Probably a heart attack killed
Russell Biss. Claire viewed his startling death in light of her own recent
heart issues. It was frustrating he was so careful to ask her about what happened
to her, why didn’t he look after himself? He said he was a “Star Maker”, he
gave good advice and promoted those he favoured anyway he could by sending
notes and studio tapes to producers in London and LA, or phoning the books
editor to point out something they may have over looked. Why didn’t he realize
what was happening to him? His unexpected passing reaffirmed how close death
seemed lately and it was the ‘third thing’ she’d been waiting for: one was her
emergency heart surgery then her niece’s death and now this.
Time changed for her; any future
was unimaginable. There were no stages of time, no progression or accumulation;
just now and now now. Everything
Russell and Claire had done together became extra-vivid.
At first they weren’t friends and
they were never introduced. In second year at the Ontario College of Art she
saw his band play. When they were couriers they’d nod in passing like all the
others.
Standing near each other in the
damp and dirty winter uniform of the downtown messenger outside The Plate, a
dive bar the favored by reckless, pre-alcoholic bike couriers, Russell and
Claire would both compulsively check and recheck their walkie-talkies for calls
in case the volume was turned down; being on standby meant not making money. After the distribution of cigarettes, and the
zipping of layers, they’d speak to each other in impatient, one-up-man-ship
voices of authority, delighted for company but suffering from long days filled
with dangerous close calls faced alone, each had lots to tell. The
conversations usually started with basics, “Hey” or “plastic bags work great,”
then an expanded discussion about bearings, bottom brackets and the annual
Gortek sale. It was when the conversation lasted longer Clare found out that
Russell was a freelance music writer. He showed her a piece in a worn and
folded Toronto Star.
For a while after that he was a music
writer for the Globe and Mail then he was back working the streets and back at
the old bar. One evening Claire suggested he apply as a food writer for NOW
Magazine, the local independent paper where she worked in the design department.
He was exasperated when she finger-tipped the paper advertisement across the
table at the bar. He declared, “What do I know about food?”
She reasoned, “the people who
read the paper, the ‘demographic’, are more interested in music and lefty
politics but they still need to eat.”
He asked, “Where would I write
about?”
She shrugged and raised her palms
and said, “Here”.
He was sure her bosses wouldn’t consider
him. Claire didn’t realize the idea had resonated until a week later he told
her he had an interview with the editor. A week after that he dodged the
publisher’s questions about wine saying “Your readers drink beer!” His first
story was about the The Plate, the bar where they met.
For twenty years, with a brief
hiatus while she had a baby, they dined together once or twice a week. Russell
did the research and writing, Claire made the reservations, was on time and
didn’t draw attention. He knew what to order and ordered for both of them. Claire
would try anything. It was fun: getting dressed-up, being there at opening,
choosing a great table, ordering a coffee or a San Pellegrino while she waited
for Russell.
No one friend could keep up with
Russell’s work, he tried each restaurant three times over lunch and supper. He
needed a stable of eating partners. Claire, Russell and others had been to
hundreds of different places together. With him she had meals she would never
have had otherwise.
The deal with Russell was his
guests couldn’t say his name out loud, or talk about his articles or mention
the paper, although he did it all the time. If she forgot and said, “I read
your piece” or “Russell...” he’d scold her with an intake of breath and tense
body language as if he were the only Russell in the city and everybody was
thinking about him. He took it very seriously. In the early days he reminded
Claire more than once, “This is my work, so no need to be social. Bring a
magazine if you like. Its food I’m here to see.” She never brought anything to
read, but it relieved the impulse to be entertaining.
He was obsessed with keeping his identity
a secret. He wouldn’t allow pictures of himself to be published; none appeared
in the paper or online. He kept a luchador’s mask for occasions when the
publisher or a favored restaurateur insisted on having a photo taken. His day-to-day
disguise was more of a lifestyle than an outfit. He would amble into upscale
eateries with the casual indifference of the 70’s punk he was. He used his bike
as part of the smokescreen; no one would suspect a reviewer of merit to be the a
city-hardened commuter defiantly shaking off snow or water while conspicuously
stashing helmet, ratty gloves and a single key.
Many times he avoided suspicion,
but sometimes staff guessed and upped the customer care obviously. The owner would
come out with a big grin and a bottle of wine, patting Russell on the back and
shaking his hand like an old friend from the trenches. Those suppers lasted
longer.
This happened once during a
snowstorm in a particularly remarkable, and for once empty, restaurant
downtown. Russell had actually rubbed his hands in gleeful anticipation eyes
glittering at his three guests, before he pointed at the short menu, ran his
finger down the list and said, “We want to try everything! We’ll share.”
He told them the names and
culinary pedigree of the staff working in the open kitchen, he had interviewed
and reviewed them all, so it was only a matter of time before the talented
chef/owner, toweling his fingers, walked over and shook Russell’s hand and
coaxed them to try a martini
with local gin, Kombucha and Cointreau. Russell refused but waved the back of his
hand to the table to try, like a benevolent dad on holiday.
As Russell talked to the chef,
tiny portions of food were gently placed in front of each of them: a single
tortellini stuffed with perfectly braised beef cheek, sitting in a flavorful
dab of jus, minimally decorated with three purple stemmed radish sprouts,
refreshing in winter and in spicy contrast to all the rich food they decorated.
There had been course after course that evening: a poached oyster on the half
shell, house cured cubes of ham beside a dollop of tart blackberry jam, nothing
else on the little block of wood just meat and jam, foie gras toasts, a green
soup, a curl of
Montforte cheese balanced on house made olives framed by one pickled baby
carrot with its top still on, smoked mackerel, roasted quail and fingerling
potatoes and small slate roofing tile with a trio of luscious cheese cakes in
ramekins: pink rhubarb, golden maple syrup and the same dark purple, tart jam
as before. The meal
went on for hours. The restaurant closed. The furniture around them was piled
in that way restaurants do, all the lights dim except on their table and in the
bright kitchen at the back, snow falling, falling, falling outside the plate
glass windows in the dark. The chef and kitchen staff brought tiny perfect
samplings in turn, each staying for a glass of wine as one of the others worked
on the next masterpiece in the kitchen.
A good friend was a newish thing
for Claire who’d been living in the city for years, except the bums at the bar,
had only connected with people she worked with. Good friends were a rarity but
she knew they were evolving with Russell when one afternoon he called first
then showed up at her door and let her have it. He had made a special trip to
tell her that at lunch the day before she had acted manic, she was talking and
laughing fake loudly. She drew attention by sending back food. He’d come with
this single message to tell her to take it easy or he couldn’t bring her.
Claire, well knowing the longing other ostracized friends felt when he had cut
them cold, just said, “Thank you.” She was rewarded by an invitation to lunch
later in the week and their relationship improved.
After the paper laid her off, she
was unemployed for a while. So in addition to being free for lunch she had time
for other luxuries like art classes and writing. She started writing. Russell
was a natural critic and gave clear and sincere advice. She was delighted a
mutually satisfying subject to talk about over the sometimes dull meals. Under
his tutorage her writing would advance.
She had wondered about Russell
when they weren’t on-the-job. Her offers of movies, home cooked food or invitations
to the cottage were always refused. He said, “Oh you know, my work is to go out.
I’m out all the time, when I’m not working I just want to stay in, thank you.”
It was true: he didn’t travel, and although he planned to go to friend’s events,
he never did. He was becoming reclusive.
He expensed their meals but he
was her host and she often let him have the last word. At one of the last meals
they had together, brunch in an posh spot in an area with lots of posh spots,
she tried to explain, ”I write about the catalysts for decisions, right before people
realize they have a choice.” They both watched a waiter with tattoos, a beard, plaid
shirt and long shorts step out to the patio. It occurred to Claire Russell
could easily come back and strike up something more than a conversation about
food.
The bill came; Russell included a
memorable tip, they gathered their things from the booth. She went on, “They
are optimistic stories, about lives reclaimed, of a better second half.” Together
they stepped into the brilliant midday sun, looked in opposite directions.
After a moment Claire turned back
and said, “Thank you for lunch.” With a backwards wave, Russell said, “I don’t
know about next time. I’ll keep you posted.” They snugged on their helmets, unlocked
their bicycles and went off, each in their own direction.
Two days later Claire got an
email:
Subject: Lunch? Body: “What's your schedule 2-ish the next few days? Church
& Wellesley, -rd”
Then on Friday, the planned
meeting day an email saying, “No lunch today. I've got a stomach bug and was up
all night. Back to bed! -rd”.
That was the last.
On Tuesday it was jobless Claire
who sped 11 bocks on her bike over to Russell’s house, after his editor rang inquiring
if she had seen him lately, the paper had a deadline. It was she who paced
around the whole three story building looking for a way to break into the second
floor corner apartment she had visited only once in all these years. She called
911 to summon EMS.
She who comforted from the seedy boarding
house hallway “We’re coming, everything will be okay” and stood back while EMS
used a special pry bar to force the lock. A small bachelor apartment with a
large metal office desk set diagonally across the middle of the main room. A
huge flat-screened TV, a huge computer monitor, a wall of cookbooks and another
wall of band handbills. EMS trudged single file: office, kitchen, bedroom and
came back single file to look at her, wondering if she’d called in a prank.
Claire dismissed their implied
mischief stares to: think, think, think! Where are you? Dazed she walked in an
eerie smell of man-sleep and something else past Russell’s unmade bed, with blackout
curtain draped over the post, swung back the towel hanging over an unseen door and
pushed it against’ the leg of her friend, dead on the bathroom floor. On his
back, head into the red-painted corner, his hands near his shoulders as if
about to adjust his hair, almost unrecognizable with four days of stubble, tiny
clear bubbles along his lips, naked except flat grey penis over the top of
black Y-fronts.
Propped against the red wall there
was a tall yellow with red letters Plexiglas sign: “GIRLS GIRLS GIRLS. Hanging on
the wall four staring dolly-face molds, tarnished brass, side-by-side, one with
a scuff of red spray paint around its surprised little “oh” mouth, a slightly
erotic witness.
Claire stepped backwards, wanted
someone to be surprised with her. Actually she wanted Russell to be surprised
with her. He would have loved this: coming across a dead body in the middle of
the day without warning. At first the professionals couldn’t hear her. “I found
him. He’s there.” Then one went back to check, and bsoon back with, “No
vitals” answering the unspoken query from the others confirming what Claire already knew.
She tried to seal this image into her memory,
a little later she asked if she could take a picture of her dead friend. She
had to. She even asked though she could have anyway, the bathroom entrance was
so small nobody would have seen. She had known since the phone call, maybe
since the email she sent four days before, and email which ever prompt Russell
had never returned.
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