Tell Anna She's Safe (21 page)

*

SHE DIDN'T MENTION TO TIM
that it was their anniversary. Two years since they'd met at the Supreme Court. She was going to save that for the appropriate moment—the post-climax denouement. She had it all planned in her mind. For two days, in fact, and for the duration of the two-hour drive, she thought of nothing else. God, two years ago who would have thought she'd be ecstatically fantasizing about having sex with a convict in the corner of a prison visiting room.

She was going to arrive in her longest, fullest skirt, and nothing underneath. She was going to sit on Tim's lap and watch his eyes light up when he realized there was nothing between his hardness and her wetness. She was going to take him deep, deep, deep, and ride him slow (there had to be some discretion!), and he would go crazy. And his cock would slide over her clitoris in just the right way, in a slow hard way, and she would go crazy too. And then they would come, together, with a yell rising in each that they would have to mask by kissing each other hard.

She was wet for two days thinking about it. It was all she could do to keep from satisfying herself. On the trip down she got herself so wound up, she decided to check in to the motel first; she didn't want to arrive at Pittsburgh looking like a sex-crazed female.

As soon as she got into the motel room she knew it had been a mistake to come here first. In the stale dank room, reality raised its ugly fear-filled head. She felt herself go dry. She tried to fantasize herself back to wetness but fear had done its work.

She was even more dismayed half an hour later when she walked into the visiting room. It was crowded, noisy. She hadn't imagined actual faces and personalities in the room. Obviously no one wanted to be outside on a damp cold afternoon in early March. But weekdays weren't usually so busy. Was everyone having an anniversary? The only silver lining was that, when Tim arrived a few minutes later, it was easy to creep into a corner unnoticed.

She could barely meet Tim's eye. He seemed equally ill at ease. He sat down against the wall and pulled her onto his lap. She was grateful to be facing away from the room. She felt Tim fumbling under her skirt, unzipping himself, trying to press himself into her. She was still dry; he was soft. She wrapped her arms around him, lifted herself slightly so he could find his way inside, ignored the pain of being so dry. Achieving semi-hardness, he pumped hard. He seemed caught between the need and the shame, where she now felt only the shame.

She had forgotten the mess of sex. She hadn't thought to bring any tissues. A condom would have taken care of it, but to avoid awkward fumbling around she had opted to go without. Now the possibility of pregnancy sent panic through her veins. She could barely wait for Tim to zip himself back up so she could get to the bathroom and get his cum out. This was not the right time to get pregnant.

Cleaning herself up, she was filled with self-loathing. Here was an abject lesson in the futility of desire; things never turned out the way you envisioned them. She hadn't even come close to coming. And of course she'd entirely forgotten to whisper “happy anniversary” in Tim's ear. What had possessed her to believe for a minute she could enjoy such a private act in such a public place?

She cut the visit short. She'd forgotten to bring underwear to put on afterwards, and she felt naked and exposed, even with the long full skirt on. She had to promise Tim she'd be back at six. He seemed unusually anxious about her return, which further irritated her. Did he think she was going to turn around and go home at this time of day?

Outside, the frigid dampness hit with full force and she pulled her coat tight around her and walked quickly down the drive to the parking lot. To her right loomed Joyceville, its high electric fence and small-windowed cell blocks looking even more ominous in the encroaching dusk. Although it was a medium-security institution like Warkworth, it made Warkworth look like a country resort. The thought of voluntarily incarcerating herself behind that fence for a weekend gave her the creeps. Her groin, already sore and now chilled, felt suddenly colder. Violated. The whole property—Pittsburgh so open, Joyceville so closed—suddenly had the feel of a dark, malevolent force. What the hell was she doing here?

It took all her willpower and a double layer of underwear to get herself back to Pittsburgh. She parked as close as she could to the door, and arrived at the Visitor Control Point out of breath from running. She signed the registry and pulled open the double doors to the visiting room. Tonight, it was silent and almost empty. If only they had waited until the evening. But she knew the room would have seemed too empty, their actions too noticeable.

She picked out a couch on the other side of the room from the only other couple and waited for Tim to arrive. When he did, minutes later, it was obvious he was hiding something behind his back. He was also looking, for some reason, even more nervous than in the afternoon.

She stood up, and then took a sudden step back when a long-stem red rose was thrust under her nose. She was shocked. “Where did you get this?”

Tim smiled a secret smile. “Happy anniversary, sweetheart,” he said and bent and kissed her.

She pulled back in astonishment. “You remembered!”

“How could I forget?” The words were spoken with such devastating simplicity she sat back down on the couch. She buried her nose in the rose to hide her emotion. She felt Tim sit down beside her. Felt his arm come around her. He spoke in her ear. “You didn't think I'd forget? Two years ago today, you changed my life.”

The softness in his voice seemed to match the delicateness of the rose.

She heard him clear his throat. “Lucy?”

She looked up, wiped tears off her cheeks.

Tim was looking around, as if to make sure no one was listening. He turned
back to her, took both of her hands in his. His hands, usually dry and warm, were cold and clammy. Was he sick? She looked at him anxiously.

He took in a deep breath. “Lucy, will you marry me?”

She stared at him. Something rose up, caught in her throat. Not words. A feeling. Could one gag on joy? Gag for joy?

Her eyes filled with tears again. She wrapped her arms around his neck, trying to stifle the choking sounds in his shoulder.

Tim's arms came around her. She could feel tension and fear through the tenderness and love.

Someone loved her. Someone had asked her to marry him. Someone was terrified she was going to say no. She was overwhelmed.

“Don't answer me now,” Tim said, finally.

She sat back and met his eyes.

“I mean it,” he said. “You don't have to give me an answer now. Take the time you need. Take two years. Any time between now and then you want to tell me is okay, but I figure you've given me two years of your life—I can wait two years.”

Before she could speak, he brought an envelope out of his pocket. “I wrote you a letter. That's how much I love you; I'm willing to risk the grammar police hammering on my door, arresting me for double negatives and criminal spelling.”

She was relieved to laugh. “Should I read it now?”

“If you want.” His voice was suddenly shy.

She opened the envelope, unfolded the lined foolscap paper. By the time she got to the end, the words were a blur.

Back in the motel room, she reread the letter by the inadequate forty-watt bulb in the bedside lamp. This time it made her cringe. Not just the grammar mistakes and clichés, but the impracticality of Tim's dreams and promises in the face of their (her) current financial reality. He was promising to build her a house in the country on a private lake and said she could stop working for the government and do her own writing. Did he really think they could afford all this on what little money he would be able to bring in?

She was angry with herself; he'd even said he was willing to risk her criticism. That was how much he loved her. She made herself look past the surface to the sentiment, the deep feeling, underneath. He was giving her two years. That meant more than the proposal itself. No one had ever said they would wait. Decisions were supposed to be quick and irrevocable. And, always, on the other's terms.

She would not tell him she thought he was idealizing her—she had not “saved” him. She would not tell him his dreams for their future were unrealistic. She would not tell him she was no longer sure they even had a future. They had a “now.” And from the “now,” she had a marriage proposal. A letter of commitment. A red rose. A full heart. And two years. What more could she desire from the “now?”

She slid between the crisp clean sheets she'd brought for the bed and shut off the light.

14.

O
N MONDAY MORNING I DROVE
to the office. I tried not to think about Quinn calling. This time he'd said he'd call. But it didn't look like he was going to come out on the river with me. I would make other plans.

I phoned some friends to put out the word that I was looking for a place to live. I made calls for business. I stayed on the phone so I would not be waiting for it to ring. I told myself, again, that if he called it would be in the evening. At home. And I wasn't planning to be at home in the evening. At six o'clock I drove up the highway, took the turn-off for the village, and knocked on Mary Frances's door.

“What are you doing tonight? I want you to come with me out on the river. I've arranged to borrow the neighbours' motorboat.”

“Ellen McGinn, in a
boat
.”

“These are strange times.” I smiled.

“Why do I sense there is a macabre reason behind this excursion.”

“Because there is.” I smiled again.

Mary Frances regarded me with pursed lips. “I'll go with you. But we are not going to find anything.” She spoke accusingly.

“Maybe not,” I said. “But I can't promise.”

“Well, God help us if we do.”

“Yes,” I said.

But I felt a gap between us. I had crossed a line. There was no turning back now. In fact, every day I was more and more certain I was going to find Lucy. With the motorboat we could cover more ground in less time. And with someone with me, the sight of Lucy wouldn't be such a shock. I hoped. And if Steve Quinn wasn't going to cooperate….

Mary Frances arrived an hour later.

We putted our way down to the dam in the ten-horsepower boat. It was a beautiful evening. Mild. The trees glowed in the evening sunlight. We hugged the shore.

In the bow, Mary Frances smoked cigarette after cigarette. It was a lazy-looking gesture that betrayed the tension I knew she was holding inside. She was skeptical but she wasn't immune to the possibilities.

We entered every bay. We strained our eyes. We followed the length of the huge boom that stretched across the river just above the dam. We traced the perimeter of the Hydro-Québec island. And then we returned home on the opposite shore in the still-warm twilight.

“Well, my dear, that was a most pleasant evening,” said Mary Frances, kissing the air near my cheeks when we got back to her car. “I feel I know every inch of the Gatineau now.”

“Every resident should,” I said. “By the way, keep your eyes peeled.”

“For a body? Me? I think not.”

“For a house. For me.”

Mary Frances looked sympathetic. But under it I knew what she was thinking: it's about time; we knew from the start it would come to this.

“And thank you for not saying anything,” I added.

“You know I have only your best interests at heart.”

“If I could only be as sure as you what they are.”

“One thing I'm certain of,” she said, getting into the Cressida.

“What's that?”

“The house, you'll find.” She pulled the door shut and gave me a wave.

I made a face after the retreating car.

There was no message from Quinn when I got home, or indication that a Private Caller had called.

*

TIM HAD BEEN DENIED BOTH
day parole and a
UTA
. The denial was a brick wall. Four brick walls and no door. There was no recourse. He wouldn't be eligible for another hearing for months, and even then there was no guarantee that the same answer wouldn't be given. The system was hell-bent on screwing him around. Only Tim's Classification Officer held out a ray of hope. There was, he said, little chance for Tim through the usual channels. But there was another way: through the legal system. She could hire a lawyer to get time off his sentence, to argue that his sentences should have been served concurrently, not consecutively.

Her father gave her the name of a lawyer.

The lawyer said he'd look into the case and get back to her in a week.

A week. What could she do in that week that would not be waiting? There was the Emily Carr guide to finish up over the next couple of days to meet her deadline. That was doable. And then what? Something for herself. Something social. Something new. Someone new.

Ellen McGinn.

She had been enjoying their steady if infrequent contact these past few months. With the last of the material coming a couple of weeks ago, that contact had stopped. But it didn't have to. She felt from Ellen some need, or curiosity at the very least, to learn about the more spiritual, contemplative side of life. A wary curiosity, yes, but there was something Ellen was looking for, though she denied it. She would simply invite her over. And if Ellen accepted, and if it felt right, she would tell Ellen about Tim. She felt wonderful detachment about the “ifs”—open to them, not defeated by them. Ellen was free to make an excuse if she needed to, but she was also free to say yes.

When Ellen's “yes” came, she was euphoric.

She was still into the flow of the moment—almost high on it, though she knew that was as dangerous as trying to control it—when Ellen came over a few days later to sip wine at the kitchen table. She let the conversation come around naturally to the topic of men, boyfriends—and Tim. She had already decided on what version—and quantity—of the truth she thought Ellen could handle: most of it, but not all. Now she watched Ellen closely as she told her story, gratified to see she was not going to freak out and run away. She scrutinized Ellen's face, her body language, looking for judgement, doubt. Ellen was the kind of person who kept a mask over her feelings. But at least her initial skepticism was no longer there. What she felt now from Ellen was an air of receptivity and acceptance. It made her even more euphoric. It was, she knew, a sign of her own acceptance of herself. At last.

On Monday, the call from the lawyer came: Tim definitely had a year coming to him. And there was a court precedent on his side. He could be out within weeks. But the lawyer couldn't—or wouldn't—take it on. He gave her the name of the lawyer who had won the precedent-setting case.

She hung up the phone. She made herself breathe. Hold on to the centre, she told herself.

*

I MADE THE ROUNDS OF
the available rentals. There was nothing worth considering. I took a phone number from a notice pinned to the board at the Kirk's Ferry
depanneur.
Beside it Lucy's face mocked me from a torn poster.
Do you really think you're going to find a house? Or me?
I pulled the poster off the board. I folded Lucy up and put her in my pocket.

At home, I phoned the number I'd taken off the notice. The house had been rented. I took Lucy's photo out of my pocket and looked at it again. She wasn't mocking me at all. She was smiling in encouragement.
Keep looking.

The first of July came and went. Marc would be home in a week and a half. I didn't even bother to buy the new edition of the
Low Down
. The same houses were listed every week—the ones I'd already looked at and dismissed. I resigned myself to being at the house when he came home.

*

SUDDENLY TIM WAS GOING TO
be out. In eight days. The new lawyer was definite on that. He wasn't giving her any caveats. No maybes. No “cautious optimism.” A court hearing had been set for Friday, May twenty-seventh.

“F-day” she called it. Free or fucked again.

The lawyer might be sure, but she wasn't making any assumptions. They had been screwed over too many times. She wasn't going to tell anyone. Just her father and Anna. She held back from formulating any plans in her head, from buying the Champagne. She kept herself busy. She had a deadline to meet. Things to buy for Tim. The upstairs apartment to get ready for the new tenant. Denise had managed to trash it before she disappeared. The new tenant, Lakshmi, was moving in at the end of the month. Lakshmi: the Goddess of Prosperity. It was a good omen.

Saturday afternoon found her kneeling over the apartment bathtub, scrubbing, trying not to gag. She didn't want to think about the source of the filthy ring, the dirt and grime that had come off Denise's pallid skin.

She rinsed the tub, stood slowly to stretch the kinks out of her ankles. She surveyed the bathroom with satisfaction. Not a speck of Denise left. The mirror her boyfriend had smashed had been replaced. She made a face in the new mirror. Just what she had needed, more expenses. She had enough expenses already.

She didn't, she reminded herself, begrudge the expenses. What was three thousand dollars in lawyer's fees when it virtually guaranteed Tim would be here in a week?

A week. She felt like someone had just shot her up with caffeine. Tim. Here. An actuality in her life. What if he didn't fit in? What if he embarrassed her with his manners, his grammar, his lack of intellectual conversation?

She switched off the bathroom light, paused in the doorway of the bedroom. The floor still needed doing but the windows were clean. What a difference clean windows made. She would do the ones downstairs too. You never realized how much dirt was building up on windows; you just got used to looking out through filtered layers. You got used to clouded vision.

She filled a bucket with hot soapy water and started on the bedroom floor. Tim wanted her to go down on Friday to wait with him for the results of the hearing. The lawyer had said the legal papers would be delivered by noon. And then he would be free to go.

She scrubbed at the black scuff marks on the floor. Free to go. God! She could hardly believe it. Hardly dared to believe it. She had tried to suggest driving down after he heard the results, but that had led to a massive misunderstanding. He'd tried to tell her to stay home, not come at all; he would get the bus. But she could hear the fear in his voice. And the guilt. Guilt that, as he said, she had already done so much for him, but at the same time fear that she would abandon him at the last minute. That was what had made him assert his control, try to push her away. She knew that tactic well. If I insist you not be there, you won't disappoint me.

And didn't she have the same guilt and fear? Guilt for suggesting that she only get in the car when he got the decision. Fear that they were just too different, that it was never going to work.

A sweat broke out on her forehead. She had to sit back on her heels, wait for the dizzy spell to pass. The fear had raised its head from time to time, but she had always been able to work her way through it. She'd always had the ironic luxury of time. Now it came and smacked her in the face. Knocked her off her feet. Choked off her breathing. She beat it back with her rag, her broom, her bucket of soapy water.

At the end of the day she was exhausted but triumphant. She stood in the middle of the apartment, surveying all her hard work. Savouring the clean, light energy. She was optimistic about the new tenant; she'd looked quiet and kind.

The timing of it all was no coincidence. No coincidence that Denise and her dark energy were gone. She could admit it now: Denise had been a mirror for her former negative self. But the apartment was now clean. Every fear and dark thought had been cleared out of every corner. A new mirror was even hanging in the bathroom. A mirror of her new self. She was thrilled by the metaphor. So thrilled she went into the bathroom and this time smiled at her reflection.

Fear and negativity be gone. She had slain all the dragons. She was ready to be with Tim.

*

ON THURSDAY, JULY SIXTH, I
stopped at the
depanneur
on my way home from work to pick up a few items. A pile of the week's edition of the
Low Down
was sitting on the counter. I shrugged and tossed one in with my groceries.

Sitting on the deck with a beer, I skimmed my eye down the For Rent column on the back page. I almost missed the new listing:
Small house on Gatineau River. Former church. Hardwood floors, four appliances, $650 per month. Avail. immed.

I knew it was mine. The blind certainty was uncharacteristic of me. But the certainty, at any rate, was refreshing. And so was the joy when I saw it an hour later, the delight I felt in everything about it. From its high ceilings to its polished wood floors. From its view of the Canadian Shield cliffs on the opposite shore to the yard that sloped down to the railway tracks and the point of land that jutted out onto the water on the other side of the tracks.

The price was right. The size was right. The location was right. The location, in fact, was uncanny. It was on River Road, less than a kilometre from where I had found Lucy's car.

The timing was perfect. A tenant had fallen through at the last minute.

I tried to restrain my jubilance when I left a message for Marc that night. I could hear the disappointment in his voice when he returned my call the next morning. It was a short conversation. There was nothing left to say. I would be gone when he came home.

The red light began flashing on the phone when I hung up. The automated voice announcing there were four messages shocked me. I hadn't been on the line more than five minutes. It wasn't even 8:30. Who would be trying to get me so early?