One Memory For Each Country I've Lived In

[dotinthesky]

* Once in a while, the usual rumour ran the school's cafeteria: a new ship was in town. Sometimes you outstripped the rumour by seeing the sailors wander down the city's packed streets before anyone else, their "plain" clothes making them look so alike: tight jeans, buzz cuts, fitted shirts or T-shirts tucked in, pristine sneakers. At night, they descended upon Wan Chai, looking for Cantonese hookers and alcohol. To their surprise they would find themselves sharing clubs and bars with us, teenage gweilos who also liked a bit of cheap booze and a good time wherever ecstasy tabs were easily found.

* She called my phone to tell me she wasn't waiting by the bookshop but by the longbar. When I saw her, she was sitting beside a mother and her child, waving at the baby. In the crowded supermarket, I confessed that I was reading a trashy novel called "Labyrinth". Kevin and I made her watch Twin Peaks' pilot episode that night because she'd never seen it. I wanted to take her to Elbow's Cafe, just on the other side of Victoria Park, but the weekend was far too fast for us.

* We spent the turn of the millenium pushing a car up Saint Domingo's mountain, our feet caked with cow shit, cold rain running down our backs, the night so dark that the only thing we could see were the pine trees caught by the headlights. Then, once we had reached the top, we crammed inside the car and opened the bottle of champagne. we smoked some pot and laughed at our miserable new year's as the rain showed no sign of abating.

* Friday night and everyone from school has plans. Even my brother has gone out with his skateboard friends. I sit in my bedroom, surrounded by cheap paperbacks, computer games and a good-for-nothing TV. I have a million hours to kill and the worst company of all: myself. I haven't discovered The Smiths yet. My parents sit in the living room with my brother Nicholas and his nurse, watching television. I don't wish to join them, but I give breaks to my solitude by walking past them on my way to the kitchen.

* It's my birthday and all my friends have been asked to dress as superheroes. I am Superman and my brother is Spiderman. Another Superman arrives, taller and stronger than me, then a couple of Spideys too -- costumes from the same supermarket I'm sure. When Bianca arrives, wearing a red polka dot dress, I rush to explain away her embarrassment at having forgotten the theme, how she didn't fuck up, how there is a heroine out there, printed on a comic page, wearing the same dress and saving the world.

* The first apartment I lived on my own. A semi-basement beneath Mechtilde, the landlady with a large collection of books on Hitler. When the ice storm hit Montreal, the stairs leading to my door became a slide. I broke one of my suitcase's wheels sliding to my door after arriving from the airport. The city had been in darkness for weeks, with people sharing apartments in order to generate heat (the year of Montreal's baby boom). Mechtilde gave me boxes of chocolate in exchange for shoveling the snow off her entrance. And I, in turn, got Holly once to help me do the job. I told her it would be fun and she believed it. Then it was too late to back out when the shovel was already in her hands.

- inspired by rag_and_bone.

Comments

[commonpeople.livejournal.com]

I wasn't that nice. Bianca and Johnny were my best friends in elementary, so that's probably why I didn't want to see her cry. I think other girls showed up not dressed as superheroes but I don't remember paying much attention to them.