Looks Over(Gives Light Series) (9 page)

"You don't like it?" said the girl holding the platter, peering at me with wonder.

I tried to figure out a way to apologize without words.  Then I realized:  I know this girl.  How do I know this girl?  She was dressed in red taffeta with lavender-gray accents, her hair tied tightly in the Navajo figure-eight bun, her winglike mantle hanging heavily from her shoulders.

She smiled mysteriously.  I grinned.  Now I remembered.  We'd danced together at the summer pauwau.

Granny got up to dance with Reverend Silver Wolf.  The Navajo girl took her seat.  She scrutinized me shrewdly.  "You still don't talk?"

I shrugged my shoulders and smiled ineffectually.

She smiled back and stuck out her hand.  "I'm Kaya."

I shook her hand.  I pointed at the sky above us--rich and blue with deepening dusk.

"Hello, Sky."

Rafael sat down on the blanket with a handful of samosas.  He didn't bother trying to hide his glare, intensified as it was by the square lenses of his eyeglasses.  Unperturbed, Kaya offered him her hand.  Taken aback, he hesitated before he quickly seized it.

Kaya looked between us with recollection.  "You two were together in July."

"Nah," Rafael said.  "We were just friends."

A silence, indescribably awkward, settled over all three of us.  Rafael seemed to realize his mistake.  It was pretty impressive how quickly his face transitioned from its typically brutish visage to a sickly shade of puce.  I shook my head and dropped my face into my hands.  I was mortified, and yet I wanted to laugh.

Kaya beat me to it.  I peeked between my fingers and saw her with her head back, her chest rippling with laughter.

"You're funny, Rafael."

Rafael gave her a perplexed look.  "I didn't say my name."

"Your sister told me."

Kaya pointed to a group of Hopi who were generously giving out gifts of prayer sticks.  Mary stood among them with prayer sticks in hand, bopping them on their heads.

It was Rafael's turn to look mortified.  "Mary!" he shouted.  He leapt up from the ground and ran at her.

"Charming family," Kaya said.

I tapped Kaya's shoulder and gestured between the two of us.  I mimed writing a letter on my hand.

"You'd like to keep in contact?"

I nodded.

Kaya gestured for me to wait.  She carried her platter of sheep intestines to a woman I took to be her mother, then returned with a notepad and a pencil.  We wrote down our e-mail addresses and traded notes.  She waved goodbye and danced away just as a man began to play the Apache fiddle.

By the time Rafael returned, he was thoroughly frazzled.  His glasses were crooked, his dove's feather askew.

"I'll kill her," he swore.

I gave him a thumbs up.

"Where'd that girl go?  I wanted some ach'ii."

I gave him a dubious look.

It was our tribe's turn to show off.  Our elders gathered around the tribal flag and performed a wartime flag dance while Morgan Stout played Heavy Fog on his plains flute.  Annie and the In Winter girls danced a shawl dance together, spinning and whirling like pinwheels in the autumn wind.  Everyone laughed when Gabriel, still wearing Rosa's shawl, leapt into the fray.  Mr. Red Clay led the first graders in a decorous grass dance, steps light, arms aloft.  Jack Nabako kept abandoning his position and running at the girls.  The girls shrieked.  Morgan played the Shoshone love song, and the facade of competition dissipated.  Misty-eyed couples from every tribe danced cheek-to-cheek; mothers danced with their babies.  Gabriel wrapped Rosa's shawl around the two of them.

I got up off the ground and reached for Rafael's hand.

Rafael had promised back in August that he'd dance with me at the autumn pauwau.  The thing is, Rafael hated dancing.  He hated more or less anything that held the potential to bring attention to him.

I watched his eyes shift nervously behind his glasses while he chewed on the inside of his mouth.

Poor Rafael.  I didn't want to press the matter.  I reached down to pat him on the shoulder.  He must have misinterpreted my intent, because he grasped my hand and stood.

"Now what?" he murmured, his mouth barely moving.

I could hear my pulse in my ears.  Why was I nervous?  I was supposed to be the confident one.  No, I knew why I was nervous.  I'd never danced with another boy before, much less in front of an entire reservation full of people. 

An entire reservation full of people.  That's right, I thought.  They were all busy enjoying themselves.  They didn't care who I danced with.

I took his hands and put them on my waist.  I felt his eyes boring into mine; I didn't meet them.  I slid my hands against his hips.  His gray deerhide overcoat felt soft beneath my palms, his hips strong.  Dizziness swarmed behind my eyes. 

I felt his fingers crook beneath my chin and tilt my head up.  Our gazes slid together and locked.

Forget dancing, I thought shakily.  I wanted to kiss him.  I wanted to pull him hard against me and devour him, body and soul; and then I wanted him to devour me.

His fingers sank into my curls.  I felt the strength draining out of my spine.  Maybe he noticed.  His arm snaked around my waist.  Our hips bumped together and I felt his chest against mine, his heartbeat against mine.  His knuckles stroked patterns down my back.  I felt his breath on my lips.  His arms were around me, holding me.  I smoothed my hands against his shoulders, rubbed the feeling back into my fingers.

I wasn't even sure whether we were dancing or not.  I couldn't feel the ground beneath me, nor the autumn air on my face.  I couldn't feel anything that wasn't a part of Rafael.  I couldn't see save for Rafael's eyes in front of mine; the warmth that secretly hid there; the secret part of him that was mine.

He bent his head and buried his face against the crook between my shoulder and neck.  His hot breath tickled my skin.  He mouthed words against me, words I couldn't figure out.

The pauwau ended at midnight when the Hopi performed their corn dance, shaking their bells and their rattles in supplication to the four winds and the rain.  They gave us presents of corn and piki bread as we walked back through the reservation to our cars.  Mr. Little Hawk, his face long and childlike and his hair streaked with gray, carried a sleeping Joseph against his shoulder.  I carried our laden baskets as Granny leaned on my shoulder, chattering animatedly.  She was in an unusually bubbly mood.

Rosa was behind the wheel for the trip back to Nettlebush.  Gabriel talked to her in hushed, light tones, his elbow against the passenger-side door.  Mary and Mrs. Threefold both dozed off, Mary snoring loudly.  At some point, I must have dozed off, too; I woke with my head on Rafael's shoulder, his arm around me, and pretended I was sleeping still, because I didn't want to move.

The car rolled to a stop.  We were back in Nettlebush.  I let Rafael jostle me--it amazed me, how someone so burly could be so gentle--and drowsily, the eight of us milled out of the car.  It was three in the morning.

"I'm not going to school tomorrow," Rafael insisted.  "Today.  Whatever."

Before any of us could leave the parking lot, I heard Mrs. Takes Flight scream.

Rafael and I exchanged a look.  I saw panic on his face and knew it was a mirror of my own.  We ran to the Takes Flights' car, Mary following us.

Mr. Takes Flight was on the ground, convulsing.

"Get a doctor!  Please!" Aubrey shouted, his face as gray as concrete.

Dr. Stout came rushing over to the car and knelt at Mr. Takes Flight's side.  Morgan had followed her, his big eyes wide with fear.  Dr. Stout bent over Mr. Takes Flight, her hands on his chest.

"Oh God," Aubrey moaned.  "Oh God..."

"Shut up, Aubrey," said his brother, Isaac.  "Mother--"

Annie and Lila and Grandpa Little Hawk edged their way through the crowd.  So did Stuart and Siobhan Stout.  Dr. Stout tucked her arms under Mr. Takes Flight's back and helped him to sit up.  Rosa dashed over with a bottle of water while Dr. Stout fished medicine out of her purse.

"Do you--"  Rafael faltered.  "I can carry him--"

"No," said Reuben, Aubrey's oldest brother.  He passed his sleeping daughter into Aubrey's arms and bent down to lift his father.  Gabriel and Grandpa Little Hawk crouched on the ground next to Mrs. Takes Flight and put their hands on her shoulders, consoling her while she wept.

I stood by helplessly and watched as Reuben carried Mr. Takes Flight to the hospital.  Rosa, Dr. Stout, and three other people I didn't know were quick to follow them.

"I don't know what happened," Aubrey said distantly, dazed.

Annie's hand on his shoulder was firm, her voice low enough not to wake Serafine.  "It looked like a heart attack to me," she said.  "But he's in good hands.  You know that.  He'll be fine."

"Mom's a pediatrician," said Stuart.  "I don't know what she thinks she's doing..."

"Well, a heart is a heart," his little sister said.

If any of this was meant to reassure Aubrey, it didn't work.  He moaned with anxiety.  He might have spilled to his knees if not for the little girl in his arms.

"Aubrey!" Isaac scolded, starting up the hospital ramp.  "Don't just stand there."

Trancelike, Aubrey followed him, absently patting Serafine's back.  Mrs. Takes Flight wasn't far behind, dabbing the tears from her eyes.

"Damn it..." I heard Rafael say.

I heard a click and a hiss.  I smelled smoke.  Mary had lit a cigarette.  She took a long, deep, toxic breath and released it.

"You should be in bed," she said.

"That guy just had a heart attack," Rafael said fiercely.  "Do you even care?"

"What can you do about it?  You're not a doctor."

"I never thought I'd say this, but your sister's right," Gabriel stepped in.  "Bedtime.  Come on, kiddo."

We said good night--Aubrey's dad still on my mind--and I followed Granny back home.  Granny was silent and stoic as we walked arm-in-arm.  The hearth in the sitting room was lit, and the faint smell of alcohol clung to the wood walls, but it looked like Dad had already gone to sleep.  Balto ran at me with gusto as soon as we stepped through the front door.  I pat him on the tummy and fed him a roll of piki bread when Granny wasn't looking.

"Pray for Martin," was the last thing Granny said before retreating into her room.

I sat in a rocking chair by the fireplace, wide awake.  I left the front door partway open so Balto could run in and out.  If Aubrey's father died...  That didn't seem fair to me.  Why did all of my friends have to become so acquainted with loss?

I still wasn't very tired, but I figured I'd better go to bed anyway.  I clapped my hands and Balto came running in from the porch.  I got up and closed the front door.

A thick book lay open on one of Granny's rocking chairs.  Dad must have been reading before he'd gone to bed.  Now that struck me as a curious thing.  Dad's the kind of guy who doesn't like to read anything unless it's on the back of a ketchup bottle.  Either way, I reasoned, it was none of my business.

The flames in the fireplace jumped--shedding light on the glossy pages.  It was a photo album.

My heart pounded treacherously, my throat dry.  I sat on the chair and scooped the album onto my lap.

The very first picture that attracted my attention was a photograph of my mother.  God, was she young--about twenty-two, if my math was right.  Her eyes were crossed, her tongue stuck out at the camera.  Her arms were sleeved with freckles--like mine, I thought fondly--and her hair was curly and long.  Her belly was heavy with pregnancy.  I touched her swollen stomach with longing.  It was strange to think that I was in there, that she had carried me safely inside of her, and without that, I wouldn't be here now.

I flipped through the pages.  I felt the smile growing on my face. 
Dad
looked young, almost unrecognizable without his paunch.  There were various pictures of him sitting with Mom underneath a southern oak tree.  I swear it was the same oak under which Gabriel would later build his house.  Dad had his hand on Mom's belly in one of the photos.  The pride on his face was glowing, palpable; his love poured out of the photograph and touched me, sixteen years after the fact.  It was powerful and humbling.  I swallowed.  I was loved even when I was no more than someone else's thought.

Another page.  Another set of photographs.  Granny sitting under a winter sky, a curly-haired baby on her lap tucked tightly in her arms.  She had wrapped me in a pendleton blanket to protect me from the cold.  I realized, tremendously, that I still had that blanket.  It was upstairs, in my closet; sometimes I threw it over my bed at night when I couldn't get warm.

I turned the page and felt my heart stop. 

Two men were staring back at me from the glossy photograph, their arms tossed around each other's shoulders.  Their smiles were identical; I almost took them for brothers--except that the rest of their features didn't match up at all.  Dad's eyes were water-gray, his chin wobbly and round.  His hair was lackluster and black.  The other guy had black hair, too, but it took on a midnight-blue sheen under the light from the standing lamp.  His jaw was square, his nose flat.  He had the darkest eyes I'd ever seen on a human face: acrid and black, like infected blood.