The Video Watcher (8 page)

It took another twenty minutes to figure it out, but Cam had left without me.

 

Maria looked slightly sunburned. She leaned forward and kissed my left cheek.

“'ola,” she said.

“Hola.”

We were standing at the corner of Denman and Robson. Maria's white jeans and T-shirt looked purple in the twilight.

“Let's go,” I said.

Crowds swarmed past us. One of the drunken teens walking in front of Maria shouted, “She's a skank.” He wasn't talking about her, but I wondered if she understood the term.

The light was fading. An uneasiness was in the air. Again I felt that feeling I'd felt that day on Robson Street, the feeling that people were watching us, that someone would come out of nowhere and punch me in the face.

At the bottom of Denman, something was happening. I knew it was a fight from the loud boos and gasps, and saw over the shoulders and between the backs of heads, a blood-covered face; I pushed closer.

But Maria tugged my sleeve. We untangled ourselves from the group and headed toward the beach. Whiffs of marijuana came on the breeze. The dusk sky was rippled with grey and scarlet, the water of English Bay luminous.

I glanced back at Maria and breathed in deeply, making a face. She laughed.

 

As soon as the fireworks were over, people surged back toward the city. It was too crowded for me to think and I reached for Maria's hand and made my way through them. I'd grabbed the hand so that she wouldn't lose me, but wondered if she thought it meant something, and if it did mean something.

Downtown, we headed north on Granville, jostling through beggars and street protestors, past lines of night-clubbers, street kids with their pet dogs and “Hungry” signs, past sidewalk merchants' velvet-covered tables, turquoise and silver jewellery, past the entrances to sex shops, mannequins in bondage gear in a window, past a busker who coughed and began “Sweet Leaf” on his acoustic, past an arcade, past this man in a brown business suit with padded shoulders who yelled in front of a movie theatre “Just as in the days of Noah… just as in the days of Noah!”

And all the while the smell of marijuana came steadily on the breeze and my hand in Maria's glanced her hip, and for a second I felt connected to the city.

 

Two goths with a German shepherd sat beside the door of the McDonald's on Smithe. On the way in, I tossed the change I had in my pocket in their turned-up fedora.

A Japanese woman was waiting in the line-up, her arms crossed. She had high black boots and a mask-like face.

Maria was hungry. I got two apple pies.

As we sat and ate, we talked. I asked her how to say a few things in Spanish, and I said them, and she giggled. She looked at me and asked if I had a girlfriend. I said no. I asked her if she had a boyfriend. She said no.

 

The house's porch light, shining through the passenger-side window, silhouetted Maria's head. She turned to face me. I didn't say anything. She leaned over and kissed my lips. We kissed again. Then one more time. I enjoyed the feeling of the kisses. We kissed gently three or four more times and we opened our mouths and I put my tongue in her mouth and felt her tongue reaching for mine. I didn't know what to do, so I moved my tongue around and around. After doing this for a while, I got bored and wondered if I could touch her breasts.
With the Spanish women, you've got to take them.
This repeated itself in my head and I imagined recounting the scene to Cam, and felt the need to make it more interesting. But still I was nervous. If she stopped me, I would feel cheap and dirty. I placed my left hand gently against her stomach and moved it gradually toward her breasts, expecting to be stopped. I reached inside the bottom of her T-shirt and again lay my hand against her stomach. The skin was soft, it was hot and smooth. I left my hand there a minute, while I kissed and hugged her. I slid my hand toward her breast—I felt certain that she would stop me. She didn't. I grabbed her breast through the rough lace of her bra and squeezed it three times and pulled back the cup and pinched the nipple. The nipple was large and firm and I flicked it back and forth with my finger and squeezed the breast. I thought this is what she wanted me to do and I felt excited, but not as much as I thought I would. Doing this, I realized that I was forgetting to move my tongue in her mouth. All this was exciting for a few minutes, but then I was again bored. Almost without me even noticing that they were doing it, my fingers began to play with her nipple much as they would a small coin in my pocket or a spring. After another minute, I pulled her bra cup back in place. I got out and went around to the other side and let her out. As she stepped out of the car I felt weird, like it was the first time I was seeing her that evening. The person whom I'd been kissing and whose breast I'd fondled seemed like someone entirely different.

 

During the midsummer long weekend at the beginning of August, I seemed to be the only person left in Vancouver. Kris was at a real estate convention in Whistler, Alex was at her family's cabin in The Shuswaps, Damien was at home but only wanted to stay indoors and play Nintendo, Sadie was on the Island, and whenever I called Maria the male roommate said she was out.

As for Cam, I'd called his house over the past two weeks and left at least ten messages on his machine. He hadn't returned one of them.

 

The Police's “Message in a Bottle” was on the poolside radio. I swam six laps, then crouched in the shallow end and held my breath. Everything was silent except for the muffled sound of the music and the gurgling of the pool's filtration system. Still under, I remembered Paul Ramsey, my friend's older brother, doing this. He had seen some documentary about Polynesian skin divers—the ones who go six or seven minutes without air—and began to practice himself. His parents figured that was what he had been doing when it happened—at least, that's what they told people. No one really knows though, because no one else was at home. They returned from Hawaii and the body was floating in the pool.

My throat and lungs now burned. I held my breath longer and thought of what it would be like if I lost consciousness—passed out, died. I could imagine Damien and Cam and Alex standing around and looking at my casket. But what I couldn't imagine was where it would be. When my parents died they were cremated, I remember being told that, and told that we were going to do something with the ashes—but I can't remember if we ever did. And my grandparents, they both had small graveside services, but that was because they'd requested them.

If I died, what would Kris do? Cremate me? Bury me?

I shot up to the surface.

Taking deep breaths, I got out, towelled myself dry, then lay on one of the green chaises. Tea Party's “Temptation” had come on. I clicked off the radio and settled back in the chaise. There was a light breeze. The faint drone of a neighbour's mower and sunlight filtering through the hemlocks made me drowsy. As I lay there, struggling not to drift off, more images of neighbours' deaths flickered through my memory: the son of Dr. Haroldson, the psychiatrist, who hanged himself from the chandelier in the front hall; the Korean family that after a whole summer day of the RCMP going in and out of their silent Tudor-style house was never seen again; the renter in the house next door who was found asphyxiated during Expo 86—all these things had happened in the summer.

I went inside.

When it started to get dark, I put on a pair of chinos and T-shirt and went down to Burger King for dinner. After, I rented
Magic
and
Sleep Away Camp II.

 

 

 

 

 

4

 

 

“So—how do you
know this place?”

“What?”

“The place, the Cave.”

“Everyone knows about it,” she said. She turned up the volume on the car stereo. “I love this song.”

“Everyone?”

“Yeah,” she said. “Listen.”

The lyrics were about penetration and violation, and I didn't think I recognized the song. But when the chorus began I remembered Alex playing the song for me in her room, telling me that it was Nine Inch Nail's “Closer.”

“This place we're going, it's not like that apartment on Lonsdale?”

Alex looked at me, her eyes wide. “How do
you
know about that place?”

“Everyone knows about it,” I said trying to imitate her insouciant tone.

“No—seriously—how do you know?”

“Some girls at your party, they were talking.”

“What did they say?”

“Don't you have this CD?”

“Tell me,” she said, turning off the radio. “What did they say?”

“Nothing. Just that some guy—”

“They didn't say anything about me?”

“No. Why? Do you go there?”

“You
promise
they didn't say anything about me.”

“Yes—why? Have you been there?”

“Shhh. I want to hear this,” Alex said and turned back on the radio.

“Don't you have the CD?”

“Yeah. But it's better on the radio.”

“Why? How?”

“I don't know. It's like you're connected to all those people. The people you know are listening to it.”

“Sure,” I said, but then thought about it and realized it made sense.

 

The house we were going to that night was owned by a Korean family, but they didn't live there, they lived in Korea, and no one had ever seen the son who supposedly took care of the house for them.

When we got there it was around nine. Kids had spilled out on the lawn and were staggering and falling in the grey twilight. Two boys in navy and maroon hoodies stood at the top of the driveway hackysacking, while a third boy lay on the grass beside them.

“Shouldn't we turn him over?” I heard one boy say as I passed. “Isn't that how Pat died?”

The front door was open and we shouldered our way through the group standing there and went up the stairs and into the kitchen. More high-school kids circled the kitchen island. A bottle of shaken-up Coke stood on it, and they were having some type of argument about alcohol.

“Isn't, like, Crystal's mother supposed to get it?”

“Didn't you hear what I said, Roach? She failed some socials test. Now her mother's angry at her.”

The girl with the tank top nodded. She stuck out her tongue, and pulling it back, banged her teeth with the metal stud.

“Hey, isn't he old enough to go?” I heard one of the boys say.

I wasn't sure if he was referring to me, but I followed Alex down the hallway on the right. In the bedroom at the end two girls, maybe fifteen or sixteen, sat cross legged on the floor.

“Bead!” Alex said to the girl on the left. “Hey—do you know who's got some pot?”

“Um—” Between them on the floor was a boy, and they appeared to be minding him. “I think Reese has some.”

“Where is he?”

The boy was young, maybe eleven or twelve, and he was naked except for a green tartan kilt. He rolled to the left, and then to the right, and flailed his arm above his head, trying to reach the overturned bottle of Flintstone multi-vitamins behind him. When he rolled to the left the kilt came up, and I saw that he wasn't wearing any underwear. The penis, small, pale and limp, stuck to the side of his scrotum, and there was no pubic hair.

“Josh! Josh!” the girl on the right said. She pulled down on the kilt. But the boy's body was lying on the material, and she couldn't get it down far enough to cover him. “Josh, cover up! We can see your
pee pee
.”

“Is Garth here?”

“Nope.”

“Yeah he is,” the girl on the right said.

“Garth's not here.”

The boy got hold of the vitamin bottle. He shook it like a rattle.

“He's in Surrey. I talked to him last night.”

“I think he's back.”

“No. He's not.”

“Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

Josh held the bottle high over his upturned face. He poured out a bunch of Flintstones and chomped on them with his mouth open.

“I don't think Josh has any,” Alex said.

“Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

“
Oh
, my
Go
d
! Bead.
Bead
—”

“Check down stairs. I think—”

“Bead. Look—Josh's eaten the vitamins. He's eating the vitamins.”

The boy's face was glazed with saliva and coloured bits of half-chewed Flintstones.

“Anyway—”

“Did you
hear
me?”

“Well don't spaz about it.”

“He could die.”

“Trish, you can't die from Flintstones.”

“Yeah! You can! My cousin ate them, and he had to have his stomach pumped.”

 

In the kitchen I told Alex, “I'm going to stay here.”

“Are you okay?” she asked.

“Yeah. Why?”

“You look sad.”

I shrugged. “I'm fine.” I noticed a sofa through the doorway behind Alex and pointed. “I'm going to wait in there.”

“Are you sure?”

“Uh huh.”

Sitting on the sofa, I pulled out the Smirnoff I'd brought and unscrewed the top and took a swig. It wasn't cold enough and I sputtered. I took another one. I put the bottle back in my pocket and looked around the room. It was supposed to be some kind of family room. But the walls were decorated with faded pages cut from a porno magazine, and on the far wall I thought I saw one of Kris's calendars. I couldn't imagine any Korean family living here. The stereo in the corner was on and the first notes of “Born on the Bayou” wobbled out of the speakers. The fat boy on the couch adjacent to mine stared psychotically at the rug. He sipped a Super Big Gulp, and then swore under his breath. Two other boys were playing
Super Mario
on an old Nintendo. All three of them were dressed in baggy plaid shirts, and I felt like I was in some sort of grunge video or a scene from the movie
Kids
.

Another boy entered the room. He also wore a plaid shirt and held up a Handycam to his face. He turned down the stereo and approached the fat kid, videotaping him. “Hey Chris,” he said. “Say something really sick.”

“Fuck you, Cory.”

“Come on. You can do better than that. Just one thing.”

“I fucked your grandmother last night.”

“That's better. Did it feel good?”

“Yeah.”

“As good as your mother?”

The fat kid kicked out at the boy with the Handycam, but that boy had jumped back, keeping the Handycam fixed on the fat boy's face.

I had the bottle out again and I took another sip. It was getting easier. I needed to use the toilet.

In the washroom, I was afraid to touch anything. I pulled down my sleeve and handled everything through it. I remembered Vincent, Damien's psych-ward roommate, and worried that I was turning into him.

When I got back to the family room, Josh the boy from the bedroom was there. He was in the middle of the room and was doing an awkward sort of dance, holding the hem of his kilt with both hands and swaying it back and forth. After doing this for maybe a minute, he lay with his face on the floor and raised his ass high in the air. He wiggled it back and forth, and the kilt fell over his back. Behind him, the two boys now watched some kind of home movie on TV.

“Watch this,” one of them said. On the screen someone vomited into a toilet bowel.

“Gross,” the other said.

“Hi. What's your name?” a girl said, sitting down beside me. She was the one from the kitchen, the one in the scarelet tank top and spiky hair who couldn't understand why the other girl's mother wouldn't run liquor for them.

For some reason I was reluctant to give her my real name, and said, “Paul. And yours?”

“Roach.”

“Roach?” I said, certain that I'd misheard.

“Yeah, Roach. My parents call me Rachel, but don't call me that. I
hate
that name.”

For a minute, neither one of us said anything.

In the middle of the room, the fat kid had got off the sofa and stood over Josh. He'd found a cardboard tube somewhere, like the ones that posters come in, and began to spank Josh's bare ass with it.

“Who did you come with?”

“Alex Murphy,” I said.

The girl looked up as if thinking about it. Again she stuck out her tongue and was tapping her teeth with the piercing.

“She has short blonde hair,” I said.

The fat kid had stopped spanking Josh with the tube, and instead tried to push it into Josh's ass.

Josh, his face still on the floor, feigned an expression of pleasure, and he wiggled his ass back and forth as if trying to assist the fat kid.

My little cock can go where big cocks can't.

“I don't think I know her,” the girl said. “Listen, is it true you're nineteen?”

“Uh. Yeah,” I said, and waited for her to ask me to get them alcohol.

“Isn't that illegal?”

“What?”

“That girl and you—you know.”

“What do you mean?”

For a half-minute, the girl didn't respond, then jumping up, said, very emphatically, like she was acting some role, “Don't worry. Your secret's
Safe. With. Me.”

Before I could say anything, she'd skipped back into the kitchen.

The fat boy had given up and gone back to the couch and the Slurpee. One of the boys who'd been watching the TV now picked up the cardboard tube. He poked Josh's bum with it. But as he did this, Josh reached around and grabbed it. He yanked it from the boy's hand. The boy stepped back as Josh jumped up. Josh hit the boy surprisingly hard on the side of the head with the tube. The boy ran into the kitchen, Josh chasing him

The feeling the vodka had given me was gone. When I got the bottle out again it was half empty.

Give it time.

 

Alex didn't want to go home. She lay in the backseat of the car and insisted I take her somewhere.

“Where do you want to go?” I asked.

“I don't care. Anywhere.”

Horseshoe Bay seemed as good as anywhere.

An almost full moon shone down as we drove the highway, some DJ on one of the stations playing Harvey Danger's “Flagpole Sitta” over and over again. As always, I had the windows down.

When we got back from Horseshoe Bay, I headed to take Alex home, but she didn't want to go there.

“Is your dad home?” I finally asked.

She didn't answer, but after a pause said, “He wants to meet you.”

 

At my house I lay on my bed while Alex paced my room.

There were posters on the wall from the days when my grandparents operated a drive-in in northern BC, and Alex paused for a long time in front of the one for
Ice Man
.

“NO rhyme, no reason, just death,” she said, reading the caption.

“The poster's from my grandparents' movie theatre,” I said. “My grandparents, they used to own a drive-in movie theatre—in the seventies.
Ice Man
was one of the movies.”

Alex went to the bookshelf and looked at the titles.

“Wow, have you read all of these?”

“Yeah. Most of them.”

She pulled out
Animal Farm
, a hardcover I'd inherited when our neighbour, who was some kind of book collector, died.

“We had to read this one in school,” she said. “It was so boring.”

“You didn't like it?”

“I only read half of it. Then—I think I lost it.”

She pushed it back.