Alice, part seven Sep 24 '08    Write an essay on this topic. Tweet Popular Products in Toys Disney Pooh's Afternoon Nap 1000 Piece P From $10 The Bottom Line Copyright 2008 David MacDonald Thomas had never been in her apartment before, and he didn’t know what to expect. He had been so used to living in a house he wondered how someone as old as Alice could still live in an apartment, and help pay someone else’s mortgage. And Thomas remembered his own apartments as being less than ideal. Just some dive on the bad part of town. “Don’t be startled if you hear a bit of an echo - it happens sometimes!” Alice teased as she unlocked her apartment door, a large wooden door with fading black paint that gave it a rustic flavour. “Do you live in a cave?” Thomas asked, laughing. “Well, sometimes those echoes make things less lonely, like I’m hearing voices or something,” Alice looked at him hoping to string him along with a plea for understanding, or maybe just a curious look as if his girlfriend were a bit loopy. “Sure, Alice, you hear voices!” he responded, not too convinced at her sincerity. Thomas was rather impressed with the apartment. He noticed the height of the ceiling, and the ceiling fan which hung from the centre of the living room. The room itself was large and spacious. One could push the furniture to the walls and have a dance party with ten or twenty people and there would still be enough room to move about. And he never did hear any echoes. “Do you pay a lot for this?” 𤃂 a month? Jealous?” “No,” he said. “At least I own a home.” “Hey, I just have to worry about the rent. I don’t have to worry about the heating bills or home repair. I can let my landlord do all of that.” “True....” He saw the shelves of books on one end of the wall. There were five rows of books, as well as some dusty records and more pristine compact disks, each row running about eight feet in length. “I’m a bit of a packrat,” Alice explained. “I don’t throw anything out.” “Well, you have the room for it.” Thomas’s eyes scanned the bent and creased spines of the many books. Alice watched him as he scanned the books. And her heart began to beat faster as she slipped into nervous anticipation. “Anyway, Alice... I think I’ll turn in for the night.. or the rest of the afternoon as the case may be.” “Yea... we had a long day. But it was fun.” The two gave each other a good-bye kiss, before Thomas went on his way. Alice felt a rush of relief once the door shut behind him. Today had been a good day, but discomfort lingered within for much of the day, all over an allegation towards his character that really had little to do with her. Whatever Janice had to reveal about the past was really none of Alice’s business, but Alice couldn’t help but think about it. And Thomas obviously couldn’t help but peer, albeit superficially, at what was Alice’s business, her past. She had observed him looking at the books, and would have attempted to distract him somehow if his fingers had went anywhere near one particular volume among the hundreds of books, tucked somewhere near the edge of the shelf near the floor. She was afraid if Thomas picked up that particular volume, his false interest would graduate into genuine curiosity. He would only have to open the cover and observe the first page. It was just one insignificant paperback, its cover creased from use with rough pages behind it. But as an historical document, a record of one particularly complicated moment in time, the text was vitally important. She didn’t recall whether she bought it at one of those used book stores where other university students pawned off their textbooks. Other hands may have already flipped through the pages. Other hands certainly flipped through it afterwards. But one thing she would always remember was that he would like it. That’s why she bought it for him in the first place, nearly 25 years ago. The two met in the very same course, as they were both pursuing the same degree. They seemed to share similar goals. The paperback was a collection of Alexander Pope’s poems. She wanted a copy for herself, originally. She enjoyed what she read when she was in the Restoration Literature course. But naturally the textbook required was a heavy thing with excerpts from the usual suspects like the Rape of the Lock or The Dunciad, sandwiched in between other equally dead poets. Alice was attracted to the satire, and allured by the pricking of the mundane, of the dull, or the Dulness, as Pope would write. It comforted her to know that there was something better than being ordinary. And he appeared to be not unlike her in that sense. She learned that over the days and weeks, when the two ended up talking to each other before and after class. It was interesting. He was the only male in the entire class of 12, including the professor. Most men would consider that to be a lucky turn of events, and no doubt he felt that way too. Alice felt somewhat humbled by the fact that she ended up being the object of his attention. The two would often study together, in one of the many study rooms tucked away to one side of the library. The purpose was to study the poems, to try to memorize some of the key lines for the test tomorrow. But with utter inevitability the two would stray away from the topic at hand. It was some time before the friendship extended to the outside world. They would walk the streets of downtown Charlottetown and eat somewhere other than the university cafeteria during lunch break. They would take in a movie at the Prince Edward Cinemas on Grafton Street. Or do a bit of window browsing at some of the department stores like Zellers, Woolco, Holman’s. Occasionally, they would do more than window browse. Walking leisurely across the tiled floors, they would look at the fashions in the ladies’ sections of the store. Alice never considered herself superficial, as someone who desperately needed these clothes. Besides, she couldn’t afford them anyway. But she wanted to at least get a taste of what it would be like to dress up in these clothes and look “gorgeous.” And her friend was the most handy of witnesses. She would take one - or perhaps two - dresses from the rack, and disappear into the dressing room. She emerged as a completely different woman, wearing clothes that looked all the more striking because she would never normally wear them. She would come out of the dressing room, laughing as if she had done something mildly embarrassing, while he would laugh as if the two of them had just gotten away with something. He would then compliment her on the dress, and she would pretend to brush the compliment off, as if to say oh, I’m not so hot and it’s just a silly outfit. But Alice knew their behaviour was a mask. Her friend saw Alice in a whole new way when she trotted out in a number of attractive, form-enhancing outfits. And it was only a lack of will that prevented him from saying so. Back to the dressing room she went, to try on another dress she couldn’t afford to buy. It was much this way for many months. But things changed one day at the coffee shop. They were just drinking coffee. Alice augmented the coffee with a muffin. And that’s when he asked if they could perhaps start dating. It wasn’t as if it would be a whole lot different than what happened before. After all, the two of them spent a lot of time together as a fully functioning unit without the need for others to keep them entertained. So maybe it was the time to make it official. He didn’t try to water his words to make them more flowery. He lacked the drama, but he was serious about it. Maybe he felt that way after seeing her play dress-up every few weeks. Alice tried to act as she always did, but she felt her body thawing into a rubbery state. She thought she was going to lose her grip and fall to the floor. She was struck by a wholly unusual feeling, a feeling she never had explained to her before. It was the feeling that came from being someone’s centre of attention. And she liked it, despite her internal protests. She didn’t know if she wanted to go any further. She wanted to tell her friend that she had liked things the way they were, but at the same time, she felt very touched and wanted to take the risk. After all, she liked him. She liked spending time with him. After a time, the two of them were comfortable enough to officially define themselves as a couple. Their lives separate and together seemed more or less the same, but with the added pressure of adding, and living up to, the titles of boyfriend and girlfriend. They had to get used to the added duties, but it did work for a time. When her friend graduated, he intended to go to a university in Ontario and work on his Masters degree. That had been his plan all along, and he wasn’t willing to change it even with the title of boyfriend next to his name. When Alice graduated, she had aspirations of becoming a teacher, and it was mightily convenient for her as the University of Prince Edward Island had an Education program right there. She only had to be in the program for an extra two years and she’d be ready to teach. That was her plan all along, and she wasn’t willing to change it even with the title of girlfriend next to her name. They parted, and nothing was said, in words, to suggest that a long-distance relationship would be difficult. Alice was a patient person, anyhow. She slotted certain times over the calendar year for when she would fly over and visit him for a few days or so, and he would do the same and visit her. For the first few years, this was how it went, and Alice was okay with that. She couldn’t predict what would happen to her in the future. All she could do was carry with her an idea that once he was finished of his Masters Degree, the two of them would reunite and construct a life together. One day, Alice thought it would be a bit impulsive and romantic - or at least cute - to buy him a book, and inscribe a message inside. It would have been a constant reminder of her during those days when he was alone in Toronto. The two of them bonded over the musty old classics and so it would only have been appropriate to buy him something like a paperback of Alexander Pope - a paperback was what it’d have to be. As a student amassing a large debt - although student debts weren’t as large back in the late 1980s - she couldn't buy one of those thick hardcover anthologies. But there was a cheap paperback she found at the book store which looked just right. She hand delivered the gift on her subsequent excursion to Toronto, presenting to him while they were visiting one of the city public gardens. She smiled as she requested of him to read what was written on the title page. Her message said: Thank you for all the wonderful adventures we’ve had over the years. I wish I had a suitable lock of hair on my meager head to send to you, that you could use as a bookmark or to run your fingers through like fingertips along the tangle of letters on the page. I hope you will agree that I’ve strived to be better than a mere mediocre author of my own life. Yours, Alice. Alice was able to get that entire message on the title page, her own handwritten words competing with the standard information supplied by the publisher. She hoped her words were suitably literate and witty enough to amuse him, yet she also hoped the parallel meaning of those words would touch him. He laughed and shook his head, saying that never had someone made this sort of romantic gesture to him before. He seemed to be impressed. He gave her a kiss on the mouth, remaining in position for a few moments as they stood upon the gravel trail inside the gardens. The book wasn’t mentioned much during the remainder of the visit, but it didn’t matter. Alice’s hope was to relay the message that she continued to be patient, that she would continue to wait for a time when they actually can be together as one unit for many years to come. But she would make no attempt to pressure him. She trusted him to fulfill his plans, before moving on to the next stage of his life. Time had passed, and Alice had already completed her education degree, and soon taught as a substitute in schools across the Island. She was waiting for a permanent position, and felt she would be well-established once her friend returned to the Island. She hadn’t had a chance to see him in four months or so but knew that he was about to wrap up his master’s. The time had arrived. But what she hadn’t counted on was the fact her friend had different ideas. He had been living in Toronto for four years, and had began to realize what it had to offer was much more than anything his birthplace could ever give him. One day he phoned her, to tell her he had no plans on returning to PEI, at least not as a permanent resident. He hoped she would understand, of course. He began to see things beyond his limited experience on PEI. Unlike Alice, who was born somewhere else, her friend had always been there, had always been used to being a prisoner on this sandbar. He never realized how immobile he was, in the late 1980s in this place, until he moved to a large city with hundreds of thousands of people, where there was always things going on, where there were always people of different backgrounds, shades, skins and more. His birthplace was little more than a suffocating box with pretty and distracting features that served as brainwashing propaganda, in the hopes they would make people forget how few opportunities there really were to those who elected to stay. When he was just a child he was always restless when he and his family waited for the ferry boat to dock at the Borden terminal, just so they could cross the Northumberland Strait to New Brunswick to visit family, something they may have done once or twice a year. There was no way to get off the Island, except by boat. It drained much of the incentive for people to travel, except for special trips. And it wasn’t like there was much happening on PEI to make people forget about the difficulties of going anywhere else. As a child growing up, Alice’s friend had little to compare the Island to. That is, until he went to Toronto. He no longer had an excuse to stall his life. He was at clubs and other events almost every night. His student loan was a godsend - he had enough to pay for his courses, and for much of his living expenses. He just needed a part-time job to help pay for his more frivolous activities. He got a job as a cashier at a record shop, which attracted all types of individuals. Having an English degree wasn’t required for this type of work but at least he was capable of intelligent conversation when a customer needed assistance. Alice’s friend enjoyed his time there, and became more numb to Alice’s charms. Alice only served to remind him of the place he left behind. And Alice soon figured it out. By this time she was able to secure a permanent teaching job at the school, and she wasn’t willing to give that up. It was her first real step in her career and she wanted to be there for a suitable length of time. Besides, there were too many cars on the streets, too many people she didn’t recognize, and she didn’t want to be a victim of either loneliness or a car accident. The breakup happened with as much honesty as could be expected. The two made it clear what they wanted, and that they weren’t willing to part with those plans. Her friend attempted to make her feel uncomfortable, however, telling her that he was disappointed that she didn’t want to stay and live with him in Toronto. Her friend didn’t care much about her anymore, but he was a young man, and young men like to make the women in their lives feel guilty for whatever reason. Alice remained on PEI, while her friend remained in Toronto. She allowed her wounds to heal, or so she thought. She continued working at the school, building her career, and she soon forgot about him - well, not exactly, but her feelings were merely neglected things collecting cobwebs in the corner of her memory’s room. A decade later, Alice took advantage of a Saturday afternoon to walk into a used book store recently opened on Water Street. Her hope was to at least find out if there were different titles from those she found at the other used-book shops in town. She became attracted to the books tucked away beyond the fresh free-trade coffee machine. She expected it to be a treasure trove of wonderful discoveries, although the reality was that many of the texts were old pulpy crime novels and the like. But one particular title caught her eye and she had to pull it from the shelf, like a rabbit who carelessly tripped into a noose. It was a paperback collection of Alexander Pope. The same worn spine as the one she carried with her many years ago, the one she gave away. And the front page was the same, scrawled in her handwriting, displaying her embarrassingly private message for all the curious to see. She wondered how many people picked up the book only to read her words adorning the front page. How did this book get here, thousands of kilometres away from where he started his life over again? He certainly could not have flown all the way back here, just so he could sell this book to this particular store, when there were probably used-book stores within walking distance from where he lived. He didn’t even have the class to tear out the offending page before he sold it. It was as if he wanted to mock one of his silly ex-girlfriends by commercializing her foolish romantic gesture. Or did he even realize what the book was? Maybe he just saw it in some pile of old stuff he was shifting around one day, and thought, I might as well get rid of it, not even realizing what it was. Maybe he forgot who gave it to him. He was probably married, with kids, with a different life, and had long ago buried his memories. And who else would have owned this book? What thoughts came into their minds when they saw this very individualized message? Did it spoil their enjoyment of the book, or was the reading experience all that more intimate, knowing the emotion attached to this particular volume? She could not stand the idea of another complete stranger taking possession of her intimate past. The wounds along her heart reopened and bled anew when she removed the book from the shelf. The tears began to well up as she walked to the counter. She tried to joke with the bookseller by saying that she was getting over a cold, and was feeling an urge to sneeze. She told the bookseller that it was difficult to find anything by Alexander Pope around here, and didn’t care if there was some rude graffiti smeared on the front page. After all it was only a couple of bucks. She felt fortunate that the tear did not drop down her face until she had already paid for the book and turned away from the unsuspecting woman. Alice would never have been able to explain it to the seller anyway. Why would someone cry over a book, especially a book of ancient poetry? And Alice walked, with the book clutched to her chest, along the streets of town, passing by the memories of the places that used to exist, the places she and her friend got to know each other in. Those places were no more, replaced by wholly different businesses for new couples and friends to get to know each other in. This book with the weak spine and the yellowing pages and the personal message were all that was left. * It wasn’t all that late, but Alice decided she earned some time to just relax and wind down. She took a shower, washing away all the summer air and humidity from her skin. She entered her living room, wearing only her silk robe and letting her damp hair dry with the air. She sat down with her bottle of wine. She was going to have a glass, just one. One would be enough to ease her mind, let it drift into an early sleep. But then the phone decided to ring. “Hello?” Alice said. It was Thomas on the other end. “Wow, is it next weekend already?” “It’s just my stupid ex-wife again. She’s been calling my place all day - leaving me all these fucking messages. She won’t leave me alone.” “Oh....what were they about?” Alice attempted to decipher Thomas’s anger, to feel if it was actually warranted, or possibly, alas, not. “Oh just the usual crap. She just wants to control my life, Alice. She wants to take away all my money, I’m not her personal bank account. I’m sure if she drove me to eat at a food bank, she’d expect her share of that too.” “Sounds like such a b*tch,” Alice said, not at all convinced. “So what can I do?” “I just want to come over for a while - I’m sure in a few hours she’ll stop with the complaining.” “Okay....” she said, quietly. She wondered if she were the only friend he had. One would think he’d be more likely to complain about his ex with the guys over a jug of beer and some football. His second arrival of the day at Alice’s apartment felt particularly awkward. She felt like she was expected to be his enabler. “It’s starting to rain out there,” Thomas said. “Good thing it held off while we were out.” “So.... kicked out of your own home by a disembodied voice on a telephone. And now you’re here looking for a shoulder to cry on,” Alice teased. “I don’t cry. It doesn’t do one any good.” he said. “Maybe if you cried... you’d understand how she feels....” Alice said, thinking about her own small novella of tears she once composed. What good did that do her? “I don’t think any of her tears are real....” he said, sounding flippant as if asking Alice to laugh at his stabbing words. But he was merely cruel. Alice quietly turned her back to him, with a subtle twist of her body that appeared as a natural movement to her lover’s eyes. “Maybe.... but maybe it’s better to be fake... than to be sleepless every night with worry and burst out crying in the day....” “I’m sleepless many nights. Too much coffee.” “Same here....” Alice paced further and further from him, her steps moving so slowly that he didn’t even notice until later on in the conversation. She felt confident that she could read what his expression meant, even as her back was turned to him. He was frustrated over nothing that couldn’t have been handled in better terms. He constructed this conflict with his bare hands, out of the materials of his life. She hadn’t seen her friend in many years. But she didn’t have the desire to recreate him as an antagonist responsible for ruining her life. Maybe this was a male thing - to create enemies out of their own narcissistic anger toward someone or something. Maybe if she was ever reunited with her friend, she’d see the same thing she would see in Thomas’s eyes if she did not fear turning around. But she didn’t want to look. She closed her eyes and unloosened the string wrapped around her waist. The robe slipped from her arms and onto the floor, and she remained in place as if she had forgotten Thomas was in the other side of the room. But she did not forget. She waited for him to approach. She knew he would. And she could sense him, as he came over to rest his hands on her waist and kiss her on the back of the neck. The faint sound of rain was like beads bouncing along the sidewalk. Alice kept her eyes closed as she listened to the rain, as she felt comfort in not having to make love in awkward, sterile silence. She felt his hands as they caressed the front of her stomach and up toward her breasts. She drew a huge well of breath as her body began to quietly shiver. She knew from his touch alone that he had become distracted - that his selfish anger settled down at least for a time, trading it in for a selfish lust. And it was so that Thomas was in Alice’s bed. After they made love, the two remained there for a while. He lay on his back while she sat up to look at the digital clock. 8:30 pm. “We had a packed Sunday, wouldn’t you say?” she said. “Yes, absolutely! Something for everyone.” “And just think, I could have worked on my lesson plan all day,” Alice laughed. “Yes....” Thomas muttered. Then he suddenly, abruptly stood up from the bed. “I better get going....” His behaviour was strange, Alice thought. Thomas pulled his clothes on as if he were going to be late for an important meeting. “Why do you have to go?,” Alice said, “... it’s still early... sort of.” “Gotta make sure my lunch is packed and my work clothes ready...” he said, his voice sounding distracted. “Bullsh*t,” she laughed. “Are you impatient to get to your mistress?’ He didn’t respond. He was fully dressed and walked toward the door. Alice felt anger within her. The reason for this visit was his ex-wife. He stayed here for as long as his upset lasted, and now he was going home again. Alice was nothing more than a distraction; perhaps that was all she ever was to him. But she didn’t want to make a scene. “Bored of me already?” she asked, trying to make the chat light, as she followed him toward the door. “No, of course not!” wrapping his determination with a plastic sheen of reassurance. “It’s just... what if somebody saw us in the morning, like that old nun who lives on the ground floor?” “Well, she can sprinkle some holy water on you, to cleanse you of all your sins after you leave this den of wickedness,” she said. “So that’s what you call this place?” he joked. Alice stood next to him. “I guess I ought not to complain... it was nice to spend the day with you....” “Okay...” was all he said. He gave her a goodnight kiss that was brief and unfocused, and then he was gone. It was as if she had encountered a mere ghost whose sole purpose was to haunt her life. She felt he was trying to insult her, and it succeeded. She never felt so used by a member of the male species in a long time. She wondered what sort of things his ex-wife was saying to him on the phone that angered him so. Whatever those words were, they were probably nothing like what Alice was thinking right now.

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