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psychosis.”
    â€œYou seem pretty normal to me.” His face does not reveal what he is thinking.
    â€œI almost died a few times.”
    â€œVan Gogh, Sylvia Plath, Robert Lowell, the list is endless.”
    â€œSo you understand?”
    â€œI can relate,” he says and holds my hand.
    â€œI have to go, but we’ll talk again next week,” he says softly. I put three loonies on the table. Mark pulls out change from his pocket and puts it on top of the bill. We walk out of the café. Mark unlocks his bicycle from a parking meter by the café. I say goodbye and head toward avenue du Parc. I worry that I have told him too much, too soon. But he does not seem frightened or disturbed. He still wants to see me.
    My mother comes home from her volunteer work at the craft shop. Handmade jewellery, dolls, clothes. Profits go to charitable organizations. While she sits at the cash, the ladies from the neighborhood drop in for coffee. They talk about their children, grandchildren. They gossip. “There’s never a dull moment,” she says. We eat supper. Homemade hamburgers and oven-baked fries.
    â€œI had a good day,” I say. “Mark is going to read me his poetry.”
    â€œPoetry isn’t a serious profession,” she says. Silence. I take two bites from my hamburger and eat one slice of crisp potato.
    â€œI’ll do the dishes in an hour. I need to rest.” I lie down on my bed and feel very grateful to have met Mark. I think about how I enjoyed his company today. Trip downtown. The swim.
    The building on Hutchison where Mark lives is made of grey stone. I walk up the wooden steps to the second floor. Chipped red paint on the door. I ring the buzzer. Mark opens the door. A shorthaired grey and white cat sits in the vestibule.
    â€œSay hello to Batman,” Mark says as he points at the cat.
    â€œBonjour Batman,” I say. I follow Mark through a long dark hallway into the kitchen. The sink is stacked with dirty dishes. He makes lemon zinger tea. I look at rows of books, the colourful abstract paintings on his walls.
    â€œDid you make these?” I ask.
    â€œFriends,” he says. We sip our tea on his navy sofa. I glance up at a classical guitar hanging on his wall.
    â€œDo you play?”
    â€œI compose my own songs.” He takes the guitar down and begins to play. Folk music. His finger strums the strings with ease. The sound brings a gentle smile to my face. Mark stops playing. He tells me that he hardly plays anymore.
    â€œI made a CD,” he says. “I sold fifty copies, and then I realized that my music career wasn’t going anywhere, so I went back to poetry.” He goes into the side table drawer and hands me his book of poems. Watercolours on the cover.
    â€œCan I take it home with me to read?”
    â€œYou can keep it.” I leaf through it quickly, then put it in my handbag.
    â€œI’ll read it tomorrow,” I say.
    â€œTeardrops,” he says as he gently touches my earring made of glass.
    â€œI have to go home soon. I’m tired.”
    â€œYou can stay here. There’s an extra bed in the front room.”
    â€œThanks. Maybe next time.”
    Back home on my bed, propped up with pillows, I read Mark’s poetry. Dark. Bleak landscapes. Poems about death and loneliness. Almost went over the edge himself, but was saved, saved by his poems. My mother comes into my room. She tells me to get dressed. We’re going grocery shopping.
    The phone rings. It’s Mark. He invites me over to watch A Beautiful Mind. He rented the movie at Passport Vidéo. I say yes.
    â€œHow about six?” he says. “We can have dinner together.”
    I wear black jeans and the green wool sweater my mother made me. On the bus, on the way into the city, I do not read. My face is turned toward the window. I am fragile. I could break like glass.
    I ring Mark’s buzzer. He opens the door. He wears a faded grey