CALLING THROUGH THE HOLLOW by Mollie J. Ficek A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing Boise State University May 2012 © 2012 Mollie J Ficek ALL RIGHTS RESERVED BOISE STATE UNIVERSITY GRADUATE COLLEGE DEFENSE COMMITTEE AND FINAL READING APPROVALS of the thesis submitted by Mollie J. Ficek Thesis Title: Calling Through The Hollow Date of Final Oral Examination: 07 March 2012 The following individuals read and discussed the thesis submitted by student Mollie J Ficek, and they evaluated her presentation and response to questions during the final oral examination. They found that the student passed the final oral examination. Braden Udall, MFA Chair, Supervisory Committee Anthony Doerr, MFA Member, Supervisory Committee Clay Morgan, MFA Member, Supervisory Committee The final reading approval of the thesis was granted by Braden Udall, Chair of the Supervisory Committee. The thesis was approved for the Graduate College by John R. Pelton, Ph.D., Dean of the Graduate College. DEDICATION This work is dedicated to my grandparents: Tom and Audrie, Mary and Pete. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My supreme thanks: To Mitch Wieland, for the phone call that took me from a different world, and brought me into this one. To Brady Udall, for helping me understand what a short story is. To Tony Doerr, for his righteous line edits, and unfailing grace. For his enthusiasm, and teaching, which has made me a better writer/reader/thinker/human, than I was before. To Clay Morgan, for reading my work, and serving on my committee. To my family. For grounding me. For believing in me. To my mother, for every single thing. There would be no this without her. To my father. For the prayers, and the pride in me and my work. To Grace and Ben. For friendship. For patience. And lastly, to my classmates, who kept me together, and kept me going on this long journey. To Dylan, for the dreamspace, and the push to submit my work. To Beth and Torii, for Starbucks and Grey’s Night, and for drawing me out when I was too far in. And to Michael, for his love, and his book collection. For so much more than that. v ABSTRACT These stories are bound by place. Each was born of a connection to the upper- Midwest prairie, to North Dakota and Minnesota, to the places I’ve called home. This collection explores the complicated natures of that home: of human connection navigated across a long horizon line, of cold-weather people, of loneliness in open spaces, of hope, and hotdish, and sometimes healing, too. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS DEDICATION ......................................................................................................................... iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ...................................................................................................... v ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................................. vi BLUE RIBBON ........................................................................................................................ 1 MACDO .................................................................................................................................. 11 SACROMONTE ..................................................................................................................... 31 CALLING THROUGH THE HOLLOW ............................................................................... 52 THE REASONS WHY ........................................................................................................... 73 INTERSTATE ........................................................................................................................ 97 THE DOWN ......................................................................................................................... 110 THE HARVEST QUEEN ..................................................................................................... 129 vii 1 BLUE RIBBON Cecelia stole it. It was my Sour-Cream Raspberry Ripple Cake recipe and she walked away with the win. I normally wouldn’t make such a fuss. I’m not one to complain or point fingers. But in this case, I can’t keep quiet. I just can’t shut my big mouth. That blue ribbon means my winning recipe is going to the Minnesota State Fair, and going without me. That ribbon, and all that came with it, should have been mine and mine alone. Let me tell you a thing or two about Cecelia Bentz. She was my best friend for twenty-two years so I think I can speak freely. Cecelia Bentz is no baker. She can cook a very nice Thanksgiving dinner—turkey, potatoes, the whole nine yards. Sure, she can cook, but she cannot bake. Cecelia uses all-purpose flour for almost everything and pre- made mixes for everything else. Once I began to bake, I asked her kindly to make the sides. Leave the desserts to me, dear. And up until one week ago, she did. What makes her deceit so hard to swallow is that Cecelia was my only rock in the whole world when Roger died this winter. She was at our home when his heart gave out, and lucky, too, because I was away for a few hours, bargain shopping at the outlet mall. Later in the hospital, when his heart beat fast, trying to recover, she stayed right by my side, right by his bed, the whole time. She took the rotating shift at night to let me sleep. When I needed black coffee from the cafeteria or a hot shower at home, she stayed with Roger until I returned, never leaving him alone, not for one minute. A true, kind friend. 2 “He likes it when you hold his hand,” she said and took his left, smoothing the frail skin with her fingers. “He does,” I said. On my side of the bed, an IV pierced the top of his hand. I rubbed his forearm, slowly smoothing the black hair. When it was time, when my Roger passed out of this world and his soul took up communion with the angels in heaven, she sobbed and I sobbed and we held onto each other there in the hospital room. Cecelia’s the only reason I got through all of that. I’m still getting through. This whole horrible ordeal with the recipe happened a week ago at the Cyrus County Fair. The fair has been a constant in this part of the state for over one-hundred and twenty-two years. I am proud to say that I have attended thirty-seven of those years and my Roger, thirty-six. Roger was a man of many passions. In the beginning, he was interested in classic cars. He spent hours with them, long admiring the velvet seats and long lines of buffed pick-ups and shiny convertibles. I’d often find him under the hood, studying the parts that made them hum. If it wasn’t there, I’d catch him in line, waiting on some kind of sugar. He had an insatiable sweet tooth. I liked the corndogs, myself. But not Roger. He ate funnel cakes and elephant ears and any color of snow cone. He ate roasted almonds and honeyed fruit and miles and miles of pink cotton candy. A few years after the car shows, Roger took up the banjo and put together a small band. They played on the bandstand, which in those days was more like a houseless porch than a stage. They played for four nights in a row, and it was crowded each and 3 every night. Another year he decided to buy an old junker. He tore the doors off, gave it a spray with cheap green paint, and entered himself into the demolition derby. I was less than pleased, saying Hail Mary’s in the stands while I balanced two babies on my knees, trying to soothe them during the crashes and the cheering. He didn’t win but he didn’t hurt himself either, thank the Lord. When the kids were older, we took them to the Midway. They twirled in fat strawberries until they were almost sick, then ran over the dragon trains for a quick bounce up and down along the track. The two were terrified by the ghosts of the haunted houses, walking through them over and over again. The Midway isn’t what it used to be, I’m disappointed to say. After I accepted my red ribbon this year (or I should say, after I was denied the blue), I found myself wandering around the fair in a sort of daze, seeing everything differently. The rides looked worn, used. They had chipped paint and stiff gear shifts. They were all plugged in, with enormous hose-like extension cords, into small electrical boxes throughout the fairgrounds that sat in puddles of mud. I walked home through the cemetery and stopped to visit Roger’s grave. It was the brightest one in the whole yard, newly planted. There was a small splay of red flowers on the stone. Roger was loved by everyone, but no one as much as me. I left a snow-cone there that matched the flowers. His favorite flavor—cherry red. I walked away before I could see it melt. I loved the fair but never cared much for rides, so when Roger and the kids were off spending our summer allowance zipping and zapping around the place, I would sit on a straw bale outside the Midway or on an empty bench under the bingo tent, and watch people. That was always my favorite thing. You learn so much about people just by 4 watching them. An otherwise miserly old man will give his granddaughter ten dollars just for a funnel cake and fries. A frazzled mother will finally find peace as her children wait in line after line after line. A young couple will take each other’s hand, but not before looking around to make sure no one else is watching. I could sit and watch for hours. And for many summers, I did just that. This was all long before I had any inclination that the kitchen could be an enjoyable place, and not just one for mashing potatoes and washing dishes. I guess you could call me a late bloomer with baking. I remember the first time I tried to bake a pie, when Roger’s mother came to visit after our Donna was born. It was a disaster. A right disaster. Imagine this: mother-in-law and bawling new baby rushing into the street while the whole kitchen is thick with black smoke.