Lemon

by Cordelia Strube

  There I go with those Sick Topics again.

  ‘Why are the other servants so mean to Tilly?’ Kadylak asks.

  ‘Because she’s got the top job. They don’t want to take orders from some coal miner.’

  ‘But she’s nice.’

  ‘Since when does being nice make you popular?’

  I can’t shake Bradley, can’t believe I won’t be able to pick him up again, jostle him, make him belly laugh.

  Kadylak grabs hold of Sweetheart the penguin and strokes her wings. ‘I think they should be nice to her because she isn’t bossy.’

  ‘I agree. Unfortunately, that’s not how the world ticks.’

  She kisses Sweetheart’s head and tucks her under her covers. She’s lost so much weight the veins stick out on her temples and neck. ‘A lady my mother cleans for is always telling my mother what she did wrong. No matter how hard Mama works, Mrs. Bandakar finds something wrong.’

  ‘Which proves my point because your mother’s nice.’

  Kadylak looks at me for a long time. The blue of her eyes looks darker, deeper, full of shadows. ‘My parents wish they never came to Canada.’

  ‘They told you that?’

  She shakes her head. I try to straighten her scarf.

  ‘I don’t remember my grandmother,’ she says. ‘Mama tells me about her because she doesn’t want me to forget her. I pretend to remember.’ She rolls on her side. I untangle her lines and adjust the bed to the horizontal. I kiss her cheek, feeling chemo heat against my lips.

  ‘Can you spin the tops again?’ she asks.

  I slide the table close to the bed and spin the tops until she goes unconscious. Her breathing sounds a bit raspy but I don’t want to call anybody because they’ll wake her and shove instruments at her. I lie on the sofa bed. There’s no way another kid is disappearing on my watch.

  Brenda’s nudging me. ‘You can’t sleep here.’

  ‘I wasn’t sleeping.’

  ‘You were most definitely sleeping. I’ve just about had it with your antics.’ Her breath stinks of tuna.

  ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to fall asleep.’

  ‘Go home now, please.’

  ‘What if she wakes up?’

  ‘You are not family, Limone. The sofa bed is for family.’

  ‘Her family has to work all the time.’

  ‘We all know that she is attached to you, and for that reason we have been tolerant of your behaviour. But we have our limits. You are not being professional.’

  ‘I’m not a professional.’

  ‘Even volunteers should not get emotionally involved with the patients.’ She holds the door open for me. I think of kicking it shut, fighting the old catfish, but she’d just call security and ban me from the ward. I walk out of there feeling the air being sucked out of me.

  The subway’s full of zombies. Some Korean guy in dark glasses stands by the doors with his arms crossed and his index fingers pointed like guns. I change trains, glad to be free of him, but sure enough he shows up in my car, still by the doors with his arms crossed and his fingers pointed like guns. A leering lubber in a track suit parks across from me. Sphincter-loosening anxiety is becoming chronic with me in public places. Some woman was raped on a cruise by a security guard. Her cabin door didn’t have a peephole so she opened it, thinking it was her friend. The security guard says it was consensual sex. The fbi aren’t pressing charges because they say it’s a ‘she said, he said’ case, meaning no evidence. The rape victim was on the radio crying about it. She said the fact that nobody believes her feels like being violated all over again.

  Sick Topics.

  I get off the train and walk, inhaling car exhaust, and check out recycling bins to find out how the normal people are getting by. Lots of wine bottles and pizza boxes, Bagel Bites, sugared cereals, mini Danishes, frozen lasagna, fries, pop cans, chip packets. When in doubt they reach for junk and booze. I step in dog shit and spend an hour trying to get it off my boot with a twig. How did they do it in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries? Or did they just buck up and get used to having shit on their shoes? They had to get used to shit on their houses because they dumped it out the windows. During the rain the drainage ditches were bunged up with shit, slop and dead babies. Things are supposed to be better now because we’ve got plumbing and no bugs in our beds, and light bulbs instead of tallow candles made from sheep’s hooves. We feel superior, showered and shaved in our shit-free Nikes, sucking back CO2s.

  The worst part about the nervous woman in the hat is that she’s torpedoed Mutti. Even though I suspected my mother was trailer trash, I’m not willing to let go of Mutti. She’s been living with me for years; I can almost touch her, smell the potato latkes on her. I mix her up with Anne Frank’s mother who, even after she was separated from her daughters in the camp, managed to smuggle food scraps to them. The nervous woman in the hat sat watching me for months, folding her napkins into little squares, making dents in her Styrofoam cups with her thumbnail. Once I saw her break a Styrofoam cup into little pieces. I’ve done this. Without even realizing it, suddenly there’s a pile of Styrofoam bits in front of me. It’s just a question of time before I start wearing hats. Already my hands are starting to look witchy, don’t feel like my hands. I don’t want them on me.

  Some creep’s following me. When I cross to the other side of the street, so does he. I cross back. So does he. I hightail it down a side street and look for a house with an open-door policy, or a kind pedestrian. There’s nothing, just the racket of my boots and breathing. Turning a corner, I smash into a shopping cart and hear a yowl as plastic bags fly in all directions. I fall hard on a patch of grass and just lie there with my face in the dirt.

  ‘What did you do that for?’ a homeless man wearing a hat with flaps demands. ‘Can’t you at least say you’re sorry?’ he demands.

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Why don’t you look where you’re going?’

  ‘I was running.’

  ‘Evidently.’ He speaks clearly, like he’s educated.

  I help him stuff the bags in the cart. They smell of piss and mildew. I look around. No sign of my pursuer. The homeless guy starts spraying Lysol into a can of Coke.

  ‘Can’t drink it straight?’ I ask him.

  ‘You try it.’

  ‘Why don’t you go to a shelter?’

  ‘They want you in by nine.’

  ‘Is that so bad?’

  ‘When’s Mommy want you home?’

  ‘I don’t have a mommy.’

  ‘Aren’t you lucky.’

  ‘Where’s yours?’

  ‘Pushing up daisies.’

  ‘So I guess you don’t miss her.’

  ‘She made grand martinis.’

  All of a sudden Treeboy trots up, breathless. ‘Lemon …’ he begins.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ I demand.

  ‘Looking for you.’

  ‘Was it you chasing me?’

  ‘Trying to catch up.’

  ‘Why don’t you leave her alone?’ the homeless guy says. ‘Can’t you see she wants to be left alone?’

  ‘He’s right,’ I say, cramming in the last of his bags. He shoves his cart down the street to get away from us riff-raff. ‘Please come home,’ Vaughn says.

  ‘It’s not your home, where do you get this idea it’s your home?’

  ‘I didn’t say it was my home.’

  ‘You said “home.” You didn’t say “come back to Drew’s,” you said “home.” What the fuck are you doing there anyway? Don’t you have your own home? Your own mother? It’s sick the way you’re hanging around. It’s fucking perverted.’ I start walking, telling myself I’m lucky it was only Treeboy tailing me, lost without his forest. Although I wouldn’t have minded dying a hideous, sexually deviant death. Because then Rossi would have heard about it.

  ‘Why do you think it’s perverted?’ he asks. I don’t even look at him, just hear him panting behind me. My lungs are fully recovered, pink and steami
ng.

  ‘It’s obvious that you two have a bit of a thing going,’ I say.

  ‘What thing?’

  ‘Oh please.’

  ‘We’re friends.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘She needs help right now.’

  ‘She needs to get laid. She’s not happy unless she’s got some dickhead taking her water-skiing or something.’

  ‘Really? Hunh. So you think I should take her water-skiing?’

  The homeless man looks over his shoulder then accelerates, trying to widen the gap between us.

  ‘Drew’s house is that way,’ Treeboy says, grabbing my arm, which gives me an excuse to go at him. I jab him under the jaw, swat the side of his head. When he tries to shield himself with his arms, I kick his shins and jab my boot into the top of his foot. He yelps. I have to admit, it feels great, inflicting damage. I leave him in pain. ‘Get a job,’ I tell him.

  27

  I smear butter on my mini baguette. Don’t know how much longer I can loiter before they figure out I’m sleeping here. Shouldn’t drink any more coffee. Can feel myself ticking, thinking about those short people 1,800 years ago in Thailand who had huge cerebral cortexes, which meant they were way smarter than we are. They didn’t start wars or destroy ecosystems and were only four feet tall. A volcano wiped them out. Why them? Why wipe out peaceful people with huge cortexes?

  A small-cortexed codger wearing a fedora over his toque keeps glancing up from a tabloid to check me out. The headline on the tabloid says, ‘Who’s Had a Full-Body Makeover?’

  I read in National Geographic about Africans killing Africans. Hutus ranting on loudspeakers about what cockroaches Tutsis were. Which is how every genocide gets going, I guess. The more aggressive side mouths off about what scum, filth, lying, cheating, degenerates the weaker side is, and how these loathsome, despicable vermin are to blame for all the shit that goes down, and that if we go out and machete them, our problems will be over. We’re about due for a genocide in North America, although it’s hard to say who’s going to slaughter whom. The boys showing up for school killings are all breeds. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that committing mass murder would lose its attraction if it wasn’t the fastest road to fame. The shooters just look like regular dweebs hoping someone will be nice to them. You have to wonder if, before the rampage, somebody had been nice to them, invited them out for a cup of joe or something, the massacres might not have happened. Pretty sad how they have to talk themselves into it, dress up like action heroes and post their psycho rantings. Although I guess once you taste contempt, it’s pretty easy to make the jump to murder. It’s something in our angry-primate wiring. All it takes is a little circuit change. And desperation. I guess we just aren’t desperate enough yet in old Amérique du Nord for a full-scale genocide. Once the oil runs out maybe the religious right will round us up and get some systematic killing going, convert the non-believers into biofuel to keep their guzzlers running.

  I’ll forget about Bradley eventually. You get better at knowing you’ll get over stuff as you get older. All those people standing around during genocides, they know they’ll get over it if they just look the other way while their neighbours are being exterminated. Just like I’ll get over the fact that I sat around sucking on pretzels while Rossi got raped.

  A three-hundred-pound lady in an oversized tank top and leggings squeezes into a chair a couple of tables over. She’s clutching a croissant and a book. I try to read the title because I always check out what people are reading. It’s usually Chicken Soup for the Soul books or How to Become a Positive Thinker or something. She puts the book down to butter her croissant. It’s Pride and Prejudice. She’s reading about Lizzie pining for old Darcy, wondering what the hell happened to her Mr. Darcy and how she got so freakin’ fat.

  At least Kadylak’s getting better, off the ventilator and all that.

  I’m definitely hyper because my witchy hands have shredded my paper cup into bits. I didn’t even roll up the rim to win. I dig around for the bits of rim, find one with the tip of the big yellow arrow and roll it up. Play again, it says.

  Usually when I sit in trees I listen to bird and squirrel sounds, rustling leaves and all that. But it’s night and they’re sleeping and all I hear is cars and humans. I’m hoping Drew’s noticed I’m missing and is regretting all the shitty things she’s ever said to me. More likely Vaughn’s consoling her, cooking up slop and finding her G-spot.

  I feel around in my backpack for my mother/daughter scrapbook and tuck in the story about the mother wrongly convicted of killing her baby due to some inept pathologist. Her older kid was taken away by the Children’s Aid Society. Eventually his foster parents wanted to adopt him. His real mother had to concede that, since she wasn’t allowed to have him, he’d have a better future with the adoptive parents. Otherwise he’d be passed around in foster care, which would lead him straight to a jail cell. So even though it nearly killed her to give him up, his real mother did. She wasn’t allowed to see him until he was eighteen. But they could write to each other and send pictures and all that. Well, he couldn’t forget her, and was writing to her all the time about how much he missed her, and remembering little things they did together and asking her if she could remember them. It tore her up every time she read one of his letters because she remembered every little thing, but she didn’t know if she should encourage him to miss her or if she should try to help him forget her. Now she can see him again, hold him again, tell him she remembers everything. I hope it works out; probably won’t, though. He’ll be taking drugs to fill the gaping holes inside him. She’ll freak about what’s happened to her boy and start zoning out on antidepressants, fondling his old letters.

  Staying out all night is harder than it looks in movies. Time drags. Plus I’m getting cold. I hang around outside Zippy’s for about an hour. There’s no light in her windows. Not sure if it’s worth the hassle. I could never trust her to keep a secret, she’ll probably flip out and phone Damian. He’ll haul my ass to the police station, or Drew’s, which would be even worse.

  Moments like this it’s best to think about somebody worse off than yourself. That African girl who got her hands cut off, for example. Boy soldiers figure people without hands can’t mark ballots. One of them held a gun to her head while the other two held her arms down. The girl crawled to a village and eventually some agency hooked her up with Canadians who wanted to help her. She lives here now and goes to school with kids who can’t figure out the hand thing, like how that could happen. The girl says she has moments when she forgives the boy soldiers, which I can’t figure out. She assumes her family has been killed, but has somehow managed to get a B average and is planning a career in office administration. How do you type with no hands? Meanwhile us Americanos are taking antidepressants because kissing ass to keep our twelve-hour-day jobs gets depressing. Not to mention knowing we could be replaced by an even better ass-kisser who’ll work fourteen-hour days. Can’t see them hiring an African with no hands though. Maybe for about five minutes for the photo op.

  I buzz Zippy’s, a man answers. It’s the ape man from Marty Millionaire. I scram.

  She picks up on the first ring.

  ‘I need somewhere to sleep,’ I tell her.

  ‘Where are you? I’ll send a cab.’

  Her house is narrow and antiseptic with abstract art on the walls.

  ‘Can I make you some tea or coffee? Would you like some juice?’

  ‘I’m hungry, actually,’ I say, staring at the art to avoid staring at her.

  ‘What can I get you? Bread and cheese? Some fruit? I could scramble some eggs.’

  ‘Bread and cheese is fine.’ Her place is open concept, meaning there’s no place to hide. While she messes around in the kitchen, I scan for family photos. There are none, probably because they’d clutter the designer look. The furniture is metallic and leather, angular. A child could never live here. A child would skewer herself on the furniture.

  Constance puts
the food on the cleared dining room table. At Drew’s these days, tables are never cleared. They breed paper and dirty cups.

  She sits across from me. Without the hat I can see her hairline, which, of course, is exactly like mine. She has bed-head, her mouse-coloured hair stands out in tufts. So much for my mouse hair turning an actual colour someday.

  ‘Do you work?’ I ask.

  ‘Not anymore. I’m on permanent disability.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Fibromyalgia.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘A muscle disease. It’s not fatal but very disabling.’

  ‘You don’t look disabled.’

  ‘I have chronic pain, and tire very easily.’ She keeps tugging on the chain around her neck.

  ‘Is it genetic?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘What did you do before?’

  ‘I worked for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.’

  ‘A government job. Must have been nice. Big cheques, big benefits.’

  She lays out napkins. ‘It had its moments.’

  ‘So I guess us taxpayers are subsidizing your disability.’

  She slices a tomato. It bleeds all over the plate.

  ‘So why didn’t you abort?’ I ask.

  ‘I thought I’d be able to manage.’

  ‘What happened?’

  She sips her tea, nervously, of course, wrapping her witchy fingers around the cup. ‘I kept you for months. You cried incessantly. I thought I was losing my mind. I suspect it was post-partum depression, although they didn’t call it that then. I probably should have sought counselling. But I had my thesis to defend.’ She tugs at the chain around her neck again. ‘It just wasn’t working.’

  ‘Isn’t it great chucking stuff when it just isn’t working? Like why bother to try and fix it. Get rid of it. Computers, babies … ’ ‘You have every right to be angry.’

  I shove bread and cheese in my mouth and chew for about an hour, waiting for her to continue.

  ‘You’re probably wondering why I’ve contacted you after all these years,’ she says, ripping a slice of bread into little bits. ‘I just felt … it was time.’