Delta Girls

by Gayle Brandeis

  We stepped into Foster’s Bighorn, a legendary local restaurant; the walls were covered with taxidermied animal heads—bear, deer, lion, rhino, some animals I couldn’t even identify.

  “Antelope, boar, cougar, deer …” Quinn pointed to the different heads, cringing.

  “Creepy dead elephant,” said Abcde. “Fuck.”

  “Language,” I warned, tilting my head at Quinn.

  “Yes, it is.” Abcde sounded defiant. “Yes, it is language. And I intend to use all of it.”

  “Abcde,” I started.

  “No word is off-limits for a poet.” Her eyes blazed in the dim room. “Quinn should know that. ‘Fuck,’ ‘shit,’ ‘cunt’ … all of it’s fair game!”

  Quinn clapped her hand over her mouth, scandalized and giddy.

  “Nice,” I said. “Real nice, Abcde,” but she just shrugged.

  “This, however”—she swept an arm out to take in all the animal trophies—“this is truly unfair game.”

  A couple of people in the restaurant threw us dirty looks, and we slunk back outside. At least I slunk; Abcde and Quinn held their heads high. We walked to the end of the street, which overlooked the water, and found a monument to Humphrey, the humpback that had visited the Delta in 1985. Donated by “Silva’s Memorial’s” (“Why can’t people learn to use apostrophes correctly?” Abcde huffed), it looked like a large gray tombstone, a large picture of a whale engraved onto its smooth marble front, these words underneath:

  TO REMEMBER THE VISIT OF

  HUMPHREY

  THE HUMPBACK WHALE

  OCT. 10, 1985 NOV. 4, 1985

  A poem by a twelve-year-old boy was carved below in smaller letters, the boy’s signature also engraved in the stone:

  HUMPHREY THE HUMPBACK WHALE, A MIGHTY WHALE WAS HE

  HE SWAM INTO THE DELTA, TO SEE WHAT HE COULD SEE.

  THE PEOPLE STOOD AND STARED, THE FISH WERE SCARED.

  HE WAS FAMOUS ACROSS THE NATION, UNTIL THEY ENDED

  HIS VACATION.

  “You call that a poem?” Abcde was livid.

  “It’s cute,” said Quinn.

  “Cute doesn’t cut it.” Abcde smacked her purse against the monument. “Cute isn’t worthy of being immortalized in stone! All bewail cute!”

  “He was only twelve when he wrote it,” I said. “Give the kid a break.”

  “I give no one a break for sloppy writing,” said Abcde. “I’ve seen twelve-year-olds write very sophisticated work. ‘Until they ended his vacation.’ Who is this mysterious ‘they,’ and what did they do to the whale?”

  I suddenly felt sorry for the students in her workshop at Squaw Valley.

  “They saved him,” said Quinn. “The rescue people.” She had heard the story many times about the humpback’s visit over twenty years ago. The fact that he found his way back to the ocean after almost a month in the Delta seemed to give her hope for Bartlett and Seckel, but I knew she was still worried.

  “He saved himself, honey,” said Abcde. “That’s what all of us have to do.”

  A little tingle ran across my ribs.

  “Anyway,” she said. “Quinn could write a much better poem, and she’s nine.”

  “I don’t know …” Quinn looked down at her blue flip-flops.

  “We’ll work on it,” she said. “We’ll work on it so we’ll be ready when they make the monument for our whales.”

  “If our whales die,” said Quinn, “do you think they’ll put their heads on the wall of that restaurant?”

  “I doubt it,” I said. “Their heads would take up the whole place.”

  Quinn looked bereft.

  “They’re not going to die on our watch,” said Abcde, and I wanted to tell her not to say such a thing to Quinn. Even if they were on their way to the ocean, they weren’t out of the woods. Sometimes death can sneak up on a person. You can’t always keep someone alive, no matter how hard you will their heart to keep beating.

  WHEN WE RETURNED with cartons of bags for our sellable pears that evening, there was a big commotion in the slough. The whales were back. This time, the Marine Mammal people were piping sounds of killer whales, the humpbacks’ natural predators, into the water. Bartlett, the mother whale, was thrashing around, trying to protect Seckel, her baby. She was smacking her tail against the water in a way I had never seen before, sending huge plumes into the air that crashed onto the deck of the houseboat, which was already bucking from her movements. I had left some windows open—the houseboat was going to be drenched inside. I looked out at the Coast Guard boat but couldn’t tell which life-jacketed person was Sam—all of them had their windbreaker hoods on, ducking against the assault of water.

  “Maybe you should stay in the house tonight.” Ben stepped up next to me as I watched from the levee. “We have a guest room.” His breath was warm on my neck. My heart flopped fishlike in my chest.

  The mother whale thwapped her tail against the slough again, shooting more water through my window. I was glad to see she still had such strength in her—she had seemed a bit listless lately, her color growing dull, her sores looking worse—but I hoped the beautiful bedspread wouldn’t be ruined.

  “Thanks,” I said, avoiding eye contact, biting down a smile. “That sounds like a good idea.”

  SHE DIDN’T HAVE TO INVITE NATHAN INTO HER ROOM that night. It just made sense for him to follow her through the door, for him to kiss her against the hall of the entryway, for them to walk, kissing, into the room, drop, kissing, onto the bed.

  She held her breath as he unzipped the jacket of her tracksuit, as he slipped all her clothes off before she even really knew what was happening—he did it easily, swiftly, like a magician pulling a tablecloth out from under plates and knives. She held her breath as he took off his own clothes and stood above her, naked, just staring at her body. She hoped she looked sexy enough on top of the bedspread. She hoped he wasn’t disappointed in the sparseness of her curves. She could barely bring herself to look between his legs; when she stole a quick glance, his penis looked like a small arm raising a fist—a gesture of victory, or maybe threat.

  “Look at you,” he said, wonder in his voice. “You’re like ice before anyone’s ever skated on it.”

  She thought about fresh, new ice, that pure white gleam. Did it long for a blade to dig into its surface or did it cringe against the metal? Was that first slice a relief or a wound? She closed her eyes and tried to be like the ice, welcoming the blade, letting it tear her surface to shreds.

  AFTER THE WHALES TOOK OFF, I WENT DOWN TO THE houseboat to gather our belongings. The place was drenched; so were all our clothes that weren’t safely tucked away in the closet. I tossed our wet things into the washing machine; the bedspread, sadly, was soaked through, and too big to fit in the small stacked washer. I wondered if the Vieiras would let me wash it in their house.

  I had only been in their kitchen before, with glimpses of the living and dining rooms; most of the furniture looked like it had been there for generations—well used, well maintained, just a touch of formality in some of the armchairs, some of the carved dining-set legs. I had never been up the staircase with its thick wooden banister. Mrs. Vieira showed me where to put my things in the guest room that was also her sewing room, neat piles of fabric next to the sewing machine, colorful spools of thread mounted on dowels on the wall. I tried to catch a glimpse of Ben’s room on the way back down the hall, but all the other doors were closed. Everyone was busy preparing for the fair the next morning.

  Abcde, Mrs. Vieira, and I stayed up until 2 a.m. bagging pears to sell from our booth, about ten pears per bag, while Mr. Vieira and Ben worked on the tractor. The paper bags were adorable—like little pale blue gift bags with a single white paper handle arching across the top; they were the same color as a box from Tiffany’s, and nicely set off the pale green of the pears. The packages looked like they should be on the cover of Martha Stewart’s magazine. We stuck a flyer for Eau de Vieira in each bag, plus a pamphlet about why organic was better
.

  Quinn helped for the first few hours, but eventually passed out on the padded swing on the front porch. I had to carry her upstairs to the guest room.

  “You’re strong.” Ben stepped out of the bathroom; it smelled as if he had just brushed his teeth. He was wearing pajama pants and a T-shirt so old, you could see through it. His chest hair looked like some sort of plant pressed under wax paper.

  “Lifting all those pears.” I could hear the strain in my voice. Quinn was a bit heavier than a bag of fruit—especially when she was asleep.

  “Well, good night, I guess,” he said. He must have showered recently, too. I could smell the spicy tang of his shampoo, feel some residual steam rising from his skin.

  “Yeah, tomorrow’s a busy day,” I said. If Quinn hadn’t been in my arms, I would have taken a step closer. Part of me was tempted to just set her on the floor, take a step closer anyway.

  “Sweet dreams, then.” He smiled and disappeared into his darkened room.

  After I put Quinn on the bed, I stood in the doorway for a while, shifted to make the floorboards creak beneath me, but Ben’s door stayed closed.

  I FELT DISORIENTED when I woke up on a stiff tall mattress with a wrought-iron headboard, a bumpy chenille spread. The light coming through the windows looked different from the light in the houseboat, thinner, brighter. Quinn was still sound asleep as I got up to brush my teeth, use the bathroom. I could smell coffee wafting, so I threw a sweatshirt on over my pajamas and padded downstairs to finagle a cup.

  Ben was in the kitchen, still in his pajamas, too, leaning over a bowl of pears. The thin cotton pants rode low on his hips; as he bent forward, his shirt rode up, exposing a strip of his lower back. His skin looked so smooth; I clenched my hands to keep myself from reaching out to touch it.

  Ben turned around, cupping a pear in his palm.

  “You know,” he said, as if we were already in the middle of a conversation, “Emerson said, ‘There are only ten minutes in the life of a pear when it is perfect to eat.’”

  “Nice quote,” I said.

  “This pear I have here?” He held it out in front of him. “This pear is perfect.”

  I walked across the room, leaned toward the fruit. Its scent was sweet as rain.

  “Take a bite.” He grinned mischievously.

  “Really?” I asked.

  “We only have a ten-minute window.” He held the pear closer.

  I touched my lips to the skin, warm from the sun through the window, and could feel it give slightly, like a sigh. I pressed harder until juice flooded into my mouth. The skin of the pear curled against my nose as my teeth went deeper. Ben took a bite from the other side. My eyes met his. He pulled back slightly.

  “Melting flesh,” he said, his lips wet.

  “Yes,” I said, my whole body turned to liquid.

  “That’s what you look for in a pear,” he said. “Melting flesh.”

  The pear’s flesh was perfect, ambrosial, melting like butter on my tongue. He took another bite. I took another bite, bigger, my mouth open a bit wider. Our lips moving toward the slender, thready spine, our cheeks covered with juice, chins dripping.

  “Eema.” Quinn walked into the kitchen. “There are enough pears. You don’t have to share one.”

  I jumped back and laughed nervously, wiping my face with the collar of my sweatshirt.

  “I was just teaching your mom the proper way to eat a ripe pear,” said Ben. He lifted another from the bowl. “You should try.”

  “I know how to eat a pear,” said Quinn, and took it from his hand.

  KAREN CURLED ON THE BED AS NATHAN SLEPT NEXT to her. She hoped the ice didn’t burn like this. She hoped her blade didn’t send pain all the way up the center of the rink. How could this be what everyone raved about? How could this be the subject of songs and poems, the cause of sly whispers and winks? How could this be what she had wanted?

  “YOU LIKE THIS? You like this?” Nathan had grunted as he pounded into her.

  She had nodded, eyes clamped shut, tears streaming down her face.

  Afterward, he had kissed her so sweetly, cleaned the blood off her thighs with a wet washcloth, promised it would get easier over time, but she wasn’t sure she believed him.

  ———

  SHE COULDN’T FALL asleep with him beside her. She tried to match her breathing to his, but it made her feel claustrophobic, as if she had forgotten how to breathe on her own. She closed her eyes and willed herself, uselessly, to get some rest. She didn’t want to be bleary-eyed and groggy for the full day of interviews ahead. She finally drifted off for an hour or so before she woke to Nathan nuzzling her breast. She could feel him hard against her side, and it filled her with a cottony panic.

  “I don’t think I can …,” she started, her head ringing with exhaustion.

  “You don’t need to do anything,” he said. “Just relax.”

  He took one nipple in his mouth, then the other, sending delicious shivers through her body. The raw place between her legs began to throb. His mouth trailed down her belly, to that broken, aching place, and he soothed it with his tongue, he lavished it with his tongue, he lapped until the pleasure crested over the discomfort, and her whole body filled with liquid light.

  AS THEY SAT for press conferences and interviews in the morning, Karen felt spaced out—between lack of sleep and her body still reverberating from Nathan’s ministrations, she couldn’t answer reporters’ questions with much more than a knowing smile.

  “It’s a year of upsets,” said a tall woman in a bright red suit from one of the networks. “Tara Lipinski unseated Michelle Kwan for the ladies’ title; you, a new team, unseat Meno and Sand. Karen, do you consider yourself part of the teen queen phenomenon at Nationals this year?”

  Karen swallowed hard. Up until the day before, Karen had looked at Tara and Michelle as her peers. Not her friends, but her peers, all of them serious teen skaters on the national stage—not that Nathan thought Tara was serious; he called her a “naughty little monkey,” which made Karen more jealous than she knew she should be. Today, those fourteen-and sixteen-year-olds looked like little girls to her. Their bodies hard, untouched. They thought jumping was the closest they could get to heaven. Just wait until they found out what they were missing. Just wait until they found out what their bodies could really do.

  “No,” said Karen. “I just consider myself Nathan’s queen.” She turned to kiss him; even with her eyes closed, the flash of the cameras was blinding.

  THE PEAR FAIR WAS HELD IN A LARGE PARK IN Courtland, about twenty minutes northwest of Comice. The Vieiras hoisted their shiny red vintage tractor onto the trailer; the back of the pickup truck was already filled with our freshly bagged pears. I felt giddy driving behind them, pear still lingering in my mouth, the scent of Ben still filling my senses.

  A church across the street from the park had “Praise Pears with Prayer” on its marquee, and I said “Hallelujah” out loud as we drove by. A group of people in tank tops on the five-and ten-mile Pear Fair fun run disappeared around the corner a few blocks ahead.

  People were setting up their booths around the trees when we arrived—some under E-Z Up tents, others inside big wooden boxes, like Lucy’s psychology stand in Peanuts; Ben and Mr. Vieira quickly hammered together theirs, pale green with yellow pears painted all around the top. Our booth was situated in the food area—mostly pear-related goods, but people set up grills for big lunches full of sausages and gyros and fajitas, too. There was also an area for local artists to display and sell their work, a beer garden where the Vieiras planned to give out some samples of Eau de Vieira, a general vending area where people sold things like fuzzy marionettes and smelly skin care products and fleece ponchos printed with wolves and football team logos. A kids’ area full of carnival games and inflatable structures for jumping. A large tent arching over picnic tables and a small stage set up for a roster of entertainers. Several booths for community organizations. A small local history museum set up insi
de the old stucco gym/auditorium on the grounds. A giant papier-mâché pear to house the Big Pear Contest.

  “Can I look around, Eema?” Quinn asked.

  “Only if Abcde goes with you.” I was slated to work the booth; the Vieiras were going to pay me for my time. That wasn’t a concern for Abcde; she had been volunteering in the orchard. I was surprised a poet didn’t have to worry about money.

  “She’ll be in good hands, Izzy.” Abcde winked.

  I gave Quinn a hug and a few dollars. I had put her in a bright red and orange striped T-shirt so she’d be easy to spot in the crowd. I myself was dressed as a farmer, even though I never dressed that way on the orchard—overalls, checkered shirt, big floppy straw hat, a bandanna around my neck, all supplied by the Vieiras. Plus my sunglasses. They were expecting thousands of people.

  I started to lug bags of pears over to the stand. Roberts walked up just as I was setting the first batch on the little wooden counter.

  “You can’t put that there.” He pointed to our sign proclaiming ORGANIC.

  “We’re organic,” I said.

  “You haven’t been certified yet. You need to put ‘transitioning.’”

  “We’re close enough.” I looked over at Mrs. Vieira for backup, but she was taking money from the customers who had already lined up. Plus she couldn’t—or at least wouldn’t—speak English. I glanced around for Mr. Vieira or Ben, but they had disappeared.

  “Then I can put it, too,” he said. “I didn’t spray today.”

  “It’s not the same thing,” I said. The Vieiras hadn’t sprayed for almost three years.

  “You bet your sweet patootie it is.” He stalked off to his booth.

  A COUPLE OF hours into the day, I took a short break to use the restroom inside the auditorium, and decided to take a moment to wander through the historical display inside—old crates and scales and sorting tables, plus easels full of posterboards covered with photos of the region, black-and-white pictures of old floods, old houses and orchards when they were new, old schools, Chinese and Portuguese children mugging for the camera in their stiff white collared shirts. Big clamshell dredgers scooping up dirt for the levees. Pickers looking serious and noble on their spindly wooden ladders. I found a couple of pictures of the Vieiras standing in front of their farmhouse in the late 1800s, working their fields in the early 1900s, holding serious-looking babies in the 1930s—including Mr. Vieira—and was happy to see a whole display of Ben’s grandmother’s crate labels, her name and portrait prominently featured at the top. All around me, fairgoers pointed at old pictures of their grandparents, their aunts and uncles, their houses, and I felt a wave of nostalgia for something I never had.