The Garneau Block Part 28

"A museum but not a museum," said Jonas. "A site of Edmonton's mythic power."

"I still don't get it."

"There's probably gonna be some buffalo." Jonas made a sweeping gesture with his gla.s.s of Scotch, and the ice tinkled. "Right, gang?"

"Yes, buffalo," said Rajinder, with a faint scowl.

At that moment, Madison understood that 10 Garneau would never be anything special. This plan was boyish and egotistical and silly. Jeanne looked at Madison and lifted an eyebrow. "Is this a joke?"

Madison shook her head.

"I'm not selling my house to you, Rajinder. Not ever. I'm selling my house to the university so they can level it."

"Wait a moment, Jeanne. Let us explain."

"You want me to agree to something that is good for you, not me. I don't want Katie growing up with a big something on the site of her father's death. How will she ever forget if the house is a big monument to...to what did you say? Mystic power? Buffaloes?"

"Yeah, mythic power," said Jonas.

"The best thing for us is to forget that life and forget that house."

"It will not work, Jeanne," said Rajinder. "Believe me. You will never forget. You must not try to forget."

Jeanne finished her gla.s.s of Scotch in one gulp. "Get out, all of you."

There were no buts. Neither Rajinder nor Jonas tried to convince her. On their way out the door, Jeanne hugged Madison again and gave her the phone number so they could get together another time, with Katie.

As Rajinder backed the car out of the driveway, Jeanne Perlitz stood in the doorway. Madison turned in the pa.s.senger seat and watched her as they drove away.

68.

the screening room Raymond Terletsky had read through the proposals from the architects and consultants several times, searching for a perfect distillation of the city's mythic power. He wasn't disappointed or deterred, but none of the proposals quite did the job. Raymond didn't know exactly what he wanted, but he would not compromise or proceed with a mediocre museum. The future of 10 Garneau was there, somewhere, flickering on the edge of the professor's vision.

As the prairie sky blackened outside the thirty-eighth-floor windows, Raymond likened the sensation to that name you can almost remember. That taste you can almost recognize. The smell in the wind that takes you back to...where?

Raymond understood and heard and even tasted the future of 10 Garneau, but he couldn't yet see it. The architects' and consultants' proposals swirled through his mind as he walked on the treadmill behind his desk. A tower of goodness. The pyramid of northern urbanity. An underground system of caves with a portal on the Garneau Block, leading to five hundred small roomsthe room of immigration, the room of skate-boarding, the room of dead-language scholarship.

And the "haunted" house, stacked with scurvy and speakeasies, the recent horrors of sprawl, unregulated exhaust pipes, chamber opera, h.o.m.oerotic paintings of shirtless Germans, grizzly bears and dinosaurs and local flowers, the Triads, black gold, rhubarb jam, Wop May and Lois Hole and Joe Shoctor, native rebellions and agricultural mishaps.

Raymond was not worried about Jeanne's refusal to sell. Soon Jeanne Perlitz and all other skeptics would kneel before the majesty of 10 Garneau.

The performance poet stood in Raymond's doorway. She had shaved her head bald, and carried a transparent garbage bag full of white feathers. "You're not going to a Halloween party tonight?"

Raymond stepped off the treadmill. "I'm not big on parties at the moment."

"Neither is the boss."

"Is he still here?"

"In the screening room. He's been watching sad French movies and eating ice-cream sandwiches all day. When I checked on him this afternoon, he'd already been through Les Enfants du paradis twice and he was putting Un Coeur en hiver into the projector. I think I saw that Juliette Binoche film, Bleu, on the floor."

"Yipes." Raymond turned off the treadmill. "I know what it's like to have one's heart ripped out of one's chest, chewed and stomped and soiled with refuse and, ultimately, forgotten in a ditch."

"Right. Maybe you should talk to him."

"Maybe so."

The performance poet lifted her bag of white feathers and started down the hall toward the elevators. "Happy Halloween."

Raymond wiped the thin layer of perspiration from his forehead and walked to the screening room. In the hallway, he could hear the echoes of symphonic music from Bleu. Inside, Rajinder Chana sat in the middle chair. The performance poet had been right about the ice-cream sandwiches. Wrappers littered the adjacent seats.

Instead of standing in front of Rajinder, Raymond sneaked up behind him. On the screen, Juliette Binoche was alone in a Paris apartment. Her husband and child were dead. Raymond wanted to comfort his friend but it had to be perfect. He considered various options and then, satisfied he had discovered the right one, proceeded to mess up Rajinder's hair and say, "You old scamp, eh? Scamp!"

The professional arts philanthropist did not respond.

So Raymond spoke.

"I'm a loser. Really, the definition of a loser in the industrialized world. But I've managed to crawl a few feet out of loser-dom to do something n.o.ble. Thanks to you, Rajinder. Of all people, I'm shocked that youyouwould allow the word 'No' to deter you from saving the Garneau Block. That you would allow a secret pregnancy to ruin your relationship with Madison Weiss."

Raymond raised his voice. He felt a conclusive sentence coming on. "I want you to turn off the movie and come outside with me, so we can scheme our dazzling futures with the women we love. Let's go! Allons-y!"

There was a small cooler next to Rajinder. He reached over, opened the lid, and pulled out a fresh ice-cream sandwich. With both hands, Rajinder unwrapped the ice-cream sandwich and began eating it without a word, a nod, or any other acknowledgement of Raymond's presence.

Raymond retraced his steps to the door of the screening room. He turned and waited for a moment of cinematic silence. It seemed important that he say something memorable. So he said, "Remember, Rajinder. Halloween is a time for...feeling better than...you feel now."

On Jasper Avenue, in the chill air, goblins and zombies and d.i.c.k Cheneys stood in front of the New City nightclub smoking cigarettes. Raymond didn't want to go back to his tiny bedroom at the Weisses' so he walked south to the crest of the river valley.

A light snow began to fall. In an instant, the snow transformed from light to heavy and the wind whipped around him. He could no longer see across the valley, and the glow of the street lights turned pale and dim.

Raymond laughed, and climbed on a sidewalk bench. Soon, a full-scale Halloween blizzard had blown in over the valley. For a million people, Raymond knew, this would be unwelcome. "Cowards!" he said. "Self-deniers. This is the north!" He danced on the bench and clapped his hands and screamed wildly into the wind. The wet snow blew into his mouth.

In an old suit and a tweed overcoat, without a hat or gloves, Raymond recognized he would not last long in the blizzard. He walked to the steep edge of the valley for a last look at the city before the sky fell upon it. Raymond lifted his hands and conducted the wind and the snow, sang aloud in German, bounced and addressed the sky. Then, as the tops of his ears began to sting, Raymond slipped on a new patch of wet snow. He reached out for something to brace himself but there was nothing. Raymond slid, fell back, and tumbled down the hill.

69.

groove is in the heart Steamer stood at the living room window of 11 Garneau, staring out at the blizzard and sighing. While he stared and sighed, Shirley attempted to finish an article about Christianity and Canadian politics in The Walrus. She really wanted a gla.s.s of red wine but she had grown to feel the sting of judgment from Steamer every time she partook.

Again he sighed, and Shirley closed the magazine with a slap. "What is it, Steamer?"

"Oh, nothing."

"Go ahead."

Steamer turned around. "Do you promise you won't, I don't know, judge me?"

"Of course."

Steamer walked over and knelt before Shirley in his jeans and tank top. There was a thick scar on his right shoulder, from a baling accident when he was thirteen, and Shirley couldn't help but focus on it. She wanted to run a finger along the scar, perhaps when Steamer was asleep some night.

Slowly and tenderly, Steamer pulled off Shirley's socks and investigated her feet. She lifted the magazine so he would not look at her and read any pleasure in her face. His hands were soft, for a hockey player who grew up on a farm, and they quivered slightly. Shirley closed her eyes as Steamer drew his thumbs along the top of her foot and said, to himself, as though he were chanting, "Navicular, medial cuneiform, intermediate cuneiform, lateral cuneiform, cuboid." He took her toes in his fingers and Shirley worked hard to cloak a soft gasp. "Phalanges," he whispered.

Steamer slowly replaced her socks and lay on the floor.

"So?"

Shirley swallowed. "So what?"

"Did I get them right?"

Steamer had given her a cheat sheet, and Shirley was supposed to have been keeping track. "One hundred per cent," she said.

"I'm sure glad you don't mind being my dummy. Before I start at Brigham Young, I want to know every bone and tendon and muscle by heart."

This pleased Shirley.

Steamer looked up at the ceiling. "You know, I never trick-or-treated. My parents wouldn't let me. They figured it was devilry, Halloween."

"What do you think?"

"I don't know. Maybe it is just about crops and pumpkin harvests."

"Did you ever dress up?"

"Never."

Shirley looked at her watch. "Because it's still Halloween for another three hours."

"I guess my parents wouldn't need to know."

Shirley invited Steamer into the spare bedroom upstairs, where her daughter kept all the clothes she refused to wear any more. Since her daughter had inherited Raymond's height and thickness, her high-school graduation dress, for example, was giant-sized. A perfect fit for Steamer, if he was interested.

"I can't dress up like a fairy."

Shirley held the pink dress up in front of him. "Why not?"

"One of the guys'll see me."

"It's Halloween."

"Are you sure about this, Ms. Wong?"

Shirley left Steamer alone in the spare room to try on the pink graduation dress. She heard the chiffon rustling before he opened the door. "Can you zip me up?"

There was an old Green Giant costume downstairs, so Shirley modified it into Peter Pan. Steamer could be Tinkerbell.

The lights were dim and the DJ had just started spinning a smash teen hip-hop hit from 1992 when they arrived at the Old Strathcona Business a.s.sociation Halloween party. A crowd of monsters were gathered on the makeshift dance floor.

Shirley went to the bar and bought a gla.s.s of wine for herself. Tinkerbell trailed close behind. "Can I get you anything, Steamer? A pop? Water?"

After a few moments of deliberation in front of the cooler, Steamer said, "A beer."

"What?"

"I want to try a cold one."

Shirley bought Steamer a Gra.s.shopper and they sat at one of the only empty tables. They touched plastic gla.s.ses and drank. "If you become an alcoholic, remember, I had nothing to do with it."

"I've been watching you, Ms. Wong. You have good morals, your own business, a nice house. The Lord hasn't destroyed you for drinking liquor."

"The Lord hasn't destroyed me yet, but he's dallied with the idea."

Steamer's first few sips were painful to behold. But as he reached the middle of the gla.s.s, he stopped puckering. A thin film appeared in front of his eyes, and he smiled. "I get it. I get it."

"Just take it easy, Steamer. Moderation is key."

"I'm not allowed to dance. But you know what, Ms. Wong? I want to dance."

Shirley nodded. "I bet even Jesus"

"Now," he said, and pulled Shirley to the square in front of the DJ table. "Groove Is in the Heart" became "Love Hurts." At first, they danced apart. But when everyone else moved in and embraced, Steamer looked around and stepped in to Shirley. "Is it all right?"

"Of course."

Shirley placed Steamer's hands on her waist, and she put her hands on his shoulders. The graduation dress had thin straps, thin enough that his scar was bare. She could feel that Steamer was shivering with fright or a related emotion. One of the Sugarbowl owners danced next to Shirley with his wife, and he dished her a naughty look.

"d.a.m.n, Shirley," said the co-owner of the Sugarbowl, just loud enough for her to hear.

Without acknowledging the remark, Shirley led Steamer to the corner of the dance floor. She dragged her thumb along the scar on his shoulder. And then she did it again.

70.