Betsy Wickwire's Dirty Secret (11 page)

T
he lake wasn't that far away but you had to know where to find it. About five minutes down the highway Dolores told Murdoch to pull over. There wasn't even a sign or a painted rock or a stick marking the spot.

We waited until a couple of eighteen-wheelers rumbled past, then we sprinted across the highway. Dolores must have loved it when Murdoch helped her over the median. I climbed over by myself.

We started down the path. It was potholed and rocky and overhung with branches. It looked like the wilderness but still sounded like the highway. I walked behind Murdoch and Dolores.

I don't know how long we'd gone when I realized I couldn't hear the trucks any more. All I could hear was the crunch of footsteps and, now and then, leaves crackling in the wind.

Sometime later, Dolores stopped and pointed at some
bushes. “Okay, children. Boys' changing room over there, girls' over here.”

I went behind the proper bush, turned my back to Dolores and changed. I looked down at my belly and realized I was disappearing. The size-zero bottoms hung off my hip bones. I had no meat on me, no colour. I imagined slicing myself open and finding I was as white and lifeless as a slab of Styrofoam.

“All set?”

Dolores was wearing her granny suit and tucking the last strands of hair under her mauve bathing cap. She put on her glasses and tucked the arms in too. Murdoch was fidgeting in his T-shirt and baggy, plaid boxers.

This is a cartoon
. That's what I thought.
My whole life has become a cartoon. Tune in next week to
Losers at the Lake
on Weirdo TV starring Betsy Wickwire, playing herself
. Cruel but true.

Murdoch held back a branch so we could cut down to the water. There were some yahoos across the way doing cannonballs and no doubt having a couple of beer but otherwise the place was deserted. It seemed odd that I'd lived my entire life in Halifax and never heard of Quarry Lake. The popular kids obviously didn't come here. I was here now.

I knelt on the flat top of the boulder, spread out my towel and lay down on my back. I could smell the pine
needles and something sort of metallic (coming from the rock) and something sort of plastic (coming from my bathing suit). Dolores and Murdoch sat down below with their legs in the water and talked. Little waves splashed up against the sh ore. Something crawled over my wrist. I wiped it away without opening my eyes. Murdoch the Dock Spider.

The spider is afraid of the water. His friends have to help him. He learns to do an excellent frog kick with all his eight legs but then a fish eats him and he dies.

I clearly was in the wrong frame of mind to write a children's story.

Maybe it was fear or exhaustion or just plain surrender, but I couldn't come up with anything else to think about. It was like my brain had been painted beige.

I must have passed out eventually, because when I opened my eyes I was hot and dizzy and the world was all bleached out. I wasn't quite sure where I was but knew better than to dig too deep. I peered around. Dolores was lying on her towel now, hands at her side, eyes closed, looking like the type of doll they sell in Giant Tiger. Murdoch was in the lake, floating on his back. Sharp flashes of sunlight snapped around him. I had to blink my eyes a few times to see him.

I should swim. Cool down.

I sat up and put my hand over my eyebrows. “How is it?”

Murdoch's head moved as he tried to figure out where the voice was coming from.

“Oh. The water? It's, um, nice, I guess.”

I nodded, then remembered he couldn't see so said, “Oh.”

I looked at the lake for quite a while and then, at some random point, just stood up. Everything seemed to be happening slightly beyond my control.

I stumbled down to the water. I didn't check the temperature with my toe or ease myself in. I jumped straight in and sank to the bottom like a lead statue.

The lake was cool and clear and totally silent. My hair floated up. I only had to work a little to stay down. I saw Murdoch's legs kicking overhead. The water turned them a yellowy brown, like a tinted picture. I wondered if this was what movies were like in the olden days.

I could have stayed under water forever, just floating, watching, absorbing. I felt sort of safe there. I didn't even mind the pain growing in my chest. It felt natural—or at least, real—not like most things in my life right then. I let a bubble of air out of my mouth and watched it wobble frantically away from me. It reminded me of the rabbit in
Alice in Wonderland
.

Murdoch turned around. His legs looked strong. I could see he was probably quite a good swimmer. I felt mean for turning him into a dock spider. No one would
want to be a dock spider. What was happening to me?

He stopped treading water. He was diving toward me now. His cheeks were puffed out and his hair was streaming back behind him.

I remembered this famous picture of a Greek god, his face all bloated like that, blowing the clouds away, but I couldn't remember his name or what he was god of. Was there a god of Hopeless Causes?

Murdoch was coming right for me and I had this sudden, horrible feeling that he wanted to play. Was this some type of game? That made me think of Nick and Carly and the little “games” they played. They were even here in the lake with me.

Murdoch grabbed my arm and began to pull me up. I thought of how gentle he'd been with his sister when she'd ambushed him the other day. This didn't feel like playing. I was suddenly frightened.

Dolores
.

Something must have happened to Dolores. That's why he'd come to get me.

I started to kick, move my arms, scramble up to the surface, scared. I was suddenly desperate to get out, suddenly desperate too, I realized, for air. I burst out of the water.

“You all right?” Murdoch's face was so close to mine I could feel his breath. He was panting. His eyes were shifting back and forth as if he was scanning me for data.

“Me? Yes.” I sort of fluttered away from him. “Me? Why?”

He took a few strokes back too. “Oh, sorry. You were down so long I thought, I don't know, something had happened to you. Like you'd hit your head or got caught in a rock or something.”

I turned down my mouth and shrugged. I tried to make out like it was nothing, but I felt a little trickle of fear. I realized I'd had no intention of coming up.

M
urdoch was treading water about a metre away from me. “You've got a good set of lungs. I wouldn't have been able to stay down half that long.” He sounded less amazed than disturbed.

I saw little pinpricks of light all around him. Can a person faint in the water? I paddled over to the side and pulled myself on to the rock.

Dolores was lying up above, whisking pine needles off her bathing suit. I didn't know why I'd been so worried. I'd been drowning and I'd been worried about Dolores. I leaned back against the rock, relieved to feel its hard edge on my shoulder blades. I didn't move for a long time.

“Oh boy. I'm famished!” Dolores sat up and peeled off her bathing cap. Her hair was as slick and green as seaweed underneath. “Shall we eat?” She dumped the bag of food out onto her towel and started ripping packages open. Food might help, I thought. Maybe I just need food.

I kept one hand on the side of the boulder to steady myself and climbed to the top. I looked down and saw Murdoch hauling himself out of the water. He was as white as I was and thin too. He stood up. Thin, but his shoulders were broad. He patted his hand on the rock until he found his glasses, then climbed toward us.

Dolores's fingers were already dyed radioactive from the Cheezies. “Dig in, guys,” she said, and stuffed another handful in her mouth.

Neither of us took up her offer.

“What? No one else hungry?” She seemed offended, as if she'd made the Cheezies herself. She wiped the crumbs off her mouth with the back of her hand and looked at Murdoch.
“Two
cookies? What's the matter with you? Have some more.” She shook the plastic tray at him until, one by one, she'd made him take a lap full.

“Careful,” he said. “I'll eat them all if you let me.”

“So? Geez. If you're hungry, just eat.”

“Bad advice,” he said.

Murdoch was sitting on the ground with one knee up and his arm stretched over the top, his hand hanging loose. It kind of reminded me of the Sistine Chapel. My thoughts were all so weird now.

“If I ate every time I was hungry, everyone else would starve.”

“How very noble of you.” Dolores cracked open a can
of something called Mountain Rain. “But stupid. It's a dog-eat-dog world, my friend. You know what they say: Do unto others before they do onto you.” She took a swig, then leaned back on her elbows.

I nibbled on a pinkish cookie with yellow icing the texture of soap. Dolores was playing the tough girl in a movie I was watching.

“You'll be sorry,” Murdoch said. He reached over and picked up ten or twelve Cheezies in his giant hand. It wasn't very convincing. He was playing a role too. I thought again how weirdly perfect they were for each other.

Dolores's phone rang. “Oy. Can I never get a moment's peace?” She laid a hand on her cheek. “When you run your own business, you're always on call.”

She rummaged through her plastic bag and pulled out her cell. “Lapins de Poussière Cleaning Service …” She listened for a moment, then her eyebrows dipped and her face went serious. She got up and walked off, as if she'd just been called away on important business.

I looked out over the lake. I was aware that at another time I probably would have thought it was pretty. A gust of wind blew past and I shivered.

“Cold?” Murdoch said.

I turned and saw he was taking a picture on his phone. I didn't know if it was of me or of Dolores or maybe just the scenery. I turned away again. “Just the breeze.”

He moved his phone and clicked some more. Dolores was taking a long time on the call. The silence was getting awkward.

“You an artist?” I was just filling the air. Murdoch shrugged. “Try to be. How'd you know?” I realized I'd given myself away. “Um. Uh, well. Your door was open and I just happened to see a little …”

“Oh.”

“I didn't mean to …” That made me sound even guiltier. “You're good. Like, I mean, as much as I saw.”

“I just goof around …” He took a dainty bite from one of the cookies and I thought the conversation was over, but then he said, “That's why I'm taking the pictures. To draw from. Like reference, you know.”

His voice trailed off and he looked away. Eventually, out of the corner of my eye, I saw him take a few more shots. I glared at Dolores like
would you hurry up?

She curled her lip at me but didn't let her charming phone voice waver. “Can I call you back in a moment just to make sure I can pull a team together? … Thanks.” She hung up.

“Got a proposition for you,” she said, then made us wait while she wolfed down two more cookies. “Anyone interested in splitting three hundred bucks with me?”

I didn't say anything. Murdoch said, “Um …”

“I knew that would grab your attention! But there's
a catch.” She laughed. “Always a catch, eh? It has to be done tonight. Apparently, this couple's splitting up. They cleaned most of their stuff out but the new people are moving in at the crack of dawn tomorrow and the house has to be clean by then. The wife —the ex-wife, I guess — said she'll pay us three big ones. So. You interested?”

Interested? No, I wasn't interested. Interested required more energy than I had. But it was money and I needed to get out of town. I knew that now. It wasn't a maybe any more.

“Okay,” I said.

“Murdoch?” Dolores said.

“I don't want to horn in …”

“Mur-doch.”

He looked at Dolores. She was doing that Italian sitcom thing with her hands again. He turned to me. I shrugged, but I tried to do it in a nice way.

He rubbed his hand over his face and shrugged too. His eyes looked amused.

“Great!” Dolores slapped her thighs. “Okay, guys, eat up. Don't want you swooning for lack of food. No way you slackers are going to stick me with all the work.”

W
e stopped at Murdoch's to get him some dry clothes, then raced over to meet the lady at her place by eight.

Sarah Tanner was sitting on the front step of a two-hundred-year-old townhouse on Creighton Street. She was young and attractive and dressed in party clothes. She was also crying her face off. She stood up when we got out of the car.

“Sorry.” She dabbed at her eyes with the tip of her finger. “Sorry.”

She held her breath until she managed to pull herself together. When she started to talk again, her voice had gone kind of fragile-perky. It reminded me of this substitute teacher we'd had in Grade 8 once.

“I forgot to mention a few things. Would you mind washing all the floors downstairs too and doing the bedroom windows on the …” She stopped as if she'd just
seen something horrible on the other side of the street. Her bottom lip turned inside out and a few seconds later she was crying again.

“This is so embarrassing.” She sucked in a big ugly breath. “I was all ready to go out and celebrate —like, you know,
whoo-hoo, he's gone!
—then I walked in there and.

And. And.”

She turned away and sobbed. Her head jerked back with each sniff. It was agony. My insides curled up. I wasn't going to outgrow this after all.

Murdoch looked at his feet. Dolores reached into her plastic bag and pulled out her compact.

“Stop that,” she said. “Now look. You got a small mascara issue on the left side. No biggie. Fix it up, reapply your lipstick—then go paint the town red. Seriously. No use hanging around here blubbering. Go out. Go crazy.”

Sarah tucked her lips into her mouth like a little kid trying not to cry. She nodded and took the compact.

Dolores gave her a few quick taps on the arm. “Don't worry. We'll clean the place up. Trust me. It'll be spotless. By the time we're through here, you'll be able to perform surgery on the kitchen table.” She turned her face sideways. “An amputation might be fun. Am I wrong— or does this guy have a body part or two you'd like to remove?”

That made Sarah laugh. “Yeah. No kidding.” She squeegeed the tears off her face and blotted at the mascara. “Better?”

Her lids were so puffy from crying that her eyes went kind of funny, but Dolores gave her a thumbs-up anyway.

“Yeah, right. Too late to do anything about it now.” Sarah handed back the compact. “Boy, you would not believe how often I've said that recently … Oh well. Whatever … I better get going.”

She gave her hair a fluff and adjusted her earrings. “Listen …” she said. “Would you do one other little thing for me?”

Dolores shrugged. “You're the one paying.” “Don't waste your life with a jerk. Okay? That's all I ask.”

Dolores snorted. “Please. I'm way ahead of you on that one.”

“Smart kid.” Sarah gave her a big fat envelope. “I didn't count but there's at least three hundred bucks here. When they moved the sofa out, I found a bunch of Cuban pesos underneath. Since I've never been to Cuba, I threw those in for you too. I doubt Justin's little conchita will miss them …”

“Geez. Quit it, would ya!” Dolores said. “You're going to mess up your makeup again. Now beat it. Seriously.” She pushed Sarah toward her car.

Sarah laughed again and my shoulders relaxed. I was never sure how people would take Dolores.

The car backed out of the driveway. Dolores swung her arm overhead as if she was waving from the deck of an ocean liner. She waited until the car was out of sight before she counted the money.

*

I could still detect a hint of Sarah's perfume when we walked into the house, but otherwise it felt deserted. Something about the milky colour of the walls and the high ceilings and the light coming in through the big old windows, though, made me think that this had been a happy place once upon a time. I couldn't believe that a beautiful old house lived in by a beautiful young woman could ever have been anything but happy. Happy and beautiful had always kind of been the same thing in my mind.

“Think she left a radio?” Dolores said. “Might be fun to crank up some tunes.”

The kitchen and living room were one big open space. Dolores systematically poked through each of the cupboards and closets and leftover boxes. Murdoch awkwardly studied the window frames. I just stood there, trying not to think too much.

Dolores clapped the dust off her hands. “Doesn't look like it. Oh well. Let's get started, then.”

She gave us each a green garbage bag and a blue recycling bag, then divided up the chores. Sweeping, wiping, window washing, the usual shtick. I took the upstairs. I figured Dolores might like the alone time with Murdoch.

I walked through each of the rooms on the second floor. I liked the soft grey of the master bedroom. Sarah had good taste. Other than that, there wasn't much I could read from the place.

I could hear Dolores downstairs belting out some old song I remembered from junior high. Her voice was low and kind of raspy. She was a pretty good singer despite obviously not knowing the lyrics. I picked up the broom and began to sweep. Hair, dust, grit, an elastic band, a thumbtack, little scraps of paper, insect carcasses: it's surprising how much is left in an empty house. I remembered hearing the number of skin cells—millions? billions?— people shed every day. It dawned on me that every person who ever walked through this house probably left a little bit of themselves behind.

I imagined my skin cells all dropping at once and my whole body just disappearing like sand down a crack in the floorboards.

Where had that come from? I was getting weirder and weirder all the time.

Carly wasn't weird. Emotional, yes, but not weird. I knew Nick wouldn't want anyone weird. I was just being realistic.

I scooped up the skin cells and assorted debris and dumped it all in the garbage bag.

I moved into the front room. It was tiny and a slightly darker grey than the bedroom. There were faint outlines on the wall where pictures or maybe diplomas had hung. I swept the floor, then opened the closet to do in there too. A bunch of photographs were scattered in the corner. I leaned my broom against the wall and knelt down to take a look.

They were all of a youngish athletic guy with short salt-and-pepper hair and a big, white grin. He often had a beer or a burger in his hand. The other arm was usually torn off. Once upon a time, I figured, Sarah must have been in the picture too.

I moved the photos around on the floor like I was lining up cards for a game of Concentration and studied them. What would I have thought of Justin if I hadn't known he'd made Sarah miserable?

He was handsome. He was fit. He laughed a lot. He had a good job.

He was a lawyer. I didn't know why I thought that. Or maybe a doctor.

Nick wants to be a doctor
.

I got this feeling as if an insect was crawling across my neck. I flicked my head. I picked up a photo of Justin in a dark suit, his tie undone, his mouth open wide, laughing.

Definitely a professional of some sort.

I considered this for a second, then thought,
No. That's not what he is
.

I gathered up the pictures.

He's trash
.

I threw them in the green garbage bag. I was so angry I just stood there panting and twitching and clenching my fists. Every so often, I even stomped my foot. Then after a while, I just sort of laughed.

I knew it wasn't fair disposing of Justin like that—I didn't know the guy, I didn't know his side of the story — but I realized it was the first thing I'd enjoyed doing in ages.