What Is and What Never Was

(Excerpt)

Kim

August 27, 2009 Fredericton, New Brunswick

Today is harder than most. It would have been my child’s 21^st birthday. I guess it is her birthday. They never revealed her gender, never let me see her but in my heart, I always knew she was a girl. To me, she’s Cassandra.

I celebrate in private with a banana cupcake. Since giving her up, I always imagine the things she would love, cupcakes being one of them.

I was a good kid. My grades were above average, my two best friends, Cece and Terri were the type who obeyed rules, never got into trouble, my parents trusted me and them. I wasn’t popular by any stretch, but I wasn’t a pariah, either. I never realized how good I had it, blending in and minimal responsibility.

In the summer of 1987, the three of us got jobs at the Dari-Delite on Main Street. If only I could go back in time… those were the best days of my life.

Fredericton isn’t a huge city but it was even smaller back then. Kids with cars either hung out at the Drive-In or went for Ice Cream. We were privy to who was dating who, who was dating more than one guy or girl and we were recipients of daily come-ons; even the occasional marriage proposal. Shelling out soft serve elevated our social standing from invisible to a notch below the popular girls. We started getting dressed up for work, now that we were practically adults. Blue mascara; miniskirts under our smocks; visors somehow worked into our sky-high hair; Peter Pan Getaway boots and double wrapped Flashdance belts. Padded push up bras under low cut neon tank tops. This was the summer we were all going to find boyfriends. With two years left of high school, we were ready to forge our futures.

Cece met Brad that summer. He was a bit older, drove a Harley, had tattoos. He was strong; muscular and handsome, always wearing tight jeans and a black t-shirt. His hair was long. Not mullet- long like the rest of the sheep who wouldn’t dare have a thought of their own, but rock-and-roll long. Like Jon Bon Jovi. I was jealous. She married him the week after graduation.

I wanted a Brad of my own, and I could have had my choice of many, but I never was the bad-boy type. I wanted someone that Tatiana wouldn’t try to steal, someone with a bright future, someone who would look after me. But I also wanted to save face, terrified of rumours that I might be picking the low hanging fruit. Teenagers are assholes and optics mattered.

I needed help with physics last semester and my parents hired a tutor. Allen Gibson flew through school, never worrying about being second best. He’d read a book once and have it memorized, do long division in his head, dissect a frog without flinching. A cool kid, he was not, but hiring him to help teach me was a no brainer.

He was patient, clear and never treated me like the idiot I was. He wasn’t handsome or fit, but he was kind and reliable; dependable. He wasn’t afraid to be different; comfortable in his own skin – unlike any kid I’d ever known. He didn’t feel the need to douse himself in Drakkar Noir simply because he was going to be in the presence of girls. Parents were throwing money at him to help their kids get passing grades. Instead of spending it on a fancy car, he had saved enough by graduation to pay for four years of university. He was going to go far and all of this potential is what attracted me to him.

I never told my friends. We were the Three Musketeers and in first grade had made a pact to never keep secrets. Losing my virginity on a Thursday afternoon to Allen Gibson, the boy who was too nerdy to even sit at the nerd table, who ate three sandwiches for lunch, who never cared what others thought of him… this was a secret that I intended to take to the grave.

I told him as much, and he was okay with it. It occurred to me that maybe his brains over brawn view of life might have appealed to more than me and he was getting lucky all over town so one day I asked him. I couldn’t have been more wrong. We were sixteen and he was in love with me. I was too embarrassed to reciprocate. Like I said, teenagers are assholes.

I thought Terri knew; was maybe even attracted to him herself. Cece was off with Brad whenever she wasn’t working. Terri and I spent a lot of time together. We were at Killarney Beach one exceptionally hot afternoon; our newfound social acceptance breeding enough courage to wear bikinis. Terri bought hers in the kids’ section at Woolco, being that she never grew above 4’10” and 80 pounds. Mine came from my mother’s closet, leftover from the 1960s, pink and flowery, it enhanced my already buxom chest.

“He’s too tall for you,” I say as I catch her staring at Allen, building a sandcastle with some younger kids. It looked like he was babysitting. He was so good with them, their innocence looking past the extra thirty pounds and coke bottle glasses. They admired him. They wanted to be him when they grew up. If only I was brave enough to see through their eyes instead of dreading what Heather and Tatiana would think if they knew. Why did I care what they thought? They didn’t care about anyone.

“Ew. Gross. Allen Gibson? Gag me, loser,” and there went any thoughts of letting her in on my secret. 

Maybe I was wrong. A few weeks later she stopped talking to me; to everyone. She quit the Dari-Delite, her parents wouldn’t let me see her and she never returned to school. Cece and I speculated, had our mothers call her mother and even went so far as to climb the trellis outside her bedroom window. She told us that she never wanted to see us again and that was that.

I lost my two best friends that summer. One to love and one to… well maybe we will never know. When I found out I was pregnant, the only people I could confide in were my parents. I refused to name Allen, knowing he would give up his dreams for the future to stay by my side and allowed myself to be sent away. I was with my father’s cousin in Norway when she was born, never knowing what happened to her.

I stayed in Sandnes, Norway, working on the family farm. I had no reason to be; to live. Last year my relative died and his kids sold the property. I was 38 years old. No friends, no family and no desire for either. I decided it was time to go home.

Before I left, I took a vacation to Northern Scotland. I visited the spot where the Founding Fathers of Fredericton first set sail, their futures uncharted, fueled by the excitement of discovery and bravery towards the unknown. In 1750 they were completely unaware that the journey would be over four thousand kilometers and take months. They didn’t even know where they were going. I could relate. I had a plane ticket and a job waiting for me and believed, in that moment, I was more lost than the Fathers ever were. 

An old school mate, Amelia, runs a sanctuary for rescue dogs outside of Fredericton. My mother suggested I call her so I did. Her sister, her twin, vanished a few months before I left home. She was never found and has been presumed dead for these last twenty two years. Amelia left home once, but came back after only a few years hoping one day Athalia would return, but she turned to animals instead of people. “If Teddy were dead, I’d know,” she used to say, using the beloved nickname she’d had since first grade. They were fraternal, barely even resembling each other, but I guess that “twintuition” doesn’t discriminate.

Amelia offered me a job at Paws-By-The-River and I accepted. I live in an apartment in the barn and spend my days rehabilitating abused dogs. It’s the first rewarding thing I have ever done, and it keeps the people at bay. Trips into town are limited to Global Pet Foods and Sobeys, with the occasional stop at Value Village when my flannel shirts get too worn. I’m not happy; I’ll never be happy - but I’m content for the first time since walking away from Allen and my future that never was.