SPLIT FEATHER
ONE
Two Falls, New Mexico, 2012
Hannah took it as some kind of sign, that day the eagle hit the wires with the rattler in its mouth and burst into flames, somersaulting into the dry brush next to the Neswoods’ farm. She wasn’t there to actually witness it. All she had to go on was what people said. But that didn’t matter. The descriptions were so vivid that Hannah saw the entire thing in her mind—the eagle swooping down to grab the snake and then lifting back up in one graceful movement with that ornery snake flailing and thrashing about, helpless as a tiny varmint in that huge bird’s talons. She pictured the way the eagle rose in a steep arc, and then, boom! It caught fire, first at the outside edge of its wings with the flames quickly swallowing up the bird and finishing up the writhing snake. Hannah would later tell folks that if she had been that eagle, she would have flapped her wings, furious-like, to get away from the fire.
“The problem is,” she would go on to say, “that eagle wouldn’t have known that flapping like that would only fuel the fire, make it burn harder and faster than it already was.”
And the more Hannah thought about the eagle and the rattlesnake, the more she came to wonder if she had seen the horrific event with her own eyes. The images were that clear. It was like looking into a still body of water and seeing yourself and the world reflected there, kind of like staring into another dimension. It was real and unreal all at the same time.
“You’re making too much of it,” her father told her that night at supper. “Things happen; it doesn’t always have to mean something.” He cocked his head from one side to the other, his usual routine to work out the kinks in his neck.
Hannah remained quiet as he pressed the heel of his hand against the lower part of his head, a sure indication one of his headaches was on the way. Pa typically blamed the headaches on too many hours of work, but how difficult could his job as a ranger be even if he was in charge of other people? To Hannah, it sounded like fun. Imagine spending day after day talking about rocks and trees and animals. Maybe part of the problem for Pa was all the carpentry he did when he was home. The furniture he built was beautiful, but the measuring and sawing and sanding with his neck angled down had to make the headaches worse.
As Pa rolled his shoulders forward and back, a thin sprinkling of sawdust floated to the heavy quarter-sawn oak table that he had built years earlier. Hannah thought of snowflakes, tiny ones that left a gentle dusting.
“You’re changing the story,” he told Hannah. “The way I heard it, the bird was a hawk, not an eagle.”
“No. I’m sure it was an eagle,” she insisted. She looked to her grandmother for support, but Yoki didn’t intervene.
“You know that how exactly?” Pa countered with a huff.
Yoki leaned forward in her chair. “Ahote!” The second syllable exploded, but Pa remained unruffled.
“I don’t know why you have to encourage her, Ma. She’s a child, one with an imagination that doesn’t quit.”
Hannah wondered whether that would be the end of it or if her grandmother would push back. Despite her slight build and short stature, she tended to meet things head on.
“So stubborn,” Yoki shook her head at her son; her long, silver hair danced with the gesture. “Like a mule with nowhere to go.” Yoki’s face crinkled up in a lacy crosshatch of wrinkles. “Logic doesn’t always win out. Sometimes the soul speaks as strong as the mind.”
“Here we go, again.” Pa rocked so that he balanced only on the back legs. The upper rim of the chair angled to within inches of the dining room wall.
If Hannah had tried that maneuver, Pa would have admonished her to stop, told her he hadn’t repainted the mustard gold room just to have her scuff the walls.
“You’re not the only one here who’s capable of deep thoughts,” Yoki reprimanded him. “I went to college, too.”
“Yes, yes, I know,” he acquiesced. “Art and Philosophy.”
“That’s right. Which means I know more than you give me credit for. I’m telling you to let the girl be, Ahote. It’s good she sees things differently. There’s no sense in her being an exact replica of you. If that’s what you’re after, go stand in front of a mirror. That’s easier than raising up a child.”
Hannah shot a furtive glance at her father, but he didn’t seem to notice.
“Takala,” Yoki said, shifting her attention.
Hannah loved the drumming syllables of her Hopi name. They helped her feel rooted.
“Tell me more about this eagle of yours.” Yoki brushed a strand of hair away from her forehead.
Hannah wanted to talk about the eagle and the rattler, felt the yearning deep in her belly. After all, this might be one of the biggest, most amazing things to have ever happened in Two Falls. And Hannah liked amazing things, things that were out of the ordinary. At twelve (almost thirteen as she would insist), out of the ordinary was important. So was the underlying meaning of things and the way you could capture the meaning with words and thoughts.
“I don’t know what kind of sign it is,” Hannah said. “But it means something. I’m positive about that.”
“Could be,” her grandmother agreed. “It seems too unusual to be happenstance.”
“Happenstance,” Hannah repeated, the word clicking off her tongue with a pleasing cadence. How many times had she heard her grandmother say that happenstance was when people thought things came together without any rhyme or reason, as if they were falling right out of the sky and landing in the same place?
“It’s easy to be misled by happenstance,” Yoki continued. “Life is all about connections and purpose. Things don’t typically happen out of the blue. The trick is you have to look long and hard enough to understand the connections.”
“A supernatural scavenger hunt,” Hannah piped up.
Her father jammed his fork down; the metal smacked loudly against the dish. Hannah picked up her glass and downed a long gulp of milk. She cautiously peered over the rim at her father, relieved when all he did was to reach for a slice of bread and then smear it from edge to edge with butter. She studied the pull of his work shirt against his arm, the knobby shape of his wrist against the pale blue of the threadbare fabric as he filled his mouth with food. Maybe now it was safe to say something more.
“All I know is the eagle and the snake plunging to the ground in a ball of fire wasn’t just straight happenstance,” Hannah announced. “It had a different feel to it, powerful and strange.”
“You weren’t even there,” her father told her. “How do you know what kind of feel it had?”
“Let the child be,” admonished Yoki.
Hannah took some courage from her grandmother’s words.
Yoki’s eyes held steady on her. “Maybe it was a warning,” said Hannah. “When I first heard about the fire, I thought people were making it up. Folks can talk, you know. They make up stories that sound more interesting than what really is.”
Pa wiped his face with a napkin. “Seems to me I know a girl who’s done the very same thing.”
“That’s not the point.” Hannah objected.
Pa’s face lit up with amusement.
“Fine. I’ll admit that I sometimes exaggerate,” Hannah acknowledged. “Like that time I hit a home run out on the back field at school and made it seem more than what it was.”
“If you say so.”
“I know you would’ve been plenty proud,” Hannah continued, “if I’d just told you about Daniel McPherson fumbling the ball out in center field and then being seconds too late to get me out on third. But instead, I got caught up in the moment. I told you how I’d slammed the ball way out to the fence line and that no one had been able to grab that ball before I’d made it all the way home.”
“All that’s true.” he agreed. “So, is there any possibility you’re making more out of this eagle thing than needs to be? Kind of like with the home run?”
“No. Absolutely not. It’s nowhere close to the same thing. And anyway, Pa, you’re getting me way off track with all this talk about baseball. We were talking about the fire. Remember?”
“You were talking about the fire. I was just sitting here.”
Hannah ignored the taunt. “Do you know the fire burned for hours and hours before they could get it out?”
“It destroyed Neswoods’ farm.” Pa’s face went pensive. “That was a real shame.”
“Daniel says the eagle had that rattler clutched in its talons as it was rising right up off the ground. Maybe that eagle was taking the snake back to its nest, to feed its young or something. At any rate, a few seconds after it took off, it brushed against a power line. Daniel says old Missus Goodly saw the whole thing from her place next door and Missus Goodly said that sparks flew off the wire and both that eagle and the rattler went up in flames right before her very eyes, crashing to the ground like some sort of Kamikaze fighter.”
“To be exact, that eagle did more than just brush against the power line.” The set of Pa’s jaw squared. “Brushing the line wouldn’t be enough to set off sparks. That eagle had to touch both wires at the same time.”
“Okay, so both of its wings touched the two wires,” Hannah agreed. “You get the point, right? That poor bird and the rattler were a ball of fire when they hit the ground!”
“The brush out that way is bone dry,” Pa observed.
Hannah pictured the brush brown and brittle, anchored in thirsty soil. “So, when the fire started, that blaze took off like a bat out of hell.” She snuck a glance at her father to see if he was going to take issue with her language. “That’s what Missus Goodly told Daniel’s mother,” she added. It was important that Pa understand that those words hadn’t originated with her. “Missus Goodly said the fire fed on every single thing in its path.”
“Yes, we know, Hannah.” Pa crumpled his napkin and tossed it on his empty plate. “Two houses went up in the fire, not to mention a barn and some livestock, too. It’s the biggest damned fire anyone’s seen around here in over twenty years.”
“That’s my point. I know some folks say it was an accident, that it couldn’t have been avoided, but—”
“Hannah, sometimes bad things happen and there’s no meaning behind it.”
Hannah was unconvinced. She knew other folks believed the fire was a blessing in disguise. They said it was God’s way of burning away what wasn’t needed. It was a way to clear the land of all the brambles and brush before the rains came and started all that new growth. The truth was, though, if it had been her house that went up in flames, she wouldn’t have seen it as much of a blessing. That was for sure. And she’d be annoyed at the folks who did see it like that.
“What if it’s some kind of sign?” she pressed. Simply uttering the thought left her unnerved. “What if it means something terrible is going to happen?”
“See, I told you.” Pa scowled at Yoki. “You fill her with this stuff and then she gets herself scared.”
“Grandma didn’t ever tell me it was an omen.”
“Omen?” Her father spit out the word. “Where did you hear that nonsense?”
Hannah straightened. “I am almost thirteen. I learned that one way back in like fourth grade.”
“Well, you can go ahead and unlearn it. I don’t want you filling your head with that kind of foolishness. There’s no sense working yourself up for nothing. Do you understand me?”
Hannah looked down at her lap. “Yes,” she muttered. When she glanced in her father’s direction, he was pulling his lanky frame out of the chair.
He gripped his plate in one hand and his empty water glass in the other. “I have some bills to pay.” He set the dishes in the sink. “You take care of the cleanup tonight, Hannah.”
The dishes were nothing compared to what could have been. Hannah was grateful there wasn’t more of a lecture coming her way.
TWO
September 1, 1996
I think I’m in love. At school, he goes by Alex even though his real name (the Native American one) is Ahote. I can’t believe I’m writing this journal entry at his mom’s house in New Mexico. Amazing!
There are stars outside my window—shimmering, glimmering jewels of light that sparkle in the darkness. Suspended beyond the roofline of the house, the moon resembles the shiny scale of a fish.
Yoki, Alex’s mother, says there is a blanket of stars that watches over us every night when we sleep. I don’t know if that’s a Hopi thing or a Navajo thing since she comes from both backgrounds. Maybe it’s simply a Yoki thing. I love the idea either way. I love her and I love being in this place! It’s so different from how things are back home. The smells, the quiet, even the sky is different—bigger and more intense. And there’s so much wide-open space. Yoki lives on three acres which isn’t all that much compared to some of the neighboring properties, but it’s huge if I think about what I’m used to.
The names of places here are so poetic. Like Two Falls. Who lives in a place with that kind of name? Not me. Not any of the kids I grew up with. Doesn’t it just make you want to close your eyes and picture the water, the churning liquid sapphire rushing around rocks and boulders before it plunges over the side of the mountain? I love the sound of the falls. It’s like a strong gust of wind.
There are other names here, too, like Horse Creek. Quite charming, I think. I expected to find wild horses there, but that wasn’t it at all. Horse Creek scales down the far side of Yas Mountain into a pool that someone once decided was shaped like a horse’s head. If it had been up to me, I would have named that mountain Plum Mountain because in those few moments between daylight and dusk when the light hits it just so, the mountain turns a deep purple—the color of ripe plums. There’s actually a Plum Creek, but there aren’t any plums there. But back to what I was saying about Yas Mountain. It’s so scenic. A line of pine trees sits below towering peaks and craggy cliffs. Alex says Yas is the Navajo word for snow. I suppose that makes sense since the top of the mountain is covered in snow in the winter.
I didn’t expect this place to look the way it does. I figured New Mexico would be mostly desert, but we’re higher up than that. We’re about an hour and a half outside of Santa Fe with the Carson National Forest to the east and the Jemez Peaks to the southwest. Surrounded by meadowland, forests, and mountains, Two Falls is a little community with less than a few hundred families, many of whom are ranchers.
Lots of places here have Native American names. Yoki has agreed to teach me the ones she knows. Alex thinks it’s funny how excited I am. He didn’t expect a white, Jewish woman to be this into Native American culture. Maybe he doesn’t know me as well as he thought.
Yoki’s house is a charming Craftsman style with a huge, covered porch that stretches across the front. It looks like it belongs out in the country, which is exactly where it is. Every single room is a different color, which works really well. Alex says his mother is an artist and sees the house as just one more canvas for her to paint. The large, boxy kitchen is mustard gold, splendid against the white cabinets and the ancient, white stove. I love the living room with its stone fireplace and bright persimmon walls. My grandmother would never be bold enough to paint a room that color. Yoki’s bedroom is the most beautiful periwinkle blue, and Alex’s is sage green. The space where I’m staying is lavender. The color reminds me of Gammie since that’s a scent she likes. But that’s kind of beside the point.
Yoki’s art studio, which actually is a sun porch, is a lovely shade of cream. She says she wanted a neutral color to make it easier to do her art. Shelves line one wall and are crammed with her supplies—paints, paper, brushes. Another wall is set up with an old door that sits atop stacked drawers; she uses it as a worktable. Alex thinks the house is too busy given the small space, but I love it. The best part is that the pictures on the walls are ones that Yoki has created—paintings of old barns and sagging fences, landscapes of Two Falls, and lots of animals and birds. There are paintings that have to do with Native American symbols, too, like Kokopeli and the trickster coyote and hawks and eagles. My favorites are the impressionistic paintings—flowers with blurred edges; cows and horses in yellows, rose, and turquoise; and rundown houses that glow in deep maroon, orange, and purple. Yoki isn’t some wannabe artist. She trained for it in college. And she’s good, really good. She supports herself by selling her stuff to galleries in Santa Fe and other places around the state.
It’s late. The house is dark and quiet which is completely the opposite of how it is during the day. Alex is across the hall in his room, probably snoring by now, that slow-paced soft rumble that happens when he sleeps on his back. But I’m not supposed to know about that yet and certainly not supposed to talk about it, at least not here, not on my first visit to his mother’s house.
Yoki went to bed long before us. She made up some story about being worn out from all the excitement of the day and wanting to turn in early. The way her face slipped into a smile when she said that made me think she was vacating in order to give Alex and me some time. We took advantage of the opportunity, snuggling on the couch and making out for the longest time. Alex wanted more than that, but I sent him off to bed, determined not to do anything that might make his mother uncomfortable if she found out. I want her to like me and trust me.
Outside, the wind skims across the field and rattles the windowpanes. Behind the house, suspended from the trees, are half a dozen wind chimes, also Yoki’s creations. The jingling reminds me of chirping birds.
Earlier today, Alex told me something he’d heard when he was a kid—when the wind blows in from the east, skirting over the top of the mountain, the spirits from the Other Side hang on its coattails and come back to visit their loved ones. He used to think this was an old Navajo tale, but recently when he asked Yoki, she laughed and said she didn’t think so and someone with a terrific imagination had most likely made it up. Still, it would be nice if it were true. I like the idea of the dead being able to blow in on a gust of wind.
Off in the distance, I hear the hoot of an owl. As its sound fades, the wind picks up even more. Perhaps the wind and the owl will be my lullaby tonight.