Thirteen Crucifixions 42

There he lay, curled up on the couch in his dark clothes, curved rather like a gigantic turd.  The man I love is a shit today, Melissa thought on her way to the kitchen.  Her make-up still wasn’t right—she should not have partied with the staff after work.  “When you gonna learn girl?”, she muttered while looking for the coffee filters.  “When are you going to learn?”  The house was, as usual, worse than a pigsty—almost a week’s worth of dirty dishes were stacked and scattered and moldering and attracting new species of vermin—how could they live like this!  She was used to better—she was surely used to much better than this.  They had taken them in, her and Stefan, rent-free, though now, to satisfy the demands of Welfare, they were paying a token amount every month.  Of course the place was a mess—with three single male rock musicians, not to mention Stefan who probably had never cleaned a toilet or washed a plate in his life—what else could she expect?  And Melissa herself was far from being the happy homemaker, but at least she washed her own dishes and usually cleaned up her own spills and never left her personal detritus cluttering the communal areas of the house.  She might try to clean up after the others a little bit but she wasn’t prepared to play Wendy in a home for lost boys.  She was being ungrateful, she supposed.  Steve, Jason and Dirk had treated her and Stefan with extraordinary kindness.  It was Dirk they met one day when they were panhandling downtown.  She liked him right away, tall, gangly, like a tower of bones covered in skin and black clothing.  He gave them a big smile and sat down next to them on the pavement, told them how he’d just spent three months on the street himself, now he was in this house together with his band-mates and they were doing a gig tonight at the Steel Toe and if they mentioned his name at the door they could get in free.  Dirk, sexy in his bony, gangly way, apparently had no such agenda with either of them.  This was pure friendship, which was like a pure sweet air that Melissa and Stefan both had been longing to inhale.  Though they had each other.   They were lovers?  But what did that word mean?  That they had sex together and slept in the same bed as often as they could?  They did sleep in the same bed, but not always together.  They weren’t just friends.  Their lives were tied together.  She had been losing her physical appetite for sex with Stefan, but they were still indefatigably together.  Which made them married?  A Mom and Pop arrangement?  She’d wondered all night where the fuck he’d got to. Jen told her he was coming in to the Steel Toe, then he didn’t show.  Yes, she was worried, but assumed that he was all right.  Stefan almost always was.  Almost always.  She was in love with him?  She was certainly used to him.  And today anyway she was thoroughly disgusted with him for—not making love to her?  To be honest she had never been that interested in his body to begin with.  He was fairly adequate in bed and that was all.  He was devoted to her.  He expected her to take care of him?  Mommy’s always around for Sonny Boy to come home to.  Madame Mommy and Mister Sonny Boy.  She should have gone home with Ed last night.  He’d had his eye on her for some time and he was hot.   He moved like a panther and just the thought of his kind of energy being channelled into bed and love-making made her positively damp.  She chickened out.

            “Coffee’s made.”

            He wasn’t stirring.

            “Wake-up, buddy boy!” she chanted in a sing-song voice.  “Wake-up!  Wake-up!”  He hadn’t taken his boots off.  What was he doing last night?

            “Get up Stefan or I’m dumping a pot full of scalding hot coffee on you.  Right now.”

            He groaned and stirred.

            “Aaaa!  It’s alive!  It’s alive!”

            He muttered something incoherent, then sat up suddenly.  He looked around, his eyes wide and frightened.  “Oh… Melissa.”

            “You still know my name”, she said.  Standing in front of the couch, “Want some coffee?”

            “Yeah.”

            “Here.”  She had a mug in one hand, the pot of coffee in the other.  She poured him one and put it on the filthy cluttered coffee table next to him.  Then she sat beside him, less than an inch between them.

            “Where were you last night?”

            “On the street.”

            “Like, you don’t have a home to come to?”

            “I was stoned.”

            “Got any left?”

            “Ate them all.  Mushrooms.”

            “You could have saved me a few.”

            “Sorry, didn’t have that many.”

            “How’d you get them?

            “Scored them on Granville.”

            “You got some money?”

            “Had a good night panhandling.”

            “Taking me out for breakfast?”

            “Where do you want to go?”

            “That place with the art we ate in yesterday?”

            “Why there?”

            “I dunno—I like the atmosphere.  Food’s good.  I love the art.  The old lady who runs the place is kinda cool.”

            “She’s mean.”

            “Mean in a nice way.”

            “Let’s go somewhere else.”

            “I wanna go to the West Wind.”

            “Don’t let me stop you.”

            “I want us to go there together.  It’s no fun alone.”

            “I’m sure you’ll live.”

            “Where ya going?”

            “To take a shower.  I feel gross.”

            “You smell gross.  Why don’t you take off your boots?”

            “Then I’ll smell real gross.”

            “You should have gone with him.  Why didn’t you?”

            “I dunno.  It didn’t feel right.”

            “You don’t need my permission.  I’ve already told you this.”

            “I know—I know.  I didn’t feel ready.”

            “Ready for what?”

            “Ready to be claimed.”

            “What’re you talking about?”

            “If I were to go to bed with Ed, with someone like Ed, then that would be it.  I’d be his.  He would have taken possession of me.”

            “Only if you want him to.  Just enjoy the sex.  He doesn’t have to have your soul too.”

            “It isn’t that easy. I can’t really separate between the two.

            “It’s easy.”

            “For you maybe.  But you’re a male.  It’s different for girls.”

            “That’s what they keep telling me.”

            “I like it with you.”

            “Don’t start.”

            “But it’s true.  Doesn’t this mean anything to you?”

            “Melissa.”

            “I love you.”

            “It’s no good.”

            “What do you mean?”

            “I mean I’m no good.”

            “What a stupid thing to say.”

            “But it’s true.”

            “Now you’re talking like a complete moron.”

            “Well, maybe I am a complete moron.  You should have gone with Ed.”

            “Stop saying that.  It’s like you don’t give a fuck.”

            “I do so give a fuck.”

            “You don’t have to shout.”  They were attracting attention.  Even Sheila, while serving another table turned around to monitor them.  After some coaxing, Stefan had agreed to join Melissa at the West Wind.  ”Where are you going?”

            “I just gotta get out.”

            “Stefan.”  He was leaving.

            “Don’t follow me.”

            “Are you coming home?”  He was gone.  Melissa sat down again, chewed a corner off her toast then washed it down with coffee.  With her forefinger she brushed away some crumbs.  Then she was crying.  She tried to bite her fist.  It didn’t work.  She broke down completely, weeping and sobbing.  Sheila sat down in Stefan’s chair.

            “There’s a couch in the back.  Would you like to lie down for a while?”

            “Yes.”  She was scarcely coherent.  She tried to steady herself.

            “Come”, Sheila said, and she followed her to a small room in the back.

            “Would you like me to bring you another coffee?” Sheila said.

            “Just a glass of water please.” Melissa sat down near the end of the couch.  Sheila brought over some water.

            “Just give yourself some time to rest.  I’ll be here all afternoon”, she said.  “Would you like me to shut the door?”

            “Could you please?”  Melissa curled up on the couch, facing the shut door of the little room.  Even now, this soon, she could tell that it wasn’t because of Stefan, nor even her period, that she was weeping.  She could see now this inevitable change that was again coming over her life, and that she had neither control nor any command over it.  She would have to content herself with simply being carried along this wave that had already taken her out to the open sea. She wondered about her mother, who she hadn’t heard from in nearly two months.  She closed her eyes, but knew already that she would not be falling asleep.

            “The Steel Toe.  Have you heard of it?”

            “It’s down at the other end of Commercial?”

            “Near Hastings.  This is my second day.  I start at five.  I don’t even feel like working now.”

            “Well, you have had a terrible upset.”

            “How could he do such a thing?”

            “There could be any number of reasons.  Best let it be.”

            “It’s hard.”

            “I know.”  Sheila refilled Melissa’s cup.

            “Just half, please.  I’ll be flying out of here if I have any more.”

            “Did you get any rest?" Sheila said sitting down with her.

            “Some.  I mostly just lay there and stared.  “Oh Gawd—I don’t want to go into work today.”

            “Then maybe you’d like to go home.”

            “It’s only my second day.  I don’t think it would look very good.”

            “You sound like a very responsible person.”

            “Well, I am really.  Don’t let the green hair fool you.  I have done some pretty stupid things but I’ve also tried to own up to them.”

            “That’s what makes life interesting.”

            “Don’t I know it.”

            “How did you meet?”

            “Stefan?  On the street.  We kinda rescued each other.”

            “Do you think he’ll come back?”

            “Probably.  He’s done this before.  Problem is he thinks he’s no good.  For anyone.  He really hates what he is?”

            “Then there isn’t much you can really do for him.”

            “No.  There’s not.  I try.  I try to assure him that he’s attractive, that he’s a good person.  That he’s worthwhile.  Only he just doesn’t seem to believe it.  And it’s not really my job anyway but I think it is because he’s been real good to me, and he’s just so pathetic and full of need—he needs a mom.  But I can’t be his mom.  I need mothering.”

            “We all do.  Even me.”

            “But you’re a mother yourself.”

            “Even mothers need mothering. And sometimes especially mothers.”

            “One day I want to have kids.  Not yet.  I’m nowhere near being ready yet.  I was  pregnant last winter.  I ended it.”

            “Stefan’s?”

.           “No, thank God.  This couple I was living with in West Van wanted me to be surrogate mother for them.  I refused.  They were keeping me as their slave, or trying to.  I escaped.  It was that night downtown that I met Stefan.  I had some money, so we got a room together.  The next day I went to the Every Woman Clinic.  Stefan came with me.  Like I just said, he doesn’t know how good he is.  But I also wish that it was a choice I didn’t have to make, and I think that’s why I’m so upset lately.”

            “I think a lot of women feel the way you do about abortion.

            “You’re not pro-life I hope.”

            “Pro-choice, actually.  But it still isn’t a perfect solution.  There are no perfect solutions.  To anything.  There’s always going to be consequences.  There will always be compromises to be made, there will always be a mess to clean up.  No matter how hard we try to avoid making one.”

            “Do you really believe that?”

            “I KNOW it.”

            “And it always has to be like that.”

            “I don’t know if it has to.  But that’s the way it is.”

            “But you say it doesn’t have to.”

            “All right—say it doesn’t.”

            “Then what do we do?”

            “I don’t know.  Keep trying I suppose.”

            “But what if we keep messing up?”

            “But isn’t that how we learn?  Through our mistakes?  By messing up?”

            “So what you’re saying then is we’re really here to learn. That it doesn’t matter if we fuck-up or not—excuse my language please.”

            “I wouldn’t say it doesn’t matter.  Of course it matters.  That’s why we have to try not to.”

            “But why does it matter?”

            “I suppose it comes back to being responsible.  To accepting responsibility.”

            “But why bother if we’re going to keep messing up anyway?”

            “Because this way we can say that at least we tried?”

            “I dunno—that sounds pretty lame, if you ask me.”

            “But does it?”  Sheila said.  “Because this way, by trying, by saying that we tried, it sets a whole different process in motion.”

            “What do you mean?”

            “I mean, okay, we try to do good.  But we mess up for having tried.  At least we’re more likely to see where we’ve messed up, and try to do something to rectify it, whereas, if we just don’t care anyway, we’re not going to recognize much of anything, and things will just keep getting worse before we all drown in the end results of our irresponsible behaviour.”

            “But even if we try to make our mistakes better, aren’t we still going to screw up some more?”

            “We likely will.  I mean, look at Germany after the war.  They were a nation destroyed by their own evil.  So along came the Americans, the well-intentioned conquerors with their Marshall Plan.  So they rebuilt Germany economically, politically.  But they were never able to conquer Nazism, which especially since reunification has become an increasing menace.  Things are still less than perfect, but what they have now is much better than nothing.”

            “So there will never be such a thing as a solution?”

            “There will never be such a thing as a perfect solution.”

            “So we’re cursed with being imperfect.”

            “No.  Not cursed. Blessed.”

            “Which makes imperfection our perfection.”

            “I’ve never thought of it that way”, Sheila said.  “You are a very wise young woman.”

            “I’d say the same about you.”

            “Well, I’d hardly call myself young.  As for being wise—”

            “Learning being wise?”

            “Well, I suppose we’re all getting wisdom.  Or we have that opportunity, that choice we can make.”

            “So it’s all about the getting of wisdom, this mess-making and bad choices”, Melissa said.

            “I suppose it is”, Sheila said, “I suppose that it is.”