by Nadia Bozak
The nurse glances at the card and passes it back. With a few graceful hand gestures, she says they can follow the lane back around to the rear of the main building then proceed down the hill; at the copse of lilac trees, turn right.
“Good Shepherd Chapel will be straight ahead.”
Mum looks down at the damp invitation.
“But you better hurry.” The nurse smiles and holds up her gold watch, also delicate. “You’re already a touch late.”
Good Shepherd Chapel is surrounded by flowering lilacs; a decorative bridge arcs over a narrow stream twinkling behind.
“Maybe Scott’s a patient here,” Shell says as the Dart noses down a steep, twisting descent.
Mum is hunched up over the wheel so it grazes her stiff chin. “I bet this place offers very good rates. They were smart to have it here.”
Two guys with feathered blond hair and baggy tuxedos preside over a gravel parking lot crammed full of pickups, motorcycles, and a few hot rods. They flag down the Dart.
“Lot’s full,” they say. “Gotta go back up to visitors’ parking.”
“Shit,” Mum says again and again. “We just came from there.”
She cranks the wheel — “Shell, you help me” — looking from mirror to mirror, squeezing the Dart’s boxy girth back up the lane. The tuxedos, hands in their pockets, watch the operation while Shell — face flushed — leans out her window and calls out: “A little to the left, easy, easy. Nope. Stop. Now to the right.” Mum’s doing okay — at the fourth point of what’s going to be an eight-point turn — but then a long white limo comes twisting down the hill behind them. The limo’s front grille is laden with flowers, streamers cascade from the antennas, and the radio is pumping something a little too loud.
“Gosh, is that Vicki’s mum?”
“Shit!” Mum says, shifting the gear lever from forward to reverse.
The tuxedos forget Mum and Shell and the rusty Dart, so Mum just reverses really hard and — with a couple of grinds and scrapes to the undercoating — pulls up on the lawn beside the chapel, cutting deep furrows into the grass. Mum grabs her purse and pushes Shell out the passenger side, practically climbing over her to get into the chapel before the limo doors open and they’re officially late.
“How did all these people not get lost?” Mum says loud enough that people sitting on the aisle turn around.
Mum and Shell take the last two seats, right near the front. There are plenty of long-hair guys in the pews, and over there is that one with the bum-chin and lion’s mane perm who drove to the beach once with Shell and Vicki and Vicki’s mum. All day he kept singing “Everybody Working for the Weekend” and another about going for a soda. Shell came home so sunburned her shoulders turned purple and Mum almost called Vicki’s mum, but Shell, crying, begged her not to: “No, she already thinks we’re weird.” Mum just drove to the co-op store for raw aloe instead.
White lilies and red roses frame the doors and windows of the chapel. Light, tinkly music leaks from the speakers at the front, where some guy in a suit is fiddling with the sound system. Shell starts telling Mum this is her very first wedding, did she know that? But Mum, she’s groping in her purse and muttering, “Shit.”
“What?”
Mum’s sunglasses blank out half her face.
“Where’s your real glasses?”
Mum looks around. “Do I still have time to run out to the car?”
Cut the tinkly music. A hush falls over the chapel. A woman Mum’s age wearing a white and gold tunic comes out of a shiny oak door behind one of the speakers and steps up to the podium. Shell finds her glasses in the pocket of her overalls just as Mum finally stops rummaging for her own. Mum leans over and whispers that the woman up there is the minister.
“Good for her.” She nods. “We need more strong women like that.”
Silence, complete and utter, is broken only by an involuntary dry rasp. The minister lifts her arms like an orchestra conductor. Everyone stands. Behind them, the tuxedos from the parking lot step through the flowered archway. Then a guy with a red rose in his lapel. Scott’s dark hair is parted down the middle and tied back in a ponytail. The three come up the aisle. Then Vicki appears. She’s taller now and slim, her hair redder than before and her skin more freckled. Her long silver dress is cut straight and narrow; a cropped jacket of matching silver covers her otherwise bare arms and shoulders. The red roses she clutches are just like the ones stuck in her upswept hair. Shell shrinks up in her overalls. Even if she stopped eating grilled cheeses before bed and washed her hair more, Shell would never look like Vicki does now — a soft, creamy girl a boy would want to touch and have a picture of in his locker.
Vicki’s dress rustles as she takes a few tiny tightrope-type steps forward. Then a “click” comes over the sound system, followed by the tempered, raspy notes of a drum machine. The electric guitar sounds like it’s from India. Then keyboard plucks — also one-two slow — join in. Vicki’s mum enters the archway next. She is still chunky and plump. Maybe her stomach staples gave out, like the spine of a book read too many times. Her sleeveless white dress shows off her freckled shoulders, and the smooth humps of cleavage are squeezed into her bustier. Her bouquet matches Vicki’s; and like Vicki, her red hair is swept up and pinned high on her head. The music gets louder as Vicki and her mum — arms linked — head up the aisle. Then a chorus of backup singers on the stereo startles everyone with a shout — “Hey” — repeated a few times before Tom Petty’s whiny mono-voice cuts in, layering with the wispy drums and Indian-from-India guitar. They can’t stop playing “Don’t Come Around Here No More” on MuchMusic or cjyg. Even in Shell’s English class, Miss Jabara discussed the video’s Alice in Wonderland references.
Vicki’s mum’s face is exploding in smile. The music slowly unfolds, keyboards and drums coalescing, up, up, up, picking up the pace and sounding more rock and roll than what they play at the Siddhartha store.
At the altar, Scott is grabbing his head like the Snow Owls just scored big, and as Vicki and her mum are getting closer, Shell sees Vicki’s got a really big zit on her nose. Her eyes, seeing Shell, fill with juicy tears; behind her scratched lenses, so do Shell’s.
“Don’t Come Around Here No More” booms for Shell alone. She wants to be in the backyard with Vicki and Timmy — putting on dried-out lipstick and tracing pictures on each other’s backs.
Mum leans over. “Is this really Bob Dylan?” she asks as Tom Petty says again and again for someone not to come around here no more, whatever she’s looking for.
With her dark sunglasses on and rusty old Dart hulked on the chapel lawn, it’s Mum who looks like she knows something about rock and roll — more than Shell in her purple jumpsuit, baggier than the coveralls Dad used to wear to sweep the studio.
“Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.”
Mum frowns.
The song bursts open: the guitar becomes more rock, drums roll, backups get shrill and Tom Petty’s voice frantic.
Right when the music cuts and it’s silent enough to hear the palming of Kleenex, a dark-haired woman clomps in. She gives a thumbs-up to those — practically everyone — who turn to look. Even without the heeled booties, she’d be taller than every man or woman in Good Shepherd. She’s at least as old as Vicki’s mum. Her red silk blouse is tucked into a short leather skirt and a fringed leather purse dangles from a solid shoulder. And with her hair cut shaggy, sooty raccoon eyes, skinny legs in a wide-legged stance, she might as well be Joan Jett. Or, no, she is Joan Jett. She stands at the back during the ceremony — Shell turns to look — and then at the end, when everyone stands up, she leads the hooting and whistling.
Out on the lawn, Joan Jett leans up against the Dart and lights a cigarette.
Shell says, “Excuse me,” and Joan Jett — “Oh, sure” — moves away from the car, her blackened eyes following the handfuls of rice skimming high in
the air and landing on Vicki’s laughing mum.
Mum and Shell wait until the parking lot is empty of tooting cars. Then Mum backs off the lawn and drives slowly up the hill and back down Euston Avenue.
The banquet hall of the Candlestick Inn is air-conditioned. It is also dark, apart from strobe lights, and smells of meatballs and chlorine. There’s a DJ and lots of requests for Led Zeppelin but no sit-down dinner as Mum had thought. Shell heads for the food tables. She promised Mum to stay for at least two hours and try to have fun. Then she’ll call from the pay phone in the lobby and, though the inn is way out in Railton, Mum will take a study break and drive out to get her.
Metal stacking chairs line the periphery of the room, opening up the floor so that just about everyone but Shell can dance. Instead of dancing, Shell fills her plate with toothpicked meatballs, ham and cheddar roll-ups, celery sticks, and Ruffles, and finds a corner near the speakers where it’s loud enough no one is going to join her. Hunching over her lap, Shell empties her plate and goes for another. This time it’s triangles of tuna sandwich, Ritz topped with cheddar, a scoop of potato salad, and a brownie. Across the dance floor, Vicki is talking to some teenage guy with his hair gelled into spikes. His skinny tie is made of leather and the tongues of his high-top basketball shoes are hanging out. Vicki pulls out a compact mirror and the guy holds on to her bouquet while she powders her zit.
When Shell goes for thirds — carrot sticks and ranch dip, a rum ball, and a cup of Sprite — the dance floor is throbbing and the speakers are so loud her bum quivers against the metal chair. Billy Idol’s “Dancing with Myself” comes on. Just as Shell jams the rum ball into her mouth, Joan Jett marches into the banquet hall, lets out a war whoop, throws her cigarette into an abandoned cup of beer, and races onto the dance floor. While everyone forms a circle around her and goes “woo-woo,” Joan kicks out her legs, her shaggy hair flying. Then she starts looking around at people, singing right to them. She grabs a guy in tux and ball cap to dance with her, but he pulls away. So does the next guy, and a lady after that.
Shell slouches forward, pretending to look for something in Mum’s beaded purse. The clapping and singing get close, and then Shell is pulled out of her chair — “Hey, no, I can’t do this!” — and she’s dancing with Joan Jett in the middle of the banquet hall. Shell closes her eyes and channels the Patti Smith of her photocopy: tough and graceful at the same time. But really, her body’s just jiggling — not dancing, jiggling — the purple crepe of her outfit clinging to her sweaty form and, despite its roominess, getting caught in her bum.
Something slow comes on. Joan Jett, panting, skin shiny, pats Shell on the head and teeters off towards the bar.
“Guess how I got home after I dropped you off?”
Shell plugs her left ear so she can hear Mum through the pay phone.
“No.” Shell gulps. “Can’t guess.”
“In a tow truck.”
Out on the dance floor, wedding guests are hopping to “The Wild Boys.” Alone in a corner, Joan Jett looms above the crowd, smoking another cigarette — a skyscraper swathed in her own blue cloud — and while everyone else has plastic cups, she’s drinking beer right from the bottle.
The Dart, Mum says, overheated on Ealing, just after the Railton exit. A tow truck came by after thirty minutes of sitting in the middle of traffic. Mum’s voice breaks up. She takes a breath. Only one of the emergency lights worked, so everyone was honking and swearing out their windows that it wasn’t a turning lane.
“Okay, so I’ll come home in a taxi.”
“Shell, that will cost a small fortune.” Besides, Mum spent all her money on the tow truck and has to cough up more when she goes back to the mechanic tomorrow.
“I don’t have any money either, Mum.” Now Joan Jett is bobbing her head and prowling the edge of the dance floor, waiting to swoop in. “Mum, please, I just want to come home.”
After a heavy silence, Mum says, “It’s that bloody old car. I just — it shouldn’t even be on the road, Shell. It’s dangerous to drive you around in it. I should have asked the guy to tow it right to the dump.”
One, two, three plump tears run down Shell’s hot cheeks.
“After all these years…and why am I still driving your dad’s bloody horrible Dart —”
“It’s not Dad’s fault,” Shell sputters through a spit bubble.
Mum breathes through her nose. “Can’t you ask someone there for a ride? Put Vicki’s mother on. Don’t they live right nearby?”
Shell’s words are filtered through gritted teeth. “Mum, everyone here is drunk. If I ask for a ride, I am going to get in an accident and die. You want that for me, Mum? Huh? You want me to die?”
Mum’s going, “Oh, Shell, be reasonable,” when Shell hangs up. Very properly and gently, the receiver — click — goes back onto the hook. Then, fists at her sides — like rocks, like hammers — Shell returns to the reception.
The cake lineup is a mile long. People push up behind her, but Shell doesn’t turn around. There’s a tap on her shoulder. Shell shrinks away.
“Hi, Shell! My mum said she invited you.” Vicki’s with that gel boy and one of the tuxedos from the parking lot.
Shell smiles. The overalls coating her body feel acidic.
“Hey Vicki.”
Gel boy drapes his arm around Vicki. Vicki says, “This is Ryan.” Then she glances around. “Where’s your mum? She here too?”
“She’s out with her new boyfriend,” Shell lies. “Some fancy dinner thing.”
“Wow, that’s great!” Vicki squeezes Shell’s arm. “I miss you, Shell. And when I have a dream that’s set in a house, it’s always yours.”
Shell smiles. “You look pretty, Vicki. So does your mum.”
Vicki doesn’t say anything about how Shell looks. She just asks a million questions: how’s Shell’s dad, who lives in Vicki’s old house now, and isn’t Shell in high school? “I can hardly wait.”
“Yeah, it’s fine,” Shell says.
The line moves up. “Brown Eyed Girl” comes on and the dance floor starts to groove. Vicki says, “Oh, I just love this song. Shell, don’t you?”
Vicki grabs Shell by the elbow and says when the next Duran Duran song comes on, they just have to get out there and dance.
“Okay?”
That’s when Ryan leans over and, scuppering his own laugh, says: “Sorry to interrupt, ladies, but hey — uh, Shell — my friends and myself, we were talking, and we’re wondering if you’re a representative of McDonald’s.”
Shell can only blink. Around her the music starts melting, the room spins.
“Because, you know, your costume, which is great, really does look like Grimace.”
“Who?” Shell swallows. She had thought it was Barbapapa.
“Grimace,” Gel boy repeats. “Ronald McDonald’s sidekick?”
The tuxedo pipes up, shaking his blond hair. “Kind of fat and doesn’t do anything but dance around and be purple.”
“Especially when Idol’s on.”
Shell’s stomach lurches. Ryan laughs and ducks away. Tuxedo realizes he should go too. The cake line shifts ahead of Shell, leaving her behind. She fights to keep her face from crumpling.
Vicki throws her arms around Shell. Vicki smells like the red bottle of perfume they always snuck squirts of until her mum hid it. “I’m so sorry, Shell!”
Shell hugs Vicki back. Her hair is chemical sweet like a beauty parlour and her body is small and thin but without being bony. Shell wishes she knew how to even start to be pretty. It must be all the cheese Shell eats.
“That asshole your boyfriend?” Shell says, and Vicki laughs.
“Ryan’s not my boyfriend!” He’s Scott’s nephew, so that makes him Vicki’s step-cousin. “Anyway, his sense of humour is kind of weird.”
Shell lets go of Vicki.
�
�You better get some cake, Shell.” Vicki ushers Shell to the front of the line, the guests nodding and smiling as they butt ahead. Then Vicki steps away.
“You don’t want any?” Shell asks, grabbing two Styrofoam plates with cubes of cake — white with about an inch of chocolate icing and a sprinkle of silver balls.
Vicki just clutches her handbag. “I am so happy you came, and don’t mind Ryan, he didn’t mean that about your purple suit.”
Shell promises she won’t leave without a goodbye hug. She sits on a folding chair and, as strobe lights sweep over her, eats both pieces of cake. When the cake is gone and the line is shorter, Shell goes back for more.
The picnic tables out by the parking lot are damp with humidity, but it’s better than sitting on concrete or the wet grass. And it is shadowed here. Traffic on the country highway cuts through the muffled boom and cry of the reception, and the crickets are many; must be a stream nearby. Shell wishes for a book. Her quilts and bed. The gleam of the Dart’s headlights coming towards her through the dark, airless night.
With a whoosh, Joan Jett pushes out the Candlestick’s front doors. She wobbles around the parking lot, smoking hard, sucking night through her teeth. Throwing down a cigarette, she lights another. The moon above is almost full, as is the spill of stars — like the Minute Rice on the black asphalt out front of the psychiatric chapel. Joan Jett lets her head fall back.
“Star light, star bright, the first star I see tonight. I wish I may, I wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight.” Then she shuts her eyes — lids blackened — and whispers fast, under her breath. She finishes her cigarette.
Flick.
The butt lands on the back of Shell’s hand.
“Jeez!” Shell sucks in.
Joan Jett squints into the shadows. “Hey.”
She teeters over in her booties, knees rubbing together in her narrow leather skirt. “Like a Virgin” begins to thump. Maybe it’s Vicki who lets out that squeal.
Joan Jett steadies herself against Shell’s picnic table, finding Shell’s face in the dark.