Goose Journal 2021 by Goose Fiction

goose AN ANNUAL REVIEW OF SHORT FICTION

Volume 10 Spring 2021 Produced at Victoria College in the University of Toronto

Masthead

Table of Contents

CO-EDITORS-IN-CHIEF Hadiyyah Kuma Emily Hurmizi

Letter from the Editors 6

ASSOCIATE EDITORS Charlotte Chellew Syeda Hasan Phoebe Jenner Laura Kim Quinn Lui Allison Zhao ARTISTS Brigita Gedgaudas Karen Kan Lydia Shan LAYOUT EDITOR Allison Zhao

My Fairy Godmother Turned Me into a White Boy for a Day Anya Shen 9 Cold Feet Siena Kunanec

Blanketing a Stone Claire Ellis

A Near Stranger’s Bathroom Floor Sabryna Ekstein 34 Little Swallow Yi Nuo Cheng

Proof Julia Pape

About the Authors 4

Letter from the Editors

We sincerely thank all those who submitted their works to us

this year, attended our open mic, applied for a position on the board, or contacted us asking how to get involved. Your passion inspires us. You are all part of UofT’s literary community and we hope that you

First and foremost, we would like to thank readers of Goose

enjoy the stories in this volume as much as we have.

Fiction. Whether you have read one of our past journals, whether this is the first volume you’ve ever laid eyes on, we want you to know that we are so grateful for your support.

With love, Hadiyyah Kuma & Emily Hurmizi

We have always taken pride in the craftsmanship of our

Co-Editors in Chief 2020-2021

journal and the feeling it brings to hold these stories in the palm of your hands. This year’s journal arrives under the shade of more than a year of unspeakable tragedy, separation, and loss. It is the second year that the Goose has had to forgo printing and it is unclear when we might print again. As editors, we are faced with the difficulty of having to curate a set of stories that speak to the gravity of moment and yet surpass the immediate through the power of imagination and storytelling. It has become especially clear that although you will likely be reading this on a screen, we mustn’t sacrifice quality stories and the experience of connectivity, compassion, and joy that these stories bring. In fact, it is what the moment asks of us. With themes of survival, intimacy, family, and love, we can all find something to relate to in the words of our brilliant authors. We would like to thank our editors and illustrators for dedicating their energy to producing this journal. It is through their labours and creativity at the lowest points of the last year that we can share these stories with you.

My Fairy Godmother Turned Me into a White Boy for a Day Anya Shen

My fairy godmother turned me into a white boy for a day. You

know. Just for fun.

I don’t hate myself. I’d probably look sensational strolling

down a red carpet in a dark satin cheongsam. Silver dragon splayed, embroidered with threads coiling in bravado. Click, click, click, go the paparazzi and my stiletto heels. Flirt with a journalist or two in this perfectly colonized tongue—baseball references interlaced with Shakespeare because American girls are sweetest when you mix those highs and the lows.

I don’t hate myself—I’ll drop the sarcasm. For one, I enjoy

the comedy of dinner with my parents: white wine with stir-fried noodles, chopsticks and cutlery. I have a hazy working knowledge of my father’s family history, scraped together from retrospections perfunctorily discharged through stilted conversations. As I now transcribe these strings of Oriental tchotchkes — I’ll drop the sarcasm—I am proud of this man whose first job began in a coal gas factory’s boiler room on the east side of Shanghai. I am proud of this man who, to this day, practices his -er’s and -th’s by reading twentyfive cent words aloud from a dictionary. There are things I like about my twisted disposition, my dysfunctional family. Things such as how that every time someone mentions the Cultural Revolution, I’ll always

have something pseudo-intellectual to contribute.

My fairy godmother turned me into a white boy for a day. I’m

not quite sure if I have self-esteem problems or hubris problems.

It happened on Christmas Eve. Obviously — it’s when the

magic happens. I checked with my head. Still secular. Still wincing at the notion of Coca-Cola romanticizing its freight trains as the Polar Express of family reunions and selling miracles at prime-time ad

shimmering in seduction; I was a part of this. Like, really a part of this. My ancestors participated in stitching the fabric of this city. It felt as if I were a politician sliding into a bespoke suit. At long last a bureaucrat to these rules of Western business, starched stiff and spotless with half an inch of exposed shirt cuffs. Under this temporary sorcery, I could cast to the wind my sardonic checklists, obsessive speculations, “notes to self regarding holiday parties.” I knew the right way to behave.

breaks. Politics contingent upon identity was a plenty flawed thing. It was the same old naïve bitterness masquerading beneath my onenight borrowed privilege — I suppose I could attribute it to an indie upbringing, a liberal education.

1. Wear your combat boots with a heel, glitter nails, a lot of eyeliner.

I put on a black greatcoat, because I could.

No more amputating unfortunate toes to fit into some crystal

slippers. Tonight, I was Cinderella. Used to be a morbid schoolgirl perched on the windowsill, leafing through sacred texts for show. Draped over a chair, sulking for laughs. Tonight, I was Bukowski — I was God. I was the voice of reason, the flâneur, the narrator, creator of life. Promising young lad.

Tyrannical self-assurance was more than comfortable to walk

in. Chimney-sweeping little sister drunk on sparkles for the first time. Feline coachmen, rodent equines. Histories on pause, genetics in havoc. Enjoy it while it lasts, kid. It was only sensible that I packed

No curly hair. To the best of your abilities, avoid any remote resemblance to the neighborhood nice girl who will probably grow up to be a competent accountant and mother of two. 2. Yes, alcohol. 3. Pocket a thick book to read on uncomfortable chairs in dim corners. It’s a cute look. 4. Rehearse small talk in advance. Memorize jokes, applicable anecdotes, literary references, spicy remarks to employ when terms such as “math grades” or “East Asian modesty” surface in unsolicited conversations. 5. Well, I certainly hope that I strike as intelligent and pass as fun.

myself off to a party.

Interlude: The Aforementioned Checklist

Brisk walk, cold air swelling in anticipation, city lights

Either way I will be departing by the after-party to watch bad sitcoms at home and cry.

I proceeded to abide by 2 and 3. Good advice transcends

The night condensed. My head spun, not in intoxicated

human difference or whatever. I preferred to believe that everybody

pirouettes but in a melancholic wobble, the kind of sheepish

brings a piece of battle armour to parties: latex dress, new cologne, A

dizziness that creeps in as your feet seek the ground after alighting a

People’s History of the United States or other. In this blue neon light,

midway ride. Eventually I went to hide in the bathroom. Exited the

silent night, mildly dehydrated plight, I looked like an emotional

theatrically brooding neon blue to enter the abject cleanliness of those

masochist. I recalled that time in junior high when I watched my

off-white panel lights. Thin walls, marker graffiti. Of course I thought

acquaintance-friends play in the pool as I read on the damp floor by

of the possibilities. Backs flushed against the stalls. Shortening

the dubiously real foliage, covertly hoping to get hit on by some other

breaths. Deepening breaths. Slithering proximity. Public little secrets.

loser as one does in YA novels. Some other loser, some other winner.

Nevertheless, I was alone. Did I like being alone? My life required

Social climbing was a delicate ploy.

little routine besides solitude in the evening and coffee with breakfast.

Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas, said one immigrant to

another. Lurking in my corner, I pondered whether to judge it as comedic. Then pretty girl, wrecking bar, ra ra ra ra, there she was. Svelte under a pilling black knit, interwoven with metallic threads that caught light as she came closer. Would that be the gaze setting

I liked that solitude freed one from the self. A stream of consciousness without the body. No mirror reflections, no assessments of character from indecipherable eyes, no interjections from friendly or unfriendly frequencies. Fairy gimmicks and magical makeovers that I neither had nor needed the words to defend or deny.

in? Should I have been disgusted with myself for making conversation

Merry Christmas, Merry Christmas. The muffled party outside

with her about Salinger? But there she was, finishing my sentences —

rolled to a gentle boil. I unlocked the door. And, oh hello, there she

oh no. But I was Cinderella, and she was beckoning me into a waltz.

was. Expressionless according to the spotty glass above the sink. A

There she was, making time pass with grace. I was stumbling into a

little mundane for protagonistic adventures. A little awkward for

vortex. What kind of impostor did I want to be this time? I lacked the

anonymous trysts on winter nights. The furthest thing from punk

composure to decode that.

rock you had ever seen. Passable as the type that held onto paperbacks like vital appendages. I don’t hate myself I don’t hate myself I don’t

She tasted of cherries.

I was pretty certain the magic was kicking in.

How much longer until the clock struck twelve?

hate myself —

My love, why are you so insecure?

Let’s get on with it then.

Stepping back out into the party, now simmering to a close, it

was as if I just arrived. Well, I did just arrive. No one noticed. That was okay. I went for the way out. The crystal slippers dissipated into a Cheshire wink, though the city was still there. You know, the feeling of taking your first instinctive long inhale upon exiting a cinema dense with human emotions, infused in a saccharine daze, and, promptly, you’re welcomed back into the smoky cold of the open air — the city was still there.

And I was in it now. A chameleon on the prowl with a redacted

past.

Behold, I am in this now.

Karen Kan

Cold Feet

I like it, I say, it reminds me of springtime. It is almost

springtime. I swirl my hand through the dust.

Just come to bed, Andrew says.

My spider plant is having babies and they are growing in my

Siena Kunanec

I tell him, come stand with me in the rays of light.

Why, he says. Come to bed, under the covers where it’s warm.

carpet. My room is lemon drop yellow and so is my hair and tonight

Because it’s the first light since the fall. The sun actually feels

my toes are stained dirty green and numb from running barefoot in the cold spring grass. I pet the baby spider plants and whisper in their

warm on my face.

imaginary ears, “Please stay in my carpet, I want you to grow to be as

It’s warm in bed, he says.

I can taste the warmth. I close my eyes and lick my lips. It

big as your mummy spider plant.”

tastes like the lake and like dust.

My feet are six years old. Before tonight, my six-year-old toes

had never touched the cold ground of mid-April. My five-year-old feet

I want to taste you, he says, but I ignore him, opening the

did last year, but they forgot to remind my six-year-old feet about how

door to the backyard so I can hear he warmth. It sounds like robins.

you have to be careful not to jump too high off of the swings; landing

Close that, my feet are freezing, he says.

on the cold ground will make the bones in your feet rattle and shake

I know, isn’t it fantastic.

You’re crazy. He watches me. I realize he wants me to say

and leave behind a buzzing feeling like there are bees trapped in your toes.

something. What?

My lemon drop yellow bedroom and my lemon drop yellow

hair begin to glow as the setting sun makes its way through the

Close the door.

window. The dust particles dance in the rays of light. My six-year-old

No, look at the dust dance in the light.

toes and my baby spider plants say “hello” to spring.

You’re going to catch a cold with your bare feet outside like

that.

On the night I sat on the curb and shook like an alarm clock, I

also saw a cat.

The sky was purple. I remember this because it was the first

night of spring where the sun seemed to take its sweet time setting.

My boyfriend Andrew sits beside me and squeezes my hand

and rubs my back. That was sweet, my mum would tell me later. But I want to scream at him to go away.

My feet feel swollen in my boots, pushing against the leather

like my thoughts are pushing against my skull. I think, if my body is shaking to let go of my thoughts, I should let my feet be free too. So, I yank off my boots to give my toes some air.

Andrew just keeps on kissing my cheek.

I peel off my socks next and I push my thumbs into the

clammy sole of my left foot. Pushing harder I tell Andrew to please stop kissing me, I know you’re trying to help, but actually it is not helping. My words are breathy, and my teeth are chattering.

Andrew stops kissing me but continues rubbing my back. Still

pressing my thumbs into my foot, I try to focus my attention on the

He told us about what he wished you would do to him.

He knows I would like it if I just gave it a try.

Andrew is still cooing nice words into my ear, which are

disorienting for my thoughts as they try to find a path to break loose from my brain and float away into the purple sky.

I gingerly place my right foot into the stream. Squishy.

I had asked him, please tell me the truth, please.

I don’t know what you’re talking about.

Come on, I’m begging you, I won’t be mad. I squeezed his

hand.

He wouldn’t look me in the eye.

Please.

I never said that.

Why would they make that up? I told you I never wanted to

do that. How would they know that?

little stream of rotting leaves and rainwater that collects along the

base of the curb we are sitting on.

then I couldn’t breathe.

His friends told me what he said about me. It was a joke, they

The stream reminds me of going crayfish hunting at summer

camp in the Rouge Valley. Now as I press deeper in the stream of

said. He meant it as a joke.

He shook his head and lit his lighter, disappointed in me. And

But, what did he say? They looked around the room. What did

he say?

sewage, I watch the sludge of downtown Toronto seep through my toes until my pink nails are hidden.

A cat walks by and Andrew reaches out to caress it. He begins

caressing the cat and me at the same time in the same way. I place my other foot down into the trickle of dirty water. The loose dirt and leaves swim around my toes. I wriggle them in the cold stream when I realize they are numb, and the shaking finally subsides.

As a calmness settles in my body, I watch the purple sky turn

to black. To Andrew I finally say, would you please give me some space, again, I know you were trying to help, and I know that I’ve never had a panic attack before so of course I am not familiar with all of this either, but please get your hands off of me. He bum-scoots away and plays with his lighter, the other hand still petting the cat.

Then come here, he says, and pulls me into his sweaty body.

I look him straight in the eye which he says is hot and I keep

staring at him until I finally say, yes, it is too hot, like I said, it’s too hot in here.

So, when I break up with him and he finally says, you never

did enough for me. For months after, I think I’ll gag, but I think I could have liked it. Maybe I would have liked it. I should have just done what he wanted.

But I never did.

I stand in the middle of the lake up on the tippity tippity top

I am hunched over the stream, playing in the frigid sewage water, pushing the leaves around on my toes, when Andrew says that he really has had a wonderful night. I rest my chin on my shoulder to look him straight in the eye. The cat walks away.

of sand hills. Before running up the Martian-like terrain I had said, “To the highest hill!”

Andrew takes me home and plays with his lighter on the

I ran through shadows made by the few yellowing birch trees

where the sand was cool. Where the autumn sun dusted the hills, the

subway all the way to the East End. We are in a car in a parking lot

sand was warm. My feet enjoyed the change in temperature. I ran

when I say, Andrew, I say, it’s too hot in here.

past driftwood and saw forests in the distance and Lake Ontario to the

Yeah, we’re certainly steaming up the windows.

I say, no, Andrew it’s really too hot.

Are you going to have another panic attack? He pulls away

from me like I’m sick.

I say, no, and draw a heart in the condensation.

west.

Now, at the tippity tippity top I am out of breath but I am

laughing.

“Are we going down?” I ask, still panting.

“If you don’t mind, I’d like to enjoy the view,” Liam says,

pulling me in and kissing my cheek.

“Someone’s scared,” I whisper into his ear, and then I am off.

I run with a wide gait, sliding and sinking into the sand hill

on my descent. I reach the bottom, where Lake Ontario can lick my

So, I call Liam a baby and wriggle my toes in the October

water of Lake Ontario, waiting for him to join me, and laugh when he splashes me and let him kiss my cold, wet lips.

feet. I throw off my jacket, my scarf, my hat, and drop the boots I was carrying. I peel off my dress and I feel his warm hands on my waist. Liam pulls me in and rests his chin on my shoulder. The two of us stand there against each other, watching the autumn lake and catching our breath. I squirm out of his grip giggling. I run backwards, facing Liam with a smirk on my face. I feel my feet enter the cold water and wait for the numbness to sink in before I go deeper.

She sees his face. Curved lips like the sand hill. Bones sharp

like the stones on the beach.

Have you ever seen the light pour into your bedroom and

bring warmth, the lake, the robins, the dust, to life for the first time since fall?

Liam is jumping from foot to foot in his bathing suit trying to keep

warm. I have my face tilted towards the sky watching my clouds of

dust particles float in the yellow space.

breath in the October air. I imagine my breath clouds finding the sky clouds like a family reunion.

He yells, “You won’t do it,” and I am brought back to this

world away from the clouds where my feet are in the lake in October.

“Watch me!” I turn around and stride into the deeper water.

I submerge my body and feel the cold water in my throat.

She opens her door, lies down on the floor, and watches the

She floats too.

Right now, she imagines his arm resting on her stomach,

squeezing her heart up through her chest, her throat, until her heart comes out of her in tears.

She pauses, getting up to open the door. She says, “I have to

tell you something,” and lies back down, waiting for the dust particles

The water stings my fingers and my legs start to burn. I surface and

to become Liam’s face. She rolls her head to the side, pressing her

I am smiling and Liam is laughing and the group of hikers that has

cheek to the floor that is warm in the sun. “I thought of you and

gathered on the shore is cheering. I dig my toes deeper under the sand

cried,” she says to Dust Liam. She laughs and the dust particles

searching for something colder. I find a stream of rotting sewage. I

disperse.

begin to wiggle my toes, sinking into the rot, the slime, the sludge. Too late, my toes are already numb.

She breathes in. Holds. Breathes out. She sticks her feet

outside into her backyard. She waits for the numbness to set in.

The dust settles.

Through her bedroom window, Liam watches her talk to her

toes as she wiggles them in the first light of spring. Liam smiles. Liam joins her.

Brigita Gedgaudas

conversation. She sent me to bed earlier than I was used to, but I was

Blanketing a Stone Claire Ellis

Kicking at snow crusts, I lost my footing and fell twelve feet

mind thought I was in a medieval jail. I went upstairs anyway, to be alone, and I had a surprise in my room.

It was hung all over with quilts. The little bed had a quilt

twice its size –– it was folded down three times at the pillow, yet still

down into a ditch. ***

not tired in this cold and isolated mound of stone. Some part of my

In that winter, the winter in the middle of my childhood, they

pooled on the stone floor at every side. The squares were every colour, with very delicate, small patterns: yellow and blue, pink and green, red and white. But there were quilts on the walls, too. They hung

sent me to stay with my grandmother. She lived nowhere; as a child I

right from the ceiling, and they too dripped onto the floor, as if the

thought that a northern expanse of trees stretched a quarter of the

whole room was coated in melted wax. Some were more like tapestries:

globe, and that she was the centre of it, like a lighthouse in a sea. As

great sheets of canvas with bold embroidery of forests and alien

an adult, I could point out the region and border on a map, but I had

flowers and deer with unnaturally long legs.

no conviction.

My grandmother lived in a true stone house. The walls were

stone straight through, like a little castle, and caterpillars of snow dozed on every windowsill. I dreaded the cold when I first came to it. Standing on the threshold, I put a hand to the inner side of the wall and found it chilled all the way through. My heart sank.

My grandmother was mostly happy to see me. Her hair

was very long, for an old woman, and as she sat on the faded couch, stabbing at an embroidery hoop, she seemed a touch unearthly. Long

It was much warmer up there.

I’d seen her doing some kind of needlework below. I was

certain these were all her work. I had mixed feelings. It was comforting, like a cocoon, but also unsettling. I wanted to miss the bed altogether and sleep on the floor, in the folds of one of the giant quilts. It was a hermitage, but not one I’d made for myself.

cold nose. ***

grey hair in lamplight.

I slept deeply in the quilt cathedral, and woke up early with a

We had tea, and then dinner, and more tea. We spoke

regularly, every few minutes like clockwork, but did not keep a

Now an adult, I had twisted my ankle alone in the woods.

I had once imagined my grandmother’s house as a stone well

hidden in a single unbroken parade of trees from sea to sea. By that unchallenged childish idea, I was still within the parade. She was out there, somewhere. Far, but in the same forest.

I thought fruitlessly about making a splint from some twigs.

She sniffed, as if that answered everything.

A few minutes later, she went on. “You must come back when

you’re older, and I have finished the other rooms. It will be a beautiful house then. All soft, wherever you step.”

That only made me more terrified –– on top of my injury, I was

***

finding that I had no good instincts for this kind of thing. I stayed sitting in that ditch, looking up at the trees with tears welling. A couple of birds shook themselves into the sky. ***

I could see it clearly in my mind. The rough, pitted stone

that made up the squat round house, frosted and frozen. And inside, the finished quilts. Every surface, covered by fantastically coloured patchwork or bold, unearthly embroidery. A beehive, a cave with soft

“Grandma, why are there quilts everywhere?”

stalactites.

They were everywhere. In every room on the upper floor there

I thought I understood what she was trying to say. No one

were at least three. It seemed to me that she was in the process of

else in the world had ever tried to blanket the inside of a stone like

lining the whole house with them.

that. But if you live all alone in a place that frightens you, you must invent your own art, your own spell of comfort. Only you can enchant

“Do you like them?”

“Yes, they’re beautiful. But I’ve never seen quilts all over a

yourself to be unafraid.

room before.”

When I froze to death, my ankle would cease to hurt.

She carefully put down her tea to answer me, her voice low

for story-telling. “Have you seen a house like this before? Stone, and circular, and surrounded by woods, with animals that come and prowl around the clearing? Birds that land on the chimneys and flap into

I did not know what to do. ***

man with leather gloves is dusting off his hands by the fireplace?” I did not know what to say to that, besides, “No.”

Gritting my teeth, I managed to crawl on my hands back up

to the trail where I had fallen. Little stones stuck in my knees.

them and wake you up in the middle of the night, thinking that a grey

My ankle hurt very badly. But it was the cold I was afraid of.

I did not like to think of her as a witch in the woods, like in

a fairy tale. But in the years since I’d seen it, the house had taken on

that cartoonish quality. I had lost the real feeling of it.

She did not die, or become ill, as far as I knew. I didn’t know

They would see me sprawled out and stop.

Now that I was in the hands of others, I was free to sleep.

anything. I did not go back to visit, and she haunted me. In spare

***

moments, I thought that I should return. ***

Dusk came, and gradually the light fell out of the woods. I

In my dream, I finally visited my grandmother. I found her

lying in her bed, on the second stone floor. The walls were three quilts thick, and the ceiling was pinned with them too, now. They were piled

was wounded to my soul, seeing true twilight. There was nothing in

on the floor like drifting snow, and the bed was a mound. She was so

the whole forest brighter than shadow, and so much that was blind

small, lying there. Her long grey hair fanned out on the pillow, like a

dark. My eyes strained as my mind yearned for any source of light. I

girl’s.

wanted to curl up into a ball at the foot of a tree and imagine myself a small woodland creature in a den. My ankle ached, but now I was so cold that it was a distant throbbing. I dragged myself along the path. I was very certain that I would die.

For some reason, I was ascending. The incline made me so

much slower. I might as well have tried to inch forward on my belly. But then the ground changed, and I saw that I was on the face of a hill, and below me was a road. It was snowed over, but I could see tire

Hugging myself, and nearly out of my mind, I tumbled and

danced down the hill, throwing myself into saplings to slow me down.

In my dream, her room was lit by candles that, which glowed

through some of the hanging fabric. I did not feel afraid of the open flames by the quilts; this was not real. And the quilts were like wax, the candle flames could only soften and light them.

She was asleep, but so was I, so we could talk. She told me she

was happy to see me, and that she would make me pancakes in the morning. We would go for a walk.

tracks.

I did not believe this, partly because I did not believe she was

in any state to leave her bed, but mostly because I did not think there would be a morning. I had seen the light leach out of the woods, and I was no longer certain that it would come back.

I reached the foot of the hill and rolled. I knew I should stand.

***

I should stand and wait and hitchhike.

But it was impossible. I dragged myself three times the length

of my body so that I was lying beside the road. Someone would stop.

Searchlights found me in the ocean, the lighthouse beam

swinging round and round over my soaked skull. There was a roaring: the waves, or a motor.

The car did stop. I don’t remember it, but it stopped for me on

that road.

woke up in a hospital gown and a hospital bed. I had a

twisted ankle, I was dehydrated, and I had nearly died of exposure.

I laid there, on my back, hair fanning out, and I tried to

remember my grandmother. She wasn’t real. She wasn’t one of mine. I’d thought, over hours and hours in the woods, that I was remembering her. But I had dozed off again and again: layers of dreams thrown loosely on top of dreams, piling up.

She wasn’t a real person, but I had a sore ache in my chest

trying to remember her. I’d promised myself I’d visit her, if I lived. I’d wanted, desperately, to visit her.

I didn’t know what it meant, that padded cathedral, that fire

hazard in a stone circle, that long-haired old woman. I clung to the memory, the fantastic embroidery, the multicoloured quilt, the wax dripping in my mind.

The beautiful house, it meant something. I had made it from

nothing.

I had blanketed the stone. I had not died.

Karen Kan

see your fingers covered in blood.

A Near Stranger’s Bathroom Floor Sabryna Ekstein

You wake up and see a guitar resting against a bookshelf. Of

You rush to the adjoining bathroom. There are three toilet

paper rolls, but each has only a few sheets on them. You bunch them all into one clump and press the papers to your nose with the hand that’s still holding your phone, trying not to wonder if getting blood

course, he plays guitar. You roll your eyes; you’re not surprised, you’re

in your phone’s crevices would render the device useless. You throw

disappointed. Three guys you dated this year also played guitar.

a toilet paper roll against the shower, and it’s at this moment that he

You decide to get out of bed to see if you share any literary

interests. Books can be a sign of a decent personality. Perhaps he spends his free time curled up in this bed, sunlight streaming in

walks in. You imagine what he sees—you, naked, holding your phone and bloody toilet paper in one hand as you chuck the empty roll across the room with the other.

through the blinds, a cup of tea in his hand, while getting lost in the

Cute.

literary word. Maybe the guitar is a decorative choice.

toilet paper, and hands it to you. While he does this, you try not to

Pulling back the plaid covers, you crawl out carefully to avoid

Silently, he opens the bathroom cupboard, grabs a new roll of

waking the snoring man beside you. The wall in front of you is covered

focus on his naked body. It was dark last night, and you didn’t get a

in dark geometrical shadows, a result of sunlight struggling to peer

chance to admire it. You assume he realizes you’re checking him out.

through tangled blinds.

Is he checking you out a little?

Looking down, you see your purse lying on top of a discarded

You both remain still in your occupied spaces. No more than

pizza box. You two didn’t order a pizza last night. Clearly, he wasn’t

six hours ago, you were a mound of tangled limbs touching each other

expecting company. You hope there aren’t any leftovers in there—or

intimately. You still smell slightly like the other’s sweat. “Can you

insects.

hold my phone?” you ask, breaking the silence. He takes it from you

On impulse, you grab your phone from your purse to see if you

before leaving the bathroom.

have any messages. As you’re scrolling through your inbox, a drop of

What is an appropriate amount of time to sit naked on the

blood lands on an email regarding the overdraft fee you were charged

bathroom floor with a bloody nose while your co-worker gets dressed

with last night. You put your hand to your nose. When you check, you

in his room? Technically you’re not co-workers anymore. You were 48 hours ago. But he quit. And it’s your fault.

You’re both head servers at a pub downtown. It’s as if you’re

distant co-captains; your shifts never overlap. He works the morning shift. You work at night. For an hour between your shifts, the restaurant is closed. You were both hired when the restaurant opened nine months ago and worked seven days a week ever since. While you’ve never met, you both make sure the restaurant is ready to go for when the other person arrives: that there are enough roll-ups in the side stations, that the salt and pepper shakers are full, that the bar is stocked, and whatever other mind-numbing tasks seem essential. For nine months, your paths never crossed, except for the occasional handwritten note left for the other at the host station, usually saying, “The restaurant is running precariously low on hand soap,” and could

Ish.

On Wednesday night, the restaurant was slammed, and two

servers called in sick, so you served a section twice as large as usual. It was around 8 o’clock when the rush started to die down. The bartender was complaining about the ankle she’d rolled the night before from dancing, and while you had no sympathy for her, you told her to go rest. There was a group of twenty coming in for a bachelorette party the next day, and you didn’t want her to call in sick.

Of course, it was during her break that Beer Salesman Derick

walked in. Beer Salesman Derick has had his eye on you since his first beer delivery to the pub, and every time he comes in, he tries to get

they “order some?”

You met this man last night.

Your mind keeps circling this thought as you wait for your

in your pants. As a so-called feminist, you should not be attracted to Beer Salesman Derick, because he’s rude to the other female employees and sexually inappropriate. But he’s so outrageously and

nose to stop bleeding. The other servers told you about him. You were

infuriatingly good-looking that sometimes you catch yourself flirting

told he’s shy, yet the life of the party. You’ ve heard he’s a catch, but

with him during his deliveries. Thankfully, whenever Beer Salesman

immensely private. He certainly wasn’t shy when he grabbed your ass

Derick gets close to you, you’re able to catch a whiff of his garlic

as you closed his door behind you last night. The General Manager is

breath. And just like that, your fantasies about Beer Salesman Derick

probably going to sit you down for a discussion about “the balance of

kissing your neck in the back of his truck disappear.

work and play” in your life because they frown upon sleeping with coworkers.

Last night, you did not have the patience to deal with Beer

Salesman Derick. You had previously asked him to stop coming

Wait.

at night because the pub was too busy. But there you were, on a

Right, he doesn’t work there anymore.

So, everything is okay.

Wednesday night, with Beer Salesman Derick showing up during the rush to tell you he has “a new beer you need to try.” You grab a glass

and he pours you a sample. You know the guests pretty well and want

you doubt anyone even noticed you stumbling through. Your head is

to see if the beer is something that would sell. You sample what he

pounding as you let yourself out of the restaurant.

pours. It’s delicious. Tart with a smoky flavor, hints of maple, and a beautiful amber colour. You have three samples, each a bigger pour than the last; you can’t get over how unique it is.

What Beer Salesman Derick doesn’t tell you is that it’s 12.5%.

When the bartender finally returns, you politely excuse

yourself, leaving her to fend off Beer Salesman Derick for herself. You cut through the prep kitchen and propel yourself down the soup-

This is what led him to quit. From what you’ve heard, he

showed up the next day to utter chaos. No roll-ups, no salt, the bathrooms out of toilet paper, crumbs on the floor, fruit garnish turned moldy, and a bar without any white wine. He was fed up. Why he had such a short fuse, you’re not sure, but rumor has it he quit as soon as the General Manager showed up to have brunch with his mother-in-law.

splattered stairs to the basement. Your vision is spinning, and you’re

afraid you might throw up. What would even be in your stomach to

one wants to be in their late twenties and making money as a

throw up? It’s approaching 9 o’clock, and you haven’t eaten in almost

server, especially if you have no interest in going into hospitality

twelve hours. You head to the beer and liquor room and lock the door

professionally. The thing about the service industry is that the money

behind you. It’s colder in here, and no one will bother you. Only head

is good, especially when you add on those non-taxable cash tips that

servers and management are allowed inside—there’s been a problem

you slip into your back pocket at the end of the night. And this pub

with stealing in the past. You sit down and decide you’re only going to

was so desperate to have two servers who would do everything a

close your eyes until you no longer feel like you’re on a carnival ride.

manager would but without the title, that both of you are making

You wake up at 4 in the morning.

Upstairs, all the lights are off and you don’t risk aggravating

your headache by turning them on. You walk through the empty pub and grab your coat and purse from underneath the POS stand. You have no texts asking where you are. You figure that after you disappeared, Beer Salesman Derick probably went looking for you. The staff probably thought you blew off your shift to get it on with him in the back of his truck. The prep kitchen was busy enough that

That’s only partly true. You can guess why he quit. No

way more than the minimum wage. Sure, you work seven days a week and barely have a social life. But you’ve never been richer. You live your life when everyone else is sleeping and you’re fine with that. When you’re making good money, it’s hard to leave. Really hard. You, for example, have a graduate degree that you’ve never put to work, and getting a job in that field would mean a severe pay cut.

You assume he just snapped. He saw an out and took it.

You walked in for your Thursday shift, and the swing servers

all told you he was gone. That the General Manager was going to have

forever. Sometime after peeling the label off your beer bottle, you

to cover mornings until they found a replacement. You felt weirdly

leaned over the table and kissed him, for no reason other than you

lonely. You’d never met this person before, but they were the only

wanted to. You went back to his place, and here you are now, sitting

one who understood the ins and outs of your job. The whole shift, all

naked on a near stranger’s bathroom floor.

anyone could talk about was that he had quit. No one even questioned why the pub was a state of disarray.

Friday night, you were the only one left in the restaurant

when he walked in to return his keys. You told him the pub was closed, not realizing who he was. By the time he had grabbed his tips from the office, you had officially shut the pub down.

“I’m going to grab a drink around the corner if you want to

When your nose finally stops bleeding, you brush your teeth

using your finger and the last drop of toothpaste from the tube. You wash your hands but the only towel to dry them on has “NOEL” embroidered across it and is on the floor being used as a bathmat.

Going back to his bedroom, you begin to look for your clothes.

Your shoes are under his bed. Your jeans and underwear are thrown over the bedside table. Your bra is hanging on the doorknob. But your

join,” you told him. You had no intention of grabbing a drink if he

shirt is MIA. You’re wondering what he’s done with your phone when

said no, but thought this was the only time you’d get a chance to meet

you smell bacon.

him.

“Sure,” he said, and soon you two were walking through the

crisp fall air to the Irish pub around the corner.

When you got there, he asked you what you wanted but

couldn’t hear you over the music, so he ordered two of the beers

Walking out of his bedroom, you follow the smell to the

kitchen. He’s made pancakes and is watching the bacon crackle. He hands you a cup of coffee. Out of courtesy, you take a sip before placing it down. You’re more of a hot water and lemon or peppermint tea person in the morning.

he liked. It was a little malty, but he paid, so you weren’t going to

complain. You sat on the patio and confessed to him that you had

over your chest. This man licked the entire length of your body last

passed out in the beer and liquor room. He took a long sip of his beer,

night, whispered every surface he’d like to have you on and saw

and you waited for him to say something cruel about your lack of

you naked with a bloody nose this morning—but you’re feeling too

responsibility. Instead, he told you that he had a graduate degree in a

exposed for him to see you in your black lace bra, even if it is the sexy

type of engineering that you had never heard of before. That if you

one you got at your sister’s bachelorette party.

hadn’t pulled that stunt, he probably would’ve worked as a server

“You haven’t seen my shirt, have you?” you say, arms crossed

He points to the couch. Of course. You two had arrived at

his place last night and made out like horny teenagers under the motion detector porch lights before he unlocked the door. Both of you knew you were going to have sex, but neither of you wanted to seem presumptuous, so you mutually agreed to watch an episode of The Office on Netflix first.

You pick up your grey V-neck shirt. His copy of T he Goldfinch

is underneath, and you debate telling him he’ll never finish it, because no one does, but decide against it. You see that he’s plugged in your phone and you slide it into your pocket. “There’s breakfast here if you want it,” he says, as if you couldn’t see that for yourself. You start walking to the bedroom to grab your purse when you hear him say, “And I was thinking. If you didn’t have plans before your shift, we could hang out.”

You come out of the bedroom, put on your coat, and then

grab a pancake off one of the plates he’s set out. “Thank you so much for the offer,” you begin, “but I think we should keep this professional between us. As co-workers.” And you dart out of his house before he has a chance to remind you that you no longer work together.

Lydia Shan 42

family: Mr. Martin with his crisp dress shirts and silver spectacles,

Little Swallow Yi Nuo Cheng November 2008

The country flows by in a sea of grey. They’ve left behind the

dark, stocky buildings of Calgary, and all that exists now is the snow, shredding from under the tires, sparkling in a fine lace on the windows. Inside the car, the heater swallows frost and spits out tongues of air in hot, dry hisses. Yan draws pictures on the backseat window. Her

Mrs. Martin with her wide, perpetually lipsticked mouth and shiny patent leather high heels, and Juliet, who is also in grade three and goes to the same school as Yan. Hawthorne Academy’s tall, looming gates and rows of polished wooden desks. The dress shirt and knee socks and black Mary Janes that they had to wear every day, which, along with the tuition to enroll in the school, were donations bestowed upon her by the Martins.

Mommy had sold Yan’s uniform before they left. Her new

school doesn’t have a dress code.

sketchbook sits on the seat beside her; Mommy said not to draw on the

window because she would get motion sick.

looks to the back of Mommy’s head. It’s impossible to tell what goes

In the driver’s seat, Mommy yawns and fiddles with the knobs

on the radio. Ear-splitting static sludges out, punctuated by the odd catches of discernible voices. But Saskatoon and its radio towers are disappearing swiftly behind them, so Mommy resorts to digging a CD out of the glovebox, so old its paper cover has lost all its colour..The tinny voice of some Chinese pop star replaces the static.

Sitting on her fingers to restore the warmth to them,

Yan stares out of the window through the lines she’s made in the condensation. The highway, surrounded by endless snow-covered farmland on both sides, looks like a blank page if she squints her eyes. She imagines drawing on them, pencilling pictures of her old life—the

When her eyes grow tired of the forever-stretching white, she

on beneath that short-cropped, black-dyed hair. Is she tired? Is she sad? Angry? Yan wishes she could drive, so Mommy wouldn’t have to do it all by herself. Back at home, Mommy only had to drive a couple of times a week to buy groceries and other household supplies for the Martins. When Yan had pointed this out as they were preparing for their move, Mommy had said not to worry about her. Still, Yan squeezes her eyes shut now, premonitions of the car swerving off the road or smashing into a streetlight flashing like alarms in her head.

When she wakes up, the music has been turned off. They’re

pulling into a driveway on a street that looks like the Martins’, just with smaller houses and more snow.

one they’re driving further away from by the second. She would draw

the giant, beautiful home of the Martins, and each member of the

from her throat. A churning starts in her stomach, and she cranes her

“Are we here?” Too anxious to be a yawn, the question arises

neck to look toward the front door of the house they’ve parked at. The

fails to be discreet. They could only be thinking one thing: what kind

lights don’t seem to be on.

of wife doesn’t know where her husband works?

“

We’re here.” Mommy gets out of the car and comes to

The old man shows them the way to the basement, their new

unbuckle Yan’s seatbelt. As soon as the car door opens, the cold

home. “Your Ba,” he says to Yan, who reaches for Mommy’s hand out

seeps in like a white fog, claiming skin with its icy fingers until every

of fright, “has a kitchen, bathroom, and two bedrooms down there.

memory of warmth is shivered away. They tromp through knee-high

One of those is for you, and one of them is for your Ba and Ma.”

snow to the front door. At the beck of their knocking, an old Chinese man comes to open it. As he lets them in, Yan can’t stop staring at his face, which is so densely lined with wrinkles that it looks, from afar, like a spread of phone numbers in the Yellow Pages. The inside of the house is very brown, and smells like dinner was just finished an hour ago. The old man tells Yan to put on a pair of indoor slippers, and she quivers under the attention, obediently stepping into the slippers while keeping her eyes trained on the floor. An old woman joins them before long in the living room, carrying a tray of tea. Mommy talks to the old couple about how the road conditions had been on their way here. Half-listening to their conversation, Yan learns that Daddy isn’t home yet because he’s still at work.

“Where—” Mommy hesitates, “Where does he work,

exactly?” At the doubt in her voice, Yan presses to Mommy’s side. She looks up, not at the old couple, but at the photos on the fireplace mantle behind them. There’s a young man in those photos, wearing a cap and gown, holding a hockey stick, standing between two older people who could only be the couple themselves.

Now, before her, the couple exchanges a glance that tries and

“Oh, no, I’ll be sleeping with her,” Mommy says quickly. And

that’s that.

They walk down the stairs into the dark, cold, dusty-smelling

basement. The room they are to share has only one bed and a minuscule closet, but it at least has a desk where Yan can study. A naked incandescent lightbulb hangs from the ceiling with a dangling cord to turn it on and off. The walls thrum with the baritone rumble of the water heater in the neighbouring room. Yan imagines a house in a snowglobe, with a tiny basement carved into the ground, a hidden pocket amidst the gears in the base. Maybe all snowglobe houses have basements, but it’s just that nobody knows about them. They unpack their suitcase of things, then sit on the bed, getting used to their new surroundings, until Daddy comes home.

He’s big, and tall, and smells sharp like snow and smoke. A

cold draft arrives with him, as if he’s brought the entire night inside with him. Yan sits very still on the bed until he comes over and gathers her in his arms. “My dear! My little swallow!” He calls her yan zi, the Chinese word for swallow and his nickname for her. Finally, she remembers what her Daddy is like, and relaxes. Since she hates crying

in front of people, she focuses very hard on staring at the wall as he

which is so small she can traverse its length in three steps and is

hugs her, tears freezing in her eyes and a bitter lump lodged in her

heavily populated with dust bunnies. Yan works her way through her

throat.

homework steadily, taking breaks every so often to doodle Daddy in ***

Daddy holds Yan’s hand from the car to the Taco Bell, letting

go only to unlock the door and let them inside. When the lights turn on, Yan feels a flicker of delight. The interior is like a dollhouse, with hexagonal tables and padded leather seats outfitted in cotton candy pink and blue. It’s only them in the whole place, and she can pretend for a moment that this is the dining room in their own house.

the margins of her notebook, smiling in his Taco Bell apron and cap.

When she comes to a math problem she can’t solve, she picks

up the workbook and walks toward the front counter to ask Daddy for help. The two other employees in the kitchen stare at her as she emerges from the storage room and passes through, but don’t say anything.

Daddy is at the cash register helping some customers, so she

hangs back at first. A group of teenagers, much older and taller than her, have made a hangout out of the restaurant. A boy and a girl are

Daddy leads Yan behind the counter and past the buzzing

bluish lights of the kitchen into a storage room lined with metal shelves of food. He clears a shelf of taco shells and turns over a bucket for her, a makeshift desk and chair. “There, just like at home,” he declares jovially. “Now, be good and do all the homework your Ma

at the counter, squinting at the menu, while another couple lounges at a booth, playing footsie and getting slush all over each other’s pants.

The boy at the counter orders, “We’ll get the seven-layer

burrito, four of them. And two Cokes.”

told you to. If there are any math problems you don’t understand, you

can ask Daddy.”

chicken, or steak?”

“What?” The boy frowns. “Read it from the menu.”

Daddy points on the menu at the different burrito fillings.

“No. Read it. The whole thing.”

sizzle, and various machines groan and beep; she imagines that they

Daddy looks up at the boy. A second of silence beats by, then

are all the internal organs of the restaurant, waking up to begin

he reads the options out loud. “Bean, beef, chicken, or steak.”

Yan watches out of the corner of her eye as Daddy leaves

Daddy repeats the order to confirm it, then asks, “Bean, beef,

the storage room. She sits very still, letting sounds wrap around her like a blanket: the front door swinging open and closed, the chit-chat of other employees and customers who come in. Fridges hum, fryers

the day’s work. Nobody comes to bother her in the storage room,

“Jesus. I can’t understand a thing you’re saying.” The boy

people’s thoughts if she looks hard enough—but something else is

turns to the girl beside him. “Can you understand him?” He repeats

blocking her vision. A twisted sneer, so opaque in its anger that it

what Daddy said, drawing the vowels out exaggeratedly.

makes the hairs stand up on her skin, shocks her right out of her

The girl, laughing: “Knock it off, Cody.”

Daddy, in a voice so calm and patient Yan thinks for a second

that he must be speaking to her, repeats the menu options.

“Don’t they teach you how to speak English before you

immigrate?” Throwing his hands up, the boy called Cody looks back at his friends. “Ching chong, ching chong, man.” They give him a round of laughter. “Just order, babe.” The girl elbows him. She’s spotted Yan.

“I don’t know if I even want to. All this ching chong is making

me lose my appetite.” Then, seeing the girl’s expression, he rolls his eyes. “Alright, alright.”

looks for a second longer, she’ll be able to see past it and understand him, but something in her screams for her to cast her eyes down and listen to Daddy, to back away.

Ears ringing in the silence, she stands in the blue light of the

kitchen doorway for a heartbeat, contemplating. Then she goes for the

“Hey, what are you doing?” asks a kitchen worker.

In the voice that she uses at school when teachers call on her

for an answer: “My dad told me to help make a drink.”

Daddy turns around and finally notices Yan. His eyes are very

bright as he tells her in Chinese to go back to the storage room.

heroic glow around him, threatens to swallow her whole. Maybe if she

drink machine and fills two cups with Coke.

stillness. His rage, so righteous, so unabashed that it almost raises a

“Ching chong, ching chong.” The boy’s spitting now, voice

When she’s sure the workers have stopped paying attention

to her, she carries the cups into the storage room, puts all the dust, lint, and hair she can find on the floor into them, then caps them and brings them out to the front. By then, Daddy’s gone from the cash till,

hardening. “Goddamn immigrants. Don’t speak ching chong when

replaced by one of the other employees. Coke bubbles in light brown

you’re in my country.” He sees Yan looking at him, and makes a face

beads on the lids as her shaky hands set the cups on the counter. Then

at her, sticking his tongue out and pulling the corners of his eyes to

she slinks back into the kitchen, feeling her body melting into the

turn them into slits.

blue-tinted shadows.

Yan’s frozen, staring into the boy’s face. There should be

something there that will give him away—she can usually understand

The boy brings the completed order to his table. Yan watches

his every movement. He feeds his girlfriend a fry, makes her blush and laugh. They share a kiss, a furtive look. She waits for them to share

the drink and doesn’t go back to the storage room until she sees him

at her for getting too many questions wrong. When he rakes the pencil

take a sip.

too insistently across a page and tears the paper, it makes a little May 2009

The hospital room only has three colours: blue bed, beige

wood, white wall.

Daddy’s face is beige, too, except for the round, dark circles

of his eyes when they’re open. The arms that stick out of his pale blue gown are as skinny as Yan’s own, but she’s not afraid of looking at them. They have shrunken like this gradually, before her eyes, for many months.

She’s come straight from school. She unzips her backpack and

takes out a book of math problems, telling Daddy about the new unit they’ve started at school: geometry.

“Another one hundred on this one, right?” He smiles. All the

fat has abandoned his body since starting chemotherapy, and now his smile makes the rest of his features disappear behind a wall of teeth. His new face still sometimes startles her, but Yan smiles back nonetheless. It makes her happy to tell Daddy she’s doing well in school. Before coming to Canada, he’d been an engineer, and before that, a student at a top university in China. In their basement home, there is a black-and-white photo of him from his university days, sharp-jawed and bright-eyed, taped on the fridge next to a photo of Yan as a baby. The days when she brings good test marks and praise from teachers to him, he raises himself onto his elbows with more

bubble of comfort in her stomach, and she blinks slowly, pretending behind briefly closed eyes that they are at the desk in her and Mommy’s room, and everything is the same as it was before.

But then he turns away from her to cough into his elbow.

She keeps her eyes trained on the page. A few weeks ago,

she had seen blood on his sleeve and arm after a coughing fit. He’d pretended not to notice the foreign red speckling the blue and beige, so Yan had kept quiet, too.

When Daddy’s done coughing, he says he needs to lie down. As

his bed lowers, Yan tidies the papers in her lap and hunches over them.

Minutes or maybe hours later, Daddy asks, “How’s it going?

You still understanding everything?”

She nods.

“Good.” When she turns to sneak a look at him, his eyes are

wide open, dark, looking at her without blinking.

The room darkens, colours inching closer toward the

anonymity of shadow. The curtains are drawn back, though the sun they mean to let in is fading by the second. Yan will have to leave soon, too. If Daddy gets lonely, maybe he’ll talk to the console of machines that beep around him, as Yan has overheard him doing a couple times from outside the door.

energy, and speaks in a louder voice. She doesn’t mind when he snaps

She wishes that he’d just call home, instead, though. She

would pick up if he ever did. She would pick up every time.

“That’s my smart girl.” He opens a skeletal hand, and she

reaches out to hold it. Soon after, he falls asleep. His soft snores rumble rhythmically through the room, filling space until silence has no places left to hide.

Back at home, the Martins had a pond in their backyard that

could be depended on to freeze over every December. Juliet had lent Yan a pair of old skates, and they would dash out onto the pond right when they got home from school, and pretend to know how to figure skate. “I’ll be Katie Andrews,” ordered Juliet, “and you be Blizzard.” Yan blew raspberries and got on all fours on the ice. She didn’t mind getting the animal role, because Blizzard could fly.

to tie them for her. Her parents support her arms all the way down the slippery snow-covered bank, then watch like hawks as she takes her first knock-kneed steps. Slowly, her legs remember how to push forward, how to scrape sideways to brake. The ice spreads, a heavy, rough expanse, beneath her as she slices lines and curlicues across it. When she’s done a few laps around the pond, she stops in front of her

November 2008

the skates with numb, clumsy fingers, until Daddy crouches down

One day in the last week of November, the red and yellow

“Caution Thin Ice” stickers are taken off the signs beside the ponds. When Daddy gets home from work, they head out for a walk and come upon one in the neighbourhood, sparkling in the lavender afternoon light and teeming with the lithe, brisk bodies of boys who were born with hockey sticks in their hands.

parents on the bank.

They’re in the middle of talking about something, condensed

breath swirling in ghostly speech bubbles over their head. As Yan watches them, a wave of familiarity sweeps over her. She doesn’t have any conscious memory of when her parents were still together, years ago back home in Calgary, but some part of her cries out in joy now, remembering—or at least being really good at pretending to.

“Go faster, Yan. Show your Daddy how fast you can go,” says

Mommy, then turns to Daddy, boasting, “She can go really fast, for real, look.”

So Yan takes off, gathering speed until her feet blur. Her scarf

becomes the wind itself, flapping behind her in percussive laughter. She’s the envy of every hockey boy on the pond. She’s a maverick in ill-fitting rental skates. She flies until her legs are drained of every last

“Do you know how to skate, Yan?” Daddy asks.

“The Martins’ daughter taught her,” says Mommy.

Daddy takes Yan to the skate rental booth and hands the

teenager manning the booth a pile of loose change. Yan tries to tie

drop of strength.

Finally, she skids to a stop at the bank, panting. Her parents

beam at her, wearing the same expression, standing together in one sunset-painted cloud of misty, condensed breath. She complains about

how she could’ve gone even faster, and the remembering part of her cries out again at being able to keep the smiles on their faces for a bit longer. March 2009

He’s been starting to feel better lately. Mommy claims it’s

because of the warmer air that’s signalling spring’s impending arrival. His lungs know the world is approaching rebirth, so they decided to give life another go, too. Daddy argues that it’s because his little swallow is a good luck charm. Yan scrunches her face up, but cutting through the embarrassment is pride, because she believes him.

On the days he’s strong enough to walk the distance from his

bedroom to the dining table, he sits there listening to the radio. He leans back, closing his eyes, as if basking in an imaginary ray of sun.

The old couple upstairs wouldn’t actually mind at all if he

went upstairs to feel the real sun on his skin. Yan knows; she asked the old woman one day when she got home from school. “Your Ba is welcome to come upstairs whenever he wants,” she’d said and Yan had repeated, but Daddy had just smiled and waved his hand as if he didn’t care much for the sun. So Yan keeps him company downstairs.

Today, she’s been very good and finished all her work early, so

it’s her sketchbook she brings to the table. She unfurls her fingers and

“Come on, no discount for your poor old Daddy?”

She pretends to mull it over. “Fine. Forty-nine!”

“So generous!” He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a

loonie and puts it on the table. “But this is all I have. Have mercy on a poor old man. Just one portrait, please, Miss Artist?”

Drawing Daddy is important work, more substantial than

math or science or social studies. When she’s done, the smile that lights up his face as he holds her work up to admire is better than a thousand perfect test scores. She keeps his loonies in her desk drawer, in a tin that once held chocolates.

She’s getting to his nose, the straight line that slopes out to

a soft bulb, when the stairs creak, signalling Mommy’s return from work. She turns, opening her mouth to say, Mommy, look.

The knife of her mother’s voice cuts through the comfort in

the kitchen. “What did you do with my thirty thousand dollars?”

A moment of suspension, then the air seems to waver in

disbelief.

How swiftly everything can go wrong. How little sense it

makes, but your body still knows how to move—and that’s a betrayal, somehow.

a handful of knife-sharpened pencils roll out with a clatter.

“Go to your room, Yan,” says Daddy.

“What’s your rate, young lady?”

Yan doesn’t look at her mother. She picks up her sketchbook

“Fifty dollars. Per minute,” Yan giggles.

and pencils, goes to her room, closes the door.

The walls are so thin. An ambush seizes the table. Mommy’s

voice rears like a mad horse, throwing accusations, smashing them against the walls like plates. Every one of them true, judging by Daddy’s silence. What’s he done with her thirty thousand dollars, her life savings, the last of what her parents left her, all her earnings from the past five years. What’s he done with them, monster, addict, thief. The plates shatter again and again.

Yan’s body wants to curl up under the covers and throw the

blanket over her head, but she’s frozen, standing just behind the door. Her ears are the traitors; they want to know.

He’s sitting there and taking it. He doesn’t say anything. Yan

squeezes her eyes shut, and she can’t picture him at the table at all, even though she was just sketching him there a moment ago. Is he

She can’t open her eyes now. She’s convinced that the moment

she does, she’ll be standing in her old room at the Martins’. Calgary will be coiled outside like a thick black snake. And Daddy will be so impossibly far away that she’ll never see him again.

The sketchbook gets damp in her hand. The pencils are

slippery. Her palm will smell like wood later. She begins to shiver, standing there behind the door.

An animal has found its way into the house.

It’s lost, and hungry, and letting out that low, gurgly wail in

the dark because it only knows, in its primitive animal mind, to be afraid, but not how to fix it. The sound wakes Mommy, who turns on the light and rushes out of their room, toward Daddy’s.

It’s worse when Mommy starts crying. It would be better if

she could be angry forever. Mommy’s rage has colour, but her sorrow is a void. When her voice stops being the wind and becomes the plates, when it breaks, and sobs escape curling upward like notes of

Rubbing her eyes, Yan gets up and stumbles after her. The

floor is ice beneath her bare feet. The kitchen light has been turned on, too, thickly coating everything in amber. She doesn’t make it to Daddy’s room before both her parents come out and start walking up the stairs. Only, Daddy’s not walking so much as sliding up, wedged between the wall and Mommy. He must not be completely awake yet.

there? Is he really still there?

unintended music, it’s soft and young and broken.

“Why did you wake us up, Mommy?” Yan complains, voice

thick with sleep. Mommy doesn’t answer, and Yan’s irritation sparks. “Stop walking so fast. Where are you going? Didn’t you hear that animal? What if it’s still down here?” No answer. “Daddy, wa-a-a-i-t. Where are you going?”

From the bottom of the stairs, she looks up at them. The

upstairs, so black it ripples like a mirage, resembles a dark mouth swallowing them. She’s suddenly wide awake. “Wait! Wait for me!”

Daddy finally turns his head to look down at her. It’s hard to

see his face in the darkness, but his mouth opens like he’s going to say something. Just then, the animal makes its cry again.

Yan stares, not understanding, until she does. There is no

animal. The darkness takes her parents. From the pitch black, Daddy

of a world that Yan steps after the last bell rings. Her bag heavy and

lets out another cry. She starts to run up the stairs.

step light, she starts down the sidewalk.

“Yan zi!”

She turns around, sees him standing next to the parking lot

She’s thrust outside, into the burning cold, by someone

shouting.

Snow stings her ankles. There are red lights flashing, diffusing

with all the other parents, and a surprised smile tumbles over her lips.

everywhere as if underwater. Metal on snow, slush on a car door

Daddy’s never picked her up from school before. He explains that he’s

opening, she’s being bundled inside the car where a stranger sits in the

taken the afternoon off work today because it’s Mommy’s birthday,

driver’s seat. Daddy’s in front of her in the passenger seat. She leans

and they’re going to go to the corner store to get her a present.

forward to look at him. But no, it’s not him, just another strange man she doesn’t recognize, and she shrinks back, pressing hard into the corner of the car. Through the front windshield, she can see another vehicle in front, an ambulance, its doors slamming shut.

Why are we here? The car begins to go. Where are we going?

Where’s Mommy and Daddy? She doesn’t ask. The words are glued stuck in her throat, and even if she could say them, she can feel a sob foaming at her lips, clamouring in a panic to be let out. So she keeps silent, as a dark terror settles like a puddle of tar in her stomach. She keeps small and still and good. November 2008

On a rare warm day, the trees shake off the melt and parade

“Pick a candy,” he says when they arrive. Yan balks at the

selection, eyes glazing over at the wall packed with containers of colourful treats. He points at the clear-wrapped caramel squares. “Those are Daddy’s favourite.” She nods, and they take a few out.

The rich, murky scent of wet concrete and dead leaves fills the

air as they survey the selection of fresh flowers from under the awning outside. Brow puckered, Daddy carefully picks out a single rose stem. At the counter, he buys a lottery ticket, and spends minutes digging through his pockets for change to make up the difference his card left.

When they get home, he tells her to do her homework as he

gets started on dinner. “Not Taco Bell today, something real,” he says with a conspiratorial wink. They both like fast food, but never eat

their glistening colours. Though it had seemed invincible and

it at home under Mommy’s disapproving glare. Yan giggles, caramel

ever-present when they had first arrived, as much a feature of the

hugged between her gums and cheek.

landscape as any number of buildings or roads or hills, the snow is gone now. Autumn exhales yellow, breath that smells like dirt and all the things that might still be alive in it. It’s into this second chance

When Mommy gets home from work, her eyes widen at the

sight of dinner on the table. She slaps Daddy on the back and scolds

him for taking the afternoon off when he can hardly afford to, but the quirk at the corners of her lips keeps giving her away. He opens a cabinet and pulls out the flower to present to her. His eyes are suddenly downcast, his shoulders hunched shyly as if they’re barely beyond strangers. Despite her best efforts, Mommy’s face blooms like a rose.

Lydia Shan

Proof Julia Pape

“Oh, shut up.”

“You really find this fun?” he said, poking a smiley face into

the dough.

I had to think about that for a moment. I didn’t know if I’d

“So how long do you let it rise?”

describe it as fun. It was time-consuming and tiring, but in a way that

“Uh, it depends? Last time I left it for three hours but it was a

was what made it so relaxing. It was a good way to stay away from school for a little while and it was nice to know that after all your

pretty humid day…”

“Then how do you know when it’s ready?”

“When it’s bouncy. Like when the dough kind of springs

back.”

It was satisfying and soothing. And even when it was disappointing, there was a kind of reward in that. A lesson. It reminded me of Mum. My mother was never a bad woman. But she was awfully tricky.

Jonah had not known that baking was so temperamental. The

way he saw it, a recipe should yield results.

work, you’d at least be tuckered out enough for a good night’s sleep.

“Ikea wouldn’t sell a product with instructions that only

“Yeah. Really fun.”

With Mum, sometimes it was hard to tell whether you could ever get it right. You’d think things were going well until you went to ice

worked if the weather was right and the planets aligned and the gods

the cake and found your frosting full of crumbs, or the cake divided

blessed you with good fortune.”

unevenly, or the cake topper chipped on the edges. And sometimes

But I liked that it was difficult. “It’s good practice.”

you’d know things were going to be disastrous right from the

“For what? Disappointment?” Jonah stood in his passion. “All

I want is a damn loaf of bread, why would I spend two whole days making it if I’m not even guaranteed to have something good in the end?”

the ingredients that you’d inevitably throw out either way. Sure it sucked, but it meant that every clean plate proved you created magic, that every licked lip was applause, that what Mum said was “good” was great.

“It’s a labour of love, Jonah. You just have to enjoy the

process.”

beginning, yet you’d try to plunder through anyhow so as not to waste

With Jonah, things were simple. Predictable. The comfort

made me uneasy. I’d find myself overworking the dough, confusing

“I’m too hungry to enjoy the process.”

baking soda for baking powder, melting butter that should only have

been softened, mistaking mustard powder for ginger powder —things

I knew not to do! It just didn’t feel right that all my efforts should be

you.”

successful.

“I don’t believe you.”

“Huh?”

“I don’t believe you’re having fun.”

“I am!”

“But you’re so tense.” Jonah poked my jaw. “You’re clenching

“You always do that,” I said, unable to stop myself.

“Do what?”

“Compliment me when there’s nothing to compliment!” I

shouted. It was always this way with Jonah. He’d devour my deflated soufflé, gorge on curdled custard, gnaw on whatever overbaked nonsense I gave him, just as long as he thought I’d done my best. He’d

your teeth.”

“Well, because you’re a good baker,” he said. “And I believe in

empty every mediocre dish until I couldn’t tell whether he was licking the plate or letting the dog do it for him. It felt so unearned. I wanted

“I just do that sometimes,” I answered, preheating the oven as

to prove myself. I wanted to show my love and earn the love that came

casually as I could.

back. I wanted it to make sense.

“Yeah, when you’re nervous.”

“I’m just trying to be nice…”

“I’m not nervous. I’ve made this before.”

“Well, cut it out.”

I left out the part where my first attempt was an inedible

He fell silent. I wondered what Mum would have said if she

mess. I had read the recipe through tear-glazed eyes and forgot to add the yeast. I was left with a brick of flour cement destined for the trash.

had been in the room.

She would probably make sure I knew I’d been an ass. I did

know. I knew before I said it.

“Well, I’m sure it’ll be delicious,” Jonah said.

I suddenly felt like I was about to cry.

dough, which collapsed in its bowl like a year-old helium balloon.

“Why do you say that?”

“The oven’s too hot,” he answered, adjusting the dial.

“I’m sorry,” I said, jamming my thumb into the still-proofing

“What?”

“Why do you think it’s going to be good? You’ve never had it.”

About the Authors Sabryna R. Ekstein is currently working on her MA in English in the Field of Creative Writing. She also has a graduate degree in Museum Studies.

Siena Kunanec is from Scarborough, Ontario. Siena is in her second year at Vic doing a double major in Art History and Latin American Studies with a minor in Creative Expressions and Society. “Cold Feet” is Siena’s second Goose publication. She is excited to share her work with you.

Julia Edda Pape is a second year student studying English, French Literature and Education. She is thrilled to have her story published in Goose and hopes to keep writing stories for as long as folks will read them. After graduation, Julia hopes to turn her hobbies of music, acting, and writing into some kind of career; or maybe she’ll just run away into the wilderness (a very specific kind of wilderness with wifi, AC, and indoor plumbing). She loves her pet cats, her ukulele

Brigita Gedgaudas

collection, and her family (in that order).

Anya Shen is a first-year student at UofT double majoring in Literature and Critical Theory and Economics. Her previous work is published by the Koffler Centre of the Arts in its summer 2020 exhibition, A Matter of Taste. She has recently become very interested in the very serious cultural phenomenon that is the Twilight Renaissance.

Yi Nuo Cheng was born in Jixi, China, and raised in Calgary, Alberta. She is currently doing an undergraduate degree at the University of Toronto, specializing in Management with a focus in Marketing at Rotman Commerce and minoring in Economics and English. Her debut book of poetry, this peculiar trait of being human (and other euphemisms for love) was published in 2017 and used in the English 102 curriculum at Peninsula College, WA, in 2019. More of her writing can be found at https://philosophyinuo.wordpress.com/ and @ philosophyinuo on Instagram. Apart from writing, Yi Nuo loves visual art, music, beauty and fashion, and trying out new restaurants with friends.

Claire Ellis is in her fourth year studying English and Biology at the University of Toronto, and as a result loves writing science fiction. She enjoys working on campus theatre productions and listens to music while writing, drawing, or tending greenhouse plants.