The Journey Prize Stories 21 (23 page)

I pick up the first piece and carve, glancing from time to time to watch Agnes and Anh. The girl's cuts are tentative,
which is to be expected at the start. Given the jostling from the other tables when things get busy, she'll likely cut herself today. Might as well get her first self-slice out of the way. In contrast to boisterous Agnes singing and carving next to her, Anh looks fragile. I fear one slit from a sharp knife might cause her to completely disassemble.

Just as Anh gets the hang of things, a loud male scream erupts from a table ten feet away. A tall white guy grasps at the red gush of blood coming out of his right biceps. His still-buzzing hock cutter, a hand-held version of a small buzz saw used to slice the limbs off cattle, bounces onto the table in front of him. The electric saw falls onto the concrete floor, glancing off the woman next to him. Shit. Continuing to cut my meat, I watch Leger rush over with a nurse, face riddled with anxiety. I know the bastard's worried about keeping up the speed of the line, not some poor sucker's hacked limb. It wasn't fully severed anyway. I put my slices into a grey plastic tub, put them back on the belt, and grab my next piece of meat.

Anh has dropped her knife on the ground. She watches with widened eyes as the tall man, now hunched over with a white towel pressed against his red and sopping shirt sleeve, is led away by the nurse, sobbing. Meat continues to pile up on the belt in front of us.

Agnes reaches down to grab Anh's knife up off the wet floor and holds it lightly by the blade, pointing its handle back at the young woman. She gestures to Anh with the handle. “Anh, you can't stop.”

Anh continues to stare mutely toward the hock area, where everyone else is busily back at work with a tiny bit more room per person. Agnes puts the knife into Anh's gloved
hand, closes her hand around it, and gently turns her back to face the boning table.

“You can't stop.” Agnes sighs and looks in my direction, then picks a piece of meat up off the belt and places it in front of Anh. Anh looks down at it, and cuts.

The guy is back on the line two hours later. I go into autopilot for the rest of the day. I'm no longer slicing meat, I'm fashioning a simple, elegant wedding dress out of peau de soie, an A-line with pleats that run from the waist to the feet. No frilly train, but a subtle band of patterned lace around the waistline. Sleeveless, though not low-cut, with thin straps. Pretty yet unassuming. And the sheerest, most delicate bridal gloves. No fancy patterns, basic white, and they cut off just before the elbow.

The day ends. I hope Anh comes back tomorrow. We need the extra hands at the boning table. I head for the locker room. Pushing my way numbly through the all-female mass, I reach my locker and pause. My lock's been snipped with a bolt cutter. I remove the severed combination lock and pull it open.

The severed head of a dead calf lolls lazily on the top shelf of my locker. Most of its hair has been shaved off, but tufts still cling to its floppy, oversized ears. Both lips have been removed, exposing its skeletal teeth. Its fat, amputated tongue has been stuffed back into its mouth, and it sticks out at an abnormal angle. It smells like vomit. The flesh around the base of the head is mottled and bloody. Along the hacked neckline, two flies sit and feast.

Fucking gross. I slam the locker door shut with all my strength. It bounces back open, forcing the raunchy odour back in my face. With the force of the jolt, the calf's head bounces
and tips forward. It topples out of the locker and heaves onto my yellow rubber boot. With a fearful bolt of adrenaline, I kick it down the row of lockers. It comes to a stop at the other end of the hall, where a group of women are coming out of the showers. They stop en masse, emitting yelps and grunts of disgust, looking over at me and swearing. The calf's tongue came free of the head when I kicked it; it lies on the ground a few feet away. I crumple to the bench and find myself crying for the first time in years. I wish I were anywhere but here.

I step out of the women's locker room an eternity later. As I head for the exit, a deep voice calls out to me.

“Hey, slut.” Karl Willson stomps my way with a crooked sneer on his lips.

I cross my arms in front of my chest. “What the fuck do you want?”

He answers in singsong. “Is Princess having a bad day?” Karl reaches forward with a start and shoves my crossed arms so hard I fall backward to the ground. He leans in and I cover my face quickly. He's yelling in my ear. “What? That black bitch show you what a fucking cow you are?”

I kick him in the shin, a glancing blow, and he steps back. I scramble to my feet. A dozen passersby have slowed or stopped. “What the fuck, Karl!”

“Kevin told me what you did last night, you fucking whore.”

The crowd begins to filter away. Another lover's spat. Happens all the time.

“Those people believe in revenge. You better watch out.”

“Karl, you're full of shit.”

He spits in my face and walks away. Two women's voices approach, not speaking English. I climb to my feet, recognizing Agnes's voice.

She wears a white blouse, acid-wash jeans, and a faded denim jacket. Next to her stands a tall woman with a pretty face marred by dark circles under her eyes. A dark-green, patterned scarf covers her hair and drapes across her shoulders, underneath which she wears a simple white dress. I notice the slight curve of her belly. Makok's wife.

“Wanda, this is my friend, Mende.”

I glance downward then look up at her, my face flushed. “How are you, Mende?” I manage.

“It is nice to meet you.” Her heavily accented English is stilted and formal.

Agnes turns to me. “We're going to church. There are things we need to speak to the pastor about … maybe you'd like to come with us.”

“I'm sorry, Agnes. I need to go make dinner for my father.” I look at my feet, and back at the two of them. Mende appraises me.

“I heard what happened, Wanda. I thought some spiritual guidance might be a help.”

I pause. “You know what happened?”

“At your locker.”

I exhale. “A stupid prank. Some joker from the kill floor.”

“I believe things happen for a reason, Wanda. If you don't want to come now, you could attend our Sunday morning service.” She touches Mende's arm before adding, “It can help when troubling things happen.”

I decide something. “Agnes, I'd join you but I'll be packing. Dad and I are moving to Vancouver. We leave Monday.”

Agnes breaks into a sudden grin. “I can't believe you didn't tell me!”

“No one knows.”

“It's time you saw the world.” Agnes came from Africa and had lived in Newfoundland for years before coming here. “What are you going to do in the big city – work in a butcher shop?”

“I'm going to be an apprentice to a dressmaker.” I realize this by saying it aloud for the first time.

Mende appears distracted, but offers Agnes a confused look. Agnes speaks to her quickly, pointing to me several times. I realize she's translating the conversation we just had. Karl lied – I doubt he could have communicated anything to Mende. He must've snuck in when the locker room was empty and busted into my locker himself. Whatever.

I embrace Agnes. Mende turns to me and says, “Good luck.” The two of them walk away. Men and women stream past in the opposite direction by the dozens, on their way into the plant for B shift.

Better get home and tell Dad. I exit the building and walk alongside the chain-link fence that leads from the plant to the parking lot. I can't remember where I parked my Civic. I scan the sea of parked cars, and nothing looks familiar.

W
e were on that beach in Florida when I caught a pervert snapping photos of my little girl. I was dumping the leftover fries into the garbage can by the busy road; Becky and Lora were close to the water. Becky hopped up and down in front of her mother, hairless and naked and milky white, while Lora worked the sand out of her bathing suit.

The guy looked like any other local, with a year-round tan, orange shorts, and a T-shirt that came from a closet not a suitcase. But there was a hunger in the way he leaned forward, the way his finger eagerly snapped. When I whirled around to take in his telephoto's view, it was pointed right at Becky.

He bolted just before I reached him. I chased him through the tunnel that ran under the main drag and into the state park. We sprinted past the visitor centre and the circle of covered picnic tables, trampled across a burst of plastic-like flowers, and landed along a nature trail. He pounded through the
forest, fast at first, flinging his camera into an island of tangled mangroves. I kept losing sight of him as we snaked through the trees. He made it to the parking lot before me, where he fell down on all fours and puked into the gravel. When I caught up, I decked him in the head, hard, and then I fell down too. A lady with an enormous yellow hat was close by, lugging stuff from her trunk and fumbling with a cellphone from her beach bag. She yelled into the phone: …
his head's bleeding real bad, the guy's gonna kill him
. It took me a minute to figure out I was the guy.

The holiday was Lora's idea. She wanted Becky to see the ocean – to find real seashells. We'd never even been on a plane before.

“Lake Winnipeg can be like the ocean,” I offered. “It's a lot closer.”

Lora pretended not to hear. She was filling in Becky's passport application. Next of kin. Who to call in case of emergency. The colour of her eyes, her hair. How much weight she took up in this world.

The passports cost $67 a piece. We had eleven days until payday. A carton of milk in the fridge. A couple of whitefish in the freezer. A mounting stack of bills from every quack we could find this side of the border. Tibetan herbalists. Homeo-pathologists. The oxygenated water man.

These were our dark days.

“We could go to those little cabins at Gimli,” I tried. “Becky loves it there.”

“In winter, Michael? So she can stand on the beach in her snowsuit? Nothing's open.”

“I meant in the summer. We can take Becky next summer.”

When Lora finally looked up at me, I'd become a stranger. Her eyes saw just another someone who couldn't comprehend how far away the summer was.

Two cops – a large white guy and an even larger black woman – appeared out of nowhere. Me and the pervert were still down on the ground, panting. After I choked out my side of the story, the guy muddled through his. He was just taking a few beach photos for his wife's scrapbook was all. He blubbered the words in fits and starts, like a four-year-old getting jabbed with needles.

“So why'd you dump the camera then?” the lady cop asked. Officer Jarvis. I still don't know her first name. She answers her phone like a man. Jarvis, she barks, in a deep, no-nonsense, get-to-the-point kind of way.

The guy shook his head from side to side, mumbling how there was a crazy man chasing him through the trees.

She followed me back to the mangroves and we rooted around in the muck.

“That's a nasty cut,” she said, her giant hand pointing to my shoeless foot.

Blood gurgled from between my toes and puddled on the wet ground.

I found the camera wedged between the folds in a mossy log. The lens cap had sprung loose, cracked in two. Jarvis
pushed me aside effortlessly, brushed off the ants, and lifted it by the strap.

I wanted to know what they could do to a pervert in the us of
A
. If they could shackle his wrists and throw him in a cell with carjacking types who had little girls of their own.

Her expression remained hard, but her voice seemed to soften. “Let us worry about the details, how about? You give us your information and we'll let you know.”

Lora's church paid for our airfare. I didn't want their charity – I didn't even know those people – but their gesture made Lora cry. I vaguely remembered meeting Danny the Preacher in the meat section of Sobeys. He seemed more a John Lennon than a Jerry Falwell type. I imagined him sitting beside my wife, one empathic palm lightly patting her knee, while she poured out the details of our whole sad story. I hated that picture in my head, but it was those kinds of intimacies that allowed her to go on. And she had to go on or I was done for.