Free Just Fine by France Daigle, Robert Majzels Page A

then?”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œJust to know. I’d say you’re twenty-six.”
    â€œTwenty-four.”
    â€œTwice twelve.”
    â€œExactly.” Terry had answered nonchalantly but this girl made him laugh inside. “And how old are you, then?”
    â€œThirty. I look younger though, don’t I?”
    â€œWell, yeah . . . sort of.”
    â€œIs thirty any good?”
    â€œThirty?”
    â€œYeah, thirty. Twice twelve plus six.”
    â€œOh! Well, I don’t know. Maybe. How do you like it?”
    â€œOh! I like it just fine.”
    *
    For example, I would never have boarded one of those tourist boats that sail along the Petitcodiac. Not in a million years! I’d only have to set foot on board for their renowned remote controls to break down. But even there, I could pass for normal. So many people boycott or would like to boycott the Irvings that my own resistance would go unnoticed. The fact that they’re retrieving a part of our history means nothing. The Irvings could give us back all of New France, we still wouldn’t trust them. That’s the way it is.
    It’s no different in Shediac. With all the people on the beach in summer time, I can stay on the sand or go in the water; either way, I look perfectly normal. No one has to know I swim only at high tide because at low tide you have to walk miles (I’m exaggerating) in a foot of water and if I had an episode and fainted, I’d drown. That’s a new fear from last summer. New ones crop up like that now and then. When I overcome one fear, another appears. Often I can feel them coming in my stomach. The worst places are those huge multi-floor bookstores they have in big cities. All those books do something to my intestines. When I see them, I wonder why I write.
    *
    On the return trip, Terry hoped the young woman with all the questions would be quiet for a bit. He liked her offhand manner but earlier she’d stretched him to the limit. He wasn’t sure he’d managed all right.
    â€œDo you suppose there might be a way to prove the Petitcodiac is the opposite of a delta?”
    Terry wasn’t sure he understood what Carmen Després was asking.
    She reformulated her question. “I mean, a river that fills up, mightn’t it be the opposite of a delta, which is a river that empties into the sea and fills up the sea while it empties itself?” Terry didn’t know what to answer, but Carmen Després was determined. “What I mean is that instead of the river filling up the sea, it’s the sea that fills the river. That’s all, and wouldn’t that be the reverse of a delta, then?”
    Terry was a bit shaken. She seemed to know what she was talking about. He thought back to all the readings he’d done during his training. “Well, you may be right, only I would’ve thought the opposite of a delta was an estuary. Like Shepody Bay, for example.”
    Carmen Després didn’t know how to explain herself, but that didn’t stop her from trying again. “Well, alright then, but couldn’t it be that a river that fills up with silt . . . if the same thing happened on the edge of the coast, it would be like a delta? Seems to me, a person could prove that.”
    â€œWell, maybe so, I’m sure I don’t know. And what would be the point of proving something like that?”
    â€œDon’t know. None maybe. Sometimes, you just need to prove something.”
    *
    Then one day, I decide it’s gone on long enough and I make up my mind. I grab my plastic water bottles and get in the car. I’m already up to my neck in this mess, which no one suspects but which has nevertheless become my lot. I cling to every ounce of self-confidence, I gather up all my courage, I start the car; in short, I do all that must be done and I’m off. Before I’m even past the city limits, I’ve already undone my seatbelt to breathe more easily, to