As a Thief in the Night (21 page)

On his way home from school Jason B. Prism stepped out in front of Ezra from one of the side streets. Ezra walked behind him, staring at the back of his tangled, matted dreadlocks. The street was wet and Jason didn't bother trying to avoid the puddles. His construction boots left their mark on the pavement and Ezra reached further than normal with each stride, absent-mindedly putting his own boot in each one of Jason's footprints. He looked more like a child at play than a sixteen-year-old.

His lawyer told him that he should begin collecting letters of character reference for his defense. Gord and Elsie drove him to audiences with every adult of influence they knew. They went to Father Michael at the Anglican Church, to Coach Walsh at the high school, and to Al Ford, the police sergeant who had coached the minor football team. In front of each of them Ezra was forced to recount his crime. At certain points of his story he would break down into tears, his throat would seize up, and he would look to his aunt and uncle to continue for him. But of course they did not. They waited patiently until his tears subsided. When he was finished crying, they would gesture for him to make his request, and, the tale of his dire sin having been told, he would ask his confessor for a written letter extolling his virtues, his contributions to his community, and the unlikelihood of a young man with such excellence of character ever being led astray again.

Led astray? Here Gord and Elsie sold him a lie about himself that they wanted to believe, and that he bought without believing. A fabrication that he then went out and sold to those he asked to write on his behalf. This was the lie: No evil lived in Ezra's heart. He had been a follower and a victim of Alex's charisma, deviance, and need. The older boy's experience and much more organic corruption was where the fault lay. Ezra's only real crime was that he had stolen the congregation's tithes with hands that had not listened to the honest promptings of his conscience; that, and blindness. Yes, it was a problem that he had followed, but not one with the same vilifying and threatening possibilities that other explanations brought with them. So Ezra kept the intoxication and thrill his crimes had given him a secret, and spoke the words they fed him. These were lies he
wanted
to believe about himself; each time he repeated them he silently hoped the repetition of the words would lull the memories of his lusts and greed to sleep, a slumber of forgetfulness and longed for peace of mind. He did not
want
to remember his darkness, but memory would not allow him to escape it.

The other problem was disclosure. Details of the arrest, evidence, and statements had not yet been released to the accused. Alex didn't know yet that it had been Ezra and Adam that had given his name to the police. The day they had returned to school Ezra had moved his locker away from Alex's and had barely spoken to him since. But he could see that Alex believed that the only reason behind this was the court order against the two of them associating. Alex did not care about the court's orders. That spring, while Ezra reverted to silence and isolation, Alex continued on his downward spiral. His parents kicked them out their house and he moved in with Rick Riley, a boy a year or two older who dealt drugs and lived on student welfare in a run down upstairs apartment. A story was circulating that they had fed Rick's cat a hit of LSD and that it had jumped out the window and broken its neck when it hit the driveway. Alex had also been arrested again, apparently for stealing beer (to drink) and tools (to sell) from neighborhood garages. Anyway, his lawyer would eventually tell him how the police had found out he was involved in the church theft. He would find out that it had been Ezra and Adam. Then he would come after them.

Elsie phoned her father. It had been almost fifteen years since she'd spoken to him and she did not know why she felt the need to talk to him now. Perhaps it was because she could now regard the abuse that she and her sisters had suffered from the perspective of an adult who understands, but does not condone, the mistakes of a parent.

Somewhere, as a boy, in a house he had never spoken of, Harold Mignon had been inflicted with wounds no child should have to suffer. Then, as a man, a man with a broken child hidden within painful memories, those wounds had turned to cruel words, and even to blows brought down upon those he was supposed to love. For him, that he owned a successful vineyard, put a roof over his family's head, and provided food, well... that was more than he'd ever had.

Each of us must make his own peace with those otherworldly people we call mother and father. All the strange force and conflict and love those words contain! For many this peace only comes after a long and painful war, a war that, for all the wonderful and well intentioned gifts our parents may have bestowed upon us,
must
be pitted in one's own heart. In many ways, it is a battle fought against all the magic costumes and false divinity the mind of a child invests their guardians with. But first we must have the courage and awareness to look. Once we have begun to see, then we must blame, and maybe even hate, the finger must be pointed, the stone must be cast. How have their faults, their blessings, their touch, hindered us? What struggles have they spared us? Which muscles have their course of action made strong and which atrophied and made weak? How will we use what has been given, heal that which has been wounded, and pass on all that is full of hope? Where does the life our parents wish they had lived, their secret and still cherished fantasy, show up in our own steps? These are tasks on the long and painful journey to maturity and consciousness, and as anyone who has taken them in earnest can attest, ones that pose all the threats and perils of the night sea.

Then the day comes when, as adults, our own faults and inadequacies as parents come to light. We see our own humanity in the flaws of our parents; circumstances their lives forced them to wrestle with distill our judgment and remove the sting of any bitterness we have felt toward them. Finally, and perhaps this where our real breaking away into adulthood occurs, we sympathize and understand and, most importantly, let go.

Elsie felt like she was finally there. For her sisters it was different. Sarah had never been out of contact with the old man, she had never allowed herself to hate. Hate requires liberty, and she did not have that. Olyvia
only
hated. For her, hate for her father was a ladder; he was an opponent, but only one of many against which she pitted her art and made it grow strong and visionary.

Elsie called, and he spoke to her like it had been days, not years, that had passed.

"That's what I heard..."

"Who told you? Sarah?"

"Yes, your sister had to," he said, implying that she had been remiss. "A few years back now, wasn't it?"

"It's coming up on three years now." Elsie waited for her father to make an excuse for not calling, but he did not make one.

"And how is Gordon doing?"

"He's doing good, Dad."

"Where's he working these days?"

"He's managing the terminal here in Windsor now. We moved here because of his promotion."

"He's doing well for himself then."

"What about you, dad? It's spring, you must be getting busy out in the fields again. How are you guys doing with last year's vintage?"

"Oh, we're getting by alright I suppose."

"Are you working much still?"

"Oh, yes. I'm out there every day...pretty much every day."

Finally, he asked about the boys. She was surprised that he knew exactly how old they were and what grades they were in. He had heard they were doing well in football.

"Gordon's got them into that then?"

"Oh, yeah," she went on, "you know how Gord loves his football."

"That's good."

"Dad, we'd like to have you out to the new house for dinner, if you can make it. Maybe one Sunday?" She knew that was the only day he felt safe taking his eye off the vineyard workers.

"Well, I'd have to take the ferry over in the morning."

"Yeah, it doesn't have to be this weekend or anything. Whenever you're free."

Late that April, on a Sunday, Harold Mignon woke up at 6:15 am, the same time he got up every morning. He showered, shaved carefully, put on a button-up, short-sleeved work shirt and pleated pants, and applied Brylcreem to his silver hair. From his night table he methodically gathered his belongings: a cheap silver watch, a pocket protector that held two blue pens and one red one, and a wad of folded bills held in a heavy rubber band. He counted the money and then pushed it deep inside his pocket.  Smoothing his shirt out over his thick shoulders and slight belly he went outside, and as his routine dictated, selected a portion of his vineyard to inspect, then walked slowly through it. At places he stopped to adjust the vines or note repairs that needed to be made to trellises or wiring. When he was finished he found the only Mexican worker he kept on year round, a man in his late forties named Ruiz, and instructed him to get the pick-up truck and pull it round to the front of the house.

"Where are we going Mr. Mignon?" Ruiz asked in his thick Mexican accent.

"We're not going anywhere. You're driving me to the ferry station."

"And where's an old man like you going all by yourself, Gallo?"

"None of your goddamn business."

"Ah, well. It's a woman then. You should have just said so."

"I'm going to see my daughter, you fool."

"Usually Sarah makes the trip here to see you. Well, she mostly comes to see me, but you're here too, of course."

"I'm going to see my other daughter," he said and went inside to wash up. The screen door slammed shut and, for once, Ruiz was struck silent.

"So Gordon, what do you think of this Tyson kid?" Dinner was cooking and they were having tea in the living room. Elsie watched her father staring at a stain on the couch with disapproval. The roast was almost ready.

"Seems like he's doing a lot of damage. Helluva fighter."

"But I'm not sure how together he is upstairs," the old man said as he scratched at the material with his fingernail.

"He's had some problems."

"There's this young guy I box with a bit. He's worked for me the last couple of vintages. He says Muhammad Ali would have wiped the floor with Tyson. What do you reckon about that now?" He gave up on the stain.

"Did you say a guy you box with, Dad?" Elsie interrupted before Gord could answer.

"That's right."

"I didn't know you boxed," she said, surprised not just that he boxed, but that he would be doing anything like that at seventy.

"Oh, yes," he said. "All four years that I served in the Canadian Army. That's a long time ago now. Before I met your mother, of course."

"You never told us that."

"I'm sure I probably did," he answered, shifting in his seat. "You girls were never very good listeners, Elsie."

Layne had been listening while he got a drink from the fridge. "You were a boxer, Grandpa?" he asked, stepping into the doorway to the living room.

"Oh, a bit of one, I suppose."

"You punched people in the face?" the boy asked enthusiastically.

"I'm sure I did."

Ezra was not listening. He was lying by himself on the couch in the backroom with his headphones on. Elsie restrained herself from answering her father's insult, and then dismissed it.

"And now you're sparing with one of the Mexicans?"

"De la Rocha's his name. He's pretty fast too."

"Aren't you too old to box, Grandpa?" Layne asked. Elsie smiled and looked at her father.

"Now I don't think so," the old man said, a little amused. "We don't go trying to hurt each other or anything. It gives me some exercise."

"You were always good about getting your exercise," Elsie said.

Everyone was silent for a moment.

"So this kid's a boxer back in Mexico then?" Gord asked breaking the pause.

"Well, you know the Mexicans, lots of them fight here and there. He boxes, but not for a living or anything. He asked me if he could hang his heavy bag in one of the old rooms in the cellar. I didn't see any harm in it."

"And that's how you started sparring?"

"Simple as that..."

Elsie made a fine meal with great slabs of roast beef, Yorkshire pudding, corn and dark, thick gravy. She served a bottle of Sauvignon from among those she had laid down at Walpurgis over the years. Harold Mignon ate voraciously, as he always had, and Elsie, watching him eat, was stung with the memory of the fear he had instilled in his wife and daughters each night at dinner. There had always been tension, the type one feels when they know someone's temper can explode at any moment, but does not know if it will, or what will set it off. To try and avoid his anger she and her sisters had always made the effort to be quiet and helpful. Even still, despite them trying to appease him and understand his mood, they had never been able to predict when he would come at them with an open hand or a long string of abusive words. Beside the coat rack he had kept an electric cord wrapped with duck tape to punish them. She remembered the way it looked hanging on the wall.

"Where's the wine from, Elsie?" he asked.

"Oh," she said, attempting to sound casual, "it's from Walpurgis. I made it."