Paul Farenbacher provided opportunities for individuals to purchase products for twenty-five years before he retired, before he got sick. He started out selling detergents and disinfectants — not too different from what I do now, in fact — but after that, he sold cookware: heavy, enamel-coated cast iron. He also had a brief stint selling vitamins and nutritional supplements made from Blu-Green algae. I still have a questionable canister of this powdered seaweed at home. He claimed it strengthened his immune system. I have used it exactly once. I blended it into a Blu-Green Banana Smoothie, as suggested on the side panel. The powder turned the liquefied fruit such a disturbing shade of turquoise that I was moved to pour the lumpy miracle cure down the toilet. I snapped the plastic lid onto the tin and tucked it into the back of my cupboard. I should throw it away, but I can’t.
I would really like a cup of coffee. It’s nine o’clock on Saturday morning and I’m standing on the Farenbachers’ front lawn with their son, Trevor. I’m trying to make eye contact with the early birds as they swarm the rack of Paul Farenbacher’s suits, looking for bargains. A money belt loaded with coins hugs my waist and I am grateful for the anchor. It’s beautiful today — drifts of petals from the cherry trees have sifted into small piles on both sides of the curb. A light breeze and the petals stir like confetti in a snow globe. Trevor is having a hard time with this sale. He’s going around behind his mother’s back with a black Sharpie, marking the prices up when she’s not looking. He came back from Costa Rica this winter, when his father got sick. He said he wanted to restructure his business and get certified to teach kitesurfing here in Victoria. I wonder what he wants to do now.
Paul Farenbacher used to live in Costa Rica. One of the ten windiest places in the world, he told me. That’s why Trevor was there. But in the sixties, Paul Farenbacher was involved in something called the Instinctive Nutrition Movement, a group who smelled their food and then decided to eat it based on their intuitive reaction to the odour. They used to eat live shellfish, he told me. Right out of the ocean. Something about the briny tang was intuitively comforting to the ancient reptilian mind — it triggered memories, perhaps, of an amoebic past spent suspended in saline — so they would gnaw at live prawns and crabs still blue from the waves, bite into the salty bodies before boiling water could taint them.
I’ve never been to Costa Rica. I’ve never been east of Osoyoos, British Columbia.
Trevor’s mother, Margaret, stands in the middle of the lawn, next to Paul Farenbacher’s reclining chair. One of the early birds approaches her. The woman is wearing a pale blue trench coat. She has very curly hair. It’s scraped off her face and cinched in a tight puff at the base of her head. The woman looks at Margaret, she looks at the chair, and she bites her lip, thinking.
Can I sit in it? she asks.
Of course, says Margaret. Use the lever, get a feel for it.
Just pretend you’re in your living room, Bruce says. Try to ignore us.
If only it were that easy, says Trevor.
Bruce is Margaret’s new boyfriend. Today is only the second time I’ve seen them together. The first time was the wet and uncomfortable Thursday evening at Welsh & Bloom Funeral Home, only two months ago, when the whole neighbourhood came out on the rainiest night of the winter to see Paul Farenbacher arranged in a box in a jaunty pinstripe suit I’d never seen him wear before (such wide, bold stripes: he looked as though he were dressed for a performance in Vegas). A collection of Paul’s old cronies was there, from all his years of work — the cookware men, the detergent and spray disinfectant men, the Blu-Green algae men (who were actually mostly women) — huddled under the dripping canvas awning out front, a cluster of khaki overcoats under a cloud of smoke that condensed into fog. The sixty-year-old’s version of extreme sport: smoking at a funeral sponsored by lung cancer. The risk! The bravado! And Margaret Farenbacher in the front row, tucked into a pearl-grey suit like an altocumulus formation, managing to look parched in the rainstorm, her face powdered, her lipstick bleeding into cracks, her hair shellacked into feathers. Beside her, the tall man in black we all now know as Bruce, or Margaret’s new boyfriend, looking like he could use a cigarette himself.
Margaret has sold the Farenbacher bungalow and is moving in with Bruce, which is the reason for this yard sale. Perhaps that’s why Margaret chose to dress her husband in pinstripes on the day he was buried; in a muted way, she was also celebrating her engagement to Bruce. I don’t mean to sound unkind. I’ve lived next door to the Farenbachers for thirty years. I grew up with Trevor. I learned how to ride a bicycle in their driveway. Paul and Margaret used to babysit me. Margaret can be a very lovely woman.
I still live with my parents, in the house where I grew up. I run a small business called Scrub Goddess, a line of all-natural household cleansers. I started by mixing baking soda, a mild abrasive, with clove oil. I made batches of the stuff in the kitchen sink. I called it Artemis Powder and stuck a pink label on the jar — the same kind of jar you’d find filled with Parmesan cheese at the grocery store — and started selling it door to door. Business has grown, and I’ve converted our unfinished basement into a workable industrial unit. My mother helps me run my booth at the trade shows. Ten years ago, if someone had told me this would be my life, I would never have believed it.
It’s comfortable, the woman says, after she’s sat in the chair, pressed her lower back against the lumbar pillow, experimented with the lever, and hauled herself out again. It looks very new.
Oh, it is, says Margaret. It’s hardly been used.
You’re unbelievable, says Trevor.
She just means that it’s in excellent condition, I say to Trevor.
The woman asks Margaret, Why are you selling it?
Bruce nestles Margaret’s shoulders under his big arm. Well, he says, I already have a leather club chair, and there’s just not enough room for the sectional, the loveseat and two big chairs in my living room.
Margaret pats the back of the La-Z-Boy like it’s a dog. It’s been very good to us, she says, but it’s time to let it go to a new home now.
I’ll need a hand if I get it, the woman says. Let me think. She starts to walk away.
Don’t think about it too long! calls Bruce.
Margaret is wearing a pungent perfume. The thick scent hangs around her like a sticky brown cloud. She has styled her grey hair so that it wafts up off her head like layers of meringue. She wears caramel-coloured loafers that sink into the grass. They’re dark around the toes, stained from the dew.
She’ll come back, says Bruce. Don’t worry.
Do I look worried? Trevor says.
