The Alaskan Laundry by Brendan Jones

the ladder the room opened around a bed. Books, mugs with dried tea bags at the bottom, envelopes torn open, were scattered on a slab of plywood to one side. Tara recognized the pine ceiling from looking through the rusted portholes. A hammock swung gently on the other side of the exhaust stack, which was connected to a smaller wood stove.
    â€œAnd here—the
pièce de résistance.
” Laney opened the door onto the wheelhouse, a half-circle of sash windows high over the water. The boat’s shiny wooden wheel was almost as tall as she was. Worn leather straps allowed the far windows on either side to slide up and down.
    â€œThe catbird seat up here,” Laney said. “Whaddya think?”
    It was magnificent, sitting on the water so far above the other boats. “I love it,” Tara said.
    Laney smiled. “Yeah. I knew you would.”

21
    â€œ IDES OF MARCH ,” Fritz murmured, spitting chew juice into a mug, filling in the crossword folded out on his stomach. “Ain’t that funny. Wonder if they did that on purpose.”
    Channel 16 on the VHF chattered in the background. Fritz was waiting for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game to put the seine fleet on two-hour notice. Tara made entries into the logbook, measuring the average size of the fry, the water temperature of the tanks. Fritz had forbidden anyone else to make reports, with her cursive so neat and precise.
    â€œSo I was out picking my pots the other day,” he said, “and who should come on over in his skiff to pay a visit but your pal Betteryear.”
    â€œWho?”
    â€œTall old Native dude.”
    She hadn’t seen the man since that time in the coffee shop. Months ago. She had been avoiding the library, steering clear of the payphones.
    â€œOh yeah?”
    Fritz leaned back in his chair and spit a stream of tobacco. “Yeah.”
    She finished transferring information from her notebook to the log and stretched her arms above her head, making a squeaking sound that caused Fritz to grin. She set neoprene waders out on the workbench to patch them. Fritz adjusted the waist of his oilskin pants.
    â€œYou ever hear the story about that old guy?”
    She focused on her work, squeezing silicone onto the tip of a Popsicle stick, thinking about her money saved—just over twelve hundred dollars. “I haven’t.”
    â€œJuly, maybe ten years ago. Guess he was steelhead fishing up north. It got hot in the sun, so he stripped down to his long underwear, no shirt, when all of a sudden a bear comes charging out of the brush. He had his thirty-aught on the gravel bar beside him, Winchester seventy, holds five zingers. Took him four to knock down that bruin, which skidded to a stop ten feet from where he stood.” Fritz spat. “And then, not two seconds later, from farther upstream comes a smaller one sprinting like all bananas through the shallows. Old man had one shot left, so he took his time, hit the bear dead in the brainpan. Ended up under the thing as it bled out. Finished putting on his pants, stropped his knife, and spent the next two days skinning and boning.”
    â€œNo shit.”
    He nodded slowly, tapping the end of his pen against the newspaper. “You know all that stuff Fran said at Thanksgiving, about the Tlingits getting a raw deal—don’t get Betteryear started. Man’s got a temper.”
    She thought about him in the coffee shop. “He seems pretty chilled out.”
    â€œTrust me, he’s not.”
    After a couple more minutes of listening to the VHF, Fritz heaved himself to standing, adjusted his suspender straps, and took his coat from the hook. “Gonna go change out bait on the traps.”
    â€œRoger.”
    Alone, she sat on the stool, listening to the thrum of water from the tote room and the back-and-forth on the radio. The smell of silicone was making her woozy.
    Her thoughts returned to standing with Laney in the