She hands him an envelope labelled FAIRMONT HOTELS & SPAS on the front. “For your mom.”

“Thanks.” He’s sure Patty thinks he’s a mamma’s boy. Nothing could be further from the truth.

“I’m sure she’ll love it.”

“Hopefully,” he says, though he’s never sure what his mother likes or wants. She never tells him anything directly. She speaks in code so that even when he was a child, if his father asked her if she wanted to go for ice cream and she answered, “Only if Ashif does,” he knew that meant yes. But his interpretations weren’t always right. He finds himself constantly worrying about her, even now when she’s thousands of miles away. As if she’s always with him, stuck to him like a foot on wet tar.

Patty tells him she’s confirmed his hotel reservations. Two nights in Calgary, then on to Vancouver for two more. His limo to and from the airport are also confirmed.

“Can you tell the limo company that there will be two stops in Calgary?” he instructs Patty. “I’m going to have lunch with my parents before I head to the hotel.” He writes down an address and hands it to her. “My parents’ home,” he says, though his parents would both admonish him if they heard him call it their home. In their minds, their home was his home in the same way that they thought his home was theirs. There was no difference between mine and yours. As if everything belonged to the family. If you believed anything else, you would be considered selfish.

“That’s so nice,” Patty says, as she scribbles on her notepad. “You’re a good son, Ash.”

When she leaves, he unlocks the top drawer in his desk, lifts the pen tray, and retrieves a bottle. In the distance, he can see an army of headlights moving down Bay Street. In the evening, he’ll watch the same stream in reverse when people return home, leaving behind office towers, like empty shells, with only the janitors and a few others, like him, at their desks. He taps a small white pill from the bottle. It’s tiny but he can’t manage without it. His doctor agrees. Ashif has been on anti-depressants for years now. He presses the pill to the back of his throat and swallows.

Chapter 4

MANSOOR PULLS INTO A shopping plaza, not far from his store, for his appointment with the bank. He closed the dry cleaners for an hour, putting a sign up on the front door to tell customers he would be back at 4:30 p.m., ample time for the banker to review his mortgage application. He gathers his things and steps out. A briefcase and an accordion file with all his papers. The store’s financial records, his tax returns (personal and business), the deed to his home. Ten years’ worth of numbers. But that’s how it is with bankers. You have to prove yourself, as you do in a court of law, except at a bank you are guilty until proven innocent. But he’s not worried. His store has a solid track record and he has the numbers to prove it. He’s also brought along three property listings from his real estate agent, although there’s only one he’s really interested in. An abandoned storage facility on the outskirts of Calgary.