Tales from the no. 6

A SONG FROM THE BACKWOODS

FICTION BY ANDREW LODGE STAFF & A REMINISCENCE BY MELISSA HIEBERT STAFF

Stories found on the barren road through Northern Manitoba

For the guys who picked me up somewhere near Grand Rapids, Man., up on Highway 6 where angels live amidst the trees and the broken glass.

It was just starting to get dark as he turned off the pavement and onto the gravel road. Still midwinter and it could only have been three in the afternoon. Short days, these winter days, thought Alphonse to himself as he accelerated. The ’82 Malibu still stuck to the road pretty good, he thought, even with the ice.

Beside him, Tom reached under the seat and pulled out a bottle of whisky. As he always did once on gravel, but only on gravel. When Alphonse was young, anyone with a vehicle would drive and drink wherever they happened to be, highway, town, wherever. But when Tom got out of the penitentiary 10 years ago, everyone Alphonse knew had calmed down, died, moved away or ended up in jail as well. And so Tom’s way of drinking, a calmer, less wild and reckless way, fit in.

They drove along in silence.

Without warning there was a dark blur and then contact as the Malibu smashed into the animal. Alphonse and Tom both lurched forward as Alphonse struggled to bring the big car out of a fishtail. He managed to slow down enough to come to a safe stop still on the road a ways ahead of the collision. They both got out quickly, as two men do when injected with a shot of adrenaline. They walked back but they both knew already they had hit a deer. They came up to it. It was still alive, struggling to get up but it couldn’t. Back broken, maybe its hips.

“Shit,” said Alphonse. He glanced over at Tom, whose eyes flickered as he looked down on the dying animal. He turned and trudged back up the snowy road to the car and opened the driver’s door. After a moment, he came out with a sawed-off shotgun that Alphonse always kept there for roadkill or to calm down hitchhikers who were drunk or getting out of hand. He walked back towards Alphonse and the deer and trained the barrel right up against the animal and without ceremony pulled the trigger.

The two of them dragged the deer into the bush that grew up right against the road.

“We’ll get her tomorrow with my truck,” murmured Tom. He trudged back up to the car and pulled out an old sweater from the back and returned to where they had stashed the deer. He left the sweater on the dead animal so that the wolves, who hate the work of humans, would leave the carcass alone.

They were silent for the rest of the drive home and in two hours they pulled into the dark town, with only a few cracks of light seeping through the mostly boarded-up windows of the houses. Alphonse drove through town to where it was no longer ploughed and parked the car. Tom had a shack past there down along the river and Alphonse reached behind his seat and dug out another bottle. They both got out of the car and climbed over the snowbank and made their way the half-mile to Tom’s place.

It was ice-cold inside and Alphonse quickly lit a fire in the blackened stove while Tom found the lantern and lit it. In 20 minutes the fire and the whisky made Alphonse warm and they both sat without talking in the flickering light. Tom drank not in the crazy way that some drinkers do but as something like medicine. He spoke almost no words when he drank, just as when he was not drinking. The only change that Alphonse ever saw in him were his eyes, sometimes if he had had quite a bit his eyes would go glassy. But that was it. It was a good thing too, because Tom was very hard. The swastika on his hand, the gang tattoos covering his arms, a constant reminder of the endless minutes and years in jail first as a boy and then turned into a man in those cold, bare walls.

Tom had killed a man once. A man that Tom’s aunt, who was only lonely in the world but whose heart was good, just scared, had taken home from the city and who beat her as much as he could and he and Tom would have huge rows, and even if Tom came out the worse, that was not the bad of it. And so one night he came home and his aunt was on the ground, blood streaming from her head, barely breathing, and there sat the man with a bottle of whisky, drinking and laughing at Tom as he came through the door and looked at the horror of his world. And so Tom walked back outside and over a few houses to where his father lived and drank and where he was passed out, and Tom went in there and found his father’s rifle and walked back over and through the door and shot the man three times and then dragged him outside while his aunt moaned. It took a while for the cops to get there but they did, and then Tom’s life took on new meaning.

The 15 years in jail were long and killed a part of Tom. But it never killed his kindness and Alphonse knew that and knew that it had only made Tom’s kindness cold and hard.

They drank on in silence and Alphonse woke up shivering and put some more wood in the stove and blew on the coals. Later morning came.

The sun shone bright and cold and sun dogs barked in the clear sky. It was a good day and after Alphonse got some things done in town, they went and got Tom’s truck and drove back to where they had hit the deer. It was just as they had left it and they worked on it on the spot. Alphonse made a big fire and they cooked and ate and drank tea. Already the sun was going down and so they loaded the meat onto the truck and slowly started for home.

Tom drove slowly, taking sips of whisky every so often. Darkness set in and then the light show began and they danced around all through the sky as something that neither of them had ever seen, or at least could not remember being as brilliant. What the books call aurora borealis. It was so bright that Tom turned off the headlights and could still drive easily. Amazing and beautiful lights.

“Light in darkness,” said Alphonse quietly. Tom nodded slowly. They drove along at a crawl and enjoyed for what must have been an hour or forever.

Ten years later, a few days after they found Tom’s broken body with his face blasted off by his own shotgun in the woods, Alphonse remembered that night.

I got the e-mail at 12:28 a.m.. “Pack your bags,” it read. “He just walked in the door. We leave in 10 min. See you soon. Love, Jeff.” E-mail was the only way Jeff could reach me at this hour. A phone call would cause my parents to wake up, and they were already angry with me for “being unsafe,” and travelling on what was dubbed “the worst highway in Canada” in the middle of the night, in the dead of winter. (Of course, their warnings fell on deaf ears. What do parents know anyway?)

I don’t know why he always chose to leave at obscure hours of the night; no one ever really knew what he was up to (or at least, we all pretended that we didn’t). But when he said it was time to go, Jeff always listened, unquestioningly. And so did I.

I walked a block over to Jeff’s house, dragging behind me my belongings for the next week. I started to curse the cool wind stinging my face, but then remembered that where we were going — about a thousand kilometers north of Winnipeg — it would be twice as cold. Better get used to it now, I thought.

The two of them were already outside, waiting for me. I threw my shit in the car, and squeezed into the back seat of the beat-up two-door, which was riddled with dents and featured a deployed airbag dangling from the steering wheel, both serving as badges of honour earned by surviving the trip several times before.

We make a few stops along the way to get some gas, some munchies, and what is only explained as “ummm . . . some stuff,” (accompanied by a shifty glance). Though five minutes and a cloud of smoke later, there is no more wondering — only a high level of relaxing satisfaction. And then we’re on our way.

The No. 6 is not like any other highway; it has more character than the newer, double-lane, asphalted roads to the east, west or south. Mirroring typical attitudes towards inhabitants of the North, the No. 6 remains ignored, unattended to, and largely forgotten.

No journey up the No. 6 highway is ever the same. Of course, there are the usual rituals; him lighting up every five seconds while Jeff and I struggle to keep up, inevitably ending in an overloaded stupor, wondering how he can still manage to keep a straight face, let alone operate a moving vehicle. (Though we both know it’s because he’s found his place in outer space and hasn’t come down for years.) I always sit invisibly in the back, listening to Jeff and him chat back and forth; watching, observing. Every so often they call to me or say my name, but I usually just keep staring intently out the window and don’t answer (I know I’ll hear more if I pretend I’m not listening).

The road itself, however, changes with the change of the seasons. Naturally, the scenery is always different — from the beautiful coloured leaves of late August that are just starting to turn, to the cloudy and strangely cool summer days. The coming of November sets the deer into a mating frenzy, and they dart across the road like targets at a shooting gallery. Though instead of aiming for them, a sudden jerk of the steering wheel and a squealing of tires frequently interrupt our dazed lulls.

I think of all of our trips up the forgotten highway in the past. I remember the horrified look on his face when Jeff, half-naked (after one too many zoomies), started to climb out of the rolled-down window of the moving car, claiming that he was just trying to catch up with his shadow. Jeff always was somewhat of a Peter Pan — fun, mischievous, and always with bright, twinkling eyes.

I remembered that summer. It had been a particularly cheerful one, filled with many flashes of memories — the kind that you can only catch a glimpse of in your mind and then in half a second, they’re gone.

This time though, it was the dead of winter. The highway was now barren, cold, and asleep. We first stopped to grab a bite to eat at the truck stop-style diner about four hours outside of the city. The place smelt of coffee and cigarettes, and even at this time a few lingering bodies remained scattered around the tables. Most of the people were either locals or northern truckers, and their faces and demeanors were as worn as the old highway itself. And we were just one of them.

Jeff slapped down some money on the counter for gas and grub, and we were off again. I resumed my usual routine of sitting quietly in the backseat, listening to Jeff and him banter back and forth. Often, they would get into arguments and both their voices would start to rise, growing more and more intense. This would continue until finally they would catch each other’s eyes for a moment, one of them would grin at the other, and then they would both burst into laughter.

Their relationship was fragile, no question. Jeff had always confided in me that he fostered some deep resentment towards him. I mean, he was rude and inconsiderate; the type of guy who would lay into you just to watch you squirm. A self-proclaimed sociopath, he usually only cared about himself. But every so often, a touch of softness and kindness would overcome him that would surprise us all, and Jeff’s faith in him would be restored. It was this constant state of teetering equilibrium combined with the unconditional care for one another that I had always found to be so profound, so beautiful.

My thoughts were shattered by Jeff’s uneasy voice: “Follow the road, not the snow,” Jeff instructed him. It was snowing heavily now, and the snow was blowing slightly off-kilter to the direction of the road. It would have been obvious enough to anyone else to watch the road, but not to someone who had now lit up at least 10 times in the last six hours. “Follow the road, not the snow,” Jeff repeated, his voice becoming more panicked, shriller. And then finally, he simply screamed, “Look out!!” and with that, we ploughed headfirst into the ditch, the snow reaching halfway up our windows.

So naturally, all we could do was stand there in a stupor, in the middle of the night, in the middle of an empty highway, and attempt to hitchhike back to town.

Fortunately, a late-night semi-driver picked us up and drove us back to a nearby town. After trying for an hour to convince the man running the convenience store to suit up and help us, he finally agreed — for a hefty sum. Naturally, I was the only one with any money and so I forked out $200 for the tow-truck. At this point, I was so tired and cold that I was glad to pay it.

Of course, after we were back on the road for 20 minutes, the lights in the car started to slowly dim, and finally shut off completely. We didn’t know exactly what was wrong, but the battery was definitely dying. After some debate, we decided to continue our journey in complete darkness, invisible to the semis that whizzed by going 110 km/h, just missing us.

Once we got to Thompson, the car decided it couldn’t go any further and so we slept. No, we didn’t get a hotel room like any normal, rational people might have done (who weren’t complete cheap-asses). We slept in the car, in the Wal-Mart parking lot, waiting until 10 a.m. when the auto centre opened. It might have been OK if the heat was working, but by this time the car was in such ill repair that we had no such luck. And to think I was complaining about the chilly three-minute walk back in Winnipeg.

Morning came, we had the car fixed, filled our bellies with some greasy breakfast, and we were finally ready for the last portion of our journey — the 300 km stretch of gravel road to the north of Thompson.

Past Thompson, the highway becomes even more treacherous and is even less tended-to. Crosses and overturned cars litter the roads like sinister threats, making sure that no one who isn’t supposed to will bother travelling there.

Jeff was tired, and so he curled up into the backseat for a nap. Who could blame him? The total travel-time was now nearing the 24-hour mark.

So there I sat, in complete silence, next to him. I always thought he was a character, though I had never been able to come to a definitive conclusion as to whether or not I liked him or hated him. Regardless, it was hard not to feel a tinge of admiration and respect. He was a superhero and a villain, all in one. There were times, though, when I could see his weaknesses show though his unflinching exterior, and I almost felt sorry for him. He had also never known his father (he had died before he was born), and I can only assume he had a tough time growing up. Or maybe he really was just an asshole.

We rarely spoke, but it always seemed as if we were always acutely aware of each other’s presence. Or maybe it was just me. He is one of those people with whom conversation is always a battle of wits, a chess game, each move placed very carefully. They told me he was incredible with a chessboard, though having never been any good at the game I couldn’t judge. Sometimes I suspected he was just a really good bullshitter, but I always wondered.

After listening to the same CD repeat three times over, he turned to me and asked, “What’s your favourite kind of ice cream?”

“I don’t have one,” I replied, without looking over. And then, after a 10-minute pause, “What’s yours?”

“Pineapple,” he replied, and grinned.

Never had such simple dialogue been so loaded.

We continued our bout of verbal chess for awhile, with long pauses in between moves. Eventually abandoning the game, we both reverted back into our own thoughts, eyes fixated on the highway, watching the big, winter sun set over the horizon.

Our trips, like the memories they produced, were never more than a brief glitch in time. Sometimes we would spend two days driving, just to spend one at our destination. The road was never about reality; but there was nothing more real. The highway has so many stories to tell, and awaits many more to be told. The highway is not a part of our stories; we are a part of its. For we are mere travellers coming and going, but it always remains. Sometimes I wondered if one day, we would remain trapped in its fairytale, never to return. We would just keep on driving up the forgotten road as it stretched out in front of us, forever. Infinite.

Remembering Jeff, I looked back to see if he was OK. He was asleep, wrapped up in his jacket. Bright eyes resting, for the moment. The sight was so purely innocent, so sweet, that my heart still wrenches just thinking about it.

“Jeff still sleeping back there?” he asked, glancing at the rearview mirror into the backseat, where Jeff was resting. “Awww,” he swooned, sarcastically, but a warm smile spread across his lips.

“Life is good,” he said, and then laughed a hilarious laugh, exposing a missing tooth. “It’s always all good.”

“Wake up son!” he yelled, as Jeff stirred. “We’re here.”