Bone Black

by Carol Rose GoldenEagle

  Lord goes downstairs to the kitchen to fetch two Perrier waters. This cannot be the reason why Raven disappeared. This cannot be the reason my wife worries she is infertile, why our child has gone away. Lord sobs into his hands, which he wipes on a tea towel before bringing the water upstairs to his distraught wife.

  Lord gives thanks that the curse didn’t apply to his wife. He’s been allowed to let Wren into his life and over the threshold into his heart. Before handing her the glass of water, Lord holds her again, as tightly as he can.

  “I love you so much,” he says. The couple sits in silence. Then, “You need to start creating again.”

  At this point, Wren cannot bring herself to admit that she incorporated the baby’s remains into the last pottery piece that she did fire. It’s a beautiful flower vase that now sits where that wretched photo of his dead mother used to be displayed. Late one restless night, Wren moved the photo from the mantel into a rarely used spare room at the far end of the farmhouse. That upstairs bedroom was used as a guest room, even when Wren was a girl. She looked around the room for a suitable spot.

  But who wants to share space with a dead woman in a coffin? Wren hid the photo away, deep in a dresser drawer where no one could see it—out of sight and out of mind. Lord didn’t seem to notice the displacement of the photo. Or at the very least, he didn’t mention that it was no longer prominent on the mantel in the family room. When Wren had buried the photo in the drawer, she thought of Lord’s description of his childhood, about the Magras curse, about how no one could pass the threshold. Could it have migrated here with the photo, to her childhood farmhouse?

  * * *

  “I will start working again, my dear Lord,” she promises.

  “Maybe you can start by doing some volunteer work. It’s unpaid but I think it might help you move forward,” Lord suggests. Lord tells her about a project his firm is working on: an outdoor play space in an abandoned lot behind one of the downtown women’s shelters.

  “The kids who stay there need to have a safe space to play so we’re designing a greenspace constructed with mostly recycled materials. Some of them need someone to look after them while we’re doing the work.”

  Wren knows that since Raven disappeared, she’s doing nothing more than filling up space. One day just seems to blend into the next and some days it’s an ordeal for Wren just to get out of bed. What her husband is suggesting now means she’ll be creating something with a purpose again, something that will witness the joy and laughter of children, and that’s a good start.

  “It is too quiet here with nothing but my thoughts,” Wren responds, “and I do like to be around children.”

  “My firm will even throw in for the cost of materials if you choose to do something… perhaps teach the kids pottery.”

  Lord can see the idea resonates with his wife. He also knows it’s good medicine for her broken heart. His, too. He’s always wanted a family, but things happen, he realizes, and neither he nor his wife are responsible for the common reality that not all babies are carried to term. This one went away. They will try again, when times are not so turbulent. The sun will shine again.

  “I’ll do it,” Wren proclaims. “I will fire those children’s work in my outdoor kiln.” Then turning to Lord she says, “These sweatpants need to be thrown in the wash. Want to help me take them off?”

  Love Lift Me Up

  “It will make Mommy so happy to see this!”

  Little Jeremy Lafond can’t hide his delight as he puts the finishing touches on his pinch pottery, a technique that doesn’t require throwing clay on a wheel. There is no wheel here. Only children and loads of loose clay in a box. It warms Wren’s heart to see Jeremy has picked up the material and has taken to moulding it, like hugging an old friend.

  Lord’s firm came through. It supplied boxes of clay and other materials necessary for the creation of pottery. Wren calls it an “unpaid residency” when people in town ask what she’s up to these days.

  Wren notices that Jeremy is missing a tooth, which is not surprising. That’s something that happens to six-year-olds. His mother, though, is also missing a tooth but not because she’s shedding baby teeth. Her tooth was loosened when she was punched in the face by her boyfriend. It was so badly damaged that it had to be removed. Stella and Jeremy have been living in the women’s shelter ever since.

  No one ever brings up the topic of Raven’s disappearance anymore. They’re probably uncomfortable that Wren would burst out crying whenever they’d inquire. However, the tragedy did result in changes within the community. A night-watch walk made up of volunteers has been organized. They patrol each Thursday, Friday and Saturday from ten at night until two in the morning. Even the local service club has revamped its policy on highway cleanup since the summer. Because of Wren and Raven, it will check with rcmp first to make sure that being a good Samaritan will never again mean clearing away potential evidence along the highway.

  The local church mentions Raven in their prayers each Sunday. That part hasn’t changed. Parishioners have mentioned the sisters during their services these past months, asking for resolution and healing. Wren is grateful for this as well, even though she’s only ever attended services at the United Church a handful of times. She’s pretty much isolated herself, finding that when she does venture out, the worry of others easily transfers to her, making her exhausted. And she already has more than enough of that on her own.

  At the women’s shelter, Wren is grateful to spend time bringing joy and healing to others through the creation of art. No one here knows about what happened to Raven. No one knows her sadness from losing the baby and because of that, no one asks questions or makes comments. There are only moments of joy when she shows up with a box of clay and ideas to share with the children. She experiences the clearing away of sadness, if only for fleeting bits of time. The happiness she sees in faces like Jeremy’s warms Wren’s heart. She watches the boy move his fingers over the clay, shaping a bowl for his mother. He traces a heart onto it. A child’s love. Pure, trusting and so real she can feel it.

  “I love this, Jeremy,” she finds herself saying, wiping the tear that’s formed on her face and replacing it with a smile. “This little heart that you have engraved on this bowl is just beautiful.”

  “I put the heart on it because I love Mommy. I want her to be happy again,” he explains.

  Wren hasn’t slept properly in months and along with the suggestion that Wren do some volunteer work with children at the shelter, Lord has found a little blue pill to ensure a good night’s rest. He came home two days ago with a prescription for Zopiclone—a prescription he picked up for himself—but proposed that Wren take it as well. She’s been keeping him up at night as she tosses, turns, sighs and cries.

  Along with the meds, there is a routine now too which she finds comforting: Lord makes them both some tea, then spoons some honey into the hot mug before delivering it to her in bed. He insists that each night before turning out the light, they share affirmations and reasons to be grateful, She finds that the ritual helps her and allows her the strength to do her work in the women’s shelter, in a setting where tragic, real stories lie just around the corner. These women, these mothers like Stella, are here not by choice but because of violence and abuse. But at the shelter, their sad memories are not allowed to be buried. The abuse is acknowledged and then it is banished, held off by light and love and ways of rebuilding. Healing the heart. Restoring hope.

  This is why building this pottery piece with Jeremy prompts Wren to share her own good memories of childhood, the way childhood is meant to be, filled with wonderment and magic. Wren decides to tell Jeremy a story told to her by Kohkum, the same story told to her when Wren’s own first tooth fell out. “It was the end of day,” Wren starts, “and we’d all been bathed and Kohkum read to my sister and me a story from a book. I love remembering how we would be cuddled in her arms, all warm under a
blanket. Kohkum always made sure that our tummies were full of snacks, with dry meat and apples. That dry meat was yummy but hard to chew. And that’s when my first tooth fell out.”

  Jeremy is eager to hear what happens next.

  “I told Kohkum that I needed to put that tooth under my pillow because the tooth fairy was going to come and leave me a quarter, but Kohkum told me, ‘No, that’s not what happens.’ So she told me about the Little People.”

  Wren goes on to describe that the Little People are invisible spirit helpers in the Cree culture. “Kind of like guardian angels I suppose. We can’t actually see them, but we know they’re always around.” She tells Jeremy that the Little People will come during the night, take his tooth and will offer up his tooth to the universe.

  “And that’s when magic happens,” Wren continues to Jeremy, who is listening so intently he’s abandoned his pinch pot of clay altogether. “That tooth ends up where it’s needed. Instead of under the pillow, it goes to a baby who can only drink milk from a bottle. No more bland formula for some special baby, Jeremy, because you gave up your tooth. And now you are part of the magic, too. Good for you.”

  Wren tells the boy that soon some toothless infant can enjoy peanut butter and jam sandwiches too because of him. “And that is why the Little People leave a gift. Because you gave up your tooth so that a baby can start eating peanut butter and jam sandwiches!” she finishes.

  Wren feels good she passed down a story. Whether it is real or not is irrelevant, the message is there: Believe in goodness and spirit. Before Wren leaves the shelter that night, she makes sure to tell the staff to leave a loonie under Jeremy’s pillow. She goes to the corner store, returning with a Kinder Surprise treat that she instructs the staff to leave on Jeremy’s bedside table.

  Driving Home

  A deer runs out in front of Wren’s car as she enters the valley near Lumsden on her way home. That’s when she also sees a coyote standing at the junction where Highway 11 meets the turn off to Highway 54 and the turnoff to Wren’s home in the valley. As she slows to make the turn, Wren decides to open her window and toss out the last bit of a peanut butter and jam sandwich that little Jeremy insisted he make her for her trip home. Can’t waste food, she remembers Kohkum saying, and leaving an offering for wildlife is not wasting.

  The sun disappeared from the skyline hours ago. Now is a time of twilight when moose and deer wander, sometimes even onto the highway. Wren says a prayer to the universe that those four-leggeds stay in the fields tonight, away from traffic and out of harm’s way. As she opens the passenger-side window to throw out what’s left of her sandwich, she hears a noise: the loud cackle of a raven. It is curious to Wren because she knows that ravens aren’t supposed to fly at night. She wonders why this one is here, what it’s trying to tell her.

  Ten minutes later, Wren finds herself home, unloading the pinched pottery pieces made by the children. They makes her smile. The pieces will need glazing and firing in the kiln before being offered as gifts. Wren can’t help but remember Jeremy’s words as she takes his piece from the hatchback of her car: My dad hurt my mom and that’s why we are living here now.

  Wren couldn’t stop herself from wanting to know more, so she asked staff at the shelter about Stella and why she and her son ended up there. They told her they couldn’t divulge that type of information, but one young worker gave her a name when they were alone in the kitchen: the name of the person responsible for beating Jeremy’s mom.

  “Billy Vespas is in construction. He’s started his own company. He makes a lot of money. He’s the one who beat Stella.”

  Billy Vespas. Jeremy’s dad. The name of the person who caused harm to little Jeremy and his mom. Billy Vespas. He’s the one who punched Stella in the face so hard her tooth needed to be removed by a dentist. He’s the one who left bruising to her cheek.

  Billy Vespas.

  This is a name Wren knows and hates. The memories play in her mind’s eye—he is the one who violently raped her in college. She knows that hate is a strong word filled with nothing but darkness, but that is where this man’s memory resides.

  Since Raven’s disappearance, Wren has been thinking about all the things that went wrong in her life. Getting involved with Billy is one of them. The memory of what he did to her has been keeping her awake at night. Billy. He hurt her in ways that left her so filled with shame she’s never been able to tell anyone but Raven, her beautiful sister who always held—and honoured—Wren’s secrets.

  Billy. Their relationship started pleasantly enough. They met in an economics class about the business of art in addition to the creation of art. It was tedious study except for the wandering glances of another student: Billy Vespas, handsome and charming. Wren remembers the first time he asked her out after class for a cup of coffee.

  He was so kind at first. Opening doors for her, insisting that he carry her backpack filled with books. He never let her pay for anything either. He’d pick up the tab at the university cafeteria as they talked for hours about how each had plans for rebuilding the future, how women are at the heart of it all. Through their discussions, Wren learned Billy had grown up with a single-parent mom as well. They became close, they shared something special.

  Then came that horrible violation, and all that intimacy meant nothing. Billy was drunk when he did it. “You dirty squaws,” Wren remembers him slurring. “Good for nothing but a quick fuck.”

  Billy Vespas. The same despicable ass who raped Wren all those years ago is the reason why a little boy and his mother are hiding in a shelter. She wants to make sure that Billy never punches out the teeth of a woman again; that he never terrorizes a little boy. “Billy Vespas,” she says under her breath. “You will do no harm, no more.”

  The children’s pottery is before her so her thoughts briefly shift to the practical, about what she needs to do in the morning to fire up her kiln and complete the children’s works.

  * * *

  As is so often the case, Lord is not home. He left Wren a voice message on the answering machine saying a project deadline had been pushed up and he’d be working late at the office. He would be coming home but not till after dark. As Wren finishes washing her face, she notices Lord’s vials of medication in the bathroom cabinet: insulin for his diabetes. She’s watched him inject the fluid around his midriff many times. Healthy bodies produce insulin appropriately for balancing the body’s sugar levels, but too much can lead to a coma or even death. As she studies it, Wren recalls a story she recently saw on the news about a nurse in Ontario who went on a killing spree at the care home where she worked. She injected residents with drugs that made their hearts stop.

  Instead of going to bed, Wren reapplies her makeup, changes into a provocative dress and decides to head back to the city. If she knows anything about her husband’s work ethic, he’ll likely be home close to midnight. In her mind, she maps out the bars where she thinks Billy Vespas might be: places he hung out in college and probably still frequents. She figures his habits haven’t changed much since she knew him.

  Wren gets back into her car to drive to the city but as she rounds the corner of the long driveway leading to the main highway, something stops her. She thinks she sees a woman standing in the moonlight near the creek that runs past the ditch. Raven?

  Moonlight can play tricks on the eyes and the imagination. As she strains to look again, she sees only bulrushes, a bunch of fence posts donning old footwear and a lone coyote. His eyes reflect off her headlights like patio lanterns. It’s enough to make Wren change her plans, however. The sudden invocation of Raven prompts Wren to rethink her evening’s agenda. She puts the car in reverse and slowly pulls back into the farmhouse driveway.

  What will happen to Billy can wait.

  Elements

  “So you around next week, Lord?” Wren asks her husband.

  Lord is rarely at home these days. They’re at the table eating ra
isin-bread toast.

  “I’m almost finished up with that project in Alberta. But I have to head out again tomorrow. I think I will drive this time. After this, hopefully I’ll be at home more often. I’ll probably be gone all of next week.” Lord takes another bite of his breakfast and inquires, “Why do you ask?”

  “It’s been a while since we’ve taken a trip anywhere,” laments Wren.

  “You’re right, my love.” Lord’s expression changes from sleepy to intrigued. “Any place you want to go in particular?”

  Wren tells him she wants to go somewhere hot. Maybe Cuba.

  “That is an excellent idea. I’ll check out some travel agents while in the city today and bring home some brochures. Look at the time,” he says, and quickly finishes up his last bite. “I’ll see you for dinner. And, don’t worry about cooking me anything. I’ll pick up something to go.”

  Not five minutes later, Wren watches her husband’s car make the turn from their grid road onto the main highway. He’s got plans for the day and so does she.

  It has not been difficult to stalk Billy, not hard to figure out his routine at all. Wren found him right away online. He works as an independent roofer and has ads around town. His truck dons the logo for his company and his contact information.

  After Lord leaves for the office each day, Wren leaves for the city. She’s been following Billy for the past three days. His schedule is the same every morning. At 8:30 he visits a local Tim Hortons on North Albert Street. He doesn’t use the drive-thru because it’s often faster to use the counter service, so he orders inside. She even knows what he gets: oatmeal with milk and an extra-large double-double coffee to go. She has sat, watched and noted everything, from what he wears to his mannerisms.