Cardinal Divide

by Nina Newington

  I swallow. “The last anyone heard, they were in Winnipeg?”

  “That’s where they were headed. According to Dan.” Judy takes another couple of drags of oxygen. “I didn’t see Dan for years. He went off on quite a tear. Spent a bit of time in jail.”

  “What was he like?”

  Judy purses her lips. “Nowadays,” she says, after a pause, “you’d say he had FAS. You know what that is?”

  I nod, seeing Joey with his buzz cut hair and prey animal eyes. “Rabbit,” I say.

  “Any little thing frustrated him, he got mad. He had a kind heart but ...” She shrugs.

  Chapter Fifty Eight

  TRAFFIC’S HEAVY INTO the city for a Friday night. I’ll be twenty minutes late for the Alano Club meeting. Could just go home.

  Val looks over as I walk in the door, nods. A few others smile hello but the room’s crowded, faces I don’t recognize. Getting a cup of coffee I see a cake in the kitchen, forest of candles waiting to be lit. A birthday meeting. Speaker’s a black guy. Thick African accent. I don’t remember what country. He was a Member of Parliament, the youngest ever elected. Came to Canada to get a PhD. Didn’t know anybody. Nobody knew him. “I was a big man in my country. In Canada,”—he shakes his head—“you didn’t understand how important I was.” People laugh. “Inside,”—he pats his chest with a big hand—“I didn’t feel like anybody. I wasn’t good enough unless I was the best.”

  By the sound of it, if Dan and Lisa Laboucan were my progenitors, I scored a hundred on the genetic crapshoot for this disease. Dan and Lisa and their daughter Theresa.

  Val comes over at the end. “Coffee?”

  I hesitate but she’s the closest thing I have to a sponsor these days.

  “Talk to me, sistah. How goes the search?”

  “I might have found them. My name might be Theresa Laboucan. Or not. It could just be a coincidence.”

  When I’ve told Val the story she stares down into the dregs of her coffee, turning the mug, coral fingernails against the white china.

  “So you’ll try to trace Theresa Laboucan? And the mother?”

  I nod.

  “Steve who goes to the Mustard Seed? He works in the reference section of the Public Library. Helps people with their genealogy research.”

  “This is sort of the opposite. If I find Theresa then I’m not her.”

  Val studies me. “There was a story I was going to tell you, but I’m not sure it applies anymore.”

  “Tell me anyway.”

  “You know I had a daughter, right? After I got sober I decided I had to find her. It became an obsession. I’d see her on the street. Follow her home. Realize at the last minute it wasn’t her.

  “It got to be all I cared about. Quit going to meetings. Good thing I had a sponsor who didn’t give up on me. You know Beth C., right? She showed up at the shop when I quit returning her calls, said she’d make a scene if I didn’t have lunch with her.”

  I nod, picturing Beth, built like a block of wood, hair sprouting from the mole on her lip, trademark grey sweatpants, in the middle of the swank Glenora boutique.

  “She got me talking. ‘I have to know,’ I said. ‘I have to.’

  “She raised her hand, looked at me long and steady. ‘You want to,’ she said. ‘The only thing you have to do is not pick up a drink or a drug today.’

  “I opened my mouth to argue but she just kept looking at me.” Val shrugs. “The fight went out of me. I knew it was true. I want to know. I still want to know. I pray one day I will know. But I don’t have to.”

  I look at her smooth oval face, the eau de nil turtleneck, wool like a warm cloud, long gold earrings showing off her elegant neck. I make myself meet her eyes again. She doesn’t look away, and I can’t.

  I tremble at the bareness of it. She’s sitting there, so beautifully put together, sitting with that terrible naked wanting, letting it be. Letting me see.

  “I don’t ...”

  Her eyes shift. I must have said the words out loud.

  “I don’t know if I want to know. I’m ...” I stall out.

  She waits.

  “It could be just another place I don’t belong.”

  She nods. “I’ve thought about it a lot from my daughter’s point of view. If the family she grew up in was a happy one, perhaps she wouldn’t want to find me.”

  “Oh Val, I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay. For today. Every day I turn it over. Every day I live my blessed life. And every night I thank my Creator for life exactly as it is.”

  Chapter Fifty Nine

  ON THE FAR side of the dome the little white ball dribbles away from the net. Joey and Janice are playing. He must have blown his pass privileges. She would have, if she’d had any to lose.

  Back at the desk, Jay is entering a room check in the log. “Quiet, eh?” she says, looking up at me. “Tanya’s coming in at five.”

  “How’s her mother?”

  “She stopped eating. Her kidneys are failing.”

  “So why’s Tanya coming into work?”

  “Brenda refused to give her any more time off.”

  “To look after her dying mother?”

  “According to Cathy.”

  “I don’t suppose Cathy’s standing up for us?”

  “What do you think? She says Tanya has to apply for compassionate leave. Like anything’s ever been that formal here. She also told Tanya they want to make the evening shifts into full-time positions.”

  “Make this a regular job?”

  “Sick days. The whole nine yards. So they can recruit a ‘better calibre of staff.’”

  “They haven’t mentioned this to any of us.”

  Jay shrugs. “Tanya figures Brenda’s looking for an excuse to fire her. I told her, ‘You go, I go.’”

  The phone rings. Jay swivels the chair, reaches for the receiver.

  “Doug, how you doing? ... Okay, okay .... Anyone call Cathy?” She laughs, “Isn’t that the way?” She hangs up, looks at me. “Tanya’s mother’s gone into a coma. Doug’s got the girls so he can’t come in. Heather’s away for the weekend.”

  “Did anyone call Cathy?”

  “Nope. You want to?”

  “Not much.”

  “She’d come in for the evening.”

  “Sighing mightily.” At this exact moment the idea of being in the office with Cathy makes me want to scream. “There’s Laura.”

  “There is Laura.” Jay’s using her perfectly neutral voice.

  The door dings again.

  It’s Shannon and Warren and a couple of others festooned with plastic bags. There’s not much in the bags. A box of tissues, a pack of smokes, an undershirt.

  “Have a good time?” Jay asks.

  Warren actually looks at her and nods.

  Shannon says, “We met Ash downtown. She’s clean. Harry’s going to help her reapply.”

  “That’s great.”

  “Theresa’s been taking her to meetings. She’s got a job at the Friendship Centre.”

  “Theresa does?”

  Shannon nods. “She got a place. We can stay there when we get out.” She glances sideways at Warren. He almost smiles.

  “And James?” Jay asks.

  Shannon looks away.

  Warren says, “His girlfriend kicked him out.”

  “Because he used?”

  As they head off down the corridor I say, “Shit. I guess it’s not really a surprise but shit anyway.”

  “He was doing it for his girlfriend, eh? But Ash, that’s good. And Theresa, working at the Friendship Centre.”

  Theresa, Theresa, Theresa. The name ought to ring some kind of bell, oughtn’t it?

  The door alarm chirps again. Jay glances over then she’s on her feet, a single fluid motion. I wonder suddenly if she studies some kind of martial art. “Ready for this?” she murmurs.

  Don and Danielle come in together, Don swinging his truck keys. It’s not him, it’s Danielle.

  “Come o
n back, guys, one at a time,” Jay says.

  I stay on the desk, call to Danielle as she starts to slip off toward the bedrooms, “Hold on Danielle, we’ve got to check you out.”

  “I need to use the washroom.”

  “Use the one out here, please.”

  She doesn’t look at me as she crosses the open area in front of the desk. I don’t catch a whiff of anything but there’s something different about her.

  In the office Jay checks the bags of snacks and new clothes Don brought back, logs in his cell phone and keys, puts them in the safe, all the while chatting about his day.

  When she joins me at the front desk I tip my chin toward the washroom door. “She’s been in there a while.”

  “She take her bags in?”

  “She wasn’t carrying anything.”

  The washroom door opens.

  “Come on back,” Jay calls, her tone light.

  Danielle keeps her head turned away from me as she comes through the gate.

  Jay’s standing just inside the office. “How was your day?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.” Her lips clamp shut.

  I come back to join them, Danielle still avoiding my eyes. Then I catch it, under the toothpaste, the rank, familiar tang.

  “So Danielle,” Jay says slowly, “did you pick up today?”

  “No.”

  “Sit down.”

  Jay does, I do. After a minute Danielle does too.

  “Thing is, I can smell it, the booze. And you don’t look yourself.”

  Danielle huddles, a bird cornered by two cats. Any moment she’ll break into fluttering, panicked protestations.

  She doesn’t, so we sit there.

  Eventually Jay says, “Come on, Danielle. You know the rules. You can reapply in thirty days.”

  “I didn’t.”

  We sit some more. I remember being fifteen, principal badgering me about being high. Demanding I tell him. ‘You’re lying. You’re lying. Admit it.’ The hate that twisted in me. Cornered. Humiliated. Because of course I was lying and he knew it and I knew it and the only thing I had going was to keep lying which I did until he gave up. It didn’t feel like winning.

  It isn’t in Jay, that desire to humiliate. Which is probably why, after a while, Danielle starts to cry. “I had a really shitty day,” she says so low we both have to lean in. The door alarm beeps. I go up front, shutting the door behind me. I check out the next two clients’ bags on the bench by the desk. They look at the office door. It’s almost never shut.

  When it opens again, Jay comes out first. “Danielle is calling her aunt,” she says.

  I nod, flip open the medication binder, begin the paperwork. My heart is thudding.

  Danielle, her back to us, talks into the phone. Then she turns, holds out the phone to me. “She doesn’t want to talk to me. She wants to talk to you.”

  I shake my head. “I can’t speak with her right now.”

  Danielle keeps on holding the phone out to me. I keep not taking it. I can hear Judy’s voice. “Hello. Hello.” Finally Danielle says, “She won’t talk to you,” into the receiver. She turns away again.

  I can’t hear Judy’s reply. Nor can Jay but I feel her eyes on me. I keep on looking at Danielle’s back.

  After another minute the receiver slams down. “‘Call her when I’m sober.’” Danielle’s looking at me. “I thought she cared.”

  “Hard-line,” Jay says. “We’ll call a cab.”

  “Where am I going to go?” Danielle starts crying.

  “Should have thought of that before you picked up,” Jay says. “You know the rules. Use and you’re out for thirty days. Then you can come back, try again.” Her voice softens. “Lots of people don’t make it the first time.”

  Danielle just shakes her head, fat tears rolling down her cheeks. “I’m such a fucking loser. Why did I ever think I could be any better?”

  “I’m calling a cab now,” Jay says. “Meg, will you help Danielle pack her things?” She gives me a long look.

  When half the plastic garbage bags are stuffed with clothes, Danielle slumps down on the bed and begins to sob. “Nobody cares,” she says, between sobs. “Why should they? Even if you are my sister why would you want to have anything to do with me? I’m such a fucking loser. Oh, what am I going to do now?”

  I can hear the booze in her voice, feel the bit of her that’s watching to see what effect she’s having. I know better but I say, “What happened out there, Danielle? After all you’ve been through?” I sit down on the other bed.

  “I’m just a fucking fuck up. A no good fucking loser like the rest of my fucking family except they’re just poor drunk Indians on some no hope reserve in the ass end of anywhere. I’m a fucking whore. That’s what I am. A piece of ass.”

  “Poor me, poor me, pour me a drink.” Danielle stares at me. “You’re no better and no worse than a thousand other drunks.”

  She’s stopped crying. “You wanna know what happened?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m pregnant.”

  “What?”

  “I did two tests.”

  “How? How did you get pregnant?” I stop. Stupid question.

  She’s staring at the piles of clothes on the bed, the shoe-stuffed sack on the floor by her feet. Then she looks straight at me. “Okay, I’ll tell you.” Suddenly she doesn’t sound drunk. “One last trick, before I came in. So I’d have some money. He paid extra, doing it without a rubber. I quit taking the pill in jail. I was changing my life. Now look what’s happened. I got what I deserved.”

  I don’t know what to say, and then I do. “You think God’s punishing you.”

  She nods, just a small nod but definite.

  “You think God would create a life as a way to punish someone?”

  At last she shakes her head.

  I take a deep breath. “And last weekend, when you said you saw your aunt?”

  Danielle looks away. “I called him up,” she mutters.

  I wait but she doesn’t say anything else. I stand up. “Keep packing. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

  Jay’s just finishing up with Mona and Geoffrey. They look uneasy even though they can’t have heard yet. As they stalk off toward the bedrooms Jay turns to look at me.

  “She’s pregnant.”

  Jay’s eyebrows go up.

  “Pocket money for rehab,” I say. “What are the rules?”

  Jay studies me. After a moment she says, “Any pregnant woman who applies gets the first bed that opens up.”

  “And the thirty day waiting period?”

  “Doesn’t apply. She found out today?”

  I nod.

  “Who’s her counsellor?”

  “Angela.”

  “Hard-ass. We could let her have her beauty sleep.”

  “Make the decision ourselves?”

  “Or call our supervisor.”

  I reach for the phone.

  “Call the cab company first,” Jay says.

  “I thought they’d be here by now.”

  “I told them an hour. Remembered how much shit she brought with her.”

  Julie and Deborah come in as I’m hanging up. Jay looks at me, one eyebrow raised. “No reply. I asked her to call. Urgent but not an emergency.”

  “Guess we’ll decide. Do you want to tell her?” Jay asks.

  “I think you should.”

  Jay studies me a moment then nods. Almost smiles.

  “Hi Julie,” I say. “How was your day?”

  As Julie’s headed down the corridor Jay and Danielle appear, walking toward us. Danielle doesn’t look at Julie as they pass each other. When they get to the desk Jay clicks open the gate. “Go on in,” she says. She looks at me. “One of us needs to stay with her until she sobers up.”

  Chapter Sixty

  “COFFEE?”

  “You don’t like me, do you? Thing is, I love you, Meg. Like a sister. You’re my sister under the skin, you know?”

  Sou
lful eyes search mine. She seems to be getting more drunk, not less.

  “Did you take anything beside booze, Danielle?”

  She shakes her head. Her face has that smudged look.

  “I’m pregnant. I told you that. You’re going to be an aunt.”

  I look at the cross around her neck, the pale puffy skin. Kudzu accent looping around me.

  “You don’t want me to be your sister. You don’t want some fucked up whore to be your sister.” She giggles. “Not proper Meg. You got a stick up your ass, you know that? You and Judy both.”

  “Drink your coffee.”

  “Don’t want it.”

  She shoves the mug away, slopping some. We both watch the puddle of black liquid spread across the vinyl surface.

  “Are you going to clean up your own mess or are you waiting for someone to do it for you?”

  “Sorry,” she mutters, reaching for the box of tissues.

  “Here.” I reach back for the roll of paper towels by the coffee maker.

  Meticulously she blots the coffee then drops the sodden paper towel in the waste basket only she misses it. “Shi-it.” She starts to laugh. “I’m fucked up. I blew it.” She’s crying. “I stayed sober in frigging jail. On the frigging reserve. Came to treatment an’ I got drunk.”

  The door opens. Jay’s head appears. “How’s it going?”

  “It’s going,” I say.

  Danielle opens her mouth but Jay’s head is gone.

  “Coffee,” I say.

  “I want to go to my room.”

  “Well, you can’t, not until you’ve sobered up.”

  “Why not?”

  “It’s not fair to your roommate.”

  “Julie wouldn’t ...” She stops and her eyes fill with tears. “Julie likes me. You don’t want to be my sister. You don’t want a whore for a sister. And now I’ve got a baby growing in me, a baby with a john for a father. A skinny guy with a comb over and a wife and three kids and a little dick. What am I going to tell her? What am I going to tell my baby?” She’s looking at me, red-eyed, beseeching. “I’m going to have a baby.” Then she’s sobbing.