Under the Bridge by Anne Bishop

Author:Anne Bishop
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Fernwood Publishing
Published: 2019-08-15T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Judith and I have an appointment to talk about what I’m going to do after probation. Now that Bara is moving out of Fresh Start, I want to know where I am on the housing co-op waiting list and ask her for a letter for Project Witness. I sit in the waiting area, bracing myself to see Judith, and not an ever-shifting dance of books and papers in an upstairs study. A law student comes instead, hands me a message in Judith’s neat, fountain-pen cursive, asking me to come to Althea’s office.

***

I falter when I see her there. She looks distracted and deadly serious, as does Althea. Is this about Judith’s basement? Have they found out?

Then I see Patty, red-eyed and ashen.

Judith sees me. “Lucy, there you are. Have you heard?”

“Heard?” I step through the door.

“Cindy’s in Burnside,” Althea tells me.

“What?” My memories of the place shudder through me. “Picked up for communicating?”

Tears spill down Patty’s cheeks, obviously just wiped dry from a previous flood. “She’s been off the street since we got the apartment and the kids back.”

“Then what?”

Althea answers. “She tried to steal a chicken from Sobeys.”

Patty grabs another tissue from the box on Althea’s desk and blows her nose. Her voice, usually so deep and clear, has been reduced to a shaky whisper. “She had to get a prescription for Leo. We’ve been out of food money for over a week. Cindy talked about maybe going out on the street. ‘Just once,’ she said. That’s what happened last time she lost the kids. She went out ‘just once.’ ‘Just once’ for sneakers. ‘Just once’ to get them into hockey. ‘Just once’ for school books. I talked her out of it. There’s no ‘just once,’ and she knows it. We had some pasta and stuff set aside and got a bag from the food bank, but the boys were hungry.”

“So she tried to take a chicken?” I say.

Patty nods, miserable. “She didn’t think ahead or anything. She saw it and thought about the kids and how long it’s been since they’ve had meat.”

“Was a store detective watching?” Althea asks. It was she who taught me, a long time ago, about how store detectives follow Black people.

Patty shook her head no. “Didn’t need a store detective. She had her wool skirt on. It’s full, you know? She put the chicken between her thighs.”

“Ooooo,” Althea winces.

“Yeah. It froze her thighs. They were all red and swollen. Couldn’t feel if she was hanging on to the chicken or not. As she tried to walk out the door, it fell on the floor.”

“And they put her in jail for that?” Althea’s eyebrows shoot up. “What’s a skinny Sobeys chicken worth? Twelve dollars?” Patty reaches for another tissue. Althea pushes the box closer.

“I think Sobeys wants to make an example of her,” Judith says. “Stores sometimes do that, and in this case it’s a bit easier for them because of her record.”

“Bail?” I ask.

“The judge set it high. She hasn’t turned up in court a few times when she should have.

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