“Goddamnit,” she said.
“It asks for our full names and badge numbers on the last page. I showed it to Martin Ryan.”
“The sneaky sons-of-bitches. What did he say?”
“He said it was illegal to ask us to put our names to an informal internal poll, and that question thirty-six was a form of union-busting and that we should ignore the whole thing. Or at least, not answer that question.”
She turned to him in the seat, which hurt, but she needed to see his face. “Who’s ‘we,’ Kraut? You mean all the PCs got this letter?”
“And the sergeants.” He looked away from her, uncomfortable. “Anyway, Ryan says the whole thing’s illegal and we don’t have to respond, but the thing is, illegal or not, it may be the only chance any of us get to have a say. If we want one. I mean, if OPSC does decide to move any of us around, and a bunch of us ignored this letter, then maybe they can say they took an informal survey and got an idea of who wanted to go where and the rest of us are going to be sent to Bumfuck. And, Skip, I want to stay in Port Dundas, but if there is no Port Dundas, I don’t want to be in Bumfuck.”
“Oh, for god’s sake. So you’re going on the record?”
“I’m thinking I have to. If I want to have any say in my future, you know? And as the detachment’s union rep, I think I have to tell the rest what I’m going to do. It wouldn’t be right otherwise.”
“Even though your regional rep tells you the letter is illegal.”
Fraser looked down at the steering wheel. “I think this Chip Willan guy is even more of a hard-on than Mason was.”
“How hard can he be with a name like ‘Chip’?”
“Listen, he’s not staring down retirement any time soon, and I think he’s going to bring it, if you know what I mean.”
“You let OPSC control you like this, Kraut, it won’t matter where they send you. And they won’t bother asking you your opinion next time.”
He turned the car on and began to back out onto the road. “I’m sorry, Skipper,” he said. “But I’m fifty next year, I got two kids in high school, and I have to speak up.”
“I’m sixty-two in less than a week. Where does all this leave me?”
Fraser stretched his neck. That wasn’t a question he could answer. “Like I say, I’m sorry. I hope you understand.”
“I do,” she said, not looking at him. “Damn it. I guess it’s time I met Chip Willan.”
10
She woke to the sound of a tray being put down close to her ear. The smell of bacon wafted over her. I must have died and gone to heaven, she thought. She opened her eyes and saw her mother standing by the bed, drinking from a mug of coffee. “You here to taunt me with your breakfast?” Hazel asked her.
“You need your strength now that you’re getting better.”
Hazel pushed herself up to sitting. It was a little easier than it had been yesterday. Not bad, in fact. She reached over to pluck a piece of bacon off the tray, watching her mother the whole time, but Emily didn’t interfere at all. “Glorious,” she said as she ate it. She reached for the steaming mug of coffee. “You don’t come round here much anymore, do you?”
“Gotta get in line if you want to be of use.”
“You’re just worried you’re going to have to see me naked.”
Emily smiled in a pained fashion. She sat down on the edge of the bed, in exactly the same place Andrew had been sitting. “What the hell were you thinking?”
“I know,” she said. “But it’s hard. Him up there and me down here, and he seems so reluctant to see me.”
“Well, wouldn’t you be?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Come on,” said Emily.
“You’re right.” She stuck her chin out so as not to appear to be capitulating completely. “But to be this close, you know? And stuck down here, aware of where they are at night?”
“You’ve known where they are at night for three years. Four, really. What difference can it make?”
“It wasn’t above my head before now.” She sipped the coffee. “When he was sitting in the bathroom, it could have been any time in my life but now. It felt that natural.” Emily let her talk, although Hazel could tell her mother was going to run out of patience for this line of conversation quickly. “The way he smells… that’s… it’s impossible. When’s that going to go away?”
“I can’t say,” said Emily, brushing crumbs off the blanket. “I couldn’t smell your father after he passed.”
“I’m not joking.”
Her mother looked up at her, and her eyes were impossible to read. “There’s always something, Hazel, but I’m not telling you anything you don’t know. It never goes. And why would it? You just have to live with it, that’s what it costs you to have had someone. You remember that fringed leather bag your father carried books in? I use it sometimes for shopping and when I put it over my arm, that stiff old strap is still curved to fit his shoulder. I have to brace myself when I pick it up.”
She covered her mother’s hand with her own. That was the most grief she’d ever admitted to after the day of her father’s death. It moved her. “Did I wreck the weekend?”
Emily withdrew her hand and stroked the corner of her mouth with her index finger. “No. Glynnis mentioned it to me, but she didn’t seem to want to talk about it.”
“Did they fight?”
“No,” said her mother. “Not at all. Glynnis didn’t seem angry, to be honest.”
Hazel took the plate down from the table and laid it on her lap. She didn’t usually eat before brushing her teeth, but she was famished this morning. There was a single fried egg sitting on a piece of seedy toast on the plate with the bacon. She picked up the toast and took a large bite of it. Salty and hot: perfect. “She didn’t really seem angry on Friday night, either.”
“She’s not that kind of person, I guess. You’ve got an appetite, I can see.”
“I think I’m making progress,” Hazel said, and washed down the egg and toast with another glug of coffee. “I told Wingate I was going to take the day off, but I might go in.”
“Good for you.” She borrowed the teaspoon off Hazel’s tray and stirred the dregs of her coffee with it. “They have the idea that you could behave yourself if they threw you a birthday dinner Thursday night.”
“Really.”
“You can decide later.” Emily put her coffee cup down on the tray. “Well, that’s enough bonding for one morning, I think.”
She removed the tray and pulled back the covers. Hazel got out of the bed and walked slowly to the bathroom. She did her morning ablutions and brushed her teeth. In the cabinet was a small pile of pills and she pushed her finger through them, selecting a Percocet. On her way out of the bathroom, it rolled over her palm and onto the floor. She leaned over and picked it up. “Hey,” said Emily, standing at the door to upstairs with the tray in her hands.
“What?”
“You bent over.”
Hazel nodded approvingly. “So I did.”
“Maybe you should leave that thing on the floor then.”
When her mother was gone, she popped the pill into the back of her throat and washed it down with the rest of the coffee. She dressed, fully this time, right to the cap. Her mother had left one of the city papers behind and she flipped through it as she finished her coffee. The long weekend in Toronto had met statistical expectations: a car crash on Lakeshore Boulevard in the middle of the night had claimed the lives of two young idiots who’d been using one of the straightaways to race. A few shootings: two downtown at clubs, one in the city’s northeast corridor. A large number of people ticketed or arrested for DUIs.