I don’t remember stuttering any poignant last words to Rufus. I hadn’t been tough enough to look in his bright blue eyes as I’d aimed the barrel at his head. I braced the buttstock on my shoulder, and pulled the trigger.
The whimpering quit.
I traded the shotgun for the shovel. Digging a hole took an eternity when I had to stop every shovelful to wipe my tears.
That night when Dad finally came home, he hadn’t said a word. He’d rested my head on his strong shoulder as we rocked together on the porch swing, in silence, listening to the familiar sounds of a summer night.
But that day had been another turning point in my life.
“Aunt Mercy?”
I blinked away the bad trip down memory lane. “Yeah?”
“Did you cry? You know, afterward?”
“Like a baby.”
Surprise registered on his face. “How come you never told Mom you cried?”
“It wouldn’t have mattered. I did what had to be done.” And in doing the right thing, once again I’d widened the gap between my sister and me.
“How old were you?”
“Twelve.”
He nodded. “When I was twelve, I had to shoot my cat Mooshu after a skunk bit her. Grandpa let me use his gun. Mom freaked out. Like, freaked out for days.”
“Did you cry?”
“Yeah. But it would’ve been worse to watch Mooshu suffer.”
“That’s true.” I took another drink. “Doing the right thing isn’t always the easiest thing, is it?”
“Nope. But now… I don’t think I could shoot Shoonga.”
“Because Grandpa gave him to you? And now Grandpa is gone?”
Levi shrugged. “Mostly. Shoonga is the one thing in my life that’s just mine.”
Silence.
We seemed to have lost our momentum. I could let the conversation die, or I could take it to the next level.
“You can tell me to take a flying leap, but I have to know why you really broke into Mr. P.’s place.”
His shoulders slumped almost as if he’d known the question was coming. “You swear you won’t tell my mom or no one else?”
“Absolutely.”
He squirmed. “Because of Albert, I’d been trying to hang with Moser and Little Bear and them guys. They was always teasing me that I was a white kid and all the Lakota classes in the world wouldn’t make me more Indian.”
Levi wanted to be more Indian? Why? Most days he could pass for a full-blood Sioux, with his tawny skin and brown eyes. What a bizarre reversal. Most Indian kids tried to be white, or-in the case of clothing and music-black.
“They asked me if I’d ever seen something I’d wanted but couldn’t have.”
“I suppose you told them something specific?”
“I told ’em about the knife Mr. P. showed me once when I was with Grandpa. I thought it was the coolest thing I’d ever seen. They said they’d let me into their group if I stole it. And if I didn’t, it just showed I was too white to hang with them.”
“The sheriff didn’t list the knife as one of the things you stole.”
“He don’t know about it.”
No judgment. Just let him continue. Let it unfold at his pace, not yours.
“The pills and booze and other stuff was to throw Mr. P. off. Even after I was caught, Mr. P. wouldn’t press charges. Moser and Little Bear said it proved I was too white to be in their club, because if a real Indian kid woulda broken into Mr. P.’s house, his red ass would’ve been tossed in jail.”
True. “That’s what you were fighting about?”
“Yeah. I did what they told me to for initiation, and now they still won’t let me be part of the club.”
“Was Albert in the club?”
“We had a big fight about it when I found out Albert didn’t have no say in who could join. He wouldn’t tell me why they were trying to keep me out. Some friend, huh? He claimed Moser is in charge, even when some other person is the main leader.”
“Who?”
“Don’t know. Don’t get to meet them until you pass the Warrior’s Challenge. Which means I probably won’t never meet ’em because I failed it.”
Why was he so desperate to be part of a group that didn’t want him? Boggled my mind. Rather than ask him to explain something even he probably didn’t understand, I changed the subject. “Where’s the knife now?”
A sheepish smile appeared, then he stared at his stained sneakers. He swung his feet, and the suspension creaked as the truck bumped up and down. “I took Ma’s car when she was sleeping and drove back to Mr. P.’s. Left it on the workbench in the garage. Might make me a pussy, but I would’ve given it back even if I had passed the stupid initiation.”
There it was, that glimmer of a decent human beneath the surly teenage behavior and bad choices. He could change. He’d already won half the battle because he wanted to change. “Smart move.”
“Thanks.”
Another round of quiet.
“Look, I just want to throw it out there that you can talk to me about stuff like this anytime. I won’t go running to your mom with what you tell me.”
“Cool. He always said the same thing. I miss him, you know? We used to talk all the time.”
“Your dad?”
“No. Grandpa.” Levi smacked a mosquito on his arm. “It sucks that he died.”
Sometimes I forgot I wasn’t the only one mourning the loss of Wyatt Gunderson. “Sucks big-time.”
Somewhere behind us I heard girls giggling, which reminded me I hadn’t passed along the message from Molly. “Hey. I saw Molly and some other girl hanging out inside. They asked about you.”
“Who was the other girl?”
“Sue… Ellen?”
His eyes lit up. “Sue Anne? Sue Anne is here?”
“Yeah. Is she your girlfriend?”
Levi snorted. “I wish.” He looked up at me, red spots on his cheeks. “She’s cool, even if she used to go out with that asshole, Little Bear. She’s in summer-school classes at the rec center with me. Sometimes we… never mind.” He hopped off the tailgate, touching the spot on his jaw where a bruise would pop up come morning. “Maybe she won’t mind if I’m a little beat up, eh?”
“She’ll probably swoon right into your arms, tough guy.”
“Swoon? You sound like Gramps. Old-fashioned. Kinda dorky.”
“Dorky?” I gave him my Eastwood flinty-eyed stare. “I’ve kicked ass for a lesser insult.”
Levi grinned. “You ain’t as mean as you let on either.”
I lifted my brows. “Now that’s pushing it, boy.”
Before he disappeared into the darkness, he said, “I’m glad you came home, Aunt Mercy.”
Home.
He’d reminded me of another complication to my decision. Like it or not, he was the sole heir to the Gunderson Ranch. How could I sell his heritage out from under him?
I couldn’t. I wouldn’t. As big as I talked about our options, and securing a solid financial future, I knew I wasn’t going anywhere. Neither was anyone else.
I snapped the lid on the cooler, slammed the tailgate, jumped in the cab, and let old memories and guilt chase me all the way home.
SIX
In the dusky early hours when the gauzy veil of the spirit world is at its thinnest, visions appear.
The body is tethered to one world while the spirit journeys to the other. Eyes roll and jerk behind thin lids. Flesh burns. Sweat oozes from skin, thick as syrup.
Muscles tighten, bracing for the first silvery flare.
Flash-Blood pools in the dirt. Ugly black puddles, a poison even thirsty Mother Earth refuses to absorb.
Flash-Blood boils the heavens, whipping clouds into an angry scarlet horizon.
Flash-Blood trickles toward the riverbed. Swirling along the bank, seeping through the jagged stones to mix with the water.