Somewhere In-Between (6 page)

Maybe she'll invite him over for dinner one night. She smiles at the thought of trying to win over the old curmudgeon. There are signs, after all, that Virgil Blue is aware of her existence. The first week he sent two hand-carved walking sticks home with Ian. Later, after her excursions became solo, she discovered a pocket book,
Identifying Animal Tracks of British Columbia
, out on the back porch railing one morning. Not long after there was an information pamphlet on how to react to wild animal encounters.

Last month, when Ian came back from collecting the rent he told her, “Virgil thinks you need a dog.”

“Oh, he does, does he?” she had replied bemused. “I think I'll pass on that.”

Then, last week, Ian had returned from one of his bi-weekly trips into Waverley Creek and handed her a black leather case. “What's this?” she'd asked. Ian was not one for unannounced gifts.

“Bear spray,” he said. “Obviously Virgil is trying to tell you something.”

“I've never seen any bears,” she said, sliding the can out of the case and inspecting it.

“Yeah, well I guess Virgil thinks that they see you.”

Now, during her hikes, Julie feels the eyes of the forest following her, and sometimes wonders if those eyes belong to their tenant.

Secretly, she can't imagine having the presence of mind to remove the can from the leather case, pull out the little red tag and point the nozzle the right way, if a bear were to actually get close enough to her to spray. Yet to reassure Ian, and perhaps Virgil, she tries to remember to strap the bear spray to her waist whenever she goes hiking.

“Quite a bossy old fellow,” she mutters. Yet here she is on her knees digging in the dirt all because of the advice of a complete stranger. The day after the hay was all in, she had found one of his yellow notes on the porch railing. She hadn't needed Ian to decipher the scrawled message advising the harvesting of some of the potatoes now, while they were small and sweet tasting.

She tosses another handful of the baby spuds into her basket just as a shadow falls across it.

“Look at this, Ian,” she says raking her hand over the potatoes in the overflowing basket.

“This is only from a couple of plants. I can't imagine why anyone would keep such a huge garden for just two people.”

When there is no response, she looks up, shielding her eyes from the sun's glare. Instead of her husband standing above her, Julie finds herself squinting into the shadowed form of a stranger.

“Oh,” she says pushing herself up, “you must be Virgil.”

The broad-shouldered man standing before her is not nearly as tall as Ian, but he still towers over her. He removes his dust-covered black cowboy hat, revealing the grey sheen of close-cropped hair in sharp contrast with his dark scalp. A wide-set face, neither smiling nor unsmiling, looks back at her with a neutral expression that she cannot interpret.

He's not as old as she had imagined, perhaps only a few years older than Ian. It's hard to tell. The crinkled crow's feet around his dark eyes, the high cheekbones, the clean-shaven copper-hued skin, smooth except for a faint trace of ancient pockmarks, make for an ageless, surprisingly handsome, face. She has seen this face before; it is not a face you would forget, although she cannot remember where. Julie reaches out to take the hand being offered, but hers stops mid-air as her gaze travels from his expressionless eyes down to the red bandanna knotted at his throat—and to the carved pendant hanging below. The moment passes in frozen silence, in heartbeats that stretch time like taut elastic, which snaps as the French doors behind her swing open.

“Hey, Virgil,” Ian calls out. “It's about time you met Julie.”

Julie's arm drops to her side, the hand trowel falls to the ground with a soft thud. “I'm sorry,” she says, her voice coming out a choked whisper. Willing herself to lift her leaded feet, she turns and walks out of the garden, each step a weighted trudge.

Ian reaches out to her as she comes up the steps. “Julie, what…”

She shakes her head and pushes past him and hurries across the wraparound porch toward the back of the house. At the corner, she glances back to see Ian rush down to where their tenant remains standing, his hat in his hands, in the garden row. Without a word, Virgil reaches into his pocket, pulls out a roll of bills, and hands his rent money to Ian.

In the mudroom, Julie closes the door behind her and with shaking hands pulls off her garden gloves and tosses them on top of the washing machine. Dirt skitters across the smooth white metal and falls to the floor. She shakes off her rubber clogs and kicks them into the corner. The back door opens.

“Jesus, Julie, what the hell was that?” Ian demands.

She whirls around to face him. She does not want to have this conversation, but there is no avoiding it, no way not to break their unspoken truce. For the last nine months they have both become adept at the careful manoeuvring around the minefields of words. They have fallen into a polite routine in dealing with each other, any conversations between the two of them now about the housekeeping of life, about the day-to-day details of existence while skirting the edges of the reality. Well, reality has just exploded in her face and she can't hold back.

“The pendant. Didn't you notice his pendant?” The words sound so much harsher, more accusatory than she intends.

Ian shuts the mudroom door with a soft click as if suddenly aware of how loud their voices are, as if the subject of their first verbal conflict since moving here might hear them.

“Pendant? What pendant?” His expression changes from anger to confusion. “What are you talking about, Julie?”

“The crow! It's exactly like the one...” she stops mid-sentence as the truth strikes her. Of course the pendant would mean nothing to Ian. He had no idea that Levi Johnny used to wear an identical carved crow—his spirit guide—around his neck.

Ian hadn't seen him take it off that night and place it around Darla's neck for good luck. Ian couldn't have, because he wasn't there the night Levi Johnny killed their daughter.

Every single day, whenever Julie allows her thoughts to stray there, whenever she lets down her guard and imagines a different conclusion to that October night, she spirals into the futile never-ever-land of what-might-have-been.

Standing behind the locked bathroom door she splashes cold water on her face in a futile effort to tide the flood of memories. She hears the back door close as Ian leaves the house—most likely going over to Virgil's cabin. To apologize? To ask him to leave? She doesn't know. What she does know is that she could not share the real reason for her strong reaction to their tenant. So she had told him she was simply startled by Virgil's crow pendant, a pendant similar to one that Levi Johnny wore. It would be too cruel to tell him that Darla was wearing it the last time she saw her alive.

“Couldn't he just go?” she had asked Ian.

“Why? Are you going to blame everyone who reminds you of Levi Johnny?” Ian's eyes narrow into a
V
. “Is it because he's Native?”

No. No of course not. She couldn't blame an entire race, any more than she could blame every teenage boy, every hockey player. And yet, Ian's accusation rang true. Because yes, she wants,
needs
, someone, something to blame, otherwise she is condemned to spend the rest of her life reliving every detail, all the mistakes, the little missteps and wrong choices that were made that night, including Ian's. And hers.

Would her world, her family, still be intact if she hadn't rummaged through her purse to answer her cell phone while she was driving to the opening performance of
Grease
, Darla's high-school play that evening?

Already anxious because Ian was late on their daughter's big night, she had looked down at her cell phone's call display expecting it to be him, but saw only the ‘undisclosed number' message. Letting the car slow to a crawl she had flipped open the phone and held it to her ear. Nothing but static. She was about to close it when she heard an angry male voice demand: “Do you know where your husband is?” She braked with a jerk, pulled to the highway shoulder and stared down at the illuminated face.
Call ended
. The sound of her windshield wipers filled the silence.

“Some kook,” she said out loud, then pressed the speed dial for Ian's office. After one ring a recorded message announced office hours. She tried his cell phone and got the same response. That meant nothing, she told herself as she pulled back onto the rain-soaked highway. Like herself, Ian might be on his way to the school right now. He refused to answer his cell phone while driving. Probably delayed by an anxious client, she reasoned, even as the hot stone of suspicion thudded into her stomach.

Inside the school she stood on the top landing of the amphitheatre cradling the cellophane-wrapped yellow rose she had brought for Darla. The building was new, a modern open institution. Still, as she scanned the audience below, Julie imagined she could detect the universal high-school odour of metallic lockers, sweaty gym shoes and chalk dust. Seeing no sign of Ian's salt-and-pepper hair, she headed down the centre aisle toward two empty seats at the end of the second row. She took the aisle seat, placed her coat on the other to indicate it was saved, and smiled ‘hello' at the couple sitting next to it. She didn't know their names but the faces were familiar. Being a realtor in a town of less than ten thousand meant most were. While she waited for the play to begin she glanced around, exchanging greetings with waves and smiles. This was one of the many things she loved about living in a small town; no matter where you went you saw friendly faces.

By the time the lights dimmed Ian was still a no-show. Feeling the guilt of hoarding a seat while others stood on the top landing, she removed her coat and arranged it on her lap with her purse and Darla's rose while the first off-key notes of the school orchestra pierced the darkness.

During the opening scenes she had to restrain herself from turning around every few minutes to survey the audience for Ian, but the moment the Rizzo character, the ringleader of the Pink Ladies of Rydell High, appeared on stage Julie's attention was riveted. If she hadn't heard Darla and her best friend, Kajul Sandhu, rehearsing their roles in the family room week after week, she might not have recognized her daughter.

For the last few months Darla had let her hair grow for the part. Now it was pulled back and tied up with a pink chiffon scarf. The satin ‘Pink Ladies' jockey jacket, rolled-up blue jeans, saddle oxfords and bobbie-socks, along with the heavy greasepaint make-up and exaggerated gum chewing, made the transformation to the '50s wannabe-tough girl startling. When her daughter sang “Look at Me, I'm Sandra Dee,” displaying a talent that surprised Julie, she had to blink back tears of motherly pride. As the room darkened at the end of the scene and the audience exploded in applause, Julie was filled with a sadness that Ian was not there to share this with her.
Damn him
, she thought as intermission arrived and he did not,
Darla will be so disappointed.

She remained seated while others around her rose to file out for the break. The young man sitting in the seat in front of her stood up slowly. Things hadn't changed much from the '50s, Julie thought, noting the familiar red-and-white lettered school jacket. As the boy turned to join the line-up in the aisle, Julie recognized the thick black hair worn just a little too long and the handsome young profile already set in the serious countenance of a First Nations Elder.

“Hello, Levi,” Julie said, surprised to see it was her daughter's friend. But then why should she be, he was the one who had picked up Darla and Kajul earlier to drive them to the school to get ready for the play. Before they went out the door she had watched him transfer the carved crow pendant from around his neck to Darla's for ‘luck.'

Now he turned to Julie, his dark depthless eyes meeting hers, and he smiled. The change never failed to amaze her. The solemn mask was replaced momentarily with a flashing white-toothed smile punctuated by cavernous dimples. As quickly as the expression appeared it was gone, the muscles of his square jaw returning his face to the chiselled lines of seriousness.

“Hey, Mrs O.D.” His voice was barely audible under the din of surrounding chatter. “That play's pretty good, eh?”

“It certainly is,” she said, then asked, “So when is your next game?”

“Saturday, up in Prince George.”

“Well, good luck.”

“Thanks.”

Watching him retreat up the aisle Julie smiled. That was probably the longest conversation she'd ever had with Levi Johnny. Still, she liked this shy young man and was glad to see that he had stayed to watch Darla's play. Levi had been part of her circle of friends ever since he moved into the high-school dorms years ago. His mother lived out on the NaNeetza Valley Reserve; the boy stayed in town for the school year. Hockey practice and games took up most of his free time. According to local rumours, and to Darla's proud declarations, he was NHL material and being scouted by a number of universities. From the beginning Julie's instincts told her that Levi was a good boy. She believed that he was the settling influence during Darla's attempted rebellion, which she had thought was over—until early this month.

Seeing Levi reminded Julie how deeply disappointed she still was with her daughter's shocking deception. The boy had unknowingly played a part in it. And perhaps she had herself when she so blindly accepted Darla's plans that Friday evening. It never occurred to Julie to question her daughter when she said that she was meeting her best friend, Kajul, at the arena to watch Levi's hockey game and so would be home late. In fact Julie had driven her downtown and dropped her off in front of the arena doors. Only later, when she thought back, would she recognize that the parking lot of the sportsplex was not nearly full enough for a hometown game. She and Ian learned the truth watching the late-night news. The visiting team,
Levi's team
, had defeated Cranbrook on their home ice that evening six to one, Levi scoring a hat trick. A hurried phone call to Kajul's home made it worse. Darla wasn't there. Kajul had not been out all night. Frantic, Julie and Ian drove around for hours checking every possible spot that teenagers were known to haunt. It was Ian who decided to drive down to the ‘Hollow.'