Read Online Waiting for Joe by Sandra Birdsell - Free Book Online Page A

tables. In comparison, the seniors look youthful with their winter tans. Snowbirds. They’ve just returned from Arizona and Texas and are reconnecting now in the food court. Joe’s clientele included people like them, women who often possessed a self-congratulatory air at having made it to their retirement with their health, marriage and funds intact.
    She takes the newspaper from her bag and unfolds it. A square-jawed and sullen man glares at her from the front page. A pedophile, with a record of sexual assault on boys. Police in both Manitoba and Saskatchewan are hunting him, hoping to apprehend him before he harms the boy he’s abducted. He’s had the poor kid for two days now. Don’t go there. She doesn’t need to stick her nose in excrement to know how awful it smells.
    “That’s gross,” she hears someone exclaim loudly.
    “I know, but I can’t help it,” another person moans.
    Laurie turns to see a couple of teenage girls nearby, colas and cartons of NY fries in front of them. Their attention is fixed on the hands one of them has spread across the table.
    “If you don’t do something about them, I’m not going out with you tonight. That’s obscene.”
    The girl with the hands moans again. “Don’t be mean. It happened before I knew what I was doing.”
    “You’ve got to go to the Nail Place and see if you can get in,” the scolder says. “If you can’t, I’m not going to be seen with you. That is, like, just so gross.”
    Laurie notes their low-rise jeans, the expanse of exposed skin, the wide studded belts that make them look as broad as hippopotamuses. One day they’ll be going through pictures of themselves and screaming, how could we?
    Beyond them, the woman wearing the hijab has been joined by other women similarly dressed, although their tunics are more colourful and of a lighter material. The woman is animated now as the women lean toward one another, gesturing as they talk, jostling small dark-haired babies on their laps. Behind them is the security office, where a uniformed man in the doorway speaks into a radio while he looks across the food court in the direction of the Dollardrama Store.
    Laurie follows his gaze and sees Pete, the man Joe is working with at Canadian Tire, the man he was supposed to have gone off with on a job. Another security man in the Dollardrama is hustling him over to the counter where Pete opens the store bag wide and holds it up so the clerk can look inside. Then he plunks it down hard on the counter to free his hands, fumbles in his vest pocket and brings out a bagel, unwraps it and makes a point of taking a huge bite, as though to prove that indeed, it is a bagel, before stuffing it back into his pocket. He then produces what is likely a sales slip from another pocket. The security man studies it, then indicates with a stiff smile and wave that Pete is free to go.
    Pete stalks away angrily toward the rear entrance of the mall. Laurie rises quickly and follows him. “Pete,” she callsand again, louder. He turns and she receives the full brunt of his scowl. “You’re Pete, right? You work with Joe, my husband?”
    Pete’s anger turns to disgust. “Not any more, I don’t. And as if I haven’t got enough trouble, those bastards are always on my case. I can’t come into this place without being accused of something.” The gap between his teeth causes his
s
sounds to whistle.
    “I was at Robin’s Donuts,” Laurie says with a placating gesture. “They said Joe was there with you. Do you know where he went?”
    “He took off. One minute we’re at Home Depot and the next he’s gone,” Pete says. “When you see him, tell him I said he’s a jerk.” He turns, pushes through the doors and into the parking lot.
    Laurie doesn’t know what to think. She retraces her steps through the mall, weaves her way among the people milling about, passes by the lit-up shops without glancing inside, only dimly aware of the woman greeter in the mall entrance to