Every season brings its own form of storytelling. Long winters favour looping, heavily peopled Dickensian or Franzenian narratives, to be imbibed with [your favourite beverage here] in a cozy chair, preferably by fireside. Summers, lamentably short, urge a brisker read, which is why Globe Books has commissioned short stories to run over the next six weeks. This week, Joseph Boyden takes us into the world of an 11-year-old aboriginal boy caught between the rough urban world of gangs and his dawning affection for a pet.
Auntie Wanda wants to take me back to the rez for the summer because Mum’s using again. I tell her that I’m old enough to look out for myself and she tells me no 11-year-old is old enough for the streets and I’d better mind my tone because she’s an elder and Indians are supposed to respect their elders. I want to tell her that she’s only 19 and that my friends think she’s a MILF because she already has two kids, but I just suck my teeth instead and turn my ball cap sideways and sit back on the sofa with my arms crossed.
When Auntie finally shakes her head and walks away, I get up to make a quick exit, but my stupid little bro, Francis, with his thick glasses taped in the middle and his retarded pet turtle in his hand, asks if he can come, too. “Yo, shut the eff up,” I say, but it’s too late, and Auntie comes storming in from the kitchen, pointing her finger to my room and telling me to get packing.
I narrow my eyes at Francis and tell him I’m one hundred per cent gangster, and he’s nothing but a wangster. I consider ripping the turtle from his hand and tossing it in the garbage but he’d scream so loud it ain’t even worth it. I’m Posse. I’ll just slip out my window because I’m Indian Posse. Francis follows me into our room, and I tell him to get out and take that diseased animal with him before it gives me warts.
“Island can’t give you warts,” he says. “Those come from toads.” Talk about the stupidest name for a turtle ever. When Mum was sober last year she got all traditional on our asses and started burning sweetgrass and telling us stories about how the Indian world is built on the back of a turtle, or some crap. That’s when Francis changed the name of his pet from Toby to Island.
The world can somehow live on the back of a turtle? Whatever. A gangster can’t build no empire on some slow-ass turtle’s back, ya hear me? Good for soup, maybe. Not for business. Francis puts Island back into its green and nasty tank that stinks like a swamp and then gives me the finger before running out the room too fast for me to whip a shoe at him.
It’s time to move, so I lift up the window quiet as I can and just when I’ve got one leg out I see the slimy tank. Quick now, I grab the turtle from it and stick it in the pocket of my hoodie, worried it’s going to ruin this fine piece of merchandise that cost me two jacked car stereos. Street rule # 1. Never take a diss.
With hood up and my face shadowed so no creeping po-po can snap a good photo from his undercover car, I limp-walk in my best Posse styling up to Wolf and his soldiers sitting on their stoop. They hoot and snicker when they see me. I sneak to see if Wolf is looking at me, but he’s all crouched over, his long arms wrapped around his legs, staring at the ground at his feet.
