Motorcycles & Sweetgrass

by Drew Hayden Taylor

  Virgil took back his bottle and poured the final drops onto the carved images, furiously rubbing away the remaining dirt. “How old are these, do you think?”

  Virgil traced the carved indentations with his hand. Already he could make out what seemed to be a moose, a dog, or more likely a wolf. A group of people holding hands in a circle. To the boy, one petroglyph looked like a fire. And some other images he couldn’t make out yet. It was quite a thrill, knowing he was probably the first person in a very long time, maybe since they were carved, to see and touch them.

  “Don’t remember. Maybe a couple of hundred years, maybe a thousand. I forget.”

  “How did you know they were here?”

  “I carved them myself.”

  It took a few seconds for the words to register on Virgil, whose attention was focused on the petroglyphs. He dropped the empty water bottle.

  “What?”

  “That was so long ago, I barely remember carving them. And you have to keep in mind, I’ve carved a lot of petroglyphs in my life, and painted pictographs too. It all depended on how I felt that day.”

  “You did this? But you said they were hundreds, maybe a thousand years old!”

  “Yeah. So?”

  “That would mean…”

  “Come on, Virgil, you can make the leap.”

  Virgil could not talk.

  “Geez, the ice age came and went in less time.”

  Finally the boy caught his breath. “Nana…”

  “Like I said earlier, what’s in a name? They’re as common as the leaves in a forest. I am who I am. Simple as that.”

  “You can’t be!”

  “Excuse me? A second ago you were ready to believe. You even asked. But now… So what’s changed?”

  Virgil slipped to the other side of the overturned boulder, giving himself space from the man who had just said he was Nanabush. True, Virgil and his uncle had been discussing that possibility. But for him to actually claim it—that was a different matter. A very big and stupendously different matter.

  John picked up the discarded bottle, hoping there were some remaining droplets of water, but it was empty.

  “You can’t be! There is no such person. I… I was joking. My uncle’s weird and…”

  The man shrugged. “Okay. Makes no difference to me.”

  “Prove it to me. My grandmother said you could change into animals.”

  “Yeah, when I have to. It’s actually really painful. You try not to do it if you can avoid it.” The man winced at the memory.

  “I remember my grandmother telling me this story about you coming upon a wigwam in the forest one night where these three beautiful women were sleeping and you changed yourself into a bear and entered…”

  John flung the empty bottle at the boulder, sending it bouncing off into the undergrowth. “Fuck I hate that story. Sure, you boff a couple of women who are asleep when you’re a bear, and over the years the story gets blown completely out of proportion. I’ve done other things too, you know! More productive things.”

  Realizing he was alone in the woods with this man and that no one knew he was here, Virgil thought he’d better change the subject quickly.

  “What do they mean? The petroglyphs?”

  Almost as quickly as it had flared, the man’s temper abated. “Oh, that. Nothing much. I was just bored. When I get bored I petroglyph, if that can be a verb. It’s just something to do when you’re on the road.” John quickly scanned the carved images, as if reading. “Ah, let’s see. Something like, I hunted a moose. Had a party with some friends. Changed into a wolf. And that”—he pointed to a stick figure of a man—“just means ‘I was here.’ That kind of thing.”

  “That’s it? That’s all? Nothing mystical or spiritual? Just a diary of some kind?”

  “I guess it is. As I said, it gets boring on the road.”

  “But there are petroglyphs and pictographs all across the country, all over North America.”

  “Yep, I know. I’ve been on the road a long, long time. Places to go, things to see.”

  “But they’re all different kinds of symbols and markings. Not like these.”

  “Different languages and different dialects. When you’re in Okanagan country, you don’t write and speak Anishnawbe. Don’t they teach you anything in that school you go to? When you decide to go.”

  “All those… they’re all nothing but… graffiti? That’s all? Just graffiti? Left by you…”

  “Yeah, what did you think they were? I mean, who knew people would think they were important? People crack me up.”

  Virgil was quickly becoming disillusioned. “I don’t believe this. This is not what I expected.”

  The man shrugged, indicating he didn’t really give a shit. “That’s your choice. But you should realize that if you don’t want to know the answer to a question, you shouldn’t ask it. It’s always amazed me how the simplest concepts are often the hardest for people to follow.”

  John stood to his full height, still looking a bit worse for wear from his visit to Otter Lake. “Virgil, I think it’s time for me to go. I’ve exhausted my stay around here. And if I were you I wouldn’t tell your mother that you met me here.” He sighed. “After all this time, I still don’t know how to impress and keep a woman. Isn’t that kind of sad?”

  “I… I don’t know.”

  “Count yourself lucky, young man. Before long, in another year or so, I bet, you too will begin that long road to hell. And heaven.”

  Two dragonflies briefly danced in and around the two figures.

  “John, why did you come here?”

  Virgil was almost sure he saw a flicker of something… something he couldn’t describe… play across John’s eyes.

  “Why did I come here? Well, the simplest answer is your grandmother was very special to me, Virgil. More special than you could understand. Simply put, she was the last person to really believe in me, not as a legend but as a real flesh-and-blood person. She saw me, touched me, loved me. You don’t forget a person like that. This is a changing world, Virgil, but your grandmother didn’t change. Okay, maybe a little, but she was still Lillian. She got new friends but I think I always held a special place in her heart. And me in hers. When she was dying, I couldn’t let her go without saying goodbye. I owed her that. Old friends are the best friends. Always remember that.”

  “You said something about a promise to her. What was that?”

  “Well, that’s between me and Lillian. Whatever promises you had between you and your grandmother are yours. Of course… I could give you a hint. Interested?”

  Virgil nodded eagerly.

  “It was a big promise. And part of it involved you. Because she really cared for you. She thought you needed a little magic in your life. Everybody does occasionally.”

  John slumped over and Virgil felt a lump in his chest for his grandmother. Both stood quietly in the forest, each remembering the woman who had passed away.

  John broke the silence. “Virgil?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Do you want a ride home? It’s a pretty long walk.”

  The boy thought for a moment. “I shouldn’t.” Ever since he could remember, he’d been taught not to accept rides from strangers, and there was nobody stranger than the guy standing next to him.

  “I gave your mother a couple of rides. She loved it. I don’t think she’d mind. It’s your last chance.”

  That was true: both his mother and Dakota had been given rides. Virgil finally nodded. “Yeah, I could handle a ride home. That would be cool.”

  John smiled his perfect smile, though one tooth seemed to be loose. “Okay but we will have to take the back roads ’cause I think the cops are looking for me.”

  “Why?”

  “It’s a long story. I will drop you off near your house. Your mother and I have already said our goodbyes. Is it a deal?”

  “It’s a deal.”

  The boy and the man shook hands.

  “I left my bik
e by the road down that way. Let’s go.”

  Side by side they walked through the woods. And they talked. They talked about life, about being Native, about being young and about being old, about Lillian and about the need to be silly occasionally.

  “Never underestimate the need for some sheer silliness,” said John. “That’s why some people drink. That’s why some people take drugs. Of course that’s the cheap way out. A good bout of complete nonsense now and again would keep everybody sane. You can quote me on that.”

  Virgil found the thought itself quite silly. “Yeah, I plan to go around directly quoting Nanabush.”

  “Ah, now you believe me?”

  “I believe nothing.”

  “Now that’s silly, and I like it.”

  “John, Nanabush, or whatever you want to call yourself, what’s next?”

  “Whatever I want. That’s what I do.”

  “I mean more specifically.”

  “Virgil, half the fun is not knowing, but I’ll send you a postcard when I do.”

  Before long, they emerged from the forest near the spot where he’d parked his motorcycle. John could tell the boy was eager to sit atop the machine.

  “Go ahead. Just don’t scratch anything.

  Slowly, as if he were in a dream and the bike might disappear in a heartbeat, Virgil approached it. He threw his leg across the fabled 1953 Indian Chief motorcycle, admiring its ageless beauty. Yeah, he’d seen Harleys and Hondas and Kawasakis in magazines and on television, but he had to admit, there was something very different about this machine. He could understand why John would choose to ride it.

  The Indian Chief was big for the boy physically but not too big for his imagination. Sitting atop the bike, hands stretching forward to grasp the handlebars, he could almost feel the wind blowing past him. He imitated the sound of the motorcycle as he pretended to shift gears. At one point, deep into his fantasy, he was trying to avoid the police as he raced down a highway. Up ahead, the cops had thrown “sticks,” with their tire-piercing prongs, across the blacktop. Desperate to avoid them, bad boy Virgil lurched to the right—only to find himself and the motorcycle falling over onto an obscure dirt road in Otter Lake.

  He found himself on his back, John standing over him with an amused look on his face.

  “You scratch it, you buy it.”

  Scrambling to his feet, Virgil helped John lift the bike up and onto the kickstand. “Just having some fun.”

  “That’s what I like to hear. Ready to go home now? The helmet’s a bit big but it should be fine.”

  Virgil put on the oversized helmet and sat across the gas tank, while John donned his own headgear. Virgil’s heart thrilled at the vibrations when John turned the ignition and kick-started the beast. To please the boy, he revved the engine a few times, making it growl, then joyously gunned it and sped down the road, leaving behind a trail of dust.

  For the last time, the 1953 Indian Chief cruised through the streets and roads of Otter Lake, though avoiding the well-travelled routes where the Res cops might be lurking. Virgil enjoyed every kilometre of it. He waved to the Otter Lake Debating Society as they roared past, momentarily disturbing today’s topic of discussion: who was sexier, Charlotte or Emily Brontë?

  John weaved in and out of side roads until he ended up down by Beer Bay, near the Second house. There he stopped the vehicle with a skidding flourish.

  His heart still beating a mile a minute, and his butt tingling from the engine’s humming, Virgil ripped his helmet off, smiling ear to ear. “That was so incredible! I want one!” He slid off the bike and turned around.

  Slowly, John removed the screaming-raven helmet from his head. For a moment, Virgil’s heart almost stopped. The blond White man he’d known for over a week was not the man before him. In his place sat a strikingly handsome Native man, still lean, but with a dusky skin colour, high cheekbones and long black hair that danced in the slight wind. Still in John’s clothes. And for a second, Virgil could see the last traces of amber in his eyes, before they filled in with brown.

  Through gritted teeth, John managed to say, “Christ that stings. I told you it hurt.”

  “J—John…?”

  “Not quite, but close enough.” The pain seemed to subside, and the Native man who was dressed like John now sat tall in the saddle.

  Virgil felt his eyes widen. “Then who…?”

  “Yes, Virgil, there is a Nanabush.”

  “Oh my God…”

  “Well, that’s a bit presumptuous, Virgil, but thank you for the compliment. You know, through these brown eyes, the world does look a little different. Curious, huh?”

  Nanabush took a deep breath. “Just smell that. Anishnawbe. Otter Lake. It never really changes, you know. You could say the more things change, the more they stay the same.”

  “Wow.”

  “You really have to work on your vocabulary.”

  “You are Nanabush!”

  “And you are Virgil. I thought we established that already.” The now-Native-looking man surveyed the surrounding land. “Virgil, this road here, where does it lead? Down to the water?”

  Virgil nodded, finding it an effort to answer. “Yeah. That’s where they take the boat trailers in the spring, to put boats into the water. And in the fall to take them out again.”

  “Good. That’s what I needed to know. Well, this is goodbye, Virgil. I am quite confident I’ve overstayed my welcome.”

  “You’re leaving! But you can’t! I want—”

  “Sure I can.” He began tying his hair back into a ponytail, similar to Wayne’s. “I’ve been away for a while, Virgil, and now I’m back. It’s a whole new country, a whole new adventure now. Lots of new people. I’ve been negligent lately. Got things to do now. I didn’t before. I hear Ottawa’s a fun town. Might go into politics. Never know. I’ll be around.”

  “Goodbye, then, I guess.”

  “No, Virgil. There is no word for goodbye in the Anishnawbe language. Only…”

  “I’ll be seeing you. Ga-waabamin.”

  “There is hope for you after all. Ga-waabamin, my friend.” Grunting, he turned his bike toward the weed-infested road.

  “But I told you, you can’t leave that way. That’s a dead end. It ends at the water.”

  Smiling his trademark smile, albeit a more tanned, high-cheekboned version of it, the man formerly known as John shook his head. “Haven’t you figured it out yet, Virgil? There are no such things as dead ends. Only people who find dead ends. I sometimes wonder if that’s the only thing I have to teach.”

  “Before you go…”

  “Yes?”

  Virgil took a braided strand of sweetgrass out of his pocket and held it up for the man to take. “I took one of these from the pile you made. I think you should keep it. A little something from Otter Lake. My mother and a lot of my relatives with cars have dreamcatchers or these hanging from their rear-view mirrors for good luck. You don’t have a rear-view mirror but still, I…”

  Reaching out, the stranger took the gift and smelled it. “That is truly the smell of the Anishnawbe. I accept your gift. Even though I made it.” He attached it to the mirror on the left handlebar. “Thanks.”

  “That’s so… White. I think you’re suppose to say ‘meegwetch.’”

  “Meegwetch, then.”

  He put on the helmet and, with a nod to the boy, Nanabush kicked the bike into gear. The wheels spun and shot vehicle and rider down the road.

  There are no such things as dead ends. Only people who find dead ends. Virgil stood, pondering the meaning of that. It would make a great title for an essay. He had planned to write about his uncle’s martial art, until Dakota, a much smarter kid than him, told him she was amazed at what he now knew about Nanabush. It would mean a lot less research too. And maybe he wouldn’t have to use so many adverbs and adjectives.

  TWENTY-SIX

  Dinner was almost over and Virgil, Maggie, Wayne and Dakota were finishing off the final crumbs of their apple p
ie.

  “Oh my God, that was tasty,” Wayne said. “I could almost get used to this kind of cooking. That pie was almost as good as Mom’s.”

  “Keep complimenting women like that and you’ll have a girlfriend in no time,” Maggie said with a smile.

  “Hell, I wouldn’t know what to do with one anymore.” Mildly amused, the three other dinner mates all looked directly at him. “I mean… I would know… I mean… it’s just been a long time since I dated… and I… geez, leave me alone, guys.” Sheepishly, he licked his plate, trying to hide behind it.

  At this, as in the other recent suppers, nobody mentioned the elephant—or in this case, the White man—in the room. It had been almost two weeks since John had left. Most of Wayne’s bruises had healed and he was walking with only a slight limp. More importantly, he had used the time he was laid up to devise a usable defense against a raccoon being thrown at him, at least in theory. He was, understandably, in no hurry to test it. Besides, he was safely ensconced at his sister’s, feeling oddly comfortable there.

  Dakota was studying up on Nanabush. Though her parents tended to dismiss “all those old stories,” she was enthralled.

  Especially by the more adult, bawdy ones that many teachers and social workers might find inappropriate for a girl of Dakota’s age. Every time she found a new Trickster story, she would mumble under her breath, “Yeah, he’d do that” or “Nah, not in a million years,” almost as if she were reading a biography.

  Maggie tried hard not to think of he who must not be named, who had entered and left her life so suddenly. But John was a hard man to forget. Like the dust from the meteor that had wiped out the dinosaurs, it would take quite a while for things to settle. At that very moment, as it had been since the press conference, that particular patch of woods was crawling with police, forensic teams, archaeologists, anthropologists, media and, for some reason, a lot of fat raccoons. Bones were still being found and there was a rumour that some ancient Mayan artifacts had been uncovered.

  In the meantime, Maggie was trying a more Zen approach to her work and her life. She could not control the things that happened in her community; she merely had to react. That, in itself, lowered her blood pressure. John, if nothing else, had taught her chaos was to be expected and nobody can really plan for it. Just prepare as best you can and deal with it when it arises. No more late nights worrying about “what if…?” Instead, more television or fishing with Virgil, thinking “whatever.” She was sleeping better.