WE’RE NO HERE.
The first letter arrives early in the morning, before anyone has realized he isn’t home. His mother finds it sticking out beneath the front door. The paper is stained with mud; there is no envelope. The note is short and very hard to read. She doesn’t know what her son’s writing looks like; he’s the sort of person who prefers to say what he has to say instead of writing it down.
This note is short and quick: Hi mum, the three of us decided to go on an early summer vacation. Did you know approximately 1/3 of the Canadian “Horseshoe” Falls is actually in US territory?!
Niagara Falls. He’s in Niagara Falls. That is a long way from home; but it makes to her. Who wouldn’t want to escape to a huge waterfall when they live in a desert? She’s thought about it herself, sometimes. She has had this thought since her son was born. Run, hitchhike, just get away from the stifling heat, the overbearing husband, and the little boy who didn’t deserve to be welcomed home to 584 Mary Avenue.
Twenty-nine letters arrive following the first. Two weeks apart, two months, two years. Each letter contains facts about where he is. The CN Tower has a glass floor, unbreakable!
The letters never stop. Even when his father dies of heart failure and his mother packs her things and moves away, closer to water, the ocean. Even though the house is now run-down and abandoned. Especially now.
With no one to collect them, the letters pile up just inside the front door. Pushed through the mail slot, the newest one lands on top of the last. Hey, he says, fancy meeting you here. The letter on the bottom of the pile, the one that grazes the dusty floor, he takes it upon himself to be the leader of the letters. You should have gotten lost in the mail. We’ve been here for years. Chances are, you will be too.
His mother moves away, leaving the unopened letters. She figures her only son has finally escaped; he won’t come back, he has his own life now. A grown-up. Probably a good-paying job and maybe his own son to treat right this time.
Back. He’s never left. He hasn’t grown up and he’ll never have a son. Or a daughter. Grandchild. Wife. He doesn’t have any friends any more. He used to think he had the best friends in the world, but they have long since left him. His makeshift friends, his friends of the earth—they’re gone, too. No longer does he have anything appealing about him. He is not any fun; he doesn’t tell jokes or laugh or run. There’s nothing left to taste of him.
I KNOW YOU ARE BUT WHAT AM I?
It has been seven months. Virginia misses her family but she dares not try and contact them. Seven months ago, she thought she could do it. She thought she could run away with Teddy and everything would be fine. Nothing is fine. For seven months, neither of them have spoken more than a sentence or two to each other. Seven months is a long time to not speak to your best friend, but the only thing they have to speak about is Jamie. They cannot talk about Jamie. Virginia can’t.
They are sitting in a small diner in a small town that resembles their own in size only. There is grass in this town: Grass lawns, grass fields, grass riverbanks. Riverbanks. Tons of them. One long, thick river flowing through the whole county. Plants. Flowers. Daises and daffodils, tulips. A field of dandelions, bright yellow. Virginia has read in books about rubbing the petals of a dandelion on your skin to test if you like butter; she picks the first dandelion she sees, a fat one, ripe and healthy, and tests herself. The test is right: She does like butter.
Teddy and Virginia have been here three days, but the yellow mark is still on Virginia’s wrist. A small yellow circle, nearly perfect. She stares at it while the two of them wait for their lunch to arrive.
Virginia likes this town. She does not know its name, but to her it is Fundy. The real Fundy. What Fundy would be like if things had worked out. What she would be like.
“Chicken Caesar Salad?” The waitress has returned, carrying two large plates steaming with food, one appetizer, and two vanilla milkshakes.
Teddy nods his head. The salad is set in front of them, right in the centre of the table. “I’m the hamburger, thanks. Steak for her.”
It’s a cheap diner, run by a loud, fat family that always sits in the corner booth and watches people eat. None of them work except the two children, short stubby kids, probably nearly thirteen. And the aunt. She’s thin. Hook-nosed. Her hair is curled from humidity; her eyes are powdered in electric blue. The family might be Greek. The food doesn’t suggest it, but their noses do.
Since she was nine, Virginia has ordered her steak medium-well. She’s leery of any pink in her meat. She tries to cut herself a piece and winces. Her steak is tough as cardboard. A disappointment. Dipping her finger in the milkshake, she can at least enjoy this. The flavour is not quite right; it tastes like sour milk sprinkled with vanilla. The milkshake is too thick to drink from a straw.
Teddy, however, seems to be thoroughly enjoying his meal. Except the milkshake. She watches him sip it, wince, and glide the glass over to her side of the table. He notices her watching him and he smiles, weakly.
“Gin,” he begins, his voice faltering slightly. “Gin. It’s been ages. I’m getting tired of running. Not because—definitely not because of you! It’s just—”
“Seven months.” Virginia’s voice is flat and quiet, husky. It sounds as if her throat has been scraped with an ice cream scooper. “It has been seven months. That is not ages! It took his mother longer than that to have him!”
“And what a mistake that was, wasn’t it?” He’s shouting now. The fat Greek family turns and gapes at them. Virginia sinks down into the booth, desperate to shrivel into her skin and hide. She shuts her eyes tight, silently pleading with him, Be quiet, don’t talk about him, let’s leave, what did we do?
Teddy lowers his eyelids, ashamed of embarrassing his dearest friend. “It was a mistake,” he murmurs quietly, so softly Virginia can barely hear him.
They leave a handful of crumpled bills on the table, then they slip away as silently as possible. Teddy tries to put his arm around Virginia but she shies away, her eyes full of tears. She can’t help but wonder about what he said. What about Teddy was a mistake: His birth…or his death?
FRIEND OF THE NIGHT or NOW THERE’S THAT FEAR AGAIN.
Virginia knows she is dreaming because the sky is dark green. Moss green. Jamie’s favourite colour. The colour her penny turned without its protective cardboard.
She looks around, hoping to see Jamie; she needs to apologise, make things right. He isn’t here; only as a colour, his favourite shade of green. Virginia sits up, leaves the tent Teddy set up for them to sleep in.
“Jamie?” She calls out his name quietly, hoping he can hear her at even the slightest volume. She doesn’t want Teddy to wake up. “Jamie?” A bit louder.
When no one answers, Virginia’s shoulders sink. Tears begin to fall, thick and wet, salty. The sky is no longer green. It’s dark blue, nearly black—midnight colour.
Suddenly Virginia feels like walking. She pulls on her sweater and slowly zips the tent flap closed, slowly so it makes no sound. The ground is cold and hard beneath her feet, desert terrain. The sky is no longer green, but she must still be dreaming, for the land if lush here, green and alive.
Virginia wanders far, until she sees a scraggly bush. Growling. A ferocious animal is hidden behind the bush. Lion. Jamie’s least favourite animal. She can’t leave without looking, she doesn’t know why. Her eyes peer slowly through the branches of the bush and as she realizes what she sees, a gasp of horror escapes her lips. There, half in the dirt, half in the lion’s claws, is Jamie.
This is when Virginia realizes what she has done, that Jamie will never forgive her because he’s been hidden away forever. Jamie was always hiding from the things he feared. She feels his fear strongly now, so strongly she doesn’t feel the wetness trickling down her leg as incontinence takes over. She is transported back to Jamie, to when he last hid himself, and it’s awful. The screaming of his mother, wild and terrified, like an animal would wail after it’s caught in the claws of a terrible beast. The laughing of his father, a hungry hyena. The crying of Jamie, seventeen but still afraid to fight. It’s the whimpering sound of a helpless animal, pleading for mercy, waiting for death.
Waiting for death.
But never wanting it.
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