ISABELLE – IZZY to friends and family – climbed onto her usual Pudgie’s stool and breathed a sigh of relief. She’d snagged an entire table. That was a coup. At this time on a Friday evening – five-thirty, to be exact – entire tables were never available.
She’d had to rush. Her hair was damp and would crinkle and frizz as it dried. Her eye makeup had been hasty and would smear as she sweated while the bar warmed up. So what? She’d snagged a table.
Server Gayle hustled over with drinks without being asked and placed them around the table so Izzy could claim all the seats. Gayle knew all their drinks – hadn’t they been patrons for every minute of her fifteen-year career? Izzy smiled her thanks: Gayle rarely stopped to chat. The bar filled fast, and orders flew. In a busy bar with few servers, charm and chit-chat went by the wayside – speed and accuracy earned the tips, and Gayle knew at the end of a shift that she was loved, indeed.
Izzy gazed around, sipping on a large glass of Pinot Grigio. The band had arrived just ahead of her and were setting up, chatting with their ‘groupies’ – spouses and friends who kept things friendly and got the crowd dancing. Band members traded insults with other musicians who had shown up to support them and for whom they often did the same. One never knew when a guitarist or drummer might suffer a medical emergency and need a replacement. This is what support looks like among geriatric musicians.
Izzy was looking forward to the evening. The band, she knew, would play her favourite genre from her favourite decade and one of her friends, Leggy Peggy Sue, would follow her up to the dance floor. Providing, of course, she was sufficiently lubricated. She thought she might catch Gayle’s eye and ask her to make sure Peggy Sue’s glass stayed full.
She extended her gaze to take in the tables closest to hers and was surprised to find that a young man, a fellow who couldn’t have been more than thirty years old, was looking back at her with friendly interest. That was unusual enough to make her suspicious. She was long past doing her hair and fussing over makeup for any other purpose than her own grooming standards, on those rare occasions when she chose to uphold them. On the make she was not! What the fuck’s wrong with him? she thought and let her gaze skim right past him. To her dismay he picked up his Budd Lite and walked over to plop his butt into the stool beside hers.
“I’m sorry,” she began, “this table is taken.”
“Of course, of course,” he responded, “I’m sure they’ll be along soon. I thought you might not mind someone to talk to while you wait. I don’t know anyone here.”
Izzy stared at him and said nothing. He was decent looking, appropriately dressed, somewhat bland, she thought, as in lacking character, or experience, or gravitas. She wasn’t sure what was missing but something was. It had also registered that there were at least two tables occupied by small groups of younger women – much more likely destinations for a young man looking for company and conversation. She remained silent, staring at him and sipping her wine.
The young man smiled. “May I treat you to a drink? White wine, is it?” He turned, tried to catch Gayle’s eye.
“No, thank you. I pace myself.” Izzy replied.
“Oh! Very good. Wise, indeed. Something learned over a lifetime of social drinking, I suppose. Had some regrettable evenings, have we?” His plastic smile was immobile, his eyes were slits in his face.
Izzy was irritated by his expression, his voice, his unwarranted familiarity. “It’s simply healthier,” she replied. She put her glass down on the table, looked away toward the band as it warmed up and silently willed him gone.
“I’m Reginald,” he said. He stood up in front of her stool and stuck out his hand. She glanced up at him and thought, Good. He’s up, up, and, hopefully, away. She shook his hand. “I’m Izzy,” she said.
“Nice to know you, Izzy. I believe your friends have arrived. I’ll be on my way.” He left his full beer on her table and walked out of the bar as her friends walked in.
***
At Pudgie’s the following Friday, Reginald appeared out of nowhere and pulled a stool from an adjoining table to insinuate himself into Izzy’s group. Introductions were made all around. Izzy watched Peggy Sue’s boyfriend Charlie engage with Reginald and though she couldn’t hear the conversation, she knew the young man was being grilled. She grinned and prodded Peggy Sue. “Up, woman,” she yelled over the pounding dance music. “They’re playing our song.”
The next song was too slow for their kind of dancing. Peggy Sue headed for the table, but Reginald appeared and grabbed Izzy by the elbow and pulled her back onto the dance floor. ‘Jesus Christ’, she thought, ‘this guy is a nuisance’. He held her close and whispered into her ear. “I can’t help but wonder. What would you give to live your life over? You can’t say you’ve never regretted anything. Haven’t you ever wished you could re-write history? If someone came along and offered you your youth back, wouldn’t you take it?”
Izzy stopped mid-shuffle and stared at the man, suddenly loathing his metallic breath, his ice-cold skin. “My life is just fine, thank you.” She walked away; he followed. When they got to the table, she noticed that her stool was waiting. His had been taken for use by someone at some other table. He stood awkwardly for a few minutes while conversation swirled around him but did not include him. He walked out of the bar and disappeared into the dark parking lot.
Charlie leaned in, tapped Izzy’s shoulder. “Your friend Reginald told me he’s a pilot. On lay-off, he says. Who’s laying off pilots?, I wanted to know. He wouldn’t say.”
“Are we going to have to find ourselves another bar?” Peggy Sue wailed. “I like this one.”
“This is our bar. I’ll straighten out Reggie-Baby if it comes to that,” Charlie assured her.
***
The week that followed was disturbing. On Monday morning, Izzy woke and hopped out of bed and stretched and realized her arthritic knee was not complaining. She didn’t need to pee. She smiled and thanked karma for a good day.
On Tuesday, she stroked her chin to see if she could get away with not plucking for one more day and her fingers found nothing but smooth flesh. Her pubic hair, however, was sprouting afresh, dark and coarse. Her salt and pepper coiffure was much more pepper than salt.
Wednesday morning, the woman she saw in the mirror was wrinkle-free. She sat on her living room couch, rocked her cat and cried. That evening she took a chance and drank caffeinated coffee after dinner. She still slept through the night.
Thursday she was twenty pounds lighter and had started her period. She was beside herself. She almost doubted her sanity, but the evidence was all there, on her body, in her face, in her very bodily functions. She was growing younger, and she was almost giddy with an emotion she couldn’t put a name to. Joy? Excitement? Surely there was some anxiety as well. A sense of dread associated with Reginald – his strange affect, his reptilian physicality.
She made a pot of tea and sat at the kitchen table with her To Do pad and a sharp pencil, determined to put Reginald out of her mind. Pros on the left of the page and Cons on the right. All pros, she thought as she grinned and began to list all the ways in which she could improve the outcomes of her long, long life if only she were young again. It was a long list. She went to bed and dreamed of renewal, rebirth, success and satisfaction. Her life, re-written.
Friday morning, she awoke to a headache and cramps in her calves and arches. The aches-upon-waking were back and she nearly peed her pants hobbling to the bathroom. In the bathroom mirror she saw the old Izzy, hairs and wrinkles back with a vengeance. She screamed briefly, then she slapped herself a few times, just to be sure she wasn’t dreaming. She sat back down, hard, on the toilet seat and rocked, keening softly. This was insane. All of it. Is this how dementia began? She did a brief inventory of all the demented folks she’d ever known, and there were quite a few of them, but she couldn’t recall any who had imagined themselves grown young and then old again in the course of less than a week.
Izzy was a practical woman, long reconciled to the inexorable destruction of aging. So she raised herself with dignity from the toilet seat, blew her nose and wiped her eyes and stood to appraise the self she saw in the mirror. But vanity thy name is woman, after all. She decided she needed to salvage what she could and called her stylist, Peter, to make an appointment for a colour and cut – she who hadn’t coloured her hair in ten years. Peter took it in stride, clucked “Nice, nice! Good for you!” and said he’d fit her in at 2 p.m.
After a quick wash and some slapdash wardrobe choices, Izzy was out the door and driving to the Pen Centre to buy fresh makeup. Enroute she took some time to consider what was lost and what could be salvaged of the pleasure she’d taken in the lost pounds, the hairless chin, the making of the list that would right all wrongs. She realized she was shattered. There was nothing on God’s green earth that could fill this sudden abyss. Yet no more than a week ago she’d been on solid footing, had totally reasonable expectations of herself and her future. It was dizzying.
Then she thought perhaps her blood sugars were low. Maybe her dizzy feelings were no more than a physiological state that could be remedied with a double-double and a donut. She bought one of each at the closest coffee shop and sat in the food court to consume them while scrolling through her phone texts and answering some of them. The debate among her friends was whether to go to Pudgie’s tonight or Saturday night – both nights featured good bands. When they finally settled on Saturday, she looked up to find Reginald sitting at a food court table several yards away and staring at her with a small cold smile. He picked up his caramel ribbon crunch frappucino and joined her.
She swiped her phone closed and turned it face-down on the table. She glared at him.
“No, Izzy, you are not insane,” he stated. His smile became oilier. He looked somehow pumped and victorious. “I’m aware of that,” Izzy spat. “Who the hell are you and what do you think you are doing?”
“Does it matter who I am?” Reginald replied. “All you need to know is that I can change the course of your life. You just have to say the word and I’ll put you back on that path you loved so much this week. You loved it. Don’t try to tell me, or yourself, that you didn’t.”
Izzy ducked her head in acknowledgement. “Why me?” she asked.
“Well, it’s actually quite random, you know. There’s nothing particularly special about you.” he said. “You fit the profile, I suppose you’d say – coming to the end of your allotted human lifespan. You and your ilk make what seems, to my kind, desperate attempts to prolong your self-concept of youthfulness. Sad really. But it makes you prime fodder for our games.”
Izzy stared at him, confounded. “What the fuck are you talking about? Now you sound insane, Reginald. What games? Whose games?”
“Do we really need to have this conversation? Just give me the go-ahead, just say yes, and you’ll live forever and I’ll win this round of the game. A win-win, as you people say. Very simple. Don’t overthink it. It’s over your head in any case.”
“I’ll live forever?” Izzy laughed. “Now I know you’re cracked.”
“Not at all. Just tell me the age you want to be, and that’s where I’ll send you. Gradually you’ll get younger until you get to the age you want. And that is where you’ll stay. All the heartaches you’ve accumulated? All the hurts you’ve caused? Gone. Can you imagine anything sweeter?” Reginald was watching her face intently now. His voice had become jarringly sibilant and pleading.
“You know I can do this, Izzy. I’ve shown you what I can do. Just say the word, and you can have Jeremy back.” He watched her with the eyes of a snake while she cringed from the gut-punch.
Jeremy. Her one and only love. Lost one night in 1982 on the icy 401 enroute to a Leafs’ game in Toronto. Crushed, then burned beyond recognition.
“Twenty!” she cried. “Make me twenty.”
Reginald launched himself from his seat at the table and ran from the food court, laughing. Izzy fought the urge to vomit.
Gradually she calmed. She gathered her things – her phone, her glasses, a notepad with her list in it, and shoved them into her purse. She stood slowly and noticed that she felt no stiffness or soreness anywhere. The age spots on her hands were gone. She shivered with guilty pleasure.
On Saturday evening at Pudgie’s, Izzy looked and felt wonderful. Her men friends were bemused and her girl friends were appalled. Young men sidled closer out of curiosity. She found it hard to stay focused, however, and it sometimes felt like she was invisible. Her friends’ eyes began to slide over her as if she wasn’t there. When she looked out the window and noticed Reginald outside smoking, she went to join him.
“I see you have begun the transition,” he said.
“To what?” she asked.
“To ‘citizen of the past’, I suppose,” he replied.
Izzy felt reassured. Then she asked, “What is the prize you play for? That made you laugh like a loon when you won it?”
“If you were like me, which you will be soon – immortal, that is – what do you imagine you might covet more that anything in the universe? Think hard, now.” Reginald paused briefly then he sighed. “I am so fucking bored,” he said.
He grabbed her hands and trapped them in his own. A feeling like liquid electricity travelled up her arms and into her spine then shot back down and out her palms. “Your mortality, luv. That’s the prize,” Reginald said. “Thank you for that, and goodbye now.”
Serpentine Reginald winked and raised his arms skyward. He disintegrated in a puff of stinky cold air, leaving a ring of twinkling metallic ash where he’d stood.
Izzy smiled. She sat on the curb with her lustrous black curls lifting in the breeze and her strong young legs stretched out before her. She waited for 1980 to bring Jeremy back to her.
The End
Canadian Stories 