The Marzipan Fruit Basket Read online

  “FUCK YOU, YOU FUCKIN’ CRUSTY FUCKER.” An eloquence of fucks. Adjective. Verb. Noun. There was an English lesson in there somewhere. She was fifteen and suspended from school. Irony.

  Her teacher was, according to Summer, “a fuckin’ perv,” but the real reason for skipping was a shift change. At three o’clock, the lines formed at the east gate, past the wooden security shack and the twelve-foot-high fencing with barbed wire. The line snaked back, curled around the plant, engines running, while the short-of-breath security guard, in a grey Stainmaster shirt and pants, checked the truck beds and trunks, searching for stolen bumpers and hand tools. The line could take forty-five minutes to clear. “They’re all fuck’in pervs. They like it when I jump in and show them my tits. For a twenty, I go down on them, and they don’t lose their place. I pull my hair back. They like that. Short skirts and T-shirts with no bra. Makes ’em hard. I can do five in a row easy. Then I puke it up. Bet you can’t make no fuckin’ hunered bucks in half’en hour.”

  She was in Grade Nine.

  I was shocked to discover that thirty minutes from my safe, middle-class life, people lived in such circumstances. No hydro. No water. Whole families squatting in abandoned buildings. Street kids sleeping in wrecked cars. Kids coming to school in deep winter without coats or boots, sitting at their desks with bleeding gums and teeth loose from scurvy.

  Summer was a survivor. She had already found a way to look after herself. The monthly cheque her mother received paid the rent and a few bills. There was never enough left for a full month of food. It was her mother who had sent Summer to “work.” Told her where to find the men and what to say to them. How to swallow.

  Summer and I had one standoff. I had attempted to chastise her for not making school a priority. “Fuck you, bitch,” she snapped. Her blue eyes focused on me intently. She moved her tiny child-like body right up to me, the smell of her strong and feral, placing her feet apart in a firm stance. She clenched her small fists and spat at me, “You just don’t fuckin’ get it!” We would have looked ridiculous to a passer-by. Me, the authority, dressed in a flowered summer dress, stepping backwards from the girl, who was all of ninety pounds, menacing and ready to pounce.

  She left school in early October. I was patrolling the smoking area at lunch when a battered black limousine pulled up; they were recruiting workers to harvest weed up north. She seemed to be expecting the summons and jumped in without hesitation. She yelled to a couple of others and they climbed in as well. “See you in two weeks,” one of them cheerfully called out while pulling the door shut. I tried to get the license plate number, but there didn’t seem to be one.

  We attempted to phone their homes but the phone numbers were out of service and the addresses bogus. It was not uncommon to discover that many of our students listed the local convenience store as their mailing address. We notified the police department, but, in truth, no crime had yet been committed. They were not missing. They were “employed.” This was not, I was told, an atypical disappearance.

  There was a biker clubhouse to the east of us, and, when they were having a membership meeting, they would swing by the school and collect a dozen girls, offering them free modelling lessons. Drugged and costumed, the girls would be used as dancers and live entertainment. The lucky ones might make it back a week later. Others, more susceptible to the crack-laced pot, would develop an affinity for the drug that would keep them captive.

  Some of the girls told Jade this when they returned and she, in turn, told me. “The guys in the black limo, miss, are messed. They’re all fuckin’ whacked. They don’t give two shits about nobody. They all got fuckin’ tats from prison. Tears for every sonofabitch they killed. Two or three each. And tattooed shit crawling up their necks. They’re fuckin’ psycho. There are girls locked in rooms in the basement. You gotta’ tell people to stay away from that limo.”

  Jade was my source. If something was about to go down anywhere in the school, she would give me a heads-up. It wasn’t that she expected me to do anything about it; she just wanted me to know that she was connected. I respected this.

  Jade aspired to dance at the Dynasty, a local hang-out for guys on the line, where sixteen-year-old girls could jump on a table and earn whatever money was shoved into their costumes. The costumes themselves didn’t have to be fancy—laced leather skirts, bikini tops, and strappy heels would do. Sometimes the girls wore their outfits to school and were indignant when I made them cover up with a T-shirt.

  I tried to tell Jade that there was more to life. That she could go to college and work anywhere she wanted. She scoffed. College was not part of her world. She was vociferous in her contempt for my prim sanctimony. She showed me her tracks and the tiny puncture marks between her toes. I learned to abbreviate my lectures, curtail my judgment, and to laugh a little.

  “K, miss, like what the fuck do I need to know that shit for? Ya’ think some Joe’s gonna come up to me and say, “Yo, Jade, like can you show me how to fuckin’ calculate the circumference of a cylinder. No way, Miss. It’s just a bunch of fuckin’ useless bullshit.”

  Although she was only fifteen, she had things to do, places to go, money to earn. If she dropped by the school three or four times a week, attending two or three classes a day, that was a concession. A good-faith demonstration that conceded a willingness to credit that maybe there was something to learn. As long as we didn’t, “just fuckin’ waste her time.”

  One afternoon, as the bell rang, our doors were pushed open and streams of teenagers escaped from the building, running purposefully to the front field. A car pulled up, and a young man I did not know jumped out with a length of pipe in one hand and a knife in the other. I ran toward the crowd that was quickly forming. They broke apart respectfully when I reached them, and I stepped forward into the ring. One of our students, a tough grade-ten boy, lay in the grass curled into a foetal position, his arm slashed and his face and head badly beaten. The attacker escaped in the waiting car. The boy was in shock. I radioed the office for an ambulance. The onlookers stood back, watching me.

  “What happened?” I screamed at them. “Who did this? Tell me what just happened here!” But they were all quiet and avoided eye contact with me. The victim couldn’t or wouldn’t speak either. “Is this what you want?” I yelled. “Do you want this violence at school? Tell me what happened!” They stepped backwards, away from my anger, and the crowd thinned quickly, leaving me alone in the centre of the field with the wounded boy.

  A couple of days later, Jade dropped by my office. “It was a set-up, Miss. A beating-in. He had to prove himself.”

  I was incredulous. “You mean he knew the attackers? He could have been killed.”

  “Yeah, sure. But now he’s safe. He belongs. He made it to the first level. He’s protected now.”

  “What do you mean, the first level? What gang is this?”

  “I’m not sayin’. Miss, there’s some shit you shouldn’t know.”

  “Why not?”

  “’Cause they’re fuckin’ all over, that’s why. And they’d mess me up if they thought I was talkin’ smack about them.”

  “What’s the first level? What does that mean?”

  “It’s like beginner. To work your way up, you gotta do shit. Bad shit. And then you move up.”

  “What kind of bad shit, Jade?”

  “You know, small stuff. Rob a store. Steal a car.”

  “And then what happens?”

  “Then, you become trusted. More powerful. Then you have to gang-bang a chick. And the last thing is you whack someone. That’s all I know.”

  I was silent. And she was scared. Just telling me these things had subdued her.

  “Ya’ gotta be careful, Miss. There’s a lot you don’t know. You can’t mess with this shit.”

  I could not help but wonder what Jade would be like if she attended another school, lived in another community. At fiftee
n, she was dressed like the tough, south-end chick she was. Her hair was shoulder-length and carefully curled into soft, big waves. She wore thick foundation with elaborate eye makeup, intense red lip gloss, and glitter on her cheekbones. Tight jeans and a deeply unbuttoned, sheer black blouse made up her look. It suited her. But sometimes, I just wanted to scrub her face and see what would happen. I wondered what it would take to get her to college. “You can be so much more than this,” I had repeatedly told all of them. “You can be anything you want to be.”

  “Hey Miss,” Jade beckoned to me one day in the hallway, “I met this really cool guy, he’s going to look after me.”

  I don’t remember my exact response, but it was likely something prim and unenthusiastic, “Well I hope he wants you to graduate.”

  “This is it!” she announced about a month later. She had dropped into my office, and was perched on the edge of my desk. “You’ll be glad to know, I’m fuckin’ done. Checkin’ out. Gonna have a kid. You’re not goin’ to have to mess with me no more.”

  “A baby?” I repeated stupidly. “Are you getting married, Jade?”

  “Fuck, no!” she said, “I’m gonna be a baby momma. He don’t gotta marry me for that.”

  “But Jade,” I protested, “you’re so smart. You could do so much with your life.”

  “An’ I’m doin’ it, bitch. Don’t you see? It’s workin’ out. I’m gonna have my own kid. I get paid to have kids. Lots of beootiffal babies.”

  My protests and sadness were left unspoken. Instead I looked at her. She was smiling at me, looking happy and confident. This was something she could do. It was something that made sense to her.

  School Days

  WHEN CARLA WALKS through the classroom door, I welcome her and pass her the handouts she needs. Her arms are scarred by the cuts she herself has made. The other students sense her distrust. I become entirely aware of her, softening my speech and establishing a quieted tone. Despite my best efforts, she bolts from the room long before the bell rings. I relax to see her leave, but then am engulfed with a sense of shame, and run after her to the nearby washroom. She cowers in the corner, hands over her face, trembling like a wild creature caught.

  I look in the mirror and I see my sister’s face. She was lovely: exotic with long lashes and a sensual energy that earned her a reputation. She was suspended from school repeatedly. “Willful.” “Disrespectful.” “Lazy.” “Careless.” “Rude.” These words formed her legacy. I was looked at disapprovingly by the teachers when I first began Junior High. I was the younger one. They waited for me to demonstrate my familial failings, my bad blood.

  I needed to be silent and unnoticed. To slouch in my seat and be passed over, to shelter in the library or an empty hallway at lunch.

  On the first day of class, Mr. Hawkins took attendance and moved me from an unobtrusive spot at the back to front-row centre. “I knew your sister,” he intoned, “and I’ll have none of that again.” I shuffled forward while my classmates peered with interest. The hallways echoed with his unkind words for weeks afterwards, as the boys parroted him. I took refuge in the stairwell until I calculated that they had grown bored and moved away.

  We began the second day of class with an introduction to Shakespeare. My classmates struggled to stay awake. I was rapt. Leaning forward, I took down in tiny script everything that Hawkins said. The poetry and the structure of the play were breathtaking. Too quickly, the class was over and we were dismissed for lunch. I was in a daze. I had never encountered anything like it. It was masterful. And this hateful man had opened a world to me without acknowledging any sense of awe.

  I was called upon to read a long soliloquy by Cassius. I read well. I did not stop at the end of my page but continued through until the end of the speech. Then I sat down. Triumphant. “Pride, Miss Maccarone, goeth before a fall,” Mr. Hawkins pronounced.

  Our first book report was due by the end of the month. The other girls in the class handed in their reports with wool bows tied through the holes of the three-ring paper, and little daisy chains decorating their title pages. Mine was neatly typed and stapled together in the top left-hand corner. The following Monday we received our papers back. Mine had a large “D-” written in red pencil. There was no explanation. No commentary. My face burned. I waited until the class was dismissed and I stood facing him. My knees were knocking. “Why?” I simply asked him, holding out my paper.

  “You could not possibly have read that book,” he sneered. “You obviously plagiarized the report from the book cover or from someone else. I don’t like cheaters.” He gathered his notes, slid them into a leather valise, and walked out of the classroom. I was too ashamed to tell anyone.

  I wondered what my sister had done to incur such hatred.

  He exacted upon me every cutting thing within his power. He allowed the boys to heckle and make jokes in class about Wops. He himself made disparaging remarks about immigrants and their inability to appreciate good literature. “Literature” was pronounced “Lit-ra-chure.” He signalled, in this way, permission for further ridicule, and the boys responded by calling out “brown-noser” when I raised my hand. He barked my name only when I had chosen not to participate. I would jump to my feet, responding smartly when prompted. It incensed him and I could see his neck go blotchy with rage. He diminished my answers with vague comments like, “yes, you would think that,” which produced nervous giggles from the rest of the room. Similarly, my marked tests and essays were savaged. Half marks taken off everywhere for undefined “errors.”

  I imagined my sister in Grade Seven or Eight, before she was removed from school. Leaning across his desk seductively. Brushing up against him. Arousing him. And then calling him a freak with disdain. She must have done something like that.

  In Grade Ten, I started high school. English was held in a large classroom in the academic wing. Perched on a stool under a spotlight, the room in shadows, was Mr. Amos. We filed in self-consciously and slid into seats. He waited until we were settled and then opened a book and began to read to us. Poetry. Ode on a Grecian Urn. His voice resonating beautifully. His tone rich. His pacing impeccable.

  He saw at once that I was entranced. He passed me Heart of Darkness to read while the rest of the class plodded through Jonathan Livingston Seagull. He took me aside and encouraged me to think about Conrad’s journey, his exploration of human nature. He pushed me to think. My friends teased me. They misunderstood entirely.

  My father gave me a gold cross and chain on my sixteenth birthday. He said that girls didn’t need an education; it was time to get a job. I bowed my head and did not look at him. “Yes, Papa.”

  I walked to the school office to tell them I was withdrawing. They called Mr. Amos. He told me that I was a gifted student. I should go to university, he said. There were scholarships available. I could spend four years working on an English degree—reading books. The guidance counsellor offered to call my parents. I stayed at school for the remainder of the day.

  My parents were waiting for me in the dining room when I got home. I summoned courage and went to them. My father was angry. “’Dey called fum ’de school,” he began, “an’ ’den dey tol’ me, I haf no right. I haf a right!” he bellowed.

  “I’m sorry, Papa,” I interjected, “I didn’t mean for them to call.” I was shaking. Afraid of what might come next.

  “You stay ’der,” he yelled, “’til June. But no calls to my work. Unerstan’?” He took his arm and swept the tablecloth and dinner plates off the table. Everything crashed to the floor. “Clean ’dis shit!” he roared.

  My mother helped me. I slunk down the hall and went to bed without dinner. I avoided him for days. I kept my head down at mealtime. My sister was delighted. For once she was not the centre of the storm. I saw her embracing him while he watched the evening news. She stood behind his chair and slid her arms around this neck, bending herself forward to put her cheek next to his. br />
  I discovered the New Canadian Library series. Margaret Laurence. Morley Callaghan. Hugh MacLennan. Gabrielle Roy. Stephen Leacock. I read all of them. After work one night, I took two buses to the university and picked up an admissions package. I applied as a mature student. Without a grade thirteen diploma, it was my only option.

  And then came the horrible part. I approached my parents one night when my sister was at a party. Boldly. I entered the living room with my acceptance letter and handed it to him. “I’m going to university,” I said. “They have accepted me.”

  My father was stunned. Choked silent while he absorbed and processed the information. He stood up and came towards me. “You can no do it!” he erupted. “Girls don’ go.” But I was resolved. He was violent. Smashing things. Threatening.

  “I dare you,” I said, “go ahead. Hit me. You don’t own me!”

  He towered over me, the veins raised on his temples, his fists clenched. I waited for the blow, but it did not happen. I opened my eyes. He spit in my face and cursed me. He pushed me hard against the wall so that I smashed my head and saw swirls of black and gold. My vision blurred. He left the house.

  “What have you done?” my mother cried. “Oh, what have you done?”

  I walk to Carla quietly and put my arms around her, pulling her gently into the safety of my embrace. I hold her and do not speak. I cannot protect her for long.

  Maid of Honour

  MY DAUGHTER WANTS TO LOOK at my wedding pictures, but I prefer to keep the album safely tucked away. Mixed memories are hard to explain, especially when she turns the plastic pages to the wedding party, posed self-consciously on a staircase in an old, grand house rented for the occasion and, particularly, when she asks me about my maid of honour.

  I met my maid of honour, Maria, in university. She wore glossy lipstick, tight jeans, and a deeply cut top, all of which contrasted sharply with the casual athletic clothing worn by everyone else. I noticed her mannerisms first: fingers splayed and hands held away from her body in gestures of helplessness. She seemed entirely out of sync with the burgeoning feminism around us. I wondered if she was a graduate student plant, one of the unending experiments taking place all over campus to monitor social behaviour. (One afternoon while crossing a courtyard, I observed a large crowd watching a young man have an epileptic seizure. “Don’t call 911,” someone shouted authoritatively. “It’s just another Zimbardo stunt.”) But, over lattes, sipped standing up against a grimy counter, I was disarmed by her and began to believe that she was consciously trying to find herself.