DEVIN’S JOURNEY ~ PART 1

Story by Linda S Barth     Artwork by Carole W

~ TORONTO, CANADA~

Lapis Lazuli

After a few hours’ restless sleep on a wooden bench, Devin exited the bus terminal and blended into the flow of morning commuters on Bay Street. Shivering in a jacket that was much too light for late October in Toronto, he glanced skyward and hurried his pace, hoping to reach his destination before the threat of rain became reality. The security guard who’d pretended not to notice the lanky teenager seeking shelter for the night, had finally urged him to be on his way but not before giving him directions for the half-hour walk to Yorkville.

His entire body ached; he needed more sleep; he craved hot coffee and a plate of scrambled eggs. But none of that mattered much. He’d made it out – all the way to another country! His slow smile quickly grew to a grin. Less than six months ago, who would have believed he’d be in a place like this? No one, not even himself. He’d been filled with fantasies, tempted by hope, tormented by doubts. He’d held onto his dreams even as they struggled to survive the threats of reality. Then, when the miraculous moment occurred, he didn’t hesitate. He grabbed it with both hands and he ran.

Now, nothing would stop him, even if he had only sketchy images, imagined adventures, and ghosts of plans to guide him. He knew whatever might happen, whatever might come, his life would evolve as it was meant to be.

But for now, he needed to find a job, a place to sleep, something to eat. He shrugged his shoulders, hefting his backpack to make sure the worn straps still held tight. Secured in one of its canvas pockets were the fake IDs – one driver’s license with a birthdate advancing his age two years and a blurry photo that could be him if no one looked too closely, along with two equally phony birth certificates and passports – precious contraband he’d bartered grunt work to obtain before leaving New York. He’d need additional documents in time, but for now he was good.

He’d adopted the name Hugh Allard a few days after escaping the tunnels and soon found himself wearing it as easily as the black Chuck Taylors he’d found in the trash where some careless New Yorker had tossed them. The name had become special to him, his first in what he knew would be a long roster. But he’d have to let it go now, choose another identity from what he had on hand.

An unexpected pang hurt his heart. He’d never even had a last name before now. Nearly everyone else in the tunnel community had one, even if many never revealed it. The only ones left disparaged with a half-identity were Vincent and him. A few angry tears burned his eyes. Even Vincent had a better chance at getting one. After all, The Old Man had more or less adopted him as his own.

But no one had claimed him as their son. No one ever would. He wiped away the tears as a tight grin hardened his face. Well, those days were over. He’d fixed it all himself, no need to rely on anyone else. He had a last name now, and he’d have however many more he wanted. 

He thought about the documents in his pack. Griffin Jones or Steve Johnson. Truth be told, he wasn’t a fan of either, but it was what he’d been offered, and he’d jumped at the chance to call himself anything other than the name he was sadly certain still echoed from time to time through the tunnel world… called out by ever-dwindling search parties; sighed in quiet, resigned conversation; whispered with tears at night in a darkened chamber.

This was his chance to try on new names to match new lives, but in his heart, he’d always be Devin. No one could take his identity from him, just as no one could continue to control the boy – and soon the man – he was meant to be. He was free now to explore all the facets of himself that had been subdued, restricted, crushed. It was as if a prison door had suddenly swung open. He’d taken his chance even though the door would be forever locked to one left behind.

He shook his head hard. He wouldn’t think about that now. If he did, the guilt would crush him. He narrowed his eyes until that microscopic pinprick world receded. Ahead of him were new places, new homes – for a day, a week, a month, a year – in places he…they…had dreamed about. Those dreams had been shared by two, but now there was only one to see them become real.   

He sighed and straightened his spine. He’d done what he had to do – no question of that. Maybe his decisions wouldn’t always be the best ones, but they’d be his. And right now he had to decide on another new name. Griffin, yeah, Griff for short. He repeated it aloud, practicing the sound of it in his mouth and ears. He’d been Hugh, sometimes Hughey, for months, and Griff still felt like a stiff pair of new jeans. But it suited him; it resonated a bit more each time he said it, and besides, he didn’t have time to waste. No room for stupid mistakes, like leaving a trail someone could follow, as unlikely as that might be. It had all been going well for him, maybe too well, and he wasn’t about to invite trouble to join him on the journey.

Incipient rain clouds yielded to a weak autumn sun, but it was enough of a good omen for him. He wandered the streets of Yorkville, the neighborhood some musician pals from his early days on his own had assured him was the place to be. And it seemed they were right.

Converted from old Victorian rooming houses, cafes the locals called coffee houses, called to him, promising a sense of comfort and community, acceptance and amusement. The people relaxing outside smiled, strummed guitars, called to passing friends to join them at tables and on benches. Even the names were intriguing – The Penny Farthing, The Purple Onion, Chez Monique, The Riverboat – not a library or a classroom or the darkness of an underground chamber in sight. He took a deep breath and felt another chunk of a weighty burden slide away to shatter to dust on the sidewalk.

It all seemed right. This could be his new home for a while. But his grin slowly tightened as slivers of reality poked holes in his plans. He needed to focus on finding someplace to stay, and to pay for that, he needed a job. Maybe sweep up or bus tables at one of the coffee houses. He hoped it wouldn’t require a work permit, but maybe his fake ID would smooth the way, and in a laid-back atmosphere like this, he assured himself that no one would look too closely or hold too fast to rules.

Within a day, his hopes were fulfilled: A ‘help wanted’ sign in the window of Peter’s Restaurant and a job as a combination bus boy-janitor. A room he could just afford in a boarding house down the street. A burgeoning friendship with Peter’s daughter, a girl his age who called herself Harmony one week, Lyric the next, Hope the one after that until she finally settled on Sky. Her name seemed to him another sign he’d found his next home. Just as he’d once longed to trade ceilings of rock and stone for endless sky above him, he now craved her presence, found promise in her optimistic embrace of life, recognized himself in her drive for adventure that matched his own. Immediately drawn to one another, she’d labeled them ‘kindred spirits’.

She looked like a fantasy to him, a reflection of the world he was quickly adopting, at least for now. She wove glistening feathers through her hair, circled rainbows of seed bead bracelets around her wrists, dangled a stone on a leather cord around her neck. He’d asked her what it was – this piece of deepest indigo blue scattered with tiny shining speckles like miniature stars in the night sky. She told him it was lapis lazuli from somewhere near Baffin Island. She’d found it in a quirky little shop where it had called to her, and she’d worn it every day since.

She told him, too, that the energy of lapis embraces wisdom and truth as it repels negative vibes, and that it promotes self-awareness and enlightenment. It all somehow made sense to him, even if he was confused when she mentioned it also activated the third chakra for enhanced personal power and confidence. He’d figure it out in time, he was sure of that.

During working hours, he wore the uniform her father had given him, but as soon as his shifts ended, he shed it for tie-dyed t-shirts, suede boots, and a fringed leather jacket she had borrowed for him from her generous circle of friends. In this comfortable skin, he welcomed Sky as his guide to his new life in his new city. Scrounging every possible hour from his work days and her high school classes, together they explored thrift shops and book stores, borrowed a rowboat to judder through windy waves on Lake Ontario, joined hundreds of other kindred spirits of varying degrees at love-ins, war protests, and other anti-establishment gatherings in Queen’s Park and felt at home in Toronto’s hippie enclave, their own Yorkville streets.

Impressed by his claim he’d worked for Joni Mitchell back in New York, Sky introduced him to her friends at the coffee houses where he reveled in an atmosphere warmly familiar yet excitingly new. He loved it all; he loved her; but he knew it wouldn’t last forever, just like he knew she understood the voices and places that called to him, for others called to her as well. They talked endlessly of their plans and dreams, where they might find themselves someday, what they longed to see and do and be; they even wondered if their paths might intertwine again someday.

One afternoon in early January while they unstrung Christmas lights from the mirror behind the counter, she asked the question he’d been anticipating for days.

“Not long,” he told her. “End of the week, I think.”

She scampered off the step ladder as he filled two mugs with hot coffee and brought them to a small booth in the back. She traced the length of leather around her neck until her fingers clasped the indigo stone. Then she smiled at him. “The urge for going, right?”

He nodded and murmured lyrics from the song that had become their personal anthem. “And all that stays is dying and all that lives is getting out.’’ He flinched as he heard what he’d said. “I didn’t mean that the way it sounded. I’ve…I’ve felt more alive here with you than I’ve felt in a long time.”

“I know. Me, too, but…” A bittersweet smile curved her lips. “See the geese in chevron flight, flapping and racing on before the snow. They’ve got the urge for going and –”

They clasped hands across the table and finished the lyrics together. “They’ve got the wings so they can go.”

They sat together for a flow of moments, then uttered a soft, shared sigh and slid their entwined fingers apart. He tilted his head toward the strings of lights strewn across the counter. “I guess we should finish up.”

He felt there might be something more he should say, but the thought slid away like a fallen leaf across a frozen pond. When the silence grew heavy, suffocating, he reached for something familiar and light, knowing it would make her roll her eyes and laugh – their ongoing debate about ownership of their favorite song. He always claimed it for Joni Mitchell, the Canadian musician – and his first teenage crush – because she wrote it. Sky consistently countered that it belonged to Tom Rush, the American singer-songwriter who first recorded it.

As if they’d read each other’s thoughts, they shared a smile like a ripple in an indigo lake. The song was Joni’s; the song was Tom’s; but most of all it was theirs.

A few days later, he climbed aboard a bus rumbling south toward Niagara Falls. In his backpack was a second postcard for his collection, an image of a sailboat skimming across the lake, secured in a manila envelope with a picture of Ann Arbor’s University of Michigan campus. He’d found that card on the sidewalk outside the concert hall where he’d worked his one night with Joni and her crew, and it sparked an idea that, at the time, seemed so right.

While he waited for the bus to leave, he carefully wrote a message on the card, to himself and to someone else, the next page in a journal of sorts that he’d share someday. As for the rest of his memories of Toronto, he’d hold them in his heart along with the wondrous pleasure of his first kiss, another gift shared with Sky, like the midnight blue stone, almost identical to hers, that he now wore around his neck.