Page 6 of Mouse

  I must be dreaming—asleep so soundly I imagine it’s been only seconds since I slid beneath the covers and turned the knob on the bedside lamp to check if the power had come back on. Had I even closed my eyes? In my nightmare my face is being slapped and something shakes me, fingers ruffle through my hair. I try to roll toward the wall but a hand pins my shoulder.

  “Come on. Get up! Nap time’s over. It’s four o’clock already.”

  “What the... Who the...”

  “It’s getting light. You said you’d help. Sun’s up in half an hour. You’re late for work, sleepyhead.” My mind slowly forms the sounds into words; my eyes refuse to open. The voice belongs Linda. What the hell is Linda doing in my dream?

  “I don’t have all day. Are you coming or not?”

  The room is dark. The form beside my bed belongs to her—dressed in her hospital uniform, hands on her hips. “What the hell are you doing here?” is the best that I can manage. I pull the quilt tight around my neck. An entire half-minute passes before I remember I’m in Orkney Post, in my bed, in the middle of a crisis.

  “No time to chat.” She flips the bedroom wall switch and instantly the room goes from indigo to a searing, brilliant white. “The hydro’s back. Came on about three.” She scoops my jeans off the floor and tosses them onto my head. “Let’s go!”

  “Why are you up so early? How do you know what time the power came on?”

  “Night shift. Rosemary is covering for me while I drag your sorry ass out of bed and deliver it to the hospital kitchen.”

  “Dragging won’t be necessary. Just scram so I can get dressed. Tell her I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”

  “Ten. It’s not a date; it’s work.” Linda crosses her arms but doesn’t budge. “You didn’t lock your door. You must’ve been really out of it when you got in.”

  “That was just three hours ago. And I didn’t lock my door because—I just didn’t.”

  “Were you and Chad drinking last night? If you’re still drunk don’t even bother coming over.”

  I work the jeans under the covers and do my best to struggle into them. “There wasn’t any drinking. Tell Rosemary I’m on my way. And you can get back to your night shift. There isn’t going to be any peep show here this morning.”

  “That’s a laugh—if you’re implying I’m here to check you out, you’re still dreaming. Don’t flatter yourself I’d want to see that married, tenderfoot equipment of yours. Now hustle up.”

  “Just go.”

  “I’m on my way. Just don’t go back to sleep,” she nags as she departs. And then from the living room she yells, “and don’t forget to lock your door, sweet pea.” She means no harm. She’s only half as tough as she makes out she is.

  I’m awake enough to focus on wearing proper gear this time: rubber boots, a warmer jacket and a pair of gloves. I have no idea what’s in store today, but the Boy Scout me is going to “be prepared” this time around. My watch reads 4:10 as I climb the steps to the hospital. The snow has stopped. The air is calm. The sky is clear. The stars are fading as Orkney Post spins slowly toward a sunrise. It looks like it will be another beautiful spring day on the muskeg. I give a thumbs-up to Chad over at the terminal; he’s pumping gas by hand from our forty-five-gallon drum into his helicopter. I hope he’ll find the key on his first or second trip, so he can use the electric pump when he does his next fill-up. My step is light this morning, but my aching arms feel like they earned a Purple Heart or maybe one of Suzanne’s race medallions. I straighten my shoulders and breath in the cool air drifting off the ice. Three hours of sleep and, yes Mouse, I’m ready to take on the world again. I made the team. My dad would smile with pride. I nonchalantly left my door unlocked before I hoofed it across the compound to the hospital.

  “Sorry I’m late. What’s my job this morning?”

  Rosemary doesn’t look up from the stove. “You can take that plate of eggs and sausage to the pilot. And that sack of sandwiches on the table goes too. And the thermos.” She doesn’t sound angry, just rushed and tired—like me. She pulls a sheet of waxed paper from the dispenser on the wall and cuts it, then wraps the plate. “When you get back we should make more formula and then get some breakfast ready for the women upstairs in the school. The elders will be coming over next. It might’ve been a rough night over there. There’s coffee on. We’ll need lots more of that and tea too, soon.”

  “I’m on it.”

  “First things, first.” She hands me the plate.

  I take it, put the thermos under one arm, pick up the bag with my other hand, and turn away from her—back into the morning gloom, eager to match her energy, eager to do my share.

  At the airstrip, I take over the pumping while Chad eats. “Everything okay? Anything else you need?” I work first one arm and then the other, curbing my impulse to whine about getting the key to the terminal.

  He shrugs. “I’m good. Won’t know what’s going on over there until I get there. I can only take five at a time now—Fed regs today: five belts, five passengers.”

  “That’s going to mean a lot of trips. How many people are there over there?”

  “Maybe I’ll know that later. Another chopper should be coming soon.”

  “Planes?”

  “No idea. First job is getting everyone out. If the ice shifts on that sand bar, it won’t be pretty. We need to hurry.”

  I don’t wait for the empty plate. It sounds like another day where I might be needed in two or three places at the same time. It’ll be another day where I find myself running instead of walking. I feel a twinge of guilt when I pour myself a cup of coffee back at the hospital kitchen before I start my next assignment.

  Rosemary makes a face at me. She is cracking eggs one at a time into a large stainless steel bowl.

  “What?”

  “That black stuff you’re drinking. There’s Carnation here and sugar. Which reminds me—we need to make tea palos for the women and the elders. The elders will call it wapakaminikan. They’ll need something filling and that will make them feel more at home on this side. I’ll put you in charge of that.”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about. Is that—whatever you called it—is it hard to make?”

  “Tea. Pah. Lohs. Now I’ll get to see how well you can follow directions. We can work on the Cree later.” She uses a large whisk to stir the eggs. “Fill the big kettle and put it on to boil. You’ll need a large bowl next—about the size of this one. They’re under the counter. The tea is in that canister. That big white pail under the counter is lard. There’s sugar and flour in the pantry.”

  “This sounds to me like pancakes. Except for the tea.”

  “Trust me.”

  “I do, Rosemary. I do. Even if you say I’m supposed to fry it.”

  

  “Just tell me what to do and I’ll get started on it.” Being in the school gives me the creeps, especially at night, but an opportunity to help Suzanne with a lesson is rare. Her frustrations this year with Grade Five puzzle me almost as much as they obviously confound her—a highly successful teacher for so many years “down south.” She’s failing. Panic lurks in her eyes. I’ve never seen her so confused and angry. We’ve been here less than two months, and almost every day exhausts her, fills her with hurt and disappointment that I’m helpless to do anything about. I dabble with my paints and pencils and really have no way to comprehend the problems she faces here inside this classroom, no way to change her situation.

  “I keep the art paper in that cupboard; I keep it locked.” Her voice is flat, a biting contrast to our last art lesson experiment, the evening of the day we met four years ago. I’m holding out my hand for her keys when she looks up—eyes widening, her fingers going to her throat as if a ghost has just appeared.

  It’s Thomas. He stands in the open classroom doorway, his face empty of expression. We freeze—as if he’s caught us breaking and entering. He just stares at us. The only sound is the hum of the clock and the hiss of the
radiator. Finally Suzanne can wait no longer. “Mr. Cheechoo? We aren’t going to be here long. David was helping me with Halloween decorations for my students. Did you come to change the burned out lights? Or was there something else?”

  The expression on the man’s face doesn’t change. He doesn’t indicate what he wants from us or what rules we might have violated or if he understood her at all. It’s logical to think he doesn’t know a word of English or can’t hear or can’t produce a sound. It’s bizarre. It’s time to pump up the scary background music.

  Then Suzanne begins the same sad pantomime that I performed the day we landed here, the pathetic stab at speaking Cree with hands instead of words. She points to the daybook on her desk and her badly painted pumpkin rough and then walks her fingers across her desk toward the door. And smiles. My best guess is: we’d be happy to leave if that’s what you want. She points at the darkened florescent tubes along the ceiling, one at a time and then at him; that should be pretty obvious. She shrugs and rolls her eyes: perhaps that signifies a question mark.

  He stands there, stony-faced, staring at us as she turns back to me; surely by now he thinks we both have mental problems. “Sister says he does, but I don’t think he understands a word of English. No one on the staff has talked with him unless it’s maybe Sister.” She covers her mouth with her hand like he could read lips, like we’re having a conference on the mound with the tying run on second base, bottom of the ninth. Like it’s time we changed the signs—just in case. I’m speechless. The man is not about to attack us, but his face is full of hostility. All I really fear is that this Thomas character will look me straight in the eye and whisper, “Meow” through clenched teeth. And then what?

  It’s late October and we have no idea who won the World Series, let alone which teams have even played. And I have no idea how a person gets that information here in Orkney Post, Ontario, sans newspapers, radio or TV. “We’d better go, David. He’ll just stand there until we do.” There’s still nothing to suggest he hears us speaking, but then again there’s no obvious reason that he doesn’t.

  “Does he ever smile?” I whisper.

  “No. But I’ve never seen him frown either. He’s never acted angry or annoyed with my students.”

  “We’ll take some paper home,” I suggest. “I’ll outline witches and goblins for your kids to colour. That should keep them occupied at least a little while, anyway.”

  “Thank you, David. I’m so in over my head. Sister says Halloween is very, very big here—as big as Christmas. I’d like to try at least to make it special. God knows, I’m not making any progress at all with anything else. Especially not his daughter.”

  While Thomas watches, we gather up supplies that we can use at home. And when we exit, in a gesture as sullen as the way he handed me our cat, he barely steps aside to let us pass.

  Later, sprawled beside the chesterfield while Suzanne brews us a cup of tea in the kitchen, I spread papers out across the cold tile of the living room floor. “We should have a rug,” I call to her. Diego lolls on the cushions watching carefully every move I make.

  “I already checked on that,” she says from the kitchen doorway. “The ones at the Bay cost a mint. I even talked to the manager. Everything costs a dollar a pound for shipping by air. So the shipping alone is double the cost of a carpet at Honest Ed’s. Of course, he didn’t mention that he takes his profit on the shipping, too, for doing nothing.”

  “Maybe that’s why everything is so expensive.” I try to think of something Halloween-ish that local kids would recognize. Pumpkins? No? Shocks of corn? Of course not. Candy? Yes.

  Suzanne comes into the living room. “So I talked to Sister. She says there’s supposed to be a rug here. Maybe the last teachers carted it away when they fled. We filled out a requisition and another form. She sends them to the District office in Moose Factory. After processing they pass it on to the Regional office in Toronto. More processing. Then it goes to Ottawa. If no one changes it or cancels it, it could go into next year’s budget. Or not. It might get ordered about the same time I’m ready to retire.”

  “Diego Rivera! Scat! Leave the paint alone.”

  “I should dress him up and bring him to the class party.”

  “You should. Unless one of the little ghosts brings her pet owl.”

  She brings in the tea and sets it on an end table and then starts to close the drapes across the picture window. “It’s really coming down out there. I miss running so much, David. It used to keep me sane. I think the snow will stay this time. Sister says we could accumulate three, four feet or even more before the winter is over. She says it never melts here after Halloween, not until the spring. I’m afraid to ask her when that might be.” Then wistfully under her breath she whispers, “Spring.”

  “I thought it was winter the day we arrived.”

  “David?” She sits down on the couch. “Hold me, please.”

  “Suzanne?”

  “Please.”

  “What’s wrong, Suz?” I already know what’s wrong as I put the paintbrush into a jar of water and slide up next to her.

  “This really isn’t working out the way I thought it would. I know I pushed this on us, on both of us really. I didn’t know. Maybe it was a selfish thing to do, dragging you up here. I really thought it would be so exciting for both of us. I thought I’d be doing something important—that both of us would. I wanted us to be proud of doing this. I had no idea.”

  “Hush. It’s okay. I’m doing fine. I’ve started to do some drawing at least. I’d like to explore, get back in the trees, but I’m afraid I’d get lost. It’s like we’re so far from anything. When we looked down from the plane, there was just nothing, nothing but swamp and trees and lakes. Nothing.”

  “You’ve been great, David. You haven’t complained.”

  “But it hasn’t been so wonderful at school, I know.”

  “God.” She shakes her head. “I just don’t understand these people. They’re all so angry and it’s like they’re directing it right at me—even the people in the store and the post office. They hate me and I’ve done nothing, not one single thing to deserve it. And I think I could take that but the kids in my class hate me too. They hate everything about the school. I don’t know how to fix that.”

  “They’re just kids. Who likes school anywhere?”

  “Lots of kids like school, David. Lots of kids like to learn things. They like to read. They like to play. They feel good when they accomplish things. They like getting good marks and they like to be praised. Not these kids. There’s this one girl—Alice, his daughter, the janitor’s. I’ve tried everything with her. I’ve stood on my head to get her to just look at me, just to answer a simple question, or even ask me a question, just blink an eye or nod a yes or no. It’s been, what, seven weeks, and nothing. Maybe she’s autistic. Sister says she’s just shy. What the hell is going on here, David? Every one of them would be in a special class down south.”

  “If she’s got a learning problem, it’s not your fault.”

  “If I was back home, I would ask her parents what was wrong, how I could approach her. I'd ask them to help me if they could. Well, fat chance of getting anything out of Thomas. It’s not just him though. We had reporting night last week: coffee and cupcakes, a chance to discuss your kid’s progress, right? David, not one single parent came, not one. And it’s not just my class either. Not a single parent in the whole freaking school came. How could that be? I went to Sister. ‘What happened,’ I say. ‘It’s not unusual,’ she answers. ‘Then why do we have a parent’s night at all?’ She says, ‘Because the Department requires it.’ I couldn’t believe it. It’s like this whole school thing is a scam. And Sister’s in on it. She’s in charge of it.”

  “I’m sorry, Suzanne. I really am.”

  “I’m a teacher. David this is worse than painting watercolours without any colour. These are children. This is about their future. What’s going to happen to these kids?” Tears are streamin
g down her cheeks and I hug her as tightly as I can.

  “Please try to let it go, Suzanne. Don’t get mad. I’m on your side. You can’t fix this all at once. Maybe not at all, but you need to be patient. It’s going to take time. Both of us need to be patient. I’m here for you. You know that.” I squeeze her and she snuggles closer. I kiss her salty cheeks and try to dry her eyes with my fingertips. I mumble trite homilies about the brighter tomorrows and not giving up. Diego discretely stretches and meanders to the spare bedroom while we spend our passion, while we make a wet spot on the chesterfield. But even that does not erase the sadness in her eyes, the desolation, the fury screaming against the storm outside—eight more months of failure yet to come, eight more months of tears.

  

  I could use a laugh right now, Mouse.

  It’s 7:00 a.m. I’ve cooked breakfasts and escorted dozens of elderly men and women to the school. The seniors creep along the snow-packed gravel leaning on me, using their canes or walkers or crutches, muttering in Cree—perhaps berating the cold night air or the helicopter ride for assaults upon their aging joints and muscles. I find them mattresses and bedding and get them settled on the school’s first floor in former offices and meeting rooms since stairs would be too difficult. If they aren’t too tired, I find them chairs or desks where they can sit and visit with their friends or simply wait for their extended families to arrive.

  I bring them wapakaminikan, which I now concoct without Rosemary’s supervision: a thick, sweet, greasy beverage the elders find not only tolerable or satisfying, but a comfort and a delight. I make it in small batches, brewing the tea in a large bowl by pouring boiling water over a handful of tea bags. Before it has a chance to properly steep, I mash the bags between two spoons until the tea is so strong it’s undrinkable. Then I make a thin paste of white flour and tap water. I add that and a large dollop of lard to the steaming tea, stir in a cup or two of white sugar, and bring it to them piping hot in mugs. And when I try to say wapakaminikan they press their lips together to supress their mirth, but gently touch my hand and nod their heads in thanks.

  By now, I am no longer a hospital cook; we’ve moved to the residential school. We’ve started transferring food and cooking pots across the compound by hand in cardboard boxes. Sr. Theresa unlocked the large school kitchen where only a few years ago students from Orkney Post and nearby communities were fed as well as educated. I ask Rosemary how she liked it there.

  “It was okay, I guess,” she says. “But, no, I really didn’t like it. Some of my friends did. When we were good, the nuns gave us candy.” She squats in front of the oven turning sausages on a large aluminum pan.

  “Sounds like every day was Halloween. Nothing wrong with that.”

  “Believe me; it was not always Halloween.”

  “Candy is candy—unless you got too many cavities? It sounds as if it might be fun. You got to have a sleepover every night with your school chums.”

  She turns. I can tell by her look my question is less amusing and more personal than I intended. “Very funny. There are a hundred reasons not to ever joke about that. People here would not appreciate your humour.”

  She’s serious. “Really? I apologize. I don’t get it though. Could you give me an example why they think it was so bad?” Toast slides from the conveyor onto the counter and I butter it carefully.

  “David.” She sighs. “Okay. I didn’t like it because my older brother, who is two years ahead of me, had a hard time in here. He was a joker, a lot like Watikwan, I guess. He liked to play tricks and see if he could push the boundaries a little. That made it very hard for him—like it does for Watikwan now, only it was much worse in those days.”

  “Like what?”

  “That’s enough, David. Are you about finished with your toast? Our refugees are getting hungry; we don’t want any food riots.”

  “Right. Look, I didn’t mean to pry.”

  She closes the oven door and stands before she says, “It’s just that some things are hard to talk about. It’s not a happy memory—being separated. I was here in the school all week even though my family was just over on the island. The boys were in one dorm and we were in another. There were separate classes, separate recesses. I only saw my brothers on the weekend. But every time Josh would misbehave he’d lose the privilege of going home. Is that enough for you?”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s not your fault.”

  Rosemary slips a dishtowel over her shoulder and rearranges my toast before covering it with a clean tea towel, moving it to a counter where it will wait until the biscuits and sausages are finished. “I’ll let them know in the nursery first. You tell the others to wait and we’ll bring them a tray.” She starts toward the door but stops. “Don’t bug them. If they’re sleeping, just let them sleep. Do you remember the sentence I taught you? ‘Michiso na? Do you want to eat?’ Say it.”

  “Me shona.” I know that isn’t right.

  “Me che so—na. I’ll be back down in a minute.”

  “Michiso na.” Making mistakes no longer paralyzes me the way it used to. I’ve realized almost everything I do must baffle people here, but when I try, when I make the effort, I’ve discovered they are quick to forgive and eager to correct. When things don’t work the way I think they should, I try not to attribute it to ignorance or sloth or stubbornness. There’s so much that needs to be done right now, so many vital things to do, I don’t have time or energy to waste worrying what people might be thinking or saying about me.

  Between the two of us we manage. A few of the upstairs women help ferry breakfasts trays while the others keep the nursery going smoothly. Even with an off-duty nurse to help them, it is, Rosemary says, a fulltime job to see that the infants are clean and dry and fed and happy. “They’re exhausted. More moms should be coming over sometime this afternoon.”

  “The second helicopter is making it go faster.”

  It is neither an elder nor a child who bursts through the kitchen doors as we fill the sink with hot water to start cleaning up after breakfast. A middle-aged man with a tiny goatee and laughing eyes makes his appearance.

  “Well, well, well.” He speaks English to my great relief. “What have we here? Which one of you is the chief cook and which one is the bottle washer? Hélène said I could apply for a job over here. Who takes the applications?”

  Rosemary smiles so broadly her teeth show. “Cheepash!” She greets her uncle with a warm embrace before she asks in English, “How is it over there? Are they okay? Everyone?”

  Their conversation switches to Cree and I study their faces looking for clues. The worry in Rosemary’s eyes gradually is replaced by a smile and both of them manage a laugh or two. It isn’t long before they turn back to me.

  “David Taylor, artist and substitute teacher, this is my uncle, Charlie Chookomoolin. Friends call him Cheepash. He is the cook at the hospital. Before that he was the cook here. He’s makes the best bannock and moose stew anywhere. If you don’t believe me, just ask him.”

  He laughs. “So you must be the new boyfriend.” He extends a hand to me.

  Rosemary frowns and slaps his hand away before I can shake it. “Behave yourself. You spend too much time flirting with the nurses. They should have taught you some manners along with the English.”

  He laughs hard at that—and then begins assigning jobs, begins making decisions, begins figuring out how we are going to feed a whole village this evening. Three or four shifts, he decides. Maybe five. We will get the old propane dishwasher going so we can clean and reuse plates every other shift. We’ll need a fan to dry them. We need to get that pickup and haul groceries from the Hudson’s Bay. There will have to be some kind of entertainment for the kids or they’ll get into mischief. My head swims with how fast he thinks this list out loud. First up is rations for the people still stranded over there waiting for their ride, water, especially water, which the helicopters can take on their return trips. “There wasn’t time for most of us t
o grab much food. People are running low on everything,” he says to me in English already searching for containers that would hold liquid.

  Rosemary fills me in on the parts of their conversation I couldn’t understand. “No loss of life or serious injuries. Not yet. The water is down a little, but it’s still kind of scary over there. The ice is very unpredictable.”

  Cheepash interrupts. “You two can chew the fat while you work. I’ll get the things to send across ready and start on the dishwasher.” He looks at Rosemary as if her assignment should be accompanied by an apology. “You talk to Thomas. Get him to lend you the truck. He shouldn’t mind when you tell him why. Then find someone who can open up the store. Or find a way to break in. Get as much as you can load into the back. Anything. Everything. Charge it all to the hospital. Get back here as quick as you can.” He is already removing the steel cover from the dishwasher to triage what is needed to get it hooked up and working after two years in mothballs.

  As we walk to the hospital Rosemary fills me in on more details of what she learned from her uncle about the crisis in the village. “Yesterday afternoon the ice started piling up along the far side of the island. The ice on this side wasn’t very stable either.”

  “I think I remember that.”

  “That’s breakup. All you can do is wait and see what the river does. Later on in the evening the water started to come up. The Chief and Council made its decision and told everyone to leave their houses. Soon they were all sitting in boats, letting the rising water carry them back toward the middle of the island. It was a good thing they didn’t wait it out in their houses. By midnight, the ice moved and many homes were smashed completely. The water is still pretty high. They’re in a sandy clearing with water all around them.”

  “The ice? Are they safe?”

  “So far the trees are holding the ice back.”

  “They were lucky a helicopter was here. Without a radio, no one would know. They’d still be on their own. Wouldn’t they?”

  “That’s what breakup is like here. Every year it’s different. Every year we cope. You look tired, David.”

  “I am. I imagine you are too. It’s funny though. I don’t know. This morning before I got to the hospital, I was really looking forward to this. I know it sounds crazy but even though I’m sorry there was a flood, doing this is what I want to do. I guess I like being able to help but I also feel different now about being here.”

  “Different how?”

  “I don’t know if I can explain. I’m not sure I understand it myself. If this sounds stupid just stop me, okay? At the beginning, everything about breakup was really new. Things happened so fast I felt dazed.”

  “Of course it was new to you. You managed though.”

  “Once the flood happened over there, there was a lot of work to do. I was so busy. Everyone was. We all worked together.”

  “That’s the way we work here.”

  “Well, I don’t. I usually work alone. But this felt... I don’t know? Special. Even with some people I don’t get along with very well like Thomas and Sr. Theresa.”

  Then we get busy carrying boxes of food from the store to the truck and loading them in the back. As usual there is little in the way of fresh produce so most of it is canned goods and frozen meat. Cheepash will have to work a miracle to turn this into meals for everyone.

  Finally I slide into the cab behind the wheel and Rosemary slams her door. I have a hard time finding the words to finish what I was trying to express. For some strange reason a story about my English prof pops into my head.

  “Back in university, this one teacher, Kaminski... I don’t know what made me think of him. A couple times he told us this weird thing about a tree falling in the middle of a forest?”

  “That doesn’t sound weird to me.”

  “He wasn’t a very nice teacher, but he kept asking this one question that made me think. I never quite understood his point. He asked us: If a tree falls down out the middle of nowhere and there isn’t anyone around to hear it, would there be any sound? If there isn’t anybody to receive a sound wave or a light wave, in what sense does it really happen? I could add a second question: what the hell does that have to do with me liking or not liking it here in Orkney? Maybe there are trees falling down all around me and I have no idea they exist, not till one falls on my head.”

  Rosemary looks at me like I’m nuts. Maybe that was a completely dumb thing to say. “Do you mean if everyone died in the flood last night, and the radio wasn’t working, then would they would still be alive? Is that what you’re trying to say?”

  “I don’t think that’s what I meant. No. They are okay, Rosemary. They are. They’ll be over here soon. I don’t know what I was saying. Sorry.”

  “I wish your professor was here right now.”

  “Why? What would you say to him? You think he could explain it better?”

  “No. I’d just appreciate his help unloading these groceries. We’ve invited a lot of people over here for supper, David.”

  

  I don’t normally need to issue breakfast invitations to Suzanne; she loves to eat. She’s a morning person. When we lived in Toronto she’d sometimes go out for her run before her eyes were fully open and then, when it was over and she was exhausted, she’d be ravenous for as much as I could feed her. Waffles, pancakes, everything was on the menu. On the days she ran post-work, she still made time to eat a healthy morning meal. Food is fuel to runners, she would say. I never heard her mention “calories” in any situation; there was never any need. Today is strange. I’ve called her twice from where she’s hiding in the bathroom.

  She emerges looking pale. “Something’s wrong, David. It’s the weirdest flu I’ve ever had.”

  She does look pale. “I’ll call in sick for you. No problem.”

  “It is a problem. I was off three days last week. I’m using up my sick leave faster than I earn it, but that’s not why I won’t let you call. Having a supply in my classroom is worse than going in feeling like hell. It would be chaos tomorrow—worse than chaos. Nothing gets accomplished and everything that isn’t nailed down goes missing or is damaged. They could just as well put the kids in charge and forget about getting a supply teacher.”

  “Then let me take you to the hospital before school starts. Surely they’ll have something that could help you through the day. Or maybe go at lunch. You were never sick a single day the last two years.”

  “God! David, what is that smell?”

  “Nothing. Well, breakfast: bacon and eggs, toast. You need to eat whether you go in or not.”

  “Maybe the bacon has gone bad, David. The smell is horrible. It’s making me sick again. Do something with it. Just get rid of it.”

  I look at her in disbelief. If she weren’t clutching her stomach and heading back to the bathroom I’d think this is a joke. The cost of bacon in Orkney Post is somewhere between totally unreasonable and astronomical. I stand there, spatula raised in one hand as if I’m ready to swat a fly, the other hand resting on my hip, trying to think of alternatives to doing the unthinkable. I don’t tell her how to run her class. She doesn’t interfere with how I run the kitchen. The bacon was supposed to be a peace offering, was supposed to smooth the troubled waters of last evening’s argument. The soon-to-be-garbage bacon was my idea of an Orkney dozen long-stemmed roses.

  Our argument was Christmas. It crashed down between us like a bolt of lightning in the middle of a snowstorm. Without a warning, not so much as ho ho ho, while she was doing schoolwork and I was sketching Diego, she tells me she wants us to spend our Christmas holiday in Pembroke with her parents, people she hasn’t said two nice words about since the day we met. I laughed—in retrospect, not the most diplomatic reply, but I genuinely thought she was making a joke. Her comment sounded like it was delivered with more than a touch of sarcasm. I still think her subsequent cloudburst of tears followed by an icy blast of accusations had more to do with frustrations about her class, about the school
than any real desire to see her mom and dad. Be that as it may, I’m not callous or insensitive. Once I knew that she was serious, of course I said we’d go. I told her I was sorry, and now I’ve made a special breakfast to show how much I meant it. I even splurged on bacon.

  I lift the spitting pan up off the electric range and carry it out the back door onto the stoop and then wonder what I should do next. I can’t just dump it into two feet of snow and hope it won’t reappear sometime in the spring, hope it won’t attract... What would it attract? Owls? Wolves? Bears? Bears ought to be in hibernation—in early December surely—unless there were polar bears around? Skunks? Mice? Village dogs? I have no desire to entice any of these predators to skulk around our home. I set the pan on the snowdrift that covers most of the porch, thinking I will deal with it later. Then I give in to the temptation to pick out the crispest piece and plop it into my mouth before returning to the kitchen.

  “It still stinks in here. Can’t you smell it, David? It’s awful.” Her nose wrinkles as she gathers books and papers from the desk in the second bedroom. “I’m skipping food. I’ll just go in and suffer through it. It comes and goes. Maybe it’ll disappear with some fresh air.”

  “You should go to the hospital. This has been going on for more than a week.”

  "It isn’t a hospital. Hospitals have doctors. I’ll be fine. It might not be so bad later in the day.”

  “It is a hospital. There are real nurses there. I can make you an appointment.”

  “I don’t need an appointment. I’m okay. I’m feeling better. Emptying my stomach helped. I’ll get some air and I’ll be fine.”

  “Suzanne, you need to eat something. We have eggs. We have toast.”

  “I’m sorry, David. I appreciate the thought; I do. I just can’t look at food this morning. Even thinking about an egg makes me want to puke again. Don’t worry. It’s not weird to get the flu when you’re exposed to twenty kids every day. I’m lucky it’s not lice and impetigo. I’ve seen enough of those to last me a lifetime. Considering where we are, I’m just lucky it’s not tuberculosis.”

  “Suzanne? Do you know what’s going on here? Something’s not right.”

  “I have no idea. I don’t have time to think about it. I’m just uptight about everything these days. I’m down; I’m up. It’s three more weeks until Christmas break. That’s all. If I can just hang on till then, maybe I can recharge, maybe get my bearings again, maybe come back here and feel like I’m doing something worthwhile. Aren’t you fed up being here?”

  “Not nearly as much as I was at first. Not as much as you. I really like the snow piled up on the tree branches. It’s so peaceful, even just a little way from our house, on the edges of the bush. You should get out there too.”

  “Maybe this weekend. Maybe we could go out together. Have a fire? You know, roast a marshmallow or something. Do they have marshmallows at the Bay?”

  I put my arm around her. “Of course they do. They have a better selection of cookies and candies than our Loblaw’s back in Toronto.”

  I turn her to face me and press her body into mine. “Suz...”

  “Ouch. That hurts.”

  “What hurts?”

  “You crushed me.”

  “I didn’t crush you.”

  “Oh shit, David.”

  “Now what?” I back away, imagining projectile vomiting.

  “David, my breasts have been really tender for awhile.”

  “Have I been neglecting them?”

  “Cute, David. I wish. You are always keen. No, this is one more sign. They’re just—sore. I’m always on the verge of tears. And I keep throwing up—just around breakfast time, hardly ever after lunch. What if... David, Jesus, David. What if this isn’t the flu? What if I’m pregnant? I can’t be pregnant. There is so much going on right now. I am freaking not ready for this. I’m not.”

  “Sit down; relax, Suzanne. We don’t know for sure. Maybe they can’t do brain surgery at the hospital, but I’d be surprised if they can’t give a pregnancy test.”

  “No way.”

  “Why?”

  “I just... Look, they’re friends. We go over there and party with them on the weekends. I don’t want to talk to them about my breasts.”

  “They’re nurses. It’s their job.”

  “Well they’re still people to me. They’ll talk. It’s not their business. Friends, you know. No, not friends, not really, just the closest thing we have to friends here. It just doesn’t look—ethical. One sister is a nurse; the other is my principal.”

  It hits me. “A baby.” I sit down on the arm of the chesterfield. I reach down and find the fur between Diego’s scapulae and wait for him to purr. “We’re going to have a baby. Suzanne.”

  “No, David. That is not what it is. It’s the flu, just the flu. Tomorrow I’ll be myself, healthy and happy, you’ll see.” She grabs her new parka from the hall closet and pulls it onto one arm. “David, this can’t be happening. We’ve been careful. Wipe that goddamn smile off your face or I swear I’ll kill you with my bare hands right here and now.”

  Diego rolls over onto his back and offers me his belly.

  

  I glance up from my work to see a kid slide sideways and skid onto his back as I mop the dining room floor. “What the hell?” I’m shocked by the sound of his footsteps flying from the hallway through the swinging door. I’m immediately furious at the muddy tracks across the gleaming wet surface I’ve just created. Gumboots! Mud! My floor! But the annoyance boiling up inside me quickly subsides when it’s Watikwan’s voice I hear.

  “Ow! This floor is too slippery.” He springs back to his feet, apparently unharmed, un-fazed, unaware of what I am trying to accomplish here.

  “I made it wet. I’m trying to get it clean, Watikwan.”

  “Hey, Dave!”

  “Your boots! My clean floor! What are you doing here?”

  “Where is Wapikoshish?”

  “Who? What?”

  The boy’s excitement drains from his face and he looks me in the eye. “I did not say anything. She’ll kill me. I’m only looking for my sister.”

  “Who’ll kill you? You did too say something. Is that her Cree name?”

  “Please, just tell me where she is? Don’t tell her what I said, okay?”

  I rack my brains, trying to remember the sounds, the word that is obviously her nickname. All I have in my memory is an “ick” and maybe something “ish.” Maybe. “You’re tracking mud, Watikwan. Take off your boots and stay right where you are. I’ll get her for you.”

  “I need to see her now.”

  “First, the boots.”

  He stops and pulls off his footwear. “Did you know this floor is wet?”

  “You’re supposed to be downstairs in the gym with the other kids. I’m supposed to be mopping the floor. Rosemary is supposed to be helping your uncle fix lunch in there.” I nod toward the kitchen door, and before I can say anything else he has already raced through it. I shrug and swirl the mop into my bucket of soapy water, then use the handle of the wringer to wheel the bucket back over to the door where I begin erasing his muddy boot prints.

  I’m not quite finished repairing the damage when the door swings open again.

  “Ow! You’re hurting me.” Watikwan yells it—in English so I know it is for my benefit. His sister guides him, her fingers firmly gripping his ear.

  “Can you give this boy a detention? I caught him stealing food from the kitchen.”

  “Very funny. Just let me go. Ekwani!”

  “I think my brother, the thief, will behave better if you are the one who escorts him back to the gym. Listen to your teacher, Watikwan.” I can tell by her face she is relieved to have another member of her family safely on the mainland. She gives me a quick smile. “You will give me a full report on his conduct, David.” Then she nods to her brother, “And I will give that report to okawiya, she will not be pleased if her son is being a nuisance.”

  “I’m just abou
t finished here anyway,” I tell her. “Do you know how much longer until lunch? Just in case there are others down there on the verge of starvation.”

  “I’m almost done making number cards so we can get this shift thing up and running. Cheepash is ready with the soup and sandwiches. Give us five more minutes. Maybe you should take a stack of numbers cards to the gym now. If you’re the one in charge they won’t accuse me of favouritism.”

  “No problem. Let’s go, Prisoner Watikwan. Will I need handcuffs or will you go peacefully?”

  “Peacefully,” he mumbles. When Rosemary lets go of his ear, I see him reach behind her and pinch her on the bum before racing back out of the dining room.

  “Shikak!” She calls after him.

  I’m slow to follow him through the door, but Watikwan waits for me on the other side.

  “Why are you mopping floors, Dave? Teachers don’t have to mop floors. You should come play with us. I thought you would be in the big city with the other teachers.”

  I put my hand on his shoulder. “I’m not a teacher today; I’m just a person. The floor is dirty; they need me to clean it. That’s where we’ll eat today—not on the floor, but in that room, okay?”

  “Okay. I’m still hungry though.”

  “You’re probably always hungry. It won’t be long. How are things over there—in the village? Are your parents in a safe place now? What did you see from the helicopter? Was that your first ride?”

  “Too many questions.”

  We walk down a long hallway, then go upstairs one floor and backtrack down another hall before we can descend two floors to the basement gym. On the way, Watikwan tells me many houses are badly damaged and his family home is now gone completely—broken kindling somewhere downriver or out in the Bay. He describes the families, including his, sitting in boats, which are tied together, anchored to trees—a huge makeshift raft, a temporary cedarstrip island. A helicopter lands every fifteen or twenty minutes and a councillor calls out the four names next in line to board. “It is very boring over there,” he tells me, “just sitting there all night and all day. Me, my whole life I see these helicopters. Chiokanamoshish. Do you know that word, Dave?”

  I shake my head.

  He furrows his brow searching for the English. “The fire animal.” Then he mimes blowing something from his mouth with all his teeth showing.

  “A dragon?”

  “Dragonfly!” he shouts. “Chiokanamoshish. They float in the air. I dreamed of being up there on the back of the big metal dragonfly. But, Dave, today I really was there and all I could think about was to see my sister and not being in that canoe anymore.”

  I squeeze his shoulder. “You’ll have lots of time to talk to Rosemary, but she’s really busy taking care of all these people. We both are.”

  “We could take care of ourselves, and then you’d have time to play. Did you ever ride on the chiokanamoshish?”

  “I like that picture of a dragonfly-copter. Someday you will have to explain to me the meaning of your name, Watikwan. Will you do that? Then I will tell you about my one and only ride.”

  “I would tell you now, but I have to play a game of dodge ball. I am a very hard thrower. My legs really want to run after sitting all that time in the canoe.”

  “I’ll take a rain check.”

  “It’s not raining, Dave. The sun’s out; the snow is gone already.”

  We are soon at the gym, and I pound on the locked door until Sister hears me. When it opens Watikwan is through it before I can say, “Scoot,” even before Sr. Theresa can grab him. He disappears into an undulating sea of children the way a caribou might blend into a herd.

  “Where does dat one come from?” Sister looks at me like she has just observed a miracle. I see Linda on the far side of the gym helping out after her night shift. I don’t envy either of them.

  “I have to get back to work, Sister. I’ll be down again soon to bring the first group up for lunch.” I hand her the cards. “You need to line them up, give everyone a random number. Then send the ‘ones.’ Hold the rest until the first group gets back.” I watch her eyes cancel out her smile as she realizes she will be working through the lunch period. So will I.

  After I’ve climbed back upstairs I move the bucket into the locked janitor’s closet. I now possess a treasured, almost hallowed, master key—a clear sign the roof has fallen in and Sr. Theresa has given up any hope of saving her precious school from the unwashed horde. I lock the door and head into the kitchen to get my next assignment.

  “Must’ve been nice to see your brother,” I tell her. Cheepash is busy underneath the dishwasher.

  She grins. “The little imp. I hope they pay you well for sitting him all day in school.” She winks. “More good news for you.”

  “Oh?”

  “Another job. He asked for a Jack-of-all-trades, but all we had was a Dave. Thomas wants you this afternoon. You must be tired of mopping and taking orders from my uncle. Time for a new boss—well, not permanently. I think Cheepash wants you back as soon as you’re finished.”

  “Thomas, eh?” Somehow this isn’t the New York Yankees offering me a hundred thousand dollars to play centre field. Do I have the option to decline the contract? “What’s the job?”

  “Is there a problem, David?”

  “No. No, I’ll do it.”

  “You know who I’m talking about, right?”

  “It’s nothing really. We just got off on the wrong foot the first day. I mean I see him doing jobs around and he looks like a really hard worker. It was probably just communication. Maybe if I could’ve talked to him in Cree, things would’ve been different? I don’t know.”

  “You don’t need Cree. Thomas speaks English very well. He was one of the first from here, one of the few to graduate from high school in the south—North Bay. That’s where I went, and he was my inspiration to finish.”

  “Really? That’s cool. But he just doesn’t respond to anything people say in English, so I just assumed... Or maybe it’s just that he’s hard of hearing. Or I’ve put him off. Or, I don’t know...”

  “He can hear. I doubt you offended him either.” She takes a deep breath. “Thomas... He’s distant. A lot of the time, he’s in some other space, but he’s a good man and, like you said, a hard worker. He needs your help. It’s an important job.”

  “Then fine, I’m in. Just tell me what to do.” My stomach still feels queasy. At least I won’t be dressing up as a mime to chit-chat about the weather, and I’m pretty sure he won’t be asking me to tie any knots.

  “It’s spade work. He’s walking the runway right now, marking the places that need repair.” She hands me another stack of small cardboard squares. “Here are the rest of your numbers. Shuffle them. Hand them out face down, otherwise they will all want to eat at the same time. Don’t worry about who gets what number or if they start trading. Just bring up all the number threes first.”

  “Tricky. You ought to be a teacher.” She laughs at that, and this time it makes me smile. “I’ll take these down to the gym and enlighten Sr. Theresa with your sneaky plan.”

  Her laugh dispels only a portion of the apprehension I feel at the prospect of working closely with the sullen Thomas who pretends to know no English, who is “distant” in places and for reasons I have yet to discover. I wouldn’t be surprised to find myself smashed up against his truck or flattened with the business end of a shovel before the afternoon is over.

  

  Our argument ends with the crash of a saucer smashing against the kitchen wall and splattering down onto the linoleum. It spurs Diego to cat-gallop for the safety of the bedroom. It turns my hamstrings to rubber, and I slide down into a helpless squat, covering my ears with my hands not so much to protect myself from either shrapnel or sound but to quash my honest feelings—to quell the words I know would only make things worse. I love my wife; I try to empathize, but there is nothing inside the skull cradled in my arms that knows how to make the mess around me any better, to fi
nd a compromise, to shovel a new path that would fix the situation. It’s chaos no matter how I turn the puzzle pieces and try to make them fit. I crouch there only minutes before the conundrum solves itself. The shock of broken china has apparently convinced Suzanne that throwing things is not the answer, any more than running in the knee-deep snow will sooth her rage. Right now her only solace is to sit alone in her classroom staring at the empty seats and dreaming of a different time, a different place, a different set of students. I listen as she opens the hall closet, slides the hangers to find her parka, slips on her boots, and leaves the house.

  It’s the first of February. Were there any groundhogs in Orkney Post this morning, were there any newspapers or televisions, were there any people who cared about the date, the dawn might have told us whether to expect six more weeks of winter. But groundhogs weren’t needed. Everyone here already knows there’ll be at least ten, likely twelve more weeks of bitter cold and blowing snow. I’d like to blame our fight on that depressing fact. I’d be happy to list weather as, at least, an extenuating circumstance in the sad explosion at our home this evening. I’d like to think that now the metaphoric pot has finally boiled over, we’ll sit down to quietly and rationally find an obvious solution.

  Our argument, however, is real. It started back in Pembroke during Christmas holidays. It was no surprise to me, not to either of us really. Suzanne discovered her mother was still annoying, her father was still too busy, both her older siblings still had lives so thoroughly conventional it felt like we, in comparison, were marching through an airport, heads shaved, begging bowls extended, chanting hari Krishna to the other travellers. And I, having built a wall between myself and any thoughts of family back in Iowa, couldn’t understand why that would be either a surprise to her or a cause to bring on her depression once again. I could not, and still can’t, fully appreciate how being pregnant might turn a woman’s thoughts away from kith and onto kin. My concerns still sound practical to me: I suggested that we see her family doctor about a pregnancy that, while conclusive to Suzanne, had never actually been confirmed by a nurse or a physician. We butted heads on that, though quietly at first.

  “You really ought to go, Suzanne.”

  “Then all of Pembroke will find out. I just know that.”

  “So? You won’t go in Orkney either. You have to go somewhere. Who cares if people find out?”

  “I’ll go there when we get back, I will. I promise.”

  “I don’t think you will. Not once we’re back there. Nothing will have changed; none of your objections will have lost their impact. Why does it matter about people knowing, whether it’s here or there? My parents would be thrilled.”

  “Your parents are so easy. You have them safely barricaded across an international border. And the U.S. guards have guns. I’ve never met your parents. How is that possible, David?”

  “Well, let’s have them over for brunch when we get home. I’m sure they’d trek the thousand miles to meet you. Look, if your parents are so terrible then why are we here? Neither one of us is comfortable. We needed a break. This is worse than Orkney for me—for both of us.”

  “It’s Christmas. Right? That’s why we’re here. If Mom finds out I’m pregnant, she’ll fight like a tiger to keep me here. I’m too frustrated, too weak, too sick to fight back right now.”

  “Your mom doesn’t seem like a tiger to me. You’re smarter than this, Suzanne.”

  “You have no idea, David. She’s a warrior. And she’ll be scared as hell. I’ve heard the blow-by-blow, scream-by-scream account of my birth a hundred times. She almost died having me, you know. If she finds out, she’ll be at the airport with a shotgun barring us from getting on the plane back north.”

  “Sometime, someplace you have to see a doctor.”

  “I will. You have to be my friend. I need you. I know you mean well, but right now I need you to be on my side.”

  “I am on your side. I always am. But you’re always the boss. If what you want is a merry Christmas here then that’s what we’ll have. It’s just... You don’t make it easy. You’re not doing much to help me understand what you’re going through.”

  “Right, David. You go ahead and dump it all back onto me. I’m so sorry if I’m letting you down.”

  Of course, then I felt guilty watching her munch on soda crackers, wondering what it must be like, knowing I would never ever really understand unless she found the words to tell me. Maybe, maybe right at that moment, a simple hug could have solved it all; it would have been enough for me. Just holding her might have wiped away the fears and anger; just touching her might have given us back some faith in how the future might unfold. Instead, we made a pact of silence.

  We left her parent’s home a few days earlier than planned, rented a car and drove down to Toronto for a private New Year’s celebration. At least that much was smart. We needed time with just the two of us alone to put things back on track; we missed Toronto even though the trip underlined our somewhat precarious financial situation. Three nights at a downtown, waterfront hotel wasn’t cheap, especially with a baby threatening fiscal ruin. We needed it; we called old friends, drank grapefruit juice, ate broccoli and spinach just because we hadn’t seen those things since summer. We made a set of rules to let us laugh and smile and charge our batteries for six more months of isolation. We faithfully obeyed our new Four Commandments: no talk about work, no talk about Orkney, no talk about Aboriginals, and no talk about the baby. We window-shopped and went to movies, watched TV and ordered pizza. We laughed and loved each other. And we kept the Four Commandments.

  January 2, 1977 was a Monday and became a second holiday so things were pretty quiet when we took the bus out to the airport to catch Air Canada back to Timmins. The shock of going back had made us quieter, but reality was on its way to meet us even sooner than we thought. It found us sitting in the departure lounge at Pearson, slapped us in the face like a snowstorm blowing off the muskeg—Sundara Singh.

  “Robinsons! Suzanne! David! New Years wishes! So glad to see you, I’m.”

  “Hey!” we mumbled weakly.

  “So we are meeting here a few hours early. You are flying Air Canada, no? Come! Come! I will buy you each a drink. Our last decent drink before the shithole.” He guided us toward a lounge and shattered every single one of the precious Four Commandments in less than thirty seconds. The pact was broken; the peace, disrupted. The sniping didn’t stop until we buckled seatbelts on the early morning flight back north.

  Suzanne pressed her mouth against my ear. “Do you get how much this shames me, David, working with a staff of racist incompetents? If I were one of my students, I would never trust an outsider. Would I ever give them half a break on anything? Not a chance. Christ, I hate this job. It makes the prejudice in Toronto seem totally innocuous.”

  “You can’t change other people or the past, Suzanne. Just keep a low profile. Do your job.”

  “Always the same David. You still don’t get it. You still have your head in the sand. It just doesn’t matter to you that I’ll never be anything but just another white person, another Anglo, another conquistador to them.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “It’s true my job is to replace their language with mine. I’m supposed to make them behave like kids down here so they can go to high school and work in an office or a factory here even if that’s not what they want. I’m the perfect little colonial boss, and they will never forgive me for that anymore than I can forgive Singh—anymore than I can forgive myself.”

  I kept my mouth shut after that—as did she. The silence continued even after we shuffled off the DC-3 in Orkney Post late on Tuesday afternoon. The snow from the apron was ploughed into banks higher than the terminal. As I walked her home and gallantly helped her with her coat, I can’t remember either of us speaking, not until I offered to make us tea before I hiked across the compound to the Nurses’ Residence to thank Linda and rescue Diego Rivera. If I couldn’t talk to Suzanne, at least I c
ould talk to him. I reassured him life with the nurses would never ever have to be repeated; I let him know the temperature at home might be a little frigid. He suggested talking wouldn’t hurt. Maybe it would help. I called a truce as I stepped through the door.

  “I’m home! Where are you? Diego’s back! He’s thrilled we’re here!”

  “In here,” she called from the desk in the second bedroom. “Just getting organized. I’ve got lots of work to do.”

  I peeked over her shoulder, wishing she’d said: we’ve got lots of things to discuss. “What’s this?”

  “Just stuff.” I could see it was a list.

  “What stuff?”

  “I’m not sure you’d be interested.”

  “I’m interested.” But I was forced to wait until she finished. And when I looked at them—it wasn’t one but several different compilations: a list of healthy foods and things to do for an unborn baby, a list about the money that we had and what we’d need the next few years, a list of names, a list of dreams—a list of what she’d always thought might happen when she finally had a child.

  There wasn’t much to say to that. For me, there’s always been a comfort in deferral, letting others lead the way, but this time I felt anything but comfort. I felt cold. I was afraid to ask her where exactly she was planning to begin, if I was going to have a voice at all in what was going to happen. “I’ll turn up the thermostat. Then get some food for Señor Rivera.”

  “Fine. I’ve got some thinking I need to do. I should go to the school and throw something together for tomorrow. Give Diego a hug from me, okay?”

  Mid-January a doctor came, and Suzanne let me go with her for her first exam. By then her slacks were getting tight, but the dress code at the school was non-existent. She’d simply looped an elastic through the buttonhole of her good jeans and hooked both ends around the button. She wore her shirts un-tucked. She was sure that no one knew as yet, but that wouldn’t last much longer. The doctor stubbed his cigarette and leaned against the examination table as she buttoned up her blouse. “Well, you’re pregnant, that’s for sure. I guess you knew that much. If we were in Toronto or Ottawa we could do an ultrasound a month from now. It’s new. You could see an actual moving picture of the foetus. You could know the baby’s sex,” the doctor said with a smile, which turned into a laugh. “Imagine that, eh? It will be awhile before they catch up with that technology here—if that ever happens. But you didn’t want to know that information anyway, I bet.” Tender breasts and enlarged nipples were perfectly normal. The due date: August 1—an excellent time to deliver, he thought—as if she could have changed the reservation if she’d wanted. Eating should be easier in a couple weeks, but she’d be showing more quite soon. It might be time, he thought, to talk to her employer, assuming the nun who works at the hospital wouldn’t let the cat out of the bag. “So to speak,” he joked. There wasn’t much else to say. Stay comfortable. Stay happy. Relax. A Lamaze class would be nice but of course that wasn’t going to happen here. Maybe the Health nurse in the village would want to organize something. “You have a cat? Well, stay away from its litter box, okay?”

  The plane going south was late that afternoon and we watched it taking off together standing in our living room in front of the picture window. We watched it fly the doctor, her doctor, back to somewhere south to some real hospital that had an honest-to-god ultrasound machine. I placed my arm around her shoulder, but she pulled away. I saw her eyes start leaking tears. She turned and opened her mouth to say something but nothing came out. I stuttered something. She walked into the bedroom and closed the door. Please tell me what I ought to do, Mouse.

  I know she is frightened. I know how far away we are from anything she could feel is normal. I can imagine her sitting at her desk at school and having all this weigh on her—thinking of what might go wrong or how the hell we can afford a baby if she has to quit her job or if artists could ever successfully transform themselves into dads. If she broke down in class and shed a tear, I’d understand. If that were to happen in Pembroke or Toronto there’d surely be at least one student who’d get up to hug her, who’d whine, “Miss Robinson, are you okay?” The odds of that in Orkney Post would be, of course, exactly zero. Less than zero really. Here, the only one to comfort her is busy playing with his paints.

  Groundhog day, we ate our supper doused in silence. Afterward, she volunteered to do the dishes while I finished up some art. I thought that’s what she wanted until she came into the living room, a dishtowel draped across her forearm. “David, it never bothers you?”

  “No, I guess I just don’t get it. I know you’re unhappy. I know I don’t have the answer. I don’t know how to solve it.”

  “But you do act pretty happy yourself these days. You’re getting outdoors more. You’re learning how to ski. You’re making friends at the residence. You’re painting. You have the time to read.”

  “I’m learning to like the winter, yes—at least, a little. I’m here. Are you mad because I don’t hate this place as much as you do? Would you rather I had a job that made me physically sick all the time? We could share that if I did. But of course there aren’t any jobs here. Sorry."

  I watched her slump heavily onto the couch. Except for her eyes, everything about her looked tired, even haggard tonight. Her eyes darted from the table lamp to the sketchpad on the carpet to the door to the cat and finally seared directly into me. “This place started hating me long before I said one negative word about it. You know that.”

  “Okay. I do. Now tell me what you’d like me to do to make it even the slightest bit better.”

  “Damn you! You’re maddening.” She jumped up off the couch and headed back toward the kitchen. In the doorway she turned and faced me once again. “Why do I always have to tell you what to do? Why is it on my shoulders? I can’t do this, not this school, not these kids, not this place. Not right now. I won’t be able to support us, David, not and have a baby too. Do you realize it’s five whole months from now until the end of school? Everyday it gets harder for me to do the things I have to do so you can sit around and draw.”

  “I don’t just draw. I cook. I clean. I help. I don’t know anything about your school really—just what you tell me. I can’t have the baby for you, Suzanne.”

  “Fuck you. I know you help. But that’s so easy. I feel like I do everything because everything I have do is so damned hard.”

  “I get it. I wish I could make you happy. I wish I could help you with your schoolwork. I try to be supportive. What else do you want from me?”

  By then she was convulsing in tears and I was catatonic. She was desperate, and I was feeling trapped. “Help me, David. Find some way to get me out of here. I don’t care about solving any of their problems. I just want out.”

  “Suz...”

  “I’m turning into a crazy person here. I don’t know who I am anymore. This has to be bad for the baby. It’s bad for me—the people, the kids, the other teachers, the hospital. I hate the hospital; it’s awful. Just somehow get me out of here.”

  “So quit then. We’ll leave.”

  “I can’t. You know that. I have a contract. We’d have no income. Are you about to sell a canvas? Think we can feed both your cat and your baby on your Tim Horton’s salary? You’re such a naive little kid. ‘Just quit; we’ll leave.’” She turned and fled into the kitchen.

  I said something to the cat; I don’t remember what it was. I know I held him close and listened to him purr. Maybe Diego told me what to say. “You can’t work. You can’t quit. You can’t stay. You can’t go. I help but I don’t help. Listen to yourself. Nobody can solve a puzzle like that.” I was reaching for a string to entertain Diego when the saucer smashed against the kitchen wall. At first, I thought it might’ve been aimed at me, but Suzanne couldn’t aim that badly. Still, I am the target. Still, the silence that floods our house after the crash is my fault. I’m the one who is supposed to say something. I’m the one designated to get up and try to comfort her.
I know she’s right. I know I’m not wrong either. Her questions are real. The puzzle is real. Maybe if Kaminski hadn’t failed me, I could be the one floundering in her classroom or the one to find a job better than deep-frying doughnuts. Maybe the baby is my fault. I should somehow share the blame for us being in Orkney Post? Could we blame her parents? The only thing I know for certain is: I have no better idea about a solution than Diego does. We’ve’ painted ourselves into a corner. I understand paint. If it were paint, I could handle it. If this were only paint it would be time to gesso over everything and start again. Better luck next time, David Taylor.

  I’m exhausted. I’m not thinking straight right now, but I am pretty sure of one thing: Suzanne is wrong about Orkney Post. It’s not an evil place. These are not savages. It isn’t their fault. Does being pregnant turn someone into someone else altogether? Everything is fuzzy. My ears barely register the sound of the front door slam.

  

  I’ve finished slamming down the braces to lock the legs in place after lugging the last of the folding tables along the floor, wrestling them into place, and flipping them upright. Once I have them positioned into long rows with 120 chairs carried down through the maze of hallways from storage and classrooms, I cover the tables with rolls of kindergarten kraft. Once I’m done with that, we’re, hopefully, more or less ready for the crowd expected at this evening’s meal, and I can take a breather. That’s when Thomas comes to get me. Good timing, right? He looks impatient to get started, which I’m happy to say is 180 degrees better than angry.

  “Wachiye, Thomas.” I’m fairly certain context ought to differentiate “hello” from “goodbye” or “greetings.” I assume Rosemary is right: we can either speak English or we’ll have a silent afternoon. Hand signals won’t be needed.

  “Wachiye,” he mumbles, which is a major break through. Then I think perhaps he’s telling me goodbye—a translation more consistent with our history. He studies the floor, and I realize we’re waiting for something or someone. Still, it’s not as awkward as it sounds. I’ve learned that eye contact is somewhat rude; in Orkney Post supposedly it makes a person quite uncomfortable. When Rosemary taught me that a month ago, it made a big improvement in how I understood my students.

  Now she comes from the kitchen drying her hands on a tea towel. She doesn’t look at me but goes right up to Thomas and lightly grasps his forearms as she speaks to him in Cree. It’s more like people talking at a funeral than a reunion or work instructions. I don’t recognize any of the words that either of them uses, and they both appear to ignore me. Still, I can tell the conversation is both intense and solemn. I’m considering taking a stroll around the dining room to give them privacy when Cheepash steps out from the kitchen’s swinging door and motions to me.

  “Busy?”

  I start to nose-point to the conversation between Rosemary and Thomas, but think better of it and step over to the cook instead. “I’m free right now. I think Thomas wants me to do something on the airstrip soon. What’s up here?”

  “Potatoes. How fast can you skin a million spuds?”

  He leads me into the kitchen and I sit at the counter with a peeler, a big basin of cold water, and a gunnysack marked P.E.I. At least it’s nice to be sitting down. My feet are sore from standing on the concrete floor all day in rubber boots.

  “So, Mister Taylor? Why are you doing all this work?” He doesn’t waste any time getting to the point, and I start to realize peeling potatoes today is going to be more complicated than one would think.

  “You just asked me to.”

  “I meant, what’s your angle? I hear you’ve been at it non-stop since before dawn. The school must be paying overtime.”

  I laugh at that. “I’m a supply. I’m not anything really until after our holiday. I’m not on any clock.”

  He sits down next to me with a paring knife and uses it to spear a potato out of the bag. “I’m waiting for the moose to marinade.”

  “Where did we get moose?”

  “Rescued from the village freezer. Got some geese too, but most of the meat was lost in the flood when the power was off and ice smashed the compressor.”

  “At least we’ll feast tonight.”

  “You didn’t answer my question. What’s up with the long hours?"

  “I haven’t thought about it. Why? There was a lot that needed doing. Still is. Is there some problem?”

  “You’re pretty good at answering questions with another question. You sure you’re a teacher and not a politician? I want to know about Rosemary. Are you trying to impress her?”

  “Charlie, I’m married. Rosemary is just a friend. I went skiing and snowshoeing with some nurses a few times. Sometimes she was there. She actually told me some things about Orkney Post that made it easier for me to do my job in the school. I think she’s a good person. Anyway, like I said, I’m married.”

  “I know you’re married. That’s one reason why I’m asking.”

  I can’t wait to hear his other reasons. “Does she think I’m hitting on her? She’s got nothing to worry about. You keep me too busy to think about anything except work. Unless you’d rather I stayed out of your kitchen?”

  “I’m saying I don’t see any other white folks getting their hands dirty.”

  “What about Sister? Linda and Hélène, the other nurses? What about Chad and the other pilot? They look white to me. They’re working.”

  “The sisters are nuns. That’s their thing. Their pay goes to the church anyway. The pilots get paid very well. So are the nurses. And if a nurse puts in an extra hour or two, well what else is there to do around here? You’re on your holiday and you’ve been working almost round the clock.”

  “The nurses do a lot of off-duty work. As far as I know. At least Rosemary does.”

  He tosses the white lump into the bowl of water. Then he looks me in the eye and makes his decision. “I see. Okay. Mr. Volunteer, thank you. You know how we say that in Cree.”

  “No idea.”

  “Mikwech. It’s not the same as English. You say thanks when somebody passes you a biscuit or opens a door. We say it when we really mean it—when somebody does something special, something important, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “Mikwech, David Taylor.” Then he takes another spud from the bag. He keeps peeling, but stops talking. I am left to my thoughts, which now are jammed, incapable of crawling forward or inching back. Appearances had not entered my brain in the rush to do what needed to be done. People gave orders; I followed them. It felt natural. If I was being too helpful, well, I hadn’t thought about it that way. Then I drift back in time, thinking about Juan’s mixed up ideas of generosity and nature, but right then Rosemary comes to rescue me from peeling spuds and answering questions.

  “That looks like fun.”

  I look up and hope I’m not blushing.

  “He’s catching on fast. Maybe we should call him Private First Class, mishaw mokoman.”

  Rosemary grins before speaking, “You exaggerate, Uncle. That is a paring knife, not a bayonet.” Cheepash laughs. Then she turns to me. “Do you know what he called you, David?”

  “Not a clue. I hope it isn’t too off colour.”

  “Not so much. He called you literally a ‘long knife.’ Somehow he knows you are an American.”

  “I used to be American. I had my chance to be soldier and passed it up.”

  “Sorry, Uncle. Thomas needs him on the airstrip shovelling gravel. Can you get along without him?”

  “I guess I’ll have to. You wouldn’t be fibbing so you two can run off and take a break together.” He winks at her.

  “Always looking out for me. Don’t worry. Thomas will work him hard. You want that runway fixed, don’t you?”

  “Well...”

  “So the planes can bring you buckets of Colonel Sanders, eh? Maybe they will start the evacuation so you can go back to being a lazy cook.”

  “Fried Chicken? I dreamed about that all last night in the ca
noe. Get this deserter out of my sight. And make him work double-time.”

  I finish the potato I’m working on and plop it into the bowl, then push my chair back. “If we get done in time, I’ll come help with supper.”

  Cheepash says, “And don’t forget to bring the girlfriend.”

  “Not this evening,” says Rosemary. “My shift at the hospital starts in less than an hour. I have to get cleaned up first. Maybe after midnight if you’re still here.”

  “Jesus, I hope not,” says Cheepash. “Seriously.”

  In the hallway, just inside the front door of the school, Rosemary puts her hand on my arm and stops me.

  “Go easy on Thomas, David.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean...” She bites her lower lip like she is trying to decide what she is and isn’t going to tell me. “Something happened a few years back. It’s not your business really. I don’t want to think about it or talk about it either. Just understand he has a heavy heart. He works very hard. But people, white people... He wants to get past this. It’s just really hard for him.”

  Then she pushes the front door open and we go out to where Thomas waits in the driver’s seat of his idling truck.

  No one says anything on the short drive along the road past the hospital and the Nurses’ Residence. Just beyond the far end of the long Pan-abode, Thomas takes a hard right off the road and into the weedy scrub and stops next to a small mound of coarse gravel.

  Rosemary heads to the residence while Thomas and I climb down, each pulling a spade from the truck box and begin the job of transferring the clay and muddy limestone into the pickup. I’m thankful for my gloves this afternoon although the weather is mild. Almost all of yesterday’s snow has melted. The gravel isn’t frozen. The sun is bright. It doesn’t take long before I need to remove my jacket and toss it onto the front seat of the cab.

  My spirits flag a little. I think about the things Cheepash said this afternoon and I admit to myself I’m disappointed that Rosemary has a shift to do this evening. I would rather be running the dishwasher or mopping the floor with her than shovelling gravel next to Thomas. But who in the universe would not make that same choice. I am a normal human being; that’s all. I’m lucky to have such a good friend in Rosemary. And, yes, Thomas is a mystery, but the world is full mysteries from where I stand right now.

 

  

  It’s one thing to stand in line beside a silent stranger and wonder what he’s thinking, but it’s quite another to walk beside your best friend in the world, your lover, your wife and not have a clue what’s going on inside her head. I want to feel some sympathy. I want to find the embers of our tenderness and breathe them back to life. But to be honest, if I dare to take my own pulse, what’s inside me now is only helplessness.

  In squeaking high-top sneakers, I lug my pregnant wife’s big suitcase along the snow-packed road across the compound toward the airstrip. Suzanne squeezes the leather glove on my free hand and leans against me, and I have no idea whether it’s to warm her chill or show me some affection or seal the contract of our separation. A brutal gust of March wind tears at my bare cheeks and slips between the folds of my wool scarf to sting my neck. The cold sifts through the lining of my jacket like it’s made of cheesecloth. There’s nothing I can do to fix things. My impotence obliterates my love, my anger, my fear; unfortunately it doesn’t change the fact I’m freezing.

  “You should be coming with me, David.” She shouts it in my ear to make herself heard above the wind. “This isn’t what I wanted.”

  I suppose it’s not what I want either, but I have no idea what I really do want now. I know I’m petrified that once the plane has lifted off, I’m under verbal contract to turn and force my feet back to the school to teach her class as a supply. For the first time in my life I have a job—a real job, one capable of supporting a wife and preparing for a baby, one that proved too difficult for the only teacher that I ever respected or admired.

  “I’m scared,” I finally answer—yes, both powerless and terrified.

  “Of what? Not me I hope. Not losing me. I’ll be just fine. Pembroke has a real hospital with actual doctors. We’ll both be fine—the baby and me. I’m not deserting you; I’m trying to save myself.”

  “I’m scared of teaching.”

  “Well, yes. You should be. They’re going to eat you up.”

  That doesn’t help. Not only does it shake my already-wilted confidence regarding school, it makes it even harder to feel sorry about our impeding separation. I know I won't miss her steady stream of negativity. I don't know what’s keeping me from feeling some regret about the loss of tenderness and friendship. Why can’t I remember all the reasons she’s amazing? She is. She was. I know. She kept us going for so long—not only with a decent job, but also with her common sense and her compassion, her constant encouragement. Why can’t I feel that now, Mouse? I’m not just thinking of the loft and what she sacrificed for art, for me. Suzanne knew how to live, how to keep it honest, how to get things done, when to shut up and when to let it all hang out. I remember that. I have no idea where it went—buried in the snow in Orkney Post—or how it happened. Half of me hopes there is some phrase or catchy sentence that would make her change her mind and stay. The other half just wants her gone and all this hurt and anger over. We’ve talked it out too many times. I can’t go with her now—not yet. We need the money and I don’t dare even dream of getting work like this in any city south of here. And then, of course, there is a child to think about. We both are trapped. Maybe both of us are feeling helpless.

  “What if you’ve forgotten something? Should I send it?”

  “I didn’t forget anything, David. You’ll be fine.”

  “You’ll be fine too. Your parents will be really glad to see you.”

  “Yeah. I might not be so glad to see them.” She smiles. I’ve missed her smile. I wonder if she misses mine.

  I review the reasons why she thinks she has to leave. Of course she made the right decision. Her job was worse than hard; it was driving her insane. There isn’t any paystub in the world worth going crazy. We both knew that. It didn’t matter that it was her call, her decision to give up a position with Toronto District School Board at Brock Public School last June, a job she loved, a cushy place to live for us. That’s in the past. I didn’t beat her up for that. She stuck it out for three whole years in Hogtown with all its noise and crowded sidewalks and its callous indifference to a small town girl from up the Valley. My big career in art was not about to blossom, really; it wasn’t on the verge of anything at all. I didn’t know it at the time, but thinking back, I was ripe for moving on. I’d taken what the city had to offer and it was time to graduate, time to find my niche, my Tahiti as she put it. Well, Tahiti isn’t here now, is it? Not anymore than this was her place to “make a difference,” to “do something important.” They were laudable dreams; I’ll give her that. We both thought it would work out better. We both thought racists all were white and lived in southern cities. We had no idea what we’d find here. The Department of Indian Affairs just put us on a plane—to nowhere. It turned out she was wrong. We couldn’t walk away. We couldn’t make it right. Of course, I wanted to point out, “It was your decision, your mistake, not mine.” But even only thinking it—that likely made it worse. Maybe I was wrong to let her call the shot again and leave. But she was so unhappy, so determined that the baby needed doctors and an ultrasound. I was helpless; I was weak. There was nothing left to do.

  “It’s not too late, David.”

  “For what?”

  “For you to get a ticket.”

  “And then what? How many times have we gone over this?”

  “I know.”

  “I have to do something. The job is money. You were right. I need to help out. Maybe it won’t last the two weeks she promised, but I need to try at least.”

  “Don’t let it do to you what it did to me.”

  I squeeze her
hand. There’s nothing more to say.

  We’re in a daze. All of this was such a shock—many shocks, one shock right after the other. We had some nasty arguments that lasted all the month of February. Like a record with a scratch, we found ourselves stuck with the same thrusts and parries over and over and over.

  I cannot understand it. What do you think the women here do, Suzanne? They go to the hospital. The nurses here know what they’re doing. There’s an air ambulance just an hour away. Women have big families. They have healthy babies. Why are we so much better than them?

  I am not one of them. My mother almost died in labour. I don’t care how it sounds; I am not like them. We have a choice; they don’t. This is our baby. I’m not taking it to be born in India or China just because there are lots of kids there. I don’t know why you can’t see that.

  The record got stuck.

  You love to teach. You love kids. They’re just kids. You’ve taught Native kids before. You’ve fought for them. You’re a great teacher and you should be proud of that. It takes time to adjust to a new place. Give them some more time to get to know you, Suz.

  The kids are so far behind in everything they can never catch up. And, for reasons I can’t understand, they hate school, they hate even being in the building. And I’m sure they hate me. They refuse to work, refuse to play, refuse to even look me in the eye. Their parents don’t care about the school. I don’t think they care about their own kids either. How would I know? They won’t speak to me in English. I can’t take this any more.

  The record kept playing. Until she, suddenly one day, resigned. And the biggest shock of all was that Sister wasn’t upset, didn’t try to talk her out of it. “Many teacher’s resign mid-year,” Suzanne reported. “Don’t feel bad about it.” No, Mouse, the biggest shock of all was what Sister told her next without even pausing for a breath: “Perhaps your husband would like to be our supply for a few weeks until we can find a permanent replacement?” That shocked both of us. It gave us both a whole new set of words to fight with.

  “You’re shivering, David. You don’t have to wait here with me. Thomas can take care of the suitcase. You might want a few minutes to organize your thoughts before your first class.”

  “I’m okay. I want to be here.”

  “Don’t feel obligated.”

  “I just feel cold is all. It’s winter.”

  “You’ll just have Diego to keep you warm tonight.”

  “He’ll be broken hearted you aren’t there to help warm him.”

  It’s funny... Actually it’s not amusing at all. Strange, then, how Suzanne and I switched places once we got here. Her frustration turned to anger, then to hatred. At the other end of the chesterfield, I softened. The place was ghastly to me at first. There was nothing interesting as far as landscapes went, but it turned out the skyscapes were breathtaking. The people were aloof, of course, but they had interesting faces. I’d have loved to try my hand at portraits even though no one here could afford to hire me. A show of portraits would have made a hit back in T.O. The problem is: there’s no one here that I could comfortably ask to sit for one. Still, I was interested. I tried to make Orkney Post work for me. I played with colour. The northern lights blew my mind. Eventually I explored the band of bush that hugs the river. I learned to snowshoe and to ski. I got by. Things kept getting better.

  So now I’m back to feeling helpless. Suzanne says she wants me to go with her, but Orkney Post might be the only place on Earth where her drop-out husband could earn a decent wage the next two weeks—or maybe even more. Suddenly I, the baby’s father, the slightly insane artist, a player in paint, the loafer who lets his daydreams burn the stew, the carpenter that can only use a hammer or a screwdriver to stretch a canvas, suddenly I am a potential bread winner. If having a baby means she’s totally forgotten how charming my lazy indifference to wealth might be or my above average ability to "smell the flowers" while the house burns down around us, at least now she can appreciate the prospect of some income from me. That’s perhaps unfair. I get it. We both agreed a paycheque is important for filling up a baby’s room with furniture and diapers, even if my students never learn to count on their fingers or spell their own names. Could I really do much worse than Singh or Sr. Michelle?

  Right now I’m freezing and being numb feels better than being angry or afraid or pre-partum depressed.

  I set the suitcase in the pile of other suitcases beside the door of the unheated terminal, and we step back outside to wait for the plane.

  “I’m sorry, David. I’m sorry it turned out like this.” She looks up at me, blinking away tears. “I feel like such a failure.”

  “I don’t know what to feel.”

  “I don’t believe this is happening.” Her voice cracks.

  I try to avoid her eyes, as blue as the sky at forty degrees below zero—crackling with cobalt and ultramarine. “This isn’t forever. You have to do what you have to do. I have to earn some dough. I’ll miss you.”

  “I need you, David. Right now it’s more than just missing each other. I wish I could make you understand.”

  Waiting for the plane there are at least a dozen others standing near: Natives, bundled in parkas that stretch below their knees, with hoods trimmed in enough fur to hide their faces, a cigarette protruding from each ring of wolf or wolverine, rubber snowmobile boots with canvas tops disappearing under their coats. They wear home-tanned moose hide mitts with gauntlets to their elbows. They look very warm to a person dressed in Keds and a cheesecloth jacket.

  “I love you, David. Please hold me.”

  I cup a gloved hand under her chin, and lose myself in the sky of her eyes. I kiss her—first on the cheek and then lightly on the lips. Still my stomach churns like I am the one about to launch myself into the atmosphere. Then I fold my arms around her and pull her tight, imagining the baby warming against my body.

  Yes, I love her, but I clench my jaws together. I hear the familiar sound of her breathing and the groan of a DC3 making a pass to line itself up with the runway: two separate white noises with no harmony between them. My powerless stomach churns.

  

  Cheepash says kitchen help eats after everyone else has finished; it doesn’t seem to matter I was airstrip help all afternoon. I try to ignore my grumbling stomach as I slip two cards off the deck palmed in my left hand and then give the first one facedown to the large squat woman in front of me. She wears a worn parka and green hip waders. She smiles weakly, and I can tell she has no idea what the card is for. The man next to her holds out his hand to get a card too. I’m about to attempt my explanation of how we have to eat in shifts because there are neither enough chairs and tables nor dishes when a hand grabs my shoulder.

  Nurse Linda shoves her face into my ear. “Dork. Just so you know—these are Rosemary’s parents: Elsie and William Metat.” Her feeble attempt at whispering—loud enough to make me wince—must be dependent on either no one understanding English or everyone being deaf.

  I turn and show her my teeth before I deal with the couple in front of me. “Umm. Could you show me the other side of the cards, please?” I should learn the words for “show me,” but it’s too late now; the day has become a blur in many ways. I hold a hand out in front of me, palm down, and then rotate my wrist; the man mimics my pantomime. When I nod my head, Elsie guesses her husband has it right and she does the same. William has a five; she’s picked a three. Quickly I turn the deck over and fan it, searching for a five or a three. When I spot a three, I make the switch with him and then jot a mental note that three will be the first shift to eat tonight. “Hang on to the card,” I say, trying not to shout as if they are deaf. I say, “Michiso,” which I hope means “eat” and not “defecate,” which both sound pretty similar—at least to me.

  As I turn to distribute more cards, I make a second mental note. What’s good for the Metatawabins should be good for everyone else as well. Why didn’t I think of this earlier? Where there are couples or families with
kids, I’ll let them pick one and then search through for matching numbers. That’s the way I would want it to be if they were passing out cards to me and I were grieving the loss of my worldly possessions and my home.

  “Smooth move, dork.” Linda is less fun to work with than Rosemary.

  The hallway is crowded and I have to admit that it’s begun to smell a little rank. I am sure, after shovelling gravel for a couple hours this afternoon, I am more than a little rank myself. I daydream a shower with me in it. At the same time it hits me there are no showers in the village, which I’ve recently learned does not have running water. An idea comes to me—one that makes me beam even though it will require a difficult talk with Sister. There are showers upstairs in the school. There must be towels and soap left over from the residence. It would be easy to organize. She’ll acquiesce to the idea if I threaten to invite them all over to use the tub at my house. I will have to wait because as soon as I finish this maître d’ job, there will be dishes to send through the dishwasher and floors to mop. But, when Sister approaches me and insists I show an after-dinner movie in the gym to help the children settle for the night, I somehow find the courage to convince her about the showers.

  Thomas steps in front of me. There are ochre streaks along his work pants, dried streams of mud from the shovelling. I start to give him a card, but he puts his hand over mine, uncurls my fingers and takes the deck away from me. All I can do is frown helplessly as he searches though the stack for the number that he wants. Then he puts the pack back in my palm. He nods. Nothing is said. Nothing was said out on the runway either. I should be pleased that at least nothing was meowed, that I survived the afternoon without any unpleasantness at all.

  Later, while I scrape the dirty plates from group three and place them in a rack to send through the humming, rattling dishwasher, I see Thomas and Anice sitting next to the Metatawabin family. While Elsie eats her dessert, William’s hand grips Thomas’ wrist as they talk. A grim-faced William looks like he’s lecturing the custodian on a subject I can’t imagine. I will ask Rosemary when I see her what her father might have said that looked so serious.

  Ping. The bell, not unlike the carriage return on my typewriter, rings to tell me to remove a rack of plates from the other end of the dishwasher. No, Mouse, by now I’ve made my peace with the mournful voice of the Underwood. The dishwasher is not so affable. Its signal is closer to the strident handbell that Sister rings to command our children to line up by the front door at the end of recess or the start of school each morning and lunch hour. Like Pavlov’s dog, I answer the stern demand without a trace of enthusiasm.

  

  Lethargy utterly consumes me as I plod back along the frozen road to the school after Suzanne’s lumbering DC-3 finally fades from sight. Lunch is out of the question. The effort I’d expend lifting and lowering my jaw might cause a cardiac arrest.

  Frightened? Panicked? Hysteria to the degree of total numbness is how I self-diagnose my problem. The image of my first real paycheque quickly wanes and morphs into a vision of my terror-wracked body strapped to the Grade Five floor by malevolent Lilliputian children. The voice inside me cautions: Mr. Gulliver, keep right on sailing; do not pause for tea on this island. I eye the bush beyond the school and consider my alternatives. Of course, there is that other side of the imaginary coin that keeps weaving through my fingers: the paycheque. It says: one day at a time; just try it out; see if you can make it through the afternoon at least.

  That’s my mantra as I mount the steps to my new second-floor classroom. It’s quiet. The kids are not due back from lunch for another twenty minutes. I have time to read the daybook and see what treats Suzanne has left for me. She’s prepared two weeks of lesson plans neatly printed in outline form on a detailed minute-by-minute schedule. She’s drawn hearts instead of dots above each “i” and “j” to calm me. It looks deceptively inviting. It looks so doable—on paper—I wonder how she could have failed or could’ve even thought she had. This afternoon we are to have a spelling bee to practice for tomorrow’s test. After that I’ll lead a class discussion about forms of transportation emphasizing how, in cities, subways and buses are advantageous over cars and taxis. My students will write a short composition about transportation in their own community: what makes sense and what doesn’t, what might be improved, what changes the future might bring to Orkney Post. “Feel free to improvise,” she’s written at the very bottom of the page. I sigh with relief. It doesn’t sound that hard.

  “M. Taylor. Nice and early for your first class, I see. Dat is the good spirit.” Without having opened a door or walked across the room, Sr. Theresa has materialized right next to me.

  “Suzanne gave me her keys,” I say, hoping we haven’t conspired to violate any rules governing the custody of school property.

  “I see her daybook she is up to the date. Please drop by my office after dismissal so we can do your paperwork. Welcome to our school.”

  “Is there anything else I ought to know?”

  “As your wife must have told you, I am here to help you, monsieur. If you have the problem send him to my office right away. I will do my best to make your job easy. I must supervise the yard now. Go with God this afternoon.” I’m pleased to tell you, Mouse, the principal does not evaporate in smoke; she walks quite normally out into the hall.

  And only minutes later I am joined by sixteen children in stocking feet who enter silently and take their seats without a word. They sit at their desks with hands clasped in front of them looking straight ahead as if they’re waiting for me to lead them in a prayer.

  I stand. “Good morning, boys and girls.” Silence. “My name is Mr. Taylor.” I pick the longest stick of chalk from the tray and print those words on the blackboard. The chalk squeals. I laugh. But my throat constricts immediately when the sound of silence behind me scares the crap out of me. What species of child doesn’t laugh at screeching chalk? I turn and clear my throat. We need to break the ice.

  “Please stand when I call your name and introduce yourself. Just say a short sentence or two about what you like in school, what subjects. You know, just a bit about yourself. What hobbies do you like? Do you have a pet? Anything at all, just a tiny bit to help me get to know you. Jean, or is it Jean?” I wondered if it might be French. Is this a boy or a girl? “Ash-i-mok. If I say your name wrong, just let me know and I’ll try my best to say it right. Jean? Or Jean? Is Jean here today?” There is silence—silence that probably lasts less than fifteen seconds but feels like an hour. Then a boy in the back raises his head off his desk and points his chin at the boy directly in front of him. I walk down the row and touch the desk of the nominated child: male. French then. “Jean? Will you please stand up?”

  Jean raises his head a half-inch off the desk. Then he cranes his neck toward the boy behind him as if somehow he knows where the betrayal came from. Then he turns back to me, not quite meeting my eyes, but lets me see a part of his face at least. He dips his forehead maybe a quarter of an inch. Then he put his head back down on the desk. Have I somehow humiliated him? Is this a test of my authority? Or is he simply waiting meekly for some executioner to either lop his head off or send him to the office?

  “Okay, class.” Then I nearly tell them to, “Settle down.” But I have never been in or even seen on television a room with children so “settled” already.

  “We have a Jean. Let’s see who’s next.” It takes half an hour to do the do the roll, and the steady buzz of the classroom clock has made more noise than any of my students when I finally close the register and say, “It’s a guess, but since there is only one name and one student left, I’m going to say you must be Reuben Williams?” I don’t wait for a response. But Reuben does respond. He indicates he’s here by pulling the hood of his sweatshirt up over his head and slumping down in his seat until his eyes are below the level of the desk. That tells me something at least. It isn’t just being asked to speak or to stand or to somehow communicate that’s the problem; th
ey must find it offensive just to be identified.

  I ease myself into the wooden teacher’s chair with a sigh and look at “Oral Reading” written in the daybook. I lift a pencil from the Mason jar on my desk and fill in the small heart hovering above the “i” in “Reading.” I can almost hear Suzanne’s mocking laugh. I drum my fingers briefly on the blotter before I draw a line through “Oral.” “Take out your readers and turn to page 103. This looks like an interesting story to me. ‘How the Skunk Got Its Stripes.’ It looks to me like it is a legend. Would anyone like to volunteer to read first?” The silence does not surprise me this time. I give them barely a second before saying, “Maybe I should go first. Please follow along. Listen carefully. After I’ve finished, there’ll be some questions for you to answer. If you want to have recess you will have to hand in the assignment.” That’s a lie, of course—the first of many empty threats, none of them instructive. The sole effect of my pronouncement is a single a muffled groan from the boy in the back row.

  As I read the story, my mind wanders. Suzanne was right. There is a palpable hostility in this room, and I have no trouble seeing how it would drive a person to distraction. It’s impossible not to take it personally. This will be a long two weeks, but that should be sufficient for Sister to find her permanent supply, and that will be enough for me—no matter what the salary.

  At recess, after filing them outdoors into the early stages of a blizzard, I head down to the staffroom for a coffee where I’m greeted with applause.

  “You hero are!” An Asian woman in her forties.

  “Made it all the way to recess, you did!” Singh.

  “Very brave man, Mr. Robinson. Your wife shows us much of courage making it so far in her condition.” He is wearing a lavender suit and a bolo tie.

  “No way I’ll be back here next year. I’ll wash windows or bus tables if I have to. Not this again.” This produces a universal nodding of agreement.

  “Don’t let those little snots get to you. If there’s a problem, just call on Sr. Theresa. She knows how to handle these kids.” She is wearing jeans and a faded yellow tee that says, “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.”

  "Hey, David! Has Alice volunteered to give a speech yet?" This produces peals of laughter.

  "Don’t turn your back on that Metat kid. He’s a real piece of work. He drove your wife nuts." It’s the lavender suit again.

  I’m speechless. Except for duelling with Sundara Singh a couple times, I’ve never exchanged a word with any of them. I don’t know what to say, but before I can exhibit any of my ignorance, shouts erupt outside the window and Sister Theresa grabs her bell and heavy ring of keys and heads down the hall at a trot. It is only minutes later that she rings them in and we all quickly carry mugs of tea or coffee back to our respective rooms.

  Albert Metat is missing from his seat at the back of the class. I plead with my students for any helpful information, and I’m both surprised and grateful when James Hook bravely murmurs something that sounds a bit like “Sister.”

  An hour later, I’m winding up my explanation of a subway when the principal enters without a knock, my missing student firmly in her grasp. “Young Albert has been getting a lesson about fighting, M. Taylor. Now he is going to apologize to you for missing your class dis afternoon. Den he will take his seat and make up any work he missed before he comes back down to my office to practice his penmanship. Albert, you may speak now.”

  The boy stops studying the floor, looks up—not directly at me but at something over my left shoulder. “Sorry, Taylor.” Sister touches the boy’s hand lightly. He winces and quickly adds, “Mister Taylor” to his succinct recitation.

  Do things between us improve over the next three days? Do I somehow win their favour where Suzanne could not? Of course not, Mouse. Each day that week we re-enact our same, sad drama with mounting tension in everyone’s part. They put their heads down on their desks and I read to them or I say their number facts out loud for them or lecture to them about the mountains of British Columbia. I work my way though each of Suzanne’s plans without a single person raising a single eyebrow to indicate they might have listened let alone have learned. On Friday afternoon, written in her planning book is the single word “Art” in pencil with an exclamation point that rests upon a heart instead of a dot. I pass out sheets of cartridge paper then show them how to roll and dip each sheet into a pail of water, how to hold it so the water would flow back into the pail, and how to press the sheet flat onto their desks. I demonstrate how bits of colour from a paint box will spread and mix across the page. Unmixed tempera powder will sometimes speckle and sometimes clump. I show them how to fool around with fingers or a brush in the pools of colour. Soon they’re talking to each other in their language. When water slops and makes a puddle on the floor and a can of powder tips and spills its contents, I let them play in that as well. And then a miracle occurs; someone laughs out loud. I don’t have to tell you, Mouse, how glorious that sounds.

  I hold their paintings up and comment on them and then stick them up against the blackboard, telling them how wonderful they are. “Oh, I think we’ve got a sunset here. That part looks like a tree to me. What do you think? When it dries maybe we could put a moose behind the tree?” Toward the end of class the boy at the back, Albert, quietly states his own suggestion in real English sentences. “Mine is the hide. It is for goose hunting. See the rifle sticking out?” Others laugh at that before they switch back to Cree.

  As usual I don’t notice Sister until it is too late. She stands there in the doorway, a smile on her lips, a frown on her brow, staring at the coloured puddle on the floor. “M. Taylor...”

  I cut her off. “I’m sorry, Sister. I spilled some water there. I was being careless. I will clean that up right after the dismissal bell. We were just about to tidy up the room.”

  By the time I sit down to eat my supper that evening, of course, I realize that it was not my clever response that defused a possible confrontation with the principal. Nor was Sister in any way impressed with my brilliant lesson. The second her voice announced her presence, the laughter stopped; my students froze; order was restored. I’m lost, wondering why and how the tiny nun can wield such power over them, when someone knocks on my backdoor.

  It’s Linda. Snow drifts in around her but she doesn’t come inside. She slides her scarf to one side for just a second and shouts above the raging storm, “We’re skiing tomorrow afternoon. One. Sharp.” Then she covers her face again and trudges off toward the hospital.

  Saturday comes and I decide I need the getaway. The snow has stopped; the sun is bright; the air is cold and crisp. I dig out my borrowed skis from the back of the hall closet and meet the nurses in the compound. It starts out well. I’m keeping up. But then we hit a rough stretch in the trail. It’s no secret any grace or balance I possess is in my fingers not my toes or ankles. Before I realize what’s happened, I find myself turned upside down and laughing at myself while choking on the snow—laughing yes, but not nearly as much as the three women do while applauding my predicament.

  “Dis trail, it is too flat for you, monsieur?” jabs Hélène. “You maybe have fall asleep again, non? Mais ouis. You need de skis to put on your hands. Dat’s for sure.” Her words and giggles are muffled from behind a balaclava so white with frost its colour and pattern are completely hidden.

  “Taylor, you are worse than dog crap on skis. Why do we let you tag along with us? We spend more time trying to keep you on your feet, than we do skiing.” It’s Linda—though I can’t see her. The unmistakable voice comes from behind me. Folded as I am into three feet of soft powder with my legs and skis up over my head, turning around to sneer at her is not an option.

  Rosemary says nothing. She falls sometimes as well. We are the novices at cross-country, doing the best we can with sub-standard gear. She’s the expert when we snowshoe. I’m the expert when we drink hot chocolate after our adventures. Whether she’s too fragile or if it’s not politically correct to dis a
Native or a fellow nurse, Rosemary isn’t teased the way I am. Most probably it’s a gender thing. Women stick together, don’t they, Mouse?

  “De teacher nun, did she make you feel you are already in over your head dere, David? You can come up now. We are not telling her.”

  “Don’t move yet, dork. I have to get my camera out for this one.”

  “Dis guy he is not going to move until someone they help him I am pretty much sure.”

  Everyone, including Rosemary, laughs at that.

  I’m starting to freeze. If someone would just reach a pole in my direction... But I’m too proud to ask. I rock from side to side trying to flatten a space wide enough for me to untangle my feet from my skis.

  “Dis is taking too long. Da frost she is biting me.” So finally Hélène offers me the hand I need to right myself.

  I’m sweating from the effort.

  Linda, the only one of us who has real talent and experience, shakes her head and starts back along the skidoo trail. “Move it guys. You’re all going to freeze if you don’t work a little harder. You need to do a better job of staying together.”

  Hélène and Rosemary fall in behind her with no hope of matching her pace. Eventually I get my boots attached to skis again and follow. It’s true that Hélène and Linda are the least likeable of the trio. Rosemary is hard to figure out; she never has much to say to anyone.

  I focus on the uneven trail, on just staying upright, not even trying to catch up, but it isn’t long before I’m right behind the straggling Rosemary. Hélène is twenty yards ahead and Linda’s out of view. This isn’t a race, I tell myself; there’s no point trying to pass. I settle in and just enjoy the crisp sharp air and smell of evergreen. The narrow corridor of trees wends its way beside the river like the lining of a parka, protected from the wind and warmer than the muskeg or a lake.

  Rosemary slows and I pull up next to her. When she stops I follow suit and listen to her quiet voice above the shushing skis ahead of us. “Watikwan tells me he had fun in your art class yesterday. I think he likes you.”

  “Who?”

  “My brother. Watikwan. Maybe he will like going to school better now.”

  “I... don’t know anyone named Watikwan. But I’ve only been in the school less than a week. He’s not in my class.” I’m surprised she even knows that I’m supplying. It’s hard for me to wrap my head around it when she says that I’m a teacher, hard for me to treat it as anything other than a joke. I feel the need to make it clear I never finished university, never took a teaching course, never felt more relieved than when it was clear that I was done with formal education. Calling me a teacher makes me quite uncomfortable. It took Suzanne and Sr. Theresa a full week to convince me they were serious, that being a supply requires no talent at all. Frankly, in my opinion, being regular staff must not require much talent either. The sad part was when Sister said her only worry was control. Up front, she made it clear she didn’t care much what I taught or tried to teach as long as I could keep them in the room and keep them quiet. If I needed help to “maintain order” then help would be provided. “Dey are not so good at discipline, the adults in the village. When I call on dem for the supplying, I always wind up with half the class sitting in my office.” So the lure of lucre and dream of baby furniture carried the day. Yes, I’ve wound up in a classroom, but it would be wrong to con a friend that I’m a teacher—especially one that’s failed already and is quitting in a week.

  “You do know him,” says Rosemary.

  “I’m not very good with all their names yet. But I’d remember one like that. I’ve never even heard that word anywhere before.”

  “How about an Albert Metatawabin?”

  “I have an Albert Metat. Could they be related?”

  She pushes off with her poles like she’s finished talking now and is ready to ski again. But then she glides to a stop and waits for me to catch up to her. “Say, ‘Mah-tah-tah-wah-bin,’ David.”

  I do. I say it carefully one syllable at a time the way she did. It sounds a little strange, but I think I get it right.

  “Could you put it all together? Or would that be too hard? Metatawabin.”

  I’m feeling the edge in her voice. “Metatawabin. Is that right?”

  “Good. It’s not that hard, is it, when you actually try? In Cree it means ‘Ten Sunrises.’ You have been calling him ‘Ten.’ Metatawabin is my name, too—if you didn’t know already. Albert’s my brother.”

  “But the register says..." I stop myself. It’s possible, probable even, that she knows her brother’s name, her own name, better than the official Ontario Student Register does. I clear my throat. “Well, it appears I need to make some changes then, don’t I?” And all of a sudden I’m the student; I’m back in school again. She’s right. “Metat” was just easier to say. It didn’t matter what it meant or whether it was right or wrong; none of us knew Cree or cared one way or the other. It was simpler for us. “And his first name? What did you call him?”

  “His name, to me, is Wa-ti-kwan. Watikwan. Doesn’t that sound nice with Metatawabin?”

  “Watikwan. Watikwan Metatawabin. So what does that word mean?” It does sound nice. It rolls off my tongue like a line from a song.

  “Most people here have three first names. You just know their English name. There is a French name since they need to be baptized and the church here is French. His is Albert pronounced Al-bear, same spelling but it’s really a different word to a kid. And Watikwan is his Cree name. You might call it a nickname but everyone in the village calls him Watikwan—his friends, his parents, everyone except the teachers and the nurses and the nuns and the priest.”

  “I get it. And I feel stupid for not knowing it before. It must have a good meaning.”

  “It’s not so easy to translate. Maybe Watikwan will tell you when he wants you to know.”

  “So what’s your Cree name, Nurse Ten Sunrises?”

  She turns away, but not in time to hide the blush that rises in her cheeks. She says nothing. She doesn’t say a word all the way back to the Nurses Residence and nothing as we drink hot chocolate and listen to Stan Rogers and Willie P. Bennet wail on their record player. Of course, Linda and Hélène recount with glee and some exaggeration how foolish a certain artist looked with his skis flailing against the winter sky. Rosemary only laughs and smiles and drinks her chocolate.

  On the following Monday, after my private lesson in Cree and Native Studies from Rosemary Metatawabin, I begin the task of correcting my students names, making changes in the register, deferring to the ones their parents use. Metat is the first to find it’s Sunrise. Hook becomes Hookimaw, which means the boss or chief. I discovered, with some help from Watikwan, that Alice is Anice. Maurice actually smiles at me and says, “Present,” right out loud when I call him Wabusk, the polar bear. Ethan is Payuk, number one, and Watikwan, of course, is Watikwan. It is all so strange after what I suffered through last week. As simple a thing as that and things begin to get a little easier. Without a formal vote the class decides I need to change my name as well; the somewhat slow and clumsy ‘Mister Taylor’ quietly become a ‘Dave.’ No, Mouse, success does not swell my head. I’m still not comfortable masquerading as a teacher, but I’m happy not to feel so much like I’m a clown.

  

  I could be Emmett Kelly, sweeping the spotlight away. The lyric from one of my favourite songs runs through my mind as I mop the gym floor all by myself just after midnight in a sleeping school—lit by a single bank of overhead lights. I did convince Sister to open up a former dormitory so those who wanted to could have a shower. I’ve set up the projector and threaded The Best Damn Fiddler from Calabogie to Kaladar and The Railrodder, the only two Film Board films I could find lying around in classrooms. After the movies ended and I turned the lights back on, I shooed the kids off to their parents who were already bedded down with mattresses spread out in classrooms, former dormitories and even hallways. I stacked the chairs so there’d be room for kids to
play here tomorrow morning. It feels like it’s been a week since Linda roughed me up and sent me off to work in the hospital kitchen. Today I was the cook, the dishwasher, the maître d’, the master of the mop and wielder of the shovel and jobs I’ve probably forgotten. Now the only thing separating me from my bed and another short night’s sleep is three sad clown-swipes with my mop.

  The song in my head masks the sound of the opening door so I’m startled when I raise my eyes to see Rosemary on the far side of the gym dressed in her nursing whites. “Still here?” she asks.

  “Hey.” I erase the last boot tracks and set the mop in the pail. “How was your shift?”

  “Busy, I guess. I felt bad deserting you, but I have to make a living somehow, you know.”

  I chuckle at that. “Right. A person needs to put food on the table. Today I was putting tables under the food.”

  “You must be tired.”

  “I should be. It was kind of nice here in the quiet for a change. That perked me up a little. You know, adrenalin. Suzanne always said it kept on flowing after a hard run.” I laugh. “I don’t think I ever had a really hard workout in my whole life until the last two days.”

  “I know what you’re saying. I have a difficult time settling after a long shift too. You want a coffee or maybe an herbal tea? The pot was still plugged in when I came past the school kitchen.”

  “That sounds perfect. I’m finished here. I hope. What’s the word on tomorrow?” I turn off the light and hold the door for her, and we start down the dim hallway toward the first set of stairs. “Sh,” I warn her. “People are sleeping up ahead.” No way I want to wake anyone and have to start rounding up kids again. I remove my gumboots and we creep stocking footed through the school around islands of snoring blankets and fussing babies.

  Once in the kitchen, I slump onto a stool. Rosemary pours us coffee while she says, “They’re expecting planes after lunch tomorrow—maybe a lot of planes. Everyone could be out of here by suppertime.”

  “Everyone?”

  “Not everyone. In fact, that might be a problem. A few men want to stick around and start the clean up over there. The ice looks more stable now, but some people have safety concerns. There’s a disagreement brewing. Indian Affairs wants absolutely everyone out. The men say the water is down enough to cross, at least for now. They think they can walk on the ice now, and they’re anxious to see what can be salvaged. Hélène says some of our patients can’t be moved so all of them will stay. I’ll have to stay. All the nurses will.”

  “Cheepash?”

  “Cheepash might go. It depends on all the rest. Thomas will stay. Sister Theresa wants to stay. It’s her holiday and she likes fishing and walking in the bush. Maybe the assistant manager will keep the Bay open—if the power plant can keep supplying hydro.”

  “And where will they go— the people being evacuated. I can’t believe a whole village could just disappear overnight, move hundreds of miles away. Do they really want to leave?”

  “They have to go somewhere. They don’t have houses anymore. They don’t want to stay here in the school; it’s too crowded. There are too many bad memories. They’ll get sent to different places. Cochrane. Timmins. North Bay. Sudbury. Already there’s a long list of places accepting families here and there. Some have relatives living in the south.”

  “Things keep changing, don’t they?"

  “And you?”

  “Me?”

  “Will you go to where Suzanne is?”

  I pass her an open can of Carnation and the sugar bowl. “I’m too tired to think clearly right now. I don’t know. I don’t think so. I haven’t thought it through, but the trip is so long and so expensive. I wasn’t keen to go before, and now this place feels even more like home. I suppose that sounds odd to you. But I don’t really have what you’d think of as a hometown, not anymore, not one that I could go to. I can’t decide yet, but some peace and quiet sounds good to me after all that’s happened the last two days.”

  Neither Rosemary nor I say anything; we sip our coffee and look down at the stainless steel table. Behind us in the dim corridors and dark classrooms a whole community is asleep. I imagine it’s an awkward reunion, a restless re-visitation of the many nights spent right here in their former residential school. A cough. A moan. A sigh. There’s a baby’s sudden cry, a mother’s soothing answer. To me it sounds like one single being, one communal body dreaming one dream of its yesterdays and hoping one hope for its tomorrow. I feel like, in some profound way, I’ve really seen this village for the very first time. Rosemary interrupts my introspection.

  “So you think a person can choose their home? I don’t think I can. Most people here can’t do that. This place picked us. We didn’t have a choice.”

  “Some people move, right?”

  “But this is still home for them.”

  “Maybe some people get to choose. I chose Canada. I picked Toronto. I think I get to pick who I want to be, too, so maybe I can decide to change as well.”

  “Is that what you meant today when you said you felt like you were someone different now. You don’t act that different to me, but I’ve only known you a short time. I don’t know how a person can stop being who they are?”

  “Maybe if they work at it or maybe it’s different events that change them or a different background. Colours change when you change the colours next to them.”

  She takes another pull from her mug before she answers. “You still drink your coffee black. If you were different, maybe it would look like mine.” She smiles and slides the sugar and Carnation back closer to me.

  “Point. Well, maybe I’ll develope a taste for your wapakaminikan.”

  She puts her hand over her mouth. “Well, then. You are learning some things anyway, David Taylor.” She clears her throat before she changes the subject. “Cheepash says we are out of eggs and bacon. He’ll be serving toast, porridge and cold cereal tomorrow morning, but not until after nine o’clock—if you want to help, that is. He said not to bother showing up until eight. We get to sleep in.”

  “We should get out of here now.”

  "Right. But I don’t think I’m ready to sleep yet.” She shrugs her shoulders back to stretch them.

  “Me either.” Even as I say it, I wonder if it’s true. I should be very tired. Am I letting someone else make my decision for me again, or am I enjoying our conversation too much to end it, or am I just too tired to know what the hell I’m doing? I stand and push the stool under the counter. Then I slip into my jacket. “My body has been going at top speed for so long it’s forgotten how to stop. My mind needs to catch up. If I slam on the brakes I might strip my gears or something.”

  “Please don’t crash. You’ll wake everybody up.”

  “What if we could took a short walk?” I suggest. “I could use the fresh air after working supper and sitting through those films.”

  “A walk would be nice. It’s a warm night. The sky is clear.”

  “The airstrip? How are you holding up about your parent’s house? Are you worried about what they’re going to find when they can finally get back over? It sounds like there’s lots of damage.”

  “Everyone is safe now. That’s all that matters. My family is happy to be back together. We could have lost so much more, you know. We were very lucky last night.”

  “For sure.” I move our empty cups to the sink. We don’t say anything while she puts on her coat and shuts off the lights before we walk the short hall to the entrance of the school. When we get to the door, I rest my hand on the crash bar, but pause there for a moment remembering my dad. Before I crossed the border to come to Canada I stopped in my parents’ town to say good-bye. My father wasn’t pleased about me going. He wanted me to stay and serve my time in uniform. It wasn’t that he liked war or killing people; he’d fought in World War Two. He hated the fighting part, he said, but he felt like he was part of something bigger than himself, bigger than his family—something important. He said he wanted that for
me. He said it changed his life more than any of the actual fighting did. I had no idea what he was talking about back then. Maybe now I do. We push out into the night air and I say, “This might sound crazy to you, but in some strange way the last two days I felt like I was a part of your community—like we were on the same team together—not just you and me but everybody, even the little babies in the tikinakanak. Does that make any sense to you? Have you ever felt that way?”

  She smiles. “Maybe I always feel that way, David. I know where I belong. Hey, let’s walk down the winter road instead of the runway. Okay?”

  “As long as we can find our way back. You realize it’s night, eh?” The airstrip is a long man-made peninsula in the arms of an oxbow lake. Unfenced, it has been the one place Suz and I could safely walk or run—any weather, any time of day except at plane time twice a week. We never had that nagging fear of predators or getting lost that I associate with forests. In contrast, the winter road at night is daunting. There are no landmarks. If we ever got turned around we might never make it back. The winter road is mostly a snowmobile trail for getting wood; it’s where we skied a month ago in daylight. Now I’m visually searching for an invisible slit somewhere in a silhouetted wall of black spruce and tamarack. “I’d have to trust you not to leave me upside down in a snow drift.”

  “The snow has melted, David. You’ll be safe enough.”

  I allow the bush to swallow us without another objection. What was once a hard packed ribbon of white slicing through a corridor of brown trunks and green needles is now an uneven tangle of flattened weeds and branches barely illuminated by a crescent moon and a billion-star sky, a sky that hasn’t yet ceased to amaze my urban eyes. Rosemary is quiet and I listen to the chorus of spring peepers in the meltwater along the path and the crunch of our rubber boots on the dry twigs and long grass of the trail. Slowly, one step at a time, my shoulders relax and my legs lose their heaviness. The light from the sky looks brighter and the trees acquire subtle colours and depth. Instead of bears and wolves lurking in the shadows, I imagine wildflowers and voles and beaver. We are only a few hundred yards from my house and yet I float inside a dream world worthy of a Disney backdrop. I finally break the silence.

  “I know I didn’t lose my house or sit out there by the ice all night in a boat with the others, but I think I shared something with the people here. Do you think that’s possible? Maybe the moon is making me foolish.”

  “Sharing sounds nice to me. Maybe you think too much, David. Maybe it’s very late and not the best time to have this discussion.”

  “You’re probably right.” Then I remember her bother running into the dining room this morning. “Oh, yeah. Watikwan let something slip today.”

  “Really?”

  “He called you by your Cree name. Only I can’t remember it. It had a ‘sheesh’ at the end—or something like that.”

  “Really? He could be in some hot water now that you’ve ratted him out.”

  “He tried his best to cover it up. I think he was just excited to see you.”

  “You mean he was hungry. He wanted a cookie.”

  “Well, I don’t remember what he said so he didn’t give away the big secret. You can still have the honour of being the first one to tell me—if you want to?”

  “Just forget it, okay.”

  “Maybe it’s important. Maybe it would help me feel more like I belong here if I knew everybody’s Cree name, not just my students. It made a huge difference with them.”

  “Maybe we’d feel safer if you didn’t know everything about us.” Her voice is lilting now and clearly teasing. “We haven’t had much luck sharing our knowledge with outsiders in the past.”

  “Come on. I’m your friend.” Our pace slows as the track narrows from a truck-width to something more suited to one skidoo. It’s softer now, wetter and our boots are sucked by mud with every step. In the eerie light I can make out stands of red willow and a carpet of Labrador tea along both sides of the trail.

  “You’re my friend too, David. But things take time. You say you see us differently. Maybe we will see you differently too.”

  “Yeah, things take time alright. But the last two days felt longer than the eight months that went before it—longer and more important too.”

  “Your people have some difficulty with patience most of the time. Do you recognize where we are? It must look different from the way it did when we were skiing?”

  “It does. I’m not even sure we’re still on the winter road. Daylight changes everything.”

  “Night changes everything too.”

  “Should that worry me?”

  Rosemary laughs. “Probably. But I’ll protect you, kemo sabe. Were you scared when we were skiing on this trail last winter? Or did you think Linda would terrify a wolf or a wolverine? We should be safe now. Unless a moose is standing around the next bend.”

  “Okay. I admit it. I’d feel safer if Linda were here.”

  We both laugh at that. Then we walk in silence except for the occasional frog song and the sounds of our footsteps. An owl. I don’t mind our silence. I don’t feel the need to fill it up. Rosemary puts her arm out and I run into it. “Here.” she says.

  I can barely see anything in the direction she points, but she leads me down a narrow side trail to the left, away from the river. We walk single file with Rosemary leading the way. I need to duck overhanging boughs and step around stumps but we go only a few dozen strides before the underbrush opens up onto a wide pond. The ice has all melted. The bush surrounding the water is mostly one big shadow except for the few remaining patches of phosphorescent snow gleaming in the bewitching moonlight. The peepers serenade us but they are the only sound. The breeze has died completely. We are in a wilderness unlike any I’ve experienced. Perhaps I’m dreaming.

  Rosemary points to an uprooted tree lying near the water. She moves toward it, and when I hesitate she takes my hand and guides me. We sit facing the shoreline, watching the night. The trees on the far side of the pond are backlit with gossamer haloes, which reflect off the lake in a postcard shimmer. It casts a spell. That’s the only way I can explain it, Mouse: a mystic spell. Everything that felt “different” to me before the events of the last few days now feels normal and natural.

  “This takes my breath away. Except for sunsets, Orkney Post has not been a place of spectacular beauty for me as an artist. This is the most amazing place I’ve been.”

  “I like it here.”

  “Are you warm enough?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Sometimes I forget I am the only one here seeing breakup for the first time. Things that amaze me are probably ordinary to you.”

  A beaver or a muskrat swims across the far side of the pond creating a “V” in its wake that spreads out across the lake toward us. “How could I call this ordinary, David?”

  “You’re lucky to live here. It still feels odd to hear myself say that. I didn’t like it very much at all, not at first, especially when we’d just arrived.”

  “It must have been a big change for you. I didn’t like it in North Bay at first when I went there for high school. The first day I cried all night. I almost quit before I started.”

  “That’s a hard thing to have do for anyone—I can’t imagine how hard it would be for a fourteen-year old.” I inhale deeply, savouring the mix of evergreen and herbs, odours I can’t identify. Each time I fill my lungs I feel more a part of this special place. My voice is slow and soft, fearful of breaking the mood. “I feel so relaxed. I could go to sleep right here.”

  “After I leave—and you start dreaming about wolves and bears again—I hope you can find your way back by yourself.”

  “Okay. Maybe I’ll stay awake and follow your lead.”

  “It was a good day, David.”

  I nod, knowing she might not see it in the dark. I don’t speak because I am thinking I might spoil it. Something deep inside me wants to let nature take its course, wants me to let go of inhibitions,
wants me to shut my brain completely. A tide washes over me pulling me into this moment; waves of emotion crash against me, pushing to express my feeling of closeness to the land, and the people, and to Rosemary. I find myself ready to risk turning the perfect day into the worst day ever. “I...”

  “Yes, David?”

  “You’re a good person, Rosemary. I’m glad that I know you.”

  “I can say the same thing. You are special, David.”

  I put my hand on her shoulder lightly. If it isn’t welcome, if she shrugs it off, it will only have been a friendly, tired, maybe foolish gesture. But she doesn’t react; she only stares intently at the brilliant lemon crescent sailing over the trees.

  My hand slides to her neck, to her warm skin, and I press lightly and she turn to face me.

  “I want to kiss you.” I only think it—or say it with my eyes, or whisper it too softly to be heard. Or did I really say it aloud? The only thing in my brain is the moonlight on her cheek. I lean forward. She doesn’t move. I touch my lips to hers. She doesn’t move. I say this aloud—I think. “You are very special too, Rosemary.”

  My hand on her neck feels her tremble before it slips back to my side and together we stand and turn and leave.

  Chapter Six