Three Years with the Rat (17 page)

“Exactly,” he practically shouted. An older woman made her way to her car. “So why can we hit the ball farther with a stick versus our hands?”

“No idea. Because it's harder? Because it makes our arms sort of longer?”

John smiled, opened his door, and got out of the car. Before he closed the door he reached back inside for the shovel. He said, “Come on.”

I climbed out of the car but left the keys in the ignition. The car made a persistent dinging sound while my door was open. Outside it was still brisk but some sun had found a hole in the cloud cover and it felt amazing on my face. Another man left the school and John asked again, “Who is that?”

The man was bundled heavily and his hair was a little greyer but it still didn't take long to recognize him. “Christ, that's Mr. Stanley. I had him for homeroom in grade six. He taught the junior elementary kids science. I can't believe he's still here.”

“Speaking of science,” John said and grasped the shovel's handle like a bat. He lifted the arrowheaded blade off the ground a little and feigned hitting a ball. “So what's happening in a swing that's so magical?”

“No idea. John, what are we doing here?”

“In a minute,” he said. He stuck the blade in the ground and pulled a toque and gloves from his pocket. I couldn't help smiling at his outfit: black pants, black pea coat, black toque, black gloves. He grabbed the shovel again by the end of the handle. “I'm going to swing again and you tell me what you see. Observation! That's half of science.”

He stood in front of me waggling the blade of the shovel like an idiot until I said, “John, I have no idea what the hell you're getting at.”

“Well, how far is the end of the shovel moving in one swing?” he asked.

“I don't know. A couple of feet?”

“And how far are my hands moving?”

I paused, a glimmer of insight coming to me. “Not very far. A couple of inches each way. Is that it? The end is moving faster than your hands.”

“Almost!” he said. “Do you remember Newton's equations from high school?”

“Are you joking?”

John was wired with energy now, practically skipping from one foot to the other in excitement. I'd never seen him so boisterous before, never experienced anything other than calm and control from him. “Acceleration is the key. If you want more force, you need more acceleration. So your hands pull at the handle, which makes the tip speed up much faster than your hands could on their own, which increases the force. Then that force is transferred to the ball. Isn't that great?”

“Riveting,” I said. I brought my hands to my face and blew on them. My fingers became warm for a moment and got cold again almost instantly. A few more teachers passed through the exit, one of whom was Ms. White, another of my homeroom teachers. It was amazing to go so unrecognized by these people, to be a couple of oddballs standing outside the parking lot with a shovel. “Is there a point to all of this, John?”

He smiled at me and stepped forward. His voice was quiet but bristling. “I've been reading about this, trying to figure out how to maximize my swing. Turns out the secret is in your hands. Poor swingers pull both of their hands in the same direction, trying to make the bat move forward faster. But professionals know you need to pull your hands in opposite directions.”

He took another slow swing, showing me his right hand moving toward his body and his left hand moving away. He said, “When your hands move in opposite directions, it creates torque, and that increases the acceleration at the end of the bat. Therefore, more force. Who are they?”

Two men exited the school together. One was young and burly, and the other was much older but looked like he used to be a physical presence. I recognized the older teacher.

“What's his name?” I said aloud. “He taught Grace for two years in a row. The second year, she practically begged my parents to leave his class—”

“Thornton,” John said.

“What? How—”

“Two of them. That's a shame.”

It happened fast. John sprang away with the shovel trailing behind him a little. Something about the lightness of his steps reminded me of a deer running full speed. He shouted, “Hey,” and both teachers looked up at him. There was one last step, still gripping the shovel at its end, and then he swung. His wide shoulders
twisted perfectly and his hands pulled in opposite directions to maximize torque and all the force in the flat end of the shovel transferred into the face of Mr. Thornton.

The sound was like dropping a rock on a pile of meat. The old teacher stumbled and took a knee. At first he looked all right, only stunned. The younger teacher looked at John in utter confusion and before he could gather his senses John cross-checked him with the handle of the shovel as hard as he could. The push caused John's coat to rip along the seam of the shoulder and the younger teacher bounced off the hood of a car and onto the ground. This happened in an instant.

I looked back to Thornton and a black stream of blood began to gush from each nostril. He opened his mouth and it was a red, wet hole. John turned and said something to me but all I could hear was my heartbeat.

A dozen disjointed pieces of my sister's life suddenly fit together, connections that I'd been either too stupid to make or too eager to avoid. On his knees in front of me was the source of so much of Grace's unhappiness, the scar that my parents never truly acknowledged because they were too wrapped up in their own fighting, the secret everyone had kept from me. There was enough of a pause that I could have stopped what was about to happen, enough space and time to shout at John or hold him back. But instead I crossed my arms and let John continue. He took two quick steps toward the old man, like a track and field athlete, and swung again as hard as he could.

This time John's aim wasn't as precise and the shovel made contact where the blade's footrest and the handle connected. There was a terrific snap and I wasn't sure if it was the shovel or Thornton's cheekbone. Thornton twisted and fell and his face made a rough sound as it scraped across the asphalt. He was unconscious but he coughed and bits of teeth and tissue sputtered into a pool in front of him.

I thought for an instant that it would be cathartic, this late revenge for Grace. Instead it felt empty, a mistake, and John's logical extreme was horrific, not heroic. I ran to stop him from doing anything else, grabbed his shoulder, and he turned to me with a fist raised. When he saw it was me, he gave me a grotesque smile. Then he looked over my shoulder and stiffened.

The young, brutish teacher was rushing toward us. I put out my arms to block him and said, “Hold on—”

He grabbed my right arm and pulled it down and toward him. I stumbled forward into his blocky fist. It made contact with my left eye and I heard a crack and my neck snapped back. There were white and pink flashes and something hard slammed against the back of my head. I tried to move and realized I was on the ground, on my back. The world swam when I lifted my head so I put it down as lightly as I could.

There was a scuffling sound and some grunted half-words and another sharp crack. Then there were hands on me, pulling me up by the collar of my coat. I heard John say, “Come on. Come on.”

He wrapped one of my arms around his neck and carried me. The toes of my shoes dragged against the ground. He opened a car door and threw me into a seat, and a moment later I heard the interior bell dinging for a few seconds as John got in. The ignition turned, the car went into gear, and we were away. It surprised me that he didn't squeal the tires but rather drove off calmly.

Eventually I could open both eyes and found that we were on the highway. The sun was setting and the sky was getting dark. I put my hand up to my bad eye and found that it was swollen and tender from the eyebrow to the cheekbone. The lid was closed.
I turned my head to look at John in the driver's seat. The world was still reeling in my vision and I groaned.

“You're all right,” he said, “but you probably have a concussion.”

I straightened my body in the seat and immediately felt lightning travel from my abdomen to my throat. I cranked open the window as quickly as I could, my stomach wrung itself out, and I vomited into the open air. A car honked behind us.

“You almost certainly have a concussion,” he said.

The air on my skin was too much so I closed the window. The signs on the side of the road made it clear we were travelling west, back into the city. There were a number of things I wanted to say, all cycling through me. I settled on “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

“I'm sorry for dragging you into this,” he said. “I keep saying that to myself, and then I keep dragging you in even further.”

“Just shut up,” I said. “Shut up. I'm done. I don't want to hear it.”

He complied. We drove the highway in silence, no radio, and veered south into town. John parked us right in front of my basement apartment. He turned off the car but didn't get out. I wouldn't look at him but I could feel his eyes on me.

He said, “You know that I had a good reason for what just happened.”

“Get the fuck out of my car, John,” I told him.

“You could have stopped me but you didn't.”

“Get out!”

He paused, almost said more, and then he opened the driver's side door and exited. He left the door open and the bell dinging straight into my skull. Eventually I raised myself from the passenger seat, collected the keys, and locked all the doors. My reliable car looked empty and useless without all of Grace's belongings filling the backseat. I looked north and could see the dark outline
of John making his way toward home, the heavy backpack on his shoulders. The shovel was nowhere to be seen.

The lights were on in the apartment and it smelled like garlic when I came in the door. Nicole was at the kitchen counter and wearing a spattered apron.

“Hi,” she said without turning to me. “I hope you're hungry.”

The sight and smell of food, even the hiss of the frying pan, made me nauseated. I kicked off my shoes, made my way to the couch, lay down, and closed my eye. I didn't bother taking off my coat.

Eventually Nicole noticed my face and came over. “Oh god. Are you all right?”

“Fine,” I told her.

“Hold on.” She went back to the kitchen and brought some ice in a paper towel. “What happened?”

“Nothing,” I said. She kept thrusting the ice at my face but it stung to the touch and I didn't like having her arms so close to me. I pushed her hands away and closed my eyes. “Just lay off for a minute. Jesus.”

“Did you get mugged? Have you been to the hospital?”

She was breathing all over me, her hands just above my face. I said, “Can you just leave me alone for once? It's nothing.”

She held her breath. She was still. Then she stood up.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” she asked.

She went to the kitchen, then yanked out some drawers in the bedroom, and finally she slammed the front door. I kept my eyes closed and must have fallen asleep. When I awoke, I found a half-cooked dinner, cold and congealed. Nicole didn't come home after that.

IT WAS A SLOW MORNING
at work. My bosses sent me out on a coffee run, and when I returned there was a sticky note on the computer monitor at my desk.

Nicole called

P.S. Keep personal calls to minimum

I waited until they were out of the office for lunch.

“Hi, Trouble.”

“Danger. Your boss man wasn't pleased to hear from me.”

“He's probably in a fight with boss lady. There's nothing else to do around here right now.”

“They should let you come home, then. I could find something for you to do.”

“Hah. Right.”

“
The idea that the poor should have leisure has always been shocking to the rich.
Your bosses should read Russell.”

“I'll let them know. Not sure they'll take philosophic advice from my cook girlfriend, though.”

“What, I can't have a rich, intellectual life? Do I suddenly have to frame all my metaphors with food?” She was smiling through the phone. “Listen, when do you want to leave tonight? I want to make sure I have enough time to bake something for your mom.”

“About that…I've been thinking.”

“Hey.” A pause. “Don't do this.”

“I'm sorry, Nicole. It's just that, after the whole fight between you and Grace—”

“This has been planned for over a month.”

“I just think it'd be better if you two weren't duking it out at the kitchen table. Grace and my mother already don't get along well.”

“I booked the day off work.”

“I'm sorry, Trouble.”

“I have to go.”

Nicole was reading in bed when I got home, her legs tucked under the covers. She put down her book when I came into the room. “So let me get this straight: you, Grace, and John are all going to dinner.”

“Yes,” I said.

“It's just me who is excluded.”

“I know it sounds horrible—”

“It
is
horrible!” she said. “Do you have any idea how that makes a person feel?”

“I really am sorry,” I said, crouching in front of her. “If it's any consolation, I think you're the lucky one in all this. I'd rather stay here and read with you.”

“
Read?
” The faintest hint of a smile, which was a relief for me. She leaned forward for a kiss and then shoved me away. “Now out of my sight, thank you.”

Despite the mild weather, Grace was huddled with John's arms draped over her. She climbed into the front passenger seat and John got in the back. I was double-parked and cars honked at me as they got in.

“You're late,” Grace told me.

“What the hell do you care?” I said. “You don't even want to go.”

“Jesus, you're snippy. What's your problem?”

I looked in the rear-view mirror. John and I exchanged a nod of greeting.

“Anyway, you're right,” Grace said. “I have zero interest in going. So let's just cancel.”

“We're going,” I told her. I put the car in gear and drove off. “Mom harasses me about visiting every week.”

“So go visit without me,” she said.

“You're a real charmer tonight,” I told her. “Mom harasses me about
you
visiting every week.”

“If she wants to know about me, she can ask me herself.”

“You'd have to pick up your phone,” John said from the back.

The car was quiet until we reached the highway. My phone buzzed in my pocket and I knew it was my mother, wondering where we were. Grace and John stared out the window and watched as the storefronts became unfamiliar, then absent. I veered the car onto the 401 and, sick of the silence, I turned on the stereo.

Grace's mix CD started to play. I skipped back to the second song. Some indeterminate squeal, maybe an electric keyboard, droned away until the bass and kick drum dropped in. And as always, just as I felt I was getting the hang of the rhythm, the guitars and cymbals crashed in and reset the beat.

“God, I love these guys,” I said.

“What's your sample size?” John asked from the back. He was smiling, trying to be light.

“What?”

Grace was hunched in her seat, bundled in her layers. She chewed at her thumb and didn't turn away from her view out the window.

“You said you love these guys,” John said. “How many of their songs do you know?”

“I don't know. Really only this one, I guess.”

“So your sample size is one. Not exactly statistically significant.”

I laughed. “You're a dick. O.K., I love this song. I've listened to this song hundreds of times. Sample size is hundreds. Totally statistically significant. Dick.”

I let the CD play out and we didn't talk much. We watched the landscape make its familiar transformations and took all the usual exits to my mother's house. I pulled into the driveway.

“I should be at work,” Grace said.

“It'll wait,” John said from the back.

“This was a mistake,” Grace muttered.

“Come on,” I said. “She's waiting at the door.”

“I don't want to do this,” Grace said.

“It'll just be a couple of hours,” John said. He reached a hand to her shoulder in the front. “We can do this.”

“It's not you who has to
do
anything, goddamn it,” Grace said, her voice getting high. “Don't act like this is difficult for you.”

“It shouldn't be difficult for anybody,” I said. “It's
dinner.
Suck it up.”

I climbed out of the car and came around to the passenger side. Grace didn't budge when I opened the door for her.

“Out,” I said.

Reluctantly she began to move. John followed her, patting me on the arm as he passed me. Our mother made a shrill sound from
the front porch. The three of us approached the house, myself in the front.

“Oh,” our mother cried. She'd left her work clothes on and tried to tame the frizz of her hair with some water. She passed me without any acknowledgement and put her arms around Grace. “Christ almighty, I wouldn't believe it if I didn't see it.”

Dinner was surprisingly civil to start, most likely because my sister snuck out beforehand to smoke a joint. Our mother fired questions at Grace, John answered most of them, and I diverted our mother's attention whenever I could. We sat at the dining room table and didn't move. The rest of the house was dim and quiet except for the hum of the television in the living room.

After dinner I collected the plates from the table and told my mother, “Nicole wishes she could be here.”

“Nicole, eh?” my mother said. She couldn't have cared less about what was going on in my life, and Nicole's name passed, flickered, and disappeared from her awareness. “Coffee, anybody?”

“Please,” John told her.

When the table was clear, I sat down again with John and Grace. My mother scurried around the kitchen. The white noise of an electric kettle rose in the background and made me feel uneasy. Over that anxious sound, my mother shouted, “God, it's nice to have everyone under one roof again.”

“Everyone?” Grace said, meaning our father.

My mother unplugged the kettle and brought it to the table, its cord dangling behind her, then shuffled back into the kitchen.

“I miss the good old days,” she said.

“When was that, exactly?” Grace asked.

“Oh hell, you know what I mean,” my mother said. She brought four mugs to the table. “It was just so nice when you were kids.”

Grace was becoming agitated, fidgety. “Are you joking?”

Our mother brought a jar of instant coffee and some milk to the table and sat down.

“Hey, instant coffee,” John said to Grace, in a calm voice. “Everybody's favourite.”

But whatever soothing effect John had had the last time we four ate dinner together, it had faded. Grace just glared at him.

My mother was spooning the coffee powder into the mugs and not paying attention to the subtleties of the conversation. She smiled at John. “Things were just simpler, you know? She was always so bloody bright. A royal pain in my ass, of course, but she was happy, and so how could I complain?”

“What kind of revisionist bullshit is this?” Grace demanded.

“Grace,” I said.

“Honey,” our mother said, “I know it was a little tough when your father left—”

Grace interrupted, “I'm not talking about Dad—”

“—and obviously there was going to be some acting out, you said and did some things, you always had a temper, ever since you were a baby. But we got over it, didn't we?” She seemed to suddenly realize how fraught this conversation had become, and smiled at Grace to calm her.

There was a painful silence and then Grace spat, “Are you fucking insane?”

My mother's face pinched a little at the curse. She looked old. “Jesus, honey. Show some respect.”

I wanted none of this conversation. I'd witnessed enough variants of it from the time my sister shaved her head at thirteen until she finally moved out for university. “Can we just take a time-out for a second?”

“You stay out of this,” Grace said to me, quietly. “Do you have any idea what it was like for me, Mom?”

“Why are you being like this?” my mother said and frowned. “You talk like I was such a bad mother.”

“You were,” Grace said. “You were the worst.”

“Will you give it a rest?” I said.

In one quick motion Grace pushed back her chair and stood. She stomped through the carpeted living room and straight into the foyer. John rose and followed her. There was some muttering between them, then the sound of keys, then the slamming of the front door.

“She was always so difficult,” my mother said. “Always convinced that everyone was against her, willing to do or say whatever, just to get revenge. Your father and I would just sit back and wait for the storm to blow over.”

Her eyes were brimming and shiny. She bit the dry flakes of skin from her bottom lip. “But I wasn't so bad, was I?”

“No, Mom,” I said. I put my hand on hers. Still, something Grace had said was bothering me. I'd heard them fight countless times but I had never heard anything that suggested there was some specific catalyst:
Do you have any idea what it was like for me, Mom?

John came back to the dining room and sat down. My mother excused herself and went upstairs.

“She took your car,” John said.

Before I realized what he was telling me, I heard Grace screech out of the driveway.

The three of us sat on the old couch and watched television. My mother held my hand and occasionally squeezed it. I wanted to scream but instead I smiled at her.

Two hours later, I heard Grace lay on my car horn for ten straight seconds. I rushed to the front door and gave her an angry stare through the window. We put on our coats and shoes and I hugged my mother goodbye. She got shrill again and urged me to visit soon. During the goodbyes, Grace lay on the horn another time and I swung open the door and shouted, “For Christ's sake, enough.”

My mother stood on the porch and waved at Grace. I couldn't make out the expression on her face.

When I opened the driver's side door, the interior light came on and it was immediately apparent that Grace hadn't just been driving around. She was scattered, wild haired, and dirty. I was too annoyed to care. I shouted at her, “Move.”

She slid to the passenger seat, her eyes like saucers. She didn't seem to notice my mother waving at her but instead wore a vacant look. I took the driver's seat and found that the car had an odd, unwashed-human smell. John climbed into the backseat.

I reversed out of the driveway, sped through the suburbs as quickly as I could. The stereo was off and I left it that way. No one spoke for thirty minutes. Cars flickered by but all I saw was their headlights. I drove over the speed limit the entire time.