by Dawn Dumont
Homecoming
“COME HOME,” HIS UNCLE said to him on the phone when Everett remembered to call one Christmas. Everett said that he would. So he did, a couple summers later. Just woke up one Friday, threw his bag in the truck and drove. He’d been down the road to the rez a few times before, hitting powwows here and there but not theirs. Never stopped in. Because I’ve been there so many times before. That must be it.
The yard was clean and neat and there were three cars parked there. He thought about turning around. They have visitors already. But that was stupid. He had to piss like a racehorse, anyways.
His uncle grinned when he saw him. “You look like you got rode hard and put away wet.”
Everett chuckled. He saw who the third car was then. Eric, the older one, his arm around a brown haired girl and when she smiled up at Everett, he felt his pecker move. Settle down, she’s family.
His aunt put some food in front of him and he sat down. He ate quietly while Eric told his dad about all the work he was doing at logging company out there in BC. He was working on “designing processes” which meant how things were done. And he talked about management which Everett knew were the bosses. And he mentioned that they were having labour problems which Everett knew was him. And he grinned into his fried potatoes.
His uncle got up for more coffee. Everett noticed that his uncle had a gut that he hadn’t had before. He asked Everett when he was getting new tires for his truck.
“Thought about it.”
“Get ’em on.” He growled. “Look like they haven’t been changed since you took that truck.” His uncle’s truck was always gleaming. He would spend hours working on it, tightening this, replacing that, filling up fluid levels. Looked a lot like a job.
Eric turned the conversation back to him and to his girl. Her name was Sierra and in certain lights her eyes looked green. She was a photographer and worked for a production company out there in BC as an assistant producer.
Nope, Everett thought. She gets coffee and her boss hits on her all the time.
Eric asked Everett what he was doing and Everett described his last job which was cooking in a kitchen in Wanuskewin, this new cultural centre outside of Saskatoon. Even though cooking was really cutting things and mopping up late at night and smoking weed in the grass behind the Centre. He and his friends would make fun of the commercial for the place, “Come to Wanuskewin” some old guy in a thick accent would say. They would pretend to do the voice, drawling out: “Wanuskewin,” trying to sound all Hollywood Indian.
“A cook?” his auntie repeated. She was at the counter, her hands in the sink washing up and he could see her shoulders shake.
“So you’re Eric’s brother?” Sierra said.
Everett and Eric spoke at the same time.
“I’m his cousin — ”
“Kind of — ”
“Raised together,” his uncle said.
“Where are your parents?” She was one of those then. Not reserve raised so didn’t know better than to ask questions like that.
Everett waited a second for someone else to speak and when they didn’t, he said, “I never knew my dad, and my mom left me.”
It sounded like a metal fork on a dish.
She exhaled a soft oh, then looked at Eric. Eric was looking at his watch. His uncle was staring at his smoke. That stupid “oh” wafted through the room like a fart.
“Left all of us.” His auntie broke in, the door slamming shut on that subject.
Everett followed his uncle around the yard. His uncle had built a firepit, a deck and was working on a new shed, even though he already had a few other sheds.
Everett ran his finger over the wood and talked about the construction details. His uncle didn’t bite. Just handed him a hammer and put him to work.
A couple hours in, Eric and Sierra walked down the hill, his arm around her again. Everett smiled; his cousin was an idiot.
“Hey Dad, I’m gonna show Sierra around the rez.”
“Be back for supper or your mom will be mad.”
“Isn’t Everett cooking us a five course meal?” Eric joked.
“Does it look like it?” his dad replied.
Eric looked at Everett who had lost track of what he was doing at least an hour ago. “You wanna come?”
Everett looked at his uncle. His uncle shrugged. “Let me change my shirt.” Then he tried to remember if he had brought another one.
Sierra told them that her production company was working on a documentary about an artist who grew up in Saskatchewan and painted pictures about life was he was young. She said the name and Everett was sure that he’d seen his pictures hanging in the halls of Wanuskewin.
“This is it, come to life,” she said. “It’s really beautiful.”
“Nothing compared to BC.” Eric said.
Everett hadn’t been there yet but he agreed with Eric. Their rez was skinny bushes that you could see through in the winter (if they weren’t covered with snow) and long grasses that hid wood-ticks, scratchy weeds and big rocks that tripped you.
“More houses now,” Eric said.
“Why are they all the same?” Sierra asked.
“Indian affairs houses. Same kind of cheap house given to everyone. Same bad construction, same leaks, same mould problems.”
Everett realized his cousin had been learning stuff then.
They passed a burnt-out building. Everett remembered it being a hall.
“Assholes,” Eric said.
“I hope no one was hurt,” Sierra said.
Everett could see how black the boards were and knew whoever set it meant for it burn to the ground. He’d seen guys that angry before. Saw them do things like punch through walls and shake their girlfriends until their teeth chattered. And when you tried to hold them down they’d throw you off and fight you like they wanted to kill you. Then the next day, they’d be the same nice guy you knew the day before. Life sure fucked with people.
They stopped at the store and picked up some cokes. Took a long time because everyone wanted to shake hands with Eric and Everett and ask them what they were up to and how come they didn’t come by anymore. People looked shyly at Sierra but she boldly shook everyone’s hands.
“Everyone likes you guys.” Sierra held the seat so that Everett could jump in the back. “You’re like the prodigal sons.”
“You calling us fuck ups?” Eric asked.
“If the shoe fits.” She was a tough one. That was good.
“Stop using such big words, Sierra. You’re offending Everett.”
“It’s all good.” Everett watched a group of young kids walking single file on the side of the road. One of them had a dog on a leash, that was a new one. Though when they drove past, he saw that it was only a piece of rope looped around the dog’s neck.
“Let’s go to the beach,” Eric said.
It was a small lake, so small that you could canoe across it in less than an hour. But there was a bit of sand down there. They pulled up the car and walked close to the water. There were beer bottles and Eric picked up a few before giving up.
“Rubbies will get them,” Everett reminded him.
Sierra took a deep breath. “Smells good.”
Everett skipped a stone, it hit three times before sinking into the water. Eric picked up a few and Sierra asked him to show her how and soon they were on their own little date.
Everett remembered the last time he was here. He and Eric and Jason, and some other people were partying out there. Even though everyone was blasted, they were playing football half in the water, half out. Eric threw long and Everett dove for it. And hit one of those big old rocks hiding out there.
“You okay?” one of the girls had called out to him.
The world had been blurry. Everett remembered looking at the beach and it looked like there were hundreds standing there. Not the kids they were, but people from other times. And those old people were looking at him, like they could see him too. And even though he was standi
ng up to his waist in water, he felt warm, like he was sitting by a wood fire.
He dragged his pounding head to the water’s edge and dropped the football at his cousin Eric’s feet. Someone tried to push a beer on him but he waved it off.
Everett had passed out on the beach and when he woke up everyone was gone. Probably someone’s idea of a joke. The kind of joke Nellie would never laugh at. Everett chuckled, imagining her pissed off face.
“What are you laughing about?” Sierra asked.
“My girlfriend,” he replied. Which he regretted a second after he said it.
“You have a girlfriend? Since when?” Eric was in his face.
“Since none of your business.”
Eric pointed at Everett. “This guy was the biggest man-slut in our high school. Should’ve named an STD after him.”
Sierra pursed her lips and turned away.
“What’s her name?”
Eric knew the people on the rez even better than Everett did and there was only one Nellie. And if Eric knew he was dating Nellie then he would say something about her and Everett would have to punch him. Everett picked up another stone and skipped it.
“You forget her name?”
“Get out of my face.” Everett said this under his breath to give Eric a chance before he kicked his ass in front of his girlfriend.
“I fucking knew it.” Eric was walking back towards Sierra. “This guy — I knew he was lying. A tomcat will settle down before him.”
Everett stared at his cousin and thought about telling them about that time they left him here with a concussion. But he kept his memory to himself along with the vision of the old people — which she probably would have liked. She was that kind of girl.
After supper, Everett walked out to his truck with his uncle.
“You need some money?”
Everett took the bills his uncle handed him.
“Take care of yourself.”
“Yeah.”
His uncle gave the truck another look over while Everett watched. Those questions that had been there since he was kid were bubbling up — that fucking Sierra girl — but he wasn’t ready to hear the answers. So he sent his mind a few miles down the road, listening to tunes too loud with the window rolled down.
Friends
October 1995
“WHY IS FRIENDS ON every channel?” Everett asked from his permanent position on the couch. His ass had practically worn a dent in it.
Nellie ignored him as she addressed Julie. “I met the most annoying guy today.” Julie wasn’t listening. She was looking for her shoes in the shoebox.
Nellie hated the shoebox. It was such a rez thing. In the city people were supposed to organize their shoes on a shoe rack, not all scrambled together in an old microwave box. But she never managed to get around to buying a shoe rack and, more importantly, her budget didn’t have room for decorative things.
Nellie turned her gaze towards Everett who was switching the TV over to the Nintendo. Nellie wasn’t sure when he’d bought that when he told her all last week that he was too broke to do anything.
“First of all he came to the NSC meeting and he isn’t even a member.” Nellie was the secretary and treasurer on the Native Student Council. “He interrupted me twice and then he kept talking over me at the meeting.” This was especially annoying because she barely spoke during meetings because she concentrated on taking completely accurate minutes. Also, she found that if she talked this only made meetings longer. So when she did have a point to make, it was an important one.
The president’s name was Donna, she was a loud-mouthed native studies major who thought the annual student powwow was of paramount importance. Then there was Gordie, the vice president, who thought the annual student powwow was of even more paramount importance.There were a couple of other officers who never bothered to show up.
Meetings were generally short; Nellie scheduled half an hour for them in her planner. She thought the powwow was the least of their priorities. The Native students were facing cutbacks on their student funding thanks to Chretien. High rents were pushing students into bad areas and racist graffiti had popped up on school buildings. But arguing with those two assholes was a waste of time. Her student council experience would go on her resumé and resumé building was how Nellie would get to the next level — acceptance into law school, then work as a corporate lawyer in a good firm, then whatever else happened in life. Nellie wasn’t sure what that was exactly but it probably involved having money for fancy shoe racks.
That afternoon, she was at the meeting, her pen poised for note-taking when the northerner walked in. You could always tell the northerners. They had black-black hair and pale skin like old-timey vampires and a cocky confidence that comes from isolation and not knowing any better.
“He’s totally bush,” Nellie said for the tenth time. “But he never shuts up. He thinks that every stupid idea that falls out of his mouth is a nugget of gold.”
“You wanna bone him,” Everett said.
“Gross, as if.”
“Yup you got a crush.”
“Not unless you mean crushing his big fat head in a vise.” Nellie’s tone was harsh but inside she was smiling that Everett showed a modicum of jealousy.
Nellie heard Julie laugh from the bottom of the shoe box. Then, “Where are my shoes?!” Julie was already late and getting later. Nellie couldn’t figure out why Julie didn’t lay out her outfit the night before work like she had suggested to her.
“And, he wouldn’t shut up the whole meeting. He kept talking about organizing protests and lobbying for more funding — like we can even do that.”
“I thought you wanted that too. Oh crap.” Julie frowned as she bent over to pull a pair of boots on.
“What’s wrong?” Everett asked.
“These boots have a heel and I hate wearing heels when I’m working.”
“Puts a little junk in the trunk,” Everett wound up as if to smack Julie in the ass. Nellie’s eyes stopped him. He reached for the remote instead.
“You should tell him your ideas and then you two can work together and maybe even get rid those other two useless tits.” Julie surveyed herself in the mirror by the door. Nellie had put it there after reading an article on good Feng Shui or maybe that was an article about being better organized?
Julie’s collaboration/takeover idea had occurred to Nellie as well. During the meeting, she had noticed how the room crackled with energy when Taz entered it. And even though she found him ugly, he did have a strong voice and good posture. Nellie hated the way the other Native kids bent their heads and made their voices soft when they spoke, especially when they were around white people.
She wanted to smack them on the back of the head like the way her dad did when she was little. “Have some fucking pride,” he would tell her and she would bite back tears but held her head up straight.
After the meeting, she’d been slow to pack up her stuff. Donna, of course, was hanging off of Taz. Donna went through men like a hot knife through lard. Nellie had to linger for a long time. She packed and unpacked her backpack a couple times before Donna scuttled off to go make supper for her kids. Nellie glanced at him from beneath her hair. He was studying the giant map of Indian reserves of Saskatchewan hanging on the wall. Students placed pins in their home communities.
He said something in Cree. Nellie asked, “What?”
“Where are you from?” He asked glancing at her but not turning around.
“Stone Man’s.”
“Asinîy napew.”
“Yes that’s how we say it in Cree.”
“Why don’t you speak your language?”
“My parents didn’t teach us.”
“There’s classes here.”
Nellie knew that but she didn’t dare take one. Language classes were hard to score high marks in and she didn’t want a low grade bringing her average down.
“Don’t you think it’s important for First Nations people to know their o
wn language?” His tone suggested that he was working his way up to a speech.
“It doesn’t make me Native.”
“Doesn’t it? It’s a connection to our past. Like the drum.”
“There are other connections.”
Taz held his hands out as if to say, “Enlighten me!” Nellie laughed sharply to cover her anger and then said she had to go — and she did have to go, she had a class starting in ten minutes.
Taz laughed then and Nellie knew it was at her. She tried not to look like she was scurrying out the door.
“Why should I work with him? I’ve been a member of the council for two years and I know those two morons aren’t capable of taking a shit without asking an Elder for permission first.I know that but who’s he to question them?”
“What’s his name?” Everett asked.
“I told you. His name is Nathan. Nathan Mosquito. But he prefers ‘Taz’ — how fucking stupid is that? And I don’t know which reserve he’s from, but he’s definitely some dumbass bush Indian.”
Everett looked towards the ceiling. This meant he was thinking. “Does he have a dimple chin?
“Yeah.”
“I know that guy.”
“What?”
Julie slipped out the door and called out “bye” over her shoulder.
“Bye Jules!” Everett called back.
“You know him? How do you know him?” Nellie moved to stand over Everett, blocking his view of the TV, which was the best way to keep his attention.
“I met him when I was working at that moving company. Y’know the one that paid by the pallet? What a rip off that was. Do you know how much shit people can load on a single pallet? If I hadn’t been stealing that guy blind, I would’ve been pissed.”
Nellie stifled a sigh and kept her voice light. “So he was working there?”
“No, Officer. I know him because he buys drugs from my roommate.”
“Oh.” Nellie felt better. A stupid pothead was no competition. “Wait, you’re living with a drug dealer?”
