Daniel Hecht - Land of Echoes

Dr. Corcoran coughed delicately into his fist and asked, "Have you, um, dealt with Native American patients before?"

"Rarely," Cree hedged.

He nodded deeply, wisely. "If I may say so, there are also cultural factors to consider."

"Oh?"

"Yes. As you know, Tommy is Navajo. There are certain beliefs-we might call them superstitions-prevalent among the Dine. These ideas inform their way of thinking about illness. It often leads to a… how to put this? A dramatizing of the problem." He smiled at her and lowered his voice. "A supernatural approach to anything mysterious. Even with the most educated Navajo, it can be a surprisingly hard paradigm to displace." He raised his eyebrows meaningfully, confidingly: Just between us white folks.

"I'm speaking of, oh, spirits, witches, curses, ghosts of ancestors-that kind of thing."

Cree managed to avoid taking him by the shoulders and shaking him and instead just nodded thoughtfully. "Actually," she told him, deadpan, "I do have some experience in that area."

Tommy had been installed in a three-bed room with a single window that looked north to a view of Gallup and the vast land beyond. The middle bed was empty, but through a gap in the curtain Cree could see that the bed nearest the door was occupied by a boy of around ten, sleeping now. An older woman sat in a chair nearby, drowsing, a magazine forgotten on her lap.

"Ah, Mr. Keeday," Dr. Corcoran said heartily. "I've brought someone to see you!"

Tommy was sitting on his bed, facing the window. He turned, looking surprised to see Cree, dismayed to see Dr. Corcoran. He wore a thin terry robe over striped pajamas. His right arm lay inert on the bed, hand and wrist bandaged.

"Yaateeh," Cree said. And to her surprise she felt it immediately, now-felt it startle and quickly go quiet in him, as if hiding when it sensed her.

"I'm just dropping Dr. Black off," Dr. Corcoran reassured him. "You two have a good chat, and we'll all touch bases later." He smiled and left the room.

With her experience at the mesa still urgent in her memory, Cree had to resist the impulse to bombard him with questions. Instead, she went to stand at the end of his bed, looking out the window. Below the hospital, the land sloped downward to a residential district that a mile or so away yielded to the two- and three-story buildings of the old downtown. Beyond were the overpass of Interstate 40 and the freight railyard that cut Gallup in two. Somewhere far out in the emptiness on the other side would be the lonely sheep ranch where Tommy had grown up.

She didn't say anything. The thing stayed inert, camouflaging itself in his body's normal energies and auras, a dark chameleon.

"My grandparents and my aunt will be back soon," he said at last. "They went away for lunch."

"You must be glad to see them."

"No."

"Why not?"

Tommy thought about it. "I scare them. I don't like to see them scared."

"I can imagine. But I don't think you should worry about them."

"Why not?"

She had to think about how to say it. "Well, because they're brave, too, aren't they? I mean, even though they're scared, they want you to come home so they can take care of you. Fear is what makes us find our courage. If they want you home, it's because they believe courage will win out over fear."

The thought seemed to please him, but he didn't say anything.

Cree kept looking out the window. "That Dr. Corcoran, he's sure got you all figured out, doesn't he? You must be thrilled."

She glanced sideways at him and caught a flicker of a grin. It felt good to have conjured it in him. He was wary as a cornered animal now, but through the fear and the typical tangle of adolescent emotions she sensed the person that was so evident in his drawings: highly observant, burning with a desire to understand the big questions.

"Know what I did last night?" she asked.

"What."

"I went for a long walk. Out to the mesa, to that ravine about a mile north of the school. You know the one? The steepest one."

He frowned. "At night?"

"Well, darkness helps me think about things. Sometimes when you can't see very well, other parts of your mind get more active, and you can sense things or imagine things more easily. You went out there with your drawing class, right?"

"You were looking at my drawings?" Disapproval: Spying on me.

"Well, I'd wanted to talk to you Saturday night, but then you.. they brought you here. So I figured I'd at least look at your work." She turned to him. "Tommy, I have to say, you absolutely blow me away! Your drawings open my eyes to things I'd never noticed. Even the most ordinary objects or scenes take on a… a magic, I guess you'd call it. I'm… I'm awed. Really."

The flattery pleased him, but his wandering eyes showed he was wary of condescension. She gave him time, but he didn't say anything. She thought the rightward bow of his body increased slightly in the interim.

"Tell me about the faces in the rocks," she said quietly. "The ones you drew."

"It just seemed like an interesting compositional idea. It's called 'personification.' 'Anthropomorphism.'"

"There's more to it than that. There had to be. You had an interpretive theme-you gave them all very different personalities, just like you did with those studies of your parents. Why?"

His expression suggested he resented her probing but that he was also impressed or pleased that she'd noticed. "I was thinking about Navajos in the old days. All you know is what you read or people tell you, you don't ever know what to believe. Sometimes I just want to know, that's all. Who they really were. I was trying to see which seemed right." From the way his eyes fled hers, she sensed he'd inadvertently revealed something very important to him. "And I liked the idea of putting them in stone, kind of a statement, like they're enduring but also frozen in time. Like stuck in their history."

Same as with your parents, Cree thought. "Were you thinking of any ancestor in particular?" She held her breath: The answer could be crucial.

But abruptly the boy in the other bed woke with a cry and a long moan that ended in coughing. The old woman gently shushed him and muttered reassurances in Spanish.

Tommy half turned to look toward the drawn curtain and whispered, "I think he's dying or something. He's been in here a long time, like six weeks, I heard his parents talking about it."

"Tommy, stay with me on this for a moment. Did anything happen when you were out at the cliffs that day? Did you see anything different or unusual? You wrote the date on your drawings-September ninth."

"If they think they can keep me that long, no way. I'd rather be dead. I'll get out somehow."

Cree thought back to Dr. Corcoran's casual comment, He'll be talking to old white geezers like me for a long, long time, and felt a terrible resolve blossom in her, just what Julieta must feel. "They won't have to. You're going to be better. But you have to help me now."

Tommy swiveled his head back to look at her, and the way he did it gave her a little shiver. Something robotic about it, too smooth and controlled.

"How did you know?" he asked. "Did Mrs. McCarty tell you?"

"Know what? Tell me what?"

"That day. When I went up the ravine. I was sick of drawing the same rocks, I thought there'd be something more dramatic up there."

"How far up did you go?" Cree tried to conceal her excitement.

"Not far. It just goes up and divides into two little washes that dwindle away at the top. I shouldn't have spent so much time in there. I got too hot."

"Oh?"

"Not too bad. I was sitting on some boulders and trying to draw the ravine, but it didn't work out. Too much glare from the rocks. I just got dizzy."

"So what'd you do?"

Shrug. "Went back down. Drank some water. It went away."