The Daughters of Germaine
an excerpt

Sometimes I see things I just don't believe are there. I attribute this to chemical changes in my brain that occurred when I stopped using smack. But, I only do that when I want to fool myself and that's kind of against the recovery code, fooling yourself. The truth is, I've been seeing things that aren't there since I was a little girl. In my first memories, I am not alone. Rockie is there. I've had about a dozen psycho-babblers tell me that Rockie is a product of my brain, my need for someone to be a constant in my life. They say that is is perfectly normal for someone who has been through the crap I've been through (they might not say crap) to want a point of stability, even a little bitty girl. they don't say little bitty girl either. I try not to go to psychiatrists anymore. I think it's habit forming and we're supposed to watch out for that sort of thing.

The thing I saw that afternoon last year was real. I know it was because of everything that has happened since then and because i wasn't alone. there was a crowd of people in front of the Germaine Cafe. Well, as big a crowd as you get in Germaine. Probably six or seven people counting me. And it wasn't unusual for there to be people standing around on the sidewalk on a Monday morning staring in the window at Tsalagi Red, Pattyjo and whoever their guest was talking into those microphones. That morning, Red and Pattyjo were in Scio at the Lamb and Wool Festival so Susie Applegate was guest hosting the Germaine Social Hour and their guest was Sheriff Sweet.

You could hear what was going on in there because there are speakers set up beneath the awning of the cafe and Radio Germaine was on the air. Normally it is just cyberair for Radio Germaine, but when they are doing a live show at the cafe, they hook up the speakers so people on the sidewalk can hear what is going on inside. If the weather is nice, then Hannah sets chairs and tables up out there and you can sit and have some coffee and bagels or danish or whatever else they've got while you listen and watch through the window.

I was just on my way to drop off the horoscope for July at the Germaine Truth and since I was way ahead of deadline and had nothing better to do, I stopped to listen to Susie and see what kind of radio personality she might be. Susie Applegate is a news reporter for the Germaine Truth and she's the daughter of Howard Applegate who owns the paper. It's been in his family forever. Susie doesn't like me very much. Okay, that's not fair. She doesn't really pay any attention which is the same as not liking in a town like Germaine. I think it's because i do the horoscope and I'm new in town. I've only been here seven years.

Susie sounded pretty good. "Sheriff Sweet," she said, "what does your office plan to do about the drug smuggling going through this County?" She can be direct.

"Well, Susie, there isn't as much of that as people like to think. I know there are rumors about all sorts of nonsense going on, but most of the travel through our beautiful little town here is really just tourists or people passing through."

"There are an awful lot of tourists and people passing through carrying guns in their belts."

"Hunting is good up in the Ochocos. You know that. The people of Germaine know that. Seems like they could spend more time minding the honeydew and less time creating rumors."

"Hunting? With lugars?"

I did want to hear what Sheriff Sweet had to say to that, but then I saw my husband. We were all so interested in what the Sweet and Susie were up to that we didn't see him walk into the cafe. We didn't see him until he was standing by the table where Susie and Sweet were set up with their coffee and mics.

"Hello, Harlan." Susie pretty much had to acknowledge he was there.

"Hi, Susie," Harlan replied to her, but he was looking at the Sheriff like he wanted to eat him alive. Then he swung a gunny sack he'd been carrying over his shoulder down and set it right on Sheriff Tony Sweet's lap. Which was only possible because the Sheriff was leaning back in his chair. Had it tipped back on the hind legs of it the way everybody's momma told them not to, except mine.

"What the hell is this, Harlan?"

"I think this belongs in your closet, Sheriff," Harlan said and he just turned around and walked back outside.

Sheriff Sweet opened the gunny sack and I swear he turned white. He reached into the bag and pulled out a bone. I don't know a femur from an ulna and wouldn't know a human bone from a deer, but it was pretty apparent that Sheriff Sweet was holding a human bone by the look on this face.

The interview was over.

I looked around for Harlan. He was gone.

Chapter 2

I haven't been in Gerfmaine long enough to know its secrets or that's what the old families believe. They think they are holding tight to all the dirt and intrigue and greed and murder and sometimes, I think, they believe they are holding onto the sweetness, kindness, generosity, and natural peacefulness like these were precious secrets, too. I see through them. I see the good and I see the bad. I don't think I'm particularly special in that regard. Doesn't everyone see those things? Just that most people ignore whichever things bother them or don't fit in with their idea of how the world works.

There are some things I see which I am pretty sure other people don't see, except maybe the Seer of Germaine. I don't want to talk about the Seer, yet, or what that has to do with me.

Ask me how I knew that the bones in that bag belonged to a man who played the saxophone and I'll tell you I didn't. Not at first. i did know that they belonged to a musician because I saw the notes dropping on the floor and heard something wild and fluid when Sheriff Sweet pulled that bone out of the bag. We all know it was the ulna from a grown man. We learned that pretty quick. It was all over town and into the country ten miles by noon. The telephone is faster than a speeding bullit. Faster than the newspaper, certainly. Especially the Germaine Truth, which comes out when it feels like it. that's not entirely fair. Howard tries to stick to a schedule. Once or twice a month. Except in August when he usually goes on vacation for a month. Don't ask me where the Applegate money comes from, could be drugs for all I know. Rockie hasn't ever told me about the Applegate family. Everyone here seems to like them okay and Harlan is related to them. He's related to everyone else in Wilbur County. Could be a slight exaggeration, but there are cousins all over this County.

Harlan is a McCoy and that that's an old family here. They came out from Virginia in the 1840's with the first settlers. A founding family. I come from a foundling family. Anyway, that's what I say to myself. I'm an orphan. My momma's dead and I don't know who my father is, but I mean to find out.

I was sixteen years old and living on the streets of Portland when Momma died. I saw it on the 11:00 news at one of my friends apartments where I was couch surfing. First they showed the motel room where she was staying. Then they said a woman had been found dead in there and it appeared she had overdosed, she was a known drug addict and prostitute and hispanic. That's all they had to say about her. They didn't give her name. I knew it was her. I also knew she had a bank account and a safe deposit box and that she got some kind of money every month and she would never tell me why or how much. It just wasn't ever enough.

I didn't want to go to the morgue to claim her because i knew someone would want to put me in foster care. But I sure wanted to get to that bank account. I figured I could really use the money. I knew which bank it was, but it took me a couple of weeks to get up the nerve and go inside. One thing Momma did, which I still don't really understand, is she put my name on that account. She put my name on the safe deposit box, too. I hadn't ever signed any cards and it took the bank people some major time to match up my Oregon ID to my face and make sure it was not faked. The only other thing I had was a social security card. Somehow I'd hung onto that through the last year since I ran away from home. Well, not home, from Momma. There wasn't really a home to run away from.

Momma had been riding the tracks up her arms and behind her knees and between her toes for a long time. The check that came every month was not enough to buy the goodbye she needed. She had a few boyfriends and some stayed longer than others, but she had never sold herself until that year I turned fourteen. The boyfriends had disappeared along with their contribution to our income, which usually amounted to a withdrawal and an IOU. Momma had been pretty at one time. She still had pretty good bones and the remnants of a nice figure. Neither of which are really necessary to your basic, bottom of the barrel skin trade. When the nightly stream of boyfriends started and we got evicted from the slummiest, mold-encrusted apartment in East Multnomah County we had ever lived in, I just decided that I wasn't going to wait around for the sheriff to come knocking with the landlord and lock us out. I pretty much expected DHS to be there and take me away. I went to school the day we the lockout notice would go in effect. I hadn't been there for awhile so I ended up in the attendance counselor's office for part of the day. I convinced them I was really, really ready to come back to school.

You know, I really might have been ready, but I had to find a place to spend the night, and the next night, and the night after that so I was kind of too busy to go back.