#the fake stucco and grey paint job do not do good things for it

[ego-sum-arbor]

I love when I need to do something important but start researching inane shit instead

[lashofer]

Damselfly

April

The black vinyl smells like Windex and rubbing alcohol. Through the thin sterile paper, my hollow stomach is cold. The doctor sets down his clipboard and retrieves a pair of latex gloves from a nearby cupboard. They’re not a trendy black like at the shop, but white, turned peach with the skin underneath. Snap. Powder in the air.

He sits down on a stool and hovers over my back. I haven’t eaten in two days. Ever since Alex, I haven’t been able keep much down. Ten months ago – that’s when I met him. Almost six months since I’ve had this thing etched on my back.

“Quite the work you've got, here,” the doctor says. I knew his name when he introduced himself, but it’s gone now.

“Can you get rid of it?” I ask.

“Black pigment is the easiest to remove. In four to six sessions, it should be gone; this looks like amateur work.”

Alex wasn’t an amateur. He was rushed. Distracted.

This clinic isn’t anything like Alex’s shop. There aren’t any sugar skulls and pin-ups, graffiti art or display cases full of gauges and tapers for stretching. It’s more sterile, cold. White, blue and fluorescent.

It’s not soon enough. If it wouldn’t leave behind a terrible scar, I would have cut it out of my skin months ago.

The doctor presses an ice pack over my side and readies the laser like a paintbrush. He glides it over the dips between my ribs. It blinks in sporadic jolts. Every blink is a hot rubber band against my skin. Every blink fades the black into moldy green.

My father was an artist. An insect taxidermist before the osteoporosis became debilitating. He arranged butterflies in patterns on white backgrounds, shiny blue and green beetles in pinwheels, and framed them as gifts. He worked at the town hall’s insect gallery. As a kid, I used to go out with him into uncultivated fields, searching for Tumbling Flower Beetles and Snakeflies. We’d store them in Tupperware and mason jars until we got home, and then would throw them in the freezer to avoid damaging their fragile bodies. Sometimes we fumigated them using sawdust soaked in ethanol. Nail polish remover worked in a pinch.

I visited the gallery a couple of months ago. Gazed at the Melissa Blue butterflies suspended with thin wire, Carpenter Ants pinned down through their thoraxes into white foam. I tried to remember which ones I collected with Dad, but all I could see were the pins. Drawers and drawers of display cases, clear glass meant for gazing. Flower Flies and Milkweed Bugs. Paper wasps, dragonflies and Arctic Skippers. Wings spread out and stabbed.

I resist the urge to rub my wrists in concentric circles. They feel tight, squeezed, held down. The bruises are still there, even if my wrists are healed.

The blinking stops, and so does the pain. “Alright,” the doctor says. The tattoo is faded, but still there. I can still see the angry word, with its rough edges and incomplete blocks. He puts a bandage over the wound, and I bring my t-shirt back down over my stomach.

I walk up to the receptionist and pay. Two hundred dollars. Sixteen hours outfitting mannequins, cleaning out change rooms and cashing out.

I zip up my hoodie and walk into the 7-Eleven next door. I don’t have any Ativan with me, and I’ve heard that smoking helps. Maybe the shaking will stop. I walk up to the counter and buy a plastic Bic lighter and a pack of strawberry-flavoured cigars that Montana used to smoke in our high school smoke pit.

Outside, I fumble with the lighter’s metal wheel, careful to not pull in too much smoke. It goes straight to my head, and my stomach flips. The smoke burns in my nostrils, and I push it out like a fidgeting dragon. It’s still cold outside, and my kneecaps rattle.

My phone buzzes.

“Sam?” The text is from a number not listed in my contacts. It doesn’t matter; I’ve memorized it anyway. I thought he would have given up by now.

Last June

I stood outside of K-Town Liquor, sweating in my sneakers. It was warm, and I felt stupid holding the multicolored horse piñata we had just bought from the dollar store.

Montana was inside, flirting with the guy doing retail. I could see her through the window, foot cocked behind her as she leaned on the counter. She tossed her blonde hair to the side. Three bottles of tequila and a pile of miniatures were on the counter – little bottles of Jäger, Triple Sec and Baileys. Maybe for the piñata, I thought. Montana didn’t tell me what it was for. She just told me to hold it until the party.

Montana had just gotten back from visiting her sister in Vancouver. She stole her sister’s driver’s license off her desk. Spent an entire afternoon alongside her and her husband, looking behind couch cushions and air vents in the floor. Montana said that a workable fake I.D. was worth an afternoon of labour.

We were both sixteen when she moved out last year. Her dad was ex-military. Once he found out that she was sneaking her boyfriend, Chris, into her room every night, she had to choose whether to move out or move to Calgary with her aunt. She convinced a landlord that she was eighteen – that was easy, almost everyone else assumed she was – and she got a job at Earl’s wearing black minis.

I met her on the first day of honours math. She wasn’t good at it, but she wanted to impress Chris. I let her copy down all my answers during quizzes – she wouldn’t have ever talked to me otherwise. I was shy, fifty pounds overweight, and couldn’t hold a conversation. Being the Bug-Man’s daughter didn’t help. But she needed a math tutor to pass, so I started to come over on weeknights. She got a kick out of getting me to identify the species of spiders that were in her apartment. Thought it was cool that I could pick them up with my bare hands to take them outside.

I squinted through the window. She gave the cashier a wad of twenties, took the change and stuffed it into her mini-shorts, and carried the white bag outside, bottles clanging.

She smiled and held up the bag.

“I can’t believe you just did that.”

Her smile widened. “I know.”

A black pickup pulled up in front of the store, Chris in the passenger seat. Montana ran over to his side and yanked the door open. Kissed him on the mouth.

I stood on the sidewalk, held onto the piñata, and since I was staring anyway, waved to the guy driving.

Chris had his tongue in Montana’s ear. The driver barked something to them, and they got in the backseat. He rolled his window down.

“If you’re not too grossed out to sit in the passenger seat, it’s free now.”

“Thanks.” I sat down and shoved the horse between my feet. The driver had dark wavy hair that came to the nape of his neck, and was wearing a grey collared shirt rolled up his forearms. He had a sleeve of traditional tattoos. Sparrows, bannered hearts and nautical stars. Pin-ups.

He put the truck in reverse and turned onto the highway. Turned on the radio to drown out the smacking sounds from the backseat. “What’s your name?” he asked.

“Sam.”

“She’s my math tutor,” Montana yelled. I heard a seal break from behind me. The smell of tequila wafted forward.

“I prefer Sam,” I said.

He laughed. It was warm. Comforting. “That has a nicer ring to it.”

“Who’re you?” I asked. Felt my cheeks go hot.

“I’m Alex. Chris’ older brother.” He pulled up the turning signal.

I nodded and fiddled with the vent on the dashboard.

He followed my gesture. “I like your bracelet.”

Surprised, I took my hand away from the vent. It was hemp, interwoven with beads, feathers, and a jackalope charm. “Thanks. It was my mom’s. She used to have a shop downtown.”

“Oh yeah? Which one?”

“It had lots of artisanal stuff. Jewelry, paintings from local artists. Wolves with hooves, geese with Pomeranian tails, that kind of thing.”

My dad was a weird mixture between an artist and a scientist. Maybe that’s why she liked him.

“Was it on Leon?”

I looked up sharply. He had dark eyes; his pupils were almost the same colour as his irises. “Did you know it?” I asked. “It was called Gilligan’s.”

“Like the island, right?”

“Yeah.”

“I remember it. The walls were painted with fish and bubbles.”

“Yeah, she had a thing for the ocean.”

He looked at my bracelet again. “And jackalopes.”

I smiled. “Right, jackalopes.”

“My shop is right next to it,” he continued, eyes back on the road. “It’s a sushi place now.”

I went down Leon sometimes, even though Dad didn’t like it. There were a lot of shopping carts, sleeping mats, and panhandlers. But I felt closer to her, even if the sign wasn’t there anymore. There was still a shadow of a large capital “G” underneath the logo of a maki roll. I ate there, sometimes. Pretended that she was still there, wearing a full-length skirt and hair extensions. She would take my hand and tell me about Kelowna’s emerging artistic talent. Show me which pieces weren’t for profit. Try to convince me to work the register while she beaded glass onto hemp string.

Then I’d finish my veggie tempura, pay, and leave. Remember the clumps of hair on the bathroom sink, the lingering smell of bile.

“Your shop. It just says ‘Tattoo’ above the door, right?” I asked. It was nondescript. Black lettering stencilled straight onto the stucco.

“Yeah. Hey!” he yelled at the Jeep in front of us. Jammed his fist onto the horn.

I pressed into the back of the seat.

“Yeah, that’s the one,” he continued. “I thought about calling it ‘No Ragrets,’ but it felt too cliché.”

“You could always add a subtitle.”

He laughed.

Montana stuck her head through the partition. “I forgot to show you.” She shoved her wrist in front of my face. It was inflamed, but a new tattoo was there. A tiny pink heart, outlined in black. “Isn’t it cute? Alex did it for me yesterday. It only took like ten minutes.”

“Cute,” I echoed, not knowing what else to say. I imagined it stretched, wrinkled and old.

Alex looked at me again. “If you ever want to get any work done, I’ll give you a great discount.”

I looked at his tattooed arm again. Felt like a child.

Montana’s apartment was terracotta and brick, with seventies wood panelling. She had a lumpy brown couch and a TV with only half of its screen working. An old Friends rerun was on, but only half of Chandler’s face was showing. Uncomfortable with the number of people who had shown up already in her small apartment, I went to the kitchen on the pretense of getting some water.

“Sam,” Montana called through the bar window. “Can you start the margaritas?” She was filling the piñata with Lindor chocolate truffles and the booze miniatures.

“Sure,” I said. I had no idea what was in a margarita, except that they were pink, and sometimes green. I plugged in the blender.

Alex came in behind me as I inspected the bottle of margarita mix. “Need any help?”

“Uh, sure.” I wasn’t sure why he would want to. There were prettier, shorter, drunker girls in the next room.

He went to the freezer and brought out a bag of ice. I hadn’t noticed before, but his fists were lacerated and bruised.

“What happened to your –”

Through the bar window, Montana screamed, “I forgot! We have nothing to whack this thing with!”

“Don’t worry,” Alex said, and left to get a baseball bat from the trunk of his car.

May

I’m at the gallery again, looking at a half-moulted damselfly that Dad and I caught seven years ago. It was clutched to a cattail stalk, and just starting to uncurl its abdomen from its old exoskeleton. Now it’s brown and shrivelled, but when it first emerged, the new form was green as a plant shoot.

My ribs ache from my last tattoo-removal session. There’s still a faint outline of a “W,” but the doctor said that my white blood cells will do the rest. They’ll carry the smaller ink particles to my liver.

“Sam?”

I look up from the display case. It’s Marianne, one of the gallery’s curators. She and Dad dated for a while – she used to come over for Sunday brunch and late-night Scrabble. I fiddle with my bracelet’s charm.

“God, I didn’t even recognize you.” Her face is wrinkled now, curly brown hair streaked with grey. She looks concerned, excited.

“Oh,” I laugh. “Pilates.” I leave out the hours I’ve spent leaning over porcelain.

“That would do it!” she exclaims. Her hair bounces, and her horn-rimmed glasses slide down her nose. “Which studio do you go to?”

I laugh again. “It was really nice to see you, Marianne, but I’ve got to get going.” I squeeze her arm. “I’ll come by sometime soon. Maybe we can do coffee.” The words are involuntary. I have no intention of following through; I’ve already bought my plane ticket, and my bags are almost packed. I found a decent apartment in downtown Vancouver, and there’s a coffee shop nearby that has agreed to do an interview whenever I arrive.

“Sure, honey. Tell your dad that the gallery isn’t the same without him.”

I straighten the strap of my purse over my shoulder and walk out the big glass doors. Dodge the hornets’ nest and the suspended black and yellow insects. The old angry words.

Last July

Alex was tattooing a wasp on someone when I first visited him at the shop. He hovered over the man’s neck, pushing the tattoo machine back and forth in short lines. His dark wavy hair hovered over the work. He wiped ink and blood away once every few strokes. His black gloves looked painted on.

The walls were covered in holographic images, spray-painted canvases and penciled portraits. I turned around to go back outside the moment I heard the buzz of tattoo machines. Montana needed help studying trig more than I needed to talk to a guy I had a crush on.

The receptionist called me before I made it to the doors. “Do you have an appointment?”

Alex looked up. Wiped his hair away from his forehead with a tattooed forearm. “Oh hey, Sam! Give me a minute – I’m almost done.” Push, push, wipe.

The receptionist gave me an anxious look.

I browsed the different display cases filled with metal bars and colourful plastic tapers, spiral wooden earrings and navel barbells. I pictured my unpierced earlobes stretched and droopy, pinned to the foam underneath the glass.

“Hey.” Alex was next to me, eyes on the Hello Kitty-stamped barbell I was looking at. He smelled like metallic ink and cologne. “What are you doing here?” His dark eyes were playful.

“I’m not really sure,” I admitted.

He laughed. “That was my last client.” He looked me up and down. “Hungry?”

“Sure.”

He opened the door for me and grabbed my hand.

Last September

Alex’s apartment was white. Sterile, purposeful, full of angles and sharp edges. His charcoal sketches were hung on the walls in neat rows behind identical black frames and museum-grade glass. Three inches apart on each side. He had a leather couch, hardwood floors, chrome appliances, and a large television. A queen-sized bed, bedside table, shaded lamp, and dresser in the other room.

I had been there for two weeks, and hadn’t been home in four. Dad was frustrated that he couldn’t be out in the field; he could hardly get out of bed and make it to the gallery with his bones grinding. Stacks of used clothing, mounting paper, embalming fluid and medication towered over him from every side. Half-empty bottles of bourbon and calcium. He hardly noticed when I left or came back anymore, and the food in the fridge was rotten. I was sick for three days after I ate a ham and cheese sandwich. I lost five pounds and figured I was onto something.

I stayed with Montana for the first two weeks until I couldn’t handle the loud sex or the smell of old vomit and beer anymore. She gave up trying to graduate on time, and she and Chris wanted the place to themselves.

I came out of the bathroom with a towel wrapped around my head, wearing jeans and a t-shirt. The leftover water droplets on my face were cold in the air conditioning. Alex liked the chill.

He was on the couch, sketching a pinup with long wavy hair and face painted to look like a sugar skull. She was wearing a tight corset with Frangipani flowers decorating her hips and hair.

“She’s pretty.”

He smirked. “I’ve been inspired lately.”

“Cute, but she looks nothing like me.” Add another forty pounds and a face of freckles. Then we could start comparing.

He put the sketchbook down. Grabbed me around my hips and lowered me onto the couch. The towel came undone, damp strands of hair unravelling onto the leather.

“Does too.” His chest was reassuring against mine. His fingers entwined through my hair. He bit my lower lip, pulled away and let go. “Staying home?”

I was already going to be late for English. Wasn’t planning on going for History. “I was thinking that I might go see my dad.” I doubted he had eaten anything all day; I could stop at McDonalds.

He sat up and looked at me. “Don’t you want to spend time with me?” His eyebrows were creased.

“Of course I do.”

“No, you don’t. You just said you want to leave.”

I sat up, brushed the damp strands out of my face. “Why are you getting so upset?”

“I thought you only needed me.”

“I –I do. But he needs me. He's all alone in that crowded townhouse, surrounded by dead insects and broken picture frames.”

“There must be something you need that I'm not giving you. Tell me what you want, Sam. I can't read your mind.”

I didn’t know what to say. Alex still had that pained look on his face. I didn't want to abandon him.

June

The gallery isn’t the same without him. Marianne’s voice rings in my head to the tune of the bus’s high-pitched whine. The skyscrapers of downtown Vancouver flicker past in muted colours, metal and glass. I haven’t seen anyone since I moved. Didn’t even speak to Alex before I left. Freed from isolation, I have new skin, lasered and thin. Moulted.

A small, strange green insect steps across the window in front of my vision. At first, it seems like an apparition. It’s too bright. No native vegetation would be able to disguise it.

I reach for my phone and dial.

“Hello?”

“Dad, it’s Sam.”

“Sam?” he asks. “Where are you?” He sounds slurred, but not incoherent.

“I’m on the bus. I’m looking at a really weird insect. It kind of looks like a stink bug, with a shielded body. But it’s green. Bright green, like an apple. And it has pink petal designs around its abdomen. And small. Almost like a ladybug.”

“Hmm.”

“Dad?”

“Mm?”

“Do you know what it is?”

“It sounds like a nymph. Maybe a southern green stink bug. But that can’t be right.”

“Southern as in South American?”

“Mm. I don’t know what it’s doing way out there.”

I pause. “Me either.”

“Come home, Sam.”

The stink bug continues to walk across the glass. A middle-aged man spots it, and his thumb starts to move toward the glass.

“Stop!” I yell, and reach in my bag for my leftover Tupperware container. It still smells like thousand island dressing. I nearly feel the lettuce coming up again. I wipe it out with the bottom of my blouse.

The man looks at me like I’m out of my mind. I don’t care. I tap the insect into the container, close the lid, and place it at the bottom of my bag. I hope it will be okay until I get home.

I lift the phone back up to my ear, but nobody is there.

The bus stops, kneels, and a woman with a stroller gets on. It’s Montana, blonde hair dyed greasy brown. She’s in a faded pull-over hoodie, face covered in acne. I didn’t even know she lived here. Maybe she moved out here to be with her sister.

“Transfer, please.” Her baby shrieks.

Before she notices me, I collect my bag and stand up. She probably wouldn’t recognize me, but I don’t want to take the chance. I blend into the crowd by the door, and get off the bus.

I’m on Robson. Tall buildings filled with boutiques and cafes are on either side of the street. The sun is bright, and reflects off the windows like mirrors. I decide to catch the next bus at a stop a few blocks down. I wish I wasn’t wearing heels.

As I pass a Starbucks, a woman in jeans and a white leather jacket approaches. Her large sunglasses make her look like a praying mantis.

“Hi there,” she says through a tight, bleached smile. “Can I talk to you for a second?”

I hesitate a second too long.

“Have you ever considered modelling?”

I can’t help but laugh. “No.”

“You’re really beautiful, you know that?” She rifles through her bag.

“Oh. Thank you.”

“Here. Take my card.” She hands it to me, simple text on a white background: Margot Sheffield. Prima Model Management.

“Call me if you’re interested.” Margot walks away, stilettos clicking on the pavement.

Last October

Alex had been in bed for fifteen hours. He and Chris were at the shop last night tattooing drunken messages on each other. Chris dropped him off this morning and shoved him onto the bed. Showed me a new rabbit tattoo on the sole of Alex’s foot. It was warbled, with broken lines and incomplete shading.

I shook my head. “At least nobody will see it.”

“It was for practice,” he said, adjusting his baseball cap. “If I get good enough, he said I’ve got a job.”

“That’s great.” I’d never known him to have a steady job. Nor did he have artistic promise.

“Yeah. Well, see ya.” He gave me a sour, stubbly kiss on the cheek and left.

I spent the day watching TLC and going through one of Alex’s sketchbooks. A row on the bookshelf was full of them, identical with black covers.

Bored, I got a glass out of the cupboard and filled it with cold tap water. Drank half, filled it again, and walked into the bedroom. Alex grunted. I put the glass on the bedside table and snuggled up behind him. Breathed in his hair and tucked my nose behind his earlobe. His shirt was damp despite the chill.

“Alex,” I whispered.

Nothing.

“Alex. Wake up.”

“Mm.” He grunted and rolled over.

I left the bedroom and went to the kitchen again. Grabbed a leftover box of pizza from the fridge and ate three cold slices at the kitchen table. Still empty, I went to the cupboard and grabbed a box of double-stuffed Oreos. Went back to the kitchen table and ate two rows. Peeled each one apart, grated the icing away with my teeth, and crunched through the rest.

I went into the bathroom and stared at myself in the mirror. Adjusted my top and pinched my sides. I lifted the toilet seat and kneeled. I didn’t even need to use my fingers anymore.

Something in the garbage can caught my attention. A dark-coloured cotton ball, and underneath, the black numbers of a syringe.

Last November

Alex was sketching on the couch again. I slipped out of my heels and manoeuvered behind him, wedging myself between him and the black leather. I put my arms around his neck and peered over his shoulder to get a better view.

He stiffened and shrugged me off, taking the charcoal sketch to a different cushion. The white paper was indented with harsh, black lines.

He didn’t look up. “It took you a while to get back.”

“Yeah,” I said, trying to keep my tone even. “I was at my dad’s.”

His fingers were black, and the charcoal crumbled under the force of his strokes.

“Look, Alex. I don’t need to justify seeing my dad. If I didn’t go over there once in a while, he would survive on potato chips and booze.” I was frustrated. Feeling bold.

He looked up, eyes blazing. They were dilated. A layer of sweat covered his skin. “I don’t think you went over there today.”

The accusation took me off guard. “But I was.”

His eyes glazed over, and stared too hard at a spot on the couch.

I leaned over to look into his face. “Are you okay?”

“Why would you lie to me? Don’t you care about me?”

“Of course I do.”

“Do you think I don’t know where you go? I’ve seen the way you look at other guys, wearing your new slutty clothes.”

“Excuse me?” I had to buy new clothes; the old ones were too big for me now.

“I think I feel more alone now than I ever did.”

I should have left right then, but I thought I could talk him down.

“I’m here with you,” I insisted. “I don’t want anybody else.”

He whipped around, and I felt his hand slam into my jaw.

Face first on the opposite end of the couch, I was too stunned to say anything.

“I thought you were different,” he was saying. “You’re the same.”

He had been explosive before, but never violent. I had never felt like I was in danger.

I stood up and started for the door.

He jumped in front of it. “They should know how much of a whore you are.”

“Who? What are you talking about?” I wiped one of my cheeks. My hand came away black with mascara.

He grabbed my wrist. Dragged me into the bedroom. I tried to grab onto the doorframe. Slipped. “They should know,” he repeated, voice broken. Over and over again. He threw me on the bed and ruffled through a nearby duffel bag. Came out with a pot of ink and his tattoo machine.

He forced my face into a pillow. I couldn’t breathe. I screamed and thrashed, tried to get a hold of the bed frame, but he was strong. Heavy.

I was dizzy. The cotton pillowcase was wet and salty. My lungs screamed for oxygen. Blackness was closing in on my vision. I tried to pry his hands away. And then nothing.

*

When I woke up, my ribs felt like they had been ripped into by a dull box cutter. The back of my head ached like I had been hit again. Maybe I had been. The tangy smell of him was all over the bed sheets. The shower was running, and the tattoo machine was still plugged in, thrown to the floor.

I felt my breath coming in short gasps, and put a hand over my mouth to stop. I needed to get out without him noticing.

My shirt was on the floor in a heap, torn at the neckline. I slipped it on, winced as I stretched. My pants were still on.

I tiptoed past the bathroom. The steam underneath the bathroom door met my bare feet. I grabbed my heels and purse in one hand, and glided the door latch open with the other. Pulled on the knob. The door creaked, and the shower curtain skirted open.

“Sam?”

I ran down the hallway, gasping before I was out of breath. Took the staircase, the concrete cold on my pounding feet.

I reached the bus stop just as the bus pulled in. Dropped some coins in the slot and sat in a seat next to the window. Curled into a ball and buried my face in my hands.

Fifteen minutes later, I looked up and pulled on the yellow cord. Got out at the next stop.

I was in front of Dad’s townhouse. The grass was un-mowed, and metal legs of the pink flamingo lawn ornaments were bent, their beaks hidden in the foliage. His rundown SUV was parked in the driveway.

As I walked in, I smelled booze and something rotten. I heard the Gilligan’s Island theme song in the next room, Dad humming along. Picture frames filled with mounted butterflies and moths were crooked on the walls, piled with weeks of dust. An insect graveyard. Piles of boxes were everywhere. Broken lamps, books and clothing.

My wrist throbbed where Alex had dragged me.

I snuck past the room and went upstairs to my old bathroom. My shirt was stuck to the wound, plasma and blood staining the yellow fabric brown. In the mirror, bruises on my jaw and neck were forming, pink circular splotches. There were ten of them, but I could only see the thumbs.

I took my clothes off, wincing as the fabric separated from my skin. The word was encrusted with blood and unwiped ink.

After showering, I padded down the carpeted hallway to my bedroom. My bed was covered in newly acquired thrift store items. I found a set of pajamas, locked the door, cleared a space to lie down, and slept for two days.

*

Dad didn’t know I was there. I stepped out for groceries once I woke up, using a twenty I found on my dresser. Milk, eggs, cereal, antibacterial liquid soap, gauze and medical tape. I’d seen Alex do aftercare on new tattoos before. It wouldn’t be hard to replicate. I made sure to wear a long sleeved shirt and a scarf.

Dad walked into the kitchen, confused at the smell of fried eggs and buttered toast. “Morning,” he said. It was four in the afternoon.

“Hi. I cleared out the fridge. Half of it was expired.”

“Oh. Thanks, kiddo.” His blue eyes crinkled through his round spectacles.

“And I figured out why it smells weird in here. When was the last time you took out the trash?”

“I thought I just did it.” He laughed. “Your mother used to do it, you know.”

“Yeah.”

We sat at the kitchen table in silence. Crunched toast and scraped metal on porcelain.

I knew that I should do this more often. Make meals, dump out booze. But I couldn’t stay here for long, nor did I want to. His E.I. would only cover so much, and the thought of being in the same town as Alex was stifling.

August

Prima Modelling Management is in an office that looks over Robson square. I stand against a cold, white wall, shoulder to shoulder with twenty other bikini-clad models. We’re all about the same age, eighteen, nineteen. Two scouts pace in front of us, pointing now and again. They jot notes on a clipboard like scientists.

“Uh,” Margot, the scout who gave me her card, gestures to me. “Samantha Cowen?”

I straighten and nod.

“Turn for me?”

I turn to the side.

Margot looks to the other scout. “Isn’t she editorial?”

He agrees. “Very distinctive. Kate Moss, almost.”

I feel the other girls stiffen beside me.

“Not quite as waifish, though.”

“I’m sure she can work on that. Can’t you, Samantha?”

November

I’m at Dad’s, sweeping rat feces into a dustbin.

“How you doin’ in there, Sam?” Marianne calls from outside.

“Fine,” I answer, but it’s muffled through my mask.

We’ve been hauling boxes and bags out of the house for two days. Dad is outside on a lawn chair, Marianne beside him, sorting through bins and trying to figure out what is most valuable to him. He can’t keep it all, but he wants to. He keeps finding Mom’s old stuff. Clothes, photos, old medication. Marianne is on edge, but doesn’t say anything. She keeps sorting, every few minutes taking off her mitts and wiping her hands with Wet Ones. There’s no snow yet, but everyone is in parkas.

I pour the contents of the dustbin into a full garbage bag. Haul it over my shoulder and set it by the entrance. The kitchen is cleared out, and no longer smells like rotten food. That’s good, because my weak stomach has already been put to the limit today. Above the table, my green stink bug nymph hangs in a tiny picture frame. It only lasted a couple of weeks before I had to mail it. I thought it would make Dad happy, but it’s hard to look at.

My throat constricts, and I make a beeline for the door. Zip up my sweater and tear off my mask. I grab the garbage bag and throw it all into the dump truck. Stare over the side until my stomach settles.

Dad and Marianne wave me over.

“Hey, kiddo,” Dad says.

“I’ve been meaning to talk to you all day!” chimes Marianne, glad for the distraction. “I was looking through Vogue this morning, and guess what I found?”

“Oh,” I say. Try to muster up some laughter. “Did you see it?”

“You bet I did!” She leans over and retrieves the magazine. Kate Winslet is on the cover. “Go to twenty-four.”

I take the magazine and flip to the page. It’s a Givenchy ad, three models posed with their mouths parted and delicate hands splayed. I’m the one on the left, head back and body turned to the side. I’m in a white dress, backless with slits going up my bare ribs.

“Now this,” Dad says, “is a good scarf. I have to have this.”

“No you don’t, Ron. We already have a box of them over there.”

“Where’s my drink?” He stands up and hobbles back inside.

“This is one for the scrapbook,” Marianne says, pointing to the magazine.

Or maybe it’ll be one for the wall, next to the stinkbug nymph and damselflies. I’m tired. Tired of being someone’s voodoo doll, stuck with needles and pins. I wish I could break the glass and free all the insects in the hall. That they’d flutter out, tap away on their hairy legs and skinny feet.

There’s a chunk of broken concrete at my feet. I pick it up. It’s heavy. The edges leave chalk smears on my hands.

I hold on to it, grab the magazine, and follow Dad into the kitchen. Take his keys from the kitchen table. Dad’s SUV is reversed into the driveway. I’m in the driver’s seat before anyone notices. The magazine and chunk of concrete are on the passenger seat.

The engine rumbles as I turn the key. I’ve never been behind the wheel, but it can’t be that hard. I rev the engine. Try both pedals. Nothing happens. I look over to the shifter handle. It’s resting in the “P” position.

“Where’re you going?” Marianne calls.

“Stupid.” I ram it back into drive and press a pedal at random. My chest hits the steering wheel, and the horn blares.

I try the other one, and the car takes off out of the driveway and onto the street. I know the rules of the road, sort of. I stop and look both ways. Try not to speed.

My heart pounds, and adrenaline pulses in my ears. The jackalope charm on my bracelet twinkles in the sun. If she were still here, she’d be in the passenger seat.

Dad and Marianne are waving from the driveway. They didn’t make it very far trying to stop me.

I take the back roads, get accustomed to the sensitivity of the pedals. Look over my shoulder every few minutes for cops.

Downtown, I stop the car in the middle of Leon. I’m next to the sushi place, can still see mom’s faded “G.” All the shops on the street are closed, lights out.

There’s a permanent marker in the back seat. One of the thick, wedge-tipped ones. “24,” I squeak on the magazine’s cover. Try to think of a simple phrase to go with it, but put the cap back on. There aren’t enough words.

I wish I had some kind of scandalous note with allegations, offensive photos of some kind. All I have is the magazine. Proof that I’m here, almost thriving. Maybe he’ll relive it, even for a moment, like I have been for the last twelve months.

After ruffling through the glove box, I find one of Mom’s old hair elastics. I curl the magazine around the chunk of concrete and fit the elastic around both.

I get out of the car and hear a cacophony of beeps and horns. I slam the door shut and plant my feet like I’m in middle school track, wielding a discus. With all my weight behind me, I fling the package through Alex’s shop window. The glass shatters, and the concrete block skids over the hardwood floor, bringing November air in with it.

A pedestrian screams, and I hear a siren in the distance. I wipe the leftover chalk on my jeans and get in the car.