Melinda Moustakis
You were a whale, said Atik's grandmother, pale and white as the snow at the top of Akutan. Your mouth had one tooth, one wall of a tooth that let the ocean through so you could eat tiny creatures, creatures the size of snowflakes. But your belly groaned with hunger and you longed to eat the black seals that swam around you. You wanted one and rubbed your wall of a tooth against the dark, slippery body. You breathed in the ocean, then, and tasted seal on your tongue. The taste went into your belly and your belly roared with wanting. You stopped eating the tiny creatures. You swam away from the other whales until you saw a glacier. You swam up to the glacier and saw a seal, behind the ice. The seal glided through the water and you pressed to the ice until your eye throbbed with cold. You rammed your head against the ice to see if you could break it. You could not. You swam away from the glacier and then you swam down. You swam down until the darkness made your skin glow. Then you turned and swam fast, every muscle arched and tense. Your teeth hit the ice first and you heard the sound of ice cracking and then you heard nothing. When you woke you tasted your own blood and your mouth ached. Your wall of a tooth was now in pieces. You followed the currents and waited for you mouth to stop bleeding. You saw a group of seals and tried to taste the skin as you had done before but you tasted blood, blood not your own. You had teeth now and could kill. You had never killed before and the thrashing of the seal between your teeth made your blood quicken. Your teeth got smaller and smaller with each hunt. Your skin turned grey and then black, black as a seal. But not your belly, your belly stayed white.
Atik's grandmother saw the whales that dragged behind boats. When the dead bodies were hauled to shore, her family cut up the whales for meat. She helped carry the bricks of flesh and then the men handed out strips of whale blubber to the children. The blubber slid down her throat in pieces.
Atik had never eaten whale meat. Could you feel the blubber slide all the way down your throat and into your stomach? He cut up a filet of halibut into strips and then the strips he cut in half. He picked up one piece of the raw fish and dangled it above his open mouth. Atik guided the piece of clammy fish toward the back of his throat. He closed his mouth and swallowed. The halibut refused to go down. He swallowed again and then began to gag. The fish clogged his airway.
Atik reached into his mouth and grabbed at the halibut with his fingers. The strip had lodged down far enough so that he had to pull the fish out, or push it down. Atik's face felt hot and he still couldn't breath. He made a fist and pounded on the table.
Atik's grandmother came into the kitchen. She slapped him on the back then wrapped her bony arms around his body, used her hips as leverage, and heaved into his abdomen. The first attempt failed. She pushed again and Atik heard her joints crackle. The slobbery piece of halibut smacked on the floor.
“Next time chew,” she said. “Or cut smaller pieces.”
Atik and Taklik took their kayaks out into the ocean. The sun burned the back of their necks. The only way to get around Akutan was by water or to walk the boarded walkways that connected their small, Aleut village. Atik and Taklit explored the deserted coves and inlets. They paddled onto shore and rested with the seals sunbathing on nearby rocks. Atik took rocks and spelled out messages for the small planes that flew overhead to other islands. This day he made the rocks spell, “MY ISLAND.”
Atik asked Taklit, “How did ‘is' and ‘land' become island. The word is a question. Is land? Is it land?”
Taklit raised his hands to the blue above. “My brother is crazy.”
They shoved off shore and embarked homeward, but Atik saw Rootok Island , and wanted to be where he was looking.
“Follow me,” he said.
Taklit followed and because he was faster he passed Atik's kayak. Atik strained towards Rootok; he focused on the back of Taklit's head. The water resisted the paddle and up ahead, the ocean crested with wind. Taklit turned his kayak and faced Atik. When he pulled up alongside he said, “The water is choppy. We need to turn back.”
Atik watched his brother's head turn and yell for him. He watched Taklit's head grow smaller. Atik continued toward Rootok. His arms cramped and he rested until he felt his arms relax. The times between rests became shorter and shorter. Atik splashed ocean on his face. When he gave up, he looked forward and back and both islands were the same size and he did not have the strength to reach either. He put his hands on his stomach, under his shirt, to keep them warm and he waited. A boat from the bottomfish plant came and took him back to Akutan.
His grandmother brought out her mukluks. They were hers when she was a child. They were made by my mother, she said. The soles are bearded sealskin and the sinew seams keep your feet dry. My mother did the beadwork in winter under the lantern. She finished the beadwork the next winter. She made the mukluks the size of her mukluks so that I would grow into them. When I wore them, she put otter fur near the toe so that they would fit. As my feet grew, she would unroll the otter fur and cut a piece off to make more room. She cut off more and more fur. And one day she did not cut any, she took out the last piece. Then she put her foot next to mine and already mine were bigger than hers and I was still young. I would still grow. My mother started to make another pair. I wore the mukluks until I could not wear them anymore. I needed the new pair before she finished the beading, so I wore them with the scrolls in the sealskin, but no beads. I kept my old mukluks and sometimes I looked at them and wanted to wear them instead. I waited until your father's feet stopped growing before I made him a pair. And by that time, we did not use sealskin anymore.
She saw how the whale body lay in the snow like a mountain. She looked into the eye. The eye was the size of her hand. The whale's pupil was a deep, black cloud, floating. She uncovered her hands and traced the oval outline of the eye with her finger. Her father saw her. He took a knife and retraced the oval, careful not to gouge the membrane. He handed her the eye and it was heavy in her hands. She peered closely into the dark cloud trapped in water, water that used to see the ocean.
How does a whale see the ocean? Atik went to the dock and jumped into the numbing water and opened his eyes. The salt stung but, with his fingers, he pried his eyes open. The water churned around him, murky and green. He let out the air in his lungs to counteract the buoyancy of his body. The bubbles of his breath drifted to the surface.
A form speared into the water. Atik struggled against the arms around his torso. He kicked and thrashed against the hold and swam upward. He took a breath of air and Taklik's face popped up in front of his. They climbed back up on the dock and threw themselves onto the wooden planks.
“What are you doing?” Taklik asked. “I was trying to help you.”
Atik looked down at his hands and all his fingers were white as if the blood had drained. The villagers, those who had seen, rushed over with blankets. Atik felt too tired to move. He didn't feel the hands of those who undressed him, took off his soaking cold clothes. He and Taklik, naked and holding blankets around their bodies, stumbled back to the house.
Their grandmother had been sleeping and the villagers told her the boys were fools. Fools to swim in the cold water without suits. What did they think they were? Seals? She closed the door and sat them down next to the fire. She put a pot of water on the stove to boil.
“Atik slipped,” said Taklik. “And I went in to help him.”
But Atik still thought about the whale eye. He came across the body of a seal that had washed up onto a rocky shore. Slow flies buzzed over the carcass. The seal's eye had milky film covering the lens. Atik cut around the eye with his pocketknife. He used his left hand to hold the head still. But even then, he pierced the sac and clear liquid trickled out. The ball deflated. He went to the other side. He removed the eye, intact, and held it in his hand. The sac felt weightless and small. Atik threw the seal eye back into the ocean and left the blinded body on the sand.