shreds together in a pile, pulls out a lighter, and sets it on fire. An ululating cry breaks out among the Mohawks.
Las feels wild with rage.
The law
, he tells himself.
No respect for the fucking law
.
The paper burns fast, leaves a ragged twining of smoke. The women walk back to their people at the barricade and begin to talk and laugh.
Nothing else happens.
“What the hell?” somebody from the crowd of townspeople yells at the cops. “Do something!”
Then they are moving forward, two dozen law-abiding Doreville citizens who have come to see justice served, and all of them are yelling, screaming at the cops and then at the natives, who begin to taunt them back. Somebody picks up a rock and tosses it towards the barricade. It is answered by a dozen rocks, all of them rookie pitches, none drawing blood.
The man in the dress pants turns on his heel and does a half lope to the black car, which accelerates away once he clambers in. Las’s father pivots in the back seat, and for an instant their eyes meet. Las holds his gaze, but the old man looks down quickly.
“No, don’t run away!” Las shouts. But the car is an onyx blur.
The police fan out to separate the townspeople from the natives. Somebody yells, “They have their backs to the lawbreakers. They’re protecting them!”
They all start yelling after that. They yell in disbelief and outrage. “Get off our land,” the natives yell back. The police remain in a stiff-necked line and say nothing, do nothing. And then, after forty minutes, the voices become raw and they fade out slowly, like all the songs Las hates. Close by, two men start talking about a motocross race in the next town, and whetherthey can reach the beer store before it closes, and the futility of staying here in the dark, wasting this good summer evening, when they could be watching the prospect of a decent crash. The crowd drifts away until there is a just a single pickup, the same colour as Gordo’s, at a remove from where the action had been. Finally, it too leaves.
Las’s voice is ragged from the strain of yelling. His fists are curled and he does not want to go home, cannot go home, where the lawyer’s gleaming black car sits in the driveway.
“I need to hurt something,” he says.
Gordo snickers.
When the reporters have scattered, Shayna feels a caffeine flush, triumphant. She turns to look for Helen, to see her good work reflected in the older woman’s eyes. But her aunt is nowhere in sight. The barricade supporters have wandered over to behind the development entrance, where a new urn of coffee has arrived and blankets are being handed out to those staying the night. Her elation loses its ballast. She was expecting pats on the back, some parsing of the scrum’s to-and-fro, even being ribbed for having tidied up for the cameras. She’s been looking forward to it.
Now only one figure waits for her in the dusky light, his thumbs tucked into his belt. Coulson’s shirt looks fresh, even new. For her? She feels a flash of irritation. There is only so much of her to go around. And this stuff between a man and a woman requires some effort, initially at least. She is out of practice. If she leans against him, surely he will bend and kiss the part in her hair, tell her she has done well. But those smiling eyes of his are bright, a measure too intense. She feels the urge to turn and run.
It’s only a year since she got a first impression of him, literally – a large bootprint in the mud among the
o’tá:ra
’s prolific black raspberry bushes. She didn’t presume the berries were only hers to pick, but they were small and seedy, not as popular as summer’s later arrivals: raspberries, blackberries, gooseberries, elderberries. She could usually assume that it was just her picking, and perhaps a few grannies who understood the sweet magic of black raspberries lightly stewed with mulberries or tossed with a teaspoon of sugar and the season’s first strawberries. But the
Las feels wild with rage.
The law
, he tells himself.
No respect for the fucking law
.
The paper burns fast, leaves a ragged twining of smoke. The women walk back to their people at the barricade and begin to talk and laugh.
Nothing else happens.
“What the hell?” somebody from the crowd of townspeople yells at the cops. “Do something!”
Then they are moving forward, two dozen law-abiding Doreville citizens who have come to see justice served, and all of them are yelling, screaming at the cops and then at the natives, who begin to taunt them back. Somebody picks up a rock and tosses it towards the barricade. It is answered by a dozen rocks, all of them rookie pitches, none drawing blood.
The man in the dress pants turns on his heel and does a half lope to the black car, which accelerates away once he clambers in. Las’s father pivots in the back seat, and for an instant their eyes meet. Las holds his gaze, but the old man looks down quickly.
“No, don’t run away!” Las shouts. But the car is an onyx blur.
The police fan out to separate the townspeople from the natives. Somebody yells, “They have their backs to the lawbreakers. They’re protecting them!”
They all start yelling after that. They yell in disbelief and outrage. “Get off our land,” the natives yell back. The police remain in a stiff-necked line and say nothing, do nothing. And then, after forty minutes, the voices become raw and they fade out slowly, like all the songs Las hates. Close by, two men start talking about a motocross race in the next town, and whetherthey can reach the beer store before it closes, and the futility of staying here in the dark, wasting this good summer evening, when they could be watching the prospect of a decent crash. The crowd drifts away until there is a just a single pickup, the same colour as Gordo’s, at a remove from where the action had been. Finally, it too leaves.
Las’s voice is ragged from the strain of yelling. His fists are curled and he does not want to go home, cannot go home, where the lawyer’s gleaming black car sits in the driveway.
“I need to hurt something,” he says.
Gordo snickers.
When the reporters have scattered, Shayna feels a caffeine flush, triumphant. She turns to look for Helen, to see her good work reflected in the older woman’s eyes. But her aunt is nowhere in sight. The barricade supporters have wandered over to behind the development entrance, where a new urn of coffee has arrived and blankets are being handed out to those staying the night. Her elation loses its ballast. She was expecting pats on the back, some parsing of the scrum’s to-and-fro, even being ribbed for having tidied up for the cameras. She’s been looking forward to it.
Now only one figure waits for her in the dusky light, his thumbs tucked into his belt. Coulson’s shirt looks fresh, even new. For her? She feels a flash of irritation. There is only so much of her to go around. And this stuff between a man and a woman requires some effort, initially at least. She is out of practice. If she leans against him, surely he will bend and kiss the part in her hair, tell her she has done well. But those smiling eyes of his are bright, a measure too intense. She feels the urge to turn and run.
It’s only a year since she got a first impression of him, literally – a large bootprint in the mud among the
o’tá:ra
’s prolific black raspberry bushes. She didn’t presume the berries were only hers to pick, but they were small and seedy, not as popular as summer’s later arrivals: raspberries, blackberries, gooseberries, elderberries. She could usually assume that it was just her picking, and perhaps a few grannies who understood the sweet magic of black raspberries lightly stewed with mulberries or tossed with a teaspoon of sugar and the season’s first strawberries. But the
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