Chapter 7
Mom and I both slept late on Christmas morning. We had exchanged gifts the modern way, by Internet shopping, back when I wasn’t planning on coming home. We laughed as we confessed that we had each opened the gifts the day they arrived. But I’d bought a package of Denver mints from a DIA gift shop so I wouldn’t arrive empty-handed. After a brunch of eggs, fruit salad, and coffee, I presented them to her with a flourish. We demolished them as we sifted through the rest of Mom’s shoebox full of memories of my father: prom tickets, folded notes on yellowed notebook paper, and her promise ring at the very bottom of the box. Bemused, she slipped it on her little finger. Then she caught me watching her; she turned pink and slipped it off.
“Leave it on, for God’s sake,” I said. “You’re out of the closet now.”
Her shoulders straightened. “I guess I am, aren’t I?” she said, and put it back on. She looked ready to take on any number of disapproving relatives – dead or alive. “Too bad it won’t fit on my ring finger any more, though.” She surveyed her hand, knuckles swollen with arthritis.
“I bet he wouldn’t care, as long as you were wearing it.”
She waved a hand at me. “He’s probably married, with a passel of kids,” she said. Then she sighed. “Or dead of the drink.”
“Or,” I suggested, “widowed, or never married either, and waiting for you.”
“Don’t you dare try to find out, missy,” she said, wagging her finger at me.
I smiled archly. “How about this? I promise not to tell you if I do.”
She pouted, but she didn’t argue.
I sifted through the pile of Mom’s memories and pulled out my father’s high school graduation picture. “Mom,” I asked, suddenly feeling a little shy, “can I keep this?”
She hesitated. Then she said, “Sure. Why not.”
I spent the first half of the flight home staring at that picture of my father, Andrew Michael Sauvage. My brain was overflowing with questions about him and about his life since he left Indiana. I realized that I might have siblings. My childhood longing for a sister, born of playing endless rounds of board games and dress-up alone, suddenly sprang to life. Excited, I hauled out my laptop, logged onto the in-air Internet, and made a cursory search for my dad – to no avail. I would have to wait until I got back to work and could use the firm’s contracted people-finding service.
With a twinge of regret, I gave up for now on the search for my dad and composed a letter to Perry.
I had not heard back from Joseph before my flight left Indy, nor was there a message from him when I turned on my phone upon arrival in Denver. I did, however, have a text message from Shannon, inviting me over for our traditional Christmas night supper and family-time debriefing and decompression. I texted her back to accept, and asked if it was okay to invite Joseph to come over later, assuming I could get in touch with him. She said okay. So I texted him her address, hoping while I did so that he didn’t get charged per text, and awaited a reply. A few minutes later, I was rewarded: “Got your messages. I will see you there at 8pm.”
I fetched my car and drove home, the holiday lights twinkling in the darkness instilling in me a feeling of peace. Maybe it was the decision I’d come to, or the knowledge that I had a father (and possibly more family) somewhere, or that I was back in my adopted hometown. Or maybe it was the calm before the storm to come. But the world seemed paused, somehow. Were the angels singing, while the world lay in solemn stillness? I had no way to know, but I felt like singing along.
Shannon met me at the door with a hug. “Merry Christmas! How’d it go with Mom?”
“Believe it or not, we’re still on speaking terms,” I said, doffing my coat. I handed her a bag of cherry cordial truffles (airport gift store shopping strikes again!) and said, “Et voila, dessert.”
She made the appropriate yummy noises as she read the tag. Then she said, “Hey, I thought you said you were in Indiana. The cherries in these things are from Michigan.”
I shrugged. “Imported, obviously. Hey, I’m doing the best I can here,” I continued, in response to her skeptical look. “So how’s Clan McDonough?”
The change of topic carried us through the leftover roast beef and green bean casserole that Shannon’s mother had insisted she take home with her. Dysfunctional behavior abounded in her family of origin, and this year’s get-together was about average. The more I heard about Shannon’s family, the more I understood why she had gone into social work – and also why she had never married.
“Okay,” she wrapped up, “your turn. Did Mom spill it?”
“I had to push her,” I admitted with some reluctance, “but yeah, she did. And the goddess was right. My father was Sioux.”
“I knew it!”
“And he didn’t die in Vietnam.”
“Is he still alive?” she asked.
I shrugged. “No idea. And Mom tried to get me to promise not to try to find him.”
“Did you?”
“Are you kidding? Of course not.”
She relaxed. “Good. I have a feeling we’ll be meeting him before all of this is over.”
I was about to ask her to explain that remark, but there was a knock at the door. Shannon answered it, and admitted Joseph.
As he apologized for being early and she told him not to be ridiculous, I studied him. And myself. Was there an attraction there? Not on my end, I decided. He was tall, which I like, but a little too thin. A little too exotic, too, with his dark skin and braided hair – although it occurred to me that with the discovery about my own background, the pot was calling the kettle black. I acknowledged ruefully that I still had some work to do in order to overcome my lower-middle-class prejudices.
But no, I decided, I didn’t feel any physical attraction toward Joseph.
Then he looked at me, his blue eyes hinting at amber in their depths, and I immediately had to reconsider. Maybe I felt no attraction in the here-and-now, but on some deeper level, we were already connected.
Thanks a lot, White Buffalo Calf Pipe Woman. Thanks one hell of a lot.
“Hi,” I said, feeling rattled.
“Hi,” he said, taking a seat across the room. “Sorry I didn’t get back to you yesterday. I was in transit.”
I waved it off, but Shannon said, “In transit? From where?”
“Here and there,” he said.
“Ah, a man of mystery,” she teased.
He ignored her bait and turned back to me. “Congratulations on joining the tribe,” he said with a quirky grin. “What’s your big decision?”
“What decision?” Shannon asked. “You didn’t tell me anything about a decision.”
“I was just getting to it,” I told her. Then I sucked in a big breath and said, “I’m going to resign from the firm tomorrow.”
“What? Why?” Shannon squawked. But Joseph’s grin widened until it lit his whole face. I couldn’t help smiling at him in return.
“I just can’t keep doing this,” I told her. “All of this stuff with Looks Far has made me realize how much of myself I’ve compromised by keeping my job. I hate the adversarial part of being a lawyer,” I continued. “I fully support the maxim that everyone is entitled to an attorney, and I applaud those who can do it. But I can’t do it any more. I work for a firm that represents Leo Durant and will do anything legal to help him implement his scheme – a vicious scheme that treats people like minor obstacles and money like a god. I’m twisting my own moral code into a pretzel just to go to work every day.”
Joseph’s amber eyes were shining. But Shannon said, “I feel like this is déjà vu all over again. Didn’t we have this conversation five years ago? I thought the mediation training was supposed to get you out of this ethical quagmire, wasn’t it?”
“It was, and it did, to a degree. But it’s not enough, Shannon. I’m still not far enough away from it. I thought I was, but I’m not. I’m tainted by even working in
the same building. I’m tainted every time I cash my paycheck.”
“Yes,” Joseph said urgently. “Yes.”
Shannon looked back and forth between us. “Tainted?” she said. “I’m missing something here.”
“You’re not,” I said. “You felt it when we walked in on Brock.”
“You did?” Joseph asked Shannon. At her nod, he said, “You get it, then. The older lawyer was bad, but I think he started out good and acquired the evil along the way. The short man was worse. Much worse. But Brock....” He shook his head. “That man has some extra-special evil attached to him.”
“Older man? Short man?” Shannon asked me.
“Perry. And Leo Durant,” I said. “When I went up to Looks Far’s home with them on Sunday, Joseph saw it all somehow.”
I was turning to him to question him further about his “bird’s eye view” of that meeting, but Shannon sat back with a whuff. “Well, okay. I’ll play along with both of you for now. What are you going to do, Naomi? Give up your loft? Come and live with me?” She raised a single eyebrow.
“Don’t worry,” I said. “You won’t have to clean out your guest room for any homeless lawyers. I’ve got enough in savings to support me for about a year. That should give me enough time to set myself up in a private mediation practice. I’ve been getting some high-profile cases lately, but court-ordered mediation has always been my bread-and-butter, and I can still do that without running into any conflicts with the firm. I’ll need to rent an office somewhere, but I plan to get one of those places where you share a receptionist and stuff with other businesses as part of the rent. And I’ll need new business cards,” I began thinking aloud. “And stationery. And I need to call a bunch of people.”
“You’re serious about this,” she said. “You’re really going to go out on your own.”
“It’s the only way I can be true to myself,” I told her. “I’ll need your advice on some of the practical stuff.”
“Of course,” she said. “I’ll help any way I can – you know that.”
“And this way,” I said, “I’ll be free to help Looks Far keep his home.”
Joseph sat back with satisfaction. “I told you you would find a way to do the right thing, didn’t I?”
I offered Joseph a ride home, and he accepted – although if I’d known how long the drive would be, I might have offered to call him a cab instead. He directed me out Peña Boulevard, to a double-wide in the middle of undeveloped land not far from DIA.
“This will all be subdivided soon, I suppose,” I said.
“Yeah,” he said. “We’ll probably have to move then. But right now, it’s perfect. Lots of rambling room. And see that thin column of smoke over there?” He leaned toward me, pointing northwest with his right arm. I barely made out a wisp of something, rising from the mountain slope. “That’s Grandfather’s place. I can keep an eye on him from here.”
I turned toward him to make a comment, and realized our faces were alarmingly close; my head was nearly on his shoulder. Stifling a gasp, I put my hands firmly back on the wheel to steady myself. “Look,” I said, “I enjoy a good mystery as much as anybody, but would you mind explaining a few of your cryptic comments to me?”
He seemed genuinely baffled. “Which comments do you mean?”
“Oh, you know,” I said. “How you saw the confrontation between Durant and your grandfather. How you know Brock is evil. Stuff like that.”
He was baffled still. “I explained it to you already.”
“Then I missed something. Start over, from the top, if you don’t mind.” I wasn’t pushing yet, but I was pretty darned close.
“It’s too cold out here,” he said. “Please come in. I’ll make tea and we can talk as long as you like.”
His offer was delivered courteously, but he hadn’t sat back, and the bit of amber in the depths of his eyes put me on my guard. “As much as I’d like to get to the bottom of this tonight, I’m going to have to take a raincheck,” I said. “I’m exhausted. And I have a big day at work tomorrow.”
He bowed his head in a surprisingly courtly manner. “Tomorrow, then. After you’ve delivered your news to your boss. I’ll meet you at the Greek amphitheater downtown at four o’clock.”
“Okay,” I said. “Four o’clock tomorrow. Well....” The cheerful “have a good night” I meant to say stuck in my throat.
He raised his hand to my cheek. Then he leaned closer and kissed my forehead. The amber was gone; his eyes were their normal blue again. Then he got out of the car and went in.
I forced myself to put my ambivalence about Joseph, and everything connected with him, on the back burner, in order to concentrate on polishing my resignation letter. I was clearly on firm ground with that, at least.
Bright and early the next morning, I went to Perry’s office, two floors above mine, and handed him the sealed envelope. While he read it, I sat upright (but not stiffly, I thought) in his guest chair and took one last look around his office: the leather sofa, the teak desk, the framed pictures of him with various politicians, the certificate with the U.S. Department of Justice seal that was signed by all the people he had worked with there. He had worked hard, I knew, to get all of these trappings of the law firm version of the good life.
I believed Joseph was right; Perry had once been a “good guy” – a young, idealistic attorney – and I thought about everything he’d had to go through to get where he sat now. And I knew that, while I was capable of doing it all, too, it would be a huge mistake for me.
Perry looked up at me, above his reading glasses, and said, “Well. We’ll miss you, Naomi. You’ve been a valuable part of the firm for the past several years.”
“Thank you, Perry,” I said.
“I thought we might have been able to mainstream you back into the traditional practice this coming year,” he went on. “I brought you on board the Durant team as the first step.”
I blinked. “I thought the firm was committed to building mediation as a separate practice group.”
“Well,” he said as he removed his glasses and sat back in his amply-padded leather desk chair, “as I’m sure you recall, the management committee agreed to give it a try. But it hasn’t turned into the profit center we were hoping for. Court-appointed mediation doesn’t generate much in the way of revenue, and the interest among our other clients just hasn’t built as quickly as we would like.”
My gut clenched, as about a thousand arguments fought to get me to give voice to them. But they all boiled down to two points: 1) from the start, my mediation practice was supposed to be a service, not a profit center; and 2) the firm’s marketing of my practice to our clients had always been desultory at best.
Now that Perry held my letter in his hands, neither point mattered any more. Except that I wanted to be clear on one thing. “I assume that if I had not agreed to be mainstreamed into a traditional practice this coming year,” I said, “my future here at the firm would have been short.”
He held both hands palm-up and shrugged. “It’s not that we don’t value your work, Naomi,” he said. “You’re smart and dedicated, you have an incisive mind, and the clients love you. And it’s not that your mediation work has been bad for the firm.”
“It’s just not generating any revenue,” I said. “I understand, Perry.” I stood. “Normally I’d give at least two weeks’ notice. But the end of the fiscal year is coming up, and all of my matters are on hiatus right now because of the holidays. I assume the firm would have no objection to my taking the court-appointed matters with me when I leave?”
“We have no objection,” he said.
“So I would like for my last day to be next Monday, December 31st.”
He nodded. “That’s fine.” He stood and shook hands with me, then walked me to his door.
“Just out of curiosity, Perry,” I said, “how long had you intended to keep the mediation practice goi
ng?”
He had the grace to look away before he replied. “Until next Monday.”
“I see,” I said. “Thank you.”
I saw no reason to delay cleaning out my office. I delivered the news to Tess, who gave me a big hug and told me she would miss me. Then, on the theory that activity was better than banging my head against the wall, I began sorting through my desk drawers and putting stuff in boxes. I was in the process of filling the third box when Brock walked in.
“I heard through the grapevine that you’re leaving,” he said.
“News travels fast,” I said, not looking up.
“I wanted to thank you,” he said.
“For what? For not broadcasting to the whole firm the compromising position I found you in on Monday?”
“For...that, yes,” he said. “And for everything else. I’ve grown so much, as a lawyer and as a person, from knowing you.”
I stopped for a moment and regarded him. I looked in vain for a hint of the taint of evil that both Joseph and Shannon had seen in him, but I just didn’t have the receptors built in. To me, Brock still looked devastatingly handsome – and, if not sincere, then at least making a good show of it.
“Thanks, Brock,” I said. “I’ve learned a lot from you, too.” I was being kind, not sarcastic – I swear it.
But then his next comment showed his true colors. “I hope your decision to leave didn’t have anything to do with me,” he said.
I couldn’t help but laugh. “No, it didn’t. I’m not quite sure how to break this to you, but the sun does not yet rise and fall on your behalf.”
“That’s not what I meant,” he said. He was starting to get angry. “What I was going to say was that you don’t have to leave the firm to avoid running into me. I’m leaving, too.”
“Oh?” I asked. “Where are you going?”
“I’m taking a job with Durant Development’s office of general counsel,” he said.
“Interesting choice,” I murmured. Then I said, “What made you decide to go there?”
“They’re a subsidiary of a nationwide corporation,” he told me, warming to his subject, “with its fingers in a lot of pies. Not just commercial real estate, but agribusiness, energy development – they’re even buying up Internet technology firms. Durant’s business is a very small part of what they do,” he went on, “but it gives me a foot in the door. I’ll be making real money much sooner than if I stayed here, hoping to make partner. And it gives me a way out of this cow town, once and for all.”
I made my next comment deceptively mild. “And it doesn’t bother you that you’ll be working for a soulless corporation that regards human beings as nothing but obstacles?”
“What are you talking about?” He frowned, and then daylight dawned. “Oh, those Indians. You know, Naomi, you’ve always had a do-gooder streak, and I’ve never understood it. First it was that part-time job with Legal Aid when we were in law school, and then it was your insistence that the firm set up a special practice for you so you could help deadbeat employees and supposedly abused wives. You’ll never make any money that way. Haven’t you figured that out yet?”
Had he truly understood so little about me? “I didn’t get into law to make a ton of money, Brock. I got into it to help people. I thought you knew that.”
“But everybody says that, their first year in law school. I didn’t think you actually meant it.”
I shrugged. “Surprise.”
He shook his head. “Whatever possessed me to propose to you?”
And just like that, I knew. Or rather, the elephant in the room became unmistakably visible. “Why don’t you just ask me to marry you already?”
I felt like whacking my head against the nearest solid object. It was me, Brock. I possessed you to propose.
Another conversation that it’s too late for me to have.
“Well,” I said, smiling brightly to cover my dismay, “I hope you enjoy your new job, working for a scumbag.”
“Good luck to you in your future life on the street,” he returned, with an equally bright smile.
I didn’t slam the door behind him, although I wanted to. I did close it, though. Then I sat in my desk chair and buried my head in my arms on the desktop for a while. I was an emotional wreck, and it wasn’t even noon yet.
I spent the afternoon e-mailing clients to let them know of my departure and organizing my files. By 3:30 p.m., I was done. I shut down my computer and told Tess I was leaving for the day. Then I headed out of the building for a walk. I hoped the exercise would clear my head. I was pretty sure nothing would get the bad taste of this day out of my mouth.
I meandered down 16th Street Mall, which was mobbed with post-Christmas bargain hunters; Walgreens was doing a land-office business in leftover wrapping paper and bows. Seeking a smaller crowd, I cut over a couple of blocks to the Denver Center for the Performing Arts and perused the “coming attractions” posters without any of the show titles registering in my brain.
All I could think about was the number of bullets I had dodged over the past week. I’d wormed a major secret out of my mother without wrecking our relationship; I’d gotten out of marrying a guy who, if he wasn’t Evil Personified, was at least incredibly self-absorbed; and I’d managed to quit my job before they had a chance to fire me. I realized that far from being devastated from the number of crises I’d handled this week, I felt exhilarated – as if I was finally putting my feet on the road I’d been heading for, all along. As if I was coming home.
Nearing Civic Center Park, I noted by the clock atop city hall that it was almost four. The last rays of the winter sun set the golden dome of the state capitol agleam across Broadway. I wound my way through the stately columns of the Voorhees Memorial and crossed the broad central plaza to the Greek Theater on the south side of the park, near the library. It had been growing steadily colder all day, and although parts of the park were brightly lit, most of the skateboarders and others who frequent the area had moved on.
As I neared the top of the Greek Theater steps, an owl hooted right behind me. I flinched as the giant bird flew past, its wingspan nearly as wide as I was tall. It flew into a niche to the left side of the stage. I stopped just below the top step, poised to crouch in the stairwell in case the bird came at me again. But no owl emerged from the niche; instead, a coyote trotted out. It stopped about three feet away from where I stood, frozen and disbelieving. Its amber eyes regarded me with intelligence. I could have sworn it not only recognized me, but was smiling.
Suddenly I was back in the sweat lodge, and White Buffalo Calf Pipe Woman was resting her hand atop the head of an amber-eyed, laughing coyote. A coyote who had turned into an amber-eyed drummer.
“Joseph?” I said, incredulous.
The beast whined and trotted toward me. He nosed my gloved hand, and almost in reflex, I placed it tentatively on his head, between his ears, and patted him twice. Then he turned around and trotted back into the niche.
I stayed where I was for a few indecisive moments. Then, like one of those crazy women in the movies who opens the door to the ax murderer, I began to follow him. But I had not gone three steps before Joseph stepped unsteadily out of the niche. He leaned against the wall, breathing hard.
“Too many changes in a row,” he panted. “Takes it out of you.”
“That was you, then.” I made it a statement. “You were the owl and the coyote both.”
He nodded. “I can change into just about any shape.” He took several more breaths before replying. “It’s called skinwalking. Most tribes frown on it. They consider us demons. It wasn’t just Grandfather’s” – he paused for another breath and sank down to the ground, his back against the wall – “fixation with White Buffalo Calf Pipe Woman that got us kicked off the rez. I’d begun to change at about the same time.”
“I thought you left the reservation voluntarily.”
He grinned cro
okedly. “Yeah. Well. Depends how you look at it.”
The sun had set in the interim, and it was getting much colder. Now I heard shouts coming from the direction of city hall, where the outdoor light display was beginning to attract its usual crowd. “Let’s get some coffee,” I suggested. “It’s freezing out here. Can you walk?”
“Sure. I’m fine now.” As if to prove it, he rose in a single, fluid movement and preceded me down the staircase.
We headed back the way I’d come, through the Voorhees Memorial and across Colfax, to a coffee shop named for the Slavic god of abundance. I wondered idly whether He was in league with White Buffalo Calf Pipe Woman, too.
“So tell me,” I asked when we were settled in with our drinks. “Every time I’ve heard an owl over the past few days – that was you, wasn’t it? And it was you I saw at Sakura Square, too.”
He nodded. “I’ve been looking for you for a long time. Finally found you a couple of weeks ago. Once I did, I couldn’t let you out of my sight again.” He sipped his coffee. “Sorry if I scared you.”
“It’s okay.” The words came out automatically. I wasn’t sure if I meant them or not.
“And I wasn’t lying when I said I saw the whole exchange at Grandfather’s on Sunday.”
I nodded. “I get that now.”
We sat in silence for a few minutes. Then I asked, “Did you follow me to Indiana, too?”
He gave a short laugh. “Yeah. Dunno what I was thinking. It was a hell of a long trip for nothing – you were fine, and I missed your call.”
“‘I was in transit.’ Yeah, no kidding.” We both chuckled. Then I asked, “But why did you go?”
He stared at me. “Same reason I’ve been following you, of course. I’m the Guardian.” I must have looked mystified, because he gave me a rueful smile. “Sorry. I’ve been living with this prophecy of Grandfather’s for so long that I forget how little you know of it.” He folded his hands around his paper cup and leaned his forearms on the table separating us. “When Grandfather was first contacted by White Buffalo Calf Pipe Woman, She told him how he would know when the next part of Her plan was going to begin.
“First there would be a Gatekeeper, whose role would be to bring the major players to the game. We figure that was the guy who owned the farm where the white buffalo calf bowed to you.”
“But he was a huckster,” I pointed out.
Joseph shook his head. “Doesn’t matter. All he has to do is open the gate.”
I was dubious, but I was willing to run with it for now. “All right. Go on.”
“Next would be the Chosen,” he said. “That’s you.”
That made me shiver. “That’s what She called me. In my vision in the sweat lodge. She said I’d been chosen.”
He nodded as if it were self-evident. “I’m the Guardian of the Chosen. My job is to keep you safe.
“We think Shannon is the Counselor. She’s your sounding board. She’s supposed to help you make the right choices.”
“I’m the chooser as well as the Chosen,” I mused. “Is that the whole cast of characters?”
“There’s supposed to be one other person – an Investigator. We haven’t pegged him or her yet.”
It dawned on me that Joseph kept saying “we.” And yet – “What’s Looks Far’s job?”
He smiled sadly. “His job, like the Gatekeeper’s, is pretty much over. He’s the Prophet. His job was the same as the Indian hunter in the legend – he was supposed to warn everyone that White Buffalo Calf Pipe Woman was coming back. But nobody would believe him.”
“He didn’t fail,” I insisted, putting one hand on his wrist. “Not yet. It’s not over yet.” What am I saying? Am I buying into all of this craziness?
Joseph grinned and sat back, pulling away from me. “Of course not. It’s just getting started.”
Another thought occurred to me. “I had a different kind of dream the other night,” I said, feeling oddly shy about mentioning it. “I seemed to be looking through someone else’s eyes. First I was a coyote, running on the prairie north of Denver. Then I was an owl, flying into the city. And then I woke up.” I looked into his eyes then, as if challenging him.
“I thought someone was with me,” was all he said.
I guessed some mysteries would take a little while longer to unravel. I had a lot to chew over already.
“How did the resignation go?” he asked after a moment.
I filled him in on how I’d quit just a few days before they were going to fire me. “I really dodged a bullet there,” I finished. “And another one by breaking up with Brock. I owe so much to you and Looks Far.”
“It was meant to be, Naomi,” he said. “She’s arranging things to suit Her, that’s all.”
“Oh,” I said, “Brock’s leaving the firm, too. He’s going to work for Durant. He expects a swift ascension to a lofty position in the home office.”
Joseph’s eyes narrowed. “What do you mean?”
“He says Durant Development is a subsidiary of a multinational conglomerate. Lots of different businesses.”
“I’d like to know more about this company,” he said.
“Good idea,” I said. “I’ll do a little research tomorrow. And I’ll need to know more about this lease your grandfather has with the guy on the Western Slope. I still don’t feel comfortable mediating the dispute, but I would be happy to advise your grandfather informally.”
He nodded. “I’ll see what I can find.”