The Hummingbird's Cage

by Tamara Dietrich

  “You all right, honey?”

  I looked up at a waitress with short champagne hair and gray roots, ruby lips and a look of concern in her eyes.

  “Could I have some water, please?” I asked.

  “You sure can,” she said. “And what can I get for the rest of you?”

  “Hey, Edie, when you gonna throw out that crap?” said an officer named Munoz, gesturing at the Harley suspended from the ceiling.

  “Well, hell, I like that crap,” Edie said. “Reminds me of the good ol’ days when we had a classier clientele.”

  The officers hooted.

  “You miss those biker freaks?” snorted an officer named Sandoval.

  “I miss their tips.” Edie rubbed her thumb and forefingers together. “You SOBs are tight as a frog’s ass.”

  The others broke into more gales of laughter, but not Jim. He didn’t like profanity in women. I thought he was choosing to ignore Edie, but after she left with the drink orders, he grinned and said:

  “Well, there goes her tip.”

  The others thought he was joking.

  The banter went on and on. I watched them as if I were outside looking in. As if I were pressing my face against a cold windowpane, marveling that people inside the bright room could be so easy with one another, so quick to laugh. I marveled the way I would if I were to parachute into some tribal village in the Amazon or Africa. It had all become something foreign to me. An alien culture. I had understood it once—once, I’d even enjoyed it—but not anymore.

  I had lost all facility with people. All interest. All connection.

  Worse, I began to look around the table, suspicious, searching their faces for telltale signs. For cracks in those happy, deceitful masks they presented to the world. Wondering what awful things they, too, were hiding.

  The waitress returned to hand out the drinks. Sandoval’s wife—CeCe, I think—called out: “Edie, when you gonna get a mechanical bull in here?”

  Her husband grimaced. “Now, what in the hell would you want with a thing like that?”

  “You never know—I might like to do a little bull ridin’.”

  He swept his arm around her and grinned. “Well, sweetheart, it’s your lucky night.”

  In the midst of the guffaws, two big hands came down on Jim’s shoulders from behind and a voice boomed, “You son of a bitch!”

  Jim recognized it at once; so did I. It was the same deputy who had come knocking on our door one day to help Jim deliver an object lesson. The buddy who had turned a 911 call into a fishing date. His name was Frank.

  Jim and Frank shook hands in greeting and slapped each other’s shoulders and inquired after each other’s wives, as if I weren’t there to answer for myself. Then Frank leaned in close and muttered something in Jim’s ear. Whatever the news was, it wasn’t good. The grin froze on Jim’s face. He stared back at Frank and said something I couldn’t hear; then they both moved away to the bar. Jim didn’t return for a long time.

  Close to midnight, most of the couples at our table had left. I was spent, nursing a single Dos Equis all evening, but Jim was downing Coors after Coors and growing more garrulous. When Edie came around next, he gave a What the hell shrug and ordered a double tequila with lime. This was not a good sign.

  Munoz shook his head at him. “How in hell you expect to get home, man?”

  Jim leaned back in his chair, bloodshot eyes glistening. “The way I always do when I tie one on—lights up, siren wailing.”

  Munoz chuckled, but his eyes were wary. He gestured at me and my Dos Equis and smiled. “Joanna here will drive you guys home. She’s been a good girl.”

  “Fuck that,” Jim snorted. “We’d just end up in a ditch somewhere.”

  Crack.

  Munoz exchanged a surprised look with his wife, both clearly uncomfortable now.

  Edie brought Jim his double shot. He slammed it and ordered another. “Easy,” Munoz murmured. “Easy.”

  When the second one came, Jim smirked and toasted him with it.

  Before Munoz could respond—if he had even planned to—he glanced past Jim to something at the other side of the saloon, and his jaw dropped a bit. “Ho-ly,” he murmured. Jim turned to look. So did I.

  A woman had walked into the Javelina.

  That’s the truest way I can describe it, except to amend it this way: a woman didn’t just walk into the Javelina—she commandeered it.

  She was tall and lithe and sturdy. As tall as Jim—taller, if you counted the two-inch heels on her biker boots. Her hair was so black it shone blue, and all of it cascaded down her back like a waterfall. She looked to be in her early thirties, and wore jeans and a studded black leather jacket. She stripped off her leather riding gloves as she strode to the bar like she owned the place. The crowd parted to make room.

  At her side, leaving no less of a wake, was a big man with salt-and-pepper hair and a mustache. He was also dressed in leather, and gave every impression that he could, should circumstances call for it, eat the dead.

  “Is that Bernadette?” Munoz murmured.

  And suddenly I understood everything—Frank’s muttered message, Jim’s abrupt mood shift and his hard drinking, which was so uncharacteristic for him. I had never met Bernadette, but for years Jim had made certain I knew of her, usually in explicit detail. She was his girlfriend from long ago, and the woman he most enjoyed comparing me to. Never, of course, in my favor.

  I knew she was a mix of Navajo, Hispanic and Irish and grew up on a sheep ranch on the northern end of the reservation, near Cuba. She had left Wheeler—and Jim—before I’d ever come here. As far as I knew, this was her first time back.

  Seeing the woman in the flesh, I understood why in Jim’s estimation I had always come up short, and always would.

  Jim was staring intently at her, glowering, working his jaw. He was breaking into a sweat, his fist squeezing the empty shot glass. Bernadette was speaking with the bartender, who nodded in our direction. She turned to look. If she was put off by Jim’s presence, she didn’t show it in the least; she didn’t take in my presence at all. She turned her back and resumed her conversation with the man she’d come in with.

  Jim stood, and for a moment I thought he intended to leave. I stood, too, and picked up my handbag and jacket. But he took no note of me and headed for the bar. Uncertain, I trailed behind.

  He stood staring at her back for some time without speaking. He stared so hard I thought he would bore tiny, smoking holes in her leather jacket. If she knew he was there, she didn’t show it.

  Finally he said, “I see you’re still drinking tequila.”

  She took her time turning around. When she did, she surprised me. She barely glanced at Jim at all when she raised her shot glass and answered with a dismissive, “I still have a lot of regrets.”

  Mostly, she turned her attention past Jim and on me, appraising me in a puzzled way that became almost sad. Then pitying. I hugged my jacket for protection against that look, suddenly and profoundly mortified.

  When she finished with me, she turned to Jim. “I hear you’re still on the force. Congratulations—never thought you’d last.” She smiled over her shoulder at her burly friend. “Where are my manners? Allow me to make introductions. Jim, this is my hombre, Sam. And, Sam, this is the reason I got my Jim Is a Prick tattoo.”

  Sam chuckled.

  Bernadette leaned back against Sam and stroked his stubble lovingly. “He laughs because it’s true.” She turned to Jim. “Want to know where I put it?”

  Now others at the bar were beginning to laugh, too. Jim’s face was turning white; I could feel him vibrate with rage.

  With an effort he spat out between clenched teeth: “And how does Sam here like worn-out pussy?”

  Sam shifted forward menacingly, but Bernadette raised a finger that stopped him in his tracks. She was appraising
Jim now with the dead calm of a stone Madonna. When she smiled, it was beatific.

  “Once he gets past the worn-out part,” she purred, “he likes it just fine.”

  The bar burst into roars of laughter. Still smiling, Bernadette leaned back against Sam, who clasped her in a bear hug and spun her on her heels back to their bottle of tequila.

  When Jim became aware of me at last, he wrenched my arm so hard I thought his fingers would tear muscle. Before he pulled me toward the exit, I threw a last glance at Bernadette, who caught it as she turned toward us from the bar.

  The look on my face wiped the laughter from hers.

  May 20

  Around two thirty in the afternoon came the growling racket of a motorcycle muffler in the drive. Then a knock on the front door. I didn’t answer. I didn’t intend to, but the knock came again. Then again. And, finally, a voice:

  “I know you’re in there.”

  With a jolt, I recognized the voice: it was Bernadette’s.

  She was the last person I expected on my doorstep, and a small part of me was intrigued. The rest of me, though, was shot through with panic. And curiosity alone couldn’t tamp that down, nor stir me from my blanket on the couch. I held myself as still as I could. I didn’t dare breathe.

  Knock knock knock knock.

  “I can keep this up all afternoon,” she called out, but it sounded more like determination than threat, so I called back, my voice croaking from disuse: “Jim’s not here.”

  “I’m not here to see that bastard,” she said quietly. “I’m here to see you.”

  My first instinct was to batten down the hatches. To look around for something heavy to defend myself. To make up some story to shoo her off my porch and back on her bike, heading west toward Wheeler. But both would have taken more strength than I had in me.

  It took a while to push myself off the couch and shuffle to the door, clutching at my bathrobe. I slipped the chain from the lock and pulled the door wide. I let her look at me.

  She didn’t speak for a long while. Then she muttered, “Holy shit.”

  I couldn’t look her in the eye. I waited for her to have her fill, to assess me one more time, then leave me alone. Instead she said:

  “Let’s have some tea, Joanna.”

  She stepped inside and gently took my elbow as I shuffled painfully back to the couch. She eased me back onto the blanket. She pulled off her leather jacket and pushed up her shirtsleeves, heading to the kitchen. She put the kettle on to boil and rummaged in the cabinets for cups and tea bags and sugar. She fixed a tray with china cups in their matching saucers, napkins, some saltine crackers, a box of tissues and a bottle of ibuprofen. She was efficient, with an eye for detail. She sat opposite me in the overstuffed chair, and we sipped Earl Grey in a weirdly companionable silence. Then she smiled.

  “You ever have a tea party with a biker chick before?”

  I laughed despite myself, but I felt out of practice, and it came out more of a hiccup, which hurt my sore ribs. I hiccupped again, and then again. It became a sob. My hand flew to my mouth, where the bottom lip was split and stinging. Tears sprang to my puffy eyes, one still swelled nearly closed, spilling down my bruised cheeks. Swiftly, Bernadette was beside me on the couch, handing me tissues, letting me cry it out, in no particular hurry.

  When I was done, she didn’t ask what had happened. Instead, she said, “Let me show you something.”

  She cocked her head and pushed her long black hair to the side, holding it back so I could see the spot she was pointing to just above her left ear. I could clearly make out a gnarled white scar running five inches along her scalp.

  “Bottle of Jose Cuervo,” she said. “Five staples to close. Concussion.”

  “Did you go to the police?”

  “Now, now, Jo. You’re smarter than that. Even back then, he was the police. And he had a police buddy who said he’d swear I was whoring on Bernalillo Road, resisted arrest, assaulted an officer, got what I had coming.”

  I gasped. “Frank.”

  “I see you’ve met. Anyway, a split scalp—I got off easy, all things considered. I left town and never looked back.”

  “You were afraid he’d kill you.”

  She snorted. “Honey, I was afraid I’d kill him. I grew up on the rez. I’ve butchered enough game and livestock to know where the knife goes. So I guess you could say he got off easy, too. He just doesn’t know it.”

  The prospect made my heart leap. If only she’d stayed in Wheeler, if only she hadn’t left, had put her hunting knife to good use . . . “I wish you had killed him.”

  She shrugged. “That’s the bruises talking.”

  Her indifference stung—clearly she had no idea.

  Finally I asked, “Did you meet him here, or in Utah?”

  “Utah? Did he tell you he was from Utah? Honey, he’s from Tucumcari. The way I hear it, they ran the whole family out of town. He’s never been very clear about parents, siblings, that sort of thing. I think he’s pure self-invention by now.” She shrugged. “Nothing wrong with that, necessarily. We’re all entitled to second chances, right? But I always did wonder what he did with his first one. We were only together a few months, but that was enough. I’ve always been a sucker for a handsome devil—only, between us girls, I prefer them more handsome than devil. Jim was a helluva wild man then. Not so much family oriented. Did he tell you about the time he shot up a motel room?”

  “Why on earth?”

  “Why on earth not? That’s just the way he was. Half the men in uniform back then should have been behind bars at one time or another.” She gave me a sidelong glance. “I hear Jim finally made it inside a jail cell a few months ago. I only regret I wasn’t here to take a picture. I would have framed it.”

  “A picture?” I spat the words out.

  Her laughter stopped short. “Sorry. I shouldn’t take pleasure in that bastard’s misery, when I know damn well he takes plenty of company with him. Honey, the stories I could tell you . . .”

  Her voice trailed off bitterly; her dark eyes grew darker.

  I didn’t know what she expected when she came knocking on my door—checking up on a batterer’s wife, an hour of tea and sympathy. Penitence for poking a rattlesnake that was sleeping in someone else’s lap. And I wasn’t sure what I could expect of her.

  But, for the first time ever, there was someone sitting right in front of me who knew Jim—the real Jim, not the affable doppelgänger he presented to everyone else. She knew him—if not to all his dark depths, then at least to his capacity for them. She had loved him, too. Once. And he’d made her bleed. Even her.

  “The stories—” I stuttered. “The stories I could tell . . .”

  And the next thing I knew, I was telling her—the dark things, the forbidden things, the things I’d never told anyone, could never tell anyone, especially when they pressed and prodded and tried to wring it out of me for my own good. The bruises, the bones, the burns, the scars—these are just the tangibles they can check off on any medical report. How do you quantify the words that cut as deep? The bottomless, wretched fear of more of the same?

  The dam cracked; the truth gushed out. I told her about my tea tin, the groceries, the gas. The fishbowl isolation. The suffocating prison of this tin-roofed house.

  The steady erosion of my own sanity. The no way out. The gut-churning horror of being forced to live every day with a monster.

  I took a deep breath and braced and told her about Tinkerbell. About the grave he made me dig, the limp body, the spear-headed shovel.

  About Laurel, and how hard it is to pretend to your clever child that everything’s all right, that Daddy loves her, that Daddy’s a good man, that Daddy would never, ever turn on her one day.

  Bernadette was staring at me, expressionless. I searched her face for traces of disgust, for judgment, for compassion, for absolution.
I couldn’t stop myself.

  I took another shuddering breath and told her what I hadn’t even allowed myself to think too much about, for fear of making it real. Making it true. About the night Jim returned home from his jail stint, just after New Year’s. The welcoming meal I’d prepared—pot roast, potatoes, coconut cake. Laurel had dressed pretty for her daddy in a crimson velvet dress with bows. We’d sat down as a family, and Jim seemed happy to be home, kissing Laurel good night, even tucking her in. When she was finally asleep, as I was washing the dinner dishes, Jim called for me from outside. He was in the backyard near the woodshed. He was wearing gloves, and I thought he was restacking the cordwood, but it wasn’t that. As I got close, I could see his face in the lantern light, and it was twisted with the old familiar rage. My stomach heaved. He grabbed my hair and pulled me inside, yanking out hunks till I gasped. He dragged me across the shed, pulled me upright, and with his other hand grabbed an object hanging on the wall. He held it close to my face so I could make it out. It was a machete.

  People disappear all the time, he’d said. He’s a cop; he should know. No one would miss you, he said. Hell, no one would even notice. And if they did, he’d just tell them I’d left him and gone back to my family in another state. No one would check. No one would care.

  This is my future, he told me. This is my end, if I ever, ever, ever humiliate him like that again.

  Bernadette was still staring at me, her eyes still blank. I waited for her to say something. To say anything. To tell me what a pathetic wreck I was. What a terrible mother. To hop on her motorcycle and leave a trail of diesel fumes all the way to the Javelina so she could sit with Sam and tell him all about the nutcase outside town.

  Instead, she said, “Show me.”