THEY REPEATED THE song. Again. Again. Until Peter could beat the drum without faltering. Until his arms buzzed long after he stopped playing. He was singing, and his mom was singing, their voices in unison but octaves apart.
The drums sustained him like coffee, except the effect didn’t wear him out. Like cigarettes, without clouding his breath. Like whiskey, if you took out the hurt. Like nice cold beers on hot days, minus the gut.
No, that wasn’t it. The drums were like water. Downright necessary. Like sex, if the world weren’t so fucked up.
Claudia showed up in the open door, blocking the light, her face rapt.
Dave patted the couch. “Join the party.”
“Please don’t stop for me.” Claudia stayed put. “That was great.”
Peter turned to his mother. “Why are there so few words?”
“When you know the story behind the words, it doesn’t matter how many there are. Each word brings the story back.”
“Will you tell the story, Maggie?” Circling around Peter, Claudia sat between his mother and Dave.
Dave rubbed her leg. “Good to see ya, Claudia.”
She patted his hand. Peter’s chest compressed with one thought—look at me. He liked her better when they were alone. When she was his.
“Son’s grandfather died before he could pass on everything.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. Will Peter be named for him?”
He cut in. “We haven’t discussed it.”
“Oh, sorry . . . um, were those vocables at the end there?”
“What?”
Dave answered. “Vocables sound like words, but they don’t mean anything. They help carry the song through where words used to be, parts that have been forgotten.”
Peter said nothing. He hated looking stupid.
“I told you to come over more, didn’t I?” Dave dropped Claudia’s knee and pulled the drum over his lap.
“You never ask me over.” Randall’s voice rumbled from the doorway.
“Doesn’t stop ya.” Dave laughed. “I guess you better come in.”
“Sorry we’re late!” Roberta piped in from behind Randall. “It took a while to get the girls out the door.”
“Did you bring them?” His mom craned to check the area around Randall’s knees, pushing to get off the couch.
“Nope.” Arms spread wide for a welcome hug, Roberta flitted around Randall, wet hair sticking to her button-down shirt. “We took them to his auntie’s house.”
“Too bad.”
Roberta gave a quick, pained smile. “We have a lot to go over.”
He couldn’t stomach another session on protocol. “Mom, why don’t you tell a story we can all enjoy? I need a break.”
“Happy to. I have just the thing.”
Randall set up two folding chairs to face the couch. With a grandiose sweep of his arm, he pulled one back for his wife and settled in as Maggie began the story.
“The people had no light. They didn’t even know what light was. They lived in the dark. They were cold. Kwa-Ti went to find light. He was bored with all the shivering and the moaning and the hunger. He walked and walked. He climbed mountains. He crossed rivers. After a long time, he came across a house. There was a big pile of mussel shells outside.” She traced an arc with one hand and smiled.
“He was so hungry. He sat a while to see if anyone was home. It was quiet, but there was smoke coming from the house. He crawled to the pile. He hid in the bushes and snatched whatever was closest. He sucked the juices from the shells at the very edge.
“Well, you know Kwa-Ti. Before long he forgot about hiding and started clawing his way into the pile to get more. He rolled around and grabbed big handfuls. Shells tumbled off the heap. They made a big clatter.
“It wasn’t long before Moon came out of the house. She stared at Kwa-Ti. Her eyes got smaller and smaller until they were bright little slits. She called for her dad. He came outside and hauled Kwa-Ti by the fire to get a good look at him. Kwa-Ti said he was too hungry to remember where he came from, but he would work if they gave him mussels. Moon was tired. Her hands were rough from scrubbing and cleaning. She looked at her dad with all that tiredness in her eyes until he said okay.
“But he didn’t trust the newcomer. Kwa-Ti worked in that house for a year. He chopped wood. Cozied up to Moon. She glowed and grew big in the belly. Still, when she and her dad gathered mussels, they left Kwa-Ti at home.
“At first, Kwa-Ti didn’t mind staying back. It was warm by the fire and cold and dark outside. But he got antsy, like always. He remembered why he was there.”
She looked at him. “Why was Kwa-Ti there?”
Peter sighed. She made him feel ten years old. “He was there to find light for the people.”
“That’s right.” She nodded. “One day, Moon’s father was busy building a new house for his daughter. Moon was getting rounder and rounder. He told Kwa-Ti to help her get mussels. She led Kwa-Ti to the cove where they kept their canoe.
“Kwa-Ti paddled along the dark shore. How was he supposed to see the mussels? He kept quiet. Soon enough, Moon pulled out a small leather bundle. She unwrapped it. Inside was a very old mussel shell. It glowed. Rays of light came through its cracks.
“Moon opened the shell. A sunbeam shot out. For the first time, Kwa-Ti could see the black rocks were covered in orange and purple starfish. Something fierce woke in his heart. His chest squeezed. He tried not to breathe too hard. Moon opened the shell all the way. Day leapt from her hands and onto the green land and blue water.
“Kwa-Ti almost died, he was so happy. He played it cool. They tied up to a big stump. Kwa-Ti held Moon’s hand. He steadied the canoe when she stepped out onto the rocks.
“‘I’ll show you how,’ Moon said. ‘Hold this.’ She picked up a cedar basket and handed him the shell. The mussels closed up tight onto the rocks. She bent over—it took some doing because of her big belly—and scraped mussels into her basket with a clamshell.
“When she turned back to the canoe, Kwa-Ti was a speck on the horizon. He’d cut the line and never looked back.
“That is his way. He has always been this way.” Her eyes flickered to Claudia, who was looking at her own hands.
“He left the shell open so Moon could find her way home. That’s what he told himself. But really, he liked seeing everything. He didn’t think about their baby or how the rocks would cut up her feet. He sweated and pulled. His greedy heart thumped in his chest. He looked at the big bright world.”
Foreboding hung on Peter. Was his mother accusing him? Of what? Out with it.
“Moon was so mad at herself. She didn’t even take time to cry. Ran home right away. She slipped on the rocks. The mussels sliced her feet to bits.
“Her dad knew when he saw her run up the path. Red footprints followed her. He went to ask Rainbow to bring Kwa-Ti back. Rainbow stood on the horizon and stretched his arms far as they would go. Kwa-Ti’s canoe was beyond his claws.
“And so it was done. The people got the Day. That is the end of the story. Shuh.”
Everyone clapped but Peter. He didn’t want to give his mother the satisfaction. He felt implicated, somehow, for something he’d done or hadn’t done or was about to do. His mom ladled unwanted instruction over what was supposed to be a welcoming moment. She was sneaky like that. Always had been. She couldn’t be trusted. Then again, no one could, not in the stories she’d been telling him since he was a kid.
Love is a kind of home. Later that day, shifting close, chest to back, he wrapped Claudia’s ribs with his arms, chin topping her crown to rest on her forehead, legs folded loose over hers. Their shadow was soft on the sheets. He was nostalgic for this love even as he lived it. He couldn’t say why he cracked open when she came into his life, why it had to be her, why it happened at this time and in this way, but it happened. It was happening. He wanted her. He had never wanted anything so bad. He pressed his dick between the swells of her ass and filled his lungs, ribs bowing into the arch of her back. His legs were sore from dancing. He felt like a man. When they were lying in bed, he didn’t have to worry about the future or mull over the past. He could just be. If they stayed here, entangled, dewy where they overlapped, their world of two felt real and true. Realer and truer than anything.
Submerged in bed, she kept his attention, slowed his breathing, stilled his thoughts, narrowed his senses to a steady state, focused on thin blade of shoulder, pale crook of arm, valley below cheekbone, sharp ridge of lip. He wanted to bathe in her, wanted to toss their togetherness around in great handfuls. Wanted to eat the light on her skin, drink her sheen of sweat. Wanted to smoke the smell of their sex, roll it up and set it ablaze.
Wanting was not the same as having. She’d been acting distant. Preoccupied. Wouldn’t drink or smoke with him. Women were like that. They’d do outrageous things then turn on you for nothing. When she split, he would, too. He didn’t expect to go with her. He couldn’t picture a place where they belonged, couldn’t see her by his side in front of changing skylines. His daydreams came back to them, right here, naked. Stark. No debts, no claims.
Maybe they’d see each other. Maybe. That’s what he told himself to ease the desperation. They didn’t owe each other anything, but they could build a room like this someplace else. They could choose to be reborn into an unknown better than who they’d been, what they’d seen. A big, bright, blank future.
He nudged her. “You awake?”
“No.”
He cupped the pooch of her belly. She sucked in and held still, her body taut, unmoving. “You don’t have to, you know. It’s cute.” Women were always so worried about their bodies. He didn’t know how to make her accept herself, and he never would. That’s not something you can do for another person. Some women had done what they could for him, and he tried not to remember them when he was lonely, tried not to remember how they had opened themselves to him, shared the sadness no one saw, too distracted by the nice body and shiny hair that were, to be honest, what attracted him in the first place. At least he didn’t tell their secrets. Women put up with serious shit from an early age, is all he would say. But Claudia, she could put their whole lives in her book. And it wasn’t the facts he minded so much, but her power, how she could place his family on a grid and insert the pin. People would believe her words because they were printed, or worse, gone viral, preserved online in perpetuity. She held their story in safekeeping that felt more like custody.
Weeks went by without his mom wandering, but it was bound to happen once he’d let down his guard. Of course, it was Roberta who noticed, charging into Dave’s house, distraught and full of accusations. “She’s gone!”
Peter and Randall quit drumming as one, but Dave kept on for a few more beats, sweat running from his forehead. Peter put his shirt back on and headed toward the door. Roberta stepped into his path.
“Claudia didn’t notice your mom had left.” She brushed off Randall’s hand, her eyes fixed on Peter. “She was sitting in the kitchen, rubbing a basket, while your mom wandered off.”
Peter stopped. “Where is she now?”
“Which one are you worried about?”
Dave picked up his keys. “I’ll get Maggie.”
“No, wait.” Peter remained planted. “I should go.”
“What’s one more time? She expects me.” Dave was out the door, just like that. Wobbling down his concrete pavers, he called through the rain, “We’ll keep at it when I get back.”
“Hold up, Dave! I’ll go with you.” Randall pointed at the door. “This is what I’m talking about. For years, Peter. Years. And when you do show up, you’re half checked out. That woman is here for her career, Peter. Not because she cares about you, or Maggie, or any of us. You watch. She won’t come back here but once a year, if she’s feeling generous.”
Roberta waited until the car left to lay into him. Tapping her foot in anger, just like when she was a girl, she looked like she was going to start hopping around. “What is going on with you?”
“It’s going to be fine. We were next door.”
“Why is she here if she’s not going to look after your mom when she’s right in front of her? That’s sick.”
“She probably thought mom was in the bathroom.”
“Your mom is old, okay, and it’s cold and rainy outside. Something could happen to her. She could slip and fall. She could catch pneumonia. She could get hit by a car. Don’t you care?”
“Why are you yelling? This has been happening, Roberta. My mom wants me over here with Dave. I’m doing the best I can.”
“You’re barely trying.” She tossed her purse onto the couch and strode into the kitchen.
He heard her run the faucet, the familiar clink of plates in the sink. Roberta was so good all the time. It never occurred to him to do Dave’s dishes. “You’re upset, and I understand that. But Mom asked for Claudia’s help.” Her back to him, Roberta shifted from one foot to the other. “I know you did a lot.”
“Every time I come by, you’re someplace else.” She plunked a soapy glass upside down on an old dish towel and plunged her hands into the sink, rustling up a handful of forks and knives. “With her.”
“She’s got nothing to do with this. Besides, we’ve both been working our asses off to make Mom’s place fit to live.”
“Here it comes.” Sponge in hand, she scrubbed and sloshed. “You think it was easy to bring my kids there? We brought her food. We kept her going.”
“I said, ‘Thank you!’ How many times do you want me to say it?”
Roberta dried glasses with a towel, working them over like she could rub the shine off them. “You have so much growing up to do. There’s not enough time in the world. We’ve done everything for you. You act like it’s nothing.”
“Why are you pretending like you’re the only one who feels anything? I came back. It wasn’t easy. It’s not like I left for no reason.”
“Don’t even try that, Peter.” She slung cutlery into a drawer with reckless clangs. One after another, knife followed spoon followed fork. “Do not go there.”
“Can’t we agree to get along?”
“What is it, exactly, that you think I’ve been doing since you got back?”
“Waiting for your chance.”
“Oh, you little . . .”
Super quick, like when they were kids, Peter put Roberta into a headlock and noogied her head. She swatted at his fist, slapping his arm. “Stop that!”
“Not till you say ‘Uncle!’”
“Peter, no! You can’t.”
Her rapid blows became an occasional punch. He knuckled the bumps of her skull. Her hair rasped. “Relax, Momma Bear. Everything will be fine.”
“My daughters have better coping skills than you.” Her body became womanish beneath his palms, warm and soft and solid. He let go.
“I’ve looked after myself my whole life.”
The deal she proposed was simple. After the potlatch, Peter could leave knowing his mom would be cared for—if he let them sing his song, bring it into their family, which after all was a blood connection, not too far back. He didn’t know what to say. He knew his mother wouldn’t approve. So did they. He didn’t have a better idea. “I’ll think on it” was all he said to send her home.
“We’d keep it going.” Roberta tried to meet his eyes. “It’s still yours.”
The sour part of Peter wanted to believe this was why they’d been looking after her. Wanted to believe that inside, they were sad and selfish, too. The rest of him knew they had him figured. They didn’t want to see good wisdom go to waste when he died alone in some apartment. And they were right. He would leave. Tooling through town in his truck, he could smell it on himself. Restlessness. He needed to make a beer run, but strangely, he didn’t want to. Or he wanted to, but the wanting was separate from who he was. He could see it from afar, the wanting. He held it at arm’s length for the first time in a long time. It was weird. This ability worked on him like guilt. Another thing to add to the list.
Of course, Dave kept nagging him about staying sober. Said it was part of the journey. Thing is, some people can drink, and others can’t. It’s not fair who gets to be what, but there you have it. Dave couldn’t drink because he did fucked up things when drunk, to hear him tell it. But me, I’m different, Peter thought. I don’t have to drink. I drink when I want to.
Ray’s was right there. Better yet, he could go to P.A. and stock up on some 24 packs. He was tired of running out. Maybe he should pick up Claudia, take her with him. She was probably holed up in her cabin. What did she do in there? What could she learn from a laptop? A road trip would do her good. They could crack the first beers on their way back. He pulled a U-turn in a driveway as soon as the thought hit him. He cruised past the beaches along Front Street, past the senior center full of elders eating lunch.
Inside the breakwater, the bay was calm. On the far side, the sea heaved skyward. Waves tossed foam to the wind. Clouds hurried from Vancouver Island to cluster over Neah Bay, backing up over the strait, where they darkened, gathering force. Just before the bend in the road, a culvert emptied onto the beach, seagulls standing in sentinel formation around an overturned trike, one handle’s silver streamers flowing with the current toward Waadah Island, the others dangling limp in the rain.
At the fort’s semicircle of flags, Peter pulled off and ran into the shelter, breathing hard. Between pillars of smoothed trunks, historical explanations went on and on in Spanish and English next to plastic reproductions of line drawings. Chiefs and old maps and ships. Peter shied away. He drifted towards the memorial for veterans. Rain shined the black rock, names chiseled there for anyone to see.
His father’s name dropped into him like an anchor. He never got the chance to ask his dad about being in the service, never got the chance to compare notes on the shitty food and the stupidity of sergeants. Never got to say thanks for serving the good old US of A, those bastards. Never got to hear it, either. His name wasn’t up there, among them, his brothers, the warriors who all came home alive, if not well. Who came home.
That’s what happens when you go MIA on your family. No one celebrates what you’ve done. All they can do is mourn your memory. Right here is where he belonged, and he damned well knew it. It burned him that his dad’s boat—his boat, by right—belonged to his cousins. Maybe he should pay them a visit, like Dave said. Maybe he could get on their crew. He couldn’t imagine pacing her deck, taking orders from someone his own age. But it got him thinking on the good times, that last fishing trip his folks took as a family, a memory he saved for special occasions, so he didn’t wear it out, him with his dad on deck, shouting, “Get up here, it’s nice!”
“I got something going on the stove!” Mom was always busy.
“That can wait!”
“I seen it before!”
“Not like this, you haven’t!”
She trudged out, wiping flour onto her apron, her face glossy red, and stepped into light that glowed blue. His dad pulled her to him, and Peter, too, that arm’s weight so welcome on his shoulders, the smell of meat and butter drifting from her, his stomach, his whole self come alive in the cold cobalt sky. Seawater swallowed the last shine of day. Wheel well glowing golden, the boat slapped and pitched through an ocean of sapphires. From far above, they must have looked like a star.