Victim, of all options. Erica finds herself in court because someone did something to her against her will, and Erica told on that someone, and the police chose to press charges, and the Crown decided that it was worth a battle.
What a world, Mams would say, as she used to do while sitting huddled with her sisters – Erica’s Aunties – in front of the television set during the broadcasts of post-coup trials. In the living room was where the real trials unfolded, hence the very good reason why the kids couldn’t even think about having their courtroom games in there. Broadcasts of what went on in the trials were intercut with footage of mass graves being unearthed. Mams put her hand over her mouth as she watched. Even then, the adults didn’t trust themselves to share the witnessing with the neighbours. It was early days yet. Mams and her sisters would draw the blinds and curtains, tell the children to stay hushed up, and keep the television on low volume. The trials were being broadcast on national television and there was only the one channel, so clearly people were watching this or nothing at all; they must have been suspicious of those people were choosing to watch nothing at all.
What a world indeed, Mams, Erica said under her breath to her absent mother.
From where Erica sits in the first row behind the Crown’s desk, she can see only the back of the head and a quarter profile of that woman, the “female companion” type of woman. She is sitting right up there, on the defense’s table, next to her lawyer. Her right ankle is over her left ankle, her left hand rests on top of her right hand, as if she planned it all. Well groomed and fit. Smooth, neat ponytail. Not a hair out of place. You would think she has been cut out of a paper sketch with a brand new pair of scissors. Contained, but not small because another human has been growing inside her for the last seven months (six when Erica met her). One of those women who looks at her man at least several times a day with that Oh honey, there you go again expression on her face. Then she will turn to Erica, who stands behind the counter, and give her that See how there he goes again? Don’t mind him, he does this all the time expression. The way dog owners tell people Oh he doesn’t bite, he’s just being friendly. These women never just come out and say it, and it is so faint, that expression, that it is never any help to Erica even as a symbolic invitation to step back and let the man’s obnoxiousness air itself out. So Erica ends up being the one who has to say I’m sorry, apologizing for everyone present.
One such time, though, while working at her Starcups job near Osgoode station, Erica could barely force those words out of her mouth. At least it is dead, she was thinking, and her mouth almost ran away from her and she almost said so. At least it is dead, which is unfortunate for the cockroach, yes, but more unfortunate for this asshole who found it wrapped inside his Starcups Spicy Tuna Wrap. Prepackaged. Number One: it’s not Erica’s fault if a dead cockroach shows up in a prepackaged Spicy Tuna Wrap that she played no part in the prepackaging of. Shit like that happens. There are more of them than there are of us – assholes, yes, but also cockroaches. Number Two: this sucker of cock was being extremely obnoxious about it, especially considering Number One. He had yelled, “Miss!” across the store at Erica. When she looked his way, he beckoned her over with a come-hither curl of his index finger. He could tell Erica wasn’t feeling sorry from the way she walked over to their table, her hips swaying lazily, taking her time like an aloof African waitress. Worse, he could tell she would have been sorry, genuinely sorry, if he weren’t being unnecessarily obnoxious about the dead insect in his wrap. That only made him even more obnoxious. Meanwhile, his “female companion” sat beside him, saying nothing, only letting that expression slip on the half of her face that he couldn’t see. This made Erica almost giggle so she quickly dispensed with one I’m sorry and hurried back behind the cash register. Then, on second thought and also to make it not seem as if she had ran away from a “customer situation”, she reached under the counter of the espresso drink delivery counter for the stack of free-drink coupons. She peeled out two coupons for the man and his woman, and three coupons for herself.
Three were NOT for myself. Three were for my three favorite sisters in sweat, horseshit and grease at Medieval ShowTimes. The day before, on what would have been my thirty-sixth month of being a wench, I had served my last shift. I had not yet announced to management that I was quitting. From disowned daughter to asylum case to office cleaner to wench and now – look at me – Barista! After months of hard training while keeping my dinner shifts at Medieval ShowTimes. Who knows, one day you might even see me on television!
I carried the three Starcups free drink coupons in my woven backpack to the wenches’ locker room at Medieval ShowTimes Exhibition Place. I, the star of Starcups. One cannot be a Barista and continue doing night wench shifts for long. Why would one? Medieval ShowTimes has nine castles across North America, but Starcups has twenty thousand eight hundred and ninety-one stores on the whole of Earth. With this, I can go anywhere in the world, as soon as my passport comes.
