Winnie’s article went on and on from there, with big words that no one but she and Monsieur Thibault could understand.
When the bell rang for lunch, a bunch of kids came up to Dylan and me to tell us they’d enjoyed our articles and had been able to follow them. One girl, Sophie, fell into a deep conversation with Dylan about the paranormal. “Sometimes my grandma sits on my bed in the middle of the night,” I heard her say, “and she’s been dead for five years!”
No one said a word to Winnie, except for Donald. “Your article was amazing,” he said as he walked past her desk. “Amazingly stupid!” He and his friend Vlad cracked up.
Winnie’s shoulders drooped. She scurried out of the room. Dylan and Sophie had moved on to the subject of Ouija boards, so I told him I’d see him in the cafeteria.
Winnie was sitting at a table by herself, eating an egg-and-bean-sprout sandwich. I felt a twinge of pity, so I sat down across from her. “I thought your article was very informative,” I said. To my utter horror, her eyes filled with tears. “Whoa. Don’t cry—”
“Last year I was diagnosed with dyscalculia.”
“That—that’s awful. Is it terminal?”
She gave me a sharp look. “What? No, dummy. It’s, like, math dyslexia. I flunked out of Kumon! And the year before that I was asked not to sign up again for ballet lessons because I was too clumsy.” She blew her nose into a Kleenex. “You think I’m this totally perfect person—”
“No. No, I don’t. Not even close—”
“But I’m not. There are so many things I’m lousy at. And I just—I thought, journalism was my thing, you know. I thought this was the thing I was actually good at. Aside from languages, I guess.”
“Winnie, come on. It’s just one article.”
“One article on a very important subject. Which nobody read.” She sighed. “No one wants to think anymore. No one wants to read anything that matters.”
“Maybe you needed to hook them more. You know, like, if the headline had been, ‘Is Your School Killing You?’ And next time, maybe simplify. You dumped a whole bunch of big words on the reader. Even in English it would have been hard to follow.”
She’d stopped crying. “In other words, you want me to pander to the lowest common denominator.” Her voice was icy.
“The lowest— What?”
She stood up and slapped her hands down on the table. “I refuse to be a part of the dumbing down of North America!” Then she grabbed her gross sandwich and flounced away in her plaid skirt, and I didn’t feel sorry for her anymore.
* * *
—
After school I didn’t go to Dylan’s place for once. Instead I walked all the way to Bean There, Donut That with a copy of the paper under my arm. Bells jingled over the door as I walked in. The walls were painted bright yellow, making it feel warm and inviting. Astrid gave me a wave; she was behind the counter, making a fancy coffee for a customer. I put the paper down beside the machine. “Is this what I think it is?” she asked.
I nodded. She stopped what she was doing and started reading.
After a moment, the customer cleared his throat. Astrid waved the paper in his direction. “My kid’s a published journalist!” Then she abandoned the coffee machine altogether and came around the counter to give me a hug. “I’m so proud of you, Felix. It’s excellent.”
The customer cleared his throat again, louder this time.
Astrid rolled her eyes. “Some people should learn how to meditate,” she said, loud enough for him to hear. She finished making his coffee. Once he’d left, muttering under his breath, it was just the two of us. “I’m going to make you a hot chocolate,” she said. “With extra whipped cream. Because I have good news, too.”
My heart did a little flip in my chest. “Is it about the place we saw?” On Sunday we had seen an apartment for rent, one that we both really liked. It was a garden suite, which was a fancy way of saying basement, but it was clean and had lots of windows, and it was close to the school.
“Yep. Landlord called, says it’s ours if we want it. He just has to call my boss, get a reference. In a week I’ll be able to show him my pay stub.”
Since we were celebrating, Astrid let me eat Chef Boyardee for dinner when we got back to the van. We had day-old oat fudge bars from the coffee shop for dessert. Horatio loved the oats, so I fed him quite a bit. We were both giddy with the thought of having our own place again, and as we lay in our beds in the dark we talked about what we looked forward to most. “Having a bathtub,” said Astrid.
“Having a toilet,” I said.
And also: no more lies, I thought. I didn’t like lying to Dylan or to Winnie. Soon I could have a friend over any time I wanted.
After I turned out my headlamp I only made it halfway through listing all the Nobel Peace Prize winners in my head before I fell into a deep, uninterrupted sleep.
* * *
—
I went to Dylan’s house after school the next day, and by the time I got back to the van it was close to six o’clock. Astrid usually didn’t get home until at least six-thirty, so I let myself in with my key.
She was curled up on the backseat, her sleeping bag wrapped around her.
“Astrid?”
She didn’t answer.
“I thought you were working till six.”
“I was supposed to,” she said, her voice muffled through the sleeping bag.
Oh no. My P.O.O. told me something was very wrong. “What happened?”
“My boss read all these lousy reviews about a ‘new barista with a bad attitude’ online. I told him it wasn’t my job to be nice to jerks. He said it was. Then he fired me.”
My skin felt clammy all of a sudden. “What about the apartment?”
“The landlord called the shop for a reference five minutes after I got fired.”
“Oh.”
“I’m sorry, Felix. I really am.”
I crawled into the van and closed the door against the rain. I sat beside my mom and rubbed her back. Then I took Horatio out of his cage and held him close. His whiskers tickled my face.
I glanced up and saw Mel on the dashboard. I could have sworn he was staring right at me.
We would not be moving out of the Westfalia. Not yet.
Before I continue I should probably explain the origins of my name. On my birth certificate I am Felix Fredrik Knutsson. Fredrik was my morfar’s name. He died before I was born. Mormor’s stories about him made him sound like a saint. But Astrid says Mormor was engaged in “revisionist history.”
“Then why did you name me after him?”
“I didn’t. I named you after Eugène Fredrik Jansson, my favorite Swedish painter. Your mormor just assumed I’d named you after my father, and I let her believe it, because it kept her more or less off my back when I gave you the first name Felix.”
My mom really named me after her older brother. The name is derived from Latin and means “lucky or successful one.” Original Felix was neither.
Astrid has told me a lot about him. They were super close. He was two years older than her. She adored him, and the feeling was mutual. Felix was handsome and funny and charming, and he watched out for my mom from an early age.
Because Fredrik was a mean dad. He was very religious, but not in a nice, “love thy neighbor” way. He was religious in more of “an eye for an eye” way. Whenever Original Felix or Astrid stepped out of line, they would get the belt. Felix couldn’t stand to see Astrid get hit, so he took the blame for everything. And he got the belt a lot.
When he was sixteen, Original Felix came out to his parents. Astrid thinks Mormor wanted to understand, because she loved Felix. But their father thought homosexuality was a sin, and he kicked Felix out of the house.
Original Felix was a smart, resourceful guy, according to my mom. But he was only
sixteen. He had to make money to pay the rent on a room in a decrepit building near Main and Hastings in Vancouver. He got a part-time job at a Burger King, but it only paid minimum wage. So he did other things to earn more money, things that made him feel bad about himself and sometimes put him in danger.
He started to use drugs. Astrid would visit him every chance she got. She could see he was sinking, and she tried to get him help. But I guess there are a lot of people who need help in Vancouver, and not enough people to help them.
She was the one who found him. She hadn’t heard from him for a few days, so she went to his place. He didn’t answer her knocks. She got a neighbor to help her force the door. The coroner said he’d died of an accidental overdose.
Astrid says their father wept at the funeral, and it made her want to rip his eyeballs out with her bare hands.
Based on my P.O.O., I have developed a theory, and the theory is that I am not sure my mom ever completely recovered from Original Felix’s death. Of course, I’ve only known my mom A.O.F. (After Original Felix). But it’s the way she talks about him, the way she gets this look on her face. I think it destroyed a little part of her. I think it’s why she has a prescription for antidepressants.
She likes to say that the day I was born was the happiest day of her life. And she named me after her brother, to keep his memory alive. I think that’s why she likes me to call her Astrid instead of “Mom,” because that’s what Original Felix called her.
I know some people find it weird. I remember other parents in the schoolyard thought I was precocious, calling her Astrid. But when they found out she wanted it that way, they looked at her like she was precocious.
I’m just trying to give some context before I mention Astrid’s Slumps. That’s her word for them. Slumps. She’s had them off and on over the years, but they usually don’t last very long—a few days at most. During a Slump she stays in bed and I take charge. Mormor took charge when she was alive, but after that it was left to me.
The first time I took charge I was eight years old. I don’t know what caused that particular Slump; perhaps it was because it was around the anniversary of Original Felix’s death. Astrid just didn’t get up one morning. So I got myself to school and I got myself home and I made us each a peanut butter and jam sandwich for dinner. I even went to bed on time, but I didn’t brush my teeth.
On the third day of that Slump, my teacher asked if everything was okay at home. I said yes. She said, “You’ve worn the same clothes to school all week.” The next day I changed my clothes. But one of the other mothers called my mom to say she’d seen me walking home alone again, and she gave her heck. Astrid grumbled about “meddling helicopter parents,” but the next day she managed to drag herself out of bed and walk me to and from school. “The last thing we need is some busybody calling the MCFD.”
I think that was the first time I’d ever heard of the MCFD.
I won’t lie, I was scared the first few times Astrid had a Slump and I had to take over. But I got good at it. I knew I had to ride it out for a few days, a week tops. Astrid would always assure me that she was okay, she just needed to get through it, and she always did.
She always does.
Okay?
She always does.
After Astrid told me she’d been fired, I was angry. Angry at her boss. Angry at the landlord for his bad timing. But mostly, I was angry with Astrid. “All you needed to do was keep your mouth shut and do your job!” I wanted to shout at her.
But I didn’t.
It’s hard to yell at a lump under the covers.
I barely slept that night. I tried to make lists, but I couldn’t focus. My mind drifted to unusual places. I couldn’t shake the thought that maybe we’d angered our tomte. I remembered everything Mormor had told me about tomtar. They were supposed to do their best to protect their family from harm, but they were also easily insulted. What if I hadn’t paid enough attention to Mel? What if Astrid’s comments about finding him creepy had made him angry? What if he was sick of living on a dashboard, in a van?
I know I fell asleep eventually, because I had a wonderful dream. I was back in Mormor’s house. Mormor and I were sitting on the couch, watching Who, What, Where, When and eating balls of pepparkakor dough. I leaned into her and closed my eyes. A car alarm started blaring outside.
The car alarm kept blaring, finally pulling me out of the dream. I picked up my phone, still groggy with sleep.
It was almost nine o’clock.
I sat up so fast, I hit my head on the roof. “How come you didn’t set the alarm?” I shouted, feeling angry all over again.
I peered down from my bed. Astrid was still a lump under her sleeping bag.
“Come on, Astrid,” I said, the anger draining from my voice. “I need you to get up. I need room to get ready.”
“Rrrmph,” she said.
I climbed down from my bed and inched the sleeping bag back from her face. “Seriously. I’m already late.”
“Sorry, Felix. I just feel so tired.” When she’s in a Slump her expression becomes lifeless, like she’s had freezing at the dentist. And her voice becomes monotone, like she’s been drugged.
My clean clothes were in a cubby that I could only reach once her bed was put away, so I just grabbed the jeans and striped T-shirt I’d worn the day before. I wriggled out of my pajamas in the front seat, after making sure no one was walking by, and slipped on my clothes. Then I fed Horatio and kissed his head and hopped out of the van. “Please try to get up today,” I said to my mom as I closed the door.
I ran the entire ten blocks to school.
* * *
—
“Felix, nice of you to join us,” said Monsieur Thibault in French as I walked into class half an hour late. I was sticky with sleep sweat and running sweat.
“Je m’excuse.” I slipped into my seat beside Dylan.
After a few minutes, Donald, who sat in front of me, turned around, holding his nose. “Pee-yew, dude! You reek!” he whispered.
I felt the blood rush to my face. I glanced at Dylan, who shrugged helplessly. He slipped me a note.
He is a dingus. But he is not wrong.
Also, your shirt is on inside out.
I raised my hand and asked to be excused. “You just got here,” said Monsieur Thibault. But he let me go. I went to my locker and got out my toiletry kit.
Someone was in the handicapped washroom, so I went to the regular one. Lucky for me, it was empty. I peeled off my shirt and gave my pits a good scrub in the sink. Then I shoved a wet towel down my pants to give a wipe there, too.
The door opened and a younger boy entered. He stood rooted to the spot, staring.
I decided to own the moment. I just stared right back at him, the wet towel still jammed down my pants. He backed out of the washroom.
I dried off, then doused my pits with deodorant and rubbed some on the inside of my shirt for good measure before pulling it back on, right-side out. Then I headed back to class.
A few minutes later, Dylan slipped me another note.
All good.
* * *
—
At lunchtime Dylan and I found a table near the back of the cafeteria. He pulled a triple-decker sandwich out of his lunch bag and started eating.
My stomach gurgled. I hadn’t eaten breakfast. I hadn’t brought anything for lunch. And I had no money.
Winnie approached our table and joined us without asking if it was okay. She was wiping off her black beret, which was covered in dust.
“What happened?” I asked.
“Donald used it as a Frisbee again.” She placed a cloth lunch bag on the table and started laying out her food: two egg sandwiches on her homemade bread, an apple, a banana, a yogurt, some cheese cubes and a rather big round pastry. “Felix, you seem discombobulated today,” she sai
d as she started in on the first sandwich. “Discombobulated means—”
“I know what it means, thanks.” My stomach issued a shockingly loud growl.
“Where’s your lunch?”
“I forgot it.”
She pushed one of her sandwiches toward me. “Eat this. It’s spelt bread.”
“Um. Thanks.” Beggars couldn’t be choosers. I took a tentative bite. I chewed. And chewed. Dylan gave me a sympathetic look and passed me a Babybel cheese, which I devoured.
When I’d managed to get her sandwich down, Winnie cut her pastry into pieces with a plastic knife and handed both me and Dylan a slice. “Try a piece of moon cake, too. My parents buy them all the time during the Moon Festival. Not super healthy, but so good. Salty egg yolks in red bean paste.”
“Yum,” said Dylan with his mouth full.
I nodded agreement; it was so good. “Thank you.”
“I’ve been thinking about what to write for the next issue of the paper,” Winnie said. Her perfect red lips were speckled with egg, and I had the unbidden thought that she looked adorable. But I don’t even like her! my inner voice said.
“I can still cover a hard-hitting topic, but I’ve decided that I need to hook the reader more. Simplify, too, without dumbing down.”