Annie Muktuk and Other Stories

by Norma Dunning

  “We are supposed to get to Nueltin, Jo. But if you want to stay here for another day, then fine. Whatever.”

  “Go get the weed out of the tent. Please, Elipsee. We’re going to burn it right now in the morning fire.”

  Elipsee returns. She has all ten of our dime bags in her hands. Two fistfuls. She looks at me and asks, “Are you sure?”

  I nod. “Elipsee, I have a lot to tell you this morning. Can we talk?”

  “Finally,” she sighs and sits on the little log. “How do you know we have to do this?”

  “Our grandfathers told me to.”

  “But Jo, you don’t know the old ways, the old life. You run away from it all the time. And why do you get to talk to our grandpas? You? Of all people in our community.”

  “I don’t know why. All I know is that they were here this morning and they told me to do this today.”

  “Here! This morning and you didn’t wake me up! You asshole!”

  “Elipsee, please don’t swear. Gimme that stuff. It’s time to get rid of it.”

  She puts five of the dimes into my hand. I look at her and ask, “Is there something we should say before we make this offering?”

  “Yeah, ‘rub-a-dub-dub…’”

  “Stop it! Elipsee, you’ve always known more than me. Is there anything we should say?”

  She closes her eyes. Her earrings wave happily at me. Her atigi shimmers with beaded fringes as she raises her pot-filled hand over the fire.

  “Isuaruti.” She whispers, “That means, ‘heal us’ OK Jo? Say it with me.”

  I raise my pot-filled hand as well and together we say, “Isuaruti.” Together we drop the baggies into the fire. Together we watch them burn, smelling one high after another move heavenward.

  I reach out my hands to her and we lock tight to each other’s knuckles. We smile because we each know we have done something right. Today we started to seek something new. Today we started to find what is old.

  “Well the pot is gone. Porridge is eaten. Now what do we do, Jo?” Elipsee is cranky. She’s jealous. I know she thinks I’m making the grandpas story up.

  “Let’s go get some birds for supper!” I’m excited. When I was a kid my dad and I would go out with our slingshots and chase birds around the tundra. Oh, it was fun and I was so happy out there with him.

  Once TV came into the settlement we stopped. Dad would still ask me to go, but there was so much of the real world to see on the television. Why spend your time running around outside? Besides I was in high school and had plans of going to college. Chasing birds around would not help me any in the real world. The world that existed below the 58th parallel.

  Elipsee sighs. Looks straight into my eyes and says, “Like you know how? Come on, Jo. You brought a shotgun—we’ll have to kill a dozen birds just to be able to get a half a pound of meat to fry up! God! You’ll go out there and blast the shit out of them!”

  “Don’t be a sour sport Elipsee—let’s go. I brought two slingshots. It’ll be fun. Come on! And by the way—stop swearing.”

  In the tent I find the two slingshots. They were bought to get after all the dogs in the community. Once the babies came and started walking I didn’t want the local mutts surrounding them. I used them for animal control, now I am using them for food.

  “See. Look Elipsee—see them. Let’s go have some real fun.”

  Elipsee reaches down and starts to fold the blanket from the log.

  “What are you doing?” I ask her.

  “Taking a blanket. Might as well gather some twigs and moss while we’re out there.”

  I’m impressed. That’s my Northern girl. She thinks of everything.

  We walk along our treeless Northern desert. I feel like I am looking at it for the first time. It is an amazing site of grey boulders, lichen-laden, tiny flowers bouncing around our feet and the air is perfectly crisp. For the first time I feel like I am walking on ground that can only be called one word. Home.

  Elipsee is silent. Walking next to me in her stunning traditional garb. Today my heart is happy. I wish hers was too.

  Sneaking. Silently slinking on the cool ground. Pebble perched on the rubber band of the slingshot. Elipsee behind me, holding her breath the way we all do when we are at a horror movie. Maybe this is a horror movie to her.

  My hand trembles slightly as I pull the elastic to a taut line. Zap! I hit the grouse in the head. She spins, dizzy from the pain. I reload with another pebble. Zap! Two stones for one bird. This is the best game ever!

  She drops. Elipsee claps. I sigh. I can’t believe I managed to do this. Geez, I’m good. Maybe I do have a bit of hunter-man somewhere in my DNA. I stand up proud.

  “Dinner for two!” I exclaim.

  Neither of us say it but we are both amazed by this success. Elipsee smiles that winner smile. She may be getting over herself.

  “Jo, congratulations! A good kill! Dinner for two over an open fire—no restaurant in New York would ever make something as good as this is going to taste.”

  “Ah, now Elipsee. Let’s not exaggerate. Those cooks in New York won’t know what to do with this—whities.”

  We both chuckle.

  “Hey, see that big rock over there—let’s roll it!”

  “Rock and roll—old-style, husband?” Elipsee grins.

  We begin our game of tundra bowling. When we were kids we used to go out and just roll the tundra rock around. We’d make castles and forts and igloos and cairns. We didn’t make inukshuks though. That was serious stuff for serious hunters.

  We are sweating and laughing. Rolling, rumbling over the land. Our happy squeals of laughter are the only sounds to be heard. We have it all right now, in this moment. We are all those words that describe happiness. Contentment. Bliss.

  Rocks tumble down small hills and we laugh at them. We decide to build a fort and in it all we talk about is how much Jake and Luke would love this. As we build and build and build, piling heavy tundra rock one on top of the next, we ask each other why we have never done this with our own kids.

  We have made a jumbled mess of merry rock statues. We stand back and admire it all. I wrap my arm around Elipsee’s shoulder and smile into her dancing eyes.

  “We need to give it a name.” I declare, “What should it be? You, my Elipsee, will name this creation.”

  I wait as Elipsee’s face wanders off to the horizon.

  “Saimu,” says Elipsee with her eyes grinning into mine.

  “Aw, now—Elipsee, now you’re getting Catholic on me,” I tease.

  “How come you know that word, Jo?”

  “I don’t know. When we are here alone it’s like all the words I heard as a kid come back. I don’t know why I can understand out here but not in town. I don’t know.”

  “This is good, Jo. Our Saimu—it will greet those who come after us to this place. It will give them the peace it has given us. Let’s go back to camp and rest. It’s been a good morning.”

  As we walk back with our dead bird dangling from my belt, we hold hands. In unison we stop and pick up some moss and twigs. We hear only the sounds of the birds around us. We see only the shrubs and tiny flowers and the clearest blue of skies. We smell the cool summer air and think we are millionaires.

  It is the first time since Elipsee’s diagnosis that we didn’t start our day talking about her disease. It is the first time in so many months that we only got up and looked at today. It is as if we have silently made a pact.

  We don’t need to have breast cancer be our daily focus. We can live and play and fight and still have a life. Cancer, after all, is only a word.

  We are back in bed. It’s so fun. Being in bed with Elipsee. Hammering myself into herself. I don’t know if it was eating the lard-fried bird or the good air or the rock rolling. I don’t know which one of them is the aphrodisiac. All I know is this is the topper to a terrific day.

  We fall away from each other exhausted. Rivers of sweat are moving in strong currents on our sleeping bag.

>   “God, that was good!” says Elipsee in broken breaths. I can only nod. What a workout, better than any elliptical machine at the gym!

  “I think that was the best time ever. Don’t you, Jo?” Here it comes—the talking. I nod again taking a huge bundle of air back into my lungs.

  “Best yet,” I agree as I try to snuggle into her back.

  “How come, do you think?” Here it comes. Make it stop, I think to myself. The deep analysis of why this was the best time yet.

  Elipsee wiggles around to face me. I can’t get away from this.

  “I think it’s the fresh air,” I say. That seems to sum things up for me. We don’t need to go into more detail.

  “I think it’s cause we burned the pot. I think this is the spirits’ way of blessing us.”

  “Of course. The spirits would have nothing to do with how I moved my tongue around that hot body of yours or the way I used my hands to…”

  “Jo! You know what I mean—we’re doing the right thing so we get the right thing given back to us.”

  “Well, let’s never go home—let’s just stay put and keep killing birds and rolling rocks and all that other stuff.”

  “Have I offended your manhood?” asks Elipsee, sliding her tongue around her lips.

  “I’ll give you manhood!” I nab her and tickle her sticky armpits. Her laughter boils over and we both end up tangled in the sleeping bag. A giant pretzel made of down.

  “OK, Jo. Stop! We better settle down.”

  As we shake the sleeping bag into a fluttering, flat square I hear the sound again.

  “Ja-ja, oma, oma, ja-ja.”

  Soft words that are being whispered with a limp drumbeat. Outside of the tent again.

  “Do you hear it Elipsee?” I ask, frozen on my naked knees.

  “What, Jo?”

  “The ja-jas are back. Please tell me you hear it.”

  “Where? By the fire again?”

  “Come with me this time,” I ask as I struggle back into my black sweats and a woollen sweater.

  Elipsee is still. “Maybe I’m not allowed. Maybe you should ask first.”

  I pop my head out of the tent and ask in a low voice, “Can Elipsee come along?”

  Twin white-haired heads nod.

  “Yes,” I whisper back to her. “Put on your attigi.”

  “Right—the attigi that I can’t see. Really Jo, we have to talk…”

  “Elipsee, please. It’s our Elders. Hurry!”

  I sit down first. Next to my grandpa. He smells like his old cabin. A mixture of new furs and fire smoke. It’s a good smell, the kind you wish they would bottle and sell. “Old Inuit” instead of “Old Spice.”

  “Hey boy, give your old grandpa a smooch,” he smirks.

  I lean over and plant the wettest kiss my lips can contain. Then I add a big long lick, covering his entire cheek.

  We break into squished chuckles. Bellies moving up and down together. I reach over and snap his strong hand into mine.

  Elipsee squirms out of the tent like a worm. Arms moving forward, pull, butt high in the air, pull.

  I look over and jab Grandpa’s ribs, “Eh, look at that eh! That’s mine!”

  We both continue our giggling. Arloo hoots.

  Elipsee stands, looking confused. “Jo, there’s no one here—what’s all this about? You’re laughing by yourself out here. You made us burn the pot. The angakkug told me not to bring the white medicine so I know you’re not on any sort of relaxing kinda stuff. What are you really doing?”

  I bring my right index finger up to my mouth. “Ssshhh,” is my only reply. Elipsee stands still. Black flies dance quick circles around her body, in the grey of tonight her attigi shines.

  The grandpas and I look into the fire and minutes dribble past. My watch and the “tick, tick, tick” of it ring out like a loud church bell.

  Finally I look over at Arloo and Ayaranee and ask, “How long should we leave her like this?”

  Arloo smiles, “Not much longer. She was a yappy sort of kid. Always asking questions, never listening hard enough.” His smile widens. “I’m enjoying having her be quiet for once.”

  “Me too,” I add with a smile. All of us break into more laughter, cackles flicker around the campfire.

  “Jo, come on—where are they? Ataatatsiaq! Arloo!” she’s yelling. Her cries get louder, jetting across the tundra. Not a sound is returned.

  “Ataatatsiaq! Arlooooooo!” She appears to be working herself into a lather of sorts.

  I look towards Arloo and shrug.

  Arloo stands and opens his arms. It takes Elipsee a few minutes and then I hear her yelp. The same friendly yelp our huskies speak when they see someone they know. Elipsee is in the arms of her grandpa and tears flood her cheekbones. Tears that get mixed in with snot. Tears turning into happy goo and dripping from our chins. I have not seen her this happy in months.

  She snuggles into Arloo like a baby looking for a nipple. Snorts, snuggles and more snorts and snuggles. She is in the arms of someone she loves. Grandpa Ayaranee slaps my knee.

  “This is all good, boy.”

  “Ayaranee,” moans Elipsee, shocked back into reality. She wraps an arm around him and squeezes herself onto our log. We look like an upright checkerboard. Red, black, red, black.

  “Jo said things but I didn’t believe him. I’m sorry you guys. I am truly sorry.”

  The grandpas nod. We each turn our eyes towards the fire. Moments of silence pass. Elipsee and I are waiting. Waiting for their words. Waiting to hear what they have to say. Waiting for the big moment. The moment of healing.

  Arloo clears his throat. “I’m not a magic man, a shaman or the angakkug. I am only a man who lived the life of an Inuk. I didn’t go to a white man’s school but I know a little about reading and counting. I know how to read the sky. I know how to read the land. I know how to read the birds. I know how to count in white ways. I understand how many pelts equals money in the bank and what that money can get for my family. This is all I know.”

  Ayaranee clears his throat. “I’m not a magic man, a shaman or angakkug either. I am only a man who lived the life of an Inuk. I didn’t go to a white man’s school either and learned only to read the sky, land and birds too. I understand money, how it works, what it does and doesn’t do. We know that your body is sick, Elipsee. We know that you look to the spirits for help and take white medicine. We came to tell you only one thing.”

  Anticipation grows in the silence of the moment.

  Arloo leans forward a little. Looking into Elipsee’s eyes he tells her, “Stop the struggle. Unataqpaa.”

  That’s it? “Stop the struggle.” We sit as still as possible. Hearts waiting for more.

  Elipsee nods as if she understands. I don’t get it.

  Ayaranee takes a breath and speaks in our language. He is talking so fast that I can’t keep up. Elipsee is still nodding. She understands everything. I feel like a broken runner on a sled. Tipping to one side, out of control.

  “Hey!” I put my hand up, palm out. “Hey, slow down for a second. I don’t get all of what is being said.”

  Elipsee is calm. She reaches over, pats my hand and smiles that incredible smile. “I do.”

  “Well, that makes everything better, doesn’t it?” I’m miffed. As I strap my arms across my chest I say, “I saw them first.”

  The grandpas laugh. I’m still annoyed.

  “Come on, you guys. Stop that. I saw you first. I get first dibs. It’s like riding shotgun—sort of.”

  The grandpas laugh even more. Elipsee is trying not to look at me but she is soon caught up in the laughter. Chuckles snowball to laughter to hoots to woots to tears falling down on the fire and making small singe noises. The singe noises grow and soon they are like the firecrackers we used to set off as kids on Nunavut Day. It’s pouring singes and finally I give up and join in.

  It feels like a long time of belly shaking has passed and like the slowing down of a boat motor our laughter gears down to a f
ull stop. Boat motors and grandpas have both faded away.

  “Stop the struggle,” I whisper as I wipe the tears from my eyes.

  “It’s just us, Jo,” Elipsee says as she looks around. “It’s just us.”

  We wrap our arms around each other, my hand rubbing her bum.

  “Well, what do we do now?” I ask Elipsee.

  “We sleep. In the morning we go home to our boys.”

  “But the angakkug?”

  “It’s OK, Jo. The grandpas said.”

  I have never again slept that soundly. One night out there in the middle of nowhere brought me the deepest and calmest of sleeps. One night when the grandpas laughed and talked and told us to “stop the struggle” brought me back to where I always should have been.

  Elipsee passed away three months later. I never re-married but every summer I take our sons out to our playing spot. Every summer I take Jake Arloo Jr. and Luke Ayaranee Jr. to see our first rock pile we called “Saimu.”

  The Road Show Eskimo

  “THIS AMAUTI IS GETTING TIGHTER,” she muttered out loud to her empty bedroom.

  “I have to wear it though,” she thought to herself. Pulling and stretching at the cloth fabric as she bent forward to the floor and then twisting and twisting her back, stretching the amauti over her aging body. Standing up red-faced, she giggled to herself as she smoothed the wrinkles from the greying cotton women’s jacket. Maybe white people did this better. They stand upright and zip.

  She knew if she didn’t wear it then the essence would be lost. One thing white people wanted to see was tradition. Tradition started with how you looked. Her wrinkled, liver-spotted hands, the fingertips bent with arthritis slid along her dresser top. Those earrings with the dangling ulus—where are they? They were important too. She found them nearing the end of the dresser, a little dusty but all she had to do was blow the lint off. Whoosh! and spackled grey dots filled the bedroom. Standing in front of her full-length mirror, squinting her slanted eyes, she felt for the tiny hole on each stretched and saggy earlobe.