Becoming Normal

Malcolm woke to the ticking of the clock. Each tick churned his insides, each tick a grain of sand falling from the hour glass of his life. Outside, he saw the tops of bare trees swaying. A flock of sparrows scattered. Raindrops tapped the window.

He had been putting things off, hoping everything would be different. Rachel would wake up happy and he content. On this morning like many others before, he rolled over to the expanse of her vacant space, an arm’s length across a bed that stretched out of sight. She had gone to the couch sometime during the night. A backache or headache, maybe heartache.

He dressed without washing. Most of his stuff was packed. He’d been packed and unpacked so many times before, it didn’t mean anything anymore. She would not stir from the couch now. They would not speak. All the words had been said. In light moments, he had admitted his shortcomings, his self-absorbed nature, his flair for dramatics. She would chuckle, look away and wait. In sober moments when they attempted to flush things out, she’d use his confessions against him.  He would counterattack. They would shout and point at the same time. She would lock herself in the washroom. He would apologize. She wouldn’t answer. He would go play his guitar. Round and round, over and over.

The rain picked up. It was better that way. It put a haze on everything. Malcolm pulled the collar of his army surplus trench coat tight and threw his guitar case among half filled boxes, wires and green garbage bags filled with his belongings. He had to push hard to get the hatchback of his little import closed. He looked towards the house one last time. There in the window, Rachel,  a silhouette wrapped in the housecoat he got her last Christmas  at the last minute. Her hand pressed on the glass whitened by the pressure put upon it. He couldn’t see her face. He didn’t want to. She was probably crying and he had seen enough of her tears. The sight of them made him numb. Endless wet  little reminders of their failures together. He raised his right hand as if to take an oath. Fingers spread slightly. His hand,  the reverse image of the one on the window. One last connection, the final flittering surge of an energy flow that was once electric. His fingers slowly rolled into a gentle fist as he turned away fumbling in his pocket for his keys.

Rachel listened  for the car door to slam shut, for the engine to start. Maybe this time it wouldn’t. It always had trouble in wet weather. But the engine sputtered and fired. A couple of revs and the car pulled away, turning the corner, rattles and squeaks fading into the distance. Then, nothing but the rain and her heart pounding in her chest, in her back and in her ears. Her hand still on the window.

Later, under the unrelenting spray of her hot steamy shower her tears disappeared. She scrubbed her skin clean. “I’ve been through this before,” she whispered to herself, “Eventually I won't think about him.” She could see herself sitting with an old friend one afternoon, drinking wine, talking and laughing. Reminiscing about yesterdays. About good times, about sexual encounters, about new ventures, about her children, about planned vacations, about when Malcolm left.

****

“Free at last! Free at last! Thank god almighty, I’m free at last!” Malcolm laughed out loud. The intro from ‘Born to be Wild’ blasted through the speaker cabinets that took up half the back seat. He turned up the bass enough to shake loose anything that was not securely fastened. By now the rain was letting up and the sun was peaking through the clouds. “It’s a sign, I know it’s a sign!” 

He pulled over a few blocks down the road and jumped out of his car.  He took off his damp trench coat, whirled it over his head and tossed it into the back. He shook his longish dark wavy hair like a dog after a bath, brushed it back with his hand, then propped his prized, vintage Brooklyn Dodgers ball cap on backwards. He put on his sunglasses and caught a glimpse of himself in the car door window. Then with a glint in his eye, in a gyrating flurry, he began thrashing out passionate air guitar, singing the Steppenwolf chorus on cue, “Born to be wi-i-ild, born to be wi-i-ild!” A passing motorist honked and Malcolm flailed more intensely dropping to his knees to dramatize the effect. Giddiness filled his insides. He shrieked like a warrior ready for battle. By this time, the gray clouds had been replaced by cottony white cumulous billows that floated over a brilliant blue sky. The sun shone in all its glory, and so did Malcolm.

Soon, Malcolm was cruising down the road bobbing to the beat of some generic rap rhythm, stretching his neck out front and then from side to side, puckering his lips, accompanying the tune with his own yelps and groans. He was in total groove mode.  A tiny dark figure scurried from the curb into the street. Malcolm instinctively slammed the brakes and swerved into the next lane without looking to avoid the furry creature. He cut off a monster pick-up. Honking, screeching, it swerved to avoid him. At the next stop light, Malcolm was totally oblivious to what just happened. Wearing a pained smile and accentuating his movements, he was centre-stage now, drumming from the steering wheel across the dashboard and back.

The monster pick-up pulled up beside him. It was full of cranky construction workers. One of them hung out the window from above and shouted down, “Hey dickwod where’d you learn to drive. Same place you got that shit music?” 

 “Fuck you!” Malcolm snapped waggling his middle finger.

“I’d rip your fucking head off but I’m working,” the worker said and then he spat on Malcolm’s windshield. The workers all laughed and the truck peeled away.

Feeding on rage,  Malcolm spewed expletives, stepped on the clutch, shifted into second, floored his vibrating compact and jerked forward. The truck disappeared out of sight just as Malcolm jammed the stick into a reluctant third gear. His sunglasses fell into his lap. His car coughed and chugged before coasting to a stop. Dark smoke seeped out from under the hood. Cars honked all around him.

Malcolm bounded on to the road and slammed the door of his car, “Up yours!” he barked pumping both middle fingers relentlessly at the long gone truck, at the motorists who made gestures as they pulled around and passed him, at the people who laughed while waiting at the bus stop.

“What are you assholes looking at?” he muttered as he popped the hood. The smoke cleared, but a strong smell of burned oil and rubber lingered. A syrupy fluid oozed out from below and snaked to the curb. Malcolm looked across the road to a gas station. He sighed, then turned to the people at the bus stop, “Hey sorry about that. I kinda lost it for a second. Can somebody help me push this thing over to the garage?”

Nobody moved. Then the bus pulled up.

****

A self portrait. She was sinking below the surface. Rachel took one last pass at her canvas, touched up some shreds of golden light that glinted off ripples in dark waters, then rested her paint brush on her easel and cleaned her fingers with a rag.

She flopped into the couch to admire her work, stretched out her bare legs from beyond her bathrobe resting them among the heap of books, sketchpads and half-filled cups of herb tea and such that populated a long upturned wooden crate. She pulled the turbaned towel from her head and threw it to the side. Her full mane of dark locks fell past her shoulders.  She reached for the black decaf that was already cold. One last cringing slurp, a deep sigh.

“So now what?”

She picked at dead skin around her finger nails, sucking on the thumb where it had started to bleed. Examining its imperfections, Rachel thought about where she could chew next. A sunbeam streamed  in through a crack in the curtains and the charm of dust particles floating illuminated in the late morning light put a spell on her.  Her mind wandered.

“It’s funny how you hardly ever see that dust, but it’s always there.”

A cigarette? She could smoke whenever, now that Malcolm was gone. “No more how can I kiss you if your breath stinks,” she thought, “it’s funny how my breath didn’t stink when he was hot for me. No more long sermons about smoking my life away, blah, blah, blah. Geezus, he could go on.” How does sweet talk turn to advice, infatuation to precaution, passion to pressure? Another sigh. Her mind wandered some more.

She looked around the room, felt in between the cushions of the couch and in behind her. No luck.  “I don’t really feel like a cigarette anyways. Maybe, I’ll quit in spite of the bastard.”  Rachel sneered. The levitating dust bits in the sunbeam swirled. Her mind raced.  “Yeah, maybe I’ll move to Greenwich Village, get all pierced and tattooed and do sidewalk art for a living.” She blurted out loud, “Who’s cool now Malcolm?”

“No, no wait,” she mused, “I’m in a tent, hunched over on my cot, sweating like a pig, scribbling out a postcard. Hey Malcolm, how’s it going? Thought I’d drop you a line. Let you know how I’m doing. I’m here in the African Rainforest teaching English to the Bakongos. Just got over a life-threatening bout of malaria. The tsetse flies are humongous. Gotta run. Drop me a line some time. Love Rachel.” Pleased with herself, Rachel gazed off into a corner of the room savoring her dreamy hypotheticals and then like a jack-in-the-box, popped up out of the couch.

She could see herself jumping out of a taxi, carrying nothing but two hand bags, heading for departures, the sound of jets overhead,  her flowered sari flowing in the rush created by her hurried and purposeful paces.  “Rachel!” Malcolm calls out. In faded denim, unshaven with straggly hair, he’s playing guitar. A burning cigarette is propped between strings of the peghead. A few coins are sprinkled in the guitar case laid open on the sidewalk below him.

“Malcolm! Wow, nice to see you, but I can’t stop to talk. I’m late for my plane.”

“What are you doing? Where are you going?” he spews hurriedly, “I’ve been trying to get in touch with you.”

With an air of destiny, she gazes deep into his eyes and says, “I’m off to Bangladesh. They’re building a school for leper orphans and I’ve been asked to oversee the project. It’s something I’ve always wanted to do, Malcolm. But here, let me give you some money. I won’t be needing this there.” She would reach into her purse, toss coins into his guitar case and then with arm outstretched towards him say, “Shalom!”

She found herself back on the couch. She gnawed on her thumb nail some more, picking at skin where there wasn’t any. “I guess, I’d have to learn Bangladeshi,” she thought.  Another sigh. Her gaze shifted to the floating illuminated dust in the sunbeam. She stood up again, focus panning to her art on the easel. There she had one hand below the surface of the water, the other reaching up, half out.  The eyes. So wide. Longing. Lost. Sinking.  Rachel shuddered and her body stiffened.  She swallowed hard, turned to the wall and pounded it as she cried, “This is bullshit.” She slid down the wall and curled up into a ball..

The door bell rang.

****

Malcolm shifted back and forth on  a wobbly old vinyl chair trying to refresh the blood flow to his buttocks. His neck was cramped from the twist required to view a small mute TV that was propped up in the upper corner of the grungy gas station waiting room. A chubby lady in sweatpants and ski jacket jumped out of her chair. “Kill the son-of-a-bitch!” she chortled as one behemoth body slammed another and fell on him for the final count. Malcolm nodded and smiled in courteous agreement, then got up to search between the letters of the store front window. His car had finally been brought in for a ‘look-see'. He bent down to check out a clerk swamped with oil stained invoices, coffee cups and food remnants. He was on the phone, but glanced over at Malcolm for half a second before pretending he wasn’t there. Malcolm tapped on the glass.

“Hold on there buddy,” the man said and went on talking for a while before resting the phone on his chest and turning to Malcolm, “Yep?”

“I was wondering about my car. You said it would be twenty minutes, but I’ve been here almost two hours.”

“You’re driving the old ah…” He shuffled his papers around. “Oh yeah, shouldn’t be too long now, buddy.” The man used his oblique glare to direct Malcolm back to the waiting area.

“Ah, okay if I use the phone?” Malcolm asked. Turning away as Malcolm spoke, the man pointed with his pen to a telephone booth outside.

“Hello Mom? It’s Malcolm?”

“Malcolm, I haven’t heard from you for a while. I was worried about you. Have you been eating properly?” the tired familiar voice answered.

“Yeah sure, how’s it going with you? How’s Ronnie?”

“Oh fine, I’m just getting ready to put in my shift and Ronnie’s napping on the couch. He bowled a 265 last night.”

“Nice, nice. Anyways, the reason I’m calling is, I was wondering if I could, ah, stay over for a few nights. You see I’m a little short on cash and Rachel and I, we kind of split up?”

“You what? Oh, she sounded like such a nice girl. What happened?”

“Well, you know how it is? So what do you think?”

“Oh Malcolm, I would if I could, but my place is so small. You know that.”

“I don’t need much Mom. I’d sleep on the couch and keep out of your way.”

“I know dear, but Ronnie likes to lie there and watch TV and he’s still looking for work, so I don’t think it’s a good idea right now, honey. Why don’t you call your father?”

“Yeah, I guess I should. I’ll leave him a message.”

There was a long pause as Malcolm peered out the dirty, scratched window. The smell of urine seemed more apparent now. He opened the booth door and could see his car being backed out of the garage bay.

“I better go, Mom. I’ll talk to you soon.”

“Okay sweetheart. I love you. And don’t wait so long before you call again.”

Back at the sliding glass of the station office window,  Malcolm bent down and looked in.

“It ain’t good my friend,” the grumpy clerk said, “Your engine’s toast. You’re looking at about fifteen hundred for a rebuilt, that’s if we can find one.”

“$1500?” Malcolm’s head swirled. Where was he going to get that kind of cash. “I guess I could call Rachel,” he thought, “maybe not.” He reached into his pocket and fingered his last thirty-seven dollars and fifty-one cents. He’d counted it several times while waiting. Then out loud to the clerk, he said, “Sure, go ahead, fix it.”

He got his key, unlocked his car, pulled out his guitar case and a few essentials, gave his key back and headed downtown.

“Born to be w-i-i-ild!” He couldn’t get that tune out of his head.

****

A sketch in black and white. Fetal rocking, back and forth, back and forth. Rachel cocooned in her spongy, foggy gloom. Her only comfort.

The door bell  again, followed by thumping. A determined fist on the rickety window pane of an aluminum door in a used-to-be nice townhouse development..

“Rachel! Rachel! Are you home?” A familiar voice.

Rachel raised her head. Puffy wet eyes squinting in the late morning sunshine.

“Rachel, if you’re in there girl, open the freakin’ door! Come on!”

“Cindy,” Rachel murmured behind a faded smile. She wiped her tears and snot with the back of one hand and the drool on her chin with the palm of the other, then both hands on to her lap and the sides of her house coat. Using the wall for support, she stood. “I’m coming. Just a second.”

More banging at the door. A couple of snivels. She scanned the living room for some Kleenex. A  wipe across her face with one sleeve, then the other.

“Wait a second. I’m coming.” She ran down the hall, pulled the front door slightly open, then pivoted and escaped up the stairs into the bathroom.

Light poured in with Cindy. Her spiked black hair, pink streaks, heavy eye-liner,  leather, studs, rings and things. It was her flavor of the month. “Rachel? Where the hell are ya? You don’t answer the phone?” Her voice ascending as she yelled. But the emptiness. Malcolm’s usual scattering of sneakers, gone. An open closet door. Naked hangers.

Upstairs, Rachel faced the mirror. Puffy slits hid her beautiful big brown eyes.  She turned the tap and cupped cold water, splashing it on her face over and over. Coolness soothed her warm, swollen skin.

“When did he leave?”

Rachel looked up from the sink to Cindy’s reflection in the mirror. “This morning.” Rachel said and reached blindly for a towel. There was none there so she made her way to the bedroom. Cindy followed.

“You saw it coming.”

“Sure I did, but it still happened.”

Cindy stepped closer. “You can’t have it both ways? Did Malcolm know?” 

“Why not, and I’m not sure.”

Cindy closer still. The music played. The words stopped. Cindy brushed Rachel’s hair away from her face.  Kissed her eyes. Her lips. Rachel loosened her house coat and it fell to the floor. Cindy ran her fingers down Rachel’s soft white shoulder to her firm, pert breast, down to her nipple. They spent the afternoon together.

Later, the two lovers laid on their backs side by side staring at the ceiling. “Ya know,” Rachel pauses to take a suck from the joint Cindy just passed her, “I just wish I could be, like, normal.”

Cindy flipped pictures through her mind as if she were turning the pages of her family album.

 “Normal? Oh yeah.”

Rachel continued, “Babies, a nice house with a front lawn and a bird fountain in the garden. Thanksgiving and Christmas with family and summers at the cottage and a husband who loves you, treats you good.”

“So you shacked up with an unemployed musician?”

“I thought he was the one. He could change.”

“Don’t go down that road, sister. You’re sounding like the airheads I went to high school with. Or have you been into another ‘Leave it to Beaver’ rerun marathon.”

“What’s wrong with that show?”

“Give me a fucking break, girl. In real life Mrs. Clever is on 50 mills of paxil daily or what ever they took back then, and likely getting topped up a little extra cream from the milkman. Wally and the Beave sure didn’t look like her husband. Whuz his name, Walter? Ward, whatever. Yeah, late nights at the office? Bullshit!  He was gayer than that exercise dude. You know the out of shape guy with the frizzy hair. My mom used to love him. Never got off the couch once my dad left.  Shit, she died on that god damn thing. You want normal?” Cindy laughed a sad laugh.

The part of Rachel that lay with Cindy felt a little ashamed for even thinking what she thought, but the part of Rachel that said it still was enchanted  by the possibilities and wonder of normal. She turned to Cindy and put her arm across her chest and cuddled up.

Cindy kissed Rachel’s arm and held it close. “So I’ve got to work tonight, but what are you doing tomorrow. We should go out and get so fucking hammered,” Cindy suggested.

“Can’t, my parents are expecting us, well me, for supper.”

“They don’t know?”

“About you and me? My parents would have simultaneous shit-fits on the spot?”

Cindy rolled her eyes, “You and Malcolm, doofus!”

“No way, I’ll just say he had a gig out of town. Hell, my dad still refers to him as Paul.”

“But Paul’s been history for a year now?”

“I know, but my dad can’t keep up,” Rachel said, “probably doesn’t want to. Besides, my parents have never actually seen Malcolm yet. I’ve been it putting off until we settled in.”

“Oh, you’re settled in now,” Cindy said.

****

Malcolm was back in the sunshine. Set up among a string of sidewalk cafes and downtown shops, coins and the odd bill dropped into his open guitar case as he strutted back and forth strumming, crooning and strutting.  Anything from old rockin’ classics to familiar sounding originals. When he played, all his Rachel, car and money troubles turned inside out. Today, Malcolm would not be denied.

Taken by his own reflection in the shop windows, he’d posed for himself and every pretty girl that passed, throwing in a bit of the Elvis lip and pelvic thrust for timely effects. Some ladies would stay and watch for a song or two, sometimes giggling, smiling big and dropping cash in his guitar case before waving good-bye.

There was one gorgeous young thing who’d been and gone and been again. He’d seen her standing across the street watching with friends, then alone and now sitting on the curb of a store front a couple of doors down. A sweet siren, Malcolm was drawn to her. Her flowing black sleeveless dress and long flaxen hair fluttered to one side in the timid muggy air.

“I’m gonna take a break in a minute, but first I want to dedicate this last tune to the pretty thing sitting right over there,” Malcolm said pointing his guitar headstock in her direction.

He began strumming powerful, rhythmic chords that got the warmed and swelling crowd into a collective pulse. He sucked in the energy and returned the favor singing and playing with a passion, he’d never experienced before. He turned and slowly strode to the girl. He kneeled and kept playing. When he stood again, she stood with him. Then she spun into the crowd dancing madly. Her hair was wild in the sunshine. People stepped back, some spilling on to the street to give her room to flail herself in tribal euphoria. Soon others joined in. There was even this blue suit caught in the fever, pumping his attaché case over his head. It looked like a scene out of the movie “Fame”. Traffic clogged and horns were a plenty.

Later when the crowd cleared, she stood over him as he shoved bills and coins into his pockets. His pants sagged from the weight. “That was so cool,” she said to Malcolm.

As he stood, he panned up trinkets and charm bracelets on pale white skin and a couple of funky tattoos on her neck, some symbols he didn’t recognize.  She brushed the hair away from her face revealing crazy big blue mischievous eyes and pouty lips that took his breath away. When he got closer, he saw that she was younger than he’d thought, but old enough, and the sexual surge put a lump in his throat.

“It’s silly, but I feel like I known you,” he confessed.

“Yeah, me too,” she said, “but you know something else?”

“What’s that?”

“I don’t know your name?”

“Malcolm, and you?”

“Felicity.”

“Felicity,” he repeated, “that’s a song. Hey, you hungry?”

They  sat at an outdoor café until dark and Malcolm rambled on. “I could be anywhere. I just close my eyes and concentrate. I feel myself leaving the floor.  The deeper I get into the trance, the higher I rise until I’m floating around looking down.”

“Oh, that is so freaky. You’re not going to believe this, but I do that too. I swear!” she said. Malcolm wasn’t sure about her until she dove deep into his eyes, slipped off her sandal and stroked her bare foot against the side of his calf.

“This is crazy. I feel like I’ve died and gone to heaven,” Malcolm said reaching out across the table taking Felicity’s hands and putting his lips to them. She smiled, then looked away. He went on, “Funny, I hardly know anything about you but something inside tells me this is right.”

She gave him that diving deep into his eyes look again and leaned forward. She kissed him tenderly and then with her hot breath running straight to his groin, she whispered in his ear, “Come with me, Malcolm.”

In a moment, they were gone.

****

In the den, Rachel and her dad, Henry faced the forty-two inch plasma screen as they spoke. Henry surfed aimlessly with the remote.

“Enough all ready,” Norma, Rachel’s mother clamored.

“Oh, Jeopardy!” Henry stopped clicking.

“That Alex Trebek  still looks good,” Norma said.

“How come game show hosts always look the same, even after twenty years?” Rachel asked.

“Lighting, make up, face lifts,” Henry muttered.

“Oh so suddenly you’re Mr. Hollywood producer,” Norma snapped.

“Come on guys, let’s keep it positive. That was an awesome dinner, Mom,”

“Awesome dinner? You don’t let me make you chicken or roast beef anymore? Now you’re a vegan-shmegan. I had to buy a pakki cookbook to find something you’d eat.”

“Mom, please don’t say pakki. I don’t like it.”

“Sorry! You know what it used to say on the beaches of Toronto when your grandmother was alive. No Dogs or Jews Allowed.”

From the TV, a contestant on the answer-question show said, “Sickness and Health for a thousand.”

Alex Trebek read from the game square,  “It's the term for any substance that causes an allergic reaction.”

“Norma!” Henry shouted.

Rachel exploded with laughter.

“Mr. Comedian, you’re not!” Norma shot back, “How about a word for never gets his lazy, retired ass off the couch?”

Henry waved his hand at his wife and mumbled, “How ‘bout a word for kiss my ….”.  He kept watching the TV trying to answer each question before the contestants. Then came a commercial break.  “So what did you say your Paul was doing, sweety?”

“His name is Malcolm, Dad, remember?”

“Same guy?”

“Different guy, Dad and I told you already, he’s got a gig. You know he’s a musician and he got a job out of town, so he couldn’t make it tonight.”

“Musician, gig. What’s wrong with man, job? You can’t find yourself a nice doctor? Chartered accountant? I’ll settle for a teacher. Leah married a lawyer, they just bought a house down the street and she looks pregnant. And are you sure everything’s going to work with this Malcolm of yours?” Norma queried,  “Look at me, my Rachel.”

“Leave her alone,” Henry groaned, “she’ll be fine.” Jeopardy was over and Henry started clicking again.

“No Henry, not the news. It’s too depressing!”

“Hold your horses, I just want to check for the weather.”

The TV announcer was in midstream, “And in local news, “Mourners at Mount Pleasant Cemetery in midtown Toronto were in shock when they made the disturbing discovery of a grizzly homicide this morning.”

“Change it!”

“Wait!”

“The naked and beheaded remains of a male in his late twenties appears to have been the object of a disturbing Satanic cult sacrifice ritual. The victim tied up spread eagle over a grave was stabbed multiple times and suffered numerous body mutilations. The words, “Hate is Love” were smeared in blood over the grave’s tombstone.” An autopsy is being performed. And although the victim’s face was beyond recognition, an artist’s composite drawing has been rendered.”  It appeared on the TV screen. “If you believe you may know the identity of this man please contact local police.”

“That’s enough!” Norma groaned, “Are you happy now? Look at your daughter.”

A rush of heat swarmed over Rachel and sweat dripped down her forehead, her back and the insides of her arms. Stunned, barely able to breathe, she tried to make light of it. “Oh, it’s okay,” she said in a weak voice,  “it’s just that stuff like that…” She took a deep breath,  “upsets me. I think I ate too much anyways. Excuse me.” Then she ran to the washroom barely making it to the toilet bowl in time. Everything came up.

That night, Rachel called police from her parents’ house.

****

It was raining the day of Malcolm’s funeral, so everyone was in a rush to get away after the ceremony. Rachel remained, mesmerized. Cindy waited with her.

“It was like this the day he left.” Rachel said

“Yeah,” Cindy sighed.

“I just can’t help but think I’m responsible. Like there’s something I could have done.”

“What?”

“I don’t know. Said something, done something.  If we would have stayed together,  maybe this wouldn’t have happened.”

“Fate has its own plans, girl.”

Rachel looked up at the heavens. The clouds were separating and the rain was letting up.  “I just want to live a normal life,” she lamented.

Cindy said, “Yeah, me too.”

The sun peeked through the clouds.

“Hey, is that a rainbow?” Rachel asked.

Cindy studied the sky for a moment, “Nah.”

They turned and walked away.

Willy Blake willyblake.com.