In the Land of Birdfishes by Rebecca Silver Slayter Read Free Book Online Page B

shoulders hardly cleared the back of the seat. And then Jim, sitting on the other side of me, was maybe the biggest man I’d ever seen. When he hugged Annie at the bus station, he picked her up so high that you could see what a fluid movement it would be for her to keep flying over his head, for him to just heave her up into the air.
    “You ever been in one of these?” Annie asked.
    “No,” I said. I’d had no idea how high truck drivers rode. It didn’t feel like driving. It was like we were sailing along above the traffic, just minding the lanes.
    “Oh, it’s a trip,” said Annie.
    “So, Aileen,” said Jim. “This here’s your first time going to Dawson?”
    I nodded. I’d never been anywhere. Toronto was the farthestfrom home I’d ever gone. Jim looked at me with interest, while Annie was busy watching the road, which was paved but rough.
    “Oh honey, you’re going to love it,” Jim said.
    “Jim was born there,” said Annie. “He thinks nothing’s got scratch on Dawson. You could be in New York City, and he’d be standing there saying, ‘What’s the big deal?’”
    “In gold rush days, they called it the Paris of the North. You know that, Aileen?”
    I didn’t.
    “So why are you coming here?” Jim asked. “You looking for work?”
    “No,” I said. I hesitated. I didn’t like how friendly he was, how he was leaning to look me right in the face, even though I kept my eyes fixed on the road. I didn’t like his hand on the seat-back behind me. I said, “I’m not looking for work.”
    “Oh,” said Jim. “Aileen’s got secrets.” He said my name like
Eileen
.
    “Plenty of people in Dawson have secrets. Jim, you ought to be used to people not liking to be asked too many questions,” Annie said, but she took her eyes off the road to give me a deep, hard look.
    “It’s bright out,” I said. “This is what they call the midnight sun?”
    “Oh this is nothing,” said Jim. “Just you wait. Right now, back south, you’d be seeing the sun start to drop, right? In another hour or two, it’d be gone. But you watch. By the time we drop you off in five hours, it’ll still be so bright you could do your needlework outside.”
    “Where are we dropping you off anyway?” Annie asked. “You said you got a sister or something here? She expecting you?”
    “No,” I said. “She doesn’t know I’m coming.”
    Annie gave me another look. She said, “Most folks let someone know when they’re coming to stay.”
    “I don’t actually know where she lives. We haven’t talked in a long time.”
    “I got a sister like that,” said Jim. “She got out so fast we hardly knew her. Like she was just waiting to go since my mother birthed her. She moved to Arizona, of all places. I haven’t talked to her in years. Don’t need to either. I got no love in me for that country, or the people there.” He reached behind him and pulled out a can of beer, which he cracked open. I looked back to see a two-four. He offered me his can, and I shook my head.
    “Well, if you’re drinking, I’m smoking and that’s that,” Annie said. She lit up a cigarette, and Jim wheeled down his window. She said, “Jim doesn’t like me smoking, but it’s none of his damn business.”
    “I never had a cigarette in my life,” said Jim. “My mother smokes, my sisters smoke, my brother smokes. But I hate the shit.”
    “He just likes sitting there like a bastard judging people.”
    “You smoke?” Jim asked me, and I shook my head again. He said, “Me, I’ve got to protect my singing voice. You sing?”
    “No,” I said.
    “Jim, don’t you start. Half the time, he sings the whole way. Not normal singing either. Opera shit. If there’s something worse than being stuck in a cab with someone singing in Italian, I don’t know what it is.”
    “I love Verdi,” said Jim. “But Wagner’s my favourite. You like him?”
    “I don’t really know opera,” I said.
    “Some folks don’t like him because they