Prerequisites for Sleep (3 page)

 

On Monday, I arrive early to review my documentation on the cake. With written instructions and diagrams, May and Lin will create additional inventory. As I walk by his office, Magnus calls out to me. He is sitting at his desk, which is unusual, because Magnus is too hyper to sit still. Outside, it is raining and water is dripping from my jacket. I wipe away a drop that lands on my cheek and push my hood back.

“Do you think you can design an elephant?” he asks.

I take a moment to think. “Sitting down would be best.”

“Yes, sitting down is best. Can it be done?”

“Sure, why not?”

At the drafting table, doodling some rough elephants, I hope I'm not getting too cocky. This could prove to be much harder than a cake. Magnus comes by and looks at my sketches. “This elephant that you're making, what colour nylon should I order?”

“Pink.”

“Why pink?” he says, wrinkling his nose so that he looks like an animated rabbit.

“Haven't you ever heard of pink elephants?”

“No.”

“They're an illusion. When someone has too much to drink, they begin to see things that aren't there, like blue mice and pink elephants. If you really want some publicity, you could put one up at the top of the Don Valley where the highways all merge, and have banners that read
DON'T DRINK AND DRIVE
.”

He looks at me like I am speaking a foreign language.

 

After work, I go to Toys “R” Us at the mall. The stuffed animal section is next to the baby products, just past bikes and outdoor toys. A little boy is riding a big-wheel trike up the aisle. His bum is only inches off the floor while his feet man the pedals on the large front tire. The noise rumbles through the store.

I pick up a small elephant that is white with contrasting blue striped fabric on the undersides of its ears and the pads of its feet. Its trunk is up and I decide to buy it. I've read somewhere that elephants with their trunks up are lucky.

When Andy comes home from work he points to the elephant sitting on our dresser. “What's this?” He tosses his cooking whites into the laundry basket. I catch a whiff of someone else's menu. Garlic and onions and curry, and the lingering smell of cooking oil — too much oil. Andy would never overuse cooking oil in his own creations. “Is there something you want to tell me?” His eyes light up, and he delivers a grin that says he could handle it if I were to spring certain news.

“It's my inspiration. I'm making a twenty-five-foot pink elephant.”

“Hey,” he laughs, “you could put it next to the highway during the holidays with a
DON'T DRINK AND DRIVE
banner.”

“That's exactly what I said, but Magnus didn't get it. He didn't understand the connotation, even after I explained it.”

“Did you tell him it would make the news?”

“I tried, but he has an entirely different thought process; and I don't think pro bono is his style.”

 

On Thursday, Joanne seeks me out to give me my pay. She works an hour a day in the shop, taking care of the money and the books. She is the opposite of Magnus, serious and tense with unruly brown hair. Shadowed crescents below her eyes give her a hollow look, although overall, she is an attractive woman. With makeup and hot rollers, she would be beautiful. I heard her tell Nancy the story of how Magnus swept her off her feet in a balloon when she was backpacking with friends through Europe.

“Did you like the cake?” I ask when she hands me an envelope.

“I like the idea of the cake,” she says. “It will be good for business.”

Forcing a smile, I thank her for my pay and decide to save any future questions for Zoe, who brings me pictures and tells me that I should make them into inflatables. They all look the same, triangle bodies with big eyes. She has the basic shape right — inflatables need large bottoms.

 

The elephant is coming along nicely, although I lie awake at night correcting design flaws. I make a small-scale model, stuffed with cotton fluff, to test a pattern I drafted on graph paper. Magnus runs a low-tech shop, so to create the full-scale version I have to grid up the pattern manually. This requires taping together large pieces of heavy brown paper and using bricks and boards to hold it flat because it constantly wants to curl. The second step is measuring and drawing the lines to create giant graph paper. Afterwards there is the process of filling in the large boxes with the same information that is on my miniature version. It's not difficult, only time-consuming and hard on the knees and neck. I plug away at it while humming the jingle from an old cereal commercial. Pink elephants, pink, pink elephants, lots of pink elephants…

Magnus, antsy as he is, checks on my progress about thirty times a day. He crouches on his haunches a couple of feet from where I am trying to work.

“So when do I get that balloon ride?” I keep trying to make conversation because if I don't, he just sits there watching me with his happy-Grinch grin.

“When you finish your elephant.”

“Is that a promise?”

“I give you my word.”

“Good, an incentive plan. If I don't like it, you'll have to come up with different rewards for future projects. How about cash bonuses?”

“You'll like it.”

“Company shares?”

“You are such a dreamer.”

“Ah, but you like my dreams because I dream in 3
D
.”

“Stop dreaming and build your elephant.” He laughs as he gets up and walks away.

 

May and Lin are making a cake, so I surround myself with pink nylon and sew the elephant on my own. A cylinder-shaped baffle runs through the centre and reinforcements are necessary on the trunk and neck. For contrast, I make the insides of the ears and the toenails purple. I'm glad to be off my knees and the job goes quickly.

 

“I wish you didn't have to work today,” I say to Andy over an apple-crêpe breakfast. “Once I attach all the loops, we're going to inflate my elephant.”

“Take the video camera; we'll watch it as soon as I get home. We can have popcorn to celebrate. I'll pick up the candy-coated stuff you like from Kernels.”

Later, May operates the video camera so I can see the elephant inflate at actual size. Magnus connects the fan and turns it on. The body begins to unfold, taking shape like an embryo developing its parts. My stomach clenches when the head and trunk emerge and I worry about pressure on the seams of the neck and gusset. In less than two minutes, the large ears snap into place and my pachyderm is sitting large and pink before me — smiling.

Magnus is pleased. “Looks excellent,” he says, walking around and surveying the body from all angles. “Nice big ears for banners. And you gave him a tail.”

“Her. I gave her a tail. Can't imagine a pink elephant being a him.”

“Perhaps you wish to name her.”

“Perhaps.”

“Come, let's check to see how she is holding up.”

Undoing the back zipper, we crawl inside and stand up. The fan hums and cool air brushes my skin. Magnus closes the zipper and pulls on the baffle that stretches from the elephant's neck to the canvas base, then inspects the flat-felled seams of the outer walls.

“You don't make mistakes,” he says. That little-boy look is on his face.

“I do. I make hundreds. I just make them over and over in my head. I try to think things through before I jump in.”

Without warning he wraps me in his arms and kisses me. His breath smells like Juicy Fruit. I try to recall if I have ever seen him chew gum. He kisses me again, this time it is long and passionate. I blink and struggle to focus. Everything around me is pink. I think about Andy at work, not existing among someone else's creations, and about drifting in a balloon. I reach out and try to touch something real. There is no one there to pull me back.

 

It rained through the night and early morning, tearing the petals from the lilies in the garden. They lay on the ground like pieces of satin tinged with rust. The sky looked bruised, as if it had more crying to do. Anita stood in the kitchen, looking out at the day through the screen of the back door. The thin lines of mesh made everything appear slightly out of focus.

“Some people believe that it is good luck to have rain on your wedding day,” Judith said cheerfully.

Anita poured coffee into her favourite mug, a black one with a large white
A
on the side and a chip in the rim, then sat down at the table next to her aunt. Lately, she thought of her aunt as Saint Judith, Saint Jude for short. What else could she be after taking on the responsibility of raising Anita when her mother and father died? Judith had given up the career of an overseas correspondent to become a weekly columnist and an instant parent. In fourteen years, Anita had never heard her aunt complain. Any regrets, if she had them, were not voiced.

“Kevin's mother has rented enough tents to create an upscale refugee camp,” Anita said, scooping two heaping teaspoons of sugar into her coffee.

“It is nice of the Sinclairs to host the wedding,” Judith ventured. “Kevin's a dear, but you know we would have never been able to put on a spread for that family. Oh, they are always pleasant to everyone and not snobby by any means, but they are used to certain things. Do me a favour, don't get so used to certain things that you won't eat my macaroni and cheese casserole.”

“Well, Kevin is her only child,” Anita said. “Some women like taking care of such details. I'm not one of them. The things I decided to take care of are more than enough wedding details for me. And I don't think you have to worry about the casserole. It's still my favourite.” The spoon, hitting the mug as she stirred, underlined her words with porcelain-steel music.

“I know what you mean about wedding details,” said Judith. “They aren't my forte, that's for sure.”

“Do you ever wish that you had married?” Anita said. She searched her aunt's face as she posed the question. Up until she was sixteen, Anita would look for her mother in Judith's face, but the more she had looked the more she noticed the differences between the two sisters. What she saw these days was that the years had been good to Judith. Her mother, no longer accumulating time, existed only in the photo albums and old videos stored in the hall closet.

“Oh, I think if the right person had come along, I would have married,” said Judith, “but who's to say that the right person can't still show up? Fifty-two is not that old, you know.” Her voice shifted and she leaned back in the kitchen chair to look directly at her niece. “Don't go thinking that you're the reason I didn't get married. I had plenty of offers, just none that I could live with.”

 

Anita brushed her teeth and stepped into the shower, surveying her body as she adjusted the water temperature. She had put on a few pounds since they announced the engagement, but not a noticeable amount. At her final fitting last week, the dress was perfect. How lucky that she had been able to find one she liked that was on sale.

It was at a little boutique that Kevin's mother had recommended, located in Barberry Market, an area of old stone houses that had been turned into upscale businesses. The signs hanging from each were understated and catered to a clientele that didn't need to be shouted at. Anita drove down with Judith one afternoon, thinking they would just look. They found a parking spot on the other side of a street split by a median with a couple of benches and some annual beds. It was the end of April and the empty gardens filled the air with an organic smell of damp soil.

They looked at several dresses, but Anita kept coming back to the same one. “Go ahead, try it on,” the woman said, unzipping the clear plastic so the gown could be viewed better.

Her reflection: auburn hair, freckled skin, white dress, shouted at her without words. Was she ready for this? She didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

“It suits you,” Judith said.

“This particular gown is part of a special promotion,” the salesclerk said. “Reduced because of the arrival of new stock.”

Today that special promotion was hanging on the back of her bedroom door.

 

They met the rest of the girls at the beauty salon at eleven, Anita's friends Ingrid and Wendy, and Kevin's cousin Michelle.

Ingrid greeted them with exaggerated hugs and kisses that made Anita feel like a plush toy that had been returned after an unplanned absence. “You do realize,” Ingrid teased, “that by this time tomorrow you will no longer be a single entity but part of a pair.”

Wendy laughed. “Like shoes.”

“Or salt and pepper shakers,” said Michelle.

“I don't know if I should be jealous or relieved,” said Ingrid.

By the time they left the salon, the sky was clear, the sidewalks nothing but strips of glare. Anita wondered whether or not this had any bearing on her luck, now that both the sun and the rain had made an appearance on her wedding day.

“Just in time for photos,” Judith said. Leave it to Judith to say the right thing.

Judith excelled at saying the right thing. After the funeral, she and Anita had returned to the house, which was empty for the first time in days. Someone had tidied up, depriving them of the much-needed busywork. Anita flopped down on the sofa, no longer feeling like the preteen who, just the previous week, had gone to a sleepover with her friends. She had returned the following morning to find a police car waiting in the driveway. Anita resented the loss of her childhood almost as much as she resented her absent mother and father and the stoned kid who ran the red light. Judith came in and sat down next to her. “I always wanted to learn how to play one of those things,” she said, pointing to the Nintendo system on the shelf below the
TV
. “How 'bout we order a pizza and you can teach me?”

That night they slowly allowed themselves to laugh and yell at the characters that jumped across the television screen, and then to slip into a realm where silliness prevailed. Afterwards they slept, waking late the following day with a new understanding of the roles they had inherited in each other's lives, knowing that anything either one of them did from now on would affect the other.

 

Judith gave her away. That was something that Anita had insisted on and Kevin agreed. It was only right. They walked down the aisle arm in arm amidst harp music and the rustle of satin and silk, neither one shaking or teary-eyed, no mention of what Anita's mother or father might have felt. There was no need to; they had stopped dwelling on the past years before.

“Kevin's uncle Gerald would be glad to walk you down the aisle,” his mother had suggested, along with several other options, all male, as dictated by tradition. His mother was not one for altering institutions. But she was also not one for fighting small battles, so in the end she agreed.

Mrs. Sinclair liked Anita and thought of her as hard-working and smart, not some spoiled bimbo who couldn't see past her next visit to the spa. Although she had always been well-off, the older woman had learned the same lessons that Anita had at an early age; that nothing was to be taken for granted, and that important things can disappear, the way her brother had disappeared into the river; and afterwards, the way her mother had disappeared into the bottle. Of all the girls that Kevin had been involved with, Anita had the most substance. The least she could do for the girl was give her a beautiful wedding. And a beautiful wedding dress, for that matter; no one needed to know of the arrangement made between her and the owner of the boutique.

 

“I think I'm switching to autopilot,” Kevin whispered in her ear partway through the receiving line.

Anita smiled. She could think of nothing better than sitting down and putting her feet up. “Tell me again why we didn't elope,” she whispered back, while waiting for his grandfather to close the gap in the stream of people. Kevin laughed and bent to kiss her enthusiastically on the mouth. The room burst into a round of applause.

“Okay, break it up,” said Kevin's grandfather, leaning forward to peck Anita on the cheek.

Next in line was Richard. His face, like a statue with stone eyes and a rigid jaw, moved towards her. “Will you be going by Mrs. Sinclair now, or do you intend to keep your own name?” His question surprised her.

 

At dinner, Judith made a speech that was both happy and sad. She talked about their life together and about new beginnings, the one they undertook fourteen years earlier and the one that Anita and Kevin were now embarking on. “I believe that Anita can manage anything that comes her way, including you, Kevin,” she quipped, a statement that was followed by laughter, along with whoops and whistles from Kevin's friends.

The rest of the day went off without a hitch. Everyone would remember it as a lovely event. Mrs. Sinclair had taken their wishes and transformed them into a choreographed work of art. Anita tried to imagine how Kevin's mother would use those skills on the many committees and boards that she was a member of.

She was curled up in the king-size bed next to Kevin. He had slipped quickly into sleep after they had made love. To her, sleep didn't arrive as easily so she slid out from under the covers and pulled on the complimentary terry robe. The hotel room was on the top floor, overlooking the harbour. A fog rolled above the water, looking pinkish-yellow from city lights that never allow darkness to settle or stars to shine. Standing in the window, Anita continued to revisit the day in her thoughts. For her this was a nightly habit, rehashing the events of her life in twenty-four-hour segments, one of her prerequisites for sleep.

Richard had come to the wedding. Richard, who got through university the way she did, on part-time jobs and student loans, barely making ends meet as he worked his way towards being a heart specialist. She knew he would be excellent; he had already filled a hole in hers.

“It's up to you,” he had said to her, “but I think you should go. Why stay home all alone when you can go to a party and enjoy yourself?”

So she decided to go, taking transit to the closest intersection, then walking the rest of the way. The music could be heard all the way down the street, mostly bass, turned up and throbbing like a heart. It started to rain and she was without an umbrella, so she ran. A little later, when she was standing in a crowd, chatting and sipping a rum and Coke, she felt two hands rest on her shoulders and heard a voice from behind. “Even soggy, you're a sight for sore eyes.”

That night with Kevin was a fluke. Who would have thought they would run into each other at a party that Richard couldn't attend because he had to work? She and Kevin had been together several years earlier, the summer she was eighteen. No commitments; there were universities to attend and careers to secure. Kevin was heading off to an Ivy League college in the States to study business, while Anita had been accepted into the chemistry programs of three top local universities and had picked the one closest to home. Sex was something that had happened between them. It happened again, aided by memories and alcohol.

There was the baby to think about. She had been on antibiotics at the time, for an ear infection. A warning came with her birth control pills. She had read it only once in her teens when she first started taking the oral contraceptives. She considered an abortion, discussed the option with her doctor. He told her she needed to make a decision quickly, but she let the deadline pass. It wasn't that she was religious or that she thought it was wrong. Some days it seemed perfectly right; other days, not right for her.

The child could belong to either of them; both had similar features. Kevin was so excited when she told him. “We'll get married,” he said. “I hope it's a girl.”

Anita had weighed her options and made her decision. It was a decision she would consider every time she handed over her baby to the nanny that Kevin's mother offered to procure, and when she returned to university to get her master's debt-free. Later she would consider it again when her daughter walked down the aisle as flower girl at Judith's wedding and upon seeing a photo announcing that Richard had become Head of Cardiology at St. Michael's Hospital. She would consider it every night for the rest of her life. This was something she knew for a fact while standing in the window watching the shoreline become obscure.