Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
Kit
WHEN YOU’D KNOWN SOMEONE PRACTICALLY YOUR whole life, you rarely remembered meeting them or how you became friends. Instead, you recalled moments, like raindrops scattered through the history pages of your life. Moments that made you think, This. This is why I like them so much.
The first time Gus and I talked to George Baker was like that. I couldn’t remember much about the first year I went to school, other than I was never scared because Gus was there too. Even when we were so little, he had a way of making me feel like things would be all right.
George’s reddish hair and face full of freckles marked him out as different even before the fact he couldn’t sit still and that he talked to himself when he was running around at lunch did.
“We should play with him,” Gus had announced, watching George alone across the playground, engaged in a make-believe game no one else understood.
“Why?” I asked. “He’s—”
“Lonely.”
I was going to say weird, but the seriousness in Gus’ voice stopped me. His sympathetic gaze never flickered away from George.
Gus added, “My mum says his daddy died. And he makes up stories so he doesn’t feel so sad all the time. But she says it means he has good ’magination.”
“Imagination.”
His gaze did flick to me then, so he could roll his eyes at my correction. “She says he needs friends. You should talk to him for us.”
“Me? Why me? It’s your idea!”
“Because.” He was so matter of fact. “You talk to everyone, and they all want to be friends.”
“They’d want to be your friend too if you talked more.”
Gus shrugged—he didn’t care if he had lots of friends and never would. Aside from his family and mine, he didn’t talk much around people. He hated being called on in class. And he wouldn’t care if everyone else thought we were weird too. So, I decided I didn’t either.
“Will you?” he asked, voice hopeful.
I grinned. Maybe playing with George would be fun. “Okay.”
We trudged through the colourful fall leaves on the ground, kicking them as we went to watch them fly. George looked up from his perch on the ground in a pile of them. The worry and sadness in his wide eyes made me sure Gus was right.
“Hi, George! Can we play?”
“Why?” he asked, suspicious.
I gave him my nicest smile. “’Cause we want to play with you. Don’t you want friends?”
For a long moment he watched us both, his head tilting to the side in confusion. “You making fun of me?”
“Nuh-un.”
“Promise?”
“We promise,” Gus agreed easily, and George nodded in acceptance.
“Okay, let me tell you the game…”
At nine-thirty in the morning the telephone rang, shattering the silence of the kitchen where I was sitting with my untouched coffee, staring at nothing.
“Lovely residence, Kit speaking,” I said out of half-forgotten habit. “How can I help you?”
“Oh, Kit! Finally,” my dear friend Marion Fincher exclaimed, her American accent thicker than it usually was with emotion. “Agnes and I have been calling since your letter arrived in Montreal, but you’re never there! It only rings and rings.”
Agnes Dewey was Marion’s lover. I’d met them when I’d studied in London where we lived in the same student boarding house.
Agnes’ interest in journalism, and Marion having travelled across the Atlantic as I had for her education, was what first bonded us.
When we got to know each other better, we discovered other commonalities.
They were both atheists, as I was, and Agnes was a mage.
Neither of them were interested in the sex that society thought they ought to be either.
I could still remember Marion dragging me to her poetry readings and subtly pointing out trustworthy boys she thought I’d like.
Or in their room, Marion lying with her head in Agnes’ lap as Agnes ran her fingers through Marion’s long blonde curls while we drunkenly debated whatever political shenanigans we’d heard about that day.
During much of the war, they had been part of a network of Ally spies, until they’d been burned and Marion had been shot.
She’d been lucky as far as gunshot wounds went; it’d narrowly missed anything vital, going clean through her side.
And lucky again that Agnes had been there to save her from a second shot by working an off-the-cuff spell that rerouted the Nazi’s bullet into his own head.
They’d also been darn lucky they made it out of the country.
The experience had frightened Agnes enough that she’d found herself a temporary job on the other side of the world by the time Marion was healed up, and she brought them to Toronto.
I’d been glad they were out of danger, but I’d missed them when I returned from the front to England and found it devoid of their laughter.
“Sorry,” I responded, genuinely meaning it. She must’ve been alarmed by the last letter I sent, and I’d been so scattered since arriving that I hadn’t gotten in touch. “It’s been… Ted’s missing.”
I heard the muffled sound of the phone being snatched, and Agnes demanded, “What do you mean missing?”
I explained what I’d discovered and my plans for the day. I also let it slip I’d hired Gus. A beat of judgemental silence passed, then, shuffling as Marion retrieved the phone.
“The same Gus who broke your heart and sent you off to university alone to wander the globe in perpetual solitude and self-imposed loneliness? That Gus?”
“I wouldn’t say solitude, I—”
“Went catting around but never found someone who could get past your towering defences? It's still solitude if you feel alone, Kit.”
The rustles over the line suggested another struggle for control of the telephone.
Agnes emerged victorious. “Never mind her, she’s always looking for a love story.
Or trying to prod one into existence, as you’ll well remember.
How are you holding up, Daring? This sounds rather a lot to contend with all at once. ”
“I…” Should have said I was fine even if I hadn’t been for a long time. And now my brother was gone. There was a catch in my throat I couldn’t hide. “I could be better.”
“I know, love. Do you know what? Marion’s been dying to see more of Canada while we’re here. What do you say we come visit?”
I really, really, should say thank you for the offer, but no. It wasn’t fair for them to have to come all the way here because I—what? Wanted to see someone who really knew me? Because my heart felt bludgeoned ten ways to Sunday, and I wanted to be with people it didn’t hurt to see?
“Don’t say no, Kit, please!” Marion shouted. “We want to be there for you. Besides, we’ve already booked the train and we’ll be there Thursday. So, if you say no, we’ll just be at our hotel in Halifax all alone and distraught because we can’t visit you.”
My chest ached as I laughed, a mix of joy and solace. “Tell her I said all right, so she stops shouting the place down.”
“He says you’re very loud,” Agnes relayed to Marion, “but he accepts he needs our help.”
Laughing again, I covered my face with my free hand. “Give me the details. I’ll make sure to have a car by then so I can fetch you from the train station.”
We made plans and chatted some more, my spirits buoyed slightly at the thought of their arrival. I might not have George and Gus anymore, but I wasn’t friendless. I still had people who loved me.