Burr by Brooke Lockyer

Author:Brooke Lockyer [Lockyer, Brooke]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Novel, Literary, Gothic, Ghost, Southern Ontario
ISBN: 9780889714434
Published: 2023-04-29T00:00:00+00:00

Jane

The rain thins and stops. The neighbourhood is harsh and ugly, a string of tail lights pulsing red.

“What should we do?” Ernest asks, turning his face toward me.

“Ernest—watch out!” He narrowly avoids a telephone pole and careens into a woman eating Goldfish crackers in an electric wheelchair, almost hitting her in the face with his cane.

“Sorry!” he says, before breaking back into a jog.

The woman toots her horn and swears.

We twist our necks every few steps until we’re sure no one’s following us from the bar. Gradually, the running starts to feel okay, like I’m stomping out what that scary man said, making the city safe for us. We run down the sidewalk because we want to now, leaping over puddles and rain-drunk earthworms, storefront awnings dripping on our heads.

After Dad’s funeral, I thought about being a worm. A tiny tube of grief, stuffing my mouth with soil. I wanted to feel the earth pass through my body as I tunnelled underground. I wouldn’t have eyes anymore but it would be too dark in the casket to see Dad anyway. I could wriggle up the sleeve of his suit and lie on his embalmed chest and breathe him in through my new purple skin as he started to decompose and my boneless friends nibbled him. And if life ever cut me up again, I could grow a new head or tail, easy.

Ernest and I slow down, gulping for air. I step carefully over another earthworm.

“If the Christians are wrong and reincarnation is real, then I’ll be an invertebrate in my next life and wear my skeleton on the outside,” I tell Ernest.

“I’ll be a worm with you. That, or a shiny black crow.”

The street glistens, giving off a humid energy. Music swells as a ten-person marching band overtakes us, glittering knees lifting in unison. The feathers in their tall caps are dripping and their makeup is smeared from the rain.

A young woman in a black vinyl trench with pink buns all over her head films the action with a Panavision movie camera. She reminds me of Annie, if Annie wasn’t so tall and had never left a big city. The woman doesn’t care we’re in her frame and I wonder if she’s a guerrilla filmmaker or a music video director.

I kick-box the air when I realize what the band is playing. “Tori!” I shout to Ernest.

A different rhythm snakes in and “Cornflake Girl” morphs into Björk’s “Big Time Sensuality.”

“Come on,” says Ernest. He enters the parade and I follow him.

“Careful, girl,” says the leader in a baritone, huge blonde curls bobbing behind her. She has peacock-feather eyelashes and the most glamorous legs.

The marching band fans open, creating a V-formation. I spy Ernest at the back. I dodge trumpeters and clarinet players to get to him, shouting along to the lyrics as the stars turn on.

Ernest hoists me onto his shoulders and I twirl his wooden cane over my head like a baton.

When the song ends, Ernest tosses the drum back to the marcher behind him and I slide down his back.

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