Waiting for the Cyclone Read online

  “I don’t know,” he said. “Nothing special.”

  “You don’t look like someone who’d work up there.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Hey, don’t get mad. I just mean you don’t look like one of those guys. It’s a compliment.”

  What the hell did she know about it? Probably nothing. She looked like the kind of girl who never got her hands dirty.

  “Thanks,” he said. “I guess.”

  “Osoyoos,” she said to change the subject. “Is that where you live?”

  “When I’m not in Fort Mac.”

  “I was there on Canada Day last year,” she said. “There was a big party on the beach. Most of the people were from Quebec, ironically. Someone told me they were fruit pickers who worked at the orchards outside of town, but all I know is they were crazy. They stayed up all night playing violins and accordions and shot Roman candles at each other. It was a really wild time!”

  “I don’t get out much,” Christian said.

  The woman laughed even though he was being serious. Her lips parted to show a row of small, sharp teeth. Christian tried to remember the last time he’d driven around with a woman. It had been a while. He looked at her, sitting half prim and proper, half like a slouched teenager. She could be eighteen or thirty. It was hard to tell with some people. It didn’t matter much anyway. She’d be out of the car by Creston and forget she ever met him.

  He’s a weird one, Valery thought. On the surface, he looked like a clean-cut nobody with a boring life. Groomed hair, department store clothes, rosary hanging from the rear-view mirror. But there were tattoos on his knuckles. Black squares, probably covering something. Ex-lover’s name? A bad word? There was something unsettling about his face, too, that suggested a guilty conscience. He looked like one of those people whose life was stuck between two currents.

  She stared at the tattoos, stretched by his grip on the wheel. Christian noticed. Valery looked away. Outside the window, the highway curved with the Bow River and she thought of all the road trips she and her brother, Ben, had taken to Calgary. They’d both continued living with their parents after high school. Neither went to college. Those were the years of colossal money-wasting and all-day hangovers. Eventually, their parents kicked them out.

  During the drive, Ben liked to narrate the landscape. He told of mine explosions and grisly murders in small towns. “Imagine the sound,” Ben said to Valery in Frank, a town that had been wiped out when a mountain fell in the night. “Like a storm through a megaphone. It’d come at you too quick to even think. Blood, Val. Shooting from your eye sockets like Old Faithful.” Ben was like that—always trying to coax others into being as morose as he was. The image had stayed with her. Sometimes at night she would lie in bed, heart racing, expecting a mountain to come and pulverize her.

  But now he was getting married. No one had expected a marriage in the family, especially not from Ben. Many times he’d declared he’d rather die than spend his life trying to please a woman. Valery hadn’t met the fiancée but others had. She tried to imagine what kind of woman might decide to share a life with her brother. All she could think of was variations of Sylvia Plath, but apparently the girl was normal. That’s what everyone said. Happy even. People told her Ben was happy, too.

  Valery looked at Christian again. He wasn’t a talker. She couldn’t figure out why he’d picked her up.

  “Tell me something about yourself,” Valery said.

  “Not much to know.”

  “Oh, come on.”

  “I don’t know what to tell you.”

  His face remained composed but Valery noticed a change in his tone. Not annoyance but something else.

  “Fine,” she said. “I’ll tell you something first. But then it’s your turn.”

  He didn’t respond.

  Valery thought about what to say. Humour worked with most people, but with him it might fall flat. She decided to risk it.

  “I once took a crap in the ocean,” she told him.

  “That’s weird.”

  She looked at him. Was he smiling?

  “It was in Mexico. I was camping with friends,” she explained. “We were broke, and it cost money to use the toilet. Every day was an ordeal, looking for a place to, you know. One day I was swimming and the surf was high and I thought, This might work.”

  He was definitely smiling.

  “I swam until I couldn’t touch anymore and . . . did the deed. Afterwards, I swam back to the shore. At first, things were fine. Totally status quo. I relaxed and took out a magazine. It wasn’t long, though, before I heard a shriek. I looked up. Someone was pointing at the water. There was my turd, bobbing toward the shore.”

  “Shit,” the man said.

  They both laughed.

  “It was awful! Every time I thought it had sunk or drifted, it showed up again. I had to leave the beach.”

  Once she finished her story, Valery lounged back in the seat. Christian fiddled with the dial, looking for a radio station amongst the static. Valery folded down the sun visor and applied a fresh coat of lipstick, pursing her lips at her reflection. Christian watched her with an amused expression that made him look handsome. What if they were at a bar? Would she hit on him? Possibly. He took his hand off the wheel and for a second she thought he might place it on her knee.

  He was only reaching for his cigarettes.

  THE SMELL OF gasoline seared through Christian’s nostrils as he pushed the nozzle into the tank. They were in Radium. How quickly things change, he thought. She tells me a funny story about shitting in the ocean and I end up talking about my fucked-up life.

  “I used to be a bad person,” he told her.

  “What do you mean? Have you, like, killed people?”

  He said no, but that wasn’t exactly the truth.

  “What’s the worst thing you ever did?” she asked.

  “I can’t tell you that.”

  “Fine. How about something medium bad?”

  “I crushed a guy’s hand for a mickey of rye.”

  She sucked in her breath. “Ouch.”

  Her reaction was disapproving, but she also started flirting. Tossing her hair like she was in some kind of shampoo commercial. She kicked off her shoes and took off her movie star hat. He couldn’t decide if she looked better with or without it—she looked good either way.

  “Were you a thief?” she asked him.

  “Big time.”

  “What’s the biggest thing you ever stole?”

  “Twenty thousand dollars.”

  “What? How?”

  “From a safe.”

  “Seriously? You know how to crack codes?”

  “It’s not hard.”

  “You never got caught?”

  “No.”

  “Wow,” she said. “You’re like James Bond.”

  He didn’t like where the conversation was going. Things were different now. He was a better man than he used to be.

  “I never got caught,” he said, “but things have happened to me over the years. Bad things.”

  “Like what?”

  “I’ve been shit-kicked within an inch of my life.”

  She looked at him with wide eyes.

  “Got stabbed once, too. Probably had that coming. I’ve got a list in there of all the stuff I’ve done and all the stuff that’s happened.” Christian rapped his knuckles against the glovebox. “I’m almost even,” he told her.

  I’ve been shit-kicked within an inch of my life. Valery immediately thought of her brother and something that happened in high school. It had been years since she’d thought of the incident, but there it was, clear as the day it happened. Ben was going to a house party near St. Mary’s School. Valery was invited, too. Ben had to work late so they arranged to meet there. After his shift, he cut through Kinsmen Park. As he crossed the soccer field, someone whistled from the creek banks.

  “Down here, dude! Come have a toke!”

  Ben thought it was som
eone he knew from school. He walked over, swinging his bag of beer. Three guys were waiting for him. One took away Ben’s alcohol and pushed him to the ground. Another kicked him in the face while someone rifled through his wallet. They kicked him in the ribs and back. “I thought I might die,” Ben later told Valery. Eventually they stopped kicking and rolled his body into the creek. Ben lay in the frigid water until they went away.

  At the party, people jumped from the roof into the pool and hotboxed the bedrooms. Valery danced with the older boys and gave one a blow job in the downstairs bathroom. She kept looking for Ben but he didn’t come. That night, she slept at a friend’s. Her mother called in the morning to tell her what happened.

  Valery was hungover and Ben was high on painkillers. She crept into his room and sat beside the bed, dizzy from the shock. Ben’s left arm was in a sling, folded like a chicken wing. His face had been stitched where tread from the attacker’s boots had torn open his skin. Two teeth were missing.

  “I’ll find them,” Valery promised. “I’ll find them and kill them.”

  Something else was going on, too. It was sick the way Valery felt aroused when Christian told her about the beatings. Why did she have the urge to slip one of his hands, those former instruments of torture, under her dress? She looked out the window so Christian wouldn’t see.

  “You said you’re from Osoyoos?” she asked.

  “No. That’s where my grandmother lives.”

  “Where’d you grow up?”

  “Kamloops, mostly. Sometimes Williams Lake.”

  Good, she thought. When they’d started talking, she’d wondered. But he couldn’t have attacked Ben. No way was he that guy.

  CHRISTIAN LIT ANOTHER cigarette. Ever since the woman started asking questions, he felt the need to chain-smoke. She made him nervous. There was something disconcerting about her. The way she talked to him like they actually knew each other. That and her eyes were always roving around, landing on things. Receipts on the dashboard, cassettes, even old coffee cups. Plus she kept looking at his tattoos.

  Every day, he remembered how they’d looked, done with a Bic and a safety pin in a friend’s basement. Hurt like hell. When he got them covered years later, the guy pressed the ink gun hard. Made the squares extra black, extra deep. Hurt even worse than the first time. The guy didn’t say a word until he was done. Then he took Christian’s money and pointed to the door. “Get the fuck out,” he said. “Nazi piece of shit.”

  “HEY, DO YOU mind if we stop for a few minutes?” Valery asked. They’d just passed a sign for a rest area.

  “No problem.” Christian flicked the turn signal. Valery put her shoes back on and adjusted her hat in the mirror, tilting it slightly to one side. They were past Fairmont, driving through a dead zone between tourist towns. Narrow strips of farmland bordered one side of the road. The Columbia Basin was on the other. Most of the land was for sale. When they were kids, Valery and Ben had fantasized about having their own ranch.

  “We could have a thousand horses!”

  “And live like Billy the Kid!”

  “Grow a million Christmas trees!”

  “And decorate all of them!”

  They’d usually stopped at the same rest area on their way to Calgary. Once, Ben found a snake. He picked it up by the tail. Valery had watched in horror as it pretzelled around Ben’s fingers and snapped its tiny jaws.

  The parking lot was deserted. Christian turned off the engine and removed the keys from the ignition. He unbuckled his seat belt and put the keys in his pocket.

  “Hey,” Valery said.

  “Yeah?”

  “Thanks.”

  “For what?”

  “I don’t know. For the ride. For telling me all that stuff.”

  “Just keep it to yourself,” Christian said.

  They sat in silence, not quite looking at each other but not looking away. Valery got out of the car when she realized he wasn’t going to try anything. She climbed a bristly, desert-like hill and stood at the top, taking in the panoramic view. Columbia Lake was the colour of laundry detergent. Across the water, a rusting cattle trailer sat empty on the hillside. Horses pawed at dry patches in the grass and flicked their tails. Christian stood close beside her.

  “I always wanted to live around here instead of Cranbrook,” Valery murmured.

  “You’re not from Creston?” Christian asked.

  “No. That’s just where my brother’s getting married. We grew up Cranbrook.”

  “Funny. I lived there for a while.”

  “In Cranbrook?”

  “Yeah.”

  “When?”

  “Years ago. Haven’t been back since, except for gas.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me? I asked where you lived!”

  “I wasn’t there long. Not even a year.”

  “When were you there?” she demanded.

  “I don’t know. Maybe fifteen years ago?”

  “What year?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “Was it 1999?”

  “I don’t remember. It was a long time ago.”

  “Think. I’m sure you can figure it out.”

  “Why is this important?”

  “I need to know. Please.” Valery watched his face as he scanned through his memory, patching together a spotty chronology of a life left behind.

  “Yeah,” he finally said. “It was 1999.”

  CHRISTIAN COULDN’T FIGURE Valery out. In the parking lot, she was giving signals. Strong ones. He could’ve kissed her, no problem. Now she was acting like he’d done something terrible. After he told her he’d lived in Cranbrook, she turned and ran. When he caught up, she was circling around the car, trying to get in. The doors were locked. Christian unlocked her side first. She looked anxious. Angry even. The first thing she did when she got in the car was open the glove compartment.

  “Don’t,” he said.

  She closed it.

  They got back on the road. Valery kept her mouth shut. They’d been getting along so well. Had they met before? Maybe he’d done something to her. He wondered how to start the conversation again. He could ask what she was doing for dinner. He needed to get to Osoyoos, but a few hours wouldn’t make a difference. They could stop somewhere nice.

  She’d probably say no.

  “Let me look,” Valery said, pointing to the glove compartment.

  “No.”

  Before he could stop her, she had it open again.

  “Hey,” he said. She pushed his hand away.

  “‘June 1998, Kamloops,’” she read from his list. “‘Stole two hundred dollars from Grandma, spent it on drugs.’ Oh, that’s nice.”

  “Stop,” he said. “I’m serious.”

  If he’d done something to her—there was nowhere to pull over. The road was too windy, too unpredictable. He took the corners fast, hoping for a straight stretch.

  “‘December 1998, near Blood Nation. Beat a hitchhiker with a shovel. Might’ve died, not sure.’” Her voice lowered when she said died.

  “Stop it,” he said.

  “‘June 1999,’” she continued. “‘Cranbrook. Beat someone up and threw him in the river.’ That was my brother, you asshole.”

  He veered toward the curb and hit the brakes. Valery was out before the car reached a full stop. Her shoes crunched on the gravel as she ran. Christian turned off the engine and stood by the car. “Hey!” he called out. Valery ignored him. What were the chances? He cupped his hands to shield the wind as he lit a cigarette. It could have been someone else. He knew other people who got up to no good in Kinsmen at night.

  “It might not have been me!” he yelled.

  But it could have been. Either way, at least he hadn’t done something to her. Christian leaned through the open window and picked up the list, left crumpled on the seat. For years, he’d carried it in his shirt pocket, made notes, watched the columns equal out. He was almost even. December 2002, near Golden, he read. Car caught on fire with me in it. July 2
007, Edmonton. Stabbed in the chest by a crackhead.

  “Let me talk to you for a second!”

  To his surprise, Valery turned around. He watched as she walked back toward the car. A long, black strand of hair divided her face and her cat eyes glared. She was beautiful.

  “It could have been someone else,” Christian said. Her face registered no emotion. He took her hand. She didn’t resist. He lifted his shirt. There was a small but deep scar on his stomach above the navel. He placed her hand on the scar tissue.

  “I’ve been through shit you can’t even imagine,” he said.

  Valery raised her chin. There they were again. Her probing, searching eyes. What was she looking for? She put pressure on the scar and for a moment he thought she might kiss him. He closed his eyes and waited for it.

  She pushed him.

  “Go to hell,” she said.

  She took her suitcase and left. Christian sat in the car for a long time afterwards, holding the list in his hand. In the rear-view mirror, he watched Valery put out her thumb. It didn’t take long for someone to pick her up. He watched as the car accelerated and disappeared around the next corner. Christian smoothed his list on the dashboard. He recounted both columns. Twenty-one, twenty-one. Exactly even. There was a pen in his shirt pocket. He took it out and began to write: August 2016, near Fairmont.

  LIBERTAD

  THE LAST THING ALISON REMEMBERED was the fire show. A woman with blonde dreadlocks whipped gaslit chains in fast pirouettes, leaving traces of flame around her body. She filled her mouth with kerosene, arched her back, and sent a whoosh of flame hurling past the crowd. Such a bright, burning sound! People gasped, their open mouths glowing as the flame passed. But what happened next, Alison didn’t know. All she could remember was the smoky grey sky once the fires went out.

  In retrospect, going to the bar had been a mistake. Trance-like music and red lights had beckoned David and Alison from their nightly walk along the beach. Inside, people danced like marionettes with red-stained teeth. “Viva Mexico!” someone shouted. A woman wove through the crowd with a tray of tequila shots, shimmery barrettes taming her curly hair. She beelined for David and Alison, handing them each a shot and a slice of lime. The woman looked at David and spread her thumb and forefinger wide. “Lick,” she told him, salting it. He hesitated, giving Alison a sidelong glance.