Free Wash by Margaret Wrinkle Page B

moving. Even in this quiet water out here, it’s rising and falling like breathing. You feel it tugging on you? That’s how spirit moves, once you learn to listen. And you can drown on dry land just as easy as you can drown in this ocean, so pay attention.
    She made altars all over that island. The first one I barely remember. It was in a real hidden place where palmetto leaves brushed my face when I stepped through and saw two mud people, all worn down. Ancestors. They was us and we’ll be them was what she said as she sprinkled water and some ash then knelt there talking to em for a long time.
    I was still small when we went one day and found em broke in half, kicked in the dust. She wrapped the broken pieces in a white cloth and took em to the water. Held em under till they melted, then rinsed the cloth out good. Looked out over the waves like she was saying go on home. Maybe it’s safer there.
    After that, she always made her altars look like an accident. Just some junk so nobody else saw it for what it was. She made one in our loft but she left it real makeshift in case Thompson ever climbed up there. Just a small pile of stones laying on a bed of pine straw in the far corner.
    And she made offerings too. Long curved seedpods for the life they carried. A faded turtle shell for patience laid inside the pale curved rib of a fox. A few scattered shark teeth sharp enough to cut. Wild pink roses from the bush beside the front porch steps just because she liked the smell.
    She’d take each treasure and breathe on it, or else rub it against her throat or inside her elbow, then lay it down on the pine straw. Whenever it started to feel crowded, she’d nod at me to pick a few to take and bury at the foot of our favorite trees. Sometimes she’d take a pocketful of petals down to the beach and wade in the water to scatter em till they drifted in a bigger and bigger circle.
    She’d talk about it some but told me watch out for words, no matter what tongue. Said she didn’t get time to learn everything for sure so she just tried to see with her heart.
    Make some place to kneel and leave your offerings. It keeps you thankful . Take your journeys in the spirit world first. Be sure you go all the way there and back in spirit before you even step out your own door. It’s easier for God to keep an eye on you, knowing what you have in mind. And make your piece. Keep that talisman strong and wear it till it’s done. Then lay it somewhere safe but not till after you make your next one.
    She made my pieces for me when I was little, chewing a small patch of leather till it was soft enough while she gathered what she knew I needed, then stitching everything up tight inside. She’d wear it awhile before she strung it round my neck or else my waist. She never even told me what was in there.
    Then one day it was time for me to make my own. She sent me to find my treasures. Told me bring back only what I needed the most, but I was about to turn seven so I came back with a shirttail full. Laid everything out, all proud. Then I looked up to see her holding my next piece of leather so small in her palm. I had so much too much, it hurt my throat.
    She just folded her hand closed and sat there, tipping her head and waiting on me to do like she said and choose. That was the day when I learned how a shark tooth, a tiny piece of hair from those dark spidery tree roots and some pebbles worn almost back down to sand can be enough.
    Thompson
    The one time I caught Mena at her mojo, I was riding over the dune just as she was laying some animal bones in a shallow grave and covering them with sand. I pointed from her hands fluttering over the hole to my own chest and back, raising my eyebrows to ask if that was some version of me she was burying.
    She shook her head no with some force. All I cared about was that it wasn’t me. Beyond that, I knew to stay out of it. I kicked my gelding on along, telling myself I’d best beef up my own prayers.
    When