“You’re really sitting here asking me for money to go gambling again.”
His tone was harsh, his judgment final and without appeal. He slowly shook his head. A muscle tensed up in his jaw. He took a sip of beer, then put his glass down and sighed, running his hand over his face.
“You know I had a talk with your buddy Vincent.”
“When?”
“Doesn’t matter. He told me you still haven’t paid him a cent of what you owe.”
“That’s not true.”
“Cut the shit, right now,” he snapped. “You’re lucky you still have a friend like that left. He’s not even mad at you.”
I took a deep breath. Malik pulled his glass of beer away. He put his hands down in the middle of the table. I looked at the girls a while.
“Please,” I said. “Just one hundred bucks. That’s all I need. I’m in trouble. . . And Alex. . .”
I hesitated. Malik gave me a cold look. His face was set in a hard expression.
“Alex what?”
He asked me again, more slowly, as if to make sure I’d understood. I spit it out in a single breath.
“I owe the guys from Deathgaze two-thousand dollars. I need money fast. I’ve gotta get their album covers printed fucking now. I’m already late.”
“Come again?”
Now a change came over Malik. His elbows were propped on the table, as if ready to pounce. His face darkened over. I’d never seen him on edge like that.
“Didn’t you say they were paying you once the job was done?”
I was about to answer something, but then he said in harrowing voice:
“So you . . . when you came to see us in November, you’d already lost all the money. While we were all trying to figure out ways to get you out of trouble, all you were thinking about was when you could come back to Montreal and start gambling again? All the promises you made me, that didn’t mean shit? And then what? All the money I lent you? Your paycheques from the restaurant? You gambled all that away too?”
I was nervously picking at the eczema flakes on the back of my hands. Malik threw himself backward into his chair, crossed his arms, and stared at me. I looked away.
“So you’ve just been lying to me the whole time. Lies, lies, lies. You never stopped lying to me, from the beginning . . .Yo! I’m talking to you!”
I rubbed my face. I couldn’t look him in the eye.
“You’re not the only one who’s disappointed,” I said.
He slapped the table so hard that our glasses of beer almost tipped over.
“Shut the fuck up! Stop that shit right now!”
He was breaking up the syllables as he talked, his voice trembling with a contained rage.
“I’ve got no more time for your whining, man. You got me once. It’s not gonna happen again.”
I lowered my head. When I lifted it up again, my face was twisted in a pathetic grimace, and a stifled moan emerged from my throat. The girls playing pool next to us abandoned their game, picked up their coats and purses, and moved to another section of the bar, far from us. I couldn’t hold in my sobs any longer. A headache was pounding my temples. I wiped my mouth and nose, which were dripping with snot. Malik was staring at me, holding his forehead in his two palms. He looked totally overcome and disgusted. He slowly exhaled.
“It’s true, I lied to you. I lied to everyone. Marie-Lou won’t even look at me anymore. I can’t stop gambling. I can’t control myself. I can’t do it.”
I was struggling to squeeze out these last few sentences through the tears and the snot. Malik stared over my shoulder, gesturing to someone, as if to say that we were fine, and to leave us alone. He poured the rest of the pitcher into his glass.
“You need help, Stéphane.”
I wiped my face with the sleeve of my shirt.
“No,” I said, sniffling. “I’ll handle it.”
Malik was still leaning back in his chair, staring at me.
“You just said you couldn’t do it.”
“I don’t need anyone’s help.”
Malik pounded the tabletop again. He looked like he was about to scream. He waited a few seconds, without saying a word, and then looked at me, deep in thought.
“Okay, enough. Don’t talk. Just listen to me. And listen good. We’re going to do exactly what I say. First of all you’re going to quit your job. Tomorrow.”
“No way. I can’t quit now. They’re moving me up to the kitchen.”
“I don’t care if they’re making you chef or CEO. You’re going to quit that shit right now. Then, you’re going to go see your friend Alex and tell him the whole story.”
I turned pale. The colour drained from my face.
“I can’t.”
“Oh yes, you can, and you will. I’ll give you two days. Then you’re going to shove all your shit in a bag and you’re coming to Trois-Rivières with me.”
“What’ll I tell my boss? I can’t leave with no notice. I can’t say no to a promotion. And I need the money. To pay back the band.”
“Jesus Christ. Are you hearing a word I’m saying? This is what’s gonna happen: you’re gonna quit your job, and go see Alex and tell him the whole story. Or else I’ll call your parents and tell them the whole story.”
He leaned backed in his chair and stared at me, waiting for me to react. I was trying hard to maintain my composure. I didn’t need long to weigh my options. There was no way I was going to let anyone breathe a word of this to my mum or dad.
“You’re blackmailing me. That’s not fair.”
His eyebrows raised up to the middle of his forehead, as if he’d suddenly turned into a mime. He acted like he’d just been privy to the most revolting, inappropriate sentence uttered in the history of humankind. I immediately regretted my words. He looked all around the pool hall, with the expression of someone searching for backup, or trying to find a witness for an extraordinary phenomenon unfolding in front of him.
“I don’t think you have any idea what deep shit you’re in. It’s not a money problem, what you have.”
He never once stopped looking at me. I could no longer form coherent thoughts. I was exhausted, running around eternally in a labyrinth with neither beginning nor end.
“You’re sick. Do you understand that? I mean, you have a disease. Tonight you’re coming home with me. You’re gonna stay at my mum’s. We’ll sort out your shit tomorrow.”
Chapter 40
Alex had been gone a good half hour and I hadn’t left Chez Maurice. I’d been back here once or twice in recent weeks, perhaps in the hope that Marie-Lou might magically appear, though I knew all too well she didn’t work here anymore. I pictured her scaling some Mayan ruin with a backpack on her shoulders, her tattooed white skin grown dark in the sun.
The bar’s heating wasn’t up to the challenge of the cold creeping in. Through the windows the gloomy grey sky of each and every identical winter afternoon was hardly distinct from the faded facades. Grainy light filtered into the room.
Alex had listened to my story. He heard me out to the end, although I’d led with the punch line. He just sat there listening, serious and silent, without even touching his beer. Telling my story proved easier than expected. Once I was done a feeling of calm took hold. I felt free. I breathed easier. I could look him in the eye again.
“Do you have any idea . . . how much I stood up for you? How much I had to argue and fight with Mike because of you? How long have we known each other, man? This is total bullshit.”
Alex didn’t lose his temper. He just kept repeating himself. You didn’t do that, you didn’t do that to a friend. I started saying something. He made an unambiguous gesture telling me to shut up. I hadn’t used Malik’s words, hadn’t said it was a disease, or anything like that. I didn’t want to provoke him. I just wanted to get this over with as quickly as possible,
before the conversation went sideways.
“Don’t, man. Don’t say a word. Forget about the whole thing.”
He got up. He looked even bigger than before. His straw-coloured mane fell over his shoulders. He put on his patched-over leather jacket. He looked like a biker. He drank his beer in two sips, then banged the empty glass down on the table with a clack.
“I never want to see your face again.”
The next day I told Renaud I was quitting. I said I had a personal emergency and couldn’t give my two weeks’ notice.
“Man, you can’t just leave us hanging like that. I need you in the kitchen.”
“I know,” I said. “But I can’t stay in Montreal.”
“Why not?”
I stuck to the script Malik had devised and told him the same thing I’d told everyone else.
“It’s a long story. I’m changing schools. I’m going to live in Trois-Rivières.
That pissed him off. Almost disdainfully, he wrote a cheque for my vacation pay. I had the night off. As if a switch had been flicked, Renaud began treating me like a worthless object. I knew quitting without notice would leave them in the lurch. He’d even planned to move me up to the kitchen as part of the shakeup after he got rid of Bébert.
And I was disappointed to leave. Sure, I’d miss the money, but it was more about the people.
Adding to Renaud’s problems didn’t bother me a bit. Not after what he’d done to Bébert. The scattered parts of Renaud’s Machiavellian schemes resolved into a clear picture in hindsight. He’d started setting little traps long before I got hired. He’d dangled the sous-chef job in front of Bébert’s nose because he needed help to get rid of Christian. He’d made him work double after double, seventy hours a week through the transition from Christian’s reign to his own. He’d brought in his allies, Steven and Vlad. Getting rid of Christian had never been the whole plan: he’d had Bébert in his sights all along as well. Bébert was standing in his way, preventing him from establishing his authority. Bébert’s disastrous shift was no more than a pretext. Renaud knew enough to understand that if he packed in enough hours in a short enough period Bébert would eventually blow. He was counting on it, to fire him. It was one more devious move, like the bisque he’d “discovered” in front of Séverine the night of the forty-five. These manoeuvres hadn’t been figments of my imagination. Years later, one of the last times I saw Renaud alive, as it happened, one night after my shift, he’d admitted everything, without a trace of regret. It was abhorrent. As far as Renaud was concerned, that was simply the way of the world.
I silently emptied my locker, throwing everything in my backpack.
I ran into Bob in the prep kitchen. He was making gnocchi, cheerful as ever.
“Dude, when are we working together again? Renaud told me you’re gonna be a cook now.”
“Actually I don’t think we’ll be working together again.”
Bob looked disappointed. He took off his Red Sox cap and scratched his forehead, getting a little flour in his hair.
“What’s up? I don’t get it.”
“I’m leaving.”
He gave me a surprised look.
“That sucks.”
“I’m going to study in Trois-Rivières.”
“Trois-Rivières?” he said, almost perking up. “Well, good luck with that. If you need work I’ve got a friend who has a café there. I’ll talk to him if you want. Give me a call once you get there.”
He scribbled his cell number in marker on parchment paper. He had the handwriting of a child. I thanked him and we did a low-five.
I went upstairs and walked along the kitchen, without anyone noticing. Twenty minutes after punching in, I punched out. I took a lingering look into the dining room. Sarah was entering an order on the computer, Nick and Denver were talking about someone I didn’t know. I was invisible. The restaurant was as resplendent as ever, but it all looked somehow different now. The bottles all lit up behind the bar. The well-stocked wine cellar. The chandeliers that had so impressed me the first time I came in the room. It was all somehow lacklustre now. I looked over to the kitchen, where Bonnie and Jonathan were busy arguing like two kids at daycare. It made me smile. Vlad was doing his mise with military precision. Jade was taking liquor inventory, leaning over bar fridges. The wheels kept right on turning as if nothing had happened. I didn’t even feel like saying bye to anyone. I slipped off to the dishpit. I pushed open the back door one final time and headed into the alley. My heart was light. It wasn’t overly cold.
Basile was smoking by the door.
“You smoke now?”
He gave me a shy nod. I shook his hand and told him I was leaving.
“Oh, that’s too bad,” he said. “Are we ever going to see each other again?”
I said I didn’t know. He looked disappointed, but smiled. He must have been happy for me, imagining that I was moving on to greener pastures. As it happened we would see each other again. Years later, when he owned a restaurant. The sky was full of pink and grey clouds in the distance above the buildings. I put on my headphones and walked out into the alley. I didn’t look back.
Chapter 41
Malik made me stay with him from late January through mid-June. He put me up in the little room that had been his office, and helped find me a job at a warehouse. It felt strange to wake up early in the morning and live a daytime schedule again.
From the very first week at Malik’s I started drawing again. He lent me his university library card so I could take out books. At first he deposited my paycheques into his own account, so he could manage my money for me. Then, around March, without a word, he started letting me do it myself. The snow was melting, the days were getting longer, and my bank balance was growing. Malik wouldn’t accept any rent from me, but I’d often come home from work with groceries for both of us. I understood I was getting a second chance, and that not many people had someone in their lives capable of bailing them out and looking after them like this.
We went out for beers once in a while, and one night Malik even took me to a bar with a row of machines against the back wall. Again, we didn’t need to talk about it. He was happy to have me staying with him, and he took an interest in the progress of my drawing. When he had some free time we’d order pizza and watch movies, in boxers and wool socks. It was as if developing some structure for my life, and spending more time alone, had chased away the need to gamble. I wasn’t cured. But I could tell things were going to work out. That was something. I was starting to do what it took for things to work out, one day at a time. Today I know that if it hadn’t been for Malik’s help I never could have done it.
I moved back to Montreal in late June, just as the heat grew stifling. It felt like I’d been gone for years.
It was June 27. I came out of the Papineau Metro station and walked down Dorion all the way to René-Lévesque. The streets were bathed in the thrumming golden light of long, slow summer nights. I still felt fragile, but was happy to be back in this city, where I had to start everything from scratch again. School, work, friends. It seemed strange to be walking these same streets again, so close to the bars I’d spent hours gambling at not long ago.
In the distance the Molson brewery towered, iridescent in the sunlight. I crossed the viaduct and went up the steps of Cité 2000. The yeasty smell of beer was pungent as ever. In the lobby, two warehousemen pushed boxes on dollies. The door of the service elevator looked like the open maw of a mechanical monster. Behind the front desk sat a chubby security guard with white hair and red cheeks. I leaned over the counter to talk to him. He was doing a Sudoku puzzle.
“I want to see the guys from Deathgaze.”
“Room number?” he said, without looking up.
“322.”
He looked it up in his register. Then he called them.
“They’ll be down, shouldn’t be long.”
<
br /> I was pacing around the lobby when Mike came out of the stairwell. The neon light gleamed off his bald head. He was wearing unlaced work boots and a beat-up Cannibal Corpse t-shirt. When he recognized me, a look of scornful contempt crept over his face.
“The fuck you doing here?”
I lifted up my hands to tell him I came in peace.
“Is Alex here?”
“Alex isn’t in the band anymore.”
He was about to turn around and leave.
“Wait,” I said.
I held out an envelope.
“What’s that?”
“Your money.”
He snatched the envelope from my hand, had a look inside, and lifted his head back up.
“All right, you got no more business here. Get lost.”
Benjamin hadn’t heard from Marie-Lou in months. I wanted to leave her an envelope anyway, with all the money I owed her. Benjamin wouldn’t take it.
“I don’t even know if she’ll ever work here again. I think you’ve got a better chance of seeing her again than I do. She’s your friend, right?”
Chapter 42
A little before Canada Day I finally decided to pay a visit to La Trattoria. I got off at Mont-Royal Metro station. The last time I’d walked down Mont-Royal the sidewalks had been covered in snow, the lampposts hung with Christmas decorations. Today it was thronged with shoppers in shorts, sandals, and sunglasses.
I went in through the front door, and was greeted by the immediately familiar hum of the dining room and the underlying rumble of the service kitchen. They were finishing the lunch rush. I instantly recognized the smells of familiar dishes floating through the entrance. There were only two servers on the floor, setting tables. I didn’t know either of them. One of them strode decisively toward me, as if she were waiting for me.
“You the new dishwasher?” she asked. “Next time come in through...”
“Uh, no. I just came in to say hi to someone.”
That’s when I saw Bob behind the dessert pass-through. Right as I tried to wave at him he disappeared into the back.
The Dishwasher Page 38