The Quarantine Review, Issue 4

Volume 1, Issue 4

Sheeza Sarfraz, J.J. Dupuis, Sheeza Sarfraz, J.J. Dupuis

• Publisher: Dundurn Press
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781459748392
• Topic: Littérature
• Subtopic: Collections littéraires nord-américaines

The fourth issue of a digital journal created to alleviate the malaise of social distancing with exceptional writing and artwork.

The Quarantine Review celebrates literature and art, connecting readers through reflections on the human condition — our lived experiences, afflictions, and dreams. As we face a pandemic with profound implications, the essays within offer a variety of perspectives on the current predicament, encouraging readers to reflect on the world we knew before and contemplate how society can be reshaped once we emerge. Through The Quarantine Review, Dupuis and Sarfraz hope to give voice to the swirling emotions inside each of us during this unprecedented moment, to create a circuit of empathy between the reader, the work itself, and the wider world beyond the walls of our homes.

This issue features writing by rob mclennan, Kim Fahner, Catherine Mwitta, Jennifer LoveGrove, Anita Dolman, Sarah Elahi, Ace Boggess, and Sarah Campbell and artwork by Laura Boyle.

CREATIVE NON-FICTION

Golf and Love

Catherine Mwitta

Underneath the glowing red light that flickers on and off, making harsh patterns across Mackenzie’s face, we smoke a joint in contrived conviviality.

He blows some smoke in my face. “What made you ask me to come out tonight?”

I fiddle with my lighter instead of looking into his eyes. “Bored, I guess.”

The conversation ceases. I’m not really in the mood to impress right now. I’m more content with just having his presence. I cast my eyes across the park and shift my weight from one leg to another.

“Thought you were leading me to my death there for a moment,” he says.

How do you respond to someone when they say something like that?

I play some songs from my phone as we walk back to his car. The sunsets behind us, its rays cooking our backs like a burger on a grill.

“You can’t actually enjoy that music.”

“Why not?” I say.

“I just don’t think anyone can.”

What he probably meant was that people that look like you aren’t supposed to like classical music, and if you say you do, then you must be lying. Or trying to look cool, or better yet, trying to be “authentic.” Whatever that’s supposed to mean.

“You working tomorrow?” I ask.

“Yeah.”

“Well, see you then,” I say once we reach his car.

He waits around the driver’s side door like he’s expecting me to change my mind and get in with him. Flies dance underneath the streetlight in front of Mackenzie’s car, their synchronistic movements almost trance-like. I don’t glance back at him as I walk home.

I consider calling in sick the next day so I can do without having to see him, but remember I’d already called in the week before. Making another sick call so soon would look suspicious. My manager rules with a great iron fist that is often brought down on me whenever I make mistakes at work, or the slightest request. Unfortunately, Mackenzie is something I cannot avoid for today, no matter how much I want to.

He doesn’t try to talk to me while I’m on my shift, and I’m not particularly in the mood for his conversation either. So, we keep our distance from one another.

“Aren’t you hot in that?” Rachel asks.

“I’m fine,” I say.

She lets out a sarcastic laugh. “You’re wearing a jean jacket in thirty-degree weather. How can you be just ‘fine?’”

She’s right. I’m drenched in sweat every day I transit to work, but this is the only jacket I own.

I see the way the people in this store look at me. The amount of money customers that come into this place and spend on clubs could pay for the cost of my tuition at school. I’m aware of my economic status, how different I look from everyone else.

I don’t hold whatever Rachel or the rest of my coworkers think about me against them though. They’re a product of their environment. Being aware of that calms the darker, more depressing thoughts that surface whenever I’m around them.

“I’m off,” I say.

I move around from the register and make my way to the break room. While opening the door, I bump into Mackenzie. A smile plays on his face. Like he’s aware of something that I’m not, and he’s weighing his options on whether to let me in on that information or keep me suffering from curiosity.

“Closing tomorrow night?”

“Yes,” I say. “You?”

He smiles. “Yeah, see you then.”

He leaves the break room soon after our conversation, and I can’t help but feel as though his giddiness has caused an itch to rise at the back of my scalp. I push it aside. It’s better to have someone who genuinely wants to be around me than someone who doesn’t.

As I walk towards the front of the store, I stop at the cash register. My gaze latches onto Rachel and Mackenzie at the other side of the till by the store entrance. They look around to see if anyone is watching them. When they discover they have a sort of temporary privacy, they kiss. For a moment, I feel like a child watching another play with a toy that’s mine. Then I remind myself I’ve never owned anything in my life, so I don’t have the right to feel this way about this man. Once they’ve finished their little rendezvous, I walk towards the register.

“The amount of money customers spend on clubs could pay for the cost of my tuition at school. I’m aware of my economic status. I’m aware of how different I look from everyone else.”

“Bag check,” I yell from across the other till, the one by the store exit.

Neither of them moves from their spot from across the register. “It’s ok, you can go,” Rachel says.

She smiles at me, but it doesn’t look quite genuine and sure as hell doesn’t feel it. I spare a glance at Mackenzie. It’s not like I want him to defend me, but solidarity would’ve been great, I don’t get even a bit of that from him.

We don’t talk that much the following day. It’s just the two of us in the store so it’s a real effort to stay separate from one another, but the image of him and Rachel kissing has already been transposed in my mind like an etch-a-sketch. So when he passes by me in the store, I give him a mercenary glare. And when he tries to speak to me, if I’m not required to respond, I turn my back to him.

“Got a ride home?” he asks.

I finish counting all the money in the register before I answer him. “No, I’m bussing it.”

“Want a ride?”

Who would ever say no to a free ride? “Sure.”

I wait in his car as he locks up the store. My hand moves over all the buttons in his vehicle. It’s modern and new, a car even my mother can’t afford.

“My stereo isn’t working right now. It got all messed up this weekend,” he says.

“That’s fine, I don’t mind the quiet.”

He slides the car windows open and begins whipping down the highway. The sound of the wind is like a blow dryer in my ears, its cold breeze reaching into me through my jacket and squeezing my heart. This is the most I’ve felt this whole summer.

We stop at my street, and instead of pulling into my driveway, he parks by the sidewalk. The moon looms over his head like a tyrant, making his blonde hair a halo above him. It’s funny actually, he’s been looking less and less heaven-sent to me lately.

“Want to get high?” he asks.

My palms grow sweaty, and I wring them dry like they’re dish rags. “Sure.”

He lights up the joint, inhales twice, and then hands it to me.

My friends say you should always go with whatever a guy you like says, that you should never cry in front of them, and that they should definitely be the first one to tell you they love you. I constantly debate them on this way of thinking. Why should I be afraid to express myself? Why should I be scared to let someone know they make me feel alive?

So I don’t inhale the joint, I just pass it back to him. And he frowns at me. “I can tell you don’t smoke that much,” he says.

“How’s that?”

“The way you hold a joint is all wrong, you should hold it like this.” He then proceeds to show me the right way. “That way, you won’t end up burning your fingers when it becomes a roach.”

I nod, it’s more polite than telling him I don’t care.

“Rachel said something so funny the other day,” he says.

“Yeah?”

“She say anything about me to you?”

“Me and her don’t talk that much.”

“She’s pretty cute,” he says.

I can’t breathe quite right, so I pop my head out the car window. It’s pouring, the rain ruining the make-up I put on for Mackenzie that morning. Raindrops fall from underneath the streetlight, making the water turn into dripping gold. There are no flies around the fluorescent today.

“She’s my type,” he says. “I’ve only ever dated blonde girls.”

“Then you should ask her out.”

They’re perfect for each other, cut from the same cloth, a reflection of the type of upper-class society I can never b...