cape-breton

Well, we're originally from Glace Bay."Grandma Elsie's eyes glittered. She was looking at one of her own, a lost Cape Bretoner in need of help and offering a new story. "Tell me all about it, dear.

Alecto Sydney Steele, an entity of few words whom society managed to overlook as it rapidly dove into the 21st century. Everything about him, his interests, his friends, his own life, was constantly in danger of becoming an anachronism. And caught up in that mess was Mearth, not exactly evil in nature but just misunderstood. A very long time ago Alecto__ life had been all incandescent sparkles and Kodachrome, but that was before the environmental movement changed Mearth from a perfectly nice and kind guardian, to a deranged and malevolent monster.

Hey Alecto, film this!_ she called out. With the slide being as tall as a two-storey house, it felt slightly risky being up there. __n second thought, why don__ you come up here? It__ a blast being up here.___ don__ really like to be in high places,_ said Alecto as he filmed her, the camera lens reflecting the entire playground, which was partially secluded by tall trees that cast otherworldly shadows dancing across the ground.__f you don__ like being in high places, then why__ you take so many drugs in the seventies?_ Mandy questioned jokingly. __o you want me to go up there and push you off the top of that slide?_ Alecto threatened coldly.__ou__ never do that, we__e best friends!_ Mandy pointed out. She reached over and picked a bright red maple flower from one of the long branches of the trees, tossing it down to him. __ven in this failing 21st century, where people are cell phone addicts and crude humor and violence is the norm, even when society falls apart and drowns in its own mistakes, we__l still be best friends!_ She looked incredibly eccentric, never mind the fact that she was an adult woman wearing a trippy rainbow Pucci dress from the 1970__, standing on top of a slide at a children__ playground. Alecto didn__ seem to mind, he just continued to film her with his camera like she__ asked him to.

You__e innocent until proven guilty,_ Mandy exclaimed, unable to hide her gleeful smile. She missed the way people used to have normal conversations, used to be more caring for each other than themselves, back in the Seventies and Eighties. These days, she realized, neighbors kept to themselves, their kids kept to themselves, nobody talked to each other anymore. They went to work, went shopping and shut themselves up at home in front of glowing computer screens and cellphones_ but maybe the nostalgic, better times in her life would stay buried, maybe the world would never be what it was. In the 21st century music was bad, movies were bad, society was failing and there were very few intelligent people left who missed the way things used to be_ maybe though, Mandy could change things. Thinking back to the old home movies in her basement, she recalled what Alecto had told her. __e wanted more than anything else in the world to be normal, but we failed._ The 1960__ and 1970__ were very strange times, but Mandy missed it all, she missed the days when Super-8 was the popular film type, when music had lyrics that made you think, when movies had powerful meanings instead of bad comedy and when people would just walk to a friend__ house for the afternoon instead of texting in bed all day. She missed soda fountains and department stores and non-biodegradable plastic grocery bags, she wished cellphones, bad pop music and LED lights didn__ exist_ she hated how everything had a diagnosis or pill now, how people who didn__ fit in with modern, lazy society were just prescribed medications without a second thought_ she hated how old, reliable cars were replaced with cheap hybrid vehicles_ she hated how everything could be done online, so that people could just ignore each other_ the world was becoming much more convenient, but at the same time, less human, and her teenage life was considered nostalgic history now.Hanging her head low, avoiding the slightly confused stare of the cab driver through the rear view mirror, she started crying uncontrollably, her tears soaking the collar of her coat as the sun blared through the windows in a warm light.

If you were me you__ do the right thing, help your friends, because you__e not a coward,_ Mandy sighed sadly. __ covered up a murder because I was scared to go to jail and I did the wrong thing_ well, now__ my chance to do the right thing, to save someone__ life, because I don__ want you to die.___ave someone__ life? I__ no one,_ Alecto laughed morbidly. __ hundred and twelve years is definitely way too long to have survived. You__ be wasting your time and risking your own life_.___his is my life,_ Mandy declared, smiling sincerely. Alecto just looked concerned and very doubtful as the rain drizzled down the roads and sidewalks, towards the harbour where it fell into the ocean, indistinguishable from all the other water in the world.

With Pollution, emotion is irrelevant, it is not their nature,_ Mearth sighed, making a face as if she were talking to an ignorant small child. __ didn__ create them, humans created the Pollution. Cheryl Nobel, Alecto Steele, Albert Sanders, Olivia Campbell, all my pretty little Representations, there aren__ many of them left these days but they__e still very dangerous! They__e here to tell society all about its mistakes! You don__ understand the world of Representations.

Jeeter?" Grace whispered into her walkie-talkie. "Are you awake?" She waited.A few weeks ago, she and Jeeter had started chatting on their walkie-talkies late at night when she couldn't sleep. He always answered her call no matter how late it was."I'm here," his voice echoed back. "Trouble sleeping again?""Yeah.""Another bad dream?""Uh-huh," she sniffed, unexpected tears flooding her eyes. My dad was calling for me, but I couldn't find him." She couldn't believe she'd said it. She'd never told anyone what she saw in her dreams. But Jeeter understood. He'd told her before that he had bad dreams too, since his mom had died.

This is my home, Cape Breton is my home, and I don__ know if I really want to leave it as much as I might think and I__ sort of scared to leave it all behind, everything I__e lived with, I have so many memories of all the things I__e done here and I__ afraid if I leave, I might lose all my memories_

Repression. Her therapist, Dr. Solomon, loved the word. He'd say it slowly, letting it roll off his tongue. Sometimes he'd add a chin stroke for good measure. He always looked pleased when he did this, like he'd discovered the Caramilk secret or something.

Kipster is a perfectly valid word,_ Wendy argued, about to write down her score on the little notepad that had come with the game. __kay, so what does it mean?_ Mandy wanted to know. Wendy struggled to come up with an answer, and finally just changed the subject with school gossip. Mandy found herself just ignoring it_ it always sounded the same, the same events, same rumors, same secrets, same affairs, but never anything of interest to her.__ell Sarah__ on drugs again and that__ why she did it in Mario__ backseat, but now she might be pregnant, oh, and that messed-up Seth kid__ been cutting himself again so he was sent away to Halifax last week, and there__ a festival in Wolfville but Kathy won__ go because Audrey-Rose is going to be there and they hate each other, and_.__andy had learned two years ago to detach herself from gossip; she__ learned it from Jud__ death. Wendy may have been eighteen years old but she could be immature on the best of days.

We were poor back then. Not living in a cardboard carton poor, not __e might have to eat the dog_ poor, but still poor. Poor like, no insurance poor, and going to McDonald's was a really big excitement poor, wearing socks for gloves in the winter poor, and collecting nickels and dimes from the washing machine because she never got allowance, that kind of poor_ poor enough to be nostalgic about poverty. So, when my mom and dad took me here for my tenth birthday, it was a really big deal. They__ saved up for two months to take me to the photography store and they bought me a Kodak Instamatic film camera_ I really miss those days, because we were still a real family back then_ this mall doesn__ even have a film photography store anymore, just a cell phone and digital camera store, it__ depressing_

I might be the hazardous waste site that polluted it, but Cape Breton Island is still my home.

We__e losing society to apathy, to digital technology, the people who care about nobody else but themselves. They share every little detail of their stupid lives online as if the world even gives a damn_ digital technology is getting smarter and society is getting dumber,_ Mandy whispered in a voice filled with disbelief. __ociety is_ it__ slipping away.

Alecto isn't a person! He's just something that society made and then threw away, a memory that refuses to die.

What are you doing?_ Alecto asked in surprise, stepping back. Laughing brightly, she dragged him towards the greenhouse, the shattered glass reflecting rainbows as brilliant as a million Kodak flashcubes, glittering as they were cascaded through the breeze. __ee, don__ be afraid of the glass, it can__ hurt us,_ Mandy laughed, spectacularly eccentric, her eyes reflecting the fallen glass.__ wasn__ afraid of the glass, but this isn__ a very secluded place that you just decided to vandalize,_ Alecto cautioned, smiling despite his words. Before Mandy could reply, she heard loud whispering in the air, behind the trees_ it sounded like a group of people, all whispering in unison_ __omebody__ out there,_ she exclaimed nervously.__eah, you__e right,_ Alecto replied. Suddenly a sharp new vibrancy seemed to fill his eyes and he smiled coldly, taking the tree branch from Mandy and rapidly smashing in all of Mrs. Matthias_ stained glass house windows with it. Blue, green, yellow, red, turquoise, purple and an array of other colors showered through the sky noisily, sounding like wind chimes and crashing waves. __hey__l go away,_ he told her, glancing up at the sky.__Alecto, do you like me?_ Mandy questioned, holding out her arms like a lopsided scarecrow as the glass fell through her dark red hair.__eah, sure,_ he answered.__ill you be my friend, then? A real friend, not just another person who feels sorry for me?_ Mandy asked.__Alright, Mandy Valems,_ Alecto agreed.

Oh, I__ Chrissy Mackenzie, I__ from Vancouver but I came here to study environmental journalism,_ the girl exclaimed with way too much enthusiasm. __ou got any advice?___earch me,_ Mandy muttered, spooning another ice cube from the empty glass on the table in front of her. __ like pollution, I write in favor of it, and environmental journalism most often implies that it__ in favor of all that __o green_ hippie crap._ __h, well_._ Chrissy seemed taken aback, offended, and Mandy sighed a fourth time. __amn it, I__ really sorry,_ she apologized, smiling dismally at the aspiring writer. __t__ just been a really lousy day for me and I wasn__ really thinking. My advice? Find your own cause to represent, not one thrown out into society by a ton of environmentalist dopes. Find something new, something you think could be improved, and work from there._ Chrissy smiled with a look of total ecstasy as if the words of some nobody woman were important. Mandy momentarily noticed the groups of laughing, drunk, giggling people, all acting childish_ and for a moment she wished she could be them.

At her words, words of forgiveness from Rose, an honest and just woman, something broke inside of Wince. His tears began to flow. Age seemed to drift from his face like misty ghosts from a morning field. Katie lifted his chin and, holding back her own tears, looked into his eyes. "Thank you, Wince."Eve placed her free hand on his shoulder. "May we hold her now?"Wince nodded and gently released the baby into the waiting arms of her sisters."You did the right thing, Wince." Rose gave Wince a hug. "And you can help us bury her after Wilson and the Tar Ponds City Police see if they can find anybody to lay charges against after all this time.

Mandy was thinking back to when she was five years old, when she, her parents and Jud went outside before Christmas and had a snowball fight with the gray snow of Sydney Mines. __his is a wicked blast,_ Jud would say, and Mandy would snap photos with a 35mm disposable film camera, photos she wished very much she could step into sometimes.