Greg feels a whimper run across his chest. His feelings about the disease he has have been making ever-tightening circles around him. Not yet inside, but preventing anything from leaving. Greg lowers his head for the serenity prayer, which he pronounces sub-sonically as: “Gaw gra ma tha savanah tee ta set ah ha ah kenna shay, ah tha crash ta shay ah they aka ah tha wistah ta oh the dimffimff.”
The people who have left the meeting are gathering at the rear door of the church, smoking cigarettes and arranging groups that will leave separately and arrive together at a cafe on Queen Street. Greg is standing alone, feeling self-conscious of the fact that his Higher Power is the only one who’ll stand with him. And even then, this invisible being, dressed in black, appears to want to mingle.
On the other side of a tall hotel lobby ashtray that tilts at the edge of the asphalt, Mike is lighting April’s cigarette. April reaches across to hug him, keeping her hips back to accommodate Mike’s leading stomach. He in turn bows his back out between his shoulders to create a cave in his chest where April can store her giant breasts for the duration of the hug. They part smiling, embarrassed and thrilled by the comfort of their touching.
“How long have you been the GSR?”
“About eight months. What’s your home group?”
“Oh, I don’t have one right now, but I’m thinking of joining this one.”
“Great. Let’s go put your name in the ledger.”
“OK.”
April leads Mike back into the building and down the stairs. When they return, everyone will have left, and not wanting to go straight home on a Friday night they’ll go off together to a cafe three blocks west of where the rest of the group has already convened.
April, who has created a safer world for herself, has a test that a man must pass before she’ll spend any time with him. This test is based entirely on the spiritual principles of the program she’s adopted. Honesty. Open-mindedness. Willingness. Tolerance. Acceptance. He must also be able to care for himself completely. She is watching Mike for this now.
Mike carries himself like a gallant caricature of kindness. He makes amends to women whenever God will let him, swooping open doors and laying out well-defined compliments. He listens carefully and smiles apologetically at his own compulsion to solve their problems. He might be the kind of Mr. Right that April has been looking for.
When April and Mike move in together she will teach him the real thrill of lifelong romance, its enduring pyjama party of dirty thoughts. The delicate gift, the body as an object. But first he must prove that he can be, and not be, her sister.
Greg is standing alone near the top of an alley that runs behind a highrise apartment. Alone. Alone except for a Higher Power who stands under a streetlight, impatient now for his young charge to surrender his increasingly bizarre will. The Higher Power knows that this is a dangerous time for Greg. He has a strange new disease and nobody knows for sure how or when it will manifest itself. The Higher Power leans into the dark and, covering his mouth, shout-whispers: “Greg! Greg! Come on, let’s go have a coffee! Greg!”
But Greg disappears into the dark of the alley. He’s heard something and he’s going to investigate. The noise, coming from behind a dumpster at the far end of the garbage-strewn alley, is human in origin. A crying growl, a scraping sound. Greg stops halfway. Behind him three cars pass noisily by the entranceway and their warm triple swoosh pulls Greg cautiously back a couple of steps. He is frightened by the slurps and rustles he hears coming out from under the dumpster.
“Greg! Greg! Come on! Get out of there! Greg!”
The Higher Power feels a little slighted in being ignored.
Greg is standing pinned against the wall, facing the back of the dumpster. The Higher Power is prepared to be forceful. To launch him toward the street by his collar. He reaches out, holding two fingers over Greg’s shoulder, and he looks over his back. He blinks once at what he sees, freezes for a second and then bolts up the alley and turns the corner at full tilt.
A face is a marvellous thing for those who possess it. It is really the only thing that distinguishes us. Not quite enough to recommend us, just a trickster feature of our anatomy that makes everyone appear famous. But still, the face is beautiful. A sensitive sign of obscure integration. And every once in a while that integration is challenged.
