Motorcycles & Sweetgrass (16 page)

There would be trails for horses, workshops for tepee-making (though Anishnawbe people didn’t actually use teepees), canoe classes and a bow-and-arrow hunt for buffalo (an animal not domestic to this part of the country). Maggie couldn’t begin to list all the things culturally wrong with Gayle’s suggestion, but she gamely smiled and listened.

The other two suggestions were a little more uncomfortable. Attawop McFarlane felt the time was right, in these increasingly political and volatile times, to establish a school, or at least a training ground, for protesters. He was sure, dead sure, things were going to get worse with the provincial and federal governments, and that events like those at Oka, Ipperwash and Caledonia were going to become regular occurrences. So logically, there would be a need for experienced and professional protesters. Nothing worse than amateurs running around pointing guns and distributing press releases. Otter Lake could export those trained in blockading roads and handling media relations, and even warriors with a certain amount of paramilitary expertise.

This was when Maggie’s migraine began.

Eventually, down the road, Attawop felt they could up the ante. With all the money the institute could bring in, added to the money from the smoke shacks that had been set up recently, and maybe, down the road, a casino or two, Otter Lake could officially secede from Canada. He was already anticipating the need for Otter Lake’s own passport, flag, national anthem, etcetera. Maggie had to admire Attawop’s enthusiasm, though privately she mourned the direction it took.

The talk with Ted Hunter did not make Maggie’s migraine go away. Ted wanted the land to be turned into a gigantic movie studio. With so many television shows and movies about Native people
being shot in Canada, it seemed only natural, he said, to build a facility that would cater to that market. Three hundred acres would provide for a lot of studio space, as well as all that natural forest for period productions. For instance, a standard village for all the major tribal affiliations could be constructed in advance: an Iroquois village complete with stockades, a Haida village with totem poles (he hadn’t figured out the ocean part yet), a Plains Cree tepee village (the part about the vast empty plains would have to be dealt with at a later date) and so on. It seemed to Maggie that Ted’s degree in radio and television broadcasting from a local community college had given him, if nothing else, ambition and incentive.

By the end of the day, Maggie wanted to run screaming out of her office. But that would have been very unchief-like. So instead, she took two Advil and quietly snuck out the side door to head for Virgil’s school for her meeting with his teacher, Ms. Weatherford. Three years of being chief had taught Maggie to read in advance the mood of any meeting she would be going into. The mood of this one did not look good.

“Your son,” Ms. Weatherford began, “is not applying himself.” The woman, in her late forties, with a subtle East Coast accent, was looking over Virgil’s chart. As she read, she kept twisting her body to her left as if working a kink out of her back. “He misses a lot of classes. And when he is in class, he’s not paying attention. He seems to be… lacking motivation.”

Ms. Weatherford had been teaching at the Reserve school for going on five years now, and was very familiar with most of the kids and their families. Though not Native herself, she did claim to have a branch of Mi’kmaq growing somewhere in the family tree and was convinced it provided a window of understanding
into her students. When you teach grade eight, you need all the help you can get.

“Okay, what would you suggest?”

Maggie had been expecting something like this and was wondering how serious a lack of motivation could be for a thirteen-year-old boy. When she was thirteen, the only motivation she’d needed was the threat of her mother’s large wooden spoon. Still, it was her son’s last year of schooling in the village. Next year Virgil would be bussed off the Reserve daily for high school.

“I don’t know. All kids act and react differently. Are you having any domestic problems at home?”

A dead husband/father. A recently deceased mother/grandmother. “Nope, just the usual.” She thought of John, but surely Virgil’s lack of enthusiasm over their dinner guest didn’t pose that serious a problem.

“I was sorry to hear about your mother. But Virgil’s problem predated her passing away. I think somehow we, meaning you and I, have to find a way to focus Virgil’s attention and enthusiasm. We both know he’s a bright boy. We just need to let him know that. I have some ideas.”

Maggie listened patiently. It was a relief for once to have somebody else come up with ideas on how to solve problems in her life. Maggie nodded as Ms. Weatherford put her BA (with a minor in Psychology) and her teaching certificate to good work. It seemed her son just needed a good kick in the pants, but Ms. Weatherford explained it in less abusive terms.

After returning home from the meeting, Maggie lay in her room for an hour. Virgil must have been out playing with Dakota or
one of his other cousins, so the house was calm. She didn’t have to worry about dinner; they would have the leftover chicken cacciatore. She heard the phone ring once but refused to move. Nothing short of her son being presented the Nobel Prize, by Russell Crowe, would have induced her to move.

Eventually, the headache that had been bothering her all day began to subside and she emerged from her bedroom ready to see what fresh hell the evening would bring her.

The voice on her answering machine was from Marie, her older sister. “Throw something nice on. I’ll swing around your place at about seven tonight to pick you up, okay? I think we need to get you out of this village and have some fun. I won’t take no for an answer.”

So Marie wanted to go out. Probably to Charley’s, a place about thirty minutes from the village. The last thing Maggie wanted to do was go to a loud, smelly bar and watch Marie and her friends drink and cackle.

Then the voice added, “Heard you had somebody over last night. Looking forward to hearing all about it. Talk to you later.”

That was it, then. Her sister didn’t really want her to have some fun. She wanted gossip, the dirt on John.

At first she felt vaguely insulted, and then flattered. In the last few years, her life lacked anything that was remotely worthy of being considered entertaining gossip. The thought of Marie and all her friends leaning over their beers with bated breath, waiting to hear about her evening with the sexy, mysterious young guy on the motorcycle, suddenly appealed to her. Maybe she
would
go. And though her sister did have ulterior motives, perhaps Maggie shouldn’t pass up a chance to get out of town and leave all her chiefly responsibilities hanging in her closet.

“It will be good for you,” agreed Virgil when he got home, though the truth was, he knew his mother had just come from a meeting with his teacher. This was as good an excuse as any to put off the inevitable deluge of concerned words about his education. Even better, a night out of the house with his aunt might help get his mother’s mind off work. Virgil always looked forward to spending what precious time he could with his mom, when her schedule allowed it. But he knew these were difficult times for the Band Office and could see the need for this outing.

But more than getting her mind off work, Virgil hoped the outing would get his mother’s mind off that guy with the motorcycle.

Everything about the man warned of danger. To the boy, John seemed like some sort of flu or cold infecting his community. The longer he was around, the deeper the infection. His mother seemed to be coming down with a bad case of the Johns. So Virgil reasoned a little time with her girlfriends might help his mother build up some resistance. Because if there was one thing he knew about women on these outings, it was that they tended to make fun of most of the men they knew. He could only hope John’s name would be front and centre.

So when Marie showed up, right on time, Maggie was ready for an evening with the girls, and Virgil genuinely meant it when he said, “Goodbye, and have fun.” He would find something amusing to do. And he’d be okay by himself. He was, after all, thirteen.

Virgil was watching television when he first heard it. His mother had left twenty minutes ago and he was deep into some generic cop drama when the sound filtered through the window. It took a moment to register, and then Virgil muted the television and
listened. It sounded like music. There were four other houses in the immediate neighbourhood, but this music sounded like it came from someplace far off, like down near the bay.

The Second house was located about twenty metres up the road from what was affectionately called Beer Bay. Its real name was Burning Bay, named after a long-time resident George Burning. It had acquired the nickname in the sixties and seventies when it was a prime hangout for the village’s youth. It was said that during those two decades, more beer was drunk down in Beer Bay per week than at most Oktoberfests. In the early eighties, things changed. Houses were built and the area cleaned up its act. But nicknames die hard in Indian country.

Virgil and Maggie’s house was near the western part of the bay and, to him, the music sounded like it was coming from the east end. Everybody knew there was nothing over there except a dock where kids would go to swim and fish. The more he listened to the music, the more unusual it seemed. There was the rhythmic beat of what sounded like traditional Anishnawbe drum music, mixed in with guitars and synthesizers. And there was something else. It was hard to tell, what with the sound bouncing over water and being muffled by the trees. But somewhere under that music, Virgil was almost sure, practically positive, he could hear the rumble of a motorcycle.

Was that him? John whatever-his-last-name-is? He listened harder. “What is he up to now?” he thought. The more he listened, the more he wanted to find out. It was like the music was taunting him.

Desperate, Virgil pumped up the volume on the television in an effort to free himself from the sound. He even turned to MuchMusic, but that was no good. Dr. Dre was no match for the
music coming through the window. He could feel the thumping of the traditional drum. The sound seemed to beckon to him.

Five minutes later he had his shoes and jacket on and was running to the beach. Following the natural curve of the bay, he made his way toward the music, which was growing louder and louder as he approached. Virgil had spent time at about two or three powwows a year, as well as at all the formal ceremonies at which his mother officiated, and he’d heard his share of traditional drum music. But this was different. In no time at all, he had found the source of the music. And it
was
coming from near the dock where kids swam and fished. But tonight there were no kids. Virgil crept along slowly, keeping hidden behind a row of bushes and goldenrods until he had a clear view of the dock area.

Just a short distance away, on the shore, was the motorcycle. Beside it was a huge portable CD player. On the dock was the motorcyclist, and he was in motion. He was dancing! He was a blur of movement one minute, and almost still the next. At times John was silhouetted against the almost-full moon. Virgil was mesmerized. This wasn’t any type of dancing he’d seen on television, or at powwows. It had an ancient, tribal quality. And yet at the same time, a modern, innovative style. And just about everything in between.

There was something about the dance, and the way John moved, that tugged at Virgil’s memory. Something had been told to him a long time ago. Was it from a television show or a movie? He couldn’t be sure. Perhaps in one of the books his grandmother had given him. That’s all he could remember. Occasionally the clouds rolled past the moon, obscuring it, and John would slow down, even stop in mid-pose, as the land was bathed in black. But once the moon revealed itself again, John would resume moving,
as if the moon were his own personal spotlight. Eventually the man began to slow down. Finally he stopped, resting his hands on his knees and bending over slightly, panting. Yet he seemed empowered by what he’d been doing.

“Oh, that felt good,” Virgil heard him say.

Perplexed, the boy continued to watch, his opinion of the stranger growing ever more confused.

Not wanting to be caught, he slowly stole away, staying as low as possible to keep out of sight. Once he got to the treeline, he began to run. Though he was no expert on the art of dance, he knew what he’d just seen had been unusual, amazing and special. Downright bizarre, too. But what did it mean?

After he returned home, he spent the rest of the night lying in bed, remembering the dancing form on the dock in the moonlight.

This had all started somehow with Grandma. Where did she fit in? What was the man’s interest in his mother? John had plans to take his mother away, at the very least, and Virgil would find a way to stop him. On top of everything, the stranger had an attitude that suggested his mother was a means to an end. Exactly what means and what end the boy did not know—and this worried him. He had to put a stop to this. His mother had too many stars in her eyes right now to see clearly. It was up to him to protect her. But how?

Virgil had so many questions, all of them over his adolescent head. He needed help. His father use to say, “It takes a thief to catch a thief.” Then logically, if he wanted to figure out some strange guy with unusual talents, he’d need the advice of another strange guy with unusual talents. Virgil knew only one guy who fit the description. He’d have to visit his uncle Wayne. That thought alone made him pull the blankets in closer.

He’d seen Wayne maybe half a dozen times since his uncle had moved to the island. People said he was practising to be a mystic or medicine man or monk or something else starting with the letter
m
. Maybe Wayne would know something about this John guy and what to do. It sure wouldn’t hurt to ask, especially now that Virgil remembered what he had been struggling to recall. The dancing… A light as bright as the moon outside his window went on as he finally made the connection.

Virgil had not been alone that night in appreciating John’s dancing skills. A certain Otter Lake girl whose name was the same as two large but sparsely populated American states saw him do his thing too. But she watched from across the bay, on her family dock, through her father’s binoculars. They were very good binoculars and John was clearly visible along the far shore, lit by the full moon.