I knew the sound vibrating from your throat would pour like sand down mine. I knew my stomach would squeeze hunger when you closed the curtains on the day. I knew the walls would shriek when I saw you staring into your palm. I knew Henry would never fix it. The TV was on, and Barney was singing.

The moan was back, and you stared deep into it. It was pressed in the middle of your palm, a red dot punched into skin by the tip of the knife you use to carve turkey on Christmas day. You were master of the blade and you stopped before the weight of it gave more than required. You needed one drop, one circle. Your skin split perfectly. It always did. One scarlet pearl. I watched you watch it. Your black eyes fixated and unflinching, an eerie sight to the unaccustomed but, it was the sound your stomach made that would crawl into the skin. I heard it gnaw on your bones. I watched you gag on your soul. It moaned. I had heard this sound often but not consistently.

Sweat pilled under my armpits and I pulled Henry tight as I lay on the sofa under my Batman blanket. I close my eyes on the sound sitting at the kitchen table. Every fiber holding my blood in, is taut, and I can hear my heartbeat in my ears. I forget to breathe. I’m an antenna, a radio wave, I’m dialed in waiting for the static to clear.

The air is heavy and the dunes boom.

Grandmother says there are stories in our bones, and that our skin is red because that was the color of the sand we grew out of. Mountains are our beginning, coyotes laugh and the stars are our ancestors. She says Indian boys are sons of thunder. She named you Asiniy Wache Iskwewis,  Mountain Woman. You name me Isaiah and you called me your Thunder Being. You are an eagle and I am your bolt.

You knew in the womb I had good bones because I made my presence known.

Grandmother says Salish art requires perfect circles. Grandfather practiced chiseling circles in cedar in the basement. Grandmother used coffee cans to paint perfect circles on canvas. You said when you closed your eyes you dreamed about spinning wheels. You said it is an unstoppable force that will ruin you. Grandmother said you have spent your life crawling out of a circle. I sat with my crayons, and I drew circles in black and purple and green. I drew them small and tall. They were not perfect enough.

I heard you moan.

I closed my eyes.

My stomach grew heavy, it always did when I swallowed the sand.

I left my spot on the couch. I left Henry staring at the TV with eyes as black as yours. His long ears wilted. His grey fur snarled in love. He watched nothing silently.

I remember the day you gave him to me. The Christmas you missed. The Christmas I ate ham instead of turkey and adult voices whispered adult things while I colored course paper with red crayons and searched for you at night. You visited my dreams. You were falling, I screamed until the clouds caught you.

They said you were getting help. You came for me when they turned off the Christmas Lights. I gave you pictures I colored. They gave you little pink pills. You gave me Henry. You kept saying sorry, I never knew why.

 Henry stared at Barney. You stared into your palm. Neither of you blinked.

I went to you and hugged you the way I hugged Henry, long and hard and with all my might. I want to squeeze that sound out of you so we can go play in the park. Dark never played. Dark was alone. Dark ate cardboard corn flakes from a cardboard box. Dark swallowed water to fill the hunger the cornflakes left.

You didn’t see me.

You didn’t feel me.

You were too busy breathing.

It came out in puffs. It smelled like cotton candy and I wondered how something so bad smelled so good and I wanted to crawl up closer too you but your eyes screamed at me to stay away. I shivered. It was summer. It was hot. And the drapes were closed because the light scratched your skin and the sound of the birds burned your ears.

I whispered your name.

Sometimes that worked.

If I was quiet. If I touched you very softly sometimes you would stop moaning and move your black eyes from your palm to my face.

My fingertips touched your lips.

Tears squeezed out of the corner of your eyes and the sand in my belly grew. I go back to the sofa and grab Henry and press him to your chest. You respond.

I see the corner of your mouth move from nothing to something. Your right hand holds Henry. Your fingers rub one ear. My fingers rub the other.

Behind us Barney sings of how much we love each other. I want to watch him dance. Yesterday you danced with me. You twirled me in your skirts and the colors danced me in your hair. Bangles in gold married your wrists and chimed, and your green feather earrings brushed my skin. You painted your lips red and your nails pink. You giggled out your cotton candy and tickled me till I needed to pee. The birds laughed at us from the tree outside. We watched them dart under rays of sunshine and we ate apple pie fresh from the oven. You put ice cream on mine. I ate until I couldn’t eat any more and then You and me and Henry laid on the sofa, you were humming my eyelids closed and running your fingertips through my hair.

I fell asleep full. I dream I am coloring clouds in a red circle.

Your moan wakes me, and I wonder what I have done…