The Forgotten Daughter

by Joanna Goodman

  She sells mostly weed and booze—her uncle pays sixty bucks for a case of twelve bottles of Rikaloff vodka on the reservation, and she sells each bottle for twelve to fifteen bucks, depending on the customer. It’s pretty lucrative, given it’s really just an add-on to supplement the weed. Her uncle always says, “Even smugglers need to upsell.”

  She’s still selling CDs, too, which is booming. She doesn’t even need to work at Stan’s to do it. Roger has a partner inside the warehouse now, and they’ve been able to double their inventory. All Véronique has to do is pick up the CDs at the locker and distribute them.

  James thinks she’s only smuggling booze. He doesn’t know about the weed, and he assumes the CD thing ended when she quit Stan’s. Although he doesn’t like her smuggling at all—hates it, in fact—it was either accept it for the time being or lose her. She made her case around family loyalty and her obligation to her grieving uncle, and agreed to cut back to once a month—which frankly hasn’t had any impact on her revenue—and to extricate herself when Marc was fully trained. That was over a year ago and she’s not quite ready to walk away yet. The money is too good, and although she loves her free time, it’s really more about her freedom. Meaning she’s free to live her life on her own terms, apart from society’s underpaid, undervalued cogs and minions.

  She did have to make one other concession to get James off her back, and that was to go back to school. She quit after high school, not bothering to go on to university. Originally, she was going to take a year off and decide what to do, but when the offer came to smuggle cigarettes, she was relieved. University could wait, she figured, if she ever went at all. But the more she thinks about it now—and having made this promise to James—she thinks it’s not such a bad idea. Fidel Castro and Karl Marx studied law in university, and Che Guevara went to medical school to become a physician. School may be an institution, but she’s well aware it’s one that breeds great revolutionaries.

  She’s twenty-five now. Without a degree, her options will be limited in a new independent Quebec. She wants to be part of the change. She doesn’t want to just passively watch it unfold. More and more often lately, she imagines being able to say to her future children: I was there when we voted to separate. I helped build this country. She wants to leave her mark, just as her father yearned to leave his. She’s even considered the possibility that she might be able to do it without breaking the law.

  She applied to the political science program at a couple of local universities and has been taking night courses over the past year to make up some missing credits. This seems to have appeased James, and in return, he’s adopted a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy around her smuggling. If all goes well, she’ll start college next September.

  The Callahan incident is locked in a mental vault. Elodie said, “You can’t bury something that’s still alive.” That may be so, but she’s sure as hell trying. The memory may not be buried, but it’s shoved somewhere out of the way. For the most part, she’s feeling optimistic. Living with James in this beautiful, sun-filled apartment feels like a new beginning. She signed up to volunteer for the referendum’s Yes campaign, which has made her father delirious with pride. Yesterday he called to tell her to do one hour a week of basic cleaning at the campaign office. “Don’t wait for them to ask you,” he told her. “Just do it. Pick up a broom and sweep. Empty the garbage cans. Clean the toilets. Even our party leader used to clean the toilets with us at the RIN headquarters.”

  “I know, Dad.”

  “Just don’t wait to be asked. The campaign staff and the other volunteers will respect you. Parizeau might even notice you. Also, if you can bring in a vacuum and your own supplies, do it. It may not seem important, but it is. Trust me.”

  “Why don’t you volunteer with me and you can clean the toilets?” she said.

  He laughed, but didn’t offer to join her. The first meeting is today.

  She removes two bagels from the double toaster, smothers them with butter and cream cheese, and returns to their bedroom on the second floor.

  James moans with pleasure when she enters the bed.

  “Is that for me or the bagels?” she says.

  “Both.”

  They eat bagels in bed, their legs entwined, sesame seeds spilling onto the sheets around them.

  “Would your father be disappointed in you?” she asks him, out of the blue. “That you’re going to vote No?”

  She knows Gabriel was a separatist. Nowhere else do those two little words—Yes and No—say more about a person politically than in Montreal.

  “Probably,” James says. “But I have a mind of my own. He would have respected my choice.”

  The phone rings and James answers. “It’s your uncle,” he says, frowning.

  Véronique gets out of bed and takes the call in the hallway. She can hear James sighing as she closes the bedroom door behind her.

  “Véro?” Camil barks.

  “Is everything okay?”

  “It’s frosh week in Ottawa,” he says. “It starts Monday. I need you and Marc to do a delivery.”

  “Mon’onc—”

  “I didn’t push last year because it was so soon after Pierre, but we can’t walk away from all that money. Those kids spend like crazy, especially this week.”

  “No.”

  “Véronique, please. Why are you being so irrational?”

  “Send Marc. He doesn’t need me.”

  “Of course he needs you. He’s never met Callahan.”

  “So what? I’d never met him either the first time I went.”

  “Marc doesn’t speak English.”

  “He can get by.”

  “No, he can’t! Not in Ontario. Can’t you do it this one time for me? Introduce him to Callahan?”

  “No. I do plenty for you, mon’onc.”

  “And you make good money for it.”

  “I’m trying to get out of this, not get deeper in. I’m not doing any more universities.”

  “You don’t care at all about the money?”

  “We make plenty of money,” she says impatiently. “I have to go. I’ll see you next weekend.”

  She hangs up, not even waiting for him to say goodbye. James is grinning when she gets back into bed.

  The Yes campaign office is in Parizeau’s Outremont riding, a pleasant walk up her old street to Parc Avenue, and then onto bustling Bernard Street. She passes clusters of brunchers, enjoying their eggs and cappuccinos on patios, knowing these are the last rays of Indian summer.

  Coming through the door of the second-floor office above the Cinq Saisons supermarket, Véronique is warmly welcomed by an older woman, about fifty, wearing a yellow T-shirt with bold blue writing: OUI ET ÇA DEVIENT POSSIBLE.

  Yes and it becomes possible.

  Véronique is given a name tag to stick on her shirt. She can see right away that she’s one of the youngest volunteers, along with one other twenty-something guy. The other volunteers, about two dozen of them, are older; old enough to still vividly remember the loss of the 1980 referendum. This one is their redemption, as it is her parents’. The woman in the yellow T-shirt asks them to sit down on plastic folding chairs that have been set up haphazardly around the room. She remembers similar chairs, pea soup green, from her grandparents’ apartment in the seventies.

  “Yes and it becomes possible!” the woman bellows, startling Véronique.

  Everyone applauds enthusiastically, a couple of people whistle. “My name is Céline, and I’m one of the campaign workers for the Outremont riding. Welcome!”

  More clapping.

  “There’s coffee and donuts by the bathroom,” Céline says, and Véronique turns toward the back of the room, where an abundant display of Dunkin’ Donuts is laid out between two decrepit coffee dispensers, probably relics from the 1980 campaign. She notices the young guy is watching her—youth latching onto youth, a life preserver in a sea of the middle-aged. She smiles. He tips his head. He’s got long hair parted in the middle, h
ippie-style. He’s thin and pale, wears glasses. His sweater is ratty, unraveling at the neck and sleeves. She feels a certain solidarity with him, a guy his age who’s also here on a Saturday to volunteer for a cause she herself is so passionate about. Go separatists!

  “There are so many ways to help out,” Céline is saying. “You can do whatever you’re comfortable with, no one is here to force you to do anything. I’m going to read off a list of jobs—”

  She looks down at her clipboard. “Everybody’s favorite, the block walk,” she announces to a roar of groans. “You walk around different neighborhoods, knock on doors, and leave a door hanger if no one is home. If someone is home, you engage in conversation. We’ll give you scripts for the phone bank and the block walks. Feel free to ad-lib. The script is just a recommendation.

  “Then we have the phone bank,” she continues. “This is pretty straightforward. You just go down a list making cold calls. If you’re good with numbers, there’s data entry. We need people to log all our donations. Accuracy is very important, so if you’re dyslexic, pick another job.”

  Everyone laughs.

  “For those of you with cars, we need people to deliver lawn signs. We’re going to get lots of calls from people who want signs, and we also want to reach out to potential supporters with prime property for our biggest signs—residential or retail corners, key streets. Just make sure you wear comfortable shoes! And if none of that appeals to you, you can distribute handouts or clean the office. No one here is above cleaning. We’re all working toward the same goal: sovereignty!”

  More cheering and applause.

  “For those of you who were involved in the 1980 campaign,” Céline says, her voice rising and cracking, “this is our time! And for those of you too young to remember”—she gazes directly at Véronique—“may you never have to suffer the disappointment we suffered fifteen years ago.”

  The volunteers are on their feet now, applauding and whistling like it’s a pep rally. Even Véronique is standing, spellbound, clapping with these strangers with whom she already feels the deepest kinship.

  “We’re going to train you today in all the jobs,” Céline says. “But to really be effective, we need you to show up on a regular basis. We need to be able to count on all of you to help us win this one!”

  Véronique offers to start by delivering lawn signs and handing out campaign material at the colleges and universities. Her mandate is to engage Montreal’s youth—the students, the dropouts, the slackers, the workers. “You’re looking for the ambivalent ones,” Céline tells her. “No need to waste precious time on die-hard separatists. We’re looking for the people on the fence, the ones who aren’t sure. That’s where you can be most effective. Your job is to convince them they will have the brightest future in an independent Quebec. Master of our own domain and all that.”

  Véronique nods. Her partner is the young guy. His name is Louis. They discuss their strategy over maple donuts and watery coffee. “I have a car,” he tells her. “I can pick you up if you like. We can start with the signs. What days are good for you?”

  “Any day,” she says.

  “Me, too. I work nights.”

  They decide on next Friday. Before they leave, Céline hands them each a yellow T-shirt with the Yes campaign slogan—YES AND IT BECOMES POSSIBLE!

  Finally, after a long day of training, they set off for home, little soldiers of the revolution.

  When she gets back to the apartment, weary and exhilarated, James is at his laptop, typing away. She kisses the back of his neck.

  “Hey. How was it?” he asks her, pulling her onto his lap.

  “Amazing. There was this feeling of excitement in the room,” she says. “This energy and camaraderie. I totally get what my dad must have felt back in the sixties.”

  “Please don’t kidnap anyone.”

  “I can’t promise,” she jokes. “What’re you working on?”

  “A twenty-five-year commemorative piece about the October Crisis.”

  She groans.

  “The anniversary is coming up next month.”

  “Yes. I know.”

  “I’m doing a four-part series, and I need to ask you a favor,” he says, taking her hands. She knows exactly what he’s going to ask, and she glares at him, waiting.

  “Let me talk to your dad,” he says.

  She gets up off his lap, annoyed.

  “Please?” He tips his head, looking up at her with pleading eyes. “Just ask him if I can interview him. I know it’s for an English wire, and it will probably be printed in the Gazette—among other Anglo papers—but think about it, V. He’d get to tell his story to the people who need to hear it the most: the English. The separatists already know why he did what he did. They’re already sympathetic to him. The English don’t understand. I don’t understand, and I’m French Canadian. Your father is still perceived as a villain. I just want him to tell his side of things.”

  She’s quiet, listening.

  “And yes, this would be really good for my career, too,” he adds. “I’m not going to pretend it wouldn’t be. An interview with one of the original FLQ members? I’ve wanted to do this for a long time. Will you at least ask him?”

  “I don’t want you to paint him as a monster.”

  “I wouldn’t. I’m going to be objective.”

  “Objective,” she mutters. “Like you’re objective about the situation with the Duplessis orphans? Or the separatists?”

  “The October Crisis story will be in your father’s own words. I will present his version of events as objectively as I can.”

  “That’s what scares me,” she says.

  “Please, mon amour?”

  Maybe because she’s still on a high from her day at the Yes campaign, or maybe because she believes James, that it could be an opportunity for her father to finally explain his side of the story, that James could be the one to exonerate him after all these years of silence . . .

  “I’ll talk to him,” she says.

  “Really? Are you serious?” He kisses her face, his lips running up and down the side of her hairline, her jaw, her neck. “You sure?”

  “I said I would talk to him. Don’t get your hopes up.”

  21

  “It’s a paradoxical case,” the appellate judge says to the gallery. “Both the plaintiffs and the defendants desperately want to be heard. One claims injustice, the other seeks to defend their actions and point of view. The court has already determined that a class action suit is not the best way forward for a complex matter such as this one. There does remain the inalienable right of each plaintiff to pursue individual recourse, but this task, to my mind, is next to impossible.”

  Elodie’s body is rigid, bracing against the blow of another disappointment.

  “I think we’ve reached the end of our judicial limits here,” the judge concludes. “While I do respect your right to address the court, I believe this is not the appropriate venue to resolve this issue.”

  Outside the Palais de Justice, Elodie gropes around in her purse in search of a cigarette. Her hands are shaking.

  “Elo!” Véronique calls after her. “Wait!”

  “I’m sorry,” Elodie says, lighting her cigarette. She sucks on it to calm herself down, expels a breath, and takes another drag. “I couldn’t stay in there another second. The judge didn’t even consider our appeal!”

  “I know.”

  “What if no judge ever will? Are we stupid to think we might get justice in any of the courts?”

  “No, of course not. That judge was awful,” Véronique says. “But it’s not over.”

  “He didn’t even consider our appeal,” Elodie repeats, pacing in front of the building.

  There are no cameras here today, just another quiet loss. The public is far more interested in the referendum these days than in the ongoing misfortunes of the Duplessis orphans.

  “Why don’t we go out for lunch?” Véronique suggests.

  “I’m not hungry.
”

  “Come on,” she insists. “Let’s go to Old Montreal and walk around like tourists.”

  Reluctantly, Elodie lets Véronique lead her by the hand along Rue Notre Dame. “What do you want to hang around a middle-aged woman like me for?”

  “I guess I’ve got a middle-aged soul,” Véronique says, and they both laugh.

  They turn onto Place Jacques Cartier, which is full of people milling around the artisans’ tents. “My mom and I used to come here and get our caricatures done,” Véronique says. “I’d always send mine to my dad instead of real pictures.”

  “I’m sure even your caricature was pretty.”

  “Let’s get one together.”

  “A caricature? Of me? What do I need that for?”

  “It’s a fun souvenir. Come on.”

  Once again, Elodie lets herself be pulled through the square, weaving through all the tourists, until Véronique stops at an orange-tented booth wallpapered in caricatures of famous people—President Clinton, Madonna, Jacques Parizeau. A sign above Barbra Streisand’s face says: 5 MINUTES—$10.

  They sit side by side on two stools while the artist sketches quietly, his head tipped to one side, his lips parted slightly in concentration. His hand moves like a conductor’s, flicks and strokes and flourishes, and when he’s done, he rips the page from the easel and proudly holds it up for them to see.

  They both burst out laughing at how ridiculous it is—Véronique with her messy hair, nose piercing, and doll’s face; Elodie with the long, droopy features of a basset hound. Véronique pays the artist and gives Elodie the sketch.

  “He made me look so sad,” Elodie says, studying her exaggeratedly forlorn eyes in the drawing.

  “It’s just a caricature,” Véronique says. “It’s supposed to be exaggerated.”

  They decide to have lunch at La Grande Terrasse, a tourist spot in the center of the square. They sit beneath the red awning on the heated terrace, reveling in the fall weather. They order burgers and beer. The beer arrives in frosted mugs, just the way Elodie likes it.

  “You know what pisses me off?” Elodie says. “When the judge said the court is not the ‘appropriate venue’ for resolving this issue. Where the hell is the appropriate venue then?”