Jamie and Imogene are in the food court of the Avalon Mall with fries and tall cups of fountain pop. The tables around them are barren except for occasional golden fried crumbs. A scowling teenager in the Dairy Queen wipes down his work area. She’s procrastinating finishing her paper on shellshock and WWI veterans in Newfoundland and Labrador; he’s procrastinating going home. They smoked a joint in the parking lot and now all they can do is eat and talk.
“So you have no idea who your dad is?” Jamie says.
“His name was Anthony Green and he was a fisherman. Not from St. Felix’s, he was just around for a season. And he took off on Maggie.”
“Do you know what he looks like?”
“Not really.”
“So, he could be anybody,” he says. “He could be…that guy.” Jamie gestures with his elbow towards a rotund man walking away from Tim Horton’s. “Or that guy.” He nods at a suited man standing at the A&W cash register. “Or Rex Murphy. You’re both redheads who know lots of big words.”
“I don’t think Rex Murphy spent much time fishing.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Anyway. I don’t think about it. I don’t even know if it’s true.”
The gravy for Jamie’s fries has grown a layer of skin, but he doesn’t seem to notice. “Why wouldn’t it be true?” he says.
She shakes the ice in her cup in an attempt at nonchalance. Two days ago, Joyce MacIssac called with a new Cecil story. Imogene was alone in the house and pressured to “oh yes,” and “really” her way through Joyce’s tales of Quincy’s baby on the way and Cherry’s job in Toronto. “And I come home the other day and who’s sitting in my kitchen? Cecil Jesso. ‘Hello, there,’ he says. Like I’m a visitor in his house.”
“Really?” Imogene said.
“Oh yes. Nobody knows what’s going on, but he’s losing it quickly. You feel sorry for him.”
No, you feel sorry for him. Poor ol’ Cecil, losing his mind. Let’s forgive all his indiscretions in the name of Christian community. After she hung up, she sat on the couch and took several deep breaths. She doesn’t live there anymore. She doesn’t have to think about it.
But she loves Jamie. He should know. Fuck it.
“There were stories about this sketchy guy down the road,” she says. “He sold booze and drugs and contraband smokes. He wasn’t someone you wanted to be seen associating with. But apparently Mag—my mother used to go to his house. Or she was that summer, right after her dad died. People out home like to say something happened between them. Like a trade. He gave her booze and drugs and she gave him what he wanted.”
“And she was how old?”
“She would have been fourteen.”
“Well. That’s scandalous. And fucking horrible.”
“Yep.”
Jamie folds his arms on the table. “Is that…do you believe that?”
“People out home love their stories.”
“I’m not asking about them.” He takes a sip from his drink and the straw echoes at the bottom of the cup. Imogene’s stomach alternates between release and recoil.
“The man is a fucking pig,” she says. “Trade, bullshit. She was fourteen years old.”
“So if he is your dad... Shit. Okay, I’ll just say it. He raped her.”
“Yes.”
“I mean, if a fourteen-year-old girl gets pregnant, that’s always what it is, isn’t it? Unless the dad’s the same age? Fuck, I don’t know. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry.”
“I don’t know how else to say it.”
“Well. That’s how to say it.”
The Dairy Queen teen rattles out a mop and bucket from the back, like he’s trying to punish it. “It’s why it’s never discussed,” she says. “It’s why Maggie gets upset whenever I ask about my dad.”
Jamie chews thoughtfully on his straw. “I got an idea”
“What’s that?”
“Let’s kill him.”
Imogene laughs. Jamie’s face is serious. “Your poor mom,” he says. “Only fourteen. What a bastard. Is he still out there? Did you have to see him all the time?”
“Somewhat. He lived less than ten minutes away.”
“Jesus. Your family ever consider revenge?”
“Oh, I think so. I mean, I had pretty big ideas myself.”
“Like what?”
She shrugs and pops a fry in her mouth.
“Being a bit cryptic there, Genie Tubbs.”
“It’s nothing. Nothing happened ever.”
“I bet Agnes plotted a few things. I don’t know how you didn’t. Especially in a place that small. I mean, this place feels too small to me most of the time.”
“But you can avoid people here much easier.”
“You’d think. I guess it seems that way if you didn’t grow up here.” Jamie dips a fry in the gravy. “Jesus. So gross.”
“I think it’s molting.”
“Friggin’ gravy growing legs.”
She laughs. It’s too nice to be happily stoned and staring at Jamie’s eyes and mouth. She wants to reveal everything: the Cecil taunting, the box under her bed. Still over sixteen-hundred dollars left. She could have pissed it away by now, but it’s too important, too hers. It would feel so good to offer him all her secrets. If she knew he loved her back for sure, she would tell him.
“I’m sorry you had to deal with that,” Jamie says.
“Thank you. Shit exists for most people though, I guess.”
“It does. Do you find Maggie treats you funny?”
“Funny how?”
“I don’t know. Like, it sounds like you both won’t acknowledge what you both know? Never mind. I’m not making sense.”
“She’s never been present really. She’s always been good to me. I know she loves me.” Imogene’s never thought too much about Maggie loving her. “When Maggie’s around, I feel like she wants to run away. And I don’t blame her.”
“Run away from you?”
“Yes. And Nan. And home. I mean, she did run away, really. We rarely see her.”
“I think everyone wants to run away sometimes.”
“Oh, I know.”
“For some people, it’s the best option. What can you do when everyone thinks they know what you’re like or what’s the best for you? And they’ll never change their mind? You just want to bang your head off a wall.”
“I feel the same. I mean, imagine, you’re a kid, some monster does that to you, and then you have to look at the half monster he put in your body? Walking and talking evidence that looks and sounds like him? I’m surprised she’s been part of my life at all.” The hand holding her drink trembles and the ice cubes poke each other. “I would never do it,” she says.
“Oh, please.” He reaches across the table and touches the rim of her cup with one finger. “Who wouldn’t want to see more of you? You’re pretty great, you know.”
“A mistake is one thing,” she says. “A crime is another. I think I remind her, all the time. I’m a thing she regrets.”
“Regrets. Bullshit. If you tripped over a turd and found a diamond, would you regret getting your shoe dirty?”
“Wow. That’s the best metaphor for statutory rape resulting in pregnancy ever.”
“Well, you know. I’m deeply Christian.”
“You should make billboards for pro-lifers.”
They cackle like conspirators. “I’m serious though,” he says. “Guy did that to my mother? I’d need some revenge. And fuck what other people say. If they won’t change, they lose you.”
Jamie drives her home. A small tear in his jeans above the knee exposes a strip of skin. It makes her think of trying to fall asleep in her old bedroom when Nan left the hallway light on, creating a sliver of light under the door. She’d close her eyes and still see its outline, like it was burned into her retinas.
“If it makes you feel better,” he says, “and I know this is a completely different situation, but I wasn’t planned either.” He drives with his left hand, the other rests on his thigh. His nails are rounded and short, clean and smooth. They would feel like firm pressure points on the small of her back. He shifts his leg on the gas pedal. The tear in his jeans closes.
“Mom and Dad already had three kids and Dad was going for a vasectomy. I was conceived a week before the doctor’s appointment. I asked Mom if I was an accident and she goes, ‘Oh no, you were…a surprise.’ She was almost four months along with me when she finally went to see the doctor. She’d been on and off the pill, apparently that can make ladies irregular. Dad kept saying, Shirley, you’re pregnant. Oh no, I’m just irregular, any day now. Shirley, you’re pregnant. So she goes to the doctor to prove him wrong and the doctor says, Shirley, you’re pregnant! Ta-da.”
Imogene wishes she knew how to flirt. A flirty girl would reach over and poke her finger into that hole in his jeans, give a little giggle. It wouldn’t be weird or uncomfortable. Girls like that blow her mind, girls like Rita and Sherrie Duffy, girls who can approach a guy and just sit on his lap: “Hi!” All in a way where the guy is thrilled and doesn’t find it slutty or desperate.
“I’m sure they were real happy it was another boy,” Jamie says. “First Eric, then the twins, then, surprise! Another boy! Thomas says that’s why I like stuff like photography. Mom was hoping I’d be a girl and didn’t force me to be a man.”
The traffic light turns from yellow to red. Jamie presses the brake and they sway forward. “Whoops. My shoes are some heavy today.”
Imogene laughs. He complains about his three older brothers all the time. When he was a kid, they would dangle him out the second storey windows by his ankles. They passed him back and forth, from one bedroom window to another. The game was called “Pass the Shitbag.” And along with the blue freckle on his forehead from being stabbed with a pencil, the small scar on his lips happened when Eric chased him around the house, threatening to pound him for not writing down a phone message from some girl. Jamie wiped out on the grass and smacked his mouth on the edge of the step. “And he still gave me a boot in the ass while I was on the ground,” Jamie said. “What a prick.”
But she loves going to his house and he says he loves it when she’s over because his family get on their best behaviour when she’s present. Sometimes, she feels like she’s in a kind of rapture there. She likes peering at their hutch full of photos and trophies—mostly for sports or academics (we’re the clever jocky fuckers, Jamie says). Her eyes return to the picture of all the boys when they were in high school, Eric, the twins Joseph and Thomas, and Jamie, looking baby-faced at the end of the line.
And they like her. They lean in with interest when she speaks and refill her glass when it gets low. But with each other, they interrupt and torment. The last time she was there, Eric went on about how Information Technology is where it’s at if you want to make money and Thomas pointed his fork at him and said, “Don’t kid yourself. It’s another TAGS-like trend. Make-work project bullshit.” Eric threw his hands in the air. “Why you gotta respond like that? Jesus, can’t even put a little gas on your fire.” “The less gas at this table the better,” Joseph said and they all laughed. Later, when Jamie was driving her home, he said, “I swear, they all have the ego of a dog that chases cars.”
If Imogene ever carried on like that with Maggie, there’d be tears. Or with Nan, there’d be a gasp and glare and then the story stored up to repeat at any opportunity. Might be ten years later during supper, someone will say “Pass the sauce,” and Nan would reply, “Sauce? You should ask Immy about sauce. She once told me I didn’t know what I was effin’ talking about. That’s sauce.”
“Give us a smoke, please?” Jamie says.
Imogene takes one from the pack, lights it for him and passes it over. His lips puff at the spot where hers just touched, brown circle in white filter, like the yolk of an egg.
“Wanna get a coffee?” he says. “Get on the scene. With the caffeine machine.” He rests his cigarette-holding-hand on the steering wheel and turns onto Freshwater Road. This can’t go on forever. She has to tell him or give it up already. Piss or get off the pot.
He catches her staring. “I know what you’re thinking, Genie. It’s not reckless driving, it’s multitasking.”
She laughs. The car speeds up and the tear in his jeans opens and closes, like a wink.
Later, when he drops her off, they hug and her lips brush the space where his neck meets his collarbone. He squeezes her to him and their bodies are puzzle pieces clicking into place.
In the house, she goes to her room and grabs her notebook. She’s stoned enough to really focus. A list isn’t enough. This calls for a table.
The Possible Pros and Cons of Confessing True Feelings to Jamie Clark
| Pros | Cons |
| • He might feel the same way. | • NO. Nothing like the same. |
| • He will be flattered. | • He will be embarrassed. It will |
| • Confession will be freeing and let me get on with my life. | all be embarrassing and horrible. • Confession will cause me to lose him. Pain. So much pain. |
Looking at the table makes her tired. Christ, she’s so exhausted of thinking about him and acting normal. Especially this jealous internal fretting over his interactions with girls who are not her. And looking for an excuse to touch him when they’re together. Oh, Jamie, you have an eyelash on your cheek. Oh, Jamie, there’s a fluffy in your hair. Her hands float towards him with the subtlety of falling trees.
Time to do something. If she’s going to tell him, she must think of what to say, where to do it, how to say it. She has to be prepared to lose him. Probably not forever. He won’t do that. But maybe for a little while.
Responses to Love Confession Organized Chronologically and by Likelihood
| immediate Responses | Short Term Responses | Long Term Responses |
| • Jamie is surprised. He says “holy fuck” a lot. Hugs me. | • Jamie continues to invite me out, but I don’t accept as often, for a few weeks. He acts sweet and gingerly polite. | • The awkwardness wears off with time. We stay close and eventually get to a place where we can discuss this time in our lives with an air of nostalgia. It hurts, but he understands that it hurts and is good about it. |
| • Jamie needs space to think about everything. | • We hang out sporadically over the next few weeks, usually in groups. | • We remain close friends— no more sleepovers. It takes a while, but I get over it. |
| • Jamie already has an idea that I feel this way, but doesn’t know what to say. | • We don’t contact each other for a few weeks. We gradually return to normal. | • We remain close friends, but no more sleepovers. We stop confiding in each other. It takes years for it to stop physically hurting. |
| • Jamie already has had an idea that I feel this way and has a prepared response. | • We don’t contact each other for a few weeks. When we get together, it’s awkward. | • When we bump into each other, it’s friendly, but we keep each other at a distance. It takes years for it to stop physically hurting when I see him. |
| • Both Jamie’s unprepared and prepared responses go something like “I love you, but just as a friend. I’m so sorry. I’ve never wanted to hurt you.” | • We don’t contact each other for a few weeks. Jamie meets someone else and they start dating. | • Jamie and his new girlfriend fall deeply in love. I occasionally see them from a distance. It takes years for it to stop physically hurting when I see him. |
| • Jamie feels the same way/wants to go for it. | • We don’t contact each other for a few weeks. Jamie misses me. | • Jamie realizes he loves me too. We fuck like minks blissed out on shrooms. |
Horrible. She could never be a statistician. Who would want to tabulate the data of lost causes and hopeless cases? Either way, she should try. Next time he stays over, she’ll try.