Jilly-Bean (Jilly-Bean Series # 1) Page 9

  At the rear of the nave, a side door slowly opened and a shy timid girl with long flowing hair entered. Gradually and carefully she made her way up the centre aisle, but there was some confusion; heads were looking up to the gallery. The gramophone needle was skipping, playing the same note over and over again. People began to murmur; there were whispers and laughter. Jillian began looking frantically about the church, wondering what the commotion was all about. Then a high shrill voice, sounding very much like her mother's, called out sharply “Do you mean to sleep all day, Jillian? Jilly-Bean?”

  *****

  Ruth Crossland's voice travelled up the stairs: “Jilly-Beeeen?”

  After waiting a few moments she rapped lightly on the door, then turned the knob. Her pallid apprehensive face peered into the dim bedroom, which smelled of stale socks and perfume, and whispered “Jillian?” Her eyes darted quickly around the room as she stealthily and quietly made her way in, careful not to trip on the books and shoes that were scattered about, and picked up stray pieces of clothing that had been thrown haphazardly on the rug the night before. She placed these articles on a side chair, went to the window and drew aside one of the heavy curtains to let in the morning light. She then tugged to open one of the casement windows, just a crack, to let in the fresh ravine air. She cast an awkward glance back at her daughter, who was still sleeping at 8:30 a.m. on a Saturday morning. No sound or discernible movement came from underneath the covers. Nothing.

  She walked over to the dresser and glanced in its mirror at her own reflection; she adjusted a loose strand of hair that had fallen over one eye, revealing a raised forehead of small worried lines and creases. She had a worried expression on her face, as if expecting the worst. Her image was subtly blurred and ghostly due to watermarks on the inside of the mirror; the antique repairman she had consulted had told her that there was no way to clean them and re-silvering the mirror would be far too expensive. The dresser was from the 1930's, considered an antique now, purchased at a country auction in Stoufville long before Jillian and Adam were even born.

  Lying on the dresser was the necklace that her daughter had worn the night before; rays of morning light hit the beads from different angles, radiating deep yellow and blues. Beside it were pictures carefully preserved in silver metal frames: photographs of Jillian suddenly three years old again, running barefoot through grass and purple cornflowers that towered like trees high above her head, not even stopping to pose for the picture, her face turned away from the camera.

  The bed creaked. Now there was some movement under the bedcovers.

  “Time to get up, Jilly!”

  No answer.

  “Jillian, don't you think it's time you got up?” and then she added with an ironical note, “The day's almost over, honey.” She looked anxiously over at the bed: “How late was it when you got home?”

  Jillian blinked her eyes open. Bright sunlight was pouring in from the windows and through eyes still half shut she saw her mother standing by the dresser, her dark hair and form outlined by a white diffused light from the window.

  “What time is it?”

  “8:30 a.m. Time to get up.”

  Jillian sighed heavily and sank back down onto her pillow. She was worn out from her dream and its unsatisfactory conclusion. She turned over abruptly and pulled the covers over her head. Her voice sounded weak and strained, “It's too early, Mom.”

  “Nonsense! What time did you get in?”

  “Mmmm ... very late.”

  “Some fellow with a deep voice rang up twice within the last hour; said he wanted to talk to you but didn't leave a name. I said you were still asleep, and who would call at such an ungodly hour? I didn't want to wake you, considering the late hour you got in last night.”

  Jillian's eyes popped open. Her heart was racing and she immediately identified the caller as Matt. But how had he known her number? Did he know her last name too? How? It seemed a bit forward of him to ring her up so soon. She felt that she was losing control and being dragged into something she wasn't prepared for. Certainly she was not ready for romance; that was supposed to come later, much later. She wanted to stay true to her ideals. She was now sitting up in bed with her arms wrapped around her legs and her chin resting on her knees as she murmured vaguely, not meeting her mother's gaze, “The caller didn't want to leave his name or number?”

  “I'm sure whoever it was,” replied her mother reassuringly, “will call again.” She walked over and sat by the edge of the bed. “Did you have a nice time last night?”

  For a moment Jillian's mind was blank, but then the events of the evening raced through her mind. Matt had kissed her. Oh geez, how had she let that happen? Had she drunk too much? Could she really tell her mother about her encounter with Matt, the evening, the kiss? Her mother would not understand or, even worse, would leak it out to friends and relatives. She could just see her Aunt Jean's beaming face as she found out, her hands clasping for joy: “Oh, Jilly-Bean has a boyfriend?” She turned to her mother and said seriously, “It was all right, I guess.” Then she saw her mother's face turn quizzical, with raised eyebrows, and she had to laugh. She tried to keep her voice calm and steady as she cast her mother a furtive glance: “Well, what else do you want to know, Mom? There's nothing to tell. Absolutely nothing.”

  Her mother shrugged and got up: “Come down for breakfast as soon as you're ready, Jilly-Bee,” she said, then closed the door behind her.

  Jillian went over to her dressing-table and disrobed, alone with her body, observing herself a little too closely in the mirror. White, thin, childlike still. Yes, just little ol' me: Plain Jane Jillian. She was flat-chested with no curves. A carpenter's dream. She felt an instant of bewilderment. But she was hopeful. Her journey was just about to begin.

  She walked into the bathroom, filled the tub with hot water and lay in it, while the steam from the water rose up past her head and dampened the walls and the mirror. She dunked her head beneath the water, letting it gently wash over her as her limbs lay level and floated submerged with only her nose and mouth above the water, and took rhythmic breaths. Her body lay submerged and motionless, cut off from the world outside. In her head he could hear the pounding of her heart. She listened for sounds and could hear the clank of the pipes and the noise of creaky floorboards as a single pair of slippered feet shuffled down the stairs and into the kitchen, followed by the sounds of cupboards and drawers slamming, pots banging. This was the all too familiar clatter in the kitchen as she followed the progress of breakfast being made by her mother: stooping over the stove, wearing her saggy purple robe, ankles swollen from water retention and the effects of menopause. It was hard for Jillian to believe her mother had lived through the bra-burning seventies, political marches, the Beatles, Joni Mitchell and Woodstock. Despite strides in the so-called feminist revolution, her mother had decided early on that she wanted to be a stay-at-home-mom.

  “But Mom, you really should do something with your life. What did all that energy and discontent get you?”

  “I'm a mom to two wonderful kids. That's the best thing that could ever have happened to me.”

  Well, so much for a pricy education! From the kitchen wafted the smell of frying eggs and burnt toast.

  *****

  There was silence, except for the gentle clink of forks on plates, as her brother and dad were busily eating their breakfast in a room off the kitchen called the sunroom. It had windows extending from floor to ceiling overlooking the back garden and was crammed with childhood portraits on the walls. Jillian was leaning on her elbows, avidly watching her father and brother eating their eggs. Adam picked up a greasy egg and slipped it into his mouth, chewing it reflectively, and then glanced up from his plate at Jillian, who started.

  “What?” he asked. “What are you looking at? I'm hungry this morning.”

  Jillian smiled, shrugged indifference and poured some more tea from the pot she was carefully holding, not lifting her gaze from her hands, while Molly sat next
to her on the floor shredding a stray Kleenex that had fallen off the table. Carefully setting her teacup down, Jillian announced, “I've got great news! I got the job at the Toronto General Hospital.”

  Her father glanced up from his plate. “Congratulations! That's wonderful, Jillian. What's the job?”

  “Helping the nurses in the geriatric ward,” she replied.

  “Well, somebody has got to do it. That's why it's a summer job,” Adam quipped, grinning.

  With a deep sigh, her father reached for the Globe and Mail and turned his gaze to the front-page headlines: “Global Warming: Environmental Changes Ahead.” Seismic disturbances of up to 7 or 8 degrees magnitude were being registered in various parts of the world. The Gujarat earthquake had registered 8.1 on the Richter scale, killing 20,000 people, and another one had followed in El Salvador. Signs for sure, but who would take them for portents of a worldwide catastrophe? Could these devastating natural events be the work of an angry God, a supernatural being, or were they just natural phenomena?

  “What are the headlines today, dad?” asked Adam.

  “Global warming.”

  Her mother kept offering eggs and toast, encouraging Jillian to eat.

  “Mom, I really don't have much of an appetite this morning.” Jillian was taking little sips from her cup of tea, which she drank, as usual, black. “This Yorkshire Gold tea has such a unique flavour!”

  Her mother contorted her features into a smile and agreed, “It is a good tea.” Then her mouth went slack when she caught sight of Molly lying underneath the breakfast table, shredding Kleenex, and she added wearily, “I'm always cleaning up dog hair and washing the floors, because they constantly smell like dog poop.”

  “Ruthie, my dear,” exclaimed her husband with polite urbanity, “that's something I've been meaning to mention for some time. When you take Molly for a walk, you should carry spare tissue with you and once Molly does her— business— wipe her butt gently with it. Either that or you could ask Madame Zelda for guidance.” Molly thumped her tail a few times and lifted up her ears when she heard her name.

  Jillian and Adam broke out into laughter, but their father's suggestion made their mother's lip curl. “Geordie, please tell me you haven't been wiping Molly's butt in front of our neighbours.”

  “Why? What's so unusual about that?” He smiled with raised eyebrows as he continued to fumble with the newspaper.

  The two exchanged a tired married look.

  “Mom, I was looking through the photo albums in the attic the other day, and I could only find one picture of you. Why is that?”

  “Oh, you know how it is. I hate my pictures, so I rip them up,” she replied feebly. “I never look like myself or the way I think I should.”

  “What? How should you look, Mom?” asked Adam, aggrieved.

  Ruth Crossland wiped at her eyes and said, “Well, not the way the camera says I do.”

  “For goodness' sake!” cried Jillian, “you look great, Mom.”

  “Yeah, Mom. What will happen when you die and we have no pictures to remember you by?”

  She looked at him smiling, “You'll just have to look in the mirror, and you'll see me.”

  “Okay, get out the violins. It's not the same thing, and you know it.”

  Her mother glanced doubtfully at Jillian as she poured her more tea and offered her fresh carrot muffins, patiently waiting for the moment when her daughter would give her some sort of indication of what had happened at the dance. She was not one to pry into her daughter's private affairs. She hesitated at first but then pressed forward, “Is there something on your mind, Jilly-bean?”

  Jillian looked up, startled. “What makes you think so?”

  Her mother was sitting across from her and leaning on her elbows, looking at her with a wondering expression. “Well, I would imagine there would be something on your mind, dear,” she said smiling, and then got up from her chair to put some dirty dishes in the sink.

  Jillian looked at her father and brother, who were staring at her, and sensed that something was about to become real. “Okay, if you must know, I met a boy at the party.”

  Her mother looked sidelong at her for a few moments, then walked over to the table and took out from her robe pocket a deck of cards, which she proceeded to spread out in front of her.

  “I'm out of here!” announced her brother angrily.

  “Me too!” added her father. They both stormed out.

  “Oh, Mom. Please don't start with that.” Jillian pleaded, getting flustered.

  “It would be interesting to see. We just need a little guidance,” replied her mother reassuringly. “There are signs we must watch for— signs not to be missed.”

  “But I don't want to know what the Tarot cards have to say. Mom, did you hear what I said?”

  Her mother continued spreading the cards. “Yes, I heard you,” she replied, looking up, obviously annoyed. Her hands fluttered to her head. She gave her daughter a troubled look: “Mark my words, Jilly, these young men today are full of raging testosterone.”

  Jillian looked at her mother with a stunned look on her face but then found herself wondering whether there might be some truth to what she was saying. Matt had been rather aggressive. So maybe her mother knew what she was talking about, or perhaps she had been through all this herself as a young girl before marrying her father? The thought of sex conjured images in her mind of dancing torsos moving to tribal rhythms like the ones in those National Geographic specials, and for that matter the ones at the Hart House dance the night before; a mass gathering for a youthful orgy. She shook her head to dispel such thoughts from her mind. The absurdity of the whole thing made her laugh. “It seems absolutely ridiculous, Mom, for you to rush along without rhyme or reason and jump to conclusions about this boy I met last night. I'll probably never see him again.”

  “Well, he phoned this morning. What's his name?”

  “His name is Matt Barnes, and he's an intern at St. Michael's Hospital.”

  “An intern? How much older is this man?”

  “He's twenty-six.”

  “Twenty-six?! Why, he is much older than you, Jilly: eight years.” Her mother was in shock.

  “What difference does it make?”

  Her mother tried to make her see reason. “Well, look at it this way, Jilly: when you were born, he was already 8 years old. When you were 14, just barely a teenager, he was already 22 and probably already experienced ....” Here her words trailed off, because Adam had walked into the kitchen and had a quizzical look on his face as he made his way straight to the fridge. Things were becoming awkward. Her mother cleared her throat and continued her sentence in a lower key: “experienced in many, many ways of the world, Jilly— as in lived, loved so on and so forth. So that makes a difference, see?”

  “No.”

  Adam had been listening with detached seriousness as he cracked a handful of peanuts and popped them into his mouth: “What's this guy's name?” he asked.

  “Mathew Barnes,” replied Jillian, looking over at her brother in appeal and hoping he would come to her rescue.

  “Mathew Barnes,” reflected Adam. “Hmm ... sounds familiar. I'm sure I've heard that name before.”

  “Jilly-Bean, I've given you my good counsel as a parent, whatever happens— well... what can I do? And didn't Madame Zelda warn against such things?”

  “Madame Zelda? What does she have to do with this?”

  “I just don't want to see you get hurt, that's all,” replied her mother.

  “Why should anyone hurt me?”

  Chapter Seven

  Within one week of the séance, Mr. Mueller was dead.

  Upon hearing the news, Geordie Crossland mumbled as if to himself, “John is dead? Why, this is preposterous. There must be some mistake.”

  It was a shock— Mr. Mueller's death following a séance in which his death had been foretold was too much of a coincidence. The family was gripped in fear.

  The reality of the death
didn't hit Jillian until she read the obituary in the Globe and Mail:

  With his best friends and family by his side, at the age of 53, John Mueller suddenly passed away. Loving husband to Joyce; much loved brother to Lorraine; cherished and remembered friend to many.

  The autopsy report was finally released, revealing a blunt trauma to the head. There had been nothing in the blood system of the deceased, he was not intoxicated at the time of death and he had been in general good health until that evening. Given the circumstances of the death, a coroner's investigation was underway.

  “He hit his head, obviously.”

  “No, there was blunt trauma to the head.”

  “You mean, someone in the house killed him?”

  “No, I'm not suggesting that.”

  A death following a séance where death had been predicted soon became a topic of interest in the Globe and Mail, the headlines reading “Occult Meeting Turns Deadly.” Jillian steeled herself when she turned to the second page of the paper to reveal a picture of Madame Zelda's sinister face, dressed in sombre black— her beady eyes like shiny black pebbles peering out at her and leading her to picture the old woman shaking hands with Satan himself! Madame Zelda soon became a celebrity of sorts, appearing on the CBC news and The Fifth Estate. Maybe she was gifted after all, thought Jillian. That afternoon the telephone rang repeatedly on Baby Point Crescent as Jillian's friends all wanted to know all about the séance and the death of Mr. Mueller; they were shocked and concerned for her wellbeing but at the same time fascinated.