That Dammed Beaver, page 10
We also studied together, and went to parties and dinners together. We were inseparable.
Pat’s mother, however, was not keen on me. Though Mama Legge, an American woman from Wisconsin, was amiable enough during our first meeting, she was wary, and by the end of the visit, disapproval was in the air.
“I’m Larry Zolf. Is Patricia home?”
“Yes, of course! Come on in. Have a cup of tea. How are you? How’s the university?”
“I’m fine. So is the university.”
“Have you known Pat for very long, Mr. Zolf?”
“Three weeks, four days, eighteen hours and twenty minutes – and I’ve never had so much fun in my life.”
Images of “fun” popped into Mama Legge’s mind. The images looked very much like stills from a porno movie.
“Isn’t today Yom Kippur?” she asked, trying to clear her head. “My associate, Mr. Flink, took the day off to fast. Can you have tea and cookies?”
“I’m a socialist, Mrs. Legge, and to be a socialist, you have to eat every day, even on Yom Kippur, so that you are strong enough to bite the capitalist enemy – like James Richardson and Sons – in the throat. Pat tells me that your husband slaved for the Richardson family for thirty years before he passed away. And, if I’m not mistaken, there was no pension. This wealthy cartel that holds Winnipeg by the throat provided no help to you, the widow!”
My odd looks, my socialist views and my quasi-vampire attitude repelled her.
Later, Mama Legge felt obliged to inform Pat that Jews were descendants of the Devil, that Jews cast spells on beautiful gentile girls in order to do with those girls what they wanted. Pat and Mama Legge quarrelled bitterly. Hair was pulled, blouses ripped, ankles kicked, faces slapped.
“Patsy,” I said, when told of the episode, “if I could cast spells don’t you think I would have gotten rid of my schnozz?”
With tenderness and affection, Pat fondled my nose, my spare sex organ.
PSYCHE FROM HERE
ANNE DANDURAND
I remember exactly how everything started. It was a night in the middle of March, glacial and moonless; nonetheless I was naked, curled up under my electric blanket that was set at maximum heat. I was pretty sure my bones would never be free of winter.
I wasn’t sleeping. I wasn’t even trying. To tell the truth, I’d surrendered to insomnia ages ago (in this tormented world I can’t help but keep my eyes open, it’s a question of anxiety). That week it was the five thousand corpses done in by mustard gas in the city of Halabja that were keeping me going. Setting me off.
My next-door neighbour was listening over and over again to that song of Corey Hart’s: “I wear my sunglasses at night, so I can, so I can…” Later, I got to thinking that on that night the whole universe was conspiring against me.
It all started like this. I felt a length of warm fur tremble along the tips of my fingers on my left hand. I shivered. It didn’t feel at all like Chansonette, my grey civet cat. It bore a terrible resemblance to a man’s hair, thin and fine! My heart pounding, I turned on my amaranth lamp and lowered my only defence against calamity, but there was nothing under the wrinkled sheets at all!
And no person either!!!!
I was beginning to believe that I was having a postdated hallucination from my only acid trip (ten years ago), when I noticed Chansonette in a crouching position, two meters away.
Her gaze was rivetted on a corner of the room, a completely uninteresting corner cluttered with old shoes: her pupils wide, she was staring at a precise point in space, at about the height of a man.
Yes, of a man.
Then, just as she does when you stroke her, Chansonette lowered her head and closed her eyes, and I heard her purr particularly loudly. She went so far as to lie down on the cold floor, completely displaying herself, opening up her little underbelly for a caress, an obscene little kittenish trick that she had so far reserved for me. Always, just for me…
It should have sent cold chills down my back, but I blushed as though in front of a fire.
The next day it rained. When I began to get drowsy around the same hollow hour I took some precautions. If I were to hold my breath for just a moment I’d have certainly fallen asleep. So, I didn’t bother turning off the television. I had pirate cable channels, and with the music station on, submerged in the trembling light of a Pierre Flynn clip, I had the vague sense that these lines were endlessly streaming by: “Searching through the broken nights of capital cities, I followed her and lost her so many times.” But I’m not sure about that since my memory, grown quiet at last, also dozed off.
Around five in the morning an electrical failure woke me up. Or to put it more accurately, I was shaken by the sudden silence. No more rock music, no more rattling humidifier, nothing. Curiously, the room smelt of grass after a rain, but also of summer sand, and when I concentrated hard enough, I picked up the sweet scent of hyacinths. I saw nothing but Chansonette’s eyes glowing in the black room.
Then I heard my pussycat let out a little cooing sound. I guessed she was languishing in that uninteresting corner, and if I also let out a moan, it was not from fear, but from desire. Hermits must feel the same way when inspiration draws them forth.
As though to avoid frightening me, someone lightly touched my hair, then an imperceptible but delicious kiss was placed on my shoulder, and I had the taste of a feast in my mouth, or more precisely, a mouthful of ouzo first, then ripe, black olives, bursting with sun, and then goat cheese flavoured with basil and a drizzle of olive oil and, finally, the delicate sweetness of a honey and puff pastry.
When I felt a man’s feverish and angular hand (yes, a man’s hand) on my belly, and especially when I felt someone nibble the nape of my neck – which electrified me right down to my toes and soaked me between my legs – it was irresistible, I couldn’t hold back, I wanted to see this exquisite intruder who knew me so well. I picked up my lighter from the bedside table and lit it.
My bed and my room were just as empty as my heart. Chansonette eyed me scornfully, as though I had ignored a painfully obvious detail.
There was a tearing inside me.
The next morning I understood. That same night I closed the coral blinds as a reddish moon was rising, I put clean sheets that smelled of hope on the bed, and perfumed myself a little too much (as I always do when I have a date).
Naked, I stretched out, more ardent and tremulous than noon-day heat on the road.
Chansonette was at her post in the corner that was now becoming interesting. I waited, and waited, I was absolutely patient, but it wasn’t until an hour before dawn that a distant and indolent chant began to slowly move toward me, with its ancient harmonies of sistrum and lute. As a precaution, I closed my eyes and had a vision of a host of sprites dressed in madder and absinthe-coloured muslin. They formed a smiling ring around me.
The same stranger lay down by my side. His erect penis against my hip, its satiny pulsations, and I was faint. I didn’t move, afraid that the charm might be broken. His hand wandered over my entire body as though to awaken the blood, but there was no need: my heart was battering me to the breaking point: the stranger was quivering too, his knee opening mine, his lips opening mine, I imbibed his sweet saliva, our breathing in tune like an orchestra, the grain of his skin as smooth as youth, his chest teasing my nipples, his navel touching mine, his palms meeting mine, and he slipped into the ravine between my thighs, grasping the knot of my desire with his breath, his mouth, his tongue, with all his soul. As I ascended the spiral of sensuality my last lucid thought was that only a god incapable of any form of violence could love me so well.
When I awoke, dawn cut its blond light into the coral blind, my room still swaying in fragrant murmurs of the sea.
Later that day, I decided on an experiment.
Spring was streaming in, blushing at its belated arrival. By noon, the sun came showering down, the air dancing, drunk with heat, motorcycles crisscrossing like mysterious flaming swallows.
I locked myself into my windowless bathroom. Chansonette was curled up in the sink, as was her daytime habit. I bolted the door, just in case. I started to fill the bathtub with water and groped in the pitch dark for a sachet of dried flowers and two handfuls of coarse salt to soften the skin, which I added. I lowered myself into the hot water. To be on the safe side, I closed my eyes. Would he come?
My right hand was dangling over the steamy edge of the tub. A cooing sound from Chansonette was the first sign. Then, just as happily, the chant of the night before drew near with the step of a gentle doe; delicate fragrances of seaweed tinged with orange coiled around me, and a fleeting breeze like a fuchsia petal touched my wrist.
Before I melted into the euphoria of his presence, I breathed: “Who are you?”
He held me close and enchanting zephyrs raised us into the atmosphere, so much higher than cities or anxieties, and he whispered into my left ear, “Of all my brothers and sisters, I’m the one your heartless century has wearied the most, ravaged the most. I am only Eros.”
My poor soul faltered, marvelling. He added, “You saw me as a vulture, a jackal, I’ve been so hurt… Oh, I was only waiting to love you… Finally, you’re here, finally, you’re here for me…”
His voice sounded as if it had been drawn up from the depths of ages, but it was tender enough to make you weep. I kissed him at the base of his throat, then over all his face. I traced the corners of his lips and ran my hands through his hair dark with secrets. He laughed and I laughed too because I’d lost the whole burden of my pain. His belly quivered against mine. Ivy and cypress at once, we each wrapped a leg around the other’s waist. I opened up onto his lance of joy, and our bodies’ cantata rose up in powerful tendrils, sky and sea and flesh entangled, all the echoes of the earth suddenly voiceless, the tortured losing their distress, bombs losing their roar, and I discovered that, in the face of evil, there is nothing but love, the love so close to me, within me, and later, infinitely later, he said, “I chose you especially for your words, the words you write in darkness and doubt…There are so few who celebrate me now. Let me love you, love you forever, even it if will always be in the most complete darkness…”
Fate will not have the last word with me.
To make room, I threw out all my old shoes the next morning. Then, sitting on the floor in the corner that was now of considerable interest, I discussed the situation with Chansonette. We came to an agreement: nothing is irrevocable and the twentieth century still has something beautiful about it.
I ransacked all the boutiques on St-Laurent. I tried on almost a thousand pairs, and bought the darkest ones I could find.
For Eros, always, I will not be seen without my sunglasses.
(Translated by Luise von Flotow)
NARCISSISTIC EB AND UNLUCKY FLO
LEON ROOKE
We were down among the strippy currents basking in the afterglow of having torn ourselves apart when my true love said, “You should let some of your feminine side out.” I said, “If I let it out it will most certainly be slapped into prison.”
She said, “Give it a whirl.”
I let my feminine side out just for a minute and instantly it started dancing on its toes. It was going at this big-time.
“Put it back, Eb,” she said. “You let too much of it out.”
“Well, gosh!” I said. “Well, golly!”
I tried putting the whole thing back, but it ran one way and another and soon disappeared. It had gone to Florida. It had gone to the Sunshine Coast. Gone to where it could wear a bikini without being cold or arrested for conduct unbecoming to—
“I’m not hanging in with you any longer,” she said. “You’ve gone all nasty masculine.”
“My feminine side has gone to a place where it can fulfill its destiny.”
“Get off me,” she said. Get off me now.”
“I found it hard to love my mother,” I said. “She was a hard woman.”
“Sometimes I hate people,” she said. “I hate people who refuse to comb their hair. I’m very fond of feet, though. I have very nice feet. My mother used to tell me that. ‘You have very nice feet, Ruth,’ she’d say to me. Ruth was my sister. Mother was always confusing one of us with the other. She led a very confused life, my mother. I believe she never enjoyed a sturdy moment. She saw life through a prism of her own devising. The dog was the one party in our house able to tell Ruth and me apart. She was a most excitable dog. The house shook from that dog’s excitement and then you’d discover it was excited over nothing. Except that time the house burnt down. That time was different.”
“Are you done?” I said. “Are you quite finished?”
“Would you please get off me,” she said. “I can’t breathe down here. I’m dying. You ought to go to the gym and lose that flab.”
“What was all that stuff about dying with your boots on, I wonder?”
“What stuff?”
“I never got it. That “boots on” business. What was the point? There was a lot of stuff like that in my childhood that I never got.”
“Me, too. Like how you got me.”
“That boot business bothers me. I’m a deeply troubled guy. Yet this is pretty good, us here like this. If there were a heaven, it would be exactly like this. Look, there’s my feminine side coming back. Wow, get a load of that outfit. Been shopping, I guess. A flaming dyke!”
“Arsehole.”
’TIL DEATH
JULIE ROORDA
Who says romance is dead? If you believe that, I guarantee you’ll change your mind by the end of this Haunted Tour. Of course, the fact that you’ve come out for this special Valentine’s Day edition suggests I’m probably preaching to the choir, as far as love is concerned, but there are always a few skeptics. Take hold of your sweetie’s hand now, and cuddle up close; it’s not just the February wind chill that’s going to make you shiver on this trip.
Now, if you’ll gather around me here, I have a question for you: How many of you carry smartphones? As well as affirming your faith in the undying nature of love, this first example may serve as a cautionary tale. Look around. You may not think there is much to see here, just a typical Toronto back alley, some run-of-the-mill graffiti. There are streetlights, which means it’s well-lit at night. But those were of no use to a young woman who took a shortcut early one November evening, just a few years ago. As she entered this intersection with the alley that leads to the street, she was blowing goodnight kisses to her young lover by videophone. She didn’t notice the garbage truck that was barrelling down on her. The driver saw her, honked and tried to stop, but the young woman didn’t even look up as she stepped directly into the truck’s path. Didn’t have a chance. Her boyfriend saw a rush of dark sky and buildings flash across his screen as the woman’s phone flew through the air upon impact and then clattered to a stop on the ground, where it relayed to the horrified lover one last shot of his girlfriend’s feet sticking out from the truck under which she was pinned before his screen went black.
Reports started coming in a few years later, always from people taking the same short- cut after dark. Just as they enter this intersection, their phones ring. When they answer, they hear nothing, but feel a presence and an overwhelming sadness that makes them certain someone is there at the other end. The calls are always from unknown, untraceable numbers. In at least one instance, the person was sure her phone was turned off, yet it still rang.
I can see several of you nervously patting your pockets, but don’t worry, the calls come only if you are in this alley alone. Those who have just parted from a lover are particularly vulnerable. So, stick together, look both ways, and there’ll be no calls tonight. Shall we move along?
This is a charming little church, more than a hundred and fifty years old. There’s no need to go inside, but if you’ll just stop here in this courtyard, I’d like you to listen very carefully. Do you hear that? A grinding noise – it’s faint, but quite distinct – like the sound of a handsaw cutting wood. No? Perhaps you need a more practiced ear, like mine.
Although it now belongs to the Unitarians, this church originally housed a Lutheran congregation. Many of the couples who married here were of German descent, and the Germans had a tradition requiring the newlyweds, upon exiting the church, to saw through a log together to signify the beginning of life-long partnership and cooperation in even the most mundane and practical aspects of life. Couples took part in this meaningful ceremony for centuries, and aside from the odd severed pinkie, it was entirely safe. Not so for one unlucky couple in the 1920s. The bride created a bit of a sensation by wearing a long lace veil – they weren’t a common fashion with regular people back then, especially among austere Lutherans, but this young woman was a trendsetter. The couple were full of joy and energy as they began sawing through the log at record speed, obviously perfect life companions. Then disaster – the lace of her veil caught in the teeth of the blade and yanked her face down against the log where the saw sliced clear across her throat, severing the jugular. It happened so fast, witnesses could hardly fathom what they’d seen, least of all the poor groom whose last lusty heft on the saw had ripped his beloved away from him forever. But the groans of that saw – many say they resemble sobs – those sobs can still be heard today, forever echoing the memory of young love cut tragically short. Forgive the pun.
Zip up your coats, we’re going down the street to a children’s playground – not the kind of place you want to hear about sightings. I can assure you this particular presence has never been spotted during the day, only after nightfall, so your children can continue to play here without fear of being spooked.
What I want to show you is the wading pool. It’s empty now, of course, for the winter, but I’m going to tell you about one summer evening, shortly after the pool was constructed, about forty years ago. Toronto was experiencing a heat wave and the pools all stayed open later than usual. But eventually, evening arrived and a city worker, a man in his fifties came to drain the dirty water. He’d recently celebrated his twenty-fifth wedding anniversary for which his wife had given him a gold identity bracelet. The truth is, he wasn’t that keen on the bracelet, found it a bit fussy and feminine, but he loved his wife dearly and wore it every day with pride. You can imagine it was to his great dismay that evening when, just as he reached into the last bit of water to clear some grass from the drain, the clasp on the bracelet opened and followed the water down. Desperate, the man reached into the pipe as far as his arm would go, lying down on the ground to reach deeper. What he didn’t realize was that a valve, just a few inches down, would close automatically once the draining was complete. Severed his arm just below the shoulder.
