The City Still Breathing

by Matthew Heiti

  All the naked of Francie stretched out next to him in the shack in the summer, bodies stuck by sweat, sunk down deep into each other. This the shortest distance.

  Heck elbows him. ‘This guy’s fuckin hilarious!’

  And Slim tries to laugh, tries to laugh with everybody laughing around him, tries to be in on this. But he’s never felt so far away from everything. Everybody.

  Francie out there god knows where and that distance growing by the minute.

  All the way back down Beech, Heck’s going on about how great the show was, but something is nagging at Slim. Something more than the time ticking down on his left wrist. Maybe it’s the dead-quiet night – no breeze at all. Even Heck seems to feel it, shutting up as they pass the church, the big dark pines silent and still, the rose window dark. It’s only when they’re both back in the Dart that he realizes what it is. The snow’s finally stopped.

  The street is empty. Their footprints leading back the only sign that anyone has been down here. Like the entire world had been put on pause, everything waiting on something to drop.

  He turns the key, the engine rumbling awake. He flicks the headlights on – and back at the top of the hill, a pair of lights answers.

  Just someone else from the concert, and he waits for the car to turn around or approach, but it doesn’t move. It just sits there. The perfectly round headlights staring down, and there’s something unnerving about it, the way a hunk of metal can feel alive like that.

  ‘Let’s get out of here, Slim.’

  He puts the car in gear and starts to crawl up the hill. Just pass it on by – but then those headlights start their own crawl down. Swinging over to their lane.

  ‘Slim.’ Not panic in Heck’s voice but riding the edge.

  Slim reverses the car back down to the bottom, spinning her around, so she’s facing up Durham now. Out Heck’s window he can see the other car advancing on them, slow but deliberate. Yellow – a Beetle. He leans over, trying to get a better look. ‘Who is that?’

  ‘Who gives a fuck – let’s go.’

  He puts the car back in gear and gives her gas. The wheels spin. He gives it more, but he can see the slush being kicked up in the rear-view.

  ‘Slim!’

  The Beetle’s high beams pop on and the car is flooded with light. Slim grabs a handful of Heck’s vest and twists him toward the back seat. ‘Get your fat ass back there!’

  Heck throws himself over the console and lands in a heap in the back. Slim rides the brake and opens her up, feeling the wheels finally bite down on something, the ass of the Dart fishtailing up Durham. He winces, thinking about the spare.

  ‘Go, go!’ Heck on his knees peering out the back window.

  In the mirror he catches the Beetle making the corner and following in their wake, gaining speed. He gives Elm a quick scan as he’s pulling up and then blasts on through.

  ‘Slim – it’s one-way!’

  ‘Let’s see the fucker follow us.’

  But the fucker does follow them, some car honking and swerving through the slush to avoid the Beetle as it also cuts across Elm. At the end of the long straight stretch ahead, Slim sees another car pull onto Durham facing him, but he blows the next intersection anyway and keeps on.

  Some drunk stumbles off the sidewalk into the road, Heck yelling, ‘Watch out!’ and Slim has to jerk the wheel to the left to avoid clipping him. The Dart hops the curb, then comes back down with a crash, Heck flopping around in the back seat.

  The oncoming car now one block on and closing – that driver’s head so far up his ass he hasn’t seen them yet. Slim steals a look at the mirror – the Beetle right there behind him, sandwiching them in.

  ‘Look out!’

  Heck’s shout brings him back – another intersection, a truck turning onto Durham. Slim screeches around it, the driver’s mouth hanging open as they pass, and then he yanks back to the right to avoid the next car. The shriek of metal and he watches his side mirror tear off.

  Just ahead the road ends with a hard left onto Elgin. He guns it – Heck’s shout pitching up – and pulls on the handbrake, steering into the turn, the ass of the Dart drifting, pulling the nose back the other way, and then opening the throttle as they straighten out onto the thoroughfare.

  Heck’s crying or laughing back there now.

  The car jolts – something hitting them from behind, and Slim checks the rear-view – the big globes of the Beetle trying to climb in through the back window.

  He flashes the brakes, hoping it will throw this guy off, but instead the Beetle veers into the oncoming lane and, with a snarl, pulls up beside them, going neck and neck down past the Friendly, May’s, the Nickel Bin – giving the drunks something to look at.

  The Beetle inches over, sparks flying as they touch. He pulls as far to the curb as he can, but in comes the yellow car again. He looks over, making out the dark shape of a man. A hand coming up, a finger pointed at him. You.

  Slim swerves left and slams into the Beetle, sending it up over the curb and rolling across the grass outside the arena, cracking into one of the concrete planters. He pulls back into his lane and jams the pedal to the floor, his body thrown back as the Dart rages forward. He blows the red on Paris and sails into traffic.

  And it’s in slow motion and he’s as cool as Lee Marvin in Point Blank, the lights from all angles the horns the screeching, and then he opens his eyes and they’re across, climbing the hill on Van Horne.

  He takes a hard right off the main drag up a dark gravel lane. Pulls them into a tiny lot behind some trees and shuts it all down.

  Waits. But no one’s coming.

  ‘Aw, jinkies.’ Heck coughs in the back seat. ‘I puked all over the place.’

  They get out and follow the winding path up into the Grotto, passing the big granite statues of people in togas in various states of agony. Agony maybe at the ground littered with broken beer bottles and grocery bags.

  They reach the top and sit underneath the glowing neon cross. The lights of downtown twisted out before them. Slim picks up a handful of gravel and starts chucking stones at a little porcelain sculpture of the Virgin Mary.

  Heck’s holding his belly like he’s been gut-shot. ‘I’m so hungry I’d eat Normando’s popcorn, boogers and all. You got anything to eat?’

  Slim digs around in his pockets and comes out with a green sucker, tosses it over. ‘Try not to barf it back up.’

  Heck pulls off the wrapper and pops the sucker in his mouth, crunching away at it. ‘So … you think that was Milly?’

  Slim gives him a look to let him know how stupid he is.

  ‘Well, I dunno! How much time we got left?’

  Slim checks the moonwatch. ‘Just over an hour.’

  ‘Fuuuck.’ He watches Slim hit Mary, a piece of her cheek cracking off. ‘Don’t do that, man.’

  ‘Fuck off, Heck – you’re not Catholic.’

  ‘It’s bad luck.’ Heck tosses the dead sucker stick away.

  ‘So’s littering.’

  Heck leans back against the cross, the red neon glow washing across his face. ‘So what’re you gonna do?’

  ‘Nothin.’ Slim standing and flinging the whole handful down at the city. ‘All my life, Heck – one big nothin.’

  ‘C’mon, man – it’ll work out … somehow.’

  ‘Really? Then tell me what to do.’

  ‘Maybe you could take him on – y’know.’ Heck stretches one arm up. ‘I have the power!’ He snorts it off.

  ‘I’m serious.’ Slim sitting down beside his friend, looking him in the face and really asking. ‘What do I do?’

  Heck swallows his laugh and comes back at him with this look. ‘I dunno.’

  ‘I’m so fucked, Heck.’

  And the look opens up even more and Slim gets it. Disappointment. He always has the answers, but not this time.

  Heck shrugs. ‘Maybe you could talk to this guy – explain it to him.’

  ‘Jyrki fuckin Myllarinen? He tries to shoot me
, run me off the road – I don’t think he’s that into talking.’

  ‘Well, get out of town then.’

  ‘No, I’m done with that. He wants to find me, he’ll find me.’

  ‘So what do you want – you wanna die, man?’

  Bullet through his head, his car flying off the Paris Street bridge, beaten and kicked until everything’s broken and bleeding – all the ends of Slim, none of them good. None fit. Like the way Slim and Francie fit. They’d have had dinner at that Mexican place, and now they’d be walking Yonge Street, floating on all the light and noise. Out of here. On the way to something. If he hadn’t stolen those boots. If he hadn’t sold his gear. If he hadn’t taken that body. If he hadn’t fucked things up with Francie. If he’d only tried harder. If if if – if only. They’d be on their way, the two of them. Good days for all the days left. It’s his fault. All his fault.

  ‘Let’s go.’

  ‘But what about – ?’

  ‘Fuck Milly and the fuckin body and all the rest of it. Fuck it all.’

  He pulls the Wayfarers out of his pocket and slaps them on, heading back down the hill, cutting it all loose. But there Heck is, right at his shoulder. ‘Where’re we goin?’

  ‘I’m gonna find Francie.’

  And down they go, that cross burning in neon behind them for someone else to bear.

  The streets and faces and places swim in front of Slim. They’re at Top Hat with the skids, at the Cotton Club with the mods, at the Marymount stairs with the potheads, at the pizza place outside the mall with the scenesters, the smeared bus shelters on Lisgar with the rest. He sees her down an alley, catches her perfume on the breeze, hears her laugh, but every time he looks she’s gone. They’re everywhere and Francie’s nowhere.

  Finally, they find some punk kids from school having a snowball fight in the cement square outside the government buildings, one of them saying, ‘Yeah, I seen her at the Nash earlier.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Coupla hours ago. Said she was headed to the Bin to see some shitty blues band.’

  ‘The Bin – thanks.’

  And they’re off, cutting through Memorial, and Slim’s just about to make the break across Brady when Heck grabs him and pulls him back into the shadows of the trees at the edge of the park.

  ‘What?’

  Heck pointing across the way – a yellow Beetle in the parking lot behind the arena. They just watch, not saying anything for a few minutes. Heck finally coughs like he’s been holding his breath the whole time. ‘You think he’s in there?’

  ‘I dunno – maybe.’

  ‘What time is it?’

  Slim looks down at his watch. A minute to midnight. A minute to midnight the last time he checked too. ‘I dunno. Must be almost two in the morning.’ The piece of shit broken. A moonwatch – bullshit – even the gold plating had long since scratched away showing the metal underneath. Reminding him this is who and where you are – cheap, Slim, a big cheap fake. Slim Slider not even your real name. ‘Look, I’m gonna go cut back through the alley and work my way back over to Elgin.’

  ‘Okay, cool, let’s go.’

  ‘Nope. We split here.’

  Heck blinking, hurt. ‘Why?’

  ‘Cause I said so.’ Cause they can both feel the shit is about to get deeper. ‘Cause you’re slowing me down.’ Cause I don’t want you to get hurt – he doesn’t say it, makes it easy for both of them, and Heck doesn’t say so either, but for once he gets it, and he looks relieved.

  Heck walks slowly to a park bench and sits down. ‘I’ll just … sit here for a bit – you can shout if you need me.’

  Slim flashes a smile, one he almost feels. ‘Captain Barfbag to the rescue.’

  And there they are, awkward like that for a minute, and then without thinking Slim takes off the watch and tosses it to Heck, who catches it like it’s the Holy fuckin Grail.

  ‘Wowsers, man. This is your watch – your dad gave it to you.’

  He looks down at his wrist, the pale skin there, the line where the strap bit in – only taking it off to shower all these years. Slim Novak or Slim Slider – the same Slim. ‘Van didn’t give it to me,’ he laughs, and it’s the first real thing that’s happened all day. ‘He left it behind. Like he did with everything.’ Even left his name behind like a husk of snakeskin.

  And before anything can take the cruel beautiful truth of that away, he spins hard and walks off, closing the distance.

  13

  Normando is staring at the ceiling above the bed by the time the moon sneaks in through the shutters. Pat’s breath whistles through her nose and Norm rolls to look at her. Hair snaking in grey drifts across her pillow, creased forehead let loose with sleep – some kind of peace.

  His eyes trace the line of her neck, down to her shoulder and beyond, the nightstand and the black-bordered picture frame, turned facedown. He knows the photograph – the white flash of teeth in the smile of the young boy there, the miner’s helmet sinking low over his ears.

  When he worked late, some nights he would sneak into the boy’s room and ease onto the end of the mattress, knowing the boy was only pretending, that he’d heard the truck pull in, the latch on the front door. Normando would whisper a story about the damned mine – how he found a cockroach in his lunch pail or the time Ristimaki lost one of his boots down a pit and had to jump around on one leg like an arsehole. Normando jumping around the room to demonstrate, light on his toes and shushing the boy’s laughter so’s not to wake Pat.

  The boy liked to hear the one about the time he saved the two Italians from a cave-in. Went back down because he counted two short and moved the rocks all by himself. Nobody believed he could’ve done it. The boy loved that Normando would show him how big the rocks were with his hands and each time the rocks would get a little bigger. The boy would tease him about this because he remembered. Because he listened.

  Normando slides his skinny old bow legs out from under the sheets, pads off down the hall, Pat whistling through her nose like a kettle behind him.

  14

  It’s not even 2 a.m. when the amp blows and it’s not because they’re playing too loud but because their equipment’s so old. Moony Bedard turns to the rest of the guys to see if they want to keep going acoustic, but the drummer Lepine says, ‘My hemorrhoids hurt and I wanna go home.’ Half done murdering a Franglais cover of ‘The Thrill Is Gone’ and the evening’s over.

  The house music comes on to cover for them, but the twenty or so people who turned up for the gig barely register the changeover. Moony packs up the bass and by the time they’ve got the van loaded Stef is already asleep in the passenger side. They all stand on the pavement looking at each other, Lepine dancing from one foot to the other trying to stay warm, Felix with his hands in his pockets and Stef, drooling, face pressed against the glass in the background. Moony says, ‘Well,’ and the other guys say, ‘Well,’ and they all nod a bit more and then Moony says, ‘Well,’ again, but with more finality.

  After the van takes off, Moony heads back inside, making straight for the bar and giving Foisey the nod. The bartender slides a rum and coke across, saying, ‘This’s the last of your rider. Sorry, Moony.’

  He turns and leans against the bar, pulling off his ball cap and running a hand over the smooth dome of his skull. Le thrill est parti. Only a handful of people left but the place is still smoky as hell. In the old days someone would’ve already been up to buy him a drink. He thinks about going to talk to the cute brunette in the denim jacket who seemed to be paying attention most of the night. Then a cheer comes up from the table of mouthbreathers who kept requesting Slayer covers and he just feels sick instead.

  The men’s room has indoor plumbing but you wouldn’t know it from the smell. He goes to the last urinal and stands with his hands on his hips, dangling, waiting for the release. A poster right at eye level, BayBay Roi, a younger version of himself with more hair and a darker moustache looking back at him. All of them, Stef, Lepine and Felix, looking so g
oddamn happy. Ten Year Reunion.

  Some reunion. Stef’s voice was shit, couldn’t hit the high notes, Felix kept losing his place and Lepine … well, he was as bad as ever. They all had to be dragged out for this pretty much kicking and screaming and Moony doesn’t know why he bothered. They used to get one, maybe two, hundred on a good night. Have all their fans died? Maybe just gone senile.

  A stall door bangs open and some other old bastard, wiping his hands on his pants, takes one look at Moony. ‘Didn’t you fuckers have a ten-year reunion ten years ago?’

  ‘You gonna wash your hands, Lo?’

  Lorenzo flicks his fingers at him, like he’s flinging shit, and stands with his big grin while Moony tries to piss. ‘Y’know, we were gonna have a reunion too – but I called around and found out Marco died. Heart attack. Hadn’t talked to him in years.’

  ‘You could never play worth shit anyway.’ Moony grunts, a few drops. ‘Emilia was talkin in class again today.’

  ‘Oh yeah?’ Lorenzo sits on the counter next to the sink, getting comfortable. ‘You goin to Fitzroy’s later?’

  ‘That damn rasta still runnin the speakeasy?’ Grunt, drip drip.

  ‘People still have after-parties, don’t they?’

  ‘Guess I gotta celebrate the end of BayBay Roi somewhere, eh?’ Grunt, a trickle.

  The door swings open and one of the mouthbreathers comes in, his pants already unbuckled, ready to scoop himself into any available drain. With the entire row free, he staggers all the way down right next to Moony, immediately letting loose a stream of hot light beer. He looks at Moony, concentrating and then recognizing.

  ‘Hey, you should learn some Slayer.’

  He laughs at his own joke, but Moony doesn’t even hear him. The boy has shown him the way and he follows him down the drain with a sigh. Le thrill est gone loin de moi.

  Coming through the underpass onto Riverside. Lorenzo kicking at the slush, Moony watching for dark shapes that might want to steal his empty wallet.

  ‘I should go home, gotta teach tomorrow.’