After the Tipi Pole Tavern finally closed at 4 A.M., Chess, Checkers, and Thomas sat inside and drank Pepsi, while Junior and Victor grabbed a few beers and disappeared.
“You sounded great tonight,” Thomas said to the sisters.
“We all sounded great,” Chess said.
“Jeez,” Checkers said. “Even Victor and Junior, enit?”
“We just got to keep them sober,” Chess said. “Victor’s the best guitar player I ever heard, when he’s sober.
“I’m tired,” Thomas said.
“Where’d Victor and Junior go anyway?” Chess asked.
“Outside,” Checkers said. “Probably getting drunk in the van.”
“Well,” Chess said, “I’m tired, too. Let’s get them and go home.”
Thomas and the sisters walked outside to the van. He opened the sliding door of the van and surprised Victor and Junior, who were literally buck naked and drunk. The two naked white women in the van were even drunker and scrambled for their clothes. Thomas just stood there and stared. It was Betty and Veronica.
“Shut the goddamn door!” Victor shouted.
“Jeez,” Junior said, reached out, and slid the door shut.
“Oh, man,” Checkers said. “That’s the last thing I wanted to see.”
“I think I’m going to get sick,” Chess said.
Thomas just walked away. Checkers looked at Chess, who shrugged her shoulders. Who knew why Thomas did anything? Chess followed him to a picnic bench behind the tavern. Checkers threw her arms up, walked back into the bar, and fell asleep on the pool table.
“I can’t believe they did that,” Chess said to Thomas. “We have to ride in that van.”
“Yeah, I know,” Thomas said.
Chess sat beside Thomas at the picnic table, took his hand, studied it for a minute. Beautiful hands, beautiful hands.
“Where’s Checkers?” Thomas asked.
“I don’t know. She’s probably beating the crap out of Junior and Victor.”
Chess and Thomas sat there quietly. Thomas thought about stories and songs, but Chess only thought about those white women in the van. She hated Indian men who chased after white women; she hated white women who chased after Indian men.
“You know,” she said. “I really don’t like that. I don’t like Junior and Victor hanging out with white women.”
“Why?” Thomas asked.
“I don’t know. I guess it’s about preservation, enit? Ain’t very many Indian men to go around. Even fewer good ones.”
Thomas nodded his head.
“And you know,” Chess said, “as traditional as it sounds, I think Indian men need Indian women. I think only Indian women can take care of Indian men. Jeez, we give birth to Indian men. We feed them. We hold them when they cry. Then they run off with white women. I’m sick of it.”
“Yeah,” Thomas said. “I never dated no white woman.”
“Thomas, you never dated nobody.”
They laughed.
“Seriously, I think Junior and Victor are traitors,” Chess said. “I really do. They keep running off with white women and pretty soon, ain’t no Indian women going to touch them. We Indian women talk to each other, you know? We have a network. They’re two of the last full-blood Indians on your reservation, enit? Jeez, Junior and Victor are betraying their DNA.”
“Well,” Thomas, a full-blood Spokane himself, said, “do you like me or my DNA?”
“I like you and your DNA.”
Thomas agreed with Chess, but he also knew about the shortage of love in the world. He wondered if people should celebrate love wherever it’s found, since it is so rare. He worried about the children of mixed-blood marriages. The half-breed kids at the reservation school suffered through worse beatings than Thomas ever did.
“I wonder what it’s like,” he said.
“Wonder about what?” Chess asked.
“What’s it like to be a half-breed kid? How do you think it feels to have a white mom or dad? It must be weird.”
“My grandmother was a little bit white,” Chess said.
“Really?” Thomas said. “What kind?”
“German, I guess. Achtung.”
“What was she like?”
“She hated to be Indian.” Chess said. “She didn’t look very Indian. That white blood really showed through. She left my grandfather, moved to Butte, and never told anybody she was Indian. She left her son on the reservation, too. Just left him, and they hardly ever heard from her again.”
Thomas shook his head, closed his eyes, and told a story:
“A long time ago, two boys lived on a reservation. One was an Indian named Beaver, and the other was a white boy named Wally. Both loved to fancydance, but the white boy danced a step fancier. When the white boy won contests, all the Indian boys beat him up. But Beaver never beat up on the white boy. No matter how many times he got beat up, that white boy kept dancing.”
Thomas opened his eyes, smiled, and shrugged his shoulders.
“Wally and Beaver were half-brothers, enit?” Chess asked.
“You got it.”
“What’s that mean?”
“Don’t know. Maybe it means drums make everyone feel like an Indian.”
From The Wellpinit Rawhide Press:
Coyote Springs Home
Coyote Springs, our own little rock band, returned to the reservation late last night, with the addition of two Flathead Indians, Chess and Checkers Warm Water. The two sisters reportedly sing vocals and play piano.
Lester FallsApart saw the familiar blue van pull in about 3 A.M., Standard Indian Time.
“They was going the speed limit,” said FallsApart.
Father Arnold of the Catholic Church called early this morning to offer a prayer of thanks that the band returned safely.
According to an anonymous source, Michael White Hawk, recently released from Walla Walla State Penitentiary, is unhappy with Coyote Springs.
“They think they’re hot [manure],” White Hawk was rumored to have said. “They play a few shows and they think they’re [gosh darn] stars. [Forget] them.”
Coyote Springs could not be reached for comment.
After they arrived back at the Spokane Indian Reservation, Chess fell into an uneasy sleep in Thomas’s bed with Checkers, while he lay on the floor. Junior and Victor slept in the blue van even though there was plenty of room in the house. Chess dreamed of a small Indian man on a pale horse. With an unpainted body and un-braided brown hair, the small Indian looked unimposing. Even as she dreamed, Chess knew the unpainted Indian in her dream was not Spokane or Flathead, but she had no idea what kind of Indian he was. The unpainted one was unhappy as he rode into a cavalry fort. Many other Indians greeted him. Some with pride, others with anger.
Come along, an angry Indian shouted loudly at the unpainted one, who dismounted, and walked to an office. A dozen Indians stood in the office while hundreds of other Indians gathered outside. The white soldiers kept rifles at the ready, while the Indians and white civilians gossiped nervously. The unpainted one waited. Soon, a white officer appeared and told the unpainted one it was too late for talk. They all needed to rest.
Ho, the Indians called out and left the office. The unpainted one left last with the white officer in front of him, the angry Indian behind him, and two soldiers on either side. The unpainted one followed the officer without question. They led him to a small building, and the unpainted one quickly pulled a knife when he saw the barred windows and chains. The angry Indian grabbed the unpainted one from behind. In that way, both staggered into the open.
He’s got a knife!
In Chess’s dream, the soldiers trained their rifles on the Indians who might help the unpainted one. The angry Indian knocked the knife away from the unpainted one and pinned his arms behind his back.
Kill the Indian!
A soldier lunged forward with his bayonet and speared the unpainted one once, twice, three times. The Indians gasped as the unpainted one fe
ll to the ground, critically wounded. The angry Indian trilled. Nobody stepped forward to help the unpainted one; he lay alone in the dust.
He’s dying!
Then a very tall Indian man stepped through the crowd and kneeled down beside the unpainted one.
My friend, the tall Indian said, picked up the unpainted one, and carried him to a lodge. Other Indians sang mourning songs; the soldiers shook their heads. Dogs yipped and chased each other.
In Chess’s dream, the tall Indian sat beside the unpainted one as he bled profusely. The white doctor came and left without song, as did the medicine woman. The unpainted one tried to sing but coughed blood instead.
My father? the unpainted one asked.
He’s coming, the tall one said.
The tall one greeted the father when he arrived, and both watched the unpainted one die.
Chess woke from her dream with a snap. Unsure of her surroundings, she called out her father’s name. Checkers stirred in her sleep. Chess held her breath until she remembered where she was.
“Thomas?” she asked but received no response. He’s dead, Chess thought but was not sure whom she meant. Then she heard music, so she crawled from bed and made her way to the kitchen. Thomas sat at the kitchen table and wrote songs. He hummed to himself and scribbled in his little notebook.
“Thomas?” Chess said and startled him.
“Jeez,” he said. “You about gave me a heart attack.”
Chess sat beside him.
“When you coming back to sleep?” Chess asked.
“Pretty soon,” he said. “I’m sorry if I woke you up.”
“You didn’t wake me up. I had a bad dream.”
“It’s okay. You’re awake now.”
“Is it okay? Really?”
Chess smiled at Thomas, reached over and mussed his already messy hair. She took the guitar out of his hands and set it aside, then kissed him full and hard on the mouth.
“What was that for?” he asked.
She kissed him again. Harder. Put her hand on his crotch.
“Jeez,” he said and nearly fell over in his chair.
Their lovemaking was tender and awkward. Afterwards, in the dark, they held each other.
“We should’ve used some protection,” Chess said.
“Yeah. It was kind of stupid, enit?” Thomas asked. “Are you sure it’s okay?”
“I’m sure.”
“Next time.”
They lay there quietly for a long time. Chess thought Thomas fell asleep.
“Listen,” he said suddenly and surprised her.
“To what?” she asked.
“What do you hear?”
“The wind.”
“No,” Thomas said. “Beyond that.”
Chess listened. She heard the Spokane Reservation breathe. An owl hooted in a tree. Some animal scratched its way across the roof. A car drove by. A dog barked. Another dog barked its answer. She heard something else, too. Some faint something.
“Do you hear that?” Thomas asked.
“I hear something,” she said.
“Yeah,” Thomas said. “That’s what I mean. Do you hear it?”
“Sort of.”
Chess listened some more and wondered if it was her imagination. Did she hear something just because Thomas wanted her to hear something? She listened until she fell asleep.
Coyote Springs scheduled their first nonreservation gig in a cowboy bar in Ellensburg, Washington, of all places, and drove down I-90 to get there. The old blue van rapidly collected the miles.
“Thomas,” Victor yelled from the back. “I think it’s about time we picked up a new rig.”
Coyote Springs agreed with Victor, but Thomas wanted no part of it.
“This van is older than any of us,” Thomas said. “It has seen more than any of us. This van is our elder, and we should respect it. Besides, we have no money.”
Coyote Springs laughed, even Thomas, and kept laughing until something popped under the hood. The van shuddered and stopped in the middle of the freeway.
“Shit,” said Coyote Springs in unison.
A few cars honked at the five Indians pushing an old blue van down the road.
“Thomas,” Victor said. “We need a new rig.”
Coyote Springs pushed that blue van twenty miles down the road, across a bridge over the Columbia River, into a little town called Vantage. The band sprawled around the van in various positions and barely moved when the cop pulled up. That cop climbed out of his cruiser, pulled on a pair of those mirrored sunglasses that cops always wear.
“What seems to be the problem?” he asked.
“Our van broke down,” Thomas said.
The cop walked close to the van and looked inside.
“Is all of this your equipment?” the cop asked.
“Yes, sir,” Thomas said.
“Are you in a band or what?”
“Yeah,” Thomas said. “We’re Coyote Springs.”
The officer studied the band, tapped his foot a little, and took off his sunglasses.
“Where you guys from?” he asked.
“From Wellpinit. Up on the Spokane Indian Reservation.”
“How about you girls?”
“We’re Flathead Indians,” Chess said. “From Arlee, Montana.”
“Where you headed to?”
“Ellensburg,” Thomas answered. “We’re playing a bar called Toadstools.”
“I know that place. You sure you’re playing there?”
The cop waited briefly for an answer, then asked the band for identification. Thomas and the women pulled out their driver’s licenses. Junior offered his Spokane Tribal Driver’s License, and Victor lifted his shirt and revealed his own name tattooed on his chest.
“Are you serious about this tattoo?” the cop asked.
“Yeah,” Victor said.
“You all just wait here a second,” the cop said and walked back to his cruiser. He talked on his radio, while Coyote Springs counted the money for bail.
“We can take him,” Victor said. “He’s only one guy.”
“But he’s a big guy,” Junior said.
“Shut up,” Thomas said. “Here he comes.”
“Okay,” the cop said when he came back. “I called my cousin over in Ellensburg. He’s got a tow truck. He’s going to come over here and haul your butts to Toadstools.”
“Really?” Coyote Springs asked.
“Yeah, but it’ll cost you a hundred bucks. You got that?”
“Sure.”
“Well, you can pay my cousin directly, but you’re on your own after that.”
“Thanks, officer.”
“You’re welcome. By the way, what kind of music you play?”
“All kinds. The blues, mostly.”
“Well, good luck.”
The cop started to walk away, but stopped, turned back.
“Hey,” he said, “who’s the lead singer?”
Thomas raised his hand and smiled. The cop smiled back, put his sunglasses on, climbed into his cruiser, and left with a wave.
“Who the hell was that masked man?” Chess asked.
“I don’t know,” Junior said. “But if I find any silver bullets laying around here, I’m going to pass out.”
From The Ellensburg Tri-Weekly:
Indian Musicians Play More Than Drums
An all-Indian rock band from the Spokane Indian Reservation played for the cowboys in Toadstools Tavern last Saturday night, and nobody was injured.
Seriously, the band named Coyote Springs was very professional and played their music with passion and pride.
“They knew what they was doing,” said Toadstools owner Ernie Lively.
“I was kind of nervous about hiring Indians and all,” Lively added. “Worried they might not show up or maybe they’d stir up trouble.”
On the contrary, Coyote Springs served up a healthy dish of country music, spiced it with a little bit of rock, and even threw in a few old blues tunes
for dessert.
“I think the highlight of the night was when those Indians sang ‘Mommas, Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys.’ Everybody sang along with that one,” Lively said.
The blue van, repaired by an honest mechanic in Ellensburg and a few stories that Thomas whispered into the engine, traveled down the mostly empty freeway toward home. Coyote Springs rode in a silence interrupted only by the sudden rush of a passing truck or a name whispered by one of those sleeping. Thomas drove the van, and Chess kept him awake. Checkers, Junior, and Victor slept.
“Why you like freeway driving so much?” Chess asked. “But don’t close your eyes to tell me some story.”
“I don’t know.”
“What do you think?”
“There’s a lot of songs out here, I guess. I can hear them.”
“You want me to turn on the radio?” Chess asked.
“Yeah, but keep it low. We don’t want to wake the van up.”
“They all need a lot of beauty sleep, enit?”
Chess turned on the radio. The Black Lodge Singers still drummed away in the cassette player, but she popped that tape out and searched for a radio station. She twisted the tuner back and forth through a short history of American music until she happened upon Hank Williams.
Hank Williams is a goddamned Spokane Indian! Samuel Builds-the-Fire shouted in Thomas’s memory. Thomas smiled because so many people visited him in memories.
“Ya-hey,” Thomas said. “Leave it there.”
Chess played with the radio until Hank sang true and clear. Coyote Springs and Hank Williams continued down the freeway, past a lonely hitchhiker who heard the music through the open windows. The blue van swept by so quickly all he heard were a few isolated notes. But he heard enough to make everything weigh a little more, his shoes, his backpack, his dreams.
The music rose past the hitchhiker up into the sky, banged into the Big Dipper, and bounced off the bright moon. That’s exactly what happened. The music howled back into the blue van, kept howling until Coyote Springs became echoes. That’s exactly what happened.
“Thomas,” Chess said and wanted to explain what she heard.
“I know,” he said, wide awake, and slowly drove them all the way back home.