Read Online Vanishing and Other Stories by Deborah Willis - Free Book Online Page B

Bay Road. April was once married to a police officer, and since the divorce papers were filed she drivestoo fast, drinks too much. We speed along the narrow asphalt past a scattering of houses and the evening glitter of St. Mary Lake.
    â€œI have a good feeling about this,” she says. In the back, a bottle of her wine rolls and thuds against our seats.
    Within minutes, April and I are at the other end of the island, south, twisting around Reynolds Road. Then she takes a sharp right up a gravel driveway. The yellow Tercel bounces on rough rock. Broom and the arms of pine trees scrape against the car. The driveway seems to twist for miles, and after each corner, when I think we must be close, it’s more dusk and trees and gravel. Nerves and drink warm my cheeks as we get nearer to you, your house, and I reach around for the wine bottle, fish the corkscrew from April’s glove compartment. A corkscrew: I marvel at her foresight.
    We find your place, surprising considering the geography. The island: winding, crumbling roads and mile-long driveways that lead to houses layered in moss. Peter and I are staying in such a house, folded into such moss. We’ve tucked ourselves away for the summer, like in a bed. Or rather, Peter tucked us in, covered us with leaves like blankets, old man’s beard, the falling ash of arbutus, under the guise of
getting away from it all
.
    â€œThis is what we’ve always wanted! Our dream!” Peter said last winter, exclamation points at the ends of all his sentences. For weeks he’d talked about islands and had taken out glossy books on the West Coast from the library. We were standing at our apartment window, eating salami and hot mustard sandwiches, watching snow spit over Toronto high-rises. Peter’s hand was on my back, under my grey wool sweater. This was after his first infidelity, a period of desperate, clinging affection between us. I tried to remember if I’d ever given the impression that this—anisland that can be driven end to end in half an hour—was my dream. “You’ll find new subjects! You’ll like it! You’ll see.” He spoke as though he was thinking of me, not for me. But we are here for Peter: Peter who needs a place to think, Peter who has a book to write.
    â€œThis whole thing makes me nervous,” I say to April, a last-ditch attempt at responsibility, sobriety. The cork pops. Beyond the pine and fir and cedar, there’s finally an open clearing, short, uneven grass spotted with tiny yellow flowers.
    We’re still hidden by the earth-green shadows of trees that line the driveway. Fifteen feet away is the field you must call your yard, inside that a small fenced-in garden, then the barn-like house, painted a burnt ochre. A blanched wood fence surrounds the field, its boards fallen in most spots. More traces: laundry floating on the line (green drawstring pants, thin white T-shirt), strawberries in the yard, a deck painted Naples Yellow. Behind the garden, the house leans to one side, somehow orange and off-centre, like a rotting and caving pumpkin. The windows have pale blue trim (peeling), the door is white: paint jobs of different qualities, likely reflecting different tenants. Faded plaid curtains float in the windows.
    â€œShe shares this place with four others. A commune or something,” April says. The car is still running, old and shaky.
    â€œA commune. Of course.” We have reason to believe you are about twenty-four, twenty-five. I climb out of the car and take a few steps forward, careful to stay in the cool shadow of forest.
    April rolls down the window. “I didn’t mean for you to get out, honey, just for us to have a look.”
    The wine bottle is in my hand.
    â€œWhat are you going to do, Mimi? Hike around the property?”
    I ignore her, take an elegant sip from the bottle, and walk toward the yard. All I can think is: This is where Peter comes to see you. He has parked