Motorcycles & Sweetgrass (33 page)

Back at Sammy Aandeg’s place, John was fast asleep. It had been a long night/early morning and he was exhausted. Normally he slept only a few hours a night, if that. Most nights his sleep was uncomplicated by dreams. He had long ago taught himself not to dream because dreams had a nasty way of interfering in his life. Though he remembered a time when strange and marvellous things had sprung from dreams, and it had been a good thing. But creation had long ago ended. Nowadays, dreams were usually messages from a higher being. Other times, they were directions in life. And still other times, they were warnings about disasters or signs that something needed to be done. None of which interested him anymore, principally because he preferred his own company most of the time, so higher beings be damned. And of course, he hated being told what to do with his life by whatever spirit might tickle his subconscious. Everything else didn’t interest him. So, at the end of the day, he had chosen to dream no longer. It suited him well, especially when he saw what it did to people like Sammy. Late into the night John would stay awake, reading what few books the man had, and he would hear Sammy moaning and crying in the other room, a prisoner of his dreams.

Most of the world was unaware of the power of dreams, or simply didn’t care. So people just dreamed willy-nilly and damn the consequences. It didn’t matter where or what they dreamed, they just dreamed and dreamed and dreamed, confident in the belief that dreams had no meaning. A lot of problems in the world had sprung from the widespread disrespect of dreams and the power within them. Much like being a pharmacologist with a store full of drugs, a little knowledge was usually a good prerequisite or bad things could happen. Essentially, he felt you should never dream unless you knew what the dreams were, where they came from, what they meant or what they do. But people had forgotten that. John was sure that explained the state of the world. Look at Sammy.

Once upon a time, dreams were the doorway to different spiritual lands and powerful beings. John remembered when parts of the world were created by dreams. That was how the Creator often talked to you, through dreams. That was how you found your guardian spirit. That was how you found answers, and sometimes questions. Nowadays people ignored what their dreams told them. It was like they were driving on a highway and ignoring road signs. Sooner or later this would get them lost or into trouble.

So, most nights, hour after hour, he would sit there in his host’s living room, reading while listening to Sammy dream his unfortunate dreams. At least he had books. He’d taken out a library membership under an assumed alias in town so that he could enjoy the simple pastime of reading. Television was fine. In fact John loved the medium. However, at three in the morning, out in the “burbs” of Otter Lake, the quality of programming left a lot to be desired. He neither wanted his soul saved, nor coveted some new fabulous kitchen utensil or cosmetic.

This morning, a copy of
Black Elk Speaks
and the
Kama Sutra
by his bed, John slept, silently and dreamlessly, or so he thought at first. With all that had happened the day and night before, his resolve had weakened and a crack appeared. The normal silence of the night was slowly giving way. As he lay on his bed, his eyes began to move back and forth, slowly at first, but gradually faster. For the first time in a very long time, John dreamed.

John found himself in a wooded glade. He didn’t know where he was exactly, though it looked familiar. But then, most wooded glades do. He was barefoot, but dressed in his leather pants and a thin T-shirt. There were no paths or roads into the glade. It was almost as if the woods had been constructed around him.

“Shit, I’m dreaming,” he said. He had to be careful, for the world trembled when he dreamed.

“Language, John, language.”

The admonishment came from someone standing behind him. Turning, John saw a man in his early thirties, with long hair and dressed in a robe. John recognized him instantly.

“Am I dreaming you or are you dreaming me?” he asked.

The other man smiled. They stared at each other across the glade, then they slowly sauntered up to each other, stopping only a metre apart.

“Well, John, maybe we’re both dreaming each other.”

“Nice little place you have here. Lots of trees. I thought you preferred deserts and places like that.”

“I like to travel. And did you know, I have a cousin named John.”

“Good for you. What are you doing here? What am I doing here?”

“Love the eyes. I just wanted to say hello.”

“Hello back at you. I take it you heard me in the church?”

“Yes, you sounded… angry.”

“Do you blame me?”

“I don’t blame anybody. You forget, I forgive.”

“Well, good for you. Lillian seemed happy with all your forgiveness. I guess I can’t fault her for being happy. It worked for her. But I gotta say, you’re shorter than I thought.”

“Well, you’re whiter than I thought.”

“Touché. Hey, I read that book about you, your biography.”

“My biography?”

“Yeah, that big black book everybody talks about.”

“I think it’s called the Bible.”

“Yeah. Needed an editor. No offence, but it went on forever. And repeated itself. But man, you had a rough life.”

“Just the last part of it. And it got better. It had a happy ending. As for you, you’re looking… better. I heard some things about you, unpleasant things.”

“I have you and your friends to thank for that. You’re lucky I don’t hold a grudge either. I can forgive too. But I’ve learned my lesson. I’m trying to stay fit these days. Unlike you, I’m going to do my best to avoid dying. For my people, the novelty wore off several generations ago.”

“Your people are my people too.”

“Tell that to all your priests and ministers who used to look after my people. Tell it to Sammy Aandeg.”

“Yeah, I’m getting a lot of that lately. Well, blame free will and all that.”

“Well, they had more free will than Sammy did. And yet, you forgive them for all the horrible things they did? I’ll always have trouble figuring that one out.”

“It’s all part of the contract. Everybody deserves a light at the end of the tunnel.”

“An escape clause, huh? So, why are you here? I heard you don’t come and visit down here much anymore. Otter Lake the site of the Second Coming?”

“Not if you’re Jewish. Well, my friend, we both loved Lillian. I didn’t think we should be enemies. And many people seem to really want and love you, so I…”

“Sorry, but I am not loved like you are. I am not loved, I am beloved. There’s a substantial difference.”

“There is? And just what is that difference?”

“When you’re beloved, you get all the same warm and fuzzies as you do when you’re loved, but there’s a lot less responsibility involved. I like that kind of difference. It’s more bang for your buck.”

“And the boy?”

“What about him?”

“Do you actually want him to grow up to be just like you, rootless, subject to every whim and desire, having no structure or roots? Boys, children in general, need to be loved, not just beloved.”

“You know, every parent wants their kid to grow up like you, but most of them are actually closer to me. Perfection is boring. Flaws are interesting.”

The other man chuckled.

“You’ve got a nice smile,” said John. “You should smile more. Really.”

“Thank you, but obviously, John, we’re very different people with different priorities. But if a woman like Lillian can hold both of us in her heart, we can’t be that far apart.”

“Thanks. I appreciate that. You know, there was a time when I really envied that turning-wine-into-water trick. That would have solved a lot of problems for me then.”

“And created a whole bunch of new ones too.”

“Yes, it would have, no doubt about that.” John paused. “How’s Lillian?”

“She’s fine. In fact, I have a message from her.”

“What?”

“Thanks for the thunderstorm.”

John laughed out loud, and it felt good. “Thanks for the laugh.”

“I do what I can.”

This made John think for a second, and an idea came to him. “There is one more thing you can do for me, a small request. A favour. Guy to guy. There is something you have the ability to do that I would love to master. It would sure make travelling a lot easier.”

The other man raised an eyebrow. “Oh really? How can I help?”

“I’m glad you asked.” John explained, and the other man, whose hair was almost as long as John’s and who was just passing through the dream world, listened closely.

In his sleep, John smiled.

In another room of the house, Sammy sat fully awake, mumbling to himself, staring at the door behind which the stranger slept.

Sammy knew the man was not a man, at least not in the dictionary sense of the word. However, he didn’t know what to do about that little fact. His social contacts, and his ability for social contact, had long since evaporated. So now he just sat, like he did most mornings, wishing the man would go or be gone.

Almost ten days ago the blond White man had shown up at his door, talking like an old-fashioned Indian (as his generation still called them) should. The grouchier and crazier Sammy tried to appear, the more the man laughed. There was something about the stranger that convinced the old man that he could not turn the man away, though he was the first house guest Sammy had had in decades. He felt about the man’s presence the way you’d feel about a relative from some far-off country, or a branch of the family you’d never met, coming for a visit. They belonged there, somehow, and you had no right to deny them accommodation. You may not like it (and Sammy didn’t) but it would be wrong to do anything but tolerate them.

And the stranger’s eyes… Sammy kept forgetting to write down what colour they were. He was sure they changed colour. He knew the man was playing a game with him, and probably everyone else. Sammy grew up and lived in a world of brown eyes, so multi-coloured irises stood out. Last night, before the man left for whatever mischief he had planned, Sammy thought his eye colour had once more shifted. This time they were a peculiar whisky colour. They shone like deep amber.

Every morning, the man rose with a smile and spoke to Sammy in crystal-clear Anishnawbe. In fact, it was the kind spoken by his grandparents—ancient, and largely uninfluenced by the changing world. It was one of the many things about the stranger that unnerved him.

Sammy mumbled some more before rising from his chair. As crazy as people thought he was, there was still a schedule to follow, a pattern to his day. And no crazy White man was going to interfere. Sammy walked out of the house and into the woods. Maybe today he’d find Caliban, the real Caliban—not this guy. If pressed, he’d admit he was more interested in finding Ariel. Sammy had a sneaking suspicion she was probably cuter, and had boobs.

As Crystal Denise Park was fast approaching the Otter Lake First Nations, her assistant, Kait, was busy reading notes in the seat beside her. The 2009 Saturn engine could hardly be heard. Crystal had always had a fondness for Saturns, and had opened a dealership some fourteen years ago. It was phenomenally successful. In fact, it was so successful that she had ended up becoming a local titan of business, which, after much prodding, led her to run for the Liberals in a local by-election. Now she answered to the title Ms. Crystal Park, Member of Parliament for the county involved in the land issue with Otter Lake.

Most of her constituents felt the Native people had enough land already. The country doesn’t need a larger Reserve. Crystal didn’t care either way, but her job as MP was to piss off as few people as possible. And while the First Nations population in her riding was less than nine percent, the very fact they were First Nations, members of an oppressed minority and victims of systemic abuse at the hands of all three levels of government, gave them a substantially larger profile. Things had to be handled delicately.

Politics, Crystal discovered, was amazingly similar to running a car dealership. It consisted largely of paperwork, marketing,
negotiating, budgeting and trying to figure out what people will want next, and how to give it to them. It also made for strange bedfellows. Her best friend ran the office for an NDP colleague, and she was secretly dating a Conservative pollster, though neither would publicly acknowledge it. Like any typical Liberal, Crystal travelled the middle road. She sometimes wondered if they should be called Buddhists instead.

Kait, on the other hand, was a political science graduate from Trent University, trained for little else except being an MP’s assistant. Somewhere down the road, the civil service would welcome her with open arms into the soft bed known as federal, provincial or municipal bureaucracy. But right now, she was putting the final touches on Crystal’s speech for today. Her pen could be heard scratching on the paper. Kait would have preferred to edit on her laptop, but unfortunately, they didn’t have a portable printer in the car, so this clipboard would have to do.

“Kait?”

“Yes, Mom.”

“KAIT!”

Kait looked up from her pad, startled. “Sorry. Yes?”

“I’ve told you not to call me Mom when we’re out in public. It’s not very professional.”

“But, Mom… I mean, Ms. Park, everybody knows I’m your daughter. It’s no secret, and we’re alone in the car.”

Crystal’s hands gripped the wheel tightly. “It doesn’t matter. It’s a matter of professionalism. We are professionals and we should act accordingly. Have you finished my speech yet?”

“Just about. Don’t you think we should have cleared this with Mr. Miles?” Jonathan Miles was the local MPP, and a Tory.

“He can read about it in the papers, like everybody else.”

“Geoffrey Pindera is not going to like this either. I mean, the local municipality is going to lose taxable income on over three hundred acres. They’ve made their point very clear. And a lot of those municipality people vote in federal elections. Mom, I—”

Crystal cut her off. “First of all, it’s Ms. Park. Second, there are two Reserves in this seat. This will be a good gesture. Add the influence those two Reserves have provincially and federally, and it cancels out this particular municipality, vote wise. And, rumour has it the Department of Indian and Northern Development could be looking for a new minister. Anything is possible in politics. I like Native people, Kait. My parents used to have a lovely Algonquin lady clean our cottage once a week. I think she was Algonquin. I know she was Native. I’ve eaten deer. I have that leather vest. I’ve been to a powwow. I know the score.”