CHERRY BLOSSOMS // Revisited // Bachelorette // 2.5

Friday, June 9th

It was a long drive up to Innisfil and by the time he got on the 400, it was dark. Nia had called two hours ago from Rocco’s truck. They’d been at a work site in Schomberg, some mansion she’d told him, and they were there late and it was a Friday and a bunch of their friends from Woodbridge were camping up in Innisfil, which wasn’t far. They wanted to do a night out at a bar up there.

Nia knew Geoff’s mom was staying overnight with them in Roncesvalles. His mom had a ladies’ day on Saturday with some girls from her church, ten of them all getting together for brunch and then doing the Bible exhibit at the Museum. Mom arranged three weeks ago to come and stay with Geoff and Nia and spend some time with her favorite granddaughter. Not really her favorite, she called all of them favorites and had no shame doing it.

He had dinner with his mom and Odele, going out to eat on Roncesvalles at Odie’s favorite bakery, where they knew her, doted on her, and made her breakfast for dinner. Did it up nice, two eggs on the plate arranged like sunny-side-up eyeballs and strips of bacon as the plate’s wriggling mouth. Geoff had breakfast too, wanting in on the fun, getting himself pancakes and maple syrup and bacon. Mom complained about having breakfast at night, mostly as a symbol for acquiescence to the whims of his fanciful daughter. Mom got a sandwich and complained about that too, that sandwiches weren’t really dinner. Geoff and Odie had fun, though.

His mom worried about Odie eating at the table with her knees on the bench, saying she could fall. Odie was fine and Mom was no tyrant, just a crank sometimes. They had a nice dinner together anyway and Mom lightened, but he did have to hear the talk about his career. How he should consider becoming an editor, how she could see him doing that job well. A compliment but also an insight into how she couldn’t understand how her son made money doing dopey drawings for kids. He said, “Mom, I was on TV this morning.”

She knew he was, was proud of him, told all her friends to watch. But she still didn’t see what he did as a real job.

Evergreen Publishing had got him the spot on Breakfast Television to promote the book he was drawing on divorce. A four minute segment with the author, Dana Fields, a Toronto divorce attorney of some reputation. The host called him eye-candy. Joking, but kind of being cute, and he felt his cheeks go red. The segment went well and Jenny called him in the afternoon and said they’d have him back, solo, for the release of Big Choo. The author lived in Minnesota and Breakfast Television was only interested in the Toronto angle.

His mom thought they had money trouble because Nia went back to work. He told her it was time, that Nia was better out working than home puttering around helping him out. He’d hired an assistant.

The assistant was twenty-two, still at OCA, looking to make a little money and get a chance to learn something from a working illustrator. He was going to work some evenings, three times a week. That was all the help he needed. Nia was still going to do the books, and this kid from OCA, Winslow, just did a lot of cleanup on Photoshop files, some scanning, organizing. Winslow hoped to be doing some art with him, but he wasn’t ready. He had a nice portfolio and you couldn’t beat OCA, but there was still something missing.

Nia had called when he was in the bakery with Odie and Mom. In the truck with her monstrous boss headed north for fun, wanting him to come along. He said that was crazy. He wasn’t going to drive an hour and a half north for a couple of drinks. She said they hadn’t had a night out in so long, why wouldn’t he ask his mom to watch Odie, it would all work out.

He declined. He was mad at her for not being at home. Mad to hear her wanting to go out and spend time with other people doing things they didn’t normally do on a Friday. She should be at home with him, on the couch, watching TV. This kind of night, though, Geoff, was what led to the Epiphany.

He hung up on her, friendly enough, telling her to have a good time, but they could both feel the chill he had. He felt it stronger when he hung up. Regret.

So he walked back home with his mom and Odie, and the whole way, he couldn’t get Nia out of his mind. He could picture her there at some bar with all her raucous friends, drinking wine. Inevitably shots would arrive. Then an awful image. His sweet Nia with her hands on the wall of some seedy bar, standing in an alley with her legs apart and Rocco behind her, driving his huge cock up inside her. It would be her husband’s fault. All his ideas about sharing her. He wasn’t ready for this.

He couldn’t remember one thing his mom had said on that walk back to the house. By the time they were going up the stairs to the front door, he was asking her if she’d mind watching Odie while he went out.

Mom grimaced, but said that was fine. Gaining weapons for some future argument with him. Then he was anxious and riled, showering fast, changing clothes—twice—running around looking for keys and wallet, saying bye to Odie and Mom, catching that judgmental look in Mom’s eye. Then he was quick-stepping out to an Uber, meeting the driver out on Garden Street. He went out to Etobicoke, used the spare keys for the Volvo, and headed north late on a Friday, his hands squeaking with damp dread on the leather steering wheel.

***

He could have texted Nia and let her know he was coming after all, but something in him didn’t want that. Part of him thought he wanted to see her in her natural element. Like a perverted Jane Goodall, exploring the natural unhindered behavior of his Nia in the wild. He felt guilty about it, like he knew it was the wrong thing, but not guilty enough to pick up his phone and give Nia a shout and let her know. Well, shit, he just wanted this to be a surprise, right? Yeah, that’s right. A surprise. Light her face up and make her happy that her loving husband took an Uber to get their car and drove an hour and a half into the fucking sticks because he loves her so much. Fuck, it was kind of true, but the real truth was all he thought about on the way up here was how exciting it would be to catch her up to no good. He didn’t want to find her with a cock in her mouth or getting railed by some stranger, but he wanted to find her the way he used to know her. Fun-loving, wild Nia. Smoking, drinking, being lewd and boy-crazy, or who knows what else he might find. He toyed with that idea, poked at the thought of her going too far and how he would feel. He told himself he wouldn’t hate it, that he wanted it and would deal with it afterwards and they, as a couple, could go from there. But now, knowing she had a license, had been given permission and admitted she liked the idea, he was tortured. That was the point, though, wasn’t it?

He was alive and sizzling the entire drive. Thinking about the woman he loved and the passions she had and how he could share her because her excitement was his excitement. He’d been half hard most of the drive.

The GPS led him down a country road, lit up only with his headlights, no streetlights whatsoever. The area was rural, a lake community, seasonal homes and some year-rounders, but not many. Dwellings were sparse and most of the way was densely tree-lined, a black looming maw he was hurtling through, headlights showing him twenty yards at a time.

At a T intersection, the GPS let him down. This was where the bar was supposed to be, but there was nothing here, just trees. A sign in front of him in green and reflective white just read Twilling, and an arrow to the left, and then Hempshaw, and an arrow to the right. No signs for the Lake View, some bar Nia had said they were going to. He did the window down and heard nothing but frogs, sitting there at the intersection in the dark, amber right turn signal throbbing in the night even though he didn’t know what way he was going. Then, under the croaking, omnipresent thrum of singing spring time frogs, he heard it. A steady heartbeat of bass. The bar was nearby. He just had to find it.

He turned the Volvo to the right, keeping his ear in the proper direction, and crawled along the gravel road. Lights showed now through the dense trees, a winking porch light and a high sodium halide on a pole. Then, hidden in the bushes, a rundown hand-painted sign: Lake View Tavern. Licensed. Must have been a long time ago because the sign looked like it had seen two decades of Canadian weather.

He pulled into the wide shrub-lined gravel parking area, packed with pickups and motorcycles. There were men in the parking lot arguing, drinking, touching each other’s chest with a middle finger, bottle still clutched in hand. Exactly the kind of thing he hated. He instantly regretted coming. How would Nia feel safe coming here? The sweet mother of Odele, and his little housewife. The reality of wild Nia was like a kick in the belly, a toe catching him right under his bladder and making his insides want to burst.

“Shit, Nia,” he mumbled as he pulled off to the side, parking part on the gravel and two wheels on the grass, his passenger door stuck against the shrubs. Some beer-hazed rocker eyed him, coming out of the bushes next to the building about six feet in front of the Volvo, doing up his fly. He didn’t like the look of Geoff, that was obvious, or his stupid Volvo station wagon. Geoff fiddled with keys and wallet and imaginary things on the console that needed his attention until the man passed, stumbling along in his saggy jeans and construction boots.

***

The tavern looked like it had been a big lakeside home at one time. Probably built during the Sportsman craze as some retreat for a Toronto lawyer to come up here and fish and shoot. It was two storys, with various additions added through the years, all clad in a white-painted but chipping clapboard. There was a low single story add-on at the back, hidden in bushes that must have been the kitchen—smoking aluminum kitchen chimney billowing out fried grease smell.

He crossed the lot, walking nervously but trying not to show it, regretting the outfit he’d settled on, not thinking it would be this kind of place. He and Nia were used to places for families. Stylish bars that served expensive drinks and were filled with people, well, more like Geoff. Not like these guys. There was a distinct biker element here. Big giveaway—a lot of motorcycles. Not some Gold Wings, or Hondas, or Yamahas. These were weird bikes, low fat-tanked and wide-tired. Things you saw on the cover of American Iron in the back row of gas station magazine stands because there were pictures of bikes and topless young ladies.

The two who were arguing and pointing to each other were old. Like in their fifties, but with long grey goatees and bandanas and vests with patches on them. His sphincter literally tightened. This couldn’t be the right place. But dead ahead, as he approached the front door, porch light buzzing with some country bugs, was a lifted pickup that stood tall above all the others. Sort of what Nia described as Rocco’s. And the motorcycles?—Dino drove one, he heard. Nia was here and maybe the two aggressive male fantasy men she thought about were here too . . . and her husband at home an hour and a half away. His stomach tightened and his bowels growled at the possibilities. What would he find? His sexy fantasy Nia on her knees in some biker bar, a cock in her pussy and one in her mouth. Fuuu-uck. He didn’t want it, but he wanted it. He hated the idea, but felt an undeniable plumpness in his underoos.

A mean fucker in a backwards ball cap and a dirty flannel bumped him coming out of the doorway as he went in, even though he gave the guy berth. Geoff didn’t look back, knew that was a primitive symbol that it was on, and Geoff did not know how to fight. So he kept walking and prayed that he didn’t get punched from behind. His heart was in his throat.

The bar wasn’t as busy as the parking lot looked. Lots of open space between patrons and the place was oddly lit—brighter than expected, enough to see all the detail in the room and the foot-beaten wooden plank floor. There was a bar in the centre towards the lake side of the house, and it was dotted with guys who looked like they rode motorcycles. There was a step down from the front door to the main floor and then to the right another raised section where they had tables, mostly full. The clientele was older than he’d thought, a little rough—AC/DC blared from a stereo system that was way over-amplified. There was a stage towards the back, but there was no band tonight. He scanned the crowd briefly, nervously, for any familiar faces . . . one of Nia’s friends, Nia, shit, even Dino, if he was here at this point.

Faces turned to look at this fucking narc that walked in with his nice zippered sweater with the sleeves artfully pushed up. Maybe they just watched Breakfast Television this morning. Could be big fans of books for children. Actually, the room looked like it had a lot of experience with divorce—not amicable like his book but more the kind that ended up with restraining orders.

He walked through the crowd, trying to shake the eyes following him and he weaved through, hoping now that maybe he’d gone to the wrong bar or that maybe when Nia and Rocco got here they changed their mind, Nia telling him this wasn’t her kind of place. She was used to places now that had five-star reviews and wiped down their tables at least once a day. Then, ahead, he saw them. Angie and another face he recognized, a girl from York whose name he couldn’t remember right now. This was probably the place then. His heart sank.

Their reaction struck him. It was strange and distinct. Angie and the other girl were worried when they saw him. They looked around nervously, each clutched their drink now in both hands. They put on smiles as he got closer, but they looked as fake as could be. They greeted him with soothing and cooing hiii-iiis, their eyes worried. They were covering for Nia.