Yellowcake (19 page)

"This is the kind of evidence a medical record can provide. I'm going to read just a few summaries. Here's one from three years ago: 'Mr. Mahoney is a debilitated gentleman with multiple medical problems including severe COPD and emphysema who is oxygen dependent due to past history of exposure to uranium and coal dust.' Here's another: 'The lungs remain very hyperin-flated with chronic areas of linear scarring and emphysema.' Not only are his lungs damaged, but his esophagus has deteriorated, so he has difficulty swallowing solid food. We believe his kidneys have been damaged. His ankles sometimes swell so badly that the skin splits. I know many of you have relatives with multiple organ damage, too. If there is anybody in the audience who would like my help in contacting doctors, I would be more than happy. Hindsight is twenty-twenty."

She goes on, flipping through the years of Ryland's illness. Looking after him has made Rosy almost as housebound as he now. She used to be able to get out and exercise. That's the reason for the weight.

When she stops and steps away from the microphone, there is silence in the room. After a while, people begin to applaud, not by any means a wild clapping, but a metronomic slapping like marching feet.

Now a young woman steps up. She speaks loudly, the microphone shrieking. "My name is Susan Ray. I was born for the Tódích'í'nii clan and from the Táchii'nii Clan.
Shinálí,
my grandmother, was born over there, on the mesa above the San Juan, just south of the old mill in Shiprock. She had two daughters and a son, but my auntie and my uncle have passed on. My auntie was forty-six years old when she passed. She had a little boy who was born with a tumor the size of a baseball at the base of his skull. They took the tumor out, but the tumors come back. He's six years old. He's had three operations. He can't move the fingers on his left hand, and he falls a lot. His balance is bad."

"My God," Lily says. She folds her arms over her stomach. Little children chase each other in the open space between the refreshment table and the chairs.

"I hope you can do something for the people who live around there. That land belongs to my family, but we can't live there anymore." The young woman sits down. The metronomic clapping goes on for a minute, the crowd warming to it, the noise gathering its own momentum.

Rosy begins making her way back toward Lily and Maggie. A tall, handsome young man at the front of the room stops her. He's wearing a cowboy hat, summer cotton shirt, and jeans. He leans down, listening. The emcee begins announcing the next speaker, and Rosy continues down the side aisle, pausing to talk—Lily stops breathing—to an orange-haired Indian standing in the doorway.

B
ECKY IS THIRSTY
. She forgot to bring water with her to this meeting. She had left work early and gone for a long run to calm her nerves, but she ran too long in the heat. She knows better. The line between relaxation and exhaustion is a fine one, and she didn't drink enough water. Her head is thick, throbbing, and her tongue seems bloated; it fills her mouth.

Harrison isn't here. It's after eight o'clock. She's almost relieved. It's bad enough having to get up and talk, but a thousand times worse is thinking of him in the audience. Grading her. She wishes she'd brought water.

She regrets not writing her talk. It would be a whole lot easier just to get up there and read something, like Rose Mahoney did.

Doo'ak"ahii.
This morning she asked her father the Navajo word for No Fat Mesa. She wants to say something about running with him up there, and she wants to use the Navajo word. She wishes she could introduce herself with her clans. She wishes she knew her mother's clans. How many times in her life has she been in this position?

Her parents have been fighting. It's so odd. They never fight. Their nerves are frayed. Today when she got home, her mother was crying, and her father said, "Tell her Jesus Christ forgot to learn my name." He wants no more prayer circles in the house.

Terry Conrad is here. He came into the bank today and asked her to lunch, but she turned him down because she wanted to get her run in. He asked her to go out with him after this meeting, but she told him she had plans. He was pretty insistent, though. He has to go back to Dallas for a meeting tomorrow, and he wants to run an idea by her. She agreed to meet him for a quick cup of coffee after work. She drove to Denny's and, stopped at the light, she saw him sitting in the booth waiting for her. But she was wanting to run. When the light changed, she glided on by. She feels a little bad about that.

He has been talking to the people at the front of the room. He seems to be watching her. Now he heads her way. Tonight he's wearing a short-sleeved blue shirt that matches his blue eyes, seeming to magnify them, and a straw cowboy hat—he wears it well, like he's used to it.

"You stood me up," he says.

"Sorry," she says. "I couldn't get away."

"Anybody sitting there?"

She'd put her purse on the chair next to her, half thinking she was saving it for Harrison. She picks the purse up, and he steps over her legs.

"Good crowd," he says.

"Yeah."

He smells like cloves. A cologne-wearing businessman-cowboy. It's not unpleasant.

"How long you think they'll go?"

"It's supposed to be over at nine."

"I'd still like to get together with you. Can I buy you a beer?" He smiles, leaning toward her, his shoulder brushing her. "You owe me."

Overhead the ceiling fans turn, muted whirlybirds. She scans the back of the room. He is not here, and it's 8:20. It's a three-anda-half or four-hour drive to Albuquerque. He'll be on the road eight hours. What's in Albuquerque? Who's in Albuquerque?

"Okay," she says.

"Great."

The microphone crackles. Bill Lowry has just said her father's name. He makes comments after each speaker. "People like Woodrow Atcitty, who labored for years breathing radioactive dust..." It's her turn. She tries to focus. Will there be water up there for her? She'll just say one or two things. That the new tumors are inoperable.

People are clapping. She feels somebody's hand on her shoulder.

Harrison is looking down at her. "I made it," he says. She smells coffee on his breath. He squeezes her shoulder, saying, "
Bee'-ádíní.
"

And whatever it was she planned to say swallows her.

Standing at the podium, gripping it so her hands won't shake, she is clear about only one thing: there is no water.

She says, "I am Becky Atcitty." She moistens her lips, swishes her tongue to generate saliva. She can't look toward the east side of the room where he stands, but she sees him on the edge of her vision. He's wearing a black shirt.

She says, "This afternoon I went for a run."

She stares over the heads of all the people—so many!

"Up on the mesa near Fruitland, where I live." No Fat, no Fat. What's the Navajo word?

She blinks and blinks again. "It was hot. No clouds." She licks her lips. "I have been running since I was five years old. My father used to take me up there with him. He taught me how to stretch my hamstrings so I wouldn't get injured. Before we had good running shoes, he taught me to wear double socks so the bottoms of my feet wouldn't get bruised by stones. He taught me how to run slowly at first so as not to get winded. He taught me how to bend and touch my toes if I got a side stitch and told me not to drink soda before running because it's too acidic. 'Water,' he told me, 'is the best thing to drink.' He taught me to swish my tongue to make saliva. 'Sometimes,' he said, 'saliva is all you have to drink if you forget water.' I used to run close to the river, thinking I'd always have water, but it's not safe to drink the river water because it could be contaminated." She swallows. Overhead the whirlybirds whirl. The only noise, children and the fans. The people are listening, leaning toward her. Bill Lowry, sitting at the end of the front row, is nodding and smiling. "It's better not to forget water. You've got to remember the important things, and I remember how he said if you go a little way one day, you can go a little more the next, and that's how you get places, but he will never run up there on the mesa with me again. He is too sick." She looks at the audience. They are very quiet. Bill Lowry smiles and nods. The black shirt near the wall is a speck in her eye. She says, "That's all."

They clap as she walks away from the podium. She walks down the side aisle, forcing herself to meet Harrison's eyes. He stands with his arms folded, leaning against the wall. He doesn't say anything when she stops next to him. "So?" she says.

"So?"

She takes a breath, turns, and lets the wall hold her up, leaving several inches between them. "How'd I do?"

"Good." She notices that he has a tiny bump on the bridge of his nose, and he doesn't look away and doesn't stop smiling. His sunglasses are in his shirt pocket. She takes them out, opens them, and puts them on his face. He laughs. Beautiful straight teeth.

"Look who's here." He motions toward the other side of the room, where her cousin stands below the clock watching them. Delmar puts his fingers together in a cross, as if warding off devils.

 

Outside, her truck gleams under the parking lot lights. He washed and waxed it. He's hoisting a bicycle out of the bed. Harrison stands next to her, his elbow touching her arm. "Nice bike," he says. In the weird light, she can't tell what color it is. It's got very skinny racing tires.

"He probably stole it," she says. Delmar straddles the bike and rides over to them.

"
Yá'át'éhéii,
Harrison."

"
'Aoo', yá'át'éhéii shiak'is.
"

"Yeah, I called Aunt Delia. She told me you were here. I wanted to bring you back your truck. Good speech." He grins.

She says nothing.

"Yeah, I got the job up on Whitaker Mesa. Groundskeeper. You seen those houses up there?" he says to Harrison, who shakes his head. "I've been up there all week. Couldn't get back down until today, but I wanted to bring my cousin her truck."

He hands her the keys. He swings his knapsack around, pulling out a little stuffed elephant, which he tries to hand her. She doesn't move. He nuzzles the thing against her neck, and says, "This guy likes you." He leaves it in the crook of her neck, but it falls to the ground.

Harrison, laughing, scoops the elephant up. They watch Delmar zigzag through the parking lot. Harrison tucks the elephant under his arm, hiding its face and body, the trunk dangling over his forearm. He pinches the trunk with his other hand, wiggling it, nudging her, and says, "This guy's nasty."

"Don't get any ideas," she says.

"Like what?" The gray trunk flip-flops.

People have begun streaming out of the building. Between the two of them, they know a lot of people, who stop to say hello or comment on the meeting on their way to their cars, and then Terry Conrad is standing in front of her, bending down toward her. He says, "Ready?"

Harrison is talking to somebody from the college, but he stops midsentence, looking at her, his mouth half open.

"I didn't think you were coming," she says to him. He closes his mouth. The playfulness is suddenly gone from his eyes. "It's some sort of business thing. It'll only take half an hour. Come with us."

His jaw flexes as if he's grinding his teeth. His eyes look oily. Angry. Women probably don't tell this one no. It excites her a little, that he might see her as such a woman, but she definitely wants to see him tonight. Can she tell Terry to go away?

She doesn't get the chance. Harrison leans over whispering, "Three's a crowd," kisses her behind the ear, and walks away.

 

Terry Conrad sits across from her at a table in the Holiday Inn lounge. He orders a Budweiser, she water. The room is lit only by table candles and the lights behind the bar. A band is tuning up on the small platform on the other side of the room.

He wants to make small talk. He asks her what she thought of the meeting and where she thinks they should have the next one. She answers in single sentences. Her mind is racing. She wonders if Harrison's in the phone book. What is she doing here?

Terry doesn't have any sort of southern twang. He must be a transplanted Texan. His nails look manicured.

He begins after the waitress brings their drinks. He gives her a history of his company, a geological survey and resource development group. He tells her about research they've done on in situ leaching of uranium, saying again that most of the danger lies in ore extraction. He tells her that in situ leaching is especially effective in porous rock, through which chemicals like sulfuric acid can pass easily. "The trick is to use underground water sources for countercurrent rinsing, but then to restore the sources to their natural condition. That's been expensive in the past, but our engineers have developed cost-effective procedures to absolutely ensure a hazard-free environment both above and below ground." They've got the technology, he says, and now they're doing feasibility studies about how to cultivate resources on American soil that will ensure America's independence from foreign energy. "Other countries like Australia are rich in the ore, richer than we, and they want to get into the game, and they
are
getting into the game, and they'll be selling to unstable markets, to China for one. It's time to start thinking about safely resurrecting the industry here in order not just to be competitive but to continue to exert a governing influence on this volatile energy source. The fact is, the sandstone on the Colorado Plateau is porous. It would ensure maximum yield with an in situ leaching process."

He stops speaking, watching her in silence. He seems to be saying something more. There's something she's not getting.

"The Colorado Plateau? Monument Valley?"

"Well, for a start. And south. Southeast."

She begins to get it. He watches her gravely, his lips a straight line.

"You have got to be kidding me," she says quietly.

He takes a drink. The guitar plays a riff, the rest of the band comes in, and a man at the mike begins singing "Sweet Home Chicago."