Tribes

by Arthur Slade

  "Of course!" I accidentally spat an errant sprout. "He was a bug nut! Totally avid! There was this time in the bush when he had two rare beetles, one in each hand. Every collector's dream. Just then another monster-sized beetle crawled into the open on a piece of bark. Even rarer than the others. 'How do I capture it?' he asked himself. Then the idea hit him. He popped one beetle into his mouth." I mimicked the popping motion. "He reached for the prize beetle. But the beetle in his mouth pooped out an acrid fluid that burned his tongue. He coughed, the beetle leapt to freedom and the other vanished. Funny, hey?"

  "Yes, funny. He was just going to stick needles through them anyway, wasn't he?"

  "Well, yeah, he was a collector."

  Someone knocked. Mom took off her glasses, set them on the table, then answered the door.

  Gray Eyes came in. Her shaman. Well, shaman to a number of people, actually. He was lanky and wide-shouldered, a direct descendant of the Vikings. His hair (once blond) was long and gray and thick enough to give a rock star envy. And his eyes really were a mysterious shade of gray. He'd been named by a native elder at a powwow in Banff.

  "Hi, Percy," he said. "How's the universe unfolding?"

  "The universe doesn't unfold, it expands," I said. "It isn't a sleeping bag. It is expanding at a greater rate every day, but don't be too concerned. That won't affect us for millennia."

  Gray Eyes grinned. "You are so magnificently literal, Percy. I wish I could be half as literal as you."

  "Thank you," I said. "That's the kindest compliment I've received today."

  Mom had slipped her running shoes on. "I'm ready," she announced. She turned to me. "I won't be home until after eleven."

  Friday, I thought. Most people would be going to a movie or a bar. But not Mom. "It's sweat lodge night, eh?"

  She nodded. "You should go for a walk. Get some fresh air."

  "I should," I said, but didn't elaborate. "Have a good time with your pagan ritual."

  They both laughed, though I had been serious. I locked the door behind them.

  I finished my meal but was still hungry. A mean case of hamburgeritis possessed me. To distract myself, I retired to my room to read Discovering Archaeology. The obsession soon subsided.

  At 7:45, a finger tapped light as a sparrow on the glass. Elissa stood outside. Long ago she'd stopped using the front door, preferring to enter through my window. The grass below the sill had worn away. I'd placed a chair under the window so she could climb in easily.

  I raised the window. In a motion reminiscent of our monkey ancestors, she grasped the bottom of the sill and pulled herself into my room, stepping to the chair, then the floor, and wiping her hands on her pants.

  Beautiful. Her entrance, that is. All made possible by eons of evolution: mutations that gave her (and our species) opposable-thumbed hands uniquely qualified to grip the sill.

  "What're you staring at?" she asked, with a lopsided smile.

  "Nothing." I settled back on the bed.

  Elissa plopped on the chair. She wore stylish fatigues and a T-shirt emblazoned with i don't know. The shirt had been cut short and revealed a flat abdomen. Her belly button was an innie.

  She rested her feet on the bed, saying, "Did you know a guy in Arizona was kicked out of school for wearing a Pepsi shirt on Coke day? Teachers felt he wanted to stir up trouble. Meanwhile students toddle around in shoes made by Third World children enslaved in factories and no one makes a peep. There's no logic to the educational system." She looked across at me, apparently finished. She needed to rant like this once a day. "What you up to?"

  "Reading about ancient Egyptians."

  "Learn anything new?" she asked.

  "Actually, it's old. The old worlds. Ancient cultures were able to intuit more about the stars than we know today."

  "Did they have weird ceremonies like, say, graduation?"

  "No, theirs were advanced societies."

  She ran both hands through her hair, making her shirt rise to expose her upper abdomen and lower ribcage. Her mammae were medium-sized. I note this only out of scientific curiosity.

  "Have you thought about graduation?" she asked.

  "The event itself or the future of the graduates?"

  She began playing with a strand of her hair, twirling and untwirling. "The event. All the parties. Not to mention Grad itself. What will it mean? How will it change us?"

  "I don't intend to change. It's my—our—job to observe the tribal actions."

  "Have you thought about the specifics?"

  "Like what? The gown? The scroll? The valedictorian address?"

  "No, like who you'll take to Grad?"

  I blinked. I'd been so wrapped up in anticipating the event, I'd forgotten that society expected me to pick a female partner. Whom would I take? Or, more to the point, who would go with me?

  "You. We can study them together."

  She grinned. "Are you asking me to Grad?"

  "Yes. Isn't that what I said?" She was acting odd. Did she need a signed affidavit?

  "Good. Everybody else had a date a month ago. I've turned several guys down while I waited for you."

  Other guys had asked her? I tried to picture it but drew a blank. Then: Justin's face. Looming in my mind. No, he couldn't have, their tribes were so different.

  Elissa crawled onto the bed and curled across the end. She had never reclined there before. But here she was, transgressing my territory, head propped on hand. Staring warmly.

  She was acting...well, like she was attracted to me.

  That couldn't be. And yet...My breath quickened.

  This was one part of the human equation I knew little about. Well, nothing, actually. I'd never been on a date. I wondered what it would be like to hold her. She had inviting lips.

  But we were professionals. Partners. Friends. It wouldn't be right.

  Elissa touched my knee and I jerked. "Have you recovered from battling Goliath?"

  "I wear the bruises proudly. Wounds from the field."

  She gave me a flicker of a smile. Her large eyes were soft with emotion. Watching me. I was momentarily amazed by them; how did our cells decide to form eyes? What was it like when the first amphibian orbs opened to the world?

  "I've been thinking about you a lot," she said.

  "Oh?" Everyone was thinking of me today. Principal Michaels, Mom, Justin.

  "Yeah, it's not like you to piss someone off. Even a reptile like Justin. You've been so uptight this last month."

  Uptight? Emotional turmoil wasn't in my code.

  "What set you off?" she asked.

  I shook my head. "It was an unexpurgated outburst. It won't be repeated."

  "Talk to me in your real voice, Percy."

  Real voice? I only had one voice. "Pardon me?"

  "Why did you get into that fight?"

  I was tired of the same question. This was Elissa's second time in eleven hours. Her eyes wouldn't leave me. "I allowed myself to become involved in the situation," I slowly explained. "That's not good protocol."

  "Why did you get into the fight?" Her smile was gone, her face tight, eyes squinting as if at a blinding light.

  "It was an accident, Elissa. A miscalculation. I don't want to examine it anymore."

  She nodded slowly. "I just wondered if it had to do with Willard."

  I bit the inside of my cheek. "Willard," I said.

  "Today's the anniversary of his death."

  Why would she think I was connected to Willard? A bizarre leap of logic about the student who leapt off our school belfry. "I haven't even thought of him," I lied. I had thought of him as we walked toward the school this morning. "Why would this be about Willard?"

  "He was your best friend, Percy. And mine. I can't stop thinking about him. And I don't know if anyone notices that he's gone."

  Best friend? Yes, I had spent time with Willard. We had gone to movies. Exchanged books. Played video games (at his place). An image flashed in my mind: Willard standing outside my window in a do
wnpour, smiling, looking like a drowned rodent. The memory Mesozoic old. He'd taught Elissa the habit of climbing in my window.

  I had visited him in the hospital; that's how I knew his mother was holding his hand when he died. I'd sat in a chair in the corner waiting for him to wake. If I was there, then I was his friend. Maybe even his best friend.

  Elissa cleared her throat. I couldn't find any words. Finally, I opened my mouth. "I overheard a teacher talking about lowering the flag to half-mast."

  "Who?"

  "Principal Michaels," I lied. Lying is immoral in our culture, but this "news" seemed to cheer her up.

  "At least they're thinking of him," she said.

  "Yes, they are."

  We were silent for a very long time. Elissa repeatedly traced a pattern in my bedcover. Her circling finger entranced me.

  "I'm happy we're going to Grad together," she said without looking up. I didn't answer. Her finger stopped.

  "I, too, am pleased," I admitted. And I was: How many teens had spent angst-filled hours struggling to procure a prom date? I had avoided that pain.

  I'd wear a suit, of course. To fit in. And Elissa would be in a long dress. Maybe something with a low-cut back. She had a beautiful spine. This also I note out of scientific curiosity.

  "It's all coming to an end." She sounded almost sad. "Four years of Groverly's educational method: bore, bore, repeat, bore. Do you remember that first Halloween?"

  "I still have the cavities." We'd dressed up and toured the neighborhood, ringing doorbells, then kneeling so that we looked like kids. No one was fooled, but they gave us loads of candy. Will was there too. We were chased by one brute who thought we'd egged his window. We hid by the river, snickering quietly, bonding and devouring caramels. "I can't believe we dressed like clowns."

  "Clowns?" Elissa said. "We were aliens. Geez, nice memory you have."

  I blinked. Aliens. Yet I clearly remembered clowns. One of us was wrong. But I wouldn't argue forcefully. The hippocampus is a notoriously poor recorder of memories. I wouldn't trust it as far as I could throw it.

  "If you'd stayed in that private school you'd be ultra-stuffy by now," Elissa said. "Will and I really loosened you up."

  "Gee, yeah," I answered. Stuffy? "I didn't want to leave St. Joseph's. But it ended up being a perfect new beginning. A rebirth. I wouldn't trade the experience for anything."

  "Funny how things work out," she said.

  We mused separately for a few moments. Then a familiar desire came over me. An intellectual desire.

  "May I see your foot?" I asked.

  Elissa looked up sharply as if I'd poked her with a pin. Then she rolled her eyes. "Not again."

  "It is scientific curiosity, nothing else," I intoned. She didn't move. "Please," I added.

  "You sure you don't have a fetish?"

  "I'm certain."

  She sat up and rolled down her right black sock, slowly displaying a typical human foot, complete with five toes, ascending in size. Her nails were painted a rainbow of colors. She swung her foot closer. There was nothing out of the ordinary.

  "Please spread your toes."

  "Whatever you command, kinky boy." She giggled.

  I ignored her and waited patiently, though I admit my heart palpitated and my breathing became shallow. Slowly Elissa spread her toes. Thin webs of skin opened between them, joining her digits like a frog's. I sighed. Here it was. A webbed foot. A genetic leftover from our days as ocean-bound vertebrates. Or perhaps it was a recent mutation, the water beckoning us back home. After all, as embryos we humans do have gill pouches. One small step from becoming amphibians.

  "That is the most spectacular foot I have ever seen," I whispered. Oddly enough, her other one was normal.

  She wiggled her toes. "Try shoving it into sandals."

  "Are you certain you don't swim any faster?"

  "Not that I've noticed."

  "Do you ever feel an urge to dive in the ocean?"

  "What? Not really." She folded her arms. "My toes are tired of being on show."

  "Thank you," I said, and I meant it. I owed her for showing me this wonder, and I thanked whatever lines of consequence had supplied a friend with a webbed foot.

  "You're the weirdest person I've ever met, Percy junior." She laughed as she pulled on her sock, her eyes bright. "Weirdest to the utmost."

  ***

  Later that night I opened my field journal.

  I sketched the evolution of fins to feet and back again.

  Then wrote an article titled Codes of Violence: The Jock Tribe.

  When my hand cramped two and one-third hours later, I put down the pen. I went to bed and my thoughts turned to our greatest ancestor: Australopithecus afarensis Lucy. She was 3.2 million years old, the closest hominid to the missing link. Lucy and her relatives were likely the first to walk upright.

  I wondered if Lucy's toes had been like Elissa's.

  five

  CARNIVORE

  Like a gastronomical boomerang, my desire for a hamburger returned and shadowed me all Saturday morning. By early afternoon I found myself on Broadway, strolling past the restaurants and cafés, salivating. Most, except the Taj Mahal, were verboten to Mom.

  But she had gone to Wanuskewin for a nature walk and would be spending the night with friends in the traditional teepees that were part of the park (this accommodation was $79 per person, hallucinatory dreams not included). This meant I was free to indulge. She'd never once told me not to consume meat, but anytime I had she'd smelled it on me or heard the ghostly moo of the cow. Then she'd give me a look of absolute disappointment.

  But today I had to explore my inner carnivore. I slipped into the Broadway Café and ordered a triple burger with fries and gravy. It arrived steaming hot, on a platter-sized plate. I quickly devoured my meal.

  Then: tears. Almost. I blinked them back. This used to be my time with Dad. We'd sneak away from Mom and what he called the "infernal sprouts" and come here to gorge ourselves. He'd tell me about all the odd things he'd eaten while in the field (goats' eyeballs being his favorite). Then he'd slip me a stick of peppermint gum and say, "She'll never know." We'd slink back, keeping our distance from the matriarch.

  I had swallowed a five-pound weight. My digestive system, trained on sprouts and celery, was at a loss. The hamburger seemed to be gaining mass by the second. The best action: walk it off.

  I paid my bill, bought gum (peppermint) and proceeded toward the river, chewing. Soon I was strolling along the Meewasin Trail, staring across the river. This was a time to surrender the minutiae of my life and concentrate on the bigger picture. Where was evolution taking humanity?

  I pictured Elissa's foot. Then her ankle. Her midriff. I shook my head. This wasn't the direction I'd intended.

  I tried something different: the double helix. Encoded in our genes was almost every step of our evolution. Scientists had mapped the gene; now I had to find a way to follow that map to the beginning. Maybe there was information on the Internet that would help me.

  The hair on the back of my neck suddenly tingled. A keen anthropologist develops a sixth sense. I looked up. A familiar broad-shouldered male lumbered around a corner.

  I quickly inserted myself into nearby bushes, folded the greenery around me and crouched down. My heart thudded and a sheen of sweat coated my forehead. This attracted the attention of a fly, which tasted my perspiration with its feet. I tried not to think of the fly's previous explorations. A second fly descended. A third. I blinked, raised my eyebrows.

  I willed: stillness. In the jungle I would have to deal with hordes of insects. I, Percy Montmount, Jr., could persevere.

  Then: Thick trunklike legs became visible through the foliage. I looked up, moving only my eyeballs. Justin loomed. Could he scent me out?

  "How're you doing, buddy?" he asked.

  I made no response.

  "Would you like some ice cream?"

  Was this an attempt to bribe me out of my cover?

 
"You're pretty quiet today."

  I held my breath. The legs moved down the paved path.

  When I was sure Justin was a good distance away, I slipped into the open, nearly bumping into an ancient woman with a walker, a matriarch of the Denture Tribe. "You playing hide-and-seek, son?" she asked.

  I shook my head.

  Justin was slouching under the bridge, a little boy riding his massive shoulders. My eyes widened. I blinked, watched them disappear.

  I followed, my right hand automatically reaching into my pants pocket, retrieving my field notebook. I wrote as I walked. Could this be a breakthrough? Justin displaying affection/ protection in public. Was this a brother—a young Justin in the making? To be trained in the ways of the Jock Tribe? At what point did the rituals begin?

  They stopped at a park bench and I stole under the bridge, using the shadows for cover.

  Justin lowered his brother onto a bench, then sat beside him. They appeared to be talking. Justin tickled the young recruit. The boy giggle-shrieked. Justin wrapped him up in his arms.

  I was stunned. I stepped into the open. Justin looked up, still hugging. His eyes narrowed.

  I retreated, keeping the pillars of the bridge between me and them. Then I scrambled up the hill on the other side of the bridge and headed for home, clutching my field notebook like a shield.

  six

  NAKED AND TIED TO A STICK

  My father was always leaving. Most of my paternal memories are snapshots of him loading suitcases into the trunk of a taxi, a sun hat shielding his bald head. Or he'd be standing in line at the airport, backpack slung over one shoulder, flight tickets in hand. He'd perform a wiggly-fingered wave, then disappear through the departure gate. Mom would lead me to the window and we'd wave to his plane. Well, we'd wave to all the planes to be sure we got the right one. Whenever I see a jet bisecting the sky I think of Dad.

  His destinations were glorious: the Australian outback, the Far East, Peru, the thick urban jungles of Hong Kong. Places where wondrous events occurred daily. Where dreams came to life. Sometimes we'd read about Dad in the back pages of one of the national papers, see a grainy photo of him standing beside an ancient statue or sitting among African tribesmen.