April Raintree

by Beatrice Mosionier

  “You know that’s not true?”

  “And now you’re back here, right in there, with another white man. Half-breeds aren’t good enough for you. You’re a bigot against your own people. You want to know something else, April? I’m ashamed of you. Yeah, ashamed. You’re not my sister. You’re my keeper, buying this house, paying for my keep. That’s all you are, just my keeper. You’re disgusting. And you have the nerve to look down on me?”

  “I’ve never looked down on you, Cheryl. Never. Just on what you do. What you’re doing to yourself. I don’t understand why.”

  “Don’t give me that bull. You heard what they said in court and I saw what you felt when you avoided looking at me. You think you’re better than me. You’ve always thought you were better than me. And you’ll never understand me. You’ll never understand me.” Cheryl repeated the last line more to herself than to me. Then in a louder, more aggressive tone, she said, “You know, April, you sure have lied to me a lot. You tell me one thing when you know it’s an outright lie. It’s pretty bad in this stinking world when you can’t even trust your own sister.”

  Cheryl never did pour me a drink. She went back upstairs, I assumed, to sleep it off. I felt as if I had been in a physical fight with her. I was breathing hard. I lit up a cigarette. It was unreasonable of Cheryl to accuse me of all she accused me. She wasn’t faultless. So why, why, why, did she tear into me all the time? I thought of Alcoholics Anonymous. Cheryl would never go there. That would be like admitting that she was a down-and-out drunkard. In the previous several months, I hadn’t seen her sober because when she was sober, she avoided me like I were the plague.

  In December, Roger invited me to go to Killarney with him to meet his parents. They lived on a farm and Roger went out to visit them as often as he could. I felt I couldn’t leave Cheryl alone and Roger said I was to invite her, too. I knew Cheryl wouldn’t go and in the end, Roger decided he would remain in the city for Christmas and spend it with me. I protested, of course, but he remained firm in his decision.

  We waited most of Christmas Day for Cheryl to return so we could open our presents together. Cheryl didn’t come. I was embarrassed. Roger had forsaken Christmas with his family to be with Cheryl and me. I had forsaken a Christmas with his family for Cheryl. And Cheryl didn’t even do us the honor of being home.

  We spent New Year’s with his parents. I also met his brother, Joe, who wasn’t Indian at all. When we were by ourselves, I said, “You lied to me, Roger Maddison. You said your brother, Joe, was Ojibway.”

  “Well, I figured that would help you open up a little,” Roger grinned. “You know, give us common ground. Actually, the guy I was talking about was a good friend in school. Heck, for that matter, I was going to tell you I had a sister who had been raped. So I could say I did understand how you felt, even though I was a man.”

  “Were you really? You don’t have any scruples, do you? And here I was going to ask if Cheryl could meet Joe and, you know, maybe get together.”

  By this time, I was fully relaxed and comfortable with Roger in every way. It was almost a full year after the rape. Roger had succeeded in making me feel good about myself again. I’d have moments when I’d remember but they weren’t all-consuming. It would take a long time before I would heal completely. But Roger was right. Time was the best medicine.

  Still, I couldn’t get through to Cheryl. There was virtually no communication between us. I had resumed my part-time job. One day at the end of February, I didn’t have any assignments for the day. I sat around, almost all day, bored. Late in the afternoon, I decided to do some baking. It was already dark by the time I put the muffins in the oven. That’s when Cheryl came home. I heard her as she came down the hall and into the kitchen. She still had her jacket on but she took it off and placed it over the back of her chair.

  “Aren’t we domestic today,” she said in sneering voice. “Practicing up, are you?”

  “No, I just thought it would be nice to have some home baking. It’s a little early but do you want supper?”

  “If I wanted something to eat, I’d fix it myself. After all, I do live here, don’t I?” Cheryl said.

  “Well, excuse me, I was just offering.”

  Cheryl got up and went upstairs. I figured tonight if she wanted to grind away at me, I was going to return some of her own medicine. Sure enough, a few minutes later, she came downstairs again, with a full bottle of whiskey. She set it on the counter, got herself a glass and poured some Coke in after the whiskey. It was about half and half.

  I watched her do all this and then I said, “Is this private property or can I have some, too?”

  “Go ahead, help yourself. Don’t expect me to serve you.” She went back to sit at the dining room table.

  I decided to join her with my drink.

  “So, are the three of us going to have a nice cozy little chat?” Cheryl asked, looking at me. Her eyes were glassy and she had to focus to look straight at me.

  “What do you mean, the three of us?” I said, looking at her stomach area, avoiding her eyes.

  Cheryl laughed and said, “You, me, and my good friend there,” she said pointing back at the bottle of whiskey. “He’s going to keep us company. Yes, sir, the family that drinks together, stays together,” Cheryl laughed again.

  “Well, do take off your boots and stay awhile,” I said sarcastically. I had washed and waxed the floor the day before and I noticed then that Cheryl had tracked watery marks on it. Cheryl ignored me and took a long sip of her drink.

  “Cheryl, I wish you’d tell me what’s been bugging you these past months. Ever since that day in court, you’ve been treating me as if I’d done something wrong.”

  Cheryl looked at me but didn’t say anything.

  “I wish we could get everything out in the open. I wish there were no secrets between us. I want to help you, Cheryl, that’s all I want to do. Put that away for tonight. Go to bed and tomorrow, we can have a real honest discussion, okay?”

  “Quit it, April. All you ever do is nag at me. Nag, nag, nag. Is that how you drove Bob away? And how long is this new one going to last, eh? How long is Roger going to last before you try to run his life? Ex-Mrs. Radcliff. Socialite of the East. Big-shot. You’re such a phoney. Couldn’t manage her own life but she wants to manage mine.” Cheryl finished her drink and got up to pour herself another one. She brought the bottle with her and set it down beside her glass.

  I sighed and said, “Cheryl, don’t…”

  Cheryl cut me off and mimicked my plea, “Cheryl, don’t, Cheryl, don’t. Don’t do this, don’t do that. You’re only hurting yourself, poor, dear Cheryl. Well, I know darn well what I’m hurting. Because of me, you don’t bring any of your white friends here, do you? And with Roger, you had to explain all about your poor, drunken sister, didn’t you? So he would understand about me. And pity me? Same way you pity me. Well, I don’t need your factitious pity.”

  I studied Cheryl. This was far worse than it had ever been before. I didn’t know what to do. Should I try to appease her or provoke her, into talking to me about what was making her say these things?

  “You’re ashamed of me,” she continued. “You’re ashamed of what I do. If you were ever proud of me, you’d be proud to be a half-breed. Proud, I tell you.” Cheryl glared at me, daring me to say differently. She was swaying from side to side as she again refilled her glass.

  I said in a quiet voice, “Go look in the mirror and tell me what I’ve got to be proud of.”

  “Oh, so the truth comes out. As long as I act like a proper whitey, I’m something, eh? But a few drinks and I’m a stinking, drunken Indian.”

  “You’re doing all this to hurt me, right? Why? Do you hate me, Cheryl?”

  “Hate you? No, I don’t hate you. I hate a lot of things about you. You’re a snob. You have double standards. You were so shocked when they said I was a hooker. Well, look at you. How did you buy this house, April? How did you buy that car out there? How, April? You prostitut
ed yourself when you took Bob’s money, that’s how. You never loved that man. You loved his money. You figured you were going to be Miss High Society. But you figured wrong. But you still came out of it with your pay. A nice big fat roll for a high-classed call-girl. Yeah, your kind makes me sick. Big white snobs who think they’re the superior race. Your white governments, your white churches, sitting back in idle, rich comfort, preaching what ought to be, but making sure it isn’t. Well, Miss Know-It-All, I know something you don’t. And you won’t feel so high and mighty superior once I tell you what I know.”

  Cheryl put her finger across her lips as if to warn herself to keep silent.

  “Shh, I’m not supposed to tell her,” she said to herself. She smiled a silly, secretive smile, then frowned to herself. It looked as if she were debating on whether to keep her secret.

  I was waiting, hoping she would continue. I felt that what she was on the verge of saying would help solve the mystery of what had made her give up on everything. I felt it wasn’t just that she blamed herself for the rape. Something had happened before that. She had started drinking before that. Maybe it was something I had done. Whatever it was, I wanted to know. To goad her into more angry outbursts, I said in a cold voice. “Cheryl, you’ve had enough. Come on, I’ll help you to bed.”

  I got up and put my hands on her arm to help her.

  Cheryl shook them off, viciously. “You take your hands off me. I’m gonna have another drink and no one’s gonna stop me. Especially not a superior white madam. I can take care of myself. I don’t need anyone. Not anyone.”

  I recoiled at her loud outburst and sat down again. I watched the liquid in Cheryl’s glass go down once again. The bottle was half-empty.

  “I don’t need anyone,” Cheryl repeated to herself. Then she looked at me and said maliciously, “Especially not you. I couldn’t care less about your fancy ways. You’re just a social climber who didn’t make it.”

  Cheryl was slurring her words badly and when she saw that I winced every time she used a vulgar word, I could see that she was delighted.

  “So, April Raintree, you think you got all the answers, eh? But you can’t tell me nothing, can you? Because in reality, you know zilch. I’m the one who knows what life is really all about. Me. That’s who. I got the answers. I found the answers all by myself. You lied to me and I lied to you. I did find our precious dear ol’ Dad. He’s a gutter-creature, April. A gutter-creature! Ail the tricks I turned, well, that helped him, you know? That kept him in booze. Not only that, I joined him, too. All, but that’s not all. The best part is still to come.”

  She smiled a lopsided smile, as if she had lost control of her facial muscles,

  “Mother—you know what happened to our poor, dear Mother? She jumped off the Louise Bridge, is what she did. Committed suicide. You know why she stopped seeing us? Because she couldn’t bear the pain. Yup, she committed suicide. They were bums, you know. Both of them. Bums. Boozers. Gutter-creatures. Dad took all that money from me. He didn’t know where it came from. He didn’t care where it came from. Mark DeSoto. Jack-of-all-trades. Drug pusher, bootlegger, stealing, breaking and entering, pimping—if it was illegal, he was in it. And guess who was right there in it with him? Your little sister, Cheryl Raintree. Your baby sister. Pardon me. There was another one after me. Baby Anna. Did you know about her? Well, she died when she was still a baby. She was the luckiest one of us.”

  Cheryl leaned her head on her arms which were crossed in front of her on the table. She was weeping to herself, repeating the last sentence, “She was the luckiest one.”

  I was shocked by her revelations. I didn’t believe them. Cheryl was only trying to shock me. Except she wasn’t watching me for the desired effect. She wasn’t lying. I was going to make coffee for us. Then I was going to see Cheryl to her bed. Tomorrow, we were going to have a long talk. Now that I knew the reason behind her actions, I knew I could do something about it. I was also relieved that it wasn’t because of me that Cheryl had given up. I took the bottle over to the sink and began pouring the liquid down the drain.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Cheryl screamed, at the top of her lungs. She frightened me and I dropped the bottle into the sink as I jumped. For all of Cheryl’s drunkenness, she moved as swiftly as a mother cat coming to the rescue of her endangered kittens.

  “Give me that, that’s mine!”

  I had a hold of the bottle again and Cheryl lunged for it. We both struggled for control of it. I guess all Cheryl could see was that her precious liquid was seeping away. All I wanted was for her to quit drinking for the night. When the last drop was gone, I let go of the bottle. I started turning toward Cheryl. She was enraged. She glared at me with hatred and before I could speak to her, she brought her hand up and struck me as hard as she could across the face. I was already off-balance and the blow sent me reeling backward across the kitchen. I hit the refrigerator hard with my back and shoulders. I put my hand to my face where Cheryl had struck me and looked at her, unbelievingly.

  Cheryl, momentarily horrified by what she had just done to me, seemed to come out of her drunken stupor.

  “Well, you shouldn’t have done that.” She grabbed her jacket and I heard her go down the hall. Then the front door slammed.

  CHAPTER 16

  I shook my head to clear it. This was all too much. I went back to the sink and put the empty bottle into the garbage container. My mind started activating again and I realized I should have gone after Cheryl. I went to get my jacket and boots and then I had to look for the house keys. They weren’t in my purse and I couldn’t remember where I had put them. When I had found my keys, I went out the front way, deciding not to use the car. The closest bus stop was at Watt Street so I walked in that direction. At the bus stop, there was no sign of Cheryl. I went back towards Henderson. I was sure that if Cheryl had intended to take a bus, she would have gotten one by now. I waited at the bus stop for the next bus, heading downtown, and got on. I tried looking out both sides of the window but with it being dark outside and lighted inside, plus the condensation on the windows, I couldn’t see the sidewalks very well. I got off in front of the City Hall and decided to walk back home, by way of the Disraeli Bridge.

  That meant walking down Main Street for a ways. I walked on the north side because there were more people on that side. If Cheryl were among these people, I could spot her. But I walked all the way home, without running into her.

  I couldn’t get to sleep that night. The wind had picked up outside and I was sure there was a blizzard going on out there. Mixed in were the noises of the house, all those creakings, one doesn’t notice during the day. I listened to them, deciphering what made them. Several times, thinking that Cheryl had returned, I got up and went upstairs to check her room. The next morning, I got up, tired. I thought perhaps I had made too big a deal the night before when I worried about never seeing Cheryl again. Nonetheless, I called where she worked and found out that she had quit a few months earlier. Later, I called the Friendship Centre but the person who answered didn’t know Cheryl. I made coffee. I spent most of the day waiting and worrying. When my employer from the agency called, asking if I wanted to start a job Monday, I said no, that I’d be taking some time off again.

  At four-thirty, Roger phoned to say he was going to pick me up in an hour. We were supposed to go out for supper but I had forgotten.

  “Oh, Roger, I can’t go. Cheryl left last night. I don’t know where she is. She’s not going to come back.”

  “Well, April, Cheryl has been away overnight before. Why are you so worried?”

  “We quarreled. A lot. She was drinking heavily. She told me everything, Roger, all the things that have been bothering her. I have to find her.”

  “Okay. We’ll have supper and then we’ll go and look for her, all right?”

  “You don’t have to come with me. I don’t even know where to begin.”

  “I’ll come with you. Don’t worry, April, we’ll find her.”


  While I waited for Roger, I decided we could go down to the Friendship Centre and talk to anyone who might know where Cheryl would be. I tried to remember places Cheryl had mentioned in the past. Was it Carlos or was that the name of a beer? I got my coat and boots on and waited for Roger. I returned to the kitchen and looked in the phone book. There was a place called DeCarlos. That was it. I noted the address. Since it was a Friday night, I thought we might even find Nancy. I cursed myself for not taking more interest in Cheryl’s friends. I didn’t even know Nancy’s last name.

  After we had a quick supper, we went to the Centre. A few people said they knew Cheryl but that they hadn’t seen her for the past couple of months. From there, we drove, over to DeCarlos which was on Carlton. There was a line-up of people waiting to get in, different types of people and it reminded me of the Hungry Eye. My crowd once. When Roger and I got in, we looked the crowd over. A smoky haze hung over everyone’s heads. Music was blasting from the amplifiers. The way we were dressed, Roger and I were obviously out of place. We ordered drinks but were barely able to talk because of the noise, I watched for Cheryl or Nancy. I even felt I’d be able to tell who Mark was if I saw him. I wondered if this was where they all still hung out. On the other side of the room, there was a girl who reminded me of Sylvia Gurnan. I couldn’t see clearly because of the dimly-lit, smoky atmostphere. People kept passing between us and sometimes I was sure it was Sylvia and then I wasn’t sure. She wouldn’t have been any help, even if it had been her but I would have known there was a possibility of Cheryl being here, too. I studied the other people at the table. They were all white. Mark, as far as I knew, was Metis. When the band took a break, Roger asked me if I recognized any of Cheryl’s friends. Since I didn’t, we left.

  We drove around for a while, up and down the downtown streets, as we searched the faces for Cheryl’s. We were not successful. We returned but she hadn’t. We took our coffee into the living room and I turned the television set on.