Flight of Aquavit (17 page)

open windows my cursor was hiding in. I finally

decided to handle the onslaught on a first-come

first-serve basis, which only seemed logical. I

found my way back to the original screen and

typed in “hi.” I waited for a moment, but based on

the script since I’d been greeted so warmly, several

more chatters had joined the room and apparently

Brutus had long been forgotten. Oh well, I had sev-

eral cyber suitors who were willing to talk to me. I

found my way back to Looking for Luv. Beneath

“How r u?” was the cryptic message: “Looking for

Luv has left the room or is ignoring you.” Huh?

No bother, I always had Dandy Randy. I clicked on

his screen. After his opener, “Busy?” was a line say-

Anthony Bidulka — 131

ing “Are u there?” followed by “Where r u?” fol-

lowed by a testy-sounding “Hello????????” and a

downright irritated sounding “Fine, buddy” and

then the line telling me “Dandy Randy has left the

room or is ignoring you.” I thought about chang-

ing my bio to include something about looking for

someone with patience. Surprisingly the message

box from Can Do in Canwood was without any

remonstrations or indications of abandonment. I

warily typed in “hi.” Fifteen seconds later came

the answer: “Stats?” I wasn’t exactly sure what

Can Do in Canwood was looking for so I told him

I was a professional man in my early thirties, had

a dog and owned my own house. That certainly

sounded desirable to me. Forty-five seconds

passed. Nothing. It was as if he was waiting for

more. I told him I drove a convertible.

“Can Do in Canwood has left the room or is

ignoring you.”

Grrrrr.

This was pissing me off.

After the flurry of attention, I was left with

only one window open on my screen, the one for

the main chat room, and they were still talking

about that damned movie. I felt as if I’d been

cyber-dumped. I didn’t put out whatever they’d

been looking for so I’d been pushed aside and

ignored like a gay man wearing acid-wash jeans at

a circuit party. Well, I wasn’t about to take it sitting

down. I searched the options available to me from

the menu bar and discovered how to initiate my

own private chat. I put in a call to Mr. Can Do in

Canwood.

132 — F l i g h t o f A q u av i t

“Is something wrong?” I typed furiously.

“Stats?” was the trite response. Had he forgot-

ten me already?

“What do you mean? What stats do you

want?”

The reply came after thirty seconds. “I’m 35,

brown hair/green eyes; 6/1, 195 lbs, 6.5 in.

Looking for r/t.”

Ahhhhhhh, I said to myself as a dawning reve-

lation hit my brain. He wasn’t interested in know-

ing whether I could afford a mortgage or liked ani-

mals. I typed back, “What is r/t?”

“Real time…like get together in the flesh right

now.”

“Thanks.”

“Newbie?”

“Yup.”

“Good luck.”

“Thanks.”

“Can Do in Canwood has left the room or is

ignoring you.”

It was after 3 a.m. when I dragged myself and my

four-legged friends from the den to the bedroom.

Time in the Saskatchewan gay chat room had

passed amazingly quickly. SunLover never

showed up but I had used the time learning chat

room protocol and figured out much of the lingo.

No one would call me a newbie again.

When I woke, later than usual, on Friday

morning, I felt bleary-eyed and muddle-headed. If

I didn’t know better I’d have sworn I had a hang-

Anthony Bidulka — 133

over. Through the two sets of windows and

French doors just beyond the foot of my bed I

could see fat snowflakes floating down from a

whitewashed sky, alighting on tree branches like

translucent fairies. Barbra, as was her habit, was

curled up near my feet, satisfied that she’d fooled

me once again and slept on my bed rather than

her own, a doughy looking cushion in one corner

of the room. Brutus was no where to be seen. I

knew where he was though. Every time he came

for a sleepover he did the same thing. Although

schnauzers aren’t known for great displays of

slobbering affection, they do possess strong feel-

ings of attachment and loyalty. And, true to form,

twenty-kilogram Brutus, stoic and proud, was

desperately missing Kelly and Errall. He began

each night on the floor by the bed, but soon after

lights out he’d pad his way silently out of the bed-

room, down the hall, through the living room and

into the foyer. There he’d lie down by the front

door on the off chance that sometime during the

night his owners would come by to retrieve him.

I’d never had him long enough to break him of

this habit and I saw no reason to try.

I nudged Barbra with my foot and she opened

her eyes but otherwise remained absolutely still. I

slipped out from under the warm covers and

trudged to a nearby armchair to retrieve my thick

winter housecoat, a big wooly thing covered with

a snowflake design. Barbra hopped off the bed

and I let her out the French doors, gave myself a

cursory glance in the mirror and winced appropri-

ately at the less than beautiful sight. Brutus, who

134 — F l i g h t o f A q u av i t

had obviously heard the opening and closing of

the door, came into the room expectantly. I let him

out too and watched Barbra greet him with a

snowflake-covered snout.

In the kitchen I set the coffee then scurried out

the front door to fetch the newspaper. Back in the

kitchen I poured dog food into metal dishes on the

floor and let in the two pooches who were now at

the back door looking in with hungry desire but

too proud to bark or whine. They devoured

breakfast with gentility while I poured my coffee.

I was almost in my seat when it hit me.

Mother.

Where was she?

Where were the spitting bacon and too-weak

coffee and the pound cake that weighed a ton?

Suddenly a feeling of dread overcame me.

Something was terribly wrong. I could feel doom

as certainly as I could feel wind in my hair or rain

on my head. I dropped my coffee cup on the

island counter, almost spilling its contents over

the
StarPhoenix
and rushed to the door of my

moth…of the guestroom. It was shut, just as it had

been last night. I put my hand on the door handle,

the metal felt cold to my touch. Instead of opening

the door I raised my other hand and knocked. At

first quietly and then more insistently. Nothing.

Terrible thoughts stampeded into my brain like

ants to an anthill. Although I certainly wasn’t an

expert on my mother’s habits, in the couple of

days she’d been in my home, I knew for certain

that she was not a late sleeper. So why would she

still be in her bed? Was she…ill?

Anthony Bidulka — 135

I turned the handle downward and pushed

open the door. The bed was to my immediate

right. And it was empty. Empty and made up, as

if it hadn’t been slept in.

Damn! Why didn’t I open the door when I’d

checked on her last night? Just to be sure she was

there and safe and snug in her bed. But why

would I? She wasn’t a child and I wasn’t her par-

ent. I had no reason to expect she wasn’t there. It

was late when I’d gotten in, she’d been alone all

night after a horrible shopping expedition—guilt,

guilt, guilt—of course she’d gone to bed, what else

would she do? But now she was gone. Was she

angry I hadn’t stayed for dinner—or supper or

whatever you wanted to call it—and had gone

back home to the farm to spend Christmas by her-

self? But no. Her suitcase was in the corner of the

room next to her collection of demure shoes. I

checked the guest bathroom. Empty. Living room

and laundry room. Same thing. By now the dogs

had joined the search but were having as little luck

as I was. As I made my way through every room

and nook and cranny of the house I began to call

out for her but she never answered back. Back in

the kitchen I found the keys to her van in the bowl

where she’d taken to leaving them. So she hadn’t

gone for a drive. What was left?

In desperate need of caffeine, I threw out the

cold cup I’d poured earlier and replenished it with

some hot stuff. I leaned against the kitchen island

and stared into space trying to figure out the mys-

tery of my mother’s disappearance. Handy that I

was a detective. As minutes crawled by I began to

136 — F l i g h t o f A q u av i t

suspect foul play. Had my mother been abducted?

But why? Who would want a sixtyish, bossy

Ukrainian woman from Howell, Saskatchewan? Or

did this have something to do with me and the case

I was working on? Had I unconsciously put my

own mother in danger? Did this have something to

do with the tail from last night or the ambush at the

landfill? It all sounded too incredible. I emptied my

cup and poured more. I needed the stimulant to

clear my brain. There had to be a good explanation.

Maybe she’d gone for a walk? Unlikely. She didn’t

strike me as a walker. Had she gone to visit a neigh-

bour? I could believe she was a chatty, visit-the-

neighbour sort of person, but she’d only just

arrived on Tuesday. She didn’t know any of the

neighbours. However I had mentioned one neigh-

bour to her—just in passing—Sereena.

Sereena?

Despite the dire circumstances I found myself

laughing. Not only is Sereena Smith not a chatty,

visit-the-neighbour type of person, she and my

mother could never in a million years hit it off.

Sereena is a complex, fantastical creature with a

mythical past that no one person seems to know

the whole of. How she ended up in a little house

next to mine on an unremarkable street in

Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, I’m not quite sure.

Forty, maybe fifty, she’s an imperfect, damaged,

raving beauty. She lives her life without sham or

deception and that’s what I like about her. And, I

was pretty sure, that when she and my mother

met, they would instantly despise one another.

Yet, as impossible as it sounded, it was my only

Anthony Bidulka — 137

option at the moment. I picked up the cordless

handset of my kitchen phone and dialled my

neighbour’s number.

“Yes?” was her greeting.

“Sereena, it’s Russell.”

“You’re tense.” Intuitive too.

“I know this is going to sound preposterous,

but my mother isn’t over there, is she?”

The line was quiet and I wondered if I’d lost

the connection.

“Sereena?”

“Oh,” she said, “did you actually expect an

answer?”

“Okay, okay, I didn’t think so.”

“Is something wrong?”

“When I woke up this morning, she was gone.

All her stuff and her van are still here, but she

isn’t. I’m really worried.”

“Maybe she took a walk.”

“I don’t think so. It’s too cold outside for a

leisurely walk.”

And just then, through the back door came my

mother, bundled up in Thinsulate.

“Uh, never mind,” I said and hung up.

“I start breakfast den?” were the first words

out of her mouth.

“Mom! Where were you?”

“Eggs, ya?”

Was this her trying to elude my questions?

“Where were you? I was worried.”

“Out valking. Deed you haf goot garden dis

year? My tomatoes vere so bad, oi. I haf to buy.

Never as goot.”

138 — F l i g h t o f A q u av i t

“Mom, could you maybe leave me a note next

time you go out? Just so I don’t worry?”

“Ya, ya, uh-huh, sedai, Sonsyou, I make eggs,

ya?”

“Well, where was she?” Errall asked with

incredulity.

I shrugged my shoulders. I was in her office sit-

ting in one of the chairs meant for clients in front

of her oversized desk. Errall’s workspace is much

different from my own. It takes up nearly one half

of the main floor and is divided into three con-

necting areas. There’s the desk area, the client

meeting area and the research area. The room is

smartly planned, impressive and, I think, some-

what austere. Errall was leaning forward, her

elbows resting on the desk with shoulders

hunched up. She was wearing a navy business