Fly by Night (3 page)

“I'm sorry,” Amelia repeated, not knowing what else to say. “So, so sorry,” she said to Bryce, smoothing Jen's hair like she had for Alex after he'd been roughed up on the middle-school bus.

In the early years she'd rehearse what to say in the event of getting turned down. Now she felt like she needed a twenty-pound dive belt just to stay seated.

“Let's get out of here,” Amelia said as Jen sat up.

As they staggered out into the chilly night air, Amelia clutched her jacket around her ribs. She thought to invite them back to the Revolution House but instead had to sit. Easing down at the nearest bistro table and chair secured to the building with long cables and padlocks, she felt nothing.

Surface frost on the tabletop glittered in the parking lot lights like a crazy princess's eyes.

Bryce said. “You okay?”

“'Course not.”

The three of them were quiet before she spoke. “I just need to sit here a while, Bryce, that's all. Let's talk tomorrow—you two go on home.”

She rested her face in her hands.

 

2

Ted Drakos Jr., or TJ, was glad his mother had died before knowing the outcome of the vote.

“I know you'll stop it, Ma'iingan Ninde,” his mother, Gloria, had said earlier that morning, just hours before she'd passed.

“Feel it in my bones.” She'd hugged her sides and exaggerated like an excited girl. Aside from a three-year stint in Germany as a Navy flight nurse where she'd met and married TJ's father, Gloria had lived all her life on or near the Red Cliff Ojibwe Reservation. With short gray hair and thick glasses, his mother was still a beautiful woman at eighty-six. Dimples in her cheeks had showed even when not smiling—“Laughing Eyes” they'd called her.

“Appreciate the vote of confidence, Ma,” he'd said, though he knew such confidence was misplaced. Long ago she'd named him Wolf Heart, or Ma'iingan Ninde, in an Ojibwe ceremony: a heart that loves with fierce loyalty—quiet, ever watchful, but never calling attention unless required.

“'Cause I know you will,” she'd shot back.

But the sixty-one-year-old wolf biologist didn't smile, wouldn't indulge false hope. Life and death were an everyday part of his job and TJ knew full well the influence of the trophy-hunting, gun, and sporting lobbies working hand in hand with Wisconsin's new political regime to remove the protected status of the state's wolf population from the Endangered Species List.

He'd been headed down to Madison to testify before the state legislature against Act 169, the reinstatement of the wolf hunt. Despite hearing from a “friendly” senator that the bill already had enough votes to pass, heartsickness and rage compelled him to go in spite of it. He'd make them listen to his testimony so that no one could claim that “
they hadn't known.…
” When he was through they'd all understand the consequences of their vote. He'd expose and make public their rejection of more than thirty years' worth of scientific field data in favor of cronyism. His executive summary, as well as those of other biologists, had documented how reinstating a wolf hunt was both unjustifiable as well as potentially devastating to wolf families. With this knowledge, he thought, let them turn a deaf ear away from science and to instead embrace the bloodthirsty ways of their culture.

“You'd better leave now.” Gloria had looked over at the wall clock. “Or you'll be late.”

TJ had stood in his navy blue suit that was tight at the waist and already uncomfortable. Car keys jingling in his hand, he was just about to head out but something felt off.

He glanced around, feeling like he was forgetting something, and brushed back the same wisp of gray hair that never seemed to grow long enough to be rubber-banded at the nape of his neck along with the rest.

“Ma'iingan Ninde, you see with their eyes,” Gloria said and smiled with an expression he couldn't read. Since he was a little boy, she'd always said that the yellow green of his eyes were the eyes of a wolf.

As young as six, TJ would sit on fallen tree trunks in the woods, quiet for hours as he waited for wolves to find him. Once they did, he'd study the micro-expressions of their muzzles and cheeks, the tilt of their eyes. By ten he'd trained his eye to spot them through the feathery cover of leaves as he'd catch their eye. Talking back using his eyes, he'd believed they'd understood. And when the prairie grasses were damp he'd catch the sweet nuttiness of their scent just moments after they'd scampered off into the forest.

Wolves had always been synonymous with his mother. Often one or two would step out, sitting just far enough away to watch her hanging laundry as TJ helped. Sometimes a yearling or two, always with an adult, would lie down in the clearing near their house to sun. On pillows of tall field grass they'd roll around on their backs, pawing at each other's mouths, teeth clicking as they'd play, baking in the sun until beginning to pant, at which time they'd jump up and saunter off into the coolness of the trees.

“You gonna be okay, Ma?” TJ raised his voice and picked up the cordless phone, setting it down next to her on the side table. “I'm calling every thirty minutes until Charlotte gets home so you better pick up.”

“But you know I hate those darn salespeople—”

“Pick up anyway or I'm calling Delbert,” TJ threatened. Being a nurse, his mother was funny about the 911 Tribal Emergency Ambulance showing up at their place.

Then a shade passed across his mother's face.

TJ pulled back and blinked several times, wondering if it was just dry, scratchy eyes. But he'd seen what he'd seen.

His stomach sank, arms became slack with dread. Closing his eyes for an instant he must have seen wrong. This was
his
mother.

Only once before had he seen a shade—six years earlier when Long-Tooth, or B-1, one of the oldest wolves in the Sand River Wolf Pack, had died. For fifteen years TJ had followed the pack, including Long-Tooth, collecting data and detailed field notes about the oldest pack on the Bayfield Peninsula.

At the time, TJ had been returning e-mails in his garage/office in Red Cliff when struck with the sudden urge to stand. It was the kind of restlessness when something's about to happen.

“Huh.” He'd pinched his bottom lip as he'd stood and walked to the center of the room. Turning around once, hand in his pocket, he'd wondered if maybe Charlotte, his wife, had called from the back porch.

Sliding open the door, he stepped out to listen. Just the usual woodland sounds. It was mid-September, about the same time of year, early morning and chilly.

TJ had glanced around, wondering what the hell he was doing until he'd spotted Long-Tooth standing at the edge of the woods, eyes on him. He'd then stepped out without a coat.

Turning to face the wolf, they'd watched each other's eyes. The animal's brow relaxed. A wide toothy grin greeted an old friend who'd been out of touch for some time.

The wolf was three-legged lame and limped into the tall field grass near the office and then stopped. Keeping a watchful eye on TJ, he turned in stiff, uncomfortable circles until finding the right spot. He then let out a sigh tinged with a groan before easing down onto the grass.

He hadn't seen Long-Tooth that past spring and had wondered if the old guy hadn't made it. Many of the old ones and yearlings hadn't. It was startling how much older and thinner the wolf looked. Ratty coat, tail as bald as a possum's where formerly it had been bushy and one of the most luxuriant TJ had seen when the animal would hold it high, asserting his place in the pack.

For as many springs as TJ could recall, Long-Tooth would spot him and Jimmy, his colleague, coming to perform the annual health checks. The wolf would make the pretense of running away before half jokingly turning to TJ as if to say, “Okay, go ahead, do it.”

TJ would then dart him and stand by as the tranquilizer took effect, watching as the wolf relaxed onto the ground, quickly wadding up his jacket to tuck underneath and cushion the animal's head. He and Jimmy would then examine the animal's teeth and gums, the insides of his ears, test the flexibility of his joints and then draw the required tubes of blood.

Then the two men would slip a sling under the animal, lifting him to get an annual weight after which they'd sit with him until fully awake again so as to not leave him defenseless.

Sometimes Long-Tooth would spot TJ and play “catch me.” The wolf would run ahead and then stop, looking back to ensure that TJ was following. Then he'd lead TJ up and down the steep ravines along Lake Superior to their den in the Chequamegon to show off his litter of four week-old pups.

This time Long-Tooth had rolled onto his side, tired from the effort it had taken to summon him. TJ sat cross-legged on the dewy grass in silence, vowing to stay with the wolf until either he got up or didn't. He was used to waiting hours, days, sometimes weeks—that was what wildlife biologists did.

Juvenile eagles had soared above, their dark brown feathers the color of tree bark, playing and chasing each other from the top of one dead white pine to another. Once the sun was fully up, Long-Tooth lay peacefully; his eyes giving a chatoyant flash of cataracts.

Gravel sounds of Gloria pulling into the driveway made them both turn. She'd just moved in after turning eighty although still volunteering at the Red Cliff Health Center to give diabetes screenings to tribal members.

TJ timed how long it would take for Gloria to get inside and then phoned.

The wolf's eyes then shifted onto Gloria as she negotiated the uneven ground toward them, a blanket bundled under each arm. Long-Tooth's face moved with small jerky turns of his head as he watched with interest.

“He called you.” She said, out of breath as she reached them both, handing TJ a blanket.

“Yeah.”

Gloria eased down to sit with the same stiffness as the wolf.

She wasn't one for the magic talk but then again neither was he.

“He doesn't want to be alone,” she said.

TJ nodded, his head dropped.

“You've been a good friend.” She touched her son's knee.

TJ choked up.

“He knows you're sad, Ma'iingan Ninde.”

As she squeezed his knee TJ felt her studying his profile. His father's nose, she'd always say, only this time she hadn't. Her voice was soft, as if he was ten years old.

“But he's glad you came. They don't see death like we do.”

They'd sat in silence for a while.

“He just wants company,” she said.

TJ nodded.

And it was in that moment that he'd first seen a shade pass through his mind's eye, drawing down the wolf's soul as Long-Tooth's spirit grew dimmer as if clouded by a morning mist. In less than an hour the wolf had stopped breathing. TJ and his mother had stood and stepped closer, peering over to see.

“He's gone,” she'd whispered. The wolf's eyes were open but not seeing, lips slack with no expression.

“Yeah, Ma. He is.”

*   *   *

“I'm worried about you, Ma.” TJ set down his keys and travel mug, crossing his arms as he stepped closer, brushing off what he'd seen.

“Waste of time,” she said, tucked beneath a wool blanket though it was early September. “Worry more about your wolf brothers.”

He'd squatted to eye-level, not believing her.

The suit pants cut deeper into his belly. He pulled at the waistband to no avail as it pinched his skin. His mother always said he was built just like his father without the lean torso of her family. Charlotte had suggested the suit would give him an air of authority which only made him laugh.

“If that was the case,” he'd told her, “I'd have started wearing suits a year ago.” The presence of the Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission (GLIFWC) was pro forma. Months before the vote, the Wisconsin legislature and courts had already made up their minds to delist wolves as endangered long before they'd talked to biologists or he'd submitted his executive summary about Wisconsin wolves. It was a political, not a scientific, decision.

“You don't look good, Ma,” he said and reached to touch her brow.

“I'm fine.” She pulled away. “Go or you'll be late.”

He was tempted to call Jimmy, tell him to go on to Madison alone. Yet they'd all agreed he gave the most professional and impassioned presentation. He was good at explaining empirical research in laymen's terms of how reinstating a wolf hunt would increase the number of wolves, not decrease it. Culling would be destructive for the future health and family structure, not to mention the genetics of existing wolf packs. There were so many other ways to prevent depredation of livestock other than slaughter. He'd seen ranchers employ fences and herding dogs, but many were lazy. More country dogs were killed each week by cars than annually by wolves. And there was generous financial compensation from the State of Wisconsin if the death of a calf or a hunting dog could be reported as a wolf depredation. TJ knew that many animals died as the result of negligent or bad animal husbandry, or due to a long, tough winter. Some hunters who trained dogs to attack bears lost their animals in the course of a hunt. But it was easier and more lucrative to blame wolves for everything.

“Ma.” TJ shook her shoulder. He blinked hard several times, trying to talk himself out of having seen the shade.

“What?” Gloria brushed his hand away but then sat up and looked to the window as if a bird had collided. “You hear that?”

“Hear what?”

“That.” She turned with an odd smile.

He clicked open the sliding door and stepped out onto the deck, ready to fight off anyone or anything coming for his mother. But his stomach squeezed like driving over the steep ravine on Highway K, knowing he had no such power.

Scanning around the meadow where they'd seen Long-Tooth six years earlier, he saw nothing. Just the same birch, cedar, and a few maple trees along the forest edge but no intruders, no Windigo spirits—just swallows chasing off a cooper's hawk—a leftover vendetta from earlier that spring after it had made off with one of their newly hatched chicks.