Crow circles over
South Mountain, in Phoenix, early morning, cawing occasionally, flying lower
and lower until it lands on the branch of a palo verde tree outside a ranch
house in Ahwatukee, side-stepping until he can see through the window, at the
old man laying on the black pleather couch in the middle of the room, asleep
with an empty bottle of scotch on the floor. Long-sleeved green shirt untucked,
fly on his Wranglers unzipped, and snakeskin cowboy boots.
On the wall behind
the couch, with the door on one corner, hangs a college diploma, a doctorate in
literature from Wayne State University. Also pictures: The man a little
younger, but not too much, smiling, with a thin woman his age next to him, a
bit tired looking, though also smiling, wearing a bandanna, because she has no
hair.
More: The man and
woman, at different points in their younger lives, with a young woman/girl with
them, hugging them. The young woman in graduation robes and hat standing on the
University of Arizona campus. The three them standing on the edge of the Grand
Canyon. The man and woman looking like frazzled graduate student parents, the
man with dark hair and a beard, the woman with long brown hair, holding their
baby.
Shelves of books
on the next wall: Russian and American anarchists like Bakunin, Kropotkin,
Goldman, Thoreau, Abbey, as well as novelists like Tolstoy, Cervantes, Hugo.
One whole section filled with Louis L’amour and Zane Grey. A large screen tv
against the third wall, with rows of DVDs on each side. The television on,
sound down low, a woman on the screen. The bodies of two more young women were
found buried in the desert on the mexican side of the border this weekend, yet
more victims of drug-related violence that has been building for years in the
city of Santa Teresa, in the state of Sonora.
Crow inches
himself closer to the window, cawing again, the branch dipping down under his
weight. He caws again, and lightly taps its beak against the glass. The old man
inside moves slightly, putting his arm over his eyes. Crow tilts his head,
waiting, then caws and again taps on the glass, harder this time.
The man snores
once, loudly, jerks, and opens his eyes, looking around, not moving, then
slowly closes his eyes again. A Taco Bell commercial. Head to the border!
Crow moves his
head, looking at the man with its other eye, and caws again.
The man opens his
eyes again, sighing. He sits up and rubs his face. Goddamn crow. Goddamn
everything.
He looks out the
window and sighs again. He stands up, accidentally knocking over the bottle.
Looks at it. Leaves it. Walks around the couch to the pictures on the wall,
looking at the newest one, the latest one. He kisses his pointing finger, then
puts the finger against her mouth. Hello Jenny.
He leaves his Man
Room, goes into the kitchen and starts a pot of coffee, leaning against the
counter, staring out the window at the corral next to the house. The horses up
and out and walking around. When the coffee is ready he pours a big cup,
straight, and walks outside.
The air still
cool. The old man holds the coffee cup in both hands walking out to the corral.
The horses see him and trot over to the fence, lifting their heads. Morning
Silver. Morning Sunshine. Morning Lady.
He strokes their
snouts. Are we ready?
He goes into the
barn and pours their oats. The horses come in and dip their heads in, munching
while he runs some fresh water into their tank.
Back inside, he
goes into the bathroom with a pair of scissors, looking at himself in the
mirror as he trims his beard. With a razor, he shaves the rest off, splashing
aftershave on and wincing.
He showers, puts
on his Wranglers and boots, then a fresh, light-blue long-sleeve shirt that he
buttons up all the way. In the bedroom, he finds his white hat and puts it on,
looking at himself in the full-length mirror on the closet door.
He packs a travel
bag with two extra shirts, some underwear, and toiletries. Back outside, he
goes into the barn and saddles up Silver and Sunshine, with saddle-bags, and
puts a packsaddle with bags on Lady, filled with oats. All three of the horses
stand and wait patiently while he does this, excited. He ties a lead line
between them and leads all three out into the driveway next to the house, tying
Silver’s rein to the doorknob.
Back inside to get
his travel bag. In the hallway he stops and looks down at the Navaho rug. You
need a blanket Ed.
He stoops down and
rolls up the rug, then takes it and his bag out, putting them on Silver.
For the next hour
he goes in and out of the house, bringing food items, bread, almond butter,
Grape-Nuts, raisins, some chocolate bars, coffee, along with a pan, a coffee
pot, and some cups, all of which he tries to put in Sunshine’s bags, and if
they don’t fit, he ties them on the outside with zipties and bungee cords.
When the horses’ bags
are bulging, he tells them to hold on, and goes back inside, walking around the
house, looking for something. He can’t find it. He stands in his study, looking
around, thinking. He looks at his desk, goes over to it, and opens one of the
side drawers, labeled “School Stuff.” Taking out a black marker and going back
into the bathroom. Leaning in close to the mirror, he uncaps the marker and
draws a large circle around each eye, up over his eyebrow and over the bridge
of his nose, filling them in all black. He puts on his white hat. He smiles.
Leaving his keys
on the kitchen counter, he goes outside, locking the door behind him. Untying
the horses, he swings himself up into Silver’s saddle and sits,
straight-backed, looking around one last time. With a soft flick of the reins,
he says to his horse, Hi ho Silver, and heads south.
Gordon Lightfoot
came out the front entrance of the Wildhorse Casino, rolling up his smock. His
supervisor, Gus, right behind him. Hey college boy!
Gordon leaned up
against one of the columns, searching with one hand in his jean jacket pockets.
Gus came up to
him, pointing. No one talks to me that way, college boy.
You mean when I
said stop talking to me like I’m an idiot?
I mean you
disrespecting me.
Me disrespecting
you? Gordon handed him his bunched up smock. You can find someone else to cook
burgers.
Gus grabbed the
smock. I can find anyone to cook
burgers.
Exactly.
You can’t quit.
I just did.
You’ll never work
on the Gila River Reservation again!
I think that’s ok.
Gus stared at him
a second, then walked back inside. Gordon checked his pockets again and found a
pack of cigarettes, American Spirit, and took one out and lit it. After he took
his first drag, he looked out across the parking lot and saw a man with three
horses riding towards the casino. They reached the parking lot and kept coming
through the rows of cars, right up to the front step where Gordon was standing.
The man said whoah softly and pulled on the reins, bringing all three horse to
a stop. He looked at Gordon, pushing back his hat. Howdy.
Gordon did a
double-take. What’d you do to your eyes?
Tonto, that’s my
mask. You should know that.
Gordon took a last
drag of his cigarette, and threw it to the ground, stepping on it. What did you
call me?
Tonto.
That’s what I
thought.
We’ve got a
mission Tonto.
A what?
A mission. An
adventure. A quest.
Man, are you
fucking batshit crazy or what?
Two middle-aged
white ladies walked past them, going in, looking at both of them, wide-eyed.
Gordon heard one whisper to the other, Do they have wild west shows here?
Gordon looked back through the doors and saw Gus inside, talking to two
security guards. Shit.
Well Tonto, ready?
Let me get this
straight. You want me to go with you? Where’re we going?
Mexico.
Mexico? Why?
To rescue a
mexican señorita.
Why?
Because that’s
what we do. We help people. We rescue them when they need rescuing. Like
mexican señoritas. It’s our job. I need your Indian tracking skills.
Gordon shook his
head. Oh shit. Look man, I never rode a horse in my life.
The man pulled out
his wallet, which was bulging. I have wampum.
Gordon smiled,
shrugging. Well why didn’t you say so?
He looked back at
the casino doors, through which the two security guards were coming. He jumped
up on Sunshine’s saddle and flipped them off, smiling. Adios muthafuckas!
The man flicked
his reins, saying Hi ho Silver, and they started off through the parking lot.
They crossed the
parking lot, south and a little west, out into the Reservation desert, until
they were paralleling the freeway. Turkey buzzards circling overhead. Garbage
scattered everywhere. Beer cans. Diapers. Somewhere up wind, a sewage treatment
plant, its foul stench hitting them like a physical blow. They wrapped bandanas
over their noses and mouths, but that did no good.
In the middle of
tall scrub and palo verde trees, nearing an old deserted building, windows long
smashed in and half the roof missing, they passed three big rectangular cement
holes, with about a foot of green algae-filled water. Gordon almost jumped out
of his saddle when something long and slimy, primordial, flopped in the deepest
area. Jesus Christ what the fuck is that?!
They stopped the
horses, covering their mouths in the crooks of their arms. In the murky water
lay a huge mutant trout, the marks on its back like black eyes, or torture
scars, or a prophecy thrown with ancient bones. The fish flopped its tail
again, barely moving in what little water there was. What they looked more
closely they saw two other fish just as large, barely moving their fins.
Gordon looked at
the building. What is this place?
Ed McCarthy looked
around. Trout farm?
A trout farm? In
the middle of the desert? How? Why?
McCarthy shrugged.
Gordon shook his
head. Fucking Indians. Only they would do something like that.
The first fish
flopped again, like a death throe, but they saw that it was actually raising
itself to catch one of the bugs, flies, mosquitoes, that had begun to buzz them
and the horses, going straight for their eyes.
Come on, Tonto,
let’s get out of here. Nothing but ghosts.
They passed some
BIA houses, ten of them out in the middle of nowhere, all the same, faux-adobe
squares, scrunched together on a few acres of land when there were acres of
desert all around. Some children were playing outside one of the house and
waved to them. They waved back.
They took a dirt
road south from the BIA houses and got to a brand new complex of buildings,
though no one seemed to be around. The sign out front at the paved road/highway
proclaimed it an alcohol rehab center.
They looked up and
down the road. Nothing to the west, though to the east in the distance they
could see buildings and the sun shining cars on I-10. They nudged the horses
across the pavement and into more garbage-strewn desert.
They rode until
evening, then stopped in an old sandy wash. Ed took off his hat, wiping his
brow on his sleeve, slightly smearing the marker, which had already been
running down his cheeks like black tears. We’ll stop here and camp for the
night.
Gordon looked
around. Here?
Yep.
We’re not going to
get a hotel or anything?
Nope.
Not even a motel?
Nope.
Alright.
Now Tonto, if you
want to collect some wood, I’ll take care of the horses and then get out some
food for us.
Ok boss.
There wasn’t much
wood to get in a desert, but Gordon found some old palo verde branches and a
dried out saguaro trunk. He dragged them back and piled on other smaller
branches and some grass into a pile. Taking out a notebook from his inside
jacket pocket, he tore off a page and stuck it in the bottom of the pile, lighting
it with his lighter. The grass took, and soon flames spread to the branches. He
stared at the flames for a while, then looked up at the sky. The stars had
started to come out, bright and clear away from the city, though he could still
see car lights from the freeway way off in the distance.
Ed put the coffee
pot on the edge of the fire, and threw some beans in the frying pan. When they
were warm, he poured half in a bowl and handed it to Gordon, along with some
bread and cheese.
Gracias.
I didn’t know you
spoke Spanish, Tonto.
A little. Couple
years in college. For example, did you know that tonto means stupid?
I didn’t know
that, Tonto. We’ll need your Spanish-speaking skills when we get down to
Mexico. When we rescue María.
The mexican
señorita?
Yep.
Do you actually
know this mexican señorita?
Not actually,
Tonto, but I’ve heard she’s in trouble. Mexican banditos.
Banditos?
Or maybe the
federales. But probably banditos. Hard to tell nowadays.
Well, that’s
probably true. Do you know where to find her?
That’s where your
Indian tracking skills come in, Tonto.
Right.
They ate refried
beans on tortillas, with slices of cheese, washed down with water, sitting over
the fire, which had dwindled to some embers under the coffee pot. After he had
washed out the pan with a little water, Ed McCarthy continued to throw small
twigs and branches on, as they sipped coffee.
Gordon spat. Damn
Ed, you could’ve brought some instant. These grounds are killing me.
That’s cowboy
coffee, Tonto.
It’s like rock
coffee. If rocks could float, which they can’t, so never mind.
Adding the cold
water is supposed to make the grinds sink to the bottom.
Supposed to, huh?
Ed McCarthy
shrugged. The life of a cowboy is rough.
Gordon spat out
another ground. For an Indian too.
So Tonto, tell me
about yourself. You’re always so stoic, never saying.
Gordon stared at
him. Are you serious?
Your help is
always appreciated, but we’ve ridden so long together I feel we should finally
unburden ourselves.
As he said this,
Ed McCarthy was staring into the glowing coals. Gordon took another sip of
coffee and ate another piece of 82% cacao chocolate. Well, Ed, my father’s
Apache, but my mother’s actually Crow. She and my dad met at a powwow up in
Boseman, and she just came back down to Arizona, to Globe, with him and they
got married. My dad was a firefighter for the BIA for a long time, he was
already in his thirties when they had me. My mom, she was like eighteen. Bad
mix. Also, they both drank. My dad not so much, but my mom, a little too much.
She didn’t work cause she had me, and my dad was always gone on fires, so there
she was stuck on a new reservation and basically stuck in the house taking care
of me, so she did a lot of drinking. My dad would come back from being out of
state on fires somewhere and sometimes just find me by myself in my crib. My
mom would be down at the bar. I don’t remember any of this, you know. Anyway,
this went on, I was oh, two or so, and then one time my dad came back home and
she wasn’t there and she never came back.
They stared at the
fire.
So I got raised by
my dad when he was home, but mostly by my aunt, his sister. She already had
five kids of her own, so she didn’t really mind. I guess.
Did you ever see
your mother again?
Oh yeah. Later.
Like when I was ten she got back in touch with me. She married this white guy
up there. An oil driller, but like the owner of a company. Big christian. So he
kind of cleaned her up. Or she cleaned herself up. Didn’t want to lose out on
that money. She called, asked me if I wanted to come live with her. But I said
no. I didn’t even know who she was. Like, who was this strange woman talking to
me on the phone? She tried talking to my dad about it, but he wasn’t having any
of it. And, she didn’t push it. Probably could’ve made me go up there if she
really wanted. But she didn’t. I think she was just doing her christian duty,
though I don’t think she ever really cared about all that. Later when I was a
teenager I did go up and visit. Wanted to check it out, you know. Her husband,
Jack, was a real winner. Nice house. Nice church. She never said nothing when
he was around. Fucker tried to make me go to church when I was there. Like, any
person under my roof goes to church, but I was like, no way. His face got beet
red, you know the way palefaces get when they’re angry, which is all the time.
Later that night I
heard them fighting in the kitchen. About me. Like, arguing, but then fighting.
I was upstairs in the guest room and I heard him hit her and I was down there
like a jackrabbit. She was sitting on the floor crying, holding her face, and
he was standing over her and I didn’t even slow down, I just walked right up
and hit him right in the nose. Knocked right to the ground. I think all three
of us were surprised. I didn’t know what else to say, so I said something like,
Don’t hit my mother or I’ll kill you! He just stared at me, then got up and
went upstairs. Big guy too. I was just a scrawny Indian kid.
And what’d I get?
My mother told me, You can’t stay here. You have to leave now. So I packed my
stuff. Right before I left, she handed me an envelope with a thousand dollars
in it. I don’t know how she got it, if she just stole it or had been saving it.
But she told me, Gordon, you have to get off the Rez. You have to make money.
This is what happens to us because we don’t have any money. I’ll always
remember that. So I took the money and left. I didn’t know whether to say thank
you or what.
You never saw her
again?
No. Thing is, she stayed with the motherfucker. But, she
had my address, and sometimes she would send me money. When I got in high
school, every letter had some money, a check, and a short note, saying she was
ok and that she hoped I was ok and that I needed to keep my grades up and get
into college. Get off the Rez. Get off the Rez. And, she was right. I don’t
know how she was right, since she was
so fucked up, but there it is.
You should see her
again.
And say what?
Just, hello.
Yeah, well. Gordon
poured himself some more coffee. This isn’t decaf, I can tell. I’m gonna be up
all night.
So how did you get
off the Rez?
Well, somewhere, I
started to like reading. Didn’t get it from my dad. Didn’t get it from my mom.
And not from my aunt Mabel either, but her kids, my cousins, they were in
school and bringing home their books, and as soon as I learned to read I was
always poking around in them. Plus at school all the poor old white women who
taught us were just so grateful that some of us ignorant Indians had any
interest in reading they’d start giving us books every day. I didn’t fit in anyways,
since I was the runt of the family I was already being picked on at home, by
the time I got to school, being picked on was second nature. It was just the
way it was. Books were just a way to escape, get away. Better to go to the
library for lunch than hang around the cafeteria and get picked on. And the
teachers and librarians let me, and some others. Like I said, old white ladies
love Indians. Or at least the ones who want to read books about white people.
My daughter’s a
schoolmarm too.
A what?
A schoolmarm.
Jesus Ed, I
forgot, you’re crazy. Anyway, I shouldn’t make fun of those women. They saved
my Indian ass. By junior high I moved back into my dad’s house and basically
lived by myself, since he was gone a lot. I shouldn’t say that. In the winter
he was around, and he took me hunting. Sometimes we’d just drive, go on all the
old two tracks, listening to the radio if we could get something way out there.
Fishing. He knew some good fishing spots too. So, suddenly I wasn’t an Indian
nerd. I wasn’t overweight, didn’t have glasses. Not that there’s anything wrong
with that, but there were plenty of other kids who were eating Coco Krispies
every meal and just watching tv and getting beat and fucked by their fathers.
Prime victims. Whereas I had actual real Indian skills like fishing and
shooting guns. Kids stopped picking on me.
I never forgot
what my mom told me. Whatever else she did, she was right. I looked around at
the Rez and just saw that we couldn’t win. My dad was one of the lucky ones,
with an actual real job, but firefighting doesn’t pay that much unless you’re
on fires, unless you’re working overtime, unless you’re gone a lot. But those
kinds of jobs are the ones all the guys want. Any other BIA jobs are just hard
to get, and people who work them tend to get their family in on them. Other
than that, nothing. So, you stay and have no work and are poor, or you leave
the Rez and are just a little bit more than poor, but nobody ever does.
Families don’t want their kids to leave. They say they don’t want us to lose
our culture, our heritage, so we stay and end up like our parents, poor,
overweight, living in shitty houses in shitty cities, like Globe.
Did your father
want you to stay?
You know, I think
maybe they only thing my parents had in common was to get me to college. Once I
was sixteen, he got me into firefighting, on the BIA handcrews, during the
summer, and sometimes even during school, for the money, but even if he wasn’t
home a lot, he did always ask about my grades. I think his plan was for me to
go off to college, but then come back.
Is that what
you’re going to do?
Does it look like
it?
Something
happened.
I got up with the
fire bug. Instead of heading to college right after high school, I just fought
fires. Good money, lots of travel. Kept me in shape. I could drink all the beer
I wanted and never get a gut. I started to be gone more than my dad. We hardly
saw each other for two years.
I know why you
stopped fighting fires.
Yeah? Why?
I saw that
notebook you were scribbling in.
Gordon grinned.
Ed, you guessed my secret! The reason those white ladies loved me so much in
school was because I wasn’t just reading, I was writing.
Tonto, you are a
poet.
He nodded. Yep,
and after two years of fighting fires, I realized I hadn’t written anything,
and hadn’t read much either. I could see that I was going to end up exactly
like my dad. Which to most people, that’s not a bad thing. Most guys on the Rez
would kill for my job.
You quit.
Yep. Cold turkey.
Went back to my white lady angels from school and they helped me get my
application for Mesa Community College together and then I left.
That’s where my
daughter’s a schoolmarm.
Yeah? Small world.
I didn’t even say goodbye to my dad, he was up in Idaho with his engine. With
the fire money I had from that summer I headed to Phoenix and fell into the
Indian curse.
The Indian curse?
Away from the Rez,
surrounded by white folks. I started to understand why no one ever left. Every
fucking day somebody calling me Chief, asking me where my bow and arrows were.
Trying to go to classes, filled with white people, and work at a Safeway filled
with white people. It’s hard bagging groceries knowing you could be on a fire
out in the Chiracawas, getting paid three times what Safeway pays, and at least
getting respected. Or at least just, you know, walking around on a mountain
with a pulaski in my hand watching trees torch a hundred feet in the air. So, I
did what any self-respecting Indian would do: I started drinking.
That’s the Indian
Curse?
The whole thing’s
the Indian Curse. The drinking’s just the final manifestation of it. Or, no,
the final manifestation is waking up under a bush out back of my apartment
complex.
Did you drop out
of school?
Gordon smiled. Not
at first. I made it to year two, and I never would’ve done it without another
white woman helping me. She was my composition teacher my first semester and
then my second. She didn’t give up on me, even when I would vanish for a week
because I was drunk. I barely passed most of the other classes, and she did
some talking to some of the other instructors too. I’m telling you, she went
out of her way. I don’t know why. No, I know why. She liked my writing. She
said I was a good writer. So I took her second writing class, and then the next
year I took a creative writing class she taught. After that I didn’t have any
more writing classes and things went downhill.
As long as I had writing classes, I could keep my GPA up. That, plus I
did ok in the two lit classes I had, and ok in Spanish too. The rest? Math?
Science? Not so good. Meanwhile I kept losing jobs. They’re not so
understanding about vanishing for a week. My fire money ran out. I couldn’t get
work. I just could not take going to another white guy and asking him for a job
bagging groceries. I just couldn’t.
What was this
teacher’s name?
Ms. McCormick. Hot
too. And young, sort of.
Tonto, that’s my
daughter you’re talking about.
Ed, are you
serious? I’m sorry I said she’s hot.
It’s alright. Why
didn’t you ask her for help?
Gordon hesitated.
Well, she was always busy. I mean, she wasn’t my teacher anymore. I guess I was
just ashamed.
He dumped the
grounds at the bottom of his cup into the fire. I just didn’t want her to know
how bad it was. How bad I was. I didn’t want to disappoint her.
Ok, go on.
Go on? I haven’t
talked this much in my whole life! Nothing else to say. I couldn’t go back. I
couldn’t work in another fucking Safeway, so I went down to the Wildhorse
Casino. I went to another Rez, just
so I wouldn’t feel like a freak. Just so I could be around some more brownfaces.
And you saw how that worked out. Not all brownfaces treat other brownfaces from
other tribes very well. Plus, I’m an asshole.
Tonto, you’re a
poet.
I’m an asshole
poet.
But a poet
nonetheless.
Ed McCarthy stood
up, tossing the dregs of his coffee on the fire. Well Tonto, we have a long day
tomorrow.
Ed, can we maybe
stop at a WalMart or something tomorrow? Get some water? Or a Coke?
If you can use
your tracking skills to get us to a trading post, Tonto, I’d be much obliged.
Ok Ed. Well, I’m
going to turn in. You got a sleeping bag for me?
I’ve got this
Navaho blanket for you.
You know Ed,
nobody actually uses those anymore. Not even the Navahos. Look, this one was
made in China.
The Navahos make
great scouts, Tonto.
What’s that got to
do with anything?
Ed McCarthy didn’t
reply. Gordon stood up. Hey Ed?
Yes Tonto?
Did you pack any
toilet paper?
Cowboys don’t use
toilet paper Tonto.
They don’t? What
do they use?
Leaves. Rocks.
Rocks?
River rocks work
well because they’re smooth.
Ed, we’re in a
desert.
Goodnight Tonto.
Ed lay down on his
rug and wrapped himself up. Gordon stood looking at him for a second, then got
out his notebook, tearing out a couple sheets. For once, his poetry notebook
would be good for something.
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