You’d better believe my eyes and ears were open now. I didn’t know squat about Canada or the town of Port Hope, except that Shan and Roy and the kids lived in a semi (whatever that was) at 26 Yardley Street. A semi turned out to mean “semidetached”: the place was joined up to a twin house on one side. It was the kind of neighborhood Harley might have run his vinyl-siding-refresher scam in, or sent me through selling phony magazine subscriptions to “raise money for my school.” I wasn’t expected to know anything, though, because they’d moved from their old town. The one I “disappeared” from. When Shan asked, I said I didn’t want to go back or see anyone from there, because it brought back bad memories.
Everything seemed completely straight up. In some ways, it was a pretty standard game. I came up with memories for Uncle Pete that I got from Gram and memories for Grampy that I got from Uncle Pete. I toed out. I used the word sucker a lot. I scooted back and forth on my butt beside Matt and Brooklynne when we watched TV. (It was tiring; maybe Danny had ADHD.) I must have been a pretty good Danny Dellomondo, because they bought it. You could tell by the way Gram and Grampy hugged me before they headed back to their place in Havelock, about an hour’s drive north. Shan told me I had a case worker assigned from Children’s Aid to help “facilitate my transitioning.” She was going to come by in a couple of days, but right now I could just chill.
It was easy for her to say. For the first time in three years I’d stopped moving, but my brain was still going flat-out, bouncing around as if I were trapped on a bumper car ride. It was hard to take a breath, especially in a little house with four strangers who were supposed to be my family. We were watching each other all the time and pretending we weren’t. When Shan said Matt wanted to show me around town, I didn’t know if he did or not, but I let him. It was a chance to stretch, scope an exit and pump a little more info.
At first, I’d thought Port Hope was like a lot of towns in the northeastern States. Then I’d started noticing differences, like everything was in kilometers and liters, not miles and gallons. That took me awhile to figure out. And there were one- and two-dollar coins instead of bills. Also, there was foreign printing on packages, in what turned out to be French. I didn’t get why, because nobody in the town spoke it as far as I could tell, but of course I couldn’t ask. I was just worried that I’d be expected to know. One day, looking at a cereal box, I’d said, “I forgot about this being on everything. I can’t even read it.”
“Well, join the club,” Shan said. “We’re thinking about French immersion for Brooklynne, but I don’t know.” That hadn’t helped. After I’d found the library, I read newspapers until I learned about Quebec, this place in Canada that was all French.
I found the library the day Matt showed me around. The main street ran up and down a hill. A river crossed it at the bottom, running out to a lake. There were a lot of people around, and touristy shops selling expensive crap for your kitchen and whatever. You could almost hear the money crinkle. Harley would have had four games worked out before he parked.
It was hot. Not Tucson hot, but muggy. Matt was wearing a cap with NY on the front. He wheeled along beside me, straddling his little tricks bike. I’d ditched my rapper cap but kept my shades on.
Matt didn’t have much to say except that he liked Xbox better than Game Boy but he really wanted a Wii. He was saving up but hoped Grampy would help. I wondered if Matt kept his money in his room. It would be worth a look.
It was too early to pump him about the family, so I worked on exits. Which way is the highway, where’s the lake, how big is it, what’s there, what’s on the other side? A lot of it, he didn’t even know. You could tell he was bored. He kept circling back on the bike and trying to jump the curb. I finally got lucky when I asked, “What’s that place?”
“Uh, the library.”
“Let’s go in,” I said. It popped out before I could stop myself.
“What for?” Matt curled up one side of his mouth and pulled his chin in as if he was scared it would get contaminated. I recognized the Danny smirk I’d been practicing. I guessed it ran in the family.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Get a book.”
Matt waggled his front wheel. “Why? It’s summer.”
“I know. And it’s hot. And it’ll be air-conditioned.”
“Let’s just go get a pop.”
By now I knew “pop” was what they called sodas in Canada. I gave him back the smirk. “Got any money?”
“No,” Matt said. “Do you?”
“Come in there with me,” I said, “and I’ll get us some.”
Now he looked at me. “How?”
“You’ll see.” All at once I was doing a Harley: I was seeing three moves ahead, and it felt good. I knew Matt couldn’t resist. He put his bike in the rack. We walked into the cool.