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His commute home took him north away from the mid-city high-rises, through the business section and its three to ten storey buildings, winding him through the maze of split level homes in the suburbs, and back into the low rent district near another business centre: a valley of subway stations and basement suites. On his way, he drove over two rivers flowing South, eight railway tracks where at least one passenger train heading somewhere else made him wait, and underneath one airport runway. The planes never seemed to be landing. Always taking off.
His basement suite was located at the bottom of a cul-de-sac only a few blocks from the Trans-Canada. The upper floor was once a dance studio but now served as a quasi-warehouse for a clothing franchise and housed around a hundred naked, headless mannequins. There was a false front to make the building look like an actual house and from the street the deception was remarkable. When Tom parked his car and walked along the side to his entrance, the pretense of the siding disappeared. But the neighbourhood was quiet and the rent was cheap. He only had to forget that there were over a hundred decapitated nude mannequins, sans nipples, over his bed at night. Some tied to the ceiling. He imagined he could hear them twisting, floating and bobbing above him.
They didn’t bother his girlfriend. “It’s like... it’s like they’ve been buried in a pit and we’re underneath that, even. Like we’re the worms.” She said. Or: “It’s like heaven, really. What you think is heaven turns out to be a nightmare. Or hell.” Tom could only nod. She would take this as agreement or encouragement and continue on with darker analogies, but he only meant he heard.
No one seemed to ever collect or deliver the mannequins. They were just there. The image would not be so dramatic and unsettling if there were curtains on the windows, but the big bay windows showed the figures in his headlights as he arrived home at night. When he left for work in the morning they were there in his rear-view mirror. Headless. Soulless. Nipple-less. As he drove further away their images would disappear like something sinking in murky water.
$$$
When he got home there was no inviting smell of a roast in the oven, no beer waiting in a perspiring glass and no girlfriend gushing at his arrival. “Eddy?” He called. He set his shoes in the closet next to his other pair. He rolled up his sleeves. “Eddy?” Through the flimsy walls, he heard her tiny voice calling out over the sound of the shower.
He opened the refrigerator and watched the light dim and surge. There were three Schooners. He felt it might indeed be a three Schooner night. He twisted the cap off the beer. “Did you eat?” He shouted. He heard her diluted voice. Then the shower stopped. “How was work?”
“We were swamped,” Eddy called back. She floated into the room naked, a towel wrapped around her sodden hair. She rubbed vigorously, her small breasts shaking, and let her black hair fall in waves, hiding her face. She saw him looking at her. “Don’t, Tom. Stop.”
“What?” He skipped the beer cap across the kitchen counter and it clanged into the sink.
“Stop.” She said again and found a rag and wiped where the cap touched the counter tiles. “Jeez, Tom.” She folded the rag and continued towelling her hair. “How was work?” He watched her walk down the hall to the bedroom. She took the towel from her head and covered her bottom. “Don’t, Tom.”
There was only one battery in the remote control and he tossed it beside him on the couch. Their basement suite was small;, one bedroom, one bath, kitchen and living room separated only by a half-wall. The furnishing cobbled together from their previous domiciles. The only art on the walls were Eddy’s dark charcoal drawings and scratchings; images of stark trees, empty and abandoned buildings, and various depictions of people that, when you stood back far enough, were just skulls painted in a way that they resembled something else. The suite had windows that were all near the ceiling, the rest of the building being submerged in the earth. Soft yellow light from the sinking sun poured in and washed out the television screen. He blinked at his reflection for a few minutes. “Did you eat?” He asked. He couldn’t remember if he had asked her before.
She shuffled in and sat in the easy chair across from him. Her hair hung over her face, dripping tiny puddles in the shallow of her collarbone. Her hands clutched the inside of her sweater and her toes curled themselves inside the cuffs of her loose jeans. “How was traffic?” She said.
He shrugged. “It was an easy flow.” He sipped his beer. “Did you eat?”
“Did you sell anything today?”
“Nah.” He said. “Did you eat yet?”
“Yes, Tom.” She sat forward suddenly. “I ate. I ate. I fucking gorged myself.” She said, her handless arms bouncing up and down in a facsimile of violence against the chair. “That’s all I did was eat all day.”
“What the hell?”
“Are you happy? I heard you the first fifty times.” She fell back and turned her head to focus on one of the plants. It was in sorry need of water. “I ate.”
“Jeez, Eddy, I just want to know if I should fix us both something. Or if you were cooking, or what.” He sipped his beer. It was empty. He placed the bottle on the coffee table and it made a hollow thump. A bubble formed at the top of the bottle and he poked it with his finger. There was silence between them.
Eddy sat curled on the chair as though she were trying to hide. “Sure, Tom.” She said. Her face was flushed. How white she was against her clothes. Her hands and feet struggled in their prison, “We can have spaghetti.”
“Spaghetti’s fine.” He said. Gently, appeasing. “You want me to boil the water?”
$$$
But first the bathroom. It was obsessive the way he would check. He was ashamed. How would he explain himself if she ever caught him? He performed his nightly secret ritual with the bathroom door locked and the sink water running. He lifted the bag from the garbage can. Slowly, slowly. The crinkling could be heard through the walls despite the running water. There was nothing underneath the bag in the container. He sniffed. It stunk like garbage. Good. Now the sink. The water ran and quickly drained. Nothing clogged down the sink. Good.
The mirror was hinged in the middle, halving his face. Inside the cabinet bottles and vials lined the shelves from smallest to largest. Eight different brands of headache relief. 50 Tabs APO Prednisone 50 Mg. Take as directed. Celesoderm Val.0.1% CR. Apply sparingly to affected area(s) twice a day. Venlafaxine XR 150Mg. Effexor XR 150Mg. Take ONE capsule(s) daily. Take With Food. Good.
A sharp knock at the door made his heart do an excited flip. “Tommy, hurry up. I have to do my hair.” He heard Eddy from behind the locked door.
“I’m almost done.” He said, too loud. Did that sound unnatural? Would she suspect he was snooping through her things for evidence?
“Well, don’t stink the place up.”
Shit. Of course. It dawned on him quickly and sent a tingle through his scalp. Why hadn’t he thought of that earlier? Days ago? He opened the small cupboard below the sink. He moved the rolls of toilet paper and a box of tampons. And there it was; one box of Ex-Lax. Opened. He looked to the toilet. Slowly he pulled the seat up and bent to look inside. The water in the bowl was clean. He flushed. And there, just underneath the rim. He knew it. He leaned closer, resisting the urge to investigate with his fingers. She had cleaned but not enough. There were tell-tale splatter marks.
$$$
At night the reflections from Eddy’s fish tank played across their bedroom like a visible aquamarine breeze. Tom stared at the ceiling and imagined the mannequins just above this surface, bobbing and swaying. Each time he closed his eyes they stayed shut a little longer. When he opened them the shadows were further away and he felt as though the ceiling was slowly receding from his view. Eddy rolled to her side facing away from him. Her movements made the waterbed pulse and roll beneath his back. In his ears, the silence was threatening. No longer simply quiet but oppressive, coming from inside his head, as if his ears were blocked or plugged. He closed his mouth and blew gently through his nose. Nothing. It still felt as though he had been swimming. He stuck his fingers in his ears and wiggled. “Hello? Hello?” His voice was far away.
“What?” Eddy beside him. Groggy.
“Nothing.” He said. “Sorry.”
“What?”
“I feel sick.” He said. Now it was difficult to breathe. Each word he said expended precious energy and air. His heartbeat played catch up with his lungs. He could not get enough breath.
“Welcome to my world.” She said.
Indeed.
Our world, she meant. Her world no longer existed. His own world no longer existed. It was a mixture. They had taken their individual colours; beautiful yellow and a sublime orange and created a... what? She would know the colour. To him it resembled puke. The colours would never disassemble again. The two of them together were a new entity. Not an entirely useful or pleasing one. Much like the septic pond behind his parent’s farm; N parts water, N parts shit. The shit to water ratio was unknown. Besides, who would dig and wade through all that green swamp to find out. This is how he thought of his relationship when he was just about to fall asleep. His sub-conscious would clamour for attention as he drifted off. Work was wrong, he and Eddy were wrong, this basement suite was wrong... it all seemed wrong.
After a minute he knew she was sleeping again. He concentrated on the ceiling and on the headlights that swept past the window, whitewashing the room, as a lighthouse would. He let his body float with the waterbed until his breathing slowed. And when he stopped struggling while drowning in doubt and indecision, there would come a peace. A calm. A letting go.
There. Nothing wrong. The day was an island disappearing over the edge of the world. The office was a bad thought. The other agents were sharks sinking down, nothing to feed from where Tom floated. The management whales were spouting off for no one. Certainly not for Tom’s benefit or detriment. Floating the way he was, there was no sickness. He was all right. He could sail through this life. His basement suite could soon turn into a mortgage with a floating interest rate. Swilling drinks with the boys at the pub on Saturday. Wash the Cobalt (no, they could buy a luxury car) on Sundays. A calm ocean with his course directly in front of him. Why were things in his life never this clear in the morning? The stars so clear for navigation. The constellations plotting his actions. He should call his mother. Ease her mind. The job was fine. The job was fine. The job was fine.
And Eddy. Eddy.
He turned, letting the bed fool with his equilibrium. Letting the soft sheets fool with his libido. Eddy. He listened to her breath. Shallow. Like there was something up her nose. He pulled the blanket from her shoulder and admired the dark shadows in her collarbone. Such soft skin. He was attracted to her skin first, he remembered. Pale. When he first asked her out she reddened so quickly. Endearing. Just a film, he told her. Dinner? No, dinner was their fourth date. By then it was too late. He was in love. At least he thought he was, then. He traced lightly along her exposed ribs, feeling the defined grooves. The sharp bone of her hips gave his heart a pang.
“Tom, don’t.” She mumbled. “I’m fat.”