Love on the Hot Air Grate
By Karen Kawawada

Memoir published in Ripe Magazine.com, September 2003

Andy smells of mothballs, rain and the warm, stale breath of the hot air grate. It’s his coat in particular that holds his smell. It’s a grey-green wool greatcoat from Value Village, vaguely reminiscent of the Second World War and never-ending Russian winters. It’s thick and scratchy, and when he presses me against it in his bony hugs, I think of an old couch with springs straining to pop out.  

There are half a dozen of us huddling on the hot air grate. A couple of people are bravely brandishing signs on the sidewalk. Honk for peace. U.S. out of Iraq. No More Vietnams. It’s January 1991, I’ve just turned 15, the Gulf War is on, and I’m wondering if I’m falling in love with Andy.  

The peace camp is in front of Canada Place, in downtown Edmonton. There are signs and banners everywhere, but the organizers say a constant human presence is a must, the more, the better. 

I’ve been coming here every day for more than three weeks. I’ve come when it’s 30 below under brittle blue sky and when it’s spitting ice pellets as sharp as falling teeth. The idea is to be a constant reminder of the injustices being committed in Iraq. Some cars honk their support but most just slide by, drivers complacent in their metal cocoons. Yesterday, some guy rolled down his window in the frigid cold just to yell, Get a job! The gush of warm air hit my cheek as I stood on the sidewalk, holding a sign. I opened by mouth to yell back, but the window slid closed and he was gone.  

At first there were more of us at the peace camp, a constant little rally. Now it’s mostly down to people who like to hang out on the streets anyway, though some higher-profile activists show up once in awhile, hang up a sign, then leave. A few people basically live here. One guy has a tent set up and there are sleeping bags squashed by day into a concrete corner. It’s not too cold because the hot-air grate spews air circulated through 30-plus storeys of offices. Phil, an old hippie, likes to make jokes about the politicians’ hot air, but it’s really just bureaucrats inside.  

Andy and I come here after school. We’re the youngest who come every day. I tell my parents I’m studying at the library, then catch the bus downtown. We come because we’re committed to peace and justice, because we believe in thinking globally, acting locally, and because we wouldn’t know where else to hang out together. We live on opposite sides of town but we meet here, in the middle and a world apart. I’ve never seen him anywhere other than the peace camp and I don’t need to. I don’t want to see his parents’ suburban bungalow, his grade 11 math class, his little sister’s frilly pink room. Here, we’re comrades in cold, stamping our feet to warm them with the fire in our bellies.

Andy’s cute in a gawky kind of way. All jutting wrists and skinny legs, his hair is long, blond and tightly curly, like steel wool. His small eyes are almost obscured by horn-rimmed glasses. Today he’s wearing a tweed newsboy cap over his coat. He probably thinks the outfit makes him look proletarian and revolutionary, halfway between a striking worker and Trotsky. 

We’ve been allies since we met, and not just in the antiwar cause. He told me he tended to be a loner. I don’t have many friends at school either, because I don’t listen to Paula Abdul or Dee-lite and tend to wear outfits like waistless peasant dresses under men’s suit jackets. But slowly, something’s been growing between us, something neither of us have yet labeled.

Not that we hesitate to label things. Andy’s a Trotskyist. I’ve never met anyone who’s so clear about his political beliefs. I’m vaguer. I usually describe myself as a democratic socialist but sometimes I say social democrat or just plain socialist. I’ve never read Marx, Lenin, or even Tommy Douglas. Andy says he’s read almost everything Trotsky ever wrote. You should read his work, he tells me, somewhat admonishingly. He doesn’t carry any of it around, though, unlike The Tao of Pooh. That’s what he always has in the pocket of his greatcoat, a battered paperback with a little drawing of Winnie the Pooh flying a kite. It’s about being, says Andy. It’s something I’m struggling with, the balance between being and doing. Trotsky was a fighter. Pooh just is. I don’t know yet if I can be both a revolutionary and a Taoist, but I want to be.

This afternoon, we had a bigger turnout than usual. We stood on the sidewalk and yelled until our voices got hoarse, punctuating our slogans with the mist of our breath. But a lot of people left when the rush-hour traffic started to dissipate, so Andy and I went to warm up on the hot-air grate. That’s how we got to be snuggling together on top of the piled-up sleeping bags, holding hands through our gloves. Our breath hangs between us, fogging up Andy’s glasses. I should get home, I start to say, but Andy starts talking at the same time. I’m really glad I met you, he blurts. Not many girls are really committed to social change. 

It might be the most romantic thing anybody’s ever said to me. His face starts moving closer to mine. The freckles stand out on his nose and I suddenly think, he’s kind of funny looking. Do I really want to kiss someone so funny looking? But his thin lips are warmer than I expect. Somehow, the warmth spreads deep into my body.

Our lips separate and suddenly I’m shy, not looking at him. Hey, you two getting together? calls Phil, grinning. Good for you! Andy blushes. For a moment he looks like a paperboy caught playing dress-up in his granddad’s coat.

The next day, Andy has a present for me. It’s a Lenin pin, goatee sharply defined in silver and red. He has one too, pinned on his greatcoat. I wanted Trotsky, he says, but they didn’t have him. 

He helps me fasten Lenin on my parka. It doesn’t belong there, not on a puffy Northern Reflections coat my mother bought me from Southgate Shopping Centre. I need a less suburban coat, I think to myself, but Andy’s scribbling something in his copy of The Tao of Pooh. You can borrow this, he says. You’ll like it. I open it to the first page, where he’s written down his name and phone number. I look up at him. Uh, maybe we could get together sometime, he says.  You know, away from all this. I agree and put the book in my pocket. We kiss again and it’s a bit less awkward this time.

A few days later, the war is over. I’m surprised, and to tell the truth, a little disappointed. Obviously, I stop going to the peace camp. I decide I’ll give it a few days before I call Andy. I don’t know what we’d do if we got together. Go to a movie? To a party? Somehow I can’t imagine it.

Time passes and passes. Soon, another winter comes. The first really cold day, I put on my coat. That’s when I feel the book, heavy in the large front pocket. I pull it out and flip the pages. It smells of Value Village and musty wool, mothballs and maybe a hint of hot air grate. I try calling the number Andy left, but get: This number is no longer in service. Please hang up and place your call again. I put the book back in my pocket but take off the Lenin pin.