Stay safe, Gord, I said in my head. You are in a very dark place. I’ll tell Grandma to pray for you because she’s part Christian. My face hurt. I tried to drop my shoulders and read Dead Heat along with Grandma to take my mind off being the daughter of the world’s most unstable person. Then the lady Mom had made friends with was suddenly standing beside me and said in an even louder voice than Mom, Oh man, your mom is awesome! She said it so loud that even Grandma heard her and she said, She is indeed! She’s my daughter! One of the guys who hadn’t given Mom his seat heard it too and said Mom was a crazy bitch. Mom’s new friend said, She’s not a crazy bitch, you’re a crazy bitch. The other two men who wouldn’t give up their seats started laughing. Then Mom’s new friend said to Grandma, Oh wow! You guys are three generations! Which was like an obvious thing not an oh wow thing. One of the guys said, Suck it, bitch! Grandma said, That we are! Aren’t I lucky? Mom’s new friend said, Fuck you, you fucking piece of shit! The bus driver looked at everyone in his rear-view mirror and said they had to behave themselves or get off the bus. The lady talked away in her loud voice about wishing she could come home with us and be in our family!
I had to do something. I couldn’t slice my head off by slamming the window on it because they were sealed up to keep children safe. I stood up and said, Oh, Grandma, this is our stop, c’mon! Grandma said, What? We’re nowhere near Scarborough! I said, I know, but first we had to stop at this other place called … I quickly looked out the window … For Your Eyes Only. Grandma looked out the window. What do you want with a Gentlemen’s club, Swiv? she said. She started laughing with Mom’s new friend. I pulled Grandma up from her seat and stuffed her book section into my backpack. Because it’s where we’re going, I said. Bye, I said to the lady. I whispered it. Okay! said Grandma. She shrugged. Looks like we’ve got an interesting itinerary! I pulled Grandma off the bus without saying thank you to the driver. Mom can’t stand it when people say thank you to the driver when they get out at their stop, but Grandma thinks it’s a decent thing to do. She told Mom that people clap and applaud when Mom does her job of acting so why shouldn’t people clap for pilots when they land the plane or say thank you, at least, to a bus driver? Mom said applause seems sarcastic and bizarre, she hates applause even for herself, and Grandma asked her how the audience is supposed to express their gratitude for her performance and Mom said just by sitting there quietly. Mom is really embarrassed by people jumping to their feet and clapping their hands together like fucking idiots. When she hears clapping Mom gets really sad. Grandma said that’s because it means the show is over. Mom talked about her hatred of applause in therapy but when the therapist tried to understand what she meant Mom said aaahhh, yeah, you know what? Fuck it, just fuck it. Grandma said thank you to the bus driver and he nodded very slowly. My pleasure, he said. Enjoy your day. Grandma wanted to say more about her day but I pulled and pulled on her arm and the driver shut the door and we were finally alone on the sidewalk.
Grandma read the sign more closely and then she stood back and looked at the giant pictures of naked women and started laughing her ass off again because I of all people had wanted to get out at a strip club. She had to lean against the building, right against one of the pictures of the naked ladies, to catch her breath. I walked a way down the sidewalk so nobody would see me standing outside For Your Eyes Only and left Grandma there struggling all by herself to live. She finally finished getting her breath back and I said c’mon, Grandma, let’s go! I mean it! And then, believe it or not, she posed on the sidewalk in the same position as the naked lady in the picture with her knees bent a bit and her butt poking out and her hands on her boobs. I looked down at the sidewalk for things to kill myself with. There was nothing but globs of spit and cigarette butts and a flyer about the end of the world and then Grandma was beside me and she took my arm, laughing, and said hoooooooooo boy, where to next?
We finally made it to the lady’s house in Scarborough. It felt like we were Luath and Bodger in The Incredible Journey. Grandma and the lady, whose name is Roxanne, talked and talked while Grandma got her manicure, pedicure, electrolysis and haircut which included a stacked nape. We were in Roxanne’s basement salon. Roxanne’s husband was home from work because he was sick. We heard him stomping around upstairs but we never saw him.
Grandma was so excited about our trip. She told Roxanne all about Lou and Ken and about all the people she’d watched die in Fresno. Roxanne asked her what colour of nail polish she wanted and Grandma said she’d take the Lady Balls which was the colour of the tomato sauce we put on our conchigliettes. Roxanne tried to get me to let her put nail polish on me. I said no because I eat my fingernails, and Roxanne said having nail polish might stop me from eating them. I just need to eat them, I told Roxanne. I don’t want to get poisoned. Grandma nodded and said yes, I was at that kind of a time in life when I needed to eat my fingernails. I said, Grandma, I’ve always eaten my fingernails. So far, said Grandma, that’s true. Roxanne said she understood. She also used to eat her fingernails. She also used to eat dirt when she had a disease called pica. Now she buys special dirt from the health food store that she can eat instead of digging it up in the back yard. It’s the texture of it that she really loves. Grandma said, Well, good for you! You have to eat a peck of dirt before you die.