The Hero Next Time: A Novel of the Terribly Acronymed Detective Club (Book 4)

Chapter Eighteen: Sunny, Spring, 1981

The Vaisakhi parade in Surrey was Sunny's favourite festival of the year. Few things came close. 

The Pacific National Exhibition in Vancouver, at the end of the summer holiday, was one of them, because it also started with a parade and ended at the fairgrounds with rides, demolition derbies, farm animals and the prize home draw, its tickets sold by vendors shouting, "Win a house, win a car!" (When he reunited with Lauren thirty years later, and she informed him the animal barns on the fairgrounds once housed Japanese Canadians interned during the Second World War, his enjoyment of the PNE was diminished from then on.)

The IWA picnic on Labour Day at Ryall Park was another, when hot dogs and pop were handed to kids free of charge and you could have as much as you wanted. Dad always ran something at those picnics, either officiating the games like the sack race or tug of war, or helping at the barbecue, even though he didn't eat the hot dogs himself; Sunny got fewer hot dogs when Dad was at the grill, because Dad kept an eye on how many he ate and would quietly remind him to save some for the other kids, many of whom were less fortunate than he was. Rachel often came to the picnics at his invitation, and Dad never told her not to eat so many. Joe and his family showed up at those as well, because Joe's dad and his dad were part of the same union even if they worked at different mills. Sunny and his family sometimes showed up at the picnics Joe attended earlier in the summer too, for Roma Hall and for Holy Spirit Parish, but they brought their own food, because you had to pay for the sausages and pasta on offer; they also stayed on the edge of the picnic, uncomfortably aware of all the eyes on them, the one brown family among the sea of Italian Catholics.

What he loved about Vaisakhi, though, was that this festival was all his own. It took place in April, after the long slog that followed Christmas and New Year's Day. It was the traditional New Year's festival in the Indian subcontinent, when the day finally gained ground on the night, and the promise of warm days and long evenings of play filled the air. He considered it the first of the year's festivals, full of excitement and anticipation, which made it happier than, say, the PNE, which, although it was fun, always carried a hint of the bittersweet with it, the acknowledgement that summer was ending, school was returning, and darker days were coming.

Vaisakhi was especially memorable, at least in these last couple of years, because he was in it. Khalsa School had its own entry in the parade, and the students sang hymns they learned as part of their education in Gurmat, the teachings of the Guru, which was as much a part of the curriculum as was math, science and English. Because this wasn't his first parade, he felt a particular imperative to sing loud and on key, to provide a good example for the younger students, and to do his teachers proud.

He wanted to do his parents proud, too, and he looked for his mother and sister as he marched; his father was in his own entry with the New Westminster Labour Council. Politicians and advocacy groups had as much presence here as religion, and Dad was as proud of his union card as he was of his turban. Sunny knew his father sacrificed a lot to drive him to school every morning, getting up extra early to make sure he got to work on time, and he knew that unlike public school, Khalsa School wasn't free, and financial sacrifices were also being made to get him there. Now that Sunil Singh Parhar was Amritdhari, or baptized, he felt a duty to begin acting and living the Khalsa life, just as he felt the duty to grow his hair.

Here, he could be completely himself. Here, his Sikh identity wasn't a topic of polite but awkward questions by people who didn't know Punjabi or only had Western traditions as a reference point. Here, he felt no need to explain himself to blank-faced friends, or to run from bullies. Here, he was among thousands like him.

Not that he resented his friends for their questions, or for not understanding the things he did. People were just different. He didn't understand all of Joe's Catholic traditions, for example, nor did he expect Joe to explain them, even though Joe sometimes tried. What he liked about this parade was that his friends weren't here, and that he didn't have to walk them through it, and he could simply relax, as if he were letting out a breath he didn't know he was holding when he was around them.