Calli slowly opened her bedroom door and peeked around the door. She stepped cautiously out of her room and into the short hallway where it was darker, the air staler and weightier. Directly across from Callis room was Bens room, a twin of her own, whose window faced the backyard and Willow Creek Woods. Bens door was shut, as was her parents bedroom door. Calli paused at the top of the steps, straining to hear her fathers movements. Silence. Maybe he had left for his fishing trip already. Calli was hopeful. Her father was leaving with his friend Roger to go fishing at the far eastern edge of the county, along the Mississippi River, some eighty miles away. Roger was picking him up that morning and they would be gone for three days. Calli felt a twinge of guilt in wishing her father away, but life was so much more peaceful with just the three of them.
Each morning that he was sitting in the kitchen brought a different man to them. Some days he was happy, and he would set her on his lap and rub his scratchy red whiskers on her cheek to make her smile. He would kiss Mom and hand her a cup of coffee and he would invite Ben to go into town with him. On these days her daddy would talk in endless streams, his voice light and full of something close to tenderness. Some days he would be at the scarred kitchen table with his forehead in his hands, empty beer cans tossed carelessly in the sink and on the brown-speckled laminate countertops. On these days Calli would tiptoe through the kitchen and quietly close the screen door behind her and then dash into the Willow Creek Woods to play along the creek bed or on the limbs of fallen trees. Periodically, Calli would return to the edge of their meadow to see if her fathers truck had gone. If it was missing, Calli would return home where the beer cans had been removed and the yeasty, sweaty smell of her fathers binge had been scrubbed away. If the truck remained, Calli would retreat to the woods until hunger or the days heat forced her home.
More silence. Encouraged that he was gone, Calli descended the stairs, carefully stepping over the fourth step that creaked. The bulb from above the kitchen stove cast a ghostly light that spilled onto the bottom of the stairs. She just needed to take two large steps past the kitchen entry and she would be at the bathroom. Calli, at the bottom step, her toes curled over the edge, squeezed the hardwood tightly, pulled her nightgown to above her knees to make possible a bigger step. One step, a furtive glance into the kitchen. No one there. Another step, past the kitchen, her hand on the cool metal doorknob of the bathroom, twisting.
Calli! a gruff whisper called out. Callie stilled. Calli! Come out here!
Callis hand dropped from the doorknob and she turned to follow the low sound of her fathers voice. The kitchen was empty, but the screen door was open, and she saw the outline of his wide shoulders in the dim early morning. He was sitting on the low concrete step outside, a fog of cigarette smoke and hot coffee intermingling and rising above his head.
Come out here, Calli-girl. Whatcha doing up so early? he asked, not unkindly. Calli pushed open the screen door, careful not to run the door into his back; she squeezed through the opening and stood next to her father.
Why ya up, Calli, bad dream? Griff looked up at her from where he was sitting, a look of genuine concern on his face.
She shook her head no and made the sign for bathroom, the need for which had momentarily fled.
Whats that? Cant hear ya. He laughed. Speak a little louder. Oh, yeah, you dont talk. And at that moment his face shifted into a sneer. You gotta use the sign language. He abruptly stood and twisted his hands and arms in a grotesque mockery of Calli. Cant talk like a normal kid, got be all dumb like some kind of retard! Griffs voice was rising.
Callis eyes slid to the ground where a dozen or so crushed beer cans littered the ground and the need to pee returned full force. She glanced up to her mothers bedroom window; the curtains still, no comforting face looked down on her.
Cant talk, huh? Bullshit! You talked before. You used to say, Daddy, Daddy, specially when you wanted something. Now I got a stupid retard for a daughter. Probably youre not even mine. You got that deputy sheriffs eyes. He bent down, his gray-green eyes peered into hers and she squeezed them tightly shut.
In the distance she heard tires on gravel, the sharp crunch and pop of someone approaching. Roger. Calli opened her eyes as Rogers four-wheel-drive truck came down the lane and pulled up next to them.
Hey, there. Mornin, you two. How are you doing, Miss Calli? Roger tipped his chin to Calli, not really looking at her, not expecting a response. Ready to go fishing, Griff?
Roger Hogan was Griffs best friend from high school. He was short and wide, his great stomach spilling over his pants. A foreman at the local meat packing plant, he begged Griff every time he came home from the pipeline to stay home for good. He could get Griff in at the factory, too. Itd be just like old times, hed add.
Morning, Rog, Griff remarked, his voice cheerful, his eyes mean slits. Im goin to have you drive on ahead without me, Roger. Calli had a bad dream. Im just going to sit here with her awhile until she feels better, make sure she gets off to sleep again.
Aw, Griff, whined Roger. Cant her mother do that? Weve been planning this for months.
No, no. A girl needs her daddy, dont she, Calli? A daddy she can rely on to help her through those tough times. Her daddy should be there for her, dont you think, Rog? So Callis gonna spend some time with her good ol daddy, whether she wants to or not. But you want to, dont you, Calli?
Callis stomach wrenched tighter with each of her fathers utterances of the word daddy. She longed to run into the house and wake up her mother, but while Griff spewed hate from his mouth toward Calli when hed been drinking, hed never actually really hurt her. Ben, yes. Mom, yes. Not Calli.
Ill just throw my stuff in your truck, Rog, and meet up with you at the cabin this afternoon. Therell be plenty of good fishing tonight, and Ill pick up some more beer for us on the way. Griff picked up his green duffel and tossed it into the back of the truck. More carefully he laid his fishing gear, poles and tackle into the bed of the truck. Ill see ya soon, Roger.
Okay, Ill see you later then.You sure you can find the way?
Yeah, yeah, dont worry. Ill be there. You can get a head start on catching those fish. Youre gonna need it, cause Im going to whip your butt!
Well just see about that! Roger guffawed and squealed away.
Griff made his way back to where Calli was standing, her arms wrapped around herself despite the heat.
Now how about a little bit of daddy time, Calli? The deputy sheriff dont live too far from here, now, does he? Just through the woods there, huh? Her father grabbed her by the arm and her bladder released, sending a steady stream of urine down her leg as he pulled her toward the woods.
PETRA
I cant sleep, again. Its too hot, my necklace is sticking to my neck. Im sitting on the floor in front of the electric fan, and the cool air feels good against my face. Very quiet I am talking into the fan so I can hear the buzzy, low voice it blows back at me. I am Petra, Princess of the World, I say. I hear something outside my window and for a minute I am scared and want to go wake up Mom and Dad. I crawl across my carpet on my hands, the rug rubbing against my knees all rough. I peek out the window and in the dark I think I see someone looking up at me, big and scary. Then I see something smaller at his side. Oh, Im not scared anymore. I know them. I think, Wait, Im coming, too! For a second I think I shouldnt go. But there is a grown-up out there, too. Mom and Dad cant get mad at me if theres a grown-up. I pull on my tennis shoes and sneak out of my room. Ill just go say hi, and come right back in.
CALLI
Calli and her father had been walking for a while now, but Calli knew exactly where they were and where they were not within the sprawling woods. They were near Beggars Bluff Trail, where pink-tipped turtleheads grew in among the ferns and rushes and where Calli would often see sleek, beautiful horses carrying their owners gracefully through the forest. Calli wished that a cinnamon-colored mare or a black-splotched Appaloosa would crash from the trees, startling her father back to his senses. But it was Thursday and Calli rarely encountered another person on the trails near her home during the week. There was a slight chance that they would run into a park ranger, but the rangers had over thirty miles of trails to monitor and maintain. Calli knew she was on her own and resigned herself to being dragged through the forest with her father. They were nowhere near Deputy Sheriff Louiss home. Calli could not decide whether this was a good thing or not. Bad because her father showed no indication of giving up his search and Callis bare feet were scratched from being pulled across rocky, uneven paths. Good because if they ever did get to Deputy Louiss home her father would say unforgivable things and then Louis would, in his calm low voice, try to quiet him and then call Callis mother. His wife would be standing in the doorway behind him, her arms crossed, eyes darting furtively around to see who was watching the spectacle.
Her father did not look well. His face was white, the color of bloodroot, the delicate early spring flower that her mother showed to her on their walks in the woods, his coppery hair the color of the red sap from its broken roots. Periodically stumbling over an exposed root, he continued to clutch Callis arm, all the time muttering under his breath. Calli was biding her time, waiting for the perfect moment to bolt, to run back home to her mother.
They were approaching a clearing named Willow Wallow. Arranged in a perfect half-moon adjacent to the creek was an arc of seven weeping willows. It was said that the seven willows were brought to the area by a French settler, a friend of Napoleon Bonaparte, the willows a gift from the great general, the wispy trees being his favorite.