“Gotcha,” Tom said.
When they left the room, Tom pulled the sheet off. Neil was face down, his left hand rigid near his ear. Tom’s skin prickled. He didn’t want to touch the body. But he didn’t want to look any more squeamish than he had to in front of Paulie.
“Sorry, Neil,” he said.
The hole in the back of Neil’s head was tidy, but his face was a crater of mashed flesh and bone. The shirt was splattered but salvageable. The pants were too big and the belt didn’t have a small enough loop. The sneakers were too small. Paulie could use them. He’d use the socks. Neil had a holster, but it was empty, as were his pockets. A white shadow around his wrist showed where his watch had been. He’d been picked clean. He made a quick recon of the house – no one was home.
“Anything?” Paulie said as walked into the kitchen. She had tied her hair back in a high ponytail.
“Nada,” Tom said, holding up the pants. He plopped the sneakers on the butcher’s block beside Mel who was gnawing on a hunk of cheese. Paulie’s face was greasy from the fried chicken she was scarfing. She held up a wing. He shook his head.
“Still queasy,” he said.
“You should eat,” she said.
“Here,” he said, pushing the sneakers toward her, “they’re too small.”
Paulie threw one on the floor and jammed her foot in. Tom picked up the bread knife from the counter and poked a hole in the belt. He threaded the metal tongue through and tested the pants. They stayed up, but the pants sagged and the hems hid his feet. The pants were woollen which was fine while they were in an air-conditioned bunker but once they got outside, they were going to be in the middle of a heat wave. He sawed off the pants around his knees before he tucked the bread knife in his belt. He caught Paulie grinning at him.
“Don’t say anything,” Tom said.
Paulie filled two white plastic grocery bags with their food, Mel’s diapers and wipes. Tom went outside and stood on the porch, dazed. She stood beside him, taking deep breaths. She shielded her eyes as she surveyed the area.
“I think you’re right,” Paulie said. “We should go that way. Look how thick that smog is.”
The sun dipped closer to the trees. They might not make it very far before nightfall, but by unspoken agreement, neither of them wanted to stay anywhere near the house.
They limped up the first hill. Mel had a death grip on Paulie, so Tom slung the grocery bags over his wrists. The giddy, heady sensation of being free of the house gave way to the realization that they were lost and far from being home free. The adrenalin that had been sustaining him seeped away as they walked slower, the pains of the last few days catching up with them.
Tom thought he was sweating, until Paulie made a face. He looked down. A red circle soaked his shirt over the nipple and smaller spots dotted his torso.
“The mosquitoes are going to love me,” Tom said.
“Are you okay?” Paulie said.
“I’m fine,” Tom said.
“Do you want to use the sneakers?”
“I said I’m fine.”
Mel wanted to walk. Paulie let her down and finger-walked her a few steps. Mel found the ditch at the side of the road interesting and strained toward it. Paulie steered her back on the road. Tom walked along the smoother tire treads. The road wobbled. He blinked sweat from his eyes. He wanted to flop down like Mel and hold his hands up for Paulie to carry him.
As the sun dipped closer to the trees, their shadows stretched behind them. Tom stopped, recognizing the clearing that Firebug had first brought him to. The tire tracks from the truck were still visible in the dirt and there was a trail of flattened grass and bent bushes where Firebug had lugged the equipment back and forth.
“What is it?” Paulie said.
“Nothing,” Tom said.
Tom’s teeth chattered. His skin goose-pimpled even though he was sweating. His ankles had disappeared. Tom bent over and poked the skin of his feet. His finger left a dent mark. His thighs felt scalded. Birds sang as the sky went milky blue. Tom wondered how much time that meant before they were in darkness.
“It’s going to get really dark in an hour or two,” Paulie said. “We should get moving.”
Tom pulled at his shirt. Blood had glued it to his skin.
“God,” Paulie said. “They’re getting worse. I didn’t think they could get worse.”
The burns had bruised deep purple like ink splatters on his torso. They were crusted with puss. He couldn’t remember breaking his ribs, but they cramped when he took deep breaths or bent too far. His nipple had puffed up and split so it looked like a drooling, fat lip.
“Paulie,” Tom said. “Firebug and Leo could be looking for us right now. If you don’t leave, we’re all up shit creek.”
“I’m not leaving you here.”
“It hurts to breathe,” Tom said. “It hurts to blink. I’m not going to make it to the highway.”
“We need to get you to a hospital. Two seizures the day before. Three this morning. Tom –”
“Go. Get help. You’ll move faster without me.”
“No, we don’t split up.”
“I’ll be fine.”
Paulie’s attention shifted to something behind Tom. He turned, and saw a dust cloud billowing along the logging road. Very faintly, they could hear an engine.
“It’s coming this way,” Paulie said.
“Here,” Tom said, handing the bread knife to Paulie. “Take Mel and hide. I’ll stand behind this tree. If they look friendly, I’ll flag them down. If not, I’ll stay hidden and when they’re gone, you run like hell to the highway.”
Tom stayed behind the tree. A black van driving slowly down a logging road with its lights off couldn’t be good. He remembered the black van that had been in the parking lot of Lucky Lou’s. As it cruised closer, the engine dominated the darkening forest, drowning out the birdsong Tom hadn’t been aware of until it was gone. The noise of the engine and the forest’s darkness must have frightened Mel, because at that moment, she began to wail.
The driver cut the engine a few feet from Tom. Mel’s crying became muffled but was too loud to miss. All the van’s doors opened. The driver was young, tall and weedy, dressed in shorts and a blue T-shirt. The man who exited from the passenger’s side was bald, older, and chunky, his gut straining the seams of his muscle shirt. Jeremy Rieger stepped out of the side door, his grey sweatsuit glowing against the dark trees. They drew their weapons as if on a signal. The two men kept going toward Mel’s crying, but Jer stayed by the van.
“Nice night for a walk,” Jer said.
Mel’s crying suddenly stopped, and Tom could hear Paulie whispering a song to her. He knew that when they reached Paulie and Mel, that would be the end. He couldn’t make himself move.
“How old is Mel, Tom?” Jer said. “Almost a year?”
Tom strained to hear what was happening. He could hear the men making their way further back.
Mel started to cry again as Paulie carried her toward the road. Tom stepped away from the tree, and Jer turned, flicking the safety off his gun.
“So close,” Jer said. “But no cigar.”
The back of the van had the coppery tang of fresh blood. The window was open and the radio was off. As Tom’s eyes adjusted to the dark, he could see two metal dog cages glittering. Firebug was still alive, hands cuffed behind his back, gag stretching his mouth open. He hit the cage with his feet. Leo lay in the second dog cage, unnaturally still. He had a dark hole in the middle of his forehead.
“All in all,” Jer said. “You did pretty good. You lasted longer than Firebug. Big fucking mouth on that backstabbing whiner.” Jeremy made his voice high and squeaky. “You ripped me off, Rieger! You’re going to pay! Dumb fuck. It’s the fucking stock market, not a gas station.”
Tom turned to study his cousin. Jer grinned. The door of the van squealed open, and the light showed him Paulie and Mel in the passenger’s seat.
“We should turn him in,” Tom said.
“That’s loser talk,” Jer said.
Tom became aware of his breathing, how shallow his breaths were getting, how it felt like he was breathing through a straw.
“I’ve met a lot of big talkers,” Jer said, “who piss their pants and cry when things get bad. But you, Tom. You got everybody fooled. I know you. I know what you can do. You’re a stone-cold killer.”
“I can’t,” Tom said.
“Push comes to shove,” Jer said. “You push back.”
Jer reached under the passenger’s seat and pulled out Betty, Firebug’s pistol. He twirled it like a cowboy and held it, grip facing Tom, an offering.
“I can’t,” Tom said.
Jeremy spun the pistol again and then held it in front of Tom’s face. “Other people walked away from me when I needed them. You understand loyalty, and that’s why you’re not in the ground, Tom.”
Tom couldn’t take his eyes from the barrel.
“Is this the life you really want?” Jer said. “A job a monkey could do with brains left over to fart. Bills you can’t pay. Kids you can’t feed. A girlfriend one card short of a full deck. Playing Mother Theresa to schitzy freaks in the skids.”
Tom raised his eyes, gauging the distance between them.
“There’s my killer-diller,” Jer said. “Not far from the surface, is he?”
“You’ve been following me,” Tom said.
“I’ve had you followed,” Jer said.
“Did you know where we were all this time?”
Jer shrugged. “I heard. I still have to report back in the evenings.” He raised an ironic eyebrow. “I’ve got a weekend pass to help Aunt Chrissy look for you. I think your mom’s read one too many Agatha Christies. She just expects the cops to haul me off because she has a bunch of bad transcripts. She thinks I don’t know she’s hired another rinky-dink PI to –”
“You knew where we were. You didn’t help us,” Tom said. “Why?”
“Why did you move the bodies? Why did you take the tapes?” Tom flinched.
“Exactly. You don’t trust me. And I have to say, Tom, after all we’ve been through, I’m hurt,” Jer said, not sounding hurt. Sounding smug and cheerful now that he was holding all the cards again.
“I don’t want to kill Firebug,” Tom said.
“You reap what you sow,” Jer said.
Tom didn’t know what that meant, if it was a message intended for Firebug or for him.
“Mel and Paulie don’t go anywhere until you clean up your mess.” Jer offered him the pistol again.
The weight of the gun was strangely comforting. Tom hugged it to his chest. “They go home.”
“We all go home. We never speak of this again,” Jer said. “And everyone lives happily ever after.”
The hefty man opened the back doors of the van and the cage shrieked as it was dragged along the van’s floor. Paulie nursed Mel in the passenger’s side of the van, guarded by the skinny man. Leo lay on his side, his eyes locked at a point directly in front of him.
“Little men with big mouths and greedy girlfriends,” Jer said. “But hey, who am I to judge? A girl needs her stash, and Leo’s not exactly boyfriend of the year.”
They followed the long parallel drag marks leading off up the slight incline. Flies buzzed around bright red splotches that matted the bent grass. A small plane throbbed overhead, a yellow button of colour low to the horizon. Firebug’s pistol was heavy and slick in Tom’s sweating hands.
“Ready?” Jeremy said.
We never took any home videos of Mel, Tom thought. Lack of time, lack of money, lack of energy, but now she was almost one, and they had no movies of her. (Crows caw nearby in a tree unseen by the camcorder. The sun beats down at them from a steep angle. Firebug kneels. His hands are cuffed behind his back. His bare feet are nailed in place with spikes. Yellowed grass sprays between his feet.)
They had a scattering of pictures, snapshots of her at other kids’ birthdays, Christmas, New Year’s Eve. He kept Mel’s newborn picture – grumpy and blotchy and swaddled in hospital blankets – in his wallet and people made forced “ooooh” sounds. He’d made a mental note to go get a new picture of her so people could see her in all her jowly-cheeked, fuzzy-haired glory. (Jeremy takes Firebug’s face in his hand, helpfully draws a large red X on his forehead with a Magic Marker.) They had a set of pictures, the Deluxe Package, waiting for them in Wal-Mart, and were saving up to pay for it so they could give everyone a Mel picture at her first birthday party. Paulie was going overboard: a magician, for Pete’s sake. A tarot card reader. A psychic juggler. All volunteers, Paulie’s friends, people who balanced their chakras and ate raw food to counterbalance years of using. (Firebug refuses to play for the camera, is stubbornly mute as the camcorder light picks up his sweat and mean, glittery-eyed stare.) They had a park picked out, and Paulie had asked Jazz to go early in the morning to claim the barbeque pit. Paulie had a menu. Paulie had found a Cinderella cake pan in the Sally Ann and was watching the Food Network for pointers on decorating the birthday cake, high baroque, curlicues and gilding. Late nights after exhausted days staying up to carefully print the invitations with a calligraphy pen, blue ink and ribbon, pink paper, decoupage and vellum. (Point and shoot. Point and shoot. Point and shoot. It’s almost idiot-proof.) I was born last, Paulie said, after three brothers. I never got any birthday parties. She overcompensates with Mel, but Tom enjoys it, a taste of normal. (The tape is short. Tom walks into the frame. He presses Betty against Firebug’s forehead to muffle the sound. The unseen crows aren’t disturbed and continue to argue in the background. The recording stops.)
NOTES FROM THE AUTHOR
1. Made the Whole Thing Up
I prefer the older, bloodier versions of fairy tales. Set in Vancouver and surrounds, Blood Sports is an homage to the original Hansel and Gretel, the version where Hansel uses a finger bone from a previous victim to convince the witch he’s still too skinny to eat.
For those who are curious, this story is not autobiographical or based on anyone that I know. Although I borrowed shamelessly from the stylistic conventions of social realism, this is a dark fantasy.
2. Couches I Have Slept On
Many thanks to the following for their financial support:
The Canada Council for the Arts, the B.C. Council for the Arts, the Markin-Flanagan Writer-in-Residence Programme at the University of Calgary, the Banff Centre for the Arts, Yukon Archives & Education Writer-in-Residence Programme in the Whitehorse Public Library, and, last but never least, my parents, John and Winnie Robinson.
3. Patience Is a Virtue
My creative process involves copious drafts and partial drafts. Sometimes, deadlines notwithstanding, I abandon entire manuscripts and submit a new first draft altogether. Many thanks to my agent, Denise Bukowski, and my editors, Ellen Seligman and Jennifer Lambert of McClelland & Stewart. You are all extremely virtuous.
Eden Robinson
Kitamaat Village, B.C.
2005
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS FOR
READING GROUPS
1. Eden Robinson has referred to Blood Sports as a contemporary retelling of Hansel and Gretel – the original, ultra-gory version of the tale. In what ways, if any, do you find Robinson’s novel to be similar (in form, for instance, or in its underlying view of the world) to the traditional fairy tale?
2. Blood Sports is packed with references to popular culture – from brand-name products to street slang to characters who might have appeared in a TV detective show. Does this affect the book’s status as a literary novel? Does serious fiction have an obligation to be lofty, or should we applaud Robinson for attempting to capture contemporary textures in her work?
3. The novel’s opening section is presented in the form of a letter that Tom writes to his daughter some time – possibly years – after the events in the rest of the book have taken place. Why do you think Robinson chose this strategy of, in a sense, beginning with the ending? How did this affect your reading of
the ensuing story?
4. Jeremy is a deeply troubling character – a homicidal master criminal – and yet he is both charming and hugely successful, at least in material terms. Is this purely a cartoon, or on some level a reflection of real life?
5. From the book’s earliest sections – like the chapter in which Tom and his family get a portrait taken at a Wal-Mart photo studio – family is front and centre. What do you think the book is saying about the role of family in our lives? Is Tom misguided in clinging to the idea of family as a source of meaning, even as his family relationships seem on the verge of destroying him?
6. Eden Robinson comes from an aboriginal background. She is Haisla, and currently lives in her ancestral village in northern British Columbia. Keeping this in mind, does it surprise you that much of her work – Blood Sports included – focuses on non-native Canadians living in urban settings? Should it?
7. Robinson often includes shocking material in her stories. Which scenes in Blood Sports stood out to you as the most disturbing, and why? What do you think are Robinson’s artistic reasons for including shocking material in her work?
8. What do you make of Tom’s behaviour over the course of the novel? Is he a decent person who finds himself in the wrong place at the wrong time, or is he somehow complicit in the mayhem that follows him wherever he goes?
9. In something of a departure from her previous work, Robinson has written Blood Sports in a patchwork of different styles and voices – including standard narrative, script format, a letter, and so on. There are also several sudden jumps backwards and forwards in time. Why do you think she chose to write the book in this way, and how might the experience of reading it have been different if she’d used a more conventional structure?
10. Robinson has said that she often thinks of the situations she writes about – even many of the violent and troubling ones – as being, on some level, comical. Did you find yourself chuckling at any uncomfortable moments while reading Blood Sports? If so, what do you think is the significance of this kind of humour, and is it “healthy”?
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