At the next corner, the wind slams into me. I close my eyes, open my mouth. Blow through me wind, I can’t do this. I could keep walking, out into the night. My fingers brush the brick, tracing the curve of the building. Everyone’s in the meeting when I get back inside except for Heather who’s waiting for me by the desk.
“Everything okay?”
“All good,” I say.
“I’ll go into the meeting then.” She hesitates.
I lean over the log book.
18:55 Meg on room check
19:00 Heather, Jay, Tanya in Welcome meeting. Meg on desk.
When I put the pen down, Heather’s gone.
It was all a lie. Everything.
“Who’s going into ceremony?” Jay asks.
“I’m on my moon,” Tanya says.
“Me too,” I say. Dad. Getting his period.
“Me too,” Heather says, then cackles. I must have looked particularly dumb because she pats my arm. “There now, Meg. It’s been a while since I hit menopause and you should be glad you weren’t around for that.”
Tanya looks up from the log book. “Want to know how to end a war?”
“Enlighten us,” Jay says.
“Send in the menopausal women. Be over by dinner.”
“Because they have to cook it,” Heather says.
He would have been well past it by the time I showed up.
Theresa, a handsome woman in her early thirties with long black hair and perfect sculpted lips, hands me her rings and earrings. She must be this week’s chief. She and the council go into the chamber. The others begin to gather, slipping off their shoes. The volume of voices builds. “Sssh,” Tanya holds her finger to her lips, catching the eyes of three noisy girls.
The blanket that covers the door to the chamber is pulled aside. Deborah’s first. Smudge person holds the abalone shell with one hand, sweeps smoke toward her with a bird’s wing. A few of the new ones crane their necks to watch as she rinses her hands in the smoke, cups them to scoop it over the crown of her head, her eyes, ears, nose, mouth, chest.
The line shuffles forward, Heather in the midst of the women, all of them wearing sarongs over jeans.
In the office Tanya and Jay are talking quietly. Behind the last man, the blanket closes. On the bench outside the office, the menstruating women sit, staring straight ahead, keeping their special bloody magic to themselves. Too much power, that’s the official line. It’s not mine to argue but it still rubs at me. Or perhaps it is. Mine to argue. My culture. Even if I know squat about it. Wouldn’t make me so different from half the people in here. City Indians. Urban aboriginals. Bannock the acme of my cultural experience.
Most of the rooms are dark. Sleepy voices murmur goodnight. I could navigate these corridors with my eyes closed, the women’s end of the bedroom wing powdery, chemical sweet; the men’s musky, like the ram pens in the barn at home, though here it’s laced with pungent aftershave.
Rams and ewes. I know it’s not that simple.
I’m missing two, a man and a woman.
They’re in the cafeteria at separate tables, hunched over scrolls of newsprint. Cheryl, who wants to be an electrician, looks up and smiles. “Sorry. I got lost. Look at this, I’m not even ten yet.” Her even writing covers six feet of the coarse paper. “I didn’t think I would have anything to say, eh?”
James nods. “There’s a lot to it,” he says. “My life.” His paper is multicoloured, a wild mingle of drawings and lettering in different sizes. “I’m almost done.”
They’re in their early twenties, both of them. Same age I was. How old was Dad when he came to Canada? Or she. They’re both looking at me. “Will another fifteen minutes do you?”
Their heads are down, hands moving over the paper before I leave the room.
In the office Jay’s finishing off the overviews. “Got anything to add, Meg?”
“Uh, James and Cheryl working hard on their life lines.”
“Excuse me.” We all look up. Pointed chin, tired eyes. New girl. Wendy. “Could you come? Someone.”
Tanya and Jay are on their feet. I’m behind them, moving down the corridor. Wendy steps out of the way. Raised voices come through the door of room 19. Jay listens a moment, glances at Tanya then opens the door. Two women, one with black hair half way down her back, one with short red hair, stare at each other. Their hands are at their sides, curled. Neck tendons taut.
“Mona,” Jay says to the redhead. She’s squinty-eyed, skin dried out from too many cigarettes. “And you are?” Jay turns to black-hair, her voice one of polite inquiry.
“Janice.” Broad slab of a face, pockmarked.
Jay turns to look at the label on the room door. “Janice, you should be in your room. Or do you want to come to the office, talk to us about what’s happening here?”
“That cunt,” Janice says.
“Let’s go,” Tanya says. “Both of you.”
We step back and they troop down the hall to the office, Jay and Tanya following.
“You okay?” I ask the woman who came and got us. Wendy.
She nods.
“You sure?”
“Is it like this?” Her voice isn’t much more than a whisper. She tips her chin in the direction of the retreating backs. “Fucking cunt,” echoes down the corridor.
“Limited vocabulary, eh?”
A small smile reaches her mouth but not her eyes.
“No, it’s not usually like this. I think those two have some history.”
Her hair is a deep copper and wavy, her eyes blue-grey, skin the blue-white of skimmed milk.
“Is it ... well ... is it okay being ... not being ...? Some friends, when I said I was coming here. They said you had to be Native. Aboriginal. But the lady in admissions ...”
“Everyone’s welcome. There’s always a mix of aboriginal and non-aboriginal clients here. Staff too.” She’s pegged me for white.
“I wanted to come here. The spirituality. It’s different. I thought ... If I don’t get it this time ...” Her chin is quivering. She’s biting her lip.
“Do you want to talk a bit?”
She nods. I sit at the foot of the bed. On the little table next to the pillow is a framed photo of a blonde girl, five or six years old, and a ginger-haired toddler.
She touches the photo as she sits down. “This is my third time. I’m thirty years old. I have a degree. I had a house. Children.” She looks away. “Everything. This is all I’ve got left.” She waves a hand at her own slight body. “If I go out again ...” Her eyes are blue tunnels.
Creator. God. Whatever, please. Help this woman. I look into her eyes, can’t see the end. “You’re in the right place. You don’t ever have to pick up a drink or a drug again. So long as you remember this moment. How you feel right now. It’s the gift of desperation. Hold onto it.” The tiredness seeps back into her eyes, dims the shimmering blue. “I bet you’re exhausted.” She nods. “Go to sleep. We’ll sort this out.” I lift my chin at the other bed.
Fuck. Fury rakes my veins. Heather is sitting at the front desk, back turned to the closed door.
One of the women is saying, “I don’t want to go back to prison.”
“Drug court,” Heather mouths, slipping the client list toward me.
Janice Yellowknee. Status. Mona Bernsick. Métis.
“So can you two work on not getting into it?” Tanya asks.
“Yes.”
“Yes.”
The office door opens and they file out. Jay and Tanya are looking at each other. Jay shakes her head, “Fuuuck.”
“They didn’t waste any time,” Tanya says.
I say, “What the fuck were admissions thinking?”
“Thinking?” Jay says.
Tanya says, “It goes back before prison. This has been going on for years. Years and years.”
“I’ll do the incident report,” Jay says. “Go ahead, you guys. I’ll see you tomorrow, Meg.”
I look at the clock. Five past midnight
. “Where’s Henry?”
“Getting himself a cup of coffee. He put his head in the door, pulled it right back out.
“Well, I’m off,” Heather says. “Once again this place puts the dys in dysfunctional and once again I’m surprised which says I’m not all well up here.” She taps her forehead.
“We wouldn’t be working here if we were,” Tanya says.
Chapter Seven
HEATHER’S TAILLIGHTS JOLT over the last speed bump. She turns right. I go left. Riding the range roads after midnight. Another thing I like about this job. The long way home. Out of the north a single white light grows bigger and bigger. Right on time. I could gun it. Or turn back, go through the city. Instead I sit and watch the cars clatter past. Rust red with a flat-looking ear of wheat stencilled in yellow. Saskatchewan Wheat Board printed along the bottom. Five in a row then a series of straight sided carriages with open tops. Coal? Scrap? Nothing? They reach back out of sight around the bend in the track. I’m not even ten yet. Cheryl, waving her six sheets. Good thing I never went to treatment. Handing in my homework. Nothing there. Ten empty cars. Clackety clack. The big empty. Wendy’s eyes. Tunnels without end. The beast’s got you and you know it and there’s not a fucking thing you can do. Burn of scotch in my throat, tearing out of the farm. Yesterday. Yesterday I found out I knew less than I thought. Whatever I thought I knew, I don’t. Because it was all fucking lies. It flares again. Fire in the roots. Dad is not my father. Clack, clack, clack. I have no father. Clackety clack. No mother. No father. The last carriage passes. Red tail lights disappear around the bend. I sit staring into the dark. The good old bottomless fucking pit. What I saw in Wendy’s eyes. No human power can fill the pit. That’s what they say.
Pray for her. Pray for me.
Pray to what? I need to talk to someone.
Chapter Eight
“CATHY’S IN,” JAY mouths as I let myself into the office. “She’s been here all day.”
“I thought she took weekends off.”
“Place can’t run without her.”
“It’s just the two of us on tonight?”
“No karaoke, eh? They’re going to watch a movie. You doing cash?”
“Yes.” I open up the box, tally the coins. Five cents for every sheet of Bounce, pretty soon you have a dollar. Even the reek of fabric softener and cologne is comforting.
Footsteps in the office. Cathy, wide and bustling. She could disorganize a nunnery.
I sign off on the sheet, close up the cash box. Cathy’s in the doorway and suddenly I can’t breathe. Big body blocking the way. Can’t see her face. “Excuse me.”
“Oh, sorry.” She backs up. “How are you, Meg?”
“Good.”
Spaniel eyes, black hair pulled back in a ponytail. I keep walking toward her and she keeps backing up until we’re out of the narrow space between the table and the back wall.
“How about you?” I ask.
“Relieved. I hired a new person today. He’ll be good.”
“That right?” Jay says.
“Doug Fletcher. You know him.”
“Ah.”
“He’s coming in at six for orientation.”
“Today?” I ask, trying for neutral.
Cathy glances at me. She may not be as dim as she seems. “I thought you two could show him the ropes.”
“Time for a room check,” I say.
“Coffee?” Jay asks when I get back.
“Where is everybody?”
“They’ve got some shrink in talking about triggers.”
“So, who’s the new guy?”
“Tanya’s ex.”
“Uh oh?”
“Nah. They get along. He takes the kids a couple days a week.”
“His kids?”
“No. But they got together when the kids were little. He worked here long back. It’s how they met.”
She hands me a mug, pours one for herself. I glance at the clock. 4:45. I open my mouth but nothing comes. Jay’s eyes settle on me.
“You were going to see your father. How did it go? If you don’t mind me asking.”
I shake my head. My eyes fill with tears. Crap.
She shunts the box of tissues my way, takes the chair with a view of the front desk.
I take a deep breath, toss the tissue in the waste basket. “Want to hear a strange story?”
“Of course.”
“You know how Dad asked to see me.”
Jay waits.
After a bit I get going again. “You know what I thought. But it wasn’t that at all.” I can’t lift my eyes off the grey top of the office table. Jay is sitting very still. I’ve seen her do this with clients, letting the silence grow. I’ve forgotten how to move the muscles of my tongue. It’s like pushing against a wall of paper. Trying to reach the words. “My father told me he’s a woman.”
Jay’s eyebrows lift. Her mouth shapes ‘wow.’ She does it again, with sound this time. “Wow. How do you wrap your mind around that one?”
“Can’t even start. I stall out on pronouns.”
“When did he decide? Jesus. How old is he?”
“That’s not it. He was born a woman.”
Jay leans back in her chair. “Biologically?”
“So he says.”
“What exactly did he say? If you don’t mind me asking.”
“It’s a relief. To talk about it. I mean this is my father. My not-father. Christ.” I close my eyes. He said, ‘Meg, I’m not who you think I am.’ I thought he meant he was my real father. My blood father. But then he said, ‘I’m not a man.’ I think I said, ‘What?’ and he said, ‘I’m a woman.’”
“Who passes as a man? But not believing she’s a man?”
“He said. She said—I close my eyes again—‘I had reason to pass as ...’ No, ‘to pass myself off as a man.’”
“That’s pretty clear.” Jay pauses, staring at the back wall then she looks at me. “You believe him?”
I hesitate. “There are moments I think it can’t be true. But ... little things. Suddenly they make sense.”
“As if you’d known, unconsciously?”
I shake my head. “God, no.”
“How long has he been, she been passing?”
“I don’t know exactly. A long time. There’s a lot I didn’t ask. I got distracted by thinking about Mum.”
“Your mother ...” Jay shakes her head. “Wow. Oh, wow.”
“My hard-core evangelical homophobic mother.”
“Makes you wonder, eh?”
“What?”
“How many other couples are passing. I love it.”
I stare at her.
“Meg, think about it. All those Christian couples.”
“Who aren’t what they appear? Is that so great, to fool people? They trust you to be what you say you are and then you’re not.”
“Life’s a stage, Meg. Everyone’s in costume. Don’t get sincere on me.”
It’s like running full-tilt into a brick wall. “Got to pee,” I say. It’s the only thing I can think of. I want to cry but when I shut the washroom door I don’t. I just sit there. Outside I hear feet scuffling, laughter. Someone tries the door.
“Suppertime, it’s suppertime,” Jay’s voice booms over the intercom.
The door handle turns again.
Usually I get in line but staff are allowed to go to the front. I reach for a plate. White meat, white gravy, peas and a white bun. As soon as I get back to the desk Jay goes for hers. I force down a mouthful. The door beeps. Quarter to six. A tallish man with shoulder-length brown hair ambles in. He’s wearing an old canvas army jacket, jeans, leather work boots so worn and soft they look like paws. He stops, looking across at the dome. Hawk nose, dimple in his chin, eyebrows a straight dark slash across his face. He turns to look at me, smiles, his eyes mild and brown.
“I’m Doug Fletcher.” He extends a hand, warm, dry, calloused along the base of the fingers.
“Meg Coopworth.”
; He glances down at the plate. “I see the food’s as colourful as ever.”
“Hey Doug,” Jay sets her tray down and gives him a hug. She’s not the huggy type. “You can run but you can’t hide, eh? Welcome back.”
He dips his head. “Supervisor’s office still in the same place?”
“Same old.”
He nods to me, turns to go.
“That you Doug?” It’s Mona, the redhead.
“Hey, Mona, right? How’s it going?”
“Better for seeing you.” She’s gazing up into his eyes.
Jay, standing next to me, murmurs, “Good luck with that, Mona.”
“Catch you later,” Doug says, headed for the corridor.
“How long ago did he work here at Dreamcatcher?”
“Five, six years ago. He quit before my time. Went up north to make some money.”
“He in program?”
“Long time.”
“I haven’t seen him around.”
“He lives on an acreage over by Lac Ste. Anne now. They lived in the city, him and Tanya.”
“Why’d they break up?”
Jay glances at me. “Interested?”
“Just curious.”
“Good because, according to Tanya, he’s gay.”
Knock, wait, open doors on empty rooms. I love it. Well, Jay, I don’t. I think I said that out loud. I’m standing in an empty hallway, talking to myself. The corridor stretches out ahead of me. It’s getting longer and longer. Floor, walls, everything’s flimsy. Get a grip. Get outside.
Janice turns her broad, indifferent face my way. I should tell her to go inside, help clean up. The tip of her cigarette glows as I turn the corner of the counselling wing. Wind slices through my jeans, my sweater.
I love it. Well, I hate it. Only I suppose I’m not allowed to hate it.
Cardinal Divide Page 4