Father pops the other half into his mouth and picks up the beads. He caresses one bead, his lips moving. Lead us not into temptation.
I return my chin to his thigh, nose close to the basket.
Forgive me, Father. I was led into temptation. She kissed me — after working for me a year, she just turned and kissed me one day. She’s the same age as our eldest son. I bit right into that apple, Father. I love my wife, but I don’t desire her. That girl just has to give me a look and … it’s been three years now and she’s pregnant. I want them both, Father. I don’t have the strength to give up either woman.
“Please take it away,” Father croaks. Myother moves the basket to the bureau. “Thank you, Mary,” he whispers.
Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb. The baby was born in the apple woods far behind the Connor’s barn, left there to die. Go with God, little lamb.
Myother stands and tells Father goodbye. “See you next week.”
Father’s fingers move along the beads, touch the piece of metal at the bottom. “God willing,” Father rasps and smiles. He has all his teeth. I lick the smear of chocolate on his hand. “Goodbye to you, too, joyful mysteries.”
And I hear him say, Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. His lips move as he thinks about dying. Voices sing in his ears. He does not fear death; he does not long for death. World without end, Amen.
HELPS BEAR THE CROSS
JUNE
We move as one, Myother and me, fourteen steps from car to door, cross the threshold with four steps more, right to the west wing, left to the east. We turn right. The flags are gone and I am glad. I don’t care for changes. I can’t move as fast as I want to. We visit the first room, the second room, and the third. Now we stand outside the fourth door.
Simone does not like dogs. When Simone was new here she told Myother to keep me away. She touched scars on her leg and said a dog did that damage. We didn’t visit this room until Grace came. I make Grace happy so Simone allows me now.
Myother leans inside the open door and I watch from behind her legs.
“Good morning, Mrs. Williams,” she says.
I see Simone sitting in her purple fuzzy chair. She writes on a book of paper and is chewing gum. I have never seen Simone without gum in her mouth. Grace is not in the room. I can’t smell her.
Simone raises her head, tilts her long neck back, and looks at Myother down her nose. “Grace should be back soon. They took her by ambulance to hospital for a test this morning.”
Myother asks if we should come back later, and she takes gum from her pocket. It is wrapped in flashing paper. Simone watches Myother withdraw a stick and put it in her mouth.
“Might as well come in and wait,” Simone says. “Sit down and share that chewing gum. What flavour is it?”
We walk inside and Simone points her finger at me, points to a corner. I go there and wait for Grace. Myother sits in a chair beside Simone and hands her a piece of gum. “The flavour is supposed to shift from berry to mint.”
Simone spits her gum into a tissue and puts the new piece in her mouth. She does not say thank you. Simone is like an old dog that has lost all its teeth. Wary, her hackles are always raised. I don’t know why she is mean. She has never touched me and I wish she would. I want to lick her. Her skin is the colour of the Tim Hortons coffee Myother sometimes shares with me from a paper cup. Her silver hair is woven like rope and wrapped around her head. I like her scent; it’s spicy.
“Gum’s all right,” Simone says. “But I wish I could still get Chiclets. My father carried Chiclets, forever slipping me one. There would be a packet in that uniform pocket.” Simone nods her head toward the tree shape on her wall, made of faces and names. Some faces are white and some are dark and many are the colour of Simone.
“Daddy was a chaplain, a captain in World War One. And he was a graduate of Acadia University.” Simone pops the gum between her teeth.
Myother smiles wide. She does not say much to Simone. Simone has snapped at Myother too many times. She snaps at everyone. In the eating room she pinches people who encroach on her territory.
“That’s a lovely scarf you’re wearing,” Myother says.
Simone clicks her tongue. “Not the one I wanted to wear today. There is a thief among us.”
Simone has a drawer packed full of scarves coloured liked the morning sky, ocean, grass, and bird feathers.
Nurse Barbara comes into the room. She says Grace has arrived. She asks us to step outside while they bring Grace into the room.
“Don’t you go far from that door,” Simone snaps at Myother. “She’s expecting you today.”
Simone rises from her chair and stands so close to Nurse that she touches her toes. “And don’t think you can ask me to step out, too. The last time she came back, those attendants bumped her all over the place.”
Nurse turns away, folds back the covers on Grace’s bed, and straightens Grace’s big pillow.
Coral pokes her head inside the room. Simone waves her hands like she is shooing a bug. “You get out of here, you nosy old cow. Go chew your cud someplace else.”
Coral hurries away and Simone yells at Nurse.
“Grace needs a second pillow. Her breathing is too laboured. She is not comfortable with just the one.” Simone says this as if Nurse is to blame. Simone snatches a pillow from the base of the bed.
Nurse puts her arm around Simone’s shoulders and says, “You’re such a good friend to Grace.”
Simone raises the pillow, steps back, and hits Nurse on the head with it. Nurse’s cap flutters through the air like a white dove and lands at Myother’s feet. Nurse stands still and blinks.
Simone arranges the pillow on the other pillow on the bed. Myother picks up the cap and hands it to Nurse.
“Somebody has to be a good friend to her,” Simone says.
She turns her eyes to the picture on Grace’s bedside table. In the picture, Grace is standing. She wears a long white gown and a veil on her head. She holds flowers. A young man dressed in black stands beside Grace holding her hand.
“Somebody’s got to love that girl.”
Grace is the only not-old person here. Her hair is black and shiny and short like mine. Her eyes are the colour of sliced-open lime. Licking her skin is like licking a bowl of milk; not the taste, but how it feels too soft for skin. There is a break in her spine.
She does not have control of her body. She can move only her head and fingers on her right hand. Her arms and her legs are pinned to her wheelchair with wide cloth bands. Free of restraint, her limbs jerk outward, grab and kick at empty air.
Grace was hurt in a car. I know this because it lives in her fingertips. The man in the picture she calls Danny is with her in a car. He is talking to her and she is happy looking at his face. She turns and sees a deer bound onto the road.
Grace hears the squeal of tires, the crash of metal, then waking to her name in hospital. She is unable to move. Her clothing is gone. A doctor and nurses are doing things to her body she cannot feel. There are voices beyond the curtain. Danny’s voice weeping and her mother’s voice calling God and Jesus.
I know her memories are eight years old. Her bones have told me, the ones that grow and the ones that do not. I don’t like when she remembers him. The memories may start with joy but they end in sorrow.
How can he desert me? Just when I need him most? I can’t sign divorce papers. I can’t sign my own damn name.
Grace is being pushed down the hall. She sees me and fills her lungs with air, swallows, and squeals, “Phoebe girl.” I slash my long tail fast from side to side, flatten my ears, and smile. I can’t reach her hand as they wheel her in the room. The bed with wheels is too high.
I hear Simone barking at the men and at Nurse. “Careful you keep her head up … Look at the sweat o
n her face … I’m watching you put her in that bed … Don’t you bump her against that rail now.”
The men with the bed come into the hall. One scratches his head and the other shakes his head. I hear Grace whisper my name. Simone yells, “Bring that dog in here, Mary.”
Myother takes me inside the room. Simone is telling Nurse that Grace needs her face washed. “Bring me a basin of warm water. And don’t bring out that nasty old soap. I’ll use one of my soaps.”
Simone turns to Myother and points at her purple chair for Myother to sit. She opens her drawer and brings out a square wrapped in paper. It smells like the meadow before the ocean at home.
“Only the best for Princess Grace, French milled and all natural.”
Myother sits in the chair and releases my leash. I trot to Grace’s bedside, wiggle, and lick her fingers quick and fast. Grace laughs. She breathes deep and swallows. “My good girl, my sweet pea.”
Nurse hands Simone a basin of water. Simone tests the water and says it’s too damn cold. She mutters into the bathroom, dumps the basin, and turns on the water. I put my front paws up on Grace’s bed, stretch out my body, and lick her chin. She makes kissy noises with her lips. “Yes, you love Grace, I know you do.”
I don’t love Grace. I love Myother and steak and ice cream. I know that Grace needs me more than the others do. Her heart is in her fingertips, too.
Simone comes out of the bathroom and yells, “Get off that bed! What if fleas jump off that dog and get in your bed?”
Grace wraps her fingers around one of my legs. She breathes, swallows, and says, “Phoebe is the cleanest dog in creation.”
Simone stands beside me with the basin and I sense her threat. Raising my head, I smell the too-full bag on Grace’s leg. I point my nose at the place on her thigh under her long pants.
Simone nudges me with her hip, Get off, I said on her lips.
I won’t get down; I lay my nose near the bag.
“Nurse, get this damn dog off the damn bed.”
I climb down and sit. Nurse lowers Grace’s pants.
“Why, that bag is about to burst,” Simone says, not snapping.
Nurse goes away to get a new bag. Simone puts a washcloth in the water and rubs soap along the cloth. I move in close to the bed so Grace’s fingers can reach my head.
“Thank you, Simone,” Grace murmurs as Simone wipes the cloth over Grace’s face and neck. She wrings the cloth out in the water and wipes Grace’s face again. Grace’s fingers strum over my ear, strum under my chin.
“Mary, open my drawer and get that peacock-feather scarf?” Simone doesn’t ask please, but her voice is smooth. She says it will set off Grace’s eyes. Myother hands Simone the scarf.
“Mary, have you ever in your life seen eyes so mysterious and beautiful? I haven’t, and I have lived a long time.” Simone wraps the scarf around Grace’s neck.
Grace makes kissy sounds again. Simone puts her cheek close to Grace’s lips and Grace kisses the cheek.
“I’ve never seen eyes as beautiful as Grace’s,” Myother says.
Grace smiles, breathes deep, swallows, and says, “Phoebe’s eyes.”
She turns her face to me and I rise up on the bed again. I tickle her chin with my nose. She laughs and Simone runs her fingers along Grace’s cheek. As she does, Simone’s ribs brush against my ribs. I hear a balloon expand and float in her heart, so full of hoping that it is about to burst.
THE DAUGHTERS OF JERUSALEM
JULY
We move as one, Myother and me, fourteen steps from car to door, cross the threshold with five steps more, right to the west wing, left to the east. Today we turn left. I raise my nose and sniff as we pass the kitchen doors: chicken, potatoes, beans, and gravy. Myother finds the first room is empty, and the second, and the third. We walk into the eating room with round tables. No tables here have corners to bruise a hip. The room is lined with windows that look out at the courtyard. The sun is bright and the room is hot.
Myother lifts a hand to shade her eyes. Residents are spread in a half circle in the courtyard. A man who does not live here stands at the top of the half circle. Myother opens the sliding door and we walk outside.
There are walls around the courtyard. They are too high for me to jump over but low enough that I can see the hill and trees on the other side. The courtyard smells of things growing, of flowers and dirt, of bark stretching. I hear the water fountain, bee wings, bird song, and a chipmunk in the eaves.
Aides hold the hands and waists of Julia and the three women from the last room in the wing. The aides wear bright shirts and smile and talk too loud. Just like the residents, they come and go over the years.
Walter’s daughter stands beside him. Pansy stands beside Rose. She bends over the wheelchair to say something that makes Rose laugh. Coral’s rings around her neck flash and flash in the sunlight. Beside her is Louie, the Angel of the Sea. The man who shares his room stands next to Louie. His name is George. He walks with a stick and strikes it hard against the floor when I enter their room.
Nurse Barbara wheels Father MacLeod into the courtyard. Archie sits in a swing chair in the shade. He watches Julia.
The man who does not live here raises his arms above his head, curls his hands inward. “In t’ai chi this is Separating the Clouds,” he says. The aides urge the residents to raise their arms and curl their hands.
“Imagine you are holding a big fluffy cloud.”
Myother tells me “Sit” and she raises her arms high.
“Now turn your palms out and push the cloud away in both directions,” the man says.
I hear a sound on the other side of the wall. It sounds like a porcupine in the rocks under our front porch. I stand tall. I see a boy’s head at the top of the wall, then a second boy’s head.
The residents turn their hands outward and they move their arms down slow. I hear a match strike and smell its sharp scent. Myother looks at me as she brings her arms down. My ears are high, my eyes on the boys on the wall. She follows my stare and Myother sees them too. She picks up my leash as one boy throws a sparking square onto the courtyard.
Myother opens her mouth and shouts, but she is not heard over the exploding firecrackers. The east-wing residents jerk and howl, jumping from one foot to the other. Sarah squeals and hugs her father. She hides her face in his chest. The west-wing men shout, “Hey,” eyebrows pinched together, mouths hanging open. Pansy throws her arms around Rose. Coral ducks her head, both hands on top.
Joe runs into the courtyard as the last pop sounds. He runs to the wall and jumps. His hands grab the edge and he pulls himself over the wall. One aide takes her phone from a pocket and pushes buttons. The other aides try to lead residents to the door.
The three women from the last room in the wing will not move. They hold on to one another tight like the bud of a flower. Their heads are down, mouths wide open and wailing.
Coral points her twisted finger at the wall. “Who are they? Did anyone see their faces?”
Pansy slides open the door to wheel Rose inside. Archie is on his feet walking toward Julia. He stops. Julia is not wailing. She is standing still and laughing.
Louie touches his chest and bends from the waist. George walks to the wall waving his stick. His face is pulled with anger.
“Come back here, you little Christers. I’ll knock some manners into you,” he shouts. He turns to the three wailing women.
“Stop your caterwauling. No good crying for yourselves,” George says. “Cry for your children and grandchildren.”
He strikes his stick on the courtyard stone, swings it in a circle to include all the residents.
“If this is done while the wood is green, think what will happen when it’s dry. What will those boys do with their elders? Shove them in a boat and push them into the open sea.”
The three women stop wailing but rem
ain tight together. All the others are facing George. He strikes his stick again.
“Better to be put out to sea. Will they have a clean bed to rest in? Will they be watched over and given medicine? Will they be given even a crust of bread?”
The lunch bell rings and the three women open like poppies after a storm. The residents and aides walk through the doors without speaking. Myother and I wait until the last person is inside.
In the eating room, plates of food are steaming on the tables. My mouth waters and hunger drops from the corners of my mouth.
The residents sit quiet and look down on their food. Their eyes are calm now. Father MacLeod coughs and warms up his lips.
Myother tugs my leash. “Time to go home, Phoebe.”
I hear scuffled footsteps moving fast. Joe passes us holding onto the two red-faced boys. He pulls them to the sliding doors, turns them to face the room.
“What do you have to say to these nice people?” Joe’s words are chopped.
I smell their coppery-sweat boy scent from across the room. I also smell their fear. “We’re sorry,” they both say.
Father has found his voice and speaks. “For what we are about to receive, Lord, make us truly grateful.”
“Amen, Amen,” the residents murmur. Myother raises her head. One of the boys looks up at me. A smile is starting on his mouth when two men enter the room. They wear blue shirts with shining badges. The boys begin to cry. The residents pick up their forks.
PROMISES KINGDOM TO A THIEF
AUGUST
We move as one, Myother and me, fourteen steps from car to door, cross the threshold with five steps more, right to the west wing, left to the east. Today we turn left and Myother walks to the end of the hall.
Three women live in this room: Edith, Meg, and Nora. It is the largest room and has two windows. The women have been here since winter. They are good to each other, connected like grapes on the vine. The jelly strands in their heads are few and scattered, but growing.
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