On that October night in 1976, when Alec Spenser took to the water aboard The Anastasia, he figured everybody would think he was dead. Especially after he dropped his beer, gashed his hand picking up the broken glass, and left behind a blood splattered T-shirt. He knew he was leaving a wave of stories and suspicions in his wake. He knew that rumours would swirl in vicious circles for years, both from and about everyone in his life. He thought about his girlfriend, their unborn baby, and the big crazy cursed family she came from. He thought about his pompous old man, his cold mother, and his jealous sister. Then, he motored his little fishing boat down the coast as far as he could. Just before dawn, he ran The Anastasia aground and let her sink. He thumbed his way down into the States, where he hooked up with a bunch of glassy-eyed hippies on their way to a Buddhist shindig in Colorado. Six years later, Smart Alec Spenser was a brand new man named Brother Sharchen Gyaltso, who’d successfully transformed his personal hardships into spiritual treasure. Meanwhile, back on Cape Breton Island, Scruffy Effie Fortune was doing her damnedest to be mother and father to a little girl they’d just begun to call Crow.

While I was eighteen, loudly squawking about how stupid and confining this place was, desperate to spread my wings and fly away from this godforsaken island, Brother Gyaltso was making his way Down North, up into the highlands to run the small monastery overlooking the wild and spacious ocean. While I spent years flailing, trying to cleanse or drown myself in a sea of urban anonymity, Brother Gyaltso sat motionless on a cushion, staring out a massive window, watching the crows leap from cliff edges to play in the open air. And while I stood on the wharf, scattering Mama’s ashes on the waves of the Bras d’Or, Brother Gyaltso was on the crowd’s edge, preparing for the inevitable time when worlds and truths collide. Knowing that he’d have to emerge from the safety of his fake death’s shadow, even if it meant taking a puck in the mouth. Which it did.

Charlotte knew who he was when he walked through that door before anyone else did. Bruce the Spruce whispered to her earlier that day. Something about righteous rage and sins of the father. See, Smart Alec Spenser made a few dumb moves. He went and knocked up Peggy Fortune, too.

“Well isn’t this cute,” I sneer at the two of them as they sit side by side at my kitchen table, as if time and space don’t retain the sores and cracks of betrayal. Mama’s not here to take them to task for their treachery, but I am. And if there’s one thing I know how to do, it is hold a grudge, by Jesus.

“Crow, it’s not how you think.” Peggy’s voice sways with a blunt edge of defensiveness. “Put on the tea and we’ll talk.”