Exile. Ann Ireland
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to the empty chair.
Obediently, I sat down on the blue cushioned chair next to the fish pond, my spine erect, an awkward pose, so I swung one leg over the other in an effort to look casual, but it still didn’t feel right; there was no space with the pond in the way.
So I placed both feet flat on the flagstones, hands on my lap. I never sat like this, not since I was a child at Sunday school. The little group stared expectantly, and I thought, do they want me to sing a song now? Perhaps there will be a speech and a salute to my health. Something was anticipated, but what it was, I had no idea. I eyed the tall pitcher full of pink liquid, creaking with ice cubes.
Finally a woman with pale cheeks said, “Thank God it stopped raining. You must have gotten a terrible first impression of our city, Carlos.”
“Yes,” I said, then added quickly, “no.” I felt myself redden. Sydney poured drinks from the pitcher into tall opaque glasses. A slice of lime plopped into my glass followed by a sweet fruity smell. Sangria? After a slug I felt instantly better.
“The patio is very beautiful.”
“Thank you,” Syd replied.
I felt proud of myself, this simple exchange perfectly rendered.
“You are staying at Rita’s?” a woman called Sandy Peeple said. She wore a sleeveless tunic over tights, like a medieval courtier.
“Just for the weekend,” Rita answered. “Then he’s into the university.”
“Yes,” I pitched in gamely. “The Chair of Exiled Writer. At least I will have a place to sit.”
Their laughter was a little forced.
“Where will he live?” Sandy continued.
“I organized a spot at the married students’ housing, right on campus,” said Sharon, the full-breasted woman who was the wife of the slightly bombed Daniel Rose. “He’ll be sharing with Rashid.”
“Good old Rashid.” Syd glanced at me. “A lovely guy. Pakistani. He wrote incendiary essays that were taken to be anti-Muslim. Had to get the hell out.”
“Married students?” I reached for a dish of peanuts on the low glass table. “But I am not married.”
Everyone laughed again. They thought I was making another joke. My coordination was off and the peanuts tipped into the fish pond. I lunged for the dish, but it was too late.
“Oh my God,” Sydney cried. “If the fish eat nuts, they’ll die!” He leaped off his chair to begin the rescue.
The next five minutes we spent trolling the floor of the pond, sleeves rolled up to the elbows, plucking nuts one by one. The water was cold, yet toasted lightly on top by the sun. When a fish brushes your skin it is like an infant’s sigh.
“Look out for Blackie,” Syd warned. “He bites.”
Rodolfo’s striped shirt, the one he insisted I take with me, was spattered with water and a slowly seeping nervous sweat.
Sharon Rose touched my elbow and whispered, “Syd’s very high strung. Don’t worry.”
I loved the way she spoke, in a slow unhurried voice, her lips cracked under scarlet lipstick. She popped one of the rescued nuts in her mouth and I knew she was doing this for me, so that I would understand that nothing was wasted.
Syd took one of his oversized linen napkins and mopped himself up, carefully dabbing his forearms and each finger in turn. When he saw me watching, he gave a quick fretful smile.
We settled back into the wicker chairs and I heard Sharon mutter, “Crisis over, thank God.”
Rita was unpeeling plastic wrap from three bowls full of cold noodles and salad, and mixing their contents with a pair of tongs. There was a musty smell, some Indian spicing, and no bread to be seen. And no protein for energy and endurance. Even in my basement cell Marta would bring skewers of grilled meat along with the crusty bread my people live on.
“Excuse me,” I said quietly. “There is no meat?”
“Poor Carlos,” Rita laughed. “Syd’s a strict vegetarian.”
“Vegetarian, yes.” I nodded. I had an aunt who practised this regimen, not for health reasons but because she was convinced that dead beasts continue to claim their souls.
China plates with scalloped rims were passed around, followed by the bowls of food. I helped myself, using the pair of wooden tongs while Rita held each bowl in turn. I felt my hosts’ polite stares, and the quick, forgiving smiles when a noodle slopped to the ground. The plate was too little, almost a saucer, and I’d misjudged what it could hold.
“This is quite an occasion,” Sydney said when we’d finished serving ourselves. “Shall we toast our guest of honour?” He lifted his glass and waited while the rest of the party mimicked the gesture.
“It’s been a long and sometimes arduous journey,” Daniel Rose proclaimed. “For all of us.” He slipped an arm around his wife’s back and I watched her smile stiffen.
“Particularly for Carlos,” she said.
I lifted my own glass. “And I would like to salute all of you, to thank you sincerely, and thank you Canada.”
“To your new life,” Sandy said, her eyes moist with feeling.
“To my new life.”
We all drank, paused, then drank again, then simultaneously placed our glasses on the table, and I wondered if this was a ritual here in Canada, that all must follow the gestures of the honoured guest.
Rita touched my forearm. “Now would be a good time…”
I remembered, yes, the poem.
“Carlos would like to read to you from one of his recent works.”
“Wonderful!” Frank Peeple slapped his knee in a way you knew was foreign to him. His wife gave him a puzzled look.
Rodolfo’s jacket was folded over the back of my chair and I searched through its pockets until I found the crunched up piece of paper and my eyeglasses.
The guests were quiet during this bit of activity, and stared into their drinks.
I announced that first I would read the poem in Spanish, then Rita would read it in translation: we had worked this out a few hours earlier.
I smoothed the paper on my knee, cleared my throat, and as I read they leaned forward on their chairs, intent. Plates sat on their laps, untouched, attracting wasps and flies which were discreetly waved off. As I read, sun sifted between the branches of the arbutus tree and toasted the goldfish. A couple of guests knew enough Spanish to let out little grunts of appreciation at appropriate moments. There was a regular thump in the background — the kid next door popping baskets, slamming the backboard. Such a normal, everyday sound. An orange cat prowled the length of the fence, back arched, claws reaching out and tugging the air.
I knew my poem by heart and never looked at the paper. When my gaze swept past Sharon Rose I saw that her eyes were wet and a streak of mascara had run down her cheek.
When I was finished, I bowed my head and Rita began, in English:
“The Prisoner’s Song.”
It was all about bread, the loaf that I had seen fall from the wagon outside my basement prison. It was the most ordinary kind of bread, like a French baguette, only chunkier, the kind that in my country appears at every meal, and with every cup of coffee. The bread of everyday life.
I gulped my drink as she read. I was shaking. Not just my hands but my chest and gut. I felt faintly nauseous from all the vegetables and too much sweet sangria. It had been so long since I had been with a group of people that I had to relearn the rhythm of speaking and listening. Not only in my own language, but now in English, which felt like a blanket being constantly tugged away. Rita read on and I couldn’t understand