“Hey, Victor,” Chess shouted. “That’s a vending machine, you savage. It works on electricity.”
“Hello,” Thomas said into the phone. “This is Thomas Builds-the-Fire. Lead singer of Coyote Springs. Yeah. Coyote Springs. We’re here for the gig tomorrow night. Yeah, that’s right. We’re the Indian band.”
Thomas smiled at Chess to let her know everything was cool.
“Yeah, we’re over at the Super 8 Motel by that Pink Elephant Car Wash. We got a couple rooms, and the clerk wondered how you were going to pay for it.”
Thomas lost his smile. Chess looked around the room for it.
“I don’t understand. You mean we have to pay for it ourselves? But you invited us.”
Thomas listened carefully to the voice at the other end.
“Okay, okay. I see. Well, thanks. What time should we be there tomorrow?”
Thomas hung up the phone and walked over to the rest of the band.
“What’s wrong?” Chess asked.
“They said we’re supposed to pay for it,” Thomas said.
“No fucking way,” Victor said.
“What’s happening?” Junior asked.
“I guess it’s a contest tomorrow,” Thomas said. “A lot of bands are going to be there. The winner gets a thousand dollars. The losers don’t get nothing. I guess I didn’t understand the invitation too well.”
“What are you talking about?” Coyote Springs asked.
“It’s a Battle of the Bands tomorrow. We have to play the best to get the money. Otherwise, we don’t get nothing.”
“Jeez,” Junior said. “How many bands are there going to be?”
“Twenty or so.”
“Shit,” Victor said. “Let’s forget that shit. Let’s go home. We don’t need this. We’re Coyote Springs.”
“We don’t have enough money to get home,” Thomas said.
“Fuck,” Victor said. “Well, let’s get the goddamn rooms ourselves and kick some ass at that contest tomorrow night.”
“We don’t have enough money to get the rooms and eat, too.”
“Thomas,” Chess said, “how much money do we have?”
“Enough to eat on. But we can’t afford the rooms.”
“Looks like Checkers was right in staying home,” Chess said and missed her sister.
“What are we going to do?” Junior asked.
“We can sleep in the van,” Thomas said, feigning confidence. “Then we go and win that contest tomorrow. A thousand bucks. We go home in style, enit?”
Coyote Springs had no other options. Thomas started the van without a word, pulled out of the motel parking lot, and searched for a supermarket. He found a Foodmart and went inside. The rest of Coyote Springs waited for Thomas. He came out with a case of Pepsi, a loaf of bread, and a package of bologna. Silently, Coyote Springs built simple sandwiches and ate them.
Checkers walked to the Catholic Church early Saturday to meet Father Arnold. She wanted to join the choir. Enough of the rock music. She needed to reserve her voice for something larger. She braided her hair, pulled on her best pair of blue jeans, red t-shirt, and white tennis shoes. Nike running shoes. Checkers always bought expensive tennis shoes, no matter how poor she was.
Go in the supermarket, Luke Warm Water had said to his daughters during one of their shopping visits to Spokane, and get some eggs, milk, and butter. Oh, and get yourselves some tennis shoes. They’re in that third aisle. Try them on first.
Checkers and Chess slumped into the store, sat in the third aisle, and tried on tennis shoes, those supermarket shoes constructed of cheap canvas and plastic. Other shoppers, white people, stared as the Warm Waters tried on shoes; Checkers saw the pity in their eyes. Those poor Indian kids have to buy their shoes in a supermarket. Both sisters cried as they paid for the essential food items and those ugly shoes. Ever since her father had gone, Checkers bought the most expensive pair of shoes she found.
Those shoes felt good on her feet as Checkers walked into the church. A small church. Four walls, a few pews, an altar. Jesus crucified on the wall. Mary weeping in a corner. It felt like home. Checkers crossed herself and kneeled in a pew. She folded her hands into a prayer.
“Please,” she whispered. “Let good things happen.”
She lost track of time as she prayed. Amen, amen. Coyote Springs entered her mind, and she thought of her sister, tried to send a few prayers over the mountains. She felt a little guilty for leaving the band, but they played well without her. Chess sang and played the piano better than her.
“Thank you, Lord,” Checkers whispered as she opened her eyes, surprised to see a priest sitting a few pews in front of her. Father Arnold.
“Hello, Father,” Checkers said.
Father Arnold turned and smiled. He was a handsome man, with brown hair and blue eyes. Slightly tanned skin. Even teeth. Checkers smiled back. She believed that every priest should be a handsome man.
“Hello,” Father Arnold said. “You’re one of those sisters, aren’t you?”
“Yes,” Checkers said, thrilled. “I’m Checkers Warm Water.”
“Checkers? That’s an unusual name.”
“Well, it’s not my real name.”
“What is your real name?”
“I don’t think I’d even tell you that in confession.”
Father Arnold stood, walked back toward Checkers, and sat beside her. He smelled like cinnamon.
“So,” Father said. “How is the music business?”
“Not too good. I quit the band.”
“Oh, that’s too bad. Do you want to talk about it?”
“No, not really.”
Checkers thought about Coyote Springs. She already missed the stage. There was something addicting about it. She loved to hear her name shouted by strangers.
“Are you interested in joining our community here?” Father Arnold asked.
“I’m thinking about it,” Checkers said. “But I’m from the Flathead Reservation. Is that okay?”
“Are you confirmed?”
“Yeah. Father James over there did that. A long time ago.”
Checkers swore she remembered her baptism, though she was only a few months old at the time. Sometimes, she still felt that place on her forehead where Father James poured the water. Once, while fighting fires in her teens, she found herself trapped in a firestorm. Convinced she was going to burn, she suddenly felt the cold, damp touch on her forehead. She felt the water flow down her face, into her mouth, and she drank deeply. Satiated, she burned down a circle of grass, lay down in the middle, and lived as the fire crowned the pine trees above her.
“So,” Father Arnold said, “tell me about your faith.”
“You know,” Checkers said, “it’s hard to talk about. I mean, there’s a lot I want to talk about.”
“I’m sure.”
Checkers thought about what she had seen during her brief time with Coyote Springs. She remembered Junior and Victor naked in the van with those two white women, Betty and Veronica, who had disappeared soon after.
“You know,” Checkers said, “two of the guys in the band, Junior and Victor. They’ve been doing bad things.
“I know them. Are you here to talk about them or you?”
“Both, I guess.”
Father Arnold reached for Checkers’s hand and held it gently. Her heart quickened a little.
“You can talk to me,” Father Arnold said.
“It’s just that everywhere I look these days, I see white women. We caught Junior and Victor having sex with some white women. They’re always having sex with white women. It makes me hate them.”