A Thousand Voices

by Lisa Wingate

  Jace turned back, shaking his head. I blushed and tried to focus on the place mat.

  “There’s children in the room!” Shasta hollered without looking up. She was in the middle of sketching The Cat in the Hat, complete with two kids and a goldfish in a bowl.

  “Sorry. Got a little carried away,” A.T. called back, then returned to his performance. “So the…unmentionables are hangin’ out, and ole Rube’s standing there with his hands in the air, like this, and then here comes the park ranger….”

  Jace drummed his palms on the tabletop, then leaned back and relaxed against his chair. “So…” He drew the word out, clearly looking for some way to move the subject away from Rube and the pumpkins in the toe sack. “Shasta says you’re here to do research on some family members, your father in particular.”

  The heat deepened in my cheeks. I wished Shasta hadn’t told him about me. “It’s a long story. I didn’t grow up with my father, so I don’t know much about him, except that he was Choctaw or part Choctaw, and his name was Thomas Clay.”

  Jace nodded, cataloging information and waiting for more. I couldn’t help feeling that if he knew my whole, convoluted history, his look of interest would turn to one of sympathy.

  “It’s really kind of a long, boring story.”

  “I doubt that.” Running a finger slowly along the side of his place mat, he studied me with interest. “But I wasn’t trying to pry. My sister thought maybe I could help you find the information you’re looking for. My history students do genealogy research projects as course requirements. Over the past few years, we’ve been cataloging the projects and building a genealogy research center as part of our school library.”

  “Shasta told me. She said you know quite a bit about using the Choctaw records to do research.”

  He blinked, seeming surprised that his sister and I had been talking about him. “It doesn’t work the way most people think. Tracing information through the Choctaw records is a complicated process. Proving a direct Choctaw bloodline, which is what most people are trying to do, in order to become eligible for a CDIB card and tribal membership, is better done by starting with your own birth records, then moving backward through census reports, more birth records, CDIB numbers, and so forth, to someone who is actually listed on the original Dawes Commission Rolls.”

  Sinking back in my chair, I focused on my hands and absently picked at the rolled-up napkin with my silverware in it. “I don’t have any of those things,” I admitted. “I mean, somewhere at my parents’ house—my adopted parents’ house—we do have my original birth certificate, and it says that I was born in Tuskahoma, Oklahoma. My father’s name was Thomas Clay. There isn’t any middle name on the papers. Just Thomas Clay.”

  “There are a lot of Clays around here.” It was meant to be an encouraging statement, but the reality was that having a common family name would probably make things more difficult.

  “Shasta told me that.”

  “We even have a branch of Clays in our family.”

  “Shasta told me that, too.” The voice of reason had started whispering in my head again, telling me this search was crazy and immature. Plenty of adopted kids lived perfectly normal, happy lives knowing less about their birth families than I knew about mine.

  Jace leaned forward and rested his elbows on the table. “Come on, it’s not such bad news. I know the gene pool looks a little shallow from here”—he shrugged over his shoulder, to where his uncle was imitating the RV lady straw-bossing her husband during the loading of the minivan—“but we’re not such a bad bunch. We can cook, for one thing. No member of the Reid family has ever gone hungry at a family gathering. If you don’t believe me, just look at Rube.”

  I chuckled, focusing again on the rolled-up napkin. What I really wanted to do was tell him that, for as long as I could remember, I’d dreamed of finding a birth family like this one.

  “So, Cousin”—he flicked a packet of sugar across the table at me like a paper football—“I’m giving museum tours at the old Choctaw capitol building this morning, but I’ll be finished around one o’clock. Why don’t you meet up with us for my last tour at twelve thirty—most people who come here researching their heritage like to take the tour and learn a little more about the history of the tribe—then we’ll head on over to the genealogy library at the school, punch some names into the database, and see if we can find anything?”

  “I don’t want to take you away from the festival….” I hesitated, unsure whether I was ready to share this process, whatever it turned out to be, with someone I barely knew.

  He smiled, his face taking on a warm, welcoming look that drew me in. I realized I was leaning across the table, closer to him. “You’re not taking me away from anything.”

  Autumn wandered over and climbed into his lap, lacing her arms around his shoulders. “What’s the matter?” he asked quietly, rubbing her back.

  “Nothing,” she sighed. “I just missed you, kind of.”

  Smoothing her hair, he rested his chin on her head. “That’s all right. We all miss people sometimes.”

  “Yeah.” The word was little more than a breath exhaled. She clung there a moment longer, then wiggled away and returned to Shasta and the other kids.

  Her father watched her go, his face clouded with concern that was quickly masked, as if it were something he didn’t want anyone else to see. “She checks in a lot,” he explained. “Their mom passed away from a heart abnormality almost a year ago, and she’s had a hard time dealing with it.” Something beyond the words told me that Autumn wasn’t the only one still dealing with it. The picture of Jace Reid shifted in my mind, the details quickly changing to accommodate a new reality. He wasn’t a divorced, shared-custody dad spending a weekend with his kids, but the survivor of a tragic loss, left alone to raise two young children.

  I wondered if he, like I, struggled with how and when to reveal that information to new people. On the other side of the table, he looked stiff and uncomfortable, braced for the expression of sympathy I uttered out of reflex.

  “I’m sorry.”

  He nodded, still watching Autumn. “We were divorced,” he added, as if that changed the parameters in a way that mattered. I recognized the tactic. It was the kind of thing I would have said, trying to minimize my past, so that people wouldn’t feel the need to comfort me, to rescue or fix me.

  “My mother died when I was about Autumn’s age.” The admission came out of the blue. Normally, I didn’t bring up Mama unless I had to.

  Jace’s face registered momentary surprise. Even people who knew I was adopted assumed it had happened when I was a baby. Resting an arm on the table, he turned a shoulder to Shasta and the kids, closing off our conversation from everyone else. “How did you deal with losing your mother—I mean, if you don’t mind my asking. It seems like Autumn’s not getting what she needs to move on. She’s had some counseling services through the tribe, but she’s not the same kid she was. I don’t know if she needs more counseling, better counseling, different counseling, or just to be left alone. This weekend is the first time I’ve seen her come to life a little bit. At home, she mostly spends her time sitting in her room, trying to be Willie’s mother, or wandering in the woods by herself. She’s lost interest in most of the things she used to love, the things a little girl should be doing, you know?” The questions came rushing out as if he’d been storing them up in a box; suddenly the lid burst open, and everything was crashing out in a disorganized pile.

  Shaking his head, he drummed the tabletop with his index finger. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to dump all that. It’s just been kind of a tough weekend. The Choctaw festival a year ago was the last good day they had with their mother. A week later, she collapsed at work, and by the time the ambulance got her to the hospital, she was gone. I wasn’t sure whether to even bring them to the family campout and the festival this year, but I guess I was hoping it might break Autumn out of her shell, help her focus on some good memories. I think she’s
not just mourning her mother, but she’s mad about the way things are—that her everyday life has changed and there’s nothing she can do about it.” Straightening in his chair, he winced apologetically. “Sorry. I just did it again. Let’s talk about something else.”

  “It’s okay, really. I don’t mind.”

  “So tell me about your music,” he suggested. “Where did you learn to play the guitar like that?”

  “From my dad—my adopted dad—but you asked about how things were when my mom—my real mom—died.”

  “I shouldn’t have.”

  “It’s all right.” Surprisingly, that was true. I’d never thought there was any use in talking about Mama’s death, but now it seemed as if some good could come of it. I sat silent for a moment, watching Autumn interact with the other kids, and thinking about the months after Granny told me Mama was gone. “I can’t tell you what it’s like for her, what she’s thinking, or what she’s feeling, but I do know that when my mama died, I spent a lot of time by myself. Some of that might have been because there wasn’t really anyone for me to talk to. But later on, when Grandma Rose, my adopted grandmother, died, there were people I could have talked to, and I still chose not to.” My mind raced to the moment Granny told me Mama had been found dead in an apartment in Kansas City. She wouldn’t be coming home, and that was that. I shouldn’t ask about her anymore. I should put her out of my mind. The problem was that I couldn’t. I couldn’t let it go, as Granny wanted, so I went out into the woods to be by myself. When Grandma Rose died, I couldn’t grieve the way Aunt Kate thought I should, either, so I spent time alone by the river, again, where I could grieve for myself and not everyone else.

  Jace was studying me, as if he could see the wheels turning.

  “Do you try to get her to talk about it?” I asked.

  He nodded wearily. “All the time.”

  “Maybe that’s part of the problem.” He seemed momentarily stung, and I rushed in an attempt to explain an experience I’d never tried to put into words. “I’m not saying that you’re doing anything wrong—please don’t misunderstand. But when you’re a kid, your grief is so different. Adults have parameters for the bereavement process—they’ve seen it on TV, in movies, read about it in magazines, watched other people go through it. But when you’re young, you don’t have all that. You’re just experiencing it moment by moment, not as part of a cycle that’s going to get better or worse over time. For kids, it’s better one minute, then worse the next, then better again. You keep thinking if you wish hard enough, pray hard enough, things will go back to the way they were. For years, I felt that Grandma Rose was still with me after she died. I dreamed about her at night, and talked to her. All the adults told me it wasn’t possible, that she was gone, that I needed to let go. They wanted me to grieve in a way that worked for them. I knew they were disappointed because I couldn’t. I knew I was adding to their worries, making their grief more painful, so it just became easier to stay inside myself, where I could feel any way I wanted to. I wish I could explain it better. I’m sorry.”

  Looking at Autumn, I knew she would never be the same child she was before, but that didn’t mean she wouldn’t be happy. She would move through childhood as I had, knowing that happiness is fragile, that people go away and you can’t wish them back. Sometimes at night or in the morning, just as she was drifting into sleep or coming out of it, she would feel herself near the door to heaven, and she’d know she’d just been with someone on the other side.

  “Give it time,” I said softly, and the pull of shared emotion reached into me, compelling and powerful. I had the sense that, of all the places in the world, I was supposed to be right here, right now, with him. Whether or not this trip produced the results I wanted, it did have a purpose. “She needs you to anchor her, to hold her hand when she’s lonely, but some of the journey she has to take on her own.”

  Jace nodded, his eyes rounding upward in a wise, tender curve. “You’re awfully young to know so much.” It felt strange to hear him call me young. It shouldn’t have, because just guessing from the age difference between him and Shasta, he was probably eight or ten years older than me.

  “I’m not so young,” I answered, and he leaned closer, smiling slightly, as if he were trying to figure me out. His eyes caught a tiny sliver of window light, and I found myself falling into his gaze, moving closer, caught in a magnetic connection I couldn’t explain.

  In the kitchen, someone dropped a plate, and the clatter of shattering ceramic rang through the restaurant. Both Jace and I jerked upright, blinked like sleepwalkers awakening, surprised to find ourselves surrounded by people.

  From the table in the opposite corner, Nana Jo was watching with a deepening frown.

  CHAPTER 13

  Shasta rejoined our conversation after breakfast was served, and we made pleasant chitchat about the weather, the Labor Day festival, and the annual Choctaw princess pageant, which had been held at the festival grounds yesterday. I learned that Shasta was a former princess, and that some of the younger Reid girls had participated this year. Shasta had wanted Autumn to be involved, but Jace didn’t think it was a good idea. She and her mother had always helped with the pageant together, and Jace feared there would be too many memories there for her. He planned to distract her from some of their usual events by letting her help at the Reid family craft booth, which sold screen-printed Choctaw homecoming shirts and Native American handicrafts, including some of Shasta’s hand-painted trivets and coffee mugs.

  “Mrs. Burleson fires them for me over at the high school art room,” Shasta told me. “But one of these days, I want to get a kiln of my own—just the small kind, where you can fire a few pieces at a time.” Her wistful tone said the purchase of a kiln was probably years away, if ever. Absently, she smoothed her hands over her swollen stomach and watched Benjamin wander off to his grandmother’s table to finish eating. It was easy to forget, just talking to her, that her life was filled with responsibilities. “Anyway, I’ve been looking at art supply catalogs and stuff, to get an idea of what’s out there. I think I could make a kiln pay for itself. Cody doesn’t believe me, but I could, if I put my stuff in some shops in town.” Taking a drink of her soda, she sat watching bubbles dissipate from the surface. “But there’s no point getting something like that until after we move and get settled, get some money saved up, you know?” She glanced up, like she needed reinforcement.

  “That makes sense. Kilns are pretty heavy. It would probably be hard to move one,” was all I could think to say. I knew from experience with Angelo and Kate’s kids that Shasta wouldn’t get much potting and painting done with a toddler and a new baby in the house. Even as organized as Aunt Kate was, having two kids under four drove her crazy when Josh and Rose were little. My mama gave Angelo to his daddy because she couldn’t watch him and do the things she wanted to do.

  Staring at Shasta, I realized that when my mama made that decision, she wasn’t much older than Shasta. She was sixteen when she had me, and then seven years later she had Angelo. At twenty-three, she should have been just starting out on her own life, but she was already watching the world through a face that looked old. Her movements were slow and listless, as if she knew she wasn’t headed anywhere good, so there was no reason to hurry. Once in a while, she tried for something better, and when it didn’t work out, she surrendered to life the way it was.

  I wondered if Shasta would eventually do that, if there would come a point at which she looked down the road and didn’t see a kiln and a ceramic shop anymore. Would she be happy without those dreams?

  Shasta broke into my thoughts. “Jace carves Indian flutes.” She glanced at her brother, who was frowning at her and had been about to comment on the kiln issue before she preempted him. Whatever he had been about to say, she obviously didn’t want to hear it. “He made the one Dillon was playing last night, with the wolf head on it and all. He’s an excellent carver. Our grandpa taught him.”

  “Really?” I asked, and Shas
ta nodded eagerly, answering before Jace could. “Seriously. It’s a tradition in our family—flute making, I mean. Nana Jo says that’s where the name Reid comes from. If you look for our family on the Dawes Commission Rolls back in the eighteen hundreds, some of them spelled it Reed, and some spelled it Reid. Nana Jo says probably it depended on who wrote it on the rolls and the census. Back then that happened all the time, because a lot of people couldn’t read and write. They didn’t really know how to spell their name. I’m not sure if there’s another way to spell Clay, but you might find that same thing in your family records.” She smiled encouragingly, as if the same effervescent faith that caused her to talk about buying a kiln when she was seven months pregnant also led her to believe I would delve into the tribal records today and discover a long lineage of ancestors.

  “I guess we’ll see,” I said. “I’ll be happy to find anything.”

  “Oh, you will.” Shasta seemed sure of it. Her son started whimpering and calling her name from across the room, and she heaved herself from her chair to go see what was wrong.

  Jace and I sat in silence, finishing the last of our pancakes. “I didn’t know you made Dillon’s flute,” I said finally, pushing my plate aside. “Do you play?”

  Jace was focused on Shasta’s mural, his thoughts too far away for him to hear me at first. “Nah,” he said finally. “No time for it. I don’t carve many flutes anymore, either. Too much else to do these days.” He glanced down the table at his kids, who had started arguing over the last pancake on our platter. Each of them had forks in it, and the dispute was rising in volume. “Split it in half, Autumn,” Jace ordered. “You cut it and then Willie gets to pick which half he wants.” Autumn huffed, and Jace winked at me, leaning closer. “She’ll spend the next five minutes taking measurements and making sure she comes up with perfect halves so he can’t pick the bigger one. I used to do that to Shasta.”