The Mural Gazer

Episode 7 - About Face

"Call me."

The problem with texts is you can't gauge the tone, you have to make assumptions. Even if the sender uses all-caps, exclamation marks, question marks, there's no telling what they're really feeling or how they're cloaking what they're really feeling. In Leanne's case? Angry? Oh yeah.Hurt? That too. Sarcastic? Bitter? Blaming? He stopped there, not wanting to make things worse than they already were.

Do it now! he commanded.

Still, his finger hovered over the keypad like the godly digit in Michael Angelo's ceiling fresco... except without an inkling of desire to bridge the gap... synaptic chasm, more like... an irreducible void between intent and action, which left him teetering on the brink of moral paralysis, a lost angel stuck on the sharp end of a pin... disobeying commandments of common decency and responsibility, not to mention sense, every second he didn't punch in her number.

Do it! he commanded once more.

But before he could give in to his better urge, three things happened simultaneously: a skateboarder swerved by him on the sea walk, startling Buddy; his mobile phone screen timed out, fading to black; and an email arrived in his in-box, binging and notching the unread tally from fifty-six to fifty-seven by the time he prodded the screen back to life. It might've been her, again. Best check. Go in knowing the latest. He tapped, calling up his inbox...

From: Harry & Bernice Sanderson

RE: Help Wanted

Dear Mr. Hope, Thank you for replying to our help wanted ad... topped the unread list.

"Christ almighty!" he grimaced. "You got'ta be kidding."

He opened the message, and continued reading.. "We'd like to meet you and discuss the advertisement for a companion-handyman we placed in the Courier. Could you please phone us at the number below so we can make arrangements. Regards, Bernice Sanderson.

"No fucking way!" He stared at the message, amazed, as if it were scribed in an incomprehensible code. They weren't supposed to answer, he realized, now that they had. His response to their help wanted ad had been strictly pro forma, a ritual enactment, which allowed him to say he'd tried. Tried what? Something, anything to give shape and meaning to his amorphous state of mind. The act of seeking was, in itself, all he needed to validate his existence at that tenuous moment. No further action or reaction was necessary – certainly not on their part.

But now what? They'd made a mess of things, calling his bluff – like the churlish bastards, who shout jump at the guy perched on the bridge railing. If he refused an interview, refused even so much as an answer, his fraud would be exposed. I would have become a laughingstock to myself at the very least, and at my most vulnerable moment.

Buddy punched in Bernice Sanderson's number. "Hello," she said after five rings.

"Hello, Mrs. Sanderson. Buddy Hope, here. I'm calling about your return-email concerning the help wanted ad."

"Oh!" She sounded surprised, flustered. "Thank you for getting back to me so quickly. I'm wondering if you could come for an interview."

"When?"

"Any time. We're retired."

"This afternoon?" he said. "Two o'clock?"

"Yes. That sounds fine."

Even a voice adds dimension to the person you're talking to – a live voice, that is, not the mindless yak of corporate answering services. Bernice became real to me during those few seconds of conversation. I imagined a dignified, elderly woman, brimming with gratitude, her voice quavering, ready to crack. Strange, though, I also heard the hardiness and resolve of a pioneer.

"See you then," he said. "Where do I go?"

"Last house on the right, as you approach Kin Beach on Maple Street. We look forward to meeting you."

As soon as they ended the call, he went to Google Maps and typed 'Maple Street, Chemainus' into the destination line. A blue route marker connected my location in Nanaimo to the Sanderson's street, 32 kilometres south. The drive would take half-an-hour. Five minute's walk to where the Matrix was parked in an underground lot beneath Bastion Square, thirty minutes to the Sandersons' place, another five minutes of flex-time, that left an hour or so to grab a coffee and think things over. Enough time to figure out a a strategy that would get us amicably to 'no'.

What the hell was I thinking, responding to their ad? Victoria to Chemainus is less then an hour-and-a-half's drive, not much more than a morning commute, not nearly far enough to dissipate the shimmering heat of Leanne's anger.

"Call her!" duty reared its fierce, implacable head. "Now!"

Shuffle priorities. Figure out how to deal with the Sanderson's en route. In the meantime, grab a coffee, find a private space where I can put the phone on speaker mode and get my call to Leanne over with, I told myself. 'The Matrix. My home-away-from-home. That's where I'll go.'