No title yet, Part 4

They'd left Ireland when she was still young, and though she loved country, she'd always felt like an outsider when she'd returned, as though she'd only lived there in a dream. And she'd never truely belonged to Canada, either, despite spending most of her life there. A foot in both countries, but roots in none. And now, with no parental ties to draw her back, she felt less inclined than ever to return to Canada's bitterly cold winters and hazy, humid summers.

She noticed the train had stopped. It was dark and suddenly silent. Outside a lightning storm flashed randomly, intermittently lighting up the whole night sky. Without the noise of the train, she could here the faint rumble of thunder, competing with the snores of the elderly woman sleeping behind her. A fan buzzed in the background.

There was no rain yet, just great jags of lightning slashing through the darkness, sillouetting the trees, turning the nothingness of night into a patchwork quilt of images. In a flash another train careened past, seemingly out of nowhere, and was gone, leaving the passengers to sit quietly watching the power of nature.

A long, erratic column of heat and fire streched from heaven to earth; pure white electricity, it flashed for seconds and was gone.

The rain started in great furious gusts of wet, causing the passengers to pull shut the windows, and trap themselves in the hot, now airless, carriage. As the train ressumed its rush through the night, she watched the storm rage, through the grimy, rainstreaked windows. She noticed her reflection in the window and hoped the bags under her eyes were tricks of unflattering light.

The storm stirred up memories of a cottage on the lake, the incessant whine of mosquitoes against the screen, a loon's call in the dark. Watching lightning play in the distance, the trees responding to the increased pressure of the wind, the line of rain advancing across the lake like a determined army; silver replacing black. The sudden, earth shattering, heart stopping boom of thunder right overhead. She'd always loved those nights, trapped inside the tiny cottage that always smelled like wet towels. The carpets full of sand, the worn out couches that hadn't seen a proper living room in at least 20 years. Stacks of cheesy novels and boardgames on the shelves, stubbs of candles on the tabletops for when the power inevitably went out. The familiar creak and slam of the screen door.

She'd been happy then.

They'd sit on the threadbare couches, curled around pillows, drinking mugs of tea sweetened with the honey her mom bought at a roadside stand. Her parents would talk about boring parent things, like repair jobs or what the neighbours were saying about the new cottage at the end of the lake. Or sometimes everyone would be quiet and they'd turn out all the lights and just watch the storm roll in. In the mornings they'd listen to the CBC news on the radio; her parents refused to allow a TV at the cottage. She'd wake up early as the sun brightened her bedroom, and pull on her bathingsuit, still damp from the last swim the night before.

In the area that served as a kitchen, she'd pour a bowl of cereal and chop a banana on top, carrying it out onto the deck to eat. Then she'd be off for the day; canoeing, riding her bike down the dusty dirt road to the raspberry patch, sometimes just floating in the lake, reading Archie comics and Sweet Valley High. She'd always wanted to look like the twins, with their blonde hair and perfect size 6 figures.

Her constant companion was the family's happy go lucky staffordshire terrier, Fozzy. Fozzy would lie in the canoe while she paddled or floated, run by the bike, or follow at her heal if she walked through to cool pine forest. She sighed a long, deep sigh remembering that dog, her soft fuzzy fur, her sad, gentle eyes, the goofy way her tongue lolled when she ran.

Of course, there had been plenty of human playmates, too. Other cottage kids, one or two of the locals lucky enough to live on the lake, occasionally a classmate invited up for a week. Then there'd be secrets whispered under the dock, and diving competitions her mother would judge, or long walks to the nearest store by the highway for popsicles. One summer she'd even had a best friend, inseperable for the whole 2 months. But when September came, they'd gone back to their different homes. They'd written letters, but 10 months is a lifetime for 9 year olds, and the next summer the magical bond just wasn't there.

Maybe it was something about her that was wrong. A chemical imbalance in her brain that made it impossible for people to form lasting bonds with her. Even her parents. The thought flashed through her mind as brightly as the lightning in the sky: A fundamental flaw that made her unlovable.

No Title Yet Part 3

The smell of curry made her mouth water, and she stopped at a booth to buy some. It came in a plastic bag, with chopsticks, and the next booth had sticky rice steamed in banana leaves. She paid for her purchases, bowed her head, and headed for a park bench away from the hustle and bustle.

She noticed something moving past her foot, and focused in, thinking it was a gecko. The tiny lizards were everywhere. But it turned out to be some sort of millipede, 2 inches long and seemingly slithering over the cement on it's zillion eyelash legs. She shivered. It seemed the hotter it got, the bigger the bugs got. At least geckos were cute.

She watched the people walking past. It was always livelier at night, though the city trapped the heat for hours after sunset. Young women in tank-tops and jeans, old men in button down shortsleeved shirts and brown pants; grandma's in flowered prints - it seemed fashion didn't vary much no matter where she went. Some people maintained the traditional costumes, but most wore the modern trends. Even in the repressed dictatorship of Myanmar, the Burmese people wanted their Louis Vuitton bags and Levi's jeans.

The curry made her mouth burn in a way she'd come to enjoy. She ate a piece of cucumber to dull the tingling, but then returned to the curry, unable to resist the delicious medley of tastes. Her forehead beaded with sweat and she brushed it away with the back of her hand, a reflexive impulse she didn't notice herself doing anymore. She watched a family drive past, four people on a scooter. She loved these lands where the rules of the west just didn't apply. Not even physics or logic stood a chance in some corners of the world.

Eventually she tired of watching. The burning in her mouth had all but disappeared, and she headed toward the train station. It was time to move on . There was more world waiting for her. As per usual, the train arrived late, and was delayed before leaving, but she was used to that. Very few countries seemed to have trains that adhered to any semblance of a schedule.
The fan near her was broken, so she was bound for a hot, sleepless night of travel. She looked out the window, watching families say goodbye - women leaning out of the train windows to hold hands with their men until the last moment, like so many romantic movies being played out. She felt sad. There was never anyone to cry when she left a place, no warm embrace awaiting her at her destination. Suddenly she felt tired, worn, like the plodding ponies at the zoo, forever trudging forward but never getting anywhere. She deeply craved to go home, but where was that?

No title yet, Part 2

She had thought about finding someone to share some of her adventures with, but no one she encountered ever looked quite right. The guys were either dreadlocked hippies with no regard for personal hygiene, or pretty playboys looking for one night stands. As for friendships with girls, she'd rarely been good at that. Most girls were overly obsessed with their looks and Hollywood trivia, or the kind that feigned friendship in order to steal your boyfriend. There were few of either sex that fell out side of those two realms, no matter where she travelled.

She took another long draft of beer. It was quickly warming up to the point where it would be bitter and unpleasant to drink. She could feel a droplet of sweat running down between her shoulder blades. She knew she was well beyond "glistening" by this point, and longed for time to race ahead, so that she could be in the cold shower of her hotel room. Initially, in the more northern areas, the idea of a cold shower seemed appalling, but now she thought the idea wonderful. In fact some days even the cold water became as warm as her beer; running through unchilled pipes, it rarely refreshed.

She looked up to watch a street dog wander lazily past, tongue lolling practically to its knees. In Korea it would be known as dong ge. Shit dog. And it would be condemned to the soup pot as a traditional remedy for the heat. Dogs don't sweat, so eating them makes you cooler. Despite her time spent there she'd never learned to understand Korean logic. Nor had she been able to try boshuntang, "dog soup". It conjured up images of her trusty childhood friend - the only one in her life that had never hurt her, never betrayed her, and only left her side when death had forced its way between them.

A crowd of boys in crisp white shirts and khaki shorts walked past, in that overly confident swagger of the teenaged male. They were still in school uniforms though classes let out ages ago.

She finished her now tepid beer, and gritted her teeth against the bitterness. Gathering her belongings, she headed out into the crowded street market. This one seemed to sell only food - chopped up fruit, every kind of meat and seafood, mostly roasted on barbeques, noodles, rice, dishes served in banana leaves, whole coconuts to drink the milk from. One table was stacked with pigs heads in plastic baggies. She wondered if they were for dinner or a Shamanistic ritual.

In the centre of a pavilion, a group danced to traditional music. She stopped to watch and a man invited her to join in. Blushing furiously, she shook her head, apologized and bowed before scampering into the safety of shadows. She preferred to be on the outside, the observer, safe behind her wall. That's why she enjoyed travelling in countries where she didn't speak the language. She'd learn to say "hello" and "thank you" and most people she dealt with spoke a little bit of useful English, but there were no conversations, no need to idily chat or gossip, or be forced to tell her life story.

Occasionally she'd meet up with other travellers, but most of them seemed to be French or German or Israeli and again she could sidestep conversations beyond the polite "where are you from" variety. Lately she'd been pretending to be French herself when she ran into English speakers. Canadians were the worst for sparking immediate intimacies with you if you said you were Canadian. The unspoken bond of being "not American", though it often meant little more than a shared knowledge of who the Tragically Hip were, and that Ottawa, not Vancouver or Toronto, is the capital.

To be continued...