Watch How We Walk (7 page)

Louisa emerged tentatively from the washroom, as though she'd been listening at the door for my mother to leave. I handed her back her sweatshirt and pants and pulled the curtain all the way around my bed and tugged the blanket over my head.

I trembled under the scratchy, coarse covers. I didn't know what had happened to me, what was real and what people were making up, and I was scared of my own mother. I didn't want to experience any more of her raw, confusing unhappiness. It made me panic. I felt like I could sleep for days.

Can you tell me a story? Like you used to?

You give up too easily.

Please?

Fine. Just this once. Once upon a time, we could fly.

12

ON SATURDAY MORNING, EMILY GOES
to the hardware store with her father. She hardly ever gets to go because he usually picks up his supplies when she's at school, so she jumps at the chance to tag along and visit the toy section. She assumes he doesn't want any talking in the car, which is fine with her, so she reads from
Circus World
on the drive into town.

The shop smells old and dusty and it's cluttered, but Emily still likes it. You never know what you might see there — a hard-to-find Star Wars action figure, doll clothes so old that the hippie outfits are becoming trendy again, and sometimes they even stock live tropical fish. Just as she reaches the farthest corner of the store, the pet section, someone bellows at her dad. She heads back to the aisle with the coils of cords and wires to see who it is.

— Ah, well, will you look at that — it's Jim Morrow! Didn't recognize you there, buddy!

— Hello, Mr. Patton. How are you keeping?

It's Carli and Sally's dad, from next door, though he doesn't live there anymore. Emily stops at the end of the row, pretending to inspect some rolls of red and blue wire.

— Call me Carl. And maybe I should call you Brother Jim, eh there, Brother Jim, how's the Lord these days? Mr. Patton laughs long and loud and looks around to see who else is listening. The other customers smirk or look away.

— Almost didn't recognize you there, Jim, without your tie on, and without that briefcase full of
Watchtower
s!

A teenage boy with thick glasses and long hair snickers from behind the cash register. Emily's dad's face turns red. He narrows his brown eyes, and Emily's stomach knots and burns. She looks down at her hands and picks at the hangnail on her thumb. It feels good to tear off bits of dry skin there. It bleeds a little bead of crimson and she pops her thumb into her mouth.

— I'm just joking with you there, Brother Jim, don't be sore. How's that wife of yours?

Emily wonders what they would look like from high above, if she were a funambulist. She puts one foot perfectly in front of the other, over and over, along the crack in the tiles on the floor until she is standing next to her father. From a hundred meters above them, she would see tall, skinny Mr. Patton, with his half-bald head and his lopsided red nose, leaning toward her father and swaying with laughter, and her dad too, stocky and not as tall, putting his hands in his pockets and angling his shoulders away.

— Fine. We're all fine. He turns his back to Mr. Patton and nods sharply.

— Let's go, Emily. They don't have the cables I need.

EMILY CAN SMELL HER MOM'S
instant coffee when they get home. Even though she would rather stay home all day and watch cartoons and read, she is going out in service with Uncle Tyler. Lenora is supposed to come too, but she overslept and promises to go on Sunday instead.

In the kitchen, her mom sits slumped at the table and Uncle Tyler leans against the fridge. The kettle screeches and Emily jumps. Her mom rubs her temples, sighs, and turns off the burner.

— Okay kiddo, looks like it's just you and me today, let's go.

Uncle Tyler's coat and suit jacket are slung over one shoulder and his tie is loosened. His hair curls over the collar of his shirt. Emily frowns. She knows that people from the Hall already think his appearance is inappropriate; their parents argue, debating whether or not they should tell him what the other brothers and sisters say about him. He might get in trouble with the elders if he doesn't start being more careful, but he doesn't care.

Emily has packed her Hall purse with her Bible, the most recent issues of
Awake!
and
The Watchtower
, and some back issues, which they can place with interested people for free. The new issues are two for a dollar, which is called a contribution
.
She has also hidden a Trixie Belden mystery under her Bible. She stayed up late reading it under her blankets with a flashlight, and she wants to find out what happens next. Uncle Tyler won't tell on her; he's not like that. She pulls her coat on and hops from one foot to the other, excited but nervous at the prospect of an afternoon with her uncle. She knows that going out in service with him is not going to be like when she goes door to door with her dad, who's always so serious, mad at her, or disappointed that she isn't better at preaching to strangers. Lenora is way better at it; her voice never shakes and her face doesn't turn bright red.

But going out in service with Uncle Tyler makes her feel like she is in trouble in a different way. She knows her dad didn't want her to go. Her parents argued about it the night before.

— I don't trust that he'll be a good influence on the girls, or that he'll set the proper example, Vivian.

— Of course he will. Just because he's young and likes to joke around doesn't mean he doesn't take the Truth seriously. They'll be fine. It'll be good for them to spend some more time with their uncle.

Emily is disappointed that Lenora isn't coming, and jealous that she can stay home whenever she wants — Emily never has any choice in what she can do — but secretly she's glad she'll get Uncle Tyler all to herself. He's never in a bad mood and, more importantly, he understands her. For example, if they're supposed to call on a house where one of her classmates lives, he'll let her wait in the car instead, lying down in the back seat with her book, or they'll skip that address entirely. He never tells her that she should be stronger or try harder or Witness more at school; he just lets her relax.

Even though he seems to always be on the verge of getting in trouble, she's missed him lately. Things are more fun when he's around, like at the meetings when he gives her silly notes when her parents aren't looking. Once, last year, he made her give him her Hall purse at the break. Besides her Bible,
Watchtower
, and songbook, she had also snuck another Trixie Belden mystery with her, and she didn't want to get caught. Not that she would read it at the Hall; only in the car on the way there, or afterwards. She just couldn't put it down. Sometimes, while her dad would chat with the elders after a meeting, she'd sneak out to the cold unlocked car and read her novel by the interior light, with the door ajar. But she trusted her uncle, and she handed over her Hall purse. He told her not to look in it until after the meeting, and she didn't, but she was unable to listen to the brothers' talks at all for that hour, since she was busy squirming in her chair, trying to guess what he put in her bag. It turned out to be a treasure map that he drew himself — a map of the car, with an arrow that pointed to the sun visor. When Emily pulled that down, she found a note that said to look under the floor mats — three of them concealed only twigs and pebbles and gum wrappers but under the fourth was a note telling her to look where “there were no mittens.” It didn't take her long to find the bag of chips — dill pickle, her favourite — in the glove compartment.

EMILY'S MOM IS STILL IN
her housecoat. Her hair is even bigger and fuzzier than usual, and she stills has smears of yesterday's dark blue eyeliner under her eyes. She's staying home with Lenora while their father is out working on another house. She makes sure Emily has her hat and mitts with her, but fortunately doesn't check her bag. When she stirs her instant coffee, the spoon clangs like a bell, shrill and loud.

— How come you're not coming, Mom? Emily knows she won't get in trouble for asking a question like this, because her uncle Tyler is here and she never gets in trouble in front of company.

— I'm not feeling well. I'll take Lenora out tomorrow, don't worry. She takes a long slurp and looks at Uncle Tyler.

— I thought you were getting your hair cut yesterday. Look at it, it's way too long. Emily's mom frowns, chews at her lip.

— Sister Bulchinsky was going on about it after the meeting the other night to anyone who would listen. It's embarrassing.

Uncle Tyler runs his fingers through his curls, stretches them out.

— Almost enough for a ponytail. What would Sister Bulchinsky say then?

Emily's mom sighs and shrugs.

— Everyone says it's immodest. Don't cause trouble. Try to set a good example for your nieces.

— Relax, would you? I forgot. I'll get it cut this week. He winks at Emily.

— Let's hit the road, kiddo.

Her uncle likes cars, and has had a different one every year or two, mostly older ones that he and his friends fix up, and his latest one is unlike any she's ever seen. The front half looks like a car and the back looks like a pickup truck. It's called an El Camino. Uncle Tyler keeps it spotless and shiny and she squints her eyes at the bright blueness of it. He starts the car, puts on his sunglasses, and turns up the radio as the car crunches down the driveway. They lurch onto the road and the tires squeal. Emily cringes and turns to look back. Her mom is shaking her head between the panels of green floral curtains.

Uncle Tyler turns the volume up and nods his head to the music, driving faster than her father would. In fact, he's nothing like Emily's dad. He's younger, and is more like a big brother than a grown-up like her parents. He's more like Lenora, someone Emily looks up to, but they both do things that make her insides clench up and then she can't sleep very well. Neither has done anything so bad that the elders have reproved them, but small things that she knows mean something bigger, like Lenora having worldly friends, or her uncle growing his hair long. One of them is not so bad, but lots of them added together turn into trouble.

Uncle Tyler drives with one hand on the steering wheel and drums on the seat to the music with his other hand.

— You like The Cult, kiddo?

Emily doesn't know what to say. Occult means the devil, Satan, Jehovah God's biggest enemy. If you are interested in the occult, you can get demonized, just like people who use Ouija boards, just like Brother Richard's house.

He turns the radio down slightly.

— Hey, relax, I'm just kidding. I know you don't listen to this stuff. I'm just teasing. Forget it.

Emily looks out the window. They pass the street the Kingdom Hall is on.

— We're supposed to go that way. She points back toward the street that they missed.

— I know. I thought we'd go for some ice cream first. We have lots of time before the service meeting.

The service meeting is always short, only about fifteen minutes, and is usually held at the Kingdom Hall, though sometimes it's at a brother's home, in his kitchen or rec room. Today it's at the Hall, and the elder will go over the main points to use when they go door to door, and then they'll organize who goes in whose car. Some brothers and sisters don't have cars of their own, or their cars are in such poor shape that it isn't appropriate to use them in service
.
They'll also find out which territory they're going to be working in today. Emily knows it is wrong, but always hopes for a territory as far from her school as possible.

Emily's dad hardly ever lets them go for ice cream when they go out in service, except maybe once in the summer, and only after they were done, after they'd marked their hours down on the time slips.

They aren't allowed to listen to the radio out in service either, unless her dad has to check the weather, but no music. No worldly
music, that's for sure. Her uncle's music is loud and fast, maybe even heavy metal
.
At one of the Thursday night meetings last month, the elders explained that if you play these songs backwards, you hear messages from the devil. They tell you to kill your mother, or commit fornication, or do drugs. Some kids in the States killed themselves after listening to Black Sabbath. It's called backward masking, and if you listen to it, even by accident, you can become demonized. Black Sabbath and Judas Priest are the worst of all.

— You like this song, kiddo? It's called ‘Rain.' Uncle Tyler hums along.

—
Here comes the rain
. . .

— It's okay, I guess. She lets her breath out carefully. It doesn't sound Satanic, they're only singing about the rain, and Jehovah makes the rain, and all natural things, so it must be all right.

— Actually, your sister loaned me this tape. She's a big fan. Her uncle looks over at her.

— Really?

— Really. She has pretty good taste in music.

Emily didn't know that Uncle Tyler and Lenora hung out together without her, trading tapes and skipping going out in service. And talking about her probably, since she wasn't invited.

— What do you think of her new hair-do? Wild, huh? She's turning out to be pretty cool.

— I guess so. Emily looks out the window, seeing nothing.

— Hey. Cheer up. What's the matter?

— Nothing. She turns away.

— Are you sure?

Emily forces herself to look over at Uncle Tyler and smile. It feels ridiculous and plastic. How can he even believe her?