Image: Cap Rouge Winterscape 1 by Roger Beaudry
Funeral Eve | Modern Day | Papillon
Rumour has it my French auntie, Matante Bijou, is gifted with the uncanny talent to smell a dead rat jammed under a rock two towns over. Or, in plain English, she’s got a nose for secrets. Matante Bijou was also my first art teacher, my grandmother’s bestie, and now quite possibly the only living person who might help me unravel the tangled roots of my family tree.
Who knows, there could be a mischief of rats to sniff out in the very house I grew up in, grand-maman’s house.
My grandmother, my mother, all my aunties and cousins—everyone except me—were born in a French-Canadian village by the ocean called Papillon. It’s such a negligible speck you can’t even find it on Google Maps.
Yesterday, Gigi insisted on driving me to the ‘negligible speck’ for the funeral. Of course, that means we were running late. After crossing the Causeway—the green bridge with a sign that says, ‘Welcome to Cape Breton’—Gigi’s lively Tesla roadster raced north as the ocean rolled to our left. Even with the car windows shut tight, we couldn’t escape the smell of salt.
Gigi was grilling me with questions about my family, especially my grandmother.
My grandmother, Mémère Bella, was a Catholic nun who had babies—no divine intervention required. Despite their naturalness, those deliveries rattled the very marrow of Papillon’s parishioners, setting in motion our family’s descent toward rock bottom. Our fate was all but sealed when gossip from a local hair salon swept through the village.
Was it true? Was one of Mémère Bella’s babies the illegitimate spawn of a famous artist? When Mémère got wind of the back gate whispers, she sharpened her claws and began shredding the cocoon in which our family had been left to rot.
My cell phone vibrated for the umpteenth time. I ignored it for the umpteenth time.
“You know you’re going to have to talk to her eventually.”
I glared into Gigi’s Termite sunglasses—noticing my reflection. Yep, I looked like shit. My diagonally cut hair—or what Mam likes to call my ‘crow’s wing’ was a grungy, dishevelled mess. Mam would never be caught dead un-coiffed, bedraggled, or in slovenly clothes. I tried to push away the unease churning in my stomach, but the anxiety mounted like waves. I reached my index finger to pick at my right eyebrow. My brain can be such a mind-boggling traitor.
“Clarisse, d’ya hear me?”
“Uh-huh.”
Besides, I only caved about coming to the funeral because Matante Bijou insisted my grandmother wanted me there. Matante said she needed to give me something, in person, and no amount of coaxing worked. No, she would never, EVER mail it.
“You know, your mom might be the one person who can spill about your famous grand-papa,” Gigi grabbed her vape pen, inhaled loudly and exhaled a cloud of berry aroma. Gigi’s hair was no better than mine, a pixie, platinum, half-spiked half-flat bedhead.
“What if it’s Picasso?”
“Not likely! Besides, I don’t need Mam. First, there’s my aunt, and if she won’t spill, I can check into those genetic tests, ‘23 and Me’ or ‘Ancestry DNA’.”
“Bloody hell!” Gigi exclaimed in her exaggerated British accent.
In our approach, the turns got sharper, but Gigi sped on in jerks, screeches, and abrupt braking. Every time she’d slam on the brakes, Gigi would yell out slang terms for breasts. “Tits!” and “Boobies” were her faves if one assessed based on repetition, but a specific expression drew my full attention at the precarious turn we call Dead Man’s curve. Gigi slammed the brakes and in a theatrical, stage whisper, enunciated:
“Holy fiery biscuits tig ol' bitties.”
I laughed for the first time since I got the news. Gigi exhaled another cloud of berries, but I caught her sneaky, snug smile through the mist. It reminded me of our first meeting and the provocative dissonance I’d felt trying to fuse her Japanese features with the British accent.
Gigi’s hazing ritual of navigating Cape Breton roads made her miss most of the scenery. Sometime later, she did notice a palette change—wooden houses painted in greys and beiges transformed into sunflower yellows, apple greens and marine blues. How much later? Who knows. It was after passing Gillis Mountain, but I can’t tell you exactly how long because time slows here, and by the time you reach Papillon, you’re beyond the flow of real time altogether.
“This looks like that Van Gogh painting from finals. Look, there’s even a steeple, and mountains.”
I pointed out ‘AuCoin’, the garage we all used as our ‘nearly there’ marker.
“AuCoin?”
“AuCoin is French for ‘at the corner’.” I explained how every important building in Papillon was ‘christened’ with a French Acadian name. Everyone talked about buildings as if they were people with actual emotions and even opinions.
“That’s crazy shit, right there. And here I thought my grandparents had weird forms of animism in Japan.”
I peered out the window. Against a wild charcoal sky, smears of crimson, orange, cerise and chartreuse streaked the clouds like lightning. The wind howled.
“Sure hope this weather clears up for tomorrow.” Even as I said it, I had this image pop in my head of the one powder-blue umbrella amidst a sea of black umbrellas and pelting rain. Matante Bijou’s umbrella started to lift her up like the character Mary Poppins from that old film Matante insisted I watch with her.
Gigi glanced in the mirror, but I looked away and cracked open the window.
And, then it happened. Accompanied by a gust of wind, a singular miracle appeared. A poetic creature with translucent topaz-coloured wings rushed through the car window. Flapping her wings slowly, she fluttered over and hovered in front of me.
My spine snapped to attention. I watched, exhilarated by her elegance.
‘Welcome back,’ my heart heard her whisper.
“Bloody hell, a butterfly! We have to get that thing out of the car.” Gigi’s words receded like a distant tide.
“At certain times of year, Papillon gets overrun by butterflies. This one must’ve lost her pack. Papillon. Butterfly,” I repeated. Neither word attested to her majesty. I felt a peculiar twinge, a thirst for light inside me, as if I were inside a cocoon in the desert about to explode and discover the taste of water and sunshine.
Matante Bijou got it right. This was the sign. I was meant to come to the funeral.
Gigi turned her signal and pulled over. She tried to shoo the butterfly out the window, but my golden friend flitted sideways and lurched forward, engulfing the car with her delicate power. She spread her wings flat against the windshield, dragging us back on the road, and along the so-called downtown part of Papillon, in a straight line across the once well-manicured lawns whose grasses had grown tired and turned olive-brown.
On the left, the harbour side, we flew by a co-op grocery store, a restaurant, coffee shop, two hair salons, a fish plant, and a Fish’n Frites shack perched on a weather-beaten wharf. On the right side, flanked by the Cape Breton Highlands, was a hospital, school, post office, tavern, and smack in the middle of the strip dominating the scene sat a grand cathedral-like church.
The wind died there.
The butterfly darted out the window.
“Hey, what’s this stone cathedral called? Le Goliath?”
“Église LeFort. Means the strong church, not so far off from Goliath.”
“Brill,” Gigi’s cackle filled the car.
We passed the last few lawns hedged with surgical precision. And there it was. The white farmhouse with its double doors painted sunporch yellow, its tall windows and shutters trimmed in blue-violet. We turned in the driveway, passing by Mémère’s wild garden out front. My butterfly friend flew by, landing on a decaying birdhouse nailed to a tree by the house.
The second Gigi killed the engine, I jumped out to a burst of applause from the waves crashing into the rocks across the way. My nostrils filled with that briny, ocean smell—the smell of home.
Mam flew out the door. “I was worried sick. Don’t you ever answer your phone?” She flashed a dazzling smile at Gigi. Even in grief, Mam’s black Chanel sunglasses matched the exact shade of her hair, her red lipstick, applied perfectly. It reminded me of Taylor Swift’s lipstick in that dreamy music video when she wore a jet-black wig playing up the Old Hollywood vibes.
“I turned it off to save the battery,” I lied. Before she could hug me, I hurried to the car door and pulled out my cat carrier with my rescue Zaz inside. It was so much easier to feel pissed than sad.
But something was off. Mam had let her shock of long, dark spirals down, and was wrapped in the black silk kimono Mémère had given her, the one with the deep V and hand-painted monarchs and birds of paradise—a novel wardrobe choice given it was way past lunchtime.
Mam removed her glasses, extended her hand, and I saw Gigi’s eyes widen.
“Let’s head in, shall we? Matante Bijou’s waiting and there’s enough food to feed an army.”
“Same eyes,” Gigi whispered as we headed towards the back step. “They shine like a sunrise on the ocean.”
Sure, Mam and I share feline-shaped eyes in shades of violet-blue with specks of silver and charcoal, much like the ocean. However, because of my affliction, without my falsies mine are sans the long, dark eyelashes, and thus an uninterrupted horizon. Not today though. I may not have combed my hair, but I did pop in false eyelashes and pencil in my trademark tree branch over my right brow.
“You’re both lush, in your own way,” Gigi added.
I groaned.
Matante Bijou appeared, leaning heavily on her cane. I set down the cat carrier, ran up the steps into Matante’s arms, and felt my tears rise like the ocean.
I spent the next few hours on the veranda with Matante poring over photo albums.
Whenever she steps outside, Matante Bijou dons her signature wide-brimmed, powder-blue hat that matches her Cadillac. Her hat is always tilted low to keep the sun off her face. At her age, Bijou possesses the sort of glamour one doesn't expect. It’s not that she doesn't look her age; her style defies age.
“Matante, are you gonna spill about this box you mentioned on the phone?”
Matante let her reading glasses slide down her nose, and delivered a rather uncharitable look: “Non! And besides, it’s not one box, it’s three. That’s all I’m saying about that, so don’t bother wasting your breath. You’ll get them at the funeral tomorrow, not a second earlier.” Even when admonishing me, Matante’s voice was melodic, warm as honey.
Three boxes. Hmm.
As the chartreuse light in the sky began to turn coral, I took out another album. Mémère labelled them by decades. This one: 1950s. What else to do on a funeral eve but pore over pics of a loved one? Besides, Mam, and no one else, lorded over every, last detail for the funeral.
I flipped to another album page and felt a frisson, trilling like a wave up my spine.
In every photo, a younger version of Mémère, laughing and dancing, at some party. I recognized several, famous artists in the photos: Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera, Picasso, O’Keefe, and Chagall. Matante Bijou’s bony fingers gripped the chipped, china teacup in her hand.
Her knuckles paled.
As I examined each photo, last year’s Christmas eve potluck came to mind. The first I’d heard of this famous artist-grandfather story. Mam got lit as a tit that night, regaling guests with tales of the back gate whispers: was she really the illegitimate daughter of a famous artist? What! The next morning, I asked about him. How famous was famous? Mam denied she’d said anything that preposterous, so I’d chocked it up to one of her drunken tall tales, and let it go.
Besides, it was bad enough I didn’t know who my biological father was, now this.
However, a few weeks later, doubts about my lineage sprouted and took root. They lived rent-free in my head for half my second semester till the night after my opening when Gigi kissed me. Like a double opening!
Other than nagging doubts about my paternity, second semester turned out great, or as we say in Cape Breton, a gigantic cornucopia of awesomeness. My anxiety disorder took a back seat to the freedom of foundation year. I explored different mediums outside my comfort zone, discovered I loved ceramics, documentary film, and the weekly art openings at the Anna Leonowens Gallery.
I also loved the ‘unofficial’ motto of our school: Art is dope!
I flipped another page. “Matante?” I pointed.
Matante made a harrumphing sound, a sigh, and finally, “oh right, them. When Bella came back from the war, I guess she felt obligated to some of those artist-types who helped her escape.”
“The war? What war?”
“The Spanish Civil War.”
The Spanish Civil War! Was Matante going to drop that bomb, with no details?
“Red sky at night, sailors' delight,” Mam quipped as she glided outside. Gigi trailed behind, starstruck. Great. Less than an hour and Gigi had already joined my mother’s fandom. In her version of maternal affection, Mam leaned over and tried to pat down my crow’s wing as she calls it. “Clarisse, your lovely friend Gigi told me about the kind thing you did for her, giving her your apartment key. She also tells me you haven’t eaten all day. You have to eat.”
Mam delivered her pronouncement in the usual way. She had this habit of firing up passions in others they didn’t even know they possessed. This was not one of those times. At least, this is what I tried to tell myself.
Mam was doing her thing, fussing over details, and bringing out a continuous parade of plates jam-packed with homemade gourmet goodies, charcuterie boards, and now this flat bread that looked like Mémère’s wild garden. The bread smelled divine, a buttery herbaceous heaven.
I wanted to resist, but it was impossible. I ripped off a piece. It practically melted in my mouth; it was that delicious.
Matante asked what was this kind gesture Mam had mentioned.
Gigi started telling Matante about how I noticed her ex-girlfriend being abusive at a café, followed Gigi to the washroom, and handed her my spare apartment key, just in case she ever needed a safe place. And then, Gigi noticed. She pointed at Picasso in the photo and raised her dramatic eyebrows.
Mam handed me her designer sunglasses. “Here, Clarisse dear, stop squinting. You’ll regret it later.”
Oh my mother, ….it’s not as if I don’t love the woman, but she can be so exasperating, her standards impossibly high for Gandhi himself.
Bella, Bijou and Océane (or Mam as I know her). Such pretty names. Had Mam followed tradition, I could’ve ended up with a dreamy name too. But, no such luck. When I was born, Mam had amnesia. Unaware of all the lovely names dangling from our family tree, she stuck me instead with Clarisse, which flies in the face of fashion. If I were an appliance, I’d be harvest- gold, or maybe pukey, avocado green. And no matter how I tried to get a cool nickname going, as a kid home-schooled by a bossy, know-it-all, I lacked the social skills to make it happen.
How come no one told me about Mémère escaping a war? Really! Just why?
As coral turned into fiery orange and crimson, I watched the colours dance across the sky above the harbour. Papillon’s sunsets always remind me of that painting my stepdad loves so much, Monet’s San Giorgio Maggiore. The contrast of the vibrant strokes of colour with the delicate brushwork suggests movement, the passage of time. Soon, the sunset would paint the horizon to sleep.
The rest of the 1950s album didn’t offer much for clues about my real father or grandfather. The end of the album did, however, mark the appearance of colour photos. By placing them side by side, Mémère had created a panorama showing the craggy, coastal inlet known as the ‘commercial’ side of Papillon.
“Matante, this Papillon panorama is super creative. Did Mémère take any art classes with those artists?
Matante squinted, shifted, and then lifted her shoulders. “Who knows?” It was a statement though, not a question.
A second panorama of photos featured the (supposedly) charitable side of Papillon, flanked by the Highlands: hospital, school, post office, the cathedral-like church…
The very church where the funeral would go down tomorrow. The funeral of my favourite person in the whole world, my Mémère.
For the rest of the night and into the wee hours, I couldn’t sleep and kept going over those conversation snippets on the veranda.
Strikes me as odd—how tongue-tied Matante got when I asked about the pics. All Bijou added, muttered really, was that the party photos were in Mexico, and that Mémère had met Picasso and Diego whatshisname during the Spanish Civil War.
Not once had Mémère mentioned she’d been to either Mexico, Spain, or war. You’d think one would mention something that monumental.
Outside, on the eve of the funeral, sad, dark moths spread over Papillon. They eventually slid under my windowsill and into my bed where they burrowed inside me till I could hardly breathe.
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