Читать книгу Under Nushagak Bluff - Mia Heavener - Страница 10

My Girl, how did we get here? What the hell did I just do?

Anne Girl agreed to marry John the following summer, only after her mother’s death, after she burned Marulia’s clothes in a great fire on the beach that made all the village women come down and watch. They circled the flames, telling spirit and ghost stories until the driftwood burned down to glowing chunks. It seemed as if every woman on the bluff—young and old—crawled out of their homes to join the fire on the beach. Anne Girl’s closest friend, Alicia, stood next to her and made sure that nothing of Marulia’s remained intact.

When the bottles of booze began to be passed around, some of the women wanted to keep the flames high and made a move for the skiff, which lay on its side at the grassy edge. It still needed work to float again, but at least it was no longer suffocating under John’s double ender.

“Not the skiff!” Anne Girl yelled. She positioned herself between the woman and the boat. “It’s all I got left.”

“Com’on, it’s nothing but dry wood.”

“Burn your own damn boat.” Anne Girl patted the bowed ribs. “This one’s still good—once my Norwegian learns how to wood work.”

The women laughed and muttered among themselves that Anne Girl was probably drunk to think John would fix that heap of wood.

Anne Girl could breathe easy standing on the shore with the women who had known her mother better than she did, but didn’t really know it would be alright until she saw a raven perched on the ridge of her mom’s roof with berries tucked in her beak. She then saw her mother fly toward Dillingham with a sleek black coat and wings clipped at the edges. Her largeness eased Anne Girl’s worries. Her mom was already eating good.

Somehow word about John’s inability to pick a net or handle a tiller must have traveled to the cannery, because that summer he couldn’t find anyone interested in hiring him on. Often during low tides, he would go down to the docks and talk to fishermen who were waiting for the tide to change. The fishermen would laugh a little and become guarded as soon as they learned his name. “I see now,” they said, while grinning. “You’ve had a little experience with sailboats, huh? Whatever happened to it?”

Sometimes Anne Girl joined John at the dock, hoping that maybe her presence would convince the thick-skinned fishermen that John was worth at least one high tide, maybe two if she could talk fast enough. Most of the time, she and John sat on the dock with their legs swinging over the side as they shared leftovers from the mess hall or smoked fish with the fishermen. It was a rough season, the fishermen said, when they saw Anne Girl. Or some would hint that John looked a little skinny to be pulling a sailboat. Once she almost convinced a stocky Norwegian to take John. “He is your cousin,” Anne Girl said. “Looks just like you only with thinner fingers.” The fisherman laughed as he crawled down the ladder to his boat. “Next tide, huh?”

Anne Girl couldn’t tell, but perhaps the Norwegian felt sorry for them, because when he reached his boat he jumped over the bunched up cloth, rummaged through a wooden crate, and tossed a bottle to John. He nodded at them both before bending down to his net pile.

“Ooh, good times,” John whispered, and held the tan bottle before them. “I haven’t had this brand in a long while.”

Anne Girl took the bottle from John and saw that it was wine. She licked her lips slowly. “We aren’t sharing this with nobody,” she said. She stood up and brushed the wooden splinter from her slacks. “Maybe we should just come down here and beg for food. We’ll be like seagulls.”

Yet without work, Anne Girl wondered how they were going to pay for the next food order that was to arrive on the barge. He insisted on certain foods from the barge, like cheeses and jellies, yet he didn’t seem to think about how much it cost. She smoked extra fish and gathered berries until the pads of her fingers felt sticky and hot. At least they would have fish, she figured. And when she returned home, she watched John haul water and gather driftwood, as if that’s all they needed to get through the winter. And he would stack the wood ever so neatly against the house, laying the sticks against one another in perfect order. It made her want to spit. She shook her head and wondered if she could teach him to shoot a caribou, or if she would have to do that herself.

“Where you going?” he asked, when Anne Girl picked up her berry bucket as soon as he walked through the door.

“Up past the bluff, the berries are ripe,” Anne Girl answered, and she continued putting on her boots. She wore a qaspeq that hung down to her knees. “Going berry picking with Alicia.”

John stared at her mouth.

Anne Girl looked up. “What?”

“You picked yesterday. Why do we need this many berries all the time? For just the two of us?”

“Ahh, you want to come?” Anne Girl smirked. She picked up her berry buckets and her naivaa cup, still grinning. She ran her tongue across her lips, teasing him.

John bit his lower lip, but his face was beginning to redden. “I think you should sew.”

“Sew? What does that have to do with berries? I don’t have enough berries. And we need a lot in the winter. You’ll crave them just like you itch for coffee.”

“Why don’t you sew more? We could bring your furs to the trading post in Dillingham.”

Anne Girl stared at him and rattled the buckets against her legs. She was thinking, placing his statement about the furs against his strong frame that was good for nothing but water and rotten wood. Once her mom had asked if this John man could grab the air with his hands and guide a fishing boat, or was he just good for crashing up the beach.

“Sew? Sew what? You going to go out there and trap me some mink and beaver?” She laughed. “I see you now, on your knees calling out to the poor bastards, because you don’t know how to set a trap line.”

“We could sell fur parkas, you know,” he said, his voice rising. “We could do that together, if you would just sit still and start sewing. We’re broke.”

A line of color crept up his neck, but Anne Girl shook her head as if it wasn’t her problem. “I must’ve married the wrong man then.” And then she motioned with her head toward the Killweathers’ house. “Go ask your Frederik. He knows everything. Maybe he can teach you to work.”

Anne Girl stopped in the doorway and tapped the handle with her finger. Her expression had transformed into one of impatience and disgust, as if looking at him made her want to vomit. “Are you going to just sit there?”

“I didn’t mean that you should sew for us,” John paused. “For me.”

But she had already walked out the door with the two buckets clanking against her legs.

“Go pick then. Pick your damn heart out until you have enough to feed the entire village!” John yelled after her.

Outside, the wind cut through Anne Girl’s qaspeq and she shivered. She felt the noise of the cannery settle on her skin, and she stopped mid-stride. She took in a long breath. “Ha, the entire village,” she muttered as she turned back toward the house.

John was staring out the window when she returned. He didn’t move when she opened the door, even after a gush of wind flapped the curtains. Anne Girl saw that she missed a chunk of hair above his left ear during his last trim. Maybe he would let her cut it now. Real quick. She stood in the doorway, and it seemed like the new moon had come and gone before John looked up.

“I’m eating nails,” Anne Girl said and met his gaze. “Sorry. Winter gets to me, you know.”

The corners of John’s mouth turned up slowly until he looked something like a spotted seal, grinning at her. “You are nails,” he chuckled. “You just now figure that out? I knew that the first day you flung that damn salmon at me.”

“If it wasn’t for that salmon . . .” Anne Girl paused as she realized that John wasn’t angry at all, that he had forgiven her that easily. Just like that—he forgot, and for a brief second she understood that happiness can exist. “Come with us.” Anne Girl tossed one bucket toward him. “Them long legs of yours will be good for the hills. Please.”

“Nah, you go,” John said. “It’s too fine of a day for me to hold you back. That pilot that flies in packages for the mission is at their house. He says it’s a good time to be flying in the bush now. Good time.”

Anne Girl’s hand went to her mouth, “Ooh, you can be one of them pilots.” She giggled. “My mom loved a pilot—probably my father. Then he flew away,” she said. “Couldn’t get far enough, I bet.”

“Now the truth comes out. What else do you have hiding under that hood? A pilot? A boat captain? I don’t believe a word you say.”

“You shouldn’t,” Anne Girl said. “My dad was probably a fat beluga.”

“Don’t believe that either,” John countered, and he stood up to stretch. “You would have eaten us out of the house by now.”

Anne Girl took all of him in. “Hmm . . . a flying Norwegian.” She traced the grains in the door with her fingernail, trying on the idea of living with a pilot. She almost liked the sound of it. All the places she could go. “Hmm . . . we can fly to Anchorage. I want to see a movie there. Pray, if Frederik says that will help.”

John chuckled. “Don’t get too ahead of yourself. I got to learn first. Might have to go to Anchorage for that.” And he motioned toward the bluff. “Get out there. I know you are dying to go. I’ll tell you all about it when you get back. We want five buckets!”

Jumping up, Anne Girl gave him a quick kiss on the cheek. “Listen real good and tell me if Frederick talks to himself. Alicia says he does!” Across the village, past the grassy bluff where the land rolled into gentle, soggy tundra, Anne Girl, Alicia, and her cousins trudged through the soft ground, their eyes fixed on the horizon, searching for the pale pinkness of salmonberries.

Anne Girl watched the younger girls run up and down the trail, and she remembered a time when she had sprinted through the tundra. She wasn’t much older than they were, but her mother’s death and her marriage to John had changed her. She felt the weight of responsibility in her blood, slowing her down. Now she picked for food, not to play. Yet it was nice to feel the breeze that skipped the surface for a thousand miles brush her cheeks. It was good to breathe again. No one warned her that living so close with a man would be like sitting in maqi with the stove door open, heat clinging to her flesh. He was always clinging, like a girl.

“You girls watch it, uh. You might be stepping on berries!” she hollered. But a smile played on her lips. She couldn’t help herself, no matter how much she wanted to be serious.

“Don’t go too far. The carayak will get you.” Alicia joined in, although she laughed, because no one was worried about ghosts.

“You always say that.”

“Well, how else we going to get them to listen?” Alicia answered. She stopped and cupped her hands around her eyes, so that she could see only the patches of salmonberries. “We need to go this way,” she said, and pointed to several rolling hills toward the village of Ekuk.

Anne Girl picked up some tea leaves and stuffed them in her pocket. She would show John how to make some good tea. She looked up and spotted a lone figure lumbering in the distance. “Is that Sweet Mary . . . or a bear?”

Alicia’s head snapped toward the direction of Anne Girl’s finger. “Better be Sweet Mary. You see it roll? Hmmm . . . looks like Mary. A bear would have caught wind of us by now.”

“I don’t know,” Anne Girl said. “Sweet Mary won’t leave us any berries, you know. Probably planning to feed the cannery with them. All them cannery men. One by one.”

“Well, someone has to,” Alicia answered. “She will not let one starve, if she can help it.”

Anne Girl watched the figure and tried to determine whether it had a long braid trailing behind it. That was Sweet Mary’s pride. When she was finally convinced that the round spot wasn’t a bear, Anne Girl looked down at the green carpet beneath her feet. She jumped a little to feel the marsh quiver around her. “Better her than me. That’s too much damn work,” Anne Girl laughed. And then she felt bad. Everyone in the village loved Sweet Mary, who would give her last meal to anyone who needed it. Yet she was a busy woman, making a name for herself at the cannery. When they were younger, Marulia had told Anne Girl to stay away from Sweet Mary, that the larger woman would cause stories to stick to her legs. The whole village would know, Marulia had said. But it seemed silly now.

“You like it up near that church?” Alicia asked.

“Yeah, it’s good.”

“You lie.”

“No, it’s good when the cannery is closed. Quiet. I don’t have to haul water as far,” Anne Girl said. “Actually, I don’t have to haul water at all. It seems that’s all John likes to do.” Anne Girl wanted to say more, but she stopped herself. She knew that he was talking to Frederik right then, and she didn’t want to say anything to Alicia just yet. She didn’t want Alicia to make up any stories about her, because the woman would talk once she gleaned enough information. That was the one thing that she missed about her mother—she knew the difference between stories and gossip and never went so far as spreading any of the latter. Her mother had said gossip was as bad as the coughing disease that went through the village many years ago and took her parents.

“Except,” Anne Girl said. She grabbed Alicia’s arm and pulled her close so that she could smell the faint odor of smoked fish in her friend’s hair. “Except, sometimes I hear them singing.”

Alicia’s eyes widened. “Who?”

“The neighbors,” Anne Girl said. “I think they have thin walls.”

“You mean during church you hear the singing? Damn, I heard they liked their music. Didn’t know they did that every day.”

Anne Girl smiled mischievously. “No, I mean at night.”

“Really? Who would have guessed that they sing in bed?” Alicia threw back her head and laughed. “Really that loud, uh? If Nora only knew, she wouldn’t be inviting you over so much. I could just see her ears turn red if she knew you heard them.”

“I know. I know.” Anne Girl laughed.

They veered off the trail, both following their own sense for the berries. Anne Girl took a deep breath, feeling the fresh tundra soak into her lungs as she looked around. These same hills were brown and lifeless just a few months ago before spring took root. And now everything was ripe, spilling into seeds. Moss and lichen with emerald-colored leaves formed a carpet around them. Few low brushes with the buds of cranberries and blueberries waved in the breeze. The tundra was out of hibernation and ready to give back sweet berries.

As if a part of them had finally awakened to the moving land, the women got to work. Alicia sat down with her legs sprawled in front of her, and Anne Girl squatted into a perch. Close to the ground she smelled the green of the tundra, its moist moss and fresh flowers. She heard the wind rustle through the low brush and the grass as it followed the slope of the land. She ran her hands through the brush, feeling the leaves tickle her palms and the ripe berries stick to her touch. And then Anne Girl began to pick with a determined fierceness that rose from the pit of her stomach. She picked a handful of salmonberries, dropped them in the bucket, and then picked another handful. Her fingers became sticky as they guided her. She picked quickly and rarely raised her head to catch her breath. Yet, once when she looked up toward the direction of the bluff, Anne Girl’s eyes caught something. She couldn’t be sure and blinked twice before seeing a black-tailed ermine scurry by her. He stopped briefly and turned to Anne Girl with beady black eyes. He stopped only long enough to wave and then dashed toward the brushes. Anne Girl turned back to the green before her, and she saw the bright salmonberries sparkle as if they popped up from the ground only for her. And for the first time since her marriage, since her mother’s death, the knot in her stomach loosened a bit.