by E. C. Frey
As a child, I loved the game of rock-paper-scissors: the paper, ever so gently, without violence, simply shrouded the rock and obliterated any trace of its existence, a fine and translucent membrane coating the most solid of objects. It was a game I played with Terrell. But his strength could not endure the shrouding jungle. No stone could withstand the torment of clinging vine and rotting earth.
Now I have Jerome. I promised Jerome that this would be my last sojourn in Africa. Just like that, I reversed course. It only took a moment to re-chart my path toward an entwined life—a life I have avoided since my teenage years in Sunny Hollow. I vowed then that I would never again lose myself, never again be cast out into the world. If I was already alone, I could never again be made to be alone.
When Terrell went to Vietnam in 1968, he did not return, nor did his remains. The mystery of it nearly drove me mad like it did Mama. In 1975, while I was still in college, my sweet mama put a gun to her head. I rushed home from classes. She had chosen the messiest of exits.
I understood. Something should mark the passing. Mama had lain for years imagining the worst of it—body parts spread across an inhospitable jungle. No time to gather the bits and pieces as the Viet Cong moved in; no talisman to mark his passing from the world, the ultimate violence, the ultimate betrayal, her beloved only son corrupted by the dark forces of the interior jungle. I knew because I had built the same scene into my history, because at night dark creatures slithered through my dreams, and somewhere between the dream and the waking, the figures materialized in the shadows that danced and spun across the walls of my bedroom. My bedroom could never again serve as sanctuary in a world that had lost its inviolability.
I smiled and thanked the authorities for their concern. How could they understand? Mama had ceased to exist in 1968. She had become a ghost moving through the days as if they were something to be haunted by the ambivalent, the betwixt and between. She had only destroyed the shell—they had gutted her soul long ago. After all, what was a mother without her flesh and bone?
Daddy was broken differently. He stooped against the weight of his losses. He had believed in the possibility of a different world. He had taken up the cross of non-violent resistance, and his son had died for the sin of his beliefs. And now his wife lay shattered in a sterile box of death, her brain matter gone but its casing neatly pieced back together, as if nothing amiss had ever transpired to mar the integrity of the illusion. He told me he longed to rip the head apart and reveal to everyone the truth. You could not crack a shell and make it whole again. The bits of shells were just so damned complicated.
I begged Daddy to hold on for me. But he too let go. His broken heart could not be so easily repaired, not even for me. Within the year, I was alone. And I planned to stay that way. The darkness did not yield easily to the light.
So how did I end up here? All that resolve nurtured through the years, gone, with one impetuous promise, one moment of weakness buried within the folds of compromise. Can I possibly quit my wanderings? Africa is as close to home as I have. Here, the pace of striving makes me want to tear my skin from my bones. Terrell, my reason for recreating my life so many years ago, will be reduced to the memory of a history I have maintained as the present—his promise still intact. He is still my rock. Can I forsake him for another? And this will be my reality, my wanderlust a torment. One year and I will be done.
I just have to convince Jerome.
I have a year to convince myself.
Jerome walks through the door ten minutes after me.
“What’s up?”
I can’t gauge his mood. “Nothing much. I got a bunch of errands done. How was your night last night?”
“It was good. You know the guys were giving me the business. You know how it is.”
“No. I don’t. My friends tend to support me and don’t bother with the business.”
He scowls at me.
I am tired. I did not want to go in this direction. “I didn’t mean it that way.”
He scratches his head. “They made some decent points. Why should we stay together when you’re choosing to leave? It’s not like you’re going to Paris or Bangkok, where they at least have semi-decent phone service. No, you go to some war-torn country in Africa and I have to sit and imagine you coming home in a body bag. You’re asking me to hang on to a prayer.”
At least there would be a body bag. But I can’t say this to him. I promised myself I would check my sarcasm and cynicism at the door. “I’d never thought of it that way. I’ve always returned to Africa with no one left behind to worry about me.”
“Maybe you should consider sticking with that plan.”
“Maybe that’s not what I want anymore. Maybe I don’t want to leave for Africa without knowing you’re here when I return.”
“Then don’t go at all.”
“You know I can’t do that. I’ve already committed.”
“Yeah, I know. So what does that make me, your afterthought?”
“No. I just don’t want to lose you.” I wipe the creeping sweat from my forehead.
“Okay, tell you what, we’ll compromise. You show me how much you’re willing to sacrifice in exchange for what I’m willing to sacrifice: you give up seven days in Charleston and I’ll consider waiting 365. Sounds like you’re getting the bargain.”
I could sacrifice just about anything except that sacred pact. I can’t begin to explain this to Jerome. It would require me giving up a secret I am duty bound to keep. My honor depends upon it. Besides, how could he ever see me with the same eyes again once he knows?
“I can’t do that, Jerome. I’ll do anything else, but that commitment runs so deep, I would never jeopardize it.”
“I thought so. You have some weird thing going on. You take a detour to some little town without an international airport before you fly out for a whole year. A whole year, Eve? You have to take your smart-ass clothes with you. That’s just fucked up. You can’t even spend your last week with me. You gotta spend your last moments with your girlfriends. What does that make me? It makes me a fool. It doesn’t make any sense but you want me to buy into it.”
“You wouldn’t understand, Jerome. I just have to go. Please, don’t do this to me. I’m willing to stay home after this year. I will. I’ll give up Africa after this year. Just give us a chance.”
“Shit, this makes no sense, Eve. You can’t even make the promise without breaking a sweat. Look at you. Jesus, what the hell am I supposed to do for a year waiting for you?”
“I’ll be back before you know it. A year goes quickly.”
He shakes his head, walks to the window, and pulls the curtain back on the grayness of the moment. Drops of water cling to the window where tiny beads dance along the perimeter of the apartment.
His voice is barely audible. “You’re playing me now.”
“No, I swear I’m not. I won’t leave again. I promise. You have to believe me. I will never leave again.”
Jerome looses his grip on the curtain before turning. “You’re not giving anything up. Why should I believe you’ll even come back? That leaves me sitting here like a bitch-whipped fool.”
“No. I promise. I’ve never promised anything to anyone. Except . . .”
Jerome slides his hands into his pockets. “Except Terrell and your dad.” He sighs. “All right, but one year and you’re done. We will never have this conversation again. It’s done. I won’t be a fool again.”
“One year and I’m done.” I bury my face in his chest. I could stay like this forever. How will I survive Africa without him? Suddenly, the land I’m headed to seems as grim and perilous as the darkness behind my eyelids, vast and deadly. It is a momentous shift in consciousness, a rift as large and cavernous as that which divides East Africa from the continent. I have never feared the trip to the camp the way I do now.
I miss Terrell. I saw things more clearly back then. In Terrell’s view, the truth of the world divided into black and white. I have never been able to
capture his simplicity. And now his body lays fully decayed in some faraway Vietnamese jungle halfway around the world. He is no more than dust. But he is here with me now. He has always been here in my heart, safe and made whole. The answer is stronger and clearer than ever before, pulled from the heart of the jungle.
Open your eyes.
Stay.
But I am not ready to listen yet. There is still something to do. There is still a wrong to be remedied.
10 Mariah
I wait. Wait for my coworker Daniel’s call. Wait to make sense of everything. Wait to impart my bad news to Eve. As if everything can be divined, clarified, and fixed with just a little bit of waiting. Grandmother can hold out forever. Patience is an Indian virtue. Perhaps I have been away from my people too long. I am impatient. I finish packing. Daniel will not call for a while, but my questions multiply. Like me, he’s been investigating Astride Amalgamated Corporation, but from different angles. He’s investigating malfeasance issues. I’m researching its impact on water issues. The bedside clock reads noon here—it’s midnight in Kuala Lumpur. It will be another six hours before he calls.
His voice in the message unnerved me. Why is he sending me a flash drive? What is he so paranoid about? He is the coolest and most unflappable person I know.
I can’t put those questions to bed for another six hours. I can deal with my bad news and Eve now.
“Hello.”
“Eve?”
“What’s up? And don’t tell me nothing. Spill it.”
“Well, I’m waiting for a call from a colleague. He sounds terrified and he is the least likely person. Second, I can’t find anything on the guy from down the street in Sunny Hollow. Jake Cruise remembered him—remembered when the guy arrived straight from ’Nam, remembered that his name was Paul. It’s just he can’t find anything on him. No record that he ever lived there. It’s like he never existed.”
“What do you mean he never existed? Everyone knew him. He was the lunatic who yelled at all of us kids at Halloween. Did you call Sunny Hollow? They must have a record. His house burned down. Shit. The whole damn neighborhood fought that fire that night.”
The room spins. The heat of the night burns my face. It is as if I have never left that place. My dad’s spirit is there. Burning in the flames.
“Mariah?”
“Of course I contacted Sunny Hollow police. Jake Cruise did too. I’m telling you, there’s no record of him. That house he was living in belonged to a woman named Esther LeBlanc and she claimed she was there at the time. She remembers the fire.”
“What? That doesn’t make any sense.”
“I know. I’m telling you. He doesn’t exist. At least, not officially. He’s never existed—not by the name we heard, anyway. There aren’t any records unless they’re classified, in which case I wouldn’t be able to gain access, but I would at least be able to see that he existed. Also, I had a vision.”
“What happened in the dream?”
“The vision.”
“Okay, the vision.”
“I was being stalked by something. When I investigated, a cougar slunk down my hallway. She grabbed my neck and tore it out. I wasn’t sleeping. I was sitting at my computer.”
“Yes, but clearly you had zoned out or dozed off or whatever you want to call it.”
“I understand you think I was daydreaming. I wasn’t and that’s the point. It’s an omen. Like something bad will happen. Something is stalking me. Dogging my steps. It’s a warning, Eve. Grandmother would tell me to listen to my senses. My heart is telling me something bad is afoot. I am packed to leave tomorrow for a border town in Mexico to investigate the water use of a company my colleague is calling to tell me about. A malfeasance issue. He is sending a flash drive. That’s highly unusual. And I’m about to expose things about that water use using—”
“Your voice. I get it. Maybe he just wants someone to know, to be on the lookout, and he’s sending the drive because he’s worried about losing all his work. It could be simple.”
“Yeah, I know. But he sounded freaked out.”
“I don’t understand why you don’t call home. Talk to your grandmother.”
“She doesn’t have a phone.”
“I know that. But your brothers do. Call them.”
I shake my head. I cannot share this part of my world with them. “I’m not ready to do that yet.”
“All right. I get it. Are you going to Charleston from Mexico?”
“No. I’ll only be there two days. It’s just a factory, and I’m just looking at it as an example of virtual water. It uses thousands of gallons of water to produce chips for computers that are then sent to Kuala Lumpur. My piece deals with embedded water in consumed products. Not just computers. I’ll come home and finish my piece before I go to Charleston. I don’t have to touch any malfeasance issues. Daniel is doing all of that.”
“All right. When does your flight get to Charleston?”
“Thursday at five. When do you arrive?”
“Thursday night at nine.”
“You want to meet for a night cap?”
“I’ll be in the lobby waiting for you.”
“It’s a date. See you then.”
“Mariah. We were young. Maybe we’re not remembering his name or the house correctly. There’s no reason to believe he disappeared and is just reappearing. Rethink it.”
“I will. But Jake remembers him too. We can’t all be wrong.”
“Well, something doesn’t add up.”
“Yeah, I know. See you in Charleston.”
As soon as I hang up I begin to review my notes on AAC. The production of one chip for one computer generates 89 pounds of waste and uses 2,800 gallons of water. The dicing and polishing of wafers uses huge amounts of water with hydrofluoric acid. Testing is conducted using other acids and toxic chemicals. AAC pumps huge amounts of water from an aquifer under the area that doesn’t have a large recharge zone. I need to find the containment ponds to find out how close they are to the water treatment facility. I can’t imagine one company producing tons of toxic wastewater next to their water treatment facility. It’s a symbiotic nightmare. The International Monetary Fund, as a condition for a loan, required Mexico to guarantee AAC a 50 percent margin. AAC moved in and raised prices fourfold. Those who could not afford it had their water turned off. Those who worked on the computer chip manufacturing side and, of course, needed to keep their factory jobs. On the sanitation side of the agreement, AAC made some changes. I don’t know what those changes are, but I plan to find out. It is the same story elsewhere. The International Monetary Fund, The World Bank, and the United Nations wield the economic carrot and supply the stick where a country is uncooperative. Past pattern and practice. I need more than two days to wrap this story up. I lied to Eve. Unintentionally. It was not my plan to investigate AAC’s malfeasance issues, but that’s what I’m already prepared to do. I can’t help myself.
I begin the list of questions to ask and people to see. The lack of sleep catches up to me and my eyes grow heavy. I jerk and wake, but the fatigue overwhelms me. I’m safe in here. Outside, the sky has darkened and rumbles are distant.
I roll in the sun-baked grass. Mustangs graze nearby and my dogs roll around next to me. It was a bitter winter in the city. The warmth is welcome.
I shade my eyes. A few stray clouds pass overhead, but they only provide a contrast to the brilliance of a High Plains sky, not that of D.C. There are no buildings to obstruct its beauty, no trees to obscure its immensity. I am home.
My contentment is complete. There are no deadlines. But the heavens roil now with black angry clouds. A shaft or two of light shines on the earth like a ray gun searching out its target, but even those glimmers disappear under the anger of the inner atmosphere. The wind kicks up and for miles there is nothing to see but bending grass.
The horses run as a herd toward the barn. The dogs nuzzle me and bark. They want me to get up. The air is rent with electric charge and the hairs o
n my body stand and pulse with the electromagnetic field. I am in big trouble if the electric storm moves through and catches me out in the middle of the prairie. There is no shelter for a good distance. My limbs are leaden and I move too slowly. In the distance, my brothers shepherd the horses to safety and the dogs sprint toward them.
A lone light shines and outlines the interior of the barn, a warm and comforting sanctuary. I motion to my brothers to wait. I am coming. They wave back as the dogs bolt through the doors. My brothers each take a door and close them from the inside.
I am alone.
The tornado bears down on me.
I run.
I don’t want to die alone. I vault toward the barn, but I feel a sharp pain in both my shoulders, and then I’m lifted into the air. I look up at an immense body—a lone eagle whose cries pierce the roar of the storm. He carries me to safety.
The storm spends itself, the clouds roll back, and the sun shines as though the storm had never existed. Those things that had been caught in its grasp are unscathed and moving toward home.
From the middle of the debris, something moves toward me. Whoever it is, he is confused. I motion him away; the figure continues to move intently. I turn to find the eagle, but he is perched on a lone tree, preening his feathers.
I turn again toward the figure. He is hideous and angry. His naked body is covered in paint in a symbolic fashion that I don’t recognize. He is not Lakota or Dakota or Ho-Chunk. He wields a club above his head and large bones are woven through his nose and ears.
I recognize them as human bones still dripping blood. I scream but I produce no sound. He laughs.
Tears stream down my cheeks. I must flee, but he is so close I smell his rotting flesh. I cover my throat before he lunges, and then hear the piercing cry of the eagle as he lifts me high into the air. I look toward earth as the evil creature shakes his bones and curses me.
