“The Smiths were lazy. They had the road blocked off to the rest of the world, so they just grabbed whatever they needed at the moment and left the rest right where they found it.”
“We’d like to borrow that big diesel truck from the Tremblays,” Rihanna said. “Justin and I can make a few trips to empty out those cottages. I’d guess there’s a years’ worth of supplies up there.”
“I’m not comfortable with that,” Marc Tremblay said.
“You’re not comfortable with what, exactly?”
“With you taking our truck up to Silver Queen Lake. If anything, Alain and I will take the truck and one of you can squeeze into the cab and come with us.”
“That doesn’t make sense,” Justin said. “We’ve already gone through and made a list of what’s there. It’ll be much faster for us to go grab it.”
“It’s too bad the smaller truck’s gone,” Marc said. “Maybe you guys should get your own damn truck…there are plenty of them sitting around in Cochrane.” He sounded pretty pissy for a guy who used to make runs with Justin.
“We brought back the fuel,” Rihanna said. “Just let us use the truck, please? We’ll get it done more quickly if we use the team we’re used to.”
“I think that makes sense,” Sara said. “They can retrieve the supplies while the rest of us get to work on the five hundred other things we need to get done before January hits.”
“I’m still not comfortable with it,” Marc said. “I think that should be the end of it. I don’t owe you guys anything.”
I couldn't let it drop right there; too much was being left unsaid.
“Sara’s too nice to say it,” I said to Marc, “but you’re busy enough as it is. You guys are behind on inventory and your place is nowhere near ready for minus forty. If you think you’re going through a lot of firewood now…”
“It’s fine,” Alain Tremblay said, his voice much friendlier than his brother’s. “Take the truck. But I’m going to count the pennies in the ashtray.” He gave a smile as part of his concession.
Rihanna laughed. “Actually, it’s the air freshener we’re interested in,” she said.
“So that’s settled?” Sara said. She received a few nods.
I had a feeling that nothing was really settled as far as Marc Tremblay was concerned.
After a few more topics that were more than a little boring, Sara called for adjournment, and we were soon on our walk back to our cottage. The Tremblays had driven over on their ATVs and they flew by us almost as soon as they had climbed onto their vehicles. They still use fuel like it’ll never run out.
“I’m surprised you backed me up on that truck thing,” Sara said to me as we walked along the rutted road.
“You shouldn’t be surprised by that,” I said. “I don’t agree with you on it, but I wasn’t about to argue.”
“So you don’t agree, huh? You know that Marc Tremblay was just being pigheaded.”
“I know, but that’s not the issue. There was something odd about the way the Porters were insisting on doing it all themselves. There’s no reason for them to want to avoid sharing the work.”
“You think they’re trying to hide supplies from us?”
“It’s not that. It’s just a feeling that they’re not being completely honest with us. I’m not sure I believe their story for being up at Silver Queen Lake in the first place.”
“I get what they’re doing,” Graham said. “Marc and Alain can sometimes be more trouble than they’re worth. They’re always questioning every decision, pulling their passive-aggressive bullcrap whenever they’re feeling underappreciated, which in their minds seems to be all the friggin’ time.”
“It doesn’t get us any further towards working together,” I said. “The best way to whip the Tremblays into shape is to get them used to how we do things around here.”
Sara laughed. “You’ve walked into this one, Baptiste,” she said. “Now you have no choice but to come with me this afternoon. We’re going to help the Tremblays count their inventory.”
“Help them? Who said anything about that?”
“It’s called an ambush. It’ll work better if there’s no warning beforehand.”
“Ah…I like the way you think,” I said. “And the way you look…and the way you smell…”
Sara laughed again as everyone else seemed to groan. We soon broke into two groups, with Sara and I bringing up the rear, our bodies locked together with our arms. I gave her a quick peck on the cheek.
“I wish we had more privacy right now,” she said.
“I like an audience,” I said.
She pretended to be offended. “ Mon dieu, Baptiste…you’re a sick, sick man.”
“I’m sick, eh? That’s an excellent idea. I’ll bet we can find a place in Cochrane that has just the outfit.”
“I don’t want to know…”
I leaned in and whispered into her ear. “Sara the slutty nurse. That might be my new favourite.”
She pulled back and gave me a little shove. “You’re a perv. Besides…you just had your birthday. I think you blew your chance.”
“Your birthday’s coming up.”
She gave me her widest grin. “I already have a costume picked out for that.”
“Sexy accountant?”
“Nope…beekeeper. My biggest fantasy is layers of protective clothing to keep you off of me.”
“So…sexy beekeeper.”
“Very unsexy beekeeper.”
“I can still make it work. Remember, Sara…I reached puberty in an age when they still expected people to pay for porn.”
“Keep it up, Baptiste, and you’ll be magically transported back to the era of being a lonely virgin.”
I laughed. “At least being a virgin again will cut back on some of the itching between my thighs.”
Alanna and I never really had much sex. When you’re as busy as we always seemed to be, you tend to look at the person you’re shacked up with as some kind of adversary. If only she’d turned the dishwasher on, or remembered to move the wet clothes into the dryer…then maybe I wouldn’t be so goddamned stressed…and then maybe I’d want to have a little bit of midweek action.
On most days the house was a mess, and as douchey as it was I just didn’t have the energy to do anything about it, and by the time I was ready for bed I was really ready for bed and sex was the last thing on my mind. Well…sex with another person was the last thing on my mind. It’s funny how after a few years sex becomes just a variation on masturbation that’s often more effort than I felt like making. It was so tempting sometimes to just tell her I’m too anxious to sleep or to do anything else, so then I could go rub one off on the living room couch.
I remember the last time we had sex; it was the night before I left for up north, and we were so tired from packing that I think at first it felt more like a chore for both of us. But I started to kiss her neck and run my fingers along the line of her auburn hair, just above her right temple and the little divot from the frame of her glasses, and soon I was back to those days when we were first dating, when we were so horny for each other that we’d rush home and have sex on our lunch breaks, when things were so hot that I sometimes felt like my heart would explode and I’d die right then and there, young but especially happy.
So I kissed her some more and drew one finger down her cheek, and I listened to her breathe until I knew she was ready. I went down on her then, because I had the urge to do it and because she hadn’t asked me to, and I was there with my tongue and my fingers, hearing her moans and feeling her body tighten and contract. On some nights that’s enough to make her climax, and that’s just what happened that night. I moved my body over-top of hers and I entered her, and I looked her in the eyes and told her I loved her, and at that moment I meant it, and after a few minutes I finished…and then we laid together on the bed, both of us satisfied and for the moment, both of us happy with the other.
I think the sex with Alanna was better because of all thos
e times she pissed me off. I think it was hotter because I spent half my time wishing she’d just leave me alone. I don’t think good sex is driven by love; I think it’s fueled by the kind of passion you get from occasionally hating the person closest to you.
I love Sara, but it’s not the same; she still seems too good to be true, so I know we need a little more time for reality to set in. In many ways she’s more sensual than Alanna, more willing to touch and be touched, as long as it’s in the right places.
Back when I was married, the idea of being with someone different and not knowing where to touch them was something I would have given anything to experience again. But when I’m with Sara I think of Alanna, of the way she loved feeling my lips on her neck, the way she loved the tracing of my fingers around the little ridge of her belly button.
One day I’ll probably start to be so accustomed to Sara’s body and bringing her pleasure that there will be nothing left that surprises me. On the one hand I hope that it helps me recapture some of what I had with Alanna, but I also worry that I’ll feel too guilty to enjoy it. It’s funny, but I’ve never felt like I’m cheating on Alanna with Sara. I think I’ll only start feeling that way once the sex really starts to pick up; one day it’ll be the best sex I’ve ever had, and that’s the day I’ll feel like a cheat.
After dinner we gathered in the living room as usual. I would have rather heard another selection from Ant’s diary or played some poker, but I knew that it was time to talk about the problem everyone was hoping would go away.
“I’m concerned about the Tremblays,” I said as I paced around the room.
“They’re not pulling their weight,” Lisa said. “Everyone knows that.”
“Glad I’m not the only one.”
“But what the heck are we going to do about it?” Graham asked. “When those guys aren’t falling behind, they’re crapping on every idea we have.”
“I think you guys are being too hard on them,” Fiona said. “They’ve had a rough time.”
“We’ve all had a rough time,” I said.
“But they came to us because they weren’t going to make it otherwise.”
“That’s true,” Sara said. “They weren’t willing to take any of us in a year ago, so I can’t imagine it felt good for them to show up here begging for help.”
“I’m fine with charity,” I said. “But at some point the charity stops and reality kicks in. There are seven people over there, using up supplies faster than the rest of us and providing very little in return.”
“They know we don’t have any options,” Lisa said.
“What do you mean?”
“They know that you’re too nice to force them out. So they don’t have to work very hard. Hell, if they stopped working tomorrow I’m sure we’d still keep feeding them.”
“And giving them our firewood,” Graham said.
“Indentures aren’t seeming so bad anymore,” Lisa said.
“That’s not funny,” Sara said, almost growling as she spoke.
“I’m not joking…people like the Tremblays wouldn’t last a week in Timmins. They’d have been thrown into a pit mine so that nature could take its course.”
“We’re not even going to discuss that kind of garbage,” I said. “Let’s just put them in a situation where they either have to do the work or they have to admit that they’re not contributing. I seriously doubt they’d just give in and admit that they’re useless. They’ll have to come around.”
“But they already have plenty of work they’re not doing,” Graham said. “You already went through the list with them.”
“It’s too easy for them to half-ass-it when they’re working in their cottage. They could hide in that place all day pretending they're working and getting fuck all done.” That made me think of weekends on Sackville Street, the todo lists I conveniently misplaced and the mancave I'd built in the basement that was less a workshop and more a masturbatorium. I felt myself smiling. “I know what that's like,” I said, running my hand on my chin. “I happen to be an expert on that subject. My wife used to call me ‘the invisible husband’.”
Sara glared at me, probably more from surprise than anything else. She gets uneasy when I talk about Alanna, so I don’t do it very often.
“Invisible husband?” Lisa said. “Probably a reference to your missing manhood.”
I was surprised that she beat Kayla to the joke, but then I realized that Kayla wasn’t even paying attention. She and Matt were staring out the window toward the lake. Matt was sulking, still butthurt over what I’d told him half a week ago, but Kayla just seemed vacant, like she’d checked out for the evening. I’d seen her angry; I saw that last night. But this wasn't something I'd seen from her before.
“So we need to send them out somewhere?” Sara asked.
“Marc and Alain, at least,” I said. “I think they’re the root of the problem. It’s a safe bet that those guys aren’t the ones doing laundry or food prep, either.”
“So we do need to send them with the Porters,” Graham said.
“I say we split them up. We'll send one to Silver Queen Lake and take one with us to start gathering up farm equipment.”
“The Porters won't like that,” Sara said.
“So that’s one good thing about it,” Lisa said with a smirk.
“It’s a bad idea,” Matt said from his place by the window. He'd been listening, apparently; I guess his pity party wasn’t soundproofed.
“I’m afraid we'll need more than that for a counterargument,” I said, trying not to sound like more of a dick than usual.
Matt looked right at me; he seemed more angry than hurt. “They hate each other,” he said. “Putting the Porters and Tremblays together would be a disaster. Hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if someone accidentally got shot or run over on that trip up to Silver Queen Lake.”
“This idea is getting better and better,” Lisa said.
I smiled and nodded at her; Lisa being witty is a rare treat, at least when I’m not the target. “But seriously,” I said, “does anyone agree with Matt that we should keep spoon-feeding the Tremblays?”
“That’s not what I said,” Matt said, sounding a bit like a spurned toddler.
“Matt has a point,” Sara said. “Some of the relationships here are starting to come apart. As hard as it’s been trying to bring three families together, it’ll be impossible to come up with some kind of mutual settlement if people start splitting off.”
“Isn’t that the same argument I gave for not letting them in?” I asked.
“The solution was never to let people die. We just need to make sure that everyone stays together. So we need to decide where the real risk lies. Are we better off pushing people together and risking some kind of feud, or should we let the Tremblays keep on with their crap until we all want to drown them in the lake?”
“Tempting,” Lisa said, “but I don’t really want to drown anybody. If we’re going to run into trouble with people not getting along, it’s better it happens now and out in the open.”
“That makes sense,” I said.
“It does,” Sara said.
“Then I think we’ve got a plan. We’ll push and push until someone loses their shit.”
“This’ll be fun,” Lisa said. “It’s like a psychology experiment.”
“Like rats in a maze,” Sara said.
I grinned. I had another memory from Ant coming to me and I took a minute to let it play. It was where he channeled George Carlin, about how a rat will do a lot of gross things but that he will never fuck a dead rat.
We’d all known that the mouse in the trap was dead, the bar having snapped its neck instantly. But Ant had posed that second mouse so well…so lovingly…for a moment I had thought old Carlin was wrong.
Sometimes I think anyone who never met Ant will start thinking he was a psychopath, since everything he did was at least a little crazy. But he was a good kid, and he would never have done anything to hurt someone.
That’s more than you can say about me. Just ask Matt.
Some people call them pranks, but I think of them as life lessons.
So you thought that glass held some apple juice, but it was actually mineral water with a small sample of my freshly squeezed urine? Lesson: always give your drink a safety sniff before you pound it back.
So you cracked open your porn mag expecting some pretty girls, but some joker pasted in replacement parts from an old copy of Field & Stream? Lesson: if you don't lock up your fap lit you should come to expect that every playboy bunny you see will have been made into a tastefully-constructed reverse mermaid with the head of a lake trout.
My bro used to do the same for me, teaching sixteen-year-old Ant about life by jizzing in my shoes, and by pushing me to meet girls by sending them care packages consisting of a forged love letter and a pair of dirty gotch, complete with a skid mark of legendary size. I made a promise to both Almighty God and my child psychologist that I'd get my brother back one day.
That day was on his nineteenth birthday. Obviously being a good French Canadian Eduard had started drinking back before he had the need to shave, but we still had a family tradition of getting the birthday boy wasted on the cheapest beer available, and always on the first day it's actually legal to do so.
I planned the whole thing, and had him drive us a good hour away to friends in Val Gagne in his pride and joy, a 2006 Ford Mustang with the original gas motor. It was metallic blue with leather seats that had never seen a single stain. Eddie made it clear to me that there was no way in hell he'd let me drive us home afterwards; as far as he was concerned, we were in it for the duration, sleeping over even if we weren't wanted. That was fine by me; I'd worked it all out beforehand.
The thing about a really good single malt is that it tastes so bad to a beer drinker that they'd have no idea if you were to add a little something extra to the glass. That something was ipecac, and for those of you who aren't well-versed in inducing vomit, it made that feeling of “I need to puke” come to my brother much earlier and stronger than anyone would expect. It was so unexpected, in fact, that I was able to convince Eddie that we needed to get to the hospital. We took the Mustang…and I drove.
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