Skip to main content
mark schatzker




A Muskoka spa. The air is scented with lavender and eucalyptus. The sound of waves lapping a beach and seagulls cawing filters in through hidden speakers. Three Toronto Community Housing Corporation managers sit in a tiled room wearing white terry cloth robes. Their feet are immersed in foot spas.

Linda: Shouldn't someone call the meeting to order or something?

Frank: Seriously?

Ted: Yeah, Frank, weren't you supposed to bring an agenda or something?

[Laughter.]/p>

Frank: My assistant forgot to print it out. I was going to bring my laptop down, but what if it fell in the hot tub?

Ted: Good point.

Linda: Would that, like, kill you?

Frank: I didn't want to find out.

Linda pulls a refrigerated gel pack over her eyes.

Frank: Well there's no way I'm going back to my room to get it now. I'm way too relaxed.

Linda: I am so in the mood for some Enya. [She begins rubbing an elderberry balm onto her forearms.]Sucks about the Christmas party.

Ted [angry] Why go to the trouble of renting out the Montecassino banquet hall and then shave $13,000 off the budget? It doesn't make sense.

Linda: They're getting us gourmet chocolates this year to make up for it.

Ted: Big whoop. [He mists a spray-on body conditioner onto his skin.]/p>

Frank: This agency is going down the crapper.

Ted: The government doesn't understand incentivizing. This is like communist Russia. We're hamsters on a wheel.

[Frank swigs from a bottle of Fiji water.]/p>

Linda: This little hamster is looking forward to her massage.

Frank: Not in the budget.

Linda [shocked] You're kidding.

Frank: Nope. The spa is it.

Linda: Well then, I'm not leaving. I don't care if my feet turn into 20 pound prunes.

Ted: They put special salts in the water to prevent that from happening.

[Frank begins pulling leave-in conditioner through his hair with a comb.]note>///



Linda [appraising her nails] What a terrible manicure. I can't believe I need another one already.

Frank: Remember the staff picnic?

Ted: A joke.

Frank: Four massagers for the entire TCHC staff. [He rolls his shoulders forward, as though working out a kink.]/p>

Ted: What's the point of a 10-minute massage, anyway? It's like only being aloud to listen to 30 seconds of an amazing song.

Frank: It's like the iTunes music store.

Linda: They keep chipping away here and cutting there and eventually this whole agency is going to crumble into dust and then you know who'll get blamed …

Frank: Us.

Linda: Exactly.

Ted: What's for lunch?

Linda [removing the gel pack] Please tell me we're not on the prix fixe.

Frank: No, I was adamant that we order à la carte.

Linda: I could hug you.

Frank: They can't expect us to work on an empty stomach.

Special to The Globe and Mail

Interact with The Globe