Morning, Keep the Streets Empty
Fiction by Shazia Hafiz Ramji. Illustration by Sawyer Anderson
I’ve been leaving Theo in the middle of the night. Last weekend, I went to see my friend at his studio on Gore Avenue. Now I’m on Commercial Drive, on my way to Prospect Point in Stanley Park. There’s a party. It’s 2:00 am and the Night Bus to the West End arrives in twenty minutes. Theo is asleep.
On a clear night like this last spring, when we went to Ask for Luigi for dinner, Theo said the boat he lived on for most of the year took a lot of maintenance. Eight months later, I agreed. He had always asked me to visit him at Jericho Beach and it was a trek for both of us to see each other. I invited him to live with me and now we’re together most nights when he doesn’t have back-to-back shifts as a sailing instructor and server. It’s been three months since we shacked up.
The bus rolls in. It’s full. I get on and stand at the back past the little steps. Someone has pissed in a Timmies cup and perched it on the radiator, where it’s still standing in a feat that is unsurprising for the Night Bus, where anything can happen. The air is heavy with cologne, booze, and fresh piss. It’s unpleasant, but I’m exactly where I want to be.
A brown guy with a Volcom baseball cap walks toward me from the middle of the bus where it swings around. He gives me a nod and stands on the little step, right next to me. Then he leans in closer than I’d like and asks if I have MDMA. I tell him I don’t, and then I tell him I’m on the way to see people who do.
“Are you inviting me?” he says.
“Why not? The night is just beginning,” I say, trying to sound like someone who is having a great night out on the town. He offers his fist for a fist bump. I knock it harder than I expect.
He looks me up and down. “Are you brown?” he says. I’m surprised he has to ask, but I play along and lie.
“No,” I say. “What do you think?”
“Lady likes to play games!” He offers another fist bump. “Spanish? Turkish?”
I notice his thin gold chain and a pendant of Nastaliq calligraphy hanging from it. It’s the same script on some ceramics my mum keeps on the mantelpiece. I wonder what he’s doing, asking for MDMA on the 2:20 am. It’s common to ask for weed or cigs, but not MDMA. He even says “MDMA,” not “Molly” like most people. I feel sorry for him.
“My name is Layla,” I say, even though I’d wanted to lie.
“You’re brown!” he says loudly, waking the emo guy seated across from the back door.
I laugh and he tells me his name is Tahir. “What’s a girl like you doing going to a party alone?” he says.
“Can’t a girl go to a party alone?” My voice sounds higher pitched than normal and I look away.
“Of course, of course, there’s no shame in that. A man’s just got to look out for his sisters, you know?”
I’m irritated now that I’m no longer alone. I wish I hadn’t told him I was heading toward what he wanted.
The truth is, men make me feel safe. But they scare me too.
On the way to Prospect, we bump into Trevor at Lost Lagoon. I know Trev from high school and I’d texted him to meet us there, because he had what Tahir wants and he’s always at every off-grid late-night party. Tahir pops the pill before paying Trevor and I insist that he leave with Trevor and his girlfriend, while I wait for a friend.
“You didn’t tell me your friend was coming,” Tahir says.
I tell him my friend changed his mind about heading out and texted to say he’s on the way. Trevor offers me a fresh, unlit joint and winks. I know from the way he looks at me that it’s not just weed. I stow it in my glasses case in my tote bag, anticipating the feeling of being reset, of forgetting myself temporarily, forgetting everything I’ve done, until the next morning.
The last time Trevor gave me something was the only time we hung out years ago, when we got drunk in Maillardville and almost had sex in the IKEA parking lot close to where our families lived. He gave me Coke, as in Coca-Cola Coke, when he realized I’d gotten a headstart on drinking before I met him. I had since seen him on and off again at houses and parties, where he stood out in sporty tracksuits in a sea of Topshop, black, and flesh. I’d called on him for drug deliveries, always as a last resort, and only ever twice, but this was the first time he’d given me something openly, without money in exchange.
Tahir finishes chugging an entire Evian filled with tap water from the washrooms nearby. He thanks me and gives me a hug as if we’ve known each other for years. He insists on giving me his number and says he’s worried about me. “I’m going to be fine alone, I was doing just fine before you came along,” I tell him, half joking. He’ll be high within an hour and I’m glad he decides to leave with Trevor.
I backtrack towards Alberni Street and sit on the bench overlooking the lake. It’s past 3:30 am already. There’s goose shit all around me and I can make out a faint drum-like sound in the distance. How could Tahir trust me so readily? I wouldn’t have bought drugs off a friend of a friend whom I just met on the Night Bus, though I’ve done worse before, years ago. Tahir is a man, though. I’m not — I have to walk through the park alone and I have to worry. I decide to wait for people heading towards Prospect, so that I can tag along behind them. Surely there would be others heading out late.
Another fifteen minutes go by and there’s no one. It’s chilly and I imagine the black tongues of ferns behind me nodding in the wind. If I wasn’t with Theo, I could have texted guys I’d met on the dance floor and hooked up with once or twice. They were likely at the party. They would come half-way at least, or talk to me on the phone while I walked Bridle Path to the lookout. Most guys I’ve met are sweet.
I go through my contacts, just for the hell of it. When I do this, I always stop at Tyler, who said he woke up reaching for me next to him the night after our one-night stand. He was so fun and sweet. I never talked to him again, even though I liked him. I didn’t want to ruin his life. Another fifteen minutes go by and I can no longer hear a beat in the distance. It’s quiet. The lake is too still.
Anyone could be watching me: within the forest, from the high-rises, on the street. They could do anything. I decide to text Tahir and ask him where he is. The bench digs into my back, where there is still a knot of bruised tissue right in the centre. It hurts. I got it when I visited Toronto for a couple of weeks for the opening of my first art show. I jumped out of a ground floor Airbnb room when a guy who lived in the same house tried to get inside. I hadn’t told Theo because he’d just moved into my East Van apartment and he’d been working overtime the month it happened. It was minus eighteen in Toronto at that time and the guy pounded on my door twice, even though I clearly told him he’d got the wrong room. I zipped my bags quickly and wore most of what I had packed, in case it took longer than fifteen minutes to get to College Street in the snow and find the Tim Hortons that was close to the station. I would wait out the sunrise at Timmies and catch the first train out of the city to a café close to my friend’s house on Bathurst, from where I would text her. I didn’t want to leave in the cold, though, so I turned off all the lights and stayed as still as I could in the dark room, hoping that if he thought I was asleep, he would give up. But he didn’t. He paced outside the door for two hours until 4:00 am.
Before he went back to his room, I heard a sound like the bowing of an untuned violin. It was a persistent drone. It could have been something electronic, grating and persistent, indifferent. I was scared to breathe. The room buzzed with green sparks in the dark. I felt hard for a second, in denial of what was happening. I could no longer tell whether the sparks or the sounds were real. I thought I was going to die. Then he banged the door so hard, I saw the deadbolt glint in the dark. I prayed like I did when I was a kid, eyes closed tight and whispering next to mom at mosque, who had prayed for us to get a visa to come to Canada to live in safety. I thought I was calmer after praying in the room then, but my hands shook, and then my entire body began to shake. I suddenly knew where my diaphragm was. It hurt to breathe. I was embarrassed by what my body was doing — it was shaking. This was not the first time I turned against myself in that dark way that takes a second life to unlearn, to recover from shame. I knew it from when I used to drink and get high alone, and later, when I volunteered to be the first to test any drug at any party, as if cheating death would make me feel worthy of my life. But in that room, with that guy outside the door, I couldn’t allow myself to panic. I knew I would lose control if I didn’t do something, so I jumped out of the window and fell into the bramble, where a thick branch dug squarely into my back.
When I think about it now, I still wonder how anyone could have played dead for so long, whether that was even the right thing to do. Did some part of me want to die then — before I jumped out of the window? I should have called the cops, like any sensible person. Why does what happened still feel like it’s my fault?
My back hurts and I get up now and look around behind me, slightly paranoid. I’m surprised I’ve been here, alone, for forty- five minutes. No one has walked by. What was I thinking? I’m suddenly ashamed of myself. I tap my phone. Tahir has texted and he’s definitely high but still coherent. He’s at Celebrities with Trevor, which is odd, because it’s not a place that someone like Trevor would go to, unless of course he’s dealing. It’s just past 4:00 am and I think of going back home to Theo, but the last NightBus has likely left. I don’t want to wander the streets alone. I text Tahir back and tell him I’ll be there soon. It’ll take about half an hour to walk it. I’m anxious but I feel better once I turn up Alberni. Still, what kind of woman decides to meet a man she met on the NightBus a few hours ago — a man who trusts a man she doesn’t trust — whose god-knows-what joint she has in her tote bag?
Davie and Burrard is lively for 4:30 in the morning. There’s a five-person queue at the hot dog kiosk across from the club and people are milling about with arms around each other, their talk sprinkled with laughter and exhausted sighs. It’s closing. I am tired and I need to sit so I walk over to the bus stop and watch people spill out, hop-ng to see Tahir and Trevor. I could just go home, but it would cost so much for a cab to East Van. Then I see three vertical stripes and make out Trevor’s navy Adidas suit. His eyes are dead and buggy even from here, and his pockets seem full. He’s jaywalking to the ESSO close to where I am. I get up and walk in his direction, waiting for him across the street. I shout his name and wave him down, and he walks to me as if that was his plan all along.
“You all right,” he says. It’s his standard greeting, not a question. His eyes are unfocused, as if he’s looking at something beyond me.
“Yeah, did you guys have fun? Tahir still in there?”
“Nah man, he fucked off to Gorg-O-Mish.”
“Oh, weird. That place is a bro hut.”
“You guys dating or something?”
“No, we’re not dating, I met him on the bus today.” I fidget with the straps of my tote bag and wonder if I should have been honest. It probably made me look stupid and vulnerable, asking after someone I met on the NightBus a few hours ago. I consider giving him his joint back, in case he remembers later and tells me I owe him money, or something else.
“Bus buddies eh. Let’s get out of here,” he says, walking to the parking lot beside the gas station.
“Are you driving?” I ask.
“Yeah, but I’m high. It’s just dexys though, not going to get us killed or anything.” He looks at me and his eyes are hard from exhaustion. “You want a ride, right?”
“Where are you going?”
“Going east. That where you still live?” he says.
“Yeah. Do you live in East Van now?”
“Nah man. I’m in PoCo these days, but I have to meet a honey.”
I decide to believe him. He walks over to a red Audi that seems lavish for someone living in Port Coquitlam. I don’t feel good about this, and I’ve done things like this before, but not when I’m fully aware of what’s happening. The car beeps. Getting in, he ducks his head in a sharp snap and a raised vein cuts across the right side of his face, as if it had been painted on in thick ink and was washed off recently.
He turns on the car and a hard kick drum pounds through the speakers immediately. He turns it off like a reflex.
“Wear your seat belt,” he says, “don’t want to get us killed.” Then he says, “You don’t seem the talking type, but don’t talk while I’m driving.”
I don’t know whether to be relieved or nervous. “Yeah, I’m the quiet type,” I say.
“I won’t talk.”
I realize I don’t know him at all, even though we both grew up in Coquitlam. I try not to look at him. He drives smoothly, but I can tell he’s concentrating hard, his neck inching forward, as if the road were a computer screen. When we’re on the Georgia Viaduct, I ease into the seat and feel as though I’m dispersing, the exhaustion of being watchful seeping into the leather, finally. I look out the window and try to enjoy it.
Then he says something when we’re at Kingsway and Broadway and I don’t hear it. “Did you say something?”
He laughs a small whiny laugh, from inside his nose. I get goosebumps and stay very still.
“Remember when we dry humped in the IKEA parking lot?”
I pretend to burst into laughter, to keep it light. “We were bored.”
“That was unfinished, wasn’t it? You ever think about what could have happened?”
I look at him and his hands slide down to the lower part of the wheel. I think hard about how to answer it. Thank god we’re on Fraser. We’re almost there. He’s okay, I tell myself. I turn the question back to him. “How’s your honey? Is she from Coquitlam?”
“Yeah, it’s Stephanie, you met her earlier today.”
“Stephanie, as in, Stephanie from school?” “Yeah, Stephanie from school.”
“Oh my god, I didn’t even recognize her.”
“Want to do some coke with me and Steph? Tonight, in like ten minutes?”
I stay calm. “No, I’ve got work tomorrow.”
“You work on Saturdays?”
“Yeah, yeah I work on Saturdays,” I say. It sounds like I’m lying but I’m not.
“What the hell do you do?”
“I design stuff, make stuff.” I don’t want to tell him I make art. “I have to finish up something tomorrow.”
“Ohhhh, design stuff. Is your pretty boy the same? Arty?”
“He’s fine,” I say, feeling awkward.
“I thought you were dating an Australian bloke.”
“Um, that was last year. Did you know him?”
“Yeah, I met him. He bought moonrocks off me. That was when you guys had just started dating. I don’t see him around anymore.”
I was nervous. I hadn’t expected him to know my ex. “Your boyfriend,” he said, “he looks the same as the other guy. You get your heart broken?”
I try to laugh. “No, no, it just happened that way. I don’t think they look the same.”
It suddenly strikes me that he knows what Theo looks like.
“How do you know what my partner looks like?” My voice is slightly high-pitched again. “Reeeelax. My honey’s in your hood. I see you guys all the time, buying your tomatoes and shit from Donald’s. Where’s your place?” He’s on Commercial now.
I point to JJ Bean, but my place is a couple of blocks away. He parks outside the coffee shop and I thank him profusely, keeping it as friendly as I can, in case he knows I’m nervous. I step out and wave to him from the curb. I wait for him to drive off, but he just idles there, hunched over the wheel, staring at me with the vein in his face. The window slides down.
“What the fuck girl?” he yells slightly through the window.
“What!” I say, my heart pounding.
“You okay? Want me to walk you? Want some coke?”
“No! I’m okay, just going to have a ciggy.”
“Okay, Layla. Be safe.”
I wave and shuffle in my tote bag. I find Trevor’s joint. Why isn’t he driving the fuck away? I light it. Then the window rolls up and he drives away. I turn to the wall beside the JJ Bean door and stub out the joint softly, in case I want to smoke it later, even though I know I shouldn’t. I walk a couple blocks past JJ and take a right to our sloping beige house. At the gate, I look up at the second floor, where Theo and I live, sandwiched between eco punks on the ground floor and the landlord up above. The living room light is on. Theo is awake. The air is colder here, under the grove of trees that huddle over our street. I can’t bring myself to go upstairs. The first time I left the house, I told Theo I couldn’t sleep and wanted to hang out with my friend, and the time after that, I told him I needed to go for a walk, but I’d gone out and smoked crack with a friend of a friend. He was understanding the first time, but upset the second time. This is the third weekend in a row.
I lean against the gate and back off when it whines. I look at the window closely, trying to catch any movement. I imagine Theo’s hair tucked neatly at the nape of his neck while he eats his cereal. I remember tying his hair while we had sex, so I could look at him. It made him cry. He shakes when he cries. He doesn’t make a sound.
The last time I went out, he knew I’d been lying about the walk. He’d just closed up his work and we were on the patio over-looking Jericho Beach. He was just standing there, looking out at the ocean. He didn’t say a thing after I told him. He just looked at me. It still kills me. I wanted him to hate me, but he hugged me instead and made small talk, as if it was something we could work through, as if it were about us. The wind picks up and I catch a whiff of myself. Smoke, sweat, morning breath. I dig in my pocket for a lighter and strike the joint. I take a long drag. I feel like shit instantly. I take another drag, then another. It feels good. I must be the worst person he’s ever met. »
*Title borrowed from lyrics by Fever Ray.