A Grave Denied

He looked away, face set in stubborn lines. “Yes.”

“Well, then.”

“He has to forgive him.”

“Why?”

“Because my father’s not dying easy,” Jeffrey said heavily. “I’ve been calling home every day. He’s calling for Robert. It’s all he can think about. He wants him to come home. He needs him to come home.”

She examined him long enough for him to begin to look uncomfortable. He might even have squirmed.

“What?” he said, defensive now.

“That’s the first time I’ve heard you sound like a human being, with all our faults and frailties,” she said.

He stiffened.

“Oh, lose the attitude,” she said, exasperated. “Swear to Christ, if I didn’t believe my own eyes I wouldn’t think you were in any way related to Bobby.”

Taken aback, he said, “I beg your pardon?”

“So Bobby married a white woman,” she said, “so what? So he’s best buds with a Native woman, and he’s friendly with more, and a bunch of white folks besides. I don’t know that you’ve noticed, Jeffrey, but this ain’t Te

She paused for breath, and went on in a milder tone. “The Park has a way of weeding out the unfit. Bobby fits. He always has. Because it’s not what you’re used to doesn’t make it not his home. Okay,” she added, “I know there’s like a triple negative in there somewhere, but you’ve been here what, a week now? You’ve had time to see that-well, hell.” She turned to go back inside. Over her shoulder she said, “Bobby’s found a place he loves that loves him back. Near as I can make out, he’s been looking for that place ever since your father booted him out.”

“He didn’t boot him out! Robert ran away!”

She thought of Joh

“Everything okay?” Jim said as she slid back onto her stool.

“No,” she said.

“You think Bobby should go home?”

She curved her hand around a now cool mug. “I keep thinking about Emaa,” she said.

“Your grandmother?”

“Yeah. I was angry at her for a long time. We were just starting to work things out when she died. I have some regrets.”

“ ‘Remorse is the ultimate in self-abuse,” “ Jim said.

“Who said that?”

“Travis McGee.”

She couldn’t help the grin. “And a better detective than you or I’ll ever be, Chopin.”

“One of your greater twentieth-century philosophers,” he agreed. “You know what they say about hindsight.”

He was trying to comfort her in that ham-handed way men do, and she was a little touched. “It’s okay, really. But Bobby, at the very least, needs to say good-bye. From what Jeffrey says, it doesn’t sound like he’s got a lot of time left to get it done.”

“Not your problem,” he said tentatively.

She fixed him with a steady look. “Like hell it isn’t. What kind of friend am I if I see him in trouble and I don’t try to help?”

“Depends on if he wants you to, I would think.”

“And you would think wrong.”

“Okay,” he said, “obviously not an argument I’m destined to win. Besides, I think you’re probably right. There’ll be an unsaid good-bye hanging out there until the end of his life if he doesn’t.”

“If it was your father?” Kate said.

“I’d go home, make my obeisance. I don’t know that my father would notice, but I’d be doing it more for me than for him anyway.”

And Kate had thought her relationship with her grandmother was complicated. Men and their fathers raised an appreciation of the word dysfunctional to a whole new level.

For a long time she’d felt suffocated by Emaa’s expectations. The bloodlines that tied her to the Park were tenacious to the point of strangulation. You can’t choose your relatives, as the old saw went, but she wondered now, why not? Why not walk away, as Bobby had, and build your own from scratch in a place where no one knew you and you had no history? Why not start a family the same way, from the ground up, gathering together people you liked and respected and learned to cherish? What was so awful goddamned special about blood, anyway?

“Kate,” Jim said, waving a hand in front of her face.

“Huh?” She recollected herself. “Oh. Sorry. What?”

“Want to take a look at the site?”

He was referring to the acre of ground next to the Niniltna Native Association building that the state had acquired at an almost but not quite extortionate price, upon which the ground was even then being prepared for Jim’s new post.

“Sure.” She’d stayed as far away from the whole trooper post thing as she could get all winter long, but Jim was going to be in a good position to throw work her way. The homestead was hers outright, along with the buildings and tools and vehicles. She owed no one any money, and she’d always been able to feed and clothe herself off the money she made from odd jobs in the Park, from fishing to mining to guiding. But she had Joh

The trouble was, she had a sinking feeling she wasn’t going to be able to leave out the personal angle anytime soon. Kate Shugak’s life’s work was spent searching for truth, and it was therefore folly for her to ignore a home truth staring her in the face. Something was going on between her and the big trooper. She didn’t know what, exactly, and she didn’t know if it was bad or good, but it was past time she admitted it was there.

She followed the white Chevy Crew Cab up the hill and parked behind it. They walked across the road and looked at the site, which to his faint surprise showed signs of industry in the form of a completed cinder block foundation. “All you need is some lumber and the framers,” Kate said, “and you’ll have yourself a post.” She looked at him. “Know where you’re going to live yet?”

“Figured I’d build.”

“Got your eye on some land?”

“I talked to Billy, and Ruthe. She says she might carve off a slice along the river edge of John Letourneau’s place for me. So long as it reverts back to the Kanuyaq Land Trust upon my death.”

Kate gri

“Yeah, dead last,” he said, laughing a little. “Way behind the land, that’s for damn sure.”

“You going to do it?”

He shrugged. “It’s a prime piece of land, great view, all cleared and ready. It’d amount to taking out a lifetime lease, with no buildup of equity. But hell, I’ll have all I need on retirement. Yeah, I’ll probably take her up on it.” His eyes glinted. “Build me a comfy little house where I can entertain.”

“Or not,” she said.

“Not an option,” he said, and smiled.

“What?” she said.

The smile widened. She’d never trusted that grin; it always made her think of the first pass of gray fins in deep blue water.

“What?” she said again.

“This dance we do,” he said. “See Kate. See Kate run. See Jim chase Kate. We going to get tired of this anytime soon?”

It was kind of silly, now she came to think of it. “Habit, I guess,” she said.

“My problem is I’m competing with a ghost,” Jim said.

She stiffened. “I beg your pardon?”

“It’s true,” he said, almost in despair, or as close to it as proper macho feeling would permit. “Tell me something. Isn’t there one thing Jack did that drove you insane? Did he flush spit between his teeth instead of floss? Did he fart in public? Did he sing outside the shower? Anything?”

She thought about it, really hard, for a few moments. Finally, she said, “He couldn’t drive a stick shift.”

“What?”

“He couldn’t drive a stick shift to save his life,” she said. “First gear, we’d jerk down the street like the car had Parkinson’s.”