on a tire-swing by that outcrop right over there. That boulder next to it would get really hot in the afternoons and we’d dry our swim trunks on it. Mom would grill up fish or partridge, and make us hot chocolate. The sunsets over the lake were amazing. We’d stay up and roast wieners and marshmallows. Dad would play his guitar, Grandma would read us poetry, or we’d get Grandpa to tell us his ghost stories. You should’ve seen the stars at night. It was perfect.”
Karen leaned against the railing, turned towards the sun. In that light, I could make out every individual glinting eyelash and crease in her lips. There were lines and freckles on her face that hadn’t been there before. “The sunsets are still amazing, Daniel.” She gazed sideways at me. “What’s finally brought you back?”
“Well, Grandma’s ashes.”
“I’m glad you made it.”
“The truth is, I’ve been afraid to come back ever since.”
Karen studied my face. “Afraid?”
“Yeah.”
“And now that you’re here?”
I clenched and unclenched my hands. “It’s different. It’s not what I expected.” I observed the shining lake and soaring pines, the silvery birch leaves in the breeze. “It’s okay. I’m not sure what I was afraid of anymore. I’m regretting I didn’t come up sooner.”
“Well, Daniel, you’re here now.”
“We are.”
By now, I could make out Grandpa in the stern of the canoe. He waved to us with his paddle. The red-headed woman in the bow also waved. Together, Karen and I waved back. Grandpa reached down and hefted a chain stringer, raising it high over his head. Even from this distance, we could see that it was full of fish. Blonde Dawn, Pat and David began swimming out to meet them.
“I hope you’re hungry,” Karen said.
I let the golden light wash over me. “I am.”
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I’d like to acknowledge use of the following song titles as chapter titles: “The Hockey Song” by Stompin’ Tom Connors; “Working for the Weekend” by Loverboy; “Constant Craving” by k.d. lang; “Underwhelmed” by Sloan; “High for This” by The Weekend; “Lost Together” by Blue Rodeo; “All the Things I Wasn’t” by The Grapes of Wrath; “Brother Down” by Sam Roberts; “Wake Up to the Sun” by Limblifter; “Your Ex-Lover is Dead” by Stars; “Five Days in May” by Blue Rodeo; “This Could be Anywhere in the World” by Alexisonfire; “Sudbury Saturday Night” by Stompin’ Tom Connors; “We’re Here for a Good Time” by Trooper; “Rockin’ in the Free World” by Neil Young; “We’re All in This Together” by Sam Roberts. I’d also like to acknowledge the quote taken from the film The Blues Brothers (1980; written by Dan Aykroyd and John Landis).
My personal thanks go out to Mary-Jo Dingwall for setting me on the writer’s path; to my partner Daniel and his family, whose loving spirit is the spirit of this book; and to the Pride & Prejudice team at Central Toronto Youth Services, for the opportunity to learn and grow in so many ways.
I’d like to express my gratitude to Michael Mirolla at Guernica Editions, for seeing something relevant in this work of fiction and opening the door; to my editor Julie Roorda for her kindness and expertise; and to my book designer David Moratto, for his openness and creativity.
A Boy at the Edge of the World Page 27