Nineteen October 27, 2023
AT MARCUS’S duplex, Halloween decorations are strung on the windows of the apartment next door and scattered around the unkept yard, inviting trick-or-treaters.
Elsie steps around a kid’s bike on her way to the door.
It’s Friday morning, but Marcus said he works from home, and there’s a car parked in front of his side of the building.
After texting again (and again) she finally looked up his address, found him here.
She knocks. As she waits, she inspects her new keyhole blouse, hoping she’s neither overdressed nor underdressed this time. She knocks again.
It’s not Marcus but a woman who opens the door.
Pixie cut. Sweats. And pregnant, very pregnant.
The skin of her belly sticks out below her T-shirt.
It takes Elsie a moment to process her familiar face, the incongruity of her being here.
Under her feet, the porch wood is water damaged and feels soft, like it might give way. “Amy?”
A look of bewildered joy flutters over Amy’s face. “Ziz?”
“It’s Elsie now,” she says.
Amy pulls Elsie into a hug, with that belly between them. “Oh, my god! How long has it been?”
Three years since Marcus left.
Amy releases her. “What are you doing here? You should have called, let me know you were coming. I would have cleaned up a little.” Behind her, clothes and snack-food wrappings litter a mashup of thrift-store finds that furnish the living room.
A futon flanked by two ugly pink-and-gold table lamps.
A metal coffee table on which a phone and laptop rest. A rocking chair.
Giant throw pillows on the floor. To the right, a tiny galley kitchen where dirty dishes fester.
The skunky scent of weed drifts from another room.
Amy’s not smoking while pregnant, is she?
“You live here?” Elsie asks, not yet willing to accept this truth. “With Marcus?”
Amy appears confused. “You didn’t know? Isn’t that why you’re here, to see us?”
Elsie fidgets with the hem of her blouse. “Actually, I came to see Marcus.”
Amy lifts her chin. Her nostrils flare, like she smells something that’s gone bad. “Oh. Okay. Well, come in, then.”
As Elsie closes the door behind her, Amy turns towards the back room, feet wide apart, her hand bracing her back, revealing the full moon of her belly.
She must be eight months along, maybe more.
Nearly ready to pop. Her discomfort is contagious.
Elsie feels the ache and resists an urge to hold her own back in sympathy. “Marcus!” Amy yells. “Look who’s here.”
Marcus’s familiar voice floats in from the other room. “What’s that?”
“We’ve got a visitor.”
We. There’s no doubt left, then.
Elsie reaches for the doorknob behind her as Marcus wanders out, red headphones dangling around his neck, a joint pinched between his fingers.
When he sees Elsie at the door, he bangs a shin into the corner of the coffee table, swears.
“What the hell are you doing here?” Then, recovering, he says, “Wow. Good to see you!” He gives Elsie a pleading look, before hugging her, asking her to play along.
“Here, sit,” Amy says, chucking a basket of laundry from the futon to the floor. She takes the rocking chair, no doubt a recent addition.
Elsie reluctantly sits on the edge of the futon, hugging her knees. Marcus elects to stand, perhaps to make a quick exit, or to keep the smoke away from Amy. His right foot taps as he inhales deeply from his joint.
“What happened to you, anyway?” Amy asks Elsie. “You just disappeared on us.”
Elsie glances up at Marcus before answering. “I struggled a bit, after my mother died.”
“Struggled,” Amy says. “You went catatonic. You hardly even talked to me anymore.”
Marcus breathes out a trail of smoke from the side of his mouth. “Amy, you’re being unkind,” he says quietly.
Amy stops rocking. “It wasn’t like that. I tried for months to pull Ziz out of it. Longer. Didn’t I, Ziz? I mean, Elsie.”
After the funeral, Amy texted her, certainly, and even called.
She came by with sushi, pad Thai. They played games.
But over time, Elsie’s mind filled with dark thoughts, sapping her energy, stealing her ability to string together coherent sentences.
All she could do was sleep. She left Amy’s messages unanswered until they trailed off, and then, when Marcus left, her one friend stopped calling at all.
Elsie closes her eyes briefly. She doesn’t want to revisit that now, not with Amy sitting right there, pregnant with Marcus’s baby. She’ll fall apart. “When did you two get together?” she asks.
Marcus and Amy look at each other. “I guess not long after you guys broke up,” Amy says. “Marcus texted and we met in Victoria. And then—” Amy holds out both hands. And here we are.
Now Elsie knows why she stopped hearing from Amy after Marcus ended things. Had they been sleeping together before that? (Betrayal has a taste, she learns in this moment—sour, like yogurt that has spoiled.)
Amy scans Elsie’s face. “Are you okay?”
Elsie pinches the bridge of her nose to stop herself from crying. “Yeah. I’m good.”
Marcus offers Elsie the joint. She waves a hand to decline.
“What did you want to see Marcus about?” Amy asks.
Elsie looks up at her. “What?”
“You said you came to see Marcus.”
Marcus jumps in. “Elsie texted yesterday to say she’d be in town visiting her dad in the hospital and was hoping to stop by, reconnect.”
That much is true. Her dad was just moved to a Victoria hospital this morning for a carotid endarterectomy, to clean out the blockage in his neck.
He’ll undergo surgery tomorrow. Elsie and her sister made plans to open the atlas to the seventh house chart at the Ross Bay Beach while they wait for him to leave the hospital recovery room.
“What happened to your dad?” Amy asks.
“He had a stroke.”
Amy leans sideways to put her hand on Elsie’s. “Oh, Ziz.” But then she reads Elsie’s face and pulls back. She turns to Marcus. “Wait, you knew she was dropping by, and you didn’t tell me?”
“She texted on the weekend, a few days ago, while you were out. I forgot.”
“You just said she contacted you yesterday.”
(Marcus was always a terrible liar, especially when stoned.)
“And Elsie was surprised to see me living here, with you,” Amy continues. “You didn’t think to mention me?”
Marcus takes another long toke. “We were talking about other stuff,” he says, breathing out a trail of smoke.
“You didn’t think of me,” Amy says again. “And our baby.” Amy rocks back and forth, quicker now. “Is that why you came home with your socks in your pocket on Tuesday night? Is she the reason you turned off your phone? Were you with her?”
“It’s not like that,” Marcus says. “There’s nothing going on. Honest.” He waves his joint vaguely in Elsie’s direction and gives her another pleading look. “Tell her, Ziz.” Then he catches himself. “I mean, Elsie.” The smoke from his joint churns in the air between them.
Elsie slides her hands between her knees, shoulders to her ears, making herself as small as possible. “I don’t think I want to get dragged into this.”
Marcus winds his hand in a circle. “But it’s just like I said, right? This is the first time I’ve seen you in years. You just stopped in today while visiting your dad. How is Brian, anyway?”
A twitch starts up to the side of Elsie’s eye and she puts a finger to it. She feels suddenly exhausted. Her words come out slowly. “He’s going to be okay. For now.”
Amy stands awkwardly, holding her belly, the chair rocking behind her, to look Marcus in the eye. “I can’t believe you,” she says, pointing at Marcus. “You stand there trying to get Ziz to lie for you? Christ.”
Elsie stands. “I think I should go.” But Amy and Marcus are blocking her way to the door.
“You’re hormonal,” Marcus says, flicking his joint. “It’s the pregnancy talking. You always got jealous like this, every period.”
Amy growls. “I can’t even,” she says, throwing her hand up. “That’s low, gaslighting a pregnant woman.”
Elsie points to the door. “Can I just squeeze by you? Excuse me.” She slides between them and tiptoes to the door. “It was nice seeing you,” she says, on automatic, then cringes.
After she closes the door behind her, Elsie stands on the porch for a moment, her back to the wall, trying to get her bearings.
The roar of blood in her ears. That’s it, then.
She’s done. After years of dreaming, grieving, longing for Marcus, she’s finally done.
She pulls the box of word magnets, the gift Marcus left her so long ago, from her pocket.
After opening it to take a last look, she leaves it on the porch railing along with his business card, to suggest she won’t be calling him again.
Inside, Amy shouts at Marcus. Elsie startles as something heavy, likely one of those ugly pink lamps, smashes against the door.