Under Emily's Sky
Under Emily’s Sky
Under Emily’s Sky
By Ann Alma
This book is for Gutsie,
who helped me write it
just by being there.
THANK YOU, thank you to THE SLOGGERS, Linda Lee Crosfield, Barbara Little, Marilyn McCombe, Thelma Rolingher, Helen Stevenson and Judy Wapp for their undying enthusiasm, support and helpful critiquing.
The setting of this novel is at a fictional beach and hillside. In reality, in September of 1936, Carr was camped on a sheep farm in Metchosin, which was then about ten miles out of Victoria. The ‘elephant’ was parked at the edge of a gravel pit, which gave Emily the wide views she loved for her paintings of the sky.
Lee wrenched herself from her mother’s arms. “How do you know?” she yelled, clenching her fists. “How do you know we’ll be better off without Dad? You have no idea what makes me happy.” Tears came to her eyes and she turned away. “You don’t know anything about me. Nothing. Why doesn’t anyone ask me what I want?”
She ran from the living room, slamming the door behind her. As she passed her parents’ bedroom she saw her dad standing with his back to her, packing a suitcase: shirts, pants, socks, model train engines, cowboy boots, everything thrown onto the big double bed. The section of wall where a framed picture of his favorite locomotive used to hang was now empty; only a faded patch of wall remained. Lee stormed down the hall to her own room, slamming this door even harder. Her paper kite fell off the wall and she kicked it under the bed in one swift, forceful motion.
Lee pulled the bottom drawer of her old dresser
open until it stuck. She yanked harder to get it past the grove and it slammed against her legs. “Arrrg!” she yelled, kicking it furiously. From under a sweater she picked up her journal and a battered cookie tin. She flung the lid across the room and grabbed a chewed-up pencil stub. She wrote:
My parents don’t care how I feel about all this!!!!! They’re too busy fighting to think about anyone but themselves. Mom tells Dad to leave and he stomps off for hours. When he comes home, it’s always really late, sometimes in the middle of the night. He makes a huge scene, yelling and screaming, saying he wants to try and make things work. Sometimes he doesn’t come back until the next night and it starts all over again. Why cant they just stop? Why doesn’t he give up drinking? Why doesn’t Mom make him quit??? Why, why, why?
Nobody in this house listens to me, especially Dad. I might as well be talking to his gin bottle. I told him to stop drinking. He promised he’d stay sober. Why does he lie?
She underlined promised so hard, the pencil tore the paper. Disgusted, she hurled it across the room.
Flinging herself on the bed, she banged her fists on her pillow. “You lied,” she said loudly. Then she yelled, “You lied to me!” at the top of her lungs. She buried her face in her pillow, knowing he wasn’t listening. He never listened. She knew he wouldn’t quit drinking. Deep down, she also knew that Mom was right, that they would be better off without him. But to kick him out forever, for good?
As much as she hated Dad’s behaviour, Lee wanted two parents. She’d give anything to have a family who would talk to her at dinner, take her on trips, and love each other like they did when she was younger.
There was a knock at the door.
“Go away!” she cried into her pillow.
After another knock she heard her father’s voice. “I’m coming in to say goodbye.”
Lee saw the door inch open slowly. She hid her face in the pillow.
He cleared his throat. “I’m sorry,” he said. “Lately I…I haven’t been much of a father.” His usually gruff voice sounded funny, cracked. He cleared his throat again.
“Why didn’t you just stop drinking?” Lee shouted into the pillow, gripping the edges of it with her nibbled fingernails.
“I just can’t do it, Lee. And I can’t live here any more,” he said firmly. “I won’t be coming back this time. She’s pushed me to my limit.” Lee heard the springs sigh as he sat down on the edge of the bed.
“What’d she do?” Lee looked at him sideways, her thick hair falling across most of her face.
“She phoned my boss.” He stopped and slammed his hand on his thigh. “Never mind. It’s nothing for you to worry about.” He sat very still, looking at the floor, before he said, “I’m moving to Edmonton. I’m getting a job at a train station there. It’ll be better than working at the bus depot. We’ll still see each other. I’ll take you on a vacation, on a real train.” He patted her shoulder.
“That’s not good enough.” Lee sat up. “I want to live with both of you. Why can’t you stay?” She looked into his eyes. They were the same blue as her own, but his weren’t looking back at her. They seemed to look through her, as if she weren’t even there.
“No. I can’t. We’ve been through all this.” He rubbed his unshaven chin. “You can come for a visit.”
“When?” Lee scowled.
“Soon.” His hands clenched into fists. They moved nervously against his jeans, tapping his thighs impatiently.
“You lied to me.” Now Lee’s fists were pummeling his chest, hitting him as hard as she could.
He held her wrists. “It’s no use.” He pushed Lee away so that her lanky body fell backward onto the bed. “I guess I can’t do anything right.” He jumped up and strode through the door, closing it behind him as he left.
His usual loud, angry footsteps thundered down the hall. The front door slammed. Suddenly the house was very quiet.
Lee wiped her face on the sheet and jumped up. Kicking the dresser, she turned her old tape deck on full blast. To the drum beat she kicked the bottom drawer of her dresser– whack, whack, whack. No one listened anyway, so why should she care?
Whack. Whack. Whack.
There was another knock at the door, loud, above the music.
“Go away!” Lee hollered. “Leave me alone.”
She heard Mom’s voice yelling something at her through the door, but she couldn’t understand it. Her mother didn’t come in.
Good. In the cookie tin Lee found another pencil.
It’s her stupid fault!!!! she could have tried harder to make it work. Now I’m alone. I hate them both!! I hate this room! I hate this music! I hate this day! I hate everything!!!
Lee looked up at the wall at one of her favorite photographs hanging above the bed: a picture of she and her cousin Alex tubing at “The Slide” near their usual campsite. That’s the picture she’d take with her if she left. If Dad packed his locomotive picture, he must be leaving for good. And he had said goodbye in a way that made it sound absolutely final. He had never done that before, ever.
I might as well run away too. Why stay in this place??? I’ll go and live in the old, abandoned shacks in the hills. I’ll tell Alex, he’ll understand. I’11 swear him to secrecy. He’ll bring me scraps of food. I’ll survive without them. I’m sure no one will