After her mother left, Ruth woke her son and returned to their boat on the sea. It was true, she was a creature of the ocean. She went out that night and stood on the deck shining in the sea mist, listening to the beneath.

A few weeks later Ruth went into the forest to search for the woman who had been the midwife. It was a difficult trail and more than once she was lost. But she remembered the markers. All women were given the directions. She remembered the driftwood planted along the way, a carved set of lines on an old tree.

When she reached the old cottage, she found the woman still alive. She was neat and clean in an old cotton dress, her hair pulled straight back, plants drying on racks in the little cottage.

“Yes, you were born with gill slits. It isn’t rare, especially in these parts. Just that most of them pass away before the child is born.”

There were many birds in the forest, ravens, songbirds calling from one tree. She found comfort in yellow slugs, the smell of the trees, and sounds of branches in the light wind. Ruth thought, I am happy here, almost as happy as at water. Happiness was not always a fleeting thing, but a state of mind, of being, after having lived, loved, even after being poor, alone, having survived. Even with the pain in her hands she had happiness.

The house was weathered and damp inside like the forest and smelled of the old trees. A large spider lived in the corner and spiders were worshiped. Water walkers. They brought light to the people on their backs from an island struck by lightning.

Ruth saw now that a man was there, sitting quietly, listening.

The woman washed her hands by habit, a constant thing.

“Oh yes, this is my friend Dick Russell. He works for the Forest Service. And this is Ruth, the basket weaver.”

“And fisher,” Ruth added. She reached out her hand and he shook it too hard. He was quiet, but he was taken with her and he had listened to the entire conversation.

The woman ignored them. “I always knew you’d come. Like a salmon. From the ocean to the forest so you could breathe pure forest air.”

Ruth was lost when she left. Home seemed a different way. Finally, she realized she had taken the wrong path. Then, hearing a noise in the leaves, she turned. It was Dick Russell. He smiled and in his good-natured manner, said, “You are lost. This is the way to my world. Yours is over there.”

MARCO: THE SON OF THOMAS

Mother, are you awake?” Marco said one night. He was twelve.

He knew she was. She was silent, though, wanting him to sleep, to not have any conflict. There were shadows even in the darkness.

“Are you happy?

“Why do you ask?”

He was silent. She should have said yes. But it made her think of all the things that had gone awry. All the things she had lost and given up. And that would soon include the boy.