Right Away Monday, page 36
I lay on the edge of the roof and stared down onto Water Street. No one was about. Seven thirty. Too early. Monday morning. Everyone so reluctant to move into the week. The smell of the comin fall. Pigeons. Gulls. The bronze sparkle of beer-bottle glass in the gutters. The sun blazed down on the back of my neck. The travel agency a few doors up. Mockin me. St. John’s to Heathrow for sweet fuck-all. If I had a thousand dollars I’d disappear. Vanish. And Crazy Clara, yes, that’s right, tyin her laces on the steps of the Korean store across the street, havin a heated debate with herself about something I couldnt quite make out, but something she was obviously pissed off about. Sweat runnin down her face in buckets. No surprise that she had herself a stroke. Poor old girl. I wanted to shout out to her, but I couldnt. Maybe I was afraid she wouldnt recognize me. Or that she would.
One of me buddies in Dublin, he had an apartment around Christ Church with a rooftop just like mine. There was lawn chairs and stools and a stereo and even a tabletop hockey game set up. It was wicked and no one ever fell off or wanted to jump or threw anything down into the street. Why couldnt I have thought of all that? What a spot for a summer bash. Hook up a band and blast it down into the streets, put up a rail of some sort, sleeping bags.
I gawked down at the street, thought shit over. How low I’d let meself sink. Sour smell off me skin. I stood up and balanced meself on the edge. I wasnt even feelin the five beer I drank. I looked down, down, down into the face of a possible death. A possible ending. The end of this whole mess. The way it all turned out. His gruesome finale. The closing moment. Swoop. Nosedive. Splat. No pain. All over in a matter of seconds. Or maybe so much pain, maybe a wheelchair, drinkin food through a straw and havin someone look after me for the rest of me life, cleanin me hole when I shits meself. Locked inside me own private hell for the next fifty years, or however long it took for me to die naturally. Die a natural death.
Wander into the world instead.
Get out on that highway and stick your thumb out and just go. Wherever.
I couldnt do it, couldnt make the jump.
I went back downstairs and curled up on the couch.
I’m in a hospital bed. There’s a nurse. She pulls open the blinds and the sun bursts across me face. She sets breakfast on the stand beside me bed. I gotta piss. She says:
—There’s someone here to see you Clayton. Me heart almost explodes in me chest. It’s her. It’s her. It’s gotta be.
No.
A woman walks in. She’s maybe in her mid-forties, long black woollen coat and silky scarf. Sunglasses. Black leather handbag.
—Hello Clayton.
—Hello.
—Dont tell me you dont know me?
I dont have a sweet clue who she is.
—It’s Massie for God sakes. How are you?
Massie? Aunt Massie? Holy fuck. She’s after sheddin some fuckin weight, about a hundred pounds. It must be what, three years since I saw her last? She looks rested and relaxed. I s’pose she would be though, now that she’s clear of Val. They were shacked up for fifteen odd years. Odd years too, I’d say.
—Massie, sorry. I’m barely awake girl.
—It’s okay Clayton. Weight Watchers. I quite like my new anonymity. So, how are you, other than completely fucking mental like the rest of your tribe? What are you after doing to yourself?
—I’m…I’m…How did you know I was here?
—I came in with Val.
—Where is he? Send him in.
—You mean you havent heard? God b’y, you’ve been living in the dark.
She had no idea how true that statement really was.
—He collapsed at the arts awards. It was on TV. He fell down in a heap. I drove right across the Island. He’s downstairs now, checked into the new detox unit.
—Holy fuck.
—It’s a step. Imagine, two crazy, strung-out Reids in the one hospital. Is it big enough I wonder?
—I fuckin wonder. Listen, who won what other awards?
—What?
—The music awards, who won the other ones?
—Ahhh, Rob Dawe won for Best Independent Album.
—Fuck no…
—Yup. And, oh, your old friends, that crowd of hooligans you used to play with? You didnt know that? They won Best New Rock Group or Entertainers or something.
—Fuck no…
—Yeah. And what’s his name, the guitar player…
—Corey.
—Yeah, he thanked you, said something, I cant remember now.
Fuckin right they thanked me, the bastards. I betcha Toddler fuckin Dawe never did though, old prick.
Massie stayed for about half an hour. We laughed and bullshitted about different times. She reminded me of who I use to be, when I first moved in to St. John’s and started hangin out at her and Val’s. How fuckin cracked and unbreakable I was just a few years ago. She obviously had a different idea of me than I ever allowed meself to see. But when she left I felt it, I did, I felt like I was unbreakable, or maybe that I wasnt meant to be broken just yet. It was a good visit.
The famous Valentine Reid, detoxing downstairs. Who woulda fuckin thunk it?
I lay in bed and let me mind wander back over the months and years, tried to remember who I was, tried to feel the way I useta feel, when nothing in this world could stop me, how I useta think I needed nothing, just the clothes on me back. I never looked ahead and I sure as fuck never looked back. But I reckon that changed somewhere along the way, without me noticing it. Like I got dead fuckin tired and kept goin anyhow. What must it be like to have a place to feel easy, where you can relax and not hafta put up any fronts? Just be.
Home. Randy. My old man. Who’s been tryna make it up to me for years, tryna better himself, when all I could do was spit back in his face. The time he punched one of me high school teachers in the face. Fuck, I was some delighted with ’im after that. I was after messin up one of the classrooms upstairs during lunchtime, when I wasnt supposed to be up there. Teacher asked me about it, fuckin Mr. Spurrell. I told ’im I wasnt nowhere near upstairs during lunch. He didnt believe me. Got me down in this empty classroom and picked me up by the throat. Said if I ever lied to ’im again he’d wrap me nuts up around me chin. I dont know how word of it got back to Randy, but when he came down to the school that evening he just let fuckin drift, flattened Spurrell right there on the lobby floor. Fuckin wicked. He was dead sober too, Randy was.
Lyin there in the hospital bed thinkin about the old man like that when he called. I dont remember askin to have the phone hooked up.
—Are ya gonna live or what?
—I s’pose b’y. So they tells me.
—Sure you’ll hafta come to a Meeting with me sometime. When you’re ready of course.
—I just might.
—Your room is here still you know. You can lay low for a bit, make a comeback.
—Thanks Dad.
—What?
—I said thanks.
—Yes well…well I’ll be out now tomorrow or the next day, to see you. You heard about Val I s’pose?
—Yup.
—Very well then. You hang in there. You mind if I brings the missus, ahhh Anne-Marie, with me when I comes in?
—Not at all.
There’s the distant glow of the gathering morning, shadows stirrin in the corner of the room. A song, one of Val’s. “Hard to Believe.” But it’s slowed right down. The sound seems to come from everywhere, from nowhere. Shadows dancin.
Everybody tells me there’s a light out there, even the blind can see. I borrowed a needle and popped out my eyes I find it so hard to believe…
I lays me head back on the pillow and tries to absorb the song, tries to find something in there to take me through the horror, through the terror, the dread, the stench of death. I’m fully aware of the shadows, these dancers waltzin back and forth, shufflin across the pale yellow floor. This song was never a waltz. Visiting hours have not yet begun.
Dont let nobody tell you there’s a big love
Our time is but a fleeting little dream
They’ll tell you there’s a tunnel and a garden and a gate
I find it so hard, I’m tryin real hard to believe…
The dark and damp smell of old meat and topsoil wafting across me bed each time the dancers pass. The taller shadow turns with an empty bar glass outstretched towards me. Jim McNaughton’s distinctive stutter clouds the room:
—H-how about a r-rrrefill there Clayton? And, and b-buy one for yourself.
A deep, cavernous moan drowns in me throat. I tries to pull the blankets over me head, but the other dancer pins the bottoms of ’em tight to the railing. It’s Monica, this second shadow. Her face pale and loose, a nest of crawly bugs high on her left cheekbone. She smiles wide, one of her front teeth snapped clean off.
—Come on Clay. First two rules of rock-and-roll. Remember?
Evening again. And she’s there. She. Her. Right there at the foot of me bed. Is she? I cant trust me mind to believe it. But I’m tryin real hard. Her hair is cut short. I like it. My arm stretches out to her, reachin, tryna pull her to me, command the space that lingers so heavy between us. Impossible distance. She takes a step towards the bed and stops. She sees the cast. She fades out. I struggles to keep me eyes open, but I cant. Whatever this shit is they’ve given me, a little something to help me sleep. Something to help me die, the coma I’ve been craving.
I can smell her smell. Feel her in the bed beside me. We’re a good fit. I remembers learnin about the continents in school, how they’re all like little pieces of a puzzle, how they all came from the one big piece, long, long ago. The teacher cut Europe and North America out of an old map and fit them together, almost perfect. We fits together like that, me and her. A few new grooves, erosions and scars, some pieces even missing altogether, forged outta distance and separation—but still a decent fit. You could look at us and say yes, they definitely used to be one.
She’d be Europe I s’pose, for obvious reasons.
Dark now. Again. The nurse pops her head in to say that visiting hours are over. The woman in the corner, scribblin into a notebook, she nods to indicate that she’ll be stayin. The nurse winks at the woman in the corner. I dont know if that’s good or bad, or if I’m even awake. Or alive.
With my breakfast there’s a form to fill out, says Father James Molloy will be visiting patients in the afternoon and would I appreciate a visit? I checks the box to say yes, bring ’im on.
Brent calls, says he cant make it down to see me, not today. Not today. I dont care.
Dr. Susan Miller wants me to move downstairs to the psychiatric ward on Monday morning. Just for observation. I’ll be allowed out for a smoke, no more nicotine patch, no more crazy, fucked-up dreams. But I kinda like the messy dreams, come to think of it.
How did this happen?
First time I was caught drinkin, home in the house, I was just thirteen. I barely had a half-case in me. I wasnt drunk when I went to bed, but after an hour I woke up and walked into Randy’s room and pissed all over his bed. He was vicious, but what could he say? He had to smack me awake. I s’pose I was sleepwalkin. And I done it a thousand times since then too. Go to bed sober, but then it’s like what tiny drop of booze is in me system leaks into the wrong part of me brain when I lies down and I wakes up demented an hour later, screamin me head off and tryna walk through walls. One night the winter sure I pissed in Brent’s guitar case. He didnt like that.
But that musta been what happened, how I wound up here. I musta been sleepwalkin. I musta been demented. I left the roof and went downstairs to the couch. Next thing I knows I’m crossin Water Street towards the sounds of shouts and laughter. It’s startin to rain. I lurches down to the waterfront. There’s a bunch kickin a soccer ball back and forth. They’re foreigners, off the boats, dont speak English. There’s vodka, ice cold. They’re happy to see me. I’m tryna explain meself, tryna make sense, tryna connect, tryna say, say, say that I feels like tossin meself into the harbour. I pretends to jump. I mimes it. I slips and one of ’em catches me. A cheer goes up. One guy says, over and over:
—Clay-ton, you craaa-zy, you craaa-zy.
They’re laughin. At me. I cant make ’em understand, cant connect. I slugs back the vodka. It rains harder. Me hand latches onto the knife on me belt. I pulls it out and the smiles fall away. The circle spreads out. Her face reflected in the blade, murky and blurred, not lookin at me. I presses the knife, hard against the back of me wrist. The skin pops open, like one of her mangoes, the layers of flesh and muscle and ligament, the white flash of bone underneath, clear as day for a second, before the blood comes.
It pours outta me like water, surges down the tips of me fingers and splashes into the puddles beneath me feet.
I tries to take it back, get the moment back, squint me eyes and clench me gut and beg the heavens, beg God, the devil, anyone, to give me just the last five seconds from my own history to do over again. Five measly seconds. Me hand flops over, useless. I cant understand why it wont work. I holds me arm above me head to hinder the flow. The crack of thunder across the harbour. Blood streamin down me face, drenchin me shirt. The smell of me own blood. I spins back in the direction of the Hatchet, the apartment, the mattress. Curl up there and wait. I falls onto the road. Blood in me eyes. A river of blood, gushin towards a sewage grate. My blood. It swirls round and around till the drain can hold no more. It floods over and washes back down across the waterfront. The screechin of car tires. Blood. It swamps to the edge of the moorings, pickin up bits of kelp and chip bags and feathers and cigarette butts with it, sweepin up everything in its path. My blood. Teeming down over the side of the wharf. The freshly stained St. John’s harbour. The deathly, rusty red glow on the cliffs outside the Narrows. The rain peltin down on me face.
—Good God! Are you alright buddy?
—No I’m not. Not at all.
—Where’s the blood coming from?
—Everywhere. It’s everywhere.
It is her. Is it? She’s been downstairs, broughtup coffee. She’s bought me a new toothbrush, a package of socks, a book called Living Sober.
She’s brought pictures, shots of that house on Monkstown Road, the backyard with its stone walkway and the garden in full bloom. There’s a picture of a small, bright room lined with dark hardwood. There’s a table in the middle of the room, wooden with a blackened butter-knife scar near the centre. Cant be. Iz says she bought it at St. Michael’s Salvage on Bond Street. There’s a sheet of paper laid in the centre of the table. There’s words on the sheet. It says This can be your office!
She flips through the pictures and says things like:
—I was thinking we could take a run down to that new antique shop in Petty Harbour and see if we can get a deal on some pressback chairs. Wouldnt that be nice?
I nods yes. I shakes me head no, whenever it’s appropriate. There’s a sense that some disaster has been narrowly averted, just to make way for an even greater, better quality, more superior, more devastating one.
—Try to move your fingers Clayton.
I give it everything that’s in me, like me life depends on it. The ring finger gives a little twitch and her face lights right up.
—Yeaaaayyy, for you.
She slips her hand down under the sheets.
—And how about this? Still workin fine I hope?
There’s a twitch down there too. I nods me head yes.
Father James Molloy walks in, an old fella, pushin seventy for sure. Full battle regalia. He stops when he sees Isadora in the bed with me.
—Oh. Pardon me, pardon me. I was told you were on your own.
Thick, grand, refined Irish accent that sets me mind reelin, brings on this tidal wave of utter uselessness. Me eyes are fillin up.
—Are y’alright son?
Isadora smilin, ever so soft, so girlish beside me. Beside me. Now.
—It’s okay Father.
—I can always come again? I’m here for most of the day.
—That’d be nice, Father.
—Okay, so. I’ll stop in again on my way back around.
He pauses and looks back into the room before he heads off.
—Dont worry my son. God has a plan for you. Good day young lady.
—Good day.
She presses her mouth to mine. Her lips are dry and tight. She flicks her tongue into me mouth, but it feels foreign and I cant tell if she’s doin it because it feels right to her or if that’s just the way she thinks she should kiss me. I’m afraid to close me eyes. She pulls away, takes me good hand to her mouth and sucks me fingers into it. I makes a shaky attempt to withdraw, but she’s got a firm grip on me wrist. She guides me saliva-soaked hand down under the sheets, under the elastic of her panties, into her. Her.
—Do you think God has a plan for you Clayton Reid?
The flattened tangle of her pubic hair. That devious little bump. Slippery. Her heat. Her. Here. Now. In my hand.
—God? Fuck. I dont know, girl. I dont know…
P.S.
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About the author
Joel Thomas Hynes
Author Biography
JOEL THOMAS HYNES comes from a small town called Calvert along the Southern Shore of Newfoundland’s Avalon Peninsula. Hemmed in by spruce and rock, a collapsed fishery, a disgraced church—the usual fixings. Nothing much to do for fun but drink and fight and chase girls and fight and smash windows and run from the cops and get stoned and bust into the school after hours and put cigarettes out on each other and steal cars and get caught by the cops and go to court and blame it all on everybody else and start a band.
