Remembering the Bones by Frances Itani Page B

buckets and honey pails into which were tucked roast-beef-and-radish sandwiches, or scrambled eggs on four slices of bread. In late spring, when we ran out of jam at home, Ally and I watched in dismay on the days Grand Dan prepared our lunches. We exchanged glances that meant “Sugar-sandwich day” and looked on glumly while she dampened her homemade bread with milk and sprinkled brown sugar between the slices. By the time lunch hour came around, the sugar had dried, and it scattered in every direction as we lifted our sandwiches to our mouths. Miss Grinfeld walked past, her chin defining a circle that followed the pattern of brown dots. It was humiliation of the worst sort; our dresses were speckled from neck to waist. We never spoke of this to Grand Dan.
    During health class, I did not let on to Miss Grinfeld that our mother could faint at will, because I was certain she would call this a family peculiarity, like being born with lumpy cheeks. Our teacher sat erect in her straight-backed chair and described generations of chinless families, implying some sort of bad behaviour. She told us not to let our bottom jaw hang open because doing this made a person look stunned, as if gorilla laughter would spew forth. We were quick to pull up our chins in class, but when we were out of earshot in the schoolyard we drooped our jaws and forced chortles from our throats.
    Every spring, Miss Grinfeld stood behind her desk and declared that this was the day the bees began to swarm. She taught us to be suspicious of adults who cooled their tea in their saucer before drinking—something Uncle Fred did every time he visited, though I did not betray him. I also said nothing about him wearing a freshly pressed shirt to bed every night, one that he had to iron himself.
    Before we arrived at school each winter morning, Miss Grinfeld had already placed a cod liver oil capsule in the pencil groove beside the hole in our desk that held the inkwell. We were required to swallow the fishy-tasting capsule before the day began, and she stood in front of the big boys and made them open their mouths in case they’d stored it in their cheeks to spit out when her back was turned.
    In our last year, before she sent us off to the town high school in Wilna Creek, she insisted that during the month of May we memorize an entire Shakespearean play, even though this was not on the senior curriculum. She alternated year by year between Julius Caesar and Macbeth. In my final year, it was Macbeth ’s turn, even though I had learned Julius Caesar by paying attention to the seniors’ recitations the year before. In fact, for one month of the school year, every child in our one-room school could recite at least some roles, line for line. That we often did not know what we were learning was of no consequence. The truth is, most of us loved the sound of the parts we memorized and, for a few short weeks, these were shouted out in the schoolyard at recess.
    But Little drops of water, little grains of sand did not have a predicate and was not eligible to be a sentence.
    Part of me is dry; the branches link to protect. I’m familiar now with their pattern, a soft and purposeful webbing. That small bit of water has revived my spirits. Even so, my tongue is stuck to itself, my gums and lips cracking. I’ll raise my sleeve again and suck its dampness. I must collect more drops. The sweater will absorb more if I pull back the coat. But I don’t want to freeze. The temperature could fall and I might not be rescued before nightfall. My face is in the open, but I still have a way to go.
    I hear a car on the road above and realize I’ve been listening to the sound of tires on wet pavement. Fellow humans, so close, what comfort. Maybe it’s Pete from the cul-de-sac at the end of our street, or maybe Pete’s wife. Pete walks in the ravine, but it’s still early, only April. I have no way of attracting attention. I’m out of sight. Invisible. Too far down. The flesh will