Stranger (16 page)

F
OR
the most part, she was alone in the house four afternoons a week. She did her chores and then walked the dog, Champ, a dachshund. She carried plastic bags to clean up the dog's shit. She didn't like dogs, and she didn't like picking up shit. Barbara adored Champ, though Barbara rarely took Champ for walks, and if she did, she wouldn't pick up his shit.

She of course had a reason for being there, and so she became familiar with the neighbourhood. Because the streets were oddly placed, with many dead ends, it took her some time, but while out walking one afternoon, she found the doctor's house set back in a bay. A single manor sitting by itself, surrounded by fields of grass and flowers, with a view of a small river out back. She had the house number, and she had the correct street, but now that she had
arrived, and was standing across from his house, she wasn't clear what her next step should be. There was no movement outside the house. In fact, no house in Zone 7 showed life. She walked back and forth along the far side of the street so as not to draw attention to herself, but as she was the only sign of life thereabouts, it was a fact that she would have been paid all the attention. If there'd been someone to pay attention.

Champ peed on the boulevard. Tugged at the leash. She backed away and then walked on. She returned the following day to find that nothing had changed. She was breathless, and she was dizzy with dread.

The river that wound through Zone 7 arrived via a tunnel that ran beneath the guard wall and passed behind the doctor's house and then moved south and eventually through another tunnel and back out into the unprotected world. There were paths on either side of the river, and footbridges, and there were benches placed in copses of trees for people to take advantage of the bucolic scene. There were public washrooms as well, situated at the beginning and the end of the path. This is where Íso took to walking Champ. It was quiet and away from the streets, and the path passed behind the doctor's house and she could pause and survey it.

It was on this path, late one afternoon, that she ran into the doctor. He was walking alone, and he was pushing a stroller. She saw him from a distance and she knew immediately. He was walking with long strides, as he had always done when they walked through the pueblos that surrounded the lake. Back then she had to skip or run to catch up to him, or she had to tell him to slow down. Now,
as he approached her, he had both hands on the stroller and he was talking to himself, or perhaps he was talking to the baby. His hair was cut short, and he wore a paisley shirt and a purple scarf. He was so involved in talking that he did not see her, though she was standing on the path. The river was gurgling past. Or perhaps it was the child making noises in the stroller. She was aware of the stroller and of the noises. At first, when she recognized Eric and realized that her baby was with him, her legs had gone weak from surprise and fear and dismay. She had even considered turning away and walking in the opposite direction. But she didn't turn away. She stood in the path and as he drew near she grew calm and she said hello. He looked up. And then he said hello and in that moment she remembered everything about him.

T
HEY
met on Monday and Wednesday afternoons, when he walked Meja for an hour. By the river path that led past the water wheel and down towards the elms that offered shade and privacy. On a bench near the footbridge beyond the public washroom. She was always there first, waiting, her dog at her feet. She heard them before she saw them—the sound of the stroller wheels on the packed gravel, his footsteps—and her heart leaped and she sat up straight and when they came around the bend in the path, she was always surprised, and grateful.

Sometimes he brought her a little treat, a piece of chocolate, or a candy, and she always said thank you and put the treat in her pocket. There was something childlike about this, the giving of
candy. He was not the same man, he did not have the same confidence. And once, when he asked if he could kiss her, she said, Not here, not now, and she realized that the Eric Mann she had known at the lake would never have asked that question. He would simply have kissed her.

He had no curiosity about her. Did not even ask for her name. He just accepted her as a girl on a bench. Someone to talk to. He gave her the bare facts of his life. His name, his wife's name, the baby's name. He was very willing to answer all her questions, though he said that some questions might be more difficult than others. He had suffered a brain injury and his memory was confused. Though he remembered this, didn't he? He shrugged. She said that she was sorry for him. She asked him about Susan, and about the baby, Meja. She asked who had named the baby. Susan had. She asked if Susan breastfed. Oh no, she didn't. She asked if the baby was happy. Very. She asked if he was happy. He said yes, and then he said that he wasn't sure what happy meant, or what it felt like. This was the strange thing about his head. He couldn't even recall where Meja had come from. He said that Susan had brought her. Or that the baby had come to them.

Come to them!

The first time she met him, when he was talking to himself as he walked along the path, she had said hello, surprising herself with how calm she was, and he had looked up and then said hello, and in the manner he said hello she realized that he did not remember her. She said that it was a beautiful day and he agreed. She pointed to her dog and said, This is Champ. Hi, Champ,
he said. He gestured at the stroller and said, This is Meja. Your baby? she asked. Yes, he said. And he bent to lift back the blanket. She bent with him and saw her child and she stopped breathing. She was whole, and alive. Her hands were bare and they were clenched in fists. Very small fists. Her knuckles. Her eyebrows. He covered the baby up and stood. She stood as well. She asked him if he lived nearby, and he said yes and pointed back over his shoulder towards his house. His voice was his voice. No different. His eyes, though, were different. Less clear, and his face was blanker. She said that she was going to sit on the bench. Do you want to? He did. He sat and clucked at the stroller. He smiled. He was still very handsome, even with short hair. His forearms were still strong. His fingers the same. She thought that she should hate him, but she didn't. He was ignorant. But perhaps he had always been ignorant. And selfish. And unaware. She had loved him so dearly that she might have missed some bigger flaw in him.

She had many questions that she could not ask, simply because they were too dangerous, and also because he wouldn't know the answers. She asked him his wife's name. Susan, he said. She's at work. He smiled blandly at his own statement. He did not ask her name, not then, or after. It was as if she was an object that had been placed on the bench beside him. She was angry, and then sad. She asked if she could look at the baby again. Of course, he said. She peeked into the stroller and saw her baby and she wanted to scoop up the child and run and run but she didn't. Her heart was full. The baby's eyes were black, and her lashes were long and black. Her cheeks were fat. She was well fed and healthy.
Íso
touched the
baby's face and spoke Spanish and then realized that this revealed too much about her, and so she changed to English. She asked if she could hold the baby. Yes, he said, and he went to lift Meja from the stroller, but she said that she could do it. She bent forward and picked up the baby. She sat beside him on the bench and she looked down at her child and she said her name, Meja. She said it again. Meja wore orange socks that were rolled down and
Íso
touched the chubby flesh above the socks and she smelled Meja's head and she touched her ears and she passed a hand over her crown. The girl's hair was black and there was a lot of it and she felt its soft silk and realized that she might swoon. She swallowed and said that the baby was so strong. Meja had taken her hand and was gumming one of Íso's fingers. At some point Meja leaned back and studied Íso. Stared at her as if gauging how safe she was, but of course that was impossible. She's very smart, Íso said, and she drew Meja towards her chest and Meja clutched at her. A little monkey. The softness of Meja's wrists against her own neck. Meja made noises, as if she were a small truck starting up. Listen to you, Íso said. Listen to you.

I
T
was on the second or third visit when she realized that the danger was not Eric but Susan. She looked at him and asked if this could be a secret, their visits. He was happy to agree. He said that Susan was a stickler for routines, and she disliked surprises, and she didn't know that he took these walks with the baby, and she would be upset if she knew that he was meeting a stranger by the river.

Okay, she said. This is our secret.

The visits were brief and the time between visits unbearable, and when they did finally meet, she wanted him to be quiet so that she could concentrate on the baby, but he saw her as a vessel into which he could pour information. Perhaps he was lonely. Perhaps no one ever listened to him.

He was very simple and concrete when he spoke. On Tuesdays and Thursdays he worked in his shop tearing apart and repairing small gas engines. His doctor had suggested this. There were days when he managed to put an engine back together, and there were other days when he had extra parts that lay loosely on his worktable. On Wednesdays he washed clothes and he ironed. On Fridays his nurse arrived and they worked on memory exercises and then his hairdresser came and she washed and shampooed his hair and sometimes cut it. He also received a manicure and a pedicure. When he told
Íso
this he held out his hands and she saw the perfection of his cuticles and his soft hands that she used to adore. She thought now that his hands were too soft and too white and too perfect. She was repulsed. He told her that he was often alone, and that their girl, Laura, was in charge of Meja, though Laura allowed him to walk Meja for an hour. Susan worked every day downtown. She left early and then returned in the evening and came looking for Meja and took her away to a room upstairs. They sometimes ate supper together, but usually Susan wanted to be with Meja until she was down for the night, and even after, in the dark of the evening, Susan was elsewhere. She was tired from work. She loved Meja and wanted to spend time with Meja. Susan and Meja slept together.

When she heard this, Íso was devastated, and she thought that she could not bear it, but she did. She took Eric's hand and held it. She asked if he had hope for his life, and he said that he didn't know exactly what hope was. She explained it to him. She said that hope was a wish, and of course hope couldn't exist without the possibility that what you wished for might not come to be. He thought about this and nodded. He said that every day when he walked the path with Meja, he hoped to see her.

Me too, she said.

One thing was certain: even though he did not remember her, he still loved her in his limited way. One afternoon he asked if he could give her a hug, and she allowed this. He held her and held her until she had to break free. He wanted to kiss her. She said that there might be a time for that, but not now. She discovered that she felt nothing for him except pity. He was vacant and her heart no longer had room for him. She allowed him to hug her because she knew that this was the path she must take. He was like a child rooting at her. One time, after holding her, he touched the necklace at her throat and his face went soft and he said, This. He was looking into the past, briefly recognizing something. She held her breath. Here was danger. And then he shook his head and released the necklace.

She left feeling dirty, and on the bus ride home she knew that what her uncle told her had come true: she had been attracted to an object that was beautiful, and she had become spellbound, and then its shape had changed, and what had appeared to be beautiful had turned ugly.

O
N
Thursday she worked late, and as she left to catch her bus, she went away from the exit and walked down towards the river and the doctor's house. It was close to 7 p.m. The sun fell onto the back of her head and left her with a sense of longing. She came to the bay where the doctor lived and she turned right, towards his house. She stepped off the sidewalk and stood behind a large tree and watched the house. She had no intent, just a desire to be close. She was about to leave when a car turned into the bay and pulled into the doctor's driveway. The driver's door opened and a woman appeared. The woman's hair was blonde, but it was cut very short, and for a moment Íso didn't recognize her. She wore a narrow white skirt and red high-heeled shoes and a grey flowing shirt and sunglasses. And then the woman swivelled her head just so, and she lifted a hand to touch her jaw, and in that movement of the woman's hand, so refined and tentative and self-conscious, Íso knew that this was the doctor's wife. Íso closed her eyes. Opened them. The doctor's wife was still there. Íso leaned against the tree to save herself from falling. Her chest ached and she felt the ache and she knew for the first time what pure hatred was. It was entire and it moved sideways and forwards and backwards within her, and it was as if she contained the deep waters of an ocean that had been shaken by an earthquake and what resulted were mammoth waves, waves that could not be held back. The doctor's wife bent into the back seat and reappeared, holding Meja. She was talking, moving her head close to Meja and then pulling back again. She did not remove her sunglasses as she spoke to the baby.
Íso thought she heard
Meja gurgle, though it was impossible at that distance, but
still she was filled with despair. Of course Meja would adore Susan. And of course they were attached. And of course they had eyes only for each other. And of course Meja did not know Íso. And of course
Íso did not know Meja. She tumbled into hopelessness, and then felt anger, and once again hatred, and of these three emotions, hatred gave her the most pleasure.
She turned away and pressed her face against the bark of the tree. When she looked up again, Susan and Meja had disappeared.