"To the badlands," I said.
We sat on one of the hillocks. I told Sky that Mary was at the hospital with Rosa. I asked him where Paul was and he spelled "Cyrus" with his fingers. He buried his fingers knuckle-deep in the grass. The grass rose ankle high around us, a deep mustard yellow dotted with sun-colored flowers. The petals had fallen off with chill, decorating the ground in orange dust, save where the moss grew around it in verdant patches.
Fall was Sky's favorite time of year. I watched the autumnal reflections on his face. The golden dots inside his irises were the late goldenrod and the changing trees. The creases at the corners of his eyes were the soil closing up, readying for winter. Winter was my favorite time of year.
"How do you do it?" I asked quietly.
I wanted to know how he smiled all the time. I wanted to know how he could care about people who didn't care about him.
Sky held his hand in front of his eyes, squinting through his fingers at the sun. He couldn't look at it directly without hurting himself; but I could. At least I imagined that I could. It was a snowflake inside a snowflake, all of creation the same creation. It shimmered in shades of poppy today, mirroring the interstitial earth. My parents were inside of it; I was inside of them; tomorrow was inside of me.
Sky took my hand, opening my mind. I saw what he saw through small brown fox eyes. I saw that every single person had at least one good quality, and you could love that good one or hate the bad ones instead, but the choice was yours. I saw that the bad that happened to us did not have the power to erase the good, and maybe made us aware of the good in the first place. I saw that as long as we were alive something good could potentially happen to us in the future, something tremendous enough to make up for the past; but if we stopped living today that day couldn't come.
I thought maybe that day had already come for me. But I didn't want to say it out loud. It was like that fairy tale where the princess vanished when you said her name.
Sky released a cheery sigh. His soft breath filled the arroyo below us with a sea of clouds, white-gold and purple and bleached mercury. The sea stretched beneath the rope bridge; I thought myself liable to fall right in. I wouldn't have minded. A siren sang to me, luring me under an ocean of kindness.
Something is shining, Sky sang, an old Shoshone song. He pressed his mouth to my chilly cheek, mouthing the words. I swore I heard his voice. I swore I wouldn't be the only one.
I wrestled Sky to the grass, determined to pay him back for all the times he'd tickled me. I kissed his stomach. He wasn't ticklish, but he cottoned on and laughed for me just the same. He put his hands on my head. I kissed everything when I kissed him, and he let me, and there was nothing nearly so generous as that, that he trusted me to cradle whole constellations in my hands.
Sky tugged gently on my hair. I raised my head, my chin on his chest. In his fingertips I felt vestiges of unrest.
"What is it?" I asked. I could take care of it. I could take care of him.
Adopt, Sky spelled with his fingers. Or Mfoqx. I never said I was good at this stuff.
"You're not adopted," I said, rolling my eyes. "You're just low blood quantum."
Sky shook his head, feigning exasperation. Sky made the sign for "grandmother," his fingers spread out.
"Your grandmother's adopted?" I asked, bewildered.
Sky gave up, playing with my dagger-shaped earring. I furrowed my eyebrows, replaying the words in my head. It wasn't until a lot later, when I'd gone home to show my grammar test to Uncle Gabe, that I pieced together what Sky must have meant.
"Is Mrs. Looks Over adopting Sky?" I asked.
Uncle Gabe peered at me over the top of my test paper. "This grade is atrocious."
"Sorry," I said.
"Did you even bother studying?"
I ducked my head, muttering noncommittally. 'Course I'd studied. Didn't stop me from being stupid.
"Don't worry about it," Uncle Gabriel said at length. "I'll talk to Caias about extra credit."
"You sure?" I asked, skittish.
He clapped his hand on my shoulder. He turned around and filled the kitchen sink with water, rolling back his sleeves. "You told me you studied, so I believe you."
He believed me. He didn't need a reason; he just believed me. I stared at my hiking boots so I wouldn't have to look at him. I felt that I was surrounded by people who loved me, not for anything I'd done but because they had so much love to give. It wasn't human.
"What was that about Catherine?" Uncle Gabriel asked.
I sat down at the island. "Sky said something about adoption, and his grandma," I said.
"I wouldn't know anything about that," Uncle Gabriel said. I washed him scrub the gunk off a tin cooking pan. "But he did come to the reservation as a foster child, didn't he? It's understandable that his grandmother might want permanent custody."
"How d'you mean?" I asked.
"If he's a foster child," Uncle Gabriel said, "he's not a permanent resident here."
"Y'mean he'd have to leave?" I asked, scared.
Uncle Gabriel laughed pleasantly. "Probably not. Adoption's just a precaution. I did the same when you and Mary came to live with me for the first time."
I shrank back warily. "You adopted us?"
"You didn't think I'd let some stranger raise you, did you?" Uncle Gabe let the water out of the sink. He dried his hands on a hanging towel. "Your grandmother was signed on to take you in, but when she wouldn't file for permanent custody I took over. I think she's still a little angry about that."
I never knew. Had things gone differently I might've grown up on Fort Hall, over a thousand miles away. I never knew Uncle Gabriel had gone against his own mother for my sake.
Uncle Gabriel was my father. At least as far as legal papers were concerned.
"Are you alright?" Uncle Gabriel asked. "You look ill. C'mere, let me check your forehead."
"Don't wanna," I said faintly.
I felt like I was betraying my real father. I had a father already, and it didn't matter that he was a horrible person in the end. He was still the man who made me. He wasn't always a horrible person. There used to be a time when he would surprise Mom with brownies, her favorite food, or ditch work for the day to take the three of us to Havasu Falls. He used to be a good person, or at least a decent person; so didn't I owe it to that person to remember that I loved him? How was it alright for me to even think of another man as my parent?
"Ugh, we're back," Mary's voice called out. I heard the front door slam. "What a drag!"
I grabbed candy from the pantry, a glass of juniper tea. I muttered a quick goodbye.
"Where are you going?" Uncle Gabriel asked, alarmed.
"Community bonfire," I said lamely. I'd decided to head to dinner early.
For the rest of the night I avoided Uncle Gabriel, which was easier than you'd think, considering we lived in a community of three hundred. I would have liked to avoid him the following morning, but it was a Saturday, which meant we had to go hunting together.
"Wait for me," Mary said that morning. She rushed out of her bedroom with her hair tied back, her face free of makeup. Her hiking boots looked just like mine, only her ankles came up higher.
"You're really bringing that thing with you?" I asked darkly, glancing at the hunting rifle on her back.
Mary swung the gun over her shoulder. She kissed the barrel. "Wouldn't dream of leaving my baby behind," she said.
I didn't like guns. They were taipo'o weapons, for one, and just because they were mechanical didn't mean they were more efficient than arrows and dart guns. Matter of fact, the first time guns showed up on the Plains our ancestors rejected them because they took too long to load and fire. Mary's model was a Ruger M77, lightweight with heavy rounds. I'd tried to shoot it once and the recoil had thrown my shoulder out. I thought by picking a taipo'o weapon over a Shoshone one she was making a statement of a kind. She rejected this community and all its ways. She rejected the people who claimed her father's life
.
"You sure you don't want to come, Rosa?" Uncle Gabriel asked.
Rosa tied a sleeping mask around her eyes. She settled down on the sofa. "No."
Mary and Uncle Gabe and I trudged outside the house, where we met up with the At Dawn family and the Stout family. Aisling looked weird in bulky goggles and camouflage.
"We should try and find that antelope," her son Stuart said, dark bags under his eyes.
"Wait," I said frantically. "I don't wanna kill it."
Daisy goggled at me. Holly threw me a miserable look. Siobhan said, "A grown antelope feeds a third of the whole reservation. Are you sure that's reasonable?"
We'd hunted antelope before. I didn't know why this one was any different, except that Sky said it was different. It didn't have to make sense.
I hedged, "He's on our turf. He probably got here by accident. We gotta put him back in his habitat. If we're gonna hunt him, we gotta hunt him on his own terms."
"Uh, sure," Daisy said cautiously. "You want we should ask him his permission first?"
I glared at her, humiliated. It was Mary of all people who came to my rescue.
"There's plenty of antelope in the badlands, cookie," Mary said. "Go and kill one out there instead."
"Eh," Daisy said.
"My life is a lie," Holly said.
"What?" Daisy said.
"I thought I would be someone by now," Holly said. "Be somewhere. Do something. I don't know how it came to this. I eat thirty Pixy Stix just to get through the day. Sometimes--"
"Alright," Uncle Gabriel said quickly. "Let's split up."
He handed us all packets of creosote leaves, a potent poison, and water hemlock, a paralyzing agent. I took a handful of water hemlock and picked up my spear. Mary and Siobhan came with me to look for the errant antelope out by the farms.
We didn't find the antelope that day. A couple of times we picked up on the tracks, but invariably they petered out, which Siobhan said was the wind's fault. I dunno, though; I've legitimately seen bears cover their prints with rocks. The three of us traveled by quick-stepping, because your instincts might tell you to move slowly, but the faster you move the more likely your prey's gonna mistake you for another quadruped. We even set up a temporary stand atop one of the apple trees. Two hours in and we were forced to concede the only animals out this way were the chipmunks.
"Waste of time," Mary said. "Okay, kiddies. Who's in the mood for elk steak tonight?"
On the walk back to the crossroads we found Annie kneeling in the powdery dirt, collecting wild turmeric in a hand basket. She said "Hello" politely. Mary snickered.
"Alright, now what?" Annie bristled.
"I didn't realize how freaking shrimpy you were," Mary said.
"Hey," murmured Siobhan, who wasn't much taller.
"If this is how you make friends," Annie said curtly, "I'm starting to understand why you left the reservation."
"Aren't you lucky I came back just for you?" Mary said, winking.
"I think we're losing time," Siobhan said to no one, reading her wristwatch.
"Yes, you are," Annie said promptly. She stood up with her basket, throwing her shoulders back.
"Whoa!" Mary said. "She grew a whole inch!"
"Excuse you!" Annie snapped.
"I'm leaving without you guys," Siobhan announced.
"Mary!" I growled.
"Come on, Little Hawk," Mary said, cackling. "If you don't want me bugging you, stop rising to the bait."
Annie raised an eyebrow. "Isn't that sort of like saying 'Don't carry money if you don't want me to steal it'?"
"Wha?" Mary said.
"Goodbye," Siobhan said.
I told Annie I'd see her later at the grotto. I went with Mary and Siobhan into the badlands, complaining that I didn't like Mary picking on my friends. Mary didn't care.
"There still mountain lions out here?" Mary asked, cracking her knuckles.
I shot her a dubious look. "Yeah."
"Should we feed you to 'em?" Mary asked, grinning wickedly.
"Leave me alone," I protested.
Siobhan went ahead of us to follow mule deer tracks in the gullies. I told her to take my whistle with her, 'cause those gullies caved in sometimes. Mary and I zipped past the sharp promontory, Mary whistling.
"Man," Mary said. "You almost forget how nice this place looks."
I never forgot. A strong, round sun shone tall over endless stretches of flat blue clay. The rings around the sun were oozing and orange, fruit plucked off a perfumed Jaffa tree. The clouds were so intimidated by the sight they forfeited their color, siphoning transparent and weak.
"Mary," I said quietly. "How do you still love Dad?"
Mary glanced at me. "How do you?"
I started. "Because I can't help it."
"There you go," Mary said.
"Yeah," I said. "But I don't just love him. I hate him, too. You don't hate him?" I asked. "Not even a little?"
Mary shook her head.
"How come?" I asked.
Mary stretched her arms in a soundless yawn. "You don't hate the caribou because he sheds his antlers."
I didn't understand.
"Nature, you goon," Mary said.
"Murder isn't natural," I said.
"To us it isn't," Mary said. "To Dad? Maybe it was."
My sister was the most frustrating person on the planet. She was one of the scariest, too, when she wanted to be. That morning we didn't find any antelope, but Mary shot a bighorn sheep clean through its ear, killing it on contact. She didn't so much as flinch at the rifle's angry recoil, at the gunsmoke spewing out of the hot barrel. She lowered the stock off her shoulder, eyed her fallen prey, and spread her teeth in a grin. It wasn't the kill that scared me. It wasn't even the weapon. It was like Mary was going through the motions, and didn't have to think before she ended another creature's life. Whenever I hunted an animal I apologized beforehand. I thanked it afterward. I sure as hell didn't manage to hit the mark every time.
When Mary and I went home for lunch I hid her rifle in the basement: under the floor joist beneath the filing cabinet. I emptied the magazine, too, and stuck chewing gum to the firing pin. I told myself she'd never find that gun again. I told myself she'd never turn it on Sky's dad.
She knew what I'd done. On Monday morning she stomped into my bedroom before I even had the chance to open my eyes. She yanked the coverings off my bed and I spilled to the floor, jolting awake. I swore loudly, my knees stinging where they smashed against the hardwood.
"You," she said.
The anger evaporated from her face. She burst out laughing, storming out of my room.
All throughout school that Monday I thought about Paul. I worried that I'd made matters worse instead of mitigating them, that Mary might be more determined to hurt him just to show me she didn't care what I thought. As a result I forgot to pay attention during class. It got so bad that Mr. Red Clay called me out twice and made me answer questions about Black Elk, a famous medicine man, but I couldn't answer them because I'd confused Black Elk with Black Hawk, a soldier from a completely different tribe. That's the one sucky thing about Native American names.
"Are you alright?" Aubrey asked me after school, peering at me through his huge Coke bottle glasses.
"Yeah," I replied. "Tell Sky and Annie don't wait up."
I went straight to the lake in the woods, where a bunch of the reservation's architects were busy at work building a radio tower. Sky's dad was one of them; Sky had told me so. I sat down on the northern side of the lake and watched from a distance while Paul climbed up the half-finished lattice with ease. He reminded me of Charlotte Doyle climbing the ship's mast during the Seahawk's worst storm, Captain Jaggery screaming at her over the gale.
When Paul climbed back down the mast--I mean, the lattice--the first thing he did was notice me. Puzzled, he scratched his head with a bear paw of a hand. I tried to pretend I was only waiting for the fishing boats to dock and reel in bass. He didn't fall
for it. He walked right over to me, his blobby shadow blocking the sun.
"Rafael?" Paul said.
"Uh," I said.
Paul sat next to me heavily. The grainy sand shifted underneath him. "Hello," he said awkwardly.
"Hi," I said, no less obtuse.
Paul and I shared a long stretch of silence. This time I watched the fishing boats for real. I waved hello at Annie's dad when he hauled his black net out of the pristine waters. I spotted Sleeping Fox's swan shaking out its wet feathers, sticking its bill in the mud for bugs to eat.
"Was there something you wanted, Rafael?" Paul asked quietly.
I jerked my head in an unsteady nod. My eyes roamed across the rope swings on the oak trees, the treetops, the flat roof of the tribal council building. I knew my sister. I knew she was out here somewhere.
"Is it about Skylar?" Paul asked.
"Wh--yeah," I lied.
"Is he alright?" Paul asked anxiously.
"Yeah," I said.
Why the hell did I think this was a good idea? If there was anyone who sucked at making shit up on the fly, it was me. Sky was better at it, except when he lied his smile went kind of tight, giving him away. But then I seemed to be the only person who noticed that.
"Rafael," Paul said, his shoulders, his face crumpling. "I'm so sorry."
Uh-oh. "Huh?" I asked.
Paul's hair hung around his face, lightless and limp. He fumbled with a pair of house keys. I didn't know why our houses needed locks in the first place.
"No matter what he did," Paul said to his keys, "I understand that he was your father."
Shit. Uh. "It's okay," I lied again.
Paul gave me a surprised look.
Then and there I came to a decision. If Sky could love Mary, I decided, then I could love Paul. Because when you love somebody--and I loved Sky--you gotta be willing to do things for them you never would have seen yourself doing in a million years. If you love somebody, you have to love them with your actions, not your thoughts.
I wanted to love everything Sky loved. If Sky loved it, it was good. All people were secretly good, I reminded myself. Bizarrely, it was Paul who had taught me that.