Neighbourhood Watch Read online

  * * *

  Outside, plump snowflakes are falling. Roxane is sitting at the back of the class, looking out the window. The teacher is dealing with an outburst at the front. The kid is on the floor, and he’s yelling, scrambling in every direction.‘Calm down, Kevin, calm down.’ The teacher tries to restrain him. It’s been happening a lot since his mother left. The social worker should show up any minute now for a time out, then things will get back to normal, as if nothing ever happened. A time out is a technique they learn at social worker school. It’s like a wrestling hold for children. With arms and feet pinned, there’s just the yelling to deal with, but when the kid can’t move, he quiets down on his own.

  Roxane watches the snow falling. The snowflakes look soft, but really, they’re cold. Lots of things are like that, she thinks.

  Whenever something sort of serious happens, Roxane looks outside. If it goes on too long, she leaves for Russia.

  She opens the big red book on her desk. Round castles that look like macarons. They’re so beautiful they don’t look real. She reads: ‘The Krem-lin.’ The sun hangs overhead, bits of light that shine so bright she wants to collect them. She would like to gather them up, put them in a box, and hide the box under her pillow. Roxane turns the page. There’s a woman with a red scarf on her head. Tendrils of hair stick out from under it. Blond. Soft.

  ‘Anastasia is a young Moscovite.’ It’s written underneath.

  Anastasia has red cheeks and black eyes that look straight on.

  They’re steady. It’s like they know everything and it’s not even that bad. It’s like they’re saying, ‘It’s okay, it’s okay.’

  Roxane looks at Anastasia, their eyes meet, for a long time.

  * * *

  A short break between clients. Meg is squatting at the end of an alley. Peeing. A thin stream that trickles to the middle of the alley, forges its own path, not giving a shit about obstacles. A thin stream that couldn’t give a shit.

  Meg stands up, legs bare. Pulls up her nylons.

  There’s a run. Fuck, there’s a run.

  Whatever. Anyway, they know we have runs, Meg. You think they come here to fuck Miss Universe?

  Meg silently talks to herself and smiles. She pulls up her run over all the other ones, which are invisible.

  They have runs too.

  She slips in her shoes.

  We’re all full of fucking runs.

  With all her runs, Meg reaches the street, following the course of her stream as it disappears into the gutter.

  * * *

  Roxane comes home from school.

  Heavy backpack.

  Frozen door, broken doorbell.

  Rings once. Twice.

  Goes in by the back.

  Roxane barely knows the days of the week, but she knows when it’s cheque day. It’s today. There are one two three beers on the counter. The TV is on loud. Too loud. Her mother is drinking in the living room.

  A swig. A soggy hello. Roxane, eyes worried, searches to see what’s left of her mother.

  Dark circles under eyes, holes in her smile, grey bathrobe open, showing her wrinkled neck, suffering slouched on the sofa.

  ‘Hi, Mom.’

  Silence.

  Her mother looking at the TV. Roxane looking at her mother. Roxane wants her to look at her. She wants her to see her before he gets home. Because once he gets home, the house is on fire and it’s too late. The TV as a shield, Louise doesn’t have the guts to look at her.

  It’s a quarter to six. Roxane doesn’t have time to hope. She goes into her bedroom. It’s dark in there. It’s cold in there. She sits looking out the window. In the distance, she can spot the river. Snow is falling on it. White lines from the sky to the ground, long, long, never-ending. ‘Snow … Sni-eg … ’ Between her deserted lips: ‘Snieg.’

  The sound of keys. Then the door. He’s home. The shouting’s going to start.

  Red numbers on the alarm clock: 6:00.

  Head under the pillow.

  * * *

  Night falls suddenly, as if, starting now, there were something to hide.

  At the pawnshop, they’ve rearranged the TVS, stacked them in the shape of a Christmas tree. A festive idea. A concept. The same image repeats on each screen. A woman, black veil on her head, cries, looking up at the sky. A child in her arms. Dead, no doubt. The same woman, the same child, on twelve screens in the pawnshop window. On twelve screens that together form a pathetic excuse for a Christmas tree.

  Night might as well fall all at once.

  Kelly and Kathy watch. The woman the woman the woman the woman the woman the child the child the child the child the child the child.

  It’s snowing now on Rue Ontario. Wet feet are hunting for gifts. Kathy rolls a joint.

  * * *

  A storm hangs over the apartment. Roxane has time. She slips into the kitchen. She looks for something, head in the fridge. She’s hungry.

  ‘Rox!’

  She jumps. Her mother is calling her. ‘Roooxxxx!’

  Get back to the bedroom. Fast.

  Louise in the living room, bottle in her mouth, him beside her, smoking in silence.

  ‘Have you done your homework?’

  Don’t want to talk to you, she says in her head. Don’t want to. Don’t want to. Don’t want to.

  Get back to the bedroom. Fast.

  ‘Hey! Talk to your mother, for chrissake.’

  ‘C’mon, Mom … ’

  ‘You don’t want to talk to me?’

  Her voice is dribbling.

  ‘ … ’

  ‘Well, go ahead, dammit … Go rot in your room.’

  ‘Shut up, Louise!’

  Him, spewing smoke. Gets her in line. Bridled like a horse. Roxane knows it’s starting. That’s how it begins. Her bedroom. Fast. Each stride as long as the world. One voice rising and biting, the other voice starts overtop of it, the words thick, it shoots, it spits, it spews venom. Roxane in her bedroom the window the snowflakes snieg snieg.

  ‘You’re a fucking idiot.’

  ‘Fuck you!’

  A dull thud. She hits him.

  Roxane vanishes, dives into another place, far, as far away as possible.

  ‘You sonofabitch.’

  ‘Don’t you touch me!’

  Snieg. Snowflakes like long white lines in the sky that fall and fall and fall.

  ‘You want to kill me, huh?’

  She laughs.

  ‘Shut up!’

  She shouts.

  Knock at the door.

  Snieg. It’s pretty it’s pretty it’s pretty. ‘Open this door, Roxane, goddammit … ’ Long lines long lines. Bang! The door forced in, Louise in front of the window, Louise in her bedroom, in front of the snow that keeps falling.

  ‘Look at the snowflakes, Mom,’ she might have said, and then, ‘Oh yes, they’re pretty.’

  ‘Jesus! You just run away? I’m in shit, and you’re nowhere to be seen … ’

  Her words drag along the ground, hot air pours out through the gaps in her mouth.

  ‘C’mon, Mom.’

  ‘Goddammit!’

  Louise falls. Roxane grabs her arm.

  ‘Get up, Mom.’

  She grabs her by the waist. Louise is crying.

  He comes in, drags her by the T-shirt. ‘That’s enough of this crap, for chrissake.’

  He lifts her up. It’s tight around her neck.

  ‘It’s tight around her neck,’ Roxane says, quietly.

  Louise is yelling.

  ‘It’s tight around her neck,’ Roxane says again.

  He drags her out of the bedroom.

  Silence.

  Roxane closes her door. Screaming. Screaming. Words. Blows. Her name. Her mother screaming her name. Roxane opens her drawer. Looks for her headphones, finds her headphones.

  Shostakovich, violins. Louder, louder still. The violins the window the snow snieg that falls like lines from the sky to the water like vines she could grab on to, to rise so high, all the
way up, the snowflakes fall in vines from the ground to the sky, Shostakovich’s violin flows over her, then flows in her. Roxane is a string, shrill under the bow, Roxane vibrates, Roxane explodes, flies over the street, over the dead bodies, over the shit, to the boats, to the river, to Russia. Roxane is a symphony.

  три

  3

  Morning breaks. The cathode-ray window of the pawnshop is still dormant, screens sleeping on a hypnotic storm. Sailing through winter on their square of cardboard, the hump of Kathy’s and Kelly’s bodies contorts in the morning. A soft voice glides over them.

  ‘You wouldn’t have a cigarette, would you?’

  Meg’s long legs with runs split the morning horizon.

  Sleepy, Kelly jams her hand into the maze of fabric that makes up her shell. At the innermost layer, next to the heat of her body and safe from thieves, Kelly finds a cigarette, which she offers with her broken fingers to the tired prostitute.

  ‘Thanks.’

  * * *

  They are laughing at nothing, all together, as if someone had said, ‘When I say go, everyone laugh.’ They are all laughing, even though you don’t get the joke, as if they are laughing at you behind your back. Stupid morning radio. Mélissa swats the radio. It doesn’t turn off.

  Mélissa gets up. It’s dark in the kitchen. The stepdad hasn’t come back. There’s no sign of him, no beer, no cigarette butts, no nothing. He won’t be back. This time, it’s for real.

  Mélissa opens the fridge. She grabs the orange juice container and takes a swig: she spits. It tastes like vomit. She surveys what’s left. Salad dressing, tomato sauce, mayo, relish, ketchup, chocolate sauce. Mélissa squirts a shot in her mouth. She opens the freezer and empties the contents onto the table.

  ‘What are you doing, Mélissa?’

  The boys in pyjamas, still sleepy.

  ‘I’m getting organized.’

  * * *

  There’s frost on the windows, lines criss-crossing to create a curtain inside and out. As if winter had fingers that could draw.

  Roxane is tired.

  Louise is sleeping on the sofa. Roxane approaches, bends over her face. An inch from her skin. She runs her eyes over her. Lingers at the pits, marks, lines. A trail of drool along her cheek. Beer drool. Runs a long finger over it – her mother’s drool – and traces the line up to her mouth. Open. Dry. Dead.

  If only she would die.

  Roxane picks up seven empty beer bottles from the floor and takes off.

  Outside, Roxane walks, her head held high. She didn’t take the yellow school bus. They can eat shit. She will find her own way, she will go to school like a normal girl. Totally normal.

  I think I have to turn here. I think this is where I have to turn. The yellow school bus turns here. I think …

  The street name is there, but it takes a long time to read. Reading takes a long time. She reads slowly, and anyway, she doesn’t know what street she should take, so even if she knew the name …

  Never been this way. I think. Don’t recognize it, don’t recognize anything. Go back.

  Roxane retraces her steps. Running. Turns the corner, goes back to the start, goes back to the front of her apartment block. One, two, three. Goes up on the stoop. Roxane is out of breath. They were right.

  The yellow school bus is coming down the street. One, two, three. Roxane gets in without even pretending it’s not coming for her.

  They were right. Roxane is mental.

  * * *

  At the depanneur across from the school, Mélissa haggles with the owner for a package of salty noodles, the boys hanging from her sleeves.

  ‘I’ll pay you next time, c’mon. I’m here every morning!’

  Roxane goes in, takes the empty beer bottles from her bag, puts them on the counter.

  A look from Mélissa, a quick count.

  ‘Can you give me two?’

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘Bottles, can you give me two? I don’t have enough cash.’

  Roxane looks at Mélissa and the two snot-nosed kids hanging from her. Looks at the dep owner, who is waiting, a pack of salty noodles in hand.

  ‘Yeah. I’ll give you two.’

  Mélissa pushes two empty bottles in the dep owner’s face, grabs the pack of noodles from his hands –‘Let’s go, guys!’ – and tears out of the store.

  Roxane knows it takes seven empty bottles for a May West. She has five left. She leaves.

  Mélissa is already way ahead, almost at school. She walks, head down so the cold doesn’t hit her face. The boys get behind her to shield themselves from the wind. Mélissa slices through the air for them. She creates a slipstream for them like geese. Mélissa is a warrior.

  Roxane thinks she’s beautiful.

  * * *

  Steve is lying on his back, legs apart, under a rusted Peugeot. His blackened hands roam its metallic guts as his expert eye spots the crack, which he seals mechanically. Last Christmas, he gave Kevin a model of this car. A small silver Peugeot, nice and clean. In a nice box. They assembled it together, spent all night on it. It made the kid happy.

  Steve sings ‘Blue Moon’ under the rusted Peugeot. The day is ending, and he has done a good job. Even though he doesn’t have a car himself, there are a few of them still roaming the city because of his skill.

  A deep voice resonates above the car.

  ‘Steve! Boss wants to see you!’

  Bad feeling. Steve doesn’t move, holed up in his rusted metal burrow.

  ‘Hey, Wrestlemania. Let’s go.’

  Steve emerges from the shadows. Wipes his hands.

  * * *

  At the back of Garage Lacombe, a few employees, faces blackened by sludge, watch the scene, immobile. Steve grips a rag in his hands, the black oil dribbles onto the floor.

  ‘Jesus, why? What is this shit?’

  ‘The garage isn’t making enough money. We have to let people go. That’s how it is, Steve, I – ’

  BANG!

  The boss’s face smashed into the dash. Steve mashes the rag into his cheek – the oil runs into the boss’s mouth. Steve kicks the door and takes off.

  On Ontario, a guy in the crowd. In his pockets, blackened hands, balled in a fist. He’s all alone and he wants to cry.

  Roxane is immersed in her book. A large public square. People look like they’re walking fast, the way they do here. They look down at the ground and keep moving. Only the pigeons are still in the midst of hurried steps. The pigeons are restful. They leave tracks on the ground like little stars. The people rushing by trample the stars.

  Roxane lifts her head, looks outside.

  The children are playing in the schoolyard, in their snowsuits, like cosmonauts. It’s like they’re floating. It snowed. The day is calm. The air is white and damp.

  The lights flicker in the classroom. The teacher has just come in.

  Roxane looks for the page she folded at the corner. Anastasia. Reassuring eyes looking back at her.

  * * *

  There’s a test. She didn’t know or forgot. She doesn’t understand the questions. AT ALL. Like they’re written in another language.

  She puts her head down on her desk. Anastasia looks at her.

  ‘Roxane?’

  She jumps.

  The teacher is standing beside her.

  ‘Are you working?’

  ‘ … Yes.’

  ‘You haven’t started yet?’

  ‘ … ’

  ‘Do you understand?’

  ‘ … ’

  ‘You have to complete the sentences with the words “I,” “you,” or “we.”’

  ‘Yes.’

  Understand nothing nothing nothing.

  ‘Okay?’

  ‘Yes.’

  The teacher looks at the picture of Anastasia. ‘Russia again. She’s pretty, isn’t she?’

  ‘ … ’

  ‘She looks a bit like you, don’t you think?’

  Roxane looks at Anastasia. Yes. She looks like her. It’s true.
She looks like her. ‘ … Yes.’

  Roxane is excited. Finally she looks like someone.

  The teacher closes the red book.‘Concentrate, dear. Make an effort. You have to understand your own language before you learn others, don’t you think?’

  ‘ … ’

  * * *

  The TV pyramid shows winter scenes. Live. Kelly and Kathy, under their mountain of fabric, are huddled between their dogs, only their eyes sticking out. Two pairs of sea-blue eyes in the grey-white of Rue Ontario. Survivors that the winter meteors avoid at the last minute.

  ‘Death by snowplow is a heroic death.’

  ‘Any death is heroic.’

  ‘Then we’re all heroes?’

  ‘Yep.’

  ‘Me in particular.’

  ‘Me in particular!’

  They kiss as they await death. Mouths are warm. A lover’s tongue is reassuring.

  ‘Hey!’

  A guy’s voice, a metallic voice.

  He’s standing, backlit, splitting the street in two. They don’t see his glassy eyes. They don’t see his fists balled in his pockets. But they figure it out because of the bitter cold that settles deep inside them.

  Kelly speaks in what she hopes is a steady voice.‘Don’t worry, man. We’ll pay you in – ’

  A kick to the face. Kelly’s nose cracks, broken, starts bleeding, while the dogs start barking.

  ‘Fucking psycho!’

  Kathy covers Kelly with her body. A flimsy human shield. The guy spits on them. In the language of the street, that means they’re done talking. He wants money. He walks away, leaving the perfect promise of his imminent return.

  With the end of her sleeve, Kathy tries to soak up the blood streaming from Kelly’s nose. They don’t say anything, because there is nothing to say.

  Like a rock in the middle of a torrent, the two bodies entwined under a pile of fabric.

  The day goes by, but the cold remains.

  They should go somewhere far away, but this is their home. This piece of cardboard is their country. Everywhere is nowhere, except here.

  Kelly and Kathy slowly go to sleep. The dogs stand guard.

  * * *

  In her bedroom, Roxane is reading under the covers. By flashlight, so they forget she’s there. Beside Anastasia’s picture, a block of text: