Garth found a seat in the fast-food restaurant. He tried not to look at a woman who was hunkered over a chrome table, face hidden by hair and a greasy mask of shame. Beside her, a pale boy, probably her son, was picking at french fries. Their feast, which consisted of the fries, chicken fingers, nachos, and Hawaiian pizza, had been unwrapped and laid out for sharing.
“You should eat, Justin,” the woman panted, justifying the spread. “You said you were hungry.”
Her chair was pushed in tight to the table’s edge, like the armless woman Garth had seen at the library, turning pages with her mouth. Russian history seemed to be the woman’s area of interest: Peter the Great, Ivan the Terrible, anything to do with barbarism. To get to World War II, Garth’s desired field, he had to pass her table, and every time he neared the Reformation, he prayed she wouldn’t be there.
Have Carla check phone bills. Trying to ignore the glutton and her insipid boy, Garth was logging reminders in a book that he carried close to his heart, like a hidden wire.
Pick up #124 Red. Garth smiled, thinking about his passion. The red paint was going to be for a splendid WWII formation of model airplanes on his bedroom windowsill: a Flying Fortress, a P-51 Mustang, a P-38 Lightning, and, up front, where the sun would strike it first each morning, the spunky Spitfire. Get waxed paper.
Numbly, the woman reached for a chicken finger, the sleeve of her ball jacket embroidered with her nickname, Powerhouse. Her lips quivered and her eyes rolled.
Check the lunchroom. Garth added an annoyed asterisk. Last week, Boomer, the publisher, had confronted him about a Queer Nation sticker plastered over the mouth of the softball mascot. “Where did it come from?” Boomer had demanded. “I wouldn’t worry,” Garth had assured him. “Monarchists are generally a low-key group except for that problem with the Girl Guides and the oath.” Christ, it was these bifocals: Queen, Queer, they looked the same.
Garth glanced up as an ancient man with translucent skin pulled himself from a plastic seat. He looked like a crooked Q-tip with a cotton-ball head. He was wearing a plaid shirt buttoned to his thin neck and wool pants. The man’s bones cracked as he lurched to a wrestler’s crouch, bracing himself on a chair back.
Look at Cullen’s expenses. Garth underlined the notation, angry at the unsettling man. First the library, now here. Was there no place you could sit in peace, where you didn’t have to be reminded of other people’s afflictions?
He figured that Cullen, the legislature reporter, was robbing them blind. Someone was skimming petty cash too. Three years ago, the publisher caught Hart in Advertising selling long-distance calls to outsiders, routing them through the paper as conference calls.
Get very fine sandpaper. The old man took a step. Why can’t he wait until his friends return? Garth wondered, as the man stumbled to another chair back.
Come up with good story idea for Sports. Where Are They Now?
What is Smithers up to? What happened to those two characters?
Garth thought about his planes. They had their own room now that Garth and his wife, Jean, had moved into her dream house, a two-storey in the South End, a society bunker sealed off from the hoi polloi and the guilt of scorned relations. “An address,” Jean had sighed. “I finally have an address.”
Jean had written the listing in her dreams:
Stately, tree-lined south-end boulevard, area of some of Halifax’s finest homes. Well-appointed. 4,200 square feet. Hardwood. Three baths, four bedrooms. Built-in china cabinet, leaded glass. Walk-up attic. Very few properties come up on this street.
To Jean, the front hall of the house smelled of grandfather clocks and acceptance. Honorary consuls, the Halifax Club, the Waeg, and Neptune Theatre. Upstairs, it was Junior League, kermesse, ladies auxiliary, and aerobics at the Y. “Ahhh,” Garth could hear the voices dripping with a disappointment that Jean would just have to ignore, “so you’re not related to the judge.” Unfortunately, Jean’s family had only appeared in court as defendants. He thought about how happy Jean was with her heated bathroom floor and a built-in scale. All of this for a girl who’d grown up in a trailer court eating bologna.
Garth’s mood darkened when he looked up. Powerhouse was emptying her tray like a murderer disposing of a body. Garth felt angry at the old man teetering in the aisle, as though he was imperilling them all. She’s going to mow him down; she’s going to hit him. Garth watched Powerhouse waddle down the aisle, rolling on the sides of her shoes past the warning: DO NOT BRING SHOPPING CARTS INSIDE. Oh God. She’ll crush him like a steamroller, leaving a geriatric mess for the rest of us to look at.
Adding to the peril, a horde of teens arrived. “Hey, lend me a buck,” one shouted at another, who replied, “Screw off.”
Oh Christ! Garth muttered. The old man’s arms were trembling; his colourless flesh hanging from his skull. Why doesn’t he stay put?
Powerhouse closed in, and the man, unaware, lurched again. Just as Powerhouse and the teens reached the decrepit man, a woman carrying food appeared and, with the speed of a pickpocket, grabbed his arm. Relief flooded his face as she lowered him into a chair, where he steadied his glasses. Then he lifted one blue-veined hand, as flimsy as onion paper, and pointed to the table he had felt compelled, at any cost, to leave. “No smoking,” he rasped. “No smoking.”