“Can I help you, buddy?”
“Me? Uh… no, no. It’s just… just…”
He was cross-eyed and stuttered when he was nervous. A real charmer.
“You’re either staring at me because you think I’m cute or I’ve got something stuck in my teeth and you don’t know how to tell me.”
“You wouldn’t be Emmanuelle, would you?”
How did this thirty-something with the small paunch, puffy cheeks, and sweaty hands know her? Manue wracked her brain but couldn’t place a cross-eyed I.T. guy in her circle of friends.
“Serena warned me you’re a real ball buster. It’s OK, I like a woman with character!”
“You know Serena?”
“Yeah, I’m an old friend. My name’s Bertrand.”
“I don’t believe it!”
“What?”
“She’s obviously not coming tonight. What a bitch.”
“Why would she have come?”
“Because we were supposed to meet here.”
“Oh, uh… She told me you knew. That you’d be expecting me.”
“Nope, definitely wasn’t expecting you. How the heck did it take you a half hour to grow a pair before making the first move?”
“I didn’t make a move. You spoke to me first.”
“Even worse! I opened my mouth because you wouldn’t stop staring. You were making me uncomfortable. Were you ever going to tell me we were on a date, or were you going to keep that little detail to yourself?”
“I was waiting for the right moment. I didn’t want to bother you.”
“If that’s your go-to when you want to hit on a girl, it’s no wonder you’re still single.”
“Can I come sit with you?”
The question threw Emmanuelle. He had grit, this Bertrand. He might not be very attractive, he was awkward, and he had terrible instincts when it came to girls, but he had grit. To reward his perseverance, or to mess with Serena—she’d obviously set them up to make Manue uncomfortable—she invited Bertrand to join her. Appearances can be deceiving, she reminded herself. The clothes don’t make the man, after all. Don’t judge a book by its cover.
“A beard doesn’t make one a philosopher,” Manue declared.
“Sorry?” Bertrand stammered. “The music’s loud and I can’t hear too well.”
“I said: the beard doesn’t make the philosopher.”
“What’s that supposed to mean? I should have shaved my beard? You’re right. I wasn’t sure—I thought the stubble was more manly. I’ve heard women like alpha males.”
“Probably, but let’s change the subject. You’re losing manliness points already.”
“Oh, OK. What do you want to talk about?”
It was going to be a long night. In all likelihood, Bertrand wasn’t used to going out or practising the usual courtship rituals. Serena should have taught him the basics of flirting before setting him loose in the wild. Manue was willing to give him a chance, but she couldn’t do everything. She had to constantly steer the conversation, otherwise a deathly silence settled around them. Bertrand showed absolutely no initiative and proved incapable of starting up a discussion without it falling awkwardly silent. Emmanuelle ordered a third mojito, then a fourth. The server was watching, visibly amused. She even thought he winked at her as she handed him a tip. He was quite obviously laughing at her and the mess she’d gotten herself into.
6:03 p.m. Manue asked the server to bring over some olives and chips. She had to eat something: at this rate, her empty stomach wouldn’t be able to keep it up much longer.
6:04 p.m. Bertrand: “I’m not really a big fan of olives. They taste like pickled rubber.” It was the type of comment he threw out every so often, thinking she’d laugh. Fail. Pickled rubber? Really?
6:14 p.m. Only ten minutes had passed since the last time Manue had checked the time. Disaster. The seconds always managed to creep by in moments of great distress.
6:16 p.m. The bar speakers began to crackle out an old hit by The Cure. Bertrand claimed to hate that type of music. “I prefer country—not so aggressive.” A sigh of exasperation from Manue, who had never enjoyed the twang of a banjo.
6:22 p.m. A full bladder gave Manue the perfect excuse to disappear for a few minutes. She thought about escaping through the bathroom window, but there wasn’t one. She’d have to come up with another plan.
6:37 p.m. Manue figured she’d done enough charity work. She wracked her brains for a polite excuse to ditch Bertrand and go home to watch Dirty Dancing for the 43rd time, gorging on triple butter popcorn in an effort to forget the catastrophic evening. She chewed on her leftover olive toothpick, waiting for the stroke of genius that would allow her to make a getaway.
6:41 p.m. Manue continued to pick her teeth, absently listening to Bertrand, who was talking about the impressive Monster Truck show he’d gone to see a few weeks earlier at the Olympic Stadium. When he looked up with sincere awe and said, “If the size of the truck tires have anything to do with the size of their penises, those drivers must be really well hung,” Manue nearly choked on the toothpick she’d been nervously fiddling with, suddenly, painfully, burying it straight into the roof of her mouth. She tried to wriggle it free, to no avail. Bertrand watched, slightly befuddled.
“Ca’ oo’ eye oo’ ’et ’eh out?”
“What? I can’t understand you. The music’s too loud. I hate places like this; it’s impossible to have a conversation.”
“Ere’s a oo’ick in ’y ’outh!”
“Jesus, have you had too much to drink?”
“uck ’oo an’ ’et ’eh ou’!”
“Wow, you’ve got a toothpick jammed into the roof of your mouth!”
“I ’oh! ’et ’eh ou’!”
“I’ve got… a really weak stomach for these… kinds of things. I don’t feel so good.”
Bertrand got up and made a beeline for the bathrooms, leaving Emmanuelle alone with her toothpick. The server came by to ask if she and her boyfriend needed anything else.
“Ees ’ot ’y ’oy’end! Ere’s a oo’ick in ’y ’outh!”
“Geez, what’ve you got in your mouth?”
“A oo’ick! ’et ’eh ou’!”
“A toothpick, shit! That must fucking hurt.”
When he’d run out of available expressions of profanity, the server decided to help Emmanuelle remove the splinter. He tipped her head back, pressed his right hand against her forehead, and tried to extricate the unwanted intrusion with his left. He worked gently so as not to further injure Manue, but after five minutes with no success he had to admit defeat.
“I think you’ll have to go to the ER, man. You’re lucky, Notre-Dame isn’t too far. Can I call you a cab?”
“’es, ’anks.”
7:02 p.m. The storm finally broke, and Emmanuelle jumped into the taxi that her server, Jonathan, had called for her. He gave the directions; if it were left to her she’d probably have wound up in a field somewhere in Mascouche or on the beach at Oka.
As the taxi drove down Papineau towards Notre-Dame Hospital, Emmanuelle was caught up in a fit of laughter—which sounded more like a cow with mastitis being milked. There was no denying that she was in a pickle, unable to close her mouth because of the toothpick, but she’d found a unique and completely harmless (for his ego at least) excuse to cut her date short.
To each his own method for running from uncomfortable situations.
Under The Big Top
when she got to the emergency room, Manue headed over to triage so a nurse who was ending a 16-hour shift and just wanted to go home could assess her condition and tell her to take a seat in the waiting room. Céline, said nurse, a dyed blonde with dark roots, greeted Emmanuelle frostily. When she realized why Manue was there, she fought to hold back a disapproving laugh. Her eyes, heavy with bags, seemed to say: Poor child,
what an unfortunate problem. But it’s your problem. We don’t have time to deal with this nonsense here.
“I’m not sure what we’ll be able to do for you, miss. Go sit down. They should call you in soon.”
“’anks.”
Emmanuelle’s situation reminded Céline of a kid who’d come to the ER with a saucepan jammed on his head. Unable to free her son from the cookware’s clutches, his mother had thought it best to seek medical help. The woman had evidently worried that her child would be teased in public, and since it was cold outside she’d decided to camouflage his metal headgear with a tuque. The little guy had looked completely ridiculous; both staff and patients found it impossible to stifle their giggles as he walked by. One of the men in the waiting room had come to the hospital complaining of a locked jaw. When the kid plunked down next to him wearing his Montreal Canadiens tuque-covered saucepan, the man burst out laughing—instantly cured. Sometimes laughter really is the best medicine.
Emmanuelle and her toothpick sat down in a corner, away from prying eyes and waiting room chitchat. Thanks to the adrenaline and the four mojitos coursing through her veins, she wasn’t in any pain. She was just looking forward to people actually being able to understand what she was saying. She hoped she wouldn’t have to wait too long for a doctor—or someone else, be it the janitor and his rubber gloves or the electrician and his pliers—to find a way to remove the pesky splinter.
They called her name a few minutes later. But Manue’s sense of relief was short-lived: it was just to complete her file and return her health insurance card. As she walked back to her seat empty-handed, she tripped over the leg of a man in a wheelchair who had obviously gotten up on the wrong side of the bed.
“Hey, crazy bitch! Pay some goddamn attention and watch where you’re going.”
“’orry, I ’idit ’oo it ’o ’ur’ose.”
“What in the holy hell are you on about? Can’t put a sentence together like the rest of us?”
“…”
“Like I said, crazy bitch.”
When he heard all the profanity, a rather thickset nurse named Antoine came over. From the way Antoine spoke to him, it was clear that the patient was a regular at the hospital.
“Marcel, man, you’ve gotta calm down. The lady didn’t mean to run you over. Your two left feet got in her way.”
“Me, in her way? Goddammit! You better watch your fuckin’ mouth when you’re talking to me.”
“Marcel, I said you’ve gotta calm down.”
“I’ll calm down when you start listenin’ to me. My left feet in her way! Is that some condescendant play on words or somethin’?”
“It’s ‘condescending,’ Marcel.”
“Will ya look at this guy? That’s what I said. You’re a fucking condescender.”
Emmanuelle hadn’t moved a muscle. She looked on, bewildered, wondering why Marcel was accusing the nurse of playing with words. It became clear when she saw the man grab his left leg, tear it off, and wave it in the air, threatening to hit the staff. Antoine tried to pacify the patient but struggled to hold him down. He shouted at Céline to call security.
“If you start up again, we’ll call the cops. And we can’t do anything for you if you’re with the police. So quit it, Marcel!”
Marcel screwed his plastic leg back on and stopped hollering, muttering a string of incoherent insults under his breath instead. His outburst had caused quite a commotion in the waiting room. Manue could feel the tension rise a notch; it seemed like everyone had begun fidgeting in their seats, murmuring to themselves. Was Marcel’s lunacy contagious?
Another man walked over to Manue, seized by a sudden need to talk.
“Look at my skin,” he said, indicating hands covered in eczema, fingernails missing. “Like a snake that’s moulting. I’m peeling everywhere! I’ll end up totally disappearing if it continues.”
The man tore whole ribbons of dead skin away, peeling himself like an orange. Emmanuelle gagged. The freak ended up walking over a few seats to bother another lady who had no desire to watch the snakeman’s repulsive show. Meanwhile, a woman in her forties made quite the entrance through the ER door.
“Help! I’m dying!”
An orderly brought over a wheelchair and sat her down. Céline asked what the problem was.
“My toe! It hurts so much, I bet it’s going to fall right off!”
“That won’t kill you,” sighed Céline. “Take a seat and we’ll call you when it’s your turn.”
The woman didn’t want to wait her turn and was willing to use every trick in the book to jump the line. She started by faking a sudden drop in blood pressure and stretching herself out across a row of chairs. She shamelessly laid her feet in the lap of a dumbfounded patient who didn’t dare argue, afraid that the woman would fly off the handle like Marcel had earlier. Céline advised her to quit playing games right then and there, pointing out that it wouldn’t make things move any faster. Manue couldn’t get over how many desperate people were waiting in the emergency room. She didn’t come here often and had no idea it was a hangout for the absurd, the bizarre, the crazy, the eccentric, the diseased, the unbalanced, and the colourful. It reminded her of how the big top would go up at the Expo Quebec site every year when she was a kid, and how the collection of shady, twisted characters tried to lure the crowds with cotton candy, carnival games, and pony rides. The next time she needed to feel normal alongside people even battier than she was, this was the place to come.
They finally called Manue five hours after she arrived. And this time, it was to treat her. Jean-François, a medical resident, asked her to lie down to be examined. He felt her legs and abdomen—“To rule out phlebitis and internal bleeding,” he explained. Manue had a hard time seeing how a toothpick stuck in the roof of her mouth could cause phlebitis, but you can’t be too careful. What if the toothpick was buried deeper than she thought and had reached her brain? Could she die of an aneurysm caused by a piece of wood you used to pick the steak out from between your teeth? The doctor’s excessive precautions were turning her into a hypochondriac. Jean-François, the extra-wary doctor-in-the-making, finally realized that he had only to remove the piece of wood lodged in the patient’s flesh to declare that he had saved her from certain death. He got down to business, armed with knives, scalpels, and other instruments of torture. In less than a minute, Emmanuelle was freed from the enemy. The blood the toothpick had been stopping up began to stream from her mouth.
“Don’t worry,” the valiant Jean-François reassured her. “It will stop bleeding in a few minutes. There isn’t much else I can do for you. You can go home and rest.”
Relieved to finally be free, Emmanuelle checked the time: it was well past midnight. Her carriage had turned back into a pumpkin and the metro had stopped running. She really didn’t want to spend money on another taxi, and the idea of walking home alone was less than appealing.
She fumbled around in one of her coat pockets and found Fabio’s phone number printed on a tiny scrap of paper she’d torn from his “Found: Kitten” poster. She grabbed her cellphone: dead. She hesitated for a few seconds, then walked over to the phone booth in the waiting room and dialed.
Savouring the Is
fabio answered in a husky voice.
“Oh sorry, did I wake you up?” Manue apologized.
“Who is this?”
“Emmanuelle. The girl with the goldfish.”
“Oh, hi Emmanuelle. I know who you are, you don’t have to keep reminding me.”
“OK, I won’t do it again. Promise.”
“Do what again? Call in the middle of the night or remind me who you are?”
“Both.”
“Good. But now that I’m up, to what do I owe the pleasure?”
“Are you angry?”
“No, why would I be angry?”
“Because I interrupted the sexy
dream you were having.”
“I was dreaming about you, actually.”
“Seriously?”
“Yes. I was dreaming that you called in the middle of the night and eventually told me why!”
“OK, I get it. Listen, I shouldn’t have bothered you. I’m sorry. I’ll hang up and let you sleep. Goodnight!”
“No, it’s too late now. Tell me what’s going on, Emmanuelle.”
“I’m at the hospital.”
“You’re hurt?”
“Yes and no. Everything’s fine. I’m good to go home now, but the metro’s closed and I have no money for a taxi.”
“You want me to come get you?”
That’s just what Emmanuelle was hoping Fabio would say, but she wasn’t sure how to ask. She knew it didn’t make much sense to call him; she hardly knew him. Surely there was an old friend she could’ve called, someone who would gladly get her out of this jam. But there wasn’t. She’d wracked her brains but couldn’t think of a single person who would be willing to get out of bed, brave the not-quite-warm night air, and lose precious hours of sleep to help her out. Certainly no one who might potentially meet this description and who also had a car.
Manue walked out onto Sherbrooke, sat on a bench opposite La Fontaine Park, and waited for Fabio to arrive. It had stopped raining. She scanned each passing car for her knight in shining armour. She had no idea what he drove. Probably a Fiat 500, an Italian model for the proud countryman he was, or maybe a Volkswagen—definitely something European.
In the end, Fabio rolled up on a 21-speed bike with a rusty chain. Emmanuelle had no idea why she’d imagined he owned a car; when she thought about it, he’d never mentioned one. She must have come to this conclusion out of sheer necessity. She needed a friend with a car, so she’d invented one.
“Hop on!” Fabio offered.
“Where?”
“Sit on the saddle. I’ll double you.”
“Isn’t that dangerous?”
“I’ve had lots of practice, don’t worry. Come on, up you go. It’ll be fine.”
Behind the eyes we meet Page 5