The Upending of Wendall Forbes, page 14
“Oh, he’s serious,” Ruby assures Tyler. “And it would be wonderful to meet you! A full house is a happy house, as far as I’m concerned.” Lowering her voice, she adds, “Maybe you can talk some sense into him.” Then she says to Wendall, Tyler assumes, “Well, someone has to, dear.”
By the time the call ends, it’s decided. Tyler will continue northwest to visit Wendall and Ruby in Twenty-Six Mile House instead of back-roading it over to Tim’s cottage.
He calls Darcey back and reports the plan. She is tremendously relieved and impressed that he is going to drive up to check on them. “You really are a good guy, Tyler.”
“All part of the secret agent gig, my friend.”
Darcey laughs. “Oh, we’re friends now, are we?”
“It’s a place to start,” says Tyler. “You, sir, are a shameless flirt.” “I try.”
“I didn’t say you were good at it. Just shameless. Listen, you better get going. You’ve got my number. Call me later with updates, okay?”
“Roger that.”
“Oh, brother.” Darcey ends the call.
Feeling like a superhero after his conversation with Darcey, Tyler inches the car out of the McDonald’s parking lot onto the busy street and takes the northbound ramp onto the highway. It’ll take ten hours to get to Twenty-Six Mile House, according to Ruby. He sets the cruise control and turns his grandma’s words over in his mind: Sometimes you just have to get out there and go. Have an adventure. Take a risk!
My faith has been tested lately.
At Sudbury, Tyler takes the bypass that skirts the southern edge of the city. The Big Nickel monument is on the other side of Kelly Lake, too far north to see from the highway. He saw a picture of it as a kid, but he doesn’t have time for sightseeing.
West of the city, the four lanes of the Trans-Canada Highway funnel into a two-lane ribbon of menacing tractor-trailers and impatient holiday travellers. The pavement is dry. The shoulders are piled with plowed snow. An occasional innocent-looking snowflake swirls in the air.
There is a Tim Hortons coffee shop at Espanola. Tyler parks the Caddy at the truck stop next door where the parking lot is less crowded, and hurries across to use the washroom. The large coffee he picked up in Parry Sound is threatening to burst his bladder. He washes his hands and gives up on the lukewarm breath the hand dryer is sighing.
Tyler wipes his wet hands on his pants while he joins the “Order Here” lineup. Mindful of the miles to go before he sleeps, he orders to go: three sandwiches, half a dozen donuts, two bottles of water, a large chocolate mike, and another large coffee—double-double, in the coffee chain’s parlance.
Waiting at the “Pick Up Here” counter for his order, Tyler remembers his friend Oliver saying, “You don’t know how big Ontario is until you’ve driven across it.” Ollie had been a summer research assistant near Kenora, in the Experimental Lakes Area. It took him twenty-four hours and a change in time zones to drive from Toronto to Kenora. “And you’ve still got another forty-five minutes to Manitoba,” Oliver told Tyler and Tim. “Crazy!”
“I made up a song about it,” Ollie told his friends. “Rocks and trees, rocks and trees. Oh, look! A lake! Aaand more rocks and trees, rocks and trees. Oh, look! A lake! Aaand more rocks and trees…” The song was set to the tune of “Pop Goes the Weasel.” He kept singing it over and over—“Sing it with me!”—until Tyler and Tim pinned him to the floor of his apartment and jammed a cushion over his face.
Back at the car, Tyler spreads the blanket from the trunk out on the passenger seat, then carefully organizes the food on it for easy access. He unwraps the sandwiches, opens the donut box lid, and balances the coffee and the chocolate milk on the slide-out cupholders.
He decides to eat first, and then call Darcey. He doesn’t want to chew in her ear while they talk. He connects to his phone’s Bluetooth with his earbuds before he pulls out, so he will be able to keep his eyes on the road and his hands on the wheel.
Tyler devours two of the sandwiches, the chocolate milk, and half the donuts while he drives. He decides to hold off eating the two powdered donuts until he’s not in the car. He carefully folds up the crumb-filled napkin on his lap and drops it into the takeout bag on the passenger side floor. He does all this without taking his eye off the road.
“Redial, last number,” Tyler instructs his phone. It does.
“Tyler?”
“Agent Tyler Berger, reporting ma’am.” God, listen to that laugh.
“Where are you?”
“Um, just rolling through a place called Spanish.”
“Spanish?” Darcey pauses. “You’re making good time.”
“You know where Spanish is?”
“I’m following you on Google Maps. You must be speeding, though. By my calculations, you should only be in Espanola, maybe Massey. Be careful.”
“The speed limit is ninety kilometres per hour, but everyone’s driving at least a hundred.”
“Ninety? That’s fifty-five miles an hour. How are the roads?”
“Good.”
“Be careful.” Darcey says it again.
“Can I ask you something? Why are you so interested in Ruby and Wendall?”
“Maybe it’s you I’m interested in.”
Tyler stammers, “Well, um, then why didn’t you tell me to drive to Indianapolis?”
“Maybe this is a test.” She laughs. “I don’t know. I guess I was frightened when I heard Wendall telling Ruby he wanted her to kill him. It was kind of funny at first. I mean, Ruby’s reaction was funny. She was, like, okay whatever, can I finish this chapter, but then they both started crying. It tore my heart out. Did you call them back?”
“No, Wendall refuses to talk on the phone, and it sounds like they are busy with their company, anyway.”
“Maybe they’re entertaining angels unaware.”
“That’s a quote, right?” Tyler asks. “What’s that from? Shakespeare?”
“The Bible. When I was a little kid, I was the Sunday school supastar! The other girls hated me. I still go sometimes, to church with my parents, on holidays or whatever. My faith was tested. And it failed. Christmas Eve was nice, though.”
“Tested?” Tyler waits while Darcey considers her response.
“Let’s just say what I was taught in Sunday school isn’t working for me anymore.”
“Huh. Hey, maybe you know about Zechariah?”
“Which one?”
“Ruby told me Wendall says the angels shut his mouth, just like Zechariah.”
“John the Baptist’s dad. Huh.”
They are quiet for a while, then Tyler asks, “How did you end up at Tranquil?”
“My twin brother and I started Tranquil when we were in college,” Darcey answers. “It was for a business class project about entrepreneurialism. To be honest, we were trying to be ironic. Get it? A megacorporation business plan that puts people to sleep. We thought it was hilarious, an anti-hyper business, you know? No one in our class thought it would take off, especially us. We nearly failed but our plan was solid, even if ridiculous. We had no idea how many people can’t slow their minds down enough to fall asleep. It’s a disease. Turns out Tranquil is a hit. It isn’t a lot of work to run. We feel good about helping people, and it more than pays the bills.”
A brief pause, then Darcey continues. “Where are you?”
“I’m just rolling past a place called Serpent River. No snakes but a nice-looking Trading Post.”
Another pause. “Did you know that Darcey means Dark One?” “Nice.”
They pass the miles quizzing each other on their favourite books, bands, movies, and ice cream flavours. They talk about their parents, childhoods, and hopes for the future. Time slips past effortlessly until Darcey says, “Shoot! You’re bre—ing up…”
The cell service is cutting out and then there is none. Tyler pulls off into a picnic area. The wooden tables are iced with a thick layer of snow, like giant wedding cakes. He gets out of the car and wanders the parking area, tapping redial and waving the phone above his head. Still no bars.
He texts Darcey: No service. Call u l8r. Sooner or later, he assumes he will drive through a smidgen of cell service and the text will send.
Over the course of the afternoon, what had been innocent looking snowflakes back in Sudbury are gathering in number, swarming the car and spiralling across the highway on gusts of wind. The highway traces close to the north shore of Lake Superior. A few kilometres west of Sault Ste. Marie, near Batchewana Bay, the clouds in the sky turn the colour of wet clay.
By the time Tyler is passing Pancake Bay, those clouds open up and start dumping snow in earnest.
Tyler pulls off onto the shoulder to orient himself to the windshield wiper controls. Back on the road, he focuses all his attention on the hairpin turns, white-knuckled climbs, brake-pumping descents, and blind rock cuts. The road surface disappears beneath six inches of slush. His grandmother has probably never even considered snow tires in Toronto. During his internship in North Bay, Tyler has heard people talking about studded tires but isn’t quite sure what they are or where he’d get a set. He is at least three hours out from Twenty-Six Mile House, at best speed.
It’s snowing sideways. Is this normal?
It is after 10:00 p.m. and a storm is raging outside the house. Alejandro and Wendall stand side by side at the front window, watching it like car crash gawkers. The outlines of the houses across the street are barely visible through the blast of snow squalls. The wind howls, rattling the sheet metal cap on top of the chimney.
Alejandro cants his head to the right. “It’s snowing sideways. Is this normal?”
Wendall nods and presses his lips together in a tight line. Sometimes it’s normal, but it’s never good. This is no run-of-the-mill winter storm. He can see that already, and it looks like it is just getting started. There’s a weather riot brewing out there.
A plastic garbage bin bounces past the house and down the street, spewing grocery bags and meat trays. The bin and the lid lashed to it are more airborne than earthbound. A long, undulating blade of vinyl siding and a flock of dislodged shingles look like they are chasing the bin. A bang hammers hard against the upwind side of the house. Wendall and Alejandro reflexively duck.
Alejandro puts his hand to his chest and turns to Wendall. “What was that?”
“What was that?” Ruby whisper-calls from the bedroom. She is lying on the bed with Bella, who is sleeping like, well, a baby, undisturbed by the bang.
“What was that?” Sarah echoes from the laundry room downstairs.
Wendall shrugs. It was likely a branch, another airborne trash can, or their neighbour’s doghouse being bashed against the house by the gale-force winds. It could have also been the house itself, its timbers complaining about the precipitous drop in temperature. Mother nature is out on a tear tonight. Drunk and disorderly, and looking for a fight. Wendall thinks, I should write that down.
“Is just the wind!” Alejandro calls out to Ruby and Sarah. He looks to Wendall for confirmation. “Right?”
Wendall nods, then puts his hand on Alejandro’s shoulder.
Alejandro peels his eyes away from the winter rampage outside the window to consult the weather app on his phone. Weather Alert: Severe Winter Storm Warning, it reads. He holds the phone up to show Wendall. “It’s red. That can’t be good.” Alejandro navigates to a storm-tracking satellite map. “Looks like it is stalled on the north shore of Lake Superior. What’s a snow train?”
Wendall peeks over Alejandro’s shoulder at the satellite map, scrunches his lips up like a pouch pulled closed by a drawstring, and reads: Wind speeds up to 100 kph.
Sarah joins them in the living room. Wendall sees she has repaired her glasses with the glue he found for her. He had mimed fixing them for her. She just kissed his cheek, patted his arm, and accepted the small tube. “You’re so sweet, Wendall.” The repaired bridge above Sarah’s nose, Wendall notices, could use a wee bit of sanding to clean up the excess glue.
Ruby tiptoes out from the bedroom and gently lowers the bundled Bella into her portable playpen. Undisturbed by the storm, or the change in venue, she continues to sleep, moving her lips in little kisses. The four adults stand protected by the double-paned window, mesmerized by the storm raging on the other side of it. Were they not so enthralled by the storm, they might notice that they are standing in identical postures: eyes wide, arms wrapped around their bodies, chins drawn down to their chests, their heads pulled back on their necks.
The snow is like an avalanche thundering down a mountainside, intent on burying a town at the bottom. Shingle shrapnel clatters against the side of the house. A wide piece of vinyl siding glances off the window. Everyone except Wendall jumps back. He is equally startled, but his reflexes aren’t as quick as they used to be.
Wendall is also preoccupied. Specifically, he thinks, I’m surprised the power isn’t out. In a storm like this one… And before he has completed the thought, there is a distant bang, like a gunshot. The unmistakable sound—unmistakable to Wendall, anyway—of an electrical transformer shorting out. The first bang is followed by a second. The lights on the Forbeses’s little Christmas tree wink out, along with every other light in the house. The streetlights all over Twenty-Six Mile House go dark.
Wendall takes no pride in his prediction of the power outage. Nor does he want to be right about a second prophecy that occurs to him: With a storm like this one, the power could be out for days.
Draw nearer, draw nearer.
They unconsciously shift closer to one another until their shoulders are touching. The storm and the sudden darkness shrink the distance and expand the intimacy between them. The house seems to be getting cold already, threatening them with death by freezing. (Wendall knows it isn’t that simple.)
Moments ago, they were convivial strangers; now they are co-survivalists. As suddenly as a transformer malfunctions, vulnerability bonds them to one another in an elemental way, like clans or sports fans.
Between blasts of snow, they can see that every house on the street is dark. The storm rages without sympathy for the stranded residents of Twenty-Six Mile House. Snow continues to pile onto the town; the gale-force winds pound it rock-hard into drifts.
The wind howls outside, and the familiar sounds inside the house are silent. The refrigerator, the furnace fan, and the clothes dryer have all stopped humming. The previously omnipresent digital clocks on the stove and microwave and the VCR downstairs have gone dark. It is as though everything is bowing down to the storm.
Through the heavy sheets of snow, Ruby can see pinpricks of lighters and matchsticks and candles popping to life in houses up and down the street. Flashlights sweep about inside them as if burglars are cleaning out their neighbours’ homes.
Ruby scoops Bella up from her playpen, swaddles her more tightly in the quilt, and presses her against her chest to share her warmth. Bella continues to sleep.
Wendall lights a candle and positions it next to a stack of magazines on the coffee table. The match, and then the candle, flare in the darkness. He retrieves a flashlight from the junk drawer in the kitchen, and motions for Alejandro and Sarah to follow him out to the garage. He loads their arms, and then his own, with splits of firewood. We better get a fire on, now, he thinks. It’s easier to keep the heat than to get it back.
“We have headlamps,” says Alejandro. “Downstairs in our camping gear.”
Sarah sets her armful of wood down on the hearth. “I’ve got it. I think I know where they are.” She takes the flashlight from Wendall and goes downstairs.
Wendall lowers himself to his knees in front of the fireplace and opens the flue. A cold downdraft flows into the room. He shivers, then puts a match to a curl of birch bark, sets it on the grate, and piles small sticks on top of it. The diminutive pyre chases the draft back up the chimney. He feeds more kindling and a few larger splits of maple into the fire. In no time, he has a fire burning, holding the darkness at bay, chasing off the cold. He warms his hands over the flames and then reaches up so Alejandro can help him to his feet.
Ruby pushes Big Blue closer to the fire and cradles Bella in the nest of her lap. She sings softly. “Fire’s burning, fire’s burning. Draw nearer, draw nearer. In the gloaming, in the gloaming. Come sing and be merry.”
Alejandro joins in humming, making it a round. His deep baritone harmonizes with Ruby’s aged soprano.
The song fades, and Ruby says, “You know, they never told us Girl Guides that song came from ‘London’s Burning,’ about the horrific fire. I only read about it years later. Makes you see it differently when you know.”
Sarah is back with the headlamps. She is wearing one. It sweeps around the room, blinding everyone. She clicks it off and extinguishes the candle with a puff. “Waste not, want not. Right?”
The fireplace casts sufficient light and creates a cave of warmth in the living room.
Alejandro is at the front window, awestruck by the magnificence of the storm. “There’s a car on the street!” His voice rises. “Look! Look! ¡Santo Dios! Who would be crazy enough to be driving on a night like this? Wow!”
The others join him at the window to watch a big car bucking through the rising drifts, slowly making its way down the street. The car’s headlights momentarily disappear as it plunges into another packed drift of hard snow. Then they reappear, like the lights on a ship casting in the swells and troughs of a rough sea.
The car falters. Its tires spin, losing traction. Then, when all appears to be lost, they catch. The car regains a slip of forward momentum. In the deep snow, however, the driver miscalculates the edge of the street. The car slides sideways into the ditch in front of the Forbeses’s house. The driver spins the tires ineffectually. The car slides sideways, deeper into the ditch. This car isn’t going anywhere. The car and its driver are irredeemably stranded.
