Crazy Horse's Girlfriend (9781940430447) (23 page)

“Yeah, man, they miss tapping that ass,” another dude said. He was a skinny fucker with a long, scraggly mullet, a little older than the rest.

“Shoo! Shoo! You boys are only causing trouble!” the vendor said, whooshing her hands in their direction, which only made them laugh.

“Don't worry Grandma, we ain't gonna do you any harm,” Mullet Boy said. She just said “Shooo!” one more time and of course, they burst into laughter.

“Quiet now, Grandma,” Mullet Boy said and he looked like he meant it.

“Indian boys don't have any respect anymore!” She shook her head and looked almost teary. “No respect… ” she said, trailing off.

Mullet boy shrugged and looked back over at Will, who was silent.

“Ain't you gonna tell us about your new boyfriends?” Two other boys stood in the background while their friends did all the work. All of them wore t-shirts with the names of different heavy metal bands on the front, Megadeth being the most popular
.

“C'mon Will, ain't you gonna tell us about life in the big city? You must be scoring big at all the homo bars, idnit?” Big Belly said, and they all laughed again.

“Yeah, you're probably a regular stud out here,” Mullet Boy said. “I tell you what, Will. Why don't you meet us outside and we can party, you know… you can show us exactly what kind of a stud you are, just like that one time on the rez,” Mullet Boy said and smiled, his teeth yellow.

“Get lost,” I said, and Mullet Boy looked over at me menacingly.

“Quiet now sister. You don't wanna get hurt over this faggot.”

“You got girls defending you, you pussy?” Big Belly said.

Will stood there looking like he was choking, his face pale. He hadn't said anything back to them. I wanted to say something more but I was scared of them and I could see that Megan was too, though she was a pretty scary motherfucker, generally speaking.

“Come on Will, whatd'ya say?” Big Belly asked. Will shook his head, just a little and they all laughed wildly.

“Whatsa matter Willie? Didn't I treat you good? I'll buy you flowers this time, like a real lady,” Mullet Boy said and they all laughed again.

“There's something wrong with you boys!” the vendor lady said
.

“I told you to be
quiet
Grandmother. I might just break your hip if you're not careful,” Mullet Boy said, and she drew breath.

I heard something on my right. A bunch of security guards were making their way through the crowd. The dude with the belly punched Mullet Boy in the arm. “What?” he said, annoyed.

“Look, cuz.” He pointed towards the guards, who were getting pretty close. There were three of them and they were big.

“Aw shit, the cavalry,” Mullet Boy said. “We better get the fuck outta Dodge.”

The security guys could see that they had been spotted and started coming even faster, pushing people out of the way. Mullet Boy looked over at Will and said, “We'll see you again… and we can party, you know, just like that time on the rez. You can be my girlfriend again, faggot.” Then he laughed, hard and mean, and they all cut out fast, the security guards making their way past us, following them.

“Damn,” I said. Will was still up against the wall, clutching the drink tray, which was a goddamn miracle in my opinion.

“You OK?” I asked, and he swallowed and looked at the ground.

“Yeah,” he whispered and licked his lips.

The vendor shook her head. “No respect!”

“I know,” I said, and bought a pair of earrings 'cause I felt so bad for the lady, and we moved on, Will trailing behind us. We were silent, moving through the crowd, and after a while, I sighed hard and turned around to ask Will if he was really OK. I stopped and put my hand on Megan's shoulder. Will was nowhere in sight.

“What?”

“Megan, where's Will?”

“What do you mean, where's Will?” She asked.

“Megan, look behind you. He's fucking
gone
.”

She looked behind her. “Motherfucker takes off all the time. Shit goes down in any capacity and he splits. I'll see his cheap, winkte ass in a few days.”

“He's so weird,” I said and told Megan about the night with Miguel. She told me she'd seen Miguel once herself.

“Really?”

“Yeah. I mean, you know, sometimes I see them.”

“Well, not during the day,” I said, looking around just to see if I could spot him. We had kept walking, stopping at vendors.

“Seriously, you know he'll just show up at the apartment later,” she said, frowning with those long, thin lips of hers. “Stinking of ass and booze.”

“Shit that's sad.”

Megan stopped and looked at me. “Hell if it's fucking sad! What's sad is that he won't get his fucking shit together and pay bills. I'm not going to feel sorry for that asshole. You think it's sad he's a fucking winkte? Back home, you know what he used to call me in front of the other kids, over and over?” Her lip started to quiver. I had never, ever seen her cry. “He called me… I'm not going to say that word. It means half-breed. But the way he would say it… it was shitty, Margaritte. Fuck him! I should have never let him move in.”

I took her hand and said, “I know.”

I didn't know what to say. So many thoughts were racing through my head about who had what worse and why. We kept walking.

“I
don't
feel sorry for him. He's a jerk,” she said, angrily wiping at her tears.

“I'm sorry Megan,” I said. “Let's go sit down for a while, OK?”

She nodded and let me lead her to the bleachers and we sat down and watched the dancers for a few hours. I
was
worried about Will though, and I even went around to the vendors on my own to look for him but he was gone. We had to go home without him, and she raged the whole way, crying and yelling and telling me she would probably have to go back to the rez because of him. And I knew what it was like there. It was her home and she loved that, but there were no jobs, it was far from her man, people were living hard lives and it just wasn't what she wanted. I told her I was sorry again and again and thought about telling her what was going wrong in my life, but I just didn't. She knew Jake was heading to jail and that I wasn't talking to Julia, but she didn't know that I was about t-minus two seconds to being in a position pretty fucking close to hers if I didn't hit the ejector button
.

I dropped her off and told her everything was going to be OK, though of course neither one of us believed that. I smiled at her guiltily, though the guilt wasn't mine. I drove home in a bigger funk than ever, dreading the potential clusterfuck at home. But things were OK; Mom seemed to be relieved that I was home for dinner, helping her cook and take care of the twins, Dad getting drunk and yelling at the TV and not at us, moving into his office at the end of the night, Mom into her room and me into mine.

The next day Megan called after lunch to tell me that she had woken up to Will on the couch. She begged me to come over that evening. She said she couldn't deal with him on her own, that she was going to hurt him if she did. I told her I would and lucky for me, by the evening Dad had retreated to his office and Mom was over at Auntie Justine's so I was able to just walk out the door and drive away without having to catch any hell or tell any lies. I needed to do a couple deals anyway.

I knocked, and Megan answered the door and let me in. Will was apparently still on the couch and I plopped down on the big old La-Z-Boy in the corner.

“We're watching a
Rocky
marathon,” Megan said and Will grunted.

Megan was real into
Rocky
and we'd been through several Rocky marathons together, usually with Julia though. I thought about Julia. She hadn't called either.

“You gonna get emotional this time?” I asked Megan. She would always cry at the end and I'd tease her. I'd say things like, “AAAAAAdrian!” right during the emotional part and she'd get the look of rage and I'd shut it down.

“I brought Taco Bell,” I said. It was cheap and I knew that Will eating food he wasn't paying for was a major issue and I wanted to help that issue go away, even if it was for a day. I opened my backpack and started distributing burritos and chalupas and such, first over to Megan and then to Will, who stood up to get his, smiling briefly and mumbling, “Thanks girl,” before sitting down stiffly and eating fast. After he was done, he went to the kitchen, threw his empty wrappers in the trash and shuffled off to the back. I looked at Megan and we both shook our heads silently. I figured we wouldn't see him for the rest of the night, but after a few minutes, I heard the shower going, and then later, the sound of his door opening and closing.

“I need a smoke,” Will said. “Can I bum one offa you?”

“Sure,” I said.
Rocky
had just gone to commercial. Will and me got up and shuffled outside.

“Will… Megan is about to full on freak out,” I said in between drags.

“Yeah, I know,” he said. I was surprised at his honesty, his calmness. We both puffed silently for a while. I figured I might as well smoke a cigarette. Weird as I felt doing it, I knew it didn't matter. My appointment was coming up.

I didn't know what to say, so I started do a few Fancy Shawl steps.

“Girl, you gonna fall flat on your flat Indian ass,” Will said, laughing. Even though he was insulting me, as usual, I was glad he was laughing.

“Probably,” I said. “And if I crack my head open, I leave all of my smokes to you.”

“Well, that's good.”

“I tell you what, I'll also leave you my jacket,” I said, and Will rolled his eyes. “Also, my ass is not that flat,” I said, and he shrugged.

I stopped dancing and looked out at the highway.

“I gotta get out of this town.”

“Hear that,” Will said. “Yeah. I gotta get outta here. I mean, I got away from home, and that's good, 'cause I didn't belong there. But I don't think I belong here either. I don't know where I belong. But not here. And not home,” he said, looking off into the night.

“Yep,” I said.

“You know where I would like to go? Europe. But I think it's a little outta my financial means, at least for now.”

“Yeah,” I said. “Another smoke?”

“Sure,” he said, and I handed him one and he lit up.

“I want to go to Paris,” he said, looking off. “I think maybe I'd find what I'm looking for there, on top of the Eiffel Tower. I've seen all of these pictures of the Eiffel Tower and it's always seemed right. And all of those little cafés. I want to sit outside in a café in Paris and drink espresso and wine and fall in love,” he said, laughing. It was at that point that I realized that though the shower and food had done Will good, he was still on something. Or coming off of something, crazy fucker that he was.

“That sounds great,” I said.

“Girl, you wouldn't even know what to do in Paris,” Will said and I frowned.

“How's that?”

“Probably wear damn wife-beaters and Kmart jeans and they'd run you out of the city.”

“Whatever Will,” I said. “Like you've ever been to Europe, or know anything about it besides what you've seen on TV.” Will didn't answer. I sat down in one of the beat up lawn chairs in the dark and looked up into the sky, at the setting sun and thought about Paris. About Mike. How I wish I could be in Paris with Mike. I ran my fingers over the little bit of grass growing in one of the cracked pots on the landing, the empty field in the lot across from the complex. It was full of rusting car parts and old furniture but the sun was setting and everything was golden and it was beautiful, even in Idaho Springs.

“I will make it to Paris someday,” Will said. “Right now, since I'm kinda in between jobs, though I've been making a little money doing some jobs on the side, I have to put my plans on hold. But I think I'm close to something good. I mean, I've had a lot of good jobs, you know, business-type jobs, and I've got a pretty good resume.”

“That's cool.” I said. I knew that starting anything up with Will would just be a waste of time.

We walked back in and settled back onto the couch. I promised Megan I wouldn't yell “AAAAdrian!” in her ear during the emotional parts.

“Good,” she said.

“Oh, God, it's nice outside,” I said. “Let's keep the door open until it's just too cold to keep it open any longer.”

“Hey, do you want some beer?” I asked Megan and Will.

“Sure,” Megan said. I looked over at Will.

“Ummmm,” he mumbled under his breath.

“It's on me. So let's go,” I said and got up. I slung my backpack over my shoulder and Will stood up. I shut the door as quietly as I could behind me, so as to not wake the baby.