Free Written in Stone by Rosanne Parry Page B

What if my sons received the masks and never learned to dance?
    I thought of the footprints of my descendants on the beach. Would those feet ever dance, or would they trudge after me to factories and lumber camps and cities far from home? The weight of them following me burned. I hopped up and paced the room to outrun them, heart racing and the touch of flame on my skin.

10
A Visit with Susi
    I paced the floor, numb, not seeing or hearing, only obeying the urge to keep moving the way an animal keeps moving even in a cage. It was long enough to scare Aunt Loula. Long enough to make Ida cry. Long enough for Henry and Charlie to move the loom out of sight. That night Grandma, Grandpa, and Uncle Jeremiah made hours of quiet talk by the fire. They decided I needed a change.
    Everything was set the next day. Grandpa packed a good knife and wool blankets. Aunt Loula and Uncle Jeremiah saw to the food. Grandma wrapped herbs in bundles for sore throat, cough, pain, and rest. Henry gave me a long wool army coat and fur mitts. Ida slippedmy diary and a pencil in the basket with my change of clothes.
    “You can have any crayon of mine that you want to borrow,” she said proudly. “If it is green or blue or purple.”
    I didn’t care about those stupid crayons, but Aunt Loula smiled, proud of Ida’s generosity, so I had to take one of each and say thank you. When the good-byes were done, I set off in the fish canoe that Grandma passed down to me. It was just me and the waves for the whole day it would take me to paddle to Susi’s post office in Kalaloch. I dug the paddle into the water and named each sea stack and headland I passed in Quinault and Makah and English. The weather, current, and tide were a book I could read, just as my father had. I stopped twice to rest on beaches with drinking water. The burning weight I felt at home was already behind me.
    Late that afternoon, I came to the door with the bright brass plaque: MISS SUSANNA JAMES , POSTMISTRESS . Susi was not expecting me, but when she opened her door, I smelled fresh mussels and fry bread, and there was enough for two. Aunt Susi lived in one long, low-ceilinged room over the post office. There was a glass window at each end and a squat black cookstove in the middle. I loved the pin-neatness of the room: a broom inone corner, clothes pegs on the wall, and one open cupboard that held four books and three dishes.
    Susi carried a shipping crate upstairs for my chair. She heaped a generous plate for me and opened a pot of huckleberry jam on the table. We began the meal with the required questions about family health, the weather, and the strength of the fall salmon runs. Susi didn’t ask why I came, and I wasn’t sure what to tell her about those feet following mine and wanting to do right by folks who haven’t been born yet. It sounded crazy even to me. Susi left plenty of space in our conversation in case I wanted to speak my mind, but I asked questions about jazz and silk stockings instead.
    She cranked up a Victrola while we washed the pots. Piano ragtime filled her room. It sounded like rain falling on tin cans. Susi took my hand and showed me a few steps of the Charleston. It felt completely foreign to dance face to face and touching another person. I stepped on Susi’s toes twice and our foreheads collided before I retreated to the cot along the wall. Susi laughed at me, but I didn’t mind watching her dance by herself.
    We passed three days together. In the mornings, I helped her sort letters in the post office downstairs. In the afternoons, we walked the beach or the forest along the edge of town to get blue mussels, Indian tea, orfirewood. I loved the quiet of only two people in a house, and Susi wasn’t worried about money or what people think. I could have drifted there like an otter in kelp and never thought about yesterday or tomorrow or anyone following after me.
    On our fourth evening together, a storm came through. Susi stoked the fire and stuffed