Chapter 9

My knees cracked when I stood up. We’d been working silently all morning. Instead of mindlessly thumbing through papers, I’d started to hunt for documents that would prove Grandpa wasn’t a monster, that he hadn’t mistreated children at the residential school. Or better yet, that Jess was wrong, and the school wasn’t as bad as he thought. So far, I hadn’t found anything. Maybe Jess was being dramatic about kids being stolen from their families. People in town wouldn’t have allowed it to go on if they had known, would they?

I checked to see if the angry furrow in Jess’s brow was gone. As he walked past me, I heard a loud gurgling, like the engine of a motorboat sputtering.

“Was that your stomach?”

“Uh, yeah.” He didn’t look at me, but his face relaxed. “I didn’t eat breakfast.”

“I’ll go make lunch,” I said, relieved to have an end to the tension.

Inside, the quick chatter of a talk show murmured through the house. Gam stayed asleep when I put the tray of food on her bedside table, her breathing choked and jumpy as usual. Her levels needed to be checked. I glanced at the clock. That could wait another half hour until Jess and I had eaten and I brought the empty plates inside.

Stepping outside was a relief. The air conditioner made the house unnaturally frigid, and I let the heat suffocate the chill out of me.

I’d ignored Jess’s shirtlessness while we’d been working, but couldn’t now. His skin was shiny with sweat, and rivulets ran down his neck and into the crease between his shoulder blades.

“Thanks,” he said and grabbed a sandwich, taking it with him as he moved into the shade of the garage. I slid onto the ground and leaned against a stack of boxes, conscious of keeping some distance between us. It was one thing to be working outside near him, but I should have eaten inside, alone. Not outside with him.

Jess sat with his arms hanging over his bent knees. “What do you do for fun around here?” he asked, taking a bite of sandwich.

“Fun? In Edelburg?”

He smirked at my sarcasm. I remembered the day the high school held its first dance. I’d been in grade two! The town’s squeaky-clean image was more important than letting teenagers gyrate to loud music. With only a strip mall, gas station, Chinese restaurant and two antique stores in the downtown, there wasn’t much to do in Edelburg except hang out at the ice-cream stand in the summer or watch movies in the winter. “I like to write,” I told him.

“Yeah? What kind of writing?”

“Um.” I hesitated. Trying to explain what I wrote about would feel pretentious, as if I was claiming to be a famous novelist.

He was waiting for me to speak.

“I’ve written some short stories, but right now I’m working on a novel.”

Jess wasn’t fazed. He nodded and reached for a bottle of water. “What are the short stories about?” he asked.

“About Edelburg. There’s a lot that goes on around here that no one talks about. One is about my mom.” I’d never told anyone about that story. Not even Gam. “I thought it might help to write about it.”

He took a long drink but kept his eye trained on me. “I guess we all have our own way of dealing with shit, huh?”

Like setting fires? I wondered.

Jess tipped his head back and chugged the rest of the water. He was good looking, that was for sure. But there was something unsettling in his eyes; they flashed on a dime between gentleness and anger, as if the two burned beneath the surface in equal parts.

“Deep River sucks too. Nothing to do, no jobs.”

“Would you ever leave?”

He shrugged, stuffing the last bite of sandwich into his mouth. “Don’t know. Thought about going out west to Vancouver or something. But then this happened.” He waved his hand around, almost as if the garage was to blame. “You?”

I thought about the letter from the U of M sitting in my desk drawer. I’d reread it so many times the paper had softened along the edges. “I haven’t decided yet. My grandma needs someone to look after her.”

“What’s wrong with her?”

“She’s got diabetes.” And weighs 450 pounds.

“Lots of people at Deep River have diabetes. She real sick or something?”

“Sort of.”

The slam of a car door startled me. I peeked around the corner of the garage and saw Rich’s truck. “Shit!” I scrambled up and raced to the garage.

Jess smirked as if he was enjoying my panic. I’d clamped a hand over my mouth and willed him to be quiet with my eyes. I should have known better! Of course Rich would check up on me. He’d said he was golfing all day with his dad. How could I have been so naïve?

My stomach twisted into knots. If Rich found me crouched in the corner of the garage, he’d be furious. The thought was humiliating. I hadn’t done anything wrong, but that wasn’t what he’d think.

I needed to dash for the back door. Had I unlocked it this morning? What if he kept knocking, and Gam called out to him to come inside?

Oh my God, Gam! I hadn’t gone back to check her levels. Scenarios ran through my head. She’d check before she ate lunch, she wasn’t a child! But what if she couldn’t reach the kit? What if she got so hungry she couldn’t wait and ate before she tested? Blood hammered in my head. I needed to get out of here and check on her, even if it meant dealing with Rich.

Jess stood up and whistled. “Townie! Looking for your girlfriend?”

My eyes widened to twice their size. What was he doing?

“Yeah, I am.” Rich’s voice sounded like a fist, balled for a fight.

“Saw her leave a while ago. With some lady in a blue car.”

I squeezed my eyes shut, praying that Rich would buy the lie.

Jess didn’t move. He stood with his feet spread like an animal ready to fight for its territory.

Jess yelled a sarcastic “You’re welcome”. I heard Rich’s truck door slam and his engine roar to life.

I counted to thirty and peeked out. Rich’s truck was gone.

Jess stood with his hands on his hips, shaking his head at me.

“Don’t say it,” I said, holding up my hand. I had to get to Gam. I ran past him and took the stairs three at a time, bursting into the house and slamming my hands on the door frame to her bedroom to steady myself.

Gam turned to me with an angelic smile. “Oh love, did you see Rich? I heard him knocking.”

I almost laughed with relief. “Yeah, I saw him.” When did lying become this easy? “Did you check your levels?” I asked, noticing the crumbs left on the sandwich plate.

“A while ago. When you didn’t come in, I thought I might have to call Mim to help me, but I managed.”

“Sorry. I – the garage is a bigger job than I thought.”

She leaned her head back into the pillow. “I hope it’s done soon. I don’t like it when you’re not around, especially at lunch.”

I let the barb slide. “I know,” I placated her and adjusted the pillow behind her head, leaving dirty fingerprints on the fabric.

“Is that boy still here?” she asked.

I nodded, glancing at the clock. “He’ll be leaving soon.”

“You’ll lock up the garage, won’t you, love?”

“Of course,” I said with a sigh and headed back outside.

Jess laughed when he saw me. “You were worried he’d be pissed that you were talking with me, eh?” He sounded pleased.

“Would you like it if your girlfriend was hanging out with some guy all day?” I retorted. I pulled a tarp over the boxes that I hadn’t sorted through yet.

“Don’t have a girlfriend.”

“No kidding,” I said sarcastically. “Can you tarp those boxes?” I threw him an irritated glance. He watched me with a satisfied grin, as if he’d won an argument.

“Look, Rich is a really good guy.”

“Oh!” he said and slapped his forehead. “That’s why you were hiding in the garage.”

“It’s complicated.”

“Not really. You like hanging out with me and don’t want Wienerboy to find out.”

I wanted to defend Rich, explain to this cocky boy that Rich would do anything for me, that his family treated me like a daughter. The “arrogance” Jess ridiculed was just Rich protecting me, making sure I didn’t get hurt. But I didn’t say any of those things because part of me knew Jess was right.