Page 44 of The Trip of a Lifetime

‘I like Tara but I’m disappointed in her.’

‘Can you take comfort in having beaten Sam again?’ I asked, and Erin smiled.

‘A bit.’

‘Look, it really doesn’t matter now. This leg, like the first, has us all on the same boat and train. It’s not about who comes first yet, it’s all about how much money we’re spending to do it. Later in the race there may well be more options to branch out but right now it’s all about the cash. And we should just enjoy this free time.’

‘I do feel pretty good, really,’ Erin said. ‘I’ve surprised myself with how well I’ve done considering I usually don’t do anything like this.’

‘Neither do I, these days,’ I said. ‘And I can feel it in every bone in my body.’

‘I’m going to hit the shower,’ Erin said and when she went into the bathroom I took the money from the belt and counted it out onto the bed. We had used over half the funds and we still had the return train journey to consider. I looked at the map, at what lay between us and the end. Certainly a lot of road and possibly rail. I hoped that we’d be heading into cities that would offer better transport than we’d seen so far. But then cities usually were expensive places to sleep. Maybe we could get some night buses. As I considered this, I recalled the rattling hours on end we’d just endured in seats on the train. There would obviously be a ferry over to Newfoundland at the end but before I could even think about that, there was the huge expanse of Ontario to navigate. Where on earth would we be going next?

Erin was singing in the shower. It made me smile as I remembered very clearly how her mother would do the same when she was a teenager. Clare had been a happy child, a spirited teen and a smart and driven adult. To think that this special person couldn’t realise the next stage of her life ate away at me. Perhaps she would have been a caring and loving old woman, maybe she’d have been a crotchety old bag. No one would ever know. I focused my thoughts on Erin. She was what mattered now and I was so proud of her for her part in this race. I was glad she could see how well she was doing.

The water turned off and the singing ceased. I pushed the money back into the belt. I didn’t want Erin worrying about our finances. And then I realised I was being stupid. She had proved herself competent and I was beginning to think it was a bit of a mistake not having her be a bit more involved with the money and the decision-making. On the next leg of the journey, I would give her the tracker and the money belt and let her take the lead. It would do her good to get out of her comfort zone.

The restaurant was a rustic but cosy place called The Lazy Bear Café. Erin and I had our big coats on and hats too. That race to the museum earlier had warmed us up but now in the early evening it was very cold and our breath came out in icy puffs into the air as we walked along the street, our boots crunching on the snow.

Priya and Tara were just walking through the door when Erin and I arrived but Tara hung back.

‘Erin,’ she said quickly. ‘I’m so sorry but please don’t think I took the map from you. You left it on the table and I was going to return it to you. Then I couldn’t find it and the next time I saw it, Mum had it when we got off the train. She didn’t know it was yours, truly.’

‘Truly,’ I repeated but Tara did sound sincere.

‘Don’t worry now, it’s done,’ Erin said kindly. Gone was the wish to slap this woman it seemed. ‘Let’s have a nice meal and forget about it.’

One thing was left unsaid in the doorway to the restaurant and I was sure both Erin and I thought the same.

It’s not you, Tara. It’s Priya we don’t trust.

We had steaks and salads and I ordered wine to celebrate the halfway point. There was a friendly atmosphere among us all and as the booze flowed a little, people started sharing some of the highs and lows of their journeys so far.

Femi and Liz described how they’d left their backpacks in the boot of a lift share and ended up chasing the car down the street and shouting at the driver.

Priya talked about how much energy this race was giving her but Tara admitted to how tired she was and I guessed that only one of them was lying. I almost agreed with Tara that I was tired as well, but I saw that Harrison was watching me and I just didn’t want to sound like an old woman in front of him, especially after what Priya had said. Instead, I told them of how Erin and I had shovelled a lot of pig shit in favour of a free bed and a free ride, about how beautiful I thought Canada was and what a shame to be travelling through it at such a speed when there was so much to savour.

Harrison agreed with me and said he’d consider coming back at some point and spending more time in the Rockies. Then he talked about his and Sam’s despair at being stuck at the side of the road outside Edmonton while we were all motoring ahead.

‘I honestly thought that was our race over,’ he said and I could tell by the look on his face that he meant it. I could see how easy it would be to be drawn back into Harrison’s sphere. He radiated some sort of aura that I remembered from all those years ago. It was exactly the same and it was unnerving.

The next day we were rounded up and taken to the outskirts of the town where our guide explained how we were going to travel by snowmobile further round the coast and then out onto the sea in a dingy. The snowmobile was something I had never done and I was hugely excited about the prospect. Erin began to object until I reminded her she’d managed a motorbike all right. Our tour guide was a lot of fun. She was a woman called Winona and had us all suited and booted appropriately for the conditions. The conditions were actually beautiful. There was a crispness in the air but not a cloud in the sky. The sun helped to have us all acting in high spirits and we set off in convoy across the snowy landscape. Once we were off the snowmobiles, we spent a few hours out on the ice flows learning about the wildlife that lived in the cold Arctic Ocean. About the polar bears that used the ice as a hunting ground and the seals that were their target. Winona reminded us that she was there to keep us and the polar bears safe. I wondered which of us she’d choose if push came to shove. I also thought about the unused bear spray in Erin’s backpack and if it would work on our white, furry friends. Then we stopped at a huge slab of ice where we were encouraged to get out and see what it felt like to be standing on the Arctic Ocean. It felt wonderful, I decided, and had to make a huge effort to push Clare to the back of my mind in favour of seeing the pleasure on Erin’s face as she and Liz posed for photos. We had one last group shot and then it was time to head back.

The sun was setting when we returned to town and a few of us walked down to watch it disappear where the sky met the ice.

‘This is special,’ Harrison said, and I hadn’t realised he was standing so close to me. For a mad moment I wanted to reach out my hand and take his. I wanted to share this moment with him. Of course, I didn’t, but Femi and Liz were holding hands and I suddenly ached for an intimacy I hadn’t had in years. I always told myself after Mike left me that I didn’t need that any more. He moved on and met a woman with grown-up children. He now has step-grandchildren, not that they see him as anything other than Granddad. Erin still sees him sometimes but he lives just a bit too far away to make it easy. Erin isn’t that close to her own dad either and that’s why I want to keep her as near to me as possible.

‘This is a once in a lifetime experience,’ I said, and before I even realised he’d done it, Harrison had slid his arm around behind my neck and gently squeezed my shoulder. Just once and just quickly and then his hand, his arm, in fact all of him were gone and I turned to see him striding back towards the chalets.

20

ERIN

They loaded up as much of the food from the chalet as they could the following morning before they left for the station.

Erin and Martha had spent the previous evening poring over the map and second-guessing where they would be heading for the next checkpoint. There were so many options though that they gave it up as a bad idea, and Erin went to talk to Mika in the museum to see if he would be able to look up train prices, where to get off, and connecting bus times and fares. She came back to Martha with a page ripped from her journal covered in information. It was all a guess at this point but one thing was for sure, they had to get the only train out of Churchill and they’d be on it together, again.

Sam hadn’t tried to talk to her directly again, not since the train, but offered small smiles when their paths crossed. He was utterly gorgeous was Erin’s thought every time she looked at him and try as she might, it was a thought she just couldn’t shake off.