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"T hat's too bad," said Howie, "What happened? Do you know?" and he came up behind her, behind Sasha, put his hands on her shoulders and began to rub.

"Oh, it's all right. I guess."

"Well...,"

"Kind of stupid really."

"No, no," said Howie, and as he said this Sasha reached up with one of her hands and touched his, then Howie wrapped his arms right around her and slowly, just perceptibly, the two of them began to rock back and forth. They were good like this. It showed all the time. Together they had two children: Ivan, aged seven, and Alexis, just about four, but the way in which they looked after each other, Howie and Sasha, this was something that was often commented on by anyone who came into contact with them.

"It doesn't even mean anything to me," continued Sasha, "I mean, not really."

"Sure it does," said Howie, "Sure it does. Well, maybe not the cup, but she said she was going to..."

"Yeah," said Sasha, coming down. Now that she was here with Howie, now she could be honest with herself. "Yeah," she said again. "It stinks."

They were in the kitchen of their apartment, which was on the second floor of a house, the second and third. On the third there were two bedrooms. One for themselves, one for the kids. They were now in the kitchen, Sasha at the sink hulling peas.

From the next room, the living room, came the sounds of the TV, a thing both of them hated to have on, hated seeing the kids stuck there in front of it, glued to it like it was worthy of all the attention they gave it. Gratefully, they were without even cable and this limited the viewing options to a mere channel, the public broadcaster, and at least that was just about commercial free. They'd spoken about it many times lately, how it was so unfair these days, how parents were expected to deny their children so much. Too much TV was not a good thing, and yet, there it was, and so much of it. Playing outside was acknowledged to be a wonderful thing, but if there wasn't one environmental horror or another to be avoided, smog or West Nile or the rays of the sun, then there was one's neighbours, who, if the cresting wave of suspicion was to be believed, were not to be trusted, and children should never be left unsupervised, let alone be free to go off and discover things for themselves or whatever it is we used to do when we were young and free.

And of course there were other wonders to deny the children as well: playing too much on the computer, eating junk food, going cross-eyed, thumping each other. If one really wanted to get dirty about it, fighting over these probably caused about as much misery as it tried to avert, at least that was how it felt to Howie and Sasha. And so, sprinkled through all the days, it was no to this, enough of that, and turn it off. It was a mystery how even the limited affluence that Sasha and Howie knew, how even this apparently carried with it too much of a good thing.

But what they were talking about just now had nothing to do with this. They were talking about the cup, the Stanley Cup.

Sasha managed a small cafe on George St., a very popular place known for its pastries, and now, at this time of year, also for its iced coffees. The secret was in the ice cubes, themselves made from coffee and flavoured ever so slightly with a hint of cinnamon. She'd been doing it for years now. At one time, about ten years ago, before children, she'd almost bought in. It was a little window that opened for one fleeting instant and never opened again, and it was Sasha's one big 'What if?' The thing she came back to again and again. But then, she would tell herself, how could she have foreseen she would still be there all this time later? When she'd first started working at the cafe it had all the feel of being that tiny little step one takes on the way to something else, and so, when her friend Diane had offered to make her a partner, to Sasha, saying 'No' had seemed like a smart thing, a way of avoiding being trapped along the way to whatever calling was surely waiting just round the corner. One year became two, two became four, children got thrown into the mix, a couple of bad financial decisions, credit cards, student loans, the purchase of an old Volkswagon bus which only ever worked when it wanted it to.

And that was that. No money, two kids, one job between the two of them, and a crappy apartment. This was what being thirty-five and Canadian meant today.

Howie let go the squeeze he was giving Sasha from behind and turned her around and gave her a kiss full on the lips, then pulled her in toward him once more and gave her a great big bear hug.

"Well," he said to her, "I say it stinks."

"You're so nice," said Sasha, digging her head into his shoulder. From the other room she could hear the music from the end of the show the kids were watching and aimed her voice over Howie's shoulder and shouted, "All right kids, that's it. Turn it off. Find something else to do. Dinner'll be ready in about...," and she stopped and looked up at Howie and said, "How long?"

"Five minutes," whispered Howie, "Ten if we're having the peas too."

"I want the peas," said Sasha, and over his shoulder she shouted, "Dinner in ten minutes. Come on. Turn it off. Before the next one starts. It only gets harder to turn it off."

Miraculously there was no "Aw Mom" or "Aw Dad." The TV went off without riot, and Ivan and Alexis straggled into the kitchen, Ivan asking, "What's for supper?" at the same time as Howie was trying to say, "So what happened?" and Alexis said "I'm hungry can I have a snack?"

"No, honey," said Sasha, choosing to answer Alexis, "We're just about to have dinner."

"What are those?" said Alexis. Sasha was once again hulling peas.

"They're peas, honey. Your peas."

"Dad?" said Ivan, "Can I go into my closet and get something? I..."

"I'd rather you didn't, okay?"

"But you said the paint was probably dry."

"I'll have to take a look."

"Dad...?"

"I'm just worried something'll get knocked over, Ivan. It's a bit of a minefield."

Suddenly there was a terrific cry and all eyes turned to look at Alexis who stood just next to her mother at the sink.

"My peas!" she wailed, and everyone froze as another sob engulfed the kitchen. It had taken Alexis a moment to make the connection, to process that the peas her mother was busy emptying from the pods were the same ones she and her mother had planted in April in their little corner garden in the backyard, the same peas they had gone out to look at now and again and especially lately as the pods had come into their fullness of size, and it was not until now, and too late, that Sasha realized her mistake.

"My peas! You picked my peas!"

A few minutes later, the two of them, sitting on the fire-escape steps leading down to the garden, Sasha having tried to get her daughter to come along with her and see that there were still more peas to pick, if that's what she wanted, and Alexis had dug her heels in and sat on the top step, wouldn't budge, wouldn't go down to look, just sat there crying, and it was then that Sasha was allowed to see the full extent of her daughter's remorse.

"You killed them!"

But of course it was more complicated than that even and had something to do with the fact that Alexis didn't like peas, didn't like to eat them, and somehow this was extrapolated to encompass a whole world that, just like Alexis, didn't eat peas, and so these peas, like all peas, died in vain, and the sorrow generated by this existential dilemma was beyond measurement.

Dinner was not served for another twenty minutes, Alexis notably absent from the table. She was in the other room sitting in front of the TV with the sound turned almost completely off, the only thing that could possibly benumb her enough for there to be silence.

"Okay," said Howie, "So now can you tell me what happened?"

He and Sasha stood at the sink washing the dishes. Alexis still in front of the TV, Ivan out in the back yard with his sling-shot, having just spent the whole of dinner describing something he'd been playing on the cross-the-street-neighbour's Xbox half the day, the unspoken implication being, since it had come up at least a dozen times in the past months, can't we please please get one since life is a colourless blur without one. Ivan was now in the back yard keeping busy, waiting for the others to come down. Howie and Sasha had announced they would drive down to the lake for ice cream. A small enough band aid, but apparently acceptable. The kids knew it was unlikely to get any better.

However, first the dishes.

Howie and Sasha stood at the sink, Howie asking what had happened with the Stanley Cup.

It was a story with some background, and which went something like this: In high school Sasha's best friend was a girl named Petal. The two of them were almost always together, though as the years wore on Sasha realized she, Sasha, could actually think, and as it turned out, Petal couldn't. Still they shared a history that was impossible to overlook, times when they'd watched out for each other, at parties, on trips into the city, early forays into dating. Essentially they were surrogate sisters. It was innate in Sasha to be good to those nearest to her. Then Sasha met Diane, Diane who would later own the cafe. Diane was someone who'd been at the back of the class all these years, quiet, an unknown quantity, and one day, on a field-trip to look at glacial land forms, the two wound up sitting next to each other on the bus. Memory has erased the reason Petal was absent. Diane was tall and gawky but now that Sasha looked at her there was something very complete about her. She had short hair, wore high-top running shoes with a skirt and a sleeveless t-shirt. There was something refreshingly mindful and subversive about her appearance, that and her general demeanour as well, that when she looked at you it seemed she was actually looking, that she saw. And when she listened she listened, and had more to say than a mere dig at the failings of others, which was Petal's specialty. After the short stint on the bus Sasha and Diane began to meet up the odd time Petal was not around. Then once in a while Sasha and Diane would plan to do something together and it was Petal that was excluded.

Soon this was the pattern, and so it was that whatever delicate balance had allowed Sasha and Petal to keep close, this began to waver, the less they were together the less reason there seemed to be for their friendship. In lieu of anything else it began to seem it had merely been an act of habit. At last there was a falling out. A choice. Petal, who had not relinquished the trust she had garnered for Sasha's opinion over the years, wanted her to come see a boy playing hockey, the boy, it turned out, she would eventually marry. Petal wanted Sasha to meet him after the game. She wanted the nod, wanted to know she had done well. Sasha was busy. She and Diane had already arranged to go downtown and see a movie. Petal insisted, said it was very important to her. Sasha, who had now stepped far enough back from Petal to have a different perspective on the extent of Petal's needs, knew that what Petal probably wanted most was to gloat. At one time it would have been a fine way to spend an evening. Now it was not. Sasha said no, that she trusted Petal to know the inner workings of her own heart, that if she liked this boy, whoever he was, let it be because she wanted him and not because of what anyone else might think. It was the first time Petal resented hearing what Sasha had to say, perhaps because it sounded like something someone else might have said, someone like Diane.

In the intervening years, from then till a week ago, Sasha and Petal had spoken only a handful of times, and only on chance meetings. For the remainder of their final year of high school they travelled completely different circles. Then, a week ago, Petal called out of the blue. How were things after all these years, kids all good? great! and by the way did Sasha know her husband's team had won the Stanley Cup and what a long haul it had been? Brad, that was his name, was at the end of his career and there couldn't be a better way for things to have turned out. Yes, Sasha knew all this, she didn't say it, but somehow she knew. People talked. Even Howie, who never watched sports of any kind, knew that Brad's team had taken the cup this year. It'd been in the paper often enough. Well, Petal had said to Sasha on the phone, it's Brad's turn to have the cup for a few days next week and he's letting me decide what to do with it for an afternoon. How would it be if she, Petal, brought the cup round to the cafe, stopped by for a few minutes, you're still at that cafe, aren't you? Yes, Sasha confirmed, she was still at the cafe. Well, said Petal, she thought it might be a fun place to bring it, get a few pictures taken, would it be all right? would Sasha mind? This was asked as if it was some kind of favour, and straight away, as if being accommodating where the cafe was concerned was a matter of course, Sasha said, No, that'd be fine. What day? And it was settled without Sasha being sure why this was all happening and suspecting there was plenty more to it than was being said. Why? Sasha was thinking, yet still, this word never left her lips. It was never spoken, not to Petal.

And so, on the day, the day of this story, Petal was a no show. Sasha had elected not to make any big thing out of the fact that the cup might be coming round the cafe, yet still happened to mention it in passing to one or two of the kids behind the counter. This, of course, snowballed out of all proportion and on the day at least fifty people were in the cafe, with another dozen loitering around outside. Business was brisk. Diane, who'd sold the business to a family from Malaysia, several years before, happened to call that day, out of the blue. Diane was now living somewhere in the Kootenays and called occasionally like this, said it helped remind her why she'd run off the way she had, but really Sasha thought it was because there was something she was missing, perhaps her. Diane always called her at work, saying she knew it was a bad thing to do, and that was why she did it. When Sasha told her what was happening that day, about the cup, Diane said, What?! and they went on to talk a lot longer than they should have, considering how busy the day was becoming. After hanging up Sasha felt the same sense of loss she always did when their conversations were over.

So, no, the cup never appeared. Petal never arrived. Heads were shook and shoulders shrugged and it was explained to customer after customer that they, or she, Sasha, didn't know what had happened, and three or four times Sasha found herself apologizing for something she felt she really needn't have had to, but then, that is the nature of the service industry anyway. When most of the clamour had died down and most of the would-be cup-spotters had wandered away sour and unfulfilled, Sasha sat down at one of the tables and was joined by the young woman who was coming in to manage the evening shift. They sat and talked a while.

"I'm thinking of a word," said Howie, sing-song, "To describe Petal. Not a nice word." He was just finishing up the drying.

Sasha was calling down the fire escape to Ivan, saying, "We're going now." Alexis wandered into the kitchen looking sleepy.

"Ready?" said Sasha, kneeling down to embrace Alexis.

Alexis nodded.

In a moment they were all down sitting in the Volkswagen bus, Howie trying to get the thing started. After a few unsuccessful tries all he could manage to say was, "Great."

"Well,..." said Sasha.

"Does this mean no ice cream?" said Ivan from the back.

"How about a walk to the park?" said Howie.

"Great idea," said Sasha.

"Mo-om," said Alexis.

"And we can pick up an ice cream at the store on the way. How about that?" said Sasha, looking across at Howie with the I-know-it's-ridiculously-expensive-but-what-else-can-we-do look and they climbed out of the bus, closing the doors politely, almost too politely considering.

On the walk to the store, waiting for the signal to change on O'Connor, a yellow Hummer raced through the end of the light, long enough after it had changed to red for a couple horns to sound. Driving the Hummer was a woman in sunglasses and a white dress, talking on a cell phone.

Howie shook his head. "Everything about that is wrong," said Howie.

"I'm not exactly sure," said Sasha, measuring her words, "But that looked a lot like Petal." And Howie turned to look at the after vehicle as it carried on, wondering if somewhere behind the tinted glass was the famed cup.

In the park, a little later, the kids' faces smeared with chocolate and dabs of ice cream, Alexis ignored her parents' cautioning and wandered off into some trees where she couldn't be seen, and was found after a few slightly anxious moments, sitting on the ground holding something, something she'd pulled from a bush she was sitting beside. She was holding onto it and crying, the flood gates open yet again, as what she held looked very much like a pea pod.

That night, much much later, after the kids were put to sleep in the TV room away from the smell of drying paint, and after having made love, even though it'd been much too hot, both Howie and Sasha lay covered in glistening streams of sweat, and as they lay spread-eagled across the sheets a lazy reckoning of the day settled on them and Sasha remembered something from earlier that had got lost in the shuffle of the day, and she told Howie what she and the young woman had talked about at work, the woman who looked after the cafe in the evenings. It had started out with Sasha bemoaning her ridiculous afternoon and, seeing this brought no smile to the young woman's face, asked what was wrong. The young woman, who was twenty-eight, told Sasha that when she was fourteen she'd gotten pregnant and had had the baby and somehow allowed herself to give it up for adoption. And now, on this day, had just received a letter saying her child, a young girl, thirteen years old, was interested in contacting her. The young woman wasn't sure what to do.

"Oh boy," said Howie.

"Right," said Sasha, "Oh boy. Isn't it nice never to have had to make that kind of decision? You haven't had to have you?"

"No," said Howie, and a minute later asked if the woman went home, if Sasha let her have the night off.

"She didn't want it," said Sasha. "She wanted to work."

And they lay like that, spread out across their big bed, their hands and feet touching, glistening in the hot night. Half an hour later Howie whispered, "Are you asleep?" and Sasha breathed, "No, are you?"

"I need to get more paint to finish the window," said Howie. "Can we afford it?"

"No," said Sasha, "But get it anyway. Just because we can't afford something doesn't mean we shouldn't have it."

They were quiet another moment before Sasha spoke up again.

"Don't worry," she said, "You'll find something soon."

There was another lull, then Howie spoke.

"Maybe we should think about finding a smaller place," he said.

"There is no smaller place," said Sasha, and the two of them laughed and laughed and after a while went to sleep.