their clothes and plunged in, scooping handfuls of water over Lily’s belly, whooping at the cold. I stripped down and followed them. Together, our bodies showed the marks of elastic waistbands, of chigger bites and peeling scabs, stretch marks, birthmarks, ingrown hairs, generous ripples of fat around thighs, jellied parts, furry belly buttons, sunburnt clavicles. Caked with grime, our toenails were sharp and filthy as hooves.
After, we sat on the bank.
“Why do you live at the Land Trust?” I asked.
“Because that’s where Karen is,” Lily said.
“I needed a place to stay while I went to nursing school,” Karen said. “They said I could build out there.”
“But why land that’s women only?” I asked.
“I used to think my trouble was that I didn’t want to live around men. That place brought relief for a while,” Karen said. “Now I’d just as soon not live around women, either. It turns out my trouble might be that I don’t want to live around anyone at all.”
“Even me,” Lily said. She laughed. Karen didn’t.
“My boyfriend said too much solitude is what drove Rudy crazy,” I said.
“Do you think Rudy’s crazy?” asked Karen.
I thought about how to answer. “I trust him with my life every single day that I work with him,” I said.
“That counts for a lot,” Karen said. “Maybe for everything.” She spat a wad of sticky saliva into the water, watched the current carry it away. Lily leaned back onto her elbows. Stretch marks traveled from her pubic hair to her belly button, pressed inside out.
“How long have you known Rudy?” I asked.
“Karen went to high school with him,” Lily said.
“Not really,” Karen said. “Neither one of us ever went to class.”
“How can you be friends with him?” I asked.
“We’re not friends with him,” Karen said.
“Well, we sort of are,” Lily said.
“We’re associates,” Karen said.
“I don’t think he has anyone else,” Lily said. “Except maybe for you.”
There was silence, and I thought, What am I doing? What am I doing inviting these two women down to the creek? Setting up insurance? Is it appropriate to spend time with people so that later you can call them from jail? So that they will miss you if you lie out on the coal company land too long? If Rudy was isolated and weird, so was I. To map it out: Karen and Lily sat side by side in their small square cabin, waiting for no one but their unborn child. A few ridges away from them, my camouflage camper was as far away as a comet, spectacularly wrecking itself in outer space.
They must have known it. They must have known it much better than I did. Why else would they have come to help me with the ducks? But if that’s what Karen and Lily thought of me, they did not see a need to say it out loud, and maybe it was then that I began to love them.
“We know about the names Rudy calls us,” Karen said. “We know about his bad attitude, but we have a certain relationship with him.”
“It’s because of that day with the ash tree,” Lily said. “That changes things between people.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said.
“The ash tree,” Lily said. “Oh Jesus, Shane really didn’t tell you why he was leaving?”
“Lily, stop it,” Karen said. “Don’t gossip.”
“What? You think I should just keep quiet? Is that it?” said Lily, going red.
“You’re emotional because you’re pregnant,” Karen said, stone-faced.
“Oh good,” Lily said. “The diagnosis of a medical professional!” She sat up and plunged both feet in the water, splashing Karen and me. Her voice rose to a shriek. “Fuck! What’s this tumor growing out of my stomach? Why is it kicking? It’s alive!” Her chin crumpled and her lips were wet. She turned to me. “Why do I put up with this?”
“It’s not gossip,” I said. “Or it is gossip. Tell me.”
Lily began to cry, gulping in air. On the far bank the honeybees took slow laps around the yarrow. Everything was doing what was built into it, and would keep on until it died. Karen started talking.
“Rudy and Shane showed up at the Land Trust one morning,” she said. “Me and Lily were at our place. I was whittling. Lily was weeding. It was a workday. We heard the chain saw going back there at first, but then we heard shouting, a lull, then buzzing. A low whine, something shrill, I can’t say what it was. But I stopped whittling. And then Shane came