Season of Salt and Honey

by Hannah Tunnicliffe

  “Hello? Are you there?”

  I look down at my body as if it might not be. But I’m still here. Stiff black dress with a hole, dirty shoeless feet, painted nails. “Hawaiian Sunset” the young woman at the beauty spa called the nail color.

  “Who’s in there, Dad?” A girl’s voice, light but needling.

  I peek out from under the quilt. There’s the sound of footfalls among the leaves and detritus.

  “Dad?”

  A hand pats the back wall, searching for the key. I scan the wooden floor quickly, and then the blackened fireplace and the stool near it. There is the key, lying idly on its side. I feel myself exhale, but the quilt is still gripped firmly in my fingers.

  In a game of hide-and-seek the trick is to think yourself invisible; that’s what I tried to teach Bella. “Don’t breathe,” I’d hiss at her when she followed me into a hiding place, as if that were possible.

  “Dad?”

  Over by the sink, above a cupboard containing a few chipped cups and enamel plates, a window has been cut. The frame is aging poorly, bullied by the walls, which are older and know better. The glass is warped. I stare at it, my body still and frozen, waiting.

  A face fills the window. The man cups his hands by his cheekbones to peer in.

  “Dad?”

  “Stay there, Huia.” His voice is steady and assertive, it has a hint of an accent. “Are you a Gardner?” he calls.

  The question burns. My heart beats a little faster.

  “This is a private cabin,” he adds.

  I am mute.

  “Are you a Gardner?” he presses again, voice kinder, as though he can see me now and knows already that I’m not.

  I lift the quilt over my face. I hear the little girl again, but can’t make out what she’s saying. The man taps on the window but I squeeze my eyes shut. The girl’s calls become a shadow to his footsteps around the cabin, once, and then again the other way. He knocks on the door.

  “Can you hear me? You’re trespassing.”

  “Dad?”

  “I’ll have to contact the owners of the property—”

  “Dad?”

  “It is illegal to stay here without permission. I will be contacting the owners and, following that, the authorities, if you don’t vacate.”

  My eyes stay squeezed shut. That’s the other trick with hide-and-seek. Don’t give up. Once you start thinking you’ve been seen, you stop thinking you’re invisible, and someone will notice you. Don’t give up till your cousin, tall and skinny with scraped knees, is tugging on your shoulder and smacking his forehead, declaring, “Imbecille, sta stronza!”—You idiot. Bella learned all the tricks in time, once we were well past the age for games. You could say that hiding became her forte.

  * * *

  When I finally get up, reluctantly, I pad across the floor to the window where the stranger’s face appeared. As far as I can see, which is to the closest wall of trees—Douglas firs, western red cedars, western hemlocks, salmonberry bushes, ferns, green upon green upon green—the man and the child are gone. I feel myself shiver, and glance down at my bare arms and the black dress that is creased in a thousand places like an old face, then turn from the window to take in the cabin, scanning for food and clothes.

  This was Errol Gardner’s cabin, Errol being a direct ancestor of Alex’s grandfather. It’s been passed down through the family to Marshall Gardner, Alex’s father, though he and Mrs. Gardner rarely visit. Mrs. Gardner can’t stand the isolation, the bugs, and the outhouse. Especially the outhouse.

  I bend to peer into the cupboard below the sink, clearing a grayed spiderweb. The sink and cupboard and the flushing toilet in the outhouse must have been added in the 1950s by Alex’s grandfather, Henry—Hank, as he was known. The cupboard handles are silver and round, the top covered with mint-colored linoleum. There are a few old cans on a shelf—fruit, beans, one with the label peeled off that I decide to avoid. I find a can opener and a few pieces of mismatched cutlery in a resistant drawer and open a can of peaches. The pink-orange orbs bob about in silken syrup like flotation devices. I pierce one with a fork and pop it into my mouth, juice slipping down my chin. I remain standing by the sink and look around the room. It’s a cabin for one, only a few pieces of furniture: a bed now covered in the soft, worn red-and-white quilt, a chair, an awkwardly leaning narrow closet, a small square table, a fireplace—if you consider that furniture—and a sparsely stocked bookshelf. Strangely, a child’s coloring book lies open on the small table.

  Outside, the forest is vast and towering, but inside the cabin is cozy and perfect. There is reassurance in its smallness and its age, and that nothing matches—red quilt, mint linoleum, large forks with small knives. A confused, broken, mismatched woman is not out of place here. A confused, mismatched woman can become invisible here by closing her eyes and practicing childhood tricks.

  I walk to the closet where I’d found the quilt in the dark last night. The heady, sickly smell of mothballs fills the air when I open the door and it seems to lean even more. Like the cupboard below the sink, it doesn’t contain much. An oilskin jacket on a crocheted coat hanger, a large pair of boots, blue rubber sandals. In one drawer there’s a green Hudson’s Bay blanket and starchy cream-colored sheets with a scattering of gray spots; in the other, a man’s woolen sweater with navy stripes and three brown leather-covered buttons, socks that haven’t dissuaded an opportunistic moth, a pair of well-used gardening gloves.

  I unfold the sweater and put it on. The wool is coarse against my skin but quickly warms me. I glance at the wooden chair next to the little table, but decide to take my breakfast outside instead. The door gives a protesting screech as I push against it.

  I have only visited the cabin a few times. It sits in a little patch of coastal forest near Chuckanut Drive between Seattle and Vancouver. The closest village is called Edison, which I only remember because of Thomas Edison and because we stopped there for coffee a couple of times. Coffee and a cookie from a place that only accepted cash. I long for a coffee now.

  I glance around the clearing, which seems tidy, maintained even, though I can’t imagine that’s the doing of any of the Gardners. Alex hasn’t been here for a long time, and his brother, Daniel, is neck deep in college study. He’s going to be a lawyer, to the delight of his parents. I peer into the trees, searching for the man at the window, but can’t see or hear him. I lower myself into one of the Adirondack chairs, place my can and fork on the arm, and lean back.

  The trees here are giants, forcing the light to duck and weave between them, to reach around defiant trunks to throw rays across the cabin roof. All the tiny flying things, seeds, grit, and small insects, seem to pool in the radiant fingers. Despite the light it is always cooler in the forest, the trees drinking up most of the warmth from the sunshine before it drops through the canopy. The Caputos are always complaining about the cold in this country, the warm Sicilian blood in their veins offended by the Washington damp and cold, but I don’t mind it.

  I hear a car moving along the driveway and sit up a little straighter. I consider retreating into the cabin but it seems pointless; the man who came this morning already knows I’m here. The sound of a stereo grows louder as the car comes closer and I guess it can’t be the police. Finally the nose of a white Ford comes into view, the music suddenly turned down. A young man unfolds his tall body from the driver’s seat.

  “Francesca?”

  A voice just like Alex’s. My breath catches for a moment.

  “Daniel.”

  He sits down beside me and runs his hand over his face.

  Alex’s brother doesn’t look a thing like him. Daniel looks like their father—brown hair and greenish eyes—where Alex looked like his mother. But their voices are so similar I sometimes had trouble telling them apart on the phone. It only got worse as they got older.

  Daniel glances at me, silently taking in the knitted sweater and the black dress sticking out below it. When his gaze drops to my feet I remember
I’m not wearing shoes.

  “I thought you might be here,” he says.

  “Am I in trouble?”

  He shakes his head and shuffles back a little into the chair. “For running away? I don’t think so.”

  I might not be in trouble in his books, but I know, with certainty and a pang of guilt, Papa and the aunties will be worrying about me. I look at my can of peaches and imagine their horror. You can’t eat that for breakfast! Please, my love, my heart, come home. You’ll fade away.

  “How did you know I was here?”

  Daniel shrugs. “I thought about where Alex might go.” He looks at me and I notice how drawn his face is, how dark the circles under his eyes. “Why did you come?”

  “Maybe the same reason. I wasn’t really thinking. I just had to get out. I ended up here.”

  He nods. “Yeah, the”—he can’t say it either—“was pretty . . . stifling. It’s nice here, huh?”

  We both look around.

  “Yes. It’s nice,” I agree politely. Daniel has always been sweet but formal with me. I recall when I first met him. How old was he? Fifteen? He’d been playing guitar in the basement with a friend, and Alex and I came down the steps holding hands. He’d looked between us and then at our hands and his face had gone dark red.

  Alex had cleared his throat. “This is Francesca.”

  I remember glowing inside, the way Alex said it, so seriously. Like I was important.

  “This is my brother, Daniel,” Alex had explained.

  Daniel had kept staring. Then stuttered, “You’re one of the Caputo girls.” As if it was like being a First Lady.

  “Yeah,” I’d said, and he’d nodded, as mute and bright as Papa’s tomatoes.

  Even now, years later, Daniel looks uncomfortable, half-perched, half-slumped in the chair beside me. Somehow too tall, or not tall enough, like he’s embarrassed about taking up more space than he deserves. He has always shown less confidence than Alex. I try to think of something to ask him, to talk about, but all I can think about is Alex. Alex, in his death, takes up so much space it feels like there’s no room for anything else.

  “I miss him,” Daniel says in a choked voice, when the silence has gone on too long.

  “I miss him too,” I reply softly.

  “I can’t think of any one thing—like, stuff we talked about or the way he did things. People ask me, what do you miss the most? I don’t know what to say. It’s just everything, you know? How he spoke, the way he was—just . . . him.”

  I nod.

  Daniel draws breath. “And the house feels different, even though he hasn’t lived there for ages.”

  “As though there’s a shadow in every room.”

  “Yeah.”

  “That’s why I can’t go home.”

  Daniel looks at me.

  “He’s everywhere,” I say. “Everywhere and nowhere. In the kitchen, in the living room, in the bedroom. Sorry, but . . . all over the bedroom. There’s a stack of surfing magazines that he never threw out, they always get tipped over, make a big mess. I was always on him to tidy them up or throw them out, and now I wish the whole room was full of them.”

  Daniel is silent.

  “Sorry,” I murmur.

  “No, I get it. Sometimes I want to tell him to get out. Out of my head, I mean. And then I feel bad because I just want him back. It makes me feel . . .”

  “Crazy,” I say.

  “Yeah, crazy.”

  Daniel pauses, then reaches over and pats my arm.

  I look down at his hand. The gesture is unnatural for him, but he is trying. I appreciate that he doesn’t ask me questions or tell me everything is going to be okay. He knows the world is changed and there’s no way to repair it. I take a deep breath and try not to wish that he was Alex, try to be grateful instead that he’s Daniel and the closest thing. Even silent, his presence is the most like Alex’s. It’s both comforting and torturous.

  “He did love you,” Daniel says firmly.

  I look at him. He’s gone pink again.

  “I know you guys had been together a long time, and he wasn’t always good at saying . . . I mean, it’s a family thing. . . .”

  I shift my arm away from under his hand. “I know.”

  “He may not have said it all the time. . . .”

  “Often enough.”

  “And he took all that time to ask you to marry him . . . but he did—”

  “It’s okay,” I interrupt. Daniel looks at me, concerned. “Thank you. I mean . . . I know he loved me.”

  “I wasn’t suggesting—”

  “We were going to be married.”

  “Yes.”

  Now, when the silence comes, it seems to cleave a gap between us. Daniel doesn’t reach for me and I don’t reach for him. I wish I could say “wife” in the certain, always way that Daniel gets to say “brother.”

  “I borrowed a sweater,” I say, changing the subject, then nod towards the peaches. “And some food.”

  “Sure. That sweater was Granddad’s. Alex loved it. He was Granddad’s favorite—you probably know that already.” Daniel gives a small smile. “Granddad did everything in that sweater, including fishing . . . I don’t know how often he washed it.”

  I shrug. “I can’t smell anything but mothballs.”

  “That’s Mom. She hates the bugs. I could bring you more clothes,” he adds. “If you’re staying?”

  Despite not being able to bear the thought of going home, I haven’t considered staying. Now I rapidly imagine my aunties back in Seattle, still wearing their dark clothes, heavy sobs shaking their shoulders. I imagine the phone ringing in our apartment—my boss, Alex’s friends, my cousins. Explanations, commiserations, and condolences that feel foreign and empty.

  Daniel studies me. “I’ll call someone,” he says, trying to be helpful. He’s used to being the youngest, letting others make plans for him, without him. This is new. “Your sister . . .?”

  “Bella?” I almost laugh. What help would she be? I’m not even sure where she is. Somewhere in Portland, where she’s been living since she left Seattle? I don’t have a current phone number for her. Besides, you can’t trust Bella with anything. Not even to come to your fiancé’s funeral. “Papa will help,” I say. “Are you sure it’s okay for me to stay here?”

  Daniel shrugs. “No one else is using it.”

  “You don’t want to—”

  He cuts me off. “I’ve got to be with Mom. My parents, I mean.”

  “Okay. Thank you, Daniel. I just need some . . .” But I can’t finish the sentence and Daniel doesn’t press.

  “Hey?” I manage. He looks up. “Will you do me one favor? Will you please call me Frankie? I feel so old when you call me Francesca.”

  He nods but looks away. “Sure.”

  I follow his gaze, but there’s nothing to see but forest. Cedars, firs, brave ferns growing high on a fallen tree. A tiny bird effortlessly balancing on a new branch that bends and bounces like a high wire.

  “Thank you,” I say again. For coming. For patting my arm. For sounding so much like Alex that it feels good and burns all at once.

  He nods again. “No problem, Frankie.”

  He stands, and moves towards his car, then turns back to me. “I’ll call your dad,” he promises, “and bring you some more clothes. There’s a gas bottle in there somewhere—did you find it already? There’s a camp stove.”

  I shake my head. “I’ll find it. You go. Your mom will be worried.”

  “You don’t want my phone?”

  “No.”

  He stares at me a long moment before nodding.

  This is the thing about grief: it allows you to be stubborn, even if it’s irrational and impractical. People treat you delicately, as though you have a terminal illness, and grant you your unreasonableness. Except for my family, of course, the Caputo clan, who somehow become bossier and more prying. I know the aunties will be distressed that I’m missing, though Papa will do his best to reassure the
m. That’s the way with the three of them: Concetta and Rosaria—Zia Connie and Zia Rosa to Bella and me—the two all-knowing, dictatorial, elder sisters; and Giuseppe, our father, Joe, the placating younger brother. Papa will tell them I’m okay, that I’ll come back, not to worry. He will be worrying too, but he trusts me. He has no reason not to. The aunties will be whispering about Bella too—loud enough for Papa to hear, although he’ll pretend not to.

  “Call Papa straightaway, will you?” I call out to Daniel.

  “I’ll drop by,” he reassures me.

  He curls himself into the driver’s seat and reverses. The ground is noisy beneath his tires. He lifts his hand in a wave. It reminds me of Alex leaving for work.

  That’s when I remember the man at the window. “Wait!”

  The car slows to a stop. Daniel sticks his head out the window. I curl my fingers over the edge of the window frame. “There was a man here this morning. . . . He was talking about trespassing. About calling your parents. Do you know him?”

  Daniel shakes his head. “Maybe Mom hired him.”

  We both look back to the cabin, the tidy ground around it, the weeds held back from crawling over the wooden walls.

  “I’ll talk to Mom,” he promises.

  “Okay.” I uncurl my fingers and step back.

  He surveys me. “Are you sure you’re—”

  “I’ll be fine.”

  He nods slowly, disbelieving.

  As his car drives away the music is turned up, blaring so loud it’s as though he wants it to smother him. I hear it long after the car has disappeared from sight. When it’s gone I feel cold again, as though a ghost has returned to stand beside me.

  Chapter Three

  • • • •

  I find the camp stove in the sink cupboard, pushed to the back and covered in dust.

  I stand taller, make a list of supplies in my head for Papa to pack. Towel, washcloth, soap. This makes me feel oddly purposeful. I scan the cabin again and notice things I missed in my first assessment. There’s a small lump of soap, yellowed and cracked, on the windowsill. The open pages of the coloring book have been neatly colored in all the wrong shades. A purple sun, pink ocean, orange grass as if on fire. I run my finger along the spines on the bookshelf. A historical account of the Second World War, several Reader’s Digests, four Story Collections for Boys from 1951, 1952, 1963, and 1966. My finger pauses on The Swiss Family Robinson by Johann Wyss. I remember the Disney film. The elaborate tree house, the handsome sons, the elegant, practically effortless way they all adapted to their new, lonely fate. I loved that movie. There’s a purple hair tie on a hook on the back of the door and I use it to lift my hair into a ponytail. Alex liked my hair up. The ghost leans heavily against me.