Beth
The day after the funeral, I take the Hastings bus downtown. It runs all the way from near my house to downtown and along Hastings to Burnaby. Easy enough. If I want to, I can just stay on it and it will turn around at the end of its route and bring me home again. I’m not getting off downtown, I know that much. I’ll just look out the window. I’ll look and look. That’s all.
And if I see her …? I have no idea what I’ll do if I see her.
I don’t see her. Not that day. Or the next, Monday, after school. Or the one after that. Mom’s working, so she doesn’t even know that I don’t get home until six most days.
After a week, I get braver. I get off the bus just past the scary part, get a bus back, get off downtown and head east again. I can go back and forth three or four times in an afternoon that way.
Another week passes. Still, I don’t see her.
One day I decide to skip school. Maybe she’s never out on the street in the late afternoon. Maybe I’m just missing her every single day. So, on Tuesday morning I’m on the bus by nine thirty. Back and forth I go. Back and forth. At lunchtime I get myself a milkshake and a burger. No eating on the bus, the driver says, so I sit on the bus-stop bench and wolf it down. Back and forth.
I’m on my way back downtown when I see her, standing right there on the corner, teetering on her high-heeled boots. I lurch up out of my seat, and collapse right back into it, fighting the urge to scream, Stop this bus! Instead, I check the time and the place. Princess and Hastings, northwest corner. Half past one.
As soon as I feel like I’m in a safe part of downtown, I get off the bus and cross the street. Go home, I tell myself. Or call Mom. But Mom’s picking up some night shifts, nursing, this week, so she sleeps all afternoon. I know it doesn’t matter if I wake her up; she’d want to know. She’d come. But I’m not ready for that. I need to see Kaya again.
Back I go on the bus. And there she is: same corner; same teetering sister. Half an hour later, I pass the corner again and she’s gone.
My transfer is running out. I’ll need to pay again. I should go home. I should call Mom. I don’t. Scraping together every last dime at the bottom of my purse, I buy my way onto another eastbound bus. Princess and Hastings comes. And goes. No Kaya. I look at my watch. Three o’clock. This time, I let the bus take me all the way to the end of the line, asking myself, If she’s there, will I get off?
It’s way past four when the bus approaches the corner again. The driver actually tried to make me get off at the bus loop in Burnaby, but I just said that I had slept past my stop, and he relented. I sit up straight in my seat, tip my head against the cool glass of the window and put all of my will into looking, as if my gaze can pull my sister up out of the sidewalk. Magic.
And maybe I’m more powerful than I think I am, because there she is. There she is, and this time, she’s looking right at me. Our gazes lock. As the bus passes, I turn my whole body and look back. She’s still staring, but she has not moved from the spot. The bus pulls into the stop. Get up! I shout inside my head. But I don’t. Two people get off, four get on, one of them with a stroller; many seconds tick by. I do not get up, and Kaya does not move.
At last the bus carries on its way. Our gaze is broken. I sit in my seat and shake all the way home.
It’s past five when I get there, and Mom’s up, slouched over the kitchen table with a mug of tea. She jumps to her feet when I tell her what happened.
“Let’s go,” she says.
On the drive, she asks questions. When I tell her about all my bus trips, she looks at me hard. “Smart girl,” she says when I explain why I didn’t get off.
Princess and Hastings is deserted when we drive by, so we park the car and walk the neighbourhood. I know Mom’s been doing this, but I never have, and I don’t like it. I keep my body pulled in tight and don’t meet anyone’s eyes.
Mom is silent until she stops in front of a window right near that corner. I look up. SHEWAY, the sign says, VANCOUVER NATIVE HEALTH SOCIETY. Mom points. And my gaze is drawn to a small poster on the inside of the window looking out. Have you seen Kaya? the poster says. She squints out at us from a photo Mom took in August. Underneath the picture, our phone number. And another line of text: Kaya, please come home.
She has called twice, and the second time, she left a message. Somehow she always catches us out. I’m okay, she said. Don’t worry about me. As if that were possible.
“She was standing right over there three hours ago,” I say, pointing. “Right over there. She must have seen the poster herself.”
“I put up lots,” Mom says.
“I know, Mom. I’m not blind,” a voice says.
We both jump and turn, and there she is, her hood shading her face.
“Kaya!” Mom says, and steps forward, arms outstretched, but Kaya moves away from the hug, not into it. Her eyes are stones. Damp stones, but still.
“Leave me alone, can’t you?” she says. “Just leave me the fuck alone.” Her voice is louder on the repeat. Shrill. She turns and strides away, in sneakers now and tattered jeans.
“Kaya,” Mom says again. She does not run after her, though, and neither do I.
I don’t know about Mom, but I’m feeling a little bit afraid. That girl is supposed to be my sister, but she feels so far away from me right now. She seems tough in a way that I’ve never seen before. Harder than ever. Mom and I walk slowly back to the car and drive home.
That night, I’m pretty sure I don’t sleep at all. By morning, I have new resolve. She can turn herself to granite, but we’re still her family, and she’s still ours. I’m going to bring her back to us.
They’re all at school the next morning: Jane and Samantha, Diana and Michelle. Since the funeral, I’ve been ignoring my friends, telling them I’m busy, letting them know it has something to do with Kaya.
Now that I have a plan, I look for Diana first, even though she frightens me. I find her outside with her friends. She pulls away from them as soon as she sees the expression on my face.
“Is Kaya all right?” she asks.
“Yes,” I say back, even though I want to ask questions. How does she know my sister? What does she know about her? Well, I sort of want to ask those questions. Really, I know all I need to. Kaya is downtown for the same reason that Diana was at that funeral.
“I want to go get her,” I tell Diana. “I want us to go get her together.”
“I’ll come,” she says instantly.
We approach Michelle next. She’s coming out of math class, eyes clear, shoulders back, hair gleaming. It’s a bit of a shock to see her looking so great. It almost makes me mad, with my sister in such rough shape. She’s hesitant when I tell her what we want.
“Look,” I say, “as far as I know you’re Kaya’s only friend. Can’t you help her out?”
“I stay away from downtown these days,” she says. The pause is long. “But, yes, I’ll come.”
“Well now, quite the little gathering,” says another voice, warm and round, an I’m-here! Now-step-aside kind of a voice. Jane has arrived, Samantha in position right behind her.
So we head for the front door of the school in a group of five.
“What’s going on?” a voice calls before we reach the front hall.
I stop moving. Turn. It’s Marlene.
“You show up outside my granddad’s house, you barge in on his funeral,” she says. She doesn’t seem to care that we are standing in the middle of the hallway, that Michelle and Samantha and Jane are all listening, that her voice is collapsing in on itself. She turns to Diana. “And you. You were there too. You slunk off.” She pauses, almost gasps for breath.
I stand, still and quiet, looking at her, not sure. Then it comes. Fury.
“It’s none of your business,” I say. “Just stay away from us.” My eyes make a tunnel through the air between us, locking onto hers, shutting everyone else out.
“It’s not my business,” she echoes, sounding disbelieving.
A hand grasps my arm, pulls. I yank back and find myself in a tug-of-war with Diana. “We’re going to get her sister,” Diana says to Marlene. “Are you going to come or not?”
Electricity sparks among us, every which way. I can’t believe what I’m hearing. “She can’t come,” I say, but my voice comes out croaky.
“What do you mean? Where is she?” Marlene asks.
“She ran away,” Diana says. She hesitates. “Because of your grandfather.” Diana is standing straight as anything, staring into Marlene’s eyes.
Marlene steps back again, eyes on the ground.
I pull myself together. An old man hurt my sister, and he’s dead now. This girl has done nothing wrong.
“She’s downtown. Hastings Street,” I say. “Let’s go.”