Free For Joshua by Richard Wagamese Page B

was that I kept my mouth shut, did as they did, and didn’t cause anyone else any trouble. If I could abide by these rules I was welcomed as just another part of the crew. I loved that feeling. After all the years of being burdened by shame and hurt, simple acceptance into a circle of people was like magic. I didn’t want to be anywhere else. So I learned very quickly to choose what everyone around me was choosing and to be like they were. I grew my hair out, smoked, and behaved as much like a rebel as everyone else.
    But I was never hard, never cold inside, never truly bitter at the world, society or people. I was just a scared littleboy, still play-acting. I desperately wanted a home for myself, a refuge, a warm place filled with light. Every day we rebels would meet at the pavilion in Montebello Park in downtown St. Catharines. Joints and bottles would be passed around, conjuring up a lot of loud talk, play fighting and flirting with the young teenage girls who always seemed to be hanging around. Sometimes there would be a “job” planned, either a break-and-enter or robbery or even an occasional act of revenge for some perceived slight against the dignity of the “downtowners,” as we were called. There was a car gang called the Night Stalkers who were our sworn enemies and a lot of energy went into planning “gags” on them. A gag was a spray painting or a tire slashing or something like that. I joined in on those talks and spoke as loudly and raucously as I could, but I always craved something more. I couldn’t have told anyone what “more” was, but there was an emptiness that no amount of devil-may-care camaraderie could ease.
    So I would sneak away. I would sneak off to the library and spend hours reading books. Reading always filled that emptiness for me and so I became voracious. I read history, geography, politics, architecture, astronomy, anthropology, sociology, fiction, poetry, and books on art, film, and music. There was a listening room there, and I would sit and listen to classical music and be lifted right out of that city. I filledmyself with the world in those stacks and then I went back to my buddies in the park and lied.
    I would tell them I’d been partying somewhere or passed out from too much dope, sex, and rock and roll. Sometimes I would visit members of the congregation of my parents’ church to borrow money and I’d flash those bills around and tell my pals that I’d been off pulling a job. I told them anything that would fit the lifestyle because I couldn’t tell them the truth. I couldn’t tell them that passages of prose, or the quality of light captured in a photograph or painting, or the languid ache in a passage of symphonic music could set off lights in my belly and fill the emptiness there with a warmth I’d never known before. I couldn’t tell them that there were ideas in the writings of great men and women that led me to a deeper world. I couldn’t tell them how alive the essence of knowledge made me feel because it wasn’t what being a rebel was all about.
    I learned to keep my joys as private as my pain.
    As I look back on that period of my life I see I was sad. I was sad because I didn’t know that there was so much more that I could experience beyond the books. I thought I was stuck in Montebello Park. I believed that I deserved none of the things I was finding on the library shelves. I didn’t know that the qualities of curiosity and examination were hugeparts of the person I really was. I couldn’t accept that because I couldn’t accept myself. I needed other people’s acceptance first and so I kept my refuge in the stacks a secret from everybody so that it wouldn’t endanger the first outright acceptance I had ever found.
    The second thing I found was alcohol.
    I found drugs, too, but alcohol was what I wanted once I’d had it. Alcohol took everything away. When I had a few drinks I felt none of the burden I’d carried so long. I would be magically