The river was high, even for fall, and the familiar rush of the rapids led into the calm pool of the Tent Hole where she had caught a winter steelhead just over a year ago.
Jess looked out at the rapids pouring through the river canyon into the pool. She remembered the first time she had gone down into a hatchery, on a river in southern Idaho. The adult spring chinook had been captured and were being held in horrible concrete pens. The water was murky, and they moved together like one dying organism swaying in the flaccid current of the pool. When the females were ripe, the hatchery workers pulled them out, clubbed them over the head, and took their eggs. They then pulled a male and physically squeezed his sperm onto the eggs, clubbed him over the head, too, and tossed him on a pile of bodies that would decompose or be shipped off for pet food. These eggs would then be incubated until they hatched, and then raised until they were fingerlings that could be artificially pumped back into the river.
It had sickened Jess to see the bodies of the fish lying in the heat of the sun, having been robbed of their dying crescendo in the shallow rock beds of their high mountain birthplace. And she knew from her uncle Robert that the hatcheries didn’t work the way they were supposed to.
The light was fading quickly, the sun long dipped behind the high canyon walls. Jess breathed in the familiar scent of the river, a musky coolness mingled with the tang of decaying apples from the old tree near the lodge. Reaching into the water, she felt as if she were holding the hand of an old friend, unable to tell where the boundaries of her skin left off and the river began.
Opening her eyes, she watched the water swirling in eddies around the small granite islands that seemed to have broken from the bank and were making their way into the full, strong current. These grass-tufted rocks offered miniature refuges for people fishing, herons, osprey, and leaping children when the water warmed in summer.
Standing up, she turned to Jeff, who was looking down at his feet and kicking distractedly at some exposed gravel. “This all really sucks. No one seems to care about anything or anyone other than themselves—how much money is spent, what it’s worth. How about what it’s worth to the salmon, to the forests, to the basic needs of all of life? Dammit, Jeff, I wish there were some way to convince you—I know you know this, and now we could have another chance to try to have the dam removed. I’m sure Planet Justice wouldn’t be wasting their time on a project that wasn’t worth pursuing.”
Jess wanted all this to be so much simpler than it was. There had to be a way she could convince him; she needed him, wanted him, to change. Moving toward him, she felt the force of their passion crying out from each other’s bodies.
“It really sucks, Jess. I know how much you care for this river . . .” Jess noticed that he didn’t finish his sentence, and she waited for more, but Jeff averted his eyes.
“You know, Jeff, unlike you, I do believe there is a path through this, and you and I may both be missing something really important about what we think is right for the river. And yes, it does suck. C’mon, Miko!”
Miko rushed back to them along the trail, his tongue lagging and his curled tail waving. Jess and Jeff walked in silence back to the parking lot, and, after a quick hug, she got into her truck and left.
The log trucks huffed across in front of Jess as she waited at the intersection. She suddenly felt lonely, alone. The tension and sadness rolled up through her body, and she cried onto her steering wheel. There was nothing around her but the continual loss of what she loved.
Drying her face on the sleeve of her jacket, she pulled into the evening traffic and headed for the Green Springs dam. She knew it would be cold there, but she wanted the cold, wanted to struggle against something familiar, wanted the falling light to wrap around her like a piercing velvet blanket. She wanted to fade into the darkness.
It was quiet at the dam. Jess knew Miko must be hungry, she made him stay in the truck, worried that he might take off into the night after some awakened creature. She pulled her fleece jacket around her and put on another wool sweater, which she found on the floor of the truck. The air was crisp, the river still, the sound of the turbines a constant, restless hum.
Walking over to the dam, Jess felt the mud pulling at her boots and bunched her hands in her pockets against the cold. She looked down at the road where all day large trucks had carried in loads of gravel to be dumped into the river. She sighed, remembering Jeff’s excited phone call to tell her PowerCorp had agreed to add the spawning gravel back into the river. The pile of gravel had washed down the river in that winter’s flood and had been distributed in the natural eddies and pools of the spawning grounds. The trouble with machines was that they sometimes broke. After the redds were restored, the dam shut down and the eggs in the spawning beds were destroyed.
In the twilight, Jess could see the pile of this year’s gravel. She walked to it and sat down on the riverbank, watching the rippling folds of the current. Looking upstream, she could just make out the gray-black wall of the dam, standing guard-like and forbidding. She wondered what it was like for the salmon, steelhead, and other fish of the river to continuously meet this obstruction. Something must confuse them in the certainty of their migration, the old story of the Nesika that they carried in their genetic material. Of course, then would come the confusion of the hatchery fish finding themselves in the wrong river, listening to the stories of their own genes saying something very different about the migratory path they were trying to follow.
Jess sat and closed her eyes. Her head ached, and she tried to steady her breathing by inhaling and exhaling in time with the river. She imagined diving in, sliding along the slick basalt bed, like moving through a birth canal, toward her death, pulled to completion by the stories being told to her, carried through many lives on the simple protein ladders of her DNA. Like the salmon, she shaped her life according to this story, watching her dreams, listening to the river, and pacing the migration of her desire.
There was a sudden rustling in the darkness behind her. Jess opened her eyes and shifted her attention toward the sound. She stood up slowly, trying not to fall on the pile of gravel, her body gripped by fear. She waited to hear the noise again, but all was quiet. Wondering if she had imagined it, she sat back down by the river, her attention focusing on each sound. Then she heard it again, this time much closer.
“Hello!” she called out, thinking it might be a PowerCorp worker who had stayed late to do some fishing. No one answered. She stood up and started toward her truck, stumbling over the rocks in the dark. Suddenly, a dark shape leaped in front of her. Her body stiffened. In the dim light between her and the truck was a large mountain lion. Jess started shouting, frantically trying to make herself large and intimidating to the cat, as it moved through the brush near her truck. Miko had started barking frantically, and Jess was glad at least he was safe.
“Hey, big cat! Get away!”
Her throat was dry with fear, and her wavering voice rang with terror. She looked around and, seeing a large stick, she stepped slowly toward it as the cat moved between her and the river. She bent down and reached for the downed limb, taking her eyes off the cat. Then she felt the weight, like a large boulder falling from a hill, knocking into her and throwing her against the gravel. Her head cracked on one of the river stones, and her teeth cut the inside of her mouth. She could taste her own blood and felt a pressure burning in her leg. She reached up and started hitting the cat with the stick. The cat grabbed at her head, and she felt a searing force at the back of her skull. Then she was being dragged across the pile of gravel. She tried to cry out, hoping someone would be along the river. No one was going to help her. Her body went limp. The last thing she heard was Miko’s desperate yelping and the constant drone of the powerhouse turbines.
BARBARA
Barbara set down her coffee cup and newspaper when the phone rang. When she answered, Barbara heard a low, cautious voice ask, “Is this Barbara Jensen, mother of Jessica Jensen?”
Barbara’s hea
rt fell, her nerves following the same path of panic they had eighteen years ago when Monica had died.
“Yes, this is she. Is Jessica all right?” Barbara surprised herself at her protective formality.
“Ma’am, I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but Jessica was severely injured in a mountain lion attack last night. PowerCorp workers found her early this morning along the river. She has lost a lot of blood and is unconscious. She is down here in intensive care at the Penden Valley Community Hospital. Is there someone I can call to help you?”
Her stomach turned, and she felt the room dip and spin around her.
“No, I’ll come right over. Oh my God, oh my God . . .”
Weeping and choking, she thought vaguely that she should call someone, but she couldn’t form a clear thought and her instinct was to get to the hospital as soon as possible. She pulled on her clothes, found her keys, stumbled to her car, and made her way in blind terror toward the ICU. The red of the Texaco sign seemed luminescent and strange as she turned onto the highway. She passed a playground full of children and thought she saw her two young daughters swinging in unison on the bright orange play set. She almost stopped the car. Maybe this is a dream—maybe they’re all right. But she kept going, her heart drumming her down the familiar streets. She knew she needed help, but couldn’t put the thoughts together who to go to, where to start. She needed to be with Jess, help her find a way to hold on to her life. To lose both daughters would destroy her.
The hospital room was like a glaring, fluorescent light–filled cave. Wires and tubes hung down to Jess, who had been intubated and was breathing with the help of a respirator. She was pale, her hair matted with leaves and mud. Weeping uncontrollably, Barbara stumbled through the nurses to her side.
There was a strange, feral scent in the room, and she guessed it was from the cat. It evoked the times her husband had brought home deer and other game and she had helped to skin and clean the bodies. Here was her baby, her little one, who had grown up wild and certain. Now, under the lights and the washed-out white sheets, her body was lying torn open and broken by a savage animal, as instinctive and earth-bound as the will to survive.
The doctor, a gentle-looking, middle-aged woman, came in and carefully placed her hand on Barbara’s shaking shoulder.
“Are you Jess’s mom? My name is Dr. Sheldon, and I’ve been working with Jess these past few hours. May I have a word with you in the hall?”
“Yes, of course.”
Dr. Sheldon helped her to stand and supported her out into the low light of the waiting room. They sat in the rough blue cloth chairs near the nurses’ station. Barbara noticed how time seemed to be moving slowly, the details too dreamlike . . .
“Ms. Jensen, I’m afraid your daughter has some very serious injuries. She was attacked by the mountain lion and dragged for some distance before the cat, for some reason, apparently was startled and ran away. That saved Jessica’s life. However, the cat inflicted a very deep wound to the lower part of her left leg, and she has abrasions on her back and neck, which seem to have come from the initial attack. Because of the loss of blood and her exposure to the cold last night, she’s in shock. Right now we’re trying to stabilize her blood pressure and body temperature with IV fluids and antibiotics, and we have her on the respirator. Even though her condition is very serious, unless her heart gives out, she will recover. As far as her injuries go, we will assess what kind of initial reconstruction we can try. Right now, we must get her on solid ground before moving forward. I am so sorry. The last time we treated anyone for a mountain lion attack was twenty-three years ago. It doesn’t happen often. I think she was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. They’re trying to track the cat now. The Oregon State Fish and Wildlife people will most likely be able to trap and kill the cat, at which time they will do an autopsy to determine whether it had rabies or any other diseases.”
Barbara looked at her hands the whole time, focusing on them as a way of keeping herself from screaming, as a way of holding on so she could take in what the doctor was saying. She felt like she was choking.
“So,” she said, taking a breath between each word, “she is going to live.” Barbara said it more as an announcement than as a question.
“Yes, the chances are in her favor. It’s early, but she’s young and in very good shape. Why don’t we go see how we’re doing on raising her body temperature? Can I get you anything? Water or juice?”
“No, no, thank you. I’m fine. I do need to use the restroom, though.”
“Right over here, second door on the left. I’ll be in the room with Jess. Just come back in when you’re ready. Again, I am so sorry.”
She squeezed Barbara’s hand and walked away. Her white jacket looked crisp and unreal, angelic, almost, thought Barbara, who headed down the hall into the bathroom. Sitting in the stall, she felt a breaking inside her, like an ice floe that had been holding back the terror and the searing grief she carried from losing Monica. Sobbing, she lay across her knees and let her tears wash through her hands and onto her legs.
She washed her face in the sink. In the mirror, her eyes looked stunned, filled with terror, desperate and lost. She brushed her hands through her short gray hair, breathing in the antiseptic smell of the hospital soaps. She made her way to the nurses’ station and wrote down a number for them to call, her brother, Robert, in Portland. On the precipice of breaking, Barbara wanted family, the kind of support that came from the depths of relationship, of kinship. She hoped he was home.
Barbara sat waiting like a small boat drifting on an uncertain and dangerous current. She wanted to let go, let what was happening sail away from her, unimaginable and unreal. When Dr. Sheldon walked up to her, she jumped and didn’t recognize her at first.
“What’s happening? Is Jess okay?”
“Well, unfortunately, we just discovered a puncture wound on the back of her head. Because her hair was so matted with blood and saliva, we didn’t notice it at first. There’s a possibility that there’s some damage to her brain. We’re scheduling her for X-rays and an MRI, which will show us the effects of the wound.”
Barbara felt the room fall away around her. She heard only the words “brain” and “damage.” She imagined her beautiful, strong daughter confined to a wheelchair, unable to speak. She felt rising in her a certainty and conviction that she would be there to care for Jess, no matter what, no matter how high the expense or how lasting the damage to her body. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, quieting a cry that was trying to resurface.
“I’m so sorry, Ms. Jensen, it’s just too early to be able to give you a clear prognosis. Your daughter is strong and is responding to the fluids and medications we’re giving her. We will know much more once we run the tests this afternoon. In the meantime, you can stay in the room with her if you’d like. Has someone contacted any other relatives and friends?”
“Yes, yes, I think my brother is on his way down from Portland—I guess it’s about two hours from here. I’m not sure who else to call. Do you know where her dog is?”
“Yes, there was a dog in the cab of her truck. He was very upset when the paramedics got up there. They had to call animal control, who gave him a tranquilizer and took him to the Penden Valley Veterinary Clinic. He’s okay there for now, I’m sure. Is there anything I can get you?”
Barbara thought of Jess and Miko, how they seemed to move together through the world like a little unit. Miko had been such a cute puppy, all fluff and tufted ears, like a small bear. Barbara had wondered if having a large dog while she was still in school was a good idea, but Jess had had her heart set on him, and her stubbornness and love for the furball had won over Barbara. Now, whenever they came over to visit, she looked forward to his large bright eyes and the certainty he brought to Jess’s life.
“If he’s okay there, I’ll wait until my brother gets here to decide what to do about him,” she replied in a vacant, hollow voice, sounding to herself as if she were speaking in a tunne
l.
“Well, if you need me for anything, let me know. I’ll be on call until two o’clock this afternoon. We hope to have Jess’s MRI results before then. The nurses on this floor know where to find me.”
“Thanks, Dr. Sheldon. I think I’ll just stay here.”
Barbara turned and walked into Jess’s room. Ducking under the tubes that strung across, she settled into the cold plastic chair, found her daughter’s hand, and held on to it, repeating her name, assuring her she was close by, chanting to her like prayer, like an incantation, calling her back, urging the medications and the fluids to help her. For a moment, Barbara could sense Monica’s presence trying to push Jess back into her arms.
JESS
“Jess, can you hear me?”
Her eyes opened, and she stared hard at the sound coming toward her. It seemed so far away, like wind blowing through the trees near the river. Winter. She could hear winter in the voice—that’s what she named it. She tried to form the word “winter.”
“Jess, sweetheart, it’s me, your mom.”
Jess could hear other sounds and named those “walking” and “wonder.” Wwww—the sound of w was floating around her. She imitated the sound for the person, her winter.
“W-w-w-winter.”
She closed her eyes and fell back into the whirl of sound, the swirl of light and dark holding her like water, lifting her to the surface so she could breathe like a newborn. Something was grasping for her; she resisted, then let herself rise to the surface. She opened her eyes again and cried out in pain as sharp fragments of light began to pierce her underwater world. She could see them, drifting around in the room with her: w’s made of plastic, the sound coming from winter, her winter.
The Same River Page 13