2:9

Meredith glanced in her back mirror to see whether Barney was still following her. She’d invited him to use one of her spare rooms on the third floor while he was in town. He was a man of great passion and grand ideas, and she would be glad for the company for a while.

It was a bit odd, though, that he seemed to already know so much about her, but it was a small town and people did talk, didn’t they. The town was feeling a bit better the last little while. The dollar was up and lots of people had been traveling south to shop in Great Falls. Everything seemed more prosperous, and it was time to check whether there was any interest in outside investment. Hunting was good around here, too, and the gas industry was booming. There was no reason that Magrath couldn’t see an influx of people, and of much-needed money. Meredith mused that she might even rethink her long-deferred B&B idea if there was enough traffic.

Barney certainly was a godsend if he could do half of what he thought he might. And if not, well, no harm done. Nothing succeeds if nothing is started, her father used to say.

Meredith turned off the gravel road and bumped over the washboard that had been forming all summer. Time to get that graded before I bounce myself into the ditch. She slowed in front of the house and stopped by the old outhouse. Barney’s old land yacht stopped behind her. He stepped out and turned 360 degrees, eyeing up the house, yard and outbuildings.

Meredith shut the rusty door of the pickup, leaving the keys inside, and called to the gawking man in her front yard. “Come on inside and make yourself comfortable. I’ll put on a pot and make up your room. And then you can bring your things up whenever you want. No standing on ceremony; make yourself at home.”

Barney smiled at her and nodded. “Make myself at home,” he repeated.

 

2:7

Rowan gazed out the smudged window glass at the people sitting on the small cafe chairs and tables crammed on the sidewalk. Two young women sat sipping cappuccino and chatting. They were obviously of Chinese descent and had a look about them that seemed to tell a story of strong family tradition and a prescriptive lifestyle. It was nothing you could really put your finger on except their sense of style: designer glasses, t-shirts, hair pulled back with the odd Asian-inspired accessory. All of this seemed to tell a story of a family both integrated within North American culture and yet strongly tied to an older, stricter culture.

Two tables down sat a young man with two small children. He was sipping a large cup of coffee while they slurped away at a couple of Oranginas. He seemed to be enjoying his day out, amused by the girls’ antics and bemused by the clouds overhead. Obviously trying to balance kids and me-time, Rowan smiled to herself.

She turned her attention back to her own empty cup and scraped the last of the foam out with her spoon. Should I have another? she wondered as she slowly turned her head toward Gareth and his father.

2:6

When Rowan was 14 years old she had been madly in love with the blockbuster movie star du jour. He had been a tall, muscular young man with the devil-may-care attitude that so many of the young rich and famous affected. She had the requisite posters on the wall and had even gone so far as to join the Tiger Beat-sponsored fan club so she could get regular updates and ’personal’ notes from what she considered to be the most beautiful man in the world.

This future husband had a habit of drawling. His heavenly voice was laconic and slow, and no word was safe from his iconic mispronunciation. It was charming, it was sexy, it was sooo mature, and Rowan decided then and there, much to her parents’ dismay, that this was how really beautiful and famous people spoke.

By the time she was 16 she knew better, but by then it was so much a part of her high school image she didn’t dare change. By the time she was 18, she didn’t care much about the schmucks she went to high school with. And then Carmen, whom she was head-over-heels in love with, thought it was endearing. It actually got worse.

After the Carmen episode she resolved to give the drawling accent up once and for all but found that she couldn’t. Oh, she often started out en amour in a normal fashion, but as soon as she got distracted or excited she’d forget and slip back into the drawl. So now she lived with it and even used it for effect. People she didn’t know often underestimated her, and those she did could see the cutting undertones as she employed her drawl to jab pins in people’s expectations.

 

2:5

Meredith stood in the kitchen and surveyed the table. The kids would be back from skating in a bit and the ham was in the oven. The rosemary-roasted potatoes were filling the room with a sufficiently warm and cozy smell, and she had the mugs of hot chocolate all ready for the milk warming on the stove. Everything was set, and she supposed it was time for a bit of a break.

Meredith wandered into the big sun room off the kitchen and sank onto the cushions on the bench. This was her favorite place for breakfast because the sun streamed in the east windows and she could curl up with her coffee and enjoy the warmth. Lately the beaver had taken to joining her. They usually sat in companionable silence and watched the sun rise, but this morning he had watched her for a few minutes and then asked a most unusual question.

Thinking back, Meredith now wondered why she was more surprised by the nature of the question than at the fact that the beaver had spoken to her. Until this morning he hadn’t said a word, although he was quite a good communicator — much better, in fact, than most of the people she’d had to work with over the years. But it  seemed natural that the beaver would speak when he had something to say, and not when he didn’t. Showed a lot of sense in her books. Wise old beaver, she thought with a smile. Wise old young beaver.

This morning the beaver had broken the spell by gazing at her with his soft brown eyes and asking whether she felt ready to talk about it yet.

“About what?”

“Barney,” he said softly.

Well, hadn’t she made a fool of herself then. The noise she had made. Why, it sounded more like a choking Pekingese than anything a proper adult should make. Meredith frowned at the memory. Today of all days, why would the beaver bring that up. No one’s business but her own and certainly not something she was prepared to discuss with a guest in her house.

But was he really a guest? A few times over the past week Meredith had found herself thinking of the beaver as family, thinking of the future again. It had been cold for a bit, dipping down to minus 35 at night and not much better during the day. Today was the first half-decent day in a week, and she’d been planning on getting out with the kids and stretching her soul. The one thing that could make her antsy was being inside too many days in a row, and there weren’t many chores or excuses to drag her out on bitter days. But somehow having the beaver around had changed the tenor of her days. Watching him waddle across the yard from the shop in the mornings and sharing the morning sun with him took the edge off the stir-crazy.

He usually spent the afternoons on his own, sometimes at the house but usually back in  the lodge he’d constructed up in the shop, doing whatever beavers-of-an-unusual nature did. It was a comfortable arrangement.

This morning, though, she awoke ready to go, feeling the temperature rising and anticipating some time out in the fresh prairie air. Then the beaver had spoken. And here she was, still cooped up in the house while everyone else was out and about enjoying the day. Even the beaver had gone for a walk, leaving her immersed in her own thoughts. She was strongly inclined to think some distinctly uncomplimentary thoughts in that beaver’s direction right now. Very uncomplimentary.

 

2:4

Rowan stood by the coffee bar and and pondered the panda bear in her latte. Whenever she glanced across the room she could feel the waves of tension, fear and anger emanating from Gareth and his dad, but she thought she could sense them evening out. Certainly the body language seemed a bit less frantic than it had five minutes ago.

It’s funny, she thought, I never worried about other people’s relationships all that much before. Rowan snorted and reflected on all her rows with her own parents. I suppose I never had time for other people’s issues with all the crap I thought I was dealing with. She shook her head like a sneezing cat and stared hard at the cinnamon-tinged bear. Christ, next thing you know I’ll be asking for Gareth’s help. Wouldn’t that be a hoot.

Rowan had liked Gareth for a long time. They’d first met in the playground when one of Rowan’s nannies had been looking to distract her from a particularly bratty mood. That had only lasted a few weeks before Father had found better ways for them to spend their time. But she remembered Gareth as a skinny kid with a lot of energy and little sense. “Seriously, who lets a kid hang from the crossbar on the swings?” But Gareth was often unsupervised, and fear seemed to be a foreign concept to that version of him. Things certainly have changed, haven’t they, she mused.

Rowan glanced at the tall, lanky figure gesturing at his father. He seems so balanced between this new fear of everything and that old energy. I wonder what it’s like to ride that wave? I certainly couldn’t do it; but I guess I’m lucky I don’t have to. In the back of her mind Rowan wondered why she was even here. The idea that somehow she was out of place, out of step with events, tickled her in a way she just wasn’t comfortable with. Just what was Gareth to her anyway?

With a stab of her spoon, the panda disintegrated into foamy white turbulence. Rowan picked up the cup and sipped the bitter-and-sweet liquid. Then she grabbed her iPhone and settled back to catch up on some Bejeweled. I guess I’ve got some time to fill.

 

2-3

Well, the beaver thought, I guess I’d better get the background. He picked up the tattered Hilroy and flipped through it until he came to the first page that mentioned Magrath.

Wednesday, May the twenty-second, nineteen hundred and eighty-five

Well, I blew into this piss-ass town about 12:15. Just in time to see the hayseeds and hicks shuffle their way to the local food trough on main street. I figured that was as good a place as any to find Mayor McCheese. Probably stuffing his pasty face with deep-fried buffalo chips or whatever passes for local cuisine in this hole.

And lo and behold, who was sitting on his fat ass right by the counter, making moo-eyes at the tackily dressed waitress behind the till. Well, to make a long story short (and probably more interesting than anything real involving these clods), Mr. Mayor was ’dee-lighted’ to see me and invited me over to the office to chat about the cesspool he’s forced to put up with.

Christ, I have no idea why the suicide rate in places like this doesn’t exceed the birthrate. Maybe humping’s the only thing that makes it better.

So it looks like I’m here for a few weeks at least. Mayor McStupid bought the line and is putting me on the payroll. It’s not really worth the time, but it will cover expenses while I get on with it. I mentioned this Meredith McGrath woman and got a bite. Seems she’s in the habit of picking up strays — now there’s a stupid idea if I ever heard one — and she frequents the scuzzy taverna at the hotel most Thursday afternoons.

So I’ll plug my nose, take a room in the putrid hotel and arrange to ’meet’ the ’meat’ tomorrow afternoon. And hopefully somewhere in this pus-ridden burg I can find a cup of coffee that doesn’t taste like petroleum byproducts.

Ordo ab chao,
Barnabas

 

2-2

Edward stood outside the beaver’s apartment and composed himself. He hadn’t realized until about five minutes before just where this was all leading him to. “It’s strange,” he maundered to himself. “You think you are on top of it all and so you act, and not five bloody minutes after you commit, you find out the one piece of knowledge that might have made you hesitate. This beaver is really getting on my nerves.”

The wind was picking up, and the fur around Edward’s tail was starting to lift and flow. He shuddered unconsciously. “Well.”

“Well,” he repeated. As a third “Well” left his lips, he started forward, hopped up to the front door and twitched his whiskers at the knob.

The door opened and two young men exited, talking excitedly about the game and oblivious to the small rabbit at their feet. Edward hopped inside the closing door and proceeded up the stairs to Gareth’s apartment.

As he settled on his haunches outside the door he heard a slight noise from within. Moments later the door opened inward, the beaver standing tall on his back legs, one hand on the knob and one hand over his mouth in an exaggerated moue of surprise.

“Why, it’s a little bunny!” the beaver exclaimed.

“Knock it off,” Edward replied.

“Ah. You’ve come to some conclusion, I take it? Think you’ve got something figured out, do you?” The beaver stepped back and made way for the rabbit to enter the apartment. “Mind the hardwood, and no pooping on the floor,” the beaver instructed cattily.

Edward hopped into the living room. “I take it you’ve arranged to be alone?” he queried the smirking rodent. “No one here to witness our ’meeting’ of minds?”

The beaver’s tone dropped a few degrees. “Meeting? Well, I suppose it’s not a chance encounter, but I hardly think your barging in can be considered a meeting. Why don’t you just state your business so I can be about my own, sans poop.”

“I suppose you could look at it that way, if you were to believe this an avoidable event. But you and I both know it’s not. It took me a while to piece it together. Years in fact, but now that I have, I admit to feeling bit foolish to have been so clueless for so long.”

A genuine smile lit up the beaver’s face. “I had been wondering just what was distracting you so. I always assumed you were just putting this little tête-à-tête off because you were busy with other strands.”

“No, unfortunately not,” Edward said settling onto the couch. “While I have been occupied, it’s always been a bit of mystery to me just who or what was imposing such odd conditions on events. I had taken our last brief meeting as an effect, not causative at all. Still, no harm done. These sorts of things will always wait.

“But now, my watery woodland friend, shall we discuss … Gareth, is it? … and just what we are going to do with you?”

“Gareth is outside your scope, bunny,” the beaver barked. “Completely a side issue and you know it. Let’s just stick to what’s relevant and get on with it.”

“Fine,” Edward sighed, “but I think we will find Gareth has more standing here than you imagine. You of all creatures should know it’s impossible to separate these things.” Edward eased back into the cushions, twisted his ears forward in an effort to look grave and met the beaver’s eyes with a willful stare. “So let’s talk about Barney, then.”

 

2:1

Gareth adjusted the unfamiliar tie yet again. “You can learn a lot of things on Google,” he said to the mirror, “but you can’t learn to do them well.” Giving up on trying to improve the image in the mirror, Gareth walked down the hall and grabbed his jacket. “Might as well get on with it,” he muttered. He plucked the keys off the shelf by the door and let himself out.

On the street, the cab was waiting with Rowan inside. “Well?” Gareth greeted the smiling figure in the back seat.

“It’s done,” Rowan replied with a sympathetic duck of the head. “He’ll be waitin’ at the Big Grind like ya wanted. Ain’t been no big deal t’all.”

Gareth looked searchingly into Rowan’s eyes for any clue about just how easy it had been, but found nothing but mild amusement and a hint of excitement.

“Are you going to give me anything else? Any idea of how he feels about all this? You did tell him the truth, didn’t you?”

“Well, my lanky friend, I mighta exaggerated a bit here and there, but ya, I told him straight up. Don’t worry so much. I figure y’all always worry too much. Que sera, sera, dude. He’s there and soon you will be too, and then we’ll figure it out.”

As the cab pulled away from the curb, Gareth caught a glimpse of a small brown figure in the bedroom window of his apartment. “Well, at least someone else seems to be as worried as I am,” he murmured over his shoulder.

He turned to Rowan again and, with a wicked grin, said, “Did I ever tell you about my beaver? We’ve got some time to kill, and I’ll bet you the fare you won’t believe me.”

Rowan’s eyes widened in false alarm, and then grinned back. “Well, long as this ain’t some sort of cheesy double entendre, I’m in. Hit me with ya best shot.”

The cab was just pulling off the freeway when Gareth finished with, “… and that’s my roommate. Strangest thing I’ve ever been a part of, but somehow it just seems right.”

“So yer telling me that there is a beaver, a water-dwelling, fur-bearing, flat-tailed, tree-gnawing rodent, in your apartment right now and that he comes and goes whenever and however he wants, and no one even raises an eyebrow?”

“Yup.”

“This I gotta see. I’m hereby invitin’ myself for dinner tonight if this thing gets done. Hell, I’m a think’n I’ll be there no matter what happens. C’est in-croy-able!” Rowan exclaimed in a corny Texan accent.

At the mention of what was next up in his day, Gareth frowned a little and turned to stare out the window. Two, three more blocks to the Big Grind and he’d be irrevocably committed. Still time to bail, a voice inside mused. It was a bit hard to hear because right behind it were the gibbering screams and incoherent wailings of his hind brain: RUN! Run, you fool! Take the easy way! RUN! HIDE!

Unfortunately for his hind brain, the image of the drooling, slathering, fear-ridden beast brought a grin to his lips and some decisiveness to his day. “Been there, done that,” he said to Rowan, who had been peering questioningly in his direction. “Today, we do something new.“

As they got out of the cab, Gareth checked the fare.

“Oh, no, you don’t,” Rowan interjected. “I didn’t believe not a word of your story. This ride is definitely on me.”

Gareth’s lips were beginning to feel like a faulty flashlight, blinking from solemn frown to silly grin every few seconds, but he flashed yet another smile at Rowan’s remark and said, “You’ll see. Just wait. The beaver’s gonna blow you away.”

Rowan paid the cabbie, saying “Keep the change” with a flourish, and turned back to Gareth. Doing so, he missed the even bigger grin the cabbie flashed at Rowan’s back. Cabbies see a lot of shit and no beaver tale is going to surprise them. Besides, he’d picked quite a few fares in Gareth’s neighbourhood before and was pretty sure he’d seen the beaver in question. “What’s so strange ’bout a beaver?” he wondered, turning up his radio and pulling back into traffic. “As long as he tips good…”

 

•••

 

The Big Grind was one of those coffee shops that had been a place for coffee snobs long before it was cool to shell out six bucks for a Venti. Close to the university and what passed for an artists’ quarter in this town, it had survived only because it wasn’t on a main drag or a busy neighbourhood. Quiet, filled with little niches and views of passersby and devoid of preppies, yuppies or -ies of any other kind. People came to the Big Grind not to be seen and to enjoy a bit of solitude, and that atmosphere seemed to keep the cool kids away. That and the fact that the place hadn’t been renovated since the mid 80s. The last person Gareth had introduced to this place had blurted, ”What a dump,” as he had crossed the threshold. But the coffee was good and the chairs comfortable.

Rowan opened the worn wood-and-glass door and stepped inside. Across the room a head bobbed up in recognition and Rowan stepped back, bowed elaborately and said, “The game’s afoot: your move, Sherlock.“

Gareth grimaced. “You’ll join us?”

“Nah-ah. I just paid my debt to the cabbie. This is your show. I’ll just grab an ad-rag and some java and wait for the screams when one of yous skewers the other.”

A brief look and “I guess” were all Gareth could muster. Rowan made a shooing motion and turned to the waiting barista. Gareth straighten his back, turned toward the seats in the corner and put one foot in front of another. The walk seemed to elongate and shrink like some sort of weird 70s sci-fi movie effect, and the gibbering in his head started to intensify.

When he was about five feet from the table, his father stood up, grumbling. “What a dump!”