Migrations

by Charlotte McConaghy

  I’m not sure when I first started dreaming of the passage, or when it became as much a part of me as the instinct for breath. It’s been a long time, or feels it. I haven’t cultivated this myself; it swallowed me whole. At first an impossible, foolish fantasy: the notion of securing a place on a fishing vessel and having its captain carry me as far south as he is able; the idea of following the migration of a bird, the longest natural migration of any living creature. But a will is a powerful thing, and mine has been called terrible.

  2

  I was born Franny Stone. My Irish mother gave birth to me in a small Australian town where she’d been left, broke and alone. She nearly died in the birthing, too far from the nearest hospital. But live she did, a survivor to her core. I don’t know how she found the money, but not long after we moved back to Galway, and there I spent the first decade of my life in a wooden house so close to the sea I was able to tune my swift child’s pulse to the shhh shhh of the neap and spring tides. I thought we were called Stone because we lived in a town surrounded by low stone walls that snaked silver through the hilly yellow fields. The second I was able to walk I wandered along those curving walls and I ran my fingers over their rough edges and I knew they must lead to the place from where I truly came.

  Because one thing was clear to me from the start: I didn’t belong.

  I wandered. Through cobbled streets or into paddocks, where long grass whispered hish as I passed between. Neighbors would find me exploring the flowers in their gardens, or out in the far hills climbing one of the trees so bent by the wind that its brittle fingers now reached sideways along the earth. They’d say, “Watch this one, Iris, she’s got itchy feet and that’s a tragedy.” Mam hated me being critiqued like that, but she was honest about having been abandoned by my dad. She wore the wound of it like a badge of honor. It had happened all her life: people left her, and the only way to bear it was proudly. But she would say to me most mornings that if I ever left her that would be it, the final curse, and she would give up.

  So I stayed and stayed, until one day I couldn’t stay any longer. I was made of a different kind of thing.

  We had no money, but we went often to the library. According to Mam, inside the pages of a novel lived the only beauty offered up by the world. Mam would set the table with plate, cup, and book. We’d read through meals, while she bathed me, while we lay shivering in our beds, listening to the scream of wind through the cracked windows. We’d read while we balanced on the low rock walls that Seamus Heaney made famous in his poetry. A way to leave without really leaving.

  Then one day, just outside Galway where the changing light leaches the blue from the water and drapes it over the long grass, I met a boy and he told me a story. There was a lady, long ago, who spent her life coughing up feathers, and one day when she was gnarled and gray she stretched from a woman into a black bird. From then on dusk held her in its thrall, and night’s great yawning mouth swallowed her whole.

  He told me this and then the boy kissed me with vinegar lips from the chips he was eating, and I decided that this was my favorite story of all, and that I wanted to be a bird when I was gray.

  After that, how could I not run away with him? I was ten years old; I packed a satchel filled only with books and I heaved it over my shoulder and set off, just briefly, just for a nose about, a wee adventure, nothing more. We rolled out with the storm that very same afternoon, and wound our way up the west coast of Ireland until his great sprawling family decided to turn their cars and caravans inland. I didn’t want to leave the sea, so I snuck away without anyone noticing and spent two days on the stormy shore. This was where I belonged, where all the silver walls led. To salt and sea and wind pockets that could carry you away.

  But in the night I slept, and I dreamed of feathers in my lungs, so many I choked on them. I woke coughing and frightened and knew I had made a mistake. How could I have left her?

  The walk to a village was longer than any I’d tried, and the books grew so heavy. I started leaving them on the road, a trail of words in my wake. I hoped they would help someone else find their way. A kind fat lady in the bakery fed me soda bread, then paid for my bus ticket and waited with me until it arrived. She hummed instead of talking and the tune got stuck in my head so that even after I’d left her at the station I kept hearing her deep voice in my ears.

  When I arrived home my mother was gone.

  And that was that.

  Perhaps the feathers had come for her, like they whispered they would in my dream. Perhaps my father had returned for her. Or the strength of her sadness had turned her invisible. Either way, my wandering feet had abandoned her, like she’d warned me they would.

  I was taken from my mother’s home and sent back to Australia to live with my paternal grandmother. I didn’t see the point in staying in any one place after that. I only ever tried once more, many years later when I met a man called Niall Lynch and we loved each other with brands to our names and bodies and souls. I tried for Niall, like I did for my mother. I really did. But the rhythms of the sea’s tides are the only things we humans have not yet destroyed.

  TASIILAQ, GREENLAND NESTING SEASON

  Take two. There are no men outside the bar this time, only the dogs, who look at me sleepily and then lose interest when I stride past without offerings.

  As I enter, an odd rustle moves through the patrons and then, almost in unison, they erupt into applause. I see him at one of the tables, smiling broadly and clapping along with everyone else. People thump me on the back as I head for the bar, and it makes me laugh.

  Someone meets me there with a grin. He’s maybe thirty, handsome, with long dark hair in a bun. His bottom teeth are noticeably crooked. “The lady’s drinks are on us tonight,” he tells the barman, and he’s either a different Australian or the one who called out from the balcony earlier.

  “No need—”

  “You saved his life.” He smiles again, and I don’t know if he’s taking the piss, or if he actually thinks that’s what happened. I decide it doesn’t matter—a free drink’s a free drink. I order another glass of red and then shake his hand.

  “I’m Basil Leese.”

  “Franny Lynch.”

  “I like the name Franny.”

  “I like the name Basil.”

  “You feeling all right now, Franny?”

  I never like this question. Even if I were dying of plague I would dislike this question. “It’s just cold water, right?”

  “Yeah, but there’s cold and there’s cold.”

  Basil takes my drink and carries it back to his table without asking, so I follow. He’s with the “drowning man”—who has also managed to change into dry clothes—and a few others. I’m introduced to Samuel, a portly man in his late sixties with a luscious head of red locks, then Anik, a slender Inuit man. Next Basil points out a younger trio playing pool. “Those two idiots are Daeshim and Malachai. Newest and dumbest members of the crew. And the chick is Léa.”

  There is a scruffy Korean guy, and a gangly black guy. The woman—Léa—is black, too, and taller than both the men. All three are in the middle of a heated argument about pool rules, so I turn to the drowning man last, expecting to be introduced, but Basil has already launched into a detailed complaint of the dinner he’s been presented with.

  “It’s overcooked, heavy-handed on the oregano, and way too buttery. Not to mention the pitiful bloody garnish. And look—look at the piss-poor presentation!”

  “You asked for bangers and mash,” Anik reminds him, sounding bored.

  Samuel hasn’t taken his merry eyes off me. “Where are you from, Franny? I can’t place your accent.”

  In Australia I sound Irish. In Ireland everyone thinks I’m Australian. Since the very beginning I’ve been flickering between, unable to hold fast to either.

  I swallow my mouthful of wine and grimace at the sweetness of it. “If you want you can call me Irish Australian.”

  “Knew it,” Basil says.

 
“What brings an Irishwoman to Greenland, Franny?” Samuel presses. “Are you a poet?”

  “A poet?”

  “Aren’t all the Irish poets?”

  I smile. “I suppose we like to think so. I’m studying the last of the Arctic terns. They nest along the coast but they’ll fly south soon, all the way to the Antarctic.”

  “Then you are a poet,” Samuel says.

  “You’re fishermen?” I ask.

  “Herring.”

  “Then you must be used to disappointment.”

  “Well, now, I suppose that’s true.”

  “Dying trade,” I comment. They were warned, time and again. We all were. The fish will run out. The ocean is nearly empty. You have taken and taken and now there is nothing left.

  “Not yet,” the drowning man speaks for the first time. He’s been listening quietly and now I turn to him.

  “Very few fish left in the wild.”

  He inclines his head.

  “So why do it?” I ask.

  “S’the only thing we know. And life’s no fun without a challenge.”

  I smile, but it feels wooden on my face. My insides are churning and I think of what this conversation would do to my husband, who has fought for conservation. His scorn, his disgust, would know no bounds.

  “Skipper’s got his heart set on finding the Golden Catch,” Samuel tells me with a wink.

  “What’s that?”

  “The white whale,” Samuel says. “The Holy Grail, the Fountain of Youth.” He makes such an expansive gesture that some of his beer slops onto his fingers. I think he’s drunk.

  Basil gives the older man an impatient glance and then explains, “It’s a huge haul. Like they used to catch. Enough to fill the boat, and make us all rich.”

  I consider the drowning man. “Then it’s money you’re hunting.”

  “It’s not money,” he says, and I almost believe him.

  As an afterthought, I ask, “What’s your boat called?”

  And he says, “The Saghani.”

  I can’t help laughing.

  “I’m Ennis Malone,” he adds, offering me his hand. It’s the largest hand I’ve ever shaken. Weather-bitten, like his cheeks and lips, and there is a lifetime’s worth of dirt tattooed under the fingernails.

  “She saves your life and you don’t even tell her your name?” Basil says.

  “I didn’t save his life.”

  “You meant to,” Ennis says. “Same thing.”

  “You shoulda left him in there to drown,” Samuel says. “Serve him right.”

  “You could tie stones to his feet—that would drown him quicker,” Anik offers, and I stare at him.

  “Don’t mind him,” Samuel says. “Macabre sense of humor.”

  Anik’s expression suggests there is no humor about him whatsoever. He excuses himself.

  “He also doesn’t like to be on land too long,” Ennis explains as we watch the Inuit man’s elegant passage through the pub.

  Malachai, Daeshim, and Léa join us. The men look annoyed, sitting with identical frowns and folded arms. Léa is amused until she sees me, and then something wary chases its way through her brown eyes.

  “What now?” Samuel asks the boys.

  “Dae likes to pick and choose the rules he obeys,” Malachai says with a broad London accent. “And when he’s feeling really poorly he’ll make up his own.”

  “Boring otherwise,” Daeshim says in an American accent.

  “Boredom’s for people without imaginations,” Malachai says.

  “Nah, boredom’s useful—it makes you innovative.”

  They look sideways at each other and I see them both fight not to smile. Their fingers entwine, argument concluded.

  “Who’s this then?” Léa asks. Her accent is French, I think.

  “This is Franny Lynch,” Basil says.

  I shake their hands and the boys seem to brighten.

  “The selkie, huh?” Léa asks. Her hand is strong and stained with grease.

  I pause, surprised by the reference and all the echoes in a life.

  “Seal people who take to the water, only they don’t rescue folk like you did, they drown them.”

  “I know what they are,” I murmur. “But I’ve never heard of a selkie drowning anyone.”

  Léa shrugs, letting my hand go and sitting back. “That’s ’cause they’re tricksy and subtle, no?”

  She’s wrong, but I smile a little, and my own wariness is kindled.

  “Enough about that,” Daeshim says. “A question for you, Franny. Do you obey rules?”

  Expectant eyes rest on me.

  The question seems sort of silly, and I could almost laugh. Instead I take a mouthful of wine and then say, “I’ve always tried to.”

  * * *

  At one point Ennis goes to the bar for another round, Samuel disappears to the toilet for the fourteenth time (“When you get to my age, you won’t find it so funny”), and Basil, Daeshim, and Léa go out onto the cold deck to have a cigarette, so I find myself cornered on the sofa next to Malachai, even though I’d prefer to be outside smoking. The bar has thinned out a bit—the piano player has knocked off for the evening.

  “How long you been here?” Malachai asks me in his deep voice. He has a fidgety quality about him, like an excited puppy, and dark brown eyes, and fingers that tap along to music even when there’s nothing playing.

  “Only a week. You?”

  “We berthed two days ago. Be leaving again in the morning.”

  “How long have you been with the Saghani?”

  “Two years, Dae and me.”

  “Do you … like it?”

  He flashes me the white of his teeth. “Ah, you know. It’s hard and it hurts and some nights you just wanna cry ’cause you’re so sore and there’s no way off and it feels really small, fuckin’ small. But you love it anyway. It’s home. We met on a trawler a few years back, Dae and me, but it didn’t go down too good when we hooked up. This crew don’t mind a bit, they’re family.” Malachai pauses and then his smile turns amused. “I’m telling you, it’s an insane asylum.”

  “How’s that?”

  “Samuel didn’t settle down ’til he’d had a child in every port from here to Maine, and he recites poetry because he wants people to know he can. Basil was on some cooking show in Australia but he got kicked out ’cause he couldn’t make anything normal—just that weird micro stuff you get in fancy restaurants, you know?”

  I grin. “Does he cook for you?”

  “He’s banned everyone else from the galley.”

  “At least you must eat well.”

  “We eat at midnight ’cause he spends hours stuffing around in there and then it’s usually a plate of something that looks like sand covered in flower petals and there’s only enough of it to leave a foul taste in your mouth. He can be a right prick, too. Then there’s Anik, Christ, don’t even get me started on him. He’s our first mate—did you meet him? Yeah, well, he’s like a reincarnation of a wolf. Except if you ask him on a different day he’s an eagle, or a snake, depending on how shitty he’s feeling. Took me ages to figure out he was making fun of me. He doesn’t like anything or anyone. Like, for real. But that’s what skiff men are like, you know? They’re outsiders, every one of them.”

  I file skiff men away to ask about later. “And Dae?”

  “God love him, he gets so seasick. I shouldn’t laugh, it’s not funny. But it’s part of his daily routine now—wake up, have a puke, finish the day, have a puke, and go to sleep. Wake up and do it again.”

  I think Malachai might be making all of this up, but I’m certainly enjoying it. I can hear it in his voice, how much he loves them. “Léa?”

  “She has a foul temper and she’s the most superstitious of us all. You can hardly burp without her spouting some warning and last week we were two days late to depart ’cause she wouldn’t set foot on the boat ’til the moon was right.”

  “What about Ennis?”

  Malachai shru
gs. “He’s just Ennis.”

  “What’s just Ennis?”

  “Well, I dunno. He’s our captain.”

  “But not part of the asylum?”

  “Nah, not really.” Malachai considers, looking awkward. “He’s got his shit like everyone.”

  I can believe this, since I found the man sitting in a fjord. I wait for Malachai to go on. His fingers are drumming furiously.

  “He’s a wagering man, for one.”

  “Aren’t all men?”

  “Nah, not like this.”

  “Huh. Sports? Racing? Blackjack?”

  “Anything. I’ve seen him lose himself completely. His reasoning—it just goes.” Malachai stops speaking and I can tell he feels guilty for having said as much.

  I ease off Ennis. “So why do you do it?” I ask instead.

  “Do what?”

  “Spend your life at sea.”

  He considers. “I guess it just feels like really living.” He smiles shyly. “Plus what else am I gonna do?”

  “The protesting doesn’t bother you?” Lately I feel like all I see on the news is violent protest rallies at fishing ports around the world—save the fish, save the oceans!

  Malachai looks away from me. “Sure it does.”

  Ennis returns with the drinks and hands me another glass of wine.

  “Thanks.”

  “So what does your man think of you being out here?” Malachai asks, nodding to my wedding ring.

  I scratch my arm absently. “He works in a similar field so he gets it.”

  “Science, right?”

  I nod.

  “What’s the bird one called?”

  “Ornithology. He’s teaching at the moment, and I’m doing the fieldwork.”

  “I know which sounds more fun,” Malachai says.

  “Mal, you’re the biggest pussy this side of the equator,” Basil says, sitting down. “Bet you’d love to be holed up in some safe little classroom somewhere. Although that’d require you to be able to read…”

  Malachai gives him the finger, making Basil grin.

  “What does he really think?” Ennis asks me.

  “Who?”

  “Your husband.”