Fire Is Your Water: A Novel

By Jonathan H. Earle

Sacred chants are Ada Franklin’s power and her medicine. By saying them, she can remove warts, stanch bleeding, and draw the fire from burns. At age twenty, her reputation as a faith healer defines her in her rural Pennsylvania community. But on the day in 1953 that her family’s barn is consumed by flame, her identity as a healer is upended. The heat, the roar of the blaze, and the bellows of the trapped cows change Ada. For the first time, she fears death and—for the first time—she doubts God. With her belief goes her power to heal. Then Ada meets an agnostic named Will Burk and his pet raven, Cicero.

Fire Is Your Water is acclaimed memoirist Jim Minick’s first novel. Built on magical realism and social observation in equal measure, it never gives way to sentimentality and provides an insider’s glimpse into the culture of Appalachia. A jealous raven, a Greek chorus of one, punctuates the story with its judgments on the characters and their actions, until a tragic accident brings Ada and Will together in a deeper connection.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Swallow Press
• Release date: Mar 15, 2017
• ISBN: 9780804040792

Jonathan H. Earle

Jonathan H. Earle is associate professor of history at the University of Kansas and author of the Routledge Atlas of African American History.

Book preview

Fire Is Your Water

FIRE IS YOUR WATER

A Novel

Jim Minick

Swallow Press

Athens, Ohio

Swallow Press

An imprint of Ohio University Press, Athens, Ohio 45701

ohioswallow.com

© 2017 by Jim Minick

All rights reserved

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

To obtain permission to quote, reprint, or otherwise reproduce or distribute material from Swallow Press / Ohio University Press publications, please contact our rights and permissions department at [phone] or [phone] (fax).

Printed in the United States of America

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Minick, Jim, date author.

Title: Fire is your water : a novel / Jim Minick.

Description: Athens, Ohio : Swallow Press, [2017]

Identifiers: LCCN 2016051608| ISBN 9780804011846 (hardcover : acid-free paper) | ISBN 9780804040792 (pdf)

Subjects: LCSH: Spiritual healing—Fiction. | Young women—Fiction. | Healers—Fiction. | BISAC: FICTION / General.

Classification: LCC PS3613.I6253 F57 2017 | DDC 813/.6—dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016051608

For Ida Franklin Minick (1879–1968),

great-grandmother,

first memory,

powwow doctor who chanted over me

before I was even born;

for Glenn and Susan Minick,

joined by a wink and a scoop of ice cream

on the Pennsylvania Turnpike;

for Blue and Kittatinny Mountains,

shelter and vision;

and for Sarah,

my heart’s fire.

If you are a friend of God, fire is your water.

—From The Question by Rumi

Cicero

According to the Cherokee tale—which I like—I got my black feathers by trying to fetch fire. Way back, before you and your words even existed, we animals lived in a world without fire. We shivered a lot, went to bed early, huddled to keep warm. Then one day, lightning struck a hollow sycamore far out on an island. We could see the smoke. A little bit of sun waited there.

None of the fourleggeds could swim that far, not the mountain lion or wolf or even the bear, so I volunteered. I winged across that wide water, and I could tell as I got closer that fire burned hot, the smoke shooting up in great billows. How in this cold world was I going to grab an ember and haul it back? I circled. The sycamore had no branches—it’d been dead a long time. All I could do was land on the lip of that long hollow flue. I touched the wood and felt blisters on my claws. Sparks drifted up and I pecked, but they burned my beak. For a moment, the smoke cleared and I stared down into the fire. My god, that scared me. Then a huge flame blasted up and scorched me black. I barely made it back across the water.

Owls tried. All three failed. Two snakes swam across and came back black and shiny like me. Then the little spider spoke up, and by god of all eightleggeds if she didn’t snatch a little spark in her baskety web and swim back. That’s how fire came into the world—a good thing, I guess, though I’m not always sure.

So remember this next time you kill a spider or light your stove to cook. But hell, you won’t. You never do. Just like you never call me the right name—I’m a raven, not a crow. Drill that into your convoluted brain.

Now git on with you. I got feathers to preen.

Contents

I

1

2

3

4

II

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

III

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

29

30

31

32

33

34

35

36

37

38

39

40

IV

41

42

43

44

45

46

47

48

49

Acknowledgments

I

And burn me, O Lord, with a fiery zeal

Of thee and thy house, which doth in eating heal.

—John Donne

1

Early June, 1953

Ada reached the barn door first, her own hard breathing muffled by the cows’ high-pitched bellows. Inside, the panic: cows bugling alarm calls, chickens cackling, pigs squealing as they thumped against the pen walls. All of it out of sight. Thick smoke curtained the barn windows. We’re coming, we’re coming, Ada called, her voice its odd staccato, frantic and quick, but the cows couldn’t hear her over the roar of the fire.

When she opened the door, a bank of smoke poured out around her, and she hesitated, but not her mother, Kate. She pushed past and disappeared. Ada gasped at the suddenness of how she vanished. Then she too filled her lungs, held her breath, and dove into the doorway.

The smoke blinded her. Three steps in, Ada saw nothing; her eyes teared and she started coughing. Her heart thrashed against her ribs. Easy now. Easy. She tripped over a feed sack and caught herself on the stone wall. Don’t turn around. Keep going. She could almost see her shoes, the smoke not as thick, so she half crouched, half ran the rest of the way into the barn.

The barn. Their barn. This barn. Her great-great-grandfather had built it, with oak troughs, oak stanchions, oak posts and ceiling timbers. The huge loft above held all the first cutting of hay. Every part of this barn was tinder. Every part except the metal links that held each cow.

Earlier, the two women had brought in the milk cows and clipped each one to a chain fastened to the floor. Then they fed them and looked over their black-and-white ladies as they listened to the sounds of contented chewing. They had talked about Ada’s brother, Nathan, about how they might not see him for another year, even two. And why is Peter late? her mother had asked. Ada wrinkled her forehead in worry. Normally, her father would have the milking half done, but he had driven to Harrisburg to take Nathan back to the army. The train was late, and Peter hadn’t yet returned.

In the barn, flames flickered and crackled in a far corner, and Ada could just see Belle, the first cow. Sweat slicked the cow’s black hide, and her ribs swelled and heaved. The animal pulled at her collar, strained to look behind at the fire. Ada gentled the cow to her and unclipped the chain. Belle turned to gallop down the center aisle and away.

You can do this. Sweat burned Ada’s eyes; she looked across the aisle. Where’s Mama? Then came a low scrape and groan at the other end of the barn as her mother pushed open the sliding door to the barnyard. Cool air rushed in and brushed Ada’s hands. But this fresh air also fed the fire. The smoldering suddenly flared into flames that flashed on the pile of hay behind her. Above in the huge loft, the clatter and rumble grew louder. She knelt to release the next cow, leaning against it, touching its hot neck with her forehead. The desperate clamor of so many animals filled her head, her chest, her whole body.

Keep moving. You have to do this.

She hurried to the next animal. From the far side of the barn the sound of loosened chains clacked onto the floor as her mother worked down the opposite row. Ada grabbed chains, unclipped cows, moved.

Most of the older cows cooperated, but the younger ones were too panicked, too crazy with fear. They strained against the metal holds. Their bodies arched and glistened as they whole-body yanked against the restraint. They twisted and heaved—eyes bulging, ears back, mouth open to bellow again and again. Their drool soaked her hands. Ada pulled with her long body against each animal. She braced her feet, gripped chain with both hands, and leaned back. She looked each cow in the face, pleaded with it, yelling, Come on! Come on! as it inched close enough to be freed. At last, she held the clip open and worked it off the cow’s collar.

She moved to the next cow, and the next, the rumbling all around her.

Ada knew these animals. She had healed their cuts, chanted to stop their bleeding. Always, their dark eyes had comforted her, even made her laugh as they closed with pleasure when she scratched their chins. Now, these eyes didn’t see her. They looked into a dark place backlit with fire. Ada suddenly saw that place too, a hell she’d never before realized was so close.

She remembered the story of the three Jews: Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. They were thrown into the fire and they did not burn. They had faith. They had someone in that furnace with them. A man made of fire. A man who held their hands. Where is he? Where’s my angel of fire?

She held her sleeve to her mouth, took a deep breath. Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, she began. But the words stopped. She stooped to the next cow, strained to pull it enough to unhook the chain, and began again: Though I walk through the valley . . . The words caught in her throat, and she coughed so hard she had to lean against the stanchion until the coughing stopped.

Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, she tried a third time. Again, nothing more. This verse, a comfort all her life, now swallowed and gone. Where are you, God?

Behind her, a ceiling timber crashed to the floor, booming close. The massive joist erupted, and Ada leapt away to crouch against the wall. She turned back to watch the fire reach out to the door she’d just passed through, the wooden entry now a sheet of brilliant color.

Oh God! Ada hugged her knees, rocking and suddenly sobbing. Panic froze her joints, froze even her thoughts. OhGodohGodohGod. She couldn’t walk, couldn’t move, couldn’t even yell. She coughed so hard she almost fainted.

Some flames popped toward her, and a spark smoldered on the hem of her dress. Without hesitating, she clapped her hands on the fabric until she smothered the spark. It left a small, black circle, and Ada’s hands become suddenly and totally cold. How could this be?

Ada felt light-headed. Her lips tingled, her lungs ached. The hands before her were foreign, as if they’d all of a sudden grown there—not her hands, someone else’s. And so cold. She held them in front of her face, bent the fingers, and slowly her world grew silent, the fire’s fury, the cows’ bellowing, all of it disappeared. The odd hands turned in front of her. They could be solid as ice. Yet she moved fingers, touched thumbs.

The hands settled beside her, fingers trailing the floor. Close by, the fire licked the ceiling, the bits of hay in the trough, the trough itself. How beautiful, she thought. How absolutely beautiful.

She pressed her shoulder against the wall and stared at the burning door. Each time it swung out and back, the colors danced. But she didn’t hear the sound of it slamming. So many colors. A whole whirling rainbow. And there, in the center, a clearness, no color at all. The flames came closer, but she didn’t move. And all of it so cold. Her breathing eased. Her shoulders relaxed as she settled onto the floor. Such radiance. Is this how the angel of fire looked? She coughed again, her lungs so tired. She rested her palm on her cheek, felt the coldness. Or has Satan come into this furnace? Desperation gone, the question just filled her with a sad curiosity.

Ada held this thought—I want to drink these flames.

She breathed a slow breath.

I am thirsty for fire.

She knew nothing else.

Her mother’s hand startled her. All sound returned—the cows and the drumming fire. Her fear and panic came back, too.

Slowly Ada heard her mother screaming over the roar. Ada, are you OK?

She grabbed her mother, held tight while her mother hugged her. But only briefly.

Are you hurt? That timber, did it reach you?

Ada shook her head.

Go on. Get out. I’ll get the rest of the cows.

Soot streaked her mother’s flushed face, her hair loose and wild. The thought of her in here alone—no. Ada shook her head again. I’ll keep working.

Good. Her mother squeezed her shoulders and hurried to the other side of the barn.

Ada watched her disappear into the smoke, and then she became all movement. No panic now, only numbness. No praying, just hands loosening chains, body crouching to the next animal. She leaned against cow, yanked on chain, pulled in to release out.

As she scrambled to the next, she glanced back at the fallen timber, the door swinging and aflame. No way out but one, she realized. She repeated this as she heaved on the next chain, unclipped and watched the black panic in the cow’s eyes. No way out but one. Her hands moved quicker now, her body like water.

Ada reached the last cow in her row, Molly, the oldest, slow and hobbled with arthritis. The cow didn’t even pull against the chain, but her eyes stared at the fire. Ada leaned against the animal’s solid neck, unclipped and dropped the chain, and yelled, GO! The cow shifted around the stanchion to trot out the door, her huge udder swaying.

At the barn door, Ada gasped clean air, sucked the blue sky into her, while heat and smoke billowed out behind. She turned to look for her mother. After she had opened the barn door, she had worked in the opposite direction, so while Ada released cows and moved away from the fire, her mother kept moving toward it. Now, over the growing roar, Ada heard her yelling at a cow, but she couldn’t see anything—no cows, no Mama, just smoke.

Ada ducked her head and dove into the smoke. She ran to the rear where flames covered the walls and flashed down from the ceiling timbers to lick the backs of Star and Seven, the two cows still chained in. Seven rammed the trough, stepped back to ram it again, slipping in her own manure. Star, a massive black cow, the newest of the herd, didn’t move. She stood rigid, all four legs locked, pulling against her chain. Ada’s mother crouched in front of Star, pulling, trying to free her.

Ada jumped into the stall and rammed her shoulder into Star’s side. She felt the raw ooze of the cow’s burned flesh, smelled singed hair. The sudden jolt shocked the cow, shoved it forward just enough for her mother to unclasp the hook. Ada leapt out of the stall as the wild creature hied for the door.

As they moved to release Seven, another timber fell from above. It just missed Ada and Kate but hit Seven squarely on her spine. The cow crumpled and roared. The heavy beam crushed Seven’s back, broke her so she lay at an odd angle. She could only move her neck. The cow swung her head back with that white 7 emblazoned on her forehead, a birthmark—a good luck sign, they had thought at her birth. Kate ran to the cow.

NO! Ada yelled, but her mother knelt by the animal. The chain glowed orange and bright, and without hesitating, Kate grabbed the hot metal and released this last cow.

Ada hurried to her side. Mama, come on! She pulled her arm and together they ran away from Seven’s shrill bellows. In the barnyard, they leaned against the water trough and breathed clean air. All the other cows huddled wild-eyed in the far corner.

Ada cupped her hands and poured water over her face. Her mother just stood, watching the fire. A red welt rose on her forehead, and her eyebrows were singed and gone. Ada glimpsed her mother’s hands—black and raw and oozing. That last chain had burned into her palms.

Her mother didn’t notice. She ran past Ada and shouted, Open all the doors. She disappeared through the smoke to release the chickens and heifers in the next barn.

Ada moved through the herd to the hog pen, where she slid open the chute. The pigs squealed with fright when she yelled, Out, get out! They grunted and circled and refused to leave the darkness of their little house. She waded into their pen to drive them out through the square of light.

Hunkering through the chute, Ada followed the last pig into the barnyard, where they cowered in a far corner. The fire was still too close, the animals too panicked. She shouldered her way through the Holsteins to the far side of the lot and opened the gate to the meadow. The older cows led, trotting through the gap and away from the heat. When the barnyard emptied, Ada closed the gate and looked back. Cinders blew into her face and hot wind licked her whole body. Where are you, Mama? she whispered, searching the other buildings. Finally, her mother’s head of brown hair bobbed from behind the wagon shed as she shooed the hens far into the alfalfa field.

Ada turned to watch the barn. The bottom floor brightened so she had to squint and hold her arm up to shade her eyes. Flames pressed against the windows and flicked through slats. Above, in the loft, smoke and flames pushed through the wooden siding. The barn and hay, the grain and tools and equipment, all of it was lost.

She ran to help her mother. From deep in the barn, Seven’s sharp call pierced the fire’s drum and clatter.

2

By the time the first men and their fire trucks arrived, the tin on the barn roof curled and flapped in the heat. Firelight reflected off their helmets as they rushed around the trucks, connecting hoses, opening valves, heavy boots slogging through mud. Three men charged forward with the long snake of hose, and the lead one opened the valve to release a heavy stream of water. Another fire company arrived, and soon a second team joined the first. But the tanks quickly ran dry, and heat forced the men to seek shelter behind a truck. The temperature became so intense the first crew had to move its engine back another fifty feet.

A half-hour later, two more fire companies turned into the lane. As soon as they saw the fire, the men turned off the sirens. The barn was lost, they knew, and all they could do was protect the other buildings.

Neighbors came and asked how it started or where Peter was. The older men saw calves and chickens in the alfalfa where Kate had driven them, and they sent boys out to check on these animals. Later, these neighbors would fashion a pen in the tractor shed, but now they simply leaned against their pickups and watched the blaze. Mostly they stayed silent, or they talked in low voices about the animals. They could see the milkers down in the meadow, the raw sores where a few were burned. They wondered if they’d have to be put down, or if Ada or Mark Hoover could heal them. They knew Ada and Mark could take out fire by using Bible verses and old chants for healing burns. But sometimes the burns were too severe. And not everyone believed.

Others joined the watchers—women and children, relatives and friends. They heard the sirens or saw the smoke from five miles away. When new people arrived, they greeted each other, their bodies already turning toward the fire. The women touched their faces or pulled their children close. The men spat and swore under their breath. All of them grew silent in their watching.

Light from the fire made their faces glow, and as day fell away to darkness, firelight cast strange shadows among them. Even when the watchers stilled, their shadows shifted and moved, twisting away from the smoke and blaze and the fire trucks’ revolving lights. Night’s cool air touched their backs, and women drew collars tight against their chins. The men shifted, glanced at each other, and watched another fire truck pull in. For a moment, their shadows disappeared in the truck’s headlights. Their eyes followed the firemen as they ran new lines, stumbling in their heavy gear to open valves, the water disappearing into the fire.

As the watchers stood in the shadows, they considered how much they could spare to give to the Franklins to help them through the coming year. The entire world of this one place—all its animals and people and plants—everything passed through this building’s doors. The barn was a bank of hay and wheat, corn and oats, now all gone.

But mostly, the watchers considered their own luck, their own good fortune. The women whispered quiet prayers. In their pockets, the men touched a buckeye, fingering the smooth nut, wearing away its ridges.

Like a mighty, anchored ship, the barn slowly sank. First the roof fell, then the sides, each collapse creating a shower of sparks hurling upward into the night. One side leaned and fell outward, and the men rushed away to return with their hoses to douse the blackened boards. Each collapse exposed the bones and ribs of the barn, mortised posts and beams all pegged together more than a hundred years ago. Those beams charred and ignited also, and soon they became wicks for this immense and hungry fire.

3

For a few minutes, Ada and her mother stood in silence behind the fire trucks. The men all looked tiny before the tower of flames, and they all looked the same in their heavy coats and shiny hats. Yet Ada knew one of them was Jesse. She just couldn’t tell which one. Jesse with his thick mustache and broad shoulders. Jesse who almost got her to say yes. Jesse who had other women saying yes.

The wind picked up and the inferno thundered. Sparks ascended to fall over them as ash. When one of the barn walls crashed to the ground, Ada flinched. Her mother stared straight into the blaze, a blankness on her face Ada couldn’t read.

From down the road another siren approached, this time an ambulance. Mid Kelso, their neighbor, worked her way through the people. Ada guessed she had made the call to the fire station.

You OK? Mid asked when she reached them.

Kate only nodded, her arms folded in front of her.

Mama’s hands are burned, Ada said. Come on, Mama. We can’t do any more, and I need to look at your hands. Mid gently turned her away from the roar and heat and shouts of men. As the women passed through the crowd, hands reached out to touch them, fingers lingering on their shoulders.

Ada glanced back and saw the medics with their bags, searching for anyone injured. She didn’t want their help, not yet.

In the kitchen, she told her mother to sit and asked Mid to watch the door, to not let anyone in yet. I need to powwow over Mama’s burns.

Ada washed her hands and began her silent prayer, the one she always repeated before doing a chant. Lord, make me thy instrument. Give me strength to heal Mama’s hands. All power to you, in Holy Jesus’ name. Amen.

But something wasn’t right. Something was missing.

As she dried her hands, Ada repeated the prayer. Usually by amen, her hands tingled and heated up, and she knew the Spirit was in her. But now, no tingle, no warmth, nothing. Where are you, God? The question opened the flood of sound swirling inside, that immense roar that slipped along the rafters of her thoughts. For a moment, she crouched again by the barn wall and saw that burned hole in her dress, the swinging, flame-covered door. Those chained-in cows stared at her, their blue-black pupils bottomless pools deep enough to drown in.

No, she whispered, and the roar quieted. But it didn’t disappear.

Ada drew a glass of water, hands trembling. All the while she kept tamping down the rumble in her head by saying her prayer: Make me thy instrument. Help me do right. Her fingers never tingled.

Ada put down the glass and turned. Her mother lifted her head, expectant and crying, the pain, at last, surging through her body. Ada pulled a chair to sit facing her so that their knees touched.

Just do the motions. Say the chant and maybe the powwow will work.

Gently she picked up her mother’s left wrist and placed it in her lap. The hand was so raw that she whispered, Mama! Her mother’s eyes didn’t waver, sure of her daughter.

The skin was all charred away. Only black and red flesh remained, no pink, no blisters even, like her brother’s burn from years ago. Fluid seeped onto Ada’s lap, staining her skirt. On her mother’s palm, the worst burns formed ovals in the shape of a chain.

Ada had to close her eyes. Uncle Mark had taught her to look directly into the wound, to face the Devil, but she couldn’t. When she looked at her mother’s hand, the rumbling fire roared again. She pinched the bridge of her nose, listened to her own breathing, tried to hear God’s voice above all the din. But the rumble wouldn’t stop.

Just say the chant, she kept thinking. Just get through this. Then, God, where are you?

With her mouth inches from the wound, she whispered the secret words Uncle Mark had taught her. You just have to have faith. Have to have faith.

Ada paused to wave her right palm slowly over the burn. She leaned again and repeated the chant, lips almost kissing the wound. Three times she waved her hand over her mother’s palm, and three times she leaned in to speak directly to the fire. She told the Devil to leave this place; she asked the Lord to come heal this burn. In the quiet of the room, she heard her mother breathing, heard the mantel clock, the distant shouts and low rumble from outside. Ada knew her chant wasn’t working.

When she finished, Ada only glanced at her mother. Nothing had changed.

Then Ada went against her uncle’s teachings once more and did something she had never done before—she repeated the chant a fourth time. Again, nothing. At the very least, the chant should stop the pain, and at its best, the words sometimes even healed the flesh. But for the first time in her life, Ada couldn’t heal, couldn’t help her mother, couldn’t help anyone, not even herself. God had disappeared.

Ada placed her mother’s hand back in her lap. Soot smudged her mother’s forehead and cheek. Ada had to answer the question in her eyes.

It isn’t working, Mama. She stared into her lap. With the back of her hand, she wiped her tears. It isn’t working at all, and I don’t know why. Then she clutched her mother and sobbed on her shoulder. Her mother’s awkward hug came round her, burned hands not quite able to hold on.

4

Ada stood in the middle of the kitchen, while Uncle Mark told the medics they weren’t needed. I’ll take care of these two. He filled the doorway, blocking their view. The two men hesitated before turning away, and Uncle Mark closed the door behind them.

He stepped close to Ada, looked her over intently, eyed her pale face and trembling hand. You all right?

Ada nodded and pointed to her mother.

Brother, I think I have some burns for you to powwow over, her mother said. He sat before her and began whispering the chants.

Ada shuffled to the corner and sat. All she wanted was to look away, but instead she watched. Her uncle said the same chant. He paused and waved his hand over the burns. He leaned close again to whisper those sacred words, all of it just as she had done. This time, though, her mother relaxed and the pain faded.

Ada turned to stare out the window, into the darkness with its strange firelight. Stars appeared where they shouldn’t be, a vast, new emptiness right there beside her. She heard her father enter, but she didn’t get up.

She’ll be all right, Uncle Mark murmured when he saw Peter’s face. She got these from the cow chains. He spread salve on