Now Is the Hour (41 page)

George wadded up his T-shirt in his hand, took his T-shirt with him as he walked. Just outside the line of shade, at the ditch, George knelt down, then lay down on his belly. He stuck his whole head in the water.

From where I sat, George's boots, his long Levi's legs and big, round butt, the shine of the sun off the smooth hard muscles of his back and shoulders. His head gone down into the ditch.

His head stayed in the ditch so long I began to worry. Then the splash and his big inhale of air.

Water dripped off his black hair down his shoulders and back.

Come on, now, George yelled over. He was waving his hand.

You try it, he said. It feels great.

There was nothing on earth I wanted to do more.

But you know me. Instead I sat there, holding on to my thermos for dear life.

No, I said. I'd better stay here.

My voice was high. I hated that my voice was high.

No, I'd better stay here,
George said just like I'd said, the high whine of my voice.

Get your tight ass over here, he said. Jesus Christ, Klusener, you need to give it up. Relax! Have some fun!

Something I came to know about George. What George was saying and how he was saying it were often two differnt things. He could tell you to go fuck yourself, but sometimes the way he said it made you want to smile.

I was over at the ditch before I knew it, kneeling, then lying down an arm's length from George. The smell of mud and ditch water, moss, and the sun on George's skin.

The first time I lay next to him was in the hospital during the storm of '66.

This was the second time, by the ditch next to the weeping willow.

There would be more times lying next to George.

Take your T-shirt off first, he said. You can use your T-shirt like a towel.

My whiny voice wanted to say
no.

I pulled my T-shirt off.

That moment, the way George looked at me, my arms, my chest and belly, my neck, my nipples, my naked skin, was my first time ever. All those years doing what I was not really doing, whacking off and breaking the sixth commandment — getting off only on my body getting off — all of it always internal, isolated, in my head. An imagination of sex that went on within that had nothing to do with the world.

That day, though, when George's black eyes landed on my flesh, it was the first time ever sex was outside. Sex was what I saw in George's eyes.

Everything differnt. Differnt and bright.

What always happened when I was half-naked never happened, though.

Instead, near my heart, a sharp pain. A pitchfork stuck in a bale of hay.

I shoved my head into the ditch.

The cool water all around my head, my eyes, my nose, my cheeks, my jaw, my forehead, water in my hair. Even on my lips I felt the water touch me. Bubbles in my ears.

I was doing fine, hanging out, no problem, everything was cool. No pain in my heart with my head in the ditch.

Then something happened people who have trouble with breath never want to happen.

George's flat, full hand was at the back of my head, pushing my head down.

The breath. There was no breath.

My head, my face, was pushed farther down, down into the water, into the mud.

My arms pressed hard against the earth, pushing against the hand at the back of my head.

Breath. The pain in my heart spread to all over in my chest. Down into my belly. Up over my shoulders. Down my arms.

Moments and moments and moments like forever.

Then George's hand slid away. The place on my head where his palm had been the outline of it in my mind. The splash, the rush of air, coughing. The air. Breathe the air.

On my hands and knees, I was still coughing, sputtering. My ears were trying to hear, I was trying to see, still trying to get my breath.

Serves you right, George said. You shouldn't ever trust somebody like that.

My lips, rubber lips. Tears stuck in my eyes. The pain in my chest, in my belly, up my shoulders, down my arms.

Was hate.

Finally I said:
You
did, I said. You trusted me.

My voice was way high.

I'm an
Indian,
George said. Didn't your old man ever tell you you can't trust injuns?

George was still lying across from me, leaning up on his elbow. I never once saw that man smile. His body just a leg's length away.

Spontaneous combustion. My leg and foot came up, and my boot heel landed square into the wet sod of George's nuts.

George doubled over. He was yelling loud.

All the times I'd hated and all the times I'd stopped the hate. All the people I'd hated, wished dead, plotted to kill. All the while the feeling in my forearms that meant I was helpless. Spineless ass, spineless ass, spineless ass.

Spineless, helpless, whiny.

It was too much.

I made my hand into a fist. I clenched the muscles of my forearm, my upper arm. I leaned in from the shoulder. Hit George a John Wayne punch from out of the movies. Square in the face.

I was up and running for the fence. Mid-ditch, midair, my jump stopped. George's hand was a hard grip around my leg. I went down fast, my knees and legs and boots, splashing into the ditch.

You little cocksucker, George yelled.

George's arm reached down and grabbed me around the middle. Just like that, I was up in the air on his shoulder, kicking and yelling.
My flailing arms got in one good smack to George's nose and a couple to his ears.

But early on it was clear. Despite the fight I put up during the storm of '66, as George flung me off his shoulder and onto the solid, solid ground that day under the weeping willow, it was clear. I was no match for George Serano.

No sooner had my back hit the green pasture grass than George Serano's body was smack down on mine. There went my breath again. George's hands were around my wrists above my head.

His face so close to my face, his black eyes, blood inside his nose, his sandpaper whiskers.

Tiny veins, little red lightnings in the whites of George's eyes. From out of the dark rounds, bright, sharp light.

Beyond his face, above, the wind a slow move through the willows.

You white, tight-assed little shit, George said. You think that you can work me all day out in the heat without a rest? What gives you the right to treat me like that?

Out of George's nose, a drop of blood, down to his lip. George's teeth, the red pink inside his mouth, his hot breath, tobacco and toothpaste so close to my face.

Mad dogs and Englishmen, George said. I'm not the fucking Englishman, am I?

George's thick black body hair against my chest and belly. His armpit hairs almost in my nose. The overwhelming smell of him, sweat I could taste, buckskin and flint in the back of my throat. The part of the tomato that folds together red into the stem of green.

Pinned down. Man, I hate being pinned down. It's as bad as losing your breath.

Breath. It was a miracle. Somehow my breath was back, and I was breathing.

Every breath I took, I hated George more.

I swear, if I'd had a gun, I'd have shot the son of a bitch.

The trouble was, I couldn't get to my hands.

Prick! I yelled.

Spit came out my mouth, flew through the air, and landed on his face.

You stole my wallet, I yelled. And my new madras shirt. And.

And and and. My mouth couldn't speak the other and.

For a second, the sharp bright light in George's eyes went soft. For a
second, his grip on my wrists let off, and for a second there my hands were free. Then George had them pinned down again.

What wallet? George said. What the fuck you talking about? George said. What shirt?

George was just like Sis. How convenient. All of a sudden wasn't going to remember.

In Saint Anthony's Hospital, I yelled.

I wasn't yelling. I was screaming.

Your crazy drunk DTs, I screamed. And your bologna breath.

Just then, the way George's eyes were looking at me, I was the one who was nuts, not him. George pushed his shoulders up, pulled his neck and head back.

Bologna breath? George said. I do not have bologna breath.

I was still screaming.

Don't play dumb, I screamed. You were out of your mind. The thunder and lightning. Don't say you can't remember, I screamed. You were trying to kill me. I'd be dead right now if the nurses and the doctor hadn't given you a shot. Plumb nuts, crazy bastard! You were screaming and yelling, The wind is Thunderbird breathing, you said. Thunderbird can take any form, you said. Human, plant, animal. Thunderbird has no shape, you said, but he has four legs or two legs or a fin with hooves, and the hooves have claws.

George let go of my hands, pushed himself up away from me quick, up on his arms.

I was still screaming.

Thunderbird's wings cover the world, you said. His wings are clouds, the beating of his wings brings the thunder. Thunder is the sound from deep inside his throat, you said. Although he has no head, there's teeth in his beak, and the teeth are wolves' teeth. He has one eye, you said.

George was back up to standing. Crouching standing, backing away slow. The blood from his nose, down onto his chin. George wiped his face, and his hand came back blood. In his eyes the old storm of '66.

Screaming, I was still screaming.

Lightning comes from that eye, you said. He sees everything, you said. He flies through the sky, you said. Searching to cleanse the world of filth.

Filth
was the word, the one single word, the smoldering word, for all the days and nights of hate I'd felt and never spoke.

George's boot caught on the big weeping willow root. He fell back on his ass.

I didn't miss a beat. I was a long leap up through the air landing right on top of him.

My legs straddled George's chest. My hands were slapping, slapping him across the face. Blood flying with every slap.

I was still screaming.

Then in the morning, I screamed, you were gone from the hospital and so was my wallet, my new madras shirt, and.

And and and and and, I screamed.

And.

And my pair of dirty undershorts!

The world quiet all around. The wind in the willow tree, Thunderbird breathing. Thunderbird, the water in the ditch. My back was flat on the grass. My chest so fast going up and down, up and down. Out of my eyes, beyond the weeping willow, all I could see was blue, one little bright cloud.

The sound coming out of George was a horrible human sound. The earth opening up. The heavens descending.

It was a sound I understood.

Inside first down deep, something inside that has to come up and out, and when it does, it is such a weird sound.

George was on his knees, holding his sides. His hands pounded the grass, his feet kicking. His whole body thrashed around, rolling across the ground. A high wail, snorts, sounds like only animals make.

I'd never seen anyone laugh so hard.

Laughter so hard it was all I could do not to laugh too.

It wasn't long at all, and no matter how hard I tried, there I was making sounds just like George. Inside me, the force up and out of me, I started twisting around, the earth opening up, the heavens descending, trying to make room for what was coming through me, the weird sounds coming out of me.

Weird thing, laughter.

I loved God so much right then.

That night while my parents watched TV, I called Billie. Billie and I hardly ever talked on the phone, so I didn't know what I was going to say. I just wanted to hear her voice. Mrs. Cody answered and told me
Billie'd gone out for Cokes with her girlfriends. Right off, Mrs. Cody lit a cigarette and started in talking, talking about one thing, then another, then about our marijuana night. Just when she got to the wedding dress, Dad came in the kitchen, turned on the light. The drut look. Sister Mary Cowface. He pointed to his watch. I told Mrs. Cody I had to hang up.

I snuck one of Dad's Viceroys and walked out the kitchen door. It was a big, hot Idaho night, crickets and frogs chirping and croaking. The sprinkler going razzle razzle on the front lawn. The only other sound was my boots on the rough gravel. Tramp came running up and poked his head in my crotch. He was so happy I came out he stood up on his hind legs and put his front legs on my arms. The two of us did a little jig, his pink bologna tongue hanging out. An endless source of amusement, that dog.

Into the night, past the machine shop and the granaries, out past the spud cellar. Darker and darker, like in the olden days, just Tramp and me and the yellow moon. Stars, hard bits of diamond light. A safe place. I was looking for just the right one.

The grain elevator poked up into the moonlight. When I stepped up onto the first flange, the moon shined on the slick bottom all the way to the top. Tramp made a low noise in his throat and lay down. A stairway to the stars, I kept walking up and up, the rattle of my boots on the flanges. Just past halfway, when the grain elevator began to tip, then farther out, when I hit perfect balance, I sat down careful and lit the cigarette.

That afternoon under the weeping willow, after the strange sound had come up and out of me and George, after laughing so hard like that, there was something else that happened with George. And since it happened, I didn't know what to do with myself.

The laughter had gone on so long and hard, it had to change. It was quiet under the weeping willow. Just the wind. I sat like an altar boy, an arm's length away from George, keeping my distance. I was worried any minute Dad would come driving up, yelling and waving his hands. Even worse I had my shirt off, and Dad didn't like me to take my shirt off. Especially since George's shirt was off too.

My right hand was on the green grass, a fist into the earth. For a moment, I closed my eyes. And in that moment George reached his big hand out and laid his hand on mine. I quick went to move my hand, but that's exactly what Dad would do. And because I'd laughed
with the man and met his granny, I broke the rule. I did not keep my distance and I did not move my hand. Above us, the blue sky real blue, the long green wafts of willows, Thunderbird breathing.