vermouth hit my bloodstream, I mixed a martini that was very dry and very large. The four jumbo olives I added for food value would have made a traditional martini glass pitifully small, and I complimented myself on having the foresight to use a tumbler. I took my breakfast to the deck, where I shared my crackers with Willie and savoured my martini. By the time, I’d emptied the glass, I could have flown to New Delhi. Gin: the Breakfast of Champions.
The waiting area for Athabaska Air is at the north end of the Regina airport terminal. In all, five of us were flying north: Molly and Drew Warren, Solange, Fraser Jackson, and me. I was the last to arrive, and as we exchanged greetings I thought that with our jeans, hiking boots, and air of forced conviviality, we could have been taken for a group about to fly to some sort of corporate retreat. Only the rectangular box in Molly Warren’s hand hinted at a mission grimmer than formulating shared goals or fine-tuning human-relations policies.
The 8:05 flight to Saskatoon was a favourite of business people and civil servants. A dozen of them, toting laptops and insulated coffee mugs, crossed the tarmac ahead of us. I tried to emulate their confident, purposeful stride, but my feet dragged. Halfway to the plane, filled with longing for the safe world I was leaving behind, I turned to gaze back at the terminal.
The sun was glinting off the windows that separated the waiting room from the runway, so at first I couldn’t be certain that the woman pressed so close to the wall of glass really was Livia Brook, but the Botticelli abundance of hair and the explosion of scarlet poppies on the woman’s shawl were dead giveaways. As I watched, Livia raised her arm in a gesture that could have been either farewell or benediction. I averted my glance. The memory of her sad party for one was still vivid; I didn’t need another image of Livia Brook’s painful longing for connection.
Behind me, Solange’s shout was insistent. “Joanne, what’s so fascinating? They won’t wait for us, you know.” Solange, too, had lingered, anxious for a final smoke before boarding. She had abandoned her customary uniform for a costume that was the epitome of urban chic: bluejeans, white T-shirt, smart black leather jacket, backpack decorated with Japanese cartoon characters, black ankle-length boots. When she saw me coming towards her, she took a lung-filling drag, threw the cigarette to the pavement, and ground it out with her toe. Then she looked at me with an abashed smile. “No more delaying tactics,” she said softly. “Time to take our friend home.”
In the first days after Ariel’s death, I had feared for Solange. Her grief and anger manifested themselves in a manic energy that could have consumed her, if she hadn’t found an outlet for it. Luckily, she had. Rosalie told me that Solange had taken to riding her bike for hours at a time: twice she had ridden all night. When she had shown me her shining Trek WSD the previous September, Solange had admitted the bike cost her a month’s salary and then some. That morning at the airport, it seemed the bike had been worth every penny. Solange was pale but composed; it was apparent that somewhere in her solitary journeys along the bike paths and streets of our city, she had found a measure of peace. As that seriously undervalued philosopher Frank Sinatra once said, “Whatever gets you through the night.”
When Solange and I fell into step, I touched her arm. “Did you see Livia in the airport?”
Solange made a moue of disgust. “I would have thought she’d have more pride. She’s been obsessive, as if this trip were an adventure one longed to be a part of.”
“Were she and Ariel that close?”
“Maybe at the beginning. Ariel told me that when she and Livia met at that women’s retreat on Saltspring, they were both at a turning point in their lives. They supported one another’s choices, the way women are supposed to do, and for a while there was a bond. I’ve always assumed Livia was instrumental in getting Ariel the job here.” Solange looked away. “I’ll be grateful to Livia for that as long as I live.”
At that moment, the attendant asked for our boarding passes, and we had to climb the stairs and find our seats. The plane was small and airless. I felt a flicker of panic, but the Bombay gin seemed to have long-lasting anaesthetising power, and as Solange led me to the only two empty seats left, I surrendered to inevitability.
After we’d fastened our seatbelts, Solange pointed her index finger towards the place three seats up and across the aisle from us where Fraser Jackson was sitting with Drew Warren. “Now you can answer a question for me,” she whispered. “What’s he doing here?”
I didn’t tell her the truth. The news of Ariel’s pregnancy would have caused Solange anguish, and on that grief-filled day none of us deserved another helping of pain. “I guess they were friends,” I said lamely.
“Fraser Jackson and Ariel?” Solange raised an eyebrow. “Different types, wouldn’t you say?”
“People are full of surprises,” I said.
The plane’s engines coughed to life. I closed my eyes and grasped the armrests.
Solange leaned towards me, curiosity mingled with concern. “You hate small planes,” she said.
“I hate all planes.”
Her gaze was skeptical. “The competent Joanne Kilbourn. I don’t believe it.”
“Believe it,” I said. “Right now, it’s all I can do to keep from clawing my way past you to get out of here.”
“I always thought you were impervious.” She reached into her backpack and pulled out copies of the magazines Femme Plus and Lundi. “Choose,” she said. “The human mind can hold only one thought at a time. Work on your French.”
“I’ll take Lundi,” I said. “Femme Plus is too earnest. I want to hear Pamela Anderson dit tout sur ses implants.” By the time we’d reached Saskatoon, the gin was wearing off, but as Pamela parle a coeur ouvert de sa vie, I’d learned a great deal about true love, forgiveness, and the removal of prosthetic enhancements. We were in Saskatoon just long enough to catch the flight to Prince Albert. Molly was the first of our group to board the plane; Drew and Fraser were right behind her. On the plane from Regina, I’d been puzzled by the fact that Drew had chosen to sit not with his wife but with Fraser. My assumption was that Ariel’s parents had decided that the flight north would give at least one of them a chance to come to know the man their daughter had invited into her life. Molly’s reaction when Drew tried to sit next to her forced me to re-examine my hypothesis. She tensed her lips as if to trap words she would not allow herself to speak, then she tightened her grip on the rectangular box and retreated into isolation as complete as that of a figure in an Andrew Wyeth painting.
I hurried past and sank into the next seat. When I had seen them at the symphony or the theatre, the Warrens had always struck me as the prototype of the high-functioning dual-career couple, but the death of their child was revealing the fault lines in their relationship. There wasn’t much I could do for them, but I could spare them the knowledge that a virtual stranger had witnessed the strain in their marriage.
Solange took the seat beside me. When we were buckled in, she turned towards me. “Ariel and I flew up here one weekend. It was just after we came to the university. There was so much bitterness in the department. The men had closed ranks. Ariel and I felt our lack of locker-room edge most acutely. I think at that point, if we could have found a way out, we both would have taken it.”
“But you’d signed contracts,” I said.
She shrugged. “Precisely. We’d made our bed.”
“Forgive me, Solange, but it was a pretty comfortable bed, wasn’t it? Tenure-track positions at a good university, and you were both inexperienced.”
“In retrospect, I know you’re right, but at the time the atmosphere was so poisonous. You can’t know…” She caught herself. “Well, I guess you can. At any rate, Ariel suggested we come up here for Thanksgiving to put things in perspective.” For a moment Solange seemed to lose her train of thought. When she spoke again, her voice was wistful. “It’s ironic, Joanne. The weekend worked for me. By the time we flew back to Regina, I knew the only sensible course was to do my own work and keep my head down.”
“But Ariel didn’t get to that point?”
Solange shook her head. “No. She didn’t. For her, it just kept getting worse. Every day. It seemed as if the entire situation just ate at her.”
“Maybe she wasn’t certain she was on the right side.”
“Did she tell you that?”
“Not me directly, but another member of the department. She also told this person she was going to have to right a wrong that had been done.”
Solange stiffened. “And your source for this fascinating information is…?”
I sighed. “Kevin Coyle.”
Solange threw up her hands in a furious gesture of dismissal. “Unimpeachable, of course.”
