My Diane

By Christopher Correia

Her name was Diane Budgel. Thirty years ago, she was a small part in the life of Dave Mercer. Their short-lived, three month relationship was a whirlwind for Dave. They met in a bar and suddenly moved in together. Dianes roommate acted strangeperhaps jealouswhich led Dave to believe she was a lesbian, in love with Diane as much as he was.

Then, on a visit to meet Dianes racist father in Nova Scotia, something mysterious happened, and Dianewho may have been married to someone elsebecame but a memory. The memory of her has not touched Daves life in decades until he comes across poems he wrote during their brief romantic affair. He has more questions than answers and feels haunted by past decisions he made.

Now in his fifties, Dave looks back and wonders how a woman who touched his life for such a short time could have such long-standing effects. What was it about the mysterious Diane that first drew him to her, and why does she still linger in his thoughts? He must confront the mystery of the woman he loved and unravel what they were to each other or else he may be cursed to love a ghost for the rest of his life.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Jan 15, 2015
• ISBN: 9781491756553

Christopher Correia

Christopher Correia attended art school at Vincent Massey Collegiate Institute in Etobicoke, Ontario, Canada, and has written plays, short stories, and poetry. He is a journeyman plumber by trade and lives in Brampton, Ontario, Canada, with his wife and four grown children.

Book preview

Copyright © 2015 Christopher Correia.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, incidents, organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

iUniverse

1663 Liberty Drive

Bloomington, IN 47403

www.iuniverse.com

1-800-Authors (1-800-288-4677)

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

ISBN: 978-1-4917-5652-2 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4917-5655-3 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2015900136

iUniverse rev. date: 03/02/2015

CONTENTS

Chapter 1   One Night in 1988

Chapter 2   Inside the El Mocambo

Chapter 3   Waking Up in a Strange House

Chapter 4   Who Is Diane Budgel?

Chapter 5   Dave and Diane Going Home

Chapter 6   Dreams …

Chapter 7   Funeral

Chapter 8   The Final Resting Place

Chapter 9   Patricia

Chapter 10   My Motel Room

CHAPTER 1

One Night in 1988

I’d not thought about Diane for many years until I found these typed pages in a shoe box a few days ago. Now I think about her all the time. The pages were from a story I started writing about her when I was 23 and didn’t finish. Considering what happened, maybe I didn’t want to finish the story. I think I was in love with her, and then it got complicated and I was never sure about anything. It was a long time ago when I last saw her. I relived that moment a thousand times until I had to stop blaming myself for all the things I did and didn’t do. It was easier just to forget she ever existed—until now.

I met Diane Budgel one night in 1988. I think it was May. I was heading home, travelling for hours on the public transportation system from bus to train to bus. She was a very pretty woman. It was a long time ago, but I remember her. I wrote this poem for her back then when I knew her, when she was my Diane.

Love Song

I give you a love song without any words.

I offer you the music of the passion you unbridle.

Thrashing as I kiss sweet scented lips,

You guide my fingers to the sacred pearl temple,

Sinking in and circling out, the tender walls unfurl,

Smiling at you so caught up in the rhythm,

Your hips’ spasm— legs tremble and stiffen—

Breathless whispers, as I squeeze between your fingers.

Only you, my beautiful one, can hear a love song like this.

I give to you the music of the passion you unbridle,

Thrashing as I kiss sweet scented lips.

Feasting on the passion, in your sacred pearl temple;

Tongue is a serpent in this feeding place.

Your hot mess release and saturate my taste.

Only you, my beautiful one, can hear a love song like this.

I offer you the music of the passion you unbridle.

She was a true muse to me as a young poet looking for inspiration. But she was much more than just inspiration. She changed my life from the very moment I met her. I remember that night.

Hours and hours, I had spent travelling. I was finally getting on the last bus for home.

The door closed, and the bus moved off with a jerk that knocked me off balance for a second. I grabbed the silver pole and made my way to a back seat. A few heads popped up and down as people looked at me: novice patron on board. So many people were sitting with long faces and glazed-over eyes. Then this Indian lady with a double chin, sitting in one of those single seats, looked back at me like I had farted and shouted at the same time. The middle-aged, chubby, red-faced driver with his jumbo, rusty-coloured moustache gave me a hard look through his rearview mirror.

I suddenly didn’t feel welcome on public transportation as we floated alone into the night. I looked at rows of plastic and metal benches and one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, and eight, not including the driver, people on the bus. The silence was broken only by the loud ringing cling, indicating someone needed to get off. An anxiety attack came on. My heart was beating fast, and I was struggling to find a normal breathing pattern. I started thinking of a meadow with the trees swaying in the wind. I could almost feel the sensation on my face, and my heart rate slowed. I was breathing normally again. I got that a lot in closed-up places. I had a mild form of claustrophobia, I had been told. Fresh air was the cure. Just get outside and take deep breaths. There was no need for that when I was so close to home already. A block of identical three-story buildings lined the street. Nine forty-seven on a Saturday night, and the city of skyscrapers and empty sidewalks was shut down. I didn’t want to fall asleep again, but my eyelids were heavy. I had fallen asleep earlier on the train in an empty carriage, only to be jolted awake by this young black guy who was half my size. You only paid for one seat, he said.

I had put my feet up on the seat ahead of me, and he kicked my feet and my favourite black leather boots to the ground. He walked away with his smiling girlfriend. I stared them down until their stop came, and they got off. They laughed on the platform, and as the train moved away, they were still laughing and taunting me. She was a boney, ashen-white girl with crooked teeth. I was mad at myself for letting him use me to impress her.

I hated when I had regrets about not doing something after the fact. I couldn’t get the moment back and make things right; I didn’t have those powers. What would I have done anyways? Maybe pin the little wannabe pimp against the train window and head-butt him in the eye until he passed out. But the security camera in the carriage would catch me, and I would get arrested for assault. So in the end, I did the right thing after all. But I still didn’t like being laughed at like that. Maybe I would see them again one day and make amends. Nope, that wasn’t going to happen either; his condescending look as he stood on the platform would haunt my memory for a very long time. His crooked-toothed girlfriend was impressed by him kicking my feet off that seat. I deserved it. I did only pay for one ticket, so he was right. The little fuck was right. I should’ve kicked his teeth in, but he was right; I did only pay for one seat.

The scenery changed, and the bus stopped as the driver checked his watch and began to unfold a sandwich he had taken from under his seat. I was shocked; the driver was having a break with passengers still on the bus just as casually as he would change socks. At least the view was interesting. He had stopped at a historic site. The campus of the University of Toronto came into view with its giant nineteenth-century, grey-stone buildings with oversized windows and massive wooden doors and the lush lawns rolling down the subtle incline to the low metallic fence. Shadowy places existed between the buildings, taking my mind to thoughts of nineteenth-century crime scenes, Jack the Ripper–type stuff. Funny how the mind worked, but I was suddenly wide awake.

A group of five animated young people, no doubt students, their faces lit with conversation and laughter, walked on the sidewalk, stopping for a moment under the canopy of the faint streetlight. They lit up a joint and took turns shamelessly sucking on it, smiling and giggling. They were oblivious to the stopped bus no more than 10 feet from them. One was a blond girl, who began moving her head from side to side and up and down spasmodically in the pale-yellow light. I couldn’t find the music she was moving to. But she was something to see in her faded jeans, tight with the press of her Coke-bottle figure. She suddenly became my sole focus. The tight jeans she wore were a definite pull for my eyes. Then the idiotic driver started the bus moving again just as she turned to face me and started walking closer to my window. She became smaller in the distance, and then, without thought, I pulled the string for the next stop. I thought of walking back in the direction of the last stop, but what was the point of that? I was on the playground now. The night was calling me out to play.

I walked alone along the avenue on that cool Saturday night, not knowing where to go or where I even wanted to go. There were people around me with voices: laughter and shouting and quick words. I thought of that blond I had seen earlier and looked around to find her in the fray. Cars drove by, engines and grinding tires. Then I stopped. I began looking up at up at the red-neon rectangular sign of the El Mocambo bar on the other side of the street. I jogged over to the sign and walked around the building. There were a lot of people lined up, quiet and still like they were part of a surprise party waiting for the signal to come in. I joined the line and waited, looking around at all the strange faces, sharing something with them that I didn’t quite understand. I felt comfortable there even though I didn’t recognize anyone.

I was still young enough for the clubs. There was no need for me to feel out of place. I always looked at the way everyone dressed back then. Clothes said a lot about people. They looked as though their clothes were randomly picked out from a pile of laundry, not even ironed. I was dressed like a rock star, even though I hadn’t planned on going out that night. I worked on my look. My hair was long enough to cover my eyes, but not so long as to cover my face. I tried to move and stand a certain way, like I was on stage with my crazy fans watching and being affected by my every move.

I was told that I resembled Jim Morrison. So I started collecting information on him—watching old videos and buying his posters, souvenirs, and T-shirts. I found out that Jim Morrison was one popular dead guy. His face was everywhere. I didn’t even know who the guy was until this lady at the YMCA told me I was a dead ringer for him. I was a dead ringer for a dead guy. That was sort of weird, but I was flattered that somebody actually thought I looked like this guy, with him being a rock legend like he was. I bought a Doors cassette and played it over and over in my car. Jim Morrison couldn’t sing to save his life, pardon the irony, but I really liked the music. Sometimes, I cracked open a can of beer first thing in the morning, with my unshaved, hungover look, even though I wasn’t really hungover; Jim was just in my mind so much, and I imagined he did that many times. In my head, I’d be hearing his song Break on through to the Other Side. I didn’t even know the rest of the words, just those lines repeated over and over in my head.

Video images were branded in my mind of Jim getting pulled off the stage by policemen with his loyal followers going crazy, lights flashing everywhere, Jim shrugging his shoulders and making a sarcastic expression as if to say, Why do policemen always pick on me? So what if I flash my penis on stage? Why can’t the police go and arrest real criminals and leave me and my worshipping fans alone so I can urinate on them in peace?

He died like a true rock god, a drug overdose in his bathtub in a Paris hotel room. I thought the Paris hotel room part made his death a lot more mysterious and cool, almost poetic. Just imagine if he had had a drug overdose in his own washroom like some other less-impactful rock legends or choked on his own vomit? That kind of death would not be good enough