Free An Ordinary Decent Criminal by Michael Van Rooy Page A

plastic bag that the catheter fed and then she danced out on the tips of her toes.
    Winnipeg had two daily papers and four local TV stations. By the time the cops decided to let me go, I had the names of five peoplewho might know something and who might talk to me. That was when the TV caught my attention again.
    “The police are not releasing the name of a local businessman who was rescued from a bizarre situation this morning . . .”
    It was a local news show, the noon report.
    “According to confidential sources, the businessman was found in the living room of his house after he had failed to show up to open his store. He had been tied into a chair and surrounded by more than a dozen containers of gasoline, which were wired to explode a device strapped to his own body. Although the police managed to rescue the man, he has so far refused to offer any explanation or indeed to help the police with their inquiries.”
    I shut the TV off. With criminals it’s always about money or power. With amateurs it’s about revenge or sex. Wiring a businessman to go boom was what? Whatever it was, wasn’t my problem, though, so I stopped thinking about it and tried to sleep.

9

    “The things you do to avoid real work.”
    Claire held my arm tightly until my balance returned and I could move again in the big park area near the hospital. From where we were, we could see the women’s hospital across the street, but I was concentrating on not falling and didn’t have time for sightseeing. Fred was rolling in the grass and trying to eat a black and white moth, all the while kicking the hell out of his stroller.
    I said, “I hate that stroller, you know that, don’t you?”
    Claire squeezed my arm. The stroller had been a gift from her parents, a very deliberate insult to me about the things I couldn’t afford for my family and for that reason I hated it. I focused on that hate until I was on level ground and Claire could let me go.
    “I know, but it does transform into four separate, useful shapes.”
    I swayed and nodded and that hurt. Actually, everything hurt. Behind me was a rolling IV stand carrying glucose that dumped into a vein buried in my right arm. I would have preferred to use my left arm but the veins there had long since been scarred into leathery armor by heroin and crystal meth and cocaine injections.
    Dr. Leung had advised against my little walk but Claire had promised I’d behave and so she watched and waited while I stood there. Fred wanted more stuff and he proceeded to look for other things he shouldn’t eat.
    “You just gonna stand there?”
    Claire grinned to take the sting out and I stuck my tongue out at her.
    “Nope. Watch.”
    It was a cross between a deep knee bend and a controlled collapse and then I raised back up.
    She clapped loudly and Fred rolled over to look for the cause of all the excitement.
    “Bravo. And for an encore?”
    “I may pee without aid or assistance.”
    She made a face at me as I sagged down again and sweat poured out to stain my gown at the throat and crotch. After I’d done six of the bends, I sat down on the ground and started to lean back and forth, covering maybe six inches of an arc per time. After ten of these, I had to stop and rest, and Claire kissed me.
    “My hero. How does it feel?”
    “Hurts.”
    My breath was coming in short gasps and there were spots in front of my eyes.
    “How?” Her voice was low and soft so I rolled myself onto a nearby bench and she kissed me again.
    “It’s knives in the small of my back. Short ones with wide blades. Never enough to kill, just to wound. They go peck-peck-peck.”
    Fred was eating a dandelion and Claire rescued the bright yellow flower and then sat back to listen. She listened brilliantly and understood and when she didn’t understand, she’d ask about specifics. When she didn’t agree, she’d wait and make her point afterwards.
    “The knives come with each breath. With each inhalation and exhalation and