The Door to Lost Pages

by Claude Lalumiere

  In the bathroom, Sandra turns on the shower, waits for the water to get scalding hot, and then climbs in.

  She knows that she should leave, that this relationship isn’t working anymore, but where could she go? She’s been with the boys for six years, since she met them at her first rave. The boys, already a couple by then, had seduced her as a joke—a let’s fuck the awkward, insecure virgin and make her cry thing—but they ended up really liking her, and the three of them had become inseparable. Two years later, at sixteen, they ran away together, away from their intolerant families and from everyone else who claimed to know what was best for them.

  As the steam soothes her, calms her, she watches her skin turn from olive to pink under the hot water. From the waist up, her entire body, including her face, is tattooed with stars, suns, moons, and planets of various sizes and shapes; dark green snakes coil upward from her ankles to bite her on the ass.

  She’s startled when Tom suddenly steps into the shower, followed by Kevin, who comes in from the opposite end. They both wince at the scalding water.

  She feels vulnerable and threatened, her five-foot-three self sandwiched between these six-foot giants.

  Kevin, behind her, presses down on her shoulders, his strong, dark fingers gently massaging her. Her back is so taut that even such mild pressure hurts.

  Tom—of the quick temper and hateful words; of the tall, gaunt frame; of the eerily pale skin—is careful not to touch her. Looking at her with surprising tenderness, he says, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t talk to you that way. Not ever.”

  Sandra, emotionally exhausted, slumps against Kevin’s firm, dark-brown flesh. He holds her and whispers her name. Tom steps toward them, enfolding both of them in his long arms. The tension drains from her, and she almost lets out a sob. Although she’s squeezed tightly between the boys, she no longer feels trapped. She breathes in the musk of their smooth chests, breathes in the steam and the sweat, and she feels safe, at home, where she belongs, the only place she’s ever belonged.

  It’s only late October, but a freak winter storm rages through the city. It’s minus twenty degrees, with the wind-chill factor bringing it down another fifteen. According to the weather report, eighteen centimetres of snow have already fallen by three o’clock in the afternoon, with at least another thirty expected in the next twelve hours.

  Sandra is consumed by worry about Aydee. As she piles on the layers and wraps scarves around her neck and head, she tells herself that it’s stupid to go out in this storm—but she knows the pain in her gut won’t go away unless she makes sure that her friend is safe. Friend. She’s never thought about Aydee quite like that before today. For Sandra, Aydee has always been that crazy homeless lady with the dog. But Sandra realizes that, in fact, Aydee is her only friend. They spend time together almost every day, and Sandra has come to depend on the casual intimacy of their interactions.

  Outside, Sandra instantly despairs. How will she ever find Aydee in this dark chaos of snow and wind? Sandra almost runs back in, but worry gnaws at her.

  Calling out Aydee’s name, Sandra walks toward The Small Easy, only two blocks away; Aydee usually loiters near that corner. In this weather, it takes Sandra almost fifteen minutes to walk there. She encounters no-one on the way, and neither is there anyone on the streets near the restaurant.

  It occurs to her to check the alley. Aydee and Russet get most of their food from the dumpster out back, and its bulk can offer some degree of protection from the wind. The storm’s getting fiercer, and Sandra knows that she’ll have no choice but to give up the search soon.

  She finds them there: Aydee and Russet huddled against each other, barely visible under a blanket of snow. Sandra gets in close and shouts against the wind, “Why aren’t you in a shelter, Aydee? You can’t stay outside on a day like this.”

  “Nobody’ll let Russet in. I can’t leave him alone. We always look out for each other. What kind of person would I be if I betrayed him? The other Aydee would never rescue someone like that.”

  “Aydee, you have to get inside. You could die out here, and then who would look out for Russet? Come on—come home with me.”

  “Can Russet come, too?”

  Sandra thinks about the boys’ obsessive tidiness, and Tom’s need to be always in control. “No, the boys . . . they don’t like dogs. They’d never allow it.”

  “Just go back home. We’ll be fine, Russet and me. We’ll keep each other warm.”

  Sandra can’t bear the risk of losing her friend. She doesn’t know how she’ll make Kevin and Tom accept having Aydee, let alone Russet, in the apartment, but she’ll have to find a way. She’s freezing out here, and she just wants to get inside . . . but not without Aydee.

  “Okay. Russet can come, too. Just hurry.”

  “No, we’re staying right here. I don’t want to go anywhere where we won’t really be welcome. Don’t worry about me. Just go home. I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?”

  “No! Not okay. Not okay at all. You have to come with me. Please. Please, come. For me. For Russet.”

  “Don’t be patronizing. I’m not stupid.” She looks away from Sandra, toward Russet. She rests a hand on his back, and he looks up at her—shivering. “But, okay, I’ll come.”

  Sandra takes Aydee’s hand, and runs home. Russet follows them.

  It takes a bit of arguing, but Sandra convinces Aydee to take a hot bath. It’s the bubblebath that did it, Sandra thinks; Aydee’s eyes lit up when she mentioned that.

  With Aydee sequestered in the bathroom, Russet has settled on the couch—the dog is so huge that it’s almost too small for him—and no amount of coaxing on Sandra’s part can get him down. It’s going to be hard enough to convince the boys to let Aydee and Russet stay, but she knows it’ll be impossible if they find the dog like this.

  Maybe if she offered him food? He must be hungry—a big dog like that, with nothing but garbage to sustain him. She gets some chicken from the fridge and puts it in a plastic bowl. She places it on the floor, calling Russet’s name. He sniffs the air, steps down from the couch, and trots over to the food.

  Success!

  But the dog grabs the meat in his mouth and saunters back to the couch, slobbering all over the upholstery as he eats. And that’s when the boys walk in.

  Soon after the yelling and the barking start, Aydee steps out of the bathroom—dripping wet in her dirty, tattered clothes. She calls Russet to her, and, without even glancing at Sandra, leaves.

  Sandra yells at Aydee to stay, tries to run to her friend, but Tom grabs her.

  Kevin shouts, “How dare you bring that street trash in here? And that filthy dog! They probably have lice and shit knows what else! What were you thinking? This is our home! It’s not a zoo, for fuck’s sake.”

  Sandra struggles free, but by that time Aydee and Russet are gone.

  “How can you throw them out in weather like this? How can you be so cruel?”

  Kevin says, “They’re not our responsibility. We should rescue all the homeless people? There’s no end to that if we start. We look out for each other, the three of us. Nobody else ever has; why the fuck should we give a damn about anyone else?”

  “Because they’re my friends!”

  Tom says, “Why don’t you go out there with them, then? Maybe that’s where you really belong. With the dogs.” His disgust is written all over his face.

  Sandra remembers what Aydee said about never abandoning Russet, and she feels like a coward for not rushing out to join them. She runs into the bathroom and locks herself in, traps herself there.

  She suddenly feels nauseous and throws up in the sink. While she cleans her face, she hears Tom say, “This cozy ménage with the fag hag has gone on long enough. We don’t need her anymore. Fuck knows what other crap she does behind our backs.”

  Later, Kevin’s voice comes through the bathroom door. “Sandy, baby. Look, I’m sorry things got so ugly. Tom knows he was way out of line. All we have is each other; we can’t throw it all away
because of a beggar and her dog.”

  Sandra doesn’t say anything. All she can think about is that she let Aydee go out in that storm. She doesn’t care about the boys anymore.

  Kevin tries to cajole her for another ten minutes, but then he gives up. “Could you at least come out of there so we can use the can?”

  Sandra does come out five minutes later, but she avoids the boys, doesn’t say a word.

  The boys go into the bathroom together; Kevin tells her they’ll take a shower and then all three of them will talk later. She knows they’ll use the noise of the shower to cover their conversation about her. Probably, they’ll jerk each other off to calm themselves.

  Sandra goes into the kitchen and throws some food in a bag: granola bars, raisins, things like that. From the bedroom closet, she grabs the biggest, thickest blanket she can find—an old, ratty quilt.

  She puts on her winter gear and leaves.

  Sandra’s been out in the storm for hours. The cold has seeped into her bones. She can’t find Aydee anywhere, and her legs hurt from overexhaustion. Visibility is much worse than before: she can’t see farther than an arm’s length; she’s utterly lost.

  She slips and falls. She loses the bag of food to the storm, but she manages to hold on to the quilt.

  She doesn’t have the strength to get up. Once more she yells, “Aydee!”—but the wind drowns her out.

  She wraps herself in the quilt to take the edge off the wind. Within seconds, she’s completely covered in snow. She tries to struggle free, but all her energy is spent and she loses consciousness.

  The morning sunlight rouses her. The sky is cloud-free, and the wind has died down. It’s much warmer—the snow around Sandra is moist, melting.

  Sandra is astounded to be alive. She feels giddy, joyful.

  She stands up. It hurts; her legs are stiff and cold.

  Across the street, she sees a woman fiddling with the books in a store’s window display. She looks up at the sign, green and blue letters painted onto a brown background: Lost Pages.

  Inside the bookshop, Sandra is too nervous to face the woman. Browsing through the shelves, she notices that most of the books are in languages she can’t even identify. Her eye falls on a tome whose jacket painting resembles her tattoos—twin snakes spiralling upward into the air against a backdrop of planets and stars—but she doesn’t understand the strange script above the illustration.

  She reaches out to pick up the book, but then she remembers why she’s here. She looks up at the woman and blurts out, “You’re Aydee,” astonished at the sight of this clean and healthy version of her friend.

  “Yeah, that’s me. You looking for something in particular? Chances are we have it.”

  “I’ve walked down this street hundreds of times . . . I’m sure this store was never here before . . . I can’t believe you’re real. That this place is real.” Sandra had been right: her friend Aydee must have been younger than she appeared. Looking at this Aydee—a little taller than the Aydee she knows—Sandra can tell that she can’t be more than twenty-five, maybe even only twenty. She’s exactly like her friend described: long, braided hair; beautifully smooth creamy brown skin; strong shoulders.

  “Don’t tell me you’re from one of those worlds where I’m a comic-book character or something. . . .” The bookseller lets out an irritated breath. “Look, you can click your heels all you want, but this place is real and so am I.” She collects herself and continues in a friendlier tone. “Sorry. There’s been a bit too much of that recently. Let’s start over. . . . What can I do for you?”

  Sandra looks around, and she’s struck by a missing detail. “Where are the dogs? She always told me this place was full of dogs.”

  “She?” Aydee scrutinizes Sandra. “I’ve seen you . . .” Aydee shakes her head, and her eyes narrow suspiciously. “No, the dogs . . . I don’t mind them, but that’s always been more Lucas’s thing. They’re with him, and he’s not here anymore. You know him?”

  “I’ve heard about him.”

  There’s an awkward silence.

  Aydee says, “You’re shivering. Do you want a cup of tea?”

  Aydee sips her tea, listening quietly to Sandra’s story.

  Sandra repeats, “Say something. Do something. We have to help her. You have to find her. Save her.”

  Her voice simmering with anger, Aydee says, “I think you should leave.”

  “What?”

  “Leave.”

  “But—”

  Aydee gets out of her chair, grabs Sandra by the arm, pushes her outside, and locks the door to Lost Pages.

  Sandra scours the neighbourhood for Aydee—her Aydee—while city trucks clean away the mountains of slush and snow. Sandra doesn’t return to the apartment. After the storm, the temperature warmed up to above freezing, even at night. The quilt keeps her warm enough. She knows she should go to work, but she can’t stomach the thought of cleaning up the mess at the tattoo parlour anymore. It’s time for a change, even though she has no idea what that might entail. First, she has to find Aydee.

  That other Aydee is no hero. My Aydee would never treat anyone like that. She’s loyal and brave and strong of heart and . . .

  A group of kids in the park—homeless ecopunks who hang out with a pack of dogs—say that they know Aydee and Russet, but they, also, have not seen either of them recently. The punks are mad about the dog stabber, about how the police aren’t making any effort to solve the crimes. They’ve lost five of their dogs to the stabber in the last year; most recently, one was killed the day of the storm.

  One of the girls—she can’t be more than twelve—takes Sandra aside.

  The girl whispers, “Do you have tampons or something? I’m bleeding.”

  “I think so. . . . Is this your first time?”

  “Yeah.”

  As Sandra digs a handful of tampons out of her purse, she realizes that it’s been more than two months since her last period.

  That night, Sandra almost goes back to the boys—it’s their baby, too—but in the end she decides it’s better for everyone if the boys never know about this, better if she never sees them again. She’s still not sure whether she’s keeping the child or not. Probably not, though.

  The last few days, Sandra has been too focused on finding Aydee to be afraid for her own safety. Now, realizing that she’s pregnant, Sandra has become hyper-aware of her body and of its fragility.

  She can’t find a place to sleep. Everywhere there are men who look at her as if she were a piece of raw meat. She understands how vulnerable Aydee would have felt without Russet to guard her.

  It’s been almost a week, and there’s still no sign of Aydee.

  After yet another night during which she doesn’t allow herself to sleep, Sandra hopes, now that the sun is up, she won’t feel so much like prey.

  She goes to the park where the ecopunks hang out during the day. Maybe she can nap next to them. They’re nice kids. She wishes she knew where they went at night. Maybe she’ll ask if she can tag along, at least for a while.

  When they see her, the girl who asked about the tampons yesterday runs toward her, yelling, “Aydee’s back!”

  Sandra finds Aydee and Russet foraging in the dumpster behind The Small Easy. She hugs her friend. “I looked all over for you!”

  “We hid out in that Greek place with the orange awning. It closed for a family emergency or something, and they didn’t lock the back door properly. There was tons of food. Russet loved it! We hightailed it last night when we heard someone unlocking the front door.”

  Aydee extricates herself from Sandra.

  “Plus, I stayed away because I was still ticked at you.”

  “I’m so sorry. I don’t live there anymore. I . . .” Sandra doesn’t know where to begin. Or what to say about the other Aydee, if anything at all.

  Aydee cuts in, saying, “So you met her, huh? I know you used to think I was just this crazy lady, but you were nice to me anyway. You always listened.”
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  Sandra is shocked. “Did you meet her, too?”

  “No. I told you, I know everything that happens to her, and now she’s very angry, very confused. All these years, she thought that my life was just a nightmare that haunted her: her worst fears of how her life would have turned out if the lioness hadn’t intervened. She’s terrified that her whole life is a fantasy. That only I’m real. It’ll be better for her if we never meet.”

  “But I thought you wanted her to save you?”

  “No . . . I was wrong about that. I’ve got my own life. And I’ve got Russet. We do well together.” Aydee laughs, opening her arms to let Sandra in. “And we have each other too, now, right?”

  In Sandra’s dream, she and Aydee are playing with her child—she’s not sure if it’s a boy or a girl—in a big park full of dogs, including Russet. Everyone is happy and playful. Russet rushes up to her and licks her face. He steps back and barks, then licks her again. He does this several times until Sandra wakes up to the real Russet’s tongue on her face.

  In the dark, she reaches out to pet him, and her hand falls on something sticky. Sandra immediately thinks of the dog stabber and knows that this is blood. She shouts, “Aydee! Russet is hurt! Aydee!” Where is she? The last thing Sandra remembers before going to sleep is resting her head in Aydee’s lap right here next to the dumpster.

  The dog starts running; Sandra has no choice but to follow. She’s not fast enough for him, so he keeps having to stop and run back to her to make sure she’s following.

  Russet reaches Aydee, who’s on the ground, leaning against the wall of an alley. He whines desperately, kissing her face, darting quick, worried glances at Sandra. She realizes that Russet isn’t covered in his own blood.

  There’s blood pooling around Aydee; she’s holding a hand against her ribs. She holds Sandra’s gaze and says, “Take me to her.”

  “Her? Who? . . . That other Aydee? No! I have to get you to a hospital.”

  Aydee coughs blood. “Too weak to argue. Do as I say. Please. She knows we’re coming. Knows what to do.”