COMFREY, WYOMING: Maiden Voyage

By Daphne Birkmyer

Praise for Birds of a Feather, winner of the Reader's View Bronze Award in the LGBTQ+ category: 

"Birkmyer's prose is wonderfully voiced and imaginatively detailed." -Kirkus Reviews

Praise for Marcela's Army: 

"A profound yet gentle novel that addresses childhood trauma with hone

• Language: English
• Publisher: Atmosphere Press
• Release date: Sep 13, 2022
• ISBN: 9781639885916

Book preview

P A R T O N E :

Crossing the Rubicon

C H A P T E R  O N E

The Little Cocoa Bean

Amadeus Crow baited his hook with a miniature dachshund puppy and attempted to reel his sister in.

Look, Marcela, two are chocolate-colored, he said, pointing at the computer screen.

Resting her hand on her brother’s shoulder, Marcela leaned over and frowned at the image of five puppies in a basket.

They look black, she said, squeezing his shoulder experimentally. You working out?

Always, he said, shrugging her hand off. It’s the lighting that makes them look black. They’re more like bittersweet chocolate, Heidi’s favorite. C’mon Marcela, I know you have over four hundred bucks, and I have a hundred. How much can they be?

To her credit, Marcela didn’t mention she would be pitching in most of the money, assuming a dachshund puppy could be had for five hundred dollars.

Where are they? she asked, and Amadeus felt a little tug on the line. She was interested.

That’s the thing, he said casually. It’s pretty far, but you can drive as much as you want.

They shared a car with their aunt; driving time was premium. The line gave another little tug.

Okay, maybe. So, where are they? Marcela asked again.

Ten Sleep. Amadeus winced as he felt the line go slack.

Marcela drew back and stared at her brother in disbelief. She shook her head slowly and compressed her lips into a hard line. Ten Sleep, months of nightmare eleven years ago. On occasion, even now, she would feel a wave of desolation so complete it stopped her in her tracks. The legacy of ignorance, intolerance, and alcohol addiction. She closed her eyes and swallowed hard—Amadeus couldn’t really be suggesting they go back.

Looking at his sister’s shuttered face, Amadeus continued softly, It’s just a place with puppies, Marcela. We’re sixteen now, no one can touch us, we can kick Ten Sleep in its butt. That Shit Sean’s probably gone or dead by now. We go back dressed as we want. He meant she could dress as a girl; he’d wear his standard T-shirt and jeans.

Without saying a word, Marcela went outside, slamming the door behind her. Amadeus gave her a few minutes before following. He found her sitting on the ground, her back against the trunk of the Winter Nelis pear. He lay down next to her and a sudden gust of wind buffeted the tree’s branches.

Stop it, Nara, he muttered.

Marcela looked at the sunlight dappling her brother’s bronze skin with gold. His long black hair fanned out across the fallen leaves. His face was turned away from her, but she had heard him talking to their mother. That hadn’t changed over the years; although these days he usually called her Nara instead of Mom, almost as if they were friends. He’d taken to dropping the ‘Aunt’ from Heidi too. Another strike at independence? Marcela’s mixture of frustration and jealousy eased when Amadeus clasped her ankle with his callused hand. She was grateful for his warmth.

They had always agreed they’d never go back to Ten Sleep, but now that they could drive, her brother was restless. Typical Amadeus—the puppy in that little town was just an excuse, an opportunity to prove he was invincible. They had been five years old, she had been the one singled out for abuse. Although her brother had always stood by her, it couldn’t have been as bad for him, but That Shit Sean could well be dead by now, they had willed it so many times. And if he were still alive in Ten Sleep, he wouldn’t recognize them in a black Mercedes. Would they even recognize the place their mother had gone off the road? Would they recognize where they’d climbed up the bank in the dark and stood by the highway, waiting for help, their mother unconscious in the car? Maybe not. Aside from the horror, it probably looked like most highway curves in Wyoming.

She said half-heartedly, Aunt Heidi doesn’t want another dog and she’ll say it’s too far.

Amadeus opened an eye. "She didn’t say she didn’t want another dog. She said that no other dog could ever replace Gering. He’s been dead like almost four years. If she sees a chocolate dachshund puppy, she’s not going to make us take it back."

She will say it is too far to drive, Marcela repeated, annunciating each word.

Obviously we do not tell her we are going to Ten Sleep, said Amadeus, copying her tone.

So, Sir Lies A Lot, what do we tell her?

Amadeus sat up. We just ask to borrow the car to go buy her a birthday present in Pinedale. We say after that, we’re going to Lake Fremont, paddle boarding, swimming, and stuff, so we’ll be gone all day. If we drive home from Ten Sleep through Pinedale, we can stop to get her a little something extra, so it’ll be less lying. It would be a whaddya call it?

A lie of omission, sighed his sister.

Exactly, we leave out the Ten Sleep part. Coming back, we could drive up through the reservation, through Teton, Pinedale and down. Back to our roots. Don’t you feel it on the Rez?

No, said Marcela.

Whatever, Amadeus said, serving up Marcela’s favorite response, minus the eye roll. Anyway, home for dinner. It’s summer, Heidi said we deserved a day off. Do you really want to help every damn day with dinner prep and clean up? They can get Tyree, he wants hours, he’s trying to get a better place so he can attract a woman.

Marcela remained silent, but he could feel her weakening. Encouraged, he continued, "We take food, we put gas in the car, and we’ll still have over four hundred ’n fifty bucks. The ad says the price is negotiable. You can choose which puppy and name it, but Heidi can change the name to some German food thing, like Wiener Schnitzel or Strudel or something, if she wants. Okay?"

Wiener Schnitzel … Marcela bit back a grin.

Okay, she said finally, but I drive as much as I want to and we phone first to make sure there are still puppies. How do you negotiate a puppy price, anyway?

Amadeus considered … few people desired the unconventional when it came to puppies. Maybe there’s a weird one, he said. Missing toes, no tail, runty, or something. Heidi always feels sorry for the weird ones. It would be like a bonus.

Heidi Crow sat in her office off the restaurant kitchen. She was distracted by payroll taxes and handed over the keys with few questions beyond why Marcela was dressed up so nicely to go paddle boarding at Lake Fremont.

She’s just practicing, you know the ‘I am woman hear me roar stuff’. She’s got what she needs for the lake in a bag, said Amadeus glibly, nodding to his sister to make a quick exit.

You’re going to hell, you’re such a lyin’ liar, said Marcela, as they got in the car, which was parked as usual in the lot behind The Crow’s Nest, the restaurant their aunt had owned for ten years.

I hear hell is where the hot women are, said Amadeus with a smirk.

They eased off the lot, squabbling about whether Amadeus made the hot women comment up or just heard it somewhere. Neither of them looked left before pulling on to Main Street.

When the driver of the black Mercedes turned the corner without looking, Fred Darcy blasted his horn and slammed on the brakes. His truck fishtailed right in front of the long plate-glass window of The Crow’s Nest. Fred could feel himself flushing as folks digging into their breakfasts paused to stare.

He ran his hand over his face and avoided looking at the restaurant again as he straightened the truck and drove off. Why should he feel embarrassed when he wasn’t in the wrong? But there it was, if anyone was going to feel embarrassed in any situation, it would be him. This damn small town full of watchers and judgers didn’t help.

He was surprised to see the Mercedes pulled over at the edge of town. The passenger had gotten out and was waving at him to stop. Fred parked behind the car and got out of his truck. Maybe they had stalled.

Hey, you’re Elizabeth’s husband, right? asked the boy with a grin.

Fred nodded.

"Well my sister, he pointed to the driver, who was looking steadfastly straight ahead, is sorry she scared the crap out of you and plans to be way more careful in future."

Again, Fred nodded.

And, the boy drew out the word, we’re hoping maybe you won’t say anything to our aunt, because well, we’re on our way to get her a birthday present and the present will be kinda … he searched for the word "… kinda tainted if she knew my sister, another glance at the car, was driving like an idiot."

Fred examined the boy. This was the first time he’d seen either of the twins up this close. If Marcela looked as much like her brother as people said she did, he could see what had attracted his son, Lucas, to the girl from such a young age.

I’m pretty sure all those people eating their breakfast on the other side of that long window will have informed your aunt of the, ah, incident already, said Fred, taking some satisfaction at the boy’s expletive.

Fred shrugged; the boy shrugged.

Maybe you should drive, suggested Fred.

No, we made kind of a deal, and anyway, she got her license a week before me, so she’s more experienced.

Fred raised his eyebrows and nodded at the car. That’s more experienced?

Yeah, and she learned her lesson right now. She said to say thanks.

Fred managed to meet the boy’s bold gaze and asked where the twins were going.

Um, you know, just around, maybe Pinedale, said Amadeus. You?

Gillette, so I’d best be going. Fred glanced again at the Mercedes. Drive safe.

You too, said the boy, without missing a beat. Gillette’s a big place—eyes on the road, hands at two and ten, look both ways.

Fred shook his head as he walked back to his truck. He would bet good money that boy didn’t fluster easy.

* * * * * *

Flora Wong was lost in the fragrance of the yellow roses she was trimming along the wrought iron fence that bordered her sidewalk, when she heard, then saw, the sleek, black, vintage diesel Mercedes pull up in front of the house, earlier than she expected. A car like that? Rare in these parts. She rapidly started reassessing her asking price.

The passenger waved and Flora didn’t think she could dash to the backyard to hide what her husband referred to as ‘the mutant’, who was still playing with his brothers and sisters. The mutant was not good publicity and his future was a bone of contention between her husband and herself.

Flora opened the front gate and stood awkwardly by the car as the couple inside carried on an animated conversation before glancing up at her. When they got out, she looked at them in surprise. From the voice on the phone, and now this Mercedes, she hadn’t expected Indian kids. Their hair was the same length and hung loose to well below their shoulders. Their features were strikingly similar. Twins?

The boy wore a T-shirt and jeans. The girl was beautifully dressed in a long-sleeved red blouse and black skirt, cinched with a silver belt. The heels on her black leather boots made her a little taller than the boy. Her nails were painted a blue that mirrored the blue in the intricate orange, blue, and red beaded necklace that hung around her neck. The two were an arresting sight and Flora realized with a start that she’d been staring.

Amadeus and Marcela Crow, said the boy when Flora forced a smile.

Crow Indians? Flora asked, shaking the hand he offered.

Arapaho Indians, Crow’s our last name, explained the girl.

Flora, Chinese person, last name Wong, said Flora. She was used to introducing herself to whites as simply Flora Wong, but she had never introduced herself to an American Indian person before. It looked like these two were trying not to laugh, and she felt a stab of embarrassment. What was so funny?

Amadeus and Marcela followed Flora along a flagstone path to the backyard. There were six puppies, not five, and they gamboled about, wrestling and panting, galloping and collapsing, on a well-tended green lawn. Three were chocolate and three were the color Heidi referred to as ‘biscotti brown’, the color her miniature dachshund, Gering, had been. All appeared to have the requisite number of legs, toes and tails, but the darkest puppy, the one whose coat was closest to the color of bittersweet chocolate, had a single, very appealing ice blue eye. Where its companion should have formed, there was merely a depression.

The puppy didn’t know of his defect, he didn’t know he wasn’t the most desirable of the litter and he romped over to them, wriggling, giving soft little yips and moans, turning over as Gering used to do, short little legs peddling the air, proudly exposing his private parts.

Does the blue eye see okay? asked Marcela.

Yes, said Flora, it sees fine, but the other puppies are better.

We think our aunt would like this one, said Amadeus. How much for this one?

Flora was an educated breeder and businesswoman. She was careful when selecting sires for her females, but biology could be fickle, and the occasional defective puppy was euthanized almost immediately. Something about this little dog had bought him some time. He was strong and had a good temperament. She had put off the inevitable far too long and now she had a problem. She didn’t want this puppy associated with her breeding stock.

He is not mine to sell. I board him for a friend, Flora lied, silently vowing a trip to the vet the next day.

The twins looked at each other, and Flora sensed a silent communication between them that left her suddenly longing for her sisters in Hong Kong.

He looks like he’s exactly the same age as the other puppies, said Marcela. She picked the dog up and held him close, breathing in his scent of grass, dirt, and something doughy, like fresh baked bread. He strained his neck to lick as much of her face and hands as she would allow.

But not for sale unless …. Flora appeared to consider for a moment. Let me phone my friend.

Flora went into the house and came back a few minutes later. My friend says ‘if you really want him, you can have him for two hundred,’ she said. He has no papers. You must neuter him within three months. No puppies from him.

Amadeus took the puppy from Marcela and immediately held him at arm’s length as the little dog peed his delight. Amadeus looked at Flora and said with a grin, Well, he works anyway.

They put the puppy on a towel on the backseat, but pulled the car over in less than a mile so Amadeus could scoop him up and hold him on his lap. It was lonely to be a solo puppy on the backseat of a big car.

What do you think the name of the friend was? asked Marcela, and they burst out laughing.

You know what Heidi would say … Amadeus said. ‘Do not look at the gift horse in its mouth!’

Yeah, we got a deal, his sister agreed. This little Cocoa Bean is worth four hundred easy.

Amadeus loosened his seat belt and propped himself against the passenger door, his right knee bent to make a nest for Cocoa Bean. Within minutes, Marcela became the single cognizant occupant of the car. Her brother’s head nodded, his hair falling over his face, and the puppy nestled in his lap. The comfort of their soft snoring was so sweet, Marcela imagined driving them to a den, perhaps in those rocky cliffs there, the three of them and no others. A tribe of three, two Arapahos and their dog, they would be perfect in their isolation. Amadeus could hunt, they could make fire and burn cones, needles, and sage, fragrant crackling sparks disappearing into an indigo night.

She glanced over at her brother, a reminder of how she would appear if she had remained Marcel. The texture of the road was imperceptible through the car’s heavy German engineering, and the steering wheel barely moved. Her right hand was free to seek the comfort of her breasts, rounded and firm, created by her own body in response to five years of hormone therapy, some to block the hormones she made, the more recent ones to supplement the hormones she didn’t. The smoothness of her cheeks, her slender neck, her delicate wrists and hands, Aunt Heidi had walked every step of the journey with her, and Amadeus had never wavered.

Marcela sighed. It had been a good day. Ten Sleep had seemed smaller, almost pretty in the light of early afternoon. They escaped without seeing anyone they recognized, although they had been so young when they had lived there. Neither of them mentioned where they thought their mother had driven off the road, although they had looked as they entered and left town. There was no damaged guardrail, no skid marks. Had there even been a guardrail? Had their mother, Nara, even applied the brakes?

The past slipped further away. They’d traveled over six hundred miles to bring a dachshund puppy, who saw well with his one ice blue eye, back to Comfrey.

C H A P T E R  T W O

Elizabeth Thrown Over

Elizabeth married me for my last name, Fred Darcy said a year later to the woman tending the bar in Gillette, realizing as he said it, that it was probably true. My boy and his mother are Magroots, old family in Comfrey. I’ll never be one. I never fit in that town.

Settling in Comfrey had felt like coming to a party late, everybody already into their conversations, no way to break in. Over fourteen years trapped in a town that was on the way to nowhere. Years with a woman who turned her book over in her lap and looked his way with disappointment in her eyes while he was watching television. And the disappointment was directed at him, Fred knew it, and it hurt more than he cared to admit. He had tried putting the television in the other room. He knew she would stay reading by the electric fire, but he felt it through the wall, the disappointment in him, a good guy. He did the repairs she asked him to do, stopped smoking after the baby came, didn’t drink that much. He caught fish; Elizabeth liked fish. For a few years he’d thought they were doing okay. They didn’t fight. She kept her figure. The sex didn’t stop like people said it would after Lucas was born. He stayed home in the evenings, except when he drove to Gillette each month to check on his mom or hang out with a few of his old high school buddies or his brother or sister. No one was disappointed in him in Gillette. They all thought he was doing good.

He was in his mid-thirties. There were mining jobs near Gillette, and they paid well. He thought he might miss his son more than his son would miss him. He was proud of the boy. Lucas had taught himself to play the piano before he could ride a bike, playing the little tunes that came into his head. He was one of those artistic kids, not much for hunting or gutting a fish. He could draw people, portraits that really looked like whatever person he had in mind. But Lucas wasn’t a pansy. Fred could see how a couple of his buddies might think that, so pale, almost delicate, but they didn’t see how handy the boy was. Lucas could saw a straight cut, hammer a nail upside down, cut firewood. He didn’t cry or whine if he got hurt, he’d suck it up. He was a brave boy. The last time he’d taken Lucas to Gillette, Lucas beat his older cousin at arm wrestling, just refused to give up, gritted his teeth and held on until the bigger boy folded.

The next day, before they left for Comfrey, Fred bought Lucas a couple more flannel shirts and told him to wear them for the next week so his mother wouldn’t ask about the bruises.

One beer was enough if he was going to look in on his mother, so Fred smiled at the bartender, shoved his money over the bar, and stood to leave.

You staying with your mother long? asked the bartender, who had introduced herself as Toni with an ‘i’.

Just the weekend, said Fred.

If you can get away for a few hours, it’d be my honor to cook you dinner, said Toni, with such a nice smile.

He refused his change and waited while she wrote down her address.

Fred knew as he walked to Toni’s door with a six-pack and flowers that he’d set himself on a path and he didn’t feel good about it. But then she opened the door and gave him a peck on the cheek. She introduced him to her hulking son, who lay on the sofa watching the game. When supper was ready, the game still wasn’t over, so they ate off trays in front of the television, negating the chore of dinnertime conversation.

Fred relaxed into what had to be; he belonged with these people and his mother, his brother and sister, his friends. He’d send money to Elizabeth. He could get back to Comfrey in five or six hours if she needed him. Better yet, he’d finish getting his pilot’s license. His brother might let him buy into his twin engine. He’d work things out with Lucas. The boy was busy, but one or two weekends a month they could get together. He and Elizabeth could sit down with a lawyer if they had to, but he didn’t see the need for a divorce unless Elizabeth wanted a formal end to it all.

Elizabeth would be fine with her books, her Aunt Ruth, and the others—a town full of Magroots. And she would have their boy most of the time.

* * * * * *

Your father has thrown us over, Elizabeth Darcy said to Lucas as she hung up the phone. Lucas dropped his spoon into his cereal bowl with a clatter and looked at his mother with raised eyebrows.

He said he’s staying in Gillette, said Elizabeth, a tremble to her voice.

Is Grandma sick?

No, I said he has … I said he’s not coming back. ‘I’m staying home’ is what he said, meaning Gillette. He got a mining job, a field service technician repairing equipment. He’ll send money.

Lucas pushed his bowl away and pulled his sketchbook toward him.

"Do we need money?" he asked, opening to a blank page, picking up his pencil, waggling it back and forth between his second and third fingers.

Elizabeth shook her head and watched the pencil. She prayed her son wouldn’t make one of his rapid sketches of her. With a few lines, he could capture a person’s likeness, just like that, and there she would be on the page, looking abandoned.

Lucas put the pencil down and ran his fingers over the raised surface of the blue ducks that marched in a merry line along the edge of the tablecloth. Blue ducks, he wished he’d met the grandmother who had embroidered blue ducks instead of yellow ducks. She’d died young and Bef, his mom, refused to talk about her.

He sighed. Life had been running pretty smoothly until this parent thing, but he was sure at least he hadn’t been thrown over. He picked up his pencil. The trips they made to Gillette once or twice a month, he and his dad both looked forward to those. Five and a half hours to draw. Peaceful, the occasional word back and forth, the twitch of a smile that Lucas knew was just for him. He barely noticed the red and brown strata of the cliffs, the color of the sky, the prairie grasses. He sketched people mostly, often he sketched a beautiful Arapaho girl.

When he had gone to the library two weeks ago to get a book on the geology of the Green River Basin for a school report, he’d found Marcela Crow asleep, her hair sprawled across the table like an alluvial fan. Silently, he’d picked up the chair opposite her and moved it back a few feet so he wouldn’t be too close. He sat down and sketched her until her brother appeared.

She say you could do that? Amadeus demanded, and Marcela had opened a sleepy eye.

Don’t pick on little kids, Amadeus, she’d said, but Lucas had already risen. He’d seen enough. He’d drawn her for years, but he had what he needed for the drawings he wanted to do now. A black-eyed girl, hair blowing at the whim of the wind, running, sleeping, years ago hiding with her brother in a field so they wouldn’t have to say hello to him.

Other times he drew his Aunt Ruth with her myriad of expressions, his mother, lost in thought, his father in profile, or from the back, or standing at the kitchen door, coffee cup in hand. His Gillette grandmother, sweet and vague, suspicious or scared, depending on which part of her brain was active. Sometimes he drew the Filipino girl who had visited her mother’s family in the house next to his grandmother for a few months. She was bold and experienced. She had insisted on posing for him nude in the garden shed. He was thirteen and curious. When her family left abruptly to go back to the Philippines, he hadn’t had the chance to say goodbye.

Putting up with his cousins in Gillette was a small price to pay for three hundred and fifty miles on the road with just his dad. When they arrived in Gillette, his dad would turn off the engine and hold his hand out for the sketchbook. He took his time examining the new drawings, sometimes asking a question, giving Lucas a thumb’s up or reaching over to ruffle his hair. No, Lucas didn’t believe he’d been thrown over. His mom though … well she might have been.

Sorry, Bef, Lucas said, as his mother waited for him to render some kind of response. Dad’s maybe just taking a break.

"It’s not just a break, with that mining job it’s not," Elizabeth said, pushing herself away from the kitchen counter. She darted a glance at the sketchbook, not her but Fred, half his face in shadow. She looked at the clock.

Don’t miss the bus. Take three dollars from my purse for lunch, she said, as she trailed down the hall.

Thursday meant sloppy joes, a brownie and milk, and Marcela Crow running on the high school track near where his class ate their lunch. Tempting as it was to escape to school, he couldn’t see abandoning his mother, not today. When he heard his mother’s door close, he phoned his great aunt Ruth.

When Ruth picked up the phone and expressed her surprise at his call so early on a school day, Lucas could hear a plaintive mewing in the background.

New cat, Aunt Ruth? he asked.

Unless you’re psychic, which I’m prepared to believe you may be, you didn’t phone to ask about this cat, she said crisply. I’ll tell you anyway, just to get it out of the way. That imbecile across the road hit her with a hoe because she was trying to do her business in his pathetic excuse for a flowerbed. Then he apparently had an attack of conscience, and he brought the poor little thing to me to stitch up.

Lucas imagined his aunt’s face wrinkling in disgust at her neighbor’s idiocy.

Poor cat, he said.

Poor cat indeed, said Ruth. Now talk to me, Lucas.

Okay. It’s just that Bef says my dad’s gone. He phoned, and he’s going to be staying in Gillette, I guess. She’s feeling pretty bad.

As he spoke, Lucas watched his face in the small oval mirror by the phone. He put his tongue on the tip of one of his eyeteeth, longer than most people’s. He looked older, looked way older than yesterday. Maybe he should see if he liked coffee. He heard a sigh over the phone, meows.

Did Fred … did your dad clear his stuff out? asked Ruth.

I don’t know, but he’s working out there now, so I guess he’s taken stuff, he said, watching through the kitchen window as a large black bird landed on the garden fence. The bird sidestepped its way along the fence, studying the ground. He couldn’t see the tail, so unless it vocalized, it would be hard to tell if it was a crow or a raven.

A bevy of meows and Ruth said, Hang on, Lucas. She put down the phone, and he heard soft murmurs. The sound of a tap, more comforting sounds, Ruth back at the phone, a loud gulping.

Excuse us, Kitty and I are parched. Sewing up’s a thirsty business. Now, back to your mother, the poor girl, I’m sorry, said Ruth. "And how are you feeling, Lucas?

I’m fine. I’m not going to school today.

I hear you, said Ruth.

But I’ll have to go tomorrow, he said. Then what?

"Of course you have to go tomorrow. I have an engagement this morning, library meeting. Can’t miss it, they’re trying to ban Catcher in the Rye again. I’ll be with you sometime after two. How’s that?"

Okay. Well … guess I’ll see you later then.

Now don’t go sounding so forlorn Lucas. Go grub in the garden, Ruth suggested. It’s a nice, warm day, should get in the sixties before noon.

Lucas heard a poor kid as she hung up the phone. Was he a poor kid? His dad had been learning how to fly a twin engine. There was an airstrip in Comfrey. He wouldn’t mind looking down from above.

With barely a sound, Elizabeth shut the door to what was now, officially, just her bedroom. She took off her shoes, lay down on the bed, and stared at the narrow white boards of the ceiling. She gave way to an abiding fatigue, drifting downward, slowly, so