Читать книгу Rat Medicine & Other Unlikely Curatives - Lauren B. Davis - Страница 5

Word of what happened to Stewart circulated quickly. Did you hear? Did you hear? Did you hear? The story swept through the streets like water in the gutter.

The Toronto neighbourhood was one of oak-lined streets and second hand bookstores, coffee shops and bars with tiny spaces called ‘open stages’ where on Friday or Sunday night anyone could grab the mike and read poetry, rant about the conservative provincial government or sing the song they’d just written.

Stewart knew every shopkeeper by name, knew how many kids each had; was recognised by every panhandler, plus Elio, the guy who ran the news-stand, depended on him to drop off a hot coffee every day on his way home from work. Stewart was a neighbourhood fixture, an always-smiling face. He was kind and so, if people made jokes about his bad comb-over or his brightly patterned vests, or his sometimes overpowering aftershave, they never teased him to his face. He was also, if the truth be told, a bit of a gossip. If you wanted to know anything about anyone in the neighbourhood, Stewart was the man to see. He knew where Mrs. Cheung’s daughter was hiding out when she ran away from home, and why. He knew the amount Mr. Davidson had to pay when he was audited last year and why the Campbell’s marriage broke up. He even knew the name of the girlfriend.

Every Sunday morning Stewart went to the Renaissance e for a vegetarian brunch. There he met with four or five friends and they talked over each other’s romantic problems, job problems, talk about the books they’d just read or were attempting to write, the politics that influenced them. He was the sort of fellow who made friends with strangers at the next table, drew them into conversation, and later exchanged phone numbers.

He worked in the printing department of the University of Toronto, copying reports and dissertations, brochures and lesson outlines. The job paid the rent. But he knew he was far more sophisticated than his career indicated. His real interest lay the healing powers of music and one day he dreamed of travelling to Mongolia to study shamanic chants.

“I’ve never heard of a sickness or an injury that could not be made better by listening to the Vivaldi’s Four Seasons,” he said. “You can laugh, but just try it the next time you get a bad cold.”

On a day in June, warm enough that you could finally do without a jacket, Stewart stood in line to pay for his Globe and Mail and noticed a boy standing behind him. He was eighteen, or nineteen, tall and lanky, dressed like a million other kids his age: running shoes, jeans, a T-shirt that read “There’s no such thing as gravity, the earth just sucks.” He wore a gold ring through the right side of his lower lip.

“The news just keeps getting worse and worse, doesn’t it? Just for once I’d like to see something in the paper about someone not doing something despicable to someone else, wouldn’t you?” said Stewart.

“Yeah, I guess. What a world, eh?”

That was pretty much the extent of the conversation, but it was enough to make them remember each other the next time they passed in the street and Stewart said hello. The kid asked Stewart if he could spare any change. Stewart gave him a couple of ‘loonies’ and introduced himself. The kid said his name was Philip.

And so it went. Stewart and Philip met in the street, turning the corner, in the convenience store, in the donut shop on Bloor and St. George. Once or twice they struck up a conversation. Stewart bought Philip cups of coffee, heard about his troubles. He had that knack. People he barely knew were always telling him their troubles.

Philip told Stewart how hard it was to make ends meet, to pay the rent on the room he shared with his girlfriend, Pam. Philip said he’d had to sell his stereo, his guitar. He was looking for work, he said. Stewart sympathised. Times were hard. Now and then he slipped the kid twenty bucks, bought him a hamburger, or gave him a few dollars for bus tokens, just to help out. He liked Philip, felt a soft spot for the kid. He wanted to do what he could to make his life a little easier until his situation improved.

Once he invited Philip to eat at his apartment. The kid sat hunched over his pasta, fiddling with the ring in his lip, the pierced hole red and inflamed, slightly crusted with infection. It made Stewart a little queasy to watch, and he spent the time focused on fussing about the tiny kitchen. Philip seemed ill at ease, looking around constantly and shifting in his seat. Stewart put this down to Philip’s embarrassment with is own reduced circumstances. He concluded this was why he’d never learned where Philip lived - because it would make him uncomfortable to have Stewart see his dingy lodgings.

Late one sticky Friday night in early August, it was after 11:00, there was a knock at the door. Stewart was reading, thinking about how good it would feel to soon be tucked up in bed. He went to the door, expecting it to be Craig, one of his neighbours, who locked himself out with regularity and left a key at Stewart’s. He opened the door. There stood Philip, smiling, and behind him another man and a young woman, her hair dyed a gothic blue black.

“Philip! What a surprise! What’s up?”

Philip stepped toward him, causing him to step back into the room. The other two followed close behind. Now they were all standing inside Stewart’s apartment. The other man closed the door and leaned up against it. Philip twirled the ring in his lip. He was standing too close to Stewart. Stewart backed up another step, smelling beer, cigarettes, and sweat.

“Are you all right? Is something wrong?” said Stewart. When Stewart’s friends showed up this late at night, something was usually wrong; a romantic break-up, a sick relative, something Stewart could be helpful with. Something a cup of tea and a long chat could help solve.

He wished Philip would say something.

“Is this Pamela?” Stewart extended his arm to shake the girl’s hand. Her skin was very pale, her lipstick and fingernails painted a grape colour so dark it looked almost black. She didn’t take his hand. He dropped it. He looked at Philip.

“Philip?”

“Stewart, man, we’ve come to get your stereo.”

“My stereo,” Stewart repeated, “...you want my stereo?”

“Clever boy.”

Stewart thought Philip’s eyes looked very odd, hollow and colourless, like mine shafts.

“Philip, be serious!” Stewart tried out a little laugh. “My stereo. Very funny.” He waited for Philip to join in on the joke, but Philip remained mute. Stewart concluded the situation required normalcy.

“Why don’t we have a cup of coffee? We can sit down and talk about what’s going on. You’re always welcome here. You know that. I told you to drop by any time. Now, I know you don’t really want my stereo. I mean, it’s so silly. Do you want a coffee?” Stewart felt like a fool, prattling on this way, but he couldn’t seem to stop.

Philip turned to his companions. “You guys want a fucking coffee?”

The man, who was shorter than Philip, wider, and sported a variety of tattoos, one of a spider on his left cheek, said “Coffee, sure. Why the fuck not?” He rubbed his hand over his shaved head a couple of times.

“Let’s have a tea party!” he yelled, and the two men laughed.

The girl stood staring at Philip, her hands stuffed in the oversize men’s coat she wore.

“OK Stew. Why don’t you scamper into the kitchen and fix us a nice cup of hot coffee.”

Stewart felt he should really ask them to leave but, now that he’d offered them coffee and they’d accepted, he didn’t see how he could. They would probably just leave after the coffee. He could keep the situation under control. If he just stayed calm and didn’t let on he was frightened, he’d be OK. There really was nothing to be afraid of, it was simply that the hour was late and Philip was making jokes in bad taste. But young people did things differently. Philip wouldn’t hurt him. Philip was a friend. In an hour Stewart would be in bed, safe and amused at how nervous he’d been.

In the kitchen he hurried about, boiling the kettle, spooning instant coffee into mugs, grabbing milk from the refrigerator, sugar, putting things on a tray. This is going to be OK, he kept repeating, like a mantra. This is going to be OK. OK. OK. He didn’t want to leave them alone in the living room. He heard noises, not talking, but scuffling noises. Metallic noises. He couldn’t hear voices and that made him more uncomfortable. He picked up the tray and walked back in to the living room. As he came through the doorway he could see Philip and the Spider Man. They were dismantling the stereo. The speakers were already unwired, placed by the door. Philip was bending over the back of the stereo casing, fiddling with the wires. Spider Man was hunched behind the equipment. Stewart couldn’t see the Gothic girl.

“Stop it! Philip! Don’t....”

Before he could finish the sentence he felt the back of his head explode in a starburst of yellow and red lights. He dropped the tray and fell forward to his knees in the broken china and spilled coffee. He tried to turn and see what had hit him. Gothic Girl stood behind him. She had a hammer in her right hand. That hand was raising itself up again. And coming down.

“Don’t...” Stewart whispered.

But she did.

The first sense Stewart regained was sound. Medium sized sounds, like big rodents moving around the room. He couldn’t understand. Pigeons on the roof. Then the pain began. His head hurt, his jaw hurt. His jaw felt like someone had put a white-hot ice pick in the joint. His mouth was open. Close it. The pain would stop if he closed his mouth. He couldn’t. He had something in his mouth. He opened his eyes. Oh God.

Stewart was tied to one of his dining room chairs. His ankles were tied to the legs of the chair. His arms were tied to the arms of the chair. His chest was tied to the back of the chair. He had something stuffed in his mouth and something tied around his head holding it in. It was hard to breathe. His head hurt. A lot. He was dizzy. He was nauseous. He was afraid he’d throw up, choke to death. He had to stay calm. He wanted to cry.

He heard noises from the bedroom.

Philip and Spider Man had the stereo packed up and ready to go. They also had his wallet, his watch and his silver candlesticks on the table. There was a pillowcase next to the door that looked as though it had some things in it. He didn’t have much else of any monetary value. No television. He couldn’t imagine what would be in the pillowcase. Why didn’t they just go now?

Gothic Girl came out of the kitchen and looked at him. She had no expression on her face. It was as though, under the white make-up there was nothing, just empty air, the paint merely giving form to the void. She walked into the bedroom. A moment later she came back out, followed by Philip and Spider Man.

“Weren’t sure you’d come back to us, man. But glad you aren’t going to miss the rest of the party.” Philip smiled. Spider Man smiled. “Why don’t you put the kettle on again, Babe. We didn’t get our coffee.”

Gothic Girl went back to the kitchen. There was something obscene about this parody of domestic roles. It was perverse. The girl appeared back at the door from the kitchen. She had the electric kettle in her hand. She stooped down and put it on the floor next to his chair. She plugged it in. Stewart didn’t understand. Why would she not just make coffee in the kitchen? He was missing something, his brain addled by pain and fear. There was something he was supposed to know.

The kettle began to boil. She unplugged it. She stood up with it in her hand and raised it over his head.

Losing consciousness took some time. He was more grateful for that state of oblivion than he had been for anything in his life. By that point he was past hoping they would stop torturing him, past praying someone would sense what was going on in his apartment and call the police, past imploring behind his gag for mercy. He just wanted to faint.

He had wondered from time to time, when listening to ghastly news reports of atrocities committed in far off lands, if he would break under torture and tell his captors what they wanted to know. Now he knew the answer to that question. Of course he would. The horror of this particular situation was that there was nothing they wanted to know. They just wanted to keep doing what they were doing until they didn’t want to do it anymore. It was quite simple, really. The only thing required of him was to continue feeling and he did that very well, until eventually, a merciful God granted the reprieve, the pardon, of insensibility.

When he came to, he was alone.

He lay on the floor. His ankles were still tied to the chair, although his hands had been freed. This struck him as funny, that his tormentors had been thoughtful enough to untie his hands. He couldn’t imagine why. He giggled and another part of his psyche, far off and away somewhere thought, Oh dear, laughing can’t be a good sign. I might be going crazy.

His brain worked mechanically, taking in details, without emotion, as though some vital wire had been disconnected.

His skin was sticky. He was covered with a mixture of blood, mucous, peeling skin, egg shells, green paint, cigarette butts and other things he had trouble identifying.

He was extremely tired. His body was lead, although he didn’t feel very much pain, for which he was immensely grateful. He concluded the best thing he could do was sleep. That seemed very sensible.

He untied his ankles and crawled to the couch. He hauled himself up onto the soft cool leather and instantly fell asleep.

Craig, the neighbour who often locked himself out, found Stewart later in the morning. First he was sick to his stomach, and then he called an ambulance, and so Stewart did not die, although he wished for sometime afterwards that he had.

His friends, David and Diane, came by the hospital to visit. They brought a Walkman and Vivaldi tapes.

“We thought this might help,” they said, softly, awed by the presence of so much equipment, so many blinking lights and bleeping monitors. They put the tape in, and lay the earphones gently on the batting of the bandages, trying not to hurt him.

“That’s very kind of you,” he said, although his words were hard to understand given the condition of his mouth.

When his friends left he buzzed for the nurse and asked her to disconnect the music.

Stewart moved away some months later, when he was released from hospital. He didn’t keep in touch, although he was polite when anyone called round to see how he was doing. He said the therapy was helping.

When he was gone, and the twitter of talk died down, the neighbourhood was a quieter place than it had been. More reserved. More self-conscious. The ‘perpetrators’ had never been caught. They were still out there somewhere. People drew their blinds and checked their locks twice before turning in. New people moved in and found this neighbourhood no different than other sections of the city, no warmer, no more welcoming. They wondered why their friends had raved about it. People hesitated before unfamiliar faces. They didn’t strike up conversations over their morning cappuccinos. After all, you never could tell, could you? The world was such a dangerous place these days.