St. Clair (Gives Light Series) (34 page)

just tasted way too good. After my second stint

with the stomach pump, I was certain that I would

never take it for granted again.

"You kids okay?" Racine asked. She was still in

uniform--she'd only just got off from work.

"Yeah. I mean, yeah, ma'am," Rafael said.

"Sorry."

"Nothing to apologize about. You want me to take

you to New Mexico? I'm off on Saturdays and

Paul says you don't have a ride."

I smiled with a nod. Racine bent down and

tousled my hair. Sometimes she looked at me like

I was turning eight instead of eighteen.

The night of the pauwau arrived, and Rafael and I

carried baskets of frybread and boxes of mutton

out to the hospital parking lot. Racine and her kids

were standing by the neon green Buick. Obviously

they didn't have traditional regalia to wear, but I

thought Jessica looked adorable in her little sailor

skirt. Racine popped the trunk; Rafael and I

placed our packages inside. She closed the trunk

and tried to make heads and tails of the road map

in her hand.

"Which route am I taking again?"

I pointed at 25.

"You'd better sit up front with me," Racine said

testily.

I sat in the passenger seat while Rafael sat in the

back, squished in between DeShawn and Jessica.

Jessica, who had just turned eight, dropped her

head sideways on Rafael's lap.

"Look at my birthday earrings," she said.

"Cool," Rafael said. I watched them in the rear-

view mirror and smiled to myself. At least the

cloud of moodiness was lifting. "Wanna see

mine?"

Jessica giggled. "Boys don't have earrings."

"I do. Look." He lifted his hair and showed her

his right ear, his iron earring shaped like a dagger.

"I'd better teach you to drive before you go off to

college," Racine said to me.

She pulled us out of the parking lot. I lapsed into a

contemplative silence. Of course I had to go to

college if I wanted to be a lawyer. But spending

all that time away from Dad, and the reservation...

I'm a sentimental idiot; the thought of it kind of

upset me. And I didn't want a scholarship because

I was Native American. I wasn't Native

American. I was someone else's bastard dropped

off on Dad's doorstep. Anyway, what if a school

didn't accept me?

The Three Suns Reservation was huge, and only a

couple of hours away from Nettlebush by road.

Parts of it were beautiful, unspoiled terrain--

ageless sandstones and canyons and plateaus, dry

sand and an endless, starry sky. Other parts were

as modern as you can possibly get--restaurants and

a casino, an RV park, a helicopter runway, a media

center and a shopping mall. The pauwau grounds

were in a valley below the city, artificial lights

strung up around the tents and dancers' stations. It

was probably the biggest pauwau in all of New

Mexico. It was a celebratory event, but a

competitive one, too: Tribes from all over

America came for the chance to show off their

regalia, their food, and their dancing.

Maybe this is going to sound weird, but when I

looked around the crowded pauwau grounds, I

became acutely conscious of the tribes dressed in

Plains regalia. And I started to wonder which of

the boys had gone through the sun dance, if any, or

which of the girls had gone through the vision

quest. I felt certain that you ought to be able to tell

just by looking at a person whether he or she had

been through such a significant milestone. But I

felt no different, and Rafael looked no different, so

I guess that's one theory debunked.

I sat on the ground with Rafael and Aubrey and

watched the girls' competitive shawl dance. I

thought Annie was the best, her amaranth shawl

flying around her shoulders, her body a whirlwind,

powerful and precise. The judges apparently

didn't agree, because they awarded the flower

crown to a Kiowa girl. I took DeShawn and

Jessica to play a balloon game and the Yeibichai,

a holy man in fox fur regalia and a gourd-and-

buckskin mask, came running across the grounds. I

ducked out of sight. I had forgotten to bring the

Yeibichai a gift.

It was a really pleasant night. I met up with Kaya

when the Navajo performed a piece of the Enemy

Way ceremony, a sacred ritual designed to purge

the trauma of combat from military veterans'

minds. I met up with Granny while she was

dancing the squaw dance with Reverend Silver

Wolf, Reverend Silver Wolf's face splotchy and

bright. It was midnight when the festivities wound

down, and I followed Racine back to her car,

Rafael carrying a sleeping Jessica, DeShawn

straggling drowsily behind us.

"The Navajo sure know how to party," Racine

said, unlocking the car doors.

"They're showoffs," Rafael said dismissively.

Racine navigated the unlit roads back to Arizona,

DeShawn sleeping noisily in the back seat. I

glimpsed Rafael through the rear-view mirror and

noticed he was chewing on something. I hoped it

wasn't ach'ii. I didn't feel much like kissing him

when his mouth was full of sheep intestines.

It was 2:30 in the morning when we made it back

to Nettlebush. I climbed out of the car and shook

DeShawn awake and he started, babbling about a

late test paper. He stepped out of the car and

vaulted to the ground.

"M'okay," he said.

Rafael eased Jessica out of the car and held her

against his shoulder. What is it that makes Rafael

look irresistible when he's holding a kid? We

walked the dark dirt road together, Racine

smothering a yawn. I wondered about her, and not

for the first time. I wondered that a police officer

could really date a known killer. She must have

known about what my father did to Rafael's; she

was the cop originally assigned to his case.

Weren't cops supposed to be super righteous about

breaking the law? Even in the case where the guy

on the receiving end was kind of a Grade A

Jackass?

Maybe, I thought, hiding a yawn of my own, cops

are just as human as the rest of us, minus the badge

and the gun.

We saw the Hargroves to their house on the end of

the lake. Rafael carried Jessica into her bedroom,

a cozy room decorated in posters and pink. It kind

of touched me that Dad had built this place for

them. I realized just then exactly how serious Dad

and Racine felt about each other. For Racine to

actually move to the reservation... What if they got

married one day? What if Dad moved in with

Racine?

Good, I thought, warmed. Dad deserved a wife

who didn't cheat on him and pass off the evidence

as his own kid.

"You boys be safe," Racine said brusquely.

She surprised me when she took me into a hug.

Rafael walked me back to my house when we left

the Hargroves. His hand swung at his side,

brushing against mine. We stopped beneath my

porch, faint firelight glowing in the front windows.

"Look," he said suddenly, like we were in the

middle of a conversation. "I promised I'd get your

voice back. So I don't care that--"

I waved my hands. I mimed zipping my lips. He

got the message loud and clear; he fell silent.

He looked great in gray, I thought. Never mind that

I could barely even see him--one of the setbacks

when you live in a rural community without

artificial lighting. Blue eyeglasses and gray

regalia. Like a union of the past and present.

I didn't need the voice. I just needed the boy who

wanted to give me the voice.

I shut off my clanging alarm clock and swallowed

a soundless yawn. I rolled unwillingly out of bed

and swung open my closet door. I thought it was

kind of a pain to go to school after a night of

partying and truncated sleep.

I padded down the stairs and into the kitchen,

where Granny gave me a funny look. I tilted my

head, at a loss.

"Have you seen Paul since the pauwau?"

I shook my head. Dad wasn't home yet? Back

when we lived in the city, Dad sometimes stayed

out all night and didn't show up until the next day.

I wasn't entirely worried. I guess Granny wasn't,

either, because she shrugged and went back to

frying eggs.

School was particularly mind-numbing that

morning. I think more than half of the student body

fell asleep at their tables. Mr. Red Clay didn't

even have the presence of mind to yell at us, which

told me everything I needed to know: He had had

a late night, too.

I went back to Granny's around noon for lunch.

That was when I started worrying. Dad still

wasn't home.

"Honestly..." Granny murmured.

I tried to think. I knew Dad had stayed home last

night--the minute he left the reservation, the law

stopped protecting him--but who had kept him

company? Usually it was Racine, or one of his

male friends. But Racine had come with us to

New Mexico, so she was out of the question. I had

seen Mr. At Dawn and Mr. Red Clay at the

pauwau, too.

Gabriel and Rosa had stayed home last night, I

realized.

I started north through the reserve after lunch. My

heart sank as Rafael's house loomed in view.

Gabriel and Rosa were already outside, Charity in

Rosa's arms, worry on Rosa's soft face. Mr. Little

Hawk was standing with them.

"He didn't want to cause a commotion," I heard

Mr. Little Hawk say as I drew near. He sounded

vaguely wondrous--which was just about how he

always sounded. His head wasn't quite right after

he'd suffered a stroke years ago. "That's why we

didn't call you."

"I need to call Cyrus," Gabriel said. I couldn't

decipher his tone of voice. He turned his back to

us and reached in his trouser pocket for his pager.

Rosa was the first to see me. She hurried over, as

though she was about to say something to me. She

bit her lip. Mr. Little Hawk turned around just

then, his face long, his hair brown and streaked

with gray. He noticed me; and he started to sign. I

think he had forgotten that I was mute, not deaf.

The FBI came for your father last night
, he

signed.
They arrested him.

The world around me seemed to reach a

screeching halt.

"What's going on out here?" said a bleary-looking

Mary. She came out of the house in a pair of skull-

decorated pajamas.

"The government," Rosa said. "It seems the

Department of Transportation still owns the

property rights to our houses. Even if they don't

tear them down."

Oh God, I thought, and I felt like my throat was

closing. This couldn't be happening. I thought we

were safe. I thought we had finally thrown them

off our backs--

Mary found my shoulder and squeezed it. She

knew as well as I did what this was really all

about.

Gabriel turned around. "Let's go to the tribal

council building," he said.

I thought we made for a strange motley crew, the

six of us: A man, his wife, and their infant, an ex-

stoner and a mute kid and a brain-damaged child-

man. We trekked out east and followed the lake to

the tall council building with the high-relief. Mr.

At Dawn, a member of the tribal council, was

already waiting for us inside.

"I can't imagine..." Mr. At Dawn rasped, his voice

loud and gravelly, but rueful.

"I can imagine," Gabriel said. "I wish I couldn't,

but I can. Where is he, do you know?"

"I called Nola as soon as I heard from you. She's

with him. They've got him in booking."

The strength drained slowly from my knees. I

really thought I was about to spill to the floor.

Dad. Dad in lockup. Dad in federal prison for the

crime of avenging seven--eight--murdered women.

I knew what people did to one another in prison.