The Stone Collection

by Kateri Akiwenzi-Damm

  Some days those kids, they’d come to her crying. Crying because some white kids called them “wagon burners,” or because their teacher said something shitty about Indians in front of them.

  “Aupitehih igoh nawh w’gageebawdizih!’ she’d say.

  Or they’d come in crying because they just found out that not having a status card meant they weren’t considered part of the land that had always been their home.

  She’d hug them. ‘Ah, neen binogeehns, you know who you are,” she’d say, repeating their names over and over, tracing their ancestry. “That’s what matters. We’re all relations you know. We got that blood, that same blood. Remember that. And remember the land don’t belong to anybody. We belong to her.’ Then she’d give them tea and pat their hands. “This land, she knows you. She isn’t gonna forget you,” she’d say. “Remember. Remember and you’ll always know who you are.”

  The children would believe her too. They’d stop crying and drink tea with her, asking more about the web of family relations, about the land, about the history that led them to her kitchen table that day. Before leaving they’d be laughing and telling funny stories about one another. Then they’d split and stack some wood for her and carry buckets of water into the house from the pump. That way she’d be ready for the next morning, they’d tell her, and they’d smile, putting their hands over their mouths or sticking their skinny chests out and swaggering around the yard with their knees pointing sideways like their dads and uncles. Yeah, those kids would believe her and they’d leave feeling good about themselves and their place in the world.

  After her visitors left and before she went to sleep she’d brush her long grey hair. One hundred strokes. She’d tie it with ribbon, like a bundle. Then she’d pull back that worn pink bedspread, and, while she was staring out the window at the stars, she’d give thanks for the day. Slowly, she’d rise, turn out the light and as she settled into her bed and fell asleep she’d talk to her husband, C.K., who she believed was waiting to take her to that other world.

  But all that would come later.

  First, each morning, on a table by the back door, she kept a small bundle wrapped in cotton and tied with ribbon. Before dawn she would open the back door, breathing in the moist cool air. She’d go out, the bundle held tightly in her left hand. She’d walk down the sloping backyard, and that early morning dew would coat her soles and rub against her shins. At the shore she’d stand on the stones waiting for the sun to rise from the water.

  That night, that particular night, in the early morning darkness, those guys got into the house easily through its unlocked doors. She must have heard the noise and slowly, in that quiet way of hers, stepped from the bathroom into the triangle they formed. No words were spoken. Then, as the blows pounded, the fists and hammer and cane cracked into bone, thumped into her soft flesh, there were no screams. Not one cry for help. Just a gulp of air, a gasp as her chest was slammed with fist or wood.

  Then that voice, quiet and respectful in the throes of such pain.

  “…Kitche Manitou…”

  My hair stood on end.

  I ran to the kitchen. That old fish knife with the broken wooden handle was there by the stove. I ran with it. Saw six arms rising and slamming into her. I ran with the knife. Raised my arm. Slammed it into her neck. They stopped hitting her then. She fell to the floor. Blood spurted, she fell and they stopped hitting her. They stopped hitting her, howled and went swarming through the house grabbing the few things she had, smashing what they didn’t want or couldn’t understand. I lifted her into my arms and stumbled through the back door.

  Outside I turned four times then placed her on the stones. I pulled the knife out quickly and the stones turned a deep sticky red.

  As the sun rose I picked up blood-stained pebbles and stones, placed them in my mouth and swallowed.

  Forgive. Forgive. Forgive. Forgive…

  That is how they found us in the early morning sunlight.

  Now they ask me over and over again, Why? Why? Why? But how do you explain a moment when your world is turned inside out? Some say I ran with the devil; some say I became a hollow spirit, a pauguk. They may be right. I was like a dog running with a pack. Hoping it would keep my enemies at bay. How do I tell them I set those dogs on her trail?

  Some say that what I did was satanic but they are wrong. That I drank her blood. That I am insane. But they are wrong.

  But why? they ask. Why? why?

  I am here waiting for the answer too.

  So I tell them that she was wearing that white cotton sweater I had given her for Christmas only months earlier. “For something special,” she said, holding it to her chest. I tell them how we laughed together and how I felt a kind of happiness as we peeled oranges and ate in silence.

  I could tell them about nights of drinking, about needles and smoke and a haze of sex, drugs, and fighting that made me forget everything except an emptiness I couldn’t escape. I could tell them about shaking and sweating, puking until my throat was raw. I could tell them about other break-ins. Other blood. Other bones cracking. I could tell them about living without feeling any ground underfoot, about being non-status, non-knowing, non-feeling, non- remembering.

  But instead I tell them how she would rise in the still-dark morning.

  The Palace

  SHIT.

  Saturday night and I’m broke again. Not that there’s anything much to do here on a Saturday night. Except it’s not just any Saturday night. It’s New Year’s fucken Eve. Jackie-O, Mukwa, DJ-D, and Aces are making a booze run soon ‘cause we’re all heading to The Party Palace later to ring in the New Year. And I don’t have any coin so I can get myself a six-pack or even some of that cheap fizzy wine girls like.

  I wander down the hall and peek into my little bro’s room. He’s 10 and full of piss and vinegar. He dresses in secondhand clothes because he wants to and he always looks good even in stupid looking shirts from a decade ago or jeans that are too tight or too baggy to be cool. The kid’s got style.

  “Jims?”

  He’s building a city out of Legos. Doesn’t look up. “Hey, buddy?”

  Still doesn’t look up. “What?” He’s digging in his pile of grey Lego. He’s got all of his Lego neatly sorted into colour piles. Red. Black. White. Yellow. Grey.

  “Whatcha doin’ tonight, bud?”

  “Dunno. Goin’ to Noko’s with Nim and Rave. Mom and Dad are partying at Uncle Tommy’s, so I’ll prob’ly stay at Noko’s.”

  “Get spoiled, eh bro?”

  “Guess so.”

  Nokomis will have a bunch of snacks for them, maybe a few videos she rented for ‘em, nice clean beds. She and Pops’ll stay up till midnight. She’ll give the kids those noisemaker things you blow in and twirl around. And they’ll toast in the New Year with cranberry juice and soda water. She’ll hug and kiss everyone. Pops will make a little speech about this year being the best one ever then he and Noko will head off to bed, leaving Jims and the other grandkids to stay up in front of the TV, gorging on chips and candy, drinking pop, and goofing around until the sugar buzz wears off and they all crash in front of the TV, or crawl into their beds. Noko will check on them later, put the ones on the floor into bed, make sure they’re all covered up and tucked in, and kiss them goodnight.

  “Cool.”

  I’m still leaning in his doorway. He looks at up at me.

  “What?”

  “Whaddaya mean ‘what?’?”

  “Whaddaya want?”

  “Shit, dude. Can’t a guy talk to his little bro on New Year’s Eve without him gettin’ all suspect?”

  “Sure,” he says, still eyeballing me.

  “Just wanted to make sure you were okay for tonight.”

  “Uh-huh.” Hasn’t taken his eyes off me.

  I stand there with my hands jammed in my pocket. I can see at least eight bucks on his dresser beside a Batman Band-Aid, some twist ties, a jackknife, a pack of apple Warheads, a scrunched-up newspaper article about Dudl
ey George, and a tobacco tie. Above it is a poster of a fiercely beautiful Native Hawaiian activist and one of her poems. I wonder where he gets this stuff

  “Wanna play Lego with me for a little while then?” he asks, the little bugger. “I mean since it is the last day this year that we can spend time together and all.” He grins at me all innocent like.

  The little shithead has me on that one and he knows it. His eyes are twinkling at me like they’re full of little stars.

  “Sure!” I say, as if it’s the best idea I’ve ever heard. As if all along I was just dying for him to ask. I go over and sit on the floor. Flick the hair outta my eyes. Pick at the red and green carpeting that’s older than both of us put together. Then I choose a couple of pieces of red Lego and stare at them.

  “I’m building Washington, DC,” he tells me. “But like all bombed out and destroyed. And the White House is gonna be all wrecked and everything. And there’s gonna be all these flowers and trees and animals inside. Like there’s gonna be an orangutan living in the Oval Office ‘cause the animals at the zoo all got out too, eh. And it’s like the trees and everything are taking it all back. Starting over ‘cause Bush and them made such a mess of things. And anyway, an animal’d do a better job than him anyhow.”

  Wow. Jims is a fucken smart kid. I dunno how a 10-year-old comes up with these crazy ideas. He’s always reading. Always trying to save the planet and all that shit. “Cool, Jims. Very cool.”

  I snap the two red Legos together.

  “So, uh, I was thinking of going out with Jackie-O and them tonight.” I don’t tell him that Mukwa and Tiny and that posse are gonna be there. Jims hates it when I hang out with them.

  He doesn’t say anything. He takes the red Legos from my hand and sticks them on a building.

  “But I haven’t got any money…”

  He stops what he’s doing.

  “…you know, like for snacks or so I can have a toast at New Year’s with everyone.”

  He gets up and digs around in his dresser. Then he comes over and hands me a $10 bill. It’s from his birthday money. If I didn’t feel lame already now I feel like a total shit.

  “This enough?” he asks.

  “Yeah, man. But I can’t take this, dude. It’s your birthday money.”

  He shrugs. “Take it.”

  “But…”

  “Take it. Just don’t get in trouble, okay? With Tiny and them. Okay?”

  “Okay, Jims.”

  “Promise?”

  “Sure, Jimbo. It’s cool. I just wanna have a good time. Start the year off right. With my friends.”

  “Some of your friends are assholes.”

  “Jimmy! You shouldn’t talk like that, dude.”

  “Well, they are.”

  “They’re our cousins.”

  He can’t argue with that. Blood is blood. He sits down. Pats his ponytail. Scrunches his eyebrows together.

  “Don’t worry.” I muss up his hair. He squirms and reties his ponytail.

  I stand up. “Hey, have fun at Noko’s, eh. Don’t get all strung out on sugar and do something crazeee.” I grin at him.

  He looks up and flashes me a smile. Little brat has something planned, I can tell. Last year it was a water balloon fight in the rec room. Noko made him carry wood for a week for that one. Although when he wasn’t in the room she laughed her head off about it. The brats hit Pops right in the back of the head with one and kept running. He was so surprised his eyes nearly popped out and he spit tea all over his lap and down his pant legs.

  “Damn kids!” he roared, staring at the spilled tea that looked suspiciously like a pee stain spreading across his crotch.

  “You kids get back here.” Noko was trying to sound stern but couldn’t help smiling. Pops jumped up and rubbed his hands together then took after them. The kids screamed, Noko laughed, and Pops, grinning like a crazy man and looking like he’d just wet himself, went flying around the corner at full tilt.

  Fuck, I wish I’d been there to see that.

  The dogs pace, bark, and howl when Jackie-O, Mukwa, DJ-D, and Aces pull in front of the house in DJ’s shitty old rust-bucket 4Runner. Fucken guy spent three times as much on the stereo, which is blaring Pink Floyd, as he did on his truck.

  “It’s just transportation for my sound system, dude.”

  “Yeah, great. When I’m sprouting wings and heading to heaven after the brakes give out I’ll be so friggen pleased by the audio clarity of the GNR song wafting up from the wreckage.”

  “Hey, shut up!”

  “Yeah, I’ll be like, well, yeah, okay, I’m dead because D’s rezmobile was such a shitbox it fell apart and killed us, but man, the bass sounds awesome on Paradise City.”

  “As if a dickwad like you’d be getting into heaven anyways.”

  “Yeah, Jelly, you’ve committed all the deadly sins.”

  “And that was just last weekend!”

  They all laugh at me.

  “Laugh all ya want. I’m a fucken saint and you know it.”

  “Well, ya got that right. That’s the only kinda saint you’ll ever be.”

  “Well, if you’re good, you’re good, eh! What can I say?” I puff out my chest.

  Jackie-O hits my shoulder. “Yeah, you wish.”

  The guys laugh and hit their thighs. “Shot down!” they howl. Jackie-O and I have gone out a few times over the past couple of years. One of those on again/off again things.

  D is just givin’ ‘er all the way into town. We get there in like 10 minutes. Run into the beer store, grab a 2-4, and get the hell outta there. We divvy it up at the back of the truck. We each get six ‘cause Mukwa wants to head to the LCBO for rye instead. The rest of us put our six beers in plastic grocery bags and line them up in the back. We throw a ratty old blanket over them so they won’t roll around. Mukwa runs into the liquor store and gets a 40 of rye.

  “Holy shit, man,” says Aces. “Planning to get off yer face or what?”

  “Fucken hope so,” he says. “Tiny and I are splittin’ it.”

  Jackie-O and I raise our eyebrows at each other. This can’t be good. Not fucken good at all.

  D turns off his lights when we get close to The Palace. We all crane our necks to look at the house. The front porch light is blue.

  “Party!” Mukwa yells.

  Four heads swivel in unison.

  “Shhhhhh!” we all say moving our arms up and down in that turn-it-down-dude way.

  “Yeah,” growls Jackie-O. “Shut the fuck up!”

  Mukwa hangs his head and is silent.

  Man, that J-O is one tuff chick. A shiver runs up my spine. Damn, I miss that girl.

  Blue light means the party is on. It’s still early though—so early hardly anyone is there and the music is still at an acceptable level. We decide to go have a few at the gravel pit before heading in. By then it should be insane.

  We do a bunch of dumb shit at the gravel pit to pass the time. D and Aces argue over which of the identical bags of beers is whose and roll around in the snow for a while.

  “What are ya? Ten years old?” Jackie says with an edge of disgust in her voice that could shrivel a man’s dick in milliseconds.

  They stop wrestling and look at each other.

  “What are ya? Ten years old?” they say together in weirdly high voices. They laugh, high five, then go back to rolling around in the snow.

  Meanwhile, Mukwa is having a moral dilemma about his rye. He knows that if he drinks it without Tiny he’ll possibly get the shit kicked outta him. But if he doesn’t we’ll tease the shit outta him and he’ll be the only sober one when we get to the party. Either way he’s in shit.

  “Grow some balls, man,” D says. “D’ya think that if Tiny was here instead of you he’d spend one second worrying about you? Drink your damn rye.”

  “I was going to,” Mukwa says.

  “When?” I say. “What are ya waitin’ for?”

  We all stare at him. He cracks under the pressure, just as we knew he wo
uld, twists off the top, and takes a long haul just to prove he’s no wuss. But by then no one gives a damn. Aces and DJ are in some weird competition for J’s attention. Now they’re having a spitting contest. Jackie and I lean against the front bumper, watching. It’s really stupid.

  But it is kinda cool that Aces can spit through his front teeth.

  Aces wins for both distance and style and takes several bows. J rolls her eyes. D runs up behind, gets Aces in a headlock, rips off his toque, and gives him a noogie. Aces doesn’t look so cool standing there rubbing his head.

  “Jackie,” I say, taking advantage of the fact that I’m the only one actually sitting with her. “What’s your resolution?”

  “To get away from these assholes,” she says nodding her head towards Aces and D who are now having a pissing contest. An actual pissing contest. No shit!

  Mukwa turns up the tunes.

  “Axl Rose,” he says. “Now, there’s an asshole.”

  I jump off the hood of the truck.

  “And here’s another one!” I yell before launching into an awesome air guitar version of Welcome to the Jungle. After all, a guy’s gotta compete.

  We shut off the truck, turn off the lights, and coast in behind some cedars just down the road from The Palace. We always park here so we can get in and out easily. It’s also good if one of us snags and needs a place to…ya know, get in and out easily. Plus, even though it’s shit on wheels, D is always worried about someone breaking a window or puking in the back seat or something. Fair enough. Things can get totally outta control at these parties.