Free Mennonites Don't Dance by Darcie Friesen Hossack Page A

she’s tired from the bus.” Ani tried to sound cheerful but wanted to tell him she didn’t think Caroline wanted to be friends. While she tried to think of what else to say, he let go of her hand and turned away towards another conversation. Ani slipped through the guests and didn’t see Clive again until he and her mother returned from their honeymoon in Saskatoon.
    When they came home early one morning, Ani and the aunt who had stayed with her met them at the door. Clive’s face creased but he didn’t smile the way he used to. He handed her a gold-coloured pen with a digital clock beside the pocket clip, the kind of pen a salesman might carry.
    â€œHe just doesn’t know what girls your age like,” her mother said quietly when he had left the room. Ani thought of the hair combs and knew it wasn’t true. “I didn’t want to discourage him by saying so. Maybe you can go thank him, and then you and I can run out to the Dairy Queen later to get treats for all of us.”
    That same day Ani and her mother moved into Clive’s apartment. Ani’s new bedroom had red carpeting and, after a few days, pink-painted walls. She and her mother had gone to the hardware store across the street together and picked out the colour. They rolled it over the existing wallpaper while Clive was downstairs at the butcher shop. The paint covered up the colours in the paper, but hadn’t been able to disguise the little embossed girls carrying baskets of flowers. They were still there as shadows in the paint.
    Later, while Ani’s mother was shopping for supper, Clive came upstairs and found Ani sitting in her room, admiring the fresh pink.
    â€œCaroline chose that wallpaper,” Clive said slowly. He crossed his arms. “I put it up for her. Damn it, kid.” He turned his back to her and left the room. He closed the door behind him, tightly. An hour later, Ani still didn’t know whether she should come out.
    After supper though, Ani found Clive looking through the pages of his family picture albums. She went into her room, dug through a box and found one of her own. She brought it to the living room and sat next to Clive on the couch.
    In her stepfather’s pictures, Caroline was often seen dabbing a paintbrush on a canvas in the room that used to be hers and was clean and tidy for every picture. Ani’s pictures were mostly of her in rubber boots, tromping through her grandfather’s barn, or in the kitchen with a careless mess of flour and batter spilled on the counter.
    â€œI’m sorry,” Ani said, although she still didn’t understand why he was so upset with her.
    Clive pointed to a picture of Caroline in which nothing around her was out of place. “I think we’ll make putting things away a rule around here, eh, kiddo?” He clapped her on the shoulder, as though they’d thought of a good plan together. “Everyone does their part so the place doesn’t go to hell in our sleep?” He laughed and Ani tried to laugh, too, as if there was something funny about what he’d said. Afterwards, she took her photo album back to her room.
    A few days later Ani came home from school to find her favourite doll, Susie, stuffed in the kitchen garbage and Clive sitting across at the table. He’d been waiting for her.
    â€œWhy do you think I did that?” he said.
    Ani licked her lips and pressed them together. Blood was rushing through her ears.
    â€œI don’t know,” she said.
    â€œWhere did you leave it this morning?”
    â€œIn the kitchen? Next to my cereal bowl?” It was a guess, but she hoped if she guessed right, he’d let her have her doll back.
    â€œRight. You left the bowl for your mother or me to clean up, and you and I both know that you know better than that.”
    â€œBut, she — ” Ani gestured at the doll, its dress already dirtied with potato peelings and wet coffee grounds.