The Only Good Indians(88)

But then … then: Elk Head Woman is Crow, right?

Denorah stands, pushes on, making herself run again.

No way does a Crow win. Not today, not here.

Even if the world’s blurry. Even if Denorah’s lungs aren’t working. Even if she can’t feel her legs at all. Even if she’s seeing ledger art come to life now in front of her.

She slows, shakes her head, tries to clear her eyes.

The ledger art remains. It’s there not fifteen feet in front of her.

A dying Indian slumped forward on a horse, what she sees at every booth at every powwow: The End of the Trail. The only difference is that the tired war pony, it’s usually either in silhouette or just white, to better see the dying Indian’s bare leg on that side.

This horse is a paint.

It raises its head, gives an obligatory whinny about Denorah.

“Calico?” Denorah says weakly, sure this must be a death vision.

Calico whickers, blowing her lips at the end, and Denorah tracks up the horse’s neck.

Tangled in its long mane, tangled tight, are fingers. Behind them, on Calico’s back, his blood coating down her side, is the dying rider—

“Nathan!” Denorah screams, running to him, hardly registering that they’re up on the hard hump of exactly the road she’s been trying for.

She gets to his left leg with her hand, and that nudges him awake. He looks around, then down to her.

“D,” he says back with half a messed-up smile.

“Are you—what—let me,” Denorah says, no clue where to start or how to start it.

At which point Calico dances to the side, away from Denorah.

“Po’noka,” Nathan says, sitting all the way up now.

Denorah tracks from his eyes to where he’s looking: behind her.

She turns around already shaking her head no.

Elk Head Woman.

So close.

Two free throws away and walking in a straight, pissed-off line. Probably because Nathan’s supposed to be dead, not still dying.

“Go, go, go!” Denorah says up to him.

He reaches an arm down for her, to haul her up onto Calico with him, but the effort nearly tilts him off, and grabbing onto her looks like it would rip him in half anyway. More in half. Denorah pushes him onto Calico’s back with both hands, holds him there.

“No,” she says, “I’ll—I’ll lead her to the lake. Tell my—go to town, can you do that? Ride right the fuck into town and tell them, tell them all … You know where the Game Office is? Just … find my dad, tell him I’m headed to the lake, the one that Junior guy died in, Duck Lake, tell him—”

“Your … your dad,” Nathan manages to say. “He’s—isn’t he dead?”

“My other dad!” Denorah yells, then grabs on to Calico’s head, hauls her around, and slaps her hard on the ass, screaming at the same time.

Calico explodes ahead hard, even wheelie-ing up at first, which Denorah knows is called something else when it’s a horse, but there’s no time, there’s no time.

Elk Head Woman steps up onto the packed dirt of the road.

She’s looking at Nathan and Calico, is considering them.

“Hey, you!” Denorah says, bringing that long elk face around to her. “Nineteen-sixteen,” she says, touching her own chest, then pointing across to Elk Head Woman. “Thought we had a game to finish here.”

Denorah gets the full attention of one of those big yellow eyes, and she doesn’t wait, she’s already running.

This isn’t a second or even a fourteenth wind, she knows. This is running on hardpack with feet she can’t even feel. This is running downhill, toward water.

This is the real last three seconds.





WHERE THE OLD ONES GO


It doesn’t make sense that Denorah is just now getting down to where the lake sort of is. She’s been running for years, she knows. For her whole life, maybe. And not running the whole time, either. At least three times now she’s crashed and burned, just flattened out there, ready to give up. Her chin is raw from scraping, the palms of her hands are bleeding, and she’s not thankful that she can feel her feet again. Her feet are full of needles.

In her head she mumbles apology to Coach. Players are supposed to save their legs for game day. Denorah’s not going to be able to walk for a week, she knows. If then.

But first she’s got to live.

The last time she fell and decided to just rest her eyes for a moment, for a breath, for two, okay, the hard dirt so right and perfect against the side of her face, she came to all at once, instant panic, and rolled over to see Elk Head Woman just two fence posts behind her.

She’s walking on the road now too, even though the road curves and twists, banks and falls away in places. If this were fair, if Elk Head Woman were sticking to her own rules, she’d still be taking a straight line, wouldn’t she? She’d be getting bogged down out there in the deep stuff. Even elk bog down, right?

But elk walk the road, too, Denorah knows. She’s seen them doing it, all in a long line, heads drooping like it’s the Elk Dust Bowl, the Great Elk Depression.

“What do you want?” Denorah screams back, standing her ground, leaning forward from screaming so hard. “What did I ever do to you?”