LaRose(87)

Peter answered, and when the coach said who he was Peter’s stomach clutched, sure that Maggie was getting kicked off the team. But no, this was a good call. The first good call about Maggie that her parents had ever received.

Every night after school, now, she got a pass from setting the table. Peter and LaRose set the table as long as Maggie went out to the barn to do her exercises and jumps. The dog sat in the doorway concentrating on her pogo leaps. At first it was hard to jump for five minutes. Then hard to jump for ten. Then fifteen, twenty. Dark came early. She turned on the barn light and massaged her legs. It got cold. She wore a parka and sweatpants to keep her legs warm, so they wouldn’t seize with cramps. Her muscles became hard springs. She practiced serves—running, leaping, at the height of her leap punching the ball just so, at the dog, who politely stepped aside and never got beaned.

Once, as she vaulted toward the dog, she thought that if she’d had a knife sharp enough, and with the height she could now achieve, she could have jumped up and cut the rope. Her mother falls, gagging. Maggie kicks her in despair. Maggie saw it all happen. Then she heard her mother call.

Turn out the barn light. Come in. Come in now, Maggie. It’s dinnertime. Your food is getting cold.


Old Story 2

MEWINZHA, MEWINZHA, SAID Ignatia, right after the first soft snow securely blanketed off the living from the dead. Long time ago. This was before the beginning of time. In those days everything could talk and people had powers. At that time, there was a man living in the woods with his wife and his two little boys. They lived good on what they had; they were doing okay. But then the man noticed, when he was getting ready to go out and hunt, his wife was putting on her whitest skin dress, her quill and bone earrings, all her beautiful things. The first time he thought that she was preparing herself for him, but when he returned with meat on his toboggan, he saw that she was wearing her old clothes again. He was jealous. The next time he prepared to go hunting, she put on her finery the same way. But he doubled back. He hid himself, and when she left their boys behind and went out into the woods, in her fancy clothing, he followed her secretly.

This man’s wife goes up to a tree. He watches her. She strikes the tree three times. Out of the tree comes a snake. A big one. Yes, a big snake. The wife and the snake begin to love each other up then. The man sees his woman and the snake together and oh my, she loves that snake better than she ever loved her husband.

Don’t talk bad!

Oh, shut up, Malvern.

The two women frowned at each other, and at last Malvern nicked her head at LaRose, made some motions with her lips that Ignatia interpreted.

See here, LaRose, the snake and woman they want to hold hands but the snake don’t have any hands. They want to kiss but the snake don’t have any lips. They just have to twine around together.

Ignatia moved her arms around to show LaRose how this could happen.

What kind of story is this? asks LaRose

A sacred one, Ignatia says.

Ohhhh-kayyyyy . . . LaRose has learned the okay of a skeptical eight-year-old from wise-ass sitcom eight-year-old boys.

I know this story, said Malvern. It is a frightful story. Not a good story to tell a young boy.

Maybe, said Ignatia. But it is a story of existence. This boy can know it; he is brave enough.

She went on telling the story.

The man was very jealous of the snake. So the next day he went hunting, and when he came back he said to his wife that he had killed a bear. He told her to go and fetch the meat. When she was gone, he put on a skirt and went to the serpent tree. He struck the tree three times, and the serpent appeared. Then he stuck his spear through the serpent, killing it dead. He brought the snake back to his lodge, cut that snake into pieces, and made that snake into snake soup.

Snake soup?

Yes, my boy.

They ate snake soup in the olden times?

The old women frowned at each other.

Ignatia said that in the olden times the kids had no TVs. They just shut up and listened to stories and didn’t interrupt.

Malvern said that his question was good and she would answer it.

They ate the snake soup just this one time, she said.

Okay, said LaRose. I mean, I had to ask. It’s unusual.

So moving on with the story, said Ignatia. When the woman finally returned, she said that there was no dead bear in the place he’d told her to go. There was no meat. She had searched, but found nothing. Her husband told her not to worry because he’d made soup.

Wait, said LaRose. Made soup out of the snake she . . .

Loved, yes, said Ignatia.

That’s like . . .

Point of the story, said Malvern.

Did she eat it? LaRose stared at them, pained.

Ignatia nodded.

Oh, said LaRose. This just gets worse.



IT’S NOT MUCH of a life, said Ottie in the car. But it’s something.

This dialysis makes people crazy, Landreaux said, but you’re holding up good.

I’da checked out if it wasn’t for Bap.

She loves you.

People who were chronically ill either dulled out and watched TV or cut to the chase in surprising ways, Landreaux found. The dulled-out ones were easier. But Ottie had been asking these questions and was so pleasant and forgiving that it was, almost, possible to tell the truth.

We’re in love. The good stuff lasted, said Landreaux. For me.

I get it, said Ottie.