As with most upset people, the trinity of her voice, her temper, and her blood pressure were all rising to the challenge. The boy across the cigarette-burned Formica table had been the bright light at the end of her dark tunnel. Literally, her white knight in denim armor.
But now, he was dumping her at Gretchen’s German Food Extravaganza. And what was definitely making things worse, far worse than all of the heartbreak, was the potential of hearing her father say those hated words: I told you so. Tiffany would have suffered through a thousand physics tests, kissed the ugliest boy in school, or washed her father’s clothes, including his underwear, rather than give him a reason to gloat.
“You . . .” Tiffany tried to find something witty and cruel to say to her betrayer, who was now stuffing his face with fries. But she reverted to her already-accurate assessment. “. . . prick.”
Tony squirmed in his seat. Right now he wished he was in his car far away, instead of sitting here on the edge of a reserve containing 1,100 Native people, breaking the heart of a girl who was quite probably related to half of them. And whose father shot a scarecrow effigy of him.
“Ah, Tiffany, I’m not good at this stuff. It’s for the best, okay?” Out of a nervous habit, he kept ending his sentences asking for confirmation that what he was doing was the right thing. The only problem was, he kept asking the wrong person. “Don’t make this difficult. Let’s make this quick and as painless as possible, okay? Do you wanna go now?”
Though upset, Tiffany weighed her options. The plate of fries sitting innocently in front of her provided her with several courses of action. Throw them in his face: the result being great satisfaction. Throw them at the window: less satisfaction, and evoking some sort of disturbing the peace/destroying private property charge. Be a bigger person and walk away: extreme lack of satisfaction but no criminal charges. Decisions, decisions, thought Tiffany.
“You’re being awfully quiet,” said her nervous now ex-boyfriend. Maybe he should have done this over the phone liked he’d planned.
Tiffany decided on option number four, a recently and quickly conceived alternative. Getting up from her seat, she grabbed the plate of fries and the bottle of ketchup, and started walking for the door. Knowing something was up, Tony followed. “Uh, Tiffany, where are you going? Talk to me? Tiffany . . . ?”
Paying no attention, Tiffany poured the entire contents of the ketchup bottle on the plate of fries. Sally-Ann couldn’t help notice her customers moving about as she poured the trucker yet another cup of coffee. Plus the fact that they were walking out without paying their bill, the girl carrying one of the diner’s plates and a bottle of the diner’s finest ketchup.
Sally-Ann yelled to Tiffany, “Hey, come back here. That’s Gretchen’s plate! And I got your bill right here. You don’t pay it, it comes out of my pocket.”
Intent on her mission, Tiffany kept walking, focused and silent. Sally-Ann quickly ran out from behind the counter and followed Tony, who was following Tiffany out the door, all the time trying to get her attention. The trucker didn’t care. He took a sip of his fresh coffee as Sally-Ann disappeared outside. Once alone, he put a fist full of packaged sugar into his pocket.
Out in the parking lot and halfway to his car, Tony caught up with the marching Tiffany. “Come on, Tiff, don’t act this way. You don’t want to do anything stupid, right?”
Finally, Tiffany spoke. “Don’t I? What exactly is your definition of stupid, Tony?”
Sally-Ann wasn’t far behind them, though the seven hours she’d been on her feet made it difficult. “Yo, buddy, here’s your bill and, kid, give me back that plate!”
Again Tiffany spoke. “You want the plate, go and get it.” Sally-Ann recognized the girl’s tone from several run-ins she’d had with her own daughters. She knew anything could happen next. And it did.
The fall evening was still quite warm, and on the way out of the village, Tiffany had kept her car window open to let the fresh breeze in. Tony’s car was air-conditioned, but it wasn’t really warm enough to need it. So, as a result, the plate of french fries went sailing effortlessly through the open window to smash against Tony’s closed window, scattering fries and ketchup throughout the light-blue interior of his car in a kinetic explosion of rear-view mirror, fried food, condiment, and cheap crockery.
Tony and Sally-Ann stopped in their tracks. Tiffany turned to face them. Yep, option number four had definitely been the appropriate response. It’s a pity they don’t grade clever stuff like this in school, she thought.
“Now that felt good,” said Tiffany.
“My . . . my car,” stammered Tony.
“You’ll have to pay for that plate,” contributed the shocked waitress. She paused for a second before adding, “and the fries.”
“Pay the lady, Tony,” answered a very satisfied Tiffany. As an afterthought, Tiffany reached over and grabbed the weekah root dangling around Tony’s neck and yanked with all her might. A leather thong is notoriously hard to break and requires a considerable amount of effort. Tony’s head bobbed like a squirrel landing on a skinny branch.
“Ow!” he yelled as Tiffany turned and walked away, stuffing the weekah in her pocket with a few bits of Tony’s skin attached as a bonus.
NINETEEN
IT WAS A LONG WALK home for Tiffany. Needless to say, Tony did not offer her a ride back to the reserve. Nor did she ask for or want one. She could have phoned any number of relatives but embarrassment prevented her. There was an old Anishinabe saying: “It is always better to walk home than be carried home.” Besides, it would give her time to think and calm down. Theoretically, it shouldn’t take her longer than an hour or so, depending on the enthusiasm of her walking.
Tony was probably two-thirds of the way home by now. Or maybe he was over at Julie’s already. Or, if there was justice in the world, he was sitting on top of his car as it floated near the far end of Otter Lake, having mysteriously gone off the side as he drove along Riverview Road. No, no . . . maybe he swerved to avoid hitting a deer and it made him plow into the water, where he and his precious vehicle now floated. For all eternity. Yeah, she’d settle for that.
So, under the growing moon, she made her way home. It had been a long time since she’d walked this far. She was just happy she wasn’t in those shoes Granny Ruth had bought her, then her feet would really be hurting by now. As much as she hated to admit it, there was a beautiful quality to the night. During her long hike home, she thought her thoughts as she caught glimpses of the bats dashing and darting through the darkness. Occasionally, she spotted a shooting star—but what to wish for.
The last few days had been long, complicated, and a handful emotionally. And still, she didn’t know what the world held for her. In another few years she’d be out of school, and she’d hoped to see her future suddenly appear in a flash of inspiration, her life’s path laid out and organized. She’d heard this happened to other people quite frequently. Religious people hear God’s calling. Artists and writers feel destined to do something artistic since childhood. But Tiffany was becoming worried that destiny had forgotten her along the way. Like Tony had.
Now Tony was gone. Just like her mother. Last she’d heard, Claudia was in Edmonton, starting up a new life with what’s-his-name. Maybe Tiffany was more like her mother than her father. After all, they both had ended up with white boyfriends. But Claudia’s new relationship seemed to be working out. Ted. . . that was his name. Thinking of her mother depressed Tiffany even further.
When the breakup first happened, Claudia had delicately proposed the idea of Tiffany moving with her. While Tiffany’s relationship with her father was never as strong as with her mother, Claudia had broken up the family. Therefore, she was the real villain in Tiffany’s mind, no matter what she said in fights with her dad. Plus, Claudia had already indicated that she might leave Otter Lake and that was unacceptable. All Tiffany’s friends were here, and the separation was embarrassing enough. So her mother finally left the community for her new life.
For a brief period, Claudia had attempted to keep in touch, but it became evident pretty soon that neither Keith nor Tiffany were interested in maintaining communication.
Tiffany missed her mom, even though, much like her dad, she didn’t really understand what went wrong in their family. Sure, a whole bunch of kids on the reserve and in school had things like this happen all the time, but that was other people. Single-parenting was more popular around here than The Simpsons. Her dad had been hurt by Claudia’s actions. But the pain and confusion of Claudia’s departure had driven a wedge between them. And neither was doing a good job at removing that wedge. As a result, Tiffany was walking four miles home in the middle of the night, afraid and unwilling to call her father, while Keith, on the other hand, was sitting at home considering the many different ways to punish her.
As she kicked a pebble off the shoulder of the road, a bright glow appeared over the hill she had just crested. It meant a car was coming, probably returning from town. Wanting to escape further embarrassment, Tiffany jumped down into the ditch. The last thing she needed right now were some nosy relatives questioning her about her peculiar late-night walk. As she huddled in the dirt and the darkness, waiting for the car to pass, Tiffany couldn’t help thinking how far she had fallen in such a short period of time.
Maybe tomorrow would be a better day, she hoped. The unfortunate thing was, today had not yet finished.
Pierre was running through the forest as fast as he could, which under most circumstances would be considered pretty fast. If human eyes could have seen him, there would have been precious few words in English or Anishinabe to describe his overland flight. His feet hit the pine-carpeted forest floor with barely a whisper or a misplaced needle. He moved like a shadow and left as much evidence. Speed, agility, and silence were his only companions. Fallen logs disappeared behind him. Gullies and fences were barely noticed. He cleared a small stream with the apparent ease of the fog rolling in off the lake. He ran so quickly that even the bats envied his speed.
It was the exhilaration of existence that pushed him on faster and faster. It was a feeling he had not felt in a very long time. Air in his lungs, his heart pumping, it almost made him feel alive. He ran past an errant deer without breaking a sweat. If he could sweat. But even men such as Pierre L’Errant have limits, and he was fast approaching his. With almost no nourishment in several days, he was weaker than he had been in a long time, and it affected his endurance. His blood burned and his stomach ached for sustenance. But he denied himself the luxury of his nightly feeding. He had fed enough over the long years, and a new dawn had arisen in his existence. It was time to change. Pierre was determined to see his journey home to the end. Ceremonies must be performed, protocols must be followed before it was all over.
Weakening, he began to slow down. The blur became more recognizable, until finally Pierre came to a stop and leaned against an aging pine tree, trying to recover his breath. Half of the tree was dead, filled with termite holes and displaying evidence of decades of massive woodpecker attacks. At best it had only a few more winters left in it before gravity became stronger than its roots. One time that pine tree had been young, just like he had. Now they had both seen too much and lived through too many years.
Maybe he had known that tree when he was young. Perhaps as a child he had tripped over it in play, or maybe shot an arrow into its side as he struggled to become a warrior. It was unimportant. The past was the past. Pierre had long ago given up the notion of changing the past, for it was a harsh mistress, and it would change for no one. Only the present and the future were his to mold.
Owl was lonely. He sat in his room, as he had done for days and weeks and months, in this far-off land called France. The journey across the vast water they called an ocean had been long, and he had been made sick by the motion of the ship. And the journey to this hollow stone mountain called a “palace” had also been long and arduous. The food, the clothes, the land, everything about this place was different. And Owl had long ago become tired of different.
He wanted to go home. He missed his family. His missed the beautiful nights, the laughter of his people, the village he had once thought of as boring. Over here, much like in Montreal, even the air smelled funny. But the young man had no way of getting home. It was much too far to walk, let alone swim. So here he sat, in this room for long stretches of time, until he was beckoned by their king to wander out among these strange people. They wanted him to talk Anishinabe, sing some of their sacred songs, and prance around like some animal. They were a strange people, these French.
Owl thought of his parents, his sister, and all his friends and relatives, wondering if he would ever see them again. Slowly, little by little, the young boy was beginning to hate white people. Hating what they had done to him. Why they had left him in this strange place? Why wouldn’t they let him return home? He wished there was some way to get back at them.
The only bright light in his now-dismal life was a girl. He had seen her frequently from across the courtyard, and occasionally she brought him his food. She appeared to be about his age, but had light brown hair and striking green eyes. The different-colored eyes of these white people never failed to amaze the young man.
The longer Pierre stayed on his ancestral land, the more memories came flooding back. But first things first, he had to find the place to hold the ceremony. He had come home with very specific needs and plans. This was his second night here and he had allowed himself the luxury of reveling in his past, but that time was over. It was now time to move on. Once more he scaled a tall tree, making it to the top in less time it would have taken a squirrel. From atop the huge oak, he surveyed the surrounding area. Much had changed, but the Earth had a longer memory than man or the trees. It changed more reluctantly. To the north he saw what he had hoped to see, a large hill rising high above the treed canopy. It was a drumlin, an ancient tear-shaped reminder of long-past glaciers, lying a ways inland from the lake. At least the years had not changed that.
If the drumlin remained as his memory pictured it, there would be a flat stone high up on the far side, facing east. He had once prayed to the sun and Great Spirit there an eternity ago, on his vision quest. On that day he had a vision and became a man. The stone would do for what he had in mind. He knew it was no longer used for such activities, but he hoped its sacredness would still be valued by the local people. He would see. He could make it to that stony prominence in no time.
Smiling, he jumped lightly from the top of the oak and landed on the naturally carpeted forest floor with barely a sound.
TWENTY
TIFFANY MADE IT HOME just past midnight. The house looked dark and she had been sure her father would be waiting out front with an ax or something. Luckily, her imagination was more dangerous than reality. She hoped her father had not found out about her little nocturnal exit at all, but she couldn’t be sure. Quietly circling around to the back of the house, she leaned the stepladder against the wall just below her window. Before climbing up, she looped a clothesline rope she kept hidden for just such an emergency through one rung in the ladder, then through a railing near the back door, and then up into her bedroom.
Once inside her room, she gently knocked over the stepladder, and pulled on the rope that dragged the stepladder along the ground toward the back door. When it was close enough, she let go of one of the loops and pulled on the other end, making the rope disappear completely into her room, removing all evidence of her departure and reappearance. Her friend Darla had taught her that little trick. Not exactly James Bond stuff, but effective.
Tired, angry, and generally upset, Tiffany took her jacket off, mulling over what to do. She knew tomorrow there was still her progress report to deal with, which she’d been putting off for more than a week. And there was no Tony. All in all, she had a pretty bleak Sunday ahead of her.
Exhausted, she fell back on her bed, a dull thump acknowledging her arrival. She lay there for a moment, briefly wondering if her mother had sta
yed, how things would be different today. Would she be failing at school? Would her relationship with her father be so awful? Would Tony still have dumped her? Would she have started going out with Tony in the first place? Hard to say. It was one of those questions best left to philosophers and science-fiction writers.
It was then she noticed her bedroom door was open. Tiffany was sure she had closed it before she left the house. Not much point in sneaking out if your door is wide open and all the world can see that you’ve snuck out. She got up to close it and saw, stuck to the door, another note. Instantly her stomach jumped up into her throat and all hopes of ever growing old evaporated. In the last couple days she had come to the realization that no good could come from any notes left in this house.
She read it by the light of her clock radio.
Tomorrow morning, I want to talk with you.
Dad.
Nine seemingly innocent words, dripping with forewarning and danger. Tiffany knew sleep would not come easily tonight. And to think her last meal, traditional for a condemned prisoner, had been french fries, which, come to think of it, she never even got to eat. Life did truly and completely suck.
A while later, unable to sleep, Tiffany did something she thought she’d never do. Buried in a small pink box under her bed were some letters that she had sworn she would never look at again. She never even wanted to acknowledge their existence, but these were desperate times and she felt they called for desperate action. Slowly, just as the moon was making its journey to the far horizon, she pulled out a letter.
It was the last piece of correspondence from her mother. It had arrived about five months ago. Most of the world revolved around email, but Tiffany’s mother, of a different generation and a different technology, still preferred to communicate the old-fashioned way. When it had arrived, Tiffany had crumpled the letter into a ball and thrown it in the garbage. Then she had retrieved it and put it in her little pink box. At the bottom of that letter was a phone number. An Alberta phone number.
The Night Wanderer Page 13
