Days That End in Y

by Vikki VanSickle

  We munch in silence for a little bit. Even though we don’t really have a place to begin, my spirits have lightened. It feels good to be planning this together, like one of our missions. Maybe all the missions we’d been planning and executing the past few years were leading up to this — the mission of all missions.

  “So are you going to bike around town, looking for the car?” Benji asks.

  When he says it out loud it sounds crazy, but that’s exactly what I was thinking of doing.

  “That’s a lot of cars,” he continues. Then his eyes light up. “Unless …”

  “Unless what?”

  “What if we look up all the Davieses in town and bike by those houses? There can’t be that many.”

  “Of course! He’s probably staying with relatives. Who else do you stay with when you come home? Benji, you’re a genius!”

  Benji looks pleased with himself.

  “But if Bill has relatives here, that means I have relatives here …” I trail off, unable to say what I’m thinking. If my father has relatives here, why haven’t they tried to contact me?

  “Maybe we should stop by the hotel, too,” Benji says.

  “And the bed and breakfast,” I add, happy for a change in subject.

  Benji flips the notebook to a fresh page. “New list!” he announces. “Places to stay in town.”

  “And just outside, too. Like the Lilac Motel,” I say.

  Benji shudders. “That place is creepy,” he says. “There are never any cars in the parking lot.”

  “Perfect! We’ll be able to spot his car right away!”

  Benji’s eyes widen. “You mean we’re really going to bike out there? In the dark?”

  “Not tonight, Benji! Jeez!”

  “Thank goodness. Because there are horror movies that start that way.”

  “You really do watch too much TV. Make sure it’s on the list,” I insist.

  Dutifully, Benji adds Lilac Motel in his meticulous writing, doodling a thunder cloud and lightning bolt around it. I watch him add a drawing of a car on the bottom of the page. It’s very good, even though Benji doesn’t salivate over cars like some boys do. I guess you don’t have to like something to be able to draw it well. He even writes Bill’s licence plate number in the right place.

  “How’s the wedding planning coming?” he asks.

  “Fine. Mom still doesn’t want to make a big deal out of it. It’s just a casual thing, in our backyard.”

  “Who’s coming?”

  “Not a lot of people. Mom said I could invite you, of course, and Mattie. And maybe Michael.”

  “Is he your date?”

  “No, just a guest.”

  “Aren’t you supposed to bring a date to a wedding?”

  “It’s not that kind of wedding. Why, who would you bring? Charity?”

  “I was just asking.” Benji blushes, and I wonder if maybe she is the nighttime caller he has been spending all his evenings chatting with. I used to think Benji was maybe just a little in love with Charity, but he swore up and down it wasn’t true: they were just friends and he admired her. I want to ask more about it, but Benji changes the subject on me. “How is living with Doug?”

  “Weird.”

  “Weird how?”

  “Just weird. Imagine if all of a sudden there was a woman in your house walking around in boxer shorts or singing songs you’ve never heard of in the shower.”

  “She probably wouldn’t be wearing just boxer shorts,” Benji says.

  “You know what I mean.”

  “But you like Doug, right?”

  I shrug. “Yeah, doesn’t make it any less weird.”

  “Maybe it will always be a little bit weird,” Benji muses.

  I throw a pillow at him. “Way to cheer me up.”

  Benji laughs as the pillow skims the top of his head. “You could do a lot worse than Doug,” he points out.

  “True. Your dad could’ve moved in,” I tease.

  “Hey!”

  And with that, I’ve started a full-out pillow fight.

  MISSION DAY

  Dear Clarissa,

  I just read your letter and OH MY GOSH! I can’t believe you saw your dad! It has to be him, don’t you think? It’s too much of a coincidence that we were looking him up online and all of a sudden a man named Bill, who looks exactly like him, just happens to walk into your life! The world works in mysterious ways. You HAVE to keep me updated. Write me every day if you can! Otherwise, I won’t be able to sleep — I’ll be too full of curiosity!

  Every day, Wicker writes a new saying on the chore board outside our cabin. We’re supposed to think about it all day, and then we talk about what it means and how we can incorporate the meanings into our daily life. I’ve been keeping track of them in my journal. Here are some of my favourites:

  Don’t count the days; make the day count.

  Only boring people are bored.

  Shoot for the moon, and you’ll land among the stars.

  Aren’t they inspiring? Just reading them makes me feel braver. Hopefully they do the same for you. Here’s another one just for you: change only happens to those who are ready for it. Isn’t that a good one? Try to keep it in mind! Maybe even write it down somewhere, so you can read it when you need strength.

  I haven’t had a letter from Benji yet. He’s probably busy with the showcase. Are we still going to see it together? If you want to go with Michael, I understand, but is it okay if I come, too? It’s okay if you’d rather go just the two of you. I don’t want to be a third wheel.

  Miss you (but only on days that end in y),

  XOXOXO

  Mattie

  P.S. You haven’t told me if you and Michael are official yet! Don’t think I’ve forgotten!

  ***

  I wait for Benji outside the theatre, wondering if it is, in fact, possible to sweat to death. I have to remove my backpack, which is hot and getting heavy. Inside are some snacks, my mother’s grade twelve yearbook and our list of places to investigate.

  I’m sitting beside my bike in the only shady spot, flipping through the yearbook while I wait. I stop again on the autograph page, trying to figure out the inside jokes behind the weird messages.

  Dear Annie, if modelling doesn’t work out, maybe you can be a personal assistant? The next time someone gives me a sunlight surprise, I will say no. Seriously though, you rock! Marilyn

  Yo, Beauty Queen! How come you never went out with me? I’m better than a hundred Jacks! Thanks for making English worthwhile! The Greg-meister!

  Jack? Who is Jack? Didn’t Greg mean Bill? Is Jack some sort of retro slang for boy?

  I flip to the class photos to look for this mysterious Jack, but then Benji arrives with his bike. I snap the book shut and spring to my feet. “Finally!”

  “I said three o’clock; it’s only three-ten.”

  “What were you doing?”

  “I had to say goodbye to Charity and everyone. Plus, Dean was giving me advice about my song.”

  I should probably know who Dean is, but I’ve been so distracted with the wedding and my dad showing up that I can’t quite remember. “Who’s Dean again?”

  Benji looks at me like I’m crazy. “The director? He’s a university student? He does, like, real plays in the city. He’s running camp this summer.”

  “Right. Here, I brought food.” I reach into my backpack and fish out a sandwich that is now more of a squished ball of bread and peanut butter. I hand it to Benji. I guess the food got a bit beat up with the yearbook and the water bottles clanging around in there. “Can you eat and bike at the same time?”

  Benji looks insulted. “Of course.”

  “Then let’s go. First stop, Mason Street.”

  It turns out there are four Davies families in town with listed phone numbers. The closest is on Mason Street.

  It’s so humid it feels like we’re pedalling through soup, the thick, split pea kind. Even the breeze we generate by biking feels hot; though it does li
ft the lank and heavy hair off the back of my neck, cooling it from forty degrees to thirty-nine.

  I can’t wait to get my licence. Considering the helmet, backpack, pedalling and the lack of air conditioning, biking has to be the hottest form of transportation.

  Mason Street is deserted: no kids playing street hockey or elderly people hanging out on porches. This makes spying easier. The plan is to bike by 184 Mason Street, laughing and talking, while scanning cars in the area for the licence plate number, which we have both memorized. If we see the car, we have to say, “Cramp!” at the top of our lungs. It’s the perfect code word. Anyone around will think we just need a breather, not that we are staking out a house.

  “What if we have a real cramp?” Benji asks.

  “Then say ‘Can we stop? I have a cramp,’ or anything else! Just don’t yell out ‘Cramp’ as one word!”

  “I was just asking. Calm down!”

  “I can’t calm down! My father is in town!”

  Turns out the code word was even more appropriate than we thought. I have cramps all over my stomach. These ones are from anxiety, not biking. All I want is to find out where he’s staying, so I can eventually do something about it. What if we ride by just as he’s getting out of the car and he waves and says hi? Then what will I do?

  It turns out I don’t have to worry about it yet, because there are no cars in the driveway at 184 Mason Street. The cramps loosen a little.

  “Maybe everyone’s at work,” Benji says.

  “Why would Bill be at work if he’s just visiting?”

  Instead of answering, Benji asks, “What’s the next address?”

  If you don’t count the Lilac Motel, 439 Birch Street is the furthest address on our list. That’s where we head next.

  I haven’t been able to convince Benji to bike to the motel yet, so it’s last on our list, followed by three question marks. We bike single file though town, taking the scenic route by the river because I thought it might be a bit cooler by the water, and because biking through major intersections makes Benji nervous. It adds five minutes to our travel time.

  My stomach cramps up again as we slow to our leisurely pace on Birch Street. I spot a car, but it’s red, and sure enough, the licence plate number is wrong, too.

  “Two more, then we check out the hotels,” Benji says.

  Victoria Street and Grosvenor Park are also big fat failures. There are lots of cars at the Super Eight Motel, but after three rounds of the parking lot, none of them are right, either. By the time we get to the River’s Edge Bed and Breakfast, I’m hot, irritated and in need of a win.

  No such luck.

  “The River’s Edge is pretty fancy,” Benji points out. “More for tourists. Bill isn’t exactly a tourist.”

  He’s right, but it doesn’t make me feel better. I savagely kick at the kickstand and rear my bike around in the opposite direction. “Let’s go home. I’m boiling.”

  Benji hurries to catch up. “Can we stop and get freezies?”

  “I didn’t bring any money.”

  “I have some.”

  I don’t say anything, but I let Benji lead the way. He takes us to a 7-Eleven and gets two giant freezies: red for him, blue for me. I perk up a little. Blue has always been my favourite. I’m not sure what flavour it is — raspberry, blueberry, some kind of berry — but it doesn’t matter, it’s pure delicious. Benji forgot to ask the cashier to snip the top, so I have to tear it with my teeth. I open Benji’s, too, since even his teeth are too delicate.

  It feels good to tear into something ferociously when you’re in a bad mood.

  “Let’s go to the river to eat them,” Benji says.

  Right now, with my skin so hot and sweaty it’s prickling, the river sounds perfect. “Okay.”

  ***

  A few summers ago we discovered our own secret part of the river. Well, not secret — none of the river is private. But every time we came to cool off, we were the only ones there. Less than a ten-minute bike ride from our houses, it has a small strip of beach (gravel, mostly), a willow tree that neither of us is brave enough to climb and a boulder that juts out from the water, perfect for sunning yourself after you cool off in the water.

  As hoped, there is no one else around when we arrive. So far this is the luckiest thing to happen to me all day. I let my bike fall, whip off my backpack and helmet and step out of my shoes, heading for the water. The river isn’t deep, so the water isn’t very cool. But after all that biking, it’s still refreshing to feel it slosh against my ankles. I grab fistfuls of my shorts, yanking the hems up as high as they’ll go, and wade out a bit further.

  Benji takes his shirt and shorts off, folds them neatly and places them on top of his helmet. He wades in up to his waist, wearing just his boxer shorts, and then sinks into the water, carefully keeping his hair from getting wet. At the back of his head a cowlick stands straight up. He looks like a duckling.

  “It’s really nice!” Benji says, dogpaddling in circles around me.

  “Don’t rub it in,” I say.

  “It’s not that nice,” he says dutifully.

  I wish I could take my clothes off as well. There was a time when I would have whipped off my shirt and shorts and dived in with only my underwear on, too. Benji is more like my brother than a friend. But back then I didn’t wear a bra. Everything changes when you start wearing a bra.

  I scratch furiously at the clasp, as if it’s the source of all my problems.

  “I want to go in, just for a minute. Can you turn around?”

  “Sure. I’m going to dry off, anyway.” Benji hauls himself onto the sunning rock. Not only does he face the other way, but he closes his eyes and covers them with his hands. As quickly as I can, I wiggle out of my shorts and sweaty t-shirt, tossing them at the edge of the water. Then I wade back in, plug my nose and plunge into the river. It feels wonderful.

  Underwater, I turn my head slowly, loving the feeling of my hair floating around me. When my nose starts to burn, I emerge, shaking the water from my ears.

  Benji is still sitting with his back to me, eyes covered. I slip my t-shirt back on and haul myself onto the rock beside him. I leave my shorts on the bank. My shirt is long enough, plus it will dry in about five minutes. Wet shorts take forever to dry out.

  I’m surprised to find that there’s barely enough room for the two of us on the sunning rock. The last time we were here, we comfortably sat side by side. Benji scooches over without ever opening his eyes.

  “You can look now.”

  Benji takes away his hands and blinks at me in the sunlight. “Better?”

  “Better. I feel like I can think now.”

  “So what do we do next?” I like how Benji says “we.” It makes me feel less alone.

  It’s strange, but tracking down my father has made me feel lonely. Shouldn’t I feel like I’ve found something?

  “Maybe he went somewhere on a day trip,” I suggest.

  “Or he’s visiting someone.”

  “Or he just happened to be out driving when we went by.”

  There are lots of perfectly good reasons why Bill’s black car was not in any of the driveways we saw, but this doesn’t make me feel any better. It makes me feel stupid and at a loss for what to do next. Being a detective is hard. Especially on a bike.

  “Maybe we should try again, early in the morning before people go out for the day,” I say.

  “But still late enough that the sun is up, right?” Benji really hates the dark.

  “We still haven’t checked out the Lilac Motel,” I point out.

  Benji has a handful of pebbles that he is tossing one by one at the water, attempting (but failing) to make them skip across the top. “I know.”

  “I can go by myself, if you’re that scared.”

  “I’m not scared; I just think it’s far. We’d have to bike on the highway.”

  I resist rolling my eyes. Benji can be such a scaredy-cat sometimes.

  “Really, you don’t have to
come if you don’t want to. I can make it there in less than half an hour, especially without you slowing me down.”

  “Don’t go by yourself,” Benji pleads, and he looks so pitiful I have to relent.

  “I won’t,” I say, but I don’t mean it.

  “We should probably go back now.”

  Benji and I bike all the way home without a word. We’re both too busy thinking. But before he goes inside, Benji turns to me and says, “That was nice, today. It felt like one of our old missions. Remember those?”

  I smile for the first time that day. “Yeah, I remember.”

  I’m glad I’m not the only one.

  RAINY DAY

  It’s been raining for days. As happy as I am to not be melting into a puddle of human stink, I’m ready for the sun again.

  Business has slowed at the Hair Emporium, and I spend most of my days doing crosswords and stuffing wedding favours into gauzy gift bags.

  Originally the plan was to make donations to the Breast Cancer Society in each guest’s name, but Mom decided that they needed to have a take-away, too. So she is giving everyone a little sample bottle of her favourite moisturizer and a scented candle, along with a hand-lettered card that reads A Donation Was Made to the Breast Cancer Society on Your Behalf. My job is supposed to be writing the cards, but my handwriting is functional at best. Fancy lettering is really more of a Benji task, but he’s not around to do it, which leaves me.

  Needless to say, it’s a dull way to spend a day, so when the bell jingles at the top of the stairs, I practically leap out of my seat to greet the person who will save me from dying of boredom.

  “Is that Clarissa Louise Delaney or a starlet I see down there?”

  At first I don’t recognize the woman making her way down the stairs, shaking the rain from her jacket and smoothing her long, dark hair. I can tell by the way it’s puffing out that she has been flat-ironing her natural wave into submission. Someone needs to tell her you can’t win when rain is involved. Then I get a better look at her, and despite the rain my whole day brightens.

  “Tina!”

  Tina Cooper is probably the coolest of my mom’s friends. “Hey, girl! You’re looking better than ever.” She raises her hand for a high-five. She is the only adult I know who can get away with this without looking hopelessly lame. She is also the only white person I know who can call people “girl.” Unfortunately, she moved away years ago and only drops by a few times a year when she’s in town visiting family.