Milosz (24 page)

‘Okay,' Gus replies.

‘He spoke English,' Pablo squeals.

‘Okay?' Milo says again.

‘Okay,' Gus replies, closing his eyes.

In his room, Milo goes online to search
DP
camps and learns that Poles were sheltered in Wehrmacht barracks in northern Bavaria. After fleeing from the advancing Soviets in eastern Poland, they were stranded in Czechoslovakia. Conditions were harsh in the camps;
DP
s lacked necessities and bartered their remaining belongings for milk or meat. Those who tried to return were met with hostility, their houses, possessions and jobs taken over by the communists. Many remained in the camps. In 1947 the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration closed the camps to new refugees. They were told to survive as ‘free livers.' Countries were unwilling to accept them unless close relatives sponsored them.
DP
s were screened and questioned, and forced to undergo medical and skill testing. Up until 1951, Canada accepted qualified labourers. Gus. He must have lied about his age.

Vera knocks on his door. ‘There's a woman in the loo, Milo.'

‘Is there?'

‘A strange woman. It's not Fennel.'

‘I wouldn't worry about it.'

‘Do you think she's Wally's date?'

The bathroom door opens and out swaggers Lorraine, fully clothed, her large lips newly reddened. ‘Good evening, folks,' she says.

‘Are you with Wallace?' Vera asks, looking minute beside the woman in stilettos.

‘I was. But now I'm outta here.'

‘No rush. I don't mind if you sleep over.'

‘Who are you?'

‘Wally's mum.'

‘Oh.' Lorraine looks at Milo over Vera's shoulder. He holds his finger against his lips.

‘Why don't you get back under the covers,' Vera says. ‘We'll all have a nice brekkie in the morning. I'm not in the least old-fashioned. You needn't hide anything from me.'

‘That's really nice of you, but I don't want to be any trouble.'

‘No trouble. I love a crowd at breakfast. There were nine of us in my family and we made quite a stir in the mornings, I can tell you.'

‘I don't eat breakfast,' Lorraine says, squeezing around Vera. ‘I've got to watch my figure.'

‘Oh, you must never miss breakfast, it's the most important meal of the day.'

Wallace opens his door. ‘Let her go, Mother.'

‘I've only just met her. I'm so happy you had a date, Wally. She's lovely.'

‘It wasn't a date, Mother.'

‘I've really got to go,' Lorraine says.

‘At this time of night? Surely not, it can't be safe for a girl on the streets.'

‘She's not a girl, Mother, she's a hooker, all right, she's a
whore
. I paid her to fuck me.'

Vera, speechless for once, sways slightly. Milo quickly steadies her. ‘Men do that,' he explains. ‘Hire prostitutes. It's quite common.'

‘It's a living,' Lorraine says. ‘Nice meeting you folks.' Her stilettos click on the stairs. They all listen to the front door close.

‘Go to bed, Mother.' Wallace shuts his bedroom door. Vera, leaning on Milo, stares at it.

‘How 'bout a rum toddy?' he asks.

‘I think I'll just go to bed, thank you. I'm feeling a bit knackered.'

‘Okay, well, we'll see you bright and early for brekkie.' She continues to lean on him as he walks her to her room, Milo's parents' room with the marshmallow bed.

‘Do we have any bangers?' Milo asks, even though the thought of ground pig stuffed in pigs' guts makes him heave.

‘I'm not sure. You'll have to check.'

‘Righteo, I'll do that.'

‘Yes,' she says as though she has no idea what he's talking about. ‘You do that.'

Tanis is no longer on the deck and their lights are out. She must have taken one of Robertson's tranks, otherwise how could she slumber with her boy locked in a padded room? Although maybe there is comfort to be found in a room in which you can scream your guts out and flail and kick. Milo could use such a room. More than anything he would like to kick in Tanis's door, charge upstairs and grab her, let her scream her guts out and flail and kick until there is no fight left and she lies limp in his arms. Christopher used to do this with Robertson when he was smaller. It could take an hour for the boy to surrender. Christopher would rock the exhausted child gently in his arms, and kiss his forehead.

Padded rooms. Annie sometimes stayed in one at the hospital, which meant she couldn't have visitors. When she was free to roam the floor, Gus took Milo for visits because he said it was important for mother and son to see each other. ‘If it's important for us to see each other,' Milo argued, ‘why can't she stay home?'

‘She's sick. She needs help.'

‘She's not sick, she's just tired. And she doesn't need help. You said Mrs. C. would help and she doesn't help at all. She scares Mummy.'

‘Don't be ridiculous. You couldn't find a better woman than Mrs. Cauldershot. We're lucky to have her.'

Milo wanted to say, ‘You love Mrs. Cauldershot more than Mummy.' But he feared a swat on the head. Also, he was scared if he blew Mrs. C.'s and his father's cover they would be even meaner to Annie. Already they teamed up whenever Annie had what Gus called
crazy ideas
, like sewing new curtains.

‘Why won't you let Mummy sew?' Milo asked over pork chops.

‘For what? Who needs new curtains around here, you? Besides, she never finishes anything.'

‘She does too,' Milo argued. ‘When she isn't sad.'

‘She started in on those cushion covers,' Mrs. C. said, ‘and look what happened. All that silk wasted.' She tenderly dolloped mashed turnips onto Gus's plate. ‘She's not a finisher, that one.'

Milo couldn't believe his father was allowing Mrs. C. to speak so disrespectfully of Annie.

‘Just let her be, son. Let her rest.'

It seemed to Milo that resting was killing his mother. At the hospital she rested in an armchair by the ping-pong table, watching the balls pinging back and forth. Milo thought it was great that hospitals had ping-pong tables, although he didn't understand why the table had no net or why none of the patients were bleeding or bandaged, on crutches or in wheelchairs. A teenager with a swollen nose and stiff hair kept praying. A bug-eyed girl beat her head against the wall. A hunched man paced and talked furiously to himself. The almost bald woman who shared Annie's room lay under blankets and never moved. Annie didn't look physically injured either, just numb and bloated. Milo would climb onto her lap and hope she'd stroke his hair while Gus ranted about the idiots he was working for and the idiots who worked for him. Annie rarely spoke but once she said, ‘You think everyone is an idiot.'

Gus immediately argued that he didn't think everyone was an idiot.

‘Name one person you don't think is an idiot,' she said.

‘Don't be ridiculous,' Gus said.

‘Name one.'

Gus looked around the recreation room as though hoping to spot a person who wasn't an idiot, but Milo knew his father thought all the doctors and nurses were idiots. The only person he didn't think was an idiot was Mrs. Cauldershot but Milo couldn't say this because it would upset Annie.

Gus patted her hand. ‘You,' he said finally. ‘You're not an idiot.'

‘Sure,' Annie said, pulling her hand from his and rubbing it as though it hurt. When they were leaving, Milo asked the bug-eyed girl why she was banging her head.

‘To get the poison out.'

Maybe that's what Robertson tries to do, get the poison out. Milo wouldn't mind cracking his own skull open, trashing those untrustworthy, destructive, remorseless, circular thoughts.

One morning you'll wake up and you'll be old and you'll have nothing
, Zosia said.

Cloud cover has muzzled the moon. Pablo plops into the other Muskoka chair. ‘Can't you sleep?'

Milo can't see him but hears him chewing gum.

‘You know what Mother Teresa says, Milo? She says, “Either all life matters or no life matters.”'

‘I have no idea what that means.'

‘Sarah told me she knew this guy who was a Tutsi in Rwanda when all the Hutus were hacking them with machetes. He saw chopped-up bodies all over the place. He saw a baby alive in its dead mama's arms. The baby kept reaching for its mother's breast because it didn't know she was dead. The Tutsi left the baby there. He could have tried to save it but he knew it would cry and the Hutus would find them and cut them to bits. He said all his life he remembers that baby.'

‘Your point is.'

‘He said he envied bugs. He'd be lying in dirt someplace, hiding from Hutus, and he'd look at a bug and wish he was it, just some bug that nobody wanted to murder. Just some bug living a bug life.'

‘Your point is.'

‘The bug's life matters too, Milo. All life matters or no life matters. You have to decide.'

‘Why do
I
have to decide?'

‘Everybody has to decide.'

‘What did you decide?'

‘All life matters.'

‘Is that why you sprayed poison on those fleas? Don't the fleas matter?'

‘Fleas cause harm.'

‘And humans don't?'

‘Okay, so maybe I shouldn't have killed the fleas. I'll have to ask Sarah.' Pablo chews. ‘Do you think your father was in a camp?'

‘No.'

‘It would be hard to talk about though, wouldn't it? I mean, who wants to tell their son what big boys did to him in a camp.'

‘Nobody did anything to anybody. He got on a boat and came to Canada.'

‘When? How old was he? I mean, they wouldn't let some little kid on a boat. Maybe he was in a camp before he got on the boat. And maybe he got beat up, which is why he's so mean. Sarah says people who persecute most likely grew up with abuse or neglect.'

Gus's only comment about the war was,
It destroyed the killers and the killed, and the rest paid the price. End of story
. What price? Milo never asked for fear of being scolded, and now his father only speaks Polish.

‘Sarah thinks Wallace is a super achiever because he's so driven and walks all over people. She says he was called on in childhood to make up for some family shame or tragedy. She thinks Vera married the witless dingbat because she got pregnant. Wally was expected to be the little man, you know, like, dependable, totally different from his dad.'

‘What's Sarah say about you?'

‘I'm a martyr. I go around doing everybody else's work, trying to keep everybody happy. She says my parents gave up on their dreams for me so I gave up on myself. She says I have to work on believing in myself.'

‘I've never seen you going around doing everybody else's work.'

‘Not now. But, like, before. In my family.'

‘If you did some work around here,
I'd
believe in you.'

‘You don't take none of this seriously, Milo, because you're an avoider. Avoiders are aware of problems but don't talk about them. Avoiders grow up in judgmental families with weak emotional ties. That's you all over.'

‘I'm going to bed. If you disturb me, you will be on the street tomorrow.'

But of course he can't sleep. He pounds his pillow and wrestles his blanket, wishing he could be a bug living a bug life.

Sarah Moon Dancer said people who persecute grew up with abuse or neglect. Gus. But didn't Milo attack smaller, weaker boys? Didn't he just kill a child? What's wrong with
him
? He rolls over again.

How does it feel when your son, who you love more than breathing, tries to strangle you? Knocked unconscious by pharmaceuticals, how do you get up in the morning, knowing that he is locked up, far from you, alone, screaming at deaf walls? Knowing that when you arrive to pick him up, he won't look for you, won't reach for you, you could be anybody.

Not so different, really, from Annie. Milo wanted her to reach for him once, just once. It didn't seem to matter if he clung to her or watched
TV
or smashed his
Star Wars
figures. She wasn't really there. Sometimes she'd move her mouth into a tremulous smile but Milo didn't know what it meant. It didn't mean
I love you more than breathing
. It didn't mean
come and let me hold you or we're in this together
. That's what he wanted, an ally, but she couldn't commit. Gus was in the room even when he wasn't, watching them, judging them.

Was it in the void of his mother's love and the chill of his father's scorn that Milo developed the practice of avoidance that has served him so well on his Earthwalk, being aware of problems but not talking about them? Avoiders grow up in judgmental families with weak emotional ties. That's him all over. End of story.