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  Betty Spooner hadn’t kept up to date on allergies in kids because on my second week there, she served PB&J sandwiches for lunch. I took a couple of bites and, lucky for me, Betty happened to glance up from the soap opera she was watching on the little black-and-white TV she kept in the kitchen and noticed I was swelling up like a puffer fish. She called 911 and then my mom. At the hospital, the doctor told my mom that I had a severe allergy to peanuts and that if I ever ate one again, the reaction could be even worse. That’s when I got the EpiPen and my very own MedicAlert bracelet, which I used to think was cool but which I now hate.

  Anyway, I didn’t go back to Betty Spooner’s. I heard my mom screaming at her on the phone that night and calling her a half-wit, which, in retrospect, wasn’t very fair. Betty didn’t know any better, but my mom is – well, that’s my mom. After that, she didn’t want anyone else to look after me, so she quit her teaching job and stayed home with me full-time until I started school.

  But even when she was looking after me full-time, my mom still didn’t feel I was safe. I have a vivid memory of going to the playground near our apartment, the one with the rusty red monkey bars, and an old man was sitting on a bench, feeding peanuts in their shells to the squirrels. I picked up a shell and almost put it in my mouth. Mom whacked it out of my hand just in time, then she lectured the old man about peanut allergies, and he wound up calling her a puta (which I found out much later means ‘prostitute’. Which she isn’t. She doesn’t even date).

  After that, she bought me one of those kid-harnesses, which I had to wear wherever we went. I still remember running down the street, or through a mall, and being yanked gently back when I ran out of leash. I also remember Mom getting into arguments with strangers who thought putting a kid on a leash was cruel. When that happened, I’d pretend I was a dog and bark, and that usually made them go away. Once I even licked my mom’s hand, but she didn’t like that very much.

  Nana Ruth, who still visited us a lot in those days, couldn’t stand to see me wear the harness. She and Mom had heated arguments about it when they thought I was asleep.

  ‘It’s not right, Irene. I know you want to protect him, but this is going too far.’

  ‘Get off my back, Mom, please. I’m just trying to keep him safe.’

  I loved Nana Ruth, with her powdery white hair and her brightly colored tracksuits, but I also loved my mom, and hearing them fight made my stomach hurt.

  Nana Ruth didn’t win that argument. I kept wearing the leash.

  Right up to kindergarten.

  But in case I’m painting my mom to be a nutcase, she isn’t. At least, not so much.

  In fact, she was this close to being a normal mom, and we were this close to being a normal family, with two parents and me, and who knows? Maybe a brother or a sister, or at least a pet.

  My mom and dad really loved each other. He was a handsome, tanned Australian who had come to Canada on a work visa. He’d headed straight to Banff to work as a ski instructor and he only meant to stay a year. My mom was a tiny thing, with long brown hair pulled back in a ponytail, and she wore granny glasses, which made her look serious and older than her twenty-five years. She had just finished getting her Ph.D. in English literature at the University of Calgary, where she’d written a thesis called ‘The Effects of an Isolated Upbringing on the Imaginations of the Brontë Sisters.’ It got published in a journal somewhere, even though (no offense to my mom intended) it didn’t exactly sound like a page-turner.

  She had gone to Banff for a week with a girlfriend to blow off steam and celebrate, and she met my dad one night at a pub. According to my mom, he shouldn’t have been her type at all. ‘I was all brains, he was all brawn.’ She would smile when I asked her to recount the story, which I did quite often.

  And yet, they fell head over heels in love. Within months, my dad moved to Calgary, and soon afterward they got married. They rented a bungalow just three blocks from Nana Ruth’s apartment. Mom got a full-time job at the university, teaching English literature, and she was hoping to get tenure in a couple of years. As far as I can understand, tenure basically means you have a job for life. Dad found lots of work in construction.

  Two years later, my mom got pregnant. According to my mom, my dad would talk to me every night and I would ‘answer’ with little kicks.

  When she was seven months pregnant, Mom got a call from Dad’s foreman. Dad had collapsed on the job. Just like that – keeled over. He was taken away by an ambulance. Mom drove as fast as she could to the hospital, but by the time she got there, he was DOA.

  Dead on Arrival.

  Apparently he was already dead on departure too … dead when he hit the ground. All that time, my dad had had an aneurism (seminar, surname, armies, marines, manure, remains) in his brain, a little blood vessel that had been slowly swelling like a balloon. That day it just burst.

  So I never met my dad, or any of his side of the family for that matter. His parents died when he was young. He had an older brother back in Australia, but I guess he and my mom lost touch because we never hear from him.

  I have lots of pictures of my dad, almost all of them taken by my mom. Mom will talk about him, but only when I ask. Nana Ruth will talk to me about him too, but since we moved to Edmonton, Alberta, when I was two; then to Regina, Saskatchewan, when I was five; then to Kelowna, B.C., when I was nine; then to Vancouver this summer, right after I turned twelve, I have only seen her a handful of times. She has come to visit us, but, at most, once a year because she doesn’t like to fly.

  Last time Nana Ruth visited, we were still in Kelowna, where Mom was a sessional lecturer at U.B.C. Okanagan. I heard them arguing on her last night there.

  ‘Irene, enough is enough,’ Nana Ruth said. ‘You have got to move on with your life and stop living in the past.’ Then Mom told her she was moving on with her life, that she was doing the best she could, and she was sick of Nana judging her all the time.

  So, I don’t know. Maybe that’s another reason why Nana Ruth doesn’t visit anymore.

  From little things I have heard and little clues I have picked up, I suspect my mom was quite a different person when Dad was alive. But I have only ever known her A.D.D. – After Dad’s Death. This is the only version of her I’m acquainted with, and it’s a version that I love very much.

  I also know that she loves me like crazy. So I can’t really imagine what it must have been like for her when she got the phone call this time. Because hearing ‘Your son is in hospital’ must have sounded a lot like ‘Your husband is in hospital.’

  And we all know how that turned out.

  4

  ERABMSO

  somber, bream, sober, bare, bear, bore, robes, smear, some

  AMBROSE

  THAT’S HOW I got my name. Ambrose. It was my dad’s name. It comes from the Greek ‘Ambrotos’ and means ‘divine, immortal one.’ I pointed out the irony of that to my mother once. I said, ‘Kind of funny, isn’t it, seeing as Dad clearly wasn’t. Immortal, that is.’

  Mom didn’t think it was funny at all.

  5

  PXSDEOE

  pox, dope, pod, deep, sex, pee, does, do, posed

  EXPOSED

  ‘YOU COULD HAVE killed him.’

  My mom’s voice was calm, but in a creepy, just-barely kind of way. She was wearing her best suit, the navy blue one that she’d bought at Goodwill when we lived in Regina. It had gold buttons on the jacket and made her look classy and businesslike all at once. I sat beside her in a straight-backed chair, and because I’d wanted to look businesslike too, I’d worn my brown pants (which were a little tight in the crotch) and a blue-and-white striped button-up shirt that I’d found at Value Village. It was two sizes too big, but it still looked good.

  Troy, Mike, and Josh sat opposite us, all squished together on the principal’s couch, which was old and plaid and gave off a funny smell. They hadn’t made any effort to dress up. In between us, at his desk, sat our principal, Mr Acheson. He had the look of a g
uy who’d been a jock in his day, but now he was kind of flabby and almost bald. He was wearing one of his famous ties (the one with the dancing frogs). I think he hoped the ties would make the kids like him better.

  They didn’t.

  I’d been released from hospital the day before. Other than still feeling a bit shaky, I was physically OK. But mentally, I was a wreck.

  ‘It was supposed to be a joke,’ said Troy, gazing at me with his tiny eyes like he wanted to squash me.

  My mom stiffened. ‘A joke. So, your idea of humor is to risk a friend’s life.’

  ‘It was an accident,’ Mike interjected, but Mom just stared daggers at him.

  ‘An accident?’ Her voice was rising. ‘You three deliberately put a peanut in my son’s sandwich, knowing that he had a deadly peanut allergy. What kind of heartless half-wits—’

  ‘Please, Ms Bukowski, calm down,’ the principal said.

  ‘Mrs Bukowski,’ Mom replied. ‘And calm down? My son was almost killed and you’re asking me to f—ing calm down?’

  Oh, man. I’d been keeping my fingers crossed that Mom wouldn’t get to the foulmouthed trucker stage.

  ‘I could file criminal charges against these three punks: assault causing bodily harm, willful malice—’

  ‘Ms Bukowski,’ the principal said firmly.

  ‘Mrs Bukowski.’

  ‘If you’re going to make threats like that, I’ll have to call the boys’ parents as well as the school board superintendent.’

  Mom actually shut up. There was an uneasy silence for a moment.

  ‘Boys, what do you have to say for yourselves?’ asked Mr Acheson.

  ‘We thought he was exaggerating,’ Josh said.

  ‘Yeah, how could we know he was serious?’ Mike added.

  ‘Because he’s your friend!’ Mom shouted.

  Troy snorted. I sank a little further into my seat.

  Mom stared at him. ‘What was that?’

  ‘Nothing,’ Troy mumbled.

  ‘No, I’d like to know.’

  ‘He’s not our friend,’ Troy said.

  Mom shook her head. ‘If he’s not your friend, then why did you invite him to your birthday party?’

  Like I said. Poop. Fan. Kapooey.

  Troy blinked, confused. ‘My birthday’s not till March.’

  Mom looked at me, but I pretended I’d just found something really interesting on my Ikes.

  ‘See? He’s a big fat liar,’ Mike said.

  ‘Now, boys—’ Mr Acheson began.

  ‘He told us his family was loaded and the only reason he went to a public school was because his parents wanted him to mix with regular kids,’ said Troy.

  ‘He told us you spent your weekends up at Whistler, in your chalet,’ Josh added.

  Mike said, ‘But it didn’t make sense, the way he dresses and all …’

  ‘Weird purple pants and fake Nikes.’

  ‘Yeah, if he has so much money, why does he walk around with a hot pink fanny pack?’

  OK, so I’d experimented with the truth. But being honest about myself hadn’t exactly worked for me at my other schools, so I’d decided to try something new this time.

  ‘We thought the peanut thing was another lie,’ said Troy. ‘You know, another way of trying to get our attention. We wanted to make a point, I guess.’

  My mom was speechless. I could feel her looking at me, but I kept staring at my shoes, like I was willing an N to appear.

  Mr Acheson finally filled the silence. ‘Ms … Mrs … Bukowski. This was a terribly unfortunate event, and we are deeply sorry for the pain it’s caused. The boys have each received a severe reprimand and their parents have been informed. They’re also on lunchroom clean-up for a month. They know that if anything like this, or even close to this, ever happens again, they will be suspended. But after hearing what the boys have to say, I don’t see what more we can do.’

  I waited for the next round of swears to come spewing out of my mom’s mouth. But instead, she just stood up. ‘Thank you for your time,’ she said, brushing a strand of hair off her face.

  Then she walked out.

  Without me.

  I sat there for a moment, not sure what to do. Finally I said, ‘No hard feelings on my part, dudes.’ I aimed for a casual smile, but they stared at me like I was a total idiot. Even Mr Acheson looked embarrassed for me.

  So I stood up, deciding I could at least walk out with my head held high, but I guess my leg had fallen asleep because it gave out from under me and I almost fell. I caught myself on the edge of Mr Acheson’s desk, spilling his pencil holder. I started to gather up the pencils, but he said – rather sharply, I thought – ‘Just leave it.’

  So I walked out of the office, dragging my sleeping leg behind me. And feeling like the biggest loser in the world.

  6

  PHAUPYN

  nap, nappy, pun, puny, up, ha, pan, pay, hay

  UNHAPPY

  I HAD TO practically run to keep up with my mother as we headed back to our place, which wasn’t easy because my leg was still numb. Fortunately, we lived only three blocks from the school, so it didn’t take long to get to our house.

  Well, our basement. We rent the basement suite in a house in Kitsilano, a neighborhood on the west side of Vancouver, right on the bus route to Mom’s work.

  We moved here for my mom’s new job. She’s what’s called a sessional lecturer at the University of British Columbia. It means she teaches a bunch of courses on contract, but she’s not really an employee. It’s the same job she’s had in all the other places we’ve lived. Every time she hopes she’ll be hired full-time, and every time it doesn’t happen.

  I like our new neighborhood. We’re on West 7th Ave., a two-minute walk to all the shops on Broadway and a twenty-minute walk to Jericho Beach, one of the most beautiful parks I’ve ever seen. We walked down there the day after we moved here, and it was the first time I’d ever set eyes on the Pacific Ocean, or any ocean, come to think of it.

  The house we live in is owned by Mr and Mrs Economopoulos, a friendly Greek couple who live upstairs. They didn’t call our place a basement in the ad; they called it a ‘garden suite’. Mom kind of took them to task for that when we looked at the place, but they still rented it to us. Actually (and without meaning to brag), I think they rented it to us because of me. Mrs Economopoulos, who is plump and smells like fresh-baked bread and wears shapeless dresses with flesh-colored nylons that stop at the knee, pinched my cheeks a lot that day and kept saying I reminded her of her youngest son, Cosmo, when he was my age.

  ‘He was beautiful boy,’ she said. Then her eyes filled with tears and she pinched my cheeks again and she told my mom she could have the place if she wanted it and she would even knock fifty bucks off the rent.

  I like their house. It’s white stucco and surrounded by a low, wrought-iron fence. The front yard has a bird-bath in the middle of a big flower garden, which Mrs E says will be full of roses in the spring. The backyard is even bigger, and a third of it is full of Mr E’s tomato plants, protected by a huge plastic tarp. They also have a big deck off the kitchen, where Mr E barbecues in all kinds of weather.

  The door to our place is at the side of the house, and we have our own sidewalk to lead us there.

  Our basement suite isn’t as big as our place was in Kelowna, or as sunny as our place in Regina, but, as Mom points out, rents were cheaper there so we could get more for our money. It’s got two bedrooms, a combination living-room/kitchen, and a big bathroom. Mom has covered the living room walls with her photographs. She used to be quite into photography when Dad was alive, and her pictures, mostly of trees and flowers and beaches, have made all of our apartments feel more like home.

  All in all, it’s a fine place, and so far it’s only flooded once. When that happened, the Economopouloses were really nice about getting it cleaned up for us, and we even spent a couple of nights in their spare bedroom. This was fun because, on the first night, Mrs Economopoulos made us an eno
rmous Greek dinner, with souvlaki and moussaka and even that cheese that you light on fire. And once Mom had made her swear on her statuette of the Virgin Mary that there were no peanuts in anything, I was allowed to stuff my face. Man, was it delicious, and no offense to my mother, but Mrs E is a way better cook. Mr and Mrs E told us a lot of stories about growing up in Greece and about the bakery they used to run, until they both retired last year. Mrs E translated for Mr E, who still doesn’t speak much English even though he’s lived here for over thirty years. It was really fun. As weird as it sounds, it almost felt more like home than home.

  The only not-so-nice part in the evening was when the grown-ups were drinking coffee in the living room after supper. Mr E sat in his favorite chair, a big leather La-Z-Boy. Mrs E and I sat on the couch, which had a clear plastic cover on it and made fart sounds every time anyone moved. Mom was standing up and studying a wall full of framed photos of their kids. ‘You have three children?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes. Vivian, she’s the eldest, she’s twenty-eight, married to a doctor,’ Mrs E said, beaming with pride, then pointed at her feet. ‘Podiatrist. He makes a lot of money doing the feet. Nick, he’s the middle child, he’s twenty-six and working very hard selling cars. He’s a very good boy.’

  ‘BMW and Lexus,’ Mr E added.

  There was silence for a moment, then Mom asked, ‘And your youngest?’

  ‘Cosmo,’ said Mrs E, and suddenly her eyes were filled with tears like they were on the day she pinched my cheeks, and Mr E started talking loudly in Greek.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ my mom said. ‘I didn’t mean to upset you.’