BULKY PILES WERE stacked against the walls of every room but the kitchen, where the air was thick with bleach. A fetid smell seeped from the black plastic stretched to a chalky gray in places. Peter stuffed clothing into a bag Claudia held open, sucking air through her teeth, her eyes watering. His bandana’s trace of cologne could not conceal the stench.
“You remind me of a cat.” He laughed. “Staring at nothing. Cats do that so much I end up wondering what they’re thinking. Which is stupid, because there they are, looking at a wall.”
“Your mom had cats before, I’m guessing.”
“I kicked them out when I got here.”
“You’ve made a lot of changes.”
“I’m not done making them.”
“Did you sort through this stuff before you bagged it?”
“She was in a bad way. I had to work quick.”
“Is that what you’re doing now?”
“I knew they gave PhDs for a reason.”
“You know, there’s a show about people like your mom.”
“Yeah, she probably watches it. Could tell you the story, season by season. Don’t you know trailers come with satellite TVs these days?”
Claudia started laughing and couldn’t stop. Went on and on, coughing, and spluttered, “You can say stuff like that. I can’t.”
He snorted. “You can say anything you want. We’re all alone out here.”
“Hey!” Maggie came in waving a dish towel. “What are you doing with those toys!”
“Here we go.” His face became placid, almost passive. “Mom, I am doing this so you can live somewhere safe and healthy.”
“You want to take over. But you’re not ready!” She thumped the wall, scowled and clutched her wrist with her other hand.
“We had an agreement.”
“You might need them!” Maggie plucked at her apron.
“If you can’t do this, the options get harder.”
“Stop threatening me!”
“Peter, why don’t we slow down and let your mother chime in?”
“It will take too long!” He shook the bag.
“Give it a try.”
“Mom, this stuff’s gotta go.”
“She knows what you want, Peter. That’s why she’s upset. Let her explain.”
Peter upended another bag and spread the pile of toys and worn books to an even layer, moving through Legos and paperbacks in precise circles. “There! See anything valuable?”
“Peter, these are for your children.” Maggie’s voice was small.
“I don’t have any.”
“When you do.”
“I don’t want them.”
Claudia saw a black lump in the untidy sea of red and blue plastic. She leaned closer. Buried in bright Legos and half hidden by a coverless book, it looked like a rock. A turd, most likely. Careful not to step on the mildewed books, their pages waved by years of waiting, Claudia nudged the coverless edition’s spine with her toe, revealing a curved black stone in the bed of Legos.
“These are the things you played with.” Maggie clasped her hands; from a certain angle, she seemed to be praying. “We were happy?”
Claudia picked up the rock. The stone had been smoothed, had been worked. It was a frog—squat and powerful, with a stern mouth—cut into what looked like basalt. Its big round eyes were starred with crescent moon retinas. Maybe a Makah carving, she thought. But they mostly worked wood. Some shell and bone. Stones tend to be sinkers in Makah territory. I wonder how old it is. The oldest known Makah carving was wood, a two-headed kingfisher dating back some three thousand years and found in the Hoko River.
Pebbled but dull, like surf-tumbled lava, the frog covered her palm. She cupped its haunches, feeling their heft. Wilson Duff made a book with pictures of stone carvings and short analyses of their symbols, more poetic than academic. He asked open questions that showed where his suppositions ended and curiosity began. Duff was considered a genius and a mystic. A tireless advocate for Native cultures, he’d published several books with heavy footnoting by the time he wrote Images, Stone, B.C.
Yes, this could be a find. On the page, she could riff on this frog for quite a while. Its mouth was cut wide, big enough to swallow its whole self, like the frog tobacco mortars in Duff’s book. Frog was a favored crest of Charles Edenshaw, a revered Haida artist from Kiusta, a village deserted in the 1850s, one of many emptied by epidemics. When Duff taught anthropology at UBC, he sometimes introduced himself as Edenshaw. “Professor Wilson Duff isn’t here today,” he told his students, and shortly thereafter, he made it true. A year after Images, Stone, B.C. was published, Duff killed himself, hoping to come back as a Haida artist like the carver he so admired—a brown man with blood ties to the culture Duff coveted.
“What’s this?” She opened her fingers, holding the frog up.
“Peter’s father gave me that.” Maggie plucked the frog from Claudia’s hand. It nestled in the crook of her palm before she slipped it into her apron. “Peter is a veteran like his dad.” Her eyes glistened. “Every Makah who’s gone to war has come back home alive.”
“Wow! Amazing. Peter, I didn’t know you served.”
“Army. I cleared harbors in Kuwait.”
Claudia trembled, ready to pounce. She’d had it with footnotes. She wanted to divine and portray the meaning of Makah animal symbols using snippets of artwork, song lyrics and personal testimonies, even dreams, along with her brief but compelling introductory essays, insightful but easy to skim or skip.
By itself, the frog wasn’t enough for a book. But she could spin off an article. A teaser. Frogs crowded the marshes of Neah Bay, loud as anything on spring nights. Makahs bathe and pray in fresh water. Makah lore teems with frogs. She would figure it out later.
“Maggie, tell me more about Peter’s dad.”
Peter mounded the pile again. Stepping on the edge of an empty bag and holding the opening taut, he swept Legos into the hole.
“He was a handsome man.” Maggie chuckled. “Especially in uniform. Always chasing tail.”
“Mom! Don’t.”
“What! I was talking about planes.”
“Come on now.”
“Peter, why don’t you let me talk to your mother while you finish up.” Claudia pointed at the remainders. Amid the Legos, toy soldiers surfaced, rifles raised.
“Fine. Keep each other busy. I’ll take care of everything.”
“Sounds good.”
He shot her a sordid look and addressed the ceiling. “I’m going for a smoke. Want one?”
Her body screamed yes. “No, thanks.”
He left the door open. In everything Peter did, there was some quiet rebellion. Smoke wafted in on cold air from the drizzle. She couldn’t afford to feel sorry for him. He was a grown man. This was the life he chose. It was the life he had, anyway. She fought her urge to protect him, to wrap him up in affection and attention. Stop caring for men who refuse to take care of themselves, she thought, pulling the bandana over her hair. Don’t be a mujer. You’re here to work.
“. . . brought it back from Korea, where he went after a tour in Japan. He managed supplies for the Air Force; they had a base in Neah Bay right outside of town. Where the tribal center is now. And the bingo hall. You know they closed that down. Now isn’t that a shame. All the elders loved to play. They put some gym equipment out there instead.”
“What did Sam do when he wasn’t in the Air Force?”
“He fished. He was a gypo in the off season, you know, cutting cedar into shake. Nothing lasted.”
Raindrops drummed the rhododendrons. Peter’s back was to them, but he was close enough to listen. She watched him smoke, envious, for a moment too long.
“My son needs someone who understands him.” Heat left the room faster now, chasing out the fetid air, a hint of evergreen taking over.
“Everyone does, I suppose.” Claudia pitched her voice low.
“Someone who knows what it’s like.”
“Sure.” She rustled a garbage bag, cinching its red drawstring and folding it into an awkward, angular bow.
“Not a white woman.”
Peter coughed and scuffed his boots. Both women stopped talking. Head down, he grabbed another bag from the pile.
Maggie yawned. “Time for a nap.”
“Already, Mom?”
“We have company tonight.”
“Okay. Well, go on to bed.”
“I won’t be able to rest easy with you two messing around in here.”
If Maggie went back into her bedroom with that frog, Claudia might never see it again. “I could wash the clothes we’re going to donate.”
His glance was a poison dart. “I took that bag to the truck.”
He hadn’t, not that she’d seen.
“Claudia, you go on home.” Maggie stretched her clenched up little hands to the sky. “We could all use some beauty sleep.”
Claudia jumped from the couch. She had become too cozy. “Of course, of course!” She extended a hand to Maggie, who waved it away. “Should I come back later?” She collected her purse and coat. I’ll have to air this out, she thought, sniffing the lapel on the sly.
“No.” Maggie motioned to Peter. “We’re having company.”
“My cousin.” Peter helped his mother rise with both hands and more forearm overlap than she had foreseen would be necessary. “I think you met her husband.”
“Oh, really? What’s his name?”
“Randall.”
“Hmm, when did I meet him?”
“On your way into town? On the road?”
“Oh!” Dear God, news didn’t just travel fast here. It teleported. They knew I passed out in my car, she thought, scanning outcomes. They invited me because they feel sorry for me. Or they’re curious about my problems. They will tell everyone anything I say. That’s why they let me in. Dammit! Did I say anything untoward? “Thanks for everything.”
She made her goodbyes and was outside before she pulled on her coat. The wind stole her heat with a sideways stream of air that smelled of the sea. She checked the porch next door—empty, a small miracle, because the last thing she wanted was small talk with Dave. He probably knew that she passed out at the wheel.
Perhaps it was this closeness of information—the press of people, all around you, monitoring your movements—that kept Duff away from Haida Gwaii after his 1950s expeditions to cut down totem poles for display and preservation in a museum. Decades later, by chiefs’ orders, the remaining poles were left in situ to molder, a tribute to the villages laid waste by smallpox. Tourists complained about the decay, if not about the dead.
Obsessed with Haida art and culture, Duff never went back, or so the story goes. Better to crave from a distance than be criticized up close, she supposed, and she didn’t blame him. Claudia was tired of being tracked. She was about to trundle off when Peter hurried out.
“Stay here. She’ll be asleep in no time.” He tapped out a cigarette.
“Clearly, I can’t do that.” She pulled her keys out of her purse.
“Why not?”
“I can’t lurk on your porch. She asked me to leave.”
“I live here, too.” Flames licked the end of his cigarette.
“So you know how it is.” She sidestepped toward the street. She was a professional. She would not be sucked into something stupid.
Both their heads turned toward a muffled bump inside the trailer.
“Hold this.” The filter faced her, ember cupped in his palm. “I’ll be out in a sec.”
Say no, she thought. But that’s not what she did.