Motorcycles & Sweetgrass (7 page)

Inside, not stopping or even slowing down, the man, still wearing his helmet, walked past all the startled relatives, heading directly toward Lillian Benojee’s door like he’d been here a thousand times before.

Willie and his brother Tim had other ideas. Planting themselves in front of the bedroom, they blocked the stranger’s path.

Willie was the first to speak. “Who the hell are you?”

“This is our mother’s house.” Tim had the tendency to state the obvious. “What do you want?”

The man in black just stood there for a few seconds. He was taller than the two brothers by about four inches, but substantially leaner. The way his helmet kept turning, it was obvious that he was looking back and forth between the two men.

“Well…?” asked Willie.

Once more, the stranger did not move.

“Hey Maggie, what should we do?” It was Tim asking his sister, and the community’s chief.

Before the equally curious Maggie could respond, the man in black raised both gloved hands until they were at the Benojee brothers’ ear level. The brothers instantly stiffened, wondering if they were in for a fight. Others in the room backed off to a safe distance or stepped forward a foot or two to assist their kin. Maggie rested her hand on the phone, ready to call Larry and Audrey, the two village cops, if necessary.

The mystery man’s gloved hands hung there for a time, as if he were a faith healer about to make them walk or see again. Each brother eyed them with trepidation. Suddenly the rider grabbed an ear lobe on each of them and squeezed. Though quite burly, the brothers yelped and went instantly to their knees, as if they were children caught doing something they shouldn’t. Slowly but firmly, the stranger led them away from the door and sat them on two chairs parallel to the table. He gave each ear one final squeeze, eliciting a squeal from the brothers, before returning to Lillian’s door and knocking.

Several other family members rushed, too late, to the men’s aid.

A weak voice came from behind the door. “Come in.” The pressure of the knock had forced the door to open.

No one moved for several seconds, until once more Lillian’s strained voice was heard. “Well, is anybody out there? I haven’t got all day. I’m dying, you know.”

The man disappeared into the old woman’s room, closing the door behind him.

Willie and Tim and a number of other relatives gathered outside Lillian’s bedroom, unsure how to proceed.

“Should we go in?”

“Who the fuck was that?”

“We should go in.”

“Should I call the police?”

“Tim, why don’t you go in?”

“Somebody do something!”

In the end, nobody did anything.

Maggie was mystified as to how this six-foot-two-inch, black-leather-wearing motorcyclist with social interaction issues knew her mother. Part of her wanted to tell her brothers to go in and throw out whoever the hell that was. There were certain social graces to visiting a stranger’s house. You didn’t just barge into places like you owned them and manhandle people. But another part of Maggie, she didn’t know from where or from what, told her not to worry.

Maybe that was the Anishnawbe side of her.

The stranger stood in front of the door, unmoving. Lillian lay in her bed, also unmoving. The only sound was the ancient clock ticking the seconds away as the two surveyed each other. Instinctively, she reached over to the bedside table and put in her false teeth.

“You ain’t one of my kids. Or my grandkids. Or any niece or nephew. Or cousin. And I don’t know a lot of White people who dress like that, Black or Chinese either. So I’m guessing we’ve never met. So I’m guessing you must be lost,” she said in English, with an accent.

For the first time, the man under the helmet and leather communicated. He shook his shiny black helmeted head once.

“You gonna take that silly thing off and talk to me, or we gonna be in here all day staring at each other?”

The helmet tilted back ever so slightly, giving the impression that the man might have been laughing. Then, slowly, he took off his leather gloves. The skin underneath appeared to belong to a White man, or possibly a pale Asian. From the neck down, they all look alike, Lillian believed. The man flexed his fingers for a second, then grasped his helmet with both hands. Lillian watched, curious but patient. It took a moment or two for the constricting helmet to give, then he slowly lifted it off his head.

His hair was past his shoulders, a sandy-blond colour, like freshly baked bannock. His eyes were blue as the lake outside her window. And his face… Caucasian, young—maybe twenty-five or a young thirty—and handsome, with a strong chin and masculine nose. This man was definitely in the wrong house.

“I can breathe again,” he said. He scratched just above his left ear, then tried to put his hair back in some semblance of order. “I hate helmet head, don’t you?”

“Young man, are you selling something?” she asked in English.

“Nope,” he replied. He put the helmet down on a large mirrored dresser, and approached Lillian, stopping beside her bed. “I’ve come to say goodbye.”

“Are you going someplace?”

“No, more like coming back. It’s been a while since I was last here.” The man gazed out the window, and saw a dock, the boats and, off in the distance, a float plane. “It’s changed a lot. And so have you.”

Comprehension flooded the mind of the old woman. She knew who he was. It was him. He’d come.

“Gigii bidgoshin!” she said.

“Poochgo nigiibizhaa,” he answered, saying, yes, he had had to come.

“I didn’t think… Where have you been?”

For a moment, he hesitated. “I’ve… I was sick for a while.”

Lillian reached up and touched the man’s face, his hair, as if trying to find somebody else in there. “We’ve all been sick. And this, all this? What’s up with this?”

For the first time, the young man smiled. And it was a familiar smile. “Different times, different faces. I am nothing if not adaptable. Do you like?”

She shook her head. “Never liked blonds.”

A loud interrupting knock was heard at the door. “Mom, you okay?” It was Willie.

Lillian answered quickly. “Yes. Go away.”

“All that brood out there yours?” asked the man.

She nodded. “Most of them.”

“You’ve been busy.”

“Had to do something. Baking pies gets kind of boring after a while.”

“I suppose it does. I guess you can’t go swimming forever,” he added, sadly. “How was that school of yours?”

“Educational, in more ways than one.” Over his shoulder, Lillian could see the helmet resting on the small table. She pointed at it. “Your helmet, that thing you painted on it. It’s hard to tell, the way it’s drawn, but that’s a raven, isn’t it?”

The man was surprised. “Yeah. How would you know?”

Smiling, she leaned back in her bed, her head almost disappearing into the pillow. “I used to get around. Read a lot. That’s West Coast art, ain’t it? Believe it or not, I’ve even seen a sea otter!” She sighed. The clock seemed to tick louder. “So what happens now?”

“What always happens.”

“I suppose. Why should I be any different, huh?” She saw him pick up a photograph from her dresser, one of her at a much younger age. “You came all this way to say goodbye?”

He nodded. “You called. I came.” Looking at the disease-ravaged woman in front of him, the man could still see the pretty young girl he’d once known.

She hesitated, then asked, “Tell me the truth, do you hate me? For going away?”

The man put the picture down and once again looked out the window. “No. That was a very long time ago. And you called me back… from where I was. I guess that’s fair.”

“And here I am, leaving you again.” The man did not respond. “Neither time did I have a choice. Tell me, what will you do when… when I go?”

The man turned from the window and faced her again. “I will do what my nature will tell me to do. That’s all any of us can do. I know that’s not what your boyfriend believes, but…”

Lillian put up her hand, cutting him off. “Oh, don’t start that again. Please. I am so sick of that argument. He’s not my boyfriend. He’s just a good person with a lot of good things to say. You really need to get a better grasp of this whole situation. There was room for the both of you. Quit being a child and give him a chance.”

“I don’t think we hang out in the same bars.”

Both fell into a silence.

Finally, the man said, “I am what I am. You of all people should know that.”

Her face softened. “I know. You’re right. That’s part of your charm.” He smiled, and she smiled back. “It’s so good to see you again. Blond hair, blue eyes or not. I missed you. I think we all missed you. You shouldn’t go away like that.”

“A person’s gotta feel wanted.”

Lillian shook his head. “A person’s gotta
make
himself be wanted. And you were always wanted. By me and everyone.”

“It didn’t feel like it.”

“Did you come back all this way to bitch?”

“I came back because you called me.”

“You didn’t have to come back. I didn’t think you would.”

“Of course I had to come back. You’re the last person who really believes in me. As a person. After you…” He shrugged. “Besides, sounds like you’re the one doing all the bitching.”

“Yeah, well, what are you gonna do about it, Mr. Blond Hair?” Gritting her false teeth, she grabbed a small throw pillow lying on the bed and tried to toss it at him. But the ravages of time and sickness, combined with the law of gravity, resulted in the pillow merely rolling off the bed onto the floor.

The man picked it up and held it. “Nice try. I remember when you could skip a stone clear across the river.”

“That was a long time and a lot of stones ago.”

“I suppose. Still, it’s nice to see that determination in your eyes. The furnace may have some wear and tear but the fire still burns hot.”

Her breath was now growing wheezy. “I bet you say that to all the old dying women.”

Kneeling, the man took Lillian’s hand. “No, just the pretty ones.”

“What’s going to happen? To me? Now?”

With what strength she had left, she squeezed the man’s fingers. He caressed the top of her withered hand in response.

“Like I said, what always happens.”

Her voice was now barely a whisper. “No more riddles, please.”

“In all my time on this land, I have learned there are three constants in this universe: getting fat, mosquitoes and saying goodbye,” he replied, his voice low. “I think even your buddy Jesus would agree with that one.”

“My daughter…”

“Yes?”

Lillian closed her eyes, summoning effort to speak. “She’s not doing very well. Too busy. This community. Too busy. Everybody wants something from her. She thinks life is in that Band Office building. It isn’t. Killed her husband practically. And my son. My grandson. They need to believe…”

“I have no idea where you’re going with this.”

“You…”

“Yes, me?”

“After I’m… after… I want… I want you to…” She was rapidly losing her ability to talk.

The man leaned closer. “What? What do you want?”

The old woman reached up and grabbed the back of his blond head, gripping as tightly as her frail muscles would allow. “A favour… no, two favours… okay… promise me… please…”

He put his ear by her mouth and heard her dying requests.

From outside, Virgil and Dakota had seen the man enter through the side door, and watched him barge into their grandmother’s room. They had watched the family fight in whispers about what to do, and shuffle around her door like bees around a rotten apple. Being thirteen, they were intensely curious about what was happening in there. Virgil’s grandmother’s bedroom window
was situated at the edge of the deck, and could be peeked into with a little effort.

“I wonder what’s going on in there,” said Dakota.

“Let’s find out,” said Virgil.

Dakota nervously looked at the window. “Should we?”

Virgil nodded. “Yes, we should. Come on.”

Conspiratorially, they made their way to the edge of the deck, directly under the window. It was Virgil who took the first peek. What he saw inside would shock and puzzle him till the end of his days.

His dying grandmother, patriarch of the Benojee clan and widow of Leonard Benojee, was locked in a passionate embrace with the motorcyclist. The man’s long blond hair was obscuring what was happening, but Virgil was sure, positive in fact, that the man was kissing his grandmother, and quite passionately too. It was the kind of kiss you see only in movies and on television, the eyes-closed, toe-curling kind.

This was not the grandmother Virgil was used to.

“What’s happening in there? What do you see?” Dakota was trying to push Virgil aside, eager to peek.

Unwilling to move, Virgil continued to peer through the window, unsure of what he was witnessing.

Lillian’s window was open, and as she often did when annoyed, Dakota raised her voice to an almost whining pitch. Her voice floated through the mosquito screen, across Lillian’s room and into the man’s ear. Still deep in the kiss, he opened his eyes, and his expression registered that he saw Virgil’s face at the window. The man raised an eyebrow, and Virgil quickly retreated, his heart beating loudly.

“What? What did you see?”

Virgil flattened himself against the side of the house in case the man looked out the window for him. He urged Dakota to be quiet, and dragged her against the wall too.

“What? What? Tell me!”

“Shhhh.”

They both stood there, quiet, until they heard Lillian’s door open and close, and the sound of the man’s boots fading down the hallway.

“Come on, Virgil. Tell me what you saw!”

Not knowing how to tell his cousin what he’d seen without sounding crazy, he just said, “Nothing.”

FIVE