Apocalypse for Beginners Read Free Page B

an undocumented incompatibility between clozapine and the international news.
    Still, whatever the explanation, from now on she would have to intensify her efforts to preserve domestic stability. The resulting tension only heightened her solitary tendencies and increased the number of hours per week spent in her closet retreat.
    She felt overwhelmed by the situation, but to whom could she turn for help? Certainly not the Randalls. They tolerated but did not really accept her, quite simply because Hope had not yet endured her Spell from Hell. What kind of Randall were you if you had no idea of your date for the end of the world? Barely a sub-Randall, a maggot, a foreign object orbiting around the family tree.
    Hope walked the line between two worlds, unable to set her foot down in one or the other. Luckily she had David Suzuki.

7. STRUCK DOWN BY FATE
    Inevitably, the summer of 1989 arrived.
    Hope’s mother was in the grip of indescribable dread, magnified because she did not exactly know what to expect. It had been some time since she had swallowed any pills whatsoever, and the unopened bottles of clozapine were gathering dust in the medicine cabinet. Consequently, she spent her evenings playing solitaire on the kitchen table and jumping at the slightest squeak, which her imagination immediately amplified and transformed into a cataclysm.
    At all times the neighbour’s television could be heard through the wall—a mixture of The Price Is Right , Three’s Company and Wok With Yan , occasionally pierced by angry shouts that could be ascribed to the immoderate consumption of beer. The mayhem began every morning at six and went on until midnight. It was enough to drive anybody insane—and Ann Randall’s sanity hung by such a fine thread she was like one of those cartoon characters holding on to the cliff’s edge with a shaky index finger.
    Her anxiety steadily mushroomed, until, one night in July, everything collapsed.
    Hope was drifting between two phases of sleep when she was awakened by the clink of dishes. Someone was rummaging around in the cupboards. She edged her way to the kitchen, which she found in state of total chaos. Her mother was frantically emptying the fridge.
    “What are you doing, Mom?”
    Ann Randall turned around with a start, looking like a burglar caught red-handed. She stared at her daughter for a moment and, unable to recognize her, continued to empty the fridge.
    “I’m packing.”
    “To go where?”
    “West.”
    Ann Randall truly believed that she could gain some time by escaping toward the west, perhaps by virtue of the clock’s reversal as one travelled westward through the time zones. Even more likely, however, was that her thinking was based on an abstruse biblical interpretation of the cardinal points or on the lyrics of a Led Zeppelin song that she had heard on the radio earlier that night. There was no way of knowing.
    Hope acquiesced, getting out of her pyjamas and putting on the first clothes she could find: an old pair of ripped jeans, a T-shirt and a New York Mets baseball cap. She wistfully packed her bag, managing to jam in a half-dozen volumes of her Russian textbooks. She took a last look inside the closet—the small cocoon furnished with her books, her TV, her cushions, her David Suzuki posters. She sighed. Why hadn’t she been born into a family obsessed by deer hunting, the Super Bowl or municipal politics?
    In the kitchen, her mother had almost finished emptying the fridge. She thrust a bag of provisions into Hope’s arms.
    “Here, go put this in the car.”
    Hope reluctantly obeyed. In front of the house their ancient Lada was waiting, all its doors open. It was an ailing, second-hand car purchased the year before with the family’s meagre savings. The trunk overflowed with bags, knick-knacks, clothing. Ann Randall had even jettisoned the spare tire to make room for her bible collection. Every seat except the driver’s was laden with boxes, and the floor was covered