Whisper to the Blood by Dana Stabenow

for crying out loud."
    Next to her
Harvey
chuckled, a little louder than was perhaps strictly necessary. "The rest
of us already have, Kate."
    "So what?" Kate said again. "The agenda says read them, we
read them."
    "You see, Kate,"
Harvey
said, enjoying himself hugely, "Annie sends out the draft minutes of the
last meeting to all the board members. Board members read them in advance, so
we don't have to waste our time reading them during the meeting. Then we
approve them."
    "Oh."
    Auntie Joy said anxiously, "But we read now. Is okay. Okay?" She
looked around the table.
    Joyce Shugak, eighty-something, was a subsistence fisher, retiring each
summer to a fish camp on Amartuq Creek, upstream from Alaganik Bay where all
the commercial fishers in the Park got their nets wet. She had been married
once, long ago, and the great tragedy of her life was that she had had no
children. The result of this child-hunger led her to adopt every soul in the
Park from one to a hundred as her very own. She was a plump, cheerful person,
easy to please, ready to praise, and if not quite capable of being blind to
faults in others, at least nurtured a determined nearsightedness that worked
just as well.
    Like the other aunties, she spoke a truncated, rhythmic form of English that
came from speaking it as a second language, as all the aunties grew up speaking
Aluutiq, Eyak, and Athabascan. Kate suspected that they could all of them have
spoken flawless English if they had chosen to do so, but by now it was a matter
of pride to speak in their self-invented patois. It branded them as Alaska
Natives, born and bred and living the life. They were proud of it, and they
didn't mind reminding people of that fact every time they opened their mouths,
which obviated the necessity of their having to actually say so.
    Old Sam shrugged. "Sure," Demetri said.
Harvey
heaved a sigh and said wearily,
"Sure, why not? I've only got six other things that need doing
today."
    "Yeah," said Old Sam with his patented nasty grin, "but this
one you get paid for."
    Kate looked at him. "We get paid?"
    There was a moment of silence. Annie Mike cleared her throat. "If the
board please," she murmured to her laptop, "the secretary will now
read the minutes of the last meeting, dated April fifteenth."
    "April?" Kate said, still reeling from the information that she
would draw a paycheck for this. How much? Did they get paid per meeting or was
it all in one check at the end of the year? Or maybe the beginning of the year?
She wondered if it would be enough to cover the cost of a new four-wheeler. She
could use a new-
    "Wait a minute," she said.
    Annie paused. "Yes, Kate?"
    "April? I thought the last meeting was in July."
    Harvey
rolled his eyes. "It was cancelled, Kate. You and Old Sam were fishing.
Demetri was upriver running his lodge, and the aunties were downriver at fish
camp. We didn't have a quorum."
    Kate was pretty sure she knew what the word
quorum
meant from the
context but she resolved to look it up in her tattered copy of
Webster's
Unabridged
at the earliest opportunity, just to be sure.
"Sorry," she said shortly. "I forgot."
    Annie finished reading the minutes. There was silence. "Oh," Kate
said. "Am I supposed to say something?"
    "Ask if there are any corrections,"
Harvey
said briskly. He even smiled at Kate.
    Enjoy yourself while it lasts, asshole, Kate thought. Out loud she said,
"Are there any corrections to the minutes?" There weren't, the
minutes were approved, and it was with distinct relief that Kate said,
"Reports?"
    Annie gave the treasurer's report. NNA sounded fiscally healthy to Kate, but
then she wasn't the best person ever with numbers, so she resolved to ask
Auntie Joy privately.
    "Unfinished business?" Kate said.
    "I move we table all unfinished business for the moment,"
Harvey
said.
    "Second," Demetri said.
    "Huh?" Kate said.
    Auntie Joy leaned across the table and said, "Motion moved and
seconded. In favor say aye. Opposed, say nay."
    "Oh. Okay. All in