recognize, surges up my spine.
KISKINOHANAASOWIN
Learning
A COUGHING FIT makes me open my eyes. This stretch of river is still new growth. I’m amazed that Elijah and I survived the fire only to end up in the trenches. All along the bank the bush struggles back to what it once was. I wish I were so resilient. The cough doesn’t leave me, and each one feels like another rib breaking. I lean over the gunwale for a handful of water and the pain of my rotting guts causes me to gasp out.
“Are you all right, Nephew?” Auntie asks. “Should we stop and let you rest?”
Her words make me angry. I don’t know why. “Mona,” I spit into the water. “Leave me alone.” Immediately I feel remorse. I look at my empty pant leg, the material of it pinned up, and think once again, for a moment, that I can feel the foot and calf that aren’t there any more. The medicine is loosening its hold on me. I want more, but so little is left.
“Do you want to know something, Auntie,” I say, cupping my hand and taking a small sip from the river. “So many dead men lay buried over there that if the bush grows back the trees will hold skulls in their branches.” I laugh, and it makes me feel worse. “I saw it already. We once left a place covered in our dead. When we came back a few months later flowers redder than blood grew everywhere. They covered the ground. They even grew out of rotting corpses.” Knivesof pain stab me low in the gut. My arm screams out high in the place where a bullet entered it. My head throbs with the cut of sunlight. She doesn’t respond, but I know she listens. “Those flowers grew back, but that was all.” I hurt so bad. “Useless things.”
“Sleep, Xavier,” she says. I want to tell her I’m sorry for this anger, but I close my eyes instead.
Thompson and Graves and Elijah and I have returned from the big crater. I can’t sleep for wondering if I’ve killed someone now. We all threw Mills bombs into that pit and heard the screams. We are all equally guilty.
The rain begins the night of our return. It falls for five days and makes me wonder if manitous are unhappy with me. The Germans shell this section of line more heavily than normal and the Canadians, we are miserable, cold and wet and muddy and scared we are going to die soon. Some say Fritz is doing it to avenge the crater raid.
Soon we will be sent back for a few days, and this is the only thing that keeps me going.
Elijah is happy, though. He marches around the trench, up and down in the rain, wearing that helmet he took from the crater. The rotted thing looks silly sitting on his head, and this must be partly why he does it.
To make it all worse, Elijah’s taken to talking in an English accent in the last days. This makes the other soldiers laugh, but I wonder why he really does it. It’s like he wants to become something that he’s not. He tells jokes and makes the others laugh and brags that he has now killed men, all of them close enough that he could hear them die. But is it the truth? I do not think so. I was there and know Elijah was scared too, and know that when we all threw the bombs into the crater there was no telling how many men died down there. But what is the truth in a place such as this? It might as well be Elijah’s version. After all, he makes the others happy, he keeps their spirits up, and that is worth nearly as much as good food and a warm, dry bed.
He is already a hero to them. I can see that. Me, I can feel the eyes of the section on me. They try to figure out what makes me different from them, different from Elijah. I know I am a better shot than Elijah, that it was me who taught him the ways of the bush. But they are drawn to Elijah and his easy smile. Me, I won’t give in to this army’s ways so easy. I learn their English but pretend I don’t. When an officer speaks to me I look at him and answer in Cree.
Lieutenant Breech—Bastard Breech—he doesn’t like me speaking my language at all. He
KISKINOHANAASOWIN
Learning
A COUGHING FIT makes me open my eyes. This stretch of river is still new growth. I’m amazed that Elijah and I survived the fire only to end up in the trenches. All along the bank the bush struggles back to what it once was. I wish I were so resilient. The cough doesn’t leave me, and each one feels like another rib breaking. I lean over the gunwale for a handful of water and the pain of my rotting guts causes me to gasp out.
“Are you all right, Nephew?” Auntie asks. “Should we stop and let you rest?”
Her words make me angry. I don’t know why. “Mona,” I spit into the water. “Leave me alone.” Immediately I feel remorse. I look at my empty pant leg, the material of it pinned up, and think once again, for a moment, that I can feel the foot and calf that aren’t there any more. The medicine is loosening its hold on me. I want more, but so little is left.
“Do you want to know something, Auntie,” I say, cupping my hand and taking a small sip from the river. “So many dead men lay buried over there that if the bush grows back the trees will hold skulls in their branches.” I laugh, and it makes me feel worse. “I saw it already. We once left a place covered in our dead. When we came back a few months later flowers redder than blood grew everywhere. They covered the ground. They even grew out of rotting corpses.” Knivesof pain stab me low in the gut. My arm screams out high in the place where a bullet entered it. My head throbs with the cut of sunlight. She doesn’t respond, but I know she listens. “Those flowers grew back, but that was all.” I hurt so bad. “Useless things.”
“Sleep, Xavier,” she says. I want to tell her I’m sorry for this anger, but I close my eyes instead.
Thompson and Graves and Elijah and I have returned from the big crater. I can’t sleep for wondering if I’ve killed someone now. We all threw Mills bombs into that pit and heard the screams. We are all equally guilty.
The rain begins the night of our return. It falls for five days and makes me wonder if manitous are unhappy with me. The Germans shell this section of line more heavily than normal and the Canadians, we are miserable, cold and wet and muddy and scared we are going to die soon. Some say Fritz is doing it to avenge the crater raid.
Soon we will be sent back for a few days, and this is the only thing that keeps me going.
Elijah is happy, though. He marches around the trench, up and down in the rain, wearing that helmet he took from the crater. The rotted thing looks silly sitting on his head, and this must be partly why he does it.
To make it all worse, Elijah’s taken to talking in an English accent in the last days. This makes the other soldiers laugh, but I wonder why he really does it. It’s like he wants to become something that he’s not. He tells jokes and makes the others laugh and brags that he has now killed men, all of them close enough that he could hear them die. But is it the truth? I do not think so. I was there and know Elijah was scared too, and know that when we all threw the bombs into the crater there was no telling how many men died down there. But what is the truth in a place such as this? It might as well be Elijah’s version. After all, he makes the others happy, he keeps their spirits up, and that is worth nearly as much as good food and a warm, dry bed.
He is already a hero to them. I can see that. Me, I can feel the eyes of the section on me. They try to figure out what makes me different from them, different from Elijah. I know I am a better shot than Elijah, that it was me who taught him the ways of the bush. But they are drawn to Elijah and his easy smile. Me, I won’t give in to this army’s ways so easy. I learn their English but pretend I don’t. When an officer speaks to me I look at him and answer in Cree.
Lieutenant Breech—Bastard Breech—he doesn’t like me speaking my language at all. He
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