Reservation Blues

4. Father and Farther

SOMETIMES, FATHER, you and I

Are like a three-legged horse

Who can’t get across the finish line

No matter how hard he tries and tries and tries

And sometimes, father, you and I

Are like a warrior

Who can only paint half of his face

While the other half cries and cries and cries

chorus:

Now can I ask you, father

If you know how much farther we need to go?

And can I ask you, father

If you know how much farther we have to go?

Father and farther, father and farther, ’til we know

Father and farther, father and farther, ’til we know

Sometimes, father, you and I

Are like two old drunks

Who spend their whole lives in the bars

Swallowing down all those lies and lies and lies

Sometimes, father, you and I

Are like dirty ghosts

Who wear the same sheets every day

As one more piece of us just dies and dies and dies

(repeat chorus)

Sometimes, father, you and I

Are like a three-legged horse

Who can’t get across the finish line

No matter how hard he tries and tries and tries

Coyote Springs returned to the Spokane Indian Reservation without much fanfare. Thomas drove through the late night quiet, the kind of quiet that frightened visitors from the city. As he pulled up in his driveway, the rest of the band members woke up, and the van’s headlights illuminated the old Indian man passed out on the lawn.

“Who is that?” Victor asked. “Is it my dad or your dad?”

“It’s not your dad,” Junior said. “Your dad is dead.”

“Oh, yeah, enit?” Victor asked. “Well, whose dad is it?”

“It ain’t my dad,” Junior said. “He’s dead, too.”

Coyote Springs climbed out of the van, walked up to the man passed out on the lawn, and rolled him over.

“That’s your dad, enit?” Junior asked Thomas.

Thomas leaned down for a closer look.

“Yeah, that’s him,” Victor said. “That’s old Samuel.”

“Is he breathing?” Junior said.

“Yeah.”

“Well, then leave him there,” Victor said.

Thomas shook his father a little and said his name a few times. He had lost count of the number of times he’d saved his father, how many times he’d driven to some reservation tavern to pick up his dad, passed out in a back booth. Once a month, he bailed his father out of jail for drunk and disorderly behavior. That had become his father’s Indian name: Drunk and Disorderly.

“He’s way out of it,” Victor said.

“He’s out for the night,” Junior said.

Junior and Victor shrugged their shoulders, walked into Thomas’s house, and looked for somewhere to sleep. Decorated veterans of that war between fathers and sons, Junior and Victor knew the best defense was sleep. They saw too many drunks littering the grass of the reservation; they rolled the drunks over and stole their money. When they were under age, they slapped those drunks awake and pushed them into the Trading Post to buy beer. Now, when they saw Samuel Builds-the-Fire passed out on the lawn, they crawled into different corners of Thomas’s house and fell right to sleep.

“Ain’t they going to help?” Chess asked.

“It’s my father,” Thomas said. “I have to handle this myself.”

But Chess and Checkers helped Thomas carry his father into the house and lay him down on the kitchen table. The three sat in chairs around the table and stared at Samuel Builds-the-Fire, who breathed deep in his alcoholic stupor.

“I’m sorry, Thomas,” Chess and Checkers said.

“Yeah, me, too.”

Chess and Checkers were uncomfortable. They hated to see that old Indian man so helpless and hopeless; they hated to see the father’s features in his son’s face. It’s hard not to see a father’s life as prediction for his son’s.

“Our father was like this, too,” Chess said. “Just like this.”

“But he never drank at all until Backgammon died,” Checkers said.

“Where’s your dad now?” Thomas asked.

“He’s gone.”

The word gone echoed all over the reservation. The reservation was gone itself, just a shell of its former self, just a fragment of the whole. But the reservation still possessed power and rage, magic and loss, joys and jealousy. The reservation tugged at the lives of its Indians, stole from them in the middle of the night, watched impassively as the horses and salmon disappeared. But the reservation forgave, too. Sam Bone vanished between foot falls on the way to the Trading Post one summer day and reappeared years later to finish his walk. Thomas, Chess, and Checkers heard the word gone shake the foundation of the house.

“Where’s he gone to?” Thomas asked.

“He’s just gone,” Checkers said. “He’s AWOL. He’s MIA.”

The secondhand furniture in Thomas’s house moved an inch to the west.

“It wasn’t always this way,” Thomas said and touched his father’s hand. “It wasn’t always this way.

Samuel slept on the table while Thomas closed his eyes and told the story:

“Way back when, my father was an active alcoholic only about three months of every year. He was a binge drinker, you know? Completely drunk for three days straight, a week, a month, then he jumped back on the wagon again. Sober, he was a good man, a good father, so all the drinking had to be forgiven, enit?

“My father was Washington State High School Basketball Player of the Year in 1956. Even the white people knew how good that Indian boy played. He was just a little guy too, about five-foot-six and a hundred and fifty pounds, hair in a crewcut, and big old Indian ears sticking out. Walter Cronkite came out to the reservation and interviewed him. Cronkite stood on the free-throw line and shouted questions at my father, who dribbled from corner to corner and hit jumpshots.

“He was such a good basketball player that all the Spokanes wanted him to be more. When any Indian shows the slightest hint of talent in any direction, the rest of the tribe starts expecting Jesus. Sometimes they’ll stop a reservation hero in the middle of the street, look into his eyes, and ask him to change a can of sardines into a river of salmon.

“But my father lived up to those expectations, you know? Game after game, he defined himself. He wasn’t like some tired old sports hero, some little white kid, some Wonder-bread boy. Think about it. Take the basketball in your hands, fake left, fake right, look your defender in the eyes to let him know he won’t be stopping you. Take the ball to the rim, the hoop, the goal, the basket, that circle that meant everything in an Indian boy’s life.

“My father wasn’t any different. After his basketball days were over, he didn’t have much else. If he could’ve held a basketball in his arms when he cut down trees for the BIA, maybe my father would’ve kept that job. If he could have drank his own sweat after a basketball game and got drunk off the effort, maybe he would’ve stayed away from the real booze.”

Thomas opened his eyes and looked at his father, lying still on the kitchen table. A wake for a live man. Thomas tried to smile for the sisters. Checkers looked at the overweight Indian man on the table, saw the dirt under his fingernails, the clogged pores, the darkness around his eyes and at the elbows and knees.

“I would’ve never thought he played basketball,” Chess said.

“Me, neither,” Checkers said.

Thomas looked at his father again, studied him, and touched Samuel’s big belly.

“Did you ever play?” Chess asked.

“No,” Thomas said.

“Why not?”

“Well, even Moses only parted the Red Sea once. There are things you just can’t do twice.”

“Sometimes,” Checkers said, “I hate being Indian.”

“Ain’t that the true test?” Chess asked. “You ain’t really Indian unless there was some point in your life that you didn’t want to be.”

“Enit,” Thomas said.

“You know,” Chess said, “like when you’re walking downtown or something, and you see some drunk Indian passed out on the sidewalk.”

Thomas looked at his father.

“Oh,” Chess said. “I didn’t mean your father.”

“That’s okay,” Thomas said. “I have been walking in downtown Spokane and stumbled over my father passed out on the sidewalk.”

“Yeah,” Checkers said. “And I hate it when some Indian comes begging for money. Calling me sister or cousin. What am I supposed to do? I ain’t got much money myself. So I give it to them anyway. Then I feel bad for doing it, because I know they’re going to drink it all up.”

Checkers was always afraid of those Indian men who wandered the streets. She always thought they looked like brown-skinned zombies. Samuel Builds-the-Fire looked like a zombie on the kitchen table. Those Indian zombies lived in Missoula when she was little. Once a month, the whole Warm Water family traveled from their little shack on the reservation to pick up supplies in Missoula. Those drunk zombies always followed the family from store to store.

Still, Checkers remembered how quiet and polite some of those zombies were, just as quiet as Samuel passed out on the table. In Missoula they stood on street corners, wrapped in old quilts, and held their hands out without saying a word. Just stood there and waited.

Once, Checkers watched a white man spit into a zombie’s open hand. Just spit in his palm. The zombie wiped his hand clean on his pants and offered it again. Then the white man spit again. Checkers saw all that happen. After the white man walked away, she ran up to the zombie and gave him a piece of candy, her last piece of candy.

Thank you, the zombie said. He unwrapped the candy, popped it in his mouth, and smiled.

“What are we supposed to do?” Chess asked Thomas, as Checkers remembered her zombies. “What should we do for your father?”

“I don’t know.”

Samuel groaned in his sleep, raised his hands in a defensive position.

“Listen,” Thomas said, “do you want something to drink?”

Thomas gave them all a glass of commodity grape juice. It was very sweet, almost too sweet. Thomas loved sugar.

“Our cousins are drinking this stuff mixed with rubbing alcohol at home,” Chess said.

“Really?” Thomas said. The creativity of alcoholics constantly surprised him.

“Yeah, they call it a Rubbie Dubbie.”

“Drinking that will kill them.”

“I think that’s the idea.”

Thomas, Chess, and Checkers stayed quiet for a long time. After a while, Chess and Checkers started to sing a Flathead song of mourning. For a wake, for a wake. Samuel was still alive, but Thomas sang along without hesitation. That mourning song was B-7 on every reservation jukebox.

After the song, Thomas stood and walked away from the table where his father lay flat as a paper plate. He walked outside while the women stayed inside. They understood. Once outside, Thomas cried. Not because he needed to be alone; not because he was afraid to cry in front of women. He just wanted his tears to be individual, not tribal. Those tribal tears collected and fermented in huge BIA barrels. Then the BIA poured those tears into beer and Pepsi cans and distributed them back onto the reservation. Thomas wanted his tears to be selfish and fresh.

“Hello,” he said to the night sky. He wanted to say the first word of a prayer or a joke. A prayer and a joke often sound alike on the reservation.

“Help,” he said to the ground. He knew the words to a million songs: Indian, European, African, Mexican, Asian. He sang “Stairway to Heaven” in four different languages but never knew where that staircase stood. He sang the same Indian songs continually but never sang them correctly. He wanted to make his guitar sound like a waterfall, like a spear striking salmon, but his guitar only sounded like a guitar. He wanted the songs, the stories, to save everybody.

“Father,” he said to the crickets, who carried their own songs to worry about.

Just minutes, days, years, maybe a generation out of high school, Samuel Builds-the-Fire, Jr., raced down the reservation road in his Chevy. He stopped to pick up Lester FallsApart, who hitchhiked with no particular destination in mind.

“Ya-hey,” Samuel said. “Where you going, Lester?”

“Same place you are. Now.”

“Good enough.”

Samuel dropped the car into gear and roared down the highway.

“I hear you’re getting married to that Susan,” Lester said.

“Enit.”

“You want to have kids.

“There’s already one on the way.”

“Congratulations,” Lester said and slapped Samuel hard on the back. Surprised, Samuel swerved across the center line, which caused Spokane Tribal Police Officer Wilson to suddenly appear. Officer Wilson was a white man who hated to live on the reservation. He claimed a little bit of Indian blood and had used it to get the job but seemed to forget that whenever he handcuffed another Indian. He read Tom Clancy novels, drank hot tea year round, and always fell asleep in his chair. At one A.M. every morning, he woke up from the chair, brushed his teeth, and then fell into bed. The years rushed by him.

“Shit,” Lester said. “It’s the cops.”

“Shit. You’re right.”

Samuel pulled over. Wilson stepped out of his car, walked up to the driver’s window, and shone his flashlight inside the Chevy.

“You two been drinking?”

“I’ve been drinking since I was five,” Lester said. “Kindergarten is hard on a man.”

“I’ll pretend you didn’t say that,” Wilson said.

“And we’ll pretend you’re a real Indian,” Samuel said.

Wilson reached inside the Chevy, grabbed Samuel by the collar, and grinned hard into his face. Officer Wilson was a big man.

“Better watch your mouth,” Wilson said. “Or I’ll have to hurt those precious hands of yours. I wonder how you’d play ball after that.”

“He’d still kick your ass,” Lester said.

“Shit,” Wilson said. “Let’s go for it right now. Let’s go over to the courts and go one on one. Hell, I’ll call up Officer William and we’ll play two on two.”

“Two of you ain’t going to be near enough,” Samuel said. “Lester and me will take on all six of you fake bastards. Full court to ten by ones. Make it. Take it.”

“No shit, enit?” Lester asked. “How’s that fucking treaty for you, officer?”

“You’re on,” Wilson said, and got on his radio to round up his teammates.

“Shit,” said Lester, who never played basketball on purpose. “What are you doing?”

“Don’t worry about it,” Samuel said. “Just give me the ball and get out of the way.”

Samuel and Lester arrived at the basketball courts behind the Tribal School a few moments after the entire Spokane Tribal Police Department. Wilson and William were the big white men. Certifiably one-quarter Spokane Indian, William had made the varsity basketball team in junior college. The brothers Plato, Socrates, and Aristotle Heavy Burden were the forwards. Everybody on the reservation called them Phil, Scott, and Art. The Tribal Police Chief, David WalksAlong, tied up his shoes and stretched his back. He would later be elected Tribal Chairman, but on that night, he played point guard.

“You take it out first,” WalksAlong said and threw the ball hard at Samuel’s chest.

“You better take it out,” Samuel said and threw the ball back. “It’s the only time you’ll touch it.”

The Chief faked a pass to his right and passed left, but Samuel stole the ball and dribbled downcourt for the slam.

SAMUEL & LESTER—1

TRIBAL COPS—0

Thomas stood outside while Chess and Checkers jealously watched Samuel Builds-the-Fire sleep. The sisters really needed to sleep but knew those Stick Indians might haunt Thomas if he stayed up alone.

“What should we do?” Chess asked.

“I don’t know.”

“I don’t know, either.”

“I know you’re falling in love, enit?”

“With Samuel?” Chess asked. “No way.”

“You know who I’m talking about.”

“Maybe I am. Maybe I ain’t. I mean, he’s got a lot going for him. He’s got a job, he’s sober, he’s got his own teeth.”

“Yeah,” Checkers said. “Remember the one I dated? Barney?”

Chess remembered that Checkers always chased the older Indian men and never even looked at the young bucks. Checkers dated Indian men old enough to be her father. Once she went after Barney Pipe, a Blood Indian old enough to be her grandfather. “Jeez,” Chess had said after she first met the old man, “I know we’re supposed to respect our elders, but this is getting carried away.” Barney liked to take out his false teeth while dancing and usually dropped them in the front pocket of his shirt. One night, old Barney pulled Checkers really close during a slow dance, and his false teeth bit her.

“Do you remember Barney’s false teeth?” Chess asked.

“Damn right, I remember. I still have a scar. Biggest hickey I ever got,” Checkers said. “Samuel’s about the same age as Barney, enit?”

“Enit.”

“Man, Barney had a house, a car, and three pairs of cowboy boots.”

Samuel Builds-the-Fire wore a ragged pair of Kmart tennis shoes. The laces had been broken and retied a few times over.

“Indians would be a lot better off,” Chess said, “if we took care of our feet.”

“Yeah,” Checkers said. “And those cavalry soldiers would’ve been much nicer if the government had given them boots that fit. Ain’t nothing worse than a soldier with an ingrown toenail.”

“Samuel would be all right if he’d gotten a good pair of hiking boots when he was little.”

Chess tried to fix Samuel’s hair with her fingers. Then she took out her brush and went to work. Samuel breathed deeply in his sleep. Chess hummed a song as she brushed; Checkers pulled out her brush and sang along. The song, an old gospel hymn, reminded the sisters of the Catholic Church on the Flathead Reservation. Their hands stayed in Samuel’s hair, but their minds traveled back over twenty years.

“Hurry up!” Chess, age twelve, shouted at Checkers, who had just turned eleven. “We’re going to be late for church.”

The Warm Water sisters struggled into their best dresses, dingy from too many washes but still the best they owned, and hurried to Flathead Reservation Catholic Church.

“Father James says I get to sing the lead today,” Checkers said.

“Not if I get there first.”

Chess and Checkers pulled on their shoes and tiptoed into their dad’s room, which stank of whiskey and body odor. Luke Warm Water slept alone and dreamed of his missing wife.

“Hey, Dad,” Chess whispered. “We’re going to church. Is that okay?”

Luke snored.

“Good. I’m glad you agree. Do you want to come this time?”

Luke snored.

“I don’t think it’s a good idea, either. Maybe next time?”

Luke snored.

“Don’t get mad at me. Jeez. If you walked into church, everybody might die of shock.”

“Yeah,” Checkers said. “The whole roof might fall down.”

The sisters walked to the church, which was one of those simple buildings, four walls, a door, a crucifix, and twenty folding chairs. Those folding chairs were multidimensional. Set them up facing the front, and they served as pews. Circle them around a teacher in the middle, and you had Sunday School. Push them up to card tables, and you feasted on donated food. Fold those chairs, stack them in a corner, and you cleared a dance space. Folding chairs proved the existence of God.

Chess and Checkers helped with communion and sang in the church choir. The sisters were the choir, but they sang loud enough to shake the walls.

“The louder we get,” Father James preached, “the better God can hear us.”

Chess and Checkers believed Father James. They sang until their lungs ached. Chess opened her arms wide and looked toward heaven; Checkers opened her arms wide and looked at Father James. Both sisters were in love.

“Do you remember all those gospel songs we used to sing?” Chess asked her sister as they continued to brush Samuel Builds-the-Fire’s hair.

“I remember.”

Chess and Checkers kept singing as they brushed, while Samuel dreamed of beautiful Indian nuns.

“Lucky fuckers,” Chief Walks Along said and threw the ball back to Lester. Samuel cut behind Lester, took a handoff, shrugged off Wilson and William, and launched a thirty-foot jumper.

“For Crazy Horse,” Samuel said as he released the ball.

SAMUEL & LESTER—2

TRIBAL COPS—0

“That’s traveling,” WalksAlong said.

“No way,” Samuel said. “You can’t make that call.”

“I can make any call I want. I’m Chief.”

“Yeah, that’s the only way you’re going to stop me. With a pistol.”

Lester squared off with the other five cops, danced like a boxer, flicked a few harmless jabs at the Heavy Burden brothers, and sprained his wrist.

“Our ball,” Samuel said.

As Thomas stood outside and the Warm Waters brushed Samuel’s hair, Victor dreamed. In his dream, his stepfather was packing the car. Victor had sworn never to say his parents’ names again. But his stepfather, Harold, roared to life and threw Victor’s mother, Matilda, into the trunk beside the dead body of Victor’s real father, Emery. Victor struggled to leave the nightmare, the naming, but his mother’s cries pulled him back. Matilda held tightly to Emery’s body in the trunk.

Where you going? Victor asked Harold.

Away.

Let me get my stuff.

I’ve already packed your stuff. Your suitcase is in the house.

Where we going?

You ain’t going anywhere with us. You can go any damn place you please, but I don’t want no Indian kid hanging around us no more.

Harold slammed the trunk shut, and the force knocked Victor to the ground. By the time he had gotten to his feet, Harold was sitting in the driver’s seat, turning the ignition. The car whined and whined but would not start.

Wait for me, Victor called and ran to the driver’s window. He pounded on the glass while Harold turned the key again. Victor ran into the house to find his suitcase. He ran from room to room. When he finally found it stuffed under a bed, he heard the car start outside.

Wait for me, Victor shouted and ran outside, dropping his suitcase. He ran after his stepfather’s car, followed him down the road as far as he could. He galloped down the pavement, his suddenly long hair trailing in the wind. He ran until his body lathered with sweat. He ran until he fell on all fours.

When he stood again, his head was shaved bald. Huge white men in black robes milled around.

What happened to your hair? a black robe asked.

It’s gone.

No, it’s not, the black robe said. He took Victor’s hand and led him through all the other black robes. The black robe and Victor walked down flights of stairs.

Are you tired? the black robe asked.

Yes.

Do you want me to carry you?

No.

The black robe lifted him anyway and carried him on his shoulders. Victor felt the hard muscles through the black robe. He knew that man could crush him. But the black robe carried him to the bottom of the stairs and into a large room. Paintings adorned every wall.

Look here, the black robe said. This is my favorite one.

Victor looked at the painting. A battle scene. Two armies fighting. Guns, horses, men, flags, horses, smoke, blood, horses. Victor stared at the painting until he smelled blood and smoke.

Please, Victor said, let me down.

The black robe set him down. Victor rubbed his head, scratched his head, and looked at his hand. Blood.

I’m bleeding.

So you are, the black robe said, pulled out a handkerchief, and dabbed at Victor’s wounds. When the cloth was saturated, the black robe rolled it up into a little ball and swallowed it.

Here, the black robe said, I want to show you something.

The black robe held Victor’s hand and led him through a series of doors. Victor lost track of place and time. He closed his eyes and followed the black robe. He heard the black robe sing.

Here, the black robe said. We’re here.

Victor opened his eyes in a room filled with the stink of burning hair. Other black robes shoveled hair into burning barrels, furnaces, and open fires. Long, black hair.

Here we are, the black robe said. We made it.

Victor ran from the room. He ran past doors into strange rooms. He ran until he lost his breath and collapsed on the cold, hard floor of a barren room. He lay there for hours, until the floor grew warm, then grew grass. He dug his fingers and toes into the grass, the dirt. He dug until his fingers and toes bled with the effort. He dug because he had forgotten how to stand. He dug because his father, Emery, and mother, Matilda, waited on a better reservation at the center of the world.

Samuel dribbled the ball between his legs, between William and Wilson, who crashed into each other in their defensive effort, then breezed past Phil, Art, and Scott Heavy Burden, and jumped over WalksAlong for the bucket.

SAMUEL & LESTER—3

TRIBAL COPS—0

“That shot was for every time one of you assholes wrote somebody a traffic ticket on this reservation,” Samuel said. “I mean, how could you fine some Indian who doesn’t have enough money to feed his kids?”

“Yeah,” Lester said. “They wrote old Moses a ticket for failure to stop when there wasn’t another car on the reservation even working at the time. Moses had to pawn one of his eagle feathers to pay that fine. Never got it back either.”

“Fuck both of you,” the Chief said. “Quit talking smack and play ball.”

“Shit,” Samuel said. “I should be writing you all tickets for failing to stop me.”

Samuel gave the ball to Lester, who dribbled it to his left, off his feet, and into the hands of Officer Wilson. Enraged by his turnover, Lester played tough defense by breathing on the officer with Thunderbird Wine breath. Wilson nearly threw up but recovered well enough to break Lester’s nose with an elbow and throw a nice pass to the Chief for an easy basket.

SAMUEL & LESTER—3

TRIBAL COPS—1

Lester kicked and screamed on the ground. The Tribal Police celebrated their first basket, while Samuel stood with hands on hips and knew it was the same old story.

“That was a foul,” Samuel said.

“We didn’t see nothing.”

As Victor, in one corner of the house, dreamed of black robes, Junior fell into his own dream in another corner. In his dream, Junior was in the back seat of his parents’ car outside the Powwow Tavern. Below freezing, so he shared a sleeping bag with his two brothers and two sisters. Junior struggled to remember his siblings’ names.

Run the heat for a little while, his siblings pleaded, because he had the car keys.

No, Junior said. Mom and Dad said I have to save gas. We just got enough to get home.

In his dream, Junior tried to remember his parents’ names, but they eluded him. Those names always eluded him, even in waking. In his dream, Junior’s siblings tried to wrestle the keys away, but he fought them off. They wrestled and argued until their parents staggered out of the bar.

Oh, good, his siblings said. We’re going home.

Junior’s parents knocked on the window; he rolled it down.

You warm? they asked.

Warm enough, Junior said and silenced his siblings with a mean look.

Here’s some food, mother-and-father said, and shoved potato chips and Pepsi through the open window into the arms of their children.

We’ll be out soon, okay? mother-and-father said.

Junior and his siblings watched their parents stagger back toward the bar. Mother-and-father turned and waved. Then they danced a clumsy two-step.

Jeez, Junior said in his dream. They love each other.

Mother-and-father wove their way back inside the bar, and Junior turned back to his siblings.

Make sure everybody gets enough, Junior said.

They ate their potato chips and Pepsi.

I’m bored, his siblings said after dinner, so Junior sang to them.

I’m bored, his siblings said again, and Junior started to cry. He cried as each of his siblings climbed out of the car and ran away on all fours. They ran into the darkness; hands and feet sparked on the pavement. They ran to other reservations and never returned. They ran to crack houses and lay down in the debris. They ran to tall buildings and jumped off. They joined the army and disappeared in the desert. Junior cried until his parents came out of the bar at closing time.

Where is everybody? mother-and-father asked.

Gone, gone, gone, gone.

Mother-and-father cried. Then they drove down the highway and looked for their children.

I don’t mean to say it’s all your fault, mother-and-father said. But it is all your fault.

They drove and drove. Mother-and-father sat behind the wheel and drank beer. When finished, they rolled down the window and threw the empty bottles into the dark. Junior heard them shatter against road signs. He saw the little explosions they made at impact. Impossible reds, impossible reds. He lost count of the bottles.

Ya-hey, Junior called out, but his parents pushed him back.

I don’t want to hurt you, mother-and-father said. But I might hurt you.

Junior leaned back, curled into a ball in the back seat. He heard the road sing under the wheels of the car. He heard his parents’ soft tears and quiet whispers. Then he noticed the car moving faster and faster, his parents’ tears and whispers growing into sobs and shouts.

Wait, Junior said, but the car suddenly rolled. Junior counted the revolutions: one, two, three, four, all the way to twenty. The car came to rest on its wheels, with Junior still tucked into a ball in the back seat. He listened to a faint song in the distance. He heard something dripping in the engine. He heard coughing.

Ya-hey, Junior said as he climbed out of the car and saw his mother-and-father completely still on the grass. He grabbed his parents by the arms and dragged them across the grass. It took hours. He dragged his parents up stairs and into a strange house. It took days. He dragged his parents into a bedroom and laid them down on the bed. It took years. He kneeled at the foot of the bed. He folded his hands to pray.

He opened his mouth, but nothing came out. He strained and strained, his vocal cords ached with the effort, but nothing came out. Then he heard music from the radio beside the bed. He turned up the volume until the walls and bed shook. His parents stared with fixed pupils. They danced on the bed. Their arms and legs kicked wildly, until their fingers locked, and they pulled each other back and forth, back and forth.

Chief WalksAlong hit two quick jumpshots over a seriously handicapped Lester FallsApart, who protected his broken nose with one hand. Officers William and Wilson made baskets, and Samuel ran ragged trying to defend himself against the entire world.

TRIBAL COPS—5

SAMUEL & LESTER—3

“Samuel,” the Chief asked, “don’t you sing pretty good? I might want to hear a few verses of ‘I Fought the Law and the Law Won’ after this game.”

“I don’t know that one. But I know how to sing ‘I Shot the Sheriff.’”

The Chief threw the ball to Art Heavy Burden, who missed a jumper, but the Chief followed the shot and put the rebound back in.

TRIBAL COPS—6

SAMUEL & LESTER—3

“That shot was for every time one of you drunk ass Indians told me I wasn’t real,” the Chief said. “That was for every time you little fuckers think pissing your pants is a ceremonial act.”

“Did you ever drink?” Thomas asked Chess after he came back inside the house. His father still snored on the table.

“No.”

“Not ever?”

“Neither of us ever drank,” Chess said.

“We were afraid of it,” Checkers said. “Even when we wanted to drink, we were too scared, enit?”

Thomas looked at his father on the table.

“Look what it did to my father,” he said.

Chess looked at Thomas, at his father, at both. She saw her father, Luke, in their faces. She missed her father, even after all he had done.

Checkers also saw her father in Samuel’s face, in Thomas’s eyes. She saw that warrior desperation and the need to be superhuman in the poverty of a reservation. She hated all of it.

I’m Super Indian Man, those pseudo-warriors always shouted on the reservation. Able to leap tall HUD houses in a single bound. Faster than a BIA pickup. Stronger than a block of commodity cheese. Checkers tried to ignore them, but the Indian men visited her dreams. Look at my big cowboy hat. Look at my big boots. Look at my big, big belt buckle. Those men, those ghosts, crawled into her bed at night, lifted her nightgown, and forced her legs apart. After they finished with her, those Indian men sat on the edge of the bed and cried. Ha-oh, ha-oh, ha-oh. I lost my cowboy hat. Somebody stole my boots. I pawned my belt buckle. No matter how bad she felt, those tears always moved her heart. She reached for the Indian men in her dreams and held them tightly. Her stomach turned, and she swallowed bile, but she held on.

“I hate this,” Thomas said. “I hate my father.”

“You don’t hate him,” Chess said. “You’re just upset.”

“I hate him,” Thomas said again and squeezed his hands into fists.

A few days earlier, Chess and Thomas had driven to Spokane for a cheap hamburger. They walked in downtown Spokane and stumbled onto a drunk couple arguing.

“Get the fuck away from me!” the drunk woman yelled at her drunk husband, who squeezed his hand into a fist like he meant to hit her.

Thomas and Chess flinched, then froze, transported back to all of those drunken arguments they’d witnessed and survived.

The drunk couple in downtown Spokane pulled at each other’s clothes and hearts, but they were white people. Chess and Thomas knew that white people hurt each other, too. Chess knew that white people felt pain just like Indians. Nerve endings, messages to the brain, reflexes. The doctor swung hammer against knee, and the world collapsed.

“You fucker!” the white woman yelled at her husband, who opened his hands and held them out to his wife. An offering. That hand would not strike her. He pleaded with his wife until she fell back into his arms. That white woman and man held each other while Chess and Thomas watched. A hundred strangers walked by and never noticed any of it.

After that, Chess and Thomas had sat in the van in a downtown parking lot. Thomas began to weep, deep ragged tears that rose along his rib cage, filled his mouth and nose, and exploded out.

“You don’t hate him,” Chess said to Thomas as Samuel Builds-the-Fire inhaled sharply and held his breath too long. They all waited for the next breath. When he finally exhaled loudly, it surprised him to be alive, and he smiled in his sleep.

Chess looked across Samuel’s body lying on that table, looked at Samuel’s son, and wanted a mirror. Here, she wanted to say to Thomas. You don’t look anything like your father. You’re much more handsome. Your hair is longer, and your hands are beautiful. But Thomas needed more than that. His father lay on the table, but it could have been any Indian man. It could have been a white man on the table.

“What’s going to happen to him?” Checkers asked.

“What’s going to happen to who?” Chess and Thomas asked her back.

Samuel made two beautiful moves and scored twice, but the Tribal Cops answered with two buckets of their own. The game broke down into a real war after that. Hard fouls on drives to the hoop, moving screens, kidney punches. The cops targeted Lester’s broken nose and drove Samuel into a basket support pole. Fresh wounds.

“That’s a foul!” Samuel yelled as he made a move on the Chief.

“You goddamn pussy.”

Samuel held the ball in his arms like a fullback and ran the Chief over.

“First down!” Lester yelled.

“Now,” Samuel said, “that’s a foul.”

The Chief stood, touched his head where it hit the court, and found blood.

“That’s assaulting an officer,” he said. “Good for a year in Tribal Jail.”

“This is a game,” Samuel said. “It don’t count.”

“Everything counts.”

The Chief took the ball from Samuel, passed it to Phil Heavy Burden, took a pass right back, and popped a jumper.

TRIBAL COPS—9

SAMUEL & LESTER—5

“Game point, shitheads,” the Chief said. “You two best be getting ready for jail.”

“Fuck you,” Samuel said as he stole the ball, drove down the court, and went in for a two-handed, rattle-the-foundations, ratify-a-treaty, abolish-income-tax, close-the-uranium-mines monster dunk.

“That was for every one of you Indians like you Tribal Cops,” Samuel said. “That was for all those Indian scouts who helped the U.S. Cavalry. That was for Wounded Knee I and II. For Sand Creek. Hell, that was for both the Kennedys, Martin Luther King, and Malcolm X.”

“Yeah,” Lester said. “That was for Leonard Peltier, too.”

“And for Marilyn Monroe.”

“And for Jimi Hendrix.”

“Yeah, for Jimi.”

“What about Jim Morrison,” Wilson and William asked. White guys obsessed on Jim Morrison.

“You can have Jim Morrison,” Samuel said. “We’ll take the ball.”

Lester took the pass from Samuel, faked a pass back, dribbled once, and threw up a prayer that banked in. It was the first and last basket of Lester FallsApart’s basketball career.

TRIBAL COPS—9

SAMUEL & LESTER—7

Thomas, Chess, and Checkers never slept that night. They talked stories around the table where Samuel Builds-the-Fire snored. “Your mom died of cancer, enit?” Chess asked.

“Yeah, stomach cancer,” Thomas said.

“I’m sorry.”

“It ain’t your fault. She died a long time ago.”

Checkers shivered at the thought of cancer. Cancer rose from the bodies of dead Indians and walked down the hallways of hospitals.

“Did she drink?” Chess asked.

“She did. But she quit. She was sober when she died.”

“Really? Quit just like that?”

“Cold as a turkey,” Thomas said. “She quit the morning after this really bad New Year’s Eve party at our house. This house.”

“What happened?”

“Dad got real drunk, kicked everybody out, and then took all the furniture out on the front lawn, and burned it.”

“Shit, you must have been scared.”

“Not too scared. It wasn’t that big a fire. I mean, we barely had any furniture. But then he threatened to burn down the house with all of us in it. So Mom threw me into the car, and we drove to her sister’s up in Colville. Her sister wasn’t home, so we sat in this all-night diner and waited. The sun came up, and we drove back here. Mom never drank again.”

“What happened then?”

“She kicked Dad out. Divorced him Indian style, enit? Then went to work for the Tribe as a driver. She drove the Senior Citizens’ van all over the countryside. Took the elders to every powwow. She got all traditional. Started dancing, singing, playing stickgame again.

“Jeez,” Checkers said. “That must have been some party, enit?”

“Yeah,” Thomas said. “Dad even hired a band.”

“A real band?”

“Kind of. It was just a couple of guys from the reservation. Louie and Merle. They played the blues. They were pretty good when they weren’t drunk.”

“Sounds like a couple guys we know.

“What else happened at the party?”

“Same old things,” Thomas said. “People got drunk. People fought. People got pregnant in the back rooms. A couple went to jail. One got his stomach pumped. Two died in a car wreck on the way home. And there was a partridge in a pear tree.”

“Who died?”

“Junior’s parents.”

“Jeez,” Chess said. “He must have been really young.”

“Yeah,” Thomas said. “He was the oldest, too. Had a bunch of brothers and sisters. Their auntie took them in and raised them. She died a few years ago.”

“What about Victor’s parents?”

“They’re all gone.”

“Jeez,” Checkers said. “Samuel is the only one who made it.”

Samuel rolled over on the table and coughed. He curled into a fetal position and mumbled something.

“Hard to believe, enit?”

“Yeah,” Thomas said. “The only things that will survive a nuclear war are cockroaches and my father.”

“Our father was crazy, too,” Chess said. “He’d come home all drunk and screaming. Be talking about how he was a radio man during World War II.”

“I thought all those radio men were Navajo,” Thomas said.

“They all were Navajo. And my dad was too young for the war anyway, but he kept saying it.”

“Man, you never hear about those Navajo radio guys, do you? They won the war. Those Germans and Japanese couldn’t figure that code out.”

“Yeah, just like that. Mom would tell him about all that, too. But my dad kept going on and on. He was a war hero, jumped out of airplanes. He killed Hitler.”

“Enit?” Thomas asked.

“Yeah,” Chess said. “Old Luke Warm Water told us he was the one who killed Hitler. Caught up to him in that bunker and made him drink poison.”

Thomas laughed.

“What’s so funny?”

“My dad always told me he was the one who killed Hitler. They must have been on that mission together.”

“Our fathers, the war heroes.”

Thomas thought about all the imagined and real wars their fathers fought. He thought about that New Year’s Eve party, all those parties that seemed to celebrate nothing at all. He remembered the two Indians who played the blues at that party, where Samuel burned the furniture on the front lawn. Two old Indian men played blues. In sunglasses. Big bellies. Big knuckles. Thomas tried to remember if they were any good. He searched his mind for some melody they played but heard nothing.

“You know,” Chess said. “I heard beer bottles breaking so much that I got used to it. I kind of miss them sometimes.”

Exhausted, Samuel took the ball out. His body ached. Once, pain had been a drug to him. He needed pain, but then it had just become pain. Just more weight on his body.

“It’s over,” the Chief said. “You don’t have nothing left.”

Art, Scott, and Phil Heavy Burden surrounded Lester and prevented him from moving. The Chief and the two white officers guarded Samuel.

“Fuck you twice,” Samuel said.

Samuel looked at Chief WalksAlong, at all the Tribal Cops, at Lester. He shifted the ball from his left hip to his right. He spun the ball in his hands, felt the leather against his fingertips, and closed his eyes.

“What the hell you doing?” the Chief asked.

With his eyes still closed, Samuel drove to the basket, around his defenders, and pulled up for a short jumper. The ball rotated beautifully. Years later, Lester still swore that ball stopped in midair, just spun there like it was on a stick, like the ball wanted to make sure everyone noticed its beauty.

“That shot was vain,” Lester said.

“That shot was the best story I ever told,” Samuel said.

TRIBAL COPS—9

SAMUEL & LESTER—8

The man-who-was-probably-Lakota stood in front of the Trading Post every morning. He studied his watch, waited for the top of the hour, and then started his ceremony at the same exact time every morning.

“The end of the world is near!” he chanted. “The end of the world is near!”

“Jeez,” Thomas said as he heard the chant. “It can’t be six already. We stayed up all night.”

Victor and Junior stumbled into the room.

“Shit,” Victor said. “Does that crazy Lakota have to do that every morning?”

“Enit?” Junior said. “He must think he’s one of those Plains Indian roosters.”

“Jeez,” Victor said and looked at Samuel. “How’s your old man?”

“He’s all right.”

“I’m hungry,” Junior said.

“There’s some applesauce in the fridge.”

“Commodity applesauce or real applesauce?”

“Commodity.”

“Shit, we’ll eat it anyway.”

“Ya-hey,” Victor said. “Maybe we should stick an apple in Samuel’s mouth and roast him up.”

Checkers rose in anger and slapped Victor.

“What the fuck’s wrong with you?” Victor asked as he grabbed her wrists.

“That ain’t funny. That ain’t funny.”

Victor held Checkers until she stopped struggling. He let her go, and Checkers slapped him again. She wailed on Victor. The rest of Coyote Springs remained silent, too sleepy and stunned to move. Checkers slapped and kicked the Indian man in front of her. That Indian man, those Indian men.

“Stop it!” Chess shouted as she came back to life. She tried to separate Checkers and Victor, but her sister pushed her away. Checkers balled her hands into fists and started to punch Victor.

“That’s it,” Victor said, picked Checkers up, and threw her down. Checkers bounced back up and threw a few more wild punches.

Thomas jumped Victor then, and the two wrestled around the room, bumped into walls and the other band members. Checkers crawled under the kitchen table for cover, while Samuel Builds-the-Fire slept on. Chess screamed at Thomas and Victor.

“Knock this shit off!”

Victor pulled away from Thomas. They stood face to face like boxers before a bout. Breathing hard, they stared each other down.

“You assholes,” Chess said. “Quit this macho bullshit.”

“Ya-hey,” Junior said. “I’ve got applesauce.”

Junior stepped between Thomas and Victor.

“I’ve got enough spoons for all of us, too.”

“I don’t want any,” Thomas said and walked out the door. Chess followed him. Victor took the applesauce and spoons from Junior. Checkers stayed beneath the table, while Samuel sat up, looked around, then fell back to sleep.

“Hey,” Chess said as she caught up to Thomas outside. “What the hell you think you’re doing? You think you’re some kind of tough guy, enit?”

“He can’t do that to people no more,” Thomas said. “I won’t let him. I don’t give a shit what that guitar said. I don’t care.

“Well, call it off,” Chess said. “Let’s kick them out of the band. We don’t need them. We can be a trio. Me, you, and Checkers. We’ll get a new name. We’ll move to a new place. Get the hell away from this reservation. Any reservation.”

The horses screamed.

“What do you think?” Thomas asked. “Should we do that?”

“Yeah, we should.”

Victor swallowed the last bite of applesauce just as Thomas and Chess returned to the house. Junior had crawled beneath the table with Checkers. She pushed and kicked at him, but he still sat under there. He wanted some applesauce.

“I think she’s hurt,” Junior said to Chess, who crawled beneath the table, too.

“Is she okay?” Thomas asked.

“My ass hurts,” Checkers said. She shook as Chess held her.

“She’s completely fucking nuts is what she is,” Victor said.

“Listen,” Thomas said, and the rest of Coyote Springs looked at him. He wanted to tell them about the new plan to kick Junior and Victor out of the band, but he heard a knock on the door.

“Who the hell is that?” Victor asked.

Thomas opened the door to nothing. He looked around. Nobody. He was about to shut the door when he heard a voice.

“Hey,” the voice whispered from inside a bush on the front lawn. “You’re Builds-the-Fire, right?”

“Yeah.”

“The lead singer, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay,” the voice said. “I have a letter for you.”

The Federal Express guy jumped out of the bush and handed the letter to Thomas. Then he saluted him, jumped off the porch, and ran for his truck. Thomas watched the FedEx truck kick up dust and smoke as it peeled out of the driveway.

“What was that?” Chess asked.

“This,” Thomas said and opened the letter. He read it slowly.

“Well,” Chess said, “what is it?”

“We got an offer to play at this place in Seattle. The Backboard. I guess they saw us play in Ellensburg. They’ll pay us a thousand dollars.”

“No shit!” Victor yelled and started to dance with Junior. They tangoed up and down the floor. Junior picked up a stray feather and stuck it in his teeth.

“It’s our chance,” Thomas said.

“Chance for what?” Chess asked.

“The money. We need the money. Don’t we?”

Chess knew that Coyote Springs needed the money. She needed the money. The forest fire season was nearly over. Nobody hired Flathead Indians on the Spokane Indian Reservation. Two hundred dollars a head. Checkers and Chess would have four hundred together. With Thomas and his share, they would have enough money to dump Victor and Junior.

“What do you think?” Chess asked her sister.

“I ain’t going anywhere with that asshole,” Checkers said. “Besides, how the hell do these people know who we are? They couldn’t have seen us in Ellensburg. That was just last night. I don’t trust them. I don’t trust any of this.”

“We don’t need you,” Victor said. “You can’t sing anyway.

Checkers, Chess, and Junior climbed out from under the table. Victor stepped behind Thomas because Checkers knew how to punch.

“I think we all need to sleep on this,” Chess said. “Jeez, Checkers and I ain’t got any sleep at all. You neither, Thomas.”

“We ain’t got time to sleep on it,” Thomas said. “They want us to be there tomorrow night for sound check.”

“Are you serious?” Serious enough

“Jeez,” Chess asked her sister again, “what do you want to do?”

“I told you. I ain’t going anywhere with that caveman.”

“I’m going,” Victor said.

“Me, too,” Junior said.

“This ain’t enough time to decide anything,” Chess said. “That’s not fair. How could they do that to us?”

“Strangers ask us to sing for them, and they’ll pay us a thousand bucks,” Victor said. “And you think they’re being assholes. We should be grateful.”

“Will you shut up? I’m trying to think.”

“I’m going,” Thomas said. “I have to go.”

Victor whooped. Junior hugged Thomas.

“Checkers,” Chess said, “are you sure you don’t want to go?”

“I’m sure.”

“Okay, she’s not going. But she still gets her share of the money.”

“No fucking way,” Victor said.

“Okay,” Thomas said, “we’re a democracy. We’ll take a vote.”

“Not this voting shit again,” Victor said. “Who pays attention to voting in this goddamn country anyway?”

“All those in favor of Checkers getting a full share if she stays home, raise your hand.”

Thomas, Chess, and Checkers voted for full share. Junior abstained. Victor was pissed.

“She stays home,” Thomas said, “and she gets full share.”

Lord, I’m sorry, Chess said to herself. We need the money.

“Well, Jesus,” Victor said, more worried about his share. “So she gets the money. But we got to get packed. We got to get going. Seattle, Seattle.”

The city waited.

Samuel flew. He had dreamed of flying before. But there he was, flying for real. Flying true. Flying four feet above the basketball court. He flew over the Tribal Cops. Over Chief WalksAlong. He switched the ball from left to right hand and back again. He closed his eyes, opened them, shuttered them like a camera taking photos of a historic moment. Samuel laid the ball gently over the rim. Samuel missed the shot.

“Shit,” Samuel yelled as Officer Wilson grabbed the rebound. He was still cussing as WalksAlong received a pass and drove the baseline. Samuel stopped the drive, forced the Chief toward the middle of the court.

“This is game point!” the Chief yelled. “We make it, we win.”

The Chief dribbled once, twice, three times and lifted off the ground. Samuel leapt with him, arms outstretched, watched the ball float just above his fingertips, and still watched as the ball made its lazy way toward the hoop.

Checkers waved goodbye as the blue van pulled onto the reservation highway. She waved at Chess with most of her hand, saved a little for Thomas, and maybe a bit for Junior. She excluded Victor from her wave.

“What are you going to do this weekend?” Chess had asked her sister before she climbed into the van.

“I think I’ll go to church. It’s been a while.”

“Yeah, the Catholic Church is down by the crossroads, enit?”

“Yeah, I’ve walked by it a couple times,” Checkers had said.

Checkers continued to wave goodbye as the blue van rolled out of sight. She walked back into the house, nervous, unsure what to do with her time. Maybe she should sing scales, ready her voice for the Sunday hymns. Father Arnold was the priest down there. She had read his name on the greeting board when she walked by the church. Father Arnold. She wondered about Father Arnold’s favorite song.

“You think Checkers will be all right?” Thomas asked as he drove the van off the reservation.

“She’s a grown woman,” Chess said.

“She makes me groan,” Victor said.

Everybody ignored Victor. In a unanimous vote taken just before they left, Coyote Springs had decided that was the best policy. Even Victor raised his hand for that one.

“What’s Seattle like?” Junior asked.

“It rains there,” Chess said. “It rains a lot.”

The blue van rolled through the wheat fields of eastern Washington, across the central desert, and into the foothills of the Cascades. They climbed Snoqualmie Pass and stopped at the Indian John Rest Area.

“Who is this Indian John?” Victor asked as they parked the van.

“I’m Indian John,” Junior said.

Chess and Thomas sat on the grass and shared a warm Pepsi. Victor and Junior walked to the bathroom. Inside, a little white boy stared at them.

“Hello there,” Junior said.

“Hello,” the boy said.

“What’s your name?”

“Jason. Are you an Indian?”

“Yes, I am.”

“Hey, Daddy, there’s a real Indian out here.”

A huge white man stepped out of a stall.

“Who you talking to?” the white man asked his son.

“This Indian. He’s real.”

Junior waved weakly to the man. Victor turned away and pretended not to know Junior. But they were the only two Indians in the bathroom. Both wore white t-shirts that had COYOTE SPRINGS scribbled across the front, although Junior had on jeans and Victor had on his purple bell bottoms.

“You’re an Indian, huh?” the white man asked.

“Yeah,” Junior said and prepared to run. On a reservation, this white man would have been all alone. In America, this white man was legion.

“That’s cool,” the white man said. “Did you know this rest area was named after an Indian?”

“Yeah,” Victor said and put his arm around Junior. “And you’re looking at the grandsons of Indian John himself.”

“Really? What’s your names?”

“I’m Indian Victor and this is Indian Junior.”

The white man almost believed them but came to his senses and stormed away with his son in tow.

“What took you so long?” the white man’s wife asked.

“Just some Indians,” the white man said.

“Just some Indians,” the little boy repeated.

Victor and Junior grabbed a free cup of coffee from the stand outside the bathroom. The Veterans of War offered free coffee and donuts in return for donations. Junior dropped a dollar into the box; Victor dropped sugar into his coffee. Both knew it was too warm for coffee, but they drank it anyway and talked about the price of guitar strings and drumsticks. They stood near the coffee stand and dreamed about Seattle.

Chess and Thomas sat on the grass for a long time. Neither wanted to rise and leave the rest stop, because Seattle waited somewhere down the mountain. Seattle. Seattle. The word sounded like a song.

“It’s named after an Indian,” Chess said. “Seattle is named after a real Indian chief.

“Really?”

“Really. But I guess it was something like Sealth. Chief Stealth. Or Shelf. Or something like that. Something different.”

“Seattle was his white name, huh?”

“Yeah, I guess. Jeez, you know his granddaughter lived in some old shack before she died. They name the town after her grandfather, and she lives in a shack downtown.”

“Too bad.”

“Ain’t it awful. You know, I was wondering where your father was. Where’d he take off to anyway? I never even saw him get off the table.”

“I don’t know.”

“You never told us who won that game between your father and the Tribal Cops.”

“Who do you think?” Thomas asked. “Who you think won that game?”