Fly by Night (6 page)

Then a type of slap-happy giddiness set in, the type that's as uncontrollable as it is scary, a one-way ticket on the crazy train. She was bowled over with hysterical laughter, unable to stop or catch her breath until it had run its course. She sighed and looked at the dirt.

“Jeez.” She looked around, wondering what she'd wreck next and snorted a short laugh.

Stepping back to the window, she looked for signs of Myles's car but there was nothing. His Lexus was too long to park behind her Jeep so typically he'd park on the street.

As she sat down on the window ledge a burst of freedom warmed through her. Unbidden in its lightness, she was buoyant as if just having dived off the starboard side of a ship when in an instant the heavy dive gear becomes weightless, once the forces of gravity are suspended, leaving one's body to be as light as a chiffon scarf.

“Wow.” She stretched her legs. How had a kernel of excitement worked its way in on the heels of such despair?

“Thank you, Alex.” She looked toward her phone. Had the battery not died she'd have called him back and thanked him. Maybe she didn't need to know what came next.

Amelia then sat down on the rug and rolled over onto her side. Her cheek rested on the woolen braid, recalling the immortal lives of jellyfish.
Turritopsis dohrnii
in particular, when threatened, begins to age in reverse, cycling away from death and back to the moment of its birth. Though brainless with only sensory organs, the creature knew enough to begin the process of repair until refreshed and ready to take on the ocean anew.

The smell of wool, dirty adolescent feet, and soggy ranch-flavored Doritos mashed into the spaces between the rug's braids—strange how she'd never been this close yet had vacuumed the rug more than a thousand times if she'd done it once. Gazing into the space under the sofa there were paper clips, white plastic caps from soda bottles, a misplaced sock, and all the little indistinguishable objects that had gone missing over the years.

She eyed her dead cell phone on the floor next to her bag in the foyer, wishing she'd kept her landline despite Alex's reasoning.

The screen door's old rusted springs pinged again, indicating someone was still there.

Amelia sat up and crawled over. Resting her ear against the inside of the door, she listened. Someone was shuffling. Myles's shoes made a certain clicking sound on hard surfaces. She wasn't sure. Sometimes there are no second chances.

The screen door then banged shut. Her skull absorbed the bang. She scrambled up and over to the window to catch anyone walking away but saw nothing.

He'd given up after two knocks. She frowned. That was Myles, alright. Persistence was not his strong suit. What a disappointment yet a relief at the same time.

“Jerk,” she mumbled, rubbing the side of her head.
You can't fire me, I quit.
“Shoulda dumped your ass first.”

But it wasn't true. It hurt to say it, hurt even more to feel the bitterness of it all and she wished her heart would calcify like an exoskeleton, impervious to the whims of love.

Tiptoeing to the front window, she then flipped the louvers shut and settled back into the crack couch.

The brightness of the fireplace's flames helped dim her thoughts. Kicking off her clogs, she tucked her feet under the down comforter and began to drift.

Once asleep, she dreamed of her father, carrying the red-and-gold-plaid aluminum beach cooler by the handle into the darkened Jones Beach tunnel at Field 4. Loaded with ice chips and drinks they marched out to the ocean beaches on Long Island. She was eight. The silhouette of her father's shoulders was outlined in the darkened tunnel by light from the other side. She glimpsed his long strides as he moved toward the water.

Suddenly she was falling backward off a tall pier at the Captree State Dock at the tip of Jones Beach, backward into the water.

Amelia bolted up; catching herself with such a start she could have vomited. Covering her mouth she thought to run to the kitchen sink as she tried to catch her breath. Her head pounded in time with her heartbeat.

“Shit.” She breathed through her nose, trying to calm down; maybe the fireplace was too warm.

But even as she settled, in her mind's eye was the shadow outline of her father's form, remembering the feel of cool, damp sand under bare feet on the tunnel's cement walkway as she followed him, advancing toward the water.

“Dad,” she said into her hand and started to cry.

 

4

The tree wasn't nearly as heavy as they'd first thought and between the three of them the shaggy-bark birch was easily loaded into the back of TJ's dusty black truck.

They'd headed off to old man Whitedeer's sawmill just on the other side of Red Cliff. The sound of truck tires on the old man's gravel driveway brought Whitedeer shuffling out in his bed slippers to see who was there.

“Whatcha boys got there?” Whitedeer called out before they'd come to a complete stop. “That for Gloria's Spirit House?”

TJ didn't answer. His sons were equally as quiet as they unloaded the tree, TJ still uneasy about going against Gloria's wishes for a simple burial without all the hocus pocus, as she used to call it.

“Nice Wiigwaasi-mitig you got there.” Whitedeer ran his hand along the birch tree's bark. “Where'd it find you?” The old man eyed TJ.

“Laying not fifty feet from the woods near my breakfast nook,” TJ gestured toward the direction of his house as if seeing the back windows.

“You put tobacco down?”

TJ didn't answer.

The old man rolled his eyes and shook his head as he said. In a teasing voice he said, “Of course not. Ma'iingan Ninde, why would I think you'd do the right thing. You of all people, the protector.” The old man laughed as he watched TJ fidget. “Way to teach your boys to give thanks, whatcha think lads?” The old man opened his arms wide and turned toward them. Neither spoke.

TJ had no comeback either. He was no protector. He'd been powerless against the courts, the special interests, he hadn't even stayed with his mother as she was dying. He shook his head slowly and shrugged. Little did the old man know that he was right for completely different reasons.

TJ glanced over to Skye and Gavin and each shrugged and turned, chuckling to see their father humbled and busted by an elder for tobacco blessings, where years ago it had been one of them.

“I'll give you tobacco,” the old man said to him. “Do it when you get back.”

“I will.”

“You're full of shit,” Whitedeer mumbled under his breath and turned to Gavin and Skye. “Do it for your stubborn-ass Nindede.” The old man threw up his hands in mock disgust. He then began to examine the birch trunk. “Been down at least six months or so, I'll bet,” the old man said, his eye still on TJ. “Given the underside rot.”

Old Whitedeer smiled in a knowing way.

“Your mom's spirit tree.” The old man looked at TJ as he touched the shaggy bark. “Laughing Eyes was special alright. Didn't believe a word of the old ones but I'm old enough to remember back to the time when she did.” He held TJ's eye. “But it don't matter what a person believes.” He grinned in a secretive way. “What is is what is.” He waved for them to follow him into his shop.

TJ and his sons carried the trunk, following the old man along to his sawmill, his slippers making scuff marks in the dirt without so much as lifting his feet.

“Bring 'er in.” Whitedeer kept motioning with his hand as he held open the door, waving them in as if they were backing up a trailer. He then held up a hand to stop. His long white ponytail was snaked up around the nape of his neck. He reached and flipped on the overhead fluorescent lights of the shop.

He motioned for them to pivot the birch trunk as he studied it.

“Hmm,” Whitedeer said, seeing things in the wood. His callused hands made swishing noises over the shaggy bark. “You limbed it clean. Most don't bother. Lay 'er down there.”

Whitedeer pulled his hands back and clapped with a decisiveness that spoke of a plan. “Alright.” He motioned with one clawlike finger that was more clawlike than human.

They set it down exactly where he'd indicated on the table near the saw blade.

“Now go wait by the door, all of yas.” The old man waved them away. “I'll call if I need you or when I'm done,” he said. “Go, get outta here.” He shooed the three of them out like a black fly swarm. “I ain't responsible for no lost fingers and parts,” old man Whitedeer muttered.

His whole operation was rickety; the saw blade looked precarious if not lethal, the old wooden bed was wobbly. There'd been talk in the community of shutting him down before he hurt himself, like adult children take car keys away from elderly parents. But no one dared since they marveled at how the old man still had a full set of digits. Yet with each job, people held their breath, not wanting it to be their project that broke the old man's lucky streak.

As the birch made several passes through Whitedeer's hands to debark and be flattened on all four sides, the sweet minty scent of wintergreen infused the air; the three of them inhaled the pungent fragrance of birch. After several more passes, the tree was cut into more than enough boards to build Gloria's Spirit House.

Whitedeer stopped cutting and shouted to TJ over the noise. “Asphalt or shake roof?”

“Uh—shake.”

“For Laughing Eyes,” the old man said, and then worked the boards into smaller and finer pieces.

Whitedeer switched off the power and said, “For the one who'd lost faith though we'd all believed in her.”

The shop was disturbingly quiet. The silence was like another person in the room. Gavin and Skye were somber. The old man had stacked the wood into two piles, motioning TJ over.

The old man searched TJ's face as if wanting to ask something but then forgot.

TJ reached for his wallet from his back pocket.

The old man held up both hands, powdered with sawdust. “No charge for Spirit Houses. Especially this one.”

The rough-cut boards had been trimmed to the exact length. All TJ needed to do was assemble.

“This stack is her house. I'm numbering 'em all.” The old man touched the pile of freshly cut wood, winking at Gavin and Skye in such a way that made them smile. “You kids call it idiot-proof.”

Then he turned to TJ. “The other is leftover.” He touched it with the toe of his slipper. “It's important to take this pile out first before anything else. Leave Laughing Eyes's wood in your truck. Bring the extra to the exact spot where you found the tree. You following me?” he asked, waiting for TJ to nod. “It's important,” the old man said. “Clear all around it, put down tobacco, and then burn it like we do—ask Charlotte. She knows the prayers.” His eyes stayed on TJ until he nodded and then he turned to Gavin and Skye. “Help Laughing Eyes make the journey. Her spirit came to you in this tree,” he said as he touched the stack of wood. The old man seemed to choke up. “Now she needs release. Sprinkle tobacco around where you found it to give thanks. You, her only blood, can do it.”

*   *   *

Later that afternoon Charlotte had joined to witness the burning, pulling the sides of her sweater close around her ribs in the chilly September air before the fire caught. Once it did, the wood had been so dry it was ablaze, the heat so intense that the four of them stepped back as if pushed. Charlotte, slipping her arm through both her sons', watched as the smoke rose up through the trees, up into the blue sky that Gloria had so loved that she'd painted all the walls of her house the same color.

It didn't take long before the stack was reduced to white ash. The words
purification
and
free
drifted through TJ's mind.

They'd worked late into the night in the garage, assembling and nailing together Gloria's Spirit House. By midnight it was finished and they'd all stood watching, imagining it in place over his mother's final resting place.

*   *   *

Gloria's funeral was held on Tuesday, on one of those September days when the sky is so blue it doesn't look real and its reflection on Lake Superior even less so.

Golden birches flourished the tops of the red rock cliffs for which the reservation was named. They cast images onto a lake so glassy calm that you'd have blinked and strained your eyes, thinking it a mirage. Hard to believe in only a month angry Superior would be tossing up boulders the size of small cars.

Someone had tied tobacco pouches of blue and green in tree branches toward the eastern doorway. Giving thanks for his mother's long life. She'd helped and touched so many as a nurse, as a friend, and all stood facing the east where spirits begin to journey—the east, which breathes life and then takes our last exhale to complete the circle.

As TJ stood graveside his brow furrowed, watching how upset the others were. He hoped no one would notice he wasn't. Gavin and Skye huddled next to him, solemn as they watched their Nokomis's body being lowered into the shallow grave in the quiet cemetery tucked away on Blueberry Road.

“She lived a long and good life,” Charlotte whispered into the collar of TJ's shirt.

He grunted back. “It wasn't a good life.” He resented the stab at revisionist history. There'd been enough of that around for centuries.

“It was her life, her way, her fate,” Charlotte said. “It was what happened.”

He didn't answer.

Some had come out in their finery; others from an interrupted workday, the health-care workers in uniform from the Tribal Health Clinic that Gloria had helped establish.

Even fleets of fish tugboats had taken a momentary pause during high gill net fishing season as captains and multigenerational fisherman had shown up, having had Gloria treat them for simple wounds, removing fishhooks from delicate areas over the years.