“We walked over to look in his room. People cleared the way as we got to the door. Girls were crying. A couple of the guys were freaking out. Dylan was lying in his bed. His face was grey and his mouth and eyes were still open. It was pretty fucked up.”
Nick jumped in. “All of these kids who were still in the residence weren’t from Gibson. They couldn’t get a hold of their parents. Their parents couldn’t get a hold of them. So unless someone came and got them in those first few days, they were stuck there. They were abandoned. I think they all started to realize it when that kid died.”
“This was yesterday. And that’s when we really knew it was time to go,” said Kevin. He talked about how they consoled the students distraught by the death, even though they weren’t very close with non-Native classmates. It could have been their shyness and how they mostly stuck together. It also could have been racism. But chaos brought them together, even just for a moment. Kevin continued. “Some of them just got up and left. They didn’t know where they were going, just that they had to leave too. So we just waited out the rest of the day.”
But they still needed something to cart their gear, said Nick. Between them, there were four hockey bags and four gas cans. “Then I remembered the plastic sleds in storage on our floor,” he said. “They were there for students to use to go tobogganing. So we decided to take a few on the way out. We knew we’d have to double them up because they’re flimsy.”
“When we thought everyone was asleep, we went looking for them. Finding the storage room was hard, though, without turning on the flashlights. But we finally did. I guess those plastic sleds weren’t much use to anyone, because they were still there. We grabbed them and went back to the other end of the floor to take the stairs down.”
From there, they retraced their steps to the shop. The back door was as they left it, much to their relief. “So we started getting ready. We went through all the gear there and took what we thought we’d need, like a hammer, chains, a blow torch, stuff like that. We stuffed all that in the bags. I found some bungee cord, and we started tying everything to the sleds.”
“We still had to get out of there,” said Nick. “The shop door to the outside was locked. It was this big automatic garage door and we realized we were going to have to figure out how to raise it without power. We looked it up and down using the flashlights, and saw a chain connected to this box on the side. We were gonna have to smash that thing off the chain so we could pull it ourselves. And it was gonna be fuckin’ noisy.”
Kevin jumped in, his words coming faster now. “I’d seen a sledgehammer in the far corner. I went and got it and started hitting the lock thing as hard as I could.”
“I started up the machines,” said Nick, “because I knew as soon as he had that thing open, we’d have to hurry the fuck outta there.”
“But it wasn’t breaking or moving, and I dunno how many times I had to hit it. I asked Nick to take over. So he did, and it only took him a few more hits before it finally busted right off. He pulled hard on the chain to open the door. It came up real quick. And then I saw them.”
Kevin took a deep breath through his nose. He held it in for a few seconds before exhaling from his mouth to ready himself to tell this part of the story. “There were two guys in big jackets and jeans and ski masks standing right there in front of us. They must have heard the banging on the door and came over from wherever they were. They asked what was going on. They sounded like white guys. I told them to fuck off and get out of the way. Then they started coming at me.”
“They didn’t see me though,” said Nick. “So I swung the hammer at the one closest to me. I got him in the head and he went right down. The other guy was startled, so Kevin tackled him and punched him in the face a bunch of times. I told Kevin to move. He got up, and I brought the hammer down on his face.”
Nick went silent and stared at the table. His mother began to weep, while his father stared sightlessly at the wall.
Kevin looked at his friend, whose face was stoic. “They were ready to kill us,” he reassured him. “We got right on those snowmobiles. The sleds holding the supplies were tied tight to the back. We didn’t have time to think, so we just ripped right out of there. I knew that wherever those guys came from, there were probably more like them. We went straight for the street to find our way out of town. We kept the headlamps off. It was still dark, so we didn’t see anything. Luckily.”
They found the road north and rode until the sun came up. Once they were safe inside the forest, they stopped to eat and refuel. They rode again until they found the hydro line, following it until they arrived at the outskirts of the rez and ran into Isaiah, Evan, and Tyler.
No one said anything at first. Nick’s mom wiped her eyes. Joanne rubbed Kevin’s back. Evan stood up and walked over to light the sage again. He picked up the feather that lay beside the shell and fanned the smudge gently. He approached the young men and their family, who all took their turns receiving the smudge. Afterwards, he left the shell in the middle of the table.
Terry stared at the orange embers of dried leaves and stems. The smoke thickened and rose. Still fixed on the medicine, he broke the silence. “Chi-miigwech, niniwag,” he softly muttered. “Thank you to our brave young men for sharing their story. You’ve been through a great deal. You’ve survived. You made it all the way back home against incredible odds. We are thankful.”
“Howah,” said Walter and Jeff in agreement.
There was an eerie calm to Terry’s voice, as if he hadn’t yet registered the implications of what he had just heard. “Go home now and be with your families. You need to rest, and you need to eat.”
“We’ll figure out what to do next,” Terry went on. “But for now, on behalf of council, I ask you not to tell anyone yet about what happened down there. People here are already scared — we gotta make sure we don’t set them off any more. So please, try to keep a low profile for the next day if you can. We can’t afford to have this whole place fall apart. We need a plan.”
Fourteen
“Holy shit.” Nicole collapsed into her chair and pressed her palms on the table. “Is this for real?”
Evan nodded.
“What are we going to do?”
He sighed. “We have to stay calm,” he said. “Everyone is gonna hear all about this pretty soon. We have to make sure things don’t fall apart around here.”
“Well, will we be okay?”
“We have enough food, wood, gas, and other stuff to keep us going until spring. We’ll be fine here at home. My parents will be fine. So will yours.”
“What about Cam? What about some of the other people who aren’t ready?”
“We’ll have to help them to make sure they stay warm and have food to eat.”
“Jesus, winter has barely even started. What about the power?”
“We’ll have to talk about that tomorrow with council. There’s only enough diesel to last until probably February at the latest. That’s going at full power though. Luckily most people have been conserving like we asked. Some trucks were supposed to come to deliver more diesel. But we can’t count on that now.”
“It feels like the end of the world.” Nicole stared into the darkness out the window over Evan’s shoulder.
“Don’t panic. We’ll figure this out. Look at us here in this house — we’re always ready for this kind of thing.”
“It’s not us I’m worried about.”
Evan walked around to her side of the table and wrapped his arms around her. He bent down and kissed her cheek softly. She sniffed back tears and squeezed his arm. “We’ll be alright,” he whispered.
She pushed back from the table and embraced him. Her long black hair draped over his hands where he held her close. She let go and stepped back, leading him by the hand out of the kitchen. He turned off the light on the way out and followed her to the bedroom.
T
heir love for each other had been with them since childhood and it had been physical for nearly a decade. The only person each knew intimately was the other.
They’d hardly even been apart: Nicole had left the reserve after high school to pursue a diploma in early childhood education in the city to the south, but two months in, she was homesick, with few friends outside of kids from other First Nations, and she returned to Evan and their community for good the following spring.
Nicole took off her clothes in the darkness and heard Evan’s belt unbuckle and zipper come down on the other side of the bed. She climbed into bed, eager to feel the skin of her lover against hers. They embraced under the thick covers, taking refuge in their warm pocket of sanctuary from the dangerous outside chill. They stoked the fire that began between them all those years ago.
Fifteen
Walter Meegis sat behind the desk in the shop’s lunchroom. He leaned his chair back and propped his heavy steel-toed winter boots on the table. His jacket was wide open, and under it he wore a flannel shirt tucked into his jeans.
Chief Terry paced back and forth while Dave Meegis pored over invoices, charts, and documents about energy consumption, with Evan and Isaiah looking over his shoulders. To Evan, the numbers just bled together on the page and Isaiah looked equally bewildered. Dave was muttering to himself and neither wanted to interrupt him.
The front door blasted open and a rush of cold air followed. Evan’s parents stomped in, shaking off the snow that had fallen into their hoods and coated their shoulders and sleeves. Another snowfall was blanketing the community.
“Gbakdem na?” called Dan. “You boys hungry?” He held a big steel pot, almost as wide as his torso, and Patricia carried bulging black canvas bags in each hand. Her glasses had fogged up in the sudden warmth, and she peered over them as she walked towards the small group.
Dan dropped the pot onto the table suspiciously near Walter’s raised feet and chuckled. Walter pretended to scowl as he dropped his boots to the floor. “Got some stew for yas,” Dan said. “Pat’s got the bannock and bowls and stuff.”
“Here ya go, boys,” Patricia said, as she placed the bags on the table.
“Chi-miigwech, Pat,” said Walter.
“No, you guys are the ones to thank. Keeping this place going.”
“Well, we’re doing what we can. I just wish we could tell everyone for sure when this will all be fixed.”
“Ah, don’t worry about it,” she said with a shrug. “They can cope. Most of us didn’t even have hydro or running water when we were kids!”
“Yeah, people around here sure got soft, eh?”
They both cackled, and the men around them chuckled. If only they knew, Evan thought.
“Okay, well we better let you boys get back to work,” said Dan. “Enjoy the miijim.”
“Chi-miigwech!” they all said, almost in unison as Evan’s parents walked back out to their truck.
“What the fuck are we supposed to tell people, anyway?” blurted Dave.
“We’ll get to that,” Terry replied. “We can’t let this get out of hand right now. I’m hungry!” He went to the pot, filled his bowl, grabbed a piece of bannock, and sat down.
Evan followed suit and sat down next to him. The bannock was still warm. His mouth watered and he realized he hadn’t eaten since early morning. He dipped a corner of the fried dough into the thick liquid and shoved it in his mouth. The savoury sauce overpowered even the heavy salt in the bread. Before long, all of the men were eating.
Back at his table, Dave swallowed his last bite and spoke up. “Alright,” he said, looking down at the sheets of paper spread out before him. “I have some good news and some bad news. What do you want first?”
“Don’t fuck around, Dave. Just tell us what we need to know,” ordered Terry.
Dave slid his glasses down his nose and pushed up the sleeves of his grey hoodie, revealing the faded blue tattoos on his forearms. “Fine,” he said, rearranging a few of the sheets. “According to last year’s energy usage, we have enough diesel to last us until the end of February, at the latest. That’s what we thought all along. But if we push conservation on the people like we’ve been doing since we fired these back up, we may be able to stretch that until the end of March. Maybe even April. It all depends on how much wood people have. And if they get lazy.
“Since there’s no guarantee we’ll even get diesel again, I recommend we go ahead as we have been. We may as well ease them into spring. If people don’t play along and we end up losing it all halfway through the winter, there’ll be total fuckin’ chaos. There’ll for sure be death.”
“We have to break the news to them soon,” Terry muttered, resting his face in his hands. “People are antsy and they deserve to know. We’ll hold another meeting. We’re in a crisis and everyone’s survival depends on cooperation. They’re gonna panic again. It might get ugly but it has to be done. Eventually, they’ll get used to it.”
“When should we do it?” asked Dave.
“Tomorrow afternoon. That’ll give these boys a chance to get the roads nice and clear. And this time, we definitely have to feed them.”
“How do you suggest doing that?” said Evan.
“The cache. That’s the only way.”
Stored in a bunker below the garage at the water treatment plant was a massive cache of non-perishable food for emergency measures. A fortified secret pantry was also hidden behind one of the garage’s brick walls. Thousands upon thousands of cans and boxes had been stored there for nearly two decades. Connection to the world to the south could be disrupted easily, so the chief and council of the time had passed a resolution outlining a well-maintained and updated cache of goods that could keep upwards of five hundred people fed for at least two years. Few people besides councillors knew the extent of it or where it was stored, although its existence was generally known. Gossip spread quickly in this small community, so those with specific knowledge of the food cache had kept it to themselves to protect it from raiding before it was actually needed. No one had ever really taken a prolonged disconnection from the South seriously, though.
“We’ll decide what we’ll need to get out of there that morning,” Terry went on. “It won’t be that hard to heat everything up. There’ll be more people than last time.”
“Alright,” agreed Walter. He turned to look at Evan and Isaiah. “Evan and Izzy, you guys go get Tyler and start ploughing wherever is needed. Then it looks like we’ve got to send out more notices.”
Sixteen
The angle of the sun was getting lower as the days crept closer to the winter solstice. Sunlight bounced off the pure sheen of the snow that now lay in deep piles. The wind had dropped and the air was brisk and peaceful. It nipped in nostrils and carried the smoke of furnaces and fireplaces from one end of the rez to the other. It was an idyllic winter day, even with the official beginning of the season a few weeks away, for those following the calendar. The solitude comforted Evan as he leaned against the side of the truck, smoking.
He was parked in the empty lot of the Northern. There had been no traffic here for a week. Donny Jones had shut it down shortly after the melee that emptied his shelves. There was still no contact from head office in Toronto. Some suspected Donny of hoarding food and supplies, and Evan worried that Donny’s house would be targeted and that he and his family might get hurt. Along with the snow, paranoia was rising.
Evan peered past the snowy field beyond the store. The pine and spruce trees in the distance were perfectly still. He saw no wildlife. The dogs stuck to the heart of the rez, where there was more opportunity for scraps. They would be the first to go hungry if things grew more desperate. Soon the lines of their ribs would appear through their mangy coats.
If he had more time, and his snowshoes with him, he would have traipsed through that snowy field to look for tracks. But he was on the clock, waiting for Tyler and Isaiah
to finish up their last rounds and meet here before delivering notices throughout the First Nation.
Evan pinched off the end of his smoke and stepped on the remnants. He was beginning to run low. If there was no way to get to the closest town or city, there was no way to get manufactured smokes. Filtered cigarettes would become a luxury. He snorted — this was one way to finally quit. As he opened the door and stepped up on the metal runner to get back into the warm cab, he heard the buzz of a snowmobile. It startled him, so he stepped back down to the ground. He tried to remember if it was the first he’d heard since Kevin and Nick had arrived home.
He looked across the field and then back toward the heart of the rez. Nothing. Yet the sound built, coming from the service road. He felt butterflies in his gut.
A snowmobile emerged through the trees, kicking snow high into the air. This machine was bigger than the ones Kevin and Nick had rolled in on. And even from this distance, the driver appeared tall and burly. Whoever it was blazed through the snow, easily controlling the machine and the heavy trailer attached to it.
Who the hell could that be? It didn’t look like a machine from the rez. Kevin and Nick hadn’t said if they’d mentioned their escape to anyone in Gibson. Was it someone who came from down there? Why would they come all the way here?
The hum intensified, and Evan remembered that he was still alone. He looked back up the road and didn’t see his friends’ trucks. He was going to be the sole contact at the de facto gate to the rez.
Evan stepped back up into the cab, reached for the rifle behind the bench, and switched off the safety. He realized he was likely in the driver’s sight now, so he stepped back to the ground and looped his arm through the red strap to rest the loaded gun behind his shoulder. He didn’t want to have to use it.
He rolled his head around his neck to ease the tension in his shoulders. He looked back up the road. Still, no trucks. He squeezed and released his fists rapidly in his thin thermal gloves.
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