The Lesser Blessed

by Richard Van Camp

  “A Medicine Woman in the community noticed the mother was acting strange, so she went to her and asked her straight out what had happened. The woman told her. She said, I see my boy in fire. I see him and he’s not dead. He wants to die but he’s not dead. He’s suffering, my boy, and it’s my fault.’

  “The Medicine Woman said, ‘Does your boy have any clothes that he loved?’

  “The mother said, ‘Yes, yes! My boy was in cadets last year and he loved his uniform. He was always washing it. Even his boots were always polished.

  “‘Do you still have it?’ the Medicine Woman asked.

  “The mother nodded.

  “The Medicine Woman asked, ‘Why haven’t you gotten rid of it?’

  “The mother replied, ‘It’s his. It reminds me of him. It smells like him.’

  “The Medicine Woman told her, ‘Burn it. You must burn it. You go out someplace and you make a fire. By yourself. You make a fire and you call him. He’ll come. You make a fire and you take whatever he says and you say you’re sorry. You say you’re sorry to your boy and you tell him to sleep, to rest, to die. You call him and he’ll come.’

  “So the woman did. She made a fire and her boy came. He was like always: wet, freezing. And he was pointing at her, going, ‘You ... you ... you ...’ And she took it. She took it and she cried and she wailed, ‘My boy, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.’ And she offered the clothes to the fire and she burned them. She burned the boots, the uniform, a toque, mitts and long Johns. And she told her boy to sleep, to rest, to die, and he did. She never saw him again.”

  I was quiet, and my blood was pounding in my cars. Juliet was quiet too.

  “Larry,” she whispered, “that was beautiful.”

  “No,” I said, “that’s the truth.”

  “Oh!” she whispered. “Johnny’s buzzing the apartment. I have to go. But thanks for the story, Larry. I’ll miss you.”

  And with that, she hung up.

  Jed

  I walked down to where Mister Ferguson kept his sled dogs and shit, wouldn’t you know it? The snow had covered completely the two hearts I had made the month before! Who knew what had occurred on or within them? And what was the deal with Juiet’s “I’ll miss you” ? I had the last of the dry fish with me and finished it off, running the smoked flesh of white fish over my teeth like cardboard.

  “Mmmmm,” I said as I chewed.

  The huskies weren’t there yet as Mister Ferguson kept his dogs in Fort Chip during the summer and fall. The abandoned doghouses sat on both sides of an old Ski-Doo trail in the bush behind my house. When I first moved to Fort Simmer, just after my mom met Jed, he and I would come out here and hunt ptarmigan. It was getting too cold for a jean jacket and a sweater, which is what I had on. Man, my feet were cold in my runners.

  Johnny’s coat had survived the torch job, but I liked to tease him about it. We both agreed Kevin Garner was prick of the year. I was avoiding my mom these days. I thought she’d know I was stoned. I was also starting to worry about where I was going to keep getting cash for hash. The good news was my mom and Jed were really getting along, not arguing for once. Maybe they were doing it doggy-style! I knew for sure Jed used to smoke up because he had this bullet on the end of his necklace where you could pull the bullet head off the shell casing and there was a roach clip inside. When I first saw it, I thought the roach clip was a pair of tweezers.

  I was sitting on a doghouse that had the words “Back in the doghouse again!” painted on the side. There were old slop pails for fish lying around in the cornmeal snow. (That’s what Jed called this kind of snow, because it was quite thin and it crunched when we walked on it.) I was just going to light up a smoke I had swiped from my mom when I heard the cracking of twigs and heavy boots on the path. A voice called out, “Zat you, Larry?”

  I jumped. “Who’s there?”

  “Jed. What you’re doing?”

  “Jed!” I said, surprised to see him. He came into the clearing brushing his kamiks off. “Hey, I was just thinking of you.”

  “Gretzky,” he said. I brushed snow off the plywood roof and he sat down next to me. “That one of your mother’s stogies?” he said, offering a light.

  “Yeah,” I mumbled, “howdjoo know?”

  “Export A,” he explained, “Verna’s brand. Did you save some for Uncle?”

  “Any time,” I said, taking a puff and handing him the smoke.

  “Good man,” he said, eyeing me. “There’s an acre in heaven reserved for boys like you.”

  “There better be,” I said. “Hey, I thought you quit.”

  “Did.” He took a plug. “Bad year to try.”

  I noticed that his hands were shaking. “Have a coffee, man,” I joked.

  He looked at his own hands. “Nervous, Lare, just nervous.”

  “Scoop?”

  “Nuthin’,” he lied, looking up at the stars. “You know, I had to cut through the elementary playground today. Kids in elementary are already starting to chew snuff.”

  “Yeah, it’s pretty bad.”

  “Hmmm,” he said, scratching his scruff.

  “You gonna pass that smoke back over here,” I asked, “Uncle?”

  “What? Oh... hey, look at you, a young man sticking up for himself. Yeah, sure, here you go.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Been smoking long?” he asked.

  “Naw, just started.”

  “Then you stain easy, I guess.”

  “What?”

  Jed held up his pointer and middle fingers and pointed to the top digits. He motioned for me to look at mine. I did. They were stained yellow; same with my fingernails.

  “Jesus, Jed, what am I gonna do? Mom’s gonna kill me.”

  “Verna knows.”

  “What?”

  “Larry, your mom knows a lot of things you think she doesn’t.”

  “I guess.”

  “And me too,” he said. I met his eyes.

  “If you ever need to talk,” he continued, “you just ask and we’ll come down here.”

  “Okay,” I said. “Thanks, Jed.”

  And we were silent.

  “Listen, uh ... Larry, your mom is trying to get me to take you out on the land again.”

  “What? The last time we tried, we didn’t get any moose. And when you had that bear in your sights, the gun didn’t go off.”

  “Dud,” he explained. “It was a dud. And those moose were Ninjas. We can go somewhere else.”

  “Where?”

  “Tsu Lake. Renewable Resources takes their first-year students out to bush camp for a month, and they’ll need someone to cook or teach fire science. I talked to the head instructor today and it looks like a go.”

  “When?”

  “March, winter camp, and I could stick around until September for their summer camp.”

  “Oh yeah?” I asked. “Thinking of sticking around?”

  “Well,” he said, looking at his shoes and taking a deep breath, “I think I’m going to try to stick around more than I have been.”

  (Woo hoo! Right fuckin’ on!) “Cool,” I said.

  “Yeah. Your mom and I are gonna give it a go—” Then he said really quick, “Boy, it’s getting cold out here. You come out here often?”

  “Yeah,” I said, “when I need to think.”

  “Anything particular?”

  “Naw. I’m happy for you and Mom, though.”

  “Yeah, well. You gonna stick it out here or are you going to come back to the house? I could gab on and on, but I feel like some hot chocolate. You want some?”

  “Sure,” I said. I hadn’t had hot chocolate in ages.

  “Let’s play some cards, see if I can win some money back. Hey, you see that snow on the trees over there? You know what a Cree woman once told me? She said that when the snow is on the trees like that, it’s the breath of the caribou, they are so close.”

  “Wow.”

  We got up, and I brushed my pants off. We walked up the trail togeth
er, talking and laughing.

  “Oh yeah, Larry,” Jed said, “about your friend ... John?”

  “Yeah?”

  “You know when you got into that scrap, and afterwards I asked him if he had seen you in the scrap?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Well, Larry,” he said, stopping and putting his hand on my shoulder, “that boy was lying to us when he said no.”

  “How do you know?” I asked defensively.

  “My spider senses were tingling the second I met him.”

  We walked home together, crunching snow beneath our heels. Something suddenly hit me.

  “Jed? ’Member the Dogrib story you told me? The one about how we came to be?”

  “Yeah.”

  “ ’Member those kids that made it back to the bag?”

  “The ones that turned back to pups?”

  “Yeah. What did the mother do with them?”

  “I didn’t tell you?”

  “I don’t think so. I can’t remember.”

  “She killed them, Larry.”

  Phone Call Yippety-Skip!

  As I waited for Juliet to pick up her phone, I said her name out loud to myself. I rolled it around in my mouth, savouring each syllable as if it were a sweet and delicate Christmas.

  “Juu-leee-et,” I whispered, “Juu-leee-et.”

  I had rewound the Outfield’s song “Baby, When You Talk to Me” and got it ready so that when she answered, I would press “play” and she’d hear it. Man, she just had to know how I felt. I also had Judas Priest on standby: “Turbo Lover” was set to go, and if the conversation followed along, I had backup, too. Van Haien was locked, cocked and ready to rock.

  The phone line rang again and a woman picked up. “Hello?”

  It was Missus Hope. I took my finger off “play.”

  “Good evening,” I said, “is Juliet in this evening?”

  “Why?”

  “... Urn, I’d like to talk to her,” I answered.

  “She’s grounded.” CLICK!!

  Grounded? I held the receiver. What the hell had just happened? Maybe Juliet was getting heck for something. Or maybe her mom had recognized my voice as one of the losers from the night I smoked up. Yeah, that had to be it.

  “Man oh man,” I whispered, “the shit I take.”

  I went downstairs and lit the wood stove. Mom and Jed were out partying it up because Mom had done really well on one of her exams and it was a full moon. They always celebrated the full moon, every month. In summer, we’d have a back-yard party and Jed would cook—that is, if he was in town. I sat down in the dark. Why was Juliet grounded?

  Just then, I heard the neppp-neppp-neppp of a three-wheeler pulling up in my driveway. I could hear the gravel roar as someone skidded to a halt, and the clunk-clunk-clunk of boots as someone flew up my stairs. There was the ding-dong of the doorbell. I turned on the outside light and holy shit—it was Darcy McMannus! Maybe he was here to kick my ass and give me another concussion. I opened the door, just a little bit.

  “Hey, Darce,” I said, “how’s it going?” I kept my distance and got ready to duck.

  “Hello, Larry.” He had his helmet and gloves in his hands and he was looking down the street, not making eye contact. I took a look at his nose and got ready in case I had to deck him one.

  The circle, I thought, the circle. I was scared shitless.

  “Your old lady’s out, huh?” he asked shyly. “Can we talk?”

  “Yeah,” I said. He looked pretty sad, so I took a chance. “Come on in. Put your helmet over there.”

  “It’s getting colder,” he said. “Ski-Doos will be out soon.”

  “Yeah. You still got that Phazer?”

  “Naw, rolled it. Sent her out to Hay River to get fixed but I can’t pay for it.”

  “That’s the shits.”

  I could tell he had something to say, so I motioned for him to come sit down.

  “Heard about you and Jazz busting each other up.”

  “It was stupid,” I said.

  “We got trouble.”

  “How?”

  “Ahh, shit,” he said. I thought he wanted to fight. “Juliet’s gonna have a kid.”

  “What!?”

  “She called me up crying. She’s fuckin’ preggo.”

  “No way!”

  “Yeah.”

  “Are you fuckin’ serious?”

  “Do I look fuckin’ serious?” He glared, and I realized he was scared. “Shit, man, the whole town knows.”

  “How?”

  “Nurses, doctors, fuckin’ everyone in this fuckin’ town!”

  “Oh man, oh shit,” I said. There was panic in my voice. I sat down. I stood up. I looked in the mirror. I ran my fingers through my hair.

  “She’s going to Edmonton tomorrow, gonna stay with her aunt,” Darcy said.

  “Is she going to have it?”

  “She says she wants a fuckin’ kid,” he said. “I don’t know. Fuck. She wants to see you before she goes.”

  “Me? What?” My mind was racing. What the fuck was going on?

  “Yeah, why you?” he asked suspiciously.

  “Where is she?”

  “You gonna speak to Johnny fuckhead too?” he asked.

  “What does she wanna do?”

  “You wanna double-bank Johnny?”

  “What?”

  “We could go over there and roll him.”

  “No. Does Johnny know?”

  “Hell yes! And he hung up on her, the cock. He won’t speak to her.”

  I put on my shoes and jacket and Darcy ran outside and started his machine. I got on the back and we motored down the back streets of town. It was snowing out, and I started to get jittery on the back of the bike. I realized this might be the last night Juliet would ever be in town. I couldn’t believe it. We wove past the church, past the drugstore, through the baseball field, past the Pair-a-Dice motel, under the water tower, past the graveyard and into the park behind her house.

  In the park, we scared two ptarmigans that were sleeping in the snow. Their white wings flicked to their sides and they flickered ahead of us, like calm white hands. One flanked right, but the other smashed into our windshield.

  Darcy jumped off his trike, ran over to it and knelt down.

  “Shit,” he said. “Fuck!”

  I walked over and stood looking at the destroyed bird. It was as big as a baby pup. It was pure white except for its beak and eyes, which were jet black. It was suffering, trying to move. Blood came from its mouth, and it tried to talk to us, moving its beak.

  “Look at that,” Darcy said.

  I picked up the warm bird and held it to my chest. With my left hand I held its back and with my right hand I twisted its neck, snapping it.

  “You’re fuckin’ mental?” Darcy asked and stepped back.

  I handed him the twitching bird. “Her room, which one is it?”

  He looked down for a bit. “See the blue light in the basement?”

  “I could be a while.”

  He was quiet. I didn’t want him hanging around.

  I laughed. “I’m serious, I could be a while.”

  “Don’t matter,” he said, petting the ptarmigan. “I’ll wait.”

  I hopped the fence and crouched low. I peeked into the room through the curtains.

  Juliet peeked back, wiped her eyes and waved me in. I motioned “How?” and she opened the window.

  “Climb in,” she whispered. “Quietly.”

  I did. I scraped my back and belly, but I did it. She guided me through, saying, “Shhhh, shhhhh.”

  When I landed on her bed I lay there, and she looked at me with those eyes. The room was completely blue from the light thrown off the TV. It was tuned to the blue channel, the one with the local community announcements about birthdays and bingos.

  “Is it true ... about...?”

  “Yes,” she said. “I leave tomorrow.”

  “What about Johnny?”

  “He’s moving t
o Yellowknife.”

  “Isn’t he going to—”

  “Shut up about Johnny.”

  Her room was simple, just a bed, a TV, books, a hope chest and Japanese fans all over the walls and ceilings. There were hundreds of them, small and large. They looked like moths in various states of flight.

  “Juliet—” I said.

  She kissed me.

  “But what about your—?”

  “I want this baby, Larry. Babies are perfect.”

  She pulled my shirt over my head and let it fall to the floor. I stood there, cold, and I started to shiver.

  She said two words: “One night.” She looked at me and I felt it. I felt alive, like I had fallen from the sky with the grace of God, with the petals of God, and I had finally spread my wings.

  “Don’t you want to crawl into this shirt with me?” she asked. I was hypnotized.

  She stood there, and I swallowed her image. It burned my eyes and mind, scorching them pink, and I became a disarray of limbs as I tore the rest of my clothes off. I grabbed her and kissed she kissed back and I blew shhhhh grabbing her ass and she pushed me away and threw me down pulled the covers up and over us pulled her pants and panties off pulled me close. I became gentle beneath her. I stuck my tongue in her ear and we began. We got so loud and I got so hard I thought I’d pop. I understood now the quick gush of Darcy. I was on fire with a silk black fox tasting my fingers.

  “I don’t want your hand inside me,” she said and moved closer. “Come on, Larry.”

  I rolled on top of her and her hand placed me there. She was soft giving flesh that I took with my tusk and she was hotter than the centre of the sun, like a long never-ending swallow. I couldn’t go deep enough. She shivered inside and bucked under me and I was buried in her hair. She was in my mouth in my throat and she raised her ass under me and (call her snowbird) our meat baby-blush pink (call her raven) the monkeys slept and I swam under her shirt and grabbed her breasts, one of which had slid from under her bra and I filled my mouth with her a warm dove I filled my throat with her and she was in my lungs and my tongue little lightning strikes against her nipples she threw me over and I fell out of her. We gathered it together and I was not alone; I was not forgotten; she established territory by riding position and teeth, hot little teeth against my throat. She scratched my back and I almost felt it. One hand was up her shirt, the other squeezed her ass her mouth was open her eyes were closed I watched what I did to her and I loved it. We went for spice and my tusk pulsed inside her my heart was inside her and it was sweet violation and she pulled me tight and this was the place of Jesus this was the place of Jesus this was the place of Jesus. I was touching her soul and I began to drown. There was no shame in being loud and crying out as Juliet pumped harder and moved like flames like blades of wicked fire, her tiny toes sliced my legs, her razor nails scratched my back and she felt the scales.