Gail Bowen: Burying Ariel

“Are you sure you can get through it?” Kendra asked. “Troy can come up with something.”

Charlie raised his hand, palm towards us. “The people who listen to this show trust me. I have to be honest with them.” Charlie picked up his headphones, and began speaking. “Over seven hundred years ago, a beautiful woman named Francesca da Rimini told Dante a great truth: ‘There is nothing more painful than to remember happy days in times of sorrow.’ ” The smooth professionalism of his voice shattered against the hard edge of grief, but he soldiered on. “Francesca was one of the damned. I’ve just discovered that I am, too. The topic for the rest of the show is loss. So if you’re lost, today’s your day. Troy Prigotzke will be taking over for the rest of the show. Till the next time, this is Charlie D. Be strong. Nothing lasts forever.”

His words were brave, but as soon as Troy Prigotzke entered the booth, Charlie slumped. Gentle as a mother Troy took the headphones from Charlie’s head and placed them on his own. “Time to go, Buddy,” Troy said, and Charlie stood and walked out of the booth; Howard was right behind him.

As Charlie crossed in front of me, I put my hand on his shoulder. “I’m so sorry,” I said. I turned to Howard. “Can I give you a lift anywhere?”

Howard shook his head. “Charlie’s probably better without too many people around right now. When he decides what he wants to do, we can cab it. I’ll call you tonight.”

“Do that,” I said.

After Charlie and Howard disappeared down the hall that led to the CVOX offices, Esme touched me on the shoulder. “I’ll walk you back to reception,” she said.

The walls on either side of us were hung with oversized publicity photographs of the on-air personalities of CVOX. The pictures were brightly banal and I passed them without a second glance. But I slowed at Charlie’s portrait. He had presented his best profile to the camera, but the lighting was dim and, in a gesture heartbreakingly instinctive and familiar, his right hand was raised to shield his blood-scarred hidden face.

In that instant, I gleaned something of what it was like for Charlie to live in a world full of mirrors and cameras and eyes, and my mind recoiled from this insight into his perpetual suffering. When we reached the main desk, Esme’s words wrenched me back to reality.

“I didn’t know it was her. I thought when you said there was a death in the family it was like an old uncle or something.” She ran a hand through her spiky burgundy hair. “Ariel wasn’t much older than me.”

“Too young,” I said.

She bobbed her head in affirmation. “Way, way too young.”

I started towards the door. Esme called after me. “Wait.” She walked over to a cupboard behind the desk, took out a shiny black coffee mug and handed it to me. The logo on it was silver except for the wetly red Mick Jagger mouth that hinted at appetites too hip and too dark for talk radio. Cool on cool.

I froze. Esme smacked the palm of her hand against her forehead. “Totally inappropriate, right?” she said. “It’s just that I always give these to guests. I’m such a space case.”

“Nobody knows what to do in a situation like this,” I said. “Giving a person a mug makes as much sense as anything else.”

On my way home, I turned on the radio and punched in CBC Radio Two. As I drove across the Albert Street Bridge, the graceful precision of Prokofiev’s “Classical” Symphony soothed me. I took a deep breath. With Prokofiev and luck, I might just make it through dinner.

Luck was not on my side. Our new puppy was waiting for me inside the door. He was an eight-week-old Bouvier des Flandres named Willie, my first male dog and my first Bouvier, and so far he had brought credit to neither his gender nor his breed. He was sweet but not gifted. The day before, my son Angus had come home with the news that it took Bouviers two years to grow a brain. As Willie bounded towards me with the remnants of one of my new sandals hanging out of his mouth, I found myself wondering how he and I could make it through the next twenty-two months.

I took the sandal from him and picked him up. He licked my face wildly. The smell of puppy breath won me over. “Okay,” I said. “I was young once myself.” I shifted his position, so I could establish eye contact. “But commit this to memory, Willie: during the summer of love, I scaled the heights of ecstasy many times, but I never once chewed a shoe.”

I was studying his earnest face to see if my words had penetrated when the phone rang. It was Ed Mariani.

“How’s it going?” he asked.

“Okay,” I said. “Willie and I were just having a heart-to-heart. He chewed through one of my new sandals.”

“Expensive?”

“Top of the line at Wal-Mart.”

“Another gold star for one-stop shopping.”

“One of these days you’ll have to take cold terror by the hand and try it.”

He laughed softly. “Jo, I did have a reason for calling. Are you still planning to come over to get the keys to the cottage tonight?”

“I’d forgotten all about it. More coals heaped upon my head.”

He laughed. “We’ll pass on the coals this time. I just wanted to make sure you still wanted to go out there this weekend.”

“Absolutely. Taylor’s been rattling on about the lake for the past two weeks. When’s a good time for me to come by and pick up the keys?”

“Seven? And, if she doesn’t have other plans, why don’t you bring Taylor with you? We have a new addition to the family.”

“A pet?”

“A nightingale. One of Barry’s old clients moved on to the next dimension and left him her bird. Don’t laugh. Inheriting a bird is a serious matter, especially if you hate the idea of anything being caged, which Barry and I both do. Anyway, Barry has built Florence the Taj Mahal of aviaries.”

“The nightingale is named Florence?”

“We have been spared no indignity,” Ed said dryly. “But I promise you Taylor will be dazzled, and if Florence isn’t enough, we’ve laid in a fresh supply of paper umbrellas for Taylor’s Shirley Temples.”

“You spoil her,” I said.

“Not a bit. Your daughter’s paintings are going to be worth a fortune some day, and Barry and I want to get in on the ground floor.” He sighed heavily. “Jo, I’m glad you’re coming over. I really was very fond of Ariel.”

“Everybody was,” I said.

His correction was gentle. “Not quite everybody.”

After I hung up, I was hit by the weight of the day’s events. I looked over at my kitchen counter: tins of kidney beans and tomatoes were neatly stacked against the wall. I’d put them there that morning. I’d also chopped a large bowl of onions and celery, and put three pounds of lean ground beef in the fridge to defrost. My plan had been to come home after Rosalie’s luncheon and make a pot of chili to take to Katepwa with us the next night. For the first time since New Year’s, my whole family was going to be together: my daughter Mieka, her husband, Greg, and my eight-month-old granddaughter, Madeleine, were coming from Saskatoon; my son Peter was driving from Calgary, where he’d just begun work at a veterinarian’s clinic; and the rest of us were heading out from Regina as soon as the kids got home from school. Given the unpredictability of possible arrival times, chili had seemed like an inspired idea. It still did. I took the beef out of the refrigerator, threw it in the frying pan, picked up the can opener and started cranking.

By the time the kids got home, the chili was simmering, and I was feeling less fragmented. Angus and Eli, the nephew of Alex Kequahtooway, the man in my life, floated through the house long enough to get Willie on his leash and take him for a run before they drove downtown to get their tuxes fitted for graduation. The week before, Alex had left for Ottawa to teach a month-long class, Minorities and the Justice System, and Eli had moved into Peter’s old room to finish off the school year. I was already missing Alex, but the sound of two seventeen-year-olds buzzing about dates and after-grad parties and tuxedos was a potent antidote to loneliness. Taylor revelled in having Eli around, too. When he arrived, she’d presented him with a drawing of Angus and himself in cap and gown, hanging out of a silvery stretch limo, throwing their mortarboards into the sky. Taylor, wearing a chauffeur’s cap, a billowing scarf, and a Cheshire cat grin, was behind the wheel. In art, as in life, Taylor saw herself as the person in the driver’s seat.