The Vanishing Track Read online

“I’m new there. My name is Sean.” He held out his hand.

  She looked at it. His nails were dirty, and he had a cut on his thumb, but otherwise his hands were clean. She reached over and shook it. Her grip was strong, her hands dark with the stains of her trade.

  “I’m Peaches.” She smiled. “That’s what they call me, anyway.” She held the cup out to someone who dropped a nickel in it. “What do you want with me?”

  “Look,” he said, “I’m new, so you tell me.”

  She looked into her cup. Fifty-five cents so far. She jingled the coins. “You could buy me lunch.”

  Sean looked at her cup. “Yeah, you don’t seem to be doing so well.”

  “You’re cramping my style,” she said.

  They ate lunch at the front counter of the Esquire Grill, looking out onto Hastings Street. She had soup and a sandwich and coffee. Sean just ordered coffee.

  “Tell me about yourself,” he said.

  She took a bite of her sandwich and began to talk, then paused and began again. “What do you want to know?”

  “Anything. Where are you from?”

  “Saskatchewan.”

  “Wow, you’re a long way from home,” said Sean, raising his eyebrows.

  “Yeah. I’ve been on my own since I was sixteen.”

  “Run off?”

  “Sorta. My mom was a drunk. Dad was never around. Better on the streets than at home. I tried Saskatoon for a year, but fuck was it cold there. I got enough for a bus ticket and came here.”

  “Can I ask you a personal question, Peaches?”

  She shrugged her shoulders.

  “Do you hook at all?”

  She sipped her coffee. “I did a little,” she said, looking around her. “You know, when I first got here. But I got beat up pretty good by my bastard pimp. I got into a shelter after that.”

  “Did he come after you?”

  “Yeah, once. After I left. Threatened to kill me. But I got out of the area for a little while. Stayed over in the West End for a few months and he seemed to forget about me.”

  “You don’t see him around no more?”

  She shook her head as she finished her sandwich.

  “So listen, Peaches. Where do you stay?”

  “I got places,” she said, eyeing him suspiciously.

  “Inside?”

  “Some.”

  “Like where?”

  “I go to the women’s shelter sometimes. But I hate that place. Fucking bitches always beating each other up over stupid shit. And I can’t sleep ’cause of all the fucking noise, you know what I mean?” Sean nodded sympathetically. “I stay at some of the hotels when I got the money. I sell stuff I find. Good stuff. People throw it away, I find it, clean it up. I can get some good money for some of the shit I find.”

  “Really?”

  “Oh yeah, like last week I got five bucks for a computer monitor. Still worked really good. And today I found a keyboard. I think I can get a couple bucks for that. I got a couple of places that leave things for me, too, you know, like food and clothing.”

  “People looking out for you. That’s good,” said Sean.

  “Some. Most don’t give a shit. They walk by all dressed nice, and I can tell they don’t give a shit about me.”

  “It’s like they look and don’t even see a person . . .”

  “That’s it exactly,” said Peaches, nodding, looking at him now with real interest.

  “I know.”

  “How could you know?” she said, her smile fading.

  “I know. I work now, you know, for the Community Advocacy group, but I’ve been on the street too,” he said.

  She nodded.

  “So I’d like to check in on you from time to time, Peaches. Would that be okay?”

  “Okay,” she said.

  “Where can I find you?”

  “I’m usually in Carrall Street most days around lunch,” she said.

  “I want to look in at night too, Peaches. It’s a dangerous time to be on the street. Where do you usually sleep?”

  She looked at him and he could tell that she was deciding if he was trustworthy. Finally, she said, “There’s an alley off Pender, just around the corner. There’s a park there, with a fence. There’s a spot not too many others go to.”

  “I know it,” said Sean. “Behind the Lucky Strike.”

  “That’s it. Look, don’t tell anybody about it.”

  “I won’t. It’s our secret.”

  “Okay. Well,” she said, standing up, “thanks for the food.”

  “No problem. It was my pleasure,” he said with a broad smile.

  “You’re nice,” she said. “You really seem to care. Thanks.”

  “I do care,” he said, standing and extending his hand. She took it.

  “See you around,” she said, hauling her bag out the door.

  “See you.”

  Then he went to the bathroom and washed his hands for two full minutes.

  And he had seen her again, two nights later, when he came to make the arrangements.

  “Peaches,” he said into the darkness. He was squatted down in the alley, next to the small park adjacent to the Lucky Strike Hotel: Ground Zero.

  “Peaches,” he said again.

  She woke slowly. She had her duffle bag next to her, and was sleeping on a large sheet of rain-darkened cardboard. She had several tattered woolen blankets over her, and a frayed piece of blue tarp for protection against the light rain that fell.

  “Peaches, it’s Sean.”

  “What time is it?”

  “Three AM.”

  “What do you want?”

  “I’ve come to check on you.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “It’s my job, you remember?”

  “I remember. Now let me sleep.”

  “I need you to wake up so I can ask you a few questions.”

  “Find me in the morning.”

  He reached out and nudged her.

  “Hey, fuck off, okay?” she said drowsily.

  He nudged her again, a little harder. She turned over, her eyes open. “What the fuck is wrong with you? The other one never does that.”

  “The street nurse?” he asked.

  “Yeah. With the health people.”

  “I’m not a nurse, Peaches.”

  “What the fuck do you want that can’t wait till morning?”

  He reached into his backpack, rummaging for something, his face opaque, and said, “We need to make some arrangements to get you off the street, Peaches.”

  IT WAS A learning experience. Each day was a new lesson. How to move like them. How to abandon any sense of time, as they did. Sean Livingstone was growing.

  Overcoat Man was on the move, heading south away from Oppenheimer Park. Sean felt in the pit of his stomach that now was the time. Sean followed him for ten minutes as Overcoat Man maneuvered through the Downtown Eastside. When Overcoat Man stopped to wait for the light, Sean quickened his pace a little to catch up with him. They were across the street from a park with a ball diamond with bleachers.

  “Give you a hand?” he asked, stepping up beside him with a wide, affable smile.

  “Don’t need one,” said Overcoat Man.

  “I’m heading across anyway. Let me make sure you get all your stuff over in one piece.”

  “Don’t touch my stuff,” said Overcoat Man.

  “I won’t, friend. It’s okay, I’m from the Community Advocacy Society.”

  “No you ain’t.”

  “I’m new.”

  “I got a visit from the lady already. I don’t need anything.”

  Traffic had thinned and Overcoat Man started to cross. Sean kept up with him. Several cars blew their horns at them and Sean just waved and smiled. “Made it,” he said good-naturedly when they reached the far side. “Can I get you anything?”

  “Got everything I need,” said Overcoat Man, pushing his cart toward the gate for the park.

  “You staying here tonight?” />
  “None of your business.”

  “I could bring you a blanket.”

  “Don’t need one. Got a sleeping bag in here.”

  Sean felt his pulse quicken. This was harder than he had expected. “Okay, well,” he finally said. “I guess I’ll be seeing you.”

  Sean turned to go, then looked back to watch Overcoat Man make his way toward the set of bleachers that flanked the park’s ball diamond. The park was vacant except for a man throwing a ball for a dog at the far side. After the man left with his dog, Overcoat Man set himself up under the bleachers, preparing for the possibility of rain. He looked as though he was eating something from a tin can. Sean walked directly up to him.

  “I told you I don’t need anything,” he said when Sean approached.

  “Look, friend,” said Sean, hands wide at his sides. “I’ve been told to give you a hand. My boss at the Society will be pissed if I don’t report back that I gave you the money for food that I was supposed to.”

  “Since when did the Community Society start handing out money?”

  “We got a new donor. Money for meals.” Sean hunched down in front of the man and slipped his backpack off. He could smell the sour stench of dog food in the enclosed space beneath the bleachers.

  Overcoat Man seemed to pause in his hostility a moment, waiting to see what Sean would produce from inside his bag. “I got it right here,” said Sean. He made a show of rummaging in his bag. He pulled on the white smock coat that he had liberated from a butcher shop, its arms and chest dotted with dark red splotches.

  “What the fuck is that for?” the man asked. Sean didn’t answer him.

  From the bottom of the bag he drew a foot-and-a-half-long iron tool called a come-along. Often found at logging sites, the hand winch helped pry vehicles from the mud or trees from entanglement. This one wasn’t functional, though; it was decorative. Nickel plated, it was hard and heavy. The hooks on both ends had been broken off, so that only the winch and handle remained. It weighed about nine pounds in Sean’s hand.

  “What the fuck you got there?” Overcoat Man said, pushing himself back, dropping the can of dog food.

  Sean smiled, lifting the heavy tool, then swung it at Overcoat Man’s head. The blow caught him on the left side of his face, crushing bone and splitting the skin between his left eye and his mouth. A wet spray of blood splattered across the underside of the bleachers. Sean struck the man again as he fell, connecting with the top of his skull. The gratification was akin to sexual release. Overcoat Man lay on his side, his eyes still open with the amazement of his final moment.

  “We got to get you off the street, partner,” said Sean, his hand still wrapped around the heavy tool.

  TWO

  COLE BLACKWATER COULD SMELL HORSES. He could smell the sticky sweet aroma of their bodies pressed together in the blackness of the stables beneath the barn. He could smell hay; for Cole that was the scent of green spring afternoons when the sun burnt down on the Porcupine Hills that surrounded his childhood home.

  “Open your eyes, goddamnit,” said a voice, shattering the nostalgic darkness. Cole shook his head, and beads of sweat sprayed from his face onto the canvas mat below his feet.

  “Goddamnit, boy, when I say open your eyes, I mean it.” The glove connected with Cole’s nose and he felt his head snap backward, but he couldn’t fall. He was suspended above the canvas mat, dangling there like meat on a hook.

  “That’s all you ever were to me, boy. That’s all you’ll ever be: a fucking punching bag. You are worthless.” Cole braced himself for the next blow. It caught him in the chin and snapped his head back, a spray of blood coming from a cut that the strike reopened.

  “Look at me, boy,” and this time Cole opened his eyes. The sweat and blood stung them. He blinked to try and focus on the barn.

  The shape of his father swayed before him. “You think you’re so great. You’re nothing but a worthless drunk who can’t take care of his own daughter, who fucks up everything he touches!”

  “Just like you,” spat Cole.

  “Why don’t you just get it over with?” asked Henry Blackwater, pacing around Cole like a caged animal, his face shadowed in the faint light seeping through the boards of the barn. “Why don’t you just do it?”

  “You first,” said Cole, clenching his teeth.

  “Oh, I will. I will. But I’m taking you with me this time, son. You’re coming with me.” His father steadied Cole’s swinging body. “Got to work on my combinations,” the old man slurred. Cole closed his eyes.

  Soon it would be over. He waited for the punches to stop, eyes pressed shut.

  What happened next always surprised Cole. No matter how hard he tried to keep his eyes closed, he could not help but watch. His father took the shotgun leaning against the ropes of the boxing ring and turned it so the barrel was under his chin. Then he took up a branding iron and put the crook of it in the trigger guard.

  Cole shouted, “Wait—!” But his father pulled the trigger.

  It was the blast that always woke him.

  Cole’s eyes snapped open and he felt his body tremble, his hands gripping the damp sheets. It was five o’clock. His ears rang from the final deafening sound of his nightmare.

  It was a Sunday. He knew from experience there would be no return to sleep, so he headed for the shower in the faint light of dawn. Sarah was asleep in her tiny room next to the kitchen. At ten years of age, she was all bright smiles and sunny days. He longed to keep it that way. Sarah had witnessed the collapse of her parents’ marriage thanks to Cole’s philandering ways. She was only four when Cole had been outed in the worst-kept secret in the nation’s capital—his affair with Nancy Webber, the Globe and Mail’s star parliamentary correspondent. When Jennifer Polson kicked him out of the house they had lived in together, it was almost a relief. Then she announced that she was leaving Ottawa to move to Vancouver, and was taking Sarah with her. Cole left Ottawa and drove west, following his daughter. He faltered in Alberta and visited the place he hadn’t set foot on for nearly twenty years: the Blackwater Ranch, tucked into the Porcupine Hills, two hours south of Calgary. And there, bore witness to the vicious end of a man who was not just his father but his tormentor. His nightmares relived the incident.

  That was four and a half years ago, thought Cole, standing in the shower, his left hand pressed against the wall, his right hand limp at his side, the hot water pulsing on the back of his neck. He thought he had buried that tragedy. But then, a year and a half ago, Cole had gone back to Alberta in a desperate attempt to help save the Cardinal Divide, and the unearthing began.

  The water began to run cold, and Cole realized he’d drained the tank. He turned it off and stepped from the shower. He dressed quickly, then padded barefoot to the kitchen to brew the morning coffee.

  Cole took up the weekend edition of the Vancouver Sun. His tiny Eastside apartment offered one large living room–kitchen area that he had tastefully furnished with ware from the local thrift store. Pushing aside some files and books on his tattered couch, Cole sat down and leafed through the paper, sipping his coffee.

  On page three he found a story by Nancy Webber with the headline, “City Hall and Homelessness.” He flipped the page.

  Nancy had moved to Vancouver from Edmonton in June. After the debacle in the Broughton Archipelago last spring, she had accepted a position as one of the paper’s political reporters. She could pretty much write her own ticket, she had told Cole, after winning a National Newspaper Award for the series she produced on the murder of Mike Barnes in Oracle, Alberta. She had chosen Vancouver, she said, because it was a bigger market, and because it wasn’t Edmonton, with its biting winters complete with freezing rain and ice fog. And though she hadn’t said so, she had been none too subtle in letting it be known that her choice of Lotusland had more than a little to do with one Cole Blackwater.

  Cole sipped his coffee. He didn’t want to think about Nancy Webber that morning. Since she had moved to Vancouver late i
n the spring, Cole had seen her only infrequently. In July, several months after the tragedy in Port Lostcoast, Cole, Nancy, Denman, and Sarah had returned for a few days on Grace Ravenwing’s boat, Inlet Dancer, celebrating the life of their lost friend and Grace’s father, Archie.

  The nightmares had begun in August, and Cole found that Nancy always seemed to be on his mind when he woke from them. He wanted to believe that this was simply because she was always on his mind, but he couldn’t help but associate her role in the unearthing of his past with his reliving of it every few nights.

  Nancy’s professional life was now converging with his once again. Nancy had taken to the story of homelessness in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside like a feisty dog to a piece of meat. In the few months that she had been reporting on the politics of homelessness in Vancouver, many at City Hall had come to fear her, and advocates for the homeless to celebrate her. She could be just as hard on the advocates, though, pigeon-holing the more radical elements of the movement, such as the End Poverty Now Coalition, as zealots and anarchists.

  Cole had been helping his best friend, Denman Scott, and his street-smart law firm, Priority Legal, figure out ways to leverage decision makers to solve the challenge of homelessness. It had been the first time in his four and a half years as a strategy consultant that Cole could actually donate some of his time. Despite setbacks in the spring, when he almost entirely ignored several high-paying clients due to his entanglement in the fish-farming problems in the Broughton Archipelago, Cole had steady work advising several of the city’s growing ethically-based businesses. When Cole noticed that his friend was in need of some strategic advice on dealing with City Hall and the provincial Minister for Housing, Cole was glad to offer his professional assistance.

  Cole stood and stretched, wincing. He pressed the ribs on the right side of his body, as if his fingertips could find and finish healing the cracks left by a gang of thugs who had jumped him in Port Lostcoast last spring and nearly beaten him to death. The cracked ribs had kept Cole out of the boxing ring since then. Boxing had been a good way to get back in shape, but being in the ring hadn’t done much for Cole’s temper. He thought about what Denman, an aikido master, had said to him after they had gotten back from Port Lostcoast.