by Scott Carter
“We started out working the slush piles together.” Martin punctuates the information by flashing Barrett a smirk.
Barrett knows Don gets a rush from introducing people, and he knows that Barrett’s history with Martin will make him defensive.
“Well, he’s a long way from that now.” Don taps Barrett’s elbow. “Aren’t you?”
Barrett feigns a smile.
“How do you two know each other?” Martin asks.
“Barrett’s my, uh, my broker. And nobody makes me more money than him.”
Barrett raises his drink.
Martin removes a postcard from his breast pocket and passes it to Barrett. “I have a launch for my latest book next week at the Vatic. I’d love you to come.”
Barrett flexes his nostrils. “I promised myself I’d never go to another launch.”
“I see.”
This is more than Barrett wants to bear, so he pulls out his cigarettes and raises the pack. “Nicotine calls.”
“Maybe you can give me some stock advice before you leave?”
They share a look of mutual loathing before Barrett exits. He walks through the party, past two men dressed as Rick James and steps out sliding doors to a patio, where he startles Layla. She has been married to Don for nineteen years. She is forty-six, but in her large blonde afro wig, knee-high white boots, and a fitting dress, she is the most stunning woman at the party.
“Hey,” she says with an exhale of smoke. “You scared me.” She holds up her thin cigarette to eye level. “Don’t tell Don. He thinks I quit.”
“I do a good job of keeping your secrets.” He leans into her lighter to light his cigarette, and she smiles seductively.
“I hate throwing parties for self-absorbed publishing people.”
“I hate writers.”
Layla steps closer. “I think it’s that time.”
“I love that time, but here?”
Her fingers wrap around his hand and she leads him down an unlit path to the pool-shed. They kiss, and he isn’t surprised that despite having just finished a cigarette, she tastes like vanilla. She pushes an inflatable dragon off a table, raises her skirt, and pulls at Barrett’s pants. This is how it has been since they first had sex a few months ago. All passion and impulse.
Fifteen minutes later, Barrett steps out of the pool-shed and is walking back toward the mansion when he sees Martin standing just outside the sliding doors with a glass of wine in hand. Barrett is about to turn, but it’s too late. They lock eyes for a moment before Martin pivots and returns inside.
Dishevelled, Barrett re-enters the party but doesn’t make it to the bar before Don passes him a Scotch. “Thank you again for coming. I know theme parties aren’t your thing.”
“You’d be surprised.” Barrett holds up his drink and they touch glasses.
Six
At school, Richard isn’t that different from a piece of furniture. He sits in the same place every day, never speaks, and looks just enough like everyone else that he doesn’t stand out. His grades are good enough that he doesn’t need extra help, but they are also average enough that he never receives any recognition. None of his teachers would ever admit it, but not one of them knows his full name. Some of them know him as Richard, some as Conner, but none of them know more than they have to for grading and attendance purposes. This is a fact best illustrated by the time he went home in the middle of the day to watch cartoons and nobody noticed. It was one of those days where he couldn’t stand another minute of school, so he just left. Neither of his afternoon teachers mentioned it the next day and nobody from the school called home. They simply didn’t notice he wasn’t in the room.
Today, he waits in front of the computer lab for the lunch supervisor to open the door for free computer time. He checks the doorknob to make sure it’s not open when three boys hustle through the side doors. Terrance Hershelle, Derrick Walker, and Wendell James. Immediately, it is clear that only two of the three want to be there. Richard and Wendell met in the third grade. He is a nice enough kid, but the type that is always arguing with somebody, the type that always has to be right. Richard doesn’t know exactly what Wendell said to be pinned up against the wall by two sixth graders, but he is positive that whatever it was, Wendell would happily admit he was wrong for once to get out of the situation.
“You know how we’re going to fix this?” Terrance says, fueled by Derrick’s nod of approval. “You’re going to kiss our feet. You do that, you bend down and kiss our feet and we’ll let this go. Won’t we, Derrick?”
Derrick and Terrance slap hands as if the power of touch can confirm that they are as cool as they hope.
Wendell doesn’t move. Tears fill his eyes, but not a single one falls. Paralyzed by fear, his eyes don’t blink enough to cry.
“Did you hear me?” Terrance steps closer to him. “Kiss our feet and I won’t beat you.”
Wendell still doesn’t blink, but he does turn his head to look at Richard. Terrance follows the look and steps away from the wall. They have been so focused, so high on themselves that neither Terrance nor Derrick noticed Richard until now. They share a look of confirmation that being seen wasn’t good before Terrance beelines towards Richard, stopping just an inch from his face. He stands so close that Richard can smell the remnants of the cigarette he puffed before locking in on Wendell. Up close, everything on Terrance’s face becomes clear. The sprigs of hair on his lip, the red pimples on his cheeks, and the beads of sweat gathering on his forehead. This isn’t a handsome boy.
“Do I have to worry about you saying anything about this?” Terrance does his best to make this sound intimidating, but a slight lisp makes this the wrong word choice.
The delivery doesn’t matter, though. Richard didn’t hear a word anyway. He is too focused on the look of fear in Wendell’s eyes and the weakness in his posture. But it is more than fear. Wendell looks at Terrance with admiration. He fears these boys, but he wants to be them. This is a kid that will be doing the same thing to a fourth grader by the end of the week.
Terrance bounces on the balls of his feet now that he is so full of adrenaline, and the words don’t just leave his lips, he speaks with conviction.
“Did you hear me, homo? I said …”
And those are the last words Terrance says. Before he completes the thought, Richard’s forehead smashes into the bridge of his nose with surprising force. Tears fill his eyes before they roll back in his head as he stumbles backwards until his legs buckle and he falls to the floor. Richard waits for him to respond, to get up and retaliate, but as he watches the kid’s face twitch like a dreaming dog, it’s clear he is unconscious.
Instinctually, Richard touches his forehead with two fingers. A bump throbs where he struck Terrance, leaving him stunned. He looks at Derrick, and as soon as they make eye contact, Derrick runs down the hall. Wendell is already long gone. Richard rubs his eyes and looks down at Terrance’s nose to see the blood turning his T-shirt red. He never thought of head butts before, let alone practiced one, so it surprises him that he lashed out, but that is the power of rage. The right trigger at the wrong time and blood usually follows.
Richard walks to the closest washroom and cups some water onto his forehead. The bump looks smaller in the mirror than it feels, but it is swollen enough to make him turn from the reflection. Unease replaces the rush of adrenaline, and without warning he starts to cry uncontrollably. Not because being called homo reminded him that his father was gay but because being called homo reminded him that his father abandoned the family and the pain that accompanies this sadness makes him capable of anything.
By the first period after lunch, rumours circulate that Richard hit Terrance with a hammer. One kid’s version has Richard biting off a piece of Terrance’s ear. Another claims he has rabies.
“But he’s so scrawny,” one kid says, pointing to where Richard now sits at the back of the room.
“You don’t have to be strong if you’re crazy. He beat him with a baseball
bat.”
Everyone is too busy whispering about Richard to listen to Mr. Davis’s history lesson, but Richard doesn’t care. The welt on his forehead hurts too much, and with the adrenaline rush gone, he starts to worry about Terrance’s revenge. Terrance is meaner, older, and stronger than him, and now the kid’s reputation is at stake. Richard lifts two fingers to the welt to see how much the bump has grown since he last checked when an East Indian woman steps into the classroom doorway. None of the kids know this woman’s name, but they all knew who she is. This is the woman who checks their hair for lice twice a year. Only she already checked the class a month ago, so her presence causes a buzz of unrest.
The woman speaks close to Mr. Davis so that nobody can hear her. Mr. Davis pivots, locks eyes with Richard and gestures “come here” with an index finger. Richard knows this has nothing to do with lice. Everyone watches in admiration as he walks up the isle and out into the hallway. He is not just Richard anymore to his classmates, he is the kid that beat up the school bully. He is a grade five legend.
“Follow me,” the East Indian woman says.
Richard doesn’t remember hearing the woman speak when she checked the class for lice, so it surprises him to hear such a warm tone. All the other authority figures in the school speak like they want people to fear them.
The woman leads Richard to a side room at the end of the hall that smells like a mixture of floor polish and perfume.
Besides a small cactus on a file cabinet, everything is bland. Fading white walls, grey furniture, and speckled tiles make Richard think of hospitals. The woman sits behind a desk covered in stacks of paper and Richard settles into a chair in front of her.
She is more beautiful up close than he remembered. With large eyes, full lips, and close-cropped hair that accentuates her features, he thinks she looks more like a model than someone who works at a school. He wants to take a candy from a large dish on the desk, but the look on her face warns him not to.
The woman leans forward, and from this angle Richard notices a sizable scar the shape of a lightning bolt just over her left eyebrow. Thick and bevelled, this is the type of scar that makes people wonder about its origin. A car accident? A sports injury? Or something more basic like a fall?
“I’ll give you one guess,” she says, gesturing to the scar.
Richard feels embarrassed for staring but curiosity drives him. “A coffee table.”
The woman smiles. “A hockey stick. Ninth grade. But …” she tilts her head back to reveal a bulging scar beneath her chin, “this was from a coffee table.”
Richard smiles. It feels good to be right. Almost good enough to forget about his throbbing head.
The woman digs into the candy dish and tosses Richard a wrapped mint. “You recognize me from my classroom visits, yeah?”
Richard nods.
“Well you should know that I don’t just check for lice. As a health worker I’m also a counsellor, which is why you’re visiting me before the principal.”
A poster on the wall of a giant thumbs up seems to taunt Richard so he drops his eyes to the floor.
“What you did has a mandatory two-day suspension, but Mr. Haskins wanted you to meet with me before he sends you home.”
The increasing stress makes his welt feel the size of a grapefruit.
“Why did you hit Terrance?”
Richard doesn’t flinch.
“Is everything at home all right?”
He offers a blank stare.
“Because there’s no record of you being in trouble before, and Mr. Davis says this incident is out of character. Is there something specific that made you angry?”
The questions began to anger Richard. He knows the woman suspects things aren’t going well at home, and all of this counsellor-speak only guarantees she isn’t going to get an answer.
“I understand why you’re not in the mood to speak right now.” She turns to a mini-fridge beside the desk, opens the door, and removes an ice pack. “So I’m going to end our meeting for now, but I’ll be monitoring you after the suspension, and if you need to talk just come and see me.” She slides the ice pack across the desk, and Richard immediately picks it up and holds it against his welt. “Okay?” the woman asks, just above a whisper.
Richard nods. This is only the beginning of questions about his family, if he starts to get in trouble, and he knows it, so he makes himself a promise on his way home. He promises himself not to get anyone’s attention anymore.
Whether good or bad, it doesn’t matter; what he now knows for certain is that any attention will lead to questions about his family, and that those questions will in turn lead to talk about his father.
Seven
Mornings are never easy for Barrett. His rhythms are off, the air smells funny, and his thoughts bargain for more sleep. This is why he is sitting in the trendiest breakfast spot in the city. If he has to be up, then he is going to do it with some style. The pompous décor makes him think of movies, and despite the early hour every seat in the place is filled with people happy to pay thirty dollars for breakfast.
Barrett sits by himself looking exactly like a man who has been out drinking all night should. His shirt is wrinkled, his eyes are puffy, and his consciousness is devoid of regret. He is about to cut a blueberry crepe when a bell rings. This is the type of bell that short-order cooks have been palming for decades, the type of bell that makes his hangover feel like a tumour.
He forks the crepe into his mouth, and the warm sweetness is beginning to sooth him when the bell rings again. And again. Three short dings in total, each more obnoxious, until he finds himself white-knuckling his napkin. Stretching his neck, he turns to see a small boy hitting the bell with increasing frequency. Of course. He looks at his food and decides he’s done. With the quick tap of an index finger, he shakes two Aspirin out of a lipstick-style tube and chases them with his coffee. He begins to check his messages from his iPhone until the bell’s ding compels him to stand up and walk over to the boy. With his fingers spread wide, he covers the bell with a hand.
“Enough.”
The boy is stunned. His face contorts in fear, but he doesn’t cry. A woman in her thirties steps towards Barrett with a baby in a sack on her chest. Her hair is cut short and her outfit is three price ranges down from anyone else in the place.
“Excuse me?” she says. Her tone is ready for confrontation.
“Are you his mother?”
“I am.”
“Do you really think he should be running around here like it’s a playground?”
“He’s three.”
“He’s annoying.”
The woman’s face runs flush. “And you aren’t?”
“This is a five-star restaurant. There are more than enough fast food places within walking distance that are waiting to please a soccer mom and her brood.”
The woman scoffs in disgust and leads her kid away from him by the hand.
Barrett returns to his seat and a man with grey hair a table over raises his juice glass in a toast of appreciation.
The next stop is a children’s literature lecture. He walks into a crowded lecture hall with a white mocha and sits beside a young woman who looks more ready for a club than a classroom. Knee-high leather boots, a skirt, and a fuzzy black sweater make Barrett wish he was an undergrad again.
Professor Gibson steps in front of the podium with a large bottle of water. In his early forties, this is a man who lives for his chats with admiring students in the front row. This is not just an academic platform for Gibson — this is a stage. After reading Gibson’s two dozen published articles about Russell Niles and listening to the man promote himself as the eminent academic expert on the Niles books on talk radio, Barrett decided it was time to see the man for himself.
Barrett leans into the young woman beside him and gestures at Gibson with his coffee. “How is he?”
“Douchebag,” she says, mimicking squawking with her hand.
“Well, you know what th
ey say. Those who can’t write, lecture, and those who can’t lecture, lecture about children’s lit.”
Gibson clicks a few buttons on a laptop, and the name Russell Niles appears on a screen behind him, quickly followed by the cover of Mil Bennett and the Journey of Acceptance, a dramatically colourful piece with Mil in a yellow sweater, holding his head in his hands against the backdrop of a blue ocean.
Barrett cringes. If he’d ever attended a cover meeting, he would never have let that happen.
Gibson sets his water down on the lecture podium. “Today we will explore Russell Niles and the connection between his work and Aesop’s fables.”
Barrett leans back into the young woman. “I call bullshit.” She offers a smile of approval that would normally inspire him to continue, but he can’t focus on anything except what Gibson’s saying.
“The inspiration for Niles’ latest book can be traced back to ‘The Man and the Serpent’ from Aesop’s Life and Fables.” He points a remote at the screen, and a picture of The Man and the Serpent appears.
Compulsion leads Barrett to hold up his coffee as a raised hand but Gibson’s too into the moment to notice yet.
“Now this may be a piece of work written over five hundred years ago …”
But Barrett’s waving coffee cup is too much to ignore so Gibson steps towards the audience and gestures at him. “Yes?”
With the room’s collective attention shifting to him, Barrett takes a moment to make sure everyone is listening. “Maybe Aesop’s isn’t children’s lit?”
“Really?”
“Is there really anything child-centred about exploring the origins of the universe or nature or the evolution of communication?”
Up for the challenge, Gibson steps into the aisle. “It’s children who still flock to these stories hundreds of years later.”
“Only because they’re the only ones with enough imagination left to see the connection between the fantastic and what happens in front of their faces every day.”