Border songs

19

MADELINE’S DRIVER pulled away from the maple-shaded split-level with blooming daffodils out front and a basement full of flowering cannabis. It was the fifth crop she’d tended to that day without a glitch, no longer feeling any relief that it had all passed without consequence. This illicit work still induced more adrenaline than nursing orchids and lilies but it had, as odd as it sounded, become a job, though a lucrative one.
The more she learned about Toby’s empire, the less anxious she felt. Cars parked in front of every house. Bills paid in advance. Lawns mowed. Christmas lights hung through December. Even the birdfeeders were always full. The growing logistics, too, were reassuringly consistent: Tables and lights on wheels. Holes drilled through water-meter paddles, the power meters bypassed on any op with more than ten lights. Five to six crops a year. Fourteen to seventeen pounds per harvest. And not one of the twenty-three sites she’d nursed over the last two months had been busted or ripped off. Still, Toby grew clones simultaneously in different locations to guard against losing a popular strain all at once. And he only hired people without records, reasoning that first-time offenders got such light sentences they were less likely to turn on him. All of which made everyone more careful, especially because Toby paid better than the competition.
Her driver, Michael, a large UBC undergrad, chattered about his door-to-door recruitment efforts on the American side of the border. She pretended to listen earnestly as the beige minivan navigated Abbotsford’s rush-hour snarls until Essendene Avenue turned into Old Yale Road and ascended through suburbs, past freshly logged lots into neighborhoods of mock castles with vast stone decks, climbing still higher to where unique houses hung on blond cliffs and the hill narrowed to a rocky cone and the fresh asphalt finally ended in a broad, Lexus-jammed, clamshell driveway beneath a stilted glass palace.
The giggling woman standing by the door didn’t appear naked until Madeline got close enough to see her gooseflesh and paint smears. She swapped smiles, then glided through a candle-ringed vestibule into a high-ceilinged room with glass-jeweled chandeliers and a long oval table shoved against a wall cluttered with appetizers. Michael offered his hand and guided her past two more painted women—one so skinny that her hip bones flared like handrails—and through dozens of conversations and past strangers with intentionally messy hair to an even smokier room with a ceiling higher still and a massive diamond-shaped window overlooking the checkerboard of American farms. Her hand felt lost in Michael’s, tugging her toward a glass table behind which towered a loud, tuxedoed man with a gummy smile and a lime-green cannabis leaf stitched into his black cummerbund.
He spoke nonstop to four queues of people, interrupting himself with impersonations and asides, throwing his voice and answering questions with the agility of an auctioneer. Four tiny glass pipes billowed, the puffers smacking lips, closing eyes, wincing and squinting as if trying to remember something important.
“None of these are Vietnamese B-grade,” he told them. “This ain’t your father’s schwag. These are all pedigreed triple-A sativas or indicas or some mischievous blend thereof, cured for at least a week and usually two. You won’t see any freaky growths on these buds. No purple fungus here, my fellow stoners. Check out the crystal resin on these colas. You’re looking at the Bordeaux of buds.”
“Taste tests,” Michael explained, pulling her aside so she could see the featured buds displayed on gold platters. “Marcus,” he said, pointing at the man in the tuxedo, “loves these things.” The chalkboard menu read:
Afghan Dream
Time Warp
Burmese Incredible
Love Potion #2
Marcus was coaching the testers now to notice the various flavors, the orange mango chutney of one bud, the bubble-gum fruitiness of another, and to differentiate between the swift body high one strain offered and the soaring cerebral rocker of another.
Once Madeline ditched Michael she explored the noisy house on her own, taking in the neon sculptures and erotic ceiling murals, repetitive reggae pulsing from invisible speakers in every room.
All Fisher had told her was that it was a Drug War Party and everybody who was anybody in the B.C. cannabis scene would be there. A retort, he explained, to a flurry of news flashes, the first being Forbes’s report that indoor pot was now B.C.’s largest agricultural export, followed by the U.S. drug czar accusing Canada of flooding the States with “the crack cocaine of marijuana” and citing the Space Needle Bomber as proof of the link between drugs and terror. “If you buy B.C. bud,” he concluded, “you are sending a check to the terrorists.”
Madeline wished she’d showered and changed. Nobody else looked like they’d just come from work. Searching for a bathroom, she stepped into a den and found six men and one woman slouching on green leather couches and loveseats, listening to some mohawk in a wheelchair. “We’re all just animals,” he said, his voice reminding Madeline of pull-cord dolls. “I mean, we’re essentially advanced squirrels, aren’t we? Not as agile, but smarter. Or maybe glorified possums with big brains? Well, pretty big.” He cocked his head toward the lanky redhead sucking gently on a bubbling glass bong, smoke rising toward her exaggerated lips.
“Actually, we’re fancy monkeys,” said a man with a braided beard and an eyebrow ring. “Fancy monkeys clinging to an average planet orbiting a dying star. Who said that, anyway? Chomsky, or was it Leary? Whoever. Doesn’t matter. It’s as true as—”
“Hey!” Fisher crossed the room, smoke curling from his fingers, the spotlight swinging from him to her. “How ya like Marcus’s crib?” He unfurled his spindly arms as if to hug her, but to her relief simply passed a joint. She inhaled hot smoke while Fisher introduced her as “Dahlia,” as he’d said he would. To her unease, they all nodded knowingly, including the big-lipped redhead who walked the loaded bong over. Madeline wasn’t interested, but didn’t want to seem rude, so she sucked the flame into the bud-packed bowl and gave it a steady pull until the ashes plunged. Her vision blurred on the exhale as she strained to read the sign on the wall: OVERGROW THE GOVERNMENT.
“Toby here?” she asked once Fisher escorted her out.
“Doesn’t usually show up at these sorts of things,” he whispered. “But he’s got business here tonight, so we might see him.”
He led her upstairs into what felt like a trade show, complete with T-shirts, banners and bumper stickers for sale. In one corner, a television was replaying drug-czar sound bites. In another, a manic bald guy was barking out the virtues of vaporizing hash as an “alternate ingestion strategy.” People lined up to get vaporized while a gap-toothed, green-haired woman sold grams and seed packets with the bored efficiency of a blackjack dealer. Another woman was pushing a petition. “Decriminalizing isn’t the answer,” she insisted. “It still forces everything underground.” Men bobbed in agreement, lost in her cleavage.
Fisher pointed out a refugee from the U.S. drug war and veterans of the B.C. drug courts, including an old attorney milling around like a proud grandpa. The King of Cannabis himself floated up the stairs a moment later, his head tilted back and nostrils flared. The visionary who’d invented the Marijuana Party and recruited candidates to run for everything from premier to the Vancouver school board had an entourage that included Toby, in corduroy shorts and a bowling shirt. His tanned forearms rippled as he opened a bottle of artesian water and handed it to Madeline. He’d barely made eye contact before he laid his left hand on the small of her back, gently steering her away from Fisher.
People rose from couches and beanbags to meet “Dahlia,” whom Toby introduced as one of his top growers. Poached eyeballs settled on her respectfully, as if his flattery made her not only famous, but also desirable. They asked cloning and curing questions and whether she agreed that seabird shit was the best fertilizer until Toby grabbed a decorative sword off the wall and whirled it around with such grunting intensity and precision that it left Madeline sweating and others cheering. He put the blade back, his sword hand returning to the skin right above her belt, a disconcerting numbness creeping south from his fingers. He suddenly excused himself and stranded her with the king and his acoloytes, who took turns speculating on what effect the drug czar might have on local and federal politics and their legalization crusade.
The king offered no opinion until he finally decreed: “It’s Prohibition all over again. That eventually ended because it was impossible to enforce, because alcohol was everywhere.” He lit a joint the size of a breakfast sausage, and everyone waited for him to finish popping smoke rings. “A year after legalization, every stoner will grow an ass-load of weed and stick it in pickle jars like they used to.” He held the joint at eye level, rolling it between thumb and forefinger as if focusing binoculars. “And people won’t be able to smoke all they grow. It’ll go moldy long before they can suck it down. And they won’t be buying pot, either. Please get that through your heads. They will not be buying pot. Maybe one percent of the Canadians now making a decent living at it will still be in business, okay? The best will survive, yes, but nobody will be building these McMansions—not that I don’t love yours, Marcus. Trust me, this gold rush will pass, and that’s a good thing. Yes, there eventually will be Amsterdam-style coffee shops on every block in downtown Vancouver.” A cheer rose up. “And yes, people will be cooking with cannabis, breaking up buds, sprinkling them on salads and smothering them with balsamic.” He licked his dry lips, and everyone but Madeline laughed on cue. “And the persecution of people who enjoy cannabis, my friends, will finally be over. It’s not if, it’s how f*ckin’ soon. And you know the biggest reason it won’t happen soon enough?”
“Parliament’s fear of pissing off the U.S.?” Marcus suggested.
“Not quite,” he replied. “It’s the U.S. government’s fear of its own pharmaceutical companies. Follow? That’s the real cartel that needs to get busted up. For now, Uncle Sam does the ’ceuticals’ bidding by demonizing this sacred plant and keeping citizens from realizing they could grow this medicine in their backyard and not have to pay Pfizer and the others for Vicodin, Vioxx, OxyContin and the rest of that hillbilly heroin that’s killing people faster than any natural drug ever has or will. Am I wrong?”
After a respectful pause, a man with teeth the size of thumbnails said, “Word.”
Madeline smothered a giggle, excused herself around Marcus, then glided downstairs and outside into a Zeus-like view of the valley. The farmlands were spiked with almost as many steeples as silos, and out to the west the spangled water broke free of the islands toward the smoldering belt of orange clouds and the rest of the world. There was no sense of any border, no visible line of tension other than the narrow clear-cut in the sloping foothills north of Baker’s glaciered belly.
She had no idea how long she’d been standing there when she remembered promising to make her father dinner. She’d dumped everything she owned into his tiny guesthouse again after Toby’s promised alternative never materialized. Her father had stood long-faced in the doorway looking at her mess, then told her about Mrs. Vanderkool. Why had it taken until now to think about what he’d said? Perhaps because Madeline couldn’t imagine that the elegant lady who knew exactly what to say when it mattered most was actually losing her wits.
She’d pulled Madeline aside a month after her mother’s funeral, when everyone was still avoiding her, and said, without preamble, “It may get worse before it gets better, but I promise you that the older you get, the more strength and comfort you’ll draw from knowing that such a beloved woman absolutely worshipped you.”
Once her weepiness passed—Jesus, I’m high—Madeline felt relieved that she hadn’t driven. She moseyed inside looking for a friendly face, then got wedged against the diamond-shaped window alongside a painted woman gnawing through a box of chocolates. “That paint hard to put on?” she asked, desperate for conversation.
“Ya don’t put it on yourself,” the woman drawled. “Least I don’t. Maybe you could.”
“All right,” Madeline said, not sure if she’d been insulted. “Next party, I’ll come painted and you can show up in this boring sweatshirt.” She edged away, but the woman started talking—and it could only be to her—about all the shitty job offers she’d received that night and how she’d recently dumped an abusive boyfriend hooked on blow. Madeline nodded knowingly, as if she’d been slapped around by her share of cokeheads.
“First few times I did this I felt ridiculous,” the woman admitted. “Now I don’t even notice the looks.”
“I once snuck Cuervo into a concert in Ziploc bags inside my bra,” Madeline told her. “I’ve never gotten looks like that before or since.”
The woman yawned. “You like tequila?” She reached behind her and handed Madeline half a pint. “Whaddaya think of the toilets?”
Madeline chugged, her mind racing for context.
“Haven’t gone? They don’t make any sound. I flushed twice because I thought there’s no way it was that quiet.” She looked at her earnestly. “Best job I ever had was as a hairdresser. I can cut hair, ’specially men’s.”
Madeline spontaneously offered her a job as a bud clipper at twice the going rate even though she didn’t do the hiring. Luckily, the offer simply triggered more disjointed stories. When Madeline couldn’t scare up a single thought worth sharing, the woman half-yawned and swiveled away, blue paint smearing and bubbling along the muscled groove of her spine.
Once again, Madeline realized she was getting even higher. She hadn’t noticed the music in how long? “I-I-I-I seeeeem to recogniiiiize your faaace.” She went looking for Fisher or Michael or anyone who could haul her away, trying not to look too alone, wondering how much time had careened past. She roamed up the stairs, needing the railing and hoping Toby wasn’t around to see her in this condition. Amazingly, all that remained of the trade show was a smattering of stoners and a couple pressed passionately against the floor-to-ceiling window.
She followed snorting giggles downstairs into a room where three strangers were sprawled on a round bed and two others draped across couch arms, everyone smirking in the same direction. She leaned against the doorjamb and slowly placed the cartoon faces on the large flat screen. The Simpsons.
Had the party adjourned to some secret room? She peeked into the bonging den where she’d first seen Fisher and saw an ensemble of sober-looking young men—many of them teenagers—listening to Toby’s thoughtful murmurs while he secured a map with ceramic bongs. It was too late to retreat, though his attention was the last thing she wanted. “She’s with me,” Toby said, nodding toward an open chair. Then he began pointing out where the thirty-two cameras were going in, one by one, as if they were military targets, everyone crowding in, mumble-cussing.
An older guy with a swashbuckling mustache was eyeballing her. She felt her stomach roll and jerked her sandals beneath the chair, looking everywhere but at him.
Toby crossed the den and examined her pink eyes. “You okay?”
“Where’s Fisher and Michael?” Her lips felt numb.
“I’m your ride,” he said. “We’re almost done.”
“Maybe we go back through the main portals?” someone asked as Toby returned to the table.
“No way.” Toby snorted and shook his head. “They do randoms now. They’ll search thirty cars in a row if they feel like it. And if one of those dogs signals, they’ll pull you in for a secondary and you’re toast.”
“What about the truck routes?”
Toby bobbed his head. “They X-ray every load, and bud jumps out unless it’s packed with something of identical density. I’ve got somebody working on that, but we’re not there yet. So for now we’ve just gotta do what we do better than we’re doing it. Once those cameras are up, we’ll reevaluate.”
Madeline listened to Toby’s money-handling tips and watched him hand out business cards of realtors, car dealers, insurance agents and bank tellers who took cash without questions, all of which made her worry about the awkward bricks of U.S. hundreds stacked in the bathroom closet of her father’s cottage.
Spiraling downhill in Toby’s restored Impala, she tried not to look at the fuzzy lights, but every time she closed her eyes her belly moved. He lowered her window from his side, and she heard her head bounce off the frame. “Sip this.” She felt a cold plastic bottle in her left hand and brought it to her mouth. Pepsi.
Toby was talking again, but it might as well have been a baby babbling. She had a vague sense he was following the speed limit, using blinkers, staying in his lane, but when they got to Highway 1 they didn’t head west. “You’ve got an hour or so, don’t you.” It wasn’t a question.
She nodded helplessly, wishing she could go home, afraid she would now be expected to perform.
“Wanna show you something.”
“What?” was all she could muster. She tried to raise the window, but either he child-locked it or she was pressing the wrong button. “I’m cold.”
“Have some more Pepsi,” he said.
A sip steadied her right before his first question about Brandon Vanderkool.
“Do you think your large Border Patrol friend would’ve known anybody at that party besides you?”
She hesitated, thinking she’d misheard.
“Well, he must have a mole, don’t you figure? How else would he know to hang out on the Sumas on the one day we try to float a big load?”
Madeline sorted his words and waited.
“Sure you didn’t see anyone he’d know?”
She shrugged warily. “He’s not my friend,” she said, trying to focus. “He’s just a kid I knew who never figured out how to … act normal.” She suddenly pictured him painting furiously. “He’s an innocent.”
Toby clucked his tongue. “An innocent who’s bad for business.”
Stars brightened the deeper they drove into the valley on dairy-lined Chilliwack Lake Road. Finally the pavement surrendered to gravel, then to dirt, and the Impala ground to a noisy halt. When Toby killed the lights, Madeline realized they were far beyond the last farmhouse, where any scream would blend with the whine of coyotes. She thought she saw meteorite showers, but couldn’t be sure. Toby stepped out and hustled around the hood to open her door. Her legs balked, as if warning her to stay in the car, though suddenly she was standing in mud beneath stars that quivered like fireflies. The only weapon she could think of was her keys.
He popped a heavy shovel from the trunk and shut it with a violent thunk. He handed her the flashlight, his thick fingers settling on her spine, a couple aggressive notches lower than at the party. They walked thirty yards, the beam illuminating a prior stampede of boot tracks. “See anything?” he asked.
She wanted to plead her case—I’m not a mole!—but instead looked for somewhere to run.
“Look around. Where do you think we’re going?”
Her small circle of light bounced uselessly across a grim field of mud, orchard grass and tangles of scrapped barbwire. Her mind raced. He had to have more than a hunch that she’d tipped off Brandon. Had she talked out of school? She’d blown it somehow, that much was alarmingly clear. She poked keys between the fingers of her left fist and held the flashlight in her right, gauging its heft. Was all his affection at the party designed to make his grieving more convincing? Her heart wasn’t racing so much as missing.
“Hear anything?” he pressed.
About Brandon? She tried to shake her head, but then … “Yes!” she exclaimed, as if the right answer might rescue her. “A humming sound.”
He told her where to point the flashlight, then began digging what she tried not to think of as her grave, skimming dirt until it sounded like he’d hit a rock. She flinched when he peeled back a long rug and flung it aside, clods flying. The hum was louder now, sounding like a muffled motor. She focused the flashlight on what looked like a flat handle welded to a rounded plate of scratched yellow steel.
Toby squatted and tugged at the handle until the three-by-two-foot hatch popped upright, unleashing a nimbus of white light, as if the earth had opened to its bright core.
She staggered back until the six-hundred-watt halogens and the reek of blooming cannabis rendered her nightmare harmless and familiar.
“Holy,” she managed. “What is—”
“We dug a hole with an excavator,” he explained, “then lowered a gutted school bus down there and filled it with lights, tables, plants and a generator. You like it?”
Her giggles sputtered into tears, but Toby pretended not to notice. “Not a great producer by any stretch,” he said, “but a worthwhile pilot. Least I think so. Not everyone agrees. I’ll take you inside sometime when we’re not messed up.” He dropped the lid back in place, replaced the rug and dirt, then guided her back to the car, telling her where to step, his hand sobering now, the stars returning to fixed pinpricks of light.
“Something came up tonight, an opportunity I’d like to offer you if it comes together,” Toby said neutrally. “But for it to work, I can’t have you showing up at parties like this, understand? What about the others? you might ask. Well, they don’t matter to me. You do. And I need you to come off as a young woman who has a real job and takes care of her dad.”
A new fear rolled through her: She already knew too much to ever get out. That’s what this was about.
He locked her elbow inside his. “How would you like,” he asked, now as gentle and solicitous as a department-store Santa, “to live in a nice house less than a kilometer from your father, right there along the border?”