Waiting For Sarah (9 page)

“Huh?”

The bell rang. “I must go, Michael.” She gathered her things and ran from the room, leaving him to put away her paints and clean her brush in the sink, under the corroded faucet. He picked up her still-wet painting. At first he couldn't figure it out, but then he saw that it was himself in a shadowy wheelchair. Mike Scott with a dark scowling head and a glowing red heart where his body should be. No legs below the knees.

She didn't really believe all that wait-for-me rubbish, did she?

The December days were short, dark and cold. The contractors who were supposed to be fixing the condo leaks had not been seen for the past two weeks. They're probably in the Caribbean, on a beach in Cancún, Norma wisecracked dryly to her friends in the co-op.

The history of Carleton was coming along. Mike had made a routine for himself. He would write two histories, he decided: a short snappy one for the yearbook, hitting only the highlights; and a longer one for his history teacher, one that included the less important events, and, of course, footnotes. His pages of notes grew every day, and he was selecting the best photographs from the crammed boxes of original snapshots, trying to match them up with their yearbooks.

He took newspapers, yearbooks and photographs home with him. He studied the faces of students and teachers from thirty, forty, fifty years ago and wondered about the mystery of time and age. He marveled at how a snapshot captured a brief moment of time and
preserved it for the future, marveled at how teenage faces and bodies remained ageless and indestructible. He touched with his fingernail the face of a senior boy, captain of the football team in 1951. If he were still alive now he would be about sixty-five years old, a retired pensioner. Some of the kids in the yearbook were probably dead already. Many of the teachers too. Meanwhile their faces and bodies were frozen in time, like Becky in Mike's mind, ten years old for as long as Mike should live to remember her. Or was she aging in some other dimension, carrying on with her life beyond the surly bonds of earth? Or was that just the stuff of fantasy? Becky was dead, but he had to believe he would see her again. And his mom and dad. He had to believe that.

Sarah came every day. He was surprised to discover himself starting to look forward to their ridiculous arguments, to her bright chatter. There were times when she didn't chatter, when she concentrated on her tidying and organizing or her painting instead, and that was fine too, for she filled the dismal room with warmth.

He said to her one day, “Some people die when they're young, like ten or twelve or fifteen.” He looked at her to see if he had her attention. He had. She was staring at him with her mouth open and her eyes questioning. He said, “And some people die when they're old, like over fifty.” He waited a few beats.

“So?”

“So, do you remember a while ago, talking about fate?”

“Of course.”

“Do you think we're all fated to die? At a certain time, and there's nothing we can do to prevent it?”

“I don't know, Michael. Why worry about it?”

He shrugged. “It just seems unfair, that's all; to die young, I mean. It's like you're cheated.”

She thought for a few seconds. “I don't think I really believe in fate.”

“Why not?”

“I think the opposite, that nothing is planned; everything's ... accidental.”

“Accidental?”

“We make things happen ourselves.”

“With our free will.”

“That's it, our free will.” She grinned. “Except for us.”

“Huh?”

Her grin grew wider. “You and me. It was fate that brought us together.”

She was a contradiction: practical and mushy, serious and funny, helper and nuisance. He was beginning to regret the coming of the weekend when he wouldn't see her.

Saturday morning was the time for Mike and Robbie's usual junk food fix at Granville Island Market. They got the wheelchair as far as the parking lot of Mike's building and saw Chris Telford heaving himself from his wheelchair into his old Lincoln. “You guys wanna lift anyplace?” he yelled.

“Granville Island?” Robbie yelled back.

“I thought you said you needed the exercise,” Mike reminded him.

“I need a chocolate fudge sundae more.”

Chris's wheelchair wasn't a folder, but had pop-off wheels instead. He popped off the wheels and pulled the chair into the car. “Get behind the wheel,” Chris told Mike. “You're driving.”

Mike positioned his chair the way he'd seen Chris do it and vaulted into the driver's seat of the Lincoln. Robbie folded Mike's chair, lifted it into the trunk and climbed into the rear seat.

“Start her up and just take it easy,” said Chris, handing over the keys.

Before the accident Mike had known how to drive; he had practiced in the family Chevy with his dad. But now it was different; hand controls weren't easy. He had to keep his wits about him and, most of all, had to forget it when his brain was telling his phantom right foot to hit the brake; it meant retraining his brain to signal the hands instead. He had already had lots of practice in Chris's Lincoln and had now reached the point where he felt confident in his ability to control the big car.

Lamey's Mill Road was easy and Granville Island, usually busy, today looked quiet. “Maybe you better take over here,” Mike said to Chris when they got to the Anderson junction.

“Not too many people about,” said Chris. “You think you could take her onto the island?”

“Sure, I can do it.” He drove slowly, over the train tracks, past the Granville Island Brewery and Kids Market and onto Johnston. Traffic was light. He found a parking slot near Bridge's Hotel and braked to a gentle stop. “Phew!”

“I knew you could do it.” Chris slapped him on the shoulder.

“Can I open my eyes now?” said Robbie. He lifted Mike's chair out onto the sidewalk, scattering the pigeons.

They always enjoyed the busy ambience of Gran­ville Island with its restaurants, theatres and hotels, its indoor market, its shops and its old-fashioned cobbled streets. In Broker's Bay and in the marinas there were trawlers, gill-netters, charter boats for salmon fishing, kayaks, sailboats, and power boats; in Burrard Inlet, big cruisers and tiny ferries glided to and fro under the bridges; there were even houseboats moored at the boardwalks. The smell of the sea was mixed with the odors of creosoted timbers and French fries. For Mike and Robbie the island was a colorful, exciting place.

“Come on, Chris,” said Mike. “I'll buy you a coffee.”

“Some other time, Mike. I gotta go. I'm taking Vivian out shopping.” Vivian was his lady friend. “You know what, Mike?”

“What?'

“I know it's none of my business, man, but seriously, it's about time you started thinking of pros­thetics. Get walking. Get rid of the chair. Drive with legs instead of hand controls. You hear what I'm saying?”

“I hear what you're saying, Chris, and you're right: it's none of your damn business.”

“Have it your own way, Mike, but I had to say it. Couldn't rightly call myself a friend if I didn't.”

“You did real good on the driving, Mike,” said Robbie later, when they were enjoying their sundaes — with a chaser of fries for Robbie — on the open deck among the pigeons. He pointed skyward to a small float plane buzzing down the inlet. “You'll soon be flying one of those suckers, wait and see.”

Mike felt stronger and stronger: his more active life had lent new strength to his arms and shoulders. And he felt happier; he didn't know why.

It was now the last week of school before the Christmas vacation. Sarah came to the archives on Monday and they worked and talked together.

“I hate these short dark days,” said Mike. “And it's so cold. Winter is a total pain.”

“No, it isn't. I like winter. Vancouver might be cold, but it's healthy. And we get snow. Snow is beautiful. We can ski in the mountains. And we get spring showers, fall mists.”

“Florida is better.”

“No, it isn't. I would hate to live in Florida. Same every day: two kinds of weather, hot and very hot. Two kinds of terrain, flat and very flat. Blah!”

“But better.”

“British Columbia rules.”

“No, it doesn't.”

“Does.”

He let her have the last word. It had taken a while,
but Mike had finally figured out that these little arguments were Sarah's way of getting him to talk and have fun. She didn't mean half of what she said, would argue black was white just to get something going between them. Once the simple topics were dealt with they often moved on to more challenging ones, like racial equality, pollution and the question of why there were so many wars. Sarah had opinions on everything. Talking was easier these days: the yearbooks and newspapers, because they tended to be uniform and tedious in content, needed only to be skimmed, a task hardly requiring their full attention.

On Tuesday, Sarah left early, pleading a headache. She had no sooner gone than Mike had a surprise visit from Dorfman.

“How is this little history of yours coming along, Scott?” His pale, magnified eyes searched the table and the dusty shelves.

Mike showed him what he done so far: the many pages of notes, the system of organization, the files and indexes he had set up for the material to be typed by the committee, the files of photographs to be included, each photograph numbered and referenced. He had done a lot; the history of Carleton High was obviously going to be a thorough one.

Dorfman seemed almost disappointed and soon left.

Sarah was back on Wednesday, her headache gone, but she tried to persuade Mike that they both needed fresh air.

“It's this stuffy old place,” she said. “Let's take
a day off. You have worked hard; one day off won't hurt.”

“Yes, it would.”

“No, it wouldn't.” Smiling at their usual formula.

“But I ...”

“Just for today, please?” she said, gray eyes pleading.

He could take extra work home to make up for the lost time, he thought.

“Where do you want to go?”

“Down to the sea wall.” She became excited. “It's my favorite place. The boats in the marina are so colorful, and I love the sound of their bells on a windy day.”

“I wouldn't get back in time for my next class.”

“You would if you let me help push you.”

Mike locked the archives room and they left the school through the back door near the band room. Sarah wore a red ski jacket over a pink sweater and carried her tote bag. “You don't need to push me going downhill,” said Mike. “I can manage fine.”

A thin fog hung over the Fairview Slopes, False Creek and the Cambie Bridge.

“Tell me more about those little airplanes, the ultralights, you watch at weekends.”

“No. You would find it boring.”

“No, I wouldn't.”

“Okay. There are different kinds, but they're usually made of aluminum tubing, covered in Dacron sailcloth. The Flightstar Spider is one of the best for the money. You can build it yourself. It weighs 145 kilos and it's got a chromoly steel cage and landing
gear, comes with a 447 or a 503 Rotax engine. It can do 120k, and depending on your weight, it can take you almost 300 kilometers on a 45 liter tank of gas. Then there's ...”

She was wrinkling her nose.

“You're wrinkling your nose.”

“No, I'm not.”

“You
were
wrinkling your nose.”

“No, I wasn't.”

“I told you it was boring.”

“No, it's not.”

“Do you know ‘High Flight,' the John Magee poem?”

“I don't think so.”

“It's only fourteen lines. Want to hear it?”

“I'd love to hear it.”

He recited the sonnet.

“It's beautiful, Michael.”

“I imagine flying upward through the clouds and then bursting out into the sunlight, leaving the clouds behind. I call it sunburst. The poem's like that too, I think: it hurls you up through the dark clouds into the sudden brightness of the sun.”

They were soon on the sea wall. In the marina, the boats were lurching phantoms in the gray fog.

“Listen to the chimes,” said Sarah.

They sat awhile, listening.

“You want to walk along the sea wall to Charleson Park? It's only a short way.”

She said, “No. I want to stay here for a few minutes. Then I'll help you up the hill, back to Carleton.”

They sat and peered into the fog and listened to
the boat chimes and then they went back.

On Thursday Sarah retied and put away the bundles of
Clarions
that Mike had finished with while he took stock of his progress in the archives room, going over his notes. His project was looking good. He would have it finished easily before semester's end, in January. Many
Clarions
were left unexamined — to inspect them all would be impossible in the time available, even with the ones he had been taking to read at home and the ones he had put aside to read over the Christmas holiday — but he was satisfied with the facts he had gathered, the notes he had made.

The next day would be the last school day before the Christmas holiday and the new year. He wouldn't see Sarah for another two weeks. She hadn't talked about Christmas, not once, which was unusual, especially for a girl; girls loved Christmas, didn't they?

“You looking forward to Christmas, Sarah?”

“Christmas?”

She looked blank, like she had never heard of it. Then she said, “Oh, yes, of course.” But she didn't sound enthusiastic.

Which was a bit strange, he thought.

He had brought her a Christmas gift, a set of wind chimes that sounded like boats in the marina. He hoped she would like it. He paused at the entrance to the archives room. Miss Pringle had the door open for him, as usual. He heard the sound of someone sobbing coming from inside the room.