The Sweetest Thing You Can Sing (24 page)

Morgan appears over me, and I shift my body into a seated position. None of my parts are broken. They just hurt in a way you don’t usually encounter in everyday life.

“Are you okay?” Morgan asks, hunching down next to me. “That was some flip.”

“I’m okay.”

Morgan holds his hand out to me and pulls me gently upwards. “You positive you’re all in one piece?”

“My back hurts.” My hand flies to my bruised spine. Then, in a millisecond, my brain leaps back to the moment before I fell. “Devin! Where is he?” I’ve started shouting again, my voice made hoarse by the pain from my fall. “Go after him!”

Morgan gazes in the direction of the subway entrance across the street. “He’s gone, Serena.”

“Not necessarily. We can follow him. C’mon.” I grab Morgan’s coat sleeve and pull him along with me, almost the way Devin was doing with the brunette.

Morgan doesn’t fight me. He scurries towards the subway, matching my steps, and I think this is it: we’re finally going to be reunited with Devin again, whether he wants the same or not. This is the moment four out of five of the LeBlancs have been waiting for.

But that particular subway entrance is the unmanned kind, and worse, the type they call an iron maiden — metal bars in a revolving door. Without subway tokens Morgan and I aren’t going anywhere, and there’s no way to buy one at this entrance. We’re stopped dead because we don’t have access to a stupid three-dollar subway token.

“Bellair Street entrance!” Morgan shouts to me. “Let’s go!”

We jog off towards Bellair Street, Morgan holding on to my sleeve, partly to speed me up and partly, I think, because he’s worried I might fall again. We stomp into the Bellair Street subway entrance and dart downstairs where, miraculously, the booth attendant is alone with no line to slow us down. “Two,” Morgan snaps, sliding a bill towards the attendant and not waiting for change.

Morgan runs towards the platform, his long black coat flapping behind him. I run too, as fast as I can without wiping out again.

The eastand westbound subway trains board from a central platform, meaning Morgan and I are in luck again. We stalk off in opposite directions, patrolling the subway platform. I pass a teenage couple making out, the guy grabbing handfuls of the girl’s ass, and then an old guy in a tweed cap, coughing into his palm. The sound of an oncoming train electrifies the air. Morgan and I don’t have much time left. We have to find him.

I’m running again, scanning faces and forms, and then turning to race back in the other direction, rushing towards Morgan, who is holding up his hands, looking as frustrated as I am. The eastbound subway squeals to a stop next to us. Morgan and I stand in place and continue to scan the passengers desperately as they board. I already know we missed Devin somehow. There just aren’t that many people on the platform. If Devin were still down here we’d have run into him already. He must have hopped on an earlier train while we were stuck at the other subway entrance.

For the second time this year, Devin’s been rescued by public transit, and for the second time this year, Toronto’s transportation system has let me down, swallowed up my missing brother as though he doesn’t matter to anyone.

Morgan and I stare at each other in the quiet of the now empty subway platform. His eyes are tired and anxious.

“It was him, right?” I say. “You saw him this time.”

“I saw him,” Morgan confirms. “It was definitely Devin.” Morgan’s hands magnetically attach to his waist. He bows his head before straightening it out and meeting my eyes again. “I’m not ready to face them yet.”
My parents
. Our family dinner didn’t start out well and this is another turn for the worse. Much worse. Last time I spotted Devin Morgan didn’t really want to know and warned me about Devin dragging us all down with him. But a couple of minutes ago Morgan was running as fast as I was. Today it seems we’re in this together. “Can we take a couple of minutes?” he asks.

I nod, my hand winding around my back, reaching for my spine.

“It still hurts?” Morgan asks.

“Yeah.”

Morgan sighs. His hand reaches for his hair, as though he’s about to drive his fingers through it. Changing his mind, his arm drops back to his side. “It seemed like a good idea at the time,” he says. “The dinner, the theatre tickets, all of it.”

This time I do feel sorry for Morgan, my perfect brother trying so hard and still not getting tonight right. “It was a good idea,” I tell him.

“Uh-huh,” Morgan says wearily. “Good idea, bad execution.”

“The execution wasn’t up to you.” I smile a little. “That’s where it went wrong.”

“Mmm.” Morgan presses his lips together and nods. “You sound a lot like Devin sometimes, you know. The two of you always …” He abandons his sentence to the eerie silence of the subway.

“What?” I ask.

“You were always setting up comparisons between yourselves and me, trying to make me feel like I was doing something wrong just by being myself.” Morgan shakes his head dismissively as if to suggest it’s all in the past, but Jimmy’s words come back to haunt me.
I think we’re most comfortable with people who are our mirror images.

We always felt Morgan was too good for us, Devin and me. I don’t know if I believed that because it was what Devin believed or if it was something I would’ve thought all on my own. Devin was the one who always listened to me and gave me his time, but I could’ve given my older brother more of a chance, there’s no question.

“I didn’t mean to … be like that,” I stammer. I hate regrets. On their own they’re like parasites. There’s no point to them unless they provoke some kind of change. It looks like the new, improved me still has lots more evolving to do.

“I know, Serena.” Morgan nods lightly. “It’s okay. Tonight has just …” He throws his hands into his pockets. “I don’t have a clue what to do with them.” He means my parents again. “What do we tell them?”

They would’ve heard me shout Devin’s name, definitely. Choice is an illusion. “Just the truth, I guess. What else do we have?”

“You’re right,” Morgan says resolutely. “There’s nothing else for us to work with.”

I reach out and squeeze my big brother’s arm. We walk slowly in the direction of the nearest exit, in no hurry to reach our parents and get on with the job of revealing the unhappy truth.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

~

MY PARENTS ARE EERILY
quiet when we materialize back in front of Hi-
Lo
and explain about chasing Devin down the street. Morgan wants me and my parents to come back to their place for coffee so that we can discuss things further, but my father complains that he’s tired. We drop Morgan and Jimmy off at their apartment building, and as we pull away from the curb Morgan waves to me, forming a phone with his fingers and mouthing, “Call me.”

I’ve been wrong to be jealous and angry with him. I didn’t think he even really knew because we’ve never fought in the almost feral way some brothers and sisters do. Even now I know the jealousy hasn’t been fully vanquished, but my new awareness has shrunk it, changed it.

In the car Mom finds her voice and starts firing Devin questions at me. What he looked like. Whether he seemed healthy or not. If the girl he was with appeared to be his girlfriend. Why he would run from Morgan and me.

My answers are incomplete and vague. He looked okay. Not much skinnier than when he left home. I have no idea who the girl is, not anyone I’ve seen at our house. Devin ran because he doesn’t want to talk to any of us, but I don’t say that to my mother, and anyway, it’s obvious. At first I’m surprised that my mother’s as composed as she is — maybe deep down she believed Devin was dead and the fact that he’s striding around Toronto hopping on subway trains sounds like good news. But later that night, when I’m trying to sleep, I hear crying and ragged voices from my parents’ bedroom.

I wait for it to stop. It doesn’t. I dial Morgan, who immediately calls our land line. After a few minutes my parents begin to quiet down, so this time my big brother can be assured he did something right. Then Morgan calls me back on my cell and chats about nothing like he’s trying to distract me.

After a bit I ask if Jimmy’s still awake too. “He went to bed a couple of minutes ago,” Morgan says. “While you and I were on the phone.”

“I was going to text him my email address but I guess you can pass it on to him.”

“Sure, I’ll do that,” Morgan tells me. “And next time we’ll just have
you
over for dinner like the original plan. I’ll leave it to you whether you want to bring someone or not.”

“You mean
the guy
, don’t you?”

“Exactly,” Morgan says. “
The guy
. Or not, whatever you prefer.”

“Okay, I’ll think about it.” I yawn into the phone. “I’m about three seconds away from unconsciousness so I better say good night.”

“Good night, Serena,” my brother says, and I feel like I know him a bit better than I did before Devin left last June. Is it awful to think there may be some good things about Devin’s disappearance?

I put my cell down and snuggle into my pillow. After spotting Devin earlier I’m positive I’ll have one of my two dreams about him, but when I wake up to the sound of my alarm at eight o’clock the next morning I can’t remember dreaming at all. No one else is awake yet, and normally I wouldn’t be up this early on a Sunday unless I had to go to work either, but I made up my mind what to do next just as I was dozing off last night and it can’t wait.

I’m going on a Devin quest again. A quest I won’t quit until he speaks to me. Just me.

Morgan might help, if I asked him, but when I do find Devin I don’t want him to feel like we’re ganging up on him, ready to play the home version of
Intervention
. I just need to know that he’s okay, or that he will be, eventually.

I eat a bowl of Raisin Bran, leave a note for my parents, and creep out of the house. Then I text Genevieve to inform her she’s my alibi and that I’ve gone searching for Devin in Toronto. It takes me longer than ever to get downtown because the local bus that hooks up with the commuter train to Toronto’s running on a lame Sunday schedule.

There’s no wind or snow today but the temperature’s bleak and I shiver in my hat and layers as I retrace last night’s steps along Cumberland Street. If I were skating I wouldn’t feel the cold so much. Of course, if I were skating there’d be hot chocolate too. So I pop into Starbucks for severely overpriced hot chocolate and scan the faces of the other customers. The old Devin usually preferred independent coffee shops, but if I want to maximize my chances of locating him I’ll need to stop in to every coffee shop and fast food restaurant between here and Queen Street West.

I’m under no illusions that I’ll find him today, but he can’t hide out forever. I’ll come back to Toronto whenever I can, for however long it takes. In Starbucks I dole out my change with one hand and hold my phone out with the other, pushing it under the barista’s nose and asking if she’s seen my missing brother. She barely gives my cell a glance before shaking her head and telling me no.

I put my gloves back on and slip back outside with my hot chocolate. The city rapidly becomes a blur of greasy food, ground coffee, and people replying that they’ve never seen my brother. Questioning the service industry people works best because they can’t shake me off and are more likely to have noticed Devin in the first place. I know I remember the customers that stop in regularly at Total Drug Mart — I probably remember some of them better than they remember me because normally people just want to fast-forward through the transaction and jump to more interesting moments in their lives. Me, I’m stuck behind a counter for hours at a time.

Some of the people I show Devin’s photo to stop and take the time to absorb the image and search their memory. Others couldn’t really care less but look at it anyway. In between my fast food stops it’s so chilly outside that I think about Bucky and his owner on Queen Street. I hope they’re not out in this, but if they are I have another five-dollar bill set aside for them.

When I lose feeling in my fingers, despite my thick gloves, I decide it’s time for lunch. After inhaling the scent of so much grease and sugar, the only thing I can handle the thought of is rabbit food so I buy a fresh fruit tray at Cultures and stay awhile to get warm. Back out on the street afterwards, I begin the whole cycle over with a fresh hot chocolate and a string of fast food restaurants.

I skip most of the clothing stores and lurch past a strip club. The sign’s top line promises: “THE BEST ALL NUDE DELICIOUS HOT GIRLS.” The second reads: “VISIT OUR VIP ROOM. WELCOME TOURISTS!”

Wandering by the Eaton Centre shopping mall, its warmth tempts me. But for some reason I think I’ll have better luck out on the street so I keep going, popping into any place that will feed a person for less than five dollars. That makes the Golden Arches top of the list, and I stumble into McDonald’s, reaching for my cell in my back pocket as I join the line. My eyes scour the customers — a family of five, two young Asian women grabbing a table by the wall, a trio of teenage guys in gang colours. I can’t explain, but when my gaze lands on Devin, gulping down a jumbo-sized drink near the window, the sight doesn’t come as a shock. It’s as though on some level I already knew I’d find him here.

That’s the way it seems for a moment or two anyway. Seconds
later my heart’s up in my mouth and I’m welded to the spot under my feet.

Now
. Before he sees me. I wrench my left foot up and then my right. My legs obey and rush me over to Devin’s window seat. He doesn’t even see me coming.

I stand directly in front of him so he can’t run without pushing me aside.

Shit
. That’s what he’s thinking when he looks up at me. I read it in his face. He screws up his eyes as he stares at me, cringing in his seat. Then he clamps his lashes shut and lets his mouth fall open.

My brother’s hair is the same colour as mine, but it looks as though he hasn’t washed it in a few days. He has the kind of scalp that gets oily fast; that’s like mine too. His eyes are deep-set, like my father’s. If you look closely enough you’d recognize bits of all the other LeBlancs in my brother Devin. To my eyes he seems overly skinny for his frame, but people who don’t know him may not think so.

“So sit,” Devin barks. “Stop staring at me.”

“You’ll take off,” I tell him, my voice unnaturally intense for such a mundane location. Drama must happen all the time at McDonald’s, but stupid reality show type melodrama. Devin and I shouldn’t have the crucial conversation we’re in for at a place whose mascot is a clown.

“I won’t,” he mutters.

I don’t believe him.

“I won’t,” he repeats with an ultra-sharp edge. “
Shit
. Sit, Serena!”

I angle my body towards the chair next to his and drop reluctantly into it.

“Shit,” he says again, both hands rubbing at his hair. “What’re you even doing here?”

Duh
. “Looking for you.” I stretch my legs out a bit under the table and accidentally knock one of them against his.

Devin doesn’t move to accommodate my legs. He glares at me in silence. That green shell coat I’ve spotted him in before is slung across the back of his chair. He’s wearing a blue polo shirt with the number 15 on the front and grey pants, and I can’t stop staring at him. “Morgan and I went after you yesterday, you know,” I continue. “Even after you went down to the subway. We were on the platform, searching for you.” I push my chair back to make room for my legs. “I’ve been looking for you all day.”

Devin’s expression is disinterest mixed with irritation. “You’re wasting your time.”

“I get to decide what’s a waste of my time,” I tell him.

“Okay.” Devin yawns and rubs his eyes. He has dark circles under them, something he was always prone to, only now they’re more pronounced. “Whatever.”

“
Whatever
? Do you have any idea what you’ve done to Mom and Dad?” Devin’s soul has been sucked out of his body. He doesn’t look like the Devin from my zombie dreams but the vibe surrounding him is the same. It’s like he’s not even hearing me. “Mom’s been an inch away from having a complete breakdown since the moment you left,” I explain. “All she does is visit her doctor and haunt eBay. And Dad, there’s nothing he can do about it so he pretty much just sits around too. Their whole lives revolve around staying home in case they hear news about you.”

I straighten my back against the uncomfortable McDonald’s chair and spit out, “At one point we thought you might be dead. Somebody found a body in Newmarket. Mom called the police because it could’ve been you.”

My neck cranes forward. “Every single day at our house is a day you’re not there, a day where we have no idea what’s going on with you.”

Devin smiles bitterly, his hand rhythmically tapping the table. “Dad and Mom did that to themselves. They’re the ones who kicked me out, if you remember. So why don’t you lay the blame where it belongs.”

“What else could they do but kick you out with the way you were acting?” I’m not getting through to him at all. “You
punched
Dad. You were stealing things, fighting with everyone.” Bringing weird people home.
Using
. I stop myself before adding the last two to the list, but I could go on and on.

Devin’s mouth puckers. “They’ve done a number on you — you’re brainwashed through and through. Seeing everything from their side.”

“You honestly think it was different than that?” I ask him. “Don’t you even remember what you used to be like before you started with the …” I can’t bring myself to put a name to his problem.
Meth
is such an ugly word. I never realized that before last June.

“Serena.” Devin holds his sides as he hunches over the table. “I’m not going to sit here and listen to you romanticize the past like it was so perfect. You know what I felt like before? Like shit. Like
nothing
.”

He reaches for his shake, closing his fingers around it but not picking it up. “So you think you can come looking for me and change my life? I already did that. It’s
done
and this is it. I’m not changing back to the person I was before, and it sounds like you’re the one who needs to learn to deal with that — you and Mom and Dad.” He yanks his legs towards him under the table. “I have places to be. I need to go.”

“Places?” I repeat. “Where?”

“
Oh
.” Devin forces a laugh. “Don’t we sound like Mom now?” The contempt in his words throws me off balance. It’s not fair for him to hate Mom so much after all the worrying she’s done about him. He must be frozen on the inside, his heart and mind a solid block of ice.

“Right,” I say sarcastically. “How embarrassing for me to actually give a shit about you and what you’re doing with your life. How embarrassing for me; how embarrassing for Mom.”

“Sweet Jesus,” Devin grumbles as he gets up. “Do we have to be so melodramatic?”

I stand too and watch him tug on his coat. It has a zipper around the back of the neck that suggests a missing attachable hood and one of the sleeves bunches partway up his arm. He yanks it down to cover his polo shirt as he looks at me sideways. “I’m cool,” he mutters, bobbing his head as an afterthought. “Really, okay? And you’ll be okay too if you just stop worrying so much. I don’t even know why you …” His hands comb restlessly through his hair again.

“What?” I ask him. “What?”

“Why you bothered,” he adds. “This is the way things have to be.” He shrugs.