Summary

Terese's hands shake when she remembers her father, who is now dead. He intrudes on Terese's life, causing her to be unable "to fathom being a good person when [she comes] from such misery" (85). Her father was an alcoholic artist and Terese found newspaper clippings about him in which he was said to have abducted a girl. He was homeless and living in transitional housing when he was beaten to death. Terese wonders how to write about him as an Indian woman and what her responsibilities are in that regard. She resists calling him a monster because she feels that will make her part monster as well, as his daughter. Thinking about her mother as well, she writes about her issues with "making Indian women inhuman" because "we've become too symbolic and never real enough" (87).

Mailhot remembers her parents' back and...