original fiction
Dec. 10th, 2015 01:54 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ljgeoffword count ~2100
Boots
Nanaboozhoo is a little god who watches over the Anishinaabeg, who most folk call Chippewa or Ojibwa . Sometimes he is there with them, teaching about fire or the song of the loon. Sometimes he shows them how to do something by how not to do something. Sometimes he becomes angry and tosses around trees or boulders, or turns someone into a chickadee or a snake.
But most of the time, he is not there. The Anishinaabeg greet each other, saying "Boozhoo!" just in case it is Nanaboozhoo they might be greeting. It's been known to happen.
At one time, maybe a thousand years ago or tomorrow, Nanaboozhoo sat on Turtle’s back and laughed. The strings that vibrated between each mote of existence squirmed under his bare butt cheeks, tickling, and the stars tangled in his hair. It was very undignified, but if any god could be happily, joyfully undignified it would be Great Rabbit of the Anishinaabeg. Scratching absently at his bottom, letting his fingers then rest within the primordia of Turtle’s shell, Nanaboozhoo closed his eyes and considered the Earth.
There, he could hear a child pray: “You slimy, mother fucking bastard! Come down here and face me, Nanaboozhoo! I’ll rip your freaking head off! I’ll cut your heart out! I’ll run you over with a bulldozer until you’re flat and then I’ll stomp all over you and piss on you and throw you in this God. Damned. LAKE.” There was a pleasant, full throated scream of frustration.
Nanaboozhoo cocked his head and listened hard. No, only silence now. What was that? Ah, a whimper, ever so soft, and a small voice: “Please.”
With a smile, Nanaboozhoo folded in on himself and stepped into a winter afternoon, the dusty taste of sleeping trees on his tongue and all around the smell of winter sky.
He was on the shore of a small lake, snow covered and bare except for a small blotch in the whiteness, a stain on its purity. In the middle of the lake bobbed the upper part of a person, arms outstretched as she tried to pull herself back onto the ice. Nanaboozhoo smiled in recognition and walked out to the struggling figure.
She was wearing an army-green nylon parka, the hood trimmed in wolf fur. She’d pulled her mittens off to claw at the ice and her fingers were bloody. Tears streaked her face and Nanaboozhoo could smell her anger and frustration. He squatted and sat on his heels, peering into her reddened face. She was perhaps fifteen years old.
“Nancy?”
She screamed in surprise, lost her clawed grip on the ice and bobbed down, once, twice, gasping and choking until her hands flailed up again, grabbing handfuls of snow, heaving herself up and resting her face on the cracked ice, coughing and swearing. “Pull me out of here, you fucking bastard,” she sputtered between chattering teeth, “or I’ll fucking gut you.”
He was already shaking his head. “No can do, angry-child. I’m not corporeal.”
Nancy heaved herself upwards again, gaining another inch of ice. “You were corporeal enough to fuck my mother. Why not now?”
Nanaboozhoo shrugged. “I was in a hurry just now to answer your prayer,” he said. “I’m not all the way here.”
“Fucking Christ!” the girl looked as if she might weep.
“He’s not corporeal either,” Nanaboozhoo mused, looking around. “Or here.”
Nancy coughed and spit icy lake water from her mouth. “Ok, ok, what else? What else can you do?” Another heave and another inch.
“Too much to list,” Nanaboozhoo rocked slightly on his heels. “But these are things that do not guarantee that you will stay in your present form. I could turn you into a fish?”
Another heave and another inch. “I’ll die here if I don’t get help. ” A pause as she stretched out her arm. “I don’t want to be a fish.” Another heave but this time the edge of the ice crumbled and she slid down an inch. “I’m strong because of you, but I won’t last much longer.” She clawed at the ice and another fingernail tore.
Nanaboozhoo waited for her to think of what she wanted of him. The wet fur from her parka hood was plastered to her forehead and cheeks and her full lips were pressed tight in determination. He thought that she had never been so lovely.
“Go get help,” she threw at him. Her hand lifted, making a shooing motion and then grabbed at the ice, leaving red streaks in the wet snow. “Go Lassie.” A dark chuckle dribbled past her lips. “Go get help.”
Nanaboozhoo nodded and stood. He let his perception flow out in rings around Nancy.
Ah, there.
Nanaboozhoo smiled at Nancy and folded himself up into the air, moving along with the breeze to the other side of the lake.
On the other side of the lake, Boots Mcgeshick plodded in snowshoes through the wet snow. There was a big dump of snow two days ago, but now it was warm and everything was dripping. Wet snow was the worst. Boots pulled the cool and pine flavored air deep down and let it out in a slow, white stream. Any day out in the woods beat a day in class. School sucked except for chemistry. Too bad he couldn't have seven hours of chemistry. He tried to space his skips out so the school wouldn't call his mom but he had a bad feeling about this one and just thinking about her reaction made him hunch his shoulders around his ears.
His beagle dragged herself through the knee-deep wet snow with joy. Suddenly, the dog caught scent, bayed, and was off like a shot. Boots lurched forward in a snowshoe-shuffled run, his .22 slung loose in his hand but down, and looked for tracks. Deer! Dammit! He whistled, but the dog was gone, off running deer. He ran after her for a bit but that was stupid so he stopped, bent over with his free hand on his knee, and grabbed at breath.
The jack pine he was halfway under shivered and loosed a small clump of snow, dropping it square on the back of his exposed neck. Boots let out a yell and stood, shimmying the snow down his spine and pulling out his t-shirt and coat, scooping the mostly melted slush of the small of his back with his fingers. He stamped around in a circle, snowshoes packing down the snow until it was hard and slick, and a shiver gripped his whole body, from scalp to toes.
Boots snorted, stamped his snowshoe a final time, looked up into the sky and blew out a breath. As he leaned back, he lost his balance on the slick pounded snow and his snowshoes shot out from under him. Feet flying in the air, he landed hard on his back, rifle spinning away.
He spent a moment pummeling the snow with his fists and tails of his snowshoes like a two-year old.
A breath. Another breath. Boots blinked and saw the sky was clearing to the pure blue of a robin’s egg. He took another deep breath, and blew it out in a warm white cloud. The frown on his face cleared, and when his eye caught a red tailed hawk in flight, a genuine smile flashed across his face. With a grunt, he pushed himself up and onto his feet, bent to retrieve his gun and started trudging back to the road.
All in all, Boots Mcgeshick was a pre’ easygoing guy. He liked people okay, but he’d rather watch them from a distance. You never knew what people were going to do, what they might say to make you feel sad or angry or both. It was better in the woods. He could watch chippies play for hours, watch the turkey vultures lie up there on the wind, watch a fawn sitting quietly on the forest floor until her mother came back to nurse her. People were harder to watch because they didn't seem to understand what made them happy or sad. His mom was always trying to be happy but she never got the hang of it. Once he watched a pair of red fox mating and to tell the truth, neither one of them looked all that happy about it. So maybe it wasn’t just people.
He was rounding King Lake when a rabbit shot out from the brush, biggest damn rabbit he’d ever seen. Boots stopped dead in his tracks and the rabbit stopped too, looking him up and down. Slowly, Boots brought his rifle up, finger gently on the trigger. The rabbit twitched an ear and then lifted a back foot to scratch his cheek.
His lips moved soundlessly, Meegwetch, Waabooz, and he squeezed the trigger.
The shot went high, just nicking the rabbit’s ear. Blood flicked across the snow and the rabbit flew off, east toward the lake. Boots followed, running as best he could through the wet snow, crimson drops marking the way.
The snow-covered lake was lined with red dogwood, the thin branches almost as bright red as the blood drops he’d been following. When Boots pushed through brush, he saw a man trotting away from him, across the lake, the rabbit limp in his hand.
“Hey!” Boots called. “Hey! That’s my rabbit! You got my rabbit!” The dogwood clutched at him like red fingers and Boots twisted around, snowshoes caught up in a snag of cedar. By the time he got free, the man was halfway across the lake. Boots set his chin and stomped off after him.
Fifty yards away, the man stopped and squatted down. There was something there; something in the lake. Boots began a shuffling run.
Nancy blinked at the figures, small but clear in the late-day sun. When they hovered over her, she blinked again. “Oh. My. God.” Nancy peered up at Boots and then at Nanaboozhoo. “You brought me Boots Mcgeshick? What in the everfucking world have I ever done to you?”
Boots dropped down, squatting on his heels. “Nancy? Are you okay?”
Nancy rolled her eyes at Nanaboozhoo and he scratched his nose. “Why do you call him Boots?”
Boots muttered, “Dora and Boots.”
Nancy didn't look at Boots or Nanaboozhoo. She stretched her arm out, the hand white and blood streaked, and tried to claw at the ice. “I was six,” Nancy muttered. “We were six fucking years old.”
Boots shrugged. “It’s not my fault. I didn't ask them to call me Boots.” He was kicking off his snowshoes.
“You didn't tell them not to.” Nancy clutched at the ice, gaining another inch.
Nanaboozhoo looked between the two, puzzled. He could see the bond between them glowing like a liferoot, heart to heart. Boots was laying on the ice now, his hands reaching out to Nancy. Nanaboozhoo studied Nancy’s face. “You don’t like him now?”
Nancy frowned, reaching for Boots outstretched fingers. “He changed,” she muttered.
“Everything changed.” She frowned, her fingers a hand’s breadth away from Boots’.
“Everything changes,” Nanaboozhoo frowned at his daughter.
Boots grabbed blindly at a snowshoe and pushed the rounded toe to Nancy. Her numb fingers wouldn't hold it, so she threaded them through the lacing. Slowly, Boots began to pull the Nancy-laden snowshoe towards him. She could feel her weight travel up her arm and into her frozen hand. The muscles refused to grab and pain screamed up her arm as her first two fingers snapped. “Hey, man,” he glanced up at Nanaboozhoo, “hold onto my feet.”
“Can’t.” Nancy panted, “He’s not corporeal.”
Nancy watched Boot's eyes widen, definitely not looking at Nanaboozhoo. He was looking at her face, at her hand. His eyes narrowed when he noticed her fingers twisted grotesquely in his snowshoe lacings. “I’m gonna slide this other snowshoe to you." He blinked slowly. "Can you grab it with your other hand?”
“Nope. Other hand isn't working.”
“Okay. Um. Grab it with your teeth and bite it as hard as you can.”
“Holy Wah,” Nanaboozhoo muttered, “she’s gonna have to stop cussing at me.”
“Fuck you,” Nancy tossed out, and bit the toe of the snowshoe as hard as she could.
Boots pulled even slower and tears burned down Nancy’s cheeks. She blinked and clamped harder to the wood of the snowshoe.
Her hips dragged onto the ice. Boots dropped the snowshoes and grabbed a handful of her parka, scrambling back until the toes of her boots clunked against the ice.
“Excuse me, sir, Nancy’s-Father.” He looked down at the snow, at Nancy lying there not moving, “Could you get my dog to meet me at my truck. She’s a good girl but when it comes to running deer, well, she’s a beagle.”
Nanaboozhoo lifted his face a sent a shrill whistle high. “It’s getting dark already,” he commented.
Boots looked at the sky. The dark came fast in December. “Not corporeal,” Boots muttered, shaking his head. She had told him once and he had looked into her dark eyes, dark like the earth, like the smell of musk, like the way it felt under the covers on a cold morning when your breath was white but your feet were so warm, he had seen into her eyes and known that she was telling the truth. Nanaboozhoo’s daughter.
He sat on the ice and buckled on his snowshoes. Nancy weighed more than anything he’d ever carried, more than the four-point buck he’d got in November. She couldn't help much, but she did grab at his shoulder, pulling herself up some, and he was able to heft her up, just like he carried the buck. Her body curled around his neck, dripping freezing water down his chest. He shivered and held her tighter.
Halfway to the truck, Nancy began to cry. “Goddammit,” she muttered. Then she smiled; he could feel her smile against his neck. "At least I'm not changed into a fish."
Boots had to stop for a minute, breathe and settle her better there on his shoulders. “Is your dad gonna steal my gun?”
“Dunno,” Nancy chuckled. “He might.”
“Ah, well,” said Boots.
The dog was waiting at the truck.
------ end ------
Nanaboozhoo is a little god who watches over the Anishinaabeg, who most folk call Chippewa or Ojibwa . Sometimes he is there with them, teaching about fire or the song of the loon. Sometimes he shows them how to do something by how not to do something. Sometimes he becomes angry and tosses around trees or boulders, or turns someone into a chickadee or a snake.
But most of the time, he is not there. The Anishinaabeg greet each other, saying "Boozhoo!" just in case it is Nanaboozhoo they might be greeting. It's been known to happen.
At one time, maybe a thousand years ago or tomorrow, Nanaboozhoo sat on Turtle’s back and laughed. The strings that vibrated between each mote of existence squirmed under his bare butt cheeks, tickling, and the stars tangled in his hair. It was very undignified, but if any god could be happily, joyfully undignified it would be Great Rabbit of the Anishinaabeg. Scratching absently at his bottom, letting his fingers then rest within the primordia of Turtle’s shell, Nanaboozhoo closed his eyes and considered the Earth.
There, he could hear a child pray: “You slimy, mother fucking bastard! Come down here and face me, Nanaboozhoo! I’ll rip your freaking head off! I’ll cut your heart out! I’ll run you over with a bulldozer until you’re flat and then I’ll stomp all over you and piss on you and throw you in this God. Damned. LAKE.” There was a pleasant, full throated scream of frustration.
Nanaboozhoo cocked his head and listened hard. No, only silence now. What was that? Ah, a whimper, ever so soft, and a small voice: “Please.”
With a smile, Nanaboozhoo folded in on himself and stepped into a winter afternoon, the dusty taste of sleeping trees on his tongue and all around the smell of winter sky.
He was on the shore of a small lake, snow covered and bare except for a small blotch in the whiteness, a stain on its purity. In the middle of the lake bobbed the upper part of a person, arms outstretched as she tried to pull herself back onto the ice. Nanaboozhoo smiled in recognition and walked out to the struggling figure.
She was wearing an army-green nylon parka, the hood trimmed in wolf fur. She’d pulled her mittens off to claw at the ice and her fingers were bloody. Tears streaked her face and Nanaboozhoo could smell her anger and frustration. He squatted and sat on his heels, peering into her reddened face. She was perhaps fifteen years old.
“Nancy?”
She screamed in surprise, lost her clawed grip on the ice and bobbed down, once, twice, gasping and choking until her hands flailed up again, grabbing handfuls of snow, heaving herself up and resting her face on the cracked ice, coughing and swearing. “Pull me out of here, you fucking bastard,” she sputtered between chattering teeth, “or I’ll fucking gut you.”
He was already shaking his head. “No can do, angry-child. I’m not corporeal.”
Nancy heaved herself upwards again, gaining another inch of ice. “You were corporeal enough to fuck my mother. Why not now?”
Nanaboozhoo shrugged. “I was in a hurry just now to answer your prayer,” he said. “I’m not all the way here.”
“Fucking Christ!” the girl looked as if she might weep.
“He’s not corporeal either,” Nanaboozhoo mused, looking around. “Or here.”
Nancy coughed and spit icy lake water from her mouth. “Ok, ok, what else? What else can you do?” Another heave and another inch.
“Too much to list,” Nanaboozhoo rocked slightly on his heels. “But these are things that do not guarantee that you will stay in your present form. I could turn you into a fish?”
Another heave and another inch. “I’ll die here if I don’t get help. ” A pause as she stretched out her arm. “I don’t want to be a fish.” Another heave but this time the edge of the ice crumbled and she slid down an inch. “I’m strong because of you, but I won’t last much longer.” She clawed at the ice and another fingernail tore.
Nanaboozhoo waited for her to think of what she wanted of him. The wet fur from her parka hood was plastered to her forehead and cheeks and her full lips were pressed tight in determination. He thought that she had never been so lovely.
“Go get help,” she threw at him. Her hand lifted, making a shooing motion and then grabbed at the ice, leaving red streaks in the wet snow. “Go Lassie.” A dark chuckle dribbled past her lips. “Go get help.”
Nanaboozhoo nodded and stood. He let his perception flow out in rings around Nancy.
Ah, there.
Nanaboozhoo smiled at Nancy and folded himself up into the air, moving along with the breeze to the other side of the lake.
On the other side of the lake, Boots Mcgeshick plodded in snowshoes through the wet snow. There was a big dump of snow two days ago, but now it was warm and everything was dripping. Wet snow was the worst. Boots pulled the cool and pine flavored air deep down and let it out in a slow, white stream. Any day out in the woods beat a day in class. School sucked except for chemistry. Too bad he couldn't have seven hours of chemistry. He tried to space his skips out so the school wouldn't call his mom but he had a bad feeling about this one and just thinking about her reaction made him hunch his shoulders around his ears.
His beagle dragged herself through the knee-deep wet snow with joy. Suddenly, the dog caught scent, bayed, and was off like a shot. Boots lurched forward in a snowshoe-shuffled run, his .22 slung loose in his hand but down, and looked for tracks. Deer! Dammit! He whistled, but the dog was gone, off running deer. He ran after her for a bit but that was stupid so he stopped, bent over with his free hand on his knee, and grabbed at breath.
The jack pine he was halfway under shivered and loosed a small clump of snow, dropping it square on the back of his exposed neck. Boots let out a yell and stood, shimmying the snow down his spine and pulling out his t-shirt and coat, scooping the mostly melted slush of the small of his back with his fingers. He stamped around in a circle, snowshoes packing down the snow until it was hard and slick, and a shiver gripped his whole body, from scalp to toes.
Boots snorted, stamped his snowshoe a final time, looked up into the sky and blew out a breath. As he leaned back, he lost his balance on the slick pounded snow and his snowshoes shot out from under him. Feet flying in the air, he landed hard on his back, rifle spinning away.
He spent a moment pummeling the snow with his fists and tails of his snowshoes like a two-year old.
A breath. Another breath. Boots blinked and saw the sky was clearing to the pure blue of a robin’s egg. He took another deep breath, and blew it out in a warm white cloud. The frown on his face cleared, and when his eye caught a red tailed hawk in flight, a genuine smile flashed across his face. With a grunt, he pushed himself up and onto his feet, bent to retrieve his gun and started trudging back to the road.
All in all, Boots Mcgeshick was a pre’ easygoing guy. He liked people okay, but he’d rather watch them from a distance. You never knew what people were going to do, what they might say to make you feel sad or angry or both. It was better in the woods. He could watch chippies play for hours, watch the turkey vultures lie up there on the wind, watch a fawn sitting quietly on the forest floor until her mother came back to nurse her. People were harder to watch because they didn't seem to understand what made them happy or sad. His mom was always trying to be happy but she never got the hang of it. Once he watched a pair of red fox mating and to tell the truth, neither one of them looked all that happy about it. So maybe it wasn’t just people.
He was rounding King Lake when a rabbit shot out from the brush, biggest damn rabbit he’d ever seen. Boots stopped dead in his tracks and the rabbit stopped too, looking him up and down. Slowly, Boots brought his rifle up, finger gently on the trigger. The rabbit twitched an ear and then lifted a back foot to scratch his cheek.
His lips moved soundlessly, Meegwetch, Waabooz, and he squeezed the trigger.
The shot went high, just nicking the rabbit’s ear. Blood flicked across the snow and the rabbit flew off, east toward the lake. Boots followed, running as best he could through the wet snow, crimson drops marking the way.
The snow-covered lake was lined with red dogwood, the thin branches almost as bright red as the blood drops he’d been following. When Boots pushed through brush, he saw a man trotting away from him, across the lake, the rabbit limp in his hand.
“Hey!” Boots called. “Hey! That’s my rabbit! You got my rabbit!” The dogwood clutched at him like red fingers and Boots twisted around, snowshoes caught up in a snag of cedar. By the time he got free, the man was halfway across the lake. Boots set his chin and stomped off after him.
Fifty yards away, the man stopped and squatted down. There was something there; something in the lake. Boots began a shuffling run.
Nancy blinked at the figures, small but clear in the late-day sun. When they hovered over her, she blinked again. “Oh. My. God.” Nancy peered up at Boots and then at Nanaboozhoo. “You brought me Boots Mcgeshick? What in the everfucking world have I ever done to you?”
Boots dropped down, squatting on his heels. “Nancy? Are you okay?”
Nancy rolled her eyes at Nanaboozhoo and he scratched his nose. “Why do you call him Boots?”
Boots muttered, “Dora and Boots.”
Nancy didn't look at Boots or Nanaboozhoo. She stretched her arm out, the hand white and blood streaked, and tried to claw at the ice. “I was six,” Nancy muttered. “We were six fucking years old.”
Boots shrugged. “It’s not my fault. I didn't ask them to call me Boots.” He was kicking off his snowshoes.
“You didn't tell them not to.” Nancy clutched at the ice, gaining another inch.
Nanaboozhoo looked between the two, puzzled. He could see the bond between them glowing like a liferoot, heart to heart. Boots was laying on the ice now, his hands reaching out to Nancy. Nanaboozhoo studied Nancy’s face. “You don’t like him now?”
Nancy frowned, reaching for Boots outstretched fingers. “He changed,” she muttered.
“Everything changed.” She frowned, her fingers a hand’s breadth away from Boots’.
“Everything changes,” Nanaboozhoo frowned at his daughter.
Boots grabbed blindly at a snowshoe and pushed the rounded toe to Nancy. Her numb fingers wouldn't hold it, so she threaded them through the lacing. Slowly, Boots began to pull the Nancy-laden snowshoe towards him. She could feel her weight travel up her arm and into her frozen hand. The muscles refused to grab and pain screamed up her arm as her first two fingers snapped. “Hey, man,” he glanced up at Nanaboozhoo, “hold onto my feet.”
“Can’t.” Nancy panted, “He’s not corporeal.”
Nancy watched Boot's eyes widen, definitely not looking at Nanaboozhoo. He was looking at her face, at her hand. His eyes narrowed when he noticed her fingers twisted grotesquely in his snowshoe lacings. “I’m gonna slide this other snowshoe to you." He blinked slowly. "Can you grab it with your other hand?”
“Nope. Other hand isn't working.”
“Okay. Um. Grab it with your teeth and bite it as hard as you can.”
“Holy Wah,” Nanaboozhoo muttered, “she’s gonna have to stop cussing at me.”
“Fuck you,” Nancy tossed out, and bit the toe of the snowshoe as hard as she could.
Boots pulled even slower and tears burned down Nancy’s cheeks. She blinked and clamped harder to the wood of the snowshoe.
Her hips dragged onto the ice. Boots dropped the snowshoes and grabbed a handful of her parka, scrambling back until the toes of her boots clunked against the ice.
“Excuse me, sir, Nancy’s-Father.” He looked down at the snow, at Nancy lying there not moving, “Could you get my dog to meet me at my truck. She’s a good girl but when it comes to running deer, well, she’s a beagle.”
Nanaboozhoo lifted his face a sent a shrill whistle high. “It’s getting dark already,” he commented.
Boots looked at the sky. The dark came fast in December. “Not corporeal,” Boots muttered, shaking his head. She had told him once and he had looked into her dark eyes, dark like the earth, like the smell of musk, like the way it felt under the covers on a cold morning when your breath was white but your feet were so warm, he had seen into her eyes and known that she was telling the truth. Nanaboozhoo’s daughter.
He sat on the ice and buckled on his snowshoes. Nancy weighed more than anything he’d ever carried, more than the four-point buck he’d got in November. She couldn't help much, but she did grab at his shoulder, pulling herself up some, and he was able to heft her up, just like he carried the buck. Her body curled around his neck, dripping freezing water down his chest. He shivered and held her tighter.
Halfway to the truck, Nancy began to cry. “Goddammit,” she muttered. Then she smiled; he could feel her smile against his neck. "At least I'm not changed into a fish."
Boots had to stop for a minute, breathe and settle her better there on his shoulders. “Is your dad gonna steal my gun?”
“Dunno,” Nancy chuckled. “He might.”
“Ah, well,” said Boots.
The dog was waiting at the truck.
------ end ------