“I used to drive here quite frequently, as a matter of fact.” Grandmother regarded him, cigarette pinched between two fingers. Her skin was yellow in the dull instrument lights. “You will turn left,” she said. “Then I must concentrate on the landmarks — the next turn is difficult to find.”
“I don’t know what landmarks there are around here,” said Michael. Ahead of them was nothing but November-bare fields, and town lights making a sickly aurora on a flat horizon.
“The light’s green,” she said. “Turn left.”
Michael made a wide left, and tapped the gas pedal, to push the car up the slight rise over the highway.
“It’s good you left Suzanne,” said Grandmother as they accelerated along the dark stretch of road.
“What?” Michael felt the blood drain from his face. “What did you say, Grandmother?” he managed.
Grandmother stared out the front windshield, smoke falling from her lips like water from a cataract. “Watch the road, Michael.”
Michael turned back to the road. As they drove, the darkness had completed itself — even the lights from the town to the north seemed impeded here, although Michael didn’t see the trees that might have blocked it at the edge of the roadway.
“What did you say?” he repeated. “About Suzanne?”
“Only that it is good,” she said, “that you left. I often wish your Grandfather had taken that route himself.”
Michael was about to argue — Grandfather had taken that route, hadn’t he? He’d left Grandmother, presumably to take to the skies and never look back. He opened his mouth to say so. But he couldn’t force the air out; the jealous Earth pulled it to the base of his lungs.
“Why are you slowing down?” Grandmother asked. “We aren’t there yet.”
“S-sorry,” he whispered. He glanced at the speedometer — they were down to 30 kilometres an hour. The road was posted at 80.
The car’s engine strained as he stomped the gas pedal, and he held the steering wheel as though clinging to a ledge. Grandmother laughed.
“I’m sorry, dear,” she said. “It’s just that I never thought I’d be urging my grandson to speed up. But never mind — go as slow as you like. We’re coming to the turn-off soon.”
They turned onto a narrow road of cracked pavement and stone and deep wheel-ruts. The sky was dark, but there was nowhere really dark on this land; there were no shadows, no trees to cast them. Nothing grew higher than a few inches here — so the town light reflecting from the clouds painted the landscape a dim, silvery green.
Michael was breathing better now, and he could speak easily again. But he still felt the Earth pulling at his arms, his feet. A filling in his molar ached mightily, and the pain of it leaked across the inside of his skull like a bloodstain.
At length, he broached the subject of Suzanne again with Grandmother. Had Suzanne called before he’d arrived? Or had she spoken with someone else in the family, who’d reported the separation to Grandmother? How had Grandmother learned of the situation with Suzanne? Michael was certain he hadn’t told anyone…
“I’ll tell you a story,” said Grandmother instead of answering the questions directly. “I met your Grandfather when he was in university. It was the Depression — 1933, and no one had any money, certainly not my parents. But his family was one of means, even in those times. So Grandfather was able to go to school. He was lifted by the toil of his father. Do you understand, Michael?”
“Grandmother.” Michael spoke in a low voice that sounded too much like a threat. He tried again, this time achieving at least a plaintive tone. “Grandmother, I understand. But — Suzanne?”
Grandmother motioned ahead. “Eye on the road, Michael. It’s difficult along here.”
Michael massaged the steering wheel, and looked ahead. The glow of his headlights illuminated cones of a complicated and undeniably damaged landscape. Keep his eye on the road? It was hard to tell where the road was in this jumbled plain of rock and asphalt. He let the car slow again while he peered into the dark, trying to make out a roadway.
“I met your Grandfather along the boardwalk by the lake, near the Sunnyside Amusement Park,” she said. “There was a dancehall there — it was called the Palais Royale, and the price of entry was too dear for any of us, my friends and I. Even should we have scraped together the fifty cents they demanded, none of us owned a dress fine enough for the gentlemen who would frequent such a place. None of us owned a gentleman who would make a suitable escort… But we coveted it, all the same — we stood upon the boardwalk, the lake at our backs, listening to the fine songs and the gay laughter. Wanting the thing we could never have.”
“Imagine that.” Michael muttered it, barely a whisper, but Grandmother heard anyway. She raised her eyebrows and the car ground to a halt. Michael felt his fingers slip from around the steering wheel. His hands pounded down onto his thighs, and he winced in pain. He bit his lip against the urge to cry out, though. The quicker Grandmother finished her story, the quicker they’d find Grandfather — and God, he needed to find Grandfather.
“Please—” he shut his eyes and pulled his hands from his thighs “—go on.”
“Your Grandfather also stood outside the dancehall sometimes,” she said. “Only nearer the lake; we would sometimes see him, a strange and mysterious man, staring out at the waters. On the night we met, in the midst of June, I remember my friends were late. It was still dusk when I arrived, and the music had not yet started — although the motorcars were already pulling up to the front door, the beautiful ladies already stepping from the cabs with their dashing escorts. And there he was, your Grandfather, standing in his place by the beach. Seeing me alone, he called to me. ‘Please, madam, I seem to require some assistance,’ he said. ‘Why, me?’ I asked. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘please come down now.’
“Were I with my friends, I should never have done so — imagine, an unescorted young lady, going to the side of a perfect stranger! — but I was alone for the moment, and curious; there was something odd about him.
“As I drew nearer, I saw he was near the waterline, his trousers rolled up and his feet buried up to his ankles in the sand. He wore a white dinner jacket, I remember, and held his shoes and socks in one hand.” Grandmother put her hand on Michael’s arm. “‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘I’m afraid I’ve gotten stuck.’”
“Help me,” said Michael, who was feeling increasingly stuck himself.
“Yes,” she said distractedly.
Grandmother’s fingers squeezed on Michael’s arm again, and as they did, he felt a great rush of fresh, cool air swimming into his lungs. Grandmother’s eyes locked with Michael’s. “I felt myself sinking a little in the soft sand,” she said. “As though I’d just been loaded down with a parcel. My back bent, and my belly sagged. Then, easy as that, your Grandfather stepped out of the mud.”
Michael lifted his hand, flexed the fingers and drew a deep breath. He looked at Grandmother wonderingly.
“I must finish the story,” she said. “Grandfather stepped out of the mud, and onto the water.”
“You mean—” into, Michael was going to say, but stopped himself. He could tell by her eyes that Grandmother had meant what she said: Grandfather stepped onto the water. Grandmother nodded.
“He walked out a dozen yards, and danced a little jig. I remember how his toes splashed the water so delicately. ‘Just like Jesus!’ he shouted, grinning like a fool. ‘And I couldn’t do it without you!’
“Of course, I was enthralled. As was he — for that evening was when he learned to fly,” she said. “Suzanne, bless her, has been spared the suffering — for you haven’t yet thought it through, and you’ve left her. Intact.”