Nobody Cries at Bingo (21 page)

While she daydreamed, we perused the racks of clothing. We usually shopped at places like the Saan store, Zellers and Superstore. The difference was staggering. At the second hand store, we had enough money to buy what we wanted. “How much for the fur jacket?”

“Fifty cents.”

“The high heeled boots?'

“Fifty cents.”

“This couch?”

“Fifty cents.”

My first second hand store purchase was a black sweater with a lace collar. When I wore it to school, it drew comments from teachers. “Did that belong to your grandma, dear?”

“Maybe.”

The sweater looked incongruous when I stood next to my friends who had taken to wearing heavy metal t-shirts everywhere they went. We were still in elementary school but they were preparing for high school where we heard that everyone was either a headbanger or a prep. As Natives, we would be automatically drafted onto the former team. My shirt confused my friends as the lace said
old lady
, but the black said
badass
.

While playing baseball one recess, the sweater gave off a special smell. It was as if the sweater had a memory that was awoken in the hot sun. Standing in the outfield, I relived its memories.

“Baby powder? Vicks? Cabbage?” I concluded that the former owner was a Ukrainian mother who was susceptible to colds.

One afternoon our dad took us to the south side of the city to see the university campus. Upon hearing our destination, a cold sweat broke out on my body. “Not yet, not now,” I wanted to yell, “The smart, beautiful people will judge me.” University was my Mecca, my heaven, my Hollywood and I always imagined that when I went I would be thin, well dressed, with super long thick hair and escorted by my football player boyfriend.

Instead, my first time on a university campus was in braces, with an unruly mullet, pimply skin, and my escort was my shy and awkward (yet abnormally loud) family. I told myself that nobody on the campus would remember when I returned in six years, or if they did, then they would say that this was my ugly duckling stage.

We parked in the lot and Mom marvelled at the price of parking. “Five bucks for the day? That's freakin' crazy! Do these idiots think we're made of money?”

“Everyone takes the bus. You have to watch every dime when you're in university,” Dad replied. “To save money for your booze,” he added with a wink.

Mom glared at him as she always did when he was trying to be cute.

“Hey!” Celeste pointed to the car where Tabitha was still sitting inside with her earphones on.

Dad knocked on the window of the car. “Hey, get out of the car.”

Tabitha ignored him. She was good at ignoring people.

Dad looked at Mom for help. Mom shrugged her shoulders. “She doesn't want to go.”

“But we made this trip for her.”

“She doesn't want to go.”

I cupped my hands on the car window and stared in at Tabitha. She was sixteen and university was only a year away. Was she too embarrassed to be seen with us? We were a motley crew, especially David who always had food on his shirt. I considered getting into the car too. But when I weighed the danger of humiliation against unfulfilled curiosity, my nosiness won out. I had been seeing university on TV and in movies for years. I had to see it in real life.

“Well, let's go then,” Dad said. “Let her overheat in there if she wants.” He marched ahead of us.

Under her breath, Mom murmured, “She can always roll the damn window down, she's not a puppy.”

Dad walked confidently through the campus. The rest of us followed in a clump with the weak ones in the middle, the stronger ones on the outside . . . in case the university students were prone to attacking families.

I kept separating myself from the pack. My look said, “I am not with them, I am just a particularly short university student. I find them quite odd myself. Why is there a family of Native people walking through these hallways? Who brings a baby to a university?”

My cover was blown when Mom yelled at me to keep up. New situations brought out her bossy nervous self.

I expected the university to be filled with Hollywood stereotypes. The movies I had watched would have prepared me for the characters we would encounter. There would be the well-dressed blondes and their jock boyfriends. The girls would wear their cheerleading outfits to class and we would know the jocks by their huge muscles and their bullying of nerdy guys. The nerds would be wearing thick glasses, pocket protectors and shy smiles. They wouldn't be much to look at but they would be the best, most loyal friends you could ever have, and, if needed, they could make jet fuel.

But there were no jocks or cheerleaders or even nerds on the campus that day. The only people we saw were Asian students who sat on benches and talked quietly amongst themselves.

There were other things to look at that excited me. There was the huge library that was more difficult to get into than the airport.

My dad had to use all of his charm to get us past a middle-aged librarian lady. “I used to be a student here, a few hundred years ago,” he said smiling roguishly. “And now I've brought my future students for a look around. Dawn! Celeste!”

I stepped forward and the librarian's beady eyes passed over my uncomfortable grimace and settled on Celeste's confident golden glow. She nodded and allowed all of us to pass through.

The family wandered around the stacks of books and I nearly fainted when my dad said there were three floors. I wanted to see each and every floor, and stick my nose into each book, smelling the knowledge inside.

“That would take a long time. And your brother and sisters have to eat.”

“I'm prepared to sacrifice their health to stay here longer.”

My brother's whines dragged us in the direction of the food court. Mom wouldn't let us get more than a cup of free water. The prices were at least twenty per cent more than they would be anywhere else in the city. Apparently, poor university students had to pay for convenience. “Lots of people stay on campus; it's easier to get to class,” Dad explained. “Plus it's cheaper and -”

“Every dime counts.” Celeste and I said in unison, Celeste slightly faster than me. She could be very annoying sometimes.

We walked past a concrete student residence as two girls exited. They looked no different from us except that their clothes fit them and their sweaters did not smell like someone else's cabbage. Still they weren't spectacular. I could not sense that they were inherently better than me so I decided that living with them in residence would not do. When I went to university, I would get my own apartment and I would decorate it how I wanted it. It would be a cool hang out for both the jocks and the cheerleaders. And I'd even invite the nerds over once in a while to play dungeons and dragons.

As we backtracked through the halls, I noticed that university was a place of opportunity. You could see that from the bulletin boards, which I studied in detail. Take Korean lessons, take karate lessons, buy a late model Hyundai — which would I do first? I had to do them all!

Eventually, my parents dragged me off the campus even as I argued with them. “I don't understand why I can't stay at least one night. Here's someone who's looking for a roommate.”

The tour ended the way all our tours ended — with a visit to a Chinese buffet. We had a few favourites and we were known at each of them. My dad liked to be known, particularly from his university days. “Hello Mr. Lee,” he would say as he slapped the tiny man on the back.

Mr. Lee fake-smiled and acknowledged their former relationship. “You can sit anywhere with your tribe.”

“How about I pull up a chair at the buffet?”

And he and the Asian man would laugh and laugh. The rest of us would walk way and sit down at a table. Being friendly was important, but ordering your pop and getting to the buffet was more important.

Dad always encouraged us to try new things. “Don't just eat chicken balls.”

“I like chicken balls,” I said.

“Try the fried fish. C'mon try it.”

“It looks gross,” I observed.

“You don't know until you try it.”

Celeste would pipe then up, “I love it, Dad!” which forced me to eat it.

“It IS gross,” I whined through a mouthful of mushy fish.

Dad turned away from me and shook his head sadly in the direction of the velvet dragons hanging on the wall. ‘You're not daring,” his head shaking said, “you won't have what it takes to make it the city.” I choked down the fish as if to say, you're wrong about me. I will do whatever it takes.

The drive home was always a quiet one and gave us a chance to absorb everything we had seen and heard. Next weekend we would spend on the reserve playing in the woods, riding horses at Uncle Frank's or sitting on the back steps drinking lemonade. That wasn't real life. That was the waiting time for what was to come.

T
HE
I
NDIAN
S
UMMER
G
AMES

M
Y ATHLETIC CAREER STARTED WITH A FIT
of crying in the backseat of our car. Mr. Broderick, the most athletic teacher ever, had devised a system for improving athletics for all the elementary school students. He was an energetic and tireless person; this was evident in the book-length newsletter he released at the end of my grade six school year. In the newsletter he had assessed the grade point averages and athletic prowess of every single student from grades one through to six. Beside my name were my student average, my team name, “The Trojans”, our intramural scores for the year, and then a short comment that summed up my worth as a person: “Not very athletic.”

After I read the words, there was a stunned silence as my brain temporarily shut itself off. They say shock is a protective mechanism. Sadly it only lasts for a few minutes. The pain slowly dribbled through my mind's security doors. I expressed a rain cloud of tears and heaved myself around the back seat of the car. “Why oh why would he write that — for everyone to see!”

My mom had pulled up in front of the reserve's band hall where all the parents had been invited for an assembly about summer activities for the kids. As I cried in the backseat, she urged my sister and brother out of the car. “Get out. She's not going to calm down anytime soon.”

David and Celeste stood next to my window and watched the tears stream down my red face as I pounded my head against the back of the seat. It kept their interest for a few minutes before they decided to wander inside.

I continued my crying war against injustice. Because of Mr. Broderick's cruel comments, I would now bear the dark brand of “not very athletic” . . . for the rest of my life. Everyone in the province was probably sitting around their kitchen table laughing as they read those words; “Look at this Dawn, not very athletic. Funny, I never noticed that before. Now that I think of it, Mr. Broderick is right. She isn't. In fact she probably never will be
! Ha ha ha
!”

My eye caught my sister Celeste's review. “Strong runner. Talented athlete.” Oh great, more proof that my sister was better than me. Like that point hadn't been hammered home at every family get together. “Oh look how tall Celeste is! That Dawn sure is short!” “Celeste is growing like a weed! Is Dawn getting shorter?” “That Celeste could be a model and, Dawn . . . well, she could be her sister's agent!”

In order to torture myself further, I read through everyone else's ratings and no one, not a single student had received a comment as unflattering as mine. Apparently no one was less athletic than me. On our intramural team we had Karen who could not run more than a few steps before bursting into tears. “You can do it!” I'd yell encouragingly as she ran after the soccer ball. She'd only stop, bend at the waist and rub her lower back. Mr. Broderick wrote, “Tries very hard” next to her name.

Next to my brother David's name he had written. “One awesome guy.” Mr. Broderick had been David's teacher and, for the first time, a teacher had found a way to engage David in learning; mostly by pretending to turn a machine gun on every student who wasn't listening. My brother adored Mr. Broderick.

I hated him. It wasn't fair. I was the captain of my intramural team. True, it wasn't because of my athletic ability; I had been chosen as captain because I was the oldest person on the team and because I was naturally bossy. I took my duties seriously. I made sure all my athletes attended as many games as possible. It sounds simple but have you ever tried to round up a group of students from ages six to eleven? I found that all grade one students look the same and had more than once dragged the wrong one to our field. My team was also disabled by the fact that we had more asthmatic players than every other team. They tried hard but it was difficult to chase after a ball when you had to take out your puffer every five minutes. How was I supposed to motivate asthmatics? “Run harder Ethan! Okay, stop and get some air. Ready, now? Okay, lie down. Um . . . teacher? Ethan seems to have passed out again.”

We lost every game. My team found this amusing, particularly Roy Nokusis who was the school's best athlete. He was eleven years old, six feet tall and had muscles that would make a CFL quarterback jealous. For Roy, athletics were as natural as breathing.

Before each game, he laced up his sneakers and smiled knowingly. “Another game, another chance to lose.”

I pointed at him. “This is why we lose: Roy has a bad attitude!” I said to the others.

“Whatever you say, coach,” he'd say, laughing as he jogged onto the field, his long easy steps mocking the staccato bursts of my short legs.

Still my team had heart. They played hard and sucked even harder on their inhalers; there was no reasonable explanation for our losses until Mr. Broderick found one: “Dawn: not very athletic.”

Now everyone knew. Now everyone would laugh at me. And I couldn't even shake off their laughter because secretly I believed it too. I had a younger phenom sister. She had been winning athletic awards since grade one. There weren't even athletic awards in grade one — they made one up just for her! Now her Top Grade One Athlete trophy sat on top of our TV and mocked me whenever I watched cartoons. My mom had thoughtfully hung my pink participation ribbons on it. They failed to console me.