Rusty Summer

by Mary McKinley

  That must have been our family’s first rugged individualist. Many others followed.

  We climb a little so we are near the highest point and look around us. The grass is long and green but dry and the wind catches it so it ripples like a silky dog’s fur.

  “Does it ever get dark?”

  “Dusky. Lovely, dim half-light; all summer, mostly. This is about as dark as it gets this time of year—this far south, anyway; in the ‘Banana Belt,’ as they call us here in the southeast islands. Farther north the sun stays up. Here, use some of this; it’s repellent for no-see-ums—black flies and mosquitoes. We’ll need it in the bush.” GramMer wipes some goo on me—even in my hair and clothes.

  We hike at a fairly brisk pace. She’s not even winded. She makes a lot of noise as she walks. Sings this awful song about how she’s “Hen-er-ry the VIII, she is,” really loudly.

  “Just makin’ sure,” she says vaguely as we pace. Then she starts whistling—super loud and flat. I wince.

  I know she’s warning bears, but doesn’t want to freak me out by further spelling it out in words—about ROAMING WILD-ASS GIGANTIC FREAKING KODIAK BEARS! I glance around nervously as I follow her, looking more like a Gram “cracker” than ever (with her shotgun), and try not to panic. I do not need any help spelling it out. I am very aware what the gun is for.

  We climb the rocky hillock, then sit on soft moss and gaze down the mountain to the sea. The moss is still warm from the day. Seagulls scream in stereo. I wait, as I regain my breath . . .

  The ocean calls me to order. It thrashes for me. It calms, requesting me to quiet my racing mind, though I resist, like the rocks.

  But eventually, like the rocks, my jagged edges blunt and I am smoothed.

  In spite of myself, I am soothed. I take deep breaths. They taste of salt.

  We look out in the never-ending night light. GramMer starts to talk like we had just been interrupted in the middle of a conversation.

  “That first injury was a joke. He’d broken his wrist playing some idiot game when they were supposed to be cleaning the mess hall or swabbing the deck, or something. So, since he was a great guy, I think your mom was really taken with him. But they started to have differences almost immediately, and they were just not compatible people.”

  I say nothing. I am waiting to hear something I don’t know.

  “Rylee, you have to go easy on your dad. He’s pretty deaf on the one side. And in his mind too, he’s hurt now.” She glances at me with a sympathy-seeking expression. Which makes me freak out.

  I start to bawl. I cry hard, till my nose runs and I gasp and cough. I sob and shudder and try to stifle myself to no avail. I wail. GramMer rubs my back.

  “Empathy, honey; it’s the only god I’ll worship anymore, whose only acts are kindness. I know this is crazy news, but if you can try to feel for your poor dad, it will help.”

  I say nothing and just watch tears fall through my hands to the tundra.

  After a little while GramMer resumes. And now she tells me things I don’t know.

  “Okay, I’m going to tell you something pretty bad. You remember Uncle Riley? You know how after 9/11 he enlisted? Of course you do. Well, your uncle got a terrible concussion and was sent to the hospital, where sadly, his care was egregious. Just appalling. People survive injuries in today’s military that would have killed them before. Nobody understood the possible brain trauma yet; his worst injury didn’t show. He ‘fell through the cracks,’ as they say. After he was discharged he came home to Kodiak. But he couldn’t hold a job and he fought with all his old friends and he had migraines and nightmares and they made him paranoid and unbalanced. Toward the end he was pretty delusional.

  “And for the record, your dad was there for him! He would go get him out of trouble, no matter what. Your dad was very protective of your uncle, who adored him. And it was mutual! They had always been close. That’s why you’re Rylee; you were named for your uncle. But eventually your dad got worried by Uncle Riley’s terrible nightmares and violent behavior . . . it was scary to see. He was completely unpredictable. He scared us.

  “But even more, Uncle Riley broke my heart. He’d been such a good kid and sweet-natured. He was so devoted when your grandpa died—”

  “Of smoking!” I cut in angrily.

  “Of smoking, yeah. Uncle Riley was just a little boy . . . and your poor dad, who was only a teenager, figured from then on it was his duty to look out for us.”

  “My uncle Riley and my grandpa died young!” I wail randomly. I start sobbing again, even though I never really knew my uncle all that well. He died when I was still too young.

  GramMer’s face looks sad and distant. She looks out to sea.

  “That’s right, honey. They died . . . and I don’t see any reason for it at all.”

  My uncle Riley survived an explosion—sort of. He was riding out with other guys on patrol and an IED detonated and blew them up. It blew up two of his friends—right beside him. It was a freak accident that because of where he was sitting he lived and they didn’t.

  “He saw people blown up. Rylee, he saw his friends get blown up. We can’t even understand that. Imagine, can you? Think about walking along with your two friends, Leonie and Beau back there, and suddenly they are gone—turned into a hail of blood and bone! And you’re alone when just a second ago you were talking and joking with your friends.”

  That is about the last thing I want to imagine. I weep convulsively as I look at her desolate face, frozen in timeless sorrow as she watches the writhing tide. Unbidden, the image of our injured deer rises before me—its spilled entrails, sickly split open, blood raining down on us, the poor thing worriedly noting its own broken body—till Beau put it out of its misery. The memory of that horror stabs me and involuntarily I groan with sorrow and guilt. GramMer turns to put her arm around me to hug me and brace me. We sit quiet for a little while.

  Then GramMer resumes reminiscing.

  “After Uncle Riley came home from the hospital and your parents separated, your dad moved back to Kodiak to help him.”

  GramMer goes on, saying that my dad stayed in what they called the “mother-in-law” cabin in the back, built down beside the lake. Both he and GramMer looked after Uncle Riley, who was then having constant nightmares and screaming all night. “If the nightmares got too bad Riley would come and sleep on the rug beside my bed,” GramMer said. “Like a little kid.” She found him there so many times that after a while she put a cot beside her bed, so she wouldn’t accidently fall over him. Frequently she would wake up to find him there, holding her hand in his sleep; premature lines of sorrow etched deeply in his young face.

  He kept getting worse and they tried to find him help. There wasn’t much available.

  He was finally diagnosed with PTSD. They gave him pills that he stopped taking. Then he stopped talking. Or eating.

  Uncle Riley began drinking—harder and harder, and driving like crazy. He would go on wild rides and speed down the dark rutted roads of Kodiak. My dad would go with him, to try to stop him.

  One night, when my dad was with him, they crashed. Dad survived, but the impact broke his shoulder and some bones in his face and punctured an eardrum. He’s still pretty messed up. Forever.

  Uncle Riley walked away, because he was drunk out of his mind.

  “That was the last straw. He couldn’t remember the wreck. I think Riley felt so bad about hurting your dad that he felt like it was the end of the line. Not long after, he shot himself.

  “And your dad cannot forgive himself for not being able to help him . . . though that is the government’s fault. This new secretary they’ll probably go with looks promising, but there is just so much need. The vets are slipping through the cracks, Rylee. Not just your uncle and dad.”

  I look over. Her voice is so calm that I’m surprised when I see how wet and anguished her eyes are.

  “So now your dad’s a little crazy too, honey.”

  I snort viciously.

&
nbsp; “Rylee, would you like to hear a memory of mine when I just get too fed up?” GramMer asks.

  I shrug. She takes that as a yes.

  “I heard your dad reading a story to your uncle Riley once, about these two men who were aboard the back of a train as it was about to leave the station. It was a cold day, and one of the men started to put on his gloves as the train pitched and began to move. As it lurched, he dropped one glove and it fell onto the platform. But as the train pulled away the man pulled off the glove he was wearing and threw it so it landed near its mate. ‘What did you do that for?’ asked his friend. ‘What good will one glove do the person who finds it?’ replied the man who threw the glove.”

  GramMer glances at me. But I have no reaction. She continues.

  “I remember your uncle Riley told your dad, ‘You’re like that too—like the guy with the gloves.’ And your dad said, ‘Maybe we both are.’

  “After Uncle Riley, I think he was so lost that he almost did something terrible too. Luckily he began to attend meetings, where he met Ruth . . . Raven’s mom. I think she saved your dad’s life. I’m real grateful for her, Rylee.”

  GramMer turns to me and shrugs. The look in her eyes is pleading for mercy.

  I nod vaguely. I heard. And I’m not mad at my grandma. She’s never lost touch with us, anyway. GramMer, at least, has been keeping up with us. She and my mom write cards and such. She says that she reads them to my dad.

  And she’s been reminding my dad that we’re not little children anymore, that he has to figure out what he is going to tell us, but he kept putting it off.

  Until I forced the issue.

  She said it was actually a relief, because Paul and I were getting too old for my dad to keep thinking we wouldn’t find out. She knew we’d be dazed and hurt by the lie. She nagged him often.

  But no, he just kept putting it off....

  “So, what’s up with the kid?” I ask shakily, still feeling crushed. “I have a sister now? I’m no longer my father’s only daughter?” My voice falters. I’m seriously failing at compassion.

  I feel sorry for my dad and my uncle and everything, but I am still so pissed for my family.

  GramMer sighs.

  “She’s the innocent in all this. Yes, Rylee, you have a half-sister. Raven is four years old. Her mom is Ruth Petrofsky, one of the island girls born here. I’ve known her all her life. Ruth’s family is Russian-Aleut, a real pretty girl. She’s studying to be a sociologist. Petrofskys have been here since before the gold rush. Your dad and Ruth aren’t married, not that anyone is too concerned about it up here. He wants to tell your mom before he gets married again. And he hasn’t.”

  I look at my grandmother disbelievingly. “This is so stupid.” Sobs brew anew in my throat . . .

  She meets my eyes.

  “I agree. I’m so sorry. You don’t deserve this. You’re a good kid.” She means it.

  “Thanks, GramMer,” I say as my face crumples and I start over sobbing again.

  I sit with my GramMer in the gloaming for a long time. Luckily we are not eaten by bears—or black flies. Eventually I cry myself out.

  After several hours, in the middle of the daylight night, exhausted, we return.

  We go inside. Leo and Beau are the only ones up. And The Bomb. They get up and silently hug me. Without discourse, I go to bed.

  The next morning I have no interest in getting out of bed. Why freaking bother?

  So I don’t. I lie in my own disgust. I hear voices in the living room and then I hear my grandma say to leave me alone, I’d get up when I was ready. I really appreciated that. Then I put a pillow over my head. It’s very squishy. I fall asleep in the downy silence.

  Later, I wake up. Reflect.

  Nope.

  I fall back asleep. I can sleep like it’s my job. I just don’t, usually. I find the world too interesting to sleep for twenty hours a day—a huge waste.

  But now . . . it’s just the ticket. I dream in color.

  Later, when I wake up again, it’s light. See, that was a joke. It’s always light here in the summer.

  I must be feeling better.

  I look over and Leo is in the other twin bed, along with The Bomb. They are sacked out; the clock says 4:44, so I assume a.m.

  So it must be the night light we’re sleeping in. It’s very discombobulating.

  I cautiously get up. I’m hungry. I wander out to the empty kitchen.

  Except it’s not.

  When I round the corner my dad jumps, standing at the open fridge, like he set off an alarm.

  He jumps about twenty feet. So do I. We are mutually shocked. We stand and recover.

  “Hi, Rylee,” he says.

  “Hi . . . Dad,” I respond.

  Then we stand some more, him with the fridge door hanging open.

  “You should shut the fridge, Dad,” I say gently.

  “Oh, yeah.” He gets the milk out. Then he finally shuts the fridge door.

  I can’t put it off, whatever it is, any longer. I sit down at the table.

  “Can I have some cereal too? Please?”

  “Oh, yeah. Sure.” He gets me stuff for cereal and sits down at the table. “Here.”

  We eat Cap’n Crunch. It’s very crunchy. We sound like The Bomb mackin’ on dry food.

  I start to feel better. Not great, and certainly not pro-Raven, but better.

  “Whadaya think of Beau and Leo, Dad?” I ask, though I don’t really care what he thinks.

  “Well . . . they didn’t have much to say for themselves, at first. But, then, boy, they spoke up all right. I didn’t know you were feeling so peak-ed about things, Rylee Marie.” He cocks his head to one side—his good ear. I notice a hearing aid in the other ear—or what’s left of it. It’s pretty scarred and gross.

  “Yes, you did, Dad—don’t lie; or you would have written me back! Or called! GramMer says she tells you about us all the time. You just checked out because it’s easier!”

  “I did not! Never! I send your mother money. Every month. I’ve taken care of you kids.”

  “Thanks! Seriously, thank you for that!” I’m hissing at him furiously, trying not to wake the house. (And I do mean it. I’ve seen the weary, sullen “single mom/deadbeat dad” attitude of some classmates, and I realize it could have been much worse.) “But that’s not the same, and you know it!”

  “You sure wouldn’t say that if I hadn’t sent money! That’s all you guys—your mother—ever wanted from me. As long as I kept the money coming . . . good ol’ Bank of Dad!”

  Okay, this is so unfair I want to punch him in the throat. I sit on my hands and grit my clenched teeth till they squeak. I close my eyes so I don’t have to see him.

  “Go to hell,” I rage through my teeth. “Don’t disrespect my mother.” I feel murderous.

  “I’m not, Rylee Marie! Your mother is a wonderful woman, and I will clock anyone in the gawddam’ snot locker who says otherwise, but she is hardhearted when it comes to her church! We never had a chance, with that in there! No one wants to be the bad guy all the time!”

  I suddenly stop snorting at his phraseology and start listening keenly. The church? What?!

  “What?!” I ask.

  “The whole damn Catholic church, Rylee Marie! When I met your mother she was a nurse. In a hospital run by a bunch of nuns, one of which was real nice; and after I was healed up I used to come talk with her sometimes—her name was Sister Saint George—because she knew I was lonesome. She set your mom and me on our first date. She thought your mom was just wonderful and would convert me, because your mom always said that she could only marry a Catholic boy.”

  I stare at him and chew deafeningly, so he can’t see how hard I’m listening. I gesture with my spoon for him to continue.

  “One thing led to another, and the next thing I know, I’m crazy about her and I’ve proposed and she’s so tickled, and so is Sister Saint George, and the next thing you know, I’m going to Catholic instruction and gettin’ told all kin
da dam’ things!”

  He looks at me as if pleading for understanding. I continue to hide my dawning interest and just play my game face. After a second he continues.

  “Well, I mean, fer gawd’s sake, Sugar-foots, the whole dam thing is like a fairy story! Talking snakes? Dead guys walking around? Wine just turning into blood? All kinda dam’ things I couldn’t take serious! And then, your mom got mad! Woo! Your mom can get mad harder and stay mad longer than anyone I ever met! And was I ever in the doghouse. We were already engaged and I said I was real sorry . . . then Sister Saint George told her to not give up, just keep working on me. And your mom really wanted kids—I did too. We thought maybe we could work it out. . . .” He looks at me in anguish.

  So that’s what my grandma was talking about when she said they weren’t “compatible people”!

  This is the first I’ve ever heard of this. He telling me about it finally, adult to adult. I feel a strange stirring of pity for him for the first time, thinking about it all. And I hear a dim refrain begin, and grow and gallop away, one I fear will repeat whenever I think of my dad, for the rest of my life:

  The poor old thing . . . the poor old thing . . . the poor old thing . . .

  They both meant well, my mom and dad, but I doubt they ever had a chance . . . not a prayer.

  My sore throat works with mute mourning. Poignantly I wonder if I will ever feel anything else for him. At this point it seems unlikely.

  Empathy is exhausting. GramMer didn’t tell me her god was so demanding.

  Later on, her words evoke a memory from a time when I was little. Like really little—

  We were all at the Puyallup Fair, Mom, Dad, me, Paul was around somewhere, and GramMer and Uncle Riley were there too. I was probably about four years old but I was bold. I wanted to go on those gondola pods—I don’t know what they’re called—the ones that run overhead on cables and you ride in them, like at a fair or up the side of a mountain or something. They looked like flying. I wanted to fly in one.

  My mom is afraid of heights. She took one look at the little capsule in the air and said, “No way, Rylee.” No matter what I said to plead and trip and whine it was not on. At one point I remember having kind of a meltdown and jumping up and down in an experimental tantrum. Sort of like a practice shot across the bow. But my mom remained unimpressed. I remember seeing her look at my grandma and roll her eyes. I also remember that royally pissed me off at my mom and I glared at her. Which caused my mom to give me a little frown.