Forty Words for Sorrow

The woman led him past the jukebox to a small table in the corner where a guy who looked maybe thirty was peeling the label from his Molson bottle, frowning as if it were the most important project in the world. He looked up as they approached, asking before they even sat down, "So, was I right? Is he from Toronto?"

"You two are amazing," Keith said. "I just got into town an hour ago. From Toronto."

"Well, it's not that amazing, really," the woman said, watching her boyfriend pour beer into their three glasses. "You look far too cool to be from around this dump."

Keith shrugged. "Place doesn't seem so bad. Guy at the bar was a little strange."

"Yeah, we noticed," the man said quietly. "Figured someone should come to your rescue."

"Hey! You've got cigarettes!"

The woman said, "It was the only way I could think of to introduce myself. I'm terrible at talking to strangers." Her boyfriend was lighting an Export "A" and offering the pack with a flick of the wrist. He was not quite handsome. Dark hair swept back from his brow and sat up in oily spikes along the crown of his head, as if he had just matured from a punk rock phase. And his skin was so pale that blue veins showed below his eyes and at the temples. It was the ferretlike cast to the eyes that spoiled his face a little, but he had a huddled attitude, an intense way of moving- now leaning forward to pour beer, now offering a cigarette- that captured Keith's imagination. It seemed to say he had far more important things to do at any moment, but just now he would pour you a beer or offer you a smoke. It was very compelling, and Keith wondered what he was doing with this woman with the fiberglass face.

"I guess I forgive you," Keith said cheerfully. He took a sip of beer. "My name's Keith, by the way."

"I'm Edie. He's Eric."

"Eric and Edie. Awesome."

Keith became chatty over the second pitcher of beer. It was a weakness he was aware of in himself but could not stop. "Such a Chatty Cathy," his girlfriend teased him sometimes. He was telling Eric and Edie he had just completed high school and was taking a year off, before university, to travel the country. He had already been to the East Coast and was now headed in a leisurely way toward Vancouver. Then he got on to politics and the economy. He delivered his opinions about Quebec; now he was going on about the bloody Maritimes. God, I'm a motor-mouth, he thought. Somebody stop me.

"Newfoundland," he heard himself saying. "Man, what a disaster area. Half the province is out of work because we ate all the fish. Can you imagine? There's no goddam cod left! If it wasn't for oil, the entire island would be on unemployment." He flicked his hair for emphasis. "Entire island."

The couple didn't seem to tire of him at all. Edie kept her face in the shadows, probably to hide that weird skin, but she fired off question after question. And Eric spoke up every now and then, asking this or that, and off Keith would go with another opinion, another report. It was like being interviewed.

"What brings you to Algonquin Bay, Keith?" Edie asked. "Do you know anybody here? Do you have relatives?"

"Naw, my family's all from Toronto. Toronto from way back. Real old-school Anglican, you know?"

Edie nodded, although Keith had the sense that she didn't really understand. She kept bringing a hand to her face or pulling her hair over her cheek like a curtain.

"I didn't really have any reason to stop here," he told them, "except a friend of mine passed through Algonquin Bay a couple of years ago and said he had a really good time."

"Didn't he give you some names of people to stay with? You're not staying at a hotel, are you?"

"Thought I might head over to the Birches after. Cabdriver said it's pretty decent for the price."

They asked him more questions. About Toronto, the crime, all the films being shot down there. Who were the hot bands? Where were the hot clubs? How could he stand the crowds, the pace, those subways? Pitchers of beer appeared. Packs of cigarettes. It was exactly the kind of convivial scene Keith loved, the kind of thing that made travel such a kick, the three of them really hitting it off. All the time, Edie seemed to hang off Eric's every word, and Keith began to see what it was he saw in her: adoration.

"We've been thinking of visiting Toronto," Edie said at one point. "But it's so expensive. It's outrageous what hotels charge down there."

"Stay with me," Keith said. "I expect to be back there by August at the latest. You could come and stay at my place. I could show you the big city. Man, we could have a time."

"It's awfully kind of you…"

"Consider it done. Give me something to write on. I'll write down my address."

Eric, who had been practically motionless all this time, pulled a small pad from his pocket and handed him a mechanical pencil.