“Can I have the money?” she said, her voice going too high.
A look of pain fleeted across his face. He took out his wallet with great effort.
“We said sixty?”
“Seventy-five,” she said, “that’s what you said in the email. Seventy-five.”
His hesitation allowed her to hate him, fully, to watch with cold eyes as he counted out the bills. Why hadn’t he done this ahead of time? He probably wanted her to witness this, Mark or Brian or whoever he was, believing that he was shaming or punishing her by prolonging the encounter, making sure she fully experienced the transaction, bill by bill. When he had seventy-five dollars, he held the money in her direction, just out of reach so Alice had to make an effort to grab for it. He smiled, like she had confirmed something.
When she told Oona the story on Saturday, Alice would leave this part out: how, when she tried to open the car door, the door was locked.
How the man said, “Whoops,” his voice swerving high, “whoops-a-daisy.” He went to press the unlock button, but Alice was still grabbing at the door handle, frantic, her heart clanging in her chest.
“Relax,” he said. “Stop pulling or it won’t unlock.”
Alice was certain, suddenly, that she was trapped, that great violence was coming to her. Who would feel bad for her? She had done this to herself.
“Just stop,” the man said. “You’re only making it worse.”
Alicia Elliott
Unearth
from Grain
They found him while laying the groundwork for a fast food restaurant. She forgot the name as soon as the officer said it—not McDonald’s, not Wendy’s. No, it was something new, something flashy and fleeting. Whatever it was, the thought made her sick. She couldn’t shake the image of a child’s tooth being pounded into beef patties, or tiny brown limbs being thrown into an industrial-size grinder. Sour fluids burned their way up her esophagus. She started to gag.
“Are you alright, ma’am?” the officer asked.
Henry’s makeshift grave was on the grounds of the old residential school. Of course it was. Of course. What was that famous Sir John A. Macdonald quote? Kill the Indian, save the man? Turned out killing the Indian saved no one. It just killed Indians.
“Ma’am? I can call back if you want.”
It had been 55 years since he went missing. Their mother had been dead for 20. What was there to even remember about him at this point? He was named after their alcoholic grandfather, then he was five, then he was gone. Not much to hang any misplaced nostalgia on.
She swallowed, found a tissue and wiped at her mouth.
“I’m fine. Please continue.”
The officer was nice enough, if deceptive. All dirty details were declawed. How did they even know it was her brother? There were lots of kids that died at that school. Testing was still underway, of course, but they were pretty sure. The officer mentioned school records and death certificates and police reports (no doubt filed by her mother), then started talking about “closure” and “the ceremony Henry deserved.” That very artlessly segued into the date the remains would be released, and referrals of some affordable funeral homes. What the officer really meant was that she, Beth T———, a widow on a fixed income, could now pay for the disposal of her brother’s half-century-old remains. And no, the grave and empty casket her mother had spent the last of their grocery money on would not be acceptable for use. The law had problems with reusing those sorts of things, though strictly speaking it wasn’t used in the first place. Beth should really get in touch with one of those funeral homes. They would have more information. And if she didn’t claim the body? The officer’s voice became clipped. If she didn’t claim the body for whatever reason, the province would pay for a burial. Standard-issue, nothing personal. That was the kind of thing only family could provide.
“Do you need me to—” her stomach clenched, her palms sticky, “—identify the body?”
“I’d be surprised if you could identify anything at this point. But if you want…”
Beth’s mouth suddenly filled with the taste of carbon—a taste she’d always associated with Henry’s disappearance. Once he was gone her mother couldn’t be bothered to pay attention to everyday things like cooking. Henry was all that mattered anymore. Everything Beth ate was burnt black.
Before, she used to help their mother pound roasted white corn into flour, sift it, mix it with lard and hot water and maple syrup. Henry was too small to help, too impatient, so it was just the two of them. Beth wasn’t allowed to taste any while they were making it, though sometimes she’d sneak some when her mother turned away. She was hardly a clever thief—smacking her lips together luxuriously, sometimes letting out a little groan, but her mother, gracious as she was, pretended not to notice. Once the mush was ready Beth’s mother still offered her a giant spoonful, smiling. It tasted better than any food she’d ever had. She remembered having the corn mush for breakfast and sometimes lunch or dinner, if she begged.
Then there was no more homemade mush. There were only blackened scones, then cold bread, then nothing at all, every culinary decline another rejection, another sign her family was hurtling toward disaster and nothing and no one could stop it.
This is what she remembered: her brother was taken first. Their mother had recently converted to the Anglican Church: a “saved” Indian, a prize. With the encouragement of Father Landry, her mother had traded their Mohawk names for those of English monarchs: her brother became Henry, she became Elizabeth. Her mother was now, naturally, Mary. But that wasn’t enough. Father Landry suggested the kids go to the residential school to get saved properly. They needed “a good education in the Lord.” Mary was hesitant to pull Beth out of school in the middle of the year; she had friends, she was doing well. Henry, on the other hand, was still at home, still susceptible, so he was hesitantly offered to Jesus and the Anglicans as a sort of down payment on salvation. Father Landry assured her that Henry would be back that summer, that he’d send letters thanking her. Summer arrived without a single letter, then departed much the same. Henry never came back.
When Mary went to the school and inquired, she was told Henry didn’t go there. In fact, he’d never gone there. No records existed. She was mistaken. She went to the police, to the band council. They shrugged their shoulders and shook their heads.
She couldn’t find Father Landry. Ironically enough, he’d gone to Quebec for a “family emergency.” He was gone for a month, which turned into two, which turned into six. With each passing day her mother unraveled a little more. By the time Father Landry finally came back to do a guest sermon at his old parish three years later, Mary’s nerves were tangled threads. She attacked him at Sunday mass: clawed at his black eyes, yanked out clumps of his white hair, slammed his head against the brick of God’s walls. She was arrested and sentenced to ten years in prison.
After that, Beth was promptly deposited into the same school that ate her brother, then adopted by the T———s not long after that. They were Anglicans, friends of Father Landry. They liked her pale skin, her tragedy. They liked how she forced herself to smile. She excelled at school, excelled in her career, excelled at passing, at forgetting. Beth was saved after all.
Apart from the yellow police tape, the site looked ordinary. There was no evidence this Indian burial ground was a Poltergeist scene waiting to happen, much as she wished it was—no blood bubbling forth from the ground, no eerie lights or voices from beyond the grave. Just abandoned construction equipment and dirt. Somehow she expected more. After all, that soil did sap nourishment from her brother’s body for half a century. It got more from him than she ever did.