On the last day of November, Maggie drags out the Christmas decorations. She knew Jamie would be over today. She’s so transparent. “Christmas lights,” she says. “Who’s going to put them up?”
Imogene looks at Nan with raised eyebrows. Nan sips her tea in response. Sitting in her housecoat, her own pity-pot perch. Wonder where Maggie gets it from. Mortifying, the both of them.
“Maggie,” Imogene says. “Leave him be.”
“I haven’t said a thing. It’s not necessarily a blue job.” Maggie titters at this. What the shit, blue jobs and pink jobs. Where’d she come up with that?
“Sure, Maggie,” Jamie says. “I’ll help you out.”
Maggie’s mood has brightened since she got the job at the Carpet Factory. Administrative Assistant. She’s up and out of the house every morning, but still spends most of her weekends sitting still. She needs some friends. The days are now short and dark and Imogene tries to avoid thinking about two months until February when the sidewalks will be blocked with snow, the three of them rattling around in this house, and Jamie gone. Jamie up in Ottawa, being regularly felated by Jeanette or Janine or someone else with a similarly alliterative name. Jamie and Jeanette are having a get-together. Jamie and Jeanette are having a housewarming party. Jamie and Jeanette are having a fucking theme party where all guests must dress like their favourite literary characters or in black and white or as their sexy, perfect selves.
“I can’t believe you’re going to leave me with Tweedledum and Tweedledepression,” she says. She wants to sound funny, but it comes out acidic.
“Move out, sure,” Jamie says.
The snarl of Christmas lights rests in her lap. She tugs a loose coil out of the nest and plugs it in. The Christmas lights silhouette Jamie’s profile. He’s so pretty. He catches her and winks. “What are you looking at?”
“Your eyelashes are some long.”
“Finally, they are. Mom used to trim them when we were kids. She’d cut our hair and my eyelashes. She said boys shouldn’t have long eyelashes. Makes them look girlish.”
“What? How? Did she use those little eyebrow scissors?”
“No, the shears. The first time she did it, she had finished cutting my hair and she snipped them off my right eye. One swipe. Then I had to sit still while she did the left.”
“That’s mental.”
“Yeah. I started getting my own haircuts as soon as I got an allowance.” Jamie attaches another string of bulbs and they light up. “Did I ever tell you about when Maureen dyed my hair?” he says. “Mom was pissed, but Dad really flipped out.”
“How old were you?”
“Grade ten. Maureen bleached her hair and dyed it blue. There was some left over, so we did streaks in the sides and back of mine. When I came home, Mom started screechin’. Dad tossed a bag at me and told me to get out. “Don’t come back ‘til that shit’s gone off your head,” he said.
“Where did you go?”
“Stayed at Maureen’s. Her mom got in a big racket with Dad and they let me come home after two days. But Dad made me shave it off.”
“Your whole head?”
“Yep. There’s about five bulbs blown here on the bottom.” He holds up the end of a string with dead bulbs. “So I’ve been thinking,” he says. “I want a good party before I leave. What do you want to do for New Year’s Eve?”
“Dunno. It’s such a racket. Bit early to think about that.”
“We should go to the Radisson party.”
“Really? Those tickets are pricey.”
“They are. It’s a swanky event. But Winston’s aunt works there. She can get us tickets.”
“Will Winston be there?”
“Dunno.” Jamie plugs in his string of lights and they all light up. “See,” he says. “All these bulbs agree. They know a good idea when they hear one.”
“They’re pretty bright.”
“We can get a room so we don’t have to worry about cabs at three a.m.”
“Huh. That’s a good idea.”
“We can get cleaned up nice and swill champagne. We can pick fights with rich people.”
“Can we trash a hotel room?”
“Fuck yes. Sex Pistols style. Or Mötley Crüe. Making memories, baby. Memories and carpet stains.”
A hotel room with Jamie. In one month. Dear Jesus. She plugs in a string of lights and every bulb lights up like all the bad ideas in her mind.
That Friday, Rita calls to say she’s in town and will come over Saturday afternoon. Maggie is working but can meet them for supper. “Cherry and I are staying at Uncle Kenneth’s,” Rita says. “We went to the Bon Jovi concert last night. It was wicked.”
She arrives at the house with armloads of plastic bags. “Some Christmas shopping. Plus, gifts from people out home,” she says. “They had a fundraiser at the Legion for you.” She hands Nan an envelope with a bit of a flourish. Nan opens it and her eyes flood up. “My god,” she says. “I don’t know what to say.” Rita hugs her and Nan makes small sobs. Imogene stares at her hands on the kitchen table. How lovely of Rita to bring all of these offerings and, of course, not bother to invite her along to the concert. Not that she’s even a Bon Jovi fan. Whatever.
“They played ‘Livin’ on a Prayer’ as an encore. Everyone went mad,” Rita says. She opens bags and pulls out cookie tins. “These are from Joyce. Snowballs. And these are date squares from the nuns. Hopefully not too dry.”
“Everyone is so kind,” Nan says. “I wish we were home for Christmas.”
“Well, now a bit of it has been brought to you,” Rita says.
Imogene gets up to put on the kettle. Although a drink would be nice. And she’d rather not go through the formal ritual for Rita. “Tea or beer?” she asks. “I have a few in the fridge from last night.”
“Oh, tea would be nice.”
“I’m going to have a beer.”
“Let’s see what you bought,” Nan says. A stuffed bunny for Steve’s daughter. New jeans and a sweater for Nick. Ceramic figurines for Aunt Trudy. Hockey themed clothes for Uncle Eli. Imogene sips a beer and when Nan announces she has to make phone calls to thank everyone, she cracks open another. Rita continues organizing her shopping.
“I bumped into Liam the other day,” Imogene says.
“Yeah?” Rita stuffs plastic bags into each other.
“Yeah. He’s a real creep now, huh?”
“How so?”
“He was acting all dark and ominous.”
“What does that mean?”
“Ominous means sinister, like something bad is going on.”
“I know what ominous means. What did he say?”
“He went on that Cecil Jesso died in a weird way. Like that he was susceptible to suggestion in the end. That he had a lot of enemies.”
“Well, he did. A lot of people really hated him.”
“He hinted that Cecil was getting investigated.”
“There’s been talk about that, yeah.”
“Like what?”
Rita glances at Nan’s room. She’s still on the phone. “I thought you knew about that.”
“I don’t talk to many people from home.”
“Right. I forgot.”
“Anyway.”
“Okay, so you heard Wish Benoit’s folks broke up?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, word is that this woman from Codroy called Arlene last year. She said that when she was underage, she met Bryce and he took her to Cecil’s. She never said anything afterwards because, at the time, she went there with the intention of getting drugs and thought she would have to explain herself in court. But when she was there, Cecil got her fucked up. And Bryce did stuff to her. Murray Wells too.”
“Did stuff?”
“You know. Rape.” Rita whispers the word. “The woman tells Arlene Benoit this. And Arlene says, ‘Go ahead and charge him. Just please wait until my son has gone to the army. I’m leaving Bryce then anyway.’”
“Yes, b’y.”
“Yeah, it’s fucked up.” Rita sticks a thick ball of bags into a large Sears bag. “And then, apparently, this woman was planning on pressing charges and two other women popped up, one from Flat Bay and one from Stephenville Crossing and they said they’d press charges as well. Like dominos.”
“So, three women had rape charges against Cecil?”
“No, against Bryce and Murray. Cecil was charged with being an accessory.”
“Holy fuck.”
“I feel so bad for Wish,” Rita says. “He was trying to get into the Forces for months after school ended. And then he finally gets what he wants and all this horrible shit happens to his family.”
“Yeah. I feel bad for Arlene too.”
“Yeah, that’s some scary shit to believe about your husband.”
Nan’s laughter echoes in from the bedroom. Imogene stares at Rita’s piles. So glad she’s not spending Christmas in St. Felix’s this year. “Liam seemed to suggest someone took care of Cec. Or something.”
“Yeah, well, Liam likes to be a case.”
Imogene looks up at Rita’s face. Her lips are pursed as she folds a Bruins T-shirt. “You know what else he said? ‘Must be hard, feeling like you can’t go home. I’ve felt like that before.’ And then he acted smug, like he got one over on me.”
“Well, he does know what it’s like to not be able to go home.”
“Jesus, Rita, why do you side with him?”
“I’m not taking sides, I’m just saying he’s had a hard life. And he’s kind of fucked up in general, so it’s not surprising he’s still mad at you.”
“Mad enough to joke about my house burning down? That’s more than kind of fucked up.”
“Well, I wasn’t there, so I can’t really say. And I know it was a long time ago, but you did dump him out of the blue right after he got in that fight.” Rita snips the price tag from a teddy bear. “I’m not saying you should have stayed with him. But you could have let him down better.”
“Wow. Now, is that your opinion or Nick’s?”
“Liam’s been a good friend to Nick and me. He hasn’t had the best home life, so he values his friendships. He’s the kind of friend who stays a good friend.”
Rita’s mouth is as firm as a leather belt. She straightens out Nick’s new jeans and folds them in two even halves.
“Well, if he thinks he was getting under my skin, he’s confused,” Imogene says. “I have no desire to go back to St. Felix’s. So really, the house being gone gives me a great excuse to stay away.” She takes a long sip of her beer.
“You’re just upset.”
“Don’t tell me how I feel, Rita.”
“Well, it’s a shitty thing to say.” She bunches the sweater into a bag. “I guess you think you’re hurting my feelings by saying you don’t want to come home to see me or any of us.”
“See, I didn’t say anything about you. I said I didn’t consider St. Felix’s my home. Don’t you see the difference?”
“No, because it’s my home and our family’s home.”
“Yes. And Cecil’s home. And Liam’s home. And everyone who called me shitty names and gossiped about Maggie and glossed over the fact that she was raped.” Imogene finishes her beer and opens the fridge to get a third. She ducks her head behind the fridge door and blinks hard. Don’t let Rita see her wet eyes.
“Has Aunt Maggie ever said that’s what happened to her?”
“No, but something did.”
“Do you have proof of this?”
“I think I’m proof enough.”
“Oh, come on,” Rita says. “It’s gossip. It’s gross and it’s dirty, but come on. You don’t know if anything like that happened to Aunt Maggie. No one really thinks Cecil is your father. It was teasing for the sake of teasing.”
“How can you say that? You just finished telling me he was being investigated.”
“Not for rape. And I believe people are innocent until proven guilty.”
“Nan believes it. Great Aunt Bride believes it. Great Aunt Madonna believes it. Maggie has refused to talk about it my whole life because she doesn’t want me to feel unwanted. Do you actually think everyone started calling me Cec randomly?” She flicks the beer cap towards the sink. It ricochets off the metal insides. “You can’t say you don’t believe it either.”
“Of course I don’t believe it.”
“You sound like all those people who thought the Christian brothers at Mount Cashel couldn’t have done those things.”
“Look, I’m sorry you didn’t know your father. Cecil and those guys are dirty pieces of shit. Aunt Maggie hung around them for a while because she was young and messed up because Pop had just died and she didn’t know better. People said stupid things because people are stupid. It boils down to gossip from people with boring lives.”
“I think you’re not thinking about this enough.”
“Maybe.”
“Well, there you go. I think if you thought about if more, you’d have a little more empathy.”
“Well, I think if you thought about the good things you’ve had, you’d be a lot happier.”
“Oh wow. Are you serious?”
“Listen, all growing up, I had to hear from Mom and Dad about how great you were. ‘Look at Immy, she works so hard. She helps Nan. She has a real job. She gets good marks even though she has it tough.’ They have such a high opinion of you. And you had all the clothes and gifts and free trips. It was hard to take sometimes.”
“So, I should be happy that Maggie wasn’t around, but sent me lots of stuff?”
“No, that isn’t what I mean.”
“Tell me then, how is thinking about ‘all the good things I’ve had’ supposed to make me happy?”
“Because you’re obviously smart enough not to let shit get you down. God, I was so happy when you started seeing Liam ’cause it meant you had weaknesses like the rest of us.” Rita stops and sips her tea.
She’s never really thought about me, Imogene thinks. She has the urge to go for a run, but with three beers in, she’ll puke on the sidewalk. Nan’s laughter echoes from her bedroom. “Let me see if I can find you some wrapping paper,” she says. She takes her beer with her out of the kitchen.