Hey Nostradamus! By Douglas Coupland

"Barb?"
"Go now. Because I'll break you in two. I will."
"Is this really - "
"Don't go meek on me now, you sadistic bastard."
I'd seen this side of Barb before and knew she would push this situation way further if she wanted to.
Riley made some gesture to stand between her and my father. I went over to Barb and tried removing the
chair from her grip, but she clutched it using every sinew she'd developed as captain of the girls' field
hockey team.
"Barb. No."
"You heard what he said."
"He's not worth the effort."
"He should die for the things he's done to people. Someone has to stop him."
I looked at my father, into his eye slits, and knew that nothing had changed, that he had no real
understanding of what he'd done to deserve this. I would have poured the remains of my wine on him,
but that would have been a waste.
Barb said, "I'll pour Drano on your grave, you sick bastard."
Reg took the hint. Some of the wives (not a girlfriend in the bunch) accompanied my father to his car.
I sat with your mother while the Alive! crew scoured the house of memorial residue. I said, "Barb, you
never believed me about Reg, about how evil he is. Now you know."
"It's one thing to hear about it, Jason. And another to see it in operation."
"Barb, the thing about Dad is that he'll always betray you in the end. Even if you think you've gotten
close to him, earned your way into his bosom the way Kent did, in the end he'll always sell you out to his
religion. He's actually a pagan that way - he has to make sacrifices, so he sacrificed his family one by
one. Tonight he offered the twins to his God. If he were a dog, I'd shoot him."
And so I picked up Joyce at Mom's where the TV station had kicked into late-night infomercials. She
was sleeping it off on the couch. I drove home and I'm going to bed soon.
* * *
I arrived at Ambleside Beach a few minutes ago, and something unusual happened. I was sitting in the
truck's cab removing a burr from Joyce's flank, while looking at my stack of pink invoice papers, when
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