math, lime, them, lithium, malt, helm, mule, mail
‘SUNSHINE!’ I SHOUTED the following Monday, when I looked outside my bedroom window. Standing on my bed, I could just see a band of blue sky.
I dashed into my mom’s room. She was still sleeping, but I couldn’t resist. ‘Mom, it’s sunny out.’
She opened her eyes groggily, then smiled. ‘Well, this I have to see.’
We got dressed to go out right after breakfast. Mom said, ‘Screw marking and schoolwork. We can do it later.’ It was great to see her in a cheerful mood.
When we stepped outside, both of us blinked like moles coming up from their underground burrows. ‘Let’s walk around the neighborhood and treat ourselves to a hot chocolate when we’re done,’ Mom said.
We had a great walk. I quizzed Mom on her classes at the university. ‘Best student?’ I said.
‘Easy. This young woman who’s studying mechanical engineering. Annabelle’s her name. She’s only taking my class because she needs a certain number of humanities courses. But she’s very bright, and she has a beautiful way with the English language … I wish she’d reconsider her field of study, but, on the other hand, she’ll find it easier to get a real job with an engineering degree than she ever would with an English degree. Just look at me.’ I glanced at her when she said this, but she was smiling.
‘Worst student?’
She laughed. ‘Also easy. Carl, a math major. I hope he’s better with numbers than he is with words … the guy can’t string a sentence together, let alone a coherent thought. And the most grating part is, he couldn’t care less.’
‘Friends?’
‘Friends?’
‘Have you made any friends?’
‘Oh. Well, yes. Jane. She’s another sessional lecturer. We sometimes grab a coffee together between classes.’ This was good to know, especially since mom was like me when it came to making friends: not very good at it. I was happy she’d made one, even if she’d beat me to it.
After our walk, we stopped at Yoka’s – a little coffee shop on Broadway. Mom went inside to get our hot chocolates while I waited outside and soaked up the sun. I checked out the flyers posted on a hydro pole in front of me. Mostly they were ads for rock concerts and political rallies. Except for one. Do YOU LOVE THE GAME OF SCRABBLE? it read.
COME JOIN US AT THE WEST SIDE SCRABBLE CLUB, WEDNESDAY NIGHTS AT 7:00 P.M., AT THE WEST SIDE UNITED CHURCH.
There was an address and a phone number. I didn’t have a pen, so I glanced around to make sure no one was watching, then I tore the notice off the pole and stuffed it into my pocket.
I waited till Mom had gone to work, then I knocked on the Economopouloses’ door. Mrs E answered.
‘How are you doing, Ambrose? We haven’t seen much of you lately.’
‘Is Cosmo home?’ I asked.
Mrs E looked puzzled, but she disappeared down the hallway and I heard her shouting to Cosmo that he had a visitor.
It took a couple of minutes before Cosmo appeared. He was wearing a white undershirt and boxer shorts, and his hair stood up on end. He looked like he’d just woken up.
‘What do you want?’
‘Are you working nights?’
He looked confused. ‘No.’
‘Then why do you look like you just got up? It’s five o’clock in the afternoon. Shouldn’t you be looking for a job?’
He tried to close the door, but I wedged my body in before he could.
‘I guess it’s hard to find work with a criminal record, huh?’
He gave me a dirty look. ‘Next time I see those kids kicking the piss out of you, I think I’ll join in.’
‘You don’t mean that,’ I said. I pulled the flyer out of my pocket and handed it to him.
‘Why are you showing me this?’
‘I think we should go.’
‘You think we should go. You and me. To a Scrabble club.’
‘It’s too far to walk, but I figure you can drive.’
He laughed. ‘You are hilarious. You don’t even know it, but you are. You’re, like, mildly autistic or something.’
‘Screw you,’ I retorted. That was just mean. And, I was pretty sure, untrue. I was not autistic (attics, static, tacit, acts, tact, cast, cats, cist, cuts, scat, tics). I’d seen Rain Man.
‘Look, no offense, kid, but I’m not joining a bunch of word nerds.’
‘Come on, it’ll be fun. And it’s not like you’re too busy,’ I added, indicating his boxer shorts and undershirt, which, now that I looked closer, were stained. ‘If you don’t mind my saying so, you should have a shower. You kind of smell—’
‘Bye, Ambrose.’
‘Will you think about it?’
‘No.’
‘Please. If you don’t go, I can’t go either. I need a drive—’
‘Whoa, would you look at the knockers on that chick,’ he said, staring openmouthed at someone behind me.
I spun around, looking up and down the street. All I could see was an older man, walking his bassett hound.
‘Where? I don’t see—’
The door slammed behind me.
When my mom went to work on Wednesday, she told me she might be a bit late. ‘Jane and I are going to have a drink after work.’
‘Sure thing,’ I said.
I read Bud, Not Buddy for a while, then forced down some of the chewy tuna casserole Mom had left me. Afterward I put on my rain jacket and my hat, then I walked up to Broadway in the rain, with the rest of the casserole in a yogurt container to give to Preacher Paul. He was a homeless guy who often sat outside the drug store, no matter what the weather. I always said hello to him when Mom and I walked past, even though my mom didn’t like me to.
‘How’s it going, Preacher Paul?’ I said tonight.
‘Not bad, kid.’ I don’t think he remembered my name, even though I told him every time I saw him, but that was OK.
‘You like tuna casserole?’
‘Does it have carrots in it?’
‘Yeah, but you can pick them out.’
He nodded and took the container.
‘Sorry I don’t have a fork.’
‘That’s OK, the Chinese place will give me chopsticks.’
I said good night to Preacher Paul and walked back home. When I was a few houses away, I could see Cosmo in the driveway by his Camaro, talking to someone. As I drew closer, I saw it was a guy a few years older than Cosmo, and tougher looking.
‘What? You don’t have time to have a drink with your best friend?’ the older guy was saying. His voice was like gravel. He had long thinning hair held back by a rubber band and he wore a black leather motorcycle jacket. He was wide and all muscle.
‘It’s not that, Silvio. I’m just trying to stay on the straight and narrow this time, you know?’
‘But it’s not as simple as that, is it?’ said Silvio, and it came out kind of threatening, not like something a best friend would say. ‘We left certain things unfinished.’
‘I know. And I’m working on that. But I don’t want to go back there, Sil …’
‘That might be out of your hands, buddy. Now, c’mon, one drink.’
‘I’ll meet you for coffee tomorrow.’
‘Coffee?’ Silvio laughed, but you could tell he didn’t think it was funny.
‘I took the fall that night, Sil. Isn’t that enough?’
‘Not my fault you went ahead and did the job without me.’
‘Uncle Cosmo?’ That was me talking. The words just popped out of my mouth.
Cosmo and Silvio turned to look at me.
‘You ready to take me to Scrabble Club? It starts in half an hour.’
Cosmo was so surprised, he didn’t answer.
‘You got a nephew?’ asked Silvio.
‘C’mon, Uncle Coz, we’re gonna be late.’
Cosmo found his voice. ‘Sure, buddy. Hop in.’
So I got into the passenger seat of his Camaro, and Cosmo moved to the driver’s side. I heard Silvio say, ‘I’ll come around another time, then.’
‘You do that, Sil.’
Then Cosmo got in and started the car and we pulled away.
The interior of Cosmo’s car was spotless. He had an air freshener in the shape of a pine tree hanging from the rearview mirror, which swung back and forth as we drove. It wasn’t exactly a smooth ride, but since Mom and I had never owned a car ourselves and took buses everywhere we went, I decided to sit back, relax, and enjoy the experience.
We were quiet for a few moments, then Cosmo broke the silence. ‘Uncle Coz?’
I shrugged. ‘Coz. Cosmo. No matter how you slice it, it’s a funny name.’
‘Excuse me?’
‘Not funny ha-ha. Funny unusual. Like my name. Ambrose.’
‘No. Ambrose is funny ha-ha.’
‘No, it’s not. It was my dad’s name.’
‘Let me guess. He left because you were such a pain in the ass.’
‘No. He died.’
It’s amazing what those two words do to people when a kid my age is the one to say them. Sometimes I almost enjoy watching it happen. It was no different for Cosmo. He went really quiet, then he said, ‘I’m sorry.’
‘It’s OK. It was before I was even born.’
‘What happened?’
‘Brain aneurism. It just went pop one day.’
‘Is that why your mom’s wound so tight?’
I hadn’t thought of her that way before, but all I said was ‘I guess so.’
‘She’s never met anyone else?’
‘Not really. There was this professor she dated for a while in Regina, when I was younger. Phil. I liked Phil. But one day, she just stopped taking his calls.’
‘Huh.’
‘And there was a guy in Kelowna, but she only went out with him twice.’
‘You’ve moved a lot.’
I shrugged. ‘She’s a sessional lecturer. It’s sort of like a professor without job security. We have to follow the work.’ I didn’t tell him that, aside from the time she was fired, it was usually my mom’s decision to pack up and leave; that after two or three years, she’d become disillusioned when she realized they were never going to offer her a full-time position. So she’d find yet another contract job in another university town.
I looked out my window at the houses that were getting bigger and nicer as we drove up the hill.
‘You didn’t really murder a kid, did you?’
‘What do you think?’
‘No.’
‘Well, you’re right.’
‘Then why were you in jail, really?’
He hesitated, then he said, ‘I did some B and E’s. Breaking and entering into people’s houses.’
‘You stole their stuff?’
He nodded. ‘They let me off on probation the first time, but the second time the judge felt she needed to send me a message, so she sentenced me to six months.’
‘Wow. They let you off the first time and you did it again?’
Cosmo nodded.
‘How dumb is that?’
He looked startled for a second, but then he laughed. ‘You have a point. Truth is, I also had a drug habit. I needed money to feed my addiction. It kind of won out over common sense.’
‘Are you still a druggie?’ I asked, putting my hand on the door handle and calculating that I could always jump out at the next stop sign if it turned out he was driving high.
This made him laugh even harder. ‘A druggie?’
‘Well, are you?’
‘Technically, no. They got me into a rehab program while I was in jail. But I still go to NA meetings twice a week.’
‘NA?’
‘Narcotics Anonymous.’
‘And that guy, Silvio, you knew him from before?’
Cosmo gripped the steering wheel tighter. ‘We were friends. And … business partners.’
‘Meaning, you broke into houses together.’
‘Yeah.’
I looked at the tattoo on his arm. ‘That’s an ugly tattoo.’
He glanced at me. ‘And that’s an ugly hat.’
‘My mom made it,’ I said, offended. ‘At least I can take it off.’
‘Fair enough,’ he said. ‘Now why don’t you tell me, really, why you don’t go to a normal school?’
‘I told you before. Three kids tried to kill me.’
‘The same three kids that were wailing on you the other day?’
‘Yeah.’
‘They really tried to kill you?’
‘I have a peanut allergy. They slipped a peanut into my sandwich, and I almost died.’
He glanced over at me. ‘That sounds so weird, it must be true.’
I peered out the window and saw a modern-looking blue church on the corner. ‘This is the place,’ I said.
Cosmo pulled up next to the curb. We both got out, and he immediately lit a cigarette. ‘Look, you did me a favor back there,’ he said, as he inhaled. ‘So find out how long it’s going to be and I’ll come back and pick you up when you’re done.’
‘No. No way. You’re coming in, too.’
‘No, I’m not.’
‘Yes, you are.’
‘No, I’m not—’
‘Are you two looking for the Scrabble Club?’ A woman was climbing out of a beat-up banana yellow Mazda across the street, carrying a stack of Scrabble boards. She was about Cosmo’s age. She had shoulder-length red hair and a great body. She wore form-fitting jeans and the neatest sweater, with a giant sun on it. It didn’t completely hide the fact that she had nice boobs.
In a word, she was spectacular. Cosmo must have thought so, too, because his mouth was hanging open and he was staring at her.
‘The Scrabble Club,’ she repeated. ‘Are you looking for it?’
Cosmo stood mute beside me, so I said, ‘Yes.’
‘Well, you’re in the right place. I’m Amanda. The club director. Come on in.’ She smiled and she had an overbite, which somehow made her even prettier.
I turned to Cosmo to convince him to come in with me, but I didn’t have to.
He’d butted out his cigarette and was already following Amanda inside.