Christmas at the Ranch

One

Ten Years Later . . .

Good morning! Can I interest you in an ornament from our Fit-mas Tree?"

The woman at my gym's reception desk has been asking me this for weeks. The tree is one of those fake glittery ones, heavily decorated with multicolored Christmas balls-all of which, according to a chart on the wall beside it, have a corresponding exercise to go with their color. A two-minute plank, twenty push-ups, something called a reverse sit-up, which I'm unclear on the mechanics of.

My gym routine these days consists of running slowly on the treadmill while watching news headlines scroll past on the televisions above the machines. Then I tick "went to gym" off my mental list of "Ways Not to Turn into a Complete Sloth While Working from Home." This is a list I started six months ago, when I was laid off from my news reporter job at The Globe and Mail and went freelance.

"No, thanks," I tell the receptionist as I scuttle past on my way toward the stairs that lead to the basement changeroom. But today, she gives chase, waving a white T-shirt in her hand like a race flag.

"Maybe this will provide some incentive," she says, handing me the shirt. It's emblazoned with the words "Do you have the balls to try the Fit-mas Tree?" I cringe but still take the shirt; I don't want to cause a scene. I shove it into my gym bag and flee, resolving to find a different gym in the new year.

Soon, I'm taking my place in the line of treadmills beneath the row of televisions. I increase my speed to a light jog as I gaze at the revolving ticker tape of headlines, weather squares, and local event listings. I usually leave my phone in my locker when I'm at the gym, because I recently wrote an article for Chatelaine magazine about the fact that our smartphones are turning our brains into dopamine-addicted mush. Taking a little time without my phone attached to me is just like meditation, I tell myself-which checks off another item on my daily wellness list. Even if watching news channels is probably just as brain-addling as staring at a phone.

I read the subtitles as a red-haired woman, her eyes shining bright blue from the talk-show square, does a segment called "Meal Prep Monday." She somehow manages to make four complete meals out of one store-bought rotisserie chicken. "Now, that is going to help us get through the busy holiday season," the host says. Next, a dermatologist talks about how preventative Botox and fillers are the key to never getting wrinkles. "Ever," she says, staring wide-eyed into the screen, her forehead alabaster smooth.

I reach up and touch the light furrow between my eyebrows, which I've been jade-rolling nightly in an attempt to un-crease. I can tell it's not working. But I still always say no when my mother looks at the wrinkle and shakes her head sadly, then offers me her next coveted appointment at the dermatologist she and my father both use.

I think maybe it's because I'm thinking of my parents that I believe I'm seeing them on the television screen-but then I realize it's really them. It's a photo that was taken in the fall, at a fundraiser gala for the Art Gallery of Ontario, otherwise known as the AGO. I know because I was there: The long skirt of the shimmering forest-green gown I wore is visible in the corner of the screen before the image flips to one of my father alone, gazing sternly at the camera. It's his corporate headshot. I remember when it was taken. It felt like he was frowning at me in particular, his only child who refused to take her place at his side.

At first, I assume this is just some holiday society item, until I squint at the chyron running across the bottom of the screen-deepening my furrow, I know-and realize it's not that at all.

Prominent Toronto Businessman Arrested for Fraud

My heart rate surges and the treadmill beeps frantically. I think I'm hitting the down arrow to slow myself but have actually pressed the emergency stop button. I yelp and scramble, just managing to avoid skidding off the treadmill onto the floor. It seems like everyone in the gym is staring at me. The receptionist is rushing over to see if I'm okay.

"I'm fine," I mumble, now feeling as conspicuous as an out-of-place fluorescent pink ornament on the Fit-mas Tree. I step to the floor, where I stand still and stare up at the televisions, horror slowly dawning as the news item flows past.

The North York corporate headquarters of TurbOakes Money Management were raided by police early this morning. CEO Stephen Oakes was arrested, along with Reuben Oakes, his cousin and TurbOakes's CFO. Both men have been charged with wire fraud, mail fraud, securities fraud, money laundering . . .

Now, there's a picture of Cousin Reuben, his smarmy grin causing my stomach to churn the way it always has. Meanwhile, my mouth has gone as dry as an overcooked Christmas turkey.

Then the story disappears and it's on to the next catastrophes: a staph outbreak at a local nursing home making holiday visits to aging family members a challenge. A shortage of the year's hottest toy causing a skirmish at a local big box store. I'm still frozen in place. I want to go back to being the person I was five minutes ago, someone whose biggest concern was not wanting to participate in the Fit-mas Tree promotion. Instead, the thoughts careening around in my head are moving faster than Santa's sleigh. Still, I dutifully wipe down the treadmill I just used because, I remind myself, I am not a criminal.

But you knew.

I hate my inner voice sometimes. Because in this case, she's not wrong. I'm shocked that I just saw my father on the news being arrested for fraud. I'm upset. But somehow I'm not surprised.

"Excuse me, are you done with this treadmill?"

A man holding a shiny red Fit-mas Tree ball is waiting politely behind me. I rush past him toward the stairs to the changerooms. Downstairs, I stand in front of my locker and stare at the cool metal. I can hear my phone buzzing inside the locker like an angry bee.

So far, there are ten missed calls from my mother. Then two from my best friend, Lani, and a string of texts from her, too.

I saw your dad on my Apple news alert.

Are you okay???

Call me. I'm here for you.

Various other texts from friends and acquaintances stream in, but I can't bring myself to open any more of them. I'm getting email notifications, too. When I see the names of a few of my newspaper and magazine editors pop up, my heart sinks even further. I don't have to open any of the emails to know what they say. My editors are looking for the scoop. Or maybe-and this thought makes me feel worse than I already do-they're writing to tell me my byline is no longer suitable for their publications.

I open Safari and type my father's name into a news search. CBC has the story of his arrest, and so does the Toronto Star, The Globe and Mail, the National Post. All of them detail a monthslong investigation, a dossier of evidence. And as I watch, a CNN hit appears. Then Forbes. The story has crossed the border. I click and read. Some reports discuss the victim impact. Retirement funds, nest eggs. All gone.

A tsunami of guilt engulfs me. And shame. I'm a member of the Oakes family, despite fantasies harbored as a teen about having been switched at birth. Yes, I have a trust fund, but I don't touch it unless it's an emergency. I donate the interest dividends to charities, work to pay my own rent and bills. My independence, paying my own way, has always meant so much to me.

And it was never enough.

One of the articles is showing the AGO gala photo I saw on the news. There's my leg again, and the glittering hem of my green dress. I'm in the picture, no matter how much I want to deny it.

Another text from my mother arrives: Emory. This is urgent. CALL ME!

And she's right, of course. I really should be calling her back, but I just can't. Not yet. I throw my phone into my gym bag and zip it shut. Then I walk upstairs and nod at the receptionist as she trills out a friendly "Goodbye and season's greetings."

Outside, I pull my parka hood up against the wintry blast of air that greets me on Liberty Street. I battle the wind blowing in from the desolate middle of Lake Ontario in December as I walk to my nearby condo-loft.

Suddenly, all my senses go on high alert. And I see it: My mother's navy Jaguar is pulling around a corner. I duck into an alley, press myself against the wall of a building, and pull my hood tight against my face. I feel like a horrible person for avoiding my mother when my family is completely falling apart. But I stay where I am. I wait, then peer through the faux fur ruff as her car slides past like a shark patrolling the road. Which isn't fair-she's not a shark. She's my mother. But I can't face her yet, can't deal with any of this.

My phone vibrates in my bag. I pull it out and read:

I'm at your condo. But I think I see a news truck.
I'm being followed. Are you there? Can you let me
into your parking garage?

I'm not at home right now, I text with numbing fingers. I'm at a work interview in the north end of the city. I won't be home for a while, I'm sorry.

It's true, I am sorry. My eyes are filled with tears. I close them, and I can picture my mother. Her eyes are green, like mine, and her mouth matches mine, too: cupid's bow. But that's where the similarities end. She's glamorous; I'm minimalist. She's sophisticated; I'm awkward. She has, all my life, been focused on keeping up appearances-and so I know how much this is hurting her, to see our family's dirty laundry aired on the news. But she'll want me to empathize with her, and I know I can't do that. Not now, and maybe not ever. This is starting to feel like it has to be happening to someone else. Because while I love my parents, I have always felt like an outsider in my family.

I watch as my mother's car pulls around, then away. Her face, completely smooth and free of lines, a slight downturn of her mouth and a darkening of her eyes the only way to tell she's upset, flashes past. She doesn't see me. Still, I count to thirty before stepping out from the alley. I keep my hood up and my head down. I let myself in the side door of my building's parking garage and walk quickly to my car. Once I'm inside it, I put my gym bag in the back seat and turn on the heat, full blast. My heart is racing. I take deep breaths to try to calm myself down, but it doesn't work. My inner voice is no longer all-knowing and calm.

Now there are only three words in my head, on a repetitive loop: fight or flight.

Two

I choose flight. With a modicum of fight, since navigating Toronto's perpetual gridlock is always a battle. I inch toward the Gardiner Expressway and persevere until I'm sailing down the Don Valley Parkway in my Prius. Past the icy river and the valley filled with the leaf-bare, snow-dressed trees. Past happy kids sledding down the hill beside Riverdale Farm, which gives me a twinge to see. I don't have any core memories like that and couldn't imagine either of my parents pushing a child version of me down a toboggan hill, ever. Back when my dad and I used to be close-which now feels like a different lifetime-his idea of bonding was taking me to the Toronto Stock Exchange to hear them ring the opening bell, then out for what he called a power breakfast. I asked him once if we could go to the library instead and he told me we were the sort of people to donate money to the library, not actually use it. But I loved the library and went on my own whenever I could, taking the subway two stops from our neighborhood in Rosedale to roam the stacks of the reference library, to drink coffee in the café and dream of one day writing for the newspapers my father spread on his desk every morning, keeping the business sections and leaving the rest for me.

I'm on the 404 now. I keep driving north because it feels good to do this. Because my brain is telling me that as long as I keep moving in this direction, I'll be okay. Which is not true, of course, but it's working in the moment. When the news comes on the radio station and they start talking about my family, I spin the dial away and onto 96.3. Soon, I'm being lulled into complacency by Michael Bublé's vanilla-sundae-with-a-cherry-on-top voice, singing about having myself a merry little Christmas. I only realize how far I've traveled when I speed past the sign for Webers, an iconic BBQ institution at the gateway to Ontario's cottage country.

My phone rings. It's Lani.

"Emory! I've been so worried!"

"Lani, I have to tell you something . . ." My voice wobbles and I grip the steering wheel tight. But I can tell my best friend anything. Ever since Lani and I met in our first year at Concordia in Montreal, at a Halloween party where we were both dressed up as Encyclopaedia Britannica volumes in protest of them going out of print that year, we've been soulmates. I was still heartbroken over Tate, my first boyfriend, when I met her, and she helped me through it. But this is worse. This isn't a teenage heartbreak I should have gotten over well before I did. It's my family. My culpability.

"I always knew something was going on with my dad's company," I say. "Right from the first moments he and Reuben went into business together. If I had told someone-"

"Oh, Em. Don't do this to yourself."

"He wanted me to work with him at the company, and I refused. I never would have let this happen."

"No. Just because your parents have never made it feel safe to be who you are doesn't mean who you are isn't great. You were supposed to abandon your dreams just to make your dad happy? Now, where are you? Do you want to come here?" A baby's wail in the background punctuates her words. "Hang on, let me just get this one on the boob and"-the cries reach a desperate pitch, then stop suddenly, making me realize my best friend has way too much on her plate with twin newborns to be dealing with my stuff.