Here to Stay (21 page)

“Yeah, you’re both countries’ bitch now.”

In February, the Fredericton Playhouse called. They had just secured a $2 million grant to replace all their production equipment: sound, lighting, the works. With the new equipment, they’d be able to stage full-scale Broadway productions. The technical director was in desperate need of an assistant, preferably someone up-to-date with the latest technologies. Was Erik still interested?

“Let me call you back,” Erik said.

He hung up and texted Daisy:
I’m coming home.

For all his hard work and dedication at the dinner theater, Erik had been careful not to make himself too indispensable. He’d groomed his crew well and one young tech in particular was more than ready to take over at this moment’s notice.

The dinner theater’s owner could only wish his young, exhausted friend well. Still, wanting to tie up all ends, Erik spent an insane month working in Moncton two days a week and Fredericton the other three. It was the only instance when Daisy got short with him for the hours he was clocking. And when he arrived home badly shaken one night, after nearly nodding off at the wheel, she lit into him like a dragon.

“I didn’t get through twelve goddamn years and the last six months only to have you flip your car into a ditch,” she yelled, seizing two fists of his jacket and twisting them up toward his chin. “I will
kill
you if you die on me.”

“I know,” he said, too freaked out to do anything but slide down the front door to sit on the floor, taking her with him. He put his head on his knees. “I’m sorry. I feel sick enough already, stop yelling at me.”

“I’m not,” she cried, then clicked her teeth shut. “Yelling,” she said in her normal voice.

“Jesus Christ,” he said to his kneecaps. “I’m so done.”

She put her own back up against the door and exhaled heavily. “You are. I’m drawing the line now. You stay on this side.”

He fell sideways into her lap and agreed.

Spring takes its time coming to the Maritime Provinces, but one Sunday morning in late March was full of sunshine and promise. In only a light fleece jacket, Erik sat on the concrete slab outside Barbegazi with his big cup of tea, looking out over the water. Looking into his past and his future at the same time, leaving him in a perfect, present moment.

The sun had sliced through the bathroom window that morning and he’d frozen with a mouthful of toothpaste, shocked at how the light glinted off the silver in the hair around his ears. Surely he wasn’t going
that
grey. He bent his head this way and that. No denying it: the stress of the past year had made its mark.

Daisy burst out of the shed with the wheelbarrow. Crappy jeans, mud boots and a fleece. Her hair in braids under her wool hat.

“Hello, fiancé,” she said.

Erik raised his mug. “Hello, financier.”

She laughed. “Damn straight
.”
She parked by one of the large island beds, waded in and started clearing it out with a vengeance, throwing handfuls of grasses into the wheelbarrow.

Erik watched her, swelling with love. He was home on a perfect Sunday. Dais was doing her thing and leaving him free to unpack for good. Or he could just sit here and do nothing.

He finished his tea and went to get his boxes of tools and supplies which had been in the garage all these months. Finally he’d set up the workbench which ran the length of the rear wall. The previous owner had been a tinkerer. And slightly OCD. Shapes for tools were outlined all along the pegboard on the wall. Erik followed precedent and put his things in the pre-designated places. For now. In time, he’d make it his own space.

Plenty of time.

“You in here?” Daisy called from the doors.

“Here to stay,” he called back.

SPRING LAMB WAS ON La Tarasque’s Easter table. Along with wedding plans.

Francine passed the bowl of new potatoes to her daughter. “Have you thought about where you—”

“Here,” Daisy said.

Years ago, Joe and Francine had raised a beautiful new barn on the ridge overlooking the vineyards. Fully equipped and glossy with exposed wood, it made Bianco’s a sought-after venue for all kinds of celebrations. Caterers could use the farm’s produce and wines. For a nominal fee, Francine would do the flowers. Joe had amassed a collection of pedal tractors for younger guests. Brides and grooms often stayed in the carriage house on their wedding night.

“How convenient for us,” Joe said, smiling. “But you—”

“Here,” Erik said.

“Of course, we’d love it,” Francine said. “But have you looked at other—“

“Here,” they said.

Joe shrugged and poured more wine into everyone’s glasses. “Here.”

One April afternoon, Will’s father lay down for a nap and never awoke.

Will was devastated, although he kept insisting, “If you have to go, that’s the way to go. Eat a nice lunch with your wife, lie down in your own bed and just slip away smiling.”

But he cried hard, caught up in the arms of his mother and sisters. At the funeral home Erik watched all the Kaegers weep over the loss of their beloved joker, while Erik himself mourned one of the kindest men he’d ever known.

A week passed in an exhausting blur of arrangements. Maurice was not only father and grandfather, but a popular and beloved professor at UNB. The line at the funeral home stretched for blocks with students past and present. The family had to extend two viewings to three. Runs were made to the airport, people needed to be shuttled here and there. Daisy covered the theater and Erik took time off from work to cover the home front.

Finally the chaos dissolved back into a semblance of routine. Ségolène Kaeger went out to Vancouver with one of her daughters for a spell. His filial duties wound up, Will appeared at Barbegazi with a six-pack under his arm.

“Mind if I use your dock?”

“Go ahead,” Erik said. “You want company?”

“I want to get drunk and contemplate this gaping hole in my life,” he said. “And I’d like to be looking at the water while I’m doing it.”

“Take a blanket,” Daisy said, handing him one.

He took himself out to the end of the dock where Erik and Daisy had set two Adirondack chairs and a little table.

Erik texted Lucky.
Have your husband in custody.

She replied.
Keep him safe. If he gets plowed, give him a ride or a bed. Thank you for everything. We’d be fucked without you.

Erik kept wandering past the east windows, looking out to Will’s hunched silhouette. After one prolonged staring session, Daisy’s hand slid gently up his back. “Go,” she said. “He wants you, he just won’t say so.”

So as the sun started to drop and turn the skies to creamsicle streaks, Erik took another six-pack and went down to the dock. He lit the citronella torches and sat in the vacant chair. Popped a beer. Clinked the neck against Will’s and they drank.

“Dig me not smoking,” Will said. “Yet.”

“Hand ‘em over.”

“Bitch.” Will reached in his inside pocket and drew out a brand-new, still-sealed pack of Marlboros. “Fine, you hold them. I won’t if you won’t.”

Erik set them by the leg of his chair. “Deal.”

They sat in silence, drinking, watching the skies grow dark.

“I can’t imagine doing this at eight years old,” Will said, the words slippery and thick. “How did you do it?”

“He wasn’t dead.”

“He was
gone.”

Erik tactfully decided not to debate the details. “I had my mom,” he said. “And I was really good at shutting down. As we all know too well.”

Will gave a chuckled grunt.

“Man, when that shit came out in therapy?” Erik said. “To just hold it in my hands and say out loud ‘I missed him’? I thought I was going to die. I couldn’t believe how fresh it was. I was like a little kid on the couch, bawling.”

He went quiet. Tonight wasn’t about him.

“Did I tell you,” Will said. “That when I was having my breakdown in Germany, my dad came?”

Will hadn’t told Erik anything about what had happened in Germany, but it was beside the point. “Did he?” Erik said as he took Will’s empty bottle and passed him another.

“He came for me. It was like a fucking Elton John song. Not that I ever doubted my old man loved me but he… Jesus, the next day he was on a plane. No questions. Just
hold on, I’m coming, everything’s going to be all right.
Flew across the ocean and stayed three weeks.”

“It’s what you do,” Erik said. “If Jack ever made that call, you’d be on a plane too.”

Will took a long swallow and then handed the bottle to Erik. “Cut me off. I’m done.”

Erik pushed it back. “Play through. I’ll drive you home or you can take the guest room.”

“Thank you,” Will said, taking another pull before setting the bottle down on the dock. He ran his hands over his head then hunched forward, elbows on knees, fingers woven tight in his hair. “Thank you for coming back. You weren’t at my wedding. You weren’t here when the kids came. But Jesus fuck, I needed you here now. Back when Lucky was in the dark and now Dad. I can’t talk about this shit with anyone else. I need you because you get it.”

Erik put out a hand and rested it on Will’s shoulder. “I get it.”

“Why’d you go?” Will said, his voice both hard with hurt and soft with sadness. “I mean, I know why you left Lancaster that night. Why did you stay away for good?”

“I didn’t know any other way,” Erik said. “I was out of skills. Out of resources. It was like another shooting and I couldn’t… I didn’t know any other way to survive except to desert it. I’m sorry.”

“I know.” Will exhaled and sprawled back in the chair, legs and arms flung wide. “I know all of this already. I’m just drunk and being morbid because I feel abandoned.”

“I know.”

“Check it out,” Will said, rolling up his sleeve. “Had it done this morning.” On the inside of his forearm was a new tattoo. A joker playing card, and beneath it the words
Some people call me Maurice.

“That’s awesome,” Erik said, laughing.

“Nice, huh? Took me forever to find a joker image that didn’t look evil.”

This prankster, in his hooded, quad-peaked cap, was holding a finger to his lips with a sly expression. A small smile within a beard quite reminiscent of Maurice Kaeger.