Five Minutes More Read online

  five

  minutes

  more

  five

  minutes

  more

  Darlene Ryan

  Text copyright © 2009 Darlene Ryan

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

  Ryan, Darlene, 1958-

  Five minutes more / written by Darlene Ryan.

  ISBN 978-1-55469-006-0

  I. Title.

  PS8635.Y35F59 2009 jC813’.6 C2008-907416-5

  First published in the United States, 2009

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2008941139

  Summary: After D’Arcy’s father dies, she struggles to come to terms with the fact that he committed suicide.

  Orca Book Publishers gratefully acknowledges the support for its publishing programs provided by the following agencies: the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program and the Canada Council for the Arts, and the Province of British Columbia through the BC Arts Council and the Book Publishing Tax Credit.

  Cover and text design by Teresa Bubela Typesetting by Christine Toller Cover artwork by Getty Images Author photo by Kevin Ryan

  ORCA BOOK PUBLISHERS

  PO BOX 5626, Stn. B

  VICTORIA, BC CANADA

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  ORCA BOOK PUBLISHERS

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  www.orcabook.com

  Printed and bound in Canada.

  Printed on 100% PCW recycled paper.

  12 11 10 09 • 4 3 2 1

  For Susan

  Part One

  Autumn

  one

  I play the Five Minutes More game. Five minutes. I can stand anything for five minutes. Even my father being dead.

  We’re making the arrangements. Nobody has used the word funeral. My mother’s answering questions for the announcement that will be in the newspaper. Her hands are folded in her lap, one hand over the other. She seems so calm and in control. Only I can see that on the bottom hand—the hidden one—she’s picking at the side of her thumb with the nail of her middle finger, so a patch of raw, sore skin is exposed. She sees me looking at her and she gives me a little smile that’s really just lips stretching, and I give it right back because I don’t know what else to do.

  Five minutes.

  Mom and Mr. Rosborough are standing up now, so I get up too. “And no visitation,” she says, smoothing her skirt.

  “Of course,” he murmurs.

  Mr. Rosborough is the funeral director. He’s very tall and thin, with lots of white hair combed back from his forehead. He’s wearing a dark blue suit and tie with a very white shirt. His skin is very white too, and he has deep hollows below his cheekbones, as though his face is just skin and bone and nothing else. He looks exactly how I would have expected a funeral director to look if I had ever actually thought about it before today.

  His doorplate only says Director. I guess nobody uses the word undertaker. Anyway, director seems like the right word to me. I feel as though I’ve walked onstage in the middle of a play. I’m just trying to stay out of the way until I can figure out how to get off again.

  We go up to the second floor. I trail my hand up the banister. The wood is smooth and dark with age. This used to be someone’s house. People lived here.

  The top of the stairs opens into a big room, and the whole space is full of coffins.

  Everywhere.

  My breath sticks in my chest. I hear myself make a sucking sound halfway between a gasp and a heave, but no one else seems to notice. There’s nowhere to look and not see the coffins. They’re hanging from the ceiling, mounted on the walls, displayed on stands in rows like some kind of death department store. There’s polished wood, metals that gleam like new change, velour and even some kind of white vinyl with studs that looks like it was recycled from an old car seat.

  I close my eyes, but the image of the room is printed on the inside of my eyelids in swirling colors, like some kind of psychedelic negative. I open them again and try to take a deep breath.

  Five minutes more, I tell myself. Five minutes was what my dad said when I didn’t want to get a needle or go to the dentist. It’s what he said when I hid under my bed on the first day of kindergarten.

  “Five minutes. Then, if you don’t want to stay, we’ll go for French fries.” And if I wanted to leave when the five minutes were up, he’d say, “We’re already here. Let’s just stay for five more minutes, and if you want to leave after that we’ll go get those fries.”

  My dad could five-minutes-more me through almost anything. And after, we always ended up at Fern’s Diner sharing a big plate of fries with gravy on an oversized yellow pressed-paper plate.

  “D’Arcy.” My mother motions me over to her.

  “I think you’ll be very satisfied with this,” Mr. Rosborough says, as though we were going to take the...thing home with us.

  Up close he gives off the scent of flowers and something else that seems familiar but that I can’t identify. The smell is sticky. It makes my head throb. I start to breathe through my mouth and try not to think about what that smell could be.

  “What do you think?” Mom asks. The one they’re standing beside is storm-cloud gray with some kind of space-age polymer finish. The inside is lined with a shiny blue ruffled fabric, like a tacky tuxedo shirt.

  Little sparkles of light are dancing around the edges of my vision. Yesterday my dad drove his car into the river that runs beside the old highway. How am I supposed to answer?

  “It’s nice,” I tell her.

  We drive home in the dark, spits of rain hitting the wind-shield. The wipers click on, snick snick across the glass, pause and then do it again. I need some answers—I just don’t know how to ask her the questions

  “Did he leave a letter or anything?” I jump, realizing I’ve finally said it out loud. Now the words are out, I keep going. “How can they know for sure that he...?”

  I watch my mother without turning my head. She takes a quick look in the rearview mirror, and then her eyes go back to the road. She never looks at me. “There’s no letter,” she says finally. “The car went into the river. The rest is nobody’s business.”

  The only sound is the wipers moving across the glass in front of me. My mother doesn’t say anything more. And neither do I.

  “D’Arcy, there’s a plastic garment bag somewhere in the hall closet. It’s probably on the shelf or at the back. Would you get it for me, please?” Mom asks.

  There’s a long black bag on a hook behind the coats. I take it upstairs. “Is this what you wanted?” I ask from the bedroom doorway.

  “That’s it.” She takes the bag and opens the zipper. “Does this smell okay to you?”

  I nod. I can’t go into the room.

  Mom has laid out my dad’s underwear on the bed: a white T-shirt, dark socks and a pair of those stupid boxer shorts he liked. They have green smiley faces on them.

  No.

  “Rocky and Bullwinkle,” I say.

  She turns. “What?”

  I point at the stuff on the bed. “Rocky and Bullwinkle.” She gets it then, pulls open a drawer and moves things around until she finds the right underwear.

  “I thought maybe the gray pinstripe,” she says, bringing the suit from the closet.

  My father wasn’t really a suit person, but what difference does it make? He’s not going anywhere in it. I’m pretty sur
e suggesting jeans with holes in them would be wrong.

  So I nod again. My head still hurts. Maybe I’m getting the flu or something.

  The suit’s in the bag now, along with a pale blue shirt. Mom holds up a red and navy striped tie. “I think this one.” She folds the tie and the underwear into the pocket at the bottom of the garment bag. Then she turns to me. “D’Arcy, go put the kettle on, please. I could use a cup of something hot. I’ll be right down.”

  In the kitchen I fill the kettle, set it on to boil and drop two peppermint tea bags in the china pot. When Mom turned forty-five she gave up caffeine. Now she drinks herbal tea— peppermint, chamomile and rose hip.

  I lean on the counter for a minute, but I can’t stay still. I know in a few minutes the phone will ring or someone will be at the door.

  I go upstairs again. Through the half-open bedroom door I can see Mom. She’s sitting on the end of the bed with the bag on her lap. Her hand is tracing slow circles on the plastic. I feel as though I’m watching something private that I shouldn’t be seeing. I back away from the door.

  two

  I wake up five or six times during the night from strange dreams I can’t really remember. I end up sleeping later than I wanted to, and when I get up I feel as though I didn’t go to bed at all.

  It’s the first time since Mom and I got back from the funeral home that we’ve been alone in the house for more than a few minutes. Someone else is always here, putting food on a plate, patting me on the arm and looking sad.

  A car pulls into the driveway. Mom’s at the table in the dining room. “She’s here,” I say. Mom gets up, glancing at her watch. We go into the kitchen in time to hear the soft knock on the door before it opens.

  It’s Claire. My sister. My half-sister to be exact. There’s no way anyone can make that half into a real sister for me.

  She’s carrying her coat with a tote bag over one shoulder. Her eyes make a circuit around the kitchen; then she says, “Hello.” She doesn’t look like she’s been driving for hours. She doesn’t look like her father just died. She looks perfect because that’s Claire. Her short blond hair shines like a shampoo commercial. She’s wearing navy check pants and a creamy sweater. I don’t think she owns jeans. And I bet if she put on a sweatshirt, she’d break out in a rash.

  “Claire. I’m glad you’re here,” Mom says. Her hands move, start to reach out, but then she pulls back and clasps them in front of her.

  “Leah,” Claire says. She looks at me. “Hello, D’Arcy.”

  “You must be tired. Can I get you anything? Are you hungry? There’s lots of food,” Mom says. I want to tell her to stop talking.

  “No. I stopped to eat about an hour ago. What I’d really like is more details. You didn’t say much on the telephone.”

  Details. What does she mean? The car went into the river. Dad’s dead. The end.

  I see my mother tense her shoulders. “Of course,” she says. “We should go over the arrangements of the service as well.”

  “You already planned the service.” The way Claire says the words, it sounds like my mother did something wrong.

  “Yes. I’m sorry I couldn’t wait until you got here.” Their eyes lock. Mom looks away first. “Why don’t you put your things upstairs? Then we’ll talk.”

  “Fine,” Claire says. “How are you, D’Arcy?” she asks as she passes me.

  “I’m all right,” I say back. I may as well have said “aardvark.” If you say something over and over, the way I’ve said “I’m all right” in the past twenty-four hours, it stops making any sense.

  As Claire goes by, her hand reaches out. I’m surprised to feel the prickle of tears in my eyes and throat. Claire was ten when I was born. In all my life I don’t think she’s ever hugged me, not even when I was a baby. I uncross my arms, start to open my body. She pushes the hair away from my face and moves by.

  I jerk my head back as though I’ve been smacked. I don’t think she notices. She’s done that to my hair for as long as I can remember, the only times I think we’ve touched. Claire doesn’t like my hair. It’s long and blond and it curls wherever it wants to. Like Dad’s. Not like hers. Claire could be in the middle of a hurricane and not get messed up. It’s like there’s a bubble around her so she stays neat and perfect.

  I’m standing at the living room window when my mother comes downstairs. I hear her behind me, but I don’t turn around. I don’t want to talk. It won’t help. We watch a squirrel bury a nut in the leaves around the rose bushes. I know he’ll probably forget and never come back for it.

  Mom touches my shoulder. “Are you okay?”

  “Why did she have to come?”

  “He’s her father too.”

  “I don’t care. She never came when he was...here.” I fold the edge of the curtain into little pleats.

  “D’Arcy, she’s your sister,” Mom says sharply.

  “She’s my half-sister. Half. It’s not the same. It’s not like a real sister.”

  Mom grabs my shoulder and swings me around. “Listen to me. Claire is your sister. Your real sister. We don’t divide people into halves and quarters. I know, I know, that she’s not the easiest person to get along with, but we’re going to try. It was very important to your father.” She lets me go, lets out a breath and clenches her hands into tight fists. “Please?”

  I don’t want to. Don’t try to tell me Claire is my real sister. I’m not even sure she’s a real person.

  I want to shout that at Mom, but I stop myself. I look back out the window. The squirrel, finished hiding nuts for now, runs up a tree, stopping and starting in jerky motion. It’s how I think I probably look when I move. It’s how I feel.

  I turn around to face my mother. There are tiny lines in her face that I haven’t seen before. It’s only a couple of days. This will be over. Claire will be gone. Then everything will be back to normal. I can do this.

  “All right,” I say.

  three

  We’re ready early for the service. I look out my bedroom window before I head downstairs. It’s damp and dark. I can’t even see the big oak tree where my swing used to be. Fog smothers the yard and seems to be pushing at the windows, trying to take over the house too.

  We sit in the living room, on the edge of our seats so we don’t wrinkle. Except Claire. Claire doesn’t wrinkle. She’s the only one in black—a dress that looks expensive and probably is. I wonder if she bought it for this.

  Mom is wearing her dark blue suit. I notice she has a bandage on her thumb. She keeps getting up to answer the door and coming back with another casserole or a plate of brownies. Why would anyone think that would help? How can pasta spirals and crabmeat make a difference?

  I pick microscopic bits of lint off my green skirt. My hair is twisted back in a fancy ponytail. Claire did it. She stood in the doorway of my room and said, “I’ll do your hair.” Not “can I, may I, do you want me to?” My mouth was open to say no, and then I remembered I’d said I’d try with Claire, and I thought, Maybe she’s trying with me. Maybe now we’ ll be sisters. You’d think I’d know better. How many times have I thought that before? All Claire wanted was to get my hair out of my face.

  We all seem to decide at the same time that we should leave. We take Claire’s car. I’m surprised at how much traffic there is, how many people I see. Everybody’s just going on with their lives like nothing happened. But then, to them, nothing has.

  Mr. Rosborough is waiting for us. Today he’s wearing a black suit with another of those blinding white shirts. I wonder how he keeps the lint off that suit. Maybe his wife brushes it for him every night. Maybe she wraps tape around her hand, sticky side out, and takes off every speck and thread.

  Mr. Rosborough takes us to the Chapel of Ease so we can “look things over.” The casket is at the front of the room with a big spray of red and white carnations on top. I won’t think about what’s inside.

  There are way too many flowers in the room. Dad says flowers are wasted on dead people. D
oesn’t anyone remember? This is wrong. I turn to tell Mom, but she’s kneeling on a padded step in front of all those flowers. She rests her hand next to the carnations. Claire’s just standing there, so I kneel too. I don’t want to, but it looks wrong, my mother on her knees by herself. I lower my head so I’m looking at the carpet and lace my fingers tightly in front of me. There’s no way I’m putting my hand up there.

  As Mom stands up she touches my cheek. Her hand is freezing. Her hands are always cold. “Cold hands, warm heart,” she’d always say when my dad would tell her that there were corpses with warmer hands. But I don’t want to think about that either.

  As I get up, Mr. Rosborough is saying something about the lounge. Mom shakes her head. Her voice is low, so I can’t hear what she tells him, but I guess that she wants to stay in this room.

  “I don’t think that’s necessary, Leah,” Claire says in her cool voice.

  “No, Claire, I don’t suppose that you would,” Mom answers. Her voice is still quiet, but everyone hears her. Then she turns to me, “D’Arcy will stay with me, won’t you?”

  No. I don’t want to do this. I don’t want to stay in this room, with that box, with what used to be my father, but how can I say no? Five minutes. I’ll stay here for five minutes. But not one second more.

  I nod.

  We sit on a bench, close to the door. It’s a lot like a church pew, which means you have to sit up straight and it’s not very comfortable. Mom sits with her back as rigid as the back of her seat, her hands folded in her lap—no picking at her thumbs today. I can’t look where she’s looking, so I study the flowers closest to me. Mostly there are lilies and carnations. Serious flowers.

  I don’t like the lilies. Their smell sticks in the back of my nose. I know I’ll still smell it days from now.

  I touch Mom’s arm. She jerks and looks at me as though she’d forgotten I was there. “These flowers, don’t you think they’re wrong?” I ask. “I mean, he wouldn’t like this. I don’t understand why people sent them. Didn’t anyone pay attention to what was in the paper?”