All the Winters After (26 page)

FIFTY-EIGHT

Kache could see that Nadia had taken once again to killing things. A skinned rabbit and a plucked spruce hen hung from string in the barn. The woman could skin a rabbit without a knife. The first time, he'd watched with uneasy awe as she grabbed its legs and, holding it upside down, firmly pulled the leg fur up like socks and then the tail and all the rest of it in one continuous motion, as quickly and easily as if merely removing its sweater.

Kache jumped when he heard another shot go off from the west. He liked it much better when she was shooting movies rather than animals, but there seemed to be no stopping her.

In the bracing cold, he fed the cow, goats, and chickens, all understandably a bit on edge. The pure white goat, gentle Buttercup, stuck by Kache's side the whole time he worked. He offered them all gentle reassurances along with the hay and grain, but who could be sure? Nadia's nerves were shot too. The idea of preparing a Thanksgiving meal for five had the most capable woman he knew wringing her hands—along with a spruce hen neck.

He wanted to head out to the woods to remind her they had an eighteen-pound turkey—bought from Safeway already plucked, gutted clean, and now brined and stuffed and roasting in the oven—but he didn't want to join the casualties, so instead, he removed his boots, entered the warm house, and basted the turkey.

He sifted through the pile of his mother's recipe cards until he came to the recipe for cranberry relish. They'd always used the lowbush cranberries they picked every August—the lingonberries. He and Nadia had picked enough to can and freeze some, and they glistened in a bowl, waiting for him to chop the walnuts and add the sugar and the whole orange. Staring at the recipe card with its hard chunk of lingonberry sauce still attached to it, he realized,
That lingonberry is over twenty years old
. The last time that card had been pulled out, it had been by the hands of his mother. She had no idea that the speckle of lingonberry she smudged on it when she picked it up—perhaps to check again on the amount of sugar, because she'd always complained that including the orange rind required that you add a ridiculous amount of sugar—would still be tenaciously clinging to the index card long after she'd let go of it and had to let go of this life.

So there Kache stood, holding the card his mother once held, his eyes misting up. When a tear splashed onto the card, he wiped it away quickly so it would not upset the persistent lingonberry remnant, so it might stay on the lined index card with the folksy mushroom artwork above the olive-green type that said
Our Family Recipe
.

All these years of not celebrating, declining most invitations to other families' celebrations. He'd accepted a few. One of the guys at work had told Kache that since he and his wife lived far away from their families, they always hosted a “Homeless Waif Thanksgiving,” inviting people who had nowhere else to go. Kache went to that one, ended up driving home a tall, brunette, fellow homeless waif and sleeping with her. She talked about how she was definitely going home for Christmas, that she'd already shopped and had shipped her parents' and six siblings' presents. He left before morning.

Years later, Janie had tried, and Kache had tried along with her, helping her make family recipes that her mom had emailed her. But, of course, it was never the same. It never is.

But this? This was as close as it came without having those three walk in, and he let himself imagine it once again, and soon, he was thinking about the village and what it must have been like for Nadia's family to see her standing there in real flesh and blood and bones, talking, reminding them of the way she creased her brow and fluttered her hands sometimes when she spoke.

Nadia came in through the side kitchen door, hoisting up the skinned rabbit, Leo following close behind with a triumphant grin, head and tail held high. “Time to put stew in the oven.” When Kache raised his eyebrows, she added that she would happily freeze the spruce hen, but she really wanted to serve the rabbit for Thanksgiving.

“But the turkey. There's no room in the oven.”

“Shit damn.”

Kache cracked up.

“What?”

“I swear, the way you swear.”

“I don't understand.”

“I love your original combinations.”

“‘It is better to fail in originality than to succeed in imitation.'”

“Huh?”

“Melville.”

“Of course. Anyway, it's fine. We don't need rabbit stew. We have turkey. We have dressing. Mashed potatoes. Green bean casserole. Shall I go on?”

“But Lettie loves rabbit stew.” There was such insistence in her voice, he half expected her to stamp her foot.

“She does?” He stared at her, her nose red and running a bit from the cold. “But of course
you
would know that.”

Kache cleared a pan off one of the burners, which worked fine for the stew. He managed to set the table with his mom's china without blubbering, and Nadia managed to stop shooting innocent animals. “At some point,” she said, fluffing the new pillows on the couch yet another time, “you are going to have to learn how to shoot gun.”

“I told you. I'd rather my protein sources come in those Styrofoam trays wrapped in Saran wrap with stickers. Hypocrite that I am, I don't want to kill anything. I'm the guy who takes even poisonous spiders outside, remember?”

“There are no poisonous spiders in Alaska, remember?”

“Oh, but there are in Austin. And scorpions. And rattlesnakes. And all kinds of things that creep in the night. And I didn't even shoot
them
.”

“You are—how is the word?—a pacifist.”

“So you get my point.”

“Still, you live in Alaska. I am going to teach you how to shoot tin cans at very least.”

“Right now?”

“No, right now, we get this house looking like perfection, like it is on one of those Internet websites about beautiful homes.”

“You're kidding, right?”

“Only little bit.”

“Next, you're going to want me to build you a brick patio.”

She scrunched her eyebrows together. “Why? Can you do that?” She ran her finger along the coffee table, inspecting it for dust, and then she looked at him. “What?”

“Just don't ever call me Mr. Happenings.” He took her up in his arms and kissed the gold-studded track along her ear. “Hey, are you the same woman who was hiding under the bed screaming in Russian while your ferocious dog lurched at me?” She nodded. “Look, you've gotta stop. It's going to be fine. They're going to love you. Lettie already does.”

“I am afraid I am just ‘that squatter' to them. But to me, they mean something. I feel that I know them, that I even love them.”

“You know Lettie doesn't think of you as a squatter. Never has. They're grateful to you. And so am I. Very grateful. And don't worry about Snag. She'll love you too once she meets you.”

Nadia kissed him once on the nose, the forehead, and the neck before she went up to change into her new Nordstrom clothes. Kache stuck another log in the woodstove, waited on the couch with Leo snoring at his feet, and was dumbfounded to realize he'd been imagining two little kids—a blond girl, a dark, curly-headed boy—jumping on him, climbing on Leo, disturbing the peace and quiet with their miraculous little
Daddy! Daddy!
screeches.

FIFTY-NINE

Nadia and Kache had been sure to shovel the walkway wide enough to fit a wheelchair, but in the end, Kache lifted Lettie out of the car and carried her up the porch steps she and A. R. had once built and through the doorway into the living room, which had once served as their whole cabin.

Nadia held the door open as they filed in. Leo barked, alarmed at the idea of visitors, but once Nadia reassured him, he calmed down. The woman she assumed was Snag carried the pies, and the other woman, Gilly, heaved the folded wheelchair up the steps and opened it in the living room.

“Well,” Lettie said, settling into the wheelchair, “I don't think my husband ever carried me over the threshold, and I certainly didn't think my grandson would, but thank you, Kache. That made things easier, didn't it?” She looked up at Nadia and said, “Why, there you are. How are you, my dear?” Nadia bent to hug her. Lettie said over Nadia's shoulder, “And that must be Leo. A fine dog he turned out to be. I knew it. Best of the litter.”

Nadia had read that a hostess should offer to take her guests' coats, but when she did so after Snag set down the pumpkin pie and rhubarb crunch, Snag said, “That's okay. I know where they go, believe me. I'm Snag, by the way. Nice to finally meet you.” She shook Nadia's hand with vigor and introduced Gilly, who smiled warmly and gave Nadia a hug.

There was an awkward moment of silence while the women took in their surroundings. Nadia almost felt an inventory occurring. She understood how strange it must be for them to be here, with some things finally changed but so many still the same.

“It's as if time folded back on itself,” Snag finally said.

“We've changed things a lot,” Kache said. “You should have seen it before. It was exactly the same as we left it.”

“This feels pretty exact to me.” Snag walked around, staring at the walls, at the bookshelves and the paintings, at the old Japanese fisherman ball and the photographs along the top of the piano.

Nadia saw the little difference their attempts had made. Moving the furniture, adding a coffee table, pillows, some artwork… That barely dented the accumulation of memories Snag and Lettie must have been poring through.

Everyone held their breath, and then Lettie sighed. It was a long sigh, as if she'd inhaled all the air in the room and let it all back out so that everyone could resume breathing. “All I can say is it sure feels good to be home.”

While Kache went to put the goats and Mooze in the barn for the expected cold snap, the women arranged themselves in the living room, Lettie accepting the afghan Nadia offered her for her lap—the afghan Lettie had once crocheted—and a small pillow to somewhat cushion the back of the wheelchair. Snag took the red-checked chair, and Nadia and Gilly sat on the futon. The fire crackled and sputtered, suddenly burning brighter.

“So, my dear,” Lettie said, looking at Nadia. “Tell me how your life has changed since the last time I saw you. Kache tells me you've been filming. Still dream of San Francisco?”

Nadia had once admitted to Lettie that she stared for hours at a time at one of the Winkels' oversize photography books that said
San Francisco, City by the Bay
on the cover. Until she'd seen those pictures, she hadn't imagined that such a place existed.

“Yes,” she said. “Sometimes. You remembered. Now I have a file on my computer, and it is there I keep photos of San Francisco, so I can click over and pretend I am in this great city.”

“I remembered because you reminded me of me. There was one bent-up little photo that pulled me here to Alaska. I seem to recall that one photo pulled you the most. One taken from the Golden Gate Bridge, looking toward the city. I understand that kind of magnetic force. No denying it.”

Snag said, “I didn't know that, Mom. A picture started it all for you and Daddy? Really?”

Lettie rested her chin on her fist while she spoke from her wheelchair, and Nadia thought how she looked like a much older version of Rodin's
The Thinker
. “Your poor father. He came along, of course. But he was doing it all for me. I was the one. Alaska this! Alaska that! If I hadn't heeded that call, I would have lived my life in regret.”

“But Daddy came around. He loved it here as much as you did.”

“Your father loved
me
. But if I would've just once said ‘Let's move back,' he would've had the moving truck loaded before I finished my sentence. I feel bad about it now.”

“But,” Gilly said, “you wouldn't change anything, would you?”

“Well, I'm the one who got what she wanted. He's the one to answer
that
question, but he's not available at the moment. Sometimes I think he would have lived longer had he been happier.”

Snag waved her hand. “Oh, Mom. Daddy
was
happy.”

“He loved his family. But I think he would have preferred a different kind of life, in a different kind of place. I knew him like no one else did, Eleanor.”

Nadia took this all in, and when Snag and Lettie fell silent, she turned their conversation over and over in her mind. She stared at the fire. Then she looked around to see the others also transfixed by the flames.

Long ago, she had begun seeing herself somehow, someway, finding her way to San Francisco. More recently, she'd added the idea of film school. It was what they called a long shot, followed with an “excuse the pun,” but she dreamed about it constantly. Lately, on the movie screen in her head, images flashed of her and Kache living in one of those houses like the painted ladies, a colorful Victorian with a bay window that looked out over the street where they'd watch the passersby, the cars, and the buses taking people here and there.

But Kache increasingly mentioned how much this place, this land, meant to him. How he'd always thought Denny would take it over and keep it in the family but that now he saw himself doing just that. How he was beginning to understand what his father and grandmother had meant when they talked about the way a place called you and staked its claim on your mind and heart, might even heal you and make you whole.

Lettie finally spoke. “Nadia, what will you do next? Do you know?”

Nadia hesitated but said, “I know what I would love most to do. I would love to go to film school in San Francisco. I have filled out my application on the line, but there is problem.” She told them about the missing school transcripts and birth certificate, how they were at her mother's house but she doubted her mother would turn them over to her now. Nadia should have thought to ask her before she admitted she'd “gone heathen” as Kache called it, but alas, she had been overwhelmed by the reality of her family standing before her.

Snag sat up suddenly and said, “Nadia, tell me. Do you know a woman named Agafia?”

“I know of two. One is my grandmother.”

“No, this woman would be younger than your grandmother. More along the lines of my age.”

Nadia smiled. “But my grandmother
is
about your age. My mother is only forty-three. Remember, we start young in the villages. Why? Do you know my grandmother?”

“I doubt it was her. I met an Agafia once, when I was just a girl.”

“My baba lived in Oregon most of her childhood. The other Agafia lives in Ural.”

Snag nodded but said nothing more. Through the windows, the outdoor lights illuminated plump snowflakes lolling down. Inside, the fire waltzed around in the woodstove. Nadia went to take care of the last preparations for dinner and light the candles.

The table and the faces around it were bathed in an enchanting amber. The silver and the china and the crystal all reflected the candlelight, sparkling. Steam rose from the serving dishes, piled high with three days' worth of preparations, and Nadia allowed herself a moment of pure pride while Kache poured wine. They raised their glasses, and Lettie said the only blessing the family ever said, if you could call it a blessing. Nadia knew it from Elizabeth's journal: “Good wine. Good meat. Good God, let's eat.” They clinked glasses until everyone had toasted everyone and said, “
Gracias
,
merci
,
grazie
, thank you,” and Lettie asked, “Wait, how do you say thank you in Russian?”

And Nadia said, “
Spasiba
.”

“
Spasiba
!” they said in unison, and then they took a sip and started passing the food around.

Soon, Nadia was lost within her own memories of family and celebration. This is what she missed most. She did not miss the outdated rules and regulations, the never-ending church services, the squabbles about how and when and where to worship, but she missed the rituals that came with all that. The rituals were needed.
Everyone has them, even us heathens
, she thought. Humankind must have come up with rituals to help counter all the chaos and despair.

“Is that right, Nadia?” Gilly was asking her a question. Had she spoken her thoughts aloud? She found it difficult to stay alert in a group when everyone was conversing and you had to be ready to add your opinion when there was a lull or especially a direct question. She felt her face redden.

“What was that? I am sorry. I was thinking.”

“What were you thinking about, dear?” Lettie asked while she dug into her rabbit stew. She'd passed on the turkey, saying the Old Folks' served it every Sunday and she was tired of it.

“I was thinking of my family,” Nadia admitted. As they ate and helped themselves to seconds and thirds, Kache and Nadia filled them in on their trip to the village, which required the backstory of why Nadia had fled in the first place. Nadia suggested they wait for another time for her to talk about it, but they insisted that now was as good a time as any.

When Nadia finished her story, Snag set her glass down, wiped her eyes with one of the cloth napkins she had once given to Bets and Glenn for Christmas, leaned her forearms on the table, and said, “You
faked
your own death?”

Nadia nodded, red again, she was sure.

“That takes some
cojones
.”

Nadia wondered what
cojones
were while Lettie said, “You are miles beyond smart and brave, Nadia.”

“But now I have no family.”

“We will be your family,” Lettie said with a nod. “We're not perfect, but we'll do.”

“Far from perfect,” Snag said. “I'm so far from perfect, you'd be better off leaving me out of it. In fact, Kache would have had an entirely different, much better life if—”

Lettie said, “Eleanor, no one blames you.”

“Blames you for what?” Kache asked.

Gilly sat back in her chair, shaking her head, but Snag kept on talking. Now she was the one confessing. She confessed a whole story about how she met Kache's mom before his dad did, how she fell in love with her and never stopped loving her, even after Glenn and Bets got married and had kids.

“But I kept my mouth shut until that night before the plane crash. You remember, Kache? How I came over and we were all celebrating some silly sales award I'd received? We got to drinking. I got hammered like I've never been before or since.” She took a deep breath and placed her hand on her heart. “Not that I'm trying to make excuses. There was a weird moment with your mom in the root cellar, and I…” She looked around the room. “I kissed her.”

“You what?” Lettie's wrinkled lids lifted away from her pale, magnified eyes behind her glasses.

Gilly reached out and took Snag's hand, and Snag seemed to summon the words again. “I kissed her.”

“Good Lord. Did she kiss you back?”

“No, no. But Glenn walked in before Bets even realized what was going on. And you can imagine how pissed off he was.”

“Yes, I can.” Lettie nodded.

“He took it out on you, Kache. Your dad could be a bully, but I'd never seen him like that. I had to pull him off you. So you see, Glenn wasn't in his right mind when they took off the next morning.”

Kache stared, openmouthed, silent.

A long, quiet moment ticked by before Lettie said, “Eleanor, your brother flew in the
war
. He was an exceptional pilot. I'm sure Bets explained the context. A drunken mistake. He would have never knowingly put his family in jeopardy. He had a temper, and he was bulldog stubborn, but that man loved his family. So stop this now.”

Snag bit her lip and shook her head. The room fell quiet again. “You want to know the worst thing?
You
felt guilty, Kachemak Winkel. I didn't know that you carried the burden of guilt over that fight you and your dad had the night before. Not until you told me this summer. And I've been trying ever since to find a way to tell you the fight wasn't what did it. The reason your dad was drunk and angry in the first place was because of me stepping so ridiculously far out of line. I am beyond sorry.” Snag cried so heavily, her napkin became soaked. Gilly handed over hers and Lettie's too.

Gilly said, “Neither one of you are taking into account that 22 percent of all U.S. plane crashes occur in Alaska. And that's not because of a family quarrel.”

Lettie added, “Or that they were flying through that horrible Rainy Pass, and you all know it's one of the worst blind corridors in the state. On a day when there was a three-thousand-foot ceiling with poor visibility. And that cloud cover comes out of nowhere.”

Kache kept staring at his aunt, not speaking.

Pushing her chair back from the table, Nadia said, “Elizabeth didn't blame either of you for anything.”

Snag blew her nose. “With all due respect, how would you know?”

Nadia said she'd be right back and went to retrieve Elizabeth's last journal. She returned, sat down, and opened the pages. This made Snag drop her head in her hands in more shame. “I told Kache I burned them like I was supposed to. I didn't even manage to do that right.”