The Slip

by Mark Sampson

  “Sharpe, this is really good.”

  “Told you,” I said.

  “No, seriously. This is really fucking good.” She sifted back to the first page. “I mean, your thesis statement — about unreason’s reliance on apocalyptic language, and how it moves across philosophies and religions and economies to create a durable cynicism — is really well-argued. And then …” And she flipped forward several pages, “and then here, in — one, two, three — in three paragraphs, you manage to tie together the Iranian revolution, Heraclitus’s theory on the unity of opposites, Brian Mulroney arguing for NAFTA, and the poetry of John Dryden. And it all fits. It fucking fits.” She looked up at me again. “So you just pulled this out of your arse?”

  “Yeah, pretty much.” I shrugged.

  She grinned at me. “You have to do something with this,” she said. “Promise me you’ll do something with this.”

  “Sure,” I replied. “Sure I will.”

  And it was a promise I kept. Over the coming weeks, I would work on what Rani and I now referred to as the “‘Movable’ manu­script,” and would slip her fresh pages as if they were samizdat whenever I saw her. Sometimes she was critical of what I wrote, and other times she was fawning, but her enthusiasm for it — and for me — never wavered.

  But then 1993 arrived, and everything changed. In January, Rani landed her dream job at the BBC and moved to London. During that same period, I flew to Toronto to interview for a tenure-track position back at U of T, and of course I got it. I returned to Oxford to prepare for my dissertation defence and hammer out details with OUP about its publication, but mostly I wanted to see what the future might hold for me and Rani. After a couple of phone calls and letters, she came up on the train from London to see me. We had a very unsentimental talk about where we stood, which, it became apparent, was nowhere. I did float the idea of us just throwing caution to the wind, of perhaps her giving up her new-found role and joining me in Canada, maybe get on at the CBC there, and we could build a life together. But I recognized the ridiculousness of those words the moment they left my lips — what with her dream job and large, noisy, Indian family here in England. In the end, we agreed on the inevitability of parting ways. She actually said, “It’s been great knowing you, Sharpe,” as she put on her clothes and left my flat in Jericho for the last time.

  And so, with defence done, job secured, and first book forthcoming in eighteen months, I moved back to Toronto in August of ’93 to take up my assistant professorship at U of T. A year later I got onto email for the first time, and acquired Rani’s address through a mutual friend. On a lark, I wrote her a tentative note, thinking it might somehow fail to reach her through the convoluted avenues of the information superhighway, or, if it did, come back with news of a fresh boy toy, or even marriage. Instead, her response was an enthusiastic, Oh my God, Sharpe, how the hell are ya?? And where the FUCK is the “Movable” manuscript? Send me some more of it, you ponce! And so I did, and she sent me back some critiques. We found email an agreeable platform for our flirting, and it got pretty heavy at times. We would, of course, knock it off if one of us started dating somebody new, but then it would resume once we were both single again.

  Then, in 1996, she confessed to wanting to see me, and asked how that might be possible. I told her that I was delivering a paper that summer at Dalhousie University in Halifax, and she agreed to fly there to meet me. The plan had been to just hang out together, all platonic-like, for a week as tourists, taking in the sites and maybe chatting about the “Movable” manuscript. Instead, we spent nearly our entire time fucking in my Halifax hotel room. We would take occasional breaks to go for a pint at a charming pub on the waterfront called the Nautical, where we sat at a table overlooking the ocean. She’d run her fingers through my inchoate comb-over and say, “You’re starting to lose your hair, Sharpe,” and I’d reply with, “Am not!” and then, to verify my enduring virility, we’d go back to my room and fuck some more.

  That parting of ways, in Halifax, was far more emotional than anything we’d gone through three years earlier in Oxford. We had a long clingy goodbye in the airport departure lounge, then returned to our respective home bases. A brief period of radio silence ensued. But then, inevitably, the emails and flirting picked up again. Occasionally, there would even be a transatlantic drunk dial. And during times when I wasn’t seeing anyone and she wasn’t seeing anyone, we’d make plans to visit each other again. If I was giving a talk anywhere in the U.K. or Ireland, she’d figure out a way to come “hang out” with me; and if she flew to New York on a shopping trip with her girlfriends, I’d come down on the bus and we’d slip away together for a few hours. This went on and on — for nearly ten years. No matter how long it had been since I’d last seen Rani, I felt powerless to resist her. What can I say? She lit my candle, every fucking time. And some goodbyes were easy and some goodbyes were very hard. And most of all, I longed for someone else to come into my life who could render moot this nettlesome attachment to her that I just couldn’t shake.

  But of course, I’m getting ahead of myself. In the fall of 1998, The Movable Apocalypse was published, and, as I’ve mentioned, became an unexpected hit. Philip Sharpe the Public Figure was born. And, of course, I dedicated that book to Rani Sumita. I mean, how could I not?

  Thursday, November 5

  This is how it went down last night.

  We strolled Metcalfe Street together, through autumn’s great chiaroscuro, that orange canopy of leaves releasing their strange light despite the fallen dusk, and talked about the movement of bodies. This had all started two months ago with Grace reluctantly allowing Simone to take Black Swan out of the library (we’re old school that way, here at 4 Metcalfe Street), which, upon viewing, led to an obsession. This then precipitated a request to order old episodes of Fame on DVD from Amazon. The show’s theme music became the soundtrack of our house for weeks, and provided Simone with a kind of focus that warmed us as parents. I’m gonna live forehh-ver, she sang at us. I’m gonna learn how to fly. But then came the doubt. Where does a thirteen-year-old learn doubt? Turned out her best friend, Sarah, in that psh-shaw tone of hers, had said that Simone was too old to get interested in dance, that most girls started ballet at a quarter of her age. (Grace had not put Simone in ballet as a toddler, perhaps including it in her “princess ban.”) But we said: Look, if you want to be in dance we can put you in dance. Just for fun. I dunno, she said. Simone, there’s a huge studio right at the end of our street, I reminded her. Why don’t we go to a recital and see if you’re really into it? She grew animated by this idea. You’d take me? she asked. Grace answered for me. She said: Yes, Philip will take you. She said: Philip, you’d take Simone to a dance recital, right? Absolutely, I replied. I will absolutely take my stepdaughter to a dance recital.

  So there we were, walking down Metcalfe and talking about arabesques and pas de chevals and all the rest, with Simone doing little demonstrations for me in the street. I was touched that she wanted to share this neophyte fixation with me, and have us spend some quality time together. But I also felt a bit scandalous, knowing that the protest against me was happening at that very moment back at U of T and I wasn’t there. I was here — here — supporting this bright, enthusiastic young human, like a good stepdad should.

  We arrived for the show to find only a short lineup. The Toronto Dance Studio was in a huge old church, its bell tower seeming to look out over the entire neighbourhood. I was getting a few stares from other people in the line but they held their tongues at the sight of my now-notorious visage, perhaps because I had a young child in tow. Simone and I worked our way to the box office in the cramped lobby, purchased our tickets and took our programs, and then were led into the main studio space. A large riser took up half the room, and beyond it were the church’s stained-glass windows that faced the street, now black-boxed by long dark curtains. As we climbed the riser and found some seats, I spotted the small bar set up on the far
side of the room. I said to Simone, “Do you want a drink?” and she said, “Sure. A Coke?” and I said, “Great. I’ll be right back.” I climbed down the riser and got in line at the bar. Stepping up, I saw that the best liquor they could manage was the Johnnie Walker Red, so I ordered a double. After paying for it, I started to go but then spun on my heels and cut back to the front of the line. “Oh, and a Coke, sorry,” I said. I paid for it and then double-fisted my way back to our seats. I handed Simone her drink and she sipped at it slowly, looking around that massive room with her big green eyes.

  Soon the lights fell and the show started. I must confess that, while I am progressive and open-minded, I don’t have a taste for what one might politely call the “alternative arts.” I cringe away from the spoken-rant artists who now infect our literary festivals. I tend not to give change to the unemployed millennial singing opera in a cape on College Street. This show proved more alternative than anticipated. The troupe stormed the stage with great violence, swinging their limbs in the air and then falling to the floor dramatically, forming their bodies into pods while some sort of atonal “music” — mostly squeals and long bleeps — blared above them. And then back up the dancers went, swerving and melting into each other’s bodies, then pulling away and ducking behind clenched forearms, as if blocking a punch, then back up and throwing their bosoms open to the world. Around and around they went as they spun and clenched and ached. This went on for forty-five minutes, and then the lights went up for the intermission.

  “What do you think?” I whispered to Simone as the small audience began to mill.

  She took a final, thoughtful sip of her Coke. “I’ll reserve judgment to the end,” she said in an obvious, adorable parroting of Grace. I beamed at her. What a kid.

  “Did you want a fresh Coke?”

  “No, I’m okay, thanks.”

  I went to the bar anyway, for another double Johnnie, and made it back to my seat just as the lights dimmed.

  The second half was more of the same, but only lasted thirty minutes. When it was over, we stood to go but kept our opinions to ourselves until we were out of earshot of the other audience members. Most seemed to be — based on the congratulatory hugs and reunions that happened in front of the stage — friends and/or family of the dancers themselves.

  “So,” I said as we strolled back down Metcalfe Street, “what did you think?”

  Simone pondered for a bit. “Well, I guess I kept looking for the story,” she said. “I mean — was there supposed to be a story?”

  “I don’t think so,” I replied. “With stuff like that, we’re not really supposed to look for a narrative.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, it’s like when we go to the art gallery and look at the abstract stuff. It isn’t a linear thing, right? It doesn’t have, you know, a rising action, climax, and all that. You just take it in all at once. This is sort of the same thing. When you watch dance like that, you have to imagine the performers are clutching paintbrushes in their hands and their feet. As they move their bodies around, you should try to see the abstract picture they’re painting for you.” And I mimicked some interpretive dance to demonstrate, which made Simone laugh.

  “That makes a lot of sense,” she said. “Still …” And here she thought and thought. “Maybe dance isn’t for me.”

  “You know, it’s okay if it isn’t.”

  She paused again. “Maybe I should be a zoologist. You know, when I grow up.”

  “You could be a dancing zoologist.”

  “Hmm. No. Maybe just a zoologist.”

  “Well, you do love animals,” I said, thinking of how well Simone took care of our family cat, Constance, which was her chief household chore.

  “I do love animals,” she agreed. And then, apropos of this, said, “Philip — do you think I’m too young to read Life of Pi?”

  “What? No. Fuck no. You’re super smart. You could read Life of Pi.”

  She nodded once more. “I think I’ll read Life of Pi.”

  And then we were home. When we came in, Grace looked up from the novel she was reading in the living room and asked, “How was it?” and Simone answered, “It was weird,” and we hung up our coats and I kicked off my Payless. Simone descended into the living room just as Grace was unpretzelling herself from her reading chair, and the two shared a mother-daughter hug. “It’s past your bedtime,” Grace said, and Simone nodded in acquiescence. But before she headed upstairs, she paid a visit to the enormous, overflowing bookshelves along our living-room wall, found the M’s in fiction, and pulled down the tome she wanted. “Are you going to read that?” Grace smiled. “I’m going to try,” Simone replied. As she headed up to her bedroom, she said, “Thanks for taking me, Philip.” And I said, “Anytime, kiddo.” And then Grace and I were alone.

  “Is Naomi down?” I asked.

  “Down and out. Just one story and she was done.” Grace hooked her hip into mine and took my fingers into hers. “You did the right thing,” she said, looking at me with those eyes. I nodded. Yes. I had done the right thing.

  “Can you help me with the recycling?” she asked, and I followed her to the kitchen. There was a tiny swagger to Grace’s walk as she looked over her shoulder at me, at my furry, shambling state. She giggled. I giggled back. What were we laughing at? The quiet of the house? This instance alone? This moment of forgiveness washing over us like a wave? She squatted at the cupboard under the sink while I fetched a couple of blue bags from their place in the pantry. As Grace tossed the collapsed cereal boxes and empty Jameson bottles and yesterday’s newspapers between my open arms, I thought: Yes. There was a wave of forgiveness washing over us, and something else washing in. Grace’s chest brushed against mine as she reached deep into the cupboard for a rogue cat food can that had fallen behind the blue bin. She came back up and tossed the can into the bag, then paused. Looked at my mouth. I looked at hers. Then she took up the second recycling bag, and I grabbed the other bin, also overflowing, in both hands. Grace opened the bag to me, and I raised up and then just spilled the whole bin in, giving it a good, manly shake. She set the bag, now heavy, on the floor. “You’ll take them out?” she asked, and I nodded. She stepped in to me. Grazed her hand around the doughy mound of my stomach. “Okay, I’ll see you up there then,” she said. Neither of us moved, and we laughed again, in unison. What were we laughing at?

  She slinked back to the living room and up the stairs, and I hastily tied up the recycling bags to run them outside. When I joined Grace upstairs a few minutes later, we still had the ensuite rituals to go through, the taking of vitamins, the brushing of teeth, the cursed flossing. But then we hurried into bed together. It had been several days for us, we realized, and certainly not since my TV appearance on Monday.

  And yet.

  Does it count as forgiveness sex if the forgiveness doesn’t hold? Think about that. You slip into slumber with your wife in your arms after an energetic bout of fucking, but then stir in the night to find her awake and staring at you. There has been a shift in her disposition. She wants to talk. She wants to talk, and you, by God, want to listen, but the evening’s depletions haul you back down into the selfishness of sleep. Stir again, hours later, and she’s still awake, and now angry at you — or at least annoyed. This is what being in a marriage has taught you, that you have the ca­­pacity to annoy the person you love even while unconscious. Okay, Grace, you think, let’s do it. Let’s have it out, clear the air between us. Who cares if it’s 4:00 a.m.? But no. Sleep owns you, and before you know it, it’s morning. You wake to the sound of her up and in the ensuite: the swirl of sink water, the swish of her bathrobe, the toilet’s jet-powered flush. She comes out and stands at the foot of your bed to take one last shot at engaging you, and you make every attempt to rouse yourself. But you can’t, and it’s too late anyway. She has motherwork to do, and like any woman whose chief function is motherwork, she needs to
confront the day with a certain amount of urgency.

  Okay. I am making it sound worse than it was. Truth is, I made it downstairs less than an hour after Grace. I was in fine fettle and still glowing in the pride of my good decision from last night. As if to reward me for it, Simone called me over from her place at the breakfast table: “Hey, Philip, you thought last night was weird? Check this out.” And together we huddled over her pink iPad to watch a video of some bizarre interpretive dance she had found on YouTube, and we had a good laugh about it. Grace, meanwhile, was showing Naomi what we do after we’ve smeared applesauce on the kitchen wall. The child seemed to be taking the lesson in, but then quite spontaneously bolted across the kitchen floor and leaped into my lap for a hug. The morning sacraments went on. Breakfast, breakfast — eat your breakfast, please. Hey, do you wanna show Philip that issue with your math homework? Maybe he can figure it out. Naomi, Naomi, sit on your bum, please. We’ve got to go soon. What? Oh, I’m helping out at that bake sale thing at the community centre this morning. Didn’t I tell you? Okay, okay. Dishes in the dishwasher, everybody. Don’t forget to text me at lunch, Simone. Shoes on. Shoes on. No, you can do it yourself, Naomi.

  And then we had a scant moment alone in the front entry while Simone took Naomi to the bathroom. Grace stepped up to me, looked in my face, twined her fingers into mine. She seemed tired.

  “Today’s another day,” she said.

  “Absolutely,” I replied, and we kissed. A nice slow forgiveness kiss.

  She was about to go but then said, “Oh, I meant to ask: Do you have any cash on you? I don’t think this bake sale will have Interac, and I wanted to bring something home.”

  “Sure thing,” I said cheerily, and ran upstairs to fetch my wallet. I knew that Grace was a bit lean this month: she still hadn’t been paid for October’s Motherlode column. I came back downstairs and, like the good, primary breadwinner I was, slipped her two twenties without a second thought. She didn’t even look at the bills as she tucked them into her hip pocket, because by then the girls had emerged from the bathroom.