Traplines (12 page)

“Look, there’s a sale. Don’t worry about it, you don’t have to pay me back all at once. A little here, a little there. I don’t mind.”

“Jeremy—”

“Meep
. Only two meeps this time, kid. That was the first.”

A headache had settled in Tom’s skull. Jeremy pulled him into a jewelry store and tried to get Tom a watch but the store was closing. “Damn,” Jeremy said. “We’ll have to do it later.” They sat on a bench in the mall and Jeremy pulled out all the receipts. Quickly he added them together and showed Tom how much he was in the hole. Jeremy grinned broadly. “Do you know what I need?”

“Yes,” Tom said, appalled by the numbers on the receipts. “But I left the Ritalin at home.”

“Hardy-har-har,” Jeremy said. “Nope, I need some nutritional input. I know the perfect place.”

They drove out to a small Japanese restaurant. Jeremy ordered for both of them. When the food arrived, Tom was relieved to see that he could recognize his meal.

“Try some sushi,” Jeremy said, offering him a round roll from his plate.

Tom shook his head quickly.

“You don’t know what you’re missing, kid.”

Jeremy joked with the waitress. Tom watched them, wishing Jeremy would shut up and let him go home. Jeremy had other ideas.

“How about a movie? Or dancing? Maybe a party?”

Tom leaned forward and put his head in his hands. “Can’t we just go home?”

“I thought you liked staying up late. Give me liberty or give me death. The night is young!”

“All right, a movie,” Tom said, thinking it required the least amount of energy.

“Come on then, birthday boy. Time’s a-wasting! Check!”

At eleven-thirty on his sixteenth birthday, in the middle of the movie, Tom closed his eyes and fell asleep.

When he woke up that Sunday, Tom locked himself in the bathroom and sat on the toilet. Man, Mike was going to laugh his head off. He’d say something like, “When’d the lobotomy look come back in style, shit-for-brains?”

He could wear a baseball cap. Pull it low. But then he’d have to take it off in gym. It could blow off. Mike wouldn’t be fooled, that was for sure. He got up and faced the mirror.

“Jeez,” he said, running his hand through what was left of his hair.

“Tommy?” His mom knocked on the bathroom door. “Tommy, are you finished?”

“In a minute,” Tom said. He wrapped his head in a towel. Fuck, this is stupid, he thought. He took the towel off and opened the door.

His mom put her hand to her mouth, a silent-screen movie star’s gesture.

“That bad?”

“No,” she said, starting to smile. “Oh, Tommy, it looks just fine.” She reached up and touched his forehead. “I haven’t seen your eyes for so long, I forgot what color they are.”

Tom looked down. “I dunno. I think it’s weird.”

“No, it isn’t. You look like a kid again.”

“It’s just hair.”

“No, you look really good, Tommy.” She pulled him forward, out of the doorway. “I’ve got to pee.”

Tom stood in the hallway, nerving himself to face Jeremy. But when he went into the kitchen his cousin wasn’t there. Tom looked in the living room and back in the bedroom, but Jeremy wasn’t home.

In the kitchen Tom fixed himself some Captain Crunch. The sun was coming through the kitchen window. His mom came in and made herself toast. She was humming and kept stealing looks at him, shaking her head. She sat opposite him, reached over the table, and ruffled his hair. “I told you so.”

“What?” Tom said.

“You and Jeremy. You’re friends.”

Tom wrinkled his nose. “I guess you could call it that.”

She tried to pinch his cheek and he ducked away. “You look like your grandfather when you do that.”

“Do what?”

She wrinkled her nose at him and squinted, looking peeved. “Oh, admit it. You and Jeremy are friends!”

“Mom,” Tom said. But she seemed happy, and she hadn’t for a long time, so he kept his mouth shut.

“—fly home soon, maybe even for Christmas, what do you think?” She smiled at him expectantly. He made himself smile, scrambling to piece together what she’d just said. “Great.”

“Oh, Tommy, it’ll be so much fun! You’ll see. We’ll get a huge tree and I’ll help Mother with the turkey.”

As she talked, he shrank from the thought of a family Christmas, with everyone mouthing love and good wishes
and not meaning a word of it. Well, he thought, already resigned, it’s nine months away. Things will change between now and then.

He finished breakfast, washed his dishes, and put them away, while his mom reminisced at the table, changing the facts to suit her new story. They hadn’t thrown her to the wolves, innocent and wronged, as she usually said. No, in this version she’d left home and they’d lost touch. The family came out looking better, no longer Evil with a capital
E
but something milder. Bad, maybe. A little Thoughtless.

Her face was flushed and excited. She was describing horses she had ridden, berries she had picked. Jeremy had gotten her hopes way up: the Day of Reconciliation was at hand. Tom made her coffee, extra sweet with half-and-half. He realized then that he felt a bit jealous but relieved. She was pinning her hopes on someone else.

Sooner or later Jeremy would leave and everything would go back to normal. Let Jeremy take the heat for her disappointment this time. Let Jeremy be the one she blamed.

Uncle Richard phoned. “Is your mother home?”

Tom had almost forgotten him, had thought that he’d gotten the message.

“No,” Tom lied, as his mother stopped in the bathroom doorway, raising a curious eyebrow. “I don’t know where she is.”

There was a pause at the other end of the phone. “Tell her I called again.”

He hung up and Tom felt vaguely sorry for him.

While his mom took a shower, an aura started as a creeping
feeling of dread and quickly advanced until he was sure there was someone in the apartment with them. Someone who wanted to kill them, someone going from room to room with a butcher’s knife. It’s just the aura, just the aura, he thought. His mom hated being around him when his auras hit. They made her so miserable she went on vacation.

He phoned Mike but Patricia said he was out. He went for a ride to clear his head. He biked down to Stanley Park and along the seawall. The day was sunny and brisk, with a sharp wind blowing in off the ocean. He stopped to watch the boats. Someday he wanted to have enough money to go out on a boat and sail away from everything. They’d lived in BC for eight years and the closest he’d come to getting on a boat was going to North Van on the Seabus.

He almost preferred the seizures to the auras. He never remembered the seizures. There’d be a little blank spot, and then people would be standing over him. Once he’d woken up and some guy was giving him CPR, which fucking hurt because his heart hadn’t stopped. Seizures were embarrassing and he woke up sore and tired, but they didn’t make him feel this paranoid, like he was the doomed murder victim in the opening sequence of the
X-Files
.

The bike path was crowded as he started off again. Sundays were not the day to go biking at the seawall if you wanted to be alone. He liked the crowds, though, the way that everything seemed so normal. But it was getting cold, the aura was fading, and he was tired. He turned his bike home.

Jeremy wasn’t back yet. Mom had left a note on the fridge that she’d been called in, was working the night shift again.
It was her fourth night in a row. He was surprised she was accepting the long hours so placidly but then remembered that she wanted to go back east for Christmas. She’d probably want the extra money.

Tom made himself a sandwich and settled at the kitchen table to do his homework. He’d picked French as his language and was regretting it. Mike said that Spanish was easier and he had some friends who spoke Spanish so he had people to practice on. Tom did his exercises, dutifully conjugating irregular verbs, wishing he’d listened to Mike. Provincials were coming up next year, and if he had any hope of scholarship money, he’d better—

His chair went out from under him and he was on the floor, his head bouncing off the linoleum as he landed sideways, the room going gray for a moment, then blue and gold. He smelled dust before his vision cleared. He thought, This is it, it’s over, but the seizure didn’t come. He stayed awake with his head throbbing where he’d hit the floor.

“Hi!” Jeremy said cheerfully. “Miss me?”

Jeremy hauled him to his feet, and he swayed, dizzy. He tried to punch Jeremy’s arm, missed, and almost fell again, but Jeremy laughed and held him up.

“You goddamn maniac!” he found himself shouting, mad, embarrassed.

“This way,” Jeremy said, leading him into the living room by the elbow.

He tried to get his arm out of his cousin’s grip, just on the principle of the thing. Jeremy squeezed hard, pain shot up Tom’s arm, and he left himself be led.

There were bags in the living room with designer names
on them. God, he thought, where’s he getting the money? Jeremy’s family was rich, but not that rich.

“Ta-da!” Jeremy said, letting go. He reached down and pulled out a shirt, unfolded it in one broad flap, and held it up for inspection.

“Don’t you have enough clothes?” Tom said.

Jeremy rolled his eyes dramatically. “He has eeeyes, but he cannot see. Lord …” Jeremy slapped his palm against Tom’s forehead. “… 
Heal
this bliiind soul, that he may finally seeee the light.”

“Fuck off,” Tom said.

Far from being offended, Jeremy looked more and more benevolent. He said slowly, “Come on, Tommy, take a good look. What size is this shirt? Hmm? Can Tommy tell me that?”

Tom looked at the shirt and saw that there was no way it would fit Jeremy. He looked at the bags around them, the realization slowly dawning that Jeremy was putting him further and further in debt.

“You can take these back,” he said sharply. “I won’t wear them. I’ve got clothes.”

“And what lovely clothes they are,” Jeremy said. “You are truly the epitome of haute couture. Where do you shop? I’m guessing thrift store or garbage can.”

Tom looked at him, mute. He turned and left the room, retreating to the bathroom, the only place in the apartment with a decent lock.

He heard the rustle of bags. Jeremy was bringing them into the bedroom. It didn’t matter. He’d never wear anything his cousin gave him. Not in a billion years. He heard the
closet door squeaking open. Jeremy went into the kitchen. When he came back, Tom heard the hangers clanking. He froze, thinking, No, Jeremy wouldn’t do that.

But when he left the bathroom and poked his head into the bedroom, Jeremy was cheerfully dumping Tom’s clothes into garbage bags.

Tom charged and caught Jeremy off guard. Jeremy whooped, and they rolled together on the floor. Tom got in three punches before Jeremy pinned him down. Tom was reminded suddenly of Tigger in
Winnie-the-Pooh
. Jeremy wiggled his fingers.

“No!” Tom shouted.

He fought as long as he could, gritting his teeth. Jeremy simply kept tickling him until he gave in, and then he didn’t stop until Tom began to cry. Jeremy let him up and told him to sit on the bed. Tom moved automatically. When Jeremy finished dumping the clothes in garbage bags, he lugged them to the bedroom window and tossed them out.

“I saved you a few grungies,” he said. “For cleaning and stuff.”

Then Jeremy told Tom to go to the kitchen and he went. “You eat?”

“Yes,” he said calmly as he could, thinking Jeremy would get bored with the head games if he just didn’t react. “Thanks.”

“I can make an omelet,” Jeremy said.

“I’m fine, thank you.”

Jeremy looked puzzled. “You okay, kid?”

“I’m fine, thank you.” He picked his French book up off the floor and opened it. “Excuse me. I have homework.”

He tried to lose himself in the exercises, but they were boring and he could feel Jeremy wandering around the kitchen watching him. Tom made himself think about scholarships, and that brought him back to what was important. Getting an education. Getting his mom out. Going somewhere.

“You’re mad at me.” Jeremy sat across from him, eating. “I can tell.”

Yeah, and you’re psychic, Tom thought. “Would you mind going someplace else?” he said. “I’m busy.”

He finished his French homework. When Jeremy pushed back his chair and left the room, Tom moved on to physics. The front door slammed. Tom sat still for a moment, surprised it had worked. He went to the bedroom window to see if his clothes were still on the patchy lawn. Three bags were okay, but the fourth one had burst, dumping his jeans near the bushes. Jeremy appeared. He began to gather the bags. He looked up and saw Tom in the window.

“Catch!” Jeremy said, as he dropped all the bags but one, which he lobbed upwards. It only went as far as the second floor. Jeremy caught it and tossed it up again. The bag still fell short.

“I’ll be right down,” Tom said.

“Here comes!”

Tom caught it, the plastic ripping in his hands as he scrambled to get the bag inside before it broke.

On the third bag, Mrs. Tupper poked her head out the window and Jeremy almost hit her. She shrieked and pulled back in.

“You stupid kids!” she shouted, shaking her fist at Jeremy. “You goddamn brats! I should call the police on you!”

Jeremy grinned up at her. “Help! Oh, help! I’ve been beaned by flying garbage!”

“You got no respect! No respect!”

Jeremy did a jig on the lawn. She disappeared back into her apartment and Tom shook his head. Jeremy was picking the jeans off the bushes when Mrs. Tupper nailed him with a wad of coffee grounds.

He looked up, eyes wide with surprise. A rain of orange peels, egg cartons, and TV-dinner trays came at him, and he dodged them, yelling, “Missed me! Missed me! Now you’ve got to kiss me!”

Infuriated, Mrs. Tupper shouted, “You hooligan!” and the rain of garbage increased with less and less accuracy as Jeremy bobbed and weaved, picking up the last of the jeans and running for cover.

Tom heard Mrs. Tupper shouting at his cousin in the stairwell and Jeremy giving his goofy, slightly deranged whoop. A few minutes later Jeremy staggered up the stairs, laughing so hard he couldn’t walk straight. Mrs. Tupper was doggedly chasing him, leaning on both her canes, a last banana peel dangling from her hand.