TRAPS
Copyright © 2019 Sky Curtis
Except for the use of short passages for review purposes, no part of this book may be reproduced, in part or in whole, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronically or mechanically, including photocopying, recording, or any information or storage retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher or a licence from the Canadian Copyright Collective Agency (Access Copyright).
We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program. We also acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada.
Cover design: Val Fullard
eBook: tikaebooks.com
Traps: A Robin MacFarland Mystery is a work of fiction. All the characters portrayed in this book are fictitious and any resemblance to persons living or dead, is purely coincidental.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Title: Traps / Sky Curtis.
Names: Curtis, Sky, author.
Series: Inanna poetry & fiction series.
Description: Series statement: A Robin McFarland mystery | Inanna poetry & fiction series
Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20190147814 | Canadiana (ebook) 20190147822 | ISBN 9781771336697 (softcover) | ISBN 9781771336703 (epub) | ISBN 9781771336710 (Kindle) | ISBN 9781771336727 (pdf)
Classification: LCC PS8605.U787 T73 2019 | DDC C813/.6—dc23
Printed and bound in Canada
Inanna Publications and Education Inc.
210 Founders College, York University
4700 Keele Street, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M3J 1P3
Telephone: (416) 736-5356 Fax: (416) 736-5765
Email: inanna.publications@inanna.ca Website: www.inanna.ca
TRAPS
A ROBIN MACFARLAND MYSTERY
a novel by
Sky Curtis
INANNA PUBLICATIONS AND EDUCATION INC.
TORONTO, CANADA
To my lovely family
1.
I UNFOLDED THE MONTH-OLD NEWSPAPER beside my plate and flattened it with my hand. I loved reading while I ate. I was going to enjoy my breakfast of boiled egg on whole wheat toast, no butter, and look at the paper. Yes, I knew one shouldn’t do this; one should pay attention to one’s food, but who was watching? My dog?
I checked in with him. “Do you mind if I read while I eat, little Lucky?”
He barked twice. I thought that meant no. I also thought I should get out more.
I sliced off the top of the egg, spooned out some yolk and mushed it on the toast, still no butter. I was dieting. I was always dieting. And I was always still fat. If I’ve offended the word police who want us all to accept our bodies, let’s just say I was still round. Not large. Not obese. Not a heart attack waiting to happen. Certainly not fat. Round. Round as a big fat honking beach ball. Hahaha. So, no butter.
While reaching for my toast. I looked at my fingers. Geezus. Ink. Not that I’m a germaphobe, not like my perfectionist brother Andrew, the asshole, but I got up and washed my hands. I didn’t want ink on my fingers as I was stuffing food into my gob—or rather, daintily nibbling my toast. It was the first time I’d seen my article in the paper. I didn’t read newspapers. This was sort of bizarre given that I’m a journalist, but I was allergic to the ink. It made my asthma kick up. Hence the handwashing. So, I got all my news online. My father had saved the paper from the end of May for my records and given it to me at our last Sunday family dinner. It had mostly off-gassed by now. I gave it a sniff and only coughed twice. Not too bad.
When I sat back down, I picked up the toast by the corner and wolfed down a bite. It had been a long time since dinner. I’d save some calories and give a bit to Lucky, who was prancing around the table smiling at me. I wondered briefly if he would like the toast with no butter.
I turned my attention to the somewhat yellowed newspaper. What a fantastic headline: ABUSIVE ACTOR KILLS VICTIM USING BEAR BAIT. In all caps no less. And there was my byline below the head, by Robin MacFarland. And below that, with files from Cynthia Dale. Cindy was my best friend. Most of the time. She and Diane Chu, although I didn’t see Diane much these days. We were drinking buds. Yeah, well, what could I say? Still fat. Still drinking.
Such a wonderful photograph. Cindy had snapped it while up in a tree, looking down at the scene of a giant bear charging through a forest towards a police officer. His face was twisted in terror, eyes wide, his mouth open in a silent scream. The caption read: “Robin MacFarland, an investigative reporter for The Toronto Express, deduced that a police officer had inadvertently sprayed himself with bear pheromones contained in an insect repellent bottle.”
I continued reading. The first paragraph of the article summarized the situation up pretty nicely:
The fingerprints of David Sparling, the well-known stage performer, were found on an insect repellent bottle that had belonged to Darlene Gibson, a female stagehand whom he had allegedly sexually assaulted and who was in the process of a lawsuit against him when she disappeared. Ms. Gibson’s dismembered body was found in a forest near Huntsville, Ontario, by Robin MacFarland and Cynthia Dale, Toronto Express journalists. Gibson had been mangled by a bear, apparently attracted to the young woman by bear bait that had been poured by Sparling into her insect repellent bottle.
That time at my cottage was the worst. Cindy and I had headed to Muskoka in the hopes of writing a fluff story on land development and ended up examining body parts in partial decay. It was going to be a long time before I went back to my cottage.
As I munched on my breakfast, I reread the photograph’s caption: “investigative reporter” my ass. I wrote for the Home and Garden section. My speciality was flowers, cutlery, scissors, pitchforks, and other fascinating topics to do with the home. Since May I had written not one, but two articles on Vise-Grips. I looked down at my legs and thought about Ralph, my boyfriend. Maybe I should do some scissor kicks or something to enhance my grip. Oh, Robin, get a grip. I gave the paper a shake, held it at arm’s length so it would come into focus, ah, the joys of aging, and admired my piece. I had, after all, figured out how a bear had been manipulated to kill.
This was my second front-page article in less than a year. This didn’t quite qualify for being on a roll, but the trajectory was good. It’s not that I was ambitious, nor was I competitive, but honestly, bamboo pillows? Laminate flooring? The shit I knew about. I’d been on the inside pages of the paper for decades and it was sort of depressing that my career had been so stagnant. So, two articles on the front page about murders that had been basically solved by me? Not bad. Not bad at all. I could feel my self-esteem knitting together.
I thumped the paper. And look at that! Front page. My name! I was a hot property. The chaotic days after the arrest of the actor in May went on all the way through June. My phone buzzed constantly in my purse. All the major TV networks wanted to interview me. CBC. CTV. Global News. It was awful. It was grand. But still, now that I was back in the Home and Garden section of the newspaper, I was much happier. Well, maybe. Today, my job was to write about early spring flowers, now that it was June. To be specific, peonies and ants. Back to the things I was an expert on. Sad really. Not sad that I was expert on these sorts of things, but maybe sad that I truly liked these things. They were about life. About how people lived. Maybe I was helping people with their journeys on earth. Naw, who was I kidding? Rhubarb? Keyless remote entries? And now ants, for heaven’s sake. So trite.
My phone pinged. A text. I brushed my hands off on a tissue and saw it was from Maggie, my oldest child. What now? She wanted to know if we were going to have a week at the cottage with the whole family. No way. We usually had a week together at the end of August, including Labour Day weekend. That way everyone could maximize their time off work without taking too many holiday days. Her request grated on me. I was torn. They loved the cottage, and I couldn’t go. Plus, for heaven’s sake, it was only the middle of June. The end of August was weeks and weeks away. How the hell did I know what I would be doing in two months? That Maggie sure was a planner.
I texted back to her, Let’s make a plan. Get back to you later. xoxoxox. What a good mommy I was, showing absolutely no sign of irritation.
But really? No way was I going to that cottage for a holiday. Not me. Nopers. I needed to think about this. After that horrific time in Huntsville, that torn body and the bear attacks, the last place on earth I wanted to be was up north. Being Thursday, I had a few days to figure something out before our next family dinner on Sunday. Maybe Ralph would have some ideas. Or Cindy. Or Diane. There were tons of people I could consult. Even Shirley Hay Hair, my editor. But one thing I knew for sure. I was not going to go to the cottage for a holiday this summer. Nope. Not after what happened in May.
Severed neck bones skittered across my mind. That headless torso was going to haunt me for a long time. I would have to go somewhere else this summer if I wanted to relax and enjoy myself. I had enough money saved to pay for the kids to join me, wherever. Maybe PEI. They all liked that Anne of Green Gables story, even the boys. Maybe we could go there. Or maybe to Nova Scotia and look at some Maud Lewis folk art. They all liked art. I counted this as one of my achievements, instilling a love of art in my kids. They loved nature too, but shit, I just couldn’t go to the cottage. I gagged on my egg as I thought about a finger bone buried in the earth. No, better to go east.
I glanced at my watch. Damn. It was almost nine o’clock. So late. I had to get cracking. I brushed the crumbs off the article into my hand and gave Lucky the last corner of toast. He sniffed it, gave it a tentative lick, poked it with his nose, and looked at me questioningly.
“I know. No butter. Well, that’s the way it is. I’m too fat.”
He barked once.
“I know, it has nothing to do with you. You’re nice and thin, but I’m not and now I need to take steps to lose some weight. About ten thousand steps a day. That’s all the rage these days. I should keep track on a Fitbit. More like a Fatbit. Hahaha.”
Lucky barked again, head tilted.
“Oh, I didn’t translate your first bark correctly? Silly me. You didn’t want me to call myself fat? Right. Okay, I’m sturdy.” I grunted as I bent over to pick up the uneaten piece of toast off the floor. If it hadn’t had Lucky’s spit on it, I might have been tempted to eat it. Yikes. That was disgusting. I tossed it into the organic bin along with the crumbs on my hand. “It’s time to go to work.”
Lucky barked and wagged his tail, looking at me expectantly. Every morning he did this.
“Work. Not walk. Work.” You’d think he’d know that by now. “I’ll walk you when I get home. Promise.”
Was it pathetic that I talked to my dog like this? No, lots of people talked to their dogs. I stroked his head. “Bye-bye. Love you.” I grabbed my keys and briefcase, and rushed out the door, leaving Lucky standing in the middle of the kitchen, looking at me forlornly.
Last night, I’d gotten great parking, right across the street. I lived in a semi-detached Victorian in Cabbagetown that I’d bought for a song after Trevor, my husband of two decades, had suddenly been killed by a drunk driver, leaving me with four kids, five pets, and a huge mortgage. Of course, we’d had no insurance. That would have required planning. And Trevor had not been a planner, unlike Maggie. So, I sold the big house in the nice part of town near where Cindy lived in North Toronto and bought a rundown piece of crap at Carlton and Parliament. Being a Home and Garden reporter, I had good contacts and soon the place had been replumbed, rewired, and re-drywalled. It had turned into a respectable house with the old character retained. I was proud of it. The kids had finished up their schooling while living there, the smaller mortgage was paid off, and here I was, six years later, alone in a rambling old place with my dog. Given that Trevor had been killed by a drunk, it was pretty ironic that I now drank like a fish. I loved my wine.
As I crossed the street, I looked at my little Nissan with exasperation. Maybe if I stopped drinking a bottle of wine a day, I wouldn’t have to drive a shitbox. I would be able to afford the monthly payments on, let me see, a BMW? Maybe even a Mercedes. My brother drove a BMW. His wife did, too. Plus, they drank wine. Maybe not a bottle a day, but still. Life was unfair. I yanked the rusty driver’s door open and stuffed myself behind the wheel while tossing my briefcase into the back seat. No, I hadn’t locked the car. Who on earth would steal it? Cindy always got impatient with me for not locking my car. I pointed out to her that no one in their right mind would want a tape deck. My darling Nissan Sentra was really, really old. Almost twenty years. It had almost five hundred thousand kilometres on it. And I loved it. I gave a little pat on the dusty dashboard. Maybe it was unhealthy to be attached to a car. I really didn’t care. I turned the key and it purred to life. I smiled as I gassed it and threw the gearshift into D, for Devil, spinning the wheels and racing towards Parliament Street. I squealed at the corner and headed south towards the lake and my office.
I guess I shouldn’t have said “my office.” I had no office, per se. Only the editors had offices. We underlings had spaces. We didn’t even have cubicles. There were no office dividers for us. So, I headed to the office and parked my rust bucket in the underground parking lot. At least we had free parking. In fact, the columns and the wall in front of my parking space made it more private than my desk. Maybe I should work in my car.
On the way up to the fifth floor, I struck a pose in the elevator, looking at myself in the brushed steel doors. They were like funhouse mirrors and shaved about twenty pounds off my hips. I was so pleased. Unfortunately, they also made my head the size of a baseball, which, although disconcerting and unattractive, I thought I could live with, given the weight loss. The elevator doors opened at Editorial on the fifth floor, and I saw Cindy hunched over her computer, tapping away, her red curls vibrating. Derrick Johnston, the asshole sports reporter who I couldn’t stand, was flipping a toothpick around in his mouth with his tongue while he made a show of looking at his watch. Yeah, so I was a little late. I was always a little late, and I didn’t give a shit. Actually, I did. Guilt was my best friend. I just acted as if I didn’t care. I’d read a book that had said, “Act as if.” The theory was if you acted as if long enough, eventually the as if would become the reality. So far, it hadn’t worked for me. I still felt guilty. But I was willing to keep at it. I shook my head and rolled my eyes as I stepped around his desk on the way to mine. I muttered, “Neanderthal” as I passed by him, and none too softly either. I knew he wouldn’t know what it meant. Too big a word.
Cindy looked up as I pulled my chair away from my desk and dumped my body into it. “Hi,” I said. “What are you working on? Guns in Toronto?”
Her green eyes widened, “How did you know? Did you hear about that shipment that came over the border in a car’s gas tank? I’m going to go to the police station later and talk to the guys if they let me in. I’d love to know how the woman got the guns into her tank and whether or not the gasoline wrecked the guns.”
The cops hated Cindy. As a crime reporter, she was always in their face. Rude, aggressive, demanding, strong, and usually right. Nobody liked someone who turned them into a fool. She wasn’t purely an investigative reporter, the paper had two of those: Karen Marumbo and Stanley Wong. No, my Cindy liked action. Crime. The minute she heard a siren, any siren, she catapulted out of her chair and chased it. She probably had an app for following emergency vehicles. Maybe it was called Appulance. To be fair, every now and then, she did some investigative reporting, like her great series on gangs last spring. But Cindy liked exploits. We were so different. I liked roses. And the cops liked me. In particular, Ralph Creston, a senior detective, liked me. A lot. In fact, a few weeks ago he’d told me he loved me. Why he had to ruin a nice relationship with the “L” word was beyond me.
I said, “Probably not. Gasoline is a solvent and guns do need to be cleaned. Plus, they are metal. Gasoline would be great for that.” Cindy was staring at me with that look on her face. I had stepped into her territory. And after she had been told to stand down from writing the story about the actor, she was probably sensitive to my interference into her area of expertise. I knew I needed to lighten things up. “Although you wouldn’t want to use one of those guns near a fire. Kaboom.” I laughed as I peered at her computer. What? She was on the Air Canada site. “I thought you said you were working.”
Cindy tapped her space bar and up came her story. “I am. I’m multi-tasking. I’m booking my holiday. This year I’m heading to the east coast.”
“Get out. That’s exactly what I was thinking I’d do this summer. With my kids.”
She furrowed her brow. “But don’t you usually go to your cottage?”
“Not this year. Not after that…. You know….”
“Well, I’ve booked a flight to Halifax and I’ve rented a car. I’m going to drive around Cape Breton. I always wanted to look at that Bell Museum. Want to come with me? Ding-ding? Bell?”
As much as I loved Cindy, and I really did, I was hoping that Ralph would be able to come with us out east, and they positively hated each other. It just wouldn’t work for her and me to have a holiday together. Besides, when we’d been at my cottage in May, there were times when she really bugged me. Like when she climbed huge trees, scaring me out of my wits. Mind you, she did get that great picture of the bear charging that officer. Anyway, it would be best if we didn’t hook up out there.
“Really? There’s a museum about bells?” I thought for a minute. “Well, there’s a museum about shoes in Toronto, so I guess bells could have a museum as well. Now that I think about it, bells are pretty interesting. There are all kinds of bells. Big bells, little bells, different notes and tones. Singing bells. Bowls that sound like bells. Yes, now that I think about it, a bell museum would be full of information. I should write an article about bells.”
Cindy was watching me with a small smile playing around the corners of her mouth. “The Bell Museum is in Baddeck. Alexander Graham Bell,” she said, emphasizing the guy’s last name, “invented quite a few things. Underwater sonar, air conditioners, hydrofoil boats, airplanes, you name it. He was unbelievably creative.”
Chastised, and turned into a fool, as only Cindy could do, I sort of laughed. “Oh. I see. When are you going?”
“The last two weeks in August.”
Oh no, not then. “That’s when I think I’d like to go.” I tried not to sound disappointed.
“Maybe we’ll meet up somewhere,” Cindy said.
No bloody way. “That would be fun.”
“Where are you thinking of going?” she asked.
Far away from Cape Breton. “I don’t know yet. We might even go to PEI. I have to talk to my kids about it at our Sunday dinner this weekend. Who knows. Maybe they’re so entrenched in the tradition of going to the cottage they won’t even entertain the idea of travelling to another province. I’ll see.”
“Well, if you do end up deciding on Nova Scotia, let’s get together.”
“Sure, sounds like fun,” I lied.
2.
RALPH AND I WERE ENJOYING A LEISURELY Sunday morning brunch. He’d shown up around midnight after his shift of being a cop and saving the world. Last night, we had both been exhausted, fell into bed, and then made up for lost time this morning. So, now, well-exercised, we ate heartily. Or rather, he did. I was bravely trying to enjoy a bowl of translucent low-fat yogurt topped with three wrinkled blueberries. It looked like camel cum garnished with dead flies.
“Why don’t you have some pancakes, sweetie. They’re great.” A bead of maple syrup was slowly making its way down his chin, through the bristles of his five o’clock shadow. On one hand, I was revolted. On the other, I wanted to lick it off his face.
“Um, well, I need to protect my girlish figure.”
“You don’t have a girlish figure.”
I gave him a look that said, “Screw off.”
He smiled. “No, you have a beautiful woman’s figure. Soft and mature. Real.”
“Good save.” I laughed and then gathered up some courage. “You don’t think I’m fat?”
He grinned. “God, no. I think you’re beautiful. So many women are way too thin. There’s nothing to hold on to. I like the way you look. There’s enough of you to love.”
There was that stupid “L” word again. He had been using that a lot lately. What was I supposed to do with that? Maybe he was vocabularically challenged and only knew one alternate word for “like.”
And now, on top of everything else, I was faced with a dilemma. Did I continue with the yogurt so there was less of me to love, or did I drown some pancakes in syrup and go hog-wild? And why was food associated with love anyway? Food should just be fuel for the body, not fuel for the soul. Right? Was I overthinking this? As I contemplated all this, I was also staring blankly at that bead of maple syrup on Ralph’s chin.
“What? Do I have something on my chin?”
I came back to earth. “Just some maple syrup.”
As he wiped it off with a napkin, he said, “What’s on the agenda for today?”
“Well, the first thing is to take the napkin fluff out of your stubble.” I licked my finger, leaned over, and rubbed the lint off his chin. “There. Much better.” I took a breath, trying to ignore the zing that coursed through my lower body. “Everyone is coming over for dinner tonight, and I was hoping you would, um, join us.”
I was going to say “come” but after touching his chin, I didn’t want to give him any ideas. I needed to get today’s show on the road as it was already well past ten. I still had a ton of stuff to do and that didn’t include another romp in the bedroom.
Ralph pushed himself away from the table, leaned back and looked at me. “Really? You want me to come to a family dinner? Well, that’s a first. Are you sure you want to introduce me to everyone? Are you ready for that? I mean, I know we’ve been seeing each other for almost a full year, but I know how skittish you are. I was prepared to wait awhile for things to move along, if they were going to.”
“Skittish? You think I’m skittish? What do you mean?” I sounded shrill. In fact, I sounded skittish. I was trying to keep my voice calm and reasonable, as if I were relaxed. The as if game wasn’t working that well.
Ralph looked up at he ceiling, thinking. “Well, for example, if I tell you I love you, you sort of gurgle. Like you’re being strangled or something. You don’t know what to say. It makes you really uncomfortable. But I do love you. I love your sense of humour. Your feistiness. Your smarts. Your talent. How we are together.”
Geezus. He should just shut up. My throat constricted, and I made a strangled noise.
Ralph laughed. “There. That’s what I mean. You gurgle.” He leaned forward, making a point. “Anyway, I’d love to come for dinner and finally meet your lovely family.”
“Really? Are you sure? There’s definitely some weirdness there.”
“Oh? You surprise me.”
What did he mean by that? Was I weird? I thought for a second. Yeah, probably.
“Anyway, we all need to talk about our summer holidays. The kids and I like to take a week or so together at the end of August and go to the cottage, but I just don’t think I can handle that this year. That bear business in May was really upsetting.”
“I understand.” Ralph’s eyes were so kind. “It’s not every day you see a head severed from a torso.”
We both looked away for a second, contemplating headless torsos. I felt blueberry pancakes rise up in my gorge. Yes, I had discarded the slimy yogurt, and chosen the delicious pancakes. Of course I had. I wasn’t stupid.
“So, what are your thoughts, Robin?”
“I was thinking maybe we could go out east or something. Check out Anne of Green Gables or Maud Lewis. Walk on some beaches. Swim. I don’t know. What do you think?”
Ralph peered at me. “When you say ‘we,’ are you including me in this plan?”
I told myself to be brave. Act as if it was no big deal. I took another deep breath, “Well, yes, if you could get the time off. That is, if you wanted to come with us.”
“I would love to.” He resumed eating his pancakes. “Do you think your kids would mind? I mean, they’re just meeting me tonight for the first time.”
I’d thought about it. Ralph had been in my life since the end of last summer, and I liked him. A lot, actually. I wouldn’t go as far as the “L” word, but still, it looked as if he was going to be around for a long time, so I might as well get my kids used to the idea that I was now part of a couple.
I was completely honest for a change. “I have no idea how they’ll react. But you and I are together, and we might as well be together, if you know what I mean.”
Ralph took a deep breath, looked at me straight in the eye, and said, “Thank you, Robin.” He suddenly stood up and bustled around the kitchen, rinsing off plates for the dishwasher and putting food away. And I was skittish?
As I watched him move around my space, I thought about how I felt about him. He was certainly part of my life. It was time that my children met him. But was I doing the right thing? Who knew? But I did know that if he didn’t meet my family soon it would be insulting. A year was a year. Any longer and he would think I was ashamed of him or something. Or ashamed of them. The only family I was ashamed of was my pompous prick of a conservative brother Andrew, who Ralph had already met. And my parents.
“It’s so nice that we have the day off together. Do you have things you need to do?”
“Not really,” he grunted.
A grunt? What was going on with him now? He sounded upset.
“Well,” I chirped, “I have to go to the No Frills on Parliament Street and get some food for dinner. I was thinking a chickpea curry on rice tonight, for the vegetarians in the family, and maybe roast chicken for the rest of us. Broccoli. Strawberries. They’re in season now. Also, I would like to garden for a bit and of course, walk little Lucky. Want to do any of that with me?”
Ralph didn’t turn around and was briskly running water over already rinsed dishes. What was up with him? I got out of my chair and put my arms around his waist.
“Hey,” I said. “You okay?”
“It’s just…” He paused. “It’s just that I’m so happy with us, and I don’t want it to end.”
God, men were so stupid sometimes. I had just asked him to meet my family and he was worried about the relationship ending? What a dip. “We are moving forward here, Ralphie. Not backwards.”
“Ralphie?”
I laughed and grabbed a tea towel by the corner and snapped it at his bum. “Hey Ralphie, big detective, take this.” Snap went the towel. “Assault with a deadly weapon.” Finally, he turned around and grabbed the towel as it flicked near his thigh and pulled me towards him with it.
He held me in a tight embrace and kissed the top of my head. “Where do you want to walk Lucky?”
I mumbled into his shirt. “I was thinking the Brick Works. Want to go there? Or are you thinking somewhere else?”
“The Brick Works would be great. Close to us and maybe it won’t be that busy there today. It’s not exactly a beautiful day. How about doing the food shop now, then a little gardening, lunch, a walk, a nap, and then dinner.”
This was exactly what I had in mind, right down to the “nap.” “It’s a great plan.” I snuggled deeper into his chest. “Do you think it will rain?”
He let go of me, pulled out his phone from his back pocket, and scrolled down. “Probably not. Only a thirty percent chance.”
The front of my body felt cold where he had been pressed against me. “Okay then, let’s get a move on. Lots to do!”
Seven hours later, we were back in the kitchen. We had shopped, walked, and happily napped. Lucky was snoozing by the back door, all tuckered out from chasing squirrels in the backyard while we weeded the garden, and Ralph was fishing around in the cutlery drawer for knives and forks. “How many people are coming?”
“Well, let’s see.” I counted on my fingers. “You and me, my mother and father, my brother Andrew and his wife Jocelyn, Maggie and her boyfriend Winchester, Evelyn, Calvin, and Bertie. So, eleven.”
He laughed, “Just eleven?” Silverware clattered as he gathered up knives and forks. “No wonder you wanted three cans of coconut milk for the curry and two chickens.” He walked into the dining-room area while sniffing the air. “Smells great.”
As six o’clock approached, I was finally making a cheese plate and cutting the stems out of the strawberries. They were glistening with juice. But the season hadn’t been great taste-wise, so I squirted lemon juice and honey on them. As I put the cheese and crackers on the pine blanket box, my makeshift coffee table in front of the couch, the doorbell rang. Ralph plunked a bottle of wine next to the cheese platter and beetled into the kitchen. Was he shy? I wagged my finger at Lucky as I walked to the door. “Leave that cheese alone.” He wagged his tail and licked his chops. I smacked my lips together and imitated him. Yup, I was weird.
I opened the door and saw that all the kids had arrived together. They were poking each other and laughing away. “Hi everyone. Come on in.” They parted around me like a tsunami and swept into the living room, grabbing chairs and jostling for places on the couch. “Help yourself to cheese and crackers.” As if I needed to tell them.
I ducked into the kitchen to check on Ralph. He was determinedly stirring the curry. “I was worried it was going to scald,” he said.
I knew I had turned the heat way down under the pan. “It’s okay, Ralphie, you can come out and meet them. They won’t bite.”
He sort of grimace-smiled, eyebrows raised. “Don’t call me Ralphie.” Stir stir stir. “What if they don’t like me?”
“They will, don’t worry. Come on. It’ll be fine.”
Just as he was wiping his hands on a tea towel and getting ready to face the music, the doorbell rang again. The rest of the family. He quickly grabbed the wooden spoon and started stirring the curry again. I said to his back, “Oh-h-h-h, the big strong detective is frightened of my vicious family.” He half-turned towards me and shrugged. I held up my finger and said, “I’ll be right back.”
My father and mother were already sitting in the living room, tucked together on the couch between Bertie and Calvin. Andrew and Jocelyn, my asswipe brother and his eye candy, were perched on the arms of the easy chairs. “Here, you two, sit on these.” I dragged two chairs from the dining room table and put them in the grouping around the blanket box. “Here you go.” I gave the chairs a pat. “Nice to see you.”
Not really. My brother was an asshole, and his wife? Just as bad as he was. They were the kind of people who looked you up and down, examining your hairstyle, assessing your wardrobe, putting a price tag on your looks. Pursing their lips if you were wearing brown shoes with black pants. They would never shop at IKEA or The Home Depot. Even their house paint? Farrow & Ball. God forbid the neighbours should see them opening a can of the Canadian Tire brand. Not that they ever painted anything themselves; they would hire professionals. And not that their neighbours could see them—their house was lodged behind an eight-foot cedar hedge in Rosedale.
Was I resentful because they were rich? Sour grapes? Maybe a little. I’d had a hard slog, but still, they rubbed me the wrong way. They were more interested in themselves than anything else. Everything the two of them did was for their benefit only. Narcissism was the name of their game. Even if they invited me for dinner, I knew it was to parade me as a journalist in front of their guests. And if one of their guests happened to be in manufacturing, it was to make a contact. After that weed killer fellow, I now made a point of clarifying who the other guests were before I accepted an invitation. Last thing I wanted to do was endorse weed poison.
And Jocelyn? She was always perfectly coiffed with the latest style of blonde-ombre hair, which cascaded down her back. I personally thought the look was ridiculous. Who wanted to look like they’d forgotten to touch up their dark roots? She often wore white slacks and a polo sweater, which she always tossed casually over her shoulders, the sleeves loosely tied around her neck. She was L.L. Bean personified. Jocelyn was whiter than white, blue-eyed with a dazzling smile. Maybe a touch of Botox here and there. Pearls. And worst of all, thin. I used to think Jocelyn was a nice person in a friendly American kind of way, until I figured out that she was complicit with Andrew. Every anti-community decision he made was agreed to by her. So, no, I couldn’t like her. She was a bitch. A well-dressed bitch, but a bitch.
I was a practicing Nichirin Buddhist—sort of—and one of the tenets of such practice was to find the goodness in everyone. Compassion was a big word at the Soka Gakkai International. I did my best, but geez, sometimes it was hard to do. As I looked at the two of them sitting in my living room, knees crossed, well-clad feet dangling, patronizing smirks around the corners of their mouths, I tried very hard to feel compassion for them. To be inclusive. To rise above my dislike. To hope for their happiness. But family was family and I had to invite them.
“So glad you could come. And how nice of you to bring Mom and Dad.” I turned to them on the couch. “Hi Mom, Dad. Help yourself to cheese and crackers.”
My mother looked so thin and fragile. Her eyes were taking on that empty stare that people with macular degeneration got. And my father? He was trying to look in charge, but I wasn’t sure he knew where he was. His marbles were scattering all over the floor, and he kept slipping on them. Even as I felt sorry for them, a flash of anger bolted through me. Where the hell had that come from? I told myself I’d think about it later. I opened the bottle of wine, poured several glasses, and handed them around. “Cheers,” I said, as I guzzled my glass, putting out the fire of fury that burned in my chest. What was my problem?
Oh no. I had forgotten about Ralph, stuck in the kitchen, stirring away. Is this what they meant by “stir crazy?” I tried not to turn into a hysterical hyena because of my private joke.
I called over the din, “Ralph, I wonder if you could bring in another bottle of wine. Thanks, sweetie.” “Sweetie” was as close as I could come to the “L” word.
Suddenly, the chatter stopped, and all eyes turned expectantly to the kitchen. Ralph made a red-faced entrance into the silence, carrying a bottle of red wine as if it were a life buoy. It was certainly mine. I could almost hear my kids’ brains whirring as they assessed this man of mine.
“I’d like everyone to meet Ralph, my boyfriend.” There, I’d said “my boyfriend” in public. “He’s the cop who saved my life when I was forced to eat almonds by a woman who had murdered her husband. Remember? It was not that long ago. About a year.”
Now that was what I call a good credential. The kids kept staring at him. I couldn’t believe how rude they were. He had a frozen smile on his face. This was so awkward.
My mother, bless her, broke the silence and piped up in her reedy voice. “And who are you, young man? You’re not Maggie’s boyfriend, that much I know. He’s the black man over there. Sitting beside her.”
Maggie and Winchester were snuggled up together in my reading chair, oblivious to the rest of us. Young love.
Ralph leaned forward and extended a hand to her. “Nice to meet you, Janice. I’m Ralph Creston.” He turned to my father and said, “And you must be Robin’s father, Duncan. I’ve heard so much about you.”
No, he hadn’t. I never talked about my parents to Ralph, except to tell him their names. But my father puffed his chest up and beamed at Ralph. Obviously, Ralph had said the right thing. Ralph then shook my brother Andrew’s hand and said, “Nice to see you again, and in much happier circumstances.” He turned to Jocelyn, his hand extended. “Andrew and I met a month ago at the cottage. Nice to meet you, Jocelyn.”
Jocelyn had obviously heard about the cottage fiasco where her husband’s client, Dave Sparling, had been arrested for murder. Andrew had been adamant, right up to the last minute, that his rich client couldn’t possibly have done anything wrong. He was rich! I watched Jocelyn as she tried, unsuccessfully, to mask her displeasure at meeting the man who had contradicted their core belief that the rich were all-powerful. She shook Ralph’s hand, but I could tell from the angle of her wrist that it must have felt like holding a used condom. Poor Ralph.
“And here are my kids,” I said. I pointed at each one as I said their names. “Evelyn, Maggie, her boyfriend Winchester Elliott, Calvin, and Bert.”
Ralph looked at each one and smiled as I went around the room. I could tell he was feeling self-conscious so I asked him to follow me into the kitchen to help me get the food on the table. As I was scooping the curry into a serving dish he said, “Well, at least that’s over. Everyone seems nice enough, except your brother and that Jocelyn. What’s up with her?”
“She has a pickle up her butt. Don’t worry about it. Here, take this and put it on the table.” I handed him the huge bowl of curry, threw the chicken on a platter, dumped the broccoli into a serving dish, and followed him out, my arms full as well.
“Hey everyone,” I said, “food’s going on the table. Let’s eat. Calvin, it’s your turn to be on the end of the table. Ralph, you can sit between my father and mother. Everyone else, grab a seat.” I went back into the kitchen and got the rest of the dinner. As I carried food into the room everyone was taking their places. Once we were seated, Andrew cleared his voice and started to pontificate.
Dickhead.
“We need to talk about the cottage.”
Oh God save me, here we go.