Tribb's Trouble (5 page)

“I know,” said Peter.

“It's still
moving!”
said Tribb.

“I
know
,” said Peter.

For a moment they watched the mouse in the trap, not believing what they were seeing. The mouse was pinned and flattened, but its furry back legs were still wiggling. It kept on trying to get free. The sight was awful.

“Goddamn it,” said Tribb. “That thing is
suffering.
What do we do?”

“You have to kill it,” said Peter.

“What?” exclaimed Tribb. “I can't kill anything. That's what the frigging trap is supposed to do!”

“Calm down,” said Peter.

Tribb started to breathe hard. Part of him worried that somehow the mouse might actually wiggle free and get away. Another part thought about Linda and Suzy coming home. They could walk in at any minute, and Tribb couldn't bear to let his daughter see this.

“I guess you could just throw it into the garbage,” said Peter.

“Just throw it into the garbage and let it die slowly?” said Tribb.

Peter shrugged. “It's only a mouse.”

“I can't do that.”

“Or you could drown it,” said Peter.

Tribb imagined filling a sink with water and holding the wounded mouse under the surface until it stopped moving. He knew that was how they used to kill unwanted kittens on farms. He pictured himself washing dishes later in the same sink and shuddered.

Then Tribb tried thinking about how things die naturally, in the wild, and an idea came to him. Every winter the news would report that someone had frozen to death in a blizzard. Those reports always said the same thing. They said that after a while, in extreme cold, you begin to feel warm. After that you just…fall asleep, never to wake up.

If he had to kill something, Tribb thought, making it fall asleep seemed the nicest way to do it. He took a deep breath.

“We'll freeze it,” he said.

“Freeze it?” said Peter. “How?”

“How do you freeze anything? Put it in the freezer.” He began to look around the kitchen. “Just have to find something to put it in.”

At that moment, he heard the sound of a car pulling into the driveway.

“That's Linda and Suzy!” said Tribb. “Quick, find a container!” He began to bang cupboard doors open, searching.

“What?” said Peter. “You mean, like, a box?”

“Not a box!” said Tribb. “It has to fit into the freezer.” He pointed to the top of the fridge.

Peter looked from the fridge to Tribb. He seemed shocked. “You mean you don't have a big storage freezer in the basement?”

Tribb dropped down to his hands and knees to look in the cupboards under the counter. “Linda always says we should get one, but I've never thought we needed it.” Another way he had failed his wife, and now it was coming back to haunt him. “Crap! I thought there were old plastic yogurt tubs under here!”

He heard the car doors shut outside—
chunk, chunk.
He heard the voices of Linda and Suzy as they walked toward the back door. The mouse was still pinned in the trap. Still wiggling. All Tribb could find was a see-through Tupperware container. Would that do?

“Got it!” said Peter.

Tribb saw Peter holding an empty cookie tin. The kind that held the special shortbreads Linda loved.

“Perfect!” said Tribb. “Where'd you find it?”

“Uh,” said Peter.

Tribb didn't wait for an answer. He grabbed the tin and dumped in the mousetrap with the wiggling mouse. As he fit the lid over the tin, Tribb could see the mouse kicking desperately. Then he opened the freezer and shoved in the tin. In with
the frozen hamburger, peas, toaster waffles, and Popsicles.

The back door opened. Tribb tried to calm his breathing as he turned to greet his wife and daughter. At the same time, Peter came up beside him with his hands behind his back. Tribb felt Peter nudge him with his elbow. He seemed to want to give Tribb something without anyone seeing.

“Hi, girls!” said Tribb brightly, as if he hadn't just shoved a live animal into their freezer. Secretly, Peter passed him a plastic bag filled with shortbread cookies.

Catching one little mouse was a small thing, Tribb knew, but still he felt good. He'd done something right. After Peter headed home and Suzy went upstairs to change, Tribb told Linda proudly, “I got a mouse!”

Linda gave him a small smile. She didn't seem as thrilled about the mouse as he'd hoped. Tribb felt a little disappointed. He thought maybe he needed to tell her a bit more.

“Big one, too,” he said. Tribb held his fingers wide to show the mouse's length and puffed out his chest with pride. Then he started to point to the refrigerator.

“Just so you know, it's—”

Linda stopped him. “I don't need to know the details, Tribb. I just need to know you're handling this. I've got so much work to do still, and I'm going to have a kitchen full of guests in four days.”

“Right.”

He watched Linda go into the living room. She was already getting to work on another batch of scarves and hats for the school. It was hard for Tribb to see his wife like this, tired and frustrated. He was annoyed with her for taking on the extra work. He was annoyed with himself for not being able to make life easier for her.

“Hey,” he said. He walked past the one remaining mousetrap in the hall and followed Linda into the living room. “Let me help you with that knitting.”

Linda was setting herself up on the couch. Golden afternoon light shone through the big picture window. Linda's cloth knitting bag lay over on its side on the floor. She turned it upright, then lifted out her needles and a grey hat she'd almost finished.

“Tribb, there's nothing you can do to help me,” Linda said with a sigh. “Except maybe make me a cup of tea.”

Within a few minutes, Tribb had made a steaming cup of Linda's favourite raspberry tea. He set it on a wooden coaster beside her, the way she liked. She thanked him and smiled as she brought it to her lips. Her smile made Tribb feel warmer than he had in days. Then he set himself down on the couch beside her.

“So I want to help you knit,” Tribb said. “Maybe I could hold the yarn or something. I've seen people do it in movies.”

Linda made a
pffft
sound and shook her head. “You'll be bored to death,” she said. “You won't last five minutes.”

“Sure I will!” Tribb gave his wife a big smile, to show his good intentions. He saw the line of grey yarn that stretched from his wife's needles to the knitting bag. He reached into the bag and pulled out the fuzzy ball of yarn. A few of the other yarn balls, some grey, some green, rolled and adjusted to the new space.

“What do I do?” Tribb asked.

Linda paused, then said, “Just keep turning the ball so the yarn falls off the bottom. Let it hang loose.” A small smile crept onto her face. “Thank you.”

For a few minutes, the two of them sat like that. Tribb kept turning the ball so the yarn hung down, and Linda knitted happily. And they just talked. They chatted about Suzy, about her school marks, about her swimming. Linda told him what was going on at the hospital. Tribb learned about problems she was having with a young nurse who didn't listen. He learned about doctors who were good to work with and some who were rude. He was amazed at all the romances going on between the younger doctors and nurses.

Tribb enjoyed every minute, and he felt Linda did too. They were having their best time together in months. Tribb even remembered to tell his wife, “You look great in that sweater.” And he was glad when she seemed pleased.

In the moments of happy silence, Tribb's mind wandered a little. He thought about how he'd taken the bag of shortbread cookies and shoved it into the cleaning closet. Linda wouldn't like that. Tribb wondered if he could get the cookies back into the tin without her finding out. He'd have to remember to wash it out first, after the mouse was fully frozen and dead.

Thinking about the mouse made Tribb remember that he had only one mousetrap left. He wondered if that was enough. Then he had a hopeful thought. Maybe there'd only ever been one mouse in the house. Maybe the problem was solved! Tribb relaxed a little. He liked the idea that his mouse troubles were over. He smiled at Linda. Maybe his marriage troubles were over, too.

At that moment, down in the cloth knitting bag by Tribb's feet, something moved. He caught the movement out of the corner of his eye and glanced down, not really worried. Maybe Linda had nudged the bag with her foot. Maybe the balls of yarn were just shifting again.

But no. That wasn't it.

As he looked down into the bag, he saw one of the small grey yarn balls jiggle. Just slightly. And then it disappeared.

When it reappeared, a few inches away from where it had disappeared, Tribb knew. It wasn't a small ball of yarn at all. And he took in a sharp breath.

“What, honey?” Linda asked. “Did you just remember something?”

Tribb looked up at his wife. Linda was focused on her needles, not looking at him. She didn't know he was reacting to something in her knitting bag. She was completely unaware. In a way, Tribb thought, he and Linda now lived in different times. He was living in the present, knowing the terrible truth about what was in her bag. But Linda was still in the past, before that truth had been discovered. He wished he could be back there with her, still unaware. Still happy.

Tribb wondered, could he just
not
tell her? Could he ignore what was going on in the bag at her feet? Could he drop the ball of yarn and pull his wife into his arms in a romantic rush? Could he tell her that he was taking her and Suzy out for dinner? Maybe he could. He wanted to. But then he asked himself another question. Could he enjoy that dinner, knowing what he knew?

No, he couldn't. This small, quiet moment of happiness was about to come to an end. There was no way out. He hated that he was so alert, that he could see so well out of the corner of his eye. This talent was ruining his life. He took a deep breath.

“Linda, honey,” Tribb said. “I have something to tell you, and you're not going to like it.”

Tribb was right about that: Linda didn't like what he had to tell her. At all.

The news that she had mice living in her knitting bag horrified her. Worst of all, she told Tribb, she would have to throw out all of the knitting she'd done. “Every hat,” she'd said, crying. “Every scarf!”

“Why?” Tribb said. He thought about how many hours of work she'd put in, the pain in her hands. “Why throw it all out?”

“I'm a nurse,” she said. “I know how disease spreads. I don't know which things have been touched by filthy mice. A child might put a dirty scarf against her face.”

Tribb asked her why she couldn't just wash everything before selling it. Linda's face went red. She looked down and picked up a hat she'd made.

“This is the only creative thing I do,” she said. “I'm proud of it. Nothing makes me happier than showing off the bright new things I've made. And if I have to wash everything first”—she stared straight at him—“it will all look
used.”

Linda threw her knitting bag, mice and all, and all the clothing items she'd made, into a garbage bag. She took the garbage bag straight out to the curb. She wouldn't let Tribb help her. The sadness in her face as she did this was heartbreaking. And Tribb felt that Linda's sadness went beyond her lost knitting. Beyond all the hours of wasted effort. She seemed to be sad about her whole life. Her life with him.

Then and there, Tribb decided to do what he should have done at the very beginning. At the very first sign of mouse trouble. He decided to call an expert.

Monday morning, after Linda left for the hospital and Suzy went to school, Tribb called Best Pest Control. Four hours later, the truck pulled up
in front of the house. Tribb looked out the front window. He saw the truck, with its name in big letters, and sighed. What would the neighbours be saying? Then he slapped his forehead. That was that kind of thinking that had gotten him into trouble in the first place. When the doorbell rang, he opened the front door. There stood a tall man in a dark blue uniform.