Aidan 8

By Asa Montreaux 

 

I woke up the next morning in my own bed, only vaguely remembering sliding my suitcases in zombie-like and then passing out on my stomach on the bed.

I got dressed listening to the noises outside my bedroom, listening for the sound of anything unsettling, abject. I heard nothing disconcerting, nothing in particular to do with my father or any other well-known, or potentially well-known serial killer.

I gently thumbed open the door and caressed the stairs with near silence descending to the main floor and the kitchen. There was no one in this room or that room, no one sitting in the kitchen, no one at the breakfast table. 

Eating, just resting against the kitchen countertop, I paid attention to every sound, in the kitchen, every movement around the kitchen, in the whole house. Once I heard a noise, in another room, near the front of the house, and I could have sworn my Dad would emerge from the door, or maybe I’d miss him coming in, and he might even race at me. Though no such thing happened; it was just a noise.

I couldn’t think of anything happening ever that involved someone running in. One time when we were away some robbed the house, casing it for loose cash, cd’s, dvd players, tv’s. But nothing while I was actually there, while anyone was actually there. With Bill on the outside, it wasn’t clear whether he would be someone now to run, whether he was someone threatening. Actually, that was clear. But just how threatening involved ambiguity.

I actually felt quite calm and all that could cross my mind was to write. A whole new book. Though. I wasn’t sure were to go with it, though I could envision several new novels, almost wholly formed, that I was ready to set upon the page. But I felt more like just watching the current book of mine as it sold. Watching it online, looking for comments or changes in rankings. I wanted to count any money it made and maybe add to it websites denoting very famous people’s net worth. 

But more deeply I worried or I started to worry about the process of publishing the things in itself. About what had happened just before I walked back in here as if nothing had happened. I had been at risk, and I had been unaware.

Fame came at a price. And really, I was only someone that stood up for myself and chose to be who I truly am, and write joyfully about the experience of that life. I really don’t know why I even said that because I only amount to picture on a page, a scribe detailing elements of a life symbolic in form, and not really owned by me.

If I started it now, would the same thing happen again? The only definition of insanity is doing the same thing and expecting different results. I suppose this time it might be my right leg that becomes kinetically incompetent. Or maybe it could be my back. The physical body was nothing to despise and nothing to hold in contempt.

It was not safe. And yet I could not stay here. Though it was safe for now. And I could start that novel soon. I would be able to tell in a few days if Bill ever intended to set foot in or live in this house again.

Though my fear was irrational as I was sure my father had not killed my best friend in a happenstance 

misunderstanding in which he had written a book and came out as homosexual to do so although he was not… he was not going to come back here. He was not really trying to kill me. Calum had been right about what he said. 

*

For the next few days it was just me and my mother passing the time, having the house only between the two of us for maybe the first time. I never thought I would sit down and chat with my mom passed childhood, past even prepubescence, but here we were. I couldn’t have known I wouldn’t feel too annoyed chatting only about what she had been up to earlier in the day, or what her friend had been telling her about someone we knew.  

Things were awfully quiet. I wasn’t missing having my Dad around, I wasn’t even wishing having even just another person around. I really was not someone that not liked to talk. Though I suppose I was someone that was shy and even cripplingly so in front of large crowds. Maybe I was changing in the midst of so much solitude. Slowly releasing my wound-up desire to speak, mostly about myself. Adjusting to the new normal of almost perfect quiet.

 

Everything was going fine. I found nothing much to do, though as I went around to the drug store or anywhere else, people seemed to recognize me. They had. Sometimes they asked for a photo. Around the house sometimes someone called and asked for an interview. Sometimes it wasn’t anybody except some website online that I had never heard of.

I wasn’t sad that the book tour was over. After all it was only a book tour, it wasn’t a music tour. I wasn’t Justin Bieber. Being a writer was more about the majority of the time, when that was clearly the minority of the time. Though it was sort of boring. I had money now, though there wasn’t a schedule to my day. I suppose if I wasn’t rich I would need a wife to carry out some schedule of activities throughout the day. Though I’m gay. Perhaps a husband.

Though maybe he’d have to work and we wouldn’t have this time to spend together. Men always want to have career, always need to have careers. Though women were the same way now. Why was I gay at all? Though that was hardly a reason I liked men, because they worked. It was for a whole plethora of other reasons.

There was time to reflect on things, and there was time to be myself. I felt calmer overall, my heart rate in a new low of a rhythm. It’d been five to fifteen beats higher for the entire portion of time I’d been going from city to city. And my head, it must have been throbbing. Surely it was half the time, the other half the time it felt ready to explode now. I recognized that now, as I felt a tremendous relief of pressure not just in my head but all over my body. I actually didn’t even want to see anyone. I was plenty exhausted from the interactions with people who were just recognizing me. There was nothing to do but sit and read, brainstorm new book ideas, and wait for remunerative and precious royalty cheques to come in.

The first came in hardly a week. They were finally ready, as I had exhausted my advance, and well no they were just holding back until I could receive them at home. A nice hard-cover royalty smacker of a paystub for 55,000 dollars. I peeled off the cheque portion and thought I should immediately go to the bank. 

There was no reason leaving it around. A cheque was something anyone wanted to steal! And so I readied myself to run off to the bank. I changed my shirt and splashed some water on my face and then I drove there very anxiously though completely law-abidingly. 

When I got there the line-up was out the door. Silly Bank of Canada. And really it was RBC. Though it was really the bank of Aidan. Or soon to be. 

Not that I would want a bank but think of the things I could buy with my money! Alas. I could buy a BMW. I could rent a three-bedroom apartment downtown on the waterfront. Or really, it could be a down payment on a condo as well. I pondered that it could even be outside of Vancouver as well.

The line twirled and twirled. At a certain point in time, I suppose in the future, I had reached the front of the line. And the woman called me up to her booth or whatever and without smiling said What can I do for you today?

‘Ah, I have this check to deposit, kindly.’

‘Alright. Insert your debit card please.’

‘Alrighteo.’

It blinked and then begged for me pin. I mean asked and I entered it. 0101. Just kidding. That’s not allowed.

‘Thank you,’ she said. As if I was the thousandth customer. I suppose I was.

I looked at her. As she was just looking back at me.

‘So the cheque,’ she said eventually.

‘Ah, yes. The cheque. Right.’

I proceeded to hand over the million-penny cheque to her.

‘One million pennies,’ I said.

She looked at it, and finally smiled. She thought over it. Finally she said, ‘Five million.’

‘Exactly,’ I said.

‘Is this real?’ she asked.

‘Of course,’ I said. ‘Of course.’

‘Ah, okay.’ She looked at hard. Then flipping it over and looking at that too.

She looked at the from one more time and read it to herself.

‘Aidan Soars?’ she asked.

‘Yes,’ I said. That’s me.

‘May I have a piece of ID,’ she asked.

‘Certainly.’ I whipped out my driver’s license.

She looked at it and sort of scoffed a laugh. ‘Your cute,’ she said.

‘Why, thank you,’ I said. 

‘And a second piece of ID.’

‘Ah, sure.’ I quickly passed over a credit card. I felt suddenly like I was robbing a bank.

‘You’re the writer,’ she said. A bit of an incongruous comment. Though there was sudden whispers and escaping gasps in the bank.

‘I am, that is write.’

‘Alright. I’ll deposit it. Though if it bounces don’t look at me.’

‘For sure. Understood.’

‘Would it bounce? ‘

‘No, it would not.’

‘Are you positive?’

‘Yes.’

She smiled wanly. ‘Alright.’

She scanned the cheque and typed up information on the computer screen. It took another five minutes, whatever she was doing.

‘I’ll keep this,’ she said.

‘Of course,’ I said.

‘Don’t worry, I won’t take it home.’

‘I hope not.’

‘Hah. I will.’

‘What? Would you?’

‘No, of course not. See you now.’

‘Oh, alright. Bye.’

On the way out the door someone was standing nearby and asked for a picture. She behaved shyly. And then a younger woman came up and got a picture as well. She really smiled, and then I said good-bye and left the bank.

My Mom was home early in the afternoon and I told her about depositing my first royalty cheque. My first writing pay cheque. Of much significance, anyways.

‘That’s lovely, hun.’

A couple had asked for photos.

‘That’s nice.’ She was starting to sound a little distant.

‘They say it will be available in five days.’

‘Uh huh.’

‘Everything alright?’

‘Yea, of course. You were saying it would be there in five days. Why’s that?’

‘Yea, it will be fully available. I guess it’s a little larger size. They want to make sure it’s good.’

‘I see. That’s fine. Will it be accepted?’

‘They’re good for that.’

‘Truly.’

She messed around with what she was making. She was chopping vegetables right then. ‘And 500,000?’

‘I think they’d be good for that too.’

‘I see. And 5 million?’

‘Haha. I think that’d probably bounce.’

She chopped the vegetables a little more. ‘You should get a contract. 500,000 dollars cheques. Each month.

‘That would probably work. The bank might add them up and say where is this all from though. No, it would probably work.’

‘I agree.’

‘Though I haven’t made five million.’

‘Haha. I realize that, now. I hadn’t a minute ago.

‘Though you knew that.’

‘I suppose I was only dreaming.’

‘Clearly.’

‘What will you do with it?’

‘Ah, that is the question.’

‘And what is the answer?’

‘Right to it. Maybe I’ll rent some place.’

‘Here? You’ll rent here?’

‘Maybe. Though maybe I’ll move to New York.’

‘That would make sense. Your job is kind of there.’

‘It really is.’

‘Though you could write from anywhere.’

‘I suppose. Perks of the job.’

‘You work from home though you don’t have to live at home.’

‘That’s quite right.’ There was a point coming.

‘So you wouldn’t move out and just live here, even though you already have a place.’

‘With you?’

‘Yes, with me.’

‘I can always come stay here. Though maybe I should be someone staying on my own a little more.’

‘I suppose you really should. That’d be alright. Though you can always stay here. Don’t just say good bye, ever.’

‘No of course not.’

‘Good, I’ll only get lonely, staying here, by myself.’

‘No, you can always call. I’m always wanting to talk.’

‘That’s true. Even to your Mom?’

‘Always.’

‘That’s true. I see fame hasn’t changed you.’

‘Not yet. Not as of yet.’

‘That’s all good hun. I have to go out. I forgot to grab something.’

‘Alright. See ya.’