Hey Nostradamus! By Douglas Coupland

person who ever really knew me, which is a private disgrace. Cheryl didn't know me properly as an
adult, but at least she assumed there was a soul inside my body that merited being known.
Okay then, my nephews, it's lunchtime and this little autobiography is nearly over except . . . except
there's just this one other not-so-little thing remaining to be said, but I'm going to have to mull exactly
how I tell you about it. I'm going to go pick up Joyce and head to the beach, and maybe by then my
burning brain will have cooled down and I can finally say what I've been avoiding all along.
* * *
I'm at the beach, on the same log as before, and I may as well hop right to it.
Just over a year ago, when your mother phoned me to tell me Kent was dead, I drove to her house
down in Horseshoe Bay. To get there I had to pass the scene of the accident; highway traffic was closed
down to a single lane, and there were shards of glass, strips of chrome, fragments of black plastic fenders
and pools of oil on the road. A tow truck was just then hauling the remains of Kent's Taurus onto a
flatbed. It was crumpled like picnic trash, and its beige vinyl seats were thick with broken glass. It was a
hot afternoon.
I stopped and spoke with a cop at the scene who knew me, and he gave me technical details of the
crash - quick and painless. This information still gives me comfort. I suppose that if I hadn't seen the
wreck, Kent's death would have been far harder to deal with. But when you see that big chunk of
chewed-up scrap metal, the truth is the truth, and the shock passes more quickly.
There was also the pressing need to go down to Barb's -your mother's - house right away. My cell
phone's battery had died and there'd been no way to contact my own mother or anybody else. As well,
the traffic line-ups for the ferries to Vancouver Island and up the coast were huge and clogging the roads,
and I took the wrong exit and ended up being detoured for a few frustrating miles, my temples booming
like kettle drums.
When I got to your house, your mother was at the front door talking with the cops. Her eyes were red
and wet, and I could tell the police didn't feel good having to leave her like this. When they saw me, they
hit the road.
I held Barb tight, and then asked her who in the family she'd called.
She gave me a look that I wasn't expecting - not exactly guilty, and somehow conspiratorial. "Nobody.
Did you?"
"No. My battery died."
"Jesus, thank God."
"Barb, what are you talking about - you didn't call anyone?"
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