The Alaskan Laundry

by Brendan Jones

  Port Anna community member Peter “Betteryear” Johns was killed yesterday evening when his skiff collided with Jameson buoy, just west of the airport. Port Anna Mountain Search and Rescue discovered the body off Hellebore Beach.

  She gasped. He had been running alone at night with no lights, returning with a boat full of halibut, the article said. The running lights he had meant to fix. He hit the buoy, was thrown from the console, and shattered his skull. On the back page of the paper was a grainy photo of him as a younger man, a bearskin draped over each of his long arms.

  The service for Betteryear was held several days later at the ANB building. A Native girl wept openly. An older woman stroked her hair. Tara heard about Betteryear’s hunting abilities, how he loved his walkabouts through the country. Dancers in tasseled boots made of speckled seal fur stomped on stage to a slow, steady drumbeat.

  How little she knew about the man, Tara realized. He had two daughters, one of whom came back from Tucson, where she ran a spiritual retreat center. She said a few words about her father’s intelligence, how he wasn’t always the easiest to be around, but had a good heart. That was true, Tara thought.

  The second daughter stood up. A few people murmured, and then the room went quiet. The girl was heavy, with a long, thick braid. Her underbite gave her a bulldog quality. She opened her mouth, then shook her head. “I can’t,” she said, and returned to her seat.

  For a moment Tara was about to stand, to say no matter what others might think, Betteryear was a good man. He had taught her things, had been patient, and had persisted when she was difficult, hard to know. But some weight she could feel in the room stopped her. It was the first time on the island she sensed a darkness, the dimensions of which she couldn’t quite fathom. She knew then, sitting in that room, that she never would. She didn’t have rights to it.

  79

  THE EVENING OF OCTOBER SIXTH Tara waited with her duffel on the deck of the Chief for King Bruce’s crab boat. She had asked everyone she knew about the skipper, and she didn’t like what she had heard. A crazy man, seemed to be the consensus, although people agreed he had a knack for finding crab. Just get through these weeks, she told herself, then come back, collect her dog, and this boat beneath her feet would be their new home.

  Before heading out, she had called her father.

  “Tara. You’re safe?”

  “I’m good, Pop. Are you okay?”

  His voice sounded ragged. “I’m well. Listen—Connor stopped into the bakery the other day. He said you might be coming home for Christmas.”

  She tried to detect something in his voice, some acknowledgment of how he used the word home. But nothing came across. No recognition that she would be walking into a house he kicked her out of two years ago.

  “There are a few things I have to do first. But yeah, maybe.”

  “Good, Tara. Good.”

  After she got off, she stopped by the post office, where she found a short letter from Connor.

  September 17, 1999

  Dear Tara,

  Writing quickly to say I got your note. I’m back in New York, into the swing of things once more. Do you have plans for the millennium? This summer when I got back from Kansas I used money from bricklaying to buy a shell of a house at a sheriff’s sale in South Philly. It’ll be a project. I’m looking forward to it.

  I guess I also wanted to say that I’ve been thinking. I feel bad for sending that first letter a couple years back now. There was a lot in there I could have kept to myself, or at least figured out a better way to say it. I think I was going through my own weirdness at NYU. I hope you accept my apology.

  Sometimes I think all of this would be easier if we could see each other. Which is why I like this idea of yours to come back for Christmas. In the meantime I got a mobile phone. If you ever need to call I’ll include my number.

  More soon,

  Connor

  She put the letter in the envelope, folded the slip of paper with his number into her pocket, intrigued by this new idea that she could reach him at any time.

  A black shadow of a boat moved through the gap in the breakwater. As it drew closer she made out white letters on the bow—Alaskan Reiver. Cages were stacked on the forward deck. Black smoke rose from the stainless exhaust over the castle as the captain gunned the engine. The boat swung around, narrowly missing the Chief’s prow.

  She picked up her duffel, walked down the gangway and along the dock to where the boat was mooring up. Rust streaks ran down the hull. A line landed with a thud on the planks. An amplified voice said, “Tie off that hawser to the steel posts.” Tara looked around, then picked up the rope, whipped a starfish stuck to the steel pier into the water, made a wrap with the line, then two neat half-hitches.

  “You don’t wanna go to the bull rail?” someone yelled, and she thought it might be addressed to her until a voice on the speaker responded, “I’m not gonna have my dick out in a storm.”

  A ladder clattered over the side, followed by a broad-shouldered deckhand with a mousy beard over his cheeks.

  “You don’t tie off a crab boat with half-hitches,” he snapped, then strode over to the hawser line and unlooped her knot. He made a bight and cinched up a clove hitch. She was about to shoot something back when an older man, bald with a red goatee, came down the ladder. He was short, slightly hunched, with a scrape over his forehead.

  “Tara Marconi?” he asked. A blurred crab was tattooed on one side of his neck, and Trust No Bitch was stamped in Gothic letters around its base. He wore a threaded wool workman’s cap, which he removed, then performed a small bow, revealing tattoos of red and green flames above each ear.

  “King Bruce, skipper of the Alaskan Reiver. That’s Hale over there with the line.” A couple more deckhands had joined him on the docks. “Boys? Manners?”

  One extended a thick, oil-smeared palm. “Jethro. Skip’s son.”

  A kid who appeared to be in his late teens, with a scraggly beard, stepped forward. “Jeremy. Folks call me Coon-Ass.”

  Hale tapped a foot and looked toward the harbor ramp. “And this is Rudy. Skip, we should get moving if we want one of those booths down at the Front.”

  “Care to join us, Ms. Marconi, for a beverage or two?” King Bruce asked.

  In a quiet parade they went along the docks, up the ramp, through the parking lot, and along Pletnikoff Street. Hale stayed out in front, his long arms swinging. Jethro fell back beside her. “You crabbed before?”

  She shook her head.

  “Well, in case you pick up on some weird vibes, I’m just gonna tell you what you’re in for. Hale’s best buddy, Thibault, got crossed by a pot and had his leg crushed, so he couldn’t make the trip. No one thought the old man would take on a girl.”

  “And now they think I won’t be able to pull my weight.”

  He didn’t say anything. He had a calm demeanor, and his slow, careful speech reminded her of Connor. “Just giving you a heads-up, that’s all.”

  At the bar the crew slid into the booth beneath the jukebox. Hale ordered popcorn and tater tots from Cassie. King Bruce went next door for Chinese food. Hale poked Tara in the arm. “You ever see any of these troller pussies in here throw a punch? Or are they too busy keeping their balls warm in their armpits?”

  Already she hated this kid. Maybe Petree would come in and kick his ass.

  Coon-Ass, who also had a tangle of half-grown beard over his skinny adolescent face, and a red handkerchief loosely tied around his neck, ordered a row of Jagermeister shots. He set the tray on the table, lifted a glass, and said in a southern drawl,

  May there be crawfish in your nets,

  And gumbo in the pot.

  May the Sac-au-lait be biting

  At your favorite fishing spot.

  May God’s sun be—

  Hale cut him off. “All right, Coon. We all know you’re from Louisiana. Boys?”

  They tipped back the glasses, banged them hard on the table, then ordered another round. A
n Asian girl arrived with pot stickers, cream-cheese wontons, and egg rolls. When King Bruce gave her a twenty-dollar tip on the fifteen-dollar tab, Hale shook his head. “Basic demand-side economics—invest in areas of the economy that will show a return. That’s money wasted.”

  King Bruce waved a hand. “Maybe I’ll marry her, who the hell knows?”

  One of the deckhands, the one who reminded her of Little Vic with his olive skin and broody eyes, ripped open a soy sauce packet and squeezed it down his throat.

  “Rudy’s from Portugal,” King Bruce explained to Tara. “He’s addicted to salt. Ain’t that right, buddy?”

  “Time to get this party going,” Hale said, standing. Wiping their mouths, Coon-Ass and Rudy followed.

  King Bruce clapped Jethro on the back. “What’s up, son? Don’t want to join in the fun? Cat got your tongue around the pretty new girl?”

  She thought of Newt and looked around the bar. If he found out she had a job on a crabber, he’d start whooping.

  “You writing letters in that head of yours?” King Bruce said. At first she thought he was talking to her, then saw him shake a finger at Jethro. “I know you got aggressivity in you. Soon or later it’s gotta come out.”

  Shouts came from the pool table. King Bruce set aside his pull-tabs and his half-eaten egg roll. “Here we go.”

  “I didn’t see you put down those quarters,” Hale shouted. Then, “You calling me a fucking liar?”

  Tara recognized the troller from the docks, an attractive young man who had married a Norwegian woman. They had recently had a daughter, and the man was chatting with Petree about how to deaden the noise from the boat’s engine and make a baby-changing station in the fo’c’sle. He always wore the same small animal skull of some creature tied with leather twine around his neck. He had probably come down here tonight for a bit of peace and a pool game, Tara thought.

  “Hey!” Hale shouted. “Don’t walk away from me. The fuck you think you are?”

  She could see the skull rise and fall against the man’s chest. She knew enough about fighting to see he didn’t want to be involved, even though he had a good six inches on Hale.

  Cassie yelled from behind the bar and grabbed the bat from beneath the popcorn maker. “I’ll whale the tar out of all y’all if you don’t quit it!”

  Coon-Ass, standing behind Cassie, knocked a glass from the bar. It shattered over the linoleum. He followed this with a low, woodsy howl. Hale hit the young troller in the temple. The man stumbled, swinging wildly. Hale charged, grabbing the man’s hips, driving him into the wall and rabbit-jabbing his stomach. Frames fell to the ground, the glass shattering. Cassie held the bat over them, continuing to swear. Hale was on the man’s back, with a seat-belt hold around the troller’s neck.

  Shaking his head, King Bruce slid out of the booth. “You shoulda been part of this,” he said, shaking a finger at Jethro. He stepped in front of Cassie, keeping one hand on the barrel of the bat while he hauled Hale up by his hood.

  “Let go, for godsakes. Nuff!” he growled.

  The troller was bleeding from his forehead. King Bruce held out an arm and helped the man to his feet. Someone handed him a napkin.

  “You all right, hoss?” King Bruce asked.

  “I’m callin’ the police on y’all,” Cassie said, going back behind the bar and slamming the rotary phone down. “Fuckin’ crazy-ass crabbing fucks.”

  King Bruce fanned five hundred-dollar bills on the counter. Cassie’s chest heaved. “For your troubles,” he told her.

  She flashed another five fingers. He sighed, peeled them off, and turned to Hale and Coon-Ass.

  “That’ll be coming off the top of your deck shares, you can be sure about that.”

  Cassie took the money, opened her cash register with a ding of the bell, and poured out five tequila shots.

  “You boys drink these down, and then heigh-the-fucking-ho on outta my bar.”

  Rudy, Coon-Ass, and Hale whooped their way back along Pletnikoff, pounding on truck doors and peeing in the street. Jethro walked with his hands shoved into his pockets, looking down at the wet pavement, while King Bruce tacked back and forth between the sidewalk on one side and the humming processors on the other, his cheek lit white by his cell phone.

  “You don’t want to do this,” Jethro said to her. “Trust me.”

  It sounded like a challenge, but not one that interested her. She just wanted the check at the end of the trip.

  “Is your dad a good captain?”

  Jethro bowed his head, thinking. “He knows where to drop ’em, for sure. We make money.”

  She thought about this as they crossed the parking lot. “I got a boat I want to buy.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  “Yeah—that one parked aft of the Reiver.”

  “The old wood thing?”

  “It’s a World War II tugboat.”

  When they reached the harbor Hale hoisted an unlocked bicycle out of the rack and rode it down the ramp, roaring as it slid out from under him. Coon-Ass convulsed into laughter as Hale tumbled onto the planks. Rudy clapped. The fall looked bad enough to break a bone, but Hale seemed to be constructed of some superhuman substance, just blasting through the world without a care. She made a note to herself to keep calm around him. People like Hale drove her nuts.

  Back at the boat, the boys climbed the ladder. She followed Hale, bleeding from an elbow, into the main house. The galley bench, which made a horseshoe around the table, was torn up, with plugs of yellow foam punching out from the holes. The boys scattered to their various bunks. Jethro put coffee on.

  “Here’s our food for when you cook,” he said, opening a cupboard. Hot sauce and boxes of Aunt Jemima and cans of corn and beef stew and powdered milk were arranged on the shelves. Bags of mini candy bars stacked on the bottom.

  “You’re gonna be crashing down here,” he said, walking behind the galley to a bunk. “Only single rack. Pop thought it was proper, seeing as how you’re the girl.” He pushed open a louvered door, revealing a toilet in a corner. “Head.”

  She threw her duffel on the bunk. The boat trembled as the engines fired. King Bruce’s slurred voice came over the speaker.

  “Cut ’er da fuck loose, boys. We’re gettin’ the fuck outta this fuckin’ fuckhole.”

  “He’s operating this boat?” Tara asked. “He can hardly see straight.”

  “Aw, he’s been driving boats drunk since he was twelve,” Jethro said.

  Tara went back out on deck, watching as the boys undid the lines. It wasn’t too late, she thought—she could still leap. Hale yelled up at her from the docks. “Your hands cold?” Cursing to herself, she pulled them out of her pockets. “Catch.” He tossed the bitter end toward her, but it hit the hull and flopped into the water.

  “I said ‘catch.’”

  She hauled the wet hawser line onto deck and looped it. Patience, she told herself. You will not react with anger. Just let it slide.

  With a grumble and belch of black smoke the Reiver pushed away from the dock. Swim, she thought, she could still swim. But then they were gathering speed. Tara pinched her mother’s medallion between her fingers as the tugboat tied to the corner grew small, bobbing in their wake. I’m doing this for you. Wait for me.

  80

  TIME DRAGGED, one day after the other, as they ran north toward the crab grounds. The plan was to make it to Unalaska, work on the boat for a few days, then crab twenty-four/seven for the opener. She chopped onions and carrots and made stews with crushed tomatoes and peppers. She waited to be asked to do a night wheel watch, thrilled by the idea of guiding this 106-foot steel boat through the black. Although she knew it would mean sitting there staring at screens and staying awake. But it never happened.

  When the boys weren’t on watch they took food into their bunks, emerging later with egg yolk or bread crumbs caked in their beards. A stench of seawater and moisturizer leaked into the galley. Bits of burnt bacon were stuck in their teeth, the enamel stained yel
low from coffee and cigarettes—she wondered if they ever brushed. She felt like a ghost on the boat. Except for Jethro, they continued their campaign of ignoring her, limiting communication to nods or one-syllable responses.

  Jethro spent his days curled at the far end of the galley booth, hood up, the tips of his long, oily seal-colored hair framing his jaw, and devoured books she still hadn’t read but had seen in the woods among the Alaskan Travelers: The Alchemist, The Prophet, Ishmael, Celestine Prophecies. When he wasn’t reading he wrote letters to his “hippie chick,” as Hale called her, back in college at Santa Cruz.

  Hale asked Jethro to start prepping the cages. Tara watched out the porthole as he leapt from pot to pot, coiling line in twists, moving in a fury that she didn’t recognize from the calm reader. She wondered what he’d be like as a lover—tender and gentle, or the madman on the pots, looping line between his elbow and hand.

  At night, after wiping down the galley, she lay in her bunk, steel bulkheads sweating above her, dripping onto her sleeping bag. She recalled first arriving in Alaska, sure the island would free her, allow her to rediscover some happiness taken by her mother’s death, by what happened at Avalon. This wasn’t the case—she knew this now. If anything she felt cordoned off, wrapped in yellow emergency tape. Waiting. To get the tug, perhaps, which had become, in her mind, the way forward.

  She reached out and wiped a drop from the bulkhead, closed her eyes. Thinking of that warm spot on Keta’s brow when he woke up. His blond eyelashes.

  Just get through these next few weeks. The final sprint, and then she’d be there.