Metamorphosis Two: Kerri Wonders
Hi everyone. Welcome to Volcano’s world premiere audio drama, Metamorphosis --- A Viral Trilogy. This is a series of three audio diaries by André Alexis, with original music, sound design and mix by Debashis Sinha, and directed by me, Ross Manson.
What you are about to hear is Episode Two: Kerri Wonders, starring Becky Johnson as Kerri.
This episode is also set in Toronto, Canada, and briefly visits Hamilton, Pickering, North York and Ajax Ontario – all of which is in the traditional territory of many nations and peoples, including the Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishinaabeg, the Chippewa, the Haudenosaunee, the Wendat, and also over by Hamilton, the Erie.
All of these Indigenous Nations, Indigenous peoples have been here, and continue to be here, caring for this land. And this has gone on for thousands of years. So you can imagine the many many stories that have been told in this place, about this place.
We hope you like this one.
[INTRODUCTION]
[SOUNDBITE: RAPID KALIMBA MUSIC AND PERCUSSION]
[KERRI:] Journal One (June 15, Wednesday)
When the quarantine lifted, I went out into the world again. I don’t mind eating alone. So, I headed to King’s Noodle for BBQ duck.
Just before I got to the restaurant, I saw a man sitting in a beach chair beside a sign that said: “You Must Change Your Life. $20.00/pill”. And because I felt as if the world was different in a good way, I thought: “Oh, why not? Even if it’s a placebo, it’ll change my life, because I’ll be $20.00 lighter.”
[AMBIENT OUTDOOR SOUNDS, BIRDS]
The man wasn’t anybody I recognized. There was a jar on his lap – like the kind that has pickled eggs in it if you’re in a bar. And in this huge jar was a handful of tiny black pills. Well, that kind of put me off. I mean, whatever the mood, black pills make me nervous. But then the man said:
[ECHOEY VOICE]: This pill’s for you. Your name is Kerri. You’re on your way to King’s Noodle. You live in Parkdale. Take this pill and your life will change.
[AMBIENT MUSIC SWELLS]
[KERRI]: He was right about everything. But instead of being frightened I was delighted. I paid him the twenty dollars and took the pill right there on the spot. I thought it had to be a practical joke, the kind of thing Laszlo would do! I was even half-expecting Laszlo to jump out and say “got ya!”
The pill tasted of vanilla and sesame. That was yesterday.
As of this morning: no change, except for me being twenty dollars lighter.
So, like I thought: a joke, but good tasting.
[SOUNDBITE: RAPID KALIMBA MUSIC]
[KERRI]: Journal Two (June 16, Thursday)
Yesterday, I thought the black pill was a placebo. Today I’m not sure. The thing is: I’m an average person and I’m happy with that. I wanted to be a lawyer when I was younger, but that didn’t work out and, at least for now, I’m glad to be working at Roy Thompson Hall.
But I was eating in the lunchroom before ‘An Evening with Yoyo Ma” and I heard a sound, like someone walking on cardboard.
[SOUND OF FOOTSTEPS]
The sound stops, starts again, stops. It’s distracting, but the only other creature in the lunchroom is a spider on a web over by the fridge.
[LIGHT TAPPING, FOOTSTEPS SOUNDS]
And do you know what? When I was looking at the spider, the cardboardy noise started when it moved and stopped when it stopped moving. I swear I could hear the sound it made when it walked on its web.
[SWELLING AMBIENT MUSIC, FOOTSTEPS AND TAPPING CONTINUE]
I wondered if someone was playing a trick on me. Then I thought about the pill and I thought: why would someone give me a pill to improve my hearing? I stayed in the lunchroom listening to the spider, until Rita from front of house came in and we started talking.
The pill’s got to be a steroid, and that’s not good.
[SOUND OF A CAR HORN DRIVING BY, STREETCAR CLANG]
Then again, better hearing’s not the worst thing that can happen to a person. So, tonight, before recording this, I wrote in my gratitude book that I’m grateful for my senses.
It’s not often that I have something so new to be grateful for.
[KERRI SIGHS]
[SOUNDBITE: KALIMBA AND QUIET SWELL]
[KERRI]: Journal Three (June uh ... 17, Friday)
My hearing is definitely different.
[BACKGROUND SOUND OF DISTANT BIRDS]
Today was Friday, so I went to visit mom at Luna Calm. It’s been forever, and I love visiting her. I’m grateful she survived and, these days, she’s happy at the retirement home. But I was telling her about my hearing, and she said: “Oh, Kerri, stop it. I had to have your hearing tested all the time when you were younger. Your hearing is atrocious!” So, I said “Okay. I’ll leave the room and you whisper something and I’ll tell you what you said.” So, I left the room and she whispered “You father had an affair with Mrs. Baumgartner.” I said “Mom, don’t say things like that!” She said “Well, I was grateful, Kerri. I never really liked having sex with your father.”
[KERRI SIGHS]
But I was wondering just how good my hearing is. So, I said “Why don’t you whisper something while I’m outside and we’ll see if I can hear you?” So, I went outside and I could clearly hear her whisper “Bob Baumgartner was much more my type.”
She kept going, too. A real wave of confessions.
[AMBIENT MUSIC SWELLS]
I was three blocks away before I couldn’t hear her whispers anymore.
We were both amazed. It’s a phenomenal improvement in my hearing. I thought about the man who sold me the pill, and I asked mom if she wanted better hearing. But she was in a sentimental mood, so we spent the rest of the visit with me listening to her talk about the man she’s “dating”: Mr. Maitland from 2013C.
He sounds like a nice person, but I wonder if mom wouldn’t be too much for him.
She can be pretty demanding.
But, then, why shouldn’t she be with someone nice?
[KERRI SIGHS]
[SOUNDBITE: PERCUSSION AND KALIMBA MUSIC]
[KERRI]: Journal Four (June 18, Saturday)
I’ve spent so much time getting used to my new hearing, I didn’t really notice my other senses. It’s distracting hearing other people’s conversations. They say strange things, sometimes. I’ve had to learn to turn them off by paying attention to other noises, or by listening to music turned way up in my earbuds.
It’s no surprise that it took a while to notice how strong my sense of smell is now.
My sense of smell was good to begin with. I’ve always liked smelling flowers and the cooking in other people’s houses. But when I was talking to Claude from Janitorial, I could smell red wine, pasta and a meat sauce with veal.
[AMBIENT MUSIC SWELLS IN BACKGROUND]
I could smell other things, too, like toothpaste and tuna, but the veal was what struck me. Did you have veal for lunch I asked him? No, he said. “I had it for supper, two nights ago. You can’t still smell it, can you?
But I could smell it and it killed my appetite for lunch.
[KERRI SIGHS HEAVILY]
[SOUNDBITE OF KALIMBA OVER SWELLING MUSIC]
[KERRI]: Journal Five (June 19, Sunday)
I don’t understand what’s happened to me. I don’t just wonder how a pill could change me, I also wonder if a pill could really improve my senses to the extent that I can hear things I shouldn’t be able to hear and smell things that I’ve never smelled before. Could a pill really do that? And why would anyone give me something to heighten my senses?
But that’s not even all. The worst thing happened to me today. I was late for work and I had just missed the 504, so I ran to catch it. Only I didn’t run so much as I flew.
[AMBIENT MUSIC BUILDS]
I sped up and maybe I jumped, who knows, but I found myself sailing over people’s heads and I overshot the streetcar. I jumped at Cowan and I landed at Spadina a minute later. That’s three kilometres! And I passed two or three streetcars along the way.
The person I landed beside said “Are you filming a movie?” I was so shocked by the whole business, that I said “Ya”. He said “What’s it called?” and I said the first thing that came to my mind: “Queens of Spadina”. And he said: “Oh, strange title”. Then he gave me his business card. He’s an entertainment lawyer. He said: “Your make-up department’s fantastic. You look so drab! What are you, like, Supergirl in disguise or something?”
[KERRI SIGHS, HORN HONKS IN THE DISTANCE]
I took the day off work, I went straight home: walking, on back streets. But still only ten minutes to get from Spadina to Dufferin. Too fast and I wasn’t even winded.
I spent the rest of the day in bed, trying to think what could be wrong with me.
[DISTANT HONKING]
[SOUNDBITE, SHORT SWELL OF MUSIC]
[KERRI]: Journal Six (June 21, Tuesday)
I can’t help wondering how much I’ve changed. I mean, we’ve all changed now that we can go out again. But what am I capable of? That’s what I wonder.
The first thing I wanted to see was just how far I could jump. I didn’t want to find out in public, either. So, last night at eleven, I went down to the lake, near Jameson. It was eerie, of course. The lakeshore is always eerie at night. I looked west at the lights in the distance, around Etobicoke. And I sort of jumped in that direction.
[AMBIENT MUSIC PICKS UP]
I didn’t mean to go to Hamilton. But there I was, suddenly up in the air and flying past Etobicoke, past Mississauga, Oakville, Burlington. All the way to McMaster University. Which is how I knew I’d hit Hamilton, actually, since I’d been to McMaster years ago when Bruce invited me to a Marauders’ homecoming.
[AMBIENT MUSIC CONTINUES IN BACKGROUND]
I’m not going to lie: the experience was wonderful.
One minute I was getting ready to jump, the next I was somewhere over the lake heading towards lights that came closer and closer and then were behind me. I’ve never felt anything like it. Complete freedom. But it was frightening, too, because I really couldn’t control myself. When I tried to jump back to the Lakeshore at Jameson, I landed in Pickering, then I jumped to North York, then over to Ajax, and I think I’d still be jumping back and forth like a crazy person, except that when I touched down in the Junction, I walked back home.
[MUSIC TAPERS OUT]
The flying was exhilarating, but the walk from Keele and Annette was just plain dull.
[SOUNDBITE: KALIMBA]
[AMBIENT OUTDOOR SOUNDS, BIRDS CHIRPING]
[KERRI]: Journal Seven (June 24, Friday)
My hearing is off the charts. I can smell things I’ve never been able to smell. And I’ve been teaching myself to control my jumps so that, if I want, I can get fairly close to almost any place I want. In other words, I can fly, pretty much.
How wonderful this all sounds, except it isn’t wonderful.
Flying is useless. I don’t fly during the day, because it would be embarrassing to have to talk about why and how I fly. Then, too, I have to pretend I don’t hear things I’m not supposed to hear. And it doesn’t help me to smell people’s meals on their breath.
As if all that weren’t enough, now my sense of taste is so sharp I can’t enjoy my meals. Yesterday, I decided to have some comfort food, something to remind me of dad. So, I ordered Kentucky Fried Chicken. To begin with, the smell was overpowering, and not in a good way. I could smell each and every one of those stupid herbs and spices, as clearly as if they were being pushed in my nose. Then, I took a bite of chicken and could taste everything that poor animal had eaten before it was killed, the antibiotics, in particular.
[KERRI GROANS]
Vegetables aren’t much better. I taste minerals, fertilizer, and insecticides along with the taste of carrots and celery, and so on. The only way for me to eat my food, now, is to have a cup of coffee beside me when I’m eating. The smell drives all the nasty tastes away, but it’s like having coffee for breakfast, lunch and supper.
[KERRI SIGHS]
I’ve been spending my free time looking for the man who sold me that black pill.
[SOUNDBITE: RAPID PERCUSSION OVERTOP OF AMBIENT SWELLS]
[KERRI]: Journal Eight (June 27, Monday)
I had an accident, today.
I was walking to work as usual. I don’t like taking the 504 anymore. Streetcars are roving containers of smells and noise. I can’t last more than a stop before I have to get off. Which is fine because I get to work faster on foot.
I was on my way to Roy Thompson to do box office for an “Evening with Ma Vikingur”, the Icelandic throat singer, and I heard someone call for help.
[AMBIENT MUSIC SWELLS]
I couldn’t tell where the cry came from. But before I had time to figure everything out, someone was speeding by me on a bike, peddling like crazy, holding a purse.
I reacted instinctively. I caught up to the bike and ran beside it for a while and asked him if he was sure the purse was his. He was shocked, I guess. He tried to hit me with the purse. So, I took it from him. He wasn’t happy about that, so he turned around and came at me with the bike. He tried to run me over. I was so rattled, I grabbed the bike and threw it into the lake, rider and all.
I don’t know who was more surprised, him or me. Him probably, because it’s not every day you get thrown into a lake. He was only in the shallows, thank God. I could hear him yelling about how he was going to sue me.
It turned out to be his purse.
[AMBIENT MUSIC QUIETS DOWN]
The cry I’d heard was a high school girl playing with friends around Ontario Place.
The man’s name is Vincent and, once I’d apologized and told him what had happened, he seemed more embarrassed than I was or maybe more confused.
I tried to change the subject, but we were there a long time, and he missed his appointment he was rushing to.
Which made me feel worse.
[SOUNDBITE: KALIMAB MUSIC]
[KERRI]: Journal Nine (June 29, Wednesday)
[OUTDOOR SOUNDS, CHIRPING]
I must have told Vincent where I worked because, yesterday, he was at the box office asking for me.
I half thought he decided to sue me. So, I wasn’t exactly happy to see him. Also, I was on night shift, so I wondered how long he’d waited for me. He said “not long”, but I didn’t exactly believe him. There wasn’t anything scary about him, so when he asked if I’d go for coffee sometime, I said “okay.” It wasn’t that I wanted to encourage him, but I’d thrown him into the lake so I did think I owed him something.
This morning, we had coffee at a Starbucks, because so many of the coffee shops are gone, now, after quarantine. It turns out Vincent is an okay guy. Not my type, but not awful to talk to. So, that’s something. Plus, he smells like asparagus. If a man has to smell of something that isn’t cologne, asparagus isn’t the worst I can imagine.
When I left him to go to work, he asked if I’d ever considered putting my strength to good use. I said “What do you mean ‘good use’?” He said: “Well, maybe you could help people with your strength.”
If I can help people, shouldn’t I help them?
It’s a good question, but all evening I’ve been seeing myself as a seeing-eye dog.
[SOUNDBITE: KALIMBA MUSIC AND SWELLING AMBIENT SOUNDS]
[KERRI]: Journal Ten (July 5, Tuesday)
[SOUND OF PEOPLE TALKING IN BACKGROUND]
Vincent decided that I’m interesting. He was waiting for me after work again, a few days ago. He doesn’t seem like a stalker, but I was starting to wonder what he wants.
I don’t suppose I’ll ever find out now.
We were at King and Spadina, where the liquor store used to be. And four men started being aggressive because Vincent bumped into one of them. He apologized over and over, but you could see it wasn’t going to do any good. I said “Would you leave us alone, please?” Well, I haven’t heard such swearing since Mr. Simcoe died. And they started to box us in. So, I acted instinctively, I guess.
[AMBIENT MUSIC SWELLS]
I held Vincent by the waist and jumped with him to Lakeshore and Dunn.
You can’t blame him for being surprised. I still don’t know what shook him up worse: the men trying to assault us or us flying over the city. I had to walk with him up and down Dufferin for an hour before he could talk again and even then, he was still so upset I was worried about him getting home by himself.
I haven’t seen or heard from him since then: three days ago.
[KERRI SIGHS]
I’m really starting to wonder how long my new self is going to last.
[SOUNDBITE: SLOWER KALIMBA MUSIC]
[KERRI}: Journal Eleven (July 8, Friday)
[AMBIENT BIRD SOUNDS IN BACKGROUND]
It’s been so long since the world was normal, it took me a while before I realized I don’t know what normal means. And even if the world is normal, I wonder if I am.
I’m finally seeing my friends again. Last night I went out to Louise and Ted’s. I always thought Ted is a good cook. But now that I can taste everything, I’m not sure. It’s like I have to reconstruct in my memory what good food tastes like and move towards it in my mind. What I tasted was the exact proportions of milk, nutmeg, pinot grigio, onions, veal, cow, celery, carrots, pork, tomatoes, Parmesan, salt, pepper, and canola oil that went into his Bolognese.
It’s not the same as tasting a Bolognese. When Ted asked if I liked it, I had to say I was surprised at how much a pinch of nutmeg changes the sauce. He said “Oh, you’ve become a gourmet in quarantine!” I didn’t tell him that I could also taste the grass the cow and the calf had eaten, or the swill that had been fed to the pig.
[KERRI SIGHS, QUIET AMBIENT MUSIC SWELLS]
On my way home, it was early enough for me to see the lake, but dark enough for me to be hidden when I was flying. So, I flew.
The sky was red-orange, and the way the wind felt on my face was like driving with mom and dad and being allowed to open the back window.
Near the lakeshore and Springhurst, there were homeless people lying on park benches, all looking vulnerable. When I was normal, I made my peace with the normal world. Now, I wonder what I’m supposed to do.
Am I deluded?
[SOUNDBITE: QUIET AMBIENT MUSIC]
[KERRI]: Journal Twelve (July 9, Saturday)
Today I visited mom. All the old people were out on the grounds of the retirement home. A few of the old men were in bathrobes. And mom said “Uh, men get worse when they get old. They won’t dress up for anything!” I said, “But mom, you’re in a robe!” Because she was. But she said: “This is a kimono, Kerri. No one respectable wears terry cloth in public!”
[SOUND OF BIRDS, PEOPLE TALKING IN BACKGROUND]
It was still light out, so I walked home. And on Brock near the park I saw people selling drugs. It’s the kind of thing you used to see in Parkdale all the time, but I noticed it now, like it’s new again. I must have been staring. One of the men came over to ask what I was looking at. I said, “I think I’m looking at people selling drugs.” And he said: “Keep moving. No one wants to have to hurt a cow like you.” “Your mother must be very proud,” I said.
He was one of these men who love their mothers and hate everyone else.
[AMBIENT MUSIC SWELLS]
I could see he was going to hit me. It was like he was moving in slow motion. I moved out of the way and he fell onto the curb. He got up and tried to hit me again. The same thing happened. He was really in pain from hitting the curb. He tried again and, after that, I felt sorry for him. I picked him up and shook him a few times, then I put him down.
I could see how frightened he was. I think he was terrified.
[AMBIENT MUSIC FADES]
[SOUND OF PEOPLE IN THE BACKGROUND]
His friends looked like they were coming to see what happened. And I wondered if they had guns and what that would mean. So, I went on and I was past the bridge and couldn’t see them when I turned back a few moments later. I thought: maybe they’ll think twice before trying to assault someone. Then I thought: no, maybe they’ll be on the lookout for someone who looks like me, to teach her a lesson.
It’s useless to hurt people, unless you mean it. And I almost never do.
[SOUNDBITE: AMBIENT MUSIC AND KALMIBA]
[KERRI]: Journal Thirteen (July 11, Monday)
Surprise: Vincent was waiting for me after work. He said he’d been afraid of me, and then he’d done some soul searching, trying to decide if we’d really flown through the air or if he’d been hallucinating.
I told him I didn’t think he’d been hallucinating. And he said: well, if you’re as strong as I think you are, I think we should work together to create an agency.
[QUIET AMBIENT MUSIC]
He has experience as a secretary, he said. He could take appointments and, that way, we could both help people. I could see he’d been thinking about this. He had it in mind that, at least at first, I’d have to go on working at Roy Thompson. So, I’d need his skills for “hero appointments”. He didn’t think we should advertise, because he didn’t want to get the wrong kind of clients. But he has a lot of friends, and everybody knows someone who could use a strong person’s help.
I didn’t want to discourage him, so I said I’d see about it.
He said, “I have your first customer. My mother. She needs to open an old safe. She forgot the combination and it has important things in it.” So, I said “yes”.
It was a huge safe and it was broken, so no one could get inside it. And they couldn’t blow it up because it was in her basement and impossible to move. What a long story it turned out to be, when she told us about it. My part was short, though. I punched through the door and pulled it open.
[CRASHING SOUND]
There wasn’t much inside, but Vincent’s mother was so happy, I was glad I’d done it.
Vincent told his mother not to tell anyone, because no one would believe her.
She wanted to give us twenty dollars each, but I didn’t take it. I didn’t feel like I could.
[SOUNDBITE: RAPID KALIMBA MUSIC]
[KERRI]: Journal Fourteen (July 15, Friday)
[OUTDOOR SOUNDS: BIRDS CHIRPING]
More odd jobs, thanks to Vincent. I pulled tree roots out of lawns in the Annex, planted fence posts for decks in Rosedale, moved a truck out of a ditch in Lambton Mills. All this by myself, none of it hard work.
I’ve made five hundred dollars, but that’s only because it hurts people’s feelings if you turn them down when they’re being generous.
Vincent has started to call himself my sidekick. He’s started asking me what I need. What do you need, Kerri? The world is your oyster, Kerri. Why don’t we start fighting crime, Kerri?
I said “Why is it when a person has strength they have to use it so blatantly?”
[AMBIENT MUSIC]
The only thing I want is to understand what it means to be thirty and strong and to live in a world that sometimes needs something I have.
[SOUNDBITE: ROLLING MUSIC]
[KERRI]: Journal Fifteen (July 20, Wednesday)
[OUTDOOR SOUNDS: DISTANT BIRDS]
I’ve been thinking about the “fighting crime” thing. I couldn’t stand the thought of hurting people or of having people hurt because of me. But even before it came to that I’d want to know who you can help and if they’d even want you to.
When you pull up tree trunks, it’s pretty straightforward. But flying around saving people from criminals? I just don’t see myself that way.
The interesting thing is: three days ago, when I was coming home from visiting mom, I decided to go to King’s Noodle. I hadn’t been there since the man gave me the black pill. And who should I see around King and Adelaide? The very man, walking with his oversized jar. I couldn’t decide what to feel. Mostly relief is what came over me.
But when I caught up to him, before I could ask him anything, he asked me: are you tired of your new life?
I said I wasn’t tired of it exactly, but I wasn’t really comfortable with it.
[AMBIENT MUSIC SWELLS]
He said: no one ever is, that’s the thing about new lives. I asked if he could change me back to how I was. He said he didn’t know how I am or how I was, because no two people change in the same way. He had one woman who complained because she could walk through walls and a man who could breathe underwater but was always being arrested at public pools. He said: whatever you’ve got, it can’t be as bad as that, can it?
He was right. He was so right that I didn’t even bother to answer him.
Tonight, the Vienna Symphony Orchestra was at Roy Thompson. For the first time in ages, I went in and listened.
[AMBIENT MUSIC SWELLS SLIGHTLY]
I could hear every squeak and cough and creaky note of Beethoven’s 6th Symphony and I was happy because I thought: you know, with a little effort, I think I can feel as differently as I hear. It’s such a human thing, a symphony.
That made me think about mom and her “friend”, Mr. Maitland.
I think I’ll ask her to introduce us. I’m almost sure that would make her happy.
[SOUNDBITE: AMBIENT MUSIC SPEEDS UP, GETS LOUDER, FADES OUT]
That was Becky Johnson as Kerri in part two of Metamorphosis, A Viral Trilogy, by André Alexis.
This trilogy was produced by Volcano, and part two was presented by SummerWorks.
Part one, Lucretia in Quarantine, went live on Aug 17, 2020 with TO Live. The next and final episode, Nella at 86 goes live Aug 31 with Canadian Stage.
If you’re curious to listen to a panel discussion with the artists and presenters of Metamorphosis, including André Alexis, join us on Saturday, Sept 5 at 12 noon Eastern. For links to this panel, and all the episodes, or if you’d like to make a comment or ask a question, please visit us at volcano.ca.
Thanks for listening.
Transcriber: Anastasia Chipleski