By Lucy

Edit: Forgot to add that city council voted against the natural gas plant! I don’t want to say my report and advocacy was the tie-breaker, but….!

This works better than it has any right to. Part of that is everyone’s agreeability – Kyle has said it was a lot more chaotic during the build, in the summer, because some of the guys would get in each other’s faces. If left to their own devices, both Bart and Drew prefer to hang out in their rooms, playing video games on their consoles. Me and Kyle tend to take over the living room as our own, since no one else ever protests.

There’s also the general tidiness. Someone’s always loading up the dishwasher or wiping down the counter. No one’s cleaned the bathroom, but it’s not really dirty either. There’s been no real argument over the showers; Bart is usually the first one in, me or Victoria next, Kyle and Drew later on in the evening. No one has wanted to use the stove when someone else has it.

---

I feel wretched Sunday morning.

The curtains are thin and light coloured, and do nothing to keep the sun out. I know I won’t be able to fall asleep again, but I don’t want to do anything else. I’m both still drunk and hungover. I text Kyle a bit. He’s hanging out with Draper in the living room. I decide some THC could probably get me back to sleep, and ask Kyle to bring the pen to my room. Eventually he does.

“Hey sleepyhead.”

“Sleepyhead yourself. How much sleep did you even get?” I ask, reaching for the pen.

“Who said I got any?”

I have to pick my jaw up off the floor. “You didn’t go to sleep?!”

He shrugs and smiles. “It’s my day off, I don’t want to waste it.”

How is this guy alive? Drinking constantly, working 10 hours a day, and never sleeping? I’m sure it happens, but I’ve never heard of an alcoholic who doesn’t yearn for the release of sleep.

“How does this work, again?” I hold the pen carefully in my hand.

“Just put it in your mouth and suck.”

“Giggity.”

As the acrid pot smoke fills my lungs and burns them, I flash back to 14 years ago. The bite in the November air, the crinkle of the fallen leaves as we stood in the forest.

“You’re doing it wrong, you’re crushing the joint.”

He quickly got frustrated and took a long drag on the joint, before kissing me, blowing the smoke into my mouth. Back when kissing him was the most exciting part of my day, the headrush from it and the pot, blue eyes, warm hands in the cold air...

Kyle takes off. I lay on the bed, head starting to swim, thinking. I said he has brown eyes, but he doesn’t. They just look brown when his hood is up, which is to say, most of the time. Like Landon, hiding inside his hood and ball cap…

I text Paul, “I might have… feelings… for Kyle.”

For a response, he sends the clip of Jack Sparrow saying, “There are… stirrings… alright, feelings, damn you.”

“Hardy har. What do I do about it?” How do I kill them, cut it out, go back to normal…

“You should talk to him. I think he does, too.”

Bah, feelings. What a useless prospect. There’s no winning here, right? He’s gonna go back to Toronto and I’m gonna stay in Thunder Bay…

The pen knocks me out, yay. I sleep for 3 hours and feel much better.

Kyle and Draper are still drinking on the couch when I get up. I make a breakfast, grab my laptop and new headphones, and sit at the dinner table. Draper eventually leaves.

Do I need to do anything today? I should go shopping, but it’s not urgent. I do need to do laundry, but it’s here. Nothing, then. My heart twists about Kyle requesting to go for lunch and talk, but he doesn’t try to actually take me out. Is he waiting for me to say something? Or did he forget?

Victoria orders pizza for all of us. I take my headphones off, but the boys are just talking about sports and betting odds, so I put them back on. After dinner, the boys go upstairs to play video games. I go to the living room and put on Guillermo Del Toro’s Frankenstein. Victoria watches it with me.

It’s good, very Victorian and gothic. It’s not entirely faithful to the text of the book, which I should read again, but it captures the spirit well. I always get sucked in to Frankenstein stories. The scarred monster, unloved, unable to die and unable to fit it…

Kyle texts me, “You have your G [license], right?”

“Yes, and my M.” Well, M2, but who’s counting.

“Cool. I left my bike back in Toronto.”

I’m immediately overwhelmed by fantasies of how sexy he looks on a motorcycle, which takes a moment to wrestle my thoughts back to here and now.

I’m the last one to do my laundry. I borrowed Kyle’s charger for my headset, so I take it downstairs with my laundry to put it on his bed. Surprise! He’s passed out in it, still in his jeans and sweater, and it’s barely 7. I freeze, startled; for a moment, I debate hopping in the bed with him.

Nah, we don’t have that kind of relationship. I grab my clean laundry and go back up to my room to fold it. Then I play on my laptop until sleep finds me. Kyle left the THC pen in my room, so I guess it’s mine now.

I’m too cold in the morning. I’m buying a heater from Walmart. I’m too cold at work to tolerate this on my free time.

“Drew-bear is sleeping late, even for him.” Kyle says at breakfast.

I shrug and go get dressed to head out to work. Kyle heads downstairs.

When Kyle shows up at the site, he says, “I don’t think Drew is coming in today. He got up and immediately started throwing up.”

“Hangover catching up to him finally?” I asked.

“You wouldn’t know this ’cause you went to bed early, but he took off at 8PM.” Victoria says, “Didn’t say anything to me.”

“Booty call?”

She shrugs.

Why would a booty call have him throwing up? Hungover? Molly comedown?

Bart sternly tells all of us to have our tools on today. I resist the urge to roll my eyes; he hopes for a lot. We barely have enough people to chain as it is, and none of us can match Kyle for daredevil behavior, and there’s no real reason to have your tools on to chain.

Nonetheless, when we get up to the top of the scaffold, I throw my tools on and climb up onto the ledgers with Kyle.

“What are you doing?” He says, a little too incredulously.

“I know I’m not Drew, but it’s better than nothing.” I scoff.

We do pretty good, actually. I’ve put on muscle over the weekend, and I’ve gotten better; hitting every pin the first time. My two sticking points are that I refuse to go right to the edge, and I won’t even attempt to move the decks.

At one point he tells me to tie off. Dulcinea effect kicking in, finally. Keep in mind, [REDACTED].

“Have you fallen?” Virgil asks him.

“No.”

“How often do people fall in Toronto?”

“Never.” Kyle says, hitting a pin and handing something down. “Technically. You see cut lanyards in the garbage all the time. Because when you fall, they deploy, so they cut them up and throw them out without reporting it. It’s an instant lay-off if you fall.”

“For your health.” I suggest.

“No, because the company can’t get a government contract if they have any falls on their record.”

Wow. A rule presumably put in place to protect workers is instead causing them to pretend they aren’t injured. Make no mistake, a fall where a lanyard deploys is a shock to the system. Suspension trauma is nothing to shake a stick at; massive internal bruising if nothing else. Even with the lanyard deploying, you’re still experiencing 900 pounds of force on your body. I wonder if Kyle has fallen and just says he ‘technically hasn’t’.

When Drew doesn’t show up by first break, he’s obviously not coming in for the day. Hope that theoretical booty call was worth missing a days’ pay and feeling like crap.

It’s cold today, so cold the tears from the wind are causing my eyelashes to freeze together.

The heater is also missing from the bathroom. Bathrooms, even portapotties, are required to be heated, especially when women are on-site. Victoria asks me to tell Bart, who says to ask the painter. The painter says it broke so he threw it out.

After break, Victoria is feeling brave. She wants to help Kyle dismantle. I’m a little reluctant, but I allow it. To be honest, I also just don’t want to be loading the hoist, which is my only other option.

It doesn’t help that we’re working away from the hoist, which means walking gear back and forth and ducking under things again. The constant ducking is what hurts me more than anything.

The lineworkers show up to move the internet dishes for us. There’s a team of four of them, idly chatting with Kyle. They talk about what a shitty job this is for us and how they love being atop the water tower and not balanced on a rusty cell tower.

A truck showed up to take some of the gear back to Toronto. Bart misses lunch to load it up. I suggest to Kyle that we should bring back some milk for him; Kyle scoffs at me.

Lasagna for lunch. I didn’t realize the M&M lasagna takes 9 minutes in the microwave, and I eat it boiling hot because I need food or I’ll pass out on the scaffold.

“Time to take down the tube thing.” Kyle groans.

“It’s not that hard.” I say idly.

“Oh really? Maybe I’ll put you on it.” He says, smiling.

“Go ahead.” It doesn’t scare me, and I don’t believe he would actually do it, even punitively. (I was right)

The lineworkers left without taking everything down. Still, at least we can dismantle the tube structure in the middle of the tower.

Bart comes up shortly before the end of the day; he’s hangry and bitching about the linesmen leaving their gear around. We move some of it while Bart jokes about pitching it off the scaffold.

Something went wrong in the water tower. They’re releasing all the water they filled it up with… into the yard.

Yeah, I’m sure that’s not going to be a problem when it’s a skating rink tomorrow morning, or when we can’t finish the dismantle because the jacks are buried under inches of ice.

To M&M’s. The nice old lady isn’t there. I grab 2 French onion soups for Kyle. We go to Walmart and I lose my mind at the staff because they lock up the Tylenol at 5pm. Now what? Safeway?

Go home, throw dinner in the oven and go shower. Kyle is curled up on the couch with a laptop, looking serious.

Bart comes upstairs to fix the internet. When we both laugh at his lukewarm attempt, he complains that neither of us are helping.

“I’m not helpful, Bart.” Kyle says snarkily, as he leaves.

I frown. “You helped me with my headphones.”

“You caught me in a good mood.”

I don’t believe that. I think kind and helpful is his default. He’s in a weird mood today.

He gets a phone call and I go to the dining room to eat dinner. Bart is at the table, intensely going over the collective agreement. After dinner, I go upstairs to play on the laptop for a bit. When I go to refresh my tea, Kyle’s on the couch, TV off.

I frown and he snickers. “What?”

“The TV is off.”

“I know, that’s weird, isn’t it? I’ll turn it on soon.” He smiles, in a way that’s unlike him.

When I go downstairs half an hour later to make my fried cheese curds, he’s nowhere to be seen.

Whatever. Back to my room! I text Victoria and offer her some.

The days start to blur together. The sound of our footsteps on the metal stairs, the feeling of a ledger in my hands, looking out across the towns of Fort Frances and International Falls. The sun rising through the steam of the American mill… There is no beginning and no end to the work. It is my entire reality.

“Why is there an orange slowly dying on the table?” I ask. Someone’s peeled it and put it in a bowl on Sunday, and left it there.

“Your boyfriend did that.” Victoria replies.

He’s my boyfriend now? “Ah.” I tidy it up. He’s usually pretty good at cleaning up after himself.

Drew is back Tuesday, a little shaky though. He denies going out for a booty call. There is something going around call Winter Vomiting Disease, maybe he got that?

I’ve been getting stronger day-to-day; I surprised Kyle by taking on more weight than he knows I could have a day or two before, which surprises me that he noticed. I’m also losing weight, probably a pound or two a day. A pound is 1000 calories. Because I’m eating M&M’s, I know exactly how many calories I’m consuming, somewhere around 2’000 a day. But we’re burning at least 3’000 and probably closer to 4’000 because my Fitbit doesn’t know that I’m shivering in the cold, and shivering burns 100-400 calories an hour depending on how cold you are.

Shortly before lunch, a house near the build catches fire. We all stop to watch it; partially practical, as the smoke might get in our way, partially just rubbernecking.

“Walmart locks up the Tylenol at 5.” I grumble at lunch, shaking my almost empty bottle.

“We can go to Shoppers if you want to.” Kyle says.

“I’m not used to people being nice to me.” I say, in a small voice.

“I can tell.”

He could always tell, couldn’t he?

I like that you’re broken,

broken like me.

Maybe that makes me a fool…

The end of the day is bullshit. Like, to the point that I can’t even write about it, what happened was so unsafe and illegal. I’m not convinced the MOL won’t hear about it if I post it here. Everyone walked away, at least. Virgil agreed to do it, Victoria got worn down to agreeing, only I pushed back. I don’t care if I get laid off for it.

It also upsets me… my feelings silenced me. If I didn’t have feelings for Kyle, I’d raise a bigger stink about it, and I hate it. But he’ll be the first one to get hurt if the law gets involved, Bart will make sure of it.

After work, we hop in the truck and head to Shoppers. I check the food aisle – I haven’t had any honey for a week – and Kyle mentions that we could go to Safeway.

“I don’t want to be a bother.”

“It’s no trouble. The first time I was up here, I had no car. I remember what it was like.”

I don’t believe this is regular human kindness. But I won’t argue with it. “When did you get the blower?”

“A month ago. I’ve been carless for most of the year, fighting my case.”

“Why?”

“Didn’t want a criminal record. Been there, done that.”

Wait, you have? Why? How?

He hops out of the truck and wanders into Safeway with me. He seems to find my dorky behaviour amusing, and my comments as we wander the aisles. I make a comment about escaping the store and he tells me I play too many video games.

Oh! A lightbulb.

Me and Paul were doing tarot readings weeks back, about where and when I should travel. No matter what we asked and how we shuffled the deck, we both kept getting the King of Swords. I ignored it; it didn’t match anyone I knew, so it must be someone I hadn’t met yet.

It was Kyle.

“Do you play guitar?” I ask, out of nowhere.

He glances at me, surprised. “Yeah. Why’d you ask that?”

Oh, who knows. Because the hamster in my brain is running overtime. “Skateboard?”

He nods. “Not so much anymore, I’m just the old man on the skate park, then. I still snowboard, though. Used to go to Whistler once a year.”

You do? Feel like going in, oh, say… January?

It is him.

When we get back to the house, Victoria wants to watch Kpop Demon Hunters. Apparently it’s her comfort movie. She’s got a big bag of chips and some butter tarts, and she quickly gets into the wine as well. She’s traumatized by what happened during the last push.

The movie is fine, short and snacky, and the songs are good. It’s pretty cliche, though. I make an aside comment about feeling like the demon adversary, and Kyle gives me a weird look for it.

I dunno what to do about him. It’s hard to feel torn between being pissed off at him for the stunt he pulled, and also like I can’t say a godamn thing about it.

For once, he does ask me to go up to my room. We’re up far later than I want to be, but I can’t resist him.

Kyle doesn’t work Wednesday. He headed out early to Winnipeg; he has to check in about the blower once a month, and Winnipeg is the closest tech station. At the trailer, Bart lays what happened on Kyle, but I blame Bart as well. He leans on Kyle’s tendency to play the bad guy, to get things done. It’s a failure of leadership.

If you say anything, I’ll hurt Kyle.

I clench my hands so hard I’m surprised my nails don’t draw blood.

Slow work day. Without Kyle here to crush it, we’re hamstrung. Bart could dismantle just as fast, but he’s gotta be on the ground to drive the lift truck.

C’est la vie.

Virgil is upset about the other day as well. He was high on adrenaline, and now he’s crashed he’s angry and insisting it won’t happen again.

We’re got the top of the tank cleared off, anyway.

Tearing down the 4 lifts that are a ring around the tank.

It’s cold today, cold beyond anything I’ve ever felt. Minus 20, feels like minus 30. The wind cuts through me like a knife. My hands blister and go numb.

At one point, the police take the police dog outside for training, so we stop to watch it while sheltering from the wind. Later on in the day, there’s a loud siren. Bart tells us later it’s a flood warning siren they test monthly. The surface of the river freezes and steams in the insane cold.

In the lunchroom, I confide in Victoria, “So, on Saturday Kyle asked ‘what are we doing’.”

“Aww, he caught feelings.” She grins widely. “I love love.”

“Based on that?”

“Can you think of another reason he’d ask?”

No…

Kyle’s back when we get off work. I’m the first one back to the house and I can’t resist stealing a kiss.

“How was work?” He asks.

“Cold!” Then I stick my frozen hands up his shirt.

“Ah! You are cold.” He agrees, but he doesn’t try to make me remove my hands, although I quickly do before someone walks in.

He’s cooking soup on the stove. I throw an M&M in the oven. “Nice to have a relaxing day in the car?”

“No.” He yawns. “Too much time alone with the voices. I’d rather be moving.”

That’s fair.

After he finishes eating his soup, he lays down on the living room floor with his feet under the breakfast bar. Just stretching his back out.

“I thought you were about to start doing sit ups.” I giggle.

“I could. I should.” He says, putting his hands on his abdomen. “I could walk on my hands across the room.”

“Oh yeah?”

By way of answer, he immediately launches into a handstand. He makes a few spirited attempts to walk across the room, but doesn’t quite succeed.

“There, see? Too much time in the car. And 200 bucks for the stupid appointment.”

When I go to take my food out of the oven, I discover Kyle forget the stove on and the spatula now has a giant burn mark on the bottom.

“Tomorrow is pay day! I’m buying a Switch.” I say.

“Oh yeah?” Kyle says, “Why’s that?”

“It travels well.”

“That makes sense.”

For the evening’s entertainment, we watch the Guillermo Del Toro’s Pinocchio. It’s pretty good, although I spent the first ten minutes annoyed because Geppetto has long grey hair (Geppetto, in the original story, was a nickname to make fun of the fact he hid his baldness with a hideous blonde wig). It’s nothing life-changing in terms of plot and themes, although Del Toro is clearly still working out all the “war is hell” stuff he’s been processing for twenty years, because the story is now set during World War 2.

At one point there is some scaffolding and I joke about how often I pause movies to check out the scaffolding in the background. Kyle mentions that he’s done some scaffolding work, in the background of a movie.

I’m in bed by 8:30. All of this is exhausting.

The cold continues to deepen into the next day. We’re on standby for the first half an hour; it’s so cold the generator for the hoist won’t even start. When Bart finally gets it running, the hoist doesn’t want to work either; the electricity is being zapped from the cables. Bart makes a comment about breaking out a gin wheel that I hope is sarcastic.

Eventually it starts working and we head up. I’m working with Drew and Virgil; Kyle is working with Victoria near the dance floor. I have to head down twice to warm up my hands in the trailer. When I ask Bart about winter gloves, he gestures to the pack of extra large normal gloves that aren’t built for this cold and are far, far too big for me.

“This is all they gave me.”

It’s all I can do not to scream at him. Company man! I don’t give a rats’ furry ass what they gave you, your job is to make sure we are safe and can do the job. You have the company credit card; go buy some. Or, put your foot down and insist they supply us the proper gear. That is your f*cking job!

We’re saved, ironically, by the MOL showing up just as we go on break.

The hoist froze at the top. Kyle hopped in it and rode it down on the manual emergency break; we can’t leave it up there all night, but another argument for calling it a day.

The guy steps into the trailer as we are all gearing down. “Hello, I’m from the Ministry of Labour.”

We all glance at each other. I don’t think I’ve ever seen MOL on a site.

“I had some anonymous complaints…” He lists them off. I relax when he says ‘confined space’. We haven’t been in the hole for two weeks, this has nothing to do with us.

But… it should. My guts twist at the idea of telling him about Tuesday. He’d shut us down immediately, but maybe he should.

Rat.

Bart is confrontational, y’know, the hallmark of total innocence. Buddy asks us questions, asks for our safety certs, etc etc. He was sitting in the truck for a while watching us with binoculars. He comments that Kyle has some bad habits.

I glance at Kyle and notice for the first time he has grey hair. Since we work from sun up to sun down, he always has a balaclava on at work, and the light in the AirBnB is not great, I didn’t notice. He also has hazel/ green eyes… dark enough they looked brown to me before.

Then Bart notices some of my certs have my old name on it.

“Hello, what’s this?”

No.

“Lucy had a different name.”

Stop.

“She was married.” Kyle tries to stop him.

“Formerly…”

“That’s f*cking rude, you know, I don’t give you permission to tell everyone.” I protest.

He tells them my old name anyway.

I debate flipping the table. I decide that’s a bad idea with the MOL guy here.

I should tell him. Just for that. Get Bart in real trouble for being a prick.

They’ll just hurt Kyle.

Gah!

After 45 minutes, the MOL guy says he has all he needs and we can go back to work.

“No one is getting on that scaffold while he is here.” Bart says, glancing at Kyle.

Way to look innocent, Bart.

We head out and work in the yard until lunchtime. When we head back to the house, I bitch Bart out. “You had no right to tell them my old name.”

He shrugs. “I didn’t think it was that big a deal.”

“Well it f*cking is and you had no right to assume that.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” He replies disinterestedly.

I aughta teach you a lesson… prick.

Kyle comes in, “I found a Switch.”

“A second hand one?” But we make so much money…

He shows me the ad. I message and ask the girl if she’d do 200 and she says yes. Why not, save 200 bucks and help a girl out…

When we go back for the last push, it’s warmed up enough that the lift works properly, so we continue the tear down.

After work, Kyle gives me a ride down to the girl’s place. What a weird place; there’s affirmational sayings taped all over the walls. I walk away with one Switch, one controller, and one set of Joycons absent the dock. And no charger. I should have bought a new one.

“They’re letting us stay at the AirBnb over the holidays.” Kyle says. “What’s your plan?”

“I dunno.” I have to go back and finish packing, regardless of everything else, but I wouldn’t mind staying here ’til I head out. “Are you staying?” I try not to sound hopeful.

“Oh, probably. Got no real reason to do another 20 hour drive there and 20 hours back.”

You don’t? I’m glad, but that’s also a little depressing.

We get back and start working on setting up the Switch. When I ask him to help, Kyle protests that the last game console he owned was a Super Nintendo.

“Culture kept going after 1999, you know!” I exclaim.

I should say something about something.

“Could we have a talk sometime?” I ask.

“Sure?” He says. Uh, backpedal, backpedal!

Eventually we get it working. I thought Nintendo had some kind of game pass, but they do not, so I have to buy every game and they’re all 80-100 bucks! Jeez.

I start with Mario Kart. It’s short and snacky. Kyle rounds everyone up for shots and a good time was had by all. Confusingly so… Bart gets really into the game and ends up being the only one who can really challenge me. Kyle might be throwing the races, though. He enjoys my trash talk a little too much.

Turns out Bart isn’t a Canadian citizen, just a permanent resident. He’s from the Netherlands, which explains his accent and habit of counting in Dutch.

The next day… yay.

Bart decides we are going too slow, so he comes up to help us. As mentioned previously, we can only really go as fast as the hoist is loaded and unloaded, so him ‘helping’ by dismantling isn’t actually making anything go faster at all. I’m pretty sure he’s just bored of being on the ground.

As we’re chaining decks and decks are big, heavy and tend to get hung up on my belt, I left it on the dance floor. At some point this rubs him the wrong way and he starts yelling mocking comments at me about it.

Sure. ‘Cause the job isn’t tiring, bitterly cold and long enough, let’s get on each other’s nerves.

When we go back to the AirBnb for lunch, I sit in the dinning room, put my headphones in and crank up the music until I can’t hear anything else. Makeitstopmakeitstopmakeitstop…

My phone lights up. “Not in the mood for Family Feud?” Kyle.

Go away. You’re gonna start trying to cheer me up, I know, and I can’t take it right now. “Trying not to lose my temper.” Hmm, maybe I should work on my excuses.

No, he can tell, can’t he? He just pretends to be a puppy-eyed dope.

“Did I upset you?”

“No, you didn’t.”

When we all get up to walk back to work, he hangs behind for me. “So, what’s bothering you?”

“Don’t pretend to care. I can’t take it.” I stomp out the door. He jogs to catch up.

“I’m not pretending.”

“Why would you actually care!”

He dodges that. “Is it Virgil? I don’t think it’s Victoria…”

“Virgil’s getting better…”

“So it’s Bart, then. What did he say?” He reaches over and tickles my side.

I giggle and slap his arm despite myself. “Stop it!”

“You should let your anger out, you know, it’s not good to keep it inside. You’ll have a heart attack.”

“I should be so lucky.”

“Now you sound like me.”

I sigh. “I always have.”

“I know, it’s weird, isn’t it?”

“Story of my life.”

“I could always drop a ledger on myself again, that always makes you laugh.”

I can’t resist giggling. “No it doesn’t!”

“Hey, you’re smiling again!”

“Stop!” I wail.

Bart sends Virgil, Victoria and Drew to the top to finish the dismantle. Me and Kyle get sent to the lift above the dance floor to tear up the planks. Kyle continues to tell jokes and goof off to try and thaw me out.

“Why does Bart put us together, anyway?”

“I usually ask Bart to put you on my team.”

“You… what? I can’t tell when you’re joking anymore.”

“I’m being serious.”

“Why!”

“‘Cause you’re a good worker?”

I mean, I am, but I have my doubts.

Virgil chooses the moment to come join us, they’re done everything up there. “Hey, labourer, where’s your belt?”

As my rage surfaces again, Kyle groans, “Come on, man, I spent all afternoon trying to get her to smile again.”

After work, we head to Safeway and the liquor store.

As we walk around the store, he says, “You look deep in thought.”

“Mhmm.”

“Why don’t you just say what’s on your mind?”

“I’m not good at that.”

“Just arguing with people in your head?”

“Yup. I call it the hamster wheel.” I sigh, “I shouldn’t say people aren’t nice to me. They usually are, just…”

“They want to get in your pants, so it’s not real.”

He gets it.

As we’re back in the truck, heading back to the house, he says, “So, Lucy, you wanted to talk.”

I sucked in a deep breath. This is me pushing myself off the plank, because I really don’t want to, but I should. “I kinda like you.”

He chuckles. “I figured that’s what the sex was about.”

“Oh, hah hah.” Another deep breath, watching the town slide by outside the window. “You know what I mean. More than casual sex.” I pause too long again.

“You’re having this conversation with me in your head, aren’t you?”

“Yes, because I don’t do feelings! My friends said I should tell you, but I don’t… I mean… You live in Toronto, and I live in Thunder Bay…”

“And you have a boyfriend.”

I glance at him. “Was that a sticking point for you?”

“I didn’t let myself think about those options… beyond… because of that.”

I felt a warm glow somewhere in my chest. The obvious inference being that he would have thought about them if I were single, and they were coming to his mind now. “That’s not… Oh, right, you were drunk, you forgot that conversation.” Wait, has he been sleeping with me thinking I was cheating on my boyfriend? Jeez. I explain the situation to him again.

I feel like I am betraying Kevin, who’s been nothing but nice and considerate to me, but I can’t deny the feeling that’s been slowly growing in me all summer. It’s been 4 years since I had a ‘real’ boyfriend, in the sense of a commitment. I might have loved the Vagabond to the moon and back, but I was also acutely aware there was no real chance of convincing him to settle down. I don’t want to diminish my relationship with Kevin just because it’s finite, but I can’t ignore that feeling of wanting something more. And I can’t imagine him arguing with me about it. He’d just want me to be happy.

And by the same token, that’s how I know this is real and not some infatuation. I haven’t wanted this for four years. But oh, to want it now, when it’s such an unfortunate situation!

Paul later points out I wanted to travel for the next year or two, but I don’t see that as a hinderance. Kyle isn’t packing up and moving to Thunder Bay within the next year; he’d have to sit on the idea, talk about it with his friends, pack up, and move. Lots of time for me to ramble.

“Did you want to go for a longer drive? Keep talking?” He says, as we’re near the house.

“We can always talk in my room, you know. But I am hungry and I want to shower.”

“That’s fair, I do, too.”

“Think about it, I suppose.”

“You gave me a lot to think about.” He says, before sliding his hand across the console and grabbing mine.

Oh, my poor heart!

“Let’s do dinner tomorrow.”

Gulp. “Sure!” I squeak.

There’s no getting away from the obviousness of my feelings. By the same token, the fact that he isn’t running away screaming or trying to turn me down also suggests what his feelings are…

I put on a movie. We end up cuddling a bit on the couch. Bart comes down and notices us a split second before I can scoot to the side. “Oh, I don’t like this.” He says. Kyle ignores him.

I mean, we work together well and we aren’t having sex on the kitchen counter or slacking off at work. Who cares? Some might say he’s jealous because his own girlfriend isn’t here… I think he’s worried I’ll convince Kyle not to work for him anymore.

Me and Kyle are working together for most of Saturday. Trying to convince me not to flee, I suppose.

“Hey, you’re dancing again!” He says.

“You… you noticed me dancing?” I blush.

“Of course! And the singing under your breath.”

In the afternoon, disaster strikes again. We’re all loading the hoist, and Bart comes up again. He notices me not wearing my belt again, and immediately launches into a string of humiliating and degrading comments, culminating in a threat to send me down to the ground, until I go and put my belt on.

Done.

With.

This.

This guy is bent. This guy doesn’t give a shit about us; he’d light us on fire just because he was cold.

For lunch, I can’t even stomach the idea of walking to the house and seeing his smug face. I walk to KFC and order something.

Kyle intercepts me on the walk back. “Just ignore him.”

“I can’t! I’m this close to asking him for a layoff.”

“He doesn’t mean it.”

“He does and I’m sick of it. He doesn’t care if we get hurt, if we have the right gear, but he does care that I’m not wearing my belt when I’m not dismantling?” I stomp my feet in anger. “If I leave, I’m taking Victoria and Virgil with me, and good luck getting another crew within a week. He needs me more than I need this job.”

Kyle shrugs, “So what are you worried about, then? He can’t lay you off.”

…

…

…

Dammit, he’s right.

He spends the afternoon cheering me up again. At one point a plank slips in his hands as he’s lowering it down, dumping a load of snow onto his face, although he manages to catch it before it hits the deck. I die laughing.

“As long as you’re smiling, Lucy!”

“What! You hurt yourself at work… on purpose? To amuse me?”

“Yeah. I noticed your most genuine laughs are when you’re playing video games, and when I get hurt.”

Gulp.

Sociopathy aside, it reminds me of a conversation I had with the Vagabond. He complained something similar, about how I laugh when I’m on the phone with my friends versus with him. I told him that if he wants a different laugh, he should stop being an arrogant jerk… and this was kind of what I meant. Kyle is chasing the things that make me laugh, not demanding that I change.

Oh.

My guts twist again. I can’t stop feeling guilty about my feelings. I can’t remember ever feeling this way about someone… It’s not passion, not the first overwhelming blush of love. It’s something comforting and warm, like a hug. He just wants to make me happy, in the oddball ways that bring me joy, and I… all I can see is the end of the road.

After work, I hope in the shower and change into my nice clothes, such as they are. What am I doing?

“Enjoy your date!” Victoria yells, as we put on our boots to leave. I blush and want to tell her it’s not a date, but I can’t, so I just yell back, “Thanks!”

Kyle drives us downtown to a bar/restaurant called Flint. They’re short staffed, so we sit at the bar until a table is available. I mention I’m checking out the pasta option and go on a rant about how most pasta sauces in Italy aren’t actually tomato based, and the server at the bar leans over to tell Kyle I’m right. We seem to be his favourite customers, because he keeps coming back to chat with us. Eventually we get a table. The food was acceptable… my wine based pasta tasted more like lemon.

We both order fountain drinks. The two alcoholics, at a bar, drinking mocktails.

We talk about a lot of things. He wants to hear all about me; he doesn’t like talking about himself still.

“What are you afraid of?” I demand.

“Waking up in the morning.”

“Stop deflecting!” I snicker.

He spins his glass around in his hands, “I’m still recovering from the divorce, you know? It’s hard to adjust to being out of a relationship after a decade…”

Hmm…. sure. I’m skeptical.

“I dated one girl afterwards, but she was a stalker. Like, I’d wake up for work and find her sleeping on my porch.”

“Yikes. Well, I’m not a stalker.” I say.

“No, I wouldn’t imagine you are. You seem more like a flight risk.”

Am I? I’d argue not. No one wants to commit to me, or be a real partner to me, so I don’t see it as fleeing. If he moved to Thunder Bay for me, I’d definitely stay. But it’s hard to imagine that actually happening.

“When did you realize you liked me?”

“Oh, the night at the hotel bar. I like a girl with something between her ears.” He playfully ruffles my hair.

Well, my head is stuffed so full it’s leaking out my ears, so you’re quid’s in now.

I still don’t get a solid answer from him about dating. Once bitten, twice shy.

He also confesses that Bart has been lying to us about who’s responsible for the dangerous thing that happened Tuesday. Of course, just because Bart ordered him to make us do something dangerous doesn’t mean he has to follow through on it. Even the military lets you defy illegal orders.

“You need to stop listening to Bart. Doesn’t this bother you?”

“It’s not helping me sleep, that’s for sure.” He sighs.

We don’t want to go home after dinner, so we drive around in the truck, checking out the Christmas lights. Him holding my hand on the centre console.

When we go home, everyone is in their rooms. We are the party and when we leave, no one does anything. So we sneak off to my room. Fall asleep in his arms, feeling warm and safe and cared for.

Life is not a love song,

but we can try

To fix our broken pieces

one at a time