HELEN

Perley’s wound looked like a human bite, all the little holes arranged around a circle, and Karen barked at me for iodine, tweezers, sage. I handed her the supplies, climbed up after them to watch. No one told me not to hover. No one told me anything, except how to help. In the morning we moved Perley down to the sofa. Karen stitched Perley up with her suture kit. Perley clung to Lily, who had gone liquid, salt dripping down her cheeks, milk leaking down her front. “The breast milk is good,” Karen told her. “Squeeze some into a cup so that we can use it to clean the wound.” Watching Karen push the suture through, pincer it with the needle pusher, calmly tie each graceful knot, I knew I was supposed to feel distressed, panicked even, definitely sobered. I told myself that I felt those things. But I was lying. I felt like singing.

Humming, I made breakfast. Cheerily, I clanged the pans. I melted duck fat. I unsealed a precious jar of venison. I fried extra sardines. I kept Karen and Lily full of strong coffee. I plugged in the phone and called in to work for Lily. I poured catnip tea down Perley’s throat until he spluttered. No one scolded me. No one told me to butt out. I had been seven long years with these women and their child, and this was the first time we were all in agreement.

“Should we take him to the doctor?” Lily asked, wiping her eyes into Perley’s hair.

“What could a doctor do that I’m not already doing?” Karen asked.

“What if it gets infected?” Lily asked.

“If it gets infected, I’ll give him antibiotics,” Karen said. “I can do that. Don’t worry.” She squeezed Lily’s hand. She wiped Lily’s blurred eyes with the corner of her shirt. I tried not to stare.

Perley attempted to examine his wound by straining his eyeball down toward it. This added to his new grotesqueness, eyelids half closed, eyes crossed, mouth drawn down as he tried to look at his own cheek. I brought him the shard of mirror from above the sink.

“Toxically gross,” Perley said, faint but happy. “What about school?”

“You’re not going to school,” Karen said. “You’ll stay home and rest. We need to watch and make sure this thing heals up right. We need to make sure you don’t get a fever. So just settle in.”

“Settle in where?” asked Lily. “I won’t have him stay one more night in this house until the snakes are gone.”

“Where else can he stay?” asked Karen.

“Stop crying, Mama L, I’ll camp on the pipeline with Rudy,” Perley said.

“I won’t have it,” Karen said.

“He can stay in my old camper,” I said. I waited to be rebuffed. Instead, Karen said, “There’s an idea. But it needs a little bit of work.”