Read Online World of Glass by Jocelyne Dubois - Free Book Online

until we get to the terminal. I cannot concentrate.
    Mark is reading on a dark blue seat in the lobby at the Y.
    â€œWhat are you reading?”
    â€œNeruda.” He closes the book. I follow him down metal stairs. Mark points to the women’s change room. I say, “I’ll meet you in the lobby in an hour.” I walk through the door and see two water fountains and rows of lockers. I walk around the room. A young woman blow-dries her long auburn hair in front of the wall-to-wall mirror. I turn the corner. There are private showers. Three. One for the handicapped. I open the door to the steam bath. Two women, nude, sitting on towels. They have their eyes closed. The steam makes it difficult to see clearly. I close the door. I choose locker number twelve. A locker where no one will see my scar. I take my clothes off. Put on my bathing suit. I walk through another set of doors to the pool. The bottom is aqua blue. I step down the ladder into the slow lane. I look for Mark but I cannot see clearly without my glasses. I do not know the colour of his bathing suit or cap. I am relaxed and do the breast stroke across the pool. Underwater, I see an elderly man kicking like frog legs ahead of me. He is slow, very slow. I stand. The water goes up to my breasts. I lift my goggles to rub my eyes. The chlorine stings them. Sunlight shines through the windows. A Québecois song plays through speakers. Moi mes souliers ont beaucoup voyagé . Félix Leclerc. All lanes are crowded. I move at a snail’s pace. I do four, no, five lengths and get out of the pool to rest in the steam bath. A thirty-something woman sprinklesscented oils where the vapors come out. I am hot. I feel as though I am melting. Relaxed. Very relaxed. I get out of the bath, shower, rub Healing Garden lotion on my face and legs, dress and wait for Mark in the lobby while trying to read more of Women and Madness. I see Mark climbing up the stairs. He carries a blue packsack over his shoulder.
    â€œWhere were you?” he says.
    â€œDidn’t stay in the pool long.”
    â€œHow did you like it?” he asks.
    â€œIt’s like spending a day at the spa.”
    â€œHow many lengths did you do?” he asks.
    â€œFive.” Silence.
    â€œYou must have been waiting a long time here for me.”
    â€œTwenty minutes.” Mark looks at his watch. “Do you want to go for coffee?”
    â€œSure.”
    â€œLet’s take a quieter street,” he says. We turn down Hutchison. “There are a lot of Hassidic Jews on this street,” Mark says. I look across the street and see a woman in a long black skirt and beige nylons. She is pushing a baby carriage and seems to be wearing a wig. La Croissanterie is a block away. There’s an outdoor terrace with umbrellas at each table. It is a day to sit in the shade. We arrive at the café and wait ten minutes for a table outside. We finally sit and order two café au laits in bowls.
    â€œI teach tonight,” he says.
    â€œWhat do you teach?”
    â€œEnglish at Vanier.” I have lost my fluency. Silence. My speech is crippled.
    â€œI’d love to see more poems.”
    â€œWhy don’t we plan to swim again next week? I’ll show you more of my work.”
    I do not know from day to day how I will feel. Words don’t flow from my mouth. I stutter.
    â€œI, I’d like that.”
    Mark reads a few lines by Neruda:
    Leaning into the afternoons I cast my sad nets towards your oceanic eyes.
    There in the highest blaze my solitude lengthens and flames,
    its arms turning like a drowning man’s.
    â€œIt’s got love, loneliness, longing and death,” I say.
    â€œYou need say no more than that,” he says.
    For a moment, I feel pleasure. I tell him that I am bipolar. He listens calmly. His fist rests on his chin.
    â€œI’m on powerful drugs.”
    â€œWhat kind of medication?
    â€œRisperdal and Lithium too. I suffered a