The City Still Breathing (16 page)

He keeps his head down, hands in pockets, and they're passing on by, a non-event, until someone grabs his sleeve.

‘Scuse me.'

It's a woman – pretty. Bad perm, but pretty. Nice eyes. He knows her from somewhere but can't place it. All these faces too much for him tonight.

‘We're looking for my son.'

For some reason this chokes him up, maybe because he's still half in the bag, because of everything that's happened tonight, or maybe it's the image he gets of a little kid out here walking around and he thinks about the little daughter Lo left at home. Emilia. Good kid. Deserves better.
Va chier
– don't they all.

‘His name's Slim.' This from the third one – a kid, some teenager with a mullet. The big one is standing a little off, attention elsewhere. ‘All he's wearing is a T-shirt, maybe a girl with him.'

‘Sorry.' And he says it with such feeling they're already starting to turn away. ‘No – I mean, sorry – I didn't know you meant them. Yeah, I saw em just down the street.'

‘That way?'

‘When?'

‘They still there?'

He's getting a headache from looking back and forth. ‘Are they in some kind of trouble?'

She touches his arm. ‘Please, I need to find my son.'

Young to be the mother of that kid, he thinks, but that's a mother – the love coming out of her raw and desperate. Messy to get involved. But messy not to. Just one big mess any way you cut it. Might as well jump in the mud puddle as slop around it.

He drops his arm, her hand sliding off, and just starts walking, following the tracks leading down Riverside and round the bend. Looking behind to make sure they're all following him.
Tu sais que I'm free, free maintenant, bébé. Je suis free de votre charme
.

She feels him back there the whole time, but it's not until she makes the turn on Annie, and there's the water stretching out in front of her, that she turns around. Slim about ten feet back, that denim jacket too short in the stupid sleeves. That stupid Polaroid around his neck.

‘Slim Slider, I want you to get the fuck away from me.'

And she turns around again and keeps on going, knowing that's only going to encourage him. As she's passing the old brick waterworks, the pumps coughing away, he finally jogs up beside her, keeping pace.

‘You hear me?'

‘Yeah.'

She moans in frustration and walks faster, but he keeps up. Hands in his pockets, kicking at the snow. ‘What do you want?'

‘I wanna talk.'

‘I'm done talking, Slim. I'm just done.'

He jumps in front of her, walking backwards. ‘I'm sorry.' He's trying to catch her eye, but she just keeps her focus on that black water. The moon swirling like cream across its surface.

‘I said I'm sorry.'

And she hits him in the chest, hard. So hard he stumbles back, his mouth dropping open like some kind of puppet. It feels good. She hits him again before he can shut that mouth and this time he falls back on his ass. She stands over him and he just looks up at her.

‘What d'you want me to do?'

And for maybe the first time – him lying there – he looks anything but cool. ‘Nothing – you can't do anything.' And she steps around him, keeps on going for the water, crossing that barren patch of snow and dead grass and climbing over the boulders lining the shore. Mist crawling across the lake toward them. She sits at the very edge, her legs dangling over the water and thinks, This is the end. Here I am at the very end of everything.

Slim staying on his back, trying to let it all sink in. Let the whole day sink in and all the fuckin ifs of it, him and all that weight just sink through the snow, the earth, and keep on sinking. But he's like Lee Marvin in a bare-knuckle fight, he has to get up because surrendering just isn't in him.

He goes and sits beside Francie on the ledge a few feet above the water. The mist closing in, blocking out the moon. He doesn't say anything for a few minutes because she hates when he breaks her concentration – he knows that. He counts to two hundred under his breath and then finally tries.

‘I should've taken you to Toronto.'

She keeps on staring out at the lake. ‘Yeah, you should've.'

‘I wanna fix it.' He swallows back the lump cause now's not the time. ‘I'd do anything to fix it.'

‘You can't. It isn't broken, it just … isn't anything.'

‘So this is it – we're over?'

‘Maybe – yes … I dunno.' And she looks at him and there's no anger there. ‘I feel like I don't even know you anymore. And me – you have no idea who I am.'

‘Sure I do.' She's that same girl in the shack in the summer and he's the same boy beside her. ‘Slim and Francie. Francie and Slim.' Together on all the places they carved their names.

‘If I turned back now, I don't think you'd ever really take me back.' And she's changing as she says it, older and older, until he doesn't recognize her anymore. ‘But I don't think you'll ever let me go either.'

She's so close he could grab her. Keep her here. And he thinks maybe that's what she wants, for him to topple her, convince her she's wrong. The reflection of the water is in her eyes. And he wants to jump off the rocks because at least then he'd be inside her – in that reflection. He wants it to be different. He just doesn't know which one of them is right.

Here we are, the shortest distance, and it isn't close enough.

And he loses his chance, her turning back to the water. And without really even thinking, he lifts the camera from his chest and takes her picture.

And the flash stays on her, elongating – causing her to glow like a moth flapping against a bulb, the light never-ending, until Francie turns, raising her hand to shade her eyes, looking past him.

He turns with her. Two perfectly round headlights back in the lot flooding them.

Slim drops the camera and stands to face whatever it is that's coming.

Francie hears the sound of a car door, and the silhouette of a man steps in front of the light. She gets up, but Slim turns back to her and touches her face, two fingers on her left cheek, soft and quick, and then gone. The calm in his eyes making her want to scream.

The kind of calm she saw in that trunk behind Wembley so long ago this morning. A calm that just goes on and on.

Elwy's crouched at the front of the canoe, peering into all that mist, clinging to the surface of the lake. He stopped paddling forever ago, too tired and hungry, but Emilia's still back there, grunting with every stroke. He whistles high and clear, using his sonar like a bat on Marty Stouffer's nature show, trying to bounce his whistle off anything, but the mist just gulps it up.

He thinks about the Doctor Snuggles sheets on his bed, his robot pyjamas with the feet, the mushroom lamp on his bedside table, Mom's kiss on his forehead – all of it missing from tonight. All of it maybe missing from every night. But maybe it's them missing and not everything else, and nobody looking for them.

He turns to look at Emilia. Her head down, putting all of herself into each stroke. One, two, and then she just stops. ‘Em?'

Her paddle slides over the edge of the canoe, into the water, spinning into behind them. The mist chomping down on it, pulling it from sight.

‘Em?'

She looks up, her eyes all big and afraid, not like any way Elwy's seen her before. Emilia's never ever scared. ‘El, we're gonna freeze out here.'

He can't stop the tears, cold on his cheek. ‘No, Em.'

‘We been out here for hours. Nobody knows where we are.'

‘Maybe your dad will come get us.'

‘He'd be happy if I didn't ever come home.'

‘Em, stop it.'

‘We'll never play Commodore again.'

‘Emilia Cecilia!' Elwy saying it in complete big-trouble mode. He scrunches up his eyes and makes himself stop crying, so Emilia won't be scared.

Then he turns back to the bow, purses his lips and blows. He whistles as hard as he can, as hard as Emilia hit Doug Degault when he said Elwy's mom was going to be a bag lady. Because sometimes you have to be strong for your number one best friend. You have to love them the most when no one else will. He whistles a beam of air like Voltron's laser, punching a hole straight into the mist, pushing it back. And there – the dark line of the shore in the distance. A street light like the soft glow of his mushroom lamp, calling them home.

Elwy stops whistling and starts to paddle, splashing water everywhere. ‘I'm gonna beat your top score in Pitfall.'

Martha knows her son, even from the top of the hill. She knows the pinch of his shoulders, the angle of his head, the shape of his legs. A stretched, elongated, warped version of her boy, that small warm thing waddling around the house, bumping into everything. Arms stretched out, waiting to be picked up.

She sees the girl too – the one he was going with – a little behind him. But there is somebody else down there with them. The red plaid jacket – the man from the restaurant, the one who made her skin crawl, standing in the headlights of a car. What did Hector call him – Milly? All three of them down in the circle of light and snow before the shore, something big and bad and final about to happen.

‘Gordon,' and he hears Martha's voice cracking as she speaks his name, an animal sound he recognizes, and he's off running, pushed forward by the noise.

He's got them pegged – one, the girl – two, bad news – three, the kid. Martha's kid, the same kid who stole his boots. There's no time to weigh it all, decide what was worth what. It's just real clear which way this is going to go without him. And the loneliness of that is too much to bear. There's no choice. Only him, a bullet train heading toward a brick wall.

And hell, if there wasn't that queasy feeling again, like this had all played out already.

One two three strides, and he's going down the ice. Tie game, last chance. All on him.

Slim takes a few steps toward the light, the silhouette not moving. Nobody asks,
Where is my brother
. Nobody says,
I don't know
. Nobody says anything because this has moved so far past words.

Then he pulls the black handle of the switchblade from his pocket. He fingers the hasp and out snaps the blade, stinging in the headlights.

Then the silhouette of Jyrki Myllarinen moves, something swinging from the shoulder and coming to bear.

Then someone big steps into the light between him and Milly. He recognizes the green work jacket right away – the asshole he took the boots from.

Slim steps to the side, finding an angle where the light isn't in his eyes. The big asshole gives him a look over his shoulder, a nod like,
I got this one, kid
. The guy who kicked his ass standing in against the guy who wants to kill him.

Milly takes in this new arrival, still holding the rifle at the ready. His gaze flickers over to Slim, those cold grey eyes knocking the air out of him – marking him – and then he moves his attention back to the big asshole. Drops the rifle and rolls up his sleeves.

It's like the War to Settle the Score all over again, Hogan and Piper squaring off. Heck's just outside the light, spellbound. Like wrestling, only even more real.

Milly ‘The Maniac' with his legs wide, his hands spread out at his sides. He's twitching all over, circling slowly back and forth.

Gordon ‘The Python' just standing there. Straight and still.

Milly's lips curl, teeth flashing out, some kind of animal – the kind that'd keep chopped-up bits of his parents in a freezer. The kind that could tear you apart with teeth and nails.

Gordon balls up his hands, knuckles popping.

Milly working in closer, so light on his feet he's almost floating. Jumping in close, throwing a hand up near Gordon's face – the big man not even flinching. A feint on the other side – still nothing.

Milly dances back, his lips moving, muttering something under his breath, a hiss – louder. He brings up his hands, gesturing, calling Gordon on. ‘C'mon.' His voice a high sharp sound. ‘C'mon with it.' And he keeps saying it, ‘C'mon with it,' each time his voice getting a little higher and little tighter until the veins in his neck are throbbing and his eyes are ready to pop.

And then he springs forward, smacking Gordon across the face with a left, then a right, then another left.

Gordon's head snapping back with each one but his feet stay planted.

Milly grabs him by the jacket with both hands and pulls him in, driving his forehead into Gordon's face – his legs wobbling and taking one step back. Milly knits his fingers together and before he can recover, he lays the Double Sledge on him. Gordon stumbles back, blood flinging across the snow.

‘Gordon!' Mrs. Novak running forward, Mr. Bedard reining her in.