The Weight of Feathers

“But you’re thinking about it.”


Every Corbeau thought about it. Cluck never did anything though. Dax and his cousins were the ones who used to place nets where the Palomas swam. They’d only stopped when Dax and Cluck’s mother ordered them to. “Only cowards set traps for little girls in costumes,” she told them; true men did not go after women. Cluck had tried telling them before that someone would drown, and all he’d done was earn a few more bruises from his brother. Dax only listened to their mother.

But Dax throwing out the nets hadn’t kept the Palomas from slicking the tree branches with petroleum jelly last year. The Palomas had even been smart enough to pick branches shadowed by leaves, so the performers wouldn’t see the light shining off them. They were lucky Aunt Camille had broken her leg and not her neck.

Pain throbbed through the roots of Cluck’s hair. “I won’t do anything,” he said, though God knew he wanted to sometimes. Fighting was the only safe way to touch a Paloma. Half this family believed if they ever let a Paloma brush their arm or bump their shoulder, they’d wither and die like wildflowers in July sun. But fighting was safe. The rage made it true and good. The anger and honor of defending this family shielded them like a saint’s prayer. Hitting and kicking were safe. Anything else could bring sickness.

“You better not.” Dax followed their mother, his slam of the door as fast and loud as hers.

Cluck set a hand on the trailer door frame and pulled himself up the step.

Eugenie sat on the trailer’s built-in, her skirt rippling over the threadbare mattress.

There were only two reasons Eugenie showed up in the costume trailer. Cluck only had to check her hands to know which. Sometimes it was a torn dress, usually one of Mémère’s chiffons or silks, skirts she had danced in at Eugenie’s age. Eugenie would hold the fabric out to him, and he stitched up the tear.

This time his cousin’s palms cupped not one of their grandmother’s dresses, but a plastic bag of freezer-tray ice cubes. She said nothing, just held it out to him the same way she offered a ripped dress.

He took it, his nod as much of a thank you as he had in him.

She got up from the built-in and hopped down from the trailer door, the hem of her dress dragging after her bare feet.

The bag wet his palms. He didn’t know where she meant him to use it. His temple, the back of his neck, where his ribs hit the trailer siding.

Cluck made out the sharp, far-off call of red-winged blackbirds. Pépère always meant for the sight of them to make Cluck feel better about his own feathers. Cluck could never bring himself to remind his grandfather how easily crows killed them.



Una oveja que arrea a los lobos vale más que la lana.

A sheep that herds wolves is worth more than her wool.

Lace’s uncles stood at the picnic tables in silence, half-juiced fruit filling their hands.

They were never this quiet when they made the aguas frescas. Every afternoon, their laughing carried all the way to the motel with the scent of limes and oranges.

Had they just killed a crow? Last summer, Lace had seen a black-feathered bird peck the heart from a halved passion fruit. Her uncle loaded the Winchester 1912 her father used for scaring off bears and coyotes, and shot it. Lace could still remember its eyes, shining like mercury drops.

Lace searched for the crow or the shotgun. Instead she found Abuela, standing between wooden picnic tables, her presence hushing the men.

“Rosa,” Abuela said. The wrinkles in her face thinned to cracks.

Rosa. Pink, the color of Lace’s tail. Her name to her grandmother.

Tía Lora caught up, her eyes tight. Worry pulled at her mouth.

“After the show, you stay,” Abuela told Lace.

This was it. Tonight Abuela would tell Lace off for throwing ice on Justin. He and Matías, los soldados. Abuela blessed the work of their hands. It didn’t matter that Justin knew Lace was right. To Abuela, it would never be Lace’s business to correct him.