Tales from the Bottom of My Sole Read online

  TALES FROM

  THE BOTTOM

  OF MY SOLE

  Essential Prose Series 182

  Guernica Editions Inc. acknowledges the support of the Canada Council

  for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council. The Ontario Arts Council

  is an agency of the Government of Ontario.

  We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada.

  TALES FROM

  THE BOTTOM

  OF MY SOLE

  DAVID KINGSTON YEH

  TORONTO • BUFFALO • LANCASTER (U.K.)

  2020

  Copyright © 2020, David Kingston Yeh and Guernica Editions Inc.

  All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication,

  reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic,

  mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise stored

  in a retrieval system, without the prior consent

  of the publisher is an infringement of the copyright law.

  Michael Mirolla, general editor

  Lindsay Brown, editor

  David Moratto, interior and cover design

  Guernica Editions Inc.

  287 Templemead Drive, Hamilton, ON L8W 2W4

  2250 Military Road, Tonawanda, N.Y. 14150-6000 U.S.A.

  www.guernicaeditions.com

  Distributors:

  Independent Publishers Group (IPG)

  600 North Pulaski Road, Chicago IL 60624

  University of Toronto Press Distribution,

  5201 Dufferin Street, Toronto (ON), Canada M3H 5T8

  Gazelle Book Services, White Cross Mills

  High Town, Lancaster LA1 4XS U.K.

  First edition.

  Printed in Canada.

  Legal Deposit—Third Quarter

  Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2019949232

  Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

  Title: Tales from the bottom of my sole / David Kingston Yeh.

  Names: Yeh, David Kingston, author.

  Series: Essential prose series ; 182

  Description: Series statement: Essential prose series ; 182

  Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20190175990 | Canadiana (ebook)

  20190176008 | ISBN 9781771835411 (softcover) | ISBN

  9781771835428 (EPUB) | ISBN 9781771835435 (Kindle)

  Classification: LCC PS8647.E47 T35 2020 | DDC C813/.6—dc23

  For my family and my friends

  No need to hurry. No need to sparkle.

  No need to be anybody but oneself.

  —Virginia Woolf

  CONTENTS

  PART I

  CHAPTER ONE

  Somewhere Down the Crazy River

  CHAPTER TWO

  The Limit to Your Love

  CHAPTER THREE

  Magic Carpet Ride

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Lovers in a Dangerous Time

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The Spirit of Radio

  CHAPTER SIX

  The Grand Optimist

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Where Have All the Good People Gone?

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet

  PART II

  CHAPTER NINE

  Miasmal Smoke & The Yellow-Bellied Freaks

  CHAPTER TEN

  Superman is Dead

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Taking Care of Business

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Queen of the Broken Hearts

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Wondering Where the Lions Are

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  I Will Give You Everything

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Life is a Carnival

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Boy Inside the Man

  EPILOGUE

  Golden Hour

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  PART I

  CHAPTER ONE

  Somewhere Down the Crazy River

  Christmas Eve. The one-year anniversary of Grandma’s death. My brothers Pat and Liam and I were coming back from the farmhouse of a tattoo artist named Denis out on Old Highway 69. Denis worked by appointment only and had a five-week waiting list. In October, Pat had booked us three sessions back-to-back. The story was we’d be gone the whole day volunteering with Conservation Sudbury, fixing up the boardwalk on Ramsey Lake. Pat did the fast-talking; Liam and I were never much good at pulling one over on Grandpa. This was also my first tattoo.

  “Yah, Denis and I go way back,” Pat said during the drive home. “Check this out.” In the backseat, he unzipped and pulled his pants down low over one hip.

  “What,” I asked, “is that?”

  “This,” he said, beaming, “is a rocket ship.”

  “Denis did that?”

  “Yeppers.”

  “It’s upside-down.”

  “I’ve got another one on the other side.”

  “Why, Pat, do you have two rocket ships tattooed on your hips?”

  Pat arched his back and pulled up his jeans. “Because Blonde Dawn calls me her space cowboy? Because she’s got these shooting stars all around her waist and we figured I’d get something to match?”

  Once I asked Blonde Dawn how many tattoos she had. She said that if you counted her sleeves as one piece each, then under a dozen. Pat’s second tattoo had been Blonde Dawn’s name over his heart.

  “Trust me,” Pat said, crowding forward between Liam and me so he could change the radio station, “I’m just getting started.”

  Sloan was singing about the good in everyone when Liam pulled into our drive, parking his Jeep next to Grandpa’s pick-up. The front curtains were open and the Christmas tree inside all lit up. Gingerly, I checked the sterile bandage on my upper arm. When it came to Liam’s turn, he’d said he wanted it done on his chest. Pat got his behind his shoulder. “So she can always watch over me,” he explained.

  “David’s here,” Liam said.

  “What?”

  Liam stood with his hands on his hips and pointed at tracks in the snow. “That’s a taxi. Those are a man’s size nine-and-a-half prints. Here’s where he knelt to pet Jackson.”

  “Seriously?”

  Betty stuck her head out the front door, wearing a reindeer sweater and a gold-frosted crimson bouffant. “Hello boys!” She raised a martini glass garnished with a candy cane. “Welcome back.” She leaned forward conspiratorially. “So, how’d it go?”

  “Sugar crispy.” Pat grinned. “Where’s Grandpa?”

  “In the kitchen.”

  “Does he suspect anything?” I asked.

  Betty winked and shook her head. “Come on in, wash up. Dinner’s almost ready. Oh and by the way, Daniel, you have a visitor.”

  We’d officially met Grandpa’s lady friend Betty back in September up at the Good Medicine Cabin. But the truth was we’d known her for years as the head nurse at Grandma’s nursing home.

  Inside, the rich aromas of cinnamon and cloves, pine and meat pies filled the house. In the kitchen, David and Grandpa were wearing aprons, wrapping freshly-baked tourtières. There must’ve been a dozen already stacked on the counter.

  “David,” I said from the doorway, “what are you doing here?”

  “Hey.” He was wearing a Santa hat and had flour on his nose. “Your grandpa invited me.”

  “Surprise!” Grandpa said, clapping David on the shoulder.

  David was supposed to be spending the holidays with his family in Toronto.

  “When did you get here?” I asked.

  “This afternoon.”

  “What about your mom?”

  “I’ll catch a bus back tomo
rrow morning.”

  “What about Midnight Mass?”

  “She’s got company. My aunts are visiting from Palermo, remember? Trust me, it’s all good. I’ll spend the whole day with them tomorrow.”

  “You’re sure about this?”

  “I’m here, aren’t I?”

  “Holy shit.”

  “So?” He raised and dropped his arms. “Do I get a hug or what?”

  I crossed the kitchen and gave David a bear hug. “I can’t believe you’re here.”

  “What are boyfriends for?” Grandpa said, elbowing me in the side.

  “Thanks for coming.”

  “Thank your grandpa. He paid for my ticket.” David whispered in my ear: “I love you.”

  Later that evening, after Grandpa and Betty had retired for the night, Liam, Pat and David stepped out back for a smoke. I stayed behind to tidy up and wait for my best friend Karen whose adoptive parents, the Miltons, lived just across the street. Near midnight, wearing a fuzzy toque with a skull-and-crossbones pattern and a ginormous pompom, she let herself in the front door, stamping the snow off her boots.

  “Where’s Anne?”

  Karen tossed her ski jacket onto Grandpa’s deer antler coat rack. “She went out back.”

  “They’re smoking up.”

  “Why do you think she’s out back?”

  “Okay.” It was time I stopped thinking of Karen’s sister as a little kid. Anne was nineteen. “Okay. You want a drink?”

  “No thanks.” Native artwork decorated Karen’s T-shirt: abstract, Picasso-like figures. She brushed tinsel and playing cards off the living room couch and plopped down next to me, pulling a dented flask out of her snow pants. “You want a drink?”

  “Sure.” I took a swig.

  “Fireball,” Karen said.

  I coughed, nearly choking, and took a second swig before handing it back. “That’s a cool shirt.”

  “Thanks. My aunt’s friend Daphne did this.”

  The backdoor banged opened and the others trooped into the living room. Jackson thrashed his bushy tail, licking Karen’s face and clambered up next to her.

  “Hey, Anne,” I said.

  Anne waved. “Hey.” When she was little, she’d started wearing her hair short and looked just like a boy. Now, her hair was still buzzed short, but she wore expertly applied mascara and her nails were painted emerald and electric blue. The last four months at the Ontario College of Art and Design had changed her.

  “Okay, let’s see ‘em,” Karen said. Anne perched crossed-legged on the patched arm of the couch. David slid down to the rug at Karen’s feet.

  Liam, Pat and I exchanged glances. Taking off my flannel shirt, I rolled up the sleeve of my tee and carefully peeled away the square bandage on my arm.

  “Wow.” Karen sat up. “Definitely.”

  “You like?”

  “It’s beautiful,” Anne said.

  “It’s big,” Karen said.

  “It had to be,” Pat said, “to get all the details in.” David whistled. “Nice work.”

  “Swelling’s gone down,” Liam said.

  “It looks just like her,” Anne said, eyes wide, chewing on her lip ring.

  “Denis is an artiste,” Pat said. “My man knows what he’s doing.”

  “So, let’s see all of them,” Karen said. Obligingly, Pat yanked his shirt off over his head and Liam did the same. We crowded into each other, lining up our new tattoos side-by-side. Anne glanced up the stairwell. “You sure your grandpa’s sleeping?”

  “I wouldn’t say Pépère’s sleeping,” Liam said. “But they’re not coming back down.”

  “I gotta get a picture of this,” Karen said. “Hold on, don’t move.”

  As a surprise gift to Grandpa this year, the three of us had gotten matching tattoos of our grandma, Josette Garneau. It hadn’t taken long to agree on the image we’d use: a photo of her taken just after they’d gotten married. In the end, they’d stayed married fifty-nine years. Denis had done a bang-up job. He’d gotten her dimples just right, and the beauty mark on her cheek. Back in the day, Grandma had been a glamorous gal. She always had the look of a Hollywood starlet.

  Karen had her phone out and was lining up a group shot. “These are awesome, guys.”

  “Merry Christmas!” Pat said over his shoulder. “It’s midnight. It’s Christmas.”

  “What about Betty?” Anne asked. “What will she think of this?”

  “This,” Liam said, “was Betty’s idea.”

  The flash went off. “Oh sweet Mother Earth,” Karen said, studying the image on her phone, “your grandpa is so totally going to absolutely love this.”

  And he did.

  New Year’s Eve, Pat drove me back into Toronto. My tattoo was starting to itch and peel. Pat assured me that was normal and told me to make sure I kept it clean. He insisted on dropping me off downtown before heading back out to the airport to pick up Blonde Dawn. At Spadina and Dundas, he leaned out the driver’s window and gave me a high five. “See ya tonight!” Their band Three Dog Run was playing at Graffiti’s down the street and David and I had promised to attend.

  Shouldering my backpack, I headed into Kensington Market. It was late in the afternoon, and the ramshackle neighbourhood was bustling with last-minute shoppers searching for that special sequined choker or one-of-a-kind velvet jacket. Vintage clothing stores lined Kensington Avenue with names like Courage My Love, The Fairies Pyjamas and Eye of Shiva. Crowded cafés and eateries offered everything from Tibetan dumplings and Jamaican patties to samosas and Salvadoran pupusas with generous portions of spicy curtido on the side.

  I paused in front of the window display of Orbital Arts where luminous buddhas, Eyes of Horus, angels and Indian gods decorated refurbished furniture. Inside, two coiffed boys in skinny jeans held hands, admiring a crystal paperweight. It occurred to me that, when I was their age, I was still closeted in Sudbury, sporting a mullet, and jacking off to secret fantasies about my assistant hockey coach, Stephan Tondeur.

  Turning down a shovelled alleyway, I keyed into my building. Someone had freshly Febrezed the lobby in an attempt to cover up the odour of mouldy carpeting and wet dog. Our building manager Rick stomped down the stairwell hefting a monkey wrench in his hairy paw, looking even more pissed-off than usual. When I asked him what was up, he told me the water heater was down again and he was working on it. I turned sideways to let him pass and called out politely: “Good luck.”

  At the top landing, David was waiting for me. “Happy New Year’s Eve, mister.”

  I slung my pack off my shoulders. “Happy New Year’s Eve.” There was a funny look on David’s face. I gave him a hug and stood back. “What’s wrong?”

  “It’s good to see you.”

  “Okay.”

  “My sister’s here.”

  “Your sister? Alright. Is she here right now?” He nodded. “Is everything okay?”

  “No, not really.”

  In the two years I’d known David, I’d yet to meet his sister. All I knew was that, when she was seventeen and David was twelve, she’d run away from home, and that I had strict instructions to avoid mentioning her in front of David’s mom. “Lucy, right?”

  “Well ...”

  Behind him, a slim, angular guy stepped out of our loft. He was barefoot, wearing a pair of David’s old jeans and towel-drying his hair, with a scruffy goatee and a thin dusting of hair on his narrow chest.

  For one second, a sharp knot of confusion and jealousy tightened in my throat.

  “Hey, you must be Daniel.” His voice was a scratchy tenor pitched slightly higher than David’s. He slung the towel over his shoulder. “I’ve heard a lot about you. I’m Luke.” I stared at his outstretched hand, and then at the horizontal scars just below his nipples. Still, it took me another second to put all the pieces together.

  “Luke.” I cleared my throat. “Pleased to meet you.” His grip was firm, his eyes big and steely grey, just like David’s. The resemblance was uncanny. I co
uldn’t help but notice he also had a six-pack.

  “You two have special plans?” he asked, looking from one of us to the other.

  “Plans?”

  “New Year’s Eve?”

  “Ah. My brother’s band is playing tonight,” I said, “just a couple blocks from here.”

  “Sounds like fun.” Luke tousled David’s hair. “Hey, thanks for the clothes, kiddo. I’ll be out of your way in a minute.” He winked and disappeared back inside.

  “Luke?”

  David leaned back against the wall. “She was Luciana, growing up.”

  “Whoa.”

  “The last time I saw her was three years ago. I’m sorry, I had no idea she was coming by.”

  “You always said you had an older sister.”

  “Half-sister. Look, this is all new to me.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean,” David said, “I just found out.”

  “You mean about Luke?”

  “She’s never said anything to me about this.”

  “Shouldn’t you, like, be using ‘he’ and ‘him’?”

  “Sure. Easy enough for you to say. You didn’t grow up with her. Him. Lucy, Luke. Whatever.”

  “No, I didn’t. Where’s he been?”

  “Out west, Vancouver mostly. Working in some boxing gym.”

  “How long has he been gone?”

  “Twelve years. I wouldn’t hear from her for months at a time. When I did, she’d usually be hitting me up for money.”

  “You really had no idea?”

  “Daniel, I just found out like two friggin’ hours ago, okay? She calls me this morning, says she’s coming into town and asks if she can drop by and take a shower and borrow some clothes.”

  “Whoa, okay. Relax.”

  David paced the hallway. “And she wanted to pay me back.”

  “For what?”

  “Like I said, she’d borrowed a lot of money from me over the years.”

  “How much?”

  “Apparently, four thousand dollars.”

  “Holy shit.”