Sunrise

“I don’t think Mom wants me to come back.”

I stopped and stepped out of the ski track, letting her draw alongside me. “I’m sorry.” I drew her into an awkward, one-armed, sideways hug. “How did everything get so messed up?”

She sighed heavily, leaning into me. “I thought I could convince her to, I don’t know, accept you and Darla or something. But it just got worse. It was always Darla this and Darla that—if the bacon stuck to the bottom of the pan, I swear, Mom blamed Darla for it. I tried ignoring her, I tried arguing, but nothing seemed to work.”

“I don’t get it. Why? Mom seemed to hate Darla from the moment they met.”

“Think about how they first met, in the middle of the same gun battle where Dad got shot—”

“But Darla had nothing to do with Dad’s death. If anyone was to blame, it was me! I talked Dad into helping rescue Darla. I did that.”

“It wasn’t your fault, Alex.”

“I know that. It was the goddamn Dirty White Boys’ fault. That isn’t my point. So why the hell does she blame Darla?”

“Because she can’t blame you.”

“Why not? I’d rather have her angry at me than Darla!” “It’d be too much like blaming herself.”

I fell silent, thinking about it. When had my little sister gotten so mature, so perceptive? Or maybe she had always been that way, but I was finally open enough to notice it? But it still didn’t completely make sense. “She’s obviously over Dad. She married that politiciansicle, after all.” “Politiciansicle?” Rebecca asked.

“Petty. He’s cold, has a stick up his butt, and you’ve got to lick it to get him to do anything.”

Rebecca laughed. “You always did have a way with words.”

I caught sight of two figures in the distance moving toward us. “Someone’s coming,” I whispered. I unslung the rifle from my back and dropped flat in the snow. Rebecca threw herself prone alongside me.

Chapter 59

I flicked off the safety and chambered a round, then pushed my head up just enough to see. There were definitely only two of them, headed directly toward us on skis, but I couldn’t make out their faces at this distance. I held the rifle ready and watched them approach.

When they got within shouting distance, one of them spoke up, “Alex, if you shoot me, so help me, the wedding’s off,” Darla yelled.

I pointed the rifle away from her, safetied it, and ejected the round from the chamber. When they got closer, I could see that Darla was skiing alongside Zik.

“What were you thinking, taking off on your own?” Darla said as she reached us.

“I’m fast and stealthy on my own,” I replied.

“And if you’d broken a leg or something? Who was going to go get help? Or drag your sorry ass home?”

“Oh.” I hadn’t really thought about that possible scenario. She sort of had a point.

“Sorry.”

“Never mind. Let’s get home.” Darla gave Rebecca a hug, and then all four of us pointed our skis toward Speranta.

“Guess your mom’s not coming?” Darla said after a bit.

“No,” I said.

“What’s the deal? I mean, I get that she blames me for your dad’s death for some reason, but why’s she taking it out on you?”

“That’s the main thing, but there’s more to it,” Rebecca said. “You know she was feuding with Uncle Paul, right?”

“No. When? I never heard them argue,” Darla said.

“It was stupid,” Rebecca said. “It all started about three and a half years ago, before the eruption. Max dared me to jump off the barn into a haystack. I did it, like an idiot, and broke my arm. Mom blamed Max, since he was older and it was his farm, even though it wasn’t like he pushed me or anything. And then Mom and Uncle Paul started arguing over who would take care of the medical copays. Uncle Paul sent her a check, but she wouldn’t cash it. Said it had to come from Max, or he wouldn’t learn. Maybe she was right, but Uncle Paul felt like she was meddling. So the point is, she was never comfortable on the farm anyway.”

“But that’s where she was when Yellowstone blew, right?” Darla said.

“Yeah. That’s why Mom decided to go to Warren that day. To try to patch things up with Uncle Paul.”

“I didn’t know that,” I said.

“You’re a little bit oblivious sometimes, Bro,” Rebecca said. “Anyway, then Mom cracked up before the battle— she would never talk about that, but I think she was embarrassed afterward. Maybe even afraid Uncle Paul would blame her for Aunt Caroline’s death.”

“He didn’t,” I said.

“Either way, caring for Mayor Petty became a way to avoid her brother-in-law. And then I guess Mom and Petty fell in love or something.”

I sighed. My whole body felt heavy, like God had cranked the gravity up by twenty percent. I felt like yelling at him, Could you turn the thermostat up too, while you’re at it? I didn’t want to deal with it, didn’t want to think about my mother anymore.

My sister skied more slowly, falling a little behind. I had to strain to make out her words. “I thought I could help, that I could be there for her, change her mind. But nothing ever really changes, does it? And now . . . and now she doesn’t even want me around anymore.”

I heard a choking sound—half animal snarl, half sob—and twisted to look back. Rebecca was crumpled in the snow behind me, sobbing. I performed a laborious step-turn, wishing I had skis like Rebecca’s that I could snap in and out of easily. Darla and Zik skied on a bit before noticing we had dropped back. I pulled up beside Rebecca and fell into the snow beside her, wrapping my one good arm around her, supporting us both on my hook, thrust deep into the snow beside us.

“No matter what happens, I’ll always be your family” I sat in the uncaring snow, holding my sister and sharing her tears.

Chapter 60

I woke before dawn on the morning of the wedding, dressed quietly, stepped outside, and looked to the east. Light was just begi

I straddled the peak of the roof, getting cold while staring at the horizon. The sun still wasn’t visible; it existed only as a bright smudge under a yellow-gray sky. But sometimes at dawn and dusk the sky came alight with riotous color—shows so surreal, it seemed as though we had been transported in the night to some alien planet.

That morning the sunrise was exceptional. Yellows, oranges, and reds slashed across the sky in vibrant swathes. Here and there, violets and greens emerged as if to reassure me that there was still some blue sky behind the yellow-gray murk, biding its time patiently until the thi

I waited and watched, reveling in the sunrise, until the sky faded to a uniform yellow-gray again. My legs had frozen to the roof. I pried them free and slid down to prepare for the big day.

We held the wedding in the original longhouse. We had cleared all the bedrolls and detritus of our day-to-day lives out of the middle and festooned the longhouse in plastic greenery and flowers. I stood at the front alongside the makeshift altar, trying not to shift nervously from foot to foot. Max and Ben stood beside me, Rebecca and A

Darla stepped through the longhouse door on Uncle Paul’s arm. She was a vision in her long white dress, its bodice made of some material that sparkled, playing flirtatiously with the electric lights overhead. With every step she took, the sparkles in her bodice picked up more of the light from the candles burning alongside the altar, making their flecks yellow instead of white, warming her as she neared me at the front of the room.