Flood Read online

Andy was tired; he wanted to put his head down and sleep, but no, he was near his father. It wouldn’t be long now. He could stay awake.

  He waited outside on the street for a while, but it soon became too cold, and he returned to the inside and sat on the stairs. He could not keep his eyes open. If he fell asleep in the hallway, the police might find him and take him back to Aunt Mona. Under the stairs there was a closet for housekeeping equipment and supplies. It smelled of cleaning fluid and a hundred years of dust and dirt. He crawled in and closed the door. Darkness. Nobody would find him here. He wasn’t scared of the dark, he told himself. There was nothing to be frightened of; only harmless brooms and mops and plastic bottles of solvents. Nothing to be afraid of. He lay down on the hard floor and closed his eyes. Soon he would meet his father and he wouldn’t be alone. Forget alone: think father, father, repeating in his head like the steady drip of a faucet. He could hear the buzz of a TV from the manager’s room, like a bluebottle fly on a window. He was exhausted. He wasn’t afraid. He fell asleep.

  He awoke with a start, not knowing where he was in the darkness of the closet, thinking he was in the hospital. There were sounds outside of people moving about. Voices. Noisy boots and shoes climbing the stairs over his head.

  Then he remembered. He was ALONE in a hole under the stairs. He had to get out. Acid burned in his stomach as he ran his hands frantically over the door, found the latch, pushed the door open, and peered out. The hallway was empty. Stiff and sore, he crawled from the closet, wobbled his way out to the street, and sucked in a lungful of cold air. He guessed the time to be well after midnight. He went back, climbed the stairs, and stood outside number 24. He took a deep breath to still his leaping heart and knocked on the door.

  Nothing. He knocked again, louder this time, and was startled by a sudden burst of wild laughter from within. The door was jerked open.

  An ugly, bearded man with an enormous belly said, “Howyeh?” He had a cigarette burning in the corner of his mouth. When Andy made no reply he said, “You looking for someone?”

  Don’t let this man be my father, he prayed.

  “Vincent Flynn?”

  The man stared at him. The cigarette was burning very close to his beard. “He’s busy.”

  “Who is it, Cassidy?” a man called.

  Another man shouted excitedly, “Two bucks on Black Beauty!”

  The fat man, Cassidy, turned and yelled into the room, “It’s someone for you, Vinny.” He turned again to Andy. “You might as well come in.” He stepped back, holding the door open.

  Andy stayed where he was.

  “Come on in,” Cassidy urged. “Vinny won’t bite you.” He laughed at his own joke. “Hey, Vinny, it’s a wee lad.”

  Andy peered around Cassidy’s belly. The room was foggy blue with swirling cigarette smoke. Four men were kneeling on the floor, passing around a bottle of liquor, their attention on five huge black cockroaches scuttling and scrambling inside a miniature arena formed from cartons of cigarettes. It was a game. Five small piles of bills and coins lay on the floor. There were several ashtrays with cigarette stubs and burnt matches.

  On the word “lad,” one of the men stood and faced Andy, regarding him quizzically.

  Andy recognized him immediately. It was the skinny little man in the giant’s raincoat who was selling cigarettes in the restaurant. He had watery blue eyes, and with his raincoat off he looked even skinnier than before.

  “I’m looking for Vincent Flynn.”

  The cigarette man replied with a happy smile, “You’re looking at him: Vinny Flynn at your service.”

  The Young Ones were already restless and homesick.

  “The boy looks after himself very well without us,” they grumbled in the ancient tongue.

  “He has found his father,” said another. “The boy is safe.”

  “Not yet. It is too soon. We must wait and see,” said the Old One.

  “We could be home having fun,” they complained, “playing with the traffic lights on Georgia Street.”

  “Snarling up the middle lane of Lions Gate Bridge.”

  “Crashing disk drives.”

  “Jamming revolving doors.”

  “Losing socks.”

  “Credit cards.”

  “Car keys.”

  “Wait and see,” the Old One said again.

  5

  THIS MAN WAS HIS FATHER? Andy stared at the cigarette man for the longest time, unable to speak. Finally he said, “I’m Andy.”

  Vincent Flynn smiled at him.

  “I’m Andy Flynn,” he said again. “Your son. From Vancouver.”

  The cigarette man’s eyes widened in surprise. “Andrew?”

  “Andy.”

  “Is it you? I don’t believe it!” He looked outside, down the hallway. “Where’s your mother?”

  “She’s… gone.”

  “Gone?” The cigarette man’s face fell. “Holy Mother of God! You don’t say? Judith? How…?”

  The cigarette man really was his father: his mother’s name on his lips made it true. “There was a flood… the house… everything.”

  His father stood staring, as if his shoes were nailed to the floor, as if he were seeing a ghost.

  One of the men yelled, “Hey, Vinny, are yiz in for this round or what?”

  Vincent Flynn half turned. “I’m… out,” he stammered. He hadn’t taken his eyes off Andy.

  They stared at each other. “Come in, come in,” the cigarette man said at last, holding the door open for him to pass.

  Except for his small size, Andy could see nothing of himself in this man who was supposed to be his father. Aunt Mona was right: there was very little resemblance. His father’s eyes were pale blue, for one thing, not dark like Andy’s and his mother’s and Aunt Mona’s. He had long, untidy ginger-brown hair with gray in it, and a tired, narrow face that needed a shave.

  “Place your bets, ladies and gentlemen!” called one of the players on the floor in a phony French accent.

  Aware of his father’s eyes greedily drinking him in, Andy shyly turned away and watched the game. One of the men inverted a mug in the center of the cigarette carton arena and shook the black insects out onto the floor. Long antennae probing the air ahead, they scuttled quickly for the darkness at the edges of the cigarette carton walls. The men whooped and cheered. “Show ’em the way, Gertrude!” yelled the fat man, Cassidy. “Move it, baby!” yelled a second man with a foreign accent. A third man, wearing a dirty khaki baseball cap with Pumping Iron Gym, New York City on the front in red and black, was speechless as he leaned over the arena wall, his eyes wobbling with excitement, and the fourth man, no teeth, only bare gums, screeched loudly like an owl, “Hoo-hoo, hoo-hoo!”

  The cockroaches crawled, wandered, scrambled to within an inch of the outer finishing circle, but in a sudden and most unusual move that astonished the onlookers, about-turned abruptly and sped back, side by side in a straight line, toward the center. On reaching the center, they turned again and crouched, perfectly still, antennae poised, as though awaiting a starter’s gun.

  “I never saw anything like it!” said Cassidy.

  Like racehorses at the starting gate, the black insects suddenly exploded into life and made a direct sprint for the finish.

  “Did you ever see such a thing?” screeched the toothless one.

  “Black Beauty it is!” yelled the man in the baseball cap. He twisted around to look up. “Hey, Vinny! Did ye see that? I never saw the likes of it in all my life!”

  Vincent Flynn stopped staring at Andy and turned to his friends. “Out, fellers! Game’s over! All of yiz out!” He started snatching things up off the floor, pushing at the men, hurrying them. “Move it, boys!”

  One of the men, the quiet one with the baseball cap, scooped the writhing insects up in his cupped hand and emptied them into a jam jar, capped it with a lid, and thrust the jar into his jacket pocket. Cassidy swigged back the dregs and dropped the empty bottle onto the sofa. The men grabbed
their money and hurried to the door, stuffing bills and coins into their pockets. Cassidy stopped and looked back. “Hey, Vinny! See you later at you-know-where, okay?” He gave a wink. The latch rattled as the door closed, and then there was silence.

  Vincent Flynn said, “Andrew!”

  “Andy.”

  “Andy is it now? I can’t believe it’s you I’m looking at!”

  There was that smile again, in a friendly, open face. This was the man who, according to his mother, was killed in the war, but who, according to Aunt Mona, had been kicked out by his mother when Andy was only five.

  “Sit down, why don’t you,” said his father — his dad — waving toward the sofa, “while I take a good look at you.”

  Andy sat. His father started tidying up, throwing the cartons of cigarettes from the cockroach races onto the sofa, grabbing and snatching at litter, ashtrays, glasses, rushing them out to the tiny kitchen, moving quickly, smoothly.

  Andy watching him, felt suddenly exhausted. He’d slept only a short time, two hours, maybe not that, in the broom closet.

  When Vincent Flynn had finished tidying, he grasped the bottom of the window and jerked it open to let out the smoke. Then he sat on the arm of a shabby easy chair, facing Andy. “The bruises,” he said, peering closely at Andy’s face, “are from the flood, then?”

  Andy nodded. There were so many questions he wanted to ask, but fatigue silenced him. Instead, he looked more closely at his father: he wore a plain green cotton shirt under a blue ribbed sweater, worn brown cords, and a pair of shabby brown shoes. The sweater had food stains down the front. He looked again at his open face: pale watery blue eyes, smiling mouth; recalling the warm, welcoming voice, the accent so much like Aunt Mona’s, he didn’t find it hard to believe that this was the same voice of the Little People tales when he was little.

  And yesterday he hadn’t known his father was alive.

  Vincent Flynn sprang from the arm of the chair and made as if to throw his arms about Andy, but then stopped and gripped his hand affectionately instead, as if unsure of how long-lost fathers greeted long-lost sons.

  “Andy!” he cried enthusiastically. “These old eyes are delighted to see you!” He perched himself opposite on the arm of the chair again, hands on his knees, nicotine-stained fingers drumming, eyes dancing with excitement. “All grown up! How old are you now? Ten is it?”

  “Eleven.”

  “Of course, eleven. And the fine young man you are. I wouldn’t have known you. Pinch me and tell me you’re really here, that it’s really yourself I’m looking at.” He bounced up again and grasped both Andy’s hands and crushed them in his own.

  Andy felt overwhelmed. “It’s me all right,” he said weakly.

  “You’re tired. Why don’t you take off your things and lie on the sofa. I’ll bring a blanket.”

  Andy was relieved to slip out of his jacket, kick off his wet sneakers, and stretch out on something soft.

  His father pulled off his damp socks, threw a blanket over him, and switched off the light. “I’m dreadful sorry about your mother. It’s a terrible thing. We’ll have a good chin-wag in the morning,” he said. “Will I close the window? Is it too cold?”

  “It’s okay.” At least his father had said something about his mother, that he was sorry she was gone, a terrible thing he’d called it, which was a lot more than Aunt Mona had said.

  “Sleep tight. If the Sheehogue come creeping through the open window and bother you, just give me a shout and I’ll send them on their way.”

  The Sheehogue. The Faeries. Andy smiled.

  And fell fast asleep.

  “‘Gallop apace, you fiery-footed steeds.’“

  “You cheated!” they said, giggling.

  “No I didn’t.” The Young One laughed and turned her back on her accusers.

  “Yes you did. We saw you sprinkle St. Patrick’s wort on your beast’s antennae as we all raced together, we saw you, we saw you, we saw — ”

  “I did no such thing! It was only a dab of shamrock powder for the smell.”

  “I slipped off at the start,” said another. “Or I would have won, I’m sure, St. Patrick’s wort or not.”

  “Roaches give off very little smell. Unlike horses.”

  “The roach is much faster than the horse, pound for pound.”

  “But not as reliable.”

  “Nonsense! I traveled the length of the Grand Canal from Dublin to Tullamore one moonless night in a roach and coach, and there’s no better beast in all…”

  “I’d rather ride a rat than a roach,” said a Young One who had contributed very little to the discussion so far.

  “Are you out of your mind entirely…?”

  They squabbled noisily.

  “Enough,” said the Old One, hiding a smile.

  6

  “DID AUNT MONA come looking for me last night?” asked Andy the next morning as soon as his father appeared, emerging sleepily from his bedroom in blue polka-dot boxer shorts. “I thought I heard you talking to her out in the hallway.”

  “Don’t worry; I didn’t let her in.”

  “She wants to take me away”

  “Yes.”

  “You won’t let her, will you?”

  “Of course not. You’re safe with me, my boy. She might as well try rob the Bank of Canada as steal you away from your own loving father, and that’s the truth.”

  He searched his father’s eyes and saw that it was indeed the truth.

  “Where’s the bathroom?”

  “Across the hall. It’s shared.” He scratched his skinny bare chest.

  The bathroom door was locked. Andy was about to turn away when he heard the toilet flush and the bolt rattle. He stood back as the door opened. An old man with a walking cane limped out slowly and hobbled past him without a word. Andy watched him climb the stairs that led up to the third floor, hanging on to the banister for support.

  Andy went in and switched on the light. There were no windows. The place smelled bad. There was a dead cockroach lying on its back in the tub. The toilet seat was dirty. There was no way Andy was going to sit in that tub. Or wash in that filthy basin. He didn’t need to wash, he decided.

  When he got back, his father, now in the same clothes he had worn the day before, was making tea. “An old guy from upstairs left a mess in the bathroom,” said Andy.

  “Carried a cane? Bald as an egg?”

  “That’s him.”

  “Old Peter. He’s supposed to use the toilet on his own floor, but if there’s someone using it he can’t wait; the poor man has his problems, right enough. Do you want some tea?”

  “Tea’s fine.”

  There was nothing for breakfast. “All I have mornings,” his father explained, “is a cup of tea.” Daylight, uncombed hair, and ginger stubble gave his thin face the look of an old man’s. He shuffled back and forth between the kitchen and the table. “Tell me about your poor mother,” he said, sitting at the table with two mugs of tea, pushing one toward Andy.

  Andy sat. “The flood took the house away. We were in bed. And Mom…” He stopped.

  “Judith was a fine woman. May she rest in peace.”

  “What does ’rest in peace’ mean? Is she in heaven?”

  His eyes shone with tears. “Poor Judith,” he said, shaking his head.

  Andy waited. Then he said, “Clay is resting, too. In peace. He was my stepfather.”

  “God save him.”

  “Do you think Mom is in heaven?” Andy asked again.

  His father couldn’t answer. His eyes were full. After a while he said, “God save them both,” and sat, shaking his head over his tea, talking about the random cruelty of nature and a whole bunch of stuff Andy couldn’t understand. Andy drank his tea and stared at the man opposite him, wishing he would talk about the place where his mother was, whether she was happy there, whether she could see them sitting and drinking tea together, whether she was really dead when Andy felt she was still very much alive, and what d
id she think of Andy living in Halifax with this odd, untidy man who was once her husband?

  When his father finally stopped talking, Andy said, “So you’re my real father.”

  “I’m your father, right enough, though you’d never know it, looking at the pair of us. You’re a fine boy. You’re like the Costellos, the dark chocolate eyes and hair the color of soot.” He smiled. “Your mother’s family. They came out from Ireland. Your Aunt Mona was only twelve. That was a year before your mother was born.”

  The mention of Aunt Mona prompted Andy to ask, “What if Aunt Mona sends the police for me?”

  “I’m your father, Andy. You’re safe here with me. Don’t worry.”

  “You won’t let them take me?”

  “Never, as long as I draw breath into this miserable body.”

  “I hate her.”

  He leaned forward and placed a hand over Andy’s on the table. “It’s sometimes terrible hard to love everyone, son, the way it tells us in the good book, but not hating comes a little easier. Hate will twist your soul if you let it, Andy. Hate no man or woman, you hear me?”

  He nodded.

  His father started a rambling talk again, this time about Judith’s family, how they left Ireland for Canada many years ago, and the troubles they’d had, but Andy hardly listened, letting his gaze explore the room. If he didn’t count the tiny kitchen, not much bigger than a closet, it was really just two rooms: this small living room, almost bare, with plain, dirty walls in need of fresh paint, and a door leading off into his father’s bedroom. The only furniture was the torn brown sofa and the faded green chair, probably rescued from a garbage dump by the looks of them, and the small wooden table at which they sat near the window. There was a saucer in the center of the table containing a few raisins. Their two chairs were scarred and cracked. A Playboy centerfold was taped to the wall near the kitchen. There was nothing else. No rug or carpet on the torn linoleum floor, no other pictures on the walls, no TV, no radio, and no telephone that Andy could see. The room had only one window; its ragged, smoke-stained curtains hung uncertainly on a few remaining hooks. The place had the sour, musty smell of stale food and smoke. A yellow nylon rope stretched across one corner of the room with a pair of tartan boxer shorts and a pair of grayed white socks hanging from it.