Twisted Tree

by Kent Meyers

  The funny thing is, no one saw the car go down. We watched all night, and it was still there when the sky turned orange and the lake ice with it, glowing like the ice was a muted sun flat on the ground. Since I was tending the fire, I put on water to boil for coffee, and we were all so tired we were punch-drunk, just glad to have people around, and laughing at anything. When the sun came over the hill east of the lake, I added another stocking cap and told Wilbur if he got any worse at predicting the weather he could get a job on TV, and he played along, said, Uh-huh, that car might never go down, and Jake Red Heart said, It’s gone.

  Then he said it louder: It’s gone. When’d it go?

  We all looked then, and maybe it was because we were so tired, or maybe it was that car’d been on the lake so long we’d started thinking it was a natural thing. Whatever—when we looked and it wasn’t there, for a couple seconds none of us quite knew where we were. It was like the lake was a different lake and we were someplace else. We stared at it, then stared at each other, and asked each other if anyone’d seen it go. No one had, and there’d been no sound, but all that was out where the car’d been was a jagged hole, and sun on the tips of the waves the new wind was making there.

  And Wilbur forgot to look at his watch. Careful as he’d been all along to check it, when the actual time came, he forgot. By the time he remembered, no one was sure when the car’d last been seen. Wilbur couldn’t tell whether it was closer to the last name he’d crossed off or the first name not crossed off—so they split the pot, each winner getting a quarter of it, and Leonard getting half for providing the car. Then the three of them offered to host next year’s party together, so a tradition got started, though I still don’t believe in Wilbur’s forecasting abilities enough to think it’s likely that the party and the car’s disappearance are going to be the same again. Finding a junk heap on the rez won’t be a problem, though after Leonard’s stories about that ice cracking, we might have to find a Norwegian to drive the car onto the lake for us, maybe give him a free chance to bet in exchange, and invite him and his family and friends to the party. Of course, if the EPA ever finds out we’re sinking cars in a lake that’s supposed to be a creek, we’ll have to switch to big stones or something, and just tell each other they’re cars.

  Me and Bonnie and Leonard went over to Myrna’s after it all broke up. Leonard and I didn’t say anything to each other, we didn’t have to, we knew we were OK again, and Myrna made breakfast for us, and more coffee, and we reviewed the whole night, and Myrna’s four TVs sat there shut down, and after a while we got silent, too, and I figured Myrna was thinking of David walking toward an object on a road that everyone else has run away from. No TV will tell you anything about that.

  I thought of that car again, a little light down there, fish swimming into the window Leonard left open, lying down along the brake pedal and the accelerator, looking up through the windshield like they got their own fishbowl they can look at the world out of and then swim out again if they want. Everything all quiet. Maybe that car finally got clean of its awfulness. Or maybe not. Maybe something like what happened in that car’s so bad you drown yourself trying to get clean of it, and you still ain’t clean.

  I think I need to sleep, Leonard said.

  I looked up, and there we were in Myrna’s living room, and just the fact of Leonard mentioning sleep made me suddenly so tired the room was swimming, and Myrna and Leonard wavering and floaty. We all stood up. I was feeling weightless and heavy at the same time. I kind of paddled toward the door, following Leonard out, but just before I got there Leonard stopped and walked over and hugged Myrna. Sometimes Leonard just plain does the right thing, and there’s nothing to do but follow his example.

  Acknowledgments

  I wish to thank the following people for their generosity. Without any single one of them, this book would be less than it is.

  Vince King and Amy Fuqua read, with an astonishing attentiveness, every draft I put before them. The whole first chapter stems from their advice, and their insights are so numerous and so woven into the book that I cannot isolate or distinguish them.

  Wendy Mendoza shaped and inspired parts of this novel before it realized it was a novel.

  Lia Purpura suggested memorials and chaos theory and questioned chapters no one else did. Her advice sharpened the language, deepened the ending, and clarified the structure. She also said, “Salt.”

  Judith Kitchen’s rock-solid insights into character, relationships, and architecture, into what really mattered in the story and why, anchored and aligned me through two years of work. Her enthusiasm for the novel allowed me to believe in it. And she laughed at the right, dark things.

  Bill Kamowski spent an afternoon on a mountainside with me discussing this book. His exploration of possibilities at a critical time allowed me to restructure and continue.

  Al Masarik encouraged me in the earliest stages of the novel. His appreciation for the third chapter, in particular, kept me writing.

  Deaver Traywick said, “I want to hear more from the killer.”

  Ryan Bush said, “Maybe Hayley Jo comes into the pawnshop.”

  Karl Lehman said, “Audrey’s the reader. That putting the binoculars down.”

  Christine Cremean talked with me about motels and bartending, and trauma, and the spiritual components of anorexia.

  Dave Cremean said, “What about the dinosaur at Frontier Village?”

  Elea Carey said, “I don’t think Stanley and Laura should meet in a restaurant.”

  Julie Case recognized the fishing pole.

  Peggy Schumacher believed in the whole.

  Ahrar Ahmad, Tim Steckline, and Roger Miller helped me understand machine guns and their history.

  Jace DeCory helped me with Lakota names.

  My copyeditor, Barbara Wood, caught numerous mistakes, and even noticed the colors of characters’ eyes. Lisa Glover kept it all straight.

  Sam Hurst invited me and an entire class I was teaching to his buffalo ranch, and spent an afternoon with us. Dan O’Brien’s writing also contributed to my understanding of buffalo.

  Black Hills State University supported me, and the Faculty Research Committee provided travel funds for research.

  Noah Lukeman’s agenting skills and understanding of both literature and publishing are indispensable to me. He represented the book with his usual verve and passion, understood its value, and made others believe in it—and helped me believe in it myself.

  Jenna Johnson insisted, insisted, insisted that the book could be more, and she wouldn’t let up until it was. She had a vision of the book that opened it up creatively for me. I don’t know what more a writer could ask for in an editor.

  My family, Zindie and Derek and Lauren and Jordan, supported and believed, and anchored and allowed and made possible.

  About the Author

  KENT MEYERS is the author of The Work of Wolves, Light in the Crossing, The River Warren, and The Witness of Combines. He is a recipient of an ALA Alex Award, two Minnesota Book Awards, and a Mountains and Plains Booksellers Association Award. His work has been included in the New York Times list of Notable Books and is published in a wide array of prestigious magazines.