My Name Is Not Easy (37 page)

Our Uncle’s Gun

JUNE 6, 1963

LUKE

—

Th

e dream ebbs away like water melting into sand, but even with his eyes wide open, Luke feels the pain. It was a dream of bright fl ashes and shadowy shapes and the kind of hurt that makes it hard to breathe, like something bad is happening. Something very bad, with people knowing what it is but not saying, refusing to even look at you. Th

e kind of dream

that feels signifi cant—more substantial than the army cot or the sunny window or the smell of the hair grease that Bunna is combing into his hair, like an artist applying paint to a canvas.

Today is the day they’re going home for summer break, and the air is thick with anticipation.

Bunna stands before the mirror, examining his hair with a look of satisfaction.

“I had this dream,” Luke says to Bunna’s back. But suddenly the dream details get all mixed up, and the words forming themselves in Luke’s mouth don’t make any sense.

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“Mmm?” says Bunna, turning sideways to examine the

side of his neck in the mirror.

“We were living in an ice cellar,” Luke says. But he isn’t sure who he means by
we
—not him and Bunna alone—and he doesn’t think
ice cellar
is the right word, either. Th e right

word is an Iñupiaq word, trapped in between his tongue and his teeth. Voiceless.

“Hope Uncle’s ice cellar is full of
maktak,
” Bunna says, regarding his refl ection sideways. “Th

at’s the fi rst place I’m

going when we get home.”

Suddenly something inside Luke snaps into clarity. Something important.

“We’re not going home,” he says, swinging his legs over the side of the bed and standing up. “We’re staying here.”

Because all of a sudden Luke knows with absolute cer-tainty that he and Bunna can’t go home. He doesn’t know how or why he knows this, he just does. Th

ey’ve been planning to

go home forever and can’t wait to get there, but now there’s something inside him that says they can’t go. Th

e dream. It

came from the dream, somehow. Even if the plane fl ew down to Sacred Heart School and landed right outside their window, singing their names like rock songs, they could not go.

Th

is is what Luke suddenly knows.

“
What?
”

Bunna has turned around and is now staring at Luke, dumbstruck.

“We aren’t going anywhere. We’re staying here.”

“Like hell!” Bunna turns away again and starts shoving
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O U R U N C L E ’ S G U N / L u k e

things into his duffl

e bag.

Luke scowls out at the birch tree, trying to ignore him, which is impossible because Bunna is wadding up stray socks and shorts and punching them into his duffl

e with a force

so fi erce even the birch tree seems to feel it, tapping its black branch against the window like a warning.

Luke looks at the gun on the wall—the one Uncle Joe gave him—and all he wants to do, right now, is go home. He wants this so bad it takes his breath away.

Bunna snaps his duffl

e shut, his eyes following Luke’s.

Th

en he reaches for the gun.

“You aren’t taking that gun,” Luke says. His voice feels cold and steely.

Suddenly the gun is the most important thing in the world.

Bunna scowls. “Uncle Joe says you gotta bring it home for summer.”

“I’m not going home this summer.”

Bunna pulls the gun closer. “Yeah, well, I am.”

Luke takes a step forward. Just one step. Even though they’re about the same height, Luke’s shoulders are broader than Bunna’s.

“Not with my gun,” he says. He wants, desperately, to say something else, something powerful. He isn’t sure what—he only knows for certain that it has nothing to do with the gun.

Nothing at all.

“I’m listening to Uncle Joe, not you,” Bunna says, setting the gun down by his duffl

e like a dare, like he’s daring Luke

to do something. Luke wants to do something, all right. He
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wants to do something real bad.

“You’re not listening to what I’m saying.” Th

e words taste

like tough old meat. He tears them off with his teeth, strand by strand. “You’re. Just. Being. Stupid.”

“I’m not stupid. What the heck you wanna stay at this stupid place for when you could be home hunting with Uncle?

Stupid!
”

“Quit being a damn baby.”

Luke wanted to say something stronger, something that would shake Bunna awake. Maybe the words he needed were Iñupiaq words, and maybe he had spoken English so long he no longer knew them. Or maybe there were just some things words couldn’t say. Th

ings nobody could say.

“We could make money this summer,” he says. “Go to

Fairbanks like Amiq . . .”

Amiq was going to have a job in Fairbanks this summer, live with a family—they could, too, Luke thinks, him and Bunna.

“Forget it,” Bunna snaps.

“Grow up, man, it’s—”

“Forget it!” Bunna’s mouth is like some kind of slingshot, shooting rock-hard words.
Bing, bing, bing.
And his ears seem plugged shut with those same rocks.

More than anything, Luke wants to shake him, shake the rocks right out of his head. Shake and shake and shake.

“Why don’t you just—.” His voice rises perilously.

“Forget it!” Bunnna barks.

“Hell, if you can’t even—”

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“FORGET IT!”

“LISTEN!” Luke hollers, using the side of his fi st to open Bunna’s ears, shoving him right up against the bed, slamming him hard. Shoving him into the wall. “Damn it! What’s the matter with you?” Luke’s been gritting his teeth so hard, his jaw aches. “We could make some money, staying here!”