ON A CELL PHONE, THE ADDED FEATURES (PLATFORMS, SHORT STORIES, YEAR AHEAD, ETC.) CAN BE ACCESSED FROM THE TOP LEFT HAND CORNER (STACKED LINES). ALSO, THE ‘TRANSLATE’ & WORLD CLOCK WILL APPEAR AT THE BOTTOM.
在手機上，添加的功能（平臺，短篇小說，提前一年等） 可以從左上角訪問（堆疊線）。
*** All times / dates: Please remember that all time references (e.g., “dawn”) are PDT – Pacific DAYLIGHT Time zone. You can refer to the World Clock in the sidebar for more listings or Google ‘time zone converter’.
Email: suningem@gmail.com
Tim’s YouTube links: Unveiling Astrology
Unveiling Astrology Part 2)
START NOTHING: (ALL TIMES ARE PACIFIC DAYLIGHT): 5:33 am to 1:37 pm Sun., 11:52 am to 7:35 pm Tues., and 4:25 pm to 11:08 pm Thurs., and after 10:27 pm Sat.
PREAMBLE:
See the AFTERAMBLE, after “PISCES.” A new short story, “1969,” lies beneath the Afteramble.
WEEKLY FORECAST:
ARIES: March 21-April 19
You are still riding a wave of romance and adventure, Aries — and this is just the start of many months of the same. This could be one of the prime years of your life, and for many of you, especially younger Aries, this could create a whole new life. Of the five major planets, five are in fortunate and harmonious relationship — for years ahead. You are still restless, and happy to express your opinion. You’re making many new acquaintances now. However, don’t neglect your work – there may be a mild prize to grab. In all this romance and adventure, though, there might be a flaw: the mistake will be to take a romance too seriously, to dive too deeply into a creative or pleasure project. Keep everything light and friendly. (Often, friendly romance makes a better marriage than the deep heavy stuff.) Stay quiet and rest the first half of Sunday (PDT). This afternoon to Tuesday eve, your charisma and energy rise strongly. Charge ahead, get things done and projects launched, especially Sunday night and Monday. Tuesday night through Thursday will focus on money, income, possessions, and casual sex — all unlucky until Thursday, when some stability comes in. Friday/Saturday brings travel, communications, casual, friends, and curiosity – follow that curiosity, it can open new doors. Both days flow with ease.
TAURUS: April 20-May 20
The accent remains on home and family, security and Mother Nature, Taurus. This area will expand over the next 11 to 12 months, and can be very fortunate. But at the same time there can be traps. Here’s how to avoid them: 1) don’t be over optimistic; e.g., don’t buy twice the house you can afford; 2) if, when offered or confronted with a new place, or a mortgage arrangement, etc., you feel blank, just blank, walk away; 3) if a project, especially a domestic or real estate project meets any kind of delay, it is a bad project. If a project is proposed and quickly is put into motion without delay, it is probably a good project. Money continues to flow to you, but this week will be about the end of that. You still sense sweet romance with someone, but if you haven’t acted yet you had better hurry. Sunday morning is for friends and happy optimism. But this afternoon until Tuesday eve steals your energy: lie low, rest, avoid competition, contemplate, plan, and deal with government and management people. All these go very well Monday, but be a little cautious Sunday and Tuesday. Your energy and charisma come roaring back Tuesday night through Thursday. Use this energy to solve problems of what you’ll find a few Wednesday Thursday is nicely stable. Chase money and casual sex Friday/Saturday — a good, smooth interval.
GEMINI: May 21-June 20
It is a restless time, Gemini, with lots of paperwork, receipts and bills, reports and emails — and lots of travel, and lots of conversations. This “state” will expand and —hopefully — prove lucky for the 12 months ahead. But get ready, get organized, or you could find yourself buried under a mountain of unfinished chores and penalties and interest, etc. If you’re a lawyer or a professional communicator, this will be a banner year. In general, many years ahead will be easier, more successful and happier. You will also be more nervous for the next seven years. You are still sexually magnetic until August 11, but avoid word fights. Thursday begins a nice stretch of romance and creativity lasting almost to mid September. A libra will seem “irresistible.” Be ambitious or strut your stuff Sunday morning. This afternoon to Tuesday eve brings friends, social delights, light, flirty, friendly romance, optimism and entertainment. Monday is good, especially early in the morning (PDT) and Tuesday is OK. But retreat Tuesday night through Thursday — rest, contemplate, plan future actions, liaise with government or head office, and be charitable. Be cautious Wednesday, but at confidently Thursday when everything is stable. Your energy and pizzazz returns Friday/Saturday — charge ahead, you’re the winner!
CANCER: June 21-July 22
The strong accent lies on possessions, Cancer — on earnings, money, buying/selling, temporary physical attraction (e.g., casual sex) and rote learning. These things will expand for the entire year ahead, and as long as you keep your head, you can make a fortune. By keeping your head, I mean, don’t yield to temptation, and don’t be greedy. For some reason, mixing your money with others — essentially an investment attitude — will serve you far better in the long run than trying to gather all the money you can. Continue to avoid sketchy venues and belligerent people until August 11. Thursday starts a month of affection and fortunate events in the home. A partner might try to dominate you for the next couple of years. Sunday morning is for thinking and wool gathering. Be ambitious this afternoon (PDT) through Tuesday — great strides possible late Sunday through Monday. Happiness, social joys, flirtations and friendly romance, optimism, and entertainment — these come to you Tuesday night through Thursday. It’s a happy time but be careful with all practical matters before Thursday. (Thursday is fine.) Retreat, avoid competition, rest and think Friday/Saturday. These are two easy, pleasant days. Use them to dig deep into mysteries or secrets or investigation.
LEO: July 23-Aug. 22
This is your month, Leo! You’re the star of the show, you are filled with energy and charisma, and you should get out and start things, both projects and friendships. A Gemini still intrigues you, but that might fade after mid month. If single, you might meet your future mate in a group. Your personal luck is very high, especially in romance, creativity, speculation, sports/games, raising children. This “high luck” will last through next July (’27) but at the same time a trap, a wee snake exists in the midst of this luck. When you are fortunate (as you will be) make are you share this. As a rule: independence will hurt you, bonding with or considering another will bless you. (This for the next 12 months of huge luck, but also for a half year beyond that. If something looks lucky, but you feel “blank” — or there is a delay — it means walk away. Sunday morning (PDT) is foggy, sleepy (excellent, or terrible, for sex). This afternoon through Tuesday suppertime brings intellectual expansion, international travel ideas, gentle love, and a tolerant attitude towards everyone. A good interval, especially Monday. Be ambitious late Tuesday night through Thursday. Many obstacles Wednesday, but progress through stability Thursday. Friday/Saturday, bring happiness, social delights, optimism, entertainment, and flirty, friendly romance. Both days are smooth and successful.
VIRGO: Aug. 23-Sept. 22
Stay out of the spotlight, Virgo. Lie low, rest, contemplate and plan for the three weeks ahead. Seek advice, and be charitable (helps your karma). Liaise with gov’t or head office. There might be programs you can take advantage of. This area is one of good fortune for you for the next 12 months. (You might be promoted to management levels.) Higher-ups remain hasty and temperamental until Aug.11. Face this with humour, not resentment. (These bosses will flare up quickly, but forgive and forget just as quickly.) Sunday morning might bring an exciting meeting, but from early afternoon (1:40 pm PDT) to Tuesday eve, mysteries, research, illiquid assets, investments, finances, sexual desire, medical and lifestyle considerations — these become important. Monday is by far the best day for action. Intellectual expansion, far travel, law, higher learning, media and gentle love fill Tuesday night through Thursday. Be careful before Thursday, as many obstacles exist. Thursday itself proceeds slowly and easily. Be ambitious Friday/Saturday — All aspects are good, and you can make a good impression.
LIBRA: Sept. 23-Oct. 22
Welcome to your happiness month, Libra. For three more weeks, you will meet social delights, entertainment, happiness, popularity and flirty moments. Thus August — but also the entire 12 months ahead. I urge you to join at least one group in the year ahead. It will benefit you for some time to come. If unattached, you might meet a prospective mate in a group. However, be willing to embrace deep, heavy romance also — if you do, life/karma will support your actions. Avoid all legal disputes before Aug. 11. Starting Thursday, to almost mid-September, Venus in your sign will bring benefits — chief among them, your allure increases. Tackle chores early Sunday. By mid-afternoon to Tuesday eve, you’ll deal with relationships, opportunities, relocation themes, public appearances, maybe some opposition. Late Sunday night to Tuesday afternoon is best. (Especially Monday morning.) Tuesday night through Thursday brings secrets, investigation/research, major finances, sexual temptations, and power motives — and bad results if you make any commitment before late Wednesday night (PDT). Thursday’s fine, workable. Intellectual expansion comes Fri./Sat. — as does a mellow, tolerant mood, gentle love, and possibly far travel, law, higher learning, media and similar paths. Two good days!
SCORPIO: Oct. 23-Nov. 21
The main accent lies on ambition, career, worldly standing and prestige relations, Scorpio. Now is the time to work hard, to push, and to engage higher-ups in conversation (esp. conversation about money or more duties). This area will be blessed for 12 months; promotion is not only possible, but quite likely! But there’s a glitch, also: if you are sneaky, or act unethically to get ahead, you’ll sooner or later be pushed back, maybe to a lower level than now. Be careful, not impetuous in sex and investing, until Aug. 11. Friends still support you, but from this Thursday to Sept. 9 the gov’t, or an institution, or “head office” will grant you a favour or advantage. Sunday morning’s romanic, beauty shines. But this early afternoon (PDT) to Tuesday evening brings chores and minor health concerns — all flows well. Relationships, exciting meetings, fresh horizons, opportunities and opposition rule Tuesday night through Thursday — but only Thursday is good for action or beginning a project or starting a relationship. Friday/Saturday are for mysteries, research, major finances, sexual temptations, commit ment and consequence. Everything works in your favour, mildly.
SAGITTARIUS: Nov. 22-Dec. 21
The general accent lies on the very things you love, Sage: far travel, higher learning, law, media, philosophy and social rituals. These are prominent in August, AND are very fortunate for the next 12 months. This is the time to visit another continent, or apply for university, write and publish your book, get wed, etc. But realize these great things will only thrive with balance, and for the year ahead, balance means combining the light and superficial with the deep and profound — focusing exclusively on the profound will wilt results. For example, write a book, but keep it conversational. Travel to another country, but include a lot of short local trips. Right now, until August 11, relationships are intense and passionate. This can cause a wave of love or a storm of anger. Sleep in Sunday. Early afternoon to Tuesday eve brings romance, creativity, beauty and a winning streak. Enjoy — tell someone how you feel. Tackle chores Tuesday night through Thursday — but stick to simple, routine tasks Wednesday, when snafus and obstacles are everywhere. You’ll succeed Thursday, through boring, steady effort. Friday/Saturday are for relationships, public appearances, opportunities and opposition, fresh horizons… Both days are smooth, good.
CAPRICORN: Dec. 22-Jan. 20
The general accent lies on mysteries, secrets and investigation, Cap — you could gain valuable knowledge. August emphasizes sex, power, big finances, shared money, investments — and as long as you’re honest and ethical, you can watch your commitment turn into a growing, favourable consequence. This applies not only to August, but, in terms of luck, to the entire 12 months ahead. You could exit the summer of 2027 far richer than today! One hint: combining income and investment is best; buying something as both an investment and for use, is best. In other words, combine income and investment. If a medical concern arises before August 2027, get to a doctor, as the same luck that expands your net worth, can also expand an illness. Sunday mornings for conversations or a quick trip. Be home, hug the family, look to security or the garden, Sunday afternoon (PDT) to Tuesday eve — a good, productive interval. Romance, charming kids, beauty, pleasure and games, creative surges fill Tuesday night through Thursday. Unfortunately, the aspects aren’t great. Nothing really works until Thursday (when you might deal with someone who would make a good housemate). Tackle chores Friday/Sat. — you’ll get it done. A good time (Friday) to buy equipment, machinery.
AQUARIUS: Jan. 21-Feb. 18
Relationships, fresh horizons, public appearances, major opportunities — these await you in August, Aquarius, and will be lucky now to July 2027. But don’t sacrifice everything for a bond, or to chase an opportunity — balance this with some selfishness, or you’ll regret the outcome. Romance can be hot and heavy right now, to August 11. Same period, be gentle with children. For seven years, you will experience perhaps the greatest romance, love, or creative project of your life. Sunday morning is for shopping, but buy little. This early afternoon to suppertime Tuesday brings errands, conversations, paperwork and local advertising. Be home, at least in your heart, Tuesday night through Thursday. Hug the family, enhance security, kneel in the garden. Obstacles hinder your progress until Wed. turns to Thurs. (and all day Thurs.). Great love, great romance, great creativity, beauty or pleasure — you get at least a taste of these Fri./Sat. — and maybe the beginning of something very special.
PISCES: Feb. 19-March 20
Pisces, your general accent in August lies on work, health, machinery, and duties to dependents or the helpless. This area will expand greatly in the 12 months ahead. Yes, buy machinery, but don’t let optimism make you pay too much, or buy something bigger than you need. Also, mix your chores with a sprinkling or more of management — delegate some tasks. (If you don’t, you could become dispirited as the months go by.) Now to August 11, be gentle at home; your tendency will be to argue or fight. Thursday starts almost five weeks of reward from investing, research, or intimacy. Sunday morning finds you full of energy and charm. But by this afternoon, to Tuesday suppertime, you shunt into a money/possessions phase — a fortunate one. Buy/sell, collect and pay, hug a sometime lover, study to learn. Monday best. Tuesday eve through Thursday brings communications, paperwork, and short trips. Exercise caution Wednesday. Thursday is fine for steady progress. Be home, at least in heart, Fri./Sat. — two beautiful days for family, gardening, repairs or decorating, even for visiting a therapist to solve family tangles.
THE END.
*
AFTERAMBLE:
I see Dr. Fauci was in Congress today. He read an opening statement, and then refused to answer 111 questions by invoking the fifth amendment each time. Evidently making his opening statement was a mistake: by law, If you say anything other than the invocation of the fifth, you are then not protected by the fifth, and must answer questions. His refusal to do so will earn Fauci a contempt of Congress citation. Whether that or following steps can lead to Fauci’s imprisonment, I don’t have a clue. I think he deserves to spend a couple of decades in jail, but judging by his name, he won’t.
***
I said before that I thought yellow was the most aggressive color (not red). Many police forces, especially their traffic divisions, wear yellow safety vests. So do road workers, construction workers, etc. so we could either call yellow the colour of defense, or we can get slippery and say this is a case of the best defence is offence. By appearing aggressive, the yellow warns and alerts others, hence reduces the likelihood of an accident.
Yellow is also the colour of Gemini, the most violent of signs. That doesn’t mean they win the most fights though. Gemini Kennedy signed the US up for the Vietnam war. The letters he wrote to Krushev during the Cuban crisis would make your hair stand on end. JFK was a nervous wreck or a mad man, and a nuclear war was only minutes away. Krushev wisely backed away.
Trump is also a Gemini. He has started a few wars, but he has achieved many more peace treaties.
***
I kind of said it before, but I’ll say it again: wars, especially naval wars, will be with us for the next 13 years, and will probably expand beyond what we see today. For the next two years, ground forces will be common and rather stubborn and ambitious, but when the two years ends, wars will become largely naval.
And, not only Naval, but increasingly also viral, chemical, poisoning of water sources, burning, and space – threats from space will increase fivefold.
***
Canada‘s Prime Minister Mark Carney, is feeling the anger of war, but is also acting conservatively and defensively. But if he is still Prime Minister two years from now, from this point forward, he will display his anger. Then, or now, his ministership will be fraught with struggles arising from attacks – at present, economic attacks.
***
Here’s a puzzle for you: any expert in their field will tell you that rail is the cheapest way to move anything over land, by a huge factor. (Ships are cheaper, but they don’t do well on land.)
Ten years ago you could fly return Vancouver-Toronto-Vancouver for $500-$600. At the time, I was curious about rail travel, so I looked up their prices. One way only, Vancouver Toronto, was about $2000, or $ 4,000 return, compared to $ 600 by air. One factor is that the crew is with you maybe 72 hours or more, on an airplane it’s only five or six hours. Somebody’s gotta pay for those extra wages. Two, the cheapness of raill – or more correctly rail carrying – must be based on full cars and tankers carrying lumber and oil and commodities to their brims. But these human travel cars have a vast space around their cargo.. I’m roughly estimating that the 10 or 20 human forms in a rail passenger car, fill, if we include chairs, about 20% of the space. That leaves a whopping 80% of dead space – space not paid for. In a normal cargo car or freight car that space would be filled and paid for either by the pound or by the mass or volume. In passenger cars, though, that 80% is simply un-paying air.
***
Often great artists reach a peak in their career, at which point they create their opus. A big work that often is repetitive of some earlier works, soft in plot, and lacking the energy and piercing insight (and outsight) of their earlier masterpieces.
Take for instance Dostoyevsky ‘s Brother’s Karamasov . He wrote astounding masterpieces: notes from the underground, the idiot, crime and punishment, the one with stavrogin in it, and another. Each of these novels (Notes is not a novel) has its own energy, and revolves around a different idea. Each has its own very different story based on a very different character in each one.
Then, in a large final work, a novel at least twice as long as any of his previous ones, knitted together by a long, meandering plot — which does have some brilliant moments and episodes, such as the little story with the priests who have jailed Christ and stopped the second coming. This is something that Dostoyevsky is expert at: giving a philosophical argument or dialogue passion, even illustrating it, as he does with the Cabal of priests who jailed Christ. This is one of the most significant and puzzling “arguments” in modern literature, certainly in the literature of religion. But that is only 20 or 50 pages in a very long book. And it actually bothers the reader that his three protagonist are each recycled from his previous novels. The trouble with this is there’s nothing new to discover about them. They act dramatically, but there’s not the deep sonorous sound of revelation as there is in the earlier novels.
The Brothers Karamazov is, unfortunately, long and boring.
I suspect Christopher Nolan‘s Ulysses is his Bros. Karamazov. The film is big, long, and has many scenes — unfortunately, none of them are impressive, none stand out as anything new in cinema. I sat through it all, I was comfortable, but not excited. I give it a B.
***
This is the last story in “Stories From the Other Eye.” It’s long, so I’m dividing it into sections. Here are Chapter One and Two.
1969
A Novella
CHAPTER ONE — THE DEATH
April, 1969:
I was in the woods above the Hydro cut. I usually come up here to be alone. I’ve just got an axe that I fool with. I was standing near a big mossy cedar log when a man jerked down the trail in a jolting run, dripping wet from the foliage, his hair pasted against his white face and a look of surprise in his eyes. A young man, but way older than me. I was sixteen then. I still am, but I know a lot more now, and maybe I’m wiser. His mouth was open like an “O.” He stopped, as if he wondered why he was running. He didn’t see me.
I knew right away something was wrong because he wasn’t with any other men. And he was soaked. Woods workers don’t get soaked like that; they wear rain clothes. This man wore a leather jacket and jeans. City stuff. But he was totally soaked, as if he’d just climbed out of a pool. I stood a little straighter. Now he saw me, his eyes opened wider and he put out his hand, his arm. I’m certain he was about to speak, but he seemed to be searching for words. Then a rifle shot cracked the hugeness of the woods, water dropped off the maple leaves onto my nose, and the man dropped, crumpled.
He wasn’t dead, because after a moment he squirmed. But he sure had dropped. I dropped too, to my knees, to hide beside that old cedar log. I froze, listening. But there was no more sound except the blood pounding in my ears. I rose slow as a caterpillar, to peek over the log. I looked up the trail. I couldn’t see anyone.
I wasn’t sure what to do. If I ran up to where he lay on the grit and roots of the trail, I might get shot too, because obviously someone was in the mood to shoot people. On the other hand, I had to help that man on the ground. Maybe, too, he had a message for me. Maybe he’d whisper, if he weren’t dead yet. And obviously I was the only one in the world able to get that message right now. Or he’d just die and we’d never know anything. For instance, who shot him, and why. It was the most shocking thing I’d ever seen. I’d watched fights. I’d seen an animal or two shot. I killed a duck once with my slingshot. But I’d never seen a man, a person, shot and drop like that. The whole woods became clear, wet and fresh, brighter. But there was something bad, too, though all I could smell was the rain, the sweet moldy dirt and the unripe smell of wet trees. I felt a sharp, unhappy danger. Not that delicious danger of sneaking out the bedroom window on a summer night. Or that clanging danger when you might talk to a girl and your whole body swarms with a hot red feeling. It was just cold, alarming danger; it made the whole woods uncomfortably bright and clear.
I heard the man groan or sigh. He was about fifty feet from me. The rain dropped in big dollops from the trees. I couldn’t just stay kneeling. That bad feeling, the “clearness” that I couldn’t pinpoint nudged me – so I ran, bent over, along a shallow cut filled with ferns, to five or six feet from where he lay. From the way he fell I assumed the shooter was to my right. I didn’t see how he or she could see me, as the whole way I was in a depression, and a pack of alders (they grow in the skid roads the loggers make) hid me from the right. I waited, hidden under the ferns, watching, listening. Nothing. Nothing for minutes.
If I went to help him, I might be shot. But if I didn’t, how much time did he have? And why didn’t the shooter appear, to make sure of his or her kill? Terrified, I crawled to him. He lay on his back. His stomach was blown out on one side, and I could see what looked like a bone, a rib or something, with a tatter of plaid shirt draped over it. His cheek and forehead were splotched from the mud of the trail where he’d wiped his face after falling. He looked at me silently, his eyes still questioning, surprised. There’s something about a grown man, from my view, a man of about twenty, as I guess he was – they look all raw and strange and powerful and dangerous and you can’t relate to them. I didn’t know what to do with this dangerous guy who turned his head to stare at me. I kept jerking my head around in case the shooter appeared. I planned to dive into the shallow cut, then hands-and-knees it to where I knew a small cliff was, then I’d jump down it and run. Run like crazy.
“Can I help?” I whispered. “Do you want me to – ?” His face was skinny, the cheekbones stuck out. He kept looking at me. His lips moved.
“What?” I said. I inched slightly closer. I didn’t want to get too close.
His voice was so normal and loud I jerked back, surprised. “Give her,” he said in this loud voice.
“Give? Who?”
“Get her,” he said almost irritably, his eyes strained and watery. Then he gave a huge sigh, and lay still, eyes closed.
“Are you alive?” I whispered. Nothing. “Are you dead?” I whispered again. I slowly crept my arm across the trail bed. I felt him, actually I poked him. No response. I wear glasses sometimes, though I’m too vain to wear them to school. They were in my jacket, so I worked them free. I had to dry them on my undershirt, then held them under his nose, then at his mouth. No breath, no fogging.
“Are you alive?” I said once more, to be sure. He was dead. In a moment of huge courage, I crawled closer and put my ear on his chest, where his heart would be. I rose to my knees and looked at him. He was dead.
I suddenly looked around, seized again with the fear that someone was stalking us. I lost my nerve. In a panic, I squatted back under the ferns, then crawled a good distance. I kept flat on the ground, wondering, picturing myself jumping up and running, as fast as I could before somebody saw and shot me.
I didn’t bother with the little cliff. At some point I felt safe and covered enough to rise on my haunches, walking like a duck right into the deep bush, then I rose and ran and scrambled, away from the trail about a hundred yards, off into the cedars and up a rock hill that was tangled with salal, cedar roots and moss and I sat there on my haunches with my back against a stone drop, and a dead fall in front of me, so no one could see me.
A bit of puke had come up and was burning my throat. My legs were soaked from running through the brush, my back was soaked, and my wool toque was sagging wet so I took it off. I felt hot, panicky hot.
Give her Get her. Is that what he said? Did he say give, or get? Save her? Arrest her? It made no sense. Maybe he meant give her the news: he was shot. Or maybe he held some clue in his hand, to give some female, or in his pockets — a wallet, so I’d know who he was. But I’d just run, and I hadn’t even looked! Damn! And I had hidden myself so well that I could no longer see the shot man nor if anyone came to finish the job.
I waited until the afternoon sun. I figured I probably should tell the police, but for what? He was dead, I was sure. For now, I wasn’t going back to that body, in case the murderer was waiting, watching from some hidden spot. Yet it was hard to leave, some fascination held me there. Finally I went home, creeping first, skirting the body by a few hundred yards. I think if I was there with Dave and Ger, or some other guys, we would have gone back to the body and seen what we could and maybe investigated his pockets. But not alone. I don’t know if you’ve ever walked through these kind of woods we have here. In places it’s more like climbing, since the floor keeps falling in, and the deadfalls and roots and salal and all the vegetation are like a jungle gym that you have to keep climbing through and up over and under. That’s why they have trails, or nobody’d ever get anywhere. Actually, he only reason there are trails is the loggers make skid roads to pull the logs out; within a few years they’re choked out by alder trees.
I plowed through the forest floor for about half a hour, just to skirt that body and get into the open along the hydro lines. I ran across the right-of-way clearing and into the woods on the other side. Finally I reached a logging road I knew and I hustled home, in some spurts half-running, then walking fast, keeping my back straight to show I wasn’t running, but walking, with my hands in my pockets and forming my lips into a whistle, so if the shooter saw me he’d figure I was just an innocent person whistling and walking home fast but innocently in the light rain, and he’d rather pass me over than shoot me and cause possibly more trouble and uproar for himself. Half an hour later I was on the paved road, the single highway between the ferry and Sechelt.
When I got home nobody was in, so I went out back, down to the dock. My brother was sitting on his back legs, his yellow rain gear on, pants, coat and rain hat, fishing off the side near the end. It was pouring rain now.
“I saw a dead guy.”
“You queer asshole. You didn’t see no dead guy.” He didn’t look up, he stared at the water where his line was, his eyes glinting and fierce. Then he did look up and squinted at me, his teeth bared by a tight, aggressive smile. It’s half that he’s short-sighted, and half that he thinks it looks tough.
“Where?”
I started to answer, but for some strange reason a silence came over me like something I’d never known. It was big – not heavy, but strong, like a ghost pushing me from behind. So I didn’t say it, and he looked at me with a disgusted frown and went back to studying his fishing line. He’s two years older than me; he always wanted to be in charge. I watched the sea for clues.
Then he squinted at me again and rose up to stand. He liked to stand in front of me as if he was a big punk. He’s actually an inch shorter, but a lot chunkier — he’s built square. He said, slowly, through his teeth, grinning, he liked to grin at me as if he was going to attack me: “What do you mean, you saw a dead man?”
I love my brother, but sometimes I don’t love him. Half of me wanted to tell him about it, and we’d go off on a hunt and see the body and be amazed and share this and talk about what to do, and he’d be grudgingly amazed and we’d soak in the satisfaction of it all for days, maybe even weeks. But the other half of me, something that was new and felt unfamiliar to me, wanted to not have anything to do with him, or the dead man, or anything. It wanted to walk away and have a coffee and stare out the back window at the ocean and be silent.
“Sucker,” I said, to deny my whole story.
“You little asshole!” he shouted. He leapt to chase me and usually I’d run, laughing, and usually I’d get away. But that strange silent feeling made me forget to run. And so he stopped and hesitated and looked at me intently, studying right into my eyes.
“Yeah? You really saw something, didn’t you?” His frown turned slowly to a wide grin, fists on his hips. “My queer little brother saw a dead man. Hmmn. So where is this dead man? Take me to see it, or I don’t believe you.” After waiting a moment for me to answer — I said nothing — with a satisfied air, he bent and drew up his line, holding it above his head like a child would, let it and bait circle down into a bucket, pushed his head and chin into forward gear, and marched determinedly up the dock to the house.
It wasn’t six yet so our mother wasn’t home. It was cold in the house. I changed my wet clothes, made a coffee, took it into my room and closed the door. My brother left me alone. He was probably off scheming somewhere.
I guess I should mention that my brother and I live with our mother in this grey, paint-peeling rented house beside the ocean, near nowhere on the Sunshine Coast. (The name’s a joke; it rains all the time.) We’ve lived here about two years. Our mother doesn’t say much, she mostly comes home from work and curls up on the couch, eats a candy bar and reads slave plantation adventures, white women and black studs, that sort of stuff. I’m considered smart, the teachers always tell me to “live up to your potential.” In my brother’s language, I’m “queer.”
My brother and I mostly do the cooking. I don’t know who lived here before us, but they were likely a biker gang or something, because there were swastikas painted in black over all the pink walls. We re-painted them, of course. I sometimes wonder who originally built this house with the old dock. Maybe a fisherman? He must have had a family, because there were three bedrooms. But why did they live here? Were they happy? What did they say and think and feel? Was the house nice then and warm, with carpets and nicely painted walls and warm lights in the rooms and bookcases and gentle voices? Rather than, I mean, the god awful pink walls with the black swastikas all over.
Somehow I could never quite picture this being a warm, happy house. Maybe there never was a peaceful, happy, loving and gentle family ever living here — maybe it was just built by a hermit trucker who filled the living room with his beer cans and cigarettes and lousy tv and sat on the dock and spit into the water until he coughed into a fit and died. Maybe it was always a cold, lonesome, empty place.
I lay on my bed long after supper and after the television went silent and the lights under Paul’s and Mom’s doors went out.
I had to go. There was something I had to see. I had a flashlight and a cube of cheese and wore my jeans and runners, even though they’d get soaked in the brush. I didn’t want to be trying to run from a murderer in my clunking rubber boots and a big baggy pair of rubber rain pants. I’d be worse than a girl. I took a pack of matches too, and about twenty feet of light nylon rope, I don’t know why. And a scaling knife with its sheath – that wicked thing would gut anyone.
The sky had cleared a bit and the moon was out, so some clouds glowed white in the light. I felt fine and brave on the paved road down to the hydro cut. I was going more directly to the body’s place than when I’d run away from it. I left the road and walked about a hundred feet into the cut with the hydro towers — it’s a swath they cut through the woods, from one eternity to another, and it’s about 200 yards wide, and usually has a crooked dirt road winding through it. Along both edges of the cut, tall black trees stood like sentinels, watching everything.
Walking down the muddy cut, and exposed to everything from bears to owls to the eyes of murderers, despite the knife and being in my running gear, I started to feel not only exposed but foolish, as anyone who saw me, even a murderer, would say to himself, that kid has no sense walking out there in the open under the moon. Even worse, the brush, mostly fireweed and thorn bushes about man-high, could hide anyone until they were only feet away. So I was open to all the night, and to every murderer who could sneak up on me without a moment’s notice. Yep, I was afraid, but that made me angry. I stopped and punched the air, to feel more courageous. But I didn’t move over to the edge of the cut, where I would blend with the forest, because the edge, I knew from years of playing, was a mess of swamp and sharp thorns, and occasionally a stinging clump of devil’s club. Or on a dry spot you could trip and fall into a mess of brambles and slice yourself to ribbons getting out.
So I stuck to the cut’s dirt road. I didn’t want to run, because I knew running could start the panic. Finally the whole cut became a long smooth rock for about a thousand feet. Shortly along this was the trail where I’d been in the woods. I almost missed it, it shrank from the moonlight, a half-formed dark mouth. I turned on my flashlight and stepped in. After a brilliant few seconds, my light went yellow, then dim. It wouldn’t even light my feet.
I had two objectives: 1) find out if he was still there – or his body – and 2) search his pockets for clues — like his name. And what did “Get her” mean? Setting this goal in my mind – to check those pockets then get out, fast – was the only way I could enter that darkness and stumble cautiously along the trail. My heart pounded like a trumpet the more steps I took into that darkness. Cedars and alders rose like a horrible silence, a hulking beast around me. After twenty or thirty steps I turned and ran out of that trail into the open of the hydro lines, just to breathe. I stood there, panting, exhausted.
Then suddenly I saw someone in the moonlight — it was Paul! — loping like a stumpy behemoth.
He ran right up to me and stood chest-out, sneering, eyes shining: “Couldn’t go in alone, eh little brother?” I said nothing. Still, I was very glad he was here.
“Well, where’s the body?” He stepped into the dark trail, then stopped. I could never figure Paul out. Either he was full of bravado because he was my older brother and not having a father he figured he was the man of the house and had to push all this bravado out his chest, or he really was brave. I now figure it was a fusion of the two. His bravado was so necessary that it became part of him, for real. Once I watched him stand in a circle of punks and get beat by a bigger guy with railroad gloves just because he refused to back down. Railroad gloves have ridges of stiff leather sewn along the outside of every finger, so they cut your face when they hit you. I didn’t even think of helping him; it was supposed to be a friendly fight. But I should have at least tried.
“In there,” I said.
“How far?”
“A hundred yards maybe.”
He leaned back, his fists on his hips and grinned: “Well, little brother, are we going in?”
“There might be someone waiting.”
“You mean — who killed him? Little brother, who’s going to sit up all fucking night in these shitty woods with a dead man – that they’ve fuckin’ killed? Jesus, that’s stupid! Let’s go!” (Whenever he called me “little brother” I knew he was pleased with me.) And he marched into the trail’s big dark tunnel, double-time. I caught up.
My brother is short-sighted, so he stumbled more on the roots and dirt pockets than I did, but he kept his chin high.
The body lay in a dappled pocket of moonlight. Paul stood and gazed at it for a full minute, his fists shoved in his jeans, as if savouring the moment. Then he knelt down, waved his forearm at me, and we rolled the body over. Paul patted the numerous pockets. While he was working at that, I grasped both the dead hands. I pried his fingers open — nothing. On my knees, I looked around in frustration, shining the dim, almost dead flashlight — and there it was, a dull shine near the trail’s edge. I lunged and closed my fist around it. I knew, or I suspected, this was the mystery I was looking for, a clue to “Give her” or “Get her.” It was hard, smooth and cold, the shape of a heart. I slotted it into my back jeans pocket. Possibly it wasn’t his, but that was a 1 in 1000 likelihood.
Paul stood over the body, looking at the wallet in his hand.
“I can’t read anything,” he said.
“Well, we got his wallet,” I said. “In the light, we can see who he is.”
“No, we can’t, little brother.” He threw the wallet down on the body, along with a few coins and a crushed paper napkin. He spoke through clenched teeth: “If we have the wallet, they’ll think we did it .”
Then he went quiet for a moment, bent and picked it up anyway: “Fuck it.”
We left, hardly fast enough for me. When we made the road and a streetlight, we examined the wallet. There were a few cards, Visa and a driver’s license. Dietmar Stoltz. Maybe German? Paul wanted to keep the license, but I said that would really pin him if he was ever stopped by the cops. So we decided to tell the police and hand them the dead man’s wallet.
I didn’t tell Paul what I’d found. I kept it in my pocket, and never told anyone — well, almost no one. Because a week later I did try to give it to someone. It was silver, one of those heart-shaped things that open and have a picture of someone inside. Except this one didn’t open. It was very plain, just plain silver both sides, and on one side, “B.” That was all.
CHAPTER TWO
So we phoned the police from home and they came to interview us, and we were secretly pleased and satisfied that we could wake our Mom up and have the cops there and it wasn’t us who were in trouble. The cops told us we shouldn’t have taken the wallet and dug around, but fuck them. So after awhile, as dawn started cracking the night, they took us up there in a little convoy of 4x4s, shone their searchlights into the round mouth of that trail, and walked in with flashlights. They made the trail a bright tunnel rather than the dark mouth that had swallowed us. We came across the body. They laid yellow tape around and rolled the body into a black plastic bag, and did all the police things in the slow fingers of dawn, working with flashlights. They asked me where I was when I saw the shooting, what I did, what direction did I hear the shot from, and other questions. About half an hour later, they took us home.
Our Mom was sitting in the now sunny kitchen in her housecoat, holding a coffee, concerned and curious, I thought. Paul acted superior, like she couldn’t possibly appreciate what we knew. The murder was Wednesday afternoon, and the whole thing with Paul and the dark trail and the cops went into Thursday morning. Mom let us stay home from school Thursday. Friday I said nothing at school. Something silenced me, just like it had on the dock with Paul. But Paul strutted around school like the most important kid in the nation. I knew he’d tell soon.
Friday night I called my two friends, Dave and Ger, and said let’s meet at the cut near Crowe Road. I told them why, to see a crime scene, and that I’d seen a guy die. Saturday morning we met and walked up to the spot. They were pretty skeptical, but they became complete believers when they saw the yellow police tape fluttering in the morning breeze. The body was gone.
Partly I took them there because I wanted to show off. But partly I just kept wondering what it was, so I had to see it again, and for some reason it spooked me, I had to be with friends, or I’d feel weird. I showed them a small article in the Friday paper (it only came out twice a week) but it had no mention of Paul or me. Maybe that’s because we were minors. The article said virtually nothing except a body had been found, and if anyone had any information about a Dietmar Stoltz, please contact the RCMP. Still, I read the article about ten times, searching for clues. Then I cut it out and put it in my pocket to show Dave and Ger.
I should have been elated. One, I now had super bragging rights; and two, in the couple of days since the man died, Paul was treating me a little better, almost with respect; he didn’t speak so down to me.
But something toned down my elation — I noticed my mother was puzzled about me. I noticed the half hidden, subtle looks she cast me several times, which she didn’t cast over Paul, as if she wondered what I was doing out alone in the woods, or she suspected something about me – not like I was the prime suspect or anything like that, but that she suspected something about me, something that I myself had no clue about. As if I puzzled her. That was new. Or maybe I was only seeing it now; maybe I had been born odd. It kept me thoughtful, underneath my new brave self.
“His name was Dieter Stoltz. Dietmar,” I told my friends. “We saw that from his wallet, Paul and me. Maybe he was German.”
“You took your brother?” Ger asked — because they all knew how Paul treated me.
“As far as I know there’s no Stoltz in town, or even on the coast. I looked in the phone book – not one on the whole Coast,” I said. I was explaining everything, I was like a tour guide, excited by what had happened.
Then we reached the yellow tape.
“See?” I said. “I wasn’t lying, man.”
“Holy Cow,” Gerald said.
“Holy shit,” Dave said quietly. “— Hey, you can’t go in there.”
“Bullshit,” I said, “It’s my crime scene.” I ducked under the tape and stepped in. “See? The body was here,” and I gestured lengthwise, to indicate his whole body. They cautiously ventured in.
Then they both bent over, to examine the bits of dark spots on the dirt. Ger found a stick and poked at them.
“His guts were lying out here,” I said, pointing.
“Have they caught the guy?”
“Not that I know.”
(First, maybe I should explain my mother. I don’t know why. She has nothing to do with what happened to me. No, I’ll just describe her. Who could explain her? She was about late thirties or just forty. No grey hair yet, and she still dressed for men, you could tell that. There were the little touches, perfume and a nice scarf. But there wasn’t a man around that I could see. At least not permanently. Once in awhile some man came home with her after a date, and usually spent the night. I didn’t mind these guys; they never stayed. Except one guy I hated, because he teased me; and he stayed many nights.
At about the time of the dead man I was going through a period where my mother for some reason repulsed me. I’m shy and quiet and I never let on, but inside myself, I recoiled at the sight of her. Her glasses seemed to cut into me like sharp shards, her voice had a cutting edge, and you could see her going to pot a little bit, getting fat around the butt, and that really repulsed me. I don’t know why. But now, being months older and remembering it, I think my mom was quite attractive looking, soft, gentle and pretty. Maybe that’s the truth.
People have told me – women have told me — that she was a beauty. She had dark thick hair and large brown eyes. She was usually quiet, but sometimes in her bedroom she would break out in large, loud sobs that filled the house so you had to escape outside and up the paved road so you wouldn’t hear it.
I guess she was sobbing, in particular, because some man had not come back, or they’d had a fight. But I felt she was sobbing, in general, over the whole state of things. In her worst moods she would threaten to get rid of us. I can remember having specifically no reaction to that, no feeling at all.
I could tell you what she said and what she asked about the murder and finding the body and the RCMP’s questions and etcetera, but it seems rather superfluous. All you have to know about is her sobs, and that tells you everything.)
“Hey,” Dave said. “Look!” On a knob way up a wooded rise, we could see more yellow tape. We scrambled up. Mostly we could follow an old skid road. (They aren’t really roads, just paths the machines make by dragging logs through the woods.) It was May, so the weather was still cool, the rain chilled you, but there’s some sun too, and it’s light to about eight pm. When we reached the spot, the sun came out and shone down like sweet warm honey. But otherwise, we were disappointed.
“There’s nothing here.”
“Well, the cops were obviously here.”
“Maybe this is where he stood, to shoot. See the broken ferns?”
“Hey, watch out – there’s footprints!”
There they were, partial indents in the soggy ground. We stared at them for a whole minute.
“Maybe they’re just the cops’ footprints.“
“Or maybe more likely this is where the killer stood to shoot the guy.”
“Yeah. Creepy.”
We stared at the boot prints a little longer. We had, of course, left our own footprints everywhere.
“Well, the cops got everything. No shells. No torn clothes. No condoms! HA, HA!” That was Gerald. He’d been poking through the underbrush around the site with a stick. He often made embarrassing remarks, then laughed loudly. In class, he sat, knees crossed, bent over his desk, twirling his compass, ignoring the teacher. Every day. Every hour. We three were eggheads, high I.Q. Dave was delicate, girls loved his duck-bill hair, and the punks bullied him sometimes. I was never bullied, I suspect because I was Paul’s bro. Like Ger, I never studied. Nor even, usually, bothered to learn.
After a few minutes of hopeful searching, of pretending we were the rifleman, gazing down along our outstretched arms to the dead spot as if we had rifles, Ger was bored and wanted to go.
“Let’s go back,” Dave said.
“Yah, back!” — Ger.
But I was still listening to that soft feeling inside.
“Aren’t you coming?”
I shook my head.
“Come on, man!”
They waited, already ten feet down the slope.
“What are you going to do? Stay here by yourself?”
I waved them off, and watched them go. I stood around awhile, looking in a circle at everything, but seeing nothing. I thought I’d give it one last shot, so I heaved up the hill a little more, then more, thinking I might find something – footprints, maybe. Maybe even another dead body. I knew that was too much to hope for, but, you know, anything’s possible. Finally, I thought if I reached the top of the hill, I could see further. If the shooter had shot west toward this Dietmar, then I could look east from the top, toward the killer’s origin, maybe see something else, some other clue.
But as usual in the woods, the top was just an introduction to another rise, and its top to another, and so on. I knew the real top was still in snow, and there wouldn’t be anything east of that summit anyway, but a wilderness of summits. So, disheartened, I started to wander back down. A bit of curiosity made me turn left, off the skid road, north-east into an overgrown skid road.
I was still high up; the land below was all misted and grey. Suddenly, pushing through some particularly strong alders, I fell into a ditch and scraped my hands on gravel. I had stumbled on a real road, a gravel strip about twelve feet across. I began walking in the direction I assumed led down, back home. I was tired and wet, the adventure was over. If I’d only gone with Ger and Dave, we’d be sitting in the café with hot coffee right now.
TO BE CONTINUED…