Annabel - Kathleen Winter [47]
But was there a place where she could live with truth instead of lies? Truth or Consequences was another TV show. She could relate to that title. You told the truth or you lived with consequences like these. If you held back truth you couldn’t win. You swallowed truth and it went sour in your belly and poisoned you slowly.
There was a pale green pill Wayne cut in half with the small, heavy knife his mother used to peel potatoes. There were two white capsules full of powder, which he knew was also white since he had broken one to find out. Finally there were two tiny, flat yellow pills that his mother, when he had asked, had told him were to prevent dizziness.
“Am I a diabetic?” Kevin Slab was diabetic, and he had pills, but his were orange.
“No.”
“Do I have leukemia?” In grade four Joey Penashue had got leukemia and lost his hair.
“No.”
“Do I have a brain tumour?” Last year Stevie White, who had sat two seats in front of Wayne, developed a brain tumour and died.
“No.” Jacinta sounded more impatient than she wanted to.
“Which ones can I stop taking when I start taking the new ones in grade seven?”
They had been through this before. He liked to get it straight, Jacinta believed, as this was the only aspect of the pills about which he was certain.
“You can stop taking the white ones. But then you will take four yellow ones instead of two, and you might have to have a needle.”
“But we won’t know if I need a needle until Dr. Toumishey examines me.”
“It might not be Dr. Toumishey. It might be a doctor you haven’t met.”
“Will it be Dr. Hedgehog?”
The specialist was always changing. Once it had been a Dr. Edgecombe, who had wanted to examine Wayne’s throat using an extra-wide tongue depressor that looked as if it were made of sandpaper. Wayne wouldn’t open his mouth, and Dr. Edgecombe had told Jacinta to pin his arms and pinch his nose so he couldn’t breathe. “He’ll open up then,” Dr. Edgecombe had said. Wayne had been six.
“No. Dr. Edgecombe has gone back to St. John’s.”
“Maybe this time I won’t need a needle.”
“I wish you could just wait and see.”
“If you had to take a needle you’d like to know about it first.”
“That’s true.”
“Will I have to take another needle after the first one?”
“You might.”
“If I knew how many then I would know when it was over.”
“I know. We would know where we stood.”
“Me. Not we.” This was new. Now that Wayne was twelve he demanded accuracy, and justice.
“You’re right. You. You would know where you stood.”
“What if I have to have four needles?”
“You might. You might need more than four. But you might not have to have any. We won’t know until the doctor examines you.”
“Remember that time we went, Mom? Remember the sign on the glass?” A card posted on the receptionist’s cage had said, PLEASE TELL US IF YOU LEAVE WITHOUT BEING SEEN. Wayne had looked at it for a long time. He had been eight. He had looked carefully at all the people in the waiting room, then he had said, “Mommy, do invisible people come in here?”
“Yes,” Jacinta had said. “There has been a parade of them since we came in.”
“How do you know?”
“Can’t you see their wet footprints all over the floor? And they have measles.”
“How do you know that?”
“I read it in the paper. An epidemic of measles is affecting the invisible community of Goose Bay and the Labrador Straits.”
Wayne had giggled. “Mommy, what does the sign really mean?” he had asked, and she had