We pay her no attention.
“We’ll come spend the night here sometimes, too.”
We don’t ask permission. After all, the silo doesn’t belong to her. Now that we know how to get in, we don’t need her anymore.
Mathilde shrugs.
On King Street, there’s a Mountain Equipment Co-op that sells camping and sports equipment. We’ve found a use for our allowance. We take the subway there, since we plan to return with bags that will be too heavy for our bikes.
“I’ll expect you back before dinner,” Emma says, without asking where we’re going.
The subway isn’t far. By cutting through the school park, we can get there in less than five minutes. There are a number of stops between us and downtown, and we have to change lines halfway. We rarely take the subway. The station smells like dust and bleached urine. The train isn’t very full and we easily find seats next to a window.
The stations go by in silence. They’re all different, each one distinctly decorated.
The train stops at one station and takes a while to start again. A mother struggles to roll on her heavily loaded stroller. She has to try a few times and finally succeeds by backing on. The doors finally close again.
“It was that one.”
“Yes. I remember the staircase.”
“It’s been almost ten years…”
We blink slowly, our teeth clenched, making our jaw muscles protrude. The train starts back up and we turn to look back at the station disappearing behind us.
On the tiles covering the walls, a mosaic spells “Museum.”
The sporting goods store is three storeys, with a climbing wall dominating the centre. We stroll through the aisles. Canteens, flashlights, plastic dishes, dehydrated food, knives… we want everything.
“How much do we have?”
“Two hundred and ten dollars.”
The merchandise is not only on display, you can try it out, or at least some items, on the interior climbing wall. A man is on the wall, testing climbing shoes.
We quickly find the rope and hammers. We have to ask a clerk for help using them. It’s hard. Numerous climbing ropes are on rolls, sold by the metre. The tools, however, are locked behind a glass cabinet. There are no prices listed for these items.
This will be more complicated than we had thought.
“Can I help you?”A girl in a MEC T-shirt stops beside us.
“We need a hammer and a rope.”
“A hammer? You mean a pick?”
We don’t like her smile.
“What kind of climbing is it for?”
We were going to answer that it was for climbing a wall, but weren’t sure that was precise enough.
“A concrete surface.”
“Concrete? These picks are for ice.”
We don’t respond. A moment passes and the salesgirl continues.
“I’d suggest this one then,” she says, indicating a complicated pick, curved on both ends.
Then she sells us nine metres of professional climbing rope.
“We also need a knife, like a hunting knife.”
“How old are you?” she asks, skeptical.
How old do you have to be to buy a hunting knife? We can’t exaggerate the lie or we’ll look ridiculous.
“Sixteen.”
“You have to be at least eighteen,” she declares.
We’ll remember that.
The two items cost everything we have. We’ll have to forget about the other things we’d chosen.
The pick and the rope are too precious to leave in the vacant lot. We decide to hide them under the bed in our swim bag. That way we can carry it around without Emma asking what’s in it; she’ll believe we’re still going to the pool. To make sure she doesn’t find anything, we wrap everything up in our towels and bury them in the bottom of the bag, with our bathing suits on top. The bag is stuffed full, but if we force it a little, we can still get the zipper done up.
We spend the next week working on throwing the rope, which we’ve attached to a hook we found in Emma’s garden shed.
“That’s some pro gear you’ve got there,” teases Mathilde as she arrives.
Her appearances don’t surprise us anymore. We make sure to come to the silo when no one is around, but Mathilde’s presence, unlike that of others, makes no difference to us. She watches us hook the rope onto one of the ladder rungs. We climb halfway up, then stop for an instant and throw her the pick. She looks up and smiles at us, but we’ve already turned back to continue climbing.
We take up our position from last time. Evening is just falling and it’s cool out.
“Are you going to stay the night?” Mathilde asks, noticing our sleeping bags.
We had brought the sleeping bags a few days earlier, as well as two strong ropes that we’d found at the Grace Street house to protect us from a fall into the depths. But we hadn’t yet spent a night in the silo.
“Yes.”
“I’m staying too.”
Mathilde imposes her presence as evidence. There is nothing else to say and the day stretches into night.
When no more light penetrates the rusted holes, Mathilde lights her head lamp. We brought camping flashlights. She gets completely undressed and stuffs her clothes into her bag.
Seeing her naked body gives us an erection and we start masturbating to make it go away. Her hands behind her head, Mathilde watches us working ourselves in the lamplight. Our breathing is amplified by the echo.
“Do you want me to do it?” she asks.
We say nothing, watching her approach. She jerks us off. Her breasts bounce in rhythm with her hand. Her ass, amazingly round considering her thinness, hovers close to the edge. She straddles us to keep from falling. Her vagina is completely hairless and the way she kneels opens it gently against our legs. Her clitoris pokes out between her pink lips. We want to plunge our fingers into the soft flesh. We only touch the outside before we ejaculate. Mathilde licks up the semen spread out on our
