That Dammed Beaver, page 14
The boy eyes smiling. I see dollar bills instead o’ pupils. I even hear the money clinking like when a car pass-over the piece o’ black rubber-thing in a gas station. Cling-clang. “Gimme just three months,” he say. “Gimme three bare months, and I going-show you something.”
Just as I left him and walkin’ cross Northcliffe Boulevard going to Eglinton, I see a green hornet fellow standing-up in front a fellow car. The fellow already inside the car. The fellow want to drive off. But the green hornet standing up in front the man car. The fellow inside the car honk the horn. And the green hornet fellow take out his black book. Slow-slow. And he flip back a page. And hold down a little. And start to write down the car licents. The fellow honk the car again. The hornet walk more closer. He tear off the little yellow piece o’ paper. And getting ready to put it on the man brand-new-brand grey Thunderbird. Just as the hornet was about to ticket the man for parking next to a yellow fire hydrand, the fellow jump out. A Japanee samurai wrestler would look like a twig beside o’ him. Pure muscle. Pure avoirdupois. Pure latissimus dorsi. Shoes shining bright. White shirt. Stripe tie. A three-piece grey suit. Hair slick back. And long. Gold ’pon two fingers on each hand. Gold on the left wrist. More gold on the right wrist. The hornet par’lyzed now. A rigor mortis o’ fear turn the whole uniform and the man inside it to pure starch, or like how a pair o’ pyjamas does-look when you left um out on the line in the dead o’ winter.
“Goddamn!” the man say.
“You park wrong,” the hornet say.
“Who say I park wrong?”
“You park illegal.”
“Who goddamn say I park illegal?”
“Look at the sign.”
“Which goddamn sign?”
“The sign that say NO PARKING BETWEEN FOUR AND SIX. And NOT STOPPING ANYTIME. You not only park, but you stop. You stationary too.” The Indian green hornet man’s voice get high and shaky. “You have therefore park.”
“Ahmma gonna give you two seconds, nigger, to take that goddamn ticket off my car, motherfucker!”
“What you call me? I am no damn nigger. I am Indian. Legal immigrant. I just doing my job for the City of Toronto in Metropolitan Toronto. You are a blasted American negro!”
Well, multiculturalism gone-out the window now!
All the pamphlets and the television commercials that show people of all colours laughing together and saying “We is Canadians,” all them advertisements in Saturday Night and Maclean’s, all them speeches that ministers up in Ottawa make concerning the “different cultures that make up this great unified country of ours,” all that lick-up now, and gone through the eddoes. One time. Bram!
The Goliath of a man grabble-hold of the hornet by the scruff o’ the green uniform, the peak cap fall-off all like now-so, the little black book slide under the car, the hornet himself lifted up offa the ground by a least three inches, and shaking-’bout in the Gulliver’s hands, pelting-’bout his two legs like if he is a Muppet or a puppet; and when I anticipate that the fellow going-pelt him in the broad-road, the fellow just hefted him up a little more higher offa the ground, and lay him ’cross the bonnet of the shining Thunderbird, holding-he-down like how you does-hold-down a cat to tickle-he under his chin; and the fellow say, “Now, motherfucker! Is you gonna take the goddamn ticket off mah Bird?”
I pass ‘long quick, bo’! ’Cause I know the Police does-be up in this St.Clair-Oakwood district like flies round a crocus bag o’ sugar at the drop of a cloth hat; and that they does-tek-in anybody who near the scene o’ crime, no matter how small the scene or how small the crime; and if um is Wessindians involve, pure handcuffs and licks, and pelting-’bout inside the back o’ cruisers till they get you inside the station. And then the real sport does-start! So I looking and I looking-off, knowing that a green hornet, even if he look like a Pakistani or a Indian, but is really a Trinidadian or a Guyanese, and only look a little Indian, he going-get help from the Police. Not one Police. But five carloads o’ Police.
All like now-so, the road full up with Wessindians and other people, and these Wessindians looking on and laughing, ’cause none o’ them don’t like green hornets, not even green hornets that come from the Wessindies!
I pass ‘long quick, bo’. I got to face the Immigration people in a week and I don’t want nothing concerning my past or present to be a stain through witnessing violence, to prevent them from stamping LANDED IMMIGRAND or IMMIGRANT REÇU in my Barbados passport! I may be a accessory before the fact.
But I was still thinking of my friend, the other green hornet, so I look back to see what kind o’ judgement the Thun-derbird-man was going-make with the Indian gentleman from Guyana, who now have no peak cap, no black notebook, one shoe fall-off, and the green tunic tear-up. And as my two eyes rested on the scene after the fact I hear the Charles Atlas of a man say, “And don’t call the motherfucking cops! I got you covered, nigger. I knows where you goddam live!”
I hope that this Goliath of a man don’t also know where my Bajan green hornet friend does-live! I hope the Thunder-bird don’t be park all the time up here! And I start to think ’bout getting a little message to my friend to tell him to don’t put no tickets on no grey Thunderbirds, or even on no Wess-indian cars, like Tornados, which is Wessindians’ favourite cars. And I start to wonder if he know that a Wessindian does-treat a Tornado more better than he does-treat a woman or a wife; and with a Wessindian, yuh can’t ask his woman for a dance at a dance unless you expecting some blows. Even if he give you permission to dance with his woman, don’t dance a Isaac Hayes or a Barry White slow-piece too slow and too close, yuh…
I waiting anxious now, ’cause I don’t see the boy for days, these days. I feel the boy already start making money from the scheme. I walk all over St. Clair-Oakwood, all along North-cliffe, swing right ’pon Eglinton, mek a left on Park Hill Road, a further left up by Whitmore, and find myself back ’pon Northcliffe going in the opposite direction, and still I can’t rest my two eyes on the green hornet. Fellows start telling me that the boy does-be going to the races every day, on his lunch break from ticketing people cars, and betting one hundred dollars on the nose and five hundred to show on one horse, leffing the races with bundles o’ money. And laughing like shite.
I walking-’bout day and night, all over St. Clair-Oakwood, and still no sight o’ the boy.
Then, bram! I start hearing horror stores.
“I come out my apartment last Wednesday night to get in my car, and my blasted car not there! It gone. Tow-’way!” one fellow say.
A next fellow say, “Be-Christ, if I ever catch a police towing-’way my car!”
“I don’t like this place. It too fascist. Tummuch regulations and laws. A man can’t breathe. I can’t tek it ’pon myself and lodge a complaint with the Police ’cause I here illegal. No work permit, yuh know? No job. Now, no car! You park your car, and when you come out in the cold morning to go-work at a li’l illegal job, no fucking car?”
“I was up by a little skins one night,” a next fellow say. “I tell the wife I going to Spree. I tack-up by Northcliffe at the skin’s apartment. I really and truly did-intend to spend only a hour. Well, with a few white rums in my arse, one thing lead to the next. And when I do-so, and open my two eyes, morning be-Christ brek, and um is daylight. My arse in trouble now, two times. Wife and wuk. I bound down the fire escape, not to be seen by the neighbours, and when I reach ground, no blasted car!”
Stories o’ motor cars that get tow-’way start spreading through the St. Clair-Oakwood neighbourhood, just like how the yellow leaves does-fall ’pon the grass a certain time o’ year. Stories o’ fellows getting lay-off, no work permit, getting beat-up, can’t go to the Police in case, and getting lock-out, all this gloom start spreading like influenza. The fellows scared. The fellows vex. The fellows angry. And they can’t go and complain to the Police to find out where their cars is, ’cause, yuh know, the papers not in order. As man! And the li’l matter o’ landed and reçu and so on and so forth…
They can’t even start calling the Police pigs and racists and criminals. And all this time, nobody can’t find the green hornet boy at tall.
Well, a plague o’ tow-’way cars rest so heavy on my mind, even though I don’t own no wheels, seeing as how I is a real TTC-man that I get real concern. ’Cause, drunk or sober, blood more thicker than water…
“As man!”
I hear the voice and I bound-round. And look. I see cars. I see Wessindians. I don’t see no Police, but I frighten. I see a tow-’way truck. And I still don’t see nobody I know. But I think I recognize the voice.
“As man!”
I bound-round again, and I see the same things.
“Over here, man!”
God bless my eyesight! Um is the green hornet man. My friend! Sitting down behind the wheel of DO RIGHT TOWING 24 HOURS. I do-so look! I blink my two eyes. I seeing, but I not seeing right. I watching, but I having eyes that see and that watch but they not watching right.
“Um is me, man!”
The tow-’way truck real pretty. It have-in short-wave radio. Two-way radio. CBC-FM. Stereos. And CB. It paint-up in black, yellow, and white. The green hornet boy, dress-off now in overalls and construction hat cock at a angle on his head, cigar in mouth and shades on his face, like if he is a dictator from Latin America.
“Remember the plan? The plan I tell you ’bout for making money? Well, I went to my bank and talk to my bank manager and squeeze a loan for this outta the son of a bitch.” He tap the door of the tow-truck like if he tapping a woman. “And I had a word with a fellow who was a green hornet like me. I is still a green hornet myself, but I works the afternoon shift. This fellow I know, the ex-green hornet, couldn’t take the abuse and the threats to his person of being a hornet, so he open up a little place up in Scarborough where he enpounds the cars I does tow-’way. And me and him splits the money. I brings in a car, and quick-so, um lock-up and enpounded. If a fellow want-back his car, fifty dollars! You want piece o’ this action?”
I get real frighten.
“You want to get cut-in ’pon this action?”
“But-but-but-but…”
“You see that pretty silver-grey Thunderbird park beside the fire hydrand? I watching that car ow, fifteen minutes. I see the fellow park it, and go in the apartment building there. I figure if he coming back out soon, he going-come-out within twenty minutes. I got five more minutes…”
I start getting real frighten now. ’Cause I see the car. And the car is the same car that belongs to the Goliath, the black Amurcan fellow. I so frighten that I can’t talk and warn my green hornet friend. But even if I coulda find words, my tow-truck friend too busy talking and telling me ’bout a piece o’ the action and how easy it is to tow-’way cars that belongs to illegal immigrants and get money split fifty-fifty, and to remember the Rockefellers…
“…and I had to laugh one day when I bring-in a Cadillac,” he tell me, still laughing, as if he was still bringing–in the Cadillac. “Appears that my pound-friend had a little altercation of difference of opinion with a ’Muracan man over a car once, so when I appear with the silver-grey Caddy, he get frighten and start telling me that nobody not going maim him or brutalize him or curse his mother, that before anything like that happen, he would go-back home to Guyana first and pick welts offa reefs or put-out oyster pots down by the sea wall… Look, I got to go! Time up!”
I see him, and I watch him pull off from ’side o’ me like if he didn’t know me, like if I was a fire hydrand. I watch him drive up to the shiny grey Thunderbird car, not mekking no noise, like if he is a real police raiding a Wessindian booze-can after midnight. I see him get-out the tow-truck, like if he walking on ashes. I see him let down the big iron-thing at the back o’ the tow-truck. First time in my eleven years living here as a semi-legal immigrant that I have see a tow-truck that didn’t make no noise. I see him bend-down and look under the front o’ the Thunderbird. I see him wipe his hands. I see him wipe his two hands like a labourer who did a good job does-wipe his hands. I see him go-round to the back o’ the Bird and bend-down. He wipe his two hands again. I see him size-up the car. I watch him put-on the two big canvas gloves on his two hands. I watch him cock the cigar at a more cockier angle, adjust the construction hat, tek-off the shades and put them inside his pocket, and I see him take the rope that mek out of iron and look like chain and hook-um-on ’pon the gentleman nice clean-and-polish grey 1983 Thunderbird. I seeing him and I watching him. The boy real professional. I wondering all the time where the boy learn this work. He dance round the tow-truck and press a thing, and the Bird raising-up offa the road like if it ready to tek-off and fly. I see him press a next thing in the tow-truck and the bird stationary, but up in the air, at a angle, like a Concord tekking-off. I see him bend-down again, to make sure that the chain o’ iron hook-on good. I see him wipe his two hands in the big canvas gloves a next time, and I see him slap his two hands. Telling me from the distance where I is, watching, that it is a professional job, well done. I think I see the dollar bills registering in his two eyes too! And I see him tug the chain tight, so the Bird would move-off nice and slow, and not jerk nor make no noise, when he ready to tek she to the pound to enpound she.
And then I see the mountain of a man, tipping-toe down the metal fire escape o’ the apartment building where he was, black shoes shining in the afternoon light, hair slick back and shining more brighter from a process, dress in the same three-piece suit, with the pinstripe visible now that the sun was touching the rich material at the right angle o’ sheen and shine, and I see, or I think I see, the gentleman tek-off a diamond and gold ring two times offa his right hand, and put them in his pocket – I think I see that – and I see how the hand become big-big-big like a boxing glove, and I tell my former green hornet friend to look over his left shoulder. I seeing, but I can’t talk o’ what I seeing. I find I can’t talk. I can only move. A tenseness seize the moment. I do so, and point my index finger, indicating like a spy telling another spy to don’t talk, but to look behind. But at that very moment, the black Amurcan gentleman’s hand was already grabbing my friend from outta the cab o’ the tow-truck…
REVULSION
HEATHER J. WOOD
From: greatactress@gmail.com
Subject: Re – what happened my callback?
Date: January 12, 2017
To: mel@talents.com
Hi Mel,
What do you mean the personal hygiene products agency has blacklisted me from appearing in any more of their commercials? I thought peeing my pants during the audition would add some honest-to-goodness realism to the incontinence pads ad. I was submerging myself in the role – finding my motivation. You know, Stanislavsky! Strasberg! Method acting! Sigh…some people just have no appreciation.
Anyway, I still want to try out for that herbal anti-nausea commercial. If you get me in front of the casting director on Monday, I swear I’ll stick to the actual script. I promise J. You know you can count on me, Mel. It’s not like I’m going to intentionally barf.
Remember, you’re the most awesome agent in the biz!
Hugs and kisses from your favourite client, Star
From: greatactress@gmail.com
Subject: About that little incident
Date: January 31, 2017
To: mel@talents.com
Hi Mel,
Glad you’re still talking to me. Sorry about your having to pay the insurance company’s deductible L. I don’t know what I’d do without you, Mel. You really are the best. I mean, who knew that kerosene was so flammable? I was just trying to show Mr. Serious Horror Film Director that I was totally immersed in the pyromaniac character’s backstory. You should have seen the look on his face, his hair being on fire.
Anyway, maybe you’re right about my staying away from movie bookings for a little while. How about you rustle up some live theatre auditions for me?
Can’t wait to hear what you come up with! I owe you one, Star
From: greatactress@gmail.com
Subject: V-Day audition
Date: February 14, 2017
To: mel@talents.com
Hi Mel,
Forgive me, OK? But really, rhyming “vagina from Regina” is just so grade six. Plus, I thought the whole point of this monologue show was female empowerment or something. Using vagina when you mean vulva is just not on. I told the director, “I’m empowering myself by making my lines more anatomically correct.” Boy, did that piss her off! Her face went deep purple – matching her fake Pashmina scarf. She said I was making a mockery of her critical feminist production and that I wasn’t fit to perform alongside the dedicated women who were taking the audition seriously.
I turned up the mic and shouted vulva revulsion, vulva revulsion, vulva revulsion. Then David, this really cute security guard, escorted me off the stage. (You wouldn’t know how to get in touch with him, would you?) Anyway Mel, I still really need a money-making gig. Do you think I could join Peter downtown tomorrow and audition for Puppetry of the Penis?
Star
A PREDICAMENT
MORLEY CALLAGHAN
Father Francis, the youngest priest at the cathedral, was hearing confessions on a Saturday afternoon. He stepped out of the confessional to stretch his legs a moment and walked up the left aisle toward the flickering red light of the Precious Blood, mystical in the twilight of the cathedral. Father Francis walked back to the confessional because too many women were waiting on the penitent bench. There were not so many men.
