Fallout Read online

  Fallout

  Nikki Tate

  ORCA BOOK PUBLISHERS

  Copyright © 2011 Nikki Tate All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

  Tate, Nikki, 1962-

  Fallout [electronic resource] / Nikki Tate.

  (Orca soundings)

  Type of computer file: Electronic monograph in PDF format.

  Issued also in print format.

  ISBN 978-1-55469-273-6

  I. Title. II. Series: Orca soundings (Online)

  PS8589.A8735F34 2011A JC813’.54 C2011-903356-9

  First published in the United States, 2011

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2011929242

  Summary: After the death of her sister, Tara struggles to deal with her guilt through slam poetry.

  Orca Book Publishers is dedicated to preserving the environment and has printed this book on paper certified by the Forest Stewardship Council®.

  Orca Book Publishers gratefully acknowledges the support for its publishing programs provided by the following agencies: the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund and the Canada Council for the Arts, and the Province of British Columbia through the BC Arts Council and the Book Publishing Tax Credit.

  Cover photography by dreamstime.com

  ORCA BOOK PUBLISHERS ORCA BOOK PUBLISHERS

  PO BOX 5626, Stn. B PO BOX 468

  Victoria, BC Canada Custer, WA USA

  V8R 6S4 98240-0468

  www.orcabook.com

  Printed and bound in Canada.

  14 13 12 11 • 4 3 2 1

  For those who stepped back from the edge

  and turned to the future.

  Rain bashes lilies

  left at her headstone

  smashes petals

  leaves them ugly, forlorn.

  Didn’t she know

  how flowers melt into accusations

  how they paint ragged smears

  over granite

  over grass

  over graves?

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter One

  My sister, Hannah, bought a bottle of vodka from some guy she met outside the liquor store. I doubt Hannah knew his name. She probably didn’t care. Hannah, by that point, didn’t care about much.

  She was fifteen, which is why she needed this guy to buy the booze. Maybe he felt sorry for the girl with the crutches. Maybe he thought a drink would make her feel better. Maybe she paid him.

  The police found the bottle. It was half empty and still inside a brown paper bag. What’s amazing is the bottle wasn’t broken. Not like Hannah. A kid with crutches is no match for the front end of a bus.

  What was she thinking before she took that last step? Did she think about me? Mom and Dad? Did she wonder if it would hurt? Did she think about the mess she would leave behind? Or did she just take a deep breath and step out into traffic?

  My sister took a lot of secrets to her grave.

  I wasn’t there when Hannah stepped in front of the bus. In my nightmares, though, I stand behind her on the curb. Then, I push her.

  The bus brakes squeal. I scream, “Stop!”

  Every dream ends with me on a stage. I am naked. All I have to protect me is my poetry. I yell poem after poem at the audience, trying to make them understand.

  I killed my sister.

  She won’t let me forget.

  Chapter Two

  “Put your hands together for Tara Manson!”

  I step into the spotlight. The audience is out there, though I can’t see them.

  This moment is mine. I can say anything in my poems.

  Have you ever faced fear

  and jumped

  into churning waters

  So deep there is no bottom?

  I have. At the waterslides.

  There’s always a chuckle after I say that line. Maybe I look too heavy to be a waterslide type. Whatever. It’s my job to deliver the poem. The audience hears what they want to hear.

  I change my voice so I sound like I’m in a commercial.

  Splash Kingdom!

  Your fun in the sun

  place to plunge

  in and away from

  what really matters.

  Then I go back to my normal voice.

  So what

  if the phone ringing

  in your beach bag

  needs to be answered.

  Here, I point at the audience.

  No. You don’t get it.

  Not like a hey, hi, how’s it going?

  see you later, whatever

  kind of call

  but a message you need to get now

  not tomorrow

  not some other time

  but right this second or

  someone will die.

  Then I start again, softly.

  When fun calls

  it’s wrong to ignore

  sun and sweat

  skin on skin

  his lips on mine

  my lips drinking him in

  this wild ride down

  slippery when wet

  curves ahead.

  Fun is all good, right?

  Here’s where I speed up and get louder.

  THIS is all that matters

  because we only live once

  and all that living

  is churned and pushed into

  one glorious afternoon at the

  waterslides.

  You hear what I’m saying?

  How can they hear what I’m saying? I can speak fast and loud, but they can’t really know what it was like that day last summer. One year ago—today. The whole, long, sun-baked day David and I played, splashed, laughed…while Hannah was—

  The sound of fingers clicking moves through the audience. They think I’ve lost my place. This is their way of telling me to keep going.

  Plunge feet first

  Down Big Mountain

  Time Tunnel

  Jumbo Splash

  Race and giggle

  catch each other

  and sprint to the snack stand

  hot dogs and plastic cheese.

  I ignore the ringing phone, for once.

  Turn my back on her, for once.

  Snap it shut. Click it off, for once.

  Toss it under a damp towel

  and forget

  that outside this moment

  in my heat-soaked day

  a tragedy unfolds

  one phone call away.

  The applause washes over me. I dip in a modest bow.

  Rick, the host, shakes my hand. “Careful going down the steps,” he says. “Judges, let’s see your scores for Miss Tara…”

  He calls them out. The low score is a 7.1 and the high an 8.9. That should be enough to get me through to the second round of the poetry slam.

  When I touch my fingertip to my cheek, it’s wet. When I touch my fingertip to my tongue, I taste salt.

  Chapter Three

  Outside the Koffie Klub it’s muggy. I’m still not used to t
his humid Ontario summer weather. On the west coast it cools off at night. Not here in Camden.

  Mom and Dad both called while I was at the poetry slam. Their numbers glow from my cell phone.

  I know why they called. It’s the first anniversary, and I should have checked in. But it will be awful to talk to them. We will have to remember what we don’t want to remember. What we can’t forget. It’s not like we haven’t been warned. The counselor also told us that it’s normal to imagine the worst when we don’t hear from a surviving family member. Surviving. Barely.

  I flip through the list of missed calls again. David’s number isn’t there. He’s probably thinking about the same thing I am—that day at the waterslides. Like me, he’s probably replaying that moment in the day when I could have stopped her—and didn’t. He was there. He knows. The knowledge binds us together even though he’s in Vancouver and I’m here.

  People shuffle in and out of the Koffie Klub. Sweat leaks from my pits. My bra strap has glued itself to my back. I can’t go too far, but I need to move.

  This month is a big one for poetry slams. Four cafés are hosting a series of competitions. They’ll add up points to see who will be on the team going to Nationals. The team is organized by the Camden Slammers, a group of local poets who make the local slams happen. The slams are so popular they make almost enough at the door to pay for an all-expenses-paid trip to Corinthian for the winners. Corinthian is a small city that’s being swallowed by Toronto. It may not be that far away, and putting us up might mean hostels and cheap food, but there are plenty of us who would love to go.

  On good days I imagine inviting David to meet me in Corinthian. Who am I kidding? David won’t be in the front row, clapping.

  Anyway, I’m not good enough to make the team.

  “Don’t go too far! You have another round!” Amy, one of the slam organizers yells after me. She waves when I turn to look back. “You and Ebony do the next one together, right?”

  “I know!” I shout. Even if I want to walk forever, I can’t let Ebony down. We’ve worked too hard. Returning phone calls is going to have to wait.

  Poetry has taken over everything. My friendships. My spare time. My dreams. I get in trouble at the bookstore when I scribble in my notebook instead of doing my job.

  Maybe I don’t get paid to write poetry, but if I don’t write down my ideas, they are gone. I bet half the people who work in bookstores are writers. I don’t say this to my supervisor. Sometimes it’s better to keep your head down and your mouth shut.

  Back in the café, Ebony and I wait in the shadows at the side of the stage. Round two is about to start.

  “Don’t think about who’s watching,” Ebony says. “The judges like whatever they like.”

  She’s right. The judges flip their plastic number cards as they listen to the poets. They hold up the scores just like in figure skating. We are here to share poetry, yes. But we are also here to win.

  “Ready?” Amy says. “You guys are up next.”

  “Ready as I’ll ever be.” I like the way Ebony and I have worked this poem out. Ebony only has one word to say. She repeats it over and over. That creates a kind of rhythm, the beat for my story. We step onto the stage.

  My mouth is so dry my tongue sticks to my teeth. We have up to three minutes. Three minutes can feel like forever, especially when things aren’t going well.

  And if you go overtime? Well, the audience lets loose with a chant of:

  You rat bastard—you’re ruining it

  for everyone…

  But it was weeeelll worth it.

  I push my palms into the folds of my skirt and step up to the microphone. Ebony does the same thing a few feet away.

  Ebony starts.

  Ring. Ring.

  Her voice is clear, beautiful. I speak next.

  Sister, where were you when you called?

  The words take over. I move in ways I do not move unless I am in the grip of a poem.

  Right on time, Ebony’s voice comes in again.

  Ring. Ring.

  Sister, where were you when you

  called?

  What would you have said if...

  Ring.

  If I had answered the phone

  turned away from the easy heat of

  summer

  the splash of water against

  the how-much-fun-is-this slide?

  Ring. Ring. Ring.

  If I had answered

  would you have told me

  your current location?

  Coffee shop?

  Street corner?

  Parking lot outside the liquor

  store

  where you smiled—actually

  smiled—

  at that young man whose name

  you probably never knew

  though I know

  and can never forget

  Kenyon.

  Ring. Ring.

  Kenyon who had no idea

  the fragile glass

  the Smirnoff in the brown paper bag

  would somehow survive the impact.

  Kenyon. An innocent guilty young

  man

  saw a thirsty girl

  balanced on crutches

  alone, a little sad. Nothing a drink

  couldn’t help. Nothing a favor for

  a stranger

  or a kind word

  couldn’t fix.

  Here, we begin to speak together. Ebony’s Ring Ring overlaps with my own.

  The phone rings and rings.

  Ring. Ring…

  Her ringing gets louder and louder until, at the end of the next section, we are speaking together. Our voices are loud and harsh and ugly.

  If you had told me where you were

  would I have left behind

  my beach bag, sunshine, hot dog

  loud music, playground of

  The Now and come to you?

  Rings and rings and rings and

  rings.

  And if I had found you,

  would you have told me what you

  were about to do?

  Ring. Ring.

  If you had spoken

  would I have believed you?

  Ring.

  If I had believed you

  could I have stopped you?

  Ring.

  Even now, three hundred and

  sixty-five

  days later

  and counting

  that phone rings

  Ring.

  and rings

  day and night

  Ring.

  rings through my dreams

  Ring.

  rings in my morning

  Ring ring ring

  ringsringsringsrings

  Will it ever stop, sister?

  The applause is loud when we step back from the microphones. Ebony wraps me in a tight hug.

  “Good job!” she says in my ear. “Perfect.”

  Chapter Four

  “Will you be okay, walking home alone?”

  “I’ll be fine.” I wait with Ebony until her bus comes.

  Ebony and I both did well tonight— she was third and I took fourth out of ten competing poets. The scores we got for the poem we did together don’t help us against each other since we both got the same number of points. But the judges usually like good teamwork, so the higher scores are helpful against the other poets.

  There were a lot of good things about tonight.

  Licking whipped cream from my upper lip.

  Giggling at a poem about cats and dogs running big banks.

  Ebony whispering “Perfect” in my ear.

  My good mood should have carried me all the way home. Instead, my phone rings somewhere deep in my purse. It’s so late!

  I’ve changed the ringtone at least twenty times in the last year but it doesn’t help. If I hear the phone, something in my gut squeezes tight. No matter whose number flashes on the display, if I hear the ring I must answer.

  “Hi, Mom
.”

  “Honey—hi. How are you doing?”

  She sounds like she’s out of breath.

  “Fine. Busy.”

  “How is work?” she asks.

  “Fine. Busy. How about you?”

  “I’m leaving for a conference in Denver tomorrow. I wanted to make sure we—talked—before I leave. I’m taking two of the senior sales guys…”

  I tune out while she goes on about work. Then she switches to how she had an offer on the house that fell through. “The wife was diagnosed with breast cancer. Such a shame.”

  I hold the phone a little away from my ear and keep moving through the dark streets of my neighborhood. She keeps blabbing.

  She has no clue she has ruined the end of my evening. Will she say something about Hannah? She almost never does. How can she go along with her oh-so-important life and never mention her other daughter? You know, the one who died? Doesn’t she miss her?

  “Are you still doing your poetry?”

  “Hm.” Mom doesn’t care about poetry. She and Dad never went to my slams back when I lived at home. Mom said it gave her a headache to listen to people yelling about all the terrible things that happen in the world. “None of it rhymes!” she complained. Except for the rappers. She hated them too. They talked so fast she couldn’t keep up.

  After Hannah died, I knew Mom wouldn’t want to hear what I had to say. I stopped inviting her and she never invited herself. Then I moved to Ontario.

  She’d probably kill me if she heard the poem I performed a couple of weeks ago. Then she’d have two dead daughters she wouldn’t talk about.

  I can say this because you aren’t here

  you’re in San Francisco, New York Saskatoon, God-knows-where

  with your Yes, boss

  how high, boss?

  yes-men

  standing at attention by your side.

  “I worry about you, Tara.”

  I bet you do.

  Does it make you feel better

  taller?

  smarter?

  to jet off