“Yo, homes!” he said, walking over to me. His long black hair hung down over his skinny frame and his denim jacket, which had so many rips and tears that I doubted it gave any protection against the chill. His shoes were old skateboarding slip-on sneakers, with a black-and-white checkered canvas top. However, there was a hole in the left one, his big toe protruding through the gap.
“Hey Tommy.”
“Got some forties if you wanna go out back.” He smelled like he’d already downed a forty, maybe even an eighty.
“No, I’m good.” I grabbed an old plastic chair and sat down. I felt in my pockets for my cigarettes by habit. Tommy didn’t smoke, so there was no point in hitting him up.
“I tell you about this book I read? For Indigenous Eyes Only? Shit been blowing my mind. Turns out we all been colonized like a motherfucker. Before the white people came, we didn’t have no laws, yeah? Didn’t need ’em. Didn’t need no jobs either, because we hunted our own food! Am I right?”
“Dude, you haven’t had a job in years,” I said, scanning the crowd for someone who might let me bum a smoke.
“That’s not the point! Jobs are for suckers. I’m saying we don’t see the world the same way as the, uh, colonizers. They’re all about getting stuff, buying stuff. What happens when a white kid has a birthday party?” He looked at me, eyebrows raised.
“They eat cake?”
“No, dude! They get presents! Shitloads of presents!”
“We give our kids birthday presents.”
“Because we’re colonized. Exactly what I’m saying. What do Natives do at a naming ceremony?”
“Give the kid a Lakota name?”
“Yeah, but that’s not what I mean. The giveaway! The giveaway, man, before the spirit name is announced. That’s what I’m talking about. Indian kids give away presents to everyone there, they don’t get stuff for themselves. That’s the Native way.”
“Not every Indian gets a spirit name,” I said. “I never got one.”
“Well, it’s time! Time for you to walk that red road. You should come with me to the next AIM meeting, meet some peeps.”
“I’ll think about it.” I saw that people were starting to leave the gym.
“Or maybe you should come with me to the Sun Dance this summer. Get right with yourself. You down with that? Hoka!”
“You know how I feel about that bullshit. Dancing around a tree ain’t gonna do me no good.”
Tommy looked at me with a rueful expression. “Homeboy, someday you’re gonna hear the Creator. For real.”
I’d had enough of this. Time to take off, dig up some change and buy a pack of cigs. “Nathan said you had something to tell me. What’s up?”
“Yeah, so I ran into Ben Short Bear the other day. He wants to talk to you, right away. Says he been looking for you.”
“What does he want?”
“Don’t know. Said it’s important—sounds like he might have a job for you or something.”
Strange. Ben Short Bear was a tribal councilman and usually kept as far away from me as possible. Not to mention, the last time I’d spoken to him was when he kicked me out of his office, right after his daughter Marie broke up with me. She’d said that I was an asshole and she deserved better.
I didn’t disagree.
AS I LEFT THE COMMUNITY CENTER, I saw a man helping a little boy with his shirt, and my father’s face flashed into my head. My memories of him had faded over time, but certain things always brought him back. I remembered him teaching me how to tie my shoes when I was very small. How to throw a baseball, how to use a hammer and screwdriver, how to read a map. I remembered how I’d felt safe at night, knowing he was sleeping near me.
I remembered the bad year too. Nobody told me at the time he had cancer, but I knew he was sick. Later I learned he had pancreatic cancer. I guess that’s the worst kind, the kind that can spread in just a few months. He lost a lot of weight rapidly, so much that he didn’t even look like the same person. I remembered him throwing up a lot, and because I didn’t know how serious it was, I wondered if he’d been drinking. When I was older, my mom told me that the local doctors were so bad, they didn’t diagnose his illness until it was too late. Years later I looked up pancreatic cancer on the internet, and it sounded like there wasn’t much that could have been done. But my mother always held a grudge against the doctors.
In his last few months, he was too tired to get out of bed and in terrible pain. Pain so bad, it was hard to be around him. I felt weak and worthless because there wasn’t anything I could do to help. I was scared too, scared to think about the possibility of him dying, and scared to talk about it with anyone.
Finally I gathered up my courage and asked the medicine man what I could do to help my father. The holy man was respected by our people, and I knew he’d have the answer. He told me I should go into the woods and pray. He said I should spend a full day and night up there, but I could stay longer if I needed to. He told me I shouldn’t eat or drink anything while I was praying. He said an animal might come and send me a message, maybe one of healing, and if I got a message, then I could end my prayers early and come home. He told me I should try not to sleep, but to listen to the birds and the animals and to keep praying.
I felt like a hero even though I hadn’t started the prayers yet. I imagined what my mom and sister would say when I got home from the prayers and they realized I’d saved him. I ran back home to start preparing for my vigil. I was pretty scared about going out there alone, but it would be worth it when I got back. I told my mom I’d be camping with my best friend. She was so distraught and worried about my dad’s condition that she didn’t ask about my plans.
I can’t remember much about the first day. What I remember is being massively bored, even though I tried to focus on my prayers. It was hard to be alone with no one to talk to, no TV to watch, no music to listen to. The hunger and thirst were overwhelming, and it was tough to concentrate on anything but my stomach. I daydreamed about hamburgers, french fries, frybread, ice cream. I tried to stay awake but fell asleep at some point and woke up at dawn the next day. I spent most of the second day curled up into a ball, holding my stomach and trying not to cry.
By the third day, I no longer thought about food. I prayed and wondered about my father, what I could do to heal him. In the evening, I slipped into some sort of dreamlike state, even though I was awake. I fell asleep at some point, and my dreams were really strange. I dreamed that a deer came by my camp, but the animal had two faces. I was so scared, I turned away from the creature. Later I dreamed that a white hawk flew in from the north and started speaking to me about my father and his life. It seemed like the bird was telling me I shouldn’t worry, that I should go home.
When I woke up from the dream, I decided I’d been gone long enough, and I went back. I knew I should visit the medicine man as soon as I could—after eating some food—and ask him about my dreams. He’d be able to tell me what they meant and how I could save my dad. But when I got back to my house, I could tell something was wrong. There were strange cars parked in our yard, and our dogs were missing. When I walked inside, my mom told me that my dad had passed away while I was gone. She hugged me and told me it was okay. But it wasn’t. I’d been away when he died and hadn’t even had a chance to say goodbye.
I stared at my hands while I fought back tears. I tried to say something to my mother, but no words would come. I’d thought that I’d be able to invoke the spirits to save my father, but all I’d done was miss a chance to comfort him when he made his journey.
I knew then that the Native traditions—the ceremonies, prayers, teachings—were horseshit. I believed I’d be the savior of the family, but all I’d done was make a fool of myself. I vowed that I’d never be tricked again by these empty rituals. From that moment forward, I’d rely upon myself only.
My sister handed me some burning sage, a sad look on her face. I took it and stomped on it. Long after the flame had gone out, I pounded that sage with my
feet. My mother watched as I pulverized it. I kept at it until the plant vanished, only a green stain on the floor and a bittersweet aroma hanging in the air.
3
The next day, I watched a college basketball game on the TV above the bar while I waited for Ben Short Bear. I’d heard he was planning to run for tribal president, which didn’t surprise me. Ben was ambitious, which explained why he’d never liked me when I was dating his daughter. Although he’d never said anything, I knew he wanted Marie to end up with some doctor or lawyer, or at least somebody with a real job.
“Hello, Virgil.”
I drained the last of my Coke and turned around. He looked like he’d just come from a council meeting, wearing a dark-brown blazer and a silver bolo tie in the shape of an eagle. I saw he’d grown a little mustache the color of a dog’s asshole.
“Councilman.”
He frowned and sat down next to me. “Ben. No need to be formal here.” He signaled for a beer and placed a twenty down on the bar. “Thanks for meeting me.”
“Tommy said you had a job.”
He scowled and took a drink of his beer. “You hear about that high school kid who died a few weeks ago, Paul Ghost Horse?”
“Yeah, I think so.”
“Well, the story going around is that he was another suicide. Sad, right? But that’s not it. I happen to know he overdosed. On heroin.”
He raised his eyebrows, waiting for me to say something.
“Okay. So what does this have to do with a job for me?” I slid an ice cube from the soda glass into my mouth.
“You know Rick Crow?”
I knew him. He was a real piece of shit—a mean drunk, a thief, and a liar. He always had some hustle working. Not to mention he’d been the leader of the kids who had tormented me when I was in school. He’d been the king of the bullies, the one who always went after the weaker kids. I’d been the weakest one back then. But not anymore.
“I need you to find him and set him straight. Bastard is the one bringing that crap around here. Strong stuff from Mexico.”
“Are you sure?” I said. “Haven’t heard anything about that. Weed, yeah. But not heroin.”
Something didn’t make sense. Rick Crow was a booze bootlegger, not a smack dealer. He’d buy cases of Bud Light down in Nebraska and then sell them by the bottle to the local drunks. Every so often, he’d drive down to Denver and pick up some pot, then unload that. But he never fooled around with anything stronger, as far as I knew.
“It’s just starting up,” Ben said. “That’s why we need to shut this down right away.”
“Why don’t you go to tribal police?”
“You know why. Even if they catch him, tribal court can’t hand out any sentence over a year. No point.”
This was true. “Why not go to the feds?”
He sneered. “They won’t take any case short of murder. Besides, there’s no hard evidence linking him to the drugs.”
“Then how do you know he’s bringing it in?”
“I’ve got my sources.” He finished his beer and waved his arm for another.
“Even if this is true,” I said, “why do you care? Plenty of other drugs floating around here if you want to start some sort of crackdown. You can buy weed on every corner.”
He frowned. “You know, some of us give a damn about this place. And that dead kid. Big difference between pot and heroin. Not to mention, my constituents won’t be happy if hard drugs keep spreading here.”
The upcoming tribal election. Now I understood why Ben wanted to clean out the smack dealers. But I still didn’t get one thing.
“If you want credit for getting rid of those guys, why hire me? If I make him stop, no one knows you were responsible.”
Ben signaled again for a drink, without success. “I just want that stuff gone, don’t care who does it.” Then he held up his hand and snapped his fingers. “I’ll be honest. More kids start overdosing, I’m out of a job. But the main thing is keeping our people safe.”
The bartender was nowhere to be seen, so Ben reached across the bar down into the well, lifted a couple of beer bottles, and set one in front of me. It was some fancy brew, St. Pauli Girl, the type of beer that cost six bucks a pop. I left it unopened.
“I don’t drink anymore.”
He ignored me. “There’s five thousand dollars in it for you if you can find him and get him to stop smuggling that shit here,” he said. “Do what you have to do. Any means necessary.”
Five grand. More money than I made in a year.
“I hear he’s down in Denver now, that’s where he gets it,” he said. “Don’t know exactly where in Denver, that’s your deal. I’ll advance you a thousand for expenses if you leave right away.”
I studied the St. Pauli Girl label. There was a drawing of some blond wasicu girl holding six foaming beer steins. She was smiling, but there was something cruel in her eyes. She reminded me of the teachers that used to smack the hell out of me when I was little because I didn’t act right.
“No thanks,” I said. “Not my type of job.”
Ben looked like a dog that’s heard a strange noise. He even turned his head a little to the side like some damn poodle.
“What, you want more money? That what this is about?”
“It’s not the money. This has a bad smell.”
“That asshole is selling heroin here, killed a kid. Don’t you want to shut that down?”
“Not my problem.”
“Same old Virgil,” he said. “Doesn’t give a shit about anyone but himself. You change your mind, let me know. But it’s got to be soon.”
I gave the St. Pauli Girl a final glare and walked off.
HEROIN. IT STILL DIDN’T make sense to me. I’d thrashed around in bed all night thinking about it, but I still couldn’t figure out the deal. There were plenty of pills around the rez, strong opioids that popped up years ago, no shortage of those. Weed was always easy to get, and there was meth available too, but usually just bathtub crank, small quantities. The local cooks would get some smurfs to buy boxes of Sudafed at all the drugstores in a hundred-mile radius, then pay them off in product.
But I hadn’t heard anything about smack. And Rick Crow was a low-level hustler—he wasn’t the type to mess around with serious narcotics. He was too lazy to get any big deals together. Still, I’d heard he spent a lot of time in Denver, so I supposed it was possible. Maybe Ben’s information about Rick was accurate, but it seemed doubtful. How would Ben know anything about heroin? He moved in a different world than the hustlers and scammers around here.
I needed to find out more, and then I could decide whether I should take the job—if the offer was still on the table. Yesterday, something had seemed off to me about Ben’s proposal. My gut said to decline this deal, but it had been wrong before. And I couldn’t deny that five thousand dollars was tempting. Normally I pocketed only a few hundred from a job. I decided to take a look inside Rick’s trailer, see what was in there. Get more information, find out what he was really doing.
I took my bike straight out on the highway, focused only on the road and my machine. I took a left, then another, going past the Little White River near Crow Dog’s camp. The vast sky opened in front of me as I traveled through the rolling grasslands and small canyons, the grace of the land lifting my spirits. Then I circled into town, back among the people, and I passed by the little houses, usually no more than six hundred square feet inside, but crawling with families and children. Some of the homes were in disarray, trash and old cars strewn across the yards. Others were neatly maintained, with little plots of grass and small lawn decorations. A few were boarded up, condemned because some asshole had cooked meth inside. I saw little kids playing in the streets, their parents sitting on plastic chairs keeping a watchful eye, teenagers striding in groups, a handful of elders slowly walking on the side of the road.
I rode past the big tipi-shaped building of the tribal college, then down Main Street with its small collection of businesse
s: the dollar store, the pawnshop, the off-sale liquor stand. The little motel where they used to sell Indian tacos. All the churches established by missionaries long ago to convert the heathens. The car repair shop where my uncle had spent most of his life before dying of diabetes. The snack shop where my mother had eaten her last meal.
I pulled up by Rick’s trailer, the gravel crunching under my tires. Ben had said Rick was in Denver, but I’d be careful anyway. No telling who might be poking around out there. As I walked over, I tried to slow my breathing, which sounded too loud in my head.
The trailer looked abandoned. There were no cars around, but that didn’t mean it was empty. It was one of the corrugated metal types of trailer homes, with ridged gray sides like an old battleship. The front door was closed. Faded beige curtains covered the tiny windows so I couldn’t make out what was inside.
I wasn’t sure, but I thought I heard some rattling coming from within. I took my handgun out—a Glock 19 with a standard magazine—and crouched behind a bush. If anyone came out, I’d have a clear shot if they tried to mess with me. Who could be in there? Maybe kids looking for drugs?
Another noise from inside. I wished I’d left my bike down the road and out of sight, but it was too late for that now. The seconds ticked by slowly as I waited for someone to come out. Then a sound like something falling came from inside the trailer.
Winter Counts Page 2