An excerpt from Saudade
by Thomas Trofimuk (NeWest Press)
Mâcon, France
1. Death by Tiger
Bruce Flynn now realizes he’s put too much of Pilar’s lavender bubble bath into the water. There are more bubbles than water and this mass has grown to the point where it’s threatening to topple onto the floor. He wasn’t paying attention — his eyes closed, adrift in a memory of Larry, their dog, who used to sit beside the tub and watch whoever was in the bath. Once, when Pilar fell asleep, Larry barked and woke her up. She wasn’t in any danger of drowning, but the dog didn’t know that.
The rising bubbles tickle Bruce’s chin, and he opens his eyes, reaches through the expanse of white froth, and manages to turn the water off. When he leans back, he is lost in a lavender-scented glob of bubbles.
He’s wearing a Groucho Marx nose and glasses with furry black eyebrows that tickle his forehead. The plastic nose is scratchy and smells a little oily. He’s holding a cigar, still in its cellophane wrapping, with a feigned confidence. On the windowsill there’s a bottle of cinnamon whisky and two glasses.
Massive snowflakes are drifting past the window — a steady downward movement, but he isn’t thinking about shovelling sidewalks or driveways. Given that he’s channelling Groucho, it would be more appropriate to run naked into the street and try to catch a snowflake on his tongue. Or make a snow angel while singing “Yankee Doodle Dandy.” Or bark at a passing car.
He’s playing music from a polka playlist that he stumbled across while looking for a song that was not a polka. He was surprised when he found he liked polkas. But what’s not to like? They were happy and bright, and bounced off the walls with an insatiable energy — wild and disciplined at the same time.
Pilar comes from the hallway into the bathroom holding a pile of towels and the instant she sees him, she laughs. It’s a good warm sound and it makes him happy to hear it. He brings a surprised expression to his face, as if he’s just remembered something important. “This morning I shot an elephant in my pyjamas,” he says. “How he got into my pyjamas I’ll never know.” He shoves the cigar into his mouth.
She half-giggles, half-snorts. “What are you doing?”
“Drinking cimonnin whisky in a bubble bath.” Cinnamon is a word he’s never been able to pronounce correctly unless he breaks the word down and really focuses. Pilar brought attention to this mispronunciation only once. Now, when he trips over it, she smiles quietly, as if his inability to say this word is something she alone knows about him.
“No. I meant, who are you and what are you doing in my bathtub?”
He lifts the nose and glasses off his face, takes the cigar out of his mouth. “Pilar. It’s me. It’s your husband in all his. . .you know, magnificent nakedness. I’m only pretending to be Groucho.”
“Oh, thank god. I was about to call the police.” She frowns at the speaker on the counter beside the sink. “What is that noise?”
“It’s polka music.” He grins, very pleased with himself. “I believe this is something called the Beer Barrel Polka.”
“Not exactly the kind of music you would expect to hear in a spa, is it?”
He reaches for his phone and turns the volume down a bit. “This is a true thing you have said. But here’s the thing — I’ve noticed polka music is never sad.” He sticks the cigar back into his mouth, fluffs the bubbles a little, points at her. “Listen. . .I’ve been looking for a girl like you. Not you, but a girl like you.”
“And is there room in there for a girl like me?”
She places the towels on the counter, drops her clothes in a pile, and he watches as she nimbly pushes one foot through the bubbles into the water — hyper alert, ready to catch her should she slip. But there is no need to worry. She is careful. As Pilar sinks into the tub, the water and the bubbles barely rise, as if she isn’t there.
***
On the day Pilar goes missing they are in Mâcon, France, and at first, he’s amused. Later on, not so much.
It was hot and humid in Mâcon that day — sticky, Pilar called it. They’d arrived in Paris the previous afternoon and travelled by train — on the TGV, to this small municipality in the southern part of Burgundy. Finally in Mâcon, they grabbed a bite to eat in a bistro near the hotel, crawled into bed and slept like the dead. The next morning, they found themselves in a café near the river where Pilar told one of her purposely convoluted stories, and at the end of that telling, she vanished. She was there. Bruce looked away for a few seconds. And then she was gone.
But before Pilar vanished, there was the flight, the thousand trifling details of airports, the seriously fast train, and morning in the room with the clanking air conditioner.
Excerpted from Saudade by Thomas Trofimuk © 2026. Used with permission of NeWest Press.
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Thomas Trofimuk writes both poetry and fiction. He has published six novels: The 52nd Poem, Doubting Yourself to the Bone, Waiting for Columbus, This is all a Lie, and The Elephant on Karlův Bridge, and Saudade. He lives in Edmonton, Alberta with his wife, cats who visit, and far too many books.
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