This All Happened (17 page)

18      Lydia is back from Vancouver. Had I been to Alex's show yet? Yes, I said. You went with Maisie? Yes. You drove her there and you drove her home?Yes.

She says, I wanted to go to Alex's with you.

Well, let's go.

Forget it.

She has spent the weekend with Craig, and she's jealous of my time with Maisie.

She says she did not go down to Seattle. But as it happens, Craig was in Vancouver.

So you saw him.

Lydia: We had coffee.

And then.

And then what? Yes, a bunch of us went out for a drink. And.

Nothing happened, Gabe. He was staying at a friend's apartment and he asked me to come back so he could change. He put on a cream suit. That's all.

We go down to the Ship to celebrate her win (best short film). Wilf, of course, is all over her. It is Wilf who has made Lydia. No one understands Lydia like Wilf. And I see the look of adulation for Wilf in Lydia's eye. I can't stand it. I grip my beer bottle and Max witnesses my behaviour.

Max: You want to go to the boozecan?

That sounds like an idea.

And we stay out all night.

19      My wife has slept with Wilf Jardine and she's also slept with Craig Regular and I bet I bet it happened during those hours in that apartment when he changed into a cream suit through her encouragement, that ended in something that ended for she was too short in the telling too short in telling me everything and what am I to do now that my wife has all but told me she's had an affair and with a New Brunswicker (the only thing lower than coming from Corner Brook). And Wilf. It is early morning and I've walked up from downtown, pounded on her door until she dropped a key from the window and I stagger upstairs to confront her with this. I am bold and say okay what about you and Wilf and she says Gabe youre drunk youre stinking drunk now get into bed no I'm not getting into bed until this is unravelled. I say, Okay this is a secret, but Max said to me Gabe I dont know if I should say this, but she's looking pretty absorbed in that guy, and I looked and there you were staring into Wilf's eyes like you adored him and it made me well it-

Look, if youre going to wake me up, accuse me, and want me to say I've slept with Wilf then youre mad and go on home out of it now and I'll call you tomorrow if youre lucky.

You want me to go.

I want to go to sleep. I was asleep. Youre stinking drunk. I'm not drunk.

It's six in the morning and you wake me up and call me your wife when I'm barely your girlfriend and you want me to confess and it's you who should be apologizing for saying that in front of everyone saying, Are you going down to the booze-can with Wilf? when I'm having a night out with Daphne and youve made it clear youre out with Max and I've come over to you to say I'm going down to the boozecan and you ruin it by saying that in front of Daphne and Max, man youre lucky I dont just leave you and then! you go to the boozecan and come here wailing to me that I talked to another guy.

20      She's mad at Max. Why are you mad at Max? Because he said that thing to you.

What thing.

Gabe, I dont know if I should say this, but she's looking pretty absorbed in that guy. That is so rotten.

Oh, Lydia.

Do you see why I'm mad?

He didnt say that.

You said he said it.

I was ... He might have made a joke about it.

What did he say?

He might have said Lydia's got that fella's attention. Pause.

So it was joke.

Yes. I took it badly. It was my jealousy.

So you were an arsehole.

I was upset.

Why can't you admit you were an arsehole? How I wish you could just say, Lydia, I'm such an arsehole.

Can I say asshole?

What?

Can I say asshole. Arsehole is so hard.

Say whatever you want.

Lydia, I'm such an asshole.

21      We've been invited for supper over at Max's, but I decide to wait. I am standing under a maple for shelter. It's been raining all night, a cold rain. The leaves are outlined in light and they overlap, like hands rubbing. There is Max's house. Windows in red trim. Rain dripping. How I'd prefer to stand here and wait rather than be early and talk. A car pulls up and I recognize the sound of the exhaust. A car door slams, and it's Lydia. But I want to hang on. I havent seen Lydia since yesterday morning and I was sooky on the phone. That I'd have to walk down to see her. I was home and I called her place but there was no message. It seemed like she hadnt tried to get me. So I was feeling sorry for myself. I so hate getting this way. Standing under a tree she would never do this. She is so unlike me. I urinate by the fence, it's dark in this corner.

She'd said, I'm at the Ship with Wilf. I'm not sure what I want to do tonight. I may just go home. She'd said, You can come down if you want.

There is something so uninviting in that. If you want. I wanted her to want me to come down. I didnt want her to shift the want to me. I was home and I'd gone to the early movie so that we could be together later. But here she was calling me and saying this is what she's doing. It's raining and I dont want to walk or drive down there.

I know when I walk in it's going to be uncomfortable. That she caught my sookiness on the phone. Last night, when she phoned to ask me over. But I was, for once, content to stay. But she wanted me. And I liked telling her no. But she gave in so quickly. Okay, she said. And I wanted her to beg more. Like I do. But she resigned herself, didnt yearn. She ends by saying, Sure you dont want to come over? I pause, Should I? She says, No, dont come over, I'll talk to you tomorrow, goodbye.

I keep the receiver to my ear, waiting for her click. But she has paused, waiting too. But I can say nothing and those silences so often between us, our language not folding into conversation but solidifying into isolated fragments. And she hangs up.

All of Max's windows lit up, burning around the edges of curtains and shutters. I bet there is no one else out in this weather by choice, waiting under a tree, obviously in a mood.

22      We pack Jethro for the trip west. It's an eight-hour drive to Corner Brook.

I drive as Lydia sleeps. She is peaceful in sleep. I reach behind for a blanket and as I do this I turn the wheel. Jethro is hurtling quietly down a rough steel grey shoulder full of spruce and ditch, and now a terrific new sound occurs, which wakes up Lydia and startles Tinker, and my arm shoots over to brace her.

The sun dead ahead the light of gods or inquisitors the gold of speculators.

We plunge sideways down the embankment. A hundred kilometres an hour over a boulder. Just stop now Jethro pleasy please and Lydia wide-eyed as if I have dropped a snowball down her neck. We lurch forward in our seat belts and stare at each other.

A rap on my window A young couple who have climbed down to us. I have to push hard to open the door.

Is everyone all right?

He ducks a look in and seems shocked that I've gone off the road in good weather. Embarrassment that I've been reckless. If only there were four more cars in the ditch.

That was some dive you took.

He calls up to a woman, Theyre fine. Then smiles. That's my wife, he says.

They offer us a lift. As we're getting in their car I notice the sign in the rear window: Just Married.

Congratulations. We've been thinking about getting married. Woman: Dont do it.

Then she looks at her husband and laughs.

We'll take you up to Glovertown Irving. You'll get a wrecker from there. Nice dog.

A wrecker. The next step. A ride to the Irving and get a wrecker.

23      We spend the day in Glovertown. We camp out at Kozy Kabins. The wrecker brings Jethro to a buddy of his who fixes Hondas. All he needs is an arm or a rod or something I can't remember but it's steering-related. It involves torque. In the morning we're on the road again.

I had stroked the word LOVE in the Glovertown roadsign. But Lydia might have thought I stroked OVERT.

I tell Mom and Dad about the accident. How Jethro was off the road in a second. Mom interrupts: Did you say death row?

We sleep in the room of my childhood. Feet hanging over the bunkbeds Junior and I grew up in.You grow at night. Best to write in the morning, when youve grown.

24      Lydia watches my father work. He has a mahogany table leg clamped in a vice, its claw foot sticking up, clenching a ball. He cradles a carving tool. If you keep both hands on the handle, he says, you'll never cut yourself.

We watch him carve around the filigree in the knee. I realize that my father is a handsome man. That I probably won't be as handsome when I'm his age. For some reason I'd thought the human race was evolving into better looks, but it's not the case.

He understands the physical world: electricity, plumbing, capillary action. He has built all the furniture in the house, and the copper ornaments contain his planishing. He has opinion and decisive comment whereas I am hampered by the acceptance of multiple views. I have learned no trail through the world. If I could show him batts of insulation.

25      Dad asks where Long's Hill is and Lydia says, It's the very bitter end of the Trans-Canada, Mr English. You never put on your indicator. The Trans-Canada turns into Kenmount Road and Kenmount turns into Freshwater and Freshwater turns into Long's Hill and Long's Hill is where Gabriel lives.

We visit Junior at his shed in the woods. He's studying stories of Labrador. He wants to move there. He wants to be the Member for the region. He asks me how difficult that might be. He says it's only an idea.

The shed is a garage on the first floor and a living quarters above it. Two snowmobiles lie under tarps flanking six cord of wood. He has a sky-blue Ford Fairlane standing on a sheet of plastic. When I ask, he says,You ever hear of the wick effect? Moisture coming out of the ground, it will attach to the metal of your car and rot it. A sheet of plastic acts as a vapour barrier.

He keeps one window open a crack to avoid condensation.

Inside he has a hole cut in the floor and a plastic bag full of milk, eggs, and bacon. It's cooler down in the garage, he says. I got no electricity yet. I've got no running water either. I'm living on potatoes and moose.

26      We drive to the cabin. We paddle up to Boot Brook at sunset. It takes twenty-five minutes to get to the point. Windy. It's almost ten oclock before we start fishing. I tell Lydia to fish in the calm water of the brook. Past the white stump that has sat in the current and, in low-water times, been fully exposed. I used to believe that Boot Brook produced calm water. That calm water poured from the brook, and at dusk, this still water spread over the lake and made it smooth.

We catch a few fighters.

We paddle back in the dark. The lake is vast and quiet under the stars. First the Big Dipper and this leads us to Polaris, and from that we get Cassiopeia. About two miles down the lake we see the lights of a car on the bridge to Howley. The lights cross the water and wink out.

The caribou have pulled carrots out of the ground to munch the green fern, but a two-legged animal has been at the spuds.

Lydia puts in a fire and we drink beer and play crib. We decide to leave the generator off and just light the oil lamps. There's no one else on the lake. You can hear the water lap against the big rock.

In the morning Lydia cooks the trout with bacon and squeezes lemon over the fish and packs on the pepper. We eat a loaf of bread by tearing it.

27      On our way out to the highway a moose stops us on the road. I get out. I approach the moose. It's a nervous calf. He backs up. I hear Lydia, out her window: Gabe. Behind you.

I turn to see a cow moose ploughing through the ditch, her head low. She starts up the grade. I put the car between us. The moose is determined. She clambers up Lydia's door, kicks herself onto the roof. I watch her teeter up there, turn around, metal popping and kinking like a pop can. The moose stands on Jethro's roof and stares at me, some massive hood ornament. Then she scrabbles down my side, feints my way, and veers left to her calf. She pushes her calf and they trundle off into the scrub.

Lydia stares at me through my window. She gets out. The roof is covered in stretched craters, like the punches superheroes put in metal.

We drive back to St John's and shower and head out to a party at Max's.

Max says to me, Youve got to loosen up. There's nothing going on with Lydia. She loves you. She's crazy about you. Okay, so you guys fight. Who doesnt fight? Youve got to be a big man.

Me: I know it. Thing is, I'm battling exhaustion.

Max reflects on this. Youve got to stop looking and listen with your heart. Your heart will know. Is your heart getting fed?

I go to the kitchen because Wilf is there. I lean up against the counter beside him. Alex comes in, barefoot. Wilf puts out a hand.

Dont come in here, Alex, cause I broke a glass.

This is clearly a lie.

But it forces Alex to sit at the table.

Have you tried the soup?

The soup is delicious, I say.

And Wilf turns and sees me for the first time.

Alex says, Would you mind getting me a bowl?

I ladle her up a bowl. I can't find a spoon so I give her the ladle.

Wilf turns to the chicken wings. I join him. I say, How did the show go?

What?

The show at the Hall. You were the special guest.

What?

I'm thinking maybe he forgot about the show. I dont want to be the one to remind him.

Youre talking about the show next week, he says.

Oh, that's it.

Yeah, that show. It went well.

And he gives me a little grin.

Went really well.

Lydia walks in and Wilf says, It's time for you to have some kids.

Alex:You dont need kids.

Wilf: Sure you do. He nods to me. And you dont have to worry about the donor.