Leanne Knight-Kwong pulls up in the town’s blue bus with a roaring horn honk.
“They just keep coming.” Rose shakes her head at me as Leanne leads nearly fifty women up the gazebo path. Local women, all. Most have visited before, just not all at once like this. They know we have special guests tonight.
I only had to tell Leanne about the mediums’ visit—leave it to her to inform the rest. Judging by how dolled up they are in snug-fitting stonewashed jeans and ruffled blouses or in flowing maxi dresses, I’d say Leanne’s gossip was heard loud and clear. Not quite Easter Sunday dressed, though care was put into their earrings and bangle bracelets, their fresh coats of nail polish. Leanne still wears her customary sleeveless rock T-shirt, Steppenwolf this time, though even she has put on a feminine scallop-sleeved cardigan overtop.
Reverend Agnes Radin and Reverend Esther Lutz wait in easy cross-legged seats on the gazebo floor for the group to arrive. Around them Tamara helps Bobby light the candles and lay the altar—some crystals, fresh-cut vervain and chicory, a sacred-heart pendant. Mostly, our alter is decorated with offerings of Crystal Beach Amusement Park memorabilia; a strip of ride tickets, a few dog-eared postcards, and a blue felt flag with the Crystal Beach smiling sun logo embossed in gold. Everything the way Etta likes it. Tamara and Bobby aren’t doing it for Etta, though. Tamara’s here for me—at least that’s what she told me. And it’s Hal’s devotion to the angel and to his still new sobriety that brings Bobby.
A wooden donation box—Hal’s latest handyman creation—sits at the threshold of the gazebo. I agonized over where was the most non-intrusive yet highly visible place to put the donation box. I chew the inside of my mouth as the women drop their donations in. I mustn’t stare. It’s not about the money. Not. About. Money. Although these women aren’t broke. Leanne drives the bus. Dolores and her co-workers Marge and Dolly are linen porters at Fort Erie Hospital. Union pay. A few more work over at the Bick’s pickle factory in Dunnville. Etta snoops ID cards in their purses.
Nearby, Hal ushers in a few campers who curiously circle around. “Tonight’s fer ladies only,” he says audibly, “Not my rules, just doin’ what I’m told.” His burly silhouette lumbers around in a weak attempt to keep his distance. Bobby stiffens. She makes like she’s going to scold him. Dolores pats her left shoulder and I pat her right. She turns her attention back to the women assembling around us.
Hal will stay twenty yards away as I have asked him too. He needs to be always within visual contact. Since the last coat of spar varnish was applied, Hal hasn’t ventured more than a hundred feet from the gazebo. He’s appointed himself the watcher. Tonight, however, he and Moustache will be the watchers of children. They brusquely herd Lucky and a trio of other toddlers to the cabin, where I’ve instructed them to read bedtime stories and make flashlight shadow puppets. I set The Velveteen Rabbit on the cabin’s cot for them—any fool can make rabbit shadow puppets, right? On principle, I’m glad that Bobby and the other moms can join the circle without distraction. But it’s the hot prickling across my skin that makes me grateful that the kids are tucked up in the cabin. Etta is antsy tonight. Fired up.
“Welcome,” I say as the last couple of women lower themselves onto throw pillows. “Tonight we are joined by Reverend Agnes Radin and Reverend Esther Lutz from Lily Dale, New York …”
“I heard you were all a bunch of witches?” Leanne cuts in.
Reverend Agnes’s smile is bright and toothy. Her hair is a white bubble perm wrapped with a pink glitter headscarf. She wears an eagle pendant, a fox’s head ring, and butterfly earrings. “We are an assembly of Spiritualists, devoted to finding the truth and divinity in all things,” she says.
“You talk to the dead?”
“We believe communication with discarnate humans is possible and natural. Spirits are capable of growth, emotion, and the desire to communicate, like any other being,” says Reverend Agnes.
“Can you contact my ancestors?”
“Did the angel tell you to come here?”
“Are you here on a supernatural investigation? Like in that movie? Are we going to get our picture taken?”
“Do you think the angel is real? Or is she a mischievous spirit of some kind?” Bobby asks. Good instincts again. But why do smart women even bother with that which they can’t completely trust? Pot. Kettle. Black. Truth is, I can’t claim to know why Bobby or anyone else comes to the circle. Maybe they just find me more entertaining than The Love Boat and M*A*S*H reruns that air all summer long. It’s more than that, though—there’s no making light of personal desires. Aching desires too. Desires that needle my skin like frosty air. Even the mediums want something—I feel it.
“Our guests have come to observe,” I announce. Which sums up what Reverend Agnes told me on the phone prior to their visit. To “observe.” How they found us and what they want was never made clear. I wonder how word of our little operation crossed the border and travelled down the I-90. Certainly they are all loose-lipped, but which one’s gossip could have possibly reached two mediums from Lily Dale? It makes me nervous. Etta and I could use more time to pull our act together. And am I supposed to perform miracles now?
Who’s here, Etta?
It’s hard to hear in this hen party. They’re all clucking at once. Calm ’em down so I can pick up something.
“Women,” I say. “Put your questions aside. Quiet your minds. Meditate on the reasons you’ve come here. Imagine yourselves speaking directly to the angel. Ask her for what you need.”
A minute passes. Another and another. I make meaningful eye contact with each apprehensive woman. I close my eyes and hum like a low-C on a pipe organ. Okay, maybe I don’t hit a low C, but I’ve been practicing a guttural trance, and tossing my head, rolling my eyes. Etta plays her part much better than I do. She raps on floorboards. I rap back three times. Etta echoes. Most of the women titter in awe, except the Reverends, who exchange wary looks.
They suspect we’re a smoke and mirrors show, Etta. Let’s show them.
Every inch of the gazebo creaks, as if the entire structure draws in a deep breath. The floor beneath us seems to swell for a second, then relax. Leanne scrambles to her feet, panicked. Then, noticing she’s the only one about to make a run for it, she awkwardly lowers herself back down.
Etta has information for me. I’m ready. “It’s okay to be afraid. It’s not our fault that we instinctively want to flee, want to hide, want to survive any way we can.” I eye Leanne. The shiner she had when I met her is long gone, but the inch-long scar above her left eye will last. A swipe of her eyebrow is missing where the hair likely won’t regrow. “We all have our reasons for being scared. Tonight, June 21, summer solstice, the longest day of the year, I cast a circle of strength around us.” This speech, too, I’ve practiced. Pretty darn good, if I say so myself.
I turn to the Reverend Esther Lutz. Unlike Agnes’s bright, gaudy style and lively face, Esther is the epitome of neutral. Hair in a bun. Beige button-down shirt and pressed khaki pants. No makeup, not even pierced ears. “You carry the Eye of Horus in your left pocket and a chunk of garnet in your right. There is no need for protection charms here. This circle is about undoing harm, not causing it.” I studied the Bronze Age for two weeks total. Booyah! Reverend Esther’s face remains cool, though Etta tells me she’s curled her toes into little feet fists.
The teenage ginger to your left is in the family way. About six weeks ripe.
You looked inside her body?
I see what I see. Jeez. I don’t tell you how to do your job. And she’s carrying a book of poetry in her purse. Is that better? You’re a bookworm, aren’t you, Dollface? This one’s called The Gold Cell. She’s marked a page.
‘“The Premonition’ by Sharon Olds,” I say aloud. The women lean in, confused, expecting. Except the ginger, she tilts away as if I’ve just given her a little push. Etta slips her name to me. “I too know this book, Becky McPhee. I have a copy myself. Good for you for reading it.” Did that sound patronizing? She’s so young. I didn’t discover Sharon Olds until university. Etta feeds me lines to recite; my vocal intonation, I believe, is perfect for reading poetry, “… the condom/ripped and the seed tore into me like a/flame …
“It’s your choice,” I say, cryptic to all but Becky.
“The angel says that? That it’s my choice?” Becky cries the kind of cry where her voice and facial expression remain controlled while tears stream out of both eyes. I’m about to keenly reassure her, but pause. Damn Catholic upbringing. Would a so-called angel of so-called god approve of abortion? Am I going to burn in so-called hell for this? Ah, fuck a coat hanger, who knows what god thinks? This young woman is reading The Gold Cell, for Christ’s sake. You can’t get that book at the town library. She’s obviously got a thing or two figured out.
“All that any of us have during uncertain times is the ability to make the best possible choices with the options we have. Do you know what you want to do?”
“I don’t want to be a mom,” she says with more assurance than I could have mustered at her age. “Not now.”
“You’re pregnant,” blurts Dolores. “Who’s the father? Please tell me you got knocked up by a guy your own age.”
Becky hugs herself. She looks like a crying statue, utterly still and wet-faced. “Who are any of our fathers?” I ask. I’m hardly prepared for it to get all Sally Jessy Raphael around here. I should instate some sort of confidentiality agreement. I’d prefer to pose pro-choice arguments to the group, like a classroom discussion, but I’m supposed to sound holy, not sociopolitical. Are race, class, and sex separate from spiritual life? I mean, obviously not. Good Friday is a statutory holiday and Yom Kippur isn’t. White Jesus is pictured in the church I grew up in. All of this would be so much easier if we’d never claimed an angel apparition. Why couldn’t Etta appear as a unicorn? Or some faerie queene or she-goblin or whatnot?
Etta, help. I’m not making any sense. What do I say now?
They’ll buy whatever you say, Etta insists. Who are our fathers, really? Keep going.
“Who are our fathers? Who are the men that show up for us? Who are the men that know us, our hearts and minds? The men who are never suspicious or critical of us? The men who nurture us without expecting something in return? The men who trust us? Who support us in being the women we truly are? Who, I ask you, are the men in our lives that know that we are gathered here right now?
“How many of you had to tell a man a lie about where you were going tonight?” Etta grandly raps on the floor. A few women jump, startled, but soon each of them, with the exception of Reverend Esther, raps back, beating their knuckles on the floor.
“Why should we name the men that fail us?” I ask. “No, Becky. You do not have to name the father. There is no father. There is only the choice that you alone get to make.”
Now Becky is leaning on Tamara, allowing herself to be comforted. A few other women sitting closest take Tamara’s lead and reach their hands out in support. Fingers crossed that Becky is at least sixteen and has an OHIP card. It’s not like Brian Mulroney has made it any easier to get an abortion in this country.
“The angel says one of you must volunteer to drive Becky to the clinic in Hamilton. And a few others must volunteer to care for her after her doctor’s visit. Form a group of caring.”
Is that what I said, did I? Cut. Print it. What happens in the next reel? Like a puppeteer, Etta forces my hands up. I am a puppet. When she moves me, my bones become light. Wooden popsicle sticks. Toothpicks. Limbs so flimsy a child could snap them in two. I feel no pain, only insignificance. Everyone suddenly turns back toward me as if I’m about to make a proclamation.
Etta, let go. Focus on getting me more info.
I shift my seat closer to Leanne as my tingling arms float back down. Tonight is her fifth or sixth meeting and still Etta and I haven’t been able to work with her. She’s got walls, Leanne.
“I know what I said before. I’m fine now,” she tells the group, though she ever so slightly shifts her body toward mine.
“Your husband is Anton Knight.”
“I thought we weren’t naming men.” Leanne’s face grows mean. She turns away from me. “Besides, you don’t have to be psychic. Everyone knows the bastard.”
Etta hangs over her. I see her first as a clear figure, a beauty who winks a daring eye at me. Then I see her as the rest must see her, as a shining axis of light above Leanne’s head. Some bow right to the floor. A few cry out ecstatically. Reverend Agnes scrambles to her feet, breathy. “What reason have you come?”
No way bad-perm lady is stealing the show. Get me more, Etta. More.
Etta lifts me to my feet, leads me to the wheelhouse nook on the north side of the gazebo. The women trail me, keeping near. In the funhouse mirror only I can see our misshapen faces, mine and Etta’s. She cups her hands over my eyes and what I see then is fast-moving water. What I feel is freezing night air.
“Your wedding ring lies at the bottom of the Niagara River. In the river near the foot of Bowen Road where you threw it.” My voice trances, and not in the low-C I’ve rehearsed, but popping and staticky—Etta’s voice writhes through mine. We sound like distortion-feed on a two-way radio. Everyone hears our strange harmony. I have eyes and ears everywhere. Behind me, Rose is abruptly stricken with worry. Bobby’s teeth begin to clack. Tamara motions toward me, waving her hands near the back of my head. Leanne tugs her to settle back down.
“It is early March,” we continue. “You notice crocuses peeking out of the melting snow as you walk down Bowen Road. Those little purple flowers, so encouraging. See how they bloomed early for you. The sun hasn’t quite risen yet. You wear flannel pajamas and winter boots, but no jacket, you were in such a hurry to leave the house.
“You almost stumble when you jump the guardrail. The snow-covered rocks are slippery as you scramble down to the riverbank. He didn’t follow you. The truth is, he never follows you. Always it is you going to him. If he is in a loving mood, you go. If he’s cruel, you also go. Now you are completely alone. No one to tell you if what you are about to do is right or wrong. The long, linked floating ice boom crackles in the river. The wind is still cold enough to hurt your ears. Your ring doesn’t travel as far through the air as you imagined it would. You listen, but don’t hear it hit the surface. The sound of river ice is too loud. You don’t see where it hits. There are still too many ice circles for the water to ripple. It’s as if you never threw the ring at all. As if it never existed.
“You were free in that moment. One self-determined and free moment. You didn’t stay free, did you, Leanne?” My own voice returns. I turn to face them again. Etta is perched a few feet away on the gazebo railing. I suspect Reverend Esther sees her too—her head suddenly swivels toward Etta’s sitting spot.
“You made it work between Bobby and Hal,” says Leanne. “The angel got them patched up. Why can’t she do that for me?”
“Hal has changed,” Bobby says. “Sure, he prays, he prays a lot, but it’s more on account of he was ready to change. The old coot, sometimes I think it’s too little to late, but he is trying his darn hardest. He’s doing the work of a good father and a pretty good husband. He’s doing the work. You understand? I doubt …” Bobby hesitates. She lets herself cry a little, nothing more than welling tear ducts. Then Leanne, tough nut of a woman, lets herself cry a little. “I doubt Anton is going to change,” Bobby whispers. “You gave him enough chances. Only so many chances you can give a man who don’t even try.”
Leanne nods in acknowledgement. A split second later, her face turns mean again. She stretches out the collar of her cardigan to wipe her tears. “What does the angel say? Does the angel say to leave him?”
“The angel says you have to throw the ring again, Leanne. You have to throw the ring once and for all.”
“Yeah, that’s what you say. You don’t even like men, do ya? Why should I listen to you? I want to hear it from the angel. Show me a sign.”
Oh, how I’ve been waiting for someone to ask me for a sign, to appeal to my might and solicit the gifts I’ve gained since you woke me up again. Watch me stop the blood in their veins. Make their skin bubble. One divine sign, coming right up.
Etta yanks me to my feet again, and then floats me above the floor like a rag doll. She’s never done this before. We can dance on the ceiling, she howls in my ear. The women scream. I scream. I’d kick and scream, but my legs are numb. All the candles around us snuff out. Then the lights in Rose’s house, then the RVs up and down the driveway grow dark. And in the distance the street lamps go out on Cherry Street, then Vine, then Maple. Complete darkness.
I drop back down with a hollow thud. I am empty. Do I still have bones? A beating heart? The women around me must be shouting, frantic and loud. I hear a voice that might be mine or Etta’s. It says, You asked for it you asked for it you asked for it you asked for it it it it it it it x x x xx xx xxxx xxxxx.
Tamara’s face is right next to mine, so close her lips bump my cheek as she repeats my name.
“Piss ’n’ shit!” Hal blurts out in the distance. It sounds like he is stumbling through the blackout toward us. At least he didn’t swear in front of the children, I think. Bobby hates that. Rose is crying again. I know the sound of her quickened breath without seeing her. Etta has given me eyes and ears everywhere.
Reverend Agnes asks again, “What reason have you come?”
The women around me hold onto each other in a tight and reverent circle.