by Susan Calder
Pungent animal smells greeted them in the agricultural building. Zora veered down the first aisle. Eli tore toward the opposite end.
“Better split up.” Mike sprinted after Eli.
Paula found Zora peering through the fence at a goat. “Baaa,” Zora bleated into its face. “Baaa.” Paula joined Zora’s mimicry. The goat bleated replies.
“I want to see the ponies.” Zora sped away.
They roamed aisles, stopping to talk to sheep and cows, and ran into Paula’s mother at the miniature ponies. Mike and Eli appeared around the corner. Mike asked the children if they wanted to go on the big people’s rides.
“Yeah,” Zora cried and took off with Eli.
Outside the sky had become partially clouded. Paula slowed to her mother’s pace. They caught up with Mike and the children at the games of chance.
“I don’t know about you, Theda,” Mike said. “My legs could use a rest.” He coaxed the kids toward the sky ride with the promise of ice cream.
Paula’s mother got onto a sky ride chair. Paula rode with Zora, Mike with Eli. Paula held on to the little girl to make sure she didn’t wriggle under the safety bar. Gliding over the midway, Paula marvelled at the view ahead of the downtown highrises and construction cranes. Dark clouds were forming on the horizon.
“Looks like hail clouds,” Mike said as he got off.
“I hope they blow north of here.”
Paula’s mother saved them a picnic table while the others purchased the ice cream cones. The air plunged from July to March temperatures. Paula got the sweaters from her backpack. She was down to the tip of her cone when she felt the first drop. Rain started to pelt. She linked arms with her mother and they all made a beeline for the gazebo, where they packed inside with the rest of the crowd. Around the structure rain fell in sheets. Rocks of ice pounded the glass-and-wood roof.
“Hail,” Paula said. “Tomorrow morning the insurance companies will be pummelled with new claims.”
Chapter Eleven
No pockmarks on the body of her car, Paula was grateful to note when she arrived at the parking lot. She hoped Mike, who had parked in another lot, was equally spared. She had left the grounds with the excuse of going home to check for hail damage and giving her mother a rest for her repeat visit tomorrow. She also wanted to avoid the awkwardness of Mike trying to buy her a cowboy hat and let him and kids enjoy some time on their own. He and the children had waved goodbye in brilliant sunshine, on their way to the Canine Stars show.
“Today was perfect,” her mother said in the car. “But I won’t mind tomorrow’s relaxing pace with someone of my vintage.”
Within minutes they were pulling into Paula’s lane and garage. Walter was in his backyard, checking his raspberry canes for hail damage. He told her that their street only got small pellets that had already melted. She needn’t worry about her siding and roof.
“Still a date for Seniors’ Day, Theda?” he asked her mother.
Paula promised to drop them off at the grounds in time for the free doughnuts and pick them up after the grandstand show. “Are you sure you can stand it there for fourteen hours?” she said. “I doubt I could.”
“My ankle’s all but recovered,” Walter said. To demonstrate, he raised his boot-clad foot and swirled the pointed toe around. “Theda and I will be doing our share of sitting, though, what with the rodeo, the chucks and the show band competition.”
“And on benches, watching the people and activities,” her mother added. “All I need now is tea and a nap.”
As they finished their tea in the kitchen, Paula’s cellphone rang. Nils, her boss, calling from the office, where Isabelle, their junior adjuster, was monitoring Internet reports on the hailstorm.
“It cut a swath through the middle of the city,” Nils said. “Marda Loop was hit hardest. Hail the size of golf balls. Trees down. Power out. Car crashes. A deluge of rain that’s bound to cause water damage. The in-house adjusters won’t be able to handle it all. The overflow will be a bonanza for us. I know you’re on semiholiday, but….”
In the short term a mass of hail claims would do more do more for Nils’ business than her Becker one. He and Isabelle were already covering for her regular work in the midst of packing for the office move. Paula told Nils she’d stop by the office sometime after ten tomorrow. Sam lived in Marda Loop. She called his office phone and left a message.
While her mother napped, Paula went out to the sunny front porch with Charlotte’s Web, one of her childhood favourite books. Her mother had brought it from Montreal.
“There won’t be space for many books in a seniors’ condo,” her mother had said. “Keep them for your grandchildren.”
Paula rocked back and forth. Grandchildren didn’t appear to be imminent, especially if Leah broke up with Jarrett. Erin hadn’t had a boyfriend since her first year of university. Paula propped her legs on the wobbly chair. The kitchen phone rang. Sam, returning her call?
“Mom, is it okay if I come over after supper?” Erin asked. “I’ve got this problem with my tenants.”
“The ones in the master bedroom?”
“Who else?”
“Tonight is good. We’ll sit outside while Gran watches her show.”
Erin had stayed in the family home when Paula decided she wanted a more urban lifestyle and a move from the house she’d bought with her ex-husband. Since the house was close to the university, they came up with a plan for Erin to rent bedrooms to fellow students. Paula sold the home to both daughters with a 100 percent mortgage. They drew up a schedule of payments for Erin that covered Paula’s expenses for the property. But things hadn’t gone as smoothly as Paula would have hoped. From the start the couple in Paula’s former bedroom had clashed with Erin. They were older, graduate students, and, according to Erin, acted like they owned the place. Paula sympathized with Erin’s complaint over their habit of cooking elaborate meals for themselves and leaving dirty pots all over the kitchen until someone else cleaned up. Paula had advised Erin to lay down the law, which she knew would be a challenge for her less confrontational younger daughter.
* * *
“The car showed up Sunday around suppertime,” Erin said on the porch. “They invited five friends from Saskatoon to stay with us for the Stampede and hadn’t even told me.” Erin’s voice trembled, as it often did when she felt hurt.
“Where are the five sleeping?”
“In the basement on the sofa and sleeping bags on the floor. They’re eating all our food and not paying anything. They say it’s costing so much to come to the Stampede, they can’t afford it.”
“Neither can you.”
“They act like I’m cheap for not doing this out of charity or something. It’s worst for Habib, the guy with the basement room. His bathroom is full of their toothbrushes and dirty towels and hairs. They come in late, after the bars close, and making all this noise when I’ve got to get to work in the morning”
“You have to kick them out,” Paula said. “Get Habib and Isabelle to support you.”
“Habib hates causing trouble with people and Isabelle …” Erin twisted a ribbon on her pants around a finger. “She’s a bigger problem these days.”
Paula leaned back on the wobbly chair. The last she had heard, Erin and Isabelle were the best of friends. Tomorrow at work Paula would get Isabelle’s scoop on the Saskatoon invasion.
“Shit.” Erin held up the frayed black ribbon. “I pulled it off.”
A small safety pin remained pinned to Erin’s pants, beneath two other black ribbons.
“Is that a new style?” Paula asked.
“It’s to honour the animals who’ve died at this year’s Stampede—so far.”
Paula, too, felt sad when she read about a horse having a heart attack or crashing in a chuckwagon race. Unlike Erin, though, she didn’t think animal deaths were a reason to abolish the rodeo and chuckwagon events at the Stampede. Did humans treat animals better elsewhere? Paula had once made the mistake of joking to
Erin that cattle participation in roping and wrestling competitions was better than their alternate career path: meat. Erin wouldn’t talk to her for days.
“How is Isabelle a worse problem than those freeloading jerks?” Paula asked.
“By Friday they’ll be gone. But Isabelle still won’t be paying rent.”
“She’s not paying you? How long has that been going on?”
“This is the third month. First, she said she had to buy clothes for the Stampede. Who could spend a month’s rent on that?”
Not Erin. This evening’s pants had a hole in one knee. Her fleece sweater and loose T-shirt with a panda cub decal came from a thrift store.
“Last week Isabelle turned up at work in top-quality cowboy boots,” Paula said. “A felt cowboy hat, at least two pairs of pricey jeans, several western tops, a couple of leather vests, belts, a buckle, a jewelled handbag. She could easily have dropped two months’ rent. Now I know how she could afford it all.”
“It’s not funny, Mom.”
“I know.”
Erin shoved the black ribbon into her pocket. “This month she can’t pay because she’s going out every night to the grounds or a cowboy bar.”
“Do you want me to talk to her?”
“Would you?” Erin took off her sunglasses. The sun, low in the western sky, lit up her blue eyes and the natural blond highlights in her pageboy cut. “I hate being the landlord. It spoils all the fun of living with friends.”
“Once this is resolved, it will go back to being fun.”
“I wouldn’t mind if you bought back the house,” Erin said.
“Let’s try to work this out. We agreed handling matters like these is good experience for you.” And Erin giving up at the first glitch would be a wrong adult lesson. “If I bought the house from you and Leah, I’d probably sell. I don’t want to be a landlord either, especially to students.”
“See what I mean, Mom? It sucks.” Erin said. “My boss says I can keep my job part time when I go back to school this fall. That way I could afford my own apartment.”
Sam’s red Acura passed Walter’s pickup and pulled in front of Erin’s station wagon.
Paula went down the stairs to kiss him hello. “You’re a day early.”
“Henry’s roof caved in.”
She stepped back. “Hail?”
“The storm crashed the ceiling in his son’s bedroom.” Sam glanced over her shoulder. “Hey, Erin.” His gaze darted between them both. “You wouldn’t believe all the water that funnelled in. It seeped through to the main floor and into the basement. No one was home at the time. We’ve spent the past hours bailing and mopping.”
Henry’s house was an infill in the older neighbourhood. “His roof is less than four years old.”
“Henry suspects it was a faulty job,” Sam said. “Trust an architect to get stiffed by a lousy roofer.”
“His insurers will subrogate.”
“But what a mess until then. I came over to get some tarps.” He looked at Erin. “Can I borrow your wet vac? I’ll swing by your place from here.”
Paula hated the prospect of spending the rest of her evening vacuuming, mopping and protecting Henry’s contents from further rain, but she and Sam were a couple. “The tarps are in the basement. I’ll change and come with you.”
“Erin can join the fun if she likes.”
“Fun?” Paula said.
“It feels like a party when it isn’t really our problem. We’ve got Henry’s kids, their friends and a few neighbours pitching in. Between us all, we’ve pretty much got things under control.”
“Do you need me there?”
“Not really, but you don’t want to miss out.”
“How about I take a rain check?” Paula said. “Pun intended. Tell Henry I’ll advise all he wants on insurance.”
“He’ll be glad to take you up on that.”
Erin followed them into the living room and stopped to take a call on her cellphone. With Coronation Street ended, Paula’s mother was in the den, organizing her purse for the next day. Paula and Sam went down to the basement and tromped up with armloads of coloured plastics. Her mother came out of the den wearing the pink cowboy hat to show Erin.
“Erin’s like me, Theda,” Sam said. “She thinks our annual carnival drags down Calgary’s modern image.”
“That’s not why I’m against it,” Erin said. “Leah phoned me to ask if she could stay over tonight. I said those bozos have taken over the whole house. Can she sleep on your sofa, Mom?”
“I’ve got to run,” Sam said.
“Me too,” Erin said.
Paula handed the tarps to Erin to carry to Sam’s car. “Why does Leah need a place to stay? Her apartment’s far from the hail zone.” She punched Leah’s number.
Leah answered against a backdrop of talking and clanging in the bar. “I told Erin not to bother you with this. I’ll find somewhere else.”
“What’s the problem?”
“Jarrett and I had a fight.”
Paula slumped into the armchair. Sam and Erin saluted farewell and left with tarps.
“I’m not going back there after work tonight. I thought Erin…I can try a friend.”
“You’ll stay right here.”
“Mom, Gran has the den, and your basement is full of Sam’s stuff.”
Paula glanced at her mother. “You can sleep in the living room. Better yet, I’ll take the sofa. You can have my bedroom, so we don’t wake you in the morning.”
“I don’t want to put you out.” The hum of voices behind Leah’s rose higher.
“All right. I’ll clear off the junk from Sam’s bed downstairs.”
“Mom, I said—”
“We’ll make a nice little space for you down there,” Paula said. “Do you have the spare key I gave you?” She waited through the pause on the line. What had the fight been about?
“Probably,” Leah said. “I’ll have to check.”
“In case you can’t find it, I’ll leave one in the mailbox.”
“Okay, but don’t wait up for me,” Leah said. “Or get up when I come in. I don’t want to trouble you.”
The fatigue or wistfulness in Leah’s tone went to Paula’s heart. “You’re never trouble for me, honey.”
Over tea in the kitchen Paula discussed Leah’s problem with her mother. “It probably stemmed from Jarret’s not coming to Erin’s Sunday brunch.”
“Leah can be intense,” her mother said.
“They’ve never had a real fight before.”
“I’d like to talk more, but I need to turn in early.”
Her mother went to get ready for bed. Before fixing up the basement, Paula checked her cellphone messages and discovered one from Cynthia had come in while she was collecting tarps. Call me as soon as you can. Any time before midnight.
“Can we reschedule the appraisal for The House?” Cynthia said between breaths. “I got hit hard by this hailstorm. My home and car have dents. There’s water in the basement. Wednesday would be okay.”
“I doubt the appraiser will be free. It was all he could do to fit us in tomorrow.”
“Can you call someone else?”
“With this hailstorm to occupy them now, there’s zero chance of finding anyone before next week.”
“It’s ridiculous to make us wait that long.”
“He was doing me a favour by coming tomorrow. You’re the one who wanted it done quickly.”
“I don’t know if I can make it now. I’ve got to contact the insurance—”
“You don’t have to be present. Your brothers will be there, as well as your mother—”
“Thursday, then, if Wednesday’s no good.”
“Your house isn’t close to Marda Loop. Is the damage really that bad?”
“All you insurance companies do is look for ways not to pay out.”
Paula held the receiver tightly and counted to three. “The appraiser and I will be at The House tomorrow at three o’clock. If you can join u
s, that’s good, if not—”
“I hope my home insurers provide better service than this.”
“Don’t count on it, with the flood of hail claims they’ll be getting.”
“All right. I’ll try to make it.”
Don’t do me any favours. “If you can’t, I’ll e-mail you the appraiser’s report.”
“I’ll have to find time, that’s all. Johnny and Brendan will leave it all for me to deal with. You’ll be lucky if they show up.”
She’d be luckier if all of them stayed away.
* * *
Paula hauled Sam’s weights off his bed. She lugged them to the pile of exercise equipment beside his treadmill and elliptical machines. There was a reason for keeping these things—they planned to turn her basement into a home gym—but why hadn’t he got rid of his university textbooks, jackets she’d never seen him wear and the stained glass door and chandelier? He’d brought them from the house he had sold because the buyers were going to replace them, they were beautiful and he’d thought they might fit in the renovation design for Paula’s place. They didn’t. A corner of the room was filled with taped boxes Sam had dragged through several moves without opening. Was Sam a pack rat? Why hadn’t she seen the signs? That could be worse than a guy with a poor track record for commitment.
A blast outside sounded like thunder. Was it raining again? She hoped not, for the sake of Henry’s roofless bedroom. She made up the bed, draped a sleep shirt for Leah on the duvet and admired this nook she had carved in the basement clutter. If Leah stayed long enough, they’d slip one of Sam’s oriental carpets underneath the bed. Meanwhile, his Berber mat on the cement floor would keep her daughter’s feet warm.
Upstairs in the bathroom, Paula set a new toothbrush for Leah by the sink. Cool night air drifted in through the window. Another blast. If Paula were alone, she’d run a bath, but the pipe noise might disturb her mother and baths could be dangerous during an electrical storm. She closed the bathroom and kitchen windows. No rain yet and the wind whipping up would refresh her sticky skin. She stepped out to the front porch. A few stars shone in the almost-dark sky that was clear of clouds. Another blast. Of course, this wasn’t thunder; it was the fireworks going off at the grandstand show. If she and Sam renovated, next summer they might catch glimpses of the higher displays from the deck off their upstairs master bedroom.