Jimmy reached out his hand and helped Grace up the steps into the house. It was her third trip to the toilet in an hour. She was sweating as she sat down at the table holding her large belly in her hands, breathing hard. Jimmy handed her a cup of water that she drank; then she handed the cup back for more. Her breathing settled down, and she leaned back on her chair.
“I’m not going anywhere, specially to town with all the noise and smells. You take Eddie and get a few things. Don’t take too long either. I can’t eat anything at all. My stomach is so sore. All I can think about are them cheese slices wrapped in plastic and some loafs of sliced bread. And a bottle of Canada Dry. Oh, that sounds good. Better get something for the kids, then. I’m not sharing with nobody.”
On the road shoulder just before turning left onto the highway, Jimmy jammed down on the gas pedal as if he were trying to push it through the floorboard. The loose gravel bounced off the back of the car and rattled against the rear fender walls. The tires squealed, and blue smoke pushed ahead of them by a light breeze drifted inside smelling sweet and hot. When Jimmy speed-shifted into second, the rear tires barked, and when he shifted into third, they were going fifty miles an hour. By the time they reached Moccasin Lake, Eddie watched the speedometer needle edge past ninety. Jimmy smirked; he thought he was scaring Eddie.
The road signs whipped past them so fast they made a sound. When they reached the bottom of St. Anne’s Hill, Eddie looked at the speedometer. It was so far down on the gauge it couldn’t move any more. Because of the bumps and dips in the road Jimmy had to use both hands on the steering wheel as he struggled to keep the car from going out of control.
As they rounded a bend, Eddie saw the four road signs that always drew his attention with their strange message. Lit up at night by headlights, they stood by the roadside like four square-headed ghosts.
If you drive
When you’re drunk
Carry a coffin
In your trunk.
In Vernon Jimmy parked the car behind the Kalamalka Hotel. He handed Eddie a five-dollar bill and a key.
“Get the groceries and put them in the trunk. This is my only spare, so you better not lose it. And don’t stick your head in the beer parlour looking for me. Just sit in the car and wait. Keep the change and get something to eat. Just make sure you’re here when I’m ready to go, or I’ll leave without you. Prob’ly not comin’ out till closin’ time.”
Eddie placed the bags of food in the trunk, closed it, and pocketed the key. Then he hurried to the corner of the hotel and turned down Main Street. This was one of his favourite things: just walking up and down the street with nothing to do but watch the people who came from all parts of the country. The Okanagan Valley was becoming a tourist spot. The beaches around Vernon were crowded with people swimming and waterskiing in summer, and some came for the Winter Carnival or for the skiing at Silver Star Mountain.
After walking all the way along Main Street looking in the store windows, Eddie walked back the way he’d come in case he’d missed something. Then he decided to go to the museum—he hadn’t been there in a while. He grinned at the stuffed bear that had scared him when he was younger, but now it had dry cracks on its nose, and its hair was beginning to fall out.
Eddie quickly grew bored. His stomach growled, but he wanted to wait as long he could before spending his money, at least until he needed to go to the bathroom, so the restaurant manager would see he was a paying customer.
The bus depot had the best French fries in town. For fifteen cents you could get a brown paper bag overflowing with golden fries. The bag would be wet with vinegar, and the waitress would finish it off with a big shake of salt. He would sit in the corner of the café eating his fries and drinking a Coke, watching the Band Box. When someone dropped a nickel into the jukebox and the little curtains parted, the puppet musicians seemed to come alive.
After delaying for as long as he could, he headed for Nick’s Kandy Kitchen. It was a small café where the owner, his wife, and her twin sister sold handmade chocolates and peanut brittle, and they had the cheapest hamburgers in town. Just one hamburger patty on a bun with mustard, ketchup, and relish, no extras like lettuce or tomato, no pickle sticking out both sides. But for under a dollar, with a Coke and a bowl of tomato soup made fresh from the can, it was the best deal in town. He was about to go inside when he noticed Eva Cluff on the other side of the street.
At first he wasn’t sure it was her because she had a yellow kerchief wrapped around her head to cover rows of large curlers, and she was smoking a cigarette.
Eddie sprinted across the road and stepped in front of her. She was surprised to see him.
“Oh, I look a sight, don’t I?” she said, trying to hide the curlers with her hands. Eddie thought she looked beautiful.
“What are you doing here?” Eddie asked.
“I live here now. For the summer anyway. Then I go back to UBC. Oh, it’s so good to see you again, Eddie. I’ve been thinking about you a lot lately.”
To Eddie’s surprise, she threw her arms around him and hugged him. She held him for so long that people walking by stared at them. Eddie placed his hands on her back and was about to return the hug when she pulled away. She reached out and cupped his face with her hands. Eddie didn’t know what to think. He had always liked Eva—a lot—and dreamed of them being together, kissing and looking into each other’s eyes like people in the movies. He couldn’t believe what was happening.
“Why don’t you come back to my place? You can meet my roommates, Misty and Dawn. We’re carhops at the North End Drive-In. I told them all about you, and they’d be thrilled to meet you. I think you’ll like them. Okay?”
“Sure,” he said. “You know, when I saw you smoking, I thought, that can’t be her.”
Eva laughed. “Now that I’ve left home, I get up to all sorts. Anyway, it’s my turn to do the shopping. It’s not too big a list. I used up the last of the shampoo, and they’re waiting for me, so I should get going. Come on. Hurry!”
The basement suite was dim, and the only light came from two small, grimy windows that looked out across a weedy lawn. Three single mattresses lay side by side on the floor, and clothes were piled high in a corner of the room. A metal shower stood to the side of two steps leading up to a toilet perched on a stage. The privacy of anyone using it was guarded by a flimsy curtain.
“The place is a bit messy from the little party we had last night, and we’re all feeling a little under the weather. The landlord wasn’t happy with us at all. He said he thought we were all good church girls, and if he had known we were hippie partiers, he never would have rented the place to us. We just batted our lashes at him and smiled and said we were so sorry.”
Eddie noticed an empty bottle of Baby Duck sparkling wine, Mateus Rose, and two cases of beer empties in the corner.
A girl with a bobby pin in her mouth walked over. She had gathered her long dark hair on the top of her head and pushed the last pin in place. Eddie was surprised that she was in her bra and panties and wasn’t shy about it. She was so pretty. When she saw Eddie, she smiled and looked into his eyes.
“Hi,” she said softly. “Well, well, Eva. Who is this?”
“This is Eddie. I told you all about him. Eddie, this is Misty, the only one here with a car and driver’s licence. She’s so much older than us,” Eva said.
Eddie didn’t know what to do or say when Misty reached out and shook his hand.
“Pleased to meet you. Any friend of—”
A blond-haired girl wrapped in a towel that was too short to cover her up completely stepped out from behind Misty. Eddie was stunned. She looked like a Playboy centrefold. “It’s about time, Eva. I’ve been waiting and waiting. Is that the shampoo?”
As she reached over for the bag in Eva’s hand, the towel fell away from her sides and Eddie saw the full outline of her body. When she noticed Eddie, she quickly pulled the towel under her neck, leaving her legs, hips, and shoulders bare.
“Oh!” she said in surprise. “Who is this?” She smiled and bit her bottom lip.
Eva pulled the shampoo from the bag. “This is Eddie. You get in the shower, Dawn, before you freeze to death.”
Dawn grabbed the shampoo and turned away, showing her bare backside. “Glad to see you, Eddie. I bet you’re glad to see me.”
“Oh, you are such an exhibitionist,” Eva said.
Dawn threw her head back and laughed. Eddie couldn’t look away and didn’t dare blink. This was almost too much for him. He could get aroused simply walking into a brisk wind, so he had to be careful.
Eva stepped in front of him. “Hey. Put those eyes back in your head.”
Eddie felt suddenly embarrassed and his face flushed. “I—I—”
“I was teasing, Eddie. She is so shameless. Come into the kitchen and sit down while I get ready. Do you want something to eat? How about a hamburger? We have a fridge full of them from work, but we all hate them now. Would you like one?”
“Yeah, sure,” Eddie said.
Eva’s roommates took turns in the shower, washing and shampooing their hair. They walked about in their bras and panties as easily as if he weren’t even there.
“Come on, you girls,” Eva said. “Put some clothes on. What’s Eddie going to think with all these half-dressed females parading around in their underwear?”
Dawn laughed. “Oh, come on, Eva. He’s living a boy’s dream. Even if he told everybody at school that he was locked in a basement with three nymphomaniacs and all the hamburgers he could eat, nobody would believe him anyway.”
Eddie sat in the kitchen for an hour, not wanting to be anywhere else in the world, until Eva stood in front of him in her carhop clothes.
“It wasn’t much of a visit, was it? Next time we can sit and talk, away from the distractions,” she said, pointing to her waiting roommates. “Okay?”
Eddie nodded and went to the door while Eva looked for her change purse. Her yellow kerchief hung from a coat hook. He pulled it down and stuffed it into his pants pocket.
Eva waved from the front seat as Misty ground the gears of a smoking 1960 Corvair. From the back seat Dawn blew him a kiss and smiled. He couldn’t believe he had spent time with three such beautiful girls.
“You’re right, Dawn,” he said out loud. “Nobody would believe me.”
Later Eddie stood outside Dye’s Billiards. Should he play here or go to Al’s or just keep walking? Eva had given him a hamburger, so he had enough extra money to play pool for hours. He fingered the change in his pocket for a moment and went inside.
The place was packed, and the cigarette smoke was so thick he couldn’t see the tables at the back. Someone tapped him on the shoulder. It was Otto, the flunky who cleaned the tables with a whisk broom and racked the balls after a game.
“You can’t be in here by yourself until you’re sixteen. You know that,” Otto said.
“My dad’s coming. He went to the car for his wallet,” Eddie said.
Otto walked away. Eddie bought a bag of potato chips and a pop just to show he had money and sat under the large-print sign that said No Vagrants. He munched on chips and sipped his grape pop as he watched the pool players milling around in the blue haze of smoke.
Dye’s wasn’t where Eddie normally went to play pool; it drew a certain clientele of people with money jingling in their pockets. They dressed well and followed the rules on the sign above the counter: No swearing. Use the ashtrays. No minors allowed. If any school-age kids showed up on a weekday, Vern Dye warned them, “Get back to class before I call the school.”
Eddie walked around Dye’s place. Usually he went to Al’s Pool Hall near the end of Main Street and down a steep set of stairs. The dark place with no windows made him feel he was deep underground. The games didn’t cost as much, and the pop and chips were cheaper. All the troublemakers and hooky-players who’d been kicked out of Dye’s ended up at Al’s.
It was also where Eddie and other Indians could hang around and kill time, and people left them alone. The Indians were mostly from an area of the reserve called Six Mile because it was six miles from the main highway. Six Mile Indians, Eddie called them. They didn’t bother him the first time he showed up, but they watched him out of the corners of their eyes.
The Indians always played on the tables at the back of the pool hall while the summas used the tables toward the front. Eddie got to know one of the Six Milers, an older man called Hank. When he first approached Eddie, his face was so stern that it frightened him.
“Hey, Salmon River. Shoot some pool?” he asked loudly, as if challenging Eddie to a fight.
Eddie stared at the man, not sure what to do.
Then Hank broke out in laughter. “Come on, uncle. What you doing hanging around up here? Come back and join us,” he said, polishing his pool cue with a cloth.
Hank was a skilled player who seldom paid for the table because of the loser-pays rule. All the times Eddie played Hank, he didn’t come close to winning, but he began to play better and came to know a few of the Six Milers. There was no big hello when they met, just a “lo” or a nod.
Here at Dye’s this evening there were no empty tables. Maybe Eddie should go to Al’s. He downed his pop and tossed the empty chip bag into a garbage can, then wound his way around the packed tables toward the street. If he played as well as he thought he could, he might have money left over for the next time he was in town. And instead of stealing cigarettes from his mom’s purse, he could buy his own.
Just as he neared the door, Hank walked inside. Eddie almost didn’t recognize him. Hank was clean-shaven with his hair Brylcreemed straight back, and he wore black dress pants and a new white shirt buttoned up to the neck. He carried a skinny wooden case under his arm. People seemed to know him.
“Uh oh. Looks like the pickpocket is here.”
“You might as well just hand over your wallets, boys.”
“Yeah. He’s got that look.”
“You can tell he’s a shark the way his mouth hangs.”
Hank laughed at their comments. Eddie was surprised when the summas reached out to shake his hand and pat him on the back. Hank stood at the table that was covered with a white cloth. It was the money table where only the best were allowed to play. Hank opened the case and pulled out two sections of a pool cue. After he screwed them together, he rubbed the cue with a cloth. Otto peeled back the cover on the table and turned on the overhead light.
Hank chalked his cue and looked at all the people gathering around the table, revelling in the moment. When he saw Eddie, his expression changed.
“Hey, uncle. Sit over here,” he said, tapping the chairs just out of the triangle of light above the table. “You’re my good luck tonight.”
For two hours Eddie watched Hank beat player after player. He couldn’t help but smile at the way Hank called out each shot loudly and pointed to the pocket with his cue. After a close game Hank had only the black to sink. He pointed to the corner and lined up his shot. Then he looked back at Eddie.
“Whaddya think, uncle? Am I gonna make it?”
Eddie nodded.
“I dunno,” Hank said with a grin. “You’d have to be pretty good to make a shot like this.” Without looking back at the ball, Hank hit the cue ball hard. The ball banged into the corner pocket. Hank held the pose as his cackling laugh drained the last bit of confidence out of his opponent.
A few spectators clapped and waved at Hank as they headed toward the door. Hank stuffed two five-dollar bills into his pants pocket. He took his cue apart and gently placed it in the box, then turned to Eddie.
“Nothin’ I like better than takin’ money from summas. Anyway, I’m goin’ over to the Kal for a kielbasa hot dog and a beer. Ya never know. Maybe I’ll get lucky and find me a dance partner tonight. What you gonna do?”
“I’m going to Al’s and shoot some pool,” Eddie said.
Hank reached over and shoved a two-dollar bill into Eddie’s shirt pocket.
“Thanks, Hank. Jeez,” Eddie said.
“Just don’t lose it all at once,” Hank said.
“How’s about a game there, chief?” A man approached and laid down a five-dollar bill on the table. Tall and hunched over like a crow, he swayed as his bloodshot eyes fixed on Hank. Anybody could see he’d had too much to drink. When he glanced around to see if anyone was listening, Eddie could tell the man didn’t like Indians and was looking for trouble.
Hank looked at the man and smiled. “Just headin’ out the door, uncle. Nex’ time.”
The man placed his hands on his hips, took a wider stance, and faced Hank squarely like a gunfighter. “What’s the big hurry, chief? You scared they’re gonna run outtta horse cock and beer at the Kal? Or you just scared to play somebody good? And don’t call me uncle.”
“Oh no, they always get extra beer when they hear I’m coming. That all you got? Five bucks? I just played for ten,” Hank said with a smile that didn’t waver. “And don’t call me chief.”
Eddie felt his own anger begin to spread as he sized up the man. Dumb-looking bugger. Looks like Ichabod Crane. Hah. He’s so drunk I can get a couple good shots at him before he does anything.
Just then there was loud banging on the back doors leading out into the alley. Otto limped over and unlocked the door. Hank, Ichabod, and everybody else turned to see the cause of such a commotion. “You’re not supposed to come in this way,” Otto said.
A big man stepped inside. He towered over everybody at the back tables. He had an enormous bald head and a long bushy beard. His T-shirt was sleeveless, and his biceps bulged and unbulged when he swung his arms. “Then what are we doing here?”
Players, open-mouthed in amazement, backed away to let him through. Eddie saw two more people that at first he thought were the big man’s children. Then he realized they were men but shorter than any he’d ever seen before.
Ichabod placed his hand over his mouth as if he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. “Hey, everybody. Look who it is. It’s the midget wrasslers. Ain’t that somethin’?”
Then he laughed and pointed as he staggered toward them, holding out his arms to greet them. “Damn. It’s the midget wrasslers. I don’t believe it. You guys are the funniest things I ever seen. And you. You’re the Big Bopper. Well, ain’t that somethin’. The Big Bopper and the midget wrasslers. I was in the arena just a little while ago watching you, and now here you are. Ain’t that somethin’. Jeez, I love watchin’ wrasslin’. You know some folks think it’s all phony. But I don’t. No sir. No siree.”
Hank turned to Eddie. “I’ve seen these little guys before. They’re gonna save us the trouble. If he keeps it up, that poor bugger is going to get his ass handed to him,” he said.
The two short men ignored Ichabod, but he wouldn’t shut up. Finally, one of them had heard enough. “Shut your yap and leave us alone, or I’ll tie your tongue in a knot.”
Ichabod’s face turned red. “What’s the problem? I like you people. What’s the matter, anyway?”
“I’m not gonna tell you again. Just turn around and walk the hell away from here.”
Ichabod looked at the Big Bopper.
“Don’t look at me,” he said.
“You little short-ass bastards. Don’t you tell me what to do.”
The Big Bopper jumped out of the way as both wrestlers charged at Ichabod, tackling him to the floor. One sat on Ichabod’s chest and pinned his arms to the floor while the other rained down punches. People were too afraid to stop them.
Otto pushed his way through the crowd. “What the hell is going on here? Stop that before I call the cops.”
The wrestlers left Ichabod groaning and bleeding on the concrete floor as they went back to their game. Otto pulled the man to his feet and helped him out the door. Otto closed the big doors with a bang. “All right. Closing time, everybody. Let’s go.”
Eddie looked at the clock. It was eleven. He had no idea that it was so late. Al’s would be closed now too. Had Jimmy gone without him like he said? Eddie walked quickly up the street and around the back of the Kalamalka Hotel. It was a relief to see the car was still there.
He felt tired. Jimmy wouldn’t be out for an hour and he could sleep in peace until then. As he reached for the door, he saw movement in the back seat. Looking closer, he saw Jimmy was on top of a woman and was going at it hard. Eddie stepped back into the shadows and waited. Ten minutes later, Jimmy and the woman got out of the car adjusting their clothes. The woman went inside through the Ladies and Escorts entrance, and Jimmy entered through the lobby.
Eddie fell asleep in no time. It was midnight before Jimmy came out of the beer parlour. Eddie could tell right away he was drunk. When they drove out of town, he wandered across the white line as he looked for the ashtray. Neither of them spoke. They both knew what was waiting for them back home. As the car turned down the road, Eddie saw his mom standing at the window. She must have been watching for hours because before the car came to a stop, she came outside yelling at Jimmy. She was spitting mad and even took a swing at him. He ducked just in time. It was the maddest Eddie had ever seen her. She screamed at Eddie. “You’re another one.”
“What did I do?”
“Just get into the house and go to bed.” They were still arguing when Eddie fell asleep.
It took Grace a long time before she was able to speak to Jimmy without raising her voice. Jimmy eventually gave up shouting back, and he let her go on and on until she ran out of swear words.
Grace didn’t trust Jimmy from then on. The next time she needed groceries from town, they all piled in the car and went together.