April Raintree (6 page)

“He's a Metis, like us,” Cheryl said proudly. “Mrs. MacAdams says we should be proud of our heritage. You know what that means? It means we're part-Indian and part-white. I wish we were whole Indians.”

I just about fell off my chair when I heard that. There were a few Indians or part-Indian kids in my class who couldn't hide what they were, like I could. But here was my very own sister, with brilliant grades, saying such idiotic things. Well, I didn't want to argue with her so I didn't voice my opinion.

She continued talking which was usual for her. “Mrs. MacAdams is a Metis you know, but Mr. MacAdams isn't. He teaches somewhere. Not at my school. They got a lot of books on Indian tribes and how they used to live a long time ago.”

Cheryl paused for a breather, then continued in a sombre tone, “Mrs. MacAdams gave them to me to read because no one at school would talk to me or play with me. They call me names and things or else they make like I'm not there at all. This one girl and her friends would follow me home and make fun of me so I slapped her. And her Mom called Mrs. MacAdams. And Mrs. MacAdams says that all the bad stuff was cause I'm different from them. She told me I would have to earn their respect. How come they don't have to go around earning respect? Anyways, I don't even know what respect is exactly. I just wanted to be friends with them.”

I knew what Cheryl was talking about from my own experience on the school bus. Yet, I couldn't share that with her. I guess I was too vain. She had admitted to me that some poeple didn't like her because she was different but I couldn't return that kind of honesty. So, I told her about the DeRosiers, and how much I missed the Dions. Telling her how the DeRosiers were mean to me was easy because they probably didn't like anyone and it wasn't only me.

“Why don't you give those kids a whack?” Cheryl asked.

“Are you kidding? Mrs. DeRosier would kill me.” I replied, as I leafed through the pages of my new book. “Besides, you can't go around whacking people you don't like.”

“Well, that's what I do,” Cheryl retorted off-handedly.

“And what if the kids are bigger and stronger than you?”

“Then I'd simply pretend not to hear them,” Cheryl answered with a mischievious smile. We both laughed over that and then we talked about the other kids at school who were nice.

I got to wondering what kind of present my Morn and Dad would be bringing. Our precious hours together slipped away and Cheryl's good mood faded, too.

“Maybe they're not going to come,” she said as she paced back and forth. She was puzzled and hurt and she was fighting back tears.

Miss Turner came in to tell me that Mrs. DeRosier was there to pick me up. Cheryl begged for just a little more time. I sat back down and Cheryl came to me and knelt before me. She looked up at me with her large, questioning eyes, now glistening.

“They're not coming?” she asked softly.

“Maybe they got mixed up on the days or something.” I knelt down to face her on the same level. “Cheryl, no matter what, we'll always have each other.” I hugged her close, knowing that what I said was of small comfort to her. She started to cry and naturally, that made me want to cry. Miss Turner came and poked her head in, saying I really had to go. Cheryl and I started putting on our jackets. She looked so pitiful when I left her alone in the visiting room.

Mrs. DeRosier had been told that my parents had not come for the visit. That evening, at suppertime, she told her own children they were fortunate in having a parent like her as my parents were too busy boozing it up to even come to visit me. I sat silently, not believing a word of what she said and pretended the insults to my parents didn't even bother me. She was forever putting my parents down so I was getting used to her remarks. But inside, I despised her more than I would despise my own parents, even if all the things she said about them were true. And I just knew they were not.

Later that night, I lay in bed, unable to go to sleep and unable to say my prayers. I couldn't forget that look on Cheryl's face when I had to leave her. I felt anger towards my mother and father because they were responsible. They were responsible for me being in this foster home. While I was at it, I turned my anger on Our Holy Father in Heaven.

“Oh God, why did you let me be born? Why? Why was lever born? Why do you let these bad things happen to Cheryl and me? You're supposed to be loving, protective and just. But you're not, God! You're none of those things if you can let all the bad things happen. You're just a phoney! And I hate you. You hear me? I hate you!”
That's how angry I was. I started crying and by the time I finished, I was overcome with remorse for having thought those things. At last, I was able to say my prayers and ask God to help me be strong and good.

For the rest of that month, the DeRosier kids taunted me about having drunkards for parents. It was new ammunition for them to use against me and it bothered me a lot. One Saturday morning, they started in on me again and finally I made my feeble defense. “They're not drunkards! They're sick. That's all. Sick!”

“Sick? Boy, what a dummy you are. But then half-breeds are pretty stupid, aren't they?” Maggie said maliciously.

“Yeah. Your parents didn't know how to take care of you. They just know how to booze it up,” Rick added. And then they started mimicking drunken people and talking to each other with slurred speech, laughing at intervals.

“No!” I screamed.

I ran out of the house, across the grain fields, running as hard and as fast as I could. They had acted and sounded just like my parents and their friends. I remembered. I could run all I wanted but I couldn't run away from the truth. When I reached the edge of the woods, my sides were aching. I stopped and sat down, my back against a pine tree. I was panting and sobbing very hard. As I caught my breath, I could picture my parents.

“So. That's why you never got any better. Liars! That's what you are! All those promises of getting well. All those lies about taking medicine. Liars!

You told us, ‘Soon, April. Soon, Cheryl. We'll take you back home as soon as we get better.'

Well, you lied to us. You never intended to get better. You never cared about us. You made Cheryl cry and you don't even care. And because of you, I'm stuck here. I hate you both for lying to us. And I hope I never see you again.”

I got up and started walking back to the house because I still had floors to wash. I stopped and thought,
“No. Why should I? They can beat me if they want to. I don't care. I just don't care anymore. To hell with them! To hell with my parents! To hell with everyone, except Cheryl. Even the Dions didn't answer my letters. They lied too. They didn't really care for me. But that's okay because I don't care for any of them either!”

I turned back into the woods and made my way through the heavy underbrush. I don't know how far I walked before I came upon a small clearing which bordered the Red River. The sunlight filtered through the towering trees, warming even the shady spots. The area was alive with the sounds of birds, squirrels and bugs. But I felt at peace, the tensions from the past months were lifted. I knew I felt this way because I was all cried out and I had decided that for now, I didn't care about anything. I didn't even feel guilty about using the words ‘to hell'.

I wasn't really thinking about anything when I noticed my arms and hands. They were tanned a deep, golden brown. A lot of pure white people tanned just like this. Poor Cheryl. She would never be able to disguise her brown skin as just a tan. People would always know that she was part Indian. It seemed to me that what I'd read and what I'd heard indicated that Metis and Indians were inclined to be alcoholics. I guess that was because they were a weak people. Oh, they were put down more than anyone else, but then, didn't they deserve it? Anyways, I could pass for a pure white person. I could say I was part French and part Irish. If I had to, I could even change the spelling of my name. Raintree looked like one of those Indian names but if I changed the spelling to Raintry, that could pass for Irish. And when I grew up, I wouldn't be poor; I'd be rich. Being a half-breed meant being poor and dirty. It meant being weak and having to drink. It meant being ugly and stupid. It meant living off white people. And giving your children to white people to look after. It meant that kids like me, had to take what kids like the DeRosiers gave, and none of that was good. Well, I wasn't going to live like a half-breed. When I got free of this place, when I got free from being a foster child, then I would live just like a real white person.

Then a question came to mind. What about Cheryl? How was I going to pass for a white person when I had a Metis sister? Especially when she was so proud of what she was? I loved her. I could never cut myself off from her completely. And she wouldn't go along with what I planned. I would never even be able to tell her what I planned. I sat there thinking but the problem wouldn't be resolved. Well, I had a long time to figure that one out. For sure, she would never turn out to be like the rest of the Metis people. She and maybe Mrs. MacAdams were special people. Cheryl was already a whole lot smarter than all the rest of the kids in her class and that counted for a lot. I sighed, stood up and stretched. Now I felt ready to face whatever the DeRosiers had in store for me. One day I would be free of them. One day…

For the first two weeks of the summer holidays, Maggie was going to Vancouver to visit her grandmother. I looked forward to the day when she would be leaving because she, more than Ricky, made my life miserable. She had started coming into my room whenever she felt like it, saying it was her house and she could go wherever she pleased. One night, she was looking at my suitcases thoughtfully and then she said, “I'm going to borrow your suitcases for my trip.”

I looked up at her surprised and said, “You can't just ‘borrow' my suitcases. They're mine! Besides, what if I had to move while you're gone?”

“Move? My mother's not going to let you move from here. C'mon Ape, I've got to start packing tonight,” she said in what was supposed to be a coaxing voice. I knew very well that her mother would let her have her way but I still felt stubborn.

“Look, you owe it to me. You live in my house and eat our food. You're just lucky I don't tell Mother about your selfishness.” With that, she dumped all the things in my suitcases on the floor and took them with her.

When she came back from her trip, she kept my suitcases. I asked to have them back several times so I could put my clothes back in them. But she only ignored me. One day, I entered my bedroom and my suitcases were there. They had been scratched up as if Maggie had deliberately tried to cut into them with a knife. Inside, there was dried red fingernail polish poured to form the words, ‘Ape, the bitch.' I was angry but there was nothing I could do about it. I couldn't even show them to my social worker because it would be Maggie's word against mine. I thought that would be the end of it, but it wasn't.

That same night, during supper, Maggie said, “Mother, Ape let me use her suitcases and I forgot to give them back right away. So you know what she did today? She went up to my room, threw my stuff around and stole some of my money and my jewelry. I wasn't going to say anything about it but it makes me mad that she can just come into my room and do that.”

I couldn't believe what she'd said and I looked over at her with complete astonishment. I practically growled at her, “You bloody liar!”

Mrs. DeRosier slammed her fork and knife onto the table, stood up and came over to where I was sitting. She slapped me across the side of the head, took a vise-grip of my arm and yanked me out of my chair to shake me. It seemed to me that all happened at the same time.

And she was screaming, “Don't you ever talk to my daughter in that tone of voice again! Who the hell do you think you are? We take you in because your parents don't want you, we give you food and shelter and this is how you pay us back?”

Then she asked Maggie, “Is your room still in the same condition that April left it in?”

“Yes, it is,” Maggie answered her, pathetically.

To me, she ordered, “March up there right now. We're going to see what you did. And then you're going to get the strapping of your life.”

I'd never seen Maggie's room before because the upstairs was off limits to me. Her room was beautiful. The fancy furniture all matched and was white with gold trimming. Her bed even had a canopy over it. The wall-paper was of pink and yellow roses. But right now, books, papers, and clothing littered the deep pile rug.

“You must be a sick girl, April, to do this kind of thing. What did Maggie ever do to you?” Mrs. DeRosier asked.

All the while, I was being shaken about like a rag doll. She marched me back down to my room and started to look through my things. In one of the pockets of my coat, she found some money and some earrings. Maggie was standing at the doorway with a deep look of satisfaction on her face. While Mrs. DeRosier went for the strap, Maggie said softly, “That's what you get for bugging me, April Raintree.”

The beating I got that night was one of the worst but I wouldn't cry. That seemed to infuriate Mrs. DeRosier all the more. I was sure that after that, Mrs. DeRosier would have me moved. I thought the beating would have been worth it after all. I waited for things to start happening but over the next few weeks, nothing more was said about the incident.

At the end of the summer, Cheryl and I had another visit. When we got to the Children's Aid office, we were told that our parents were not expected to come. I felt guilty about the resolution I had made a few months back. To make up for it, I told Cheryl how our family life had been when we were all together. That is, I told her the good things. I told her how Mom used to rock her to sleep and sing songs to us; how Dad always laughed and joked and played with us for hours, telling us lots of stories; how we would all go out to visit our aunts and uncles or that they would come over to our house; how Dad would bring out his fiddle and play while everyone danced jigs. I wondered if it was right to tell her only about the good things. Maybe I was lying by not telling her about the drinking and the fights. But then, Cheryl didn't need to know that just yet. I wanted Cheryl to be happy as long as possible.