Kalila by Rosemary Nixon Page B

back. Baby, I need flames.

I take the bus home from the Heartland Café. Poetry scrawls its walls. Chinook wind. The river’s melting. Ask anything in My name and I will grant it . I float the two blocks from the bus stop to our little yellow house. I’ve wasted all the salt water I am going to waste. A light-filled day. See-through to the sky. Kalila’s lungs are breathing without fifty per cent oxygen. It’s down to twenty-three per cent. The doctor says that she could catch up to her enlarged heart. And her right kidney’s fine. Women with only one kidney have been known to give birth. I can live with scars, can live with a child who may have to sit out phys ed.
    I let the dog into the yard, but soon he’s back, scratching at the door. There’s so much heaven. It’s not so far away. I pick up the morning paper, arrested by page three. An article advertising a faith healer, in town for seven shows. A week of miracles, the paper fairly shouts. My heart does one big flip-flop.
    Something’s stuck to my shoe. I look down. Skipper has dragged in a sea of leaves and a bloody pawprint. Cut on the ice. I am tending his foot when Brodie walks in the door. As he bends to untie his shoes, light catches the small scar on his forehead. When he was a kid, he barked at a neighbour’s dog, who jumped and bit him. One childhood event Brodie remembers. His past, for the most part, has forgotten him. When we first married, I would find Brodie’s notes scribbled to himself around the house.
    The measured acceleration of the picket fence was 10.4 mls. Could the picket fence have fallen from an angle, causing the readings to be off?
    Early model of the universe — a sphere with holes in it that light shone through. The fundamental elements — earth, air, fire, water, not counting celestial —
    Brodie! I hold up the loosened sheets of the morning paper. There’s a faith healer in town!

You set your physics labs on the table and look at Maggie clutching the newspaper like news could save the world.
    You try to formulate an imaginative position. Your imagination can’t take you that far. You pick up Skipper’s foot, he yelps but shakes a paw.
    He was chasing the neighbour’s cat, says Maggie. Ripped a toenail on the ice. The radio is crooning, something about a rubber ball and everything turning out okay .
    66 CFR is giving away free tickets, Brodie.
    You hold the bloodied paw, dab with a paper towel.
    Brodie.
    Don’t be silly, Maggie, you say gently. Faith healers are con men. Bogus. Maggie has a way that makes the absurd seem plausible. You disappear into the bathroom and return with a cold wet washcloth, blood flecking your hands.
    Brodie, you’ve always said, even scientists know that there is power in unexplained phenomena.
    Scientists know nothing of the kind. Now that she comes out and says it, it just sounds foolish. Was your day okay? You lean over Skipper’s paw. Did you go to the hospital? It comes to you that you are craving licorice.
    Brodie! I’d do anything for her.
    You go tight-lipped. It’s hogwash. The doctors will bring her round. You feel your our-child-is-secure-in-the-service-of-medical-science face. Your hands sudden and light against Maggie’s hair. Touching her, you think with sharp-edged longing of the women at the school who chat about unimportant things: haircuts and cruises, meat loaf and buns for supper, the latest movies, the opera, closets to be cleaned.
    Skipper, finding himself not the centre of attention, whines. Sits on his haunches in the beg position. Barks, though no one suggested he speak. Extends a hopeful paw, though no one said shake. Whips over in a jaunty roll, though no one has said, Play dead! He scrambles to his feet, looking expectant and happy.
    A memory. You were ten when your rabbit gave birth to five babies. The rabbit lived on lettuce and carrots, but the day after the birth, you brought her