Two hours into the bonfire, I was back in Dina\u2019s uncle\u2019s living room for the dog beds. The animal mounts and tobacco signs against the wood paneling appeared yellowed, hazed, as if Jack Christiansen was still smoking in his chair. The house might always smell like wet cigarette smoke. I piled the dog beds on each other\u2014one an old papasan chair\u2019s cushion\u2014stacked two cracked TV trays on top, and added a grape vine wreath, bow faded from purple to Pepto pink.<\/p>\n
At the doorway I stopped at the kingfisher mount. Dina had said, \u201cPoor bird looks like it\u2019s choking.\u201d She\u2019d swept her curtain of black hair behind her, her weirdly short bangs highlighting her inky eyes\u2014both so dark compared to all the Scandinavians in Spruce Creek.<\/p>\n
I thought Dina would be gone by now. Thought I\u2019d be back to spending nights at Park Tavern with Harry and Sven, going home to my second floor one-bedroom, halfway between the Tavern and Bloom\u2019s Hardware, listening to the stand up radiator as I tried to fall asleep.<\/p>\n
When I pried the kingfisher from the wall, one of its eyes skittered across the wood floor, stopping against tan shag. Twenty years of dust and nicotine coated the bird\u2019s feather\u2014a kind of amber that instead of insects trapped whole chairs, tables, appliances.<\/p>\n
I picked up the eyeball, and dragged the dog bed pile of crap, not wanting any part of Dina\u2019s Uncle Jack near me. The smell of urine slunk off the beds.<\/p>\n
Outside, I breathed snowmelt and bonfire. Across from the house, the barn and Quonset hut slumped. Down the hill, on the old pig barn\u2019s concrete pad in a gulley, the fire blazed. Beyond that, the tree line marked the acreage Jack hadn\u2019t sold off, small but something.<\/p>\n
Dina\u2019s thin legs and my aunt Ann\u2019s Carhartt jacket were silhouetted by flames. Dina applied lip balm from her tin that looked like two bottle caps stuck together. The balm smelled like wintergreen and gave her lips a hazy shine like fog through a windshield on a spring night.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Dina Brown\u2019s not from Spruce Creek, Minnesota, and that makes us seem alike, even though I\u2019ve always lived in Creek. Aunt Ann wanted me to see things, go to college. Aunt Muriel, Mom\u2019s other sister, couldn\u2019t see why. The U of M online class I took senior year\u2014multivariable calculus and vector analysis\u2014was hard and crazy, but not practical, and therefore nothing in Spruce Creek.I already knew way more math than I could use at the hardware store, and I wouldn\u2019t get to use it at the farmhouse since Bill and Brian were the heirs to Aunt Muriel\u2019s farm. Farm life has taught me you only want to be a farmer if you\u2019re not. Still I watch futures, trading volumes, figure application rates. Gives a body something to think on while sorting nails.<\/p>\n
When Dina entered Bloom\u2019s Hardware two weeks ago, Buck and I looked at her. When Buck turned back to me, he raised his eyebrows and wandered to the paint aisle, not finishing his story about beavers busting up his crick.<\/p>\n
I knew right off Dina was from somewhere else: when she asked for a gas can, it sounded like geyas ceyan<\/em>. She read my name tag and said, \u201cThanks, Ed,\u201d her words ricocheting through me.<\/p>\n In the shoplifting mirror, Buck crossed to fasteners, head canted, listening.<\/p>\n The guys have always given me shit for being good with the ladies, nicknaming me Old Yeller because I\u2019m a stray, which is the only thing they think I could have on them. They say I milk the orphan thing, get the honeys to feel sorry for me.<\/p>\n The guys don\u2019t know I never bring up my parents. No one wants to hear a sob story. Aunt Muriel\u2019s right about that.<\/p>\n Of course I told Dina that first day in aisle three.<\/p>\n By the gas cans, I asked, \u201cAre you broken down?\u201d<\/p>\n She, too, must have been aware Buck was listening an aisle over, his pawing through screws and bolts stopped. She leaned in and said, \u201cI am broken down,\u201d paused and added, \u201cand worn out.\u201d<\/p>\n I cocked my head, and the HVAC system rattled before blowing its tinny heat. The noise gave us privacy Buck wouldn\u2019t.<\/p>\n \u201cBut the gas is for the Fairchild.\u201d<\/p>\n I could smell her shampoo, maybe coconut, as she moved a chunk of sleek hair behind her. I\u2019d never heard of a Fairchild. Some new car out east I guessed. \u201cFive gallon good?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cDon\u2019t need anything that big. Got something smaller?\u201d<\/p>\n Working in a hardware store, there\u2019s no end to sexual innuendo. But normally the innuendos are with the likes of Buck.<\/p>\n She laughed. \u201cBet that\u2019s a request you get all the time,\u201d she said and gave me a soft fist bump on the shoulder.<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019re not from here,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat gave it away?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cJust about every damn thing.\u201d I added, \u201cNot many girls come in for a gas can for their car.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNot a car. An airplane.\u201d<\/p>\n I raised my forehead in the look I\u2019d been cultivating in the mirror. Enough girls had said I looked like James Dean that I\u2019d Googled him. It had become an effective tool. Except on Jen, who screwed around with a guy from Black Den last year when we were still together. Hadn\u2019t been with a girl since.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a radio controlled plane my uncle had in the basement. It\u2019s epic. We\u2019re sorting his stuff to sell the house. He died. His place is on Woods End.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYour uncle was Henry Anderson?\u201d<\/p>\n She shook her head and said, \u201cUncle Jack. He died a couple months ago. Jack Christiansen?\u201d she offered.<\/p>\n In my mind I surveyed Woods End, mailboxes and driveways, unable to locate Jack Christiansen.<\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s got tobacco tins filled with hinges and junk, so he probably made do. I didn\u2019t really know him.\u201d She blushed, and at the time, I took it for embarrassment, though now I know better. Dina never blushes, and she knew Jack\u2019s kind all too well.<\/p>\n She said, \u201cI\u2019m Dina. As in \u2018Dina won\u2019t you blow your horn.\u2019\u201d Which is a song I never heard until she sang it. She asked, \u201cDidn\u2019t your parents sing it to you?\u201d<\/p>\n I told her about the car accident when I was six. She didn\u2019t do that thing people do if they don\u2019t know my past\u2014look away and say sorry, the dumbest thing since it\u2019s no one\u2019s fault but Dad\u2019s. Instead, Dina looked at me for a long moment and touched my shirt against the inside of my elbow as if feeling for a pulse. She said nothing until her lips pulled into a shy smile and then mine did too.<\/p>\n At the register, she paid and asked, \u201cMaybe you want to come flying with me at lunch?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m meeting my aunt for lunch, but maybe when I get off work?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNo pressure. I can see you have a lot going on here.\u201d She nodded toward the end of the aisle, and there was Buck.<\/p>\n I asked, \u201cYou want to meet her? She\u2019d like you.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Approaching the fire, I could smell metal trying to burn. Aunt Ann said, \u201cThe hunter returns yet.\u201d Then she asked, \u201cJack had a dog?\u201d<\/p>\n Dina said, \u201cHe had dog hair and dog piss. He may or may not have had a dog.\u201d<\/p>\n When I got to the fire, I held the kingfisher up and pinched the bird\u2019s eye between thumb and forefinger. \u201cWant to do the honors with the one-eyed bandit?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYes, please.\u201d Dina held out her hand for both pieces of the kingfisher and underhanded the bird to the fire. The feathers caught and flamed to the shafts. She tossed the eye in.<\/p>\n Aunt Ann said, \u201cWho needs sparklers?\u201d She handed out beers from the case in the snow.<\/p>\n We\u2019d be at it for hours, not a thing salvageable for the church or senior center, everything coated in nicotine, and the few pieces of wood furniture that could be peeled of the tar, too broken or cigarette or bottle scarred. I couldn\u2019t imagine wrecking everything I owned.<\/p>\n I kicked the dog beds. \u201cReady?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n I frisbeed the beds, and they thumped onto the fire. There was no sound, then smoking, then a woosh of flames, and the three of us jumped back.<\/p>\n \u201cFor fuck\u2019s sake,\u201d yelled Ann and pointed to the base of the fire. There, in all directions, little flames ran from the blaze. It took a second to register the scene.<\/p>\n Dina yelled, \u201cMice!\u201d<\/p>\n Twenty plus mice, on fire or smoking, ran from the dog beds, scattering to the snow, most burrowing underneath. Two died quickly in black singed piles on the grey slush by the fire.<\/p>\n Dina bit her fogged lip, and my throat closed. \u201cI\u2019m sorry,\u201d I said. I didn\u2019t want to be like her other men. \u201cWhy didn\u2019t they escape when I moved the beds?\u201d<\/p>\n Ann bent down, scooped up snow, and held it to us. \u201cLook,\u201d she said. \u201cHe\u2019s fine.\u201d In her hand, snow melting, a mouse: beady eyes bright and livid. I smelled singed hair and Dina\u2019s wintergreen. Ann set the mouse down, and he scurried on top of the snow, then burrowed again. She said, \u201cWho needs sparklers.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n That first day I met Dina, we walked from the hardware store to Taylor\u2019s for lunch. Ashy ice banks muffled the noise of a few passing cars, and I was grateful for the snow, a wall to keep others from Dina. Of course that changed when we walked into Taylor\u2019s and Mr. Hendrickson waved, Billy gave a smeared smile, and Kristen blushed when I nodded at her sitting across from her mom. I guessed she knew about Jen, too. Dina and I sat by the window sipping pop and waiting for Ann. I couldn\u2019t think what to say to such a dark haired woman. \u201cThere she is,\u201d I said nodding out the window.<\/p>\n \u201cYour aunt drives a Wrangler?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cShe named it Sir Wildgin.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhy?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAunt Ann does stuff like that.\u201d<\/p>\n We watched her walk in, her pear shape nearly the same as every other middle-aged woman in Taylor\u2019s, but her smile, wide and almost laughing, not a thing like anyone else except Mom. With her Carhartt unzippered and her plastic nametag bouncing against her sweater, Ann opened her mouth and eyes in mock surprise, our greeting from when I was a kid, then cocked her head at Dina.<\/p>\n It wasn\u2019t that we knew everyone in Spruce Creek personally, but we\u2019d worked hard to at least recognize people because they knew of me. Forever you\u2019re the kid whose parents died. Or the kid who Muriel and Don took in. The one Stan gave a job to. So you work to protect yourself, work to not be who they want you to be. Sad. A burden. Typecast.<\/p>\n Ann smelled like pipe smoke, which meant she was taking care of Mr. Freelander on 147th. Cataracts, bad, and ALS, not too rough yet. She read to him from National Geographic<\/em>, and they did crosswords. I hugged her and introduced her to Dina.<\/p>\n \u201cYou knew Jack Christiansen?\u201d I asked when Aunt Ann said she did.<\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s the one who took me to the rodeo over in Winner,\u201d she said looking at me.<\/p>\n \u201cOh,\u201d I said and the aftertaste of Coke taste went hard and bitter.<\/p>\n I tried to think of something to say, but Violet took our order, and then Dina asked Ann about her nametag, which led to Ann telling us about putting a square of toilet paper over Mr. Freelander\u2019s bathtub drain so she could tell if he showered. After our sandwiches came, Ann asked Dina about living on different bases.<\/p>\n \u201cThey\u2019re all the same. The original strip mall. Concrete and cheap goods.\u201d Dina said her younger brother was in community college, younger sister a hairdresser in South Carolina, so they didn\u2019t make last year\u2019s move to Fort Drum.<\/p>\n \u201cPardon me but,\u201d said Ann, and I froze, waiting for the bombshell, but she only said, \u201cyou seem old to be living and traveling with your parents yet.<\/strong>\u201d<\/p>\n Dina moved her hair over her shoulder and said, \u201cI like to see new places.\u201d It sounded like a question. She ticked salt into her hand from the shaker. She licked her finger, dipped it in the salt, put it in her mouth, and looked at me and Ann. \u201cI\u2019m worried about leaving Mom. Dad can be difficult.\u201d<\/p>\n Ann leaned over her Reuben and said, \u201cIt seems the Christiansen brothers are cut from the same cloth.\u201d My bite of burger turned to stones. \u201cYour uncle threw a Bomb Pop at me when I said I wouldn\u2019t sleep with him after the rodeo. If we weren\u2019t in public, I think he would have hit me. Is that the kind of difficult you mean?\u201d<\/p>\n Dina looked at Ann and said, \u201cExactly.\u201d<\/p>\n I wanted out of there. I coughed and the two of them looked at me.<\/p>\n Ann asked, \u201cHas he gone after you?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNever. And never laid a hand on my younger brother or sister either.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAre you defending him?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m answering your next question.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIs your mother ready to leave?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cShe\u2019s closer than ever.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBut not ready.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNo,\u201d she said, reaching again for the salt shaker, then asking Ann more about work. Dina toggled her grief like the experts said to: flipping it on its belly to show its vulnerability, then snapping it right back.<\/p>\n Before I went back to work and paid the bill, my week to do so, Dina had asked Ann to join us for the Fairchild flying later that afternoon.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n By the fire, I watched Aunt Ann\u2019s profile walking the ridge toward the stucco house. In the dark, it didn\u2019t look like such a shithole. The clean kitchen windows threw white light. I could see a person, a couple, might make a go of it here, just enough land left to raise some good food, a few chickens, a decent deer stand. I wondered if Jack\u2019s Farmall H still ran.<\/p>\n Dina said, \u201cSo the truth is my parents are giving me the house. My brother and sister, too, but they won\u2019t come here.\u201d<\/p>\n I pitched my eyes to her.\u00a0 This was the third burning party. The first, for the bedroom, was the night after we flew the plane, then, a week later the second for the kitchen. This burn was supposed to be for the living room only, but Dina said if we didn\u2019t start the basement, we\u2019d never finish. Though this was our fourth time at the house, Aunt Ann and I hadn\u2019t met her parents. I\u2019d envisioned knocking out her father, but I didn\u2019t know if I could do it. I\u2019d never fought anyone but my cousins.<\/p>\n Dina\u2019s parents were staying in the motel in Black Den, but Dina had piled a bunch of blankets on the cleaned out bedroom\u2019s floor and slept there. Just walking by those blankets to and from the bathroom gave me a stiffy.<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019re staying?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n \u201cMy parents say it\u2019s the best thing for me.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019re staying.\u201d<\/p>\n She nodded, poked at the fire, and said, \u201cGot to evict the spirits.\u201d Sparks popped when a driftwood lamp fell against the coals. \u201cI want to hate him. But it\u2019s hard to hate a man that gives you a new start. I hate the memory of him.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhat are you going to do for work?\u201d In Spruce Creek, a job was the only kind of inheritance there was.<\/p>\n She shrugged. \u201cThe house will keep me busy for a while. It\u2019s been paid off forever. His truck is mine, too. A piece of shit, but I won\u2019t have a lot of expenses. Maybe a girl could get a job at the diner.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cJobs are tight around here.\u201d<\/p>\n She skipped her eyes between mine. \u201cYou telling me to leave?\u201d She pulled out her lip balm, opened it, and dipped her pinky finger into the tin.<\/p>\n \u201cNo. There just isn\u2019t a lot of work here. There\u2019s not a lot of anything here. I didn\u2019t\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n \u201c\u2014I don\u2019t play games. So if you\u2019re freaked, you should go.\u201d She smoothed the gloss over her lips, wintergreen competing with smoke.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s not what I meant.\u201d Is this what Aunt Ann had felt? Stay for me, but go for you. \u201cLook, you won\u2019t get a job at Taylor\u2019s. Violet who served us that first day? She\u2019s sick, cancer. She\u2019s worked there since she was fifteen. Her daughter will get her job.\u201d Dina listened. Flames reflected in her eyes, so dark they looked black.<\/p>\n I said, \u201cIf I wanted to play games, I\u2019d tell you I\u2019d get you work at the hardware, but I only got that job because my parents were dead and Stan, the owner, remembers my dad buying a new ice scraper every year.\u201d<\/p>\n More than once as we burned Dina\u2019s uncle\u2019s things, I\u2019d wondered who burnt up my parent\u2019s stuff, where all those ice scrapers went, and why I only had one small box of mementos, and that because of Aunt Ann.<\/p>\n Dina poked at a flaming cardboard box filled with rags.<\/p>\n I said, \u201cThis isn\u2019t like other places. The empty building next to Taylor\u2019s? That was a drugstore. We\u2019re too small now for a drugstore, hardware, and market.\u201d I jabbed at a stack of smoldering hunting magazines. \u201cYou might think it\u2019s quaint here, but you won\u2019t feel that way when everyone\u2019s talking about you, making up stories for your life.\u201d<\/p>\n She asked, \u201cAre we still talking about me?\u201d<\/p>\n Aunt Ann hollered from the top of the hill that she needed help. I headed up the hill, grabbed a chair cushion, beaver skull, and an end table, and followed her to the fire.<\/p>\n Dina filled Ann in, and I hoped Ann could make it clear jobs were tough and I wasn\u2019t being a dick. But they didn\u2019t talk about the practical stuff.<\/p>\n Dina said, \u201cDad wants to get rid of me.\u201d She tossed in a small pillow, and the fabric smoked. \u201cI shouldn\u2019t accept it. But I\u2019m tired. It\u2019s been\u2026\u201d She started again, \u201cI could justify it and say it will give Mom a place to come when she\u2019s ready.\u201d<\/p>\n Flames ate pillow edges. Dina said, \u201cOnce Uncle Jack told Dad I was too big for my britches because I wouldn\u2019t go for a tractor ride. Dad made me go. I refused to sit on Jack\u2019s lap that time, but he rubbed his arm against mine, his prickly hair and sweat.\u201d Her jaw bone knotted at the edge of her hair.<\/p>\n \u201cSon of a butt licking whore,\u201d said Ann.<\/p>\n The smoke choked. Ann always got people to say too much. I said, \u201cGoing for more combustibles,\u201d and neither of them acknowledged me, Ann standing close to Dina as if they were sisters.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n That first afternoon I met Dina, we three stood on the hill by Uncle Jack\u2019s house. The setting sun reflected off melted and refrozen snow so the fields looked shellacked.<\/p>\n The bold, primary colored Fairchild had a wingspan as tall as me. I bent to pick it up and tripped over myself when it was so light. Balsa wood, fiberglass. I extended both arms and held it in front of me, recalibrating what I knew about big, bold objects.<\/p>\n I\u2019d checked the internet to see what type of glow plug the plane might need and hoped the Fairchild had the two-stroke engine. The girls cheered when I replaced the plug and the plane finally coughed to life. The plane\u2019s hot machine smell reminded me of the train Dad set up around the Christmas tree.<\/p>\n Then, I didn\u2019t know how different the plane was from everything else in the house. The decals were placed perfectly, construction impeccable. Then, I was excited to see what else the house held, what stories would be unraveled.<\/p>\n The veneered snow made a perfect runway, and the plane lifted. For a minute, maybe two, Dina flew it across the setting sun. We couldn\u2019t tear our eyes from the hulking plane, a thing too mighty and too robust to fly. I wanted to try it, but she handed the remote control to Ann.<\/p>\n Aunt Ann took the Fairchild way up, much higher than Dina had, too high. \u201cAunt Ann,\u201d I said, but neither woman responded. I ripped my eyes from the plane to glance at them: Dina, hands pocketed in red jacket, broad smile cleaving her face, and Ann, flushed, rapid breathing visible in the lift of her shoulders through her coat. I darted my eyes back to the plane. Up it went, easier to follow out of the sun, but becoming smaller and smaller until Dina yelled, \u201cDo it!\u201d<\/p>\n And as if they\u2019d planned it, as if they\u2019d spent the entire afternoon after I left Taylor\u2019s talking about it, Ann drove the plane, screamed it toward the ground, and even after the noise of the crash, after the shards of wings and tail skittered across iced snow, I waited for it to rise again, couldn\u2019t believe a thing so bold and imposing was destroyed. And then\u2014the infectious laughter of the women, their eyes glinting, their laughter violent and reverberating off the varnished snow.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n When the fire died down, Ann said, \u201cYou could have left long ago. Your brother and sister did.\u201d<\/p>\n Dina\u2019s dark hair had tangled itself in one of her earrings. I wanted to fix it for her.<\/p>\n With an old broom Dina smacked at the leg of a half burnt chair, and it broke in two with a dull hush, followed by a quick burst of sparks. \u201cI didn\u2019t belong in New York.\u201d<\/p>\n Ann said, \u201cI don\u2019t belong in Minnesota.\u201d<\/p>\n I always thought I felt homeless because of my dead parents. I asked, \u201cWhere do you belong?\u201d<\/p>\n Aunt Ann shrugged, then asked, \u201cBeers?\u201d She flipped her can to the fire and grabbed a new round. Handing out the cans, she ignored my question and said to Dina, \u201cThat\u2019s an excuse. Just like mine.\u201d<\/p>\n Dina sipped. She said, \u201cMy grandfather, Dad and Uncle Jack\u2019s dad, beat them with the buckle end of a belt. Sometimes across the head. Sometimes he burned them with cigarettes.\u201d She cleared her throat. \u201cI made some bad decisions.\u201d She shoved a cracked wooden bowl into the fire. \u201cSome epically poor decisions, including sleeping with my dad\u2019s friend. Dad found out. I never wanted to disappoint my parents. Even Dad, which I know is stupid.\u201d<\/p>\n Dina smacked the fire and said, \u201cI forgot!\u201d and scrambled toward the Quonset hut. Ann and I hadn\u2019t been in there yet. I could only imagine the crap we\u2019d burn that night.<\/p>\n Aunt Ann tossed a ripped jacket onto the fire and said, \u201cYou like her.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSo do you.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cTrue.\u201d Smoke huffed from the jacket\u2019s pockets. \u201cShe needs time, Ed.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI know.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNo, you don\u2019t. And even then, she might\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n \u201c\u2014I know, Aunt Ann.\u201d<\/p>\n Ann sipped her beer and said, \u201cIt was easier when you needed help with your homework.\u201d<\/p>\n We couldn\u2019t see Dina, but we could hear her crunching through the snow toward us.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t need help now,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n Ann said, \u201cSure, toots.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cCarnage, anyone?\u201d asked Dina as she approached with the Fairchild\u2019s remnants. Even shredded, the plane looked regal, it\u2019s vibrant yellows, blues, and reds clean and right compared to everything else we\u2019d been burning: holed bedding, moldy folders, rinds of furniture.<\/p>\n Dina turned to Ann and asked, \u201cWant to share the honor?\u201d<\/p>\n Ann said, \u201cAll yours.\u201d<\/p>\n Dina nearly stepped into the fire, threw her arms up, and plane bits tumbled and flamed almost before they landed, as if built to burn.<\/p>\n Aunt Ann was the one who had spent her whole life single, going on bad dates until she said she was done, then never dating again. Eight years of movies, dinners, tractor pulls, everything\u2014alone. A long time not to be with anyone, even for a drink.<\/p>\n The Fairchild\u2019s tail fins charred, the stars on the wings, gone. I\u2019d never found the propeller, though it had been there for the flight. Only the little man in the cockpit could still be seen, his helmet strapped, goggles tight. The seat behind him empty. Had there been a copilot?<\/p>\n I remember Aunt Ann picking me up in her orange Pinto she called Casanova and driving to find frogs or go fishing or hunt snakes. Once, in spring, when the night had been hard cold, the ice at Wolf\u2019s Pond had refrozen clear, and we threw rocks to see who could bust the ice first. A dark ghost moved under the water, and we kneeled, put our jeans right in the ice-crystaled mud. It was a beaver, a dark ghosted pelt soundlessly moving under the ice, gliding, and I wanted to grab through the ice and hold him, so sleek and tremendous. But Ann said it was good he was wild and free, that we can\u2019t have everything we want.<\/p>\n I think Mom and Dad would have chosen Ann. But maybe it was good I hadn\u2019t lived with her. All those quibbles about who was supposed to do dishes, about how late was too late to come home, about being grateful for generosity extended\u2014it might have changed things between us.<\/p>\n When I kissed Mom the last time, she had sweat on her lip because of the contractions, so she tasted salty instead of minty or sweet. Mom and I used to eat chocolate covered peanuts that we made together. One at a time. Sweetness spread out throughout the whole day while Dad worked Uncle Don\u2019s farm.<\/p>\n Dina said, \u201cI was getting back at him.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYour dad\u2019s friend?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n Ann shook her head. \u201cAt your father,\u201d she said to Dina.<\/p>\n Dina smacked the handle of a rusted saw until it broke. She said, \u201cThat\u2019s how it started.\u201d In a smaller voice, she added, \u201cBut then I fell in love with him.\u201d<\/p>\n I bit the inside of my bottom lip and looked at a beer can not burning in the fire. So she wasn\u2019t just sleeping with him.<\/p>\n \u201cWe met at some family day. Dad makes two friends at each base\u2014one guy his age and one guy younger than him. That\u2019s always how it is. The younger guy asked me to be his partner for volleyball. I love volleyball.\u201d She looked to Ann, who nodded her encouragement. She didn\u2019t look at me.<\/p>\n \u201cI was epic that day. He asked if I\u2019d always be his partner, and I said yes. He\u2019s handsome. And funny.\u201d<\/p>\n I felt the fire\u2019s hot burn in my gut. I smashed my beer can and threw it to the blaze.<\/p>\n Dina said, \u201cWe hung out the rest of the day. Just let Dad wonder and worry.\u201d Hair near her mouth shuddered as she exhaled. \u201cHe could have stopped it if he\u2019d told me. But maybe that was his point. Let me be who he\u2019d always thought I was,\u201d she said. \u201cTwo days later, at the post office, someone called, \u2018Howdy, partner.\u2019 We went for a coffee. He was older but not too old\u2014nine years. He made me feel like a person, like I mattered.\u201d She dug in the fire, shoved an old skunk pelt onto a scorched umbrella.<\/p>\n \u201cAfter we\u2019d had sex a couple of times, he told me. He\u2019s a husband. He doesn\u2019t wear a ring. He has a little girl. Julia. Three next month when she and her mom move to Drum.\u201d<\/p>\n She\u2019d stopped moving the stick, and it caught fire. She let it burn. I took it and stabbed it in the snow. I thought I\u2019d hear it hiss, a low release of pent up steam, but only a thin trail of smoke rose from the old snow.<\/p>\n Dina said, \u201cThey\u2019ve deposited me here.\u201d<\/p>\n Aunt Ann asked, \u201cHe hit you?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNope, I\u2019m not worth the trouble.\u201d She took her balm from her pocket, unhinged the tin.<\/p>\n I breathed it in like an addict.<\/p>\n She turned to Ann. \u201cHow sick is it that I think like that?\u201d<\/p>\n Ann said, \u201cWe\u2019re all a little sick, babe.\u201d<\/p>\n Ann was right. I felt nauseous, couldn\u2019t stand the cloying smoke. \u201cShould I get more fuel?\u201d<\/p>\n Ann looked at me and cocked her head, wore her disappointed face I knew from bad grades and Muriel\u2019s bitching.<\/p>\n Dina said, \u201cLet\u2019s call it. Uncle Jack\u2019s scotch needs finishing. Can you stay?\u201d<\/p>\n I looked at Ann, and she nodded, though it shouldn\u2019t have mattered. Except now, because of the husband, it did.<\/p>\n In the kitchen, at the table with juice glasses of scotch, I was angry at my pride in the bleached air, the clean counters. I wished all that shit back, so I could smash it to the ground. I asked, \u201cYour parents still in Black Den?\u201d<\/p>\n I could hit her dad now. It was his fault she loved someone else. I could sink to his level.<\/p>\n Dina said, \u201cNope. I told them I\u2019d do it on my own.\u201d She added, \u201cWhen he went to town, I asked Mom to stay. She said she couldn\u2019t make him go back to the base alone.\u201d Dina shook her head. \u201cShe said she\u2019d come visit. She won\u2019t. She\u2019ll have black hands.\u201d<\/p>\n Ann tilted her head, silently asking the question for both of us.<\/p>\n She took out her lip balm. \u201cWhen he hits her, she polishes her grandmother\u2019s silver, gets that stinking polish all over. You smell it the moment you walk in the door. She never wears gloves. Her fingers are black for days. Like she wants everyone to know.\u201d<\/p>\n Dina got up, said she had to see if she could hear the moon. She struggled with the window until it heaved, then slammed open. She stood on her toes. The moon blazed, looked like it could be heard.<\/p>\n Not even Ann had something to say. I looked at her, and she stared at me, and I supposed she could tell I was thinking she\u2019d been right. For a long minute I just tried to hear the moon, too. Then Dina closed the window, came back to the table and talked about the next burn party for the dining room, where a thin path snaked through stacks of phonebooks, clothes, rusting cages, and traps.<\/p>\n After the scotch, we walked outside, and Aunt Ann\u2019s phone rang. She said it was her patient, Mr. Freelander. She went back in the house, fumbling for her notebook in her purse as she went. Aunt Ann\u2019s jeep was parked behind me. I had to wait.<\/p>\n I smacked icicles on the low hanging eave as we walked around the house to look at the fire. \u201cWhat the hell, anyway?\u201d I grabbed one of the longest icicles and javelined it through the air. \u201cWhy all the fake happy?\u201d<\/p>\n She turned to me, and her dark eyes speared. \u201cYou could be accused of the same.\u201d<\/p>\n I shook my head at the sky. We stopped at the top of the hill, and the night was silent without our boots crunching the snow.<\/p>\n The fire was hot coals smoldering. I remembered her describing the husband. I thought whore<\/em>. \u201cYou pretend to be all open and honest and shit, but you\u2019re just hiding your crap.\u201d<\/p>\n She kissed me. Hard. Biting my lip, forcing her tongue in my mouth, smashing her body against mine. I gripped her, felt her cape of hair at the back of her neck and clutched it, snaked my tongue in her mouth, tasted her lip balm, then the hot pulse of her.<\/p>\n I saw lightning behind my eyes and pulled back. \u201cThis is how it was with the husband? All angry fucking? I\u2019m not here for that.\u201d<\/p>\n She looked as if she was going to spit, and then she just turned back towards the fire. I kicked snow into a pile, then mounded it into my hand, trying to hide the stiffy that erupted at her touch. I stood and balled the ice.<\/p>\n Dina put on her god damn lip gloss.<\/p>\n I packed the ice ball tight, letting my heat melt it solid. I felt my biceps clench with each compression. I looked at her bedroom window. Her shitty truck\u2019s windshield.<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019re pissed,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n \u201cFuckin\u2019 right I am.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThen break something,\u201d she nodded at my hands.<\/p>\n I pulsed my hands around the ice ball. I ran my hands over it, and it was smooth all the way around.\u00a0 I shoved it toward her face. She didn\u2019t move. I regripped the ball between thumb and forefinger, my hand shaking, and held it two inches from her nose, and then moved in on her so it was just the ice between us. I smelled her gloss and whispered, \u201cWant me to be like the others? Want an excuse to write me off?\u201d<\/p>\n She snatched the ice ball and flung it toward the dining room window. The ball exploded where the shutter met the wall. Chunks clung to the stucco and fell wetly in the quiet seconds afterwards. I expected Ann\u2019s face to come to the window. \u201cYou don\u2019t get to analyze my shit,\u201d Dina said, just as quietly as I\u2019d threatened her.<\/p>\n Once, during one of my late night internet binges, I\u2019d read, Grief is wanting what you can\u2019t have<\/em>. No shit, Sherlock.<\/p>\n Dina sniffled once, and I wondered if it was the cold or if maybe I\u2019d gotten to her. She shook her head and her black hair fell over her shoulder in sine waves.<\/p>\n From where I\u2019d dug up the ice ball, a dark spot caught my eye. I bent and dug out the Fairchild\u2019s propeller.<\/p>\n I balanced the propeller on my pinky finger and tried to spin it. It wobbled and made one complete turn. \u201cI\u2019m not like that.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI didn\u2019t say you were.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYou won\u2019t like me because of that.\u201d I sounded six. I stomped at the ice with the back of my heel.<\/p>\n Dina turned to me, but I remained facing the fire. I wished for another couch to burn. Maybe old cans of stain and wasp killer from the basement. Some gasoline.<\/p>\n Dina said, \u201cYou feel sorry for yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI feel sorry for you.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t need your pity,\u201d she said, her voice even, stating a fact. The same thing I\u2019d thought hundreds of times.<\/p>\n Then we just stood there. For a long time. Listening. I pocketed the propeller. To the west, a car turned from the paved road to the gravel road. Loud quiet banged my ears. A shadow passed over us, and I turned. Through the kitchen window Ann paced, still on the phone. My breath came almost evenly again, and I matched my breathing to Dina\u2019s. Her hands weren\u2019t moving; she was still.<\/p>\n I looked at the dark horizon, hard silhouetted trees, stars glinting. Coals popped. I wanted something sweet, something chocolate covered. I looked at Dina, a sheath of her dark hair, a pelt, slipping in the night wind, wild. I said, \u201cI try to be happy because I don\u2019t want people to think I\u2019m sad.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cExactly.\u201d<\/p>\n I looked at her. The moonlight roared. I laid my hand on her jacket, my fingers feeling for the inside of her elbow, feeling for a pulse. She didn\u2019t smile, and I didn\u2019t either.<\/p>\n The front storm door slammed. We walked toward Mr. Wildgin. \u201cWhat will you do with the fields?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n Dina looked at me as if translating my words. Then she smiled, not her full lipped smile but a touch of smile, sympathetic, like I was dumb or slow. Or like the small smile she\u2019d given me when I told her my parents were dead. Then her lips revealed her teeth, and she almost laughed. Dina said, \u201cI don\u2019t know a thing about farming. I can barely grow hair. Dad said Jack planted corn and beans. I was going to let it go wild.\u201d<\/p>\n I nodded. I\u2019d wait until the snow melted to make my offer.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The guys have always given me shit for being good with the ladies, nicknaming me Old Yeller because I\u2019m a stray, which is the only thing they think I could have on them. They say I milk the orphan thing, get the honeys to feel sorry for me.
\nor
\n\u201cCarnage, anyone?\u201d asked Dina as she approached with the Fairchild\u2019s remnants.
\nor your choice<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":13719,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[139,131,680,869,971,2621,746,316,879,135],"class_list":["post-13500","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fiction","tag-abandonment","tag-arousal","tag-aviation","tag-beauty","tag-boyhood","tag-fiction","tag-flying","tag-grief","tag-small-town","tag-women","writer-heather-e-goodman"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13500","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13500"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13500\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13730,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13500\/revisions\/13730"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13719"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13500"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13500"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13500"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}