The Dead Go to Seattle

by Vivian Faith Prescott

  Jesse frowned. “Did you tell your momma?”

  “Momma knew,” Mina said. “She said we all have bad things in us. That’s why she left us. We have bad things.”

  Jesse’s mother told her about the missionaries who punished kids for speaking Tlingit, saying it was the language of the Devil. Jesse gritted her teeth. Kids taunted her in school as being an “Indian.” When she was five, she once tried to scrub the pigment off her hands.

  Jesse said, “No, you girls don’t have bad things in you. You’re made in God’s image, and you are all beautiful—every one of you.”

  Mina and Suvi smiled at Jesse, and then the girls turned and skipped out the door back to the swing set. Jesse leaned back into the chair with Rikka. She moved her moccasined toes up and down, rocking the chair back and forth. She inhaled the pale, red-haired child’s scent. She remembered her own baby, limp in her arms one night from a fever she knew he’d never wake up from.

  Rikka flipped through the book’s pages. She stopped and struggled to read the words:

  “And … the … w-wild things … roared …”

  Date: 1970s

  Recorded by John Swanton

  Girls with the Sun in Their Eyes

  The cold water jabbed Suvi’s skin like a thousand sea urchin pricks. There was only a couple of degrees difference between winter and summer water temperatures in Southeast Alaska. But now, she could hardly feel it. She hung onto the dock, and then plunged her head into Wrangell’s green harbor water. When she raised her head, she spit water up onto her sister Mina.

  “Cut that out,” Mina cried, wiping water from her skin. Mina sat on the bull rail, her bright orange life jacket pillowed under her chin. Beside her, Rikka, the youngest sister, sat without a life jacket in cutoff Levi’s and a blue Hawaiian-print halter top.

  Rikka hung her legs over, the waterline licking her calves. “I’m not sure this is a good idea. It’s only May.” Rikka’s red hair tied up in a ponytail, but it was still too long. The ends of her hair brushed the dock like a deck broom.

  Suvi nodded, her old orange life jacket rising to her ears. She wiped her wet hair from her eyes. “Jump in. It’s only cold for a second and after you’re numb.”

  “I’m busy,” Mina said, nodding toward the large white troller moored across on the next finger.

  Suvi sighed. One would never know Mina was boy crazy, but she was. She didn’t talk about it much because she didn’t like to be teased. Mina was the quiet one, Momma had always said. Mina was the “mousey” one, Momma said, too. Momma called Mina’s hair “mousey.” Mina yanked her mousey hair out whenever she was stressed. Momma called her girls “kaleidoscope girls”: one red, one blonde, and one brunette. And they were close together in age. She was the oldest, sixteen; Mina, fourteen; and Rikka, twelve. But Momma wasn’t giving advice anymore. They’d forgotten how Momma looked and what she even sounded like since she’d run off with the cult weirdoes. They’d spent half their life without her already.

  Suvi moved her arms back and forth, trying to keep warm. She knew what a cult was. She’d read about them in the book she snuck from the library: Helter Skelter. They weren’t supposed to talk about it. No one, not even Daddy, had explained it. She used to think Momma might be worshiping the Devil because Rikka had overheard someone saying that at school. Maybe that was true. Now, they all slept with cross necklaces on and stuffed animals around their bed. Something was going to protect them.

  Suvi turned around, bobbing in the water. She eyed the newly painted Sea Wolf and the young man on deck sticking halibut gear. “Oh, him.”

  “He is cute,” Rikka said.

  “Shhh,” Mina said. “Don’t you know sound carries over the water? He’ll hear us.”

  “So what,” Suvi said, turning to float on her back. She clasped her hands on the large column pads on the life jacket and started to sing, “Mina likes the cute guy. Mina likes the cute guy.” She turned her head to the side. Mina frowned at her.

  Suvi continued with her song “Mina wants a baby. Mina wants a baby.”

  Mina jumped up to her feet. “You little …” She leaned forward and in a split second she jumped into the harbor, her life jacket popping her fast up to the surface. She flapped her arms toward Suvi. Suvi twirled and swam toward the Sea Wolf.

  "Ah, come on," Rikka yelled from the dock. Then, without a life jacket on, she sat up straight and arched her back and shoved her body out. She slunk down into the water, like a seal sliding off the dock. As she entered the water, she gasped “God, that’s cold.”

  With a few long strokes of her lanky limbs, Rikka swam next to Mina. Mina still dog-paddled toward Suvi, who floated near the boat already.

  Suvi reached the side of the Sea Wolf. The young man looked over the gunwales at her. “Hi,” she said.

  “Hi,” he said, smiling.

  “Water’s fine,” Suvi said, tucking the life jacket strap below her chin.

  “Really?”

  “Really. Really. It only stings for a second.”

  The young man laughed.

  Grease dotted his white T-shirt. His dark brown hair was cut with sideburns like Elton John’s. Even his hair was receding a bit and he was stalky like most of the men in their father’s side of the family, and, like Elton. It was then the song came rising from her toes. She had to sing. She couldn’t control the urge. She started to sing the one song she knew all the way through by heart.

  The young man took a cigarette out of his T-shirt pocket and lit it with his Zippo. He blew smoke down at Suvi. “I get that all the time. You know that’s a Beatles remake?”

  “I do. But I like Elton’s version better. And I think Elton is sexier. Seems like guys are trying too much to look like Jesus. Elton’s different.”

  Suvi sunk down into the water. Bubbles floated up to the surface. She popped up, wiping water down her face. She opened her eyes and sang.

  The young man smiled down at her. “Well, I don’t sing. Not at all. Well, except when I’m out fishing and there’s no one to hear me.”

  Suvi laughed and flopped around to her back, kicking the water. She smiled at him. She liked the way he looked at her.

  Mina paddled up beside her, almost out of breath. “What are you doing?”

  “I’m visiting. And this here is … is …” Suvi said, pointing up.

  “Hank,” the young man said, blowing out smoke from his cigarette. He sat on the rail now. He flung the remainder of his cigarette out into the water.

  Rikka joined them treading water. Her hair, undone now, spread around the three of them like a bed of kelp.

  Suvi liked the way her sister’s hair felt like wet feathers. She brushed it away and asked Hank, “Why don’t you join us?”

  Hank grinned and then turned to look at the pilothouse. “Sure, why not.”

  Hank hopped off the rail, standing up on the deck. He undid his belt, letting his Levi’s fall to his knees. Rikka turned her head. But Suvi and Mina stared at Hank’s white underwear. He pulled his T-shirt over his head and let it fall on the deck on top of his pants. He stepped up on the rail and leaped into the water beside them.

  Water splashed over them. “Ohhh,” Mina screeched.

  Hank exploded through the surface of the water, shaking his head like a dog. He inhaled. “It’s c-c-c-cold,” he chattered.

  “Naw,” Suvi said, splashing water at him.

  Hank splashed her back and then turned to splash Mina.

  Rikka dove beneath Hank, jerking at his legs. Hank went down, and Suvi and Mina laughed. As Rikka released him, Hank bobbed back up and swam to the surface and splashed Mina again.

  Mina giggled, blushing despite the cold.

  Suvi splashed Hank. “Oh, Hank. Hank,” she blinked her eyes with exaggeration.

  Hank laughed and then coughed.

  “Shouldn’t smoke so much,” Mina said.

  “Yeah, it’s bad for you,” Rikka added.

  Hank half-coughed and half-laughed, sounding like a bar
king sea lion.

  Rikka moved toward him, her long red hair caressing his bare chest. He smiled at her, looking into her steel blue eyes, and, for an instant, her eyes flashed.

  “Ah, Rikka, do you have to?” Mina asked.

  Suvi shrugged. “Hey, Mina, sing with me.”

  “How does it go?” Mina asked. “Oh … I remember. She started to sing but it didn’t really sound like words but more like the sound of a ball of herring rising to the surface. Suvi started to sing, too.

  Then Rikka, so close to Hank that her breath nearly met Hank’s breath, joined them. The three girls sang together, Hank closed his eyes.

  Suvi swam to Hank’s side and Mina dog-paddled up to his back. They joined hands with Rikka. Round and round they went like they used to play washing machine when they were little girls, when they used to play every day down on the dock, when their hands and feet were still webbed with familial syndactyly, before Doc Heggan had convinced their daddy and stepmom, Liv, to clip their delicate skin. “You don’t want to raise ducks,” the doctor had said.

  Suvi started to hum. The current pulled around her, spinning them. In the swirl, Rikka’s long hair wrapped around them like a momma otter keeping her pup safe in a patch of bull kelp. Suvi loved the weightlessness, the current keeping her up. She sensed Hank liked it too. Hank kept his eyes closed. The girls sang some more, the notes flooding together into a single note, sounding like a ship’s bell clanking in the rigging.

  Suvi unclasped her life jacket and it floated away from their circle. Mina undid her life jacket too. This released something in them. Suvi felt it. The sea flowed through her fingers, where her skin once was. A memory lurked there, a power she couldn’t control. Kind of like when she first started her period. There was a change, a difference.

  The life jackets floated nearby. Beside her, Hank sank below the surface. Mina and Rikka sank too. Suvi tucked her head and submerged quite easily. Several feet beneath the surface, herring swam through Rikka’s hair that was splayed out like seaweed. Mina and Rikka’s mouths opened. They sang, the song moving through the water. Hank’s eyes opened wide, his mouth remained closed, his cheeks puffed out. Then he opened his mouth, trying to sing along. Cold harbor water rushed into his lungs. He sank beneath them. Suvi reached for her sisters’ hands and held them tight, spinning around and around, tumbling through green water sliced with gold sunlight, a splay of her sister’s red hair, and silver fish. Flashes from the herring netted the sunlight, reflecting iridescence in the girls’ eyes, now tumbling with colors.

  Date: early 1980s

  Recorded by John Swanton

  The Boy Who Shot the Star

  Veiko stepped over the log, sinking his foot into a muck hole. He jerked his foot up. His rifle sloughed off his shoulder and banged the log. “Crap,” he said. He was warned about hunting on Woronofski Island. No, it wasn’t the steep terrain people warned him about. It was the lights. Could be an alien landing strip, joked his cousin, Jason. Could be the landotter village, his friend had whispered. Even the stallo could be lurking here.

  Sure, he knew the stories. But everyone in Alaska told strange stories. He ignored them. Besides, he’d been hunting with his father, Isak. Now he was on his first hunting trip alone with a small pack and his rifle. He would get a big buck and pack it out himself. The airplane had dropped him off at Sunrise Lake early that morning. He planned to hike out in the evening and meet his dad on Sandy Beach below.

  But after falling for the sixth time and twisting his ankle, he was going to spend the night on top of this mountain. He didn’t want to sleep in the cold and dark. His father would probably wait at the beach, maybe look around a bit, then head back home and wait for daylight. It was stupid to go into the forest at night. Veiko leaned two large branches together, laid down some moss, and then spread his small green tarp over the branches.

  He’d been hunting with friends since he was nine and now he was fifteen. They’d shot nearly everything in the woods behind his house. But, his stepmother, Liv, didn’t approve. She’d told him the next time he shot something he’d have to eat it. It had been three years and he hadn’t forgiven her for making him skin, cook, and eat squirrel. This time, though, when he got a deer, he’d give most of it to his cousin’s family. After all, he could do anything he wanted with it. It would be his deer.

  A large moon rose above the peak. The man on the moon appeared more like his stepmother’s face. She looked mad and hilariously scary like she did when she saw the dead squirrel. “Kinda looks like you, Liv.” Liv had given him her typical disapproving look as she set the squirrel onto the kitchen cutting board. She nagged at him: Careful what you do and say. There are consequences.

  He lifted his rifle, aiming at the moon. “Bang,” he said without pulling the trigger. At once, a bright star came into view beside the moon. Veiko stared at the star. The star seemed to move. He watched it for a while until he closed his eyes.

  The wind fluttered his tarp, waking him. He stepped out from his shelter and rubbed his eyes. Bright moonlight surrounded him. The moon remained in its place in the sky, but the huge star pulsed above the island. What the heck? An airplane? Around him, the wind began to hum. The star pulsed blue and spit a wand of light to the side. He crouched down as the light swept the lakeshore like a searchlight. Suddenly the light sucked up a shape he knew well. “Holy crap,” he said, stepping back, “the thing is sucking up deer.”

  The light swept across the alpine, heading toward his shelter, toward him. Veiko raised his gun to the bright light. As soon as the bullet left the barrel, the light pulled him up, his mind spun like the inside of a washing machine. The sound hummed louder and louder in his head, then wham, he was on the beach.

  Veiko’s back smacked against the sand when he fell. He took shallow breaths. Slowly, he sat up. Across the strait, Wrangell’s small-town lights twinkled like a miniature village. Around him mosquitoes hummed louder and louder, sounding like a huge swarm, like something winding up. Then, the light swathed him as if he were a convict escaping from prison. Above him glowed the belly of a huge disc. In the light, something dark tumbled in slow motion toward him. He moved backward, crawling like a crab. The dark object twirled and then thudded to the ground as the search light switched off. Darkness enveloped him like a thick sleeping bag. He coughed. Beyond him, toward the water, the form appeared like a boulder in the sand. He got up, wobbly at first, and walked over to it. A huge buck splayed out, dead, in front of him. “What the hell?”

  He reached for the buck, its skin still warm. He rubbed it like a good luck charm. It was a big buck. He stumbled around to where he’d been lying, searching for his rifle he figured wasn’t going to be there anyway. He shivered. He had to get warm. He hobbled along searching for firewood. The moon glowed, though he could see it would be daylight soon.

  He built a small fire with the beach wood and sat beside it. He poked the fire with a stick for a long time, occasionally glancing up at the stars. How many people would that deer feed? His father always gave the deer’s heart and liver to their elderly neighbor. He thought about Liv’s face, bright as the moon, grinning as he gave her the hindquarter. For the rest of the night, mosquitoes hummed in his ear, and he jumped at the sound of every snap and crack and moan and cry drifting from woods and shore. When the night faded to blue, then to gray as the clouds moved in, his father’s small boat came into view, heading toward the campfire.

  Date: mid-late 2000s

  Recorded by John R. Swanton

  Assisted by Tooch Waterson

  Speaker: Charlie Edwin

  Charlie Edwin’s Trapping Stories

  “We’ll start this off as the trapping stories. My dad taught me how to trap. When I was real young, I would go out trapping—get excused from school once in a while. The trapping season was every other year. We’d go out occasionally and do trapping. Our trapline was down at Madden Bay. He taught me how to make all kinds of sets and traps. That’s how I learned to trap.

 
“I used to trap in the harbor when I was a kid. We’d set traps for otter and mink on the ends of the floats. The floats were made of logs in those days. They’d have a place to set traps on the ends of the floats, down underneath the outhouse. We got quite a few furs that way. Then, I’d trap along the beach toward the ferry terminal, toward Point Highfield. I’d set along there. I got a few mink and a couple of cats.

  “One day, I was down there at Point Highfield, and somebody had been into my traps. I thought, What the hell, you know. I had some otter-slide traps there. I could tell someone had been messing with them. I happened to be up in the woods and I heard a skiff, coming along the beach, slow down and stop. I was sitting on a stump up in the woods. And I thought, Well, someone’s coming back to the scene of the crime. And, sure enough, up through the woods came my cousin Lowell. He came up there and he starts checking the traps—my traps. I was sitting on the stump and I had a gun. I was holding a gun on him.

  “I said, ‘Lowell!’ and he about shit his pants. I said, ‘You know better than that, I’ve got it posted. These are my traps. This is my little trapline. You stay the hell off of it—cousin or not,’ I said. ‘Go back in your skiff and leave this area.’

  “He did, and he knew I was pissed. And, I had a gun too. My own cousin. I was sitting out on a stump and I was perfectly still and I was wearing brown clothes. If you sit like that, it’s hard for anyone to see you, unless you make a movement. It’s hard for anybody to pick you out. I was sitting on this stump above him and he was fooling around with my traps. After I scared him, I never had any more trouble with him after.