SEVEN
By: Debbi K. and Nancy W.
As Billy began to open his gifts, the children jostled to be the one closest to him. Which, of course, led to the inevitable pushing contest between two of them, although, Chris noted, only one of them did the pushing. The other little girl, about eight years old, allowed herself to be pushed aside as if somehow she didn't deserve a closer spot.
The girl who had pushed her stuck out her tongue and taunted, "Frog face!"
The other children laughed and several repeated the taunt. The sad thing was that the target of their abuse was a painfully unattractive little girl. She had large, disproportioned features and misaligned front teeth that looked too big for her mouth.
Mary hadn't noticed what was going on, so Chris took a couple of steps forward. That was all it took to get the children's attention. He glared at the group, who instantly went silent. "That's enough," was all he had to say. . . .
ROSALIE
Chris never could understand why kids like to stare at Rosalie. Her face scared him. The way her nose was all flat, her top lip was in two parts, and her teeth just kind of went every which way instead of being in a straight row. He wondered if you could just wake up some morning and look like that. He'd asked his mother, but she'd told him Rosalie was born that way. That it was a "curse from God". After that, Chris wondered what little kids did to get cursed by God. Didn't seem right.
Besides the fact that he didn't like looking at her, Chris didn't think Rosalie liked being looked at. At least not like she was some kind of crawling thing you found when you picked up an old and looked under it. He wondered how it must feel to look like that, especially since Rosalie wasn't stupid. She was one of the smartest girls in school, in fact. So she has to know it when people stared, pointing and laughing or making faces at her. Even if she pretended she didn't notice.
She couldn't pretend now. Four boys had made a circle around her and were taunting her, calling her "hatchet face." Chris supposed the name kind of fit, because that was almost how her face looked, like some had hit her with a hatchet. But it was still mean. Especially since Rosalie just stood there crying and couldn't get away.
Chris sized her tormentors up. They were all older than he was, but not too much bigger. One of them, Jeremy Poole, was the one who was telling the others to do it. They others were so stupid that they did whatever Jeremy said. Which was why there were Jeremy's friends.
Chris walked up to him. "Leave her along," he said to Jeremy, not sure what he'd do if Jeremy refused, which he most certainly would.
Jeremy pushed, him, hard enough that he fell backwards on his butt, hitting his tailbone on a sharp rock. The other boys laughed and began to hoot, cheering Jeremy on. But Chris didn't take his eyes off him, not once. He started straight at him, holding his gaze as he slowly reached behind his back and picked up the rock he's fallen on. He stood up slowly, still staring at Rosalie's tormentors, who were not chanting some stupid rhyme about him and Rosalie getting married.
He pulled himself to his full height. "I said, 'shut up'," he told Jeremy. He wasn't afraid of him, not now that he could feel the weight of the rock in his hand.
"Make me," Jeremy said, sticking out his tongue.
Chris brought the rock around and bashed him in the mouth with it. Stunned, Jeremy staggered back as blood began to pout from his split lip.
"Now we can call you names," Chris taunted him."
Jeremy ran off wailing, in search of a teacher. When he found one, he immediately tattled just like Chris thought he would. Chris' heart was pounding as Miss Ruggles approached him with a switch in her hand. She ordered them both into the schoolhouse. She let Jeremy go on his own, but she grabbed Chris by the ear and dragged him. It hurt, but he didn't make a sound. He wasn't a crybaby like Jeremy.
Inside, she gave Jeremy a rag for his bloody lip, then asked Chris why he had hit him with the rock. Chris told her it was because he was making fun of Rosalie.
Now, he didn't really expect any kind of reward for sticking up for Rosalie, but what Miss Ruggles said took him by surprise.
"Rosalie is not your business, Christopher. Besides, anyone who looks likes she does has to expect that people are going to make fun of her."
Chris looked up at her, trying to understand how a grown up could be so mean to a little girl. Or maybe Miss Ruggles was just as stupid as Jeremy.
"That don't make it right," he said.
"You owe Jeremy an apology. Now, I want you to shake his hand and. . . ."
"No."
"What did you say?"
Chris was too scared to look her in the eye. He wished he wasn't. "I ain't apologizing to him. He deserved it."
Miss Ruggles grabbed his chin and made him look at her. Her fingers dug into his cheeks, pressing the insides of them against his back teeth. She was hurting him, but he wasn't going to let her know that.
"You will apologize, Christopher Larabee, or you're going to get a beating."
Chris jerked his head free. "No."
Miss Ruggles grabbed a fistful of his hair and yanked him forward. Before the shock of that even could register, she bent him over a desk and delivered five sharp, stinging blows to his backside. Chris felt his eyes water and blinked back the tears.
"Tell him you're sorry!" Miss Ruggles commanded.
"No."
She hit him five more times, then repeated her demand.
Chris wasn't sure he could stand being hit again – his butt felt like someone had cut across it with a hot knife. But when he looked up at Jeremy and saw the satisfied smirk on his face, ti gave him new courage.
"No."
Miss Ruggles hit him again. Ten strokes this time. On the last one, his knees buckled. He had to bite his lip so that he wouldn't cry out.
"Are you ready to apologize now?" she asked him.
Chris had to take a deep breath so he could talk, but he hated Jeremy now and he hated Miss Ruggles, too.
"Go to hell."
For one brief instant, he enjoyed the satisfaction of watching Miss Ruggles' eyes just about pop from their sockets, she got so mad. But the next moment, she was taking the switch to him again. This time hitting his shoulder and back as well as his butt. She even caught the back of his head once. When he put his arms up to protect himself, she hit them too.
Chris felt his resolve crumble and the tears came freely, but when Miss Ruggles again commanded, "Apologize!"
His voice sobbed out, "No."
He was on the floor now, curled up in a ball to give her less of him to hit. He was bawling like a baby, but still she kept hitting him.
"What on God's earth are you doing?!" a voice shouted through the confusion. It was Mr. Peake, who taught the big kids.
He snatched the switch from Miss Ruggles' hand. Still furious, she explained why Chris was being punished.
Mr. Peak took the switch and broke it in half. "Discipline is one thing, dear lady. Beating a child half to death is another and I will not stand by and allow it."
"Well, I never!"
"Maybe that's your problem," Mr. Peake said.
Chris wasn't sure why Miss Ruggles slapped Mr. Peake for that, but the look on her face would have made Chris laugh if he wasn't hurting so much.
Mr. Peake helped him up off the floor. Chris tried to stand up straight, but it hurt too much.
"Suppose you tell me what the problem is, Master Larabee."
Chris managed to choke out his explanation, concluding with a defiant, " And I ain't apologizing' because I ain't sorry!"
He waited for Mr. Peake to hit him too, but instead, he said, "One should never apologize for defending the honor of a lady. As for you. . . ." he looked sternly at Jeremy. "I would say a taste of your own medicine is no less than you had coming."
He turned Chris around and pulled up his shirt. "I suggest you go home and have your mother put some balm on those welts. No more school for you today."
Chris wiped his eyes, and glared at Jeremy until the other boy looked away. Mr. Peake took his hand and together they walked out of the schoolhouse. Chris was limping, so Mr. Peake had to take small steps so he could keep up.
Recess was over and the other kids were filing back inside. They all stared at him. They knew he'd gotten a beating and they want to see the marks. Rosalie watched him too. Chris wasn't sure what was different about the way she looked at him, but somehow, it made him really glad he hadn't apologized to Jeremy Poole.
When they got to the door, Mr. Peake looked down at him. "Christopher, I don't wan you to think that I condone the fact that you hit Jeremy with the rock. . . that was wrong."
Chris hung his head. He supposed that was true.
"But you know what, Christopher? Sometimes, a man just had to do something that's not quite right to fix something that's even more wrong."
Then, he reached out and shook Chris' hand. Not like a man and a little boy, but like they were both men. Despite his pain-wracked body, Chris stood tall as he walked away.
After the cake and lemonade and the opening of the gifts, the party had pretty much turned into an informal playtime for the children. The space underneath the picnic table Mary had set up under the tree became a fort and the kids divided themselves into cavalry and Indians. Nothing was unusual about that until Laurie Ann Kingman declared herself a general.
"You can't be a general," Billy explained with annoyance. "You're a girl. Girls can't even be in the army."
"This is pretend," Laurie Ann explained patiently. "We can pretend whatever we want and I'll be the general if I want."
"Well, if you're a general, then I"m a sergeant. That's better than a general."
"It is not!" Laurie scoffed. "You are so stupid!"
"Let's not have any of that talk, Laurie," Mary reminded the young lady.
"Ma, tell her she can't be the general!"
"Laurie Ann is your guest, Billy. Let her be what she wants to be."
Vin watched the exchange, wondering if anyone had once told Mary she couldn't do some of the things she had done. . . run a newspaper, raise a child alone. She was a remarkable woman, and maybe, like Laurie Ann, had once had an imagination that would take her places life would never let her go.
Vin couldn't help but feel a bit sorry for the little general though. He knew what it was to be seven years old and wanting to be something you never would be. . . .
SKY-IN-HIS-EYES
Ebibitu. . . that was what color the sky was. He tried to remember the other word, the one he had known a long time ago. . . .
Blue . . . . that was it.
He sat on a rock into which a hole had been carved to catch rain, he looked down into the puddle that had formed there. He saw the sky and his own face reflected in it. But when he tried to look at his eyes, his head blocked out the light and he couldn't tell what color they were. Corn Woman said they were the color of the sky, that was why she named him 'Sky-in-his-Eyes'.
Corn Woman was his mama now. His other mama had died a long time ago. He was alone and scared then, but Running Deer had brought him to Corn Woman because she'd had a little boy once, but he was dead like his mama.
He couldn't remember anymore how his first mama had looked, but he remembered her words to him after she told him to go with Running Deer. "You're a Tanner. Your name is Vin Tanner. Don't you forget that."
And he didn't forget. Not ever. Although he didn't really mind the name Corn Woman gave him. Corn Woman didn't look like his first ma, who was skinny and had long curly hair. Corn Woman was round, like a ball, and she had no front teeth.
Vin grinned at his own reflection. He didn't have any teeth in front either. They got loose and fell out. Corn Woman said he'd grow new, big ones. He wondered – if that was true, how come she had never grown any more? He shrugged. He still had lots of other teeth, so he supposed it didn't matter.
He looked at his hair, which caught the sunlight and was the color of cornsilk. Then he looked around at the other children of the tribe. None of them had hair that color. None of them had blue eyes.
None of them looked like him.
He didn't think you could paint your eyes. That would hurt. But he'd seen the braves paint the war ponies. They made black paint with bear grease and ashes from the fire. It turned the horses' hair black . . . .
He knew where Corn Woman kept the bear grease, and he knew where to find plenty of ashes, which he gathered into a deerskin. Then he went to find Red Cloud so they could go to the Hiding Place that only they knew about. Red Cloud was his best friend, and so Vin brought him along to help out.
They hadn't brought anything to mix the paint in, so Vin decided they could just pour the ashes into the bear grease. Red Cloud held the crock of grease while Vin poured the ashes into it. The fine, gray powder overfilled the bowl, and ran out into the dirt. A cloud of it enveloped both boys as they carefully began to work it into the bear grease.
Red Cloud didn't think the mixture was getting black enough, so he went to get charcoal while Vin scooped up some of the ash that had fallen onto the dirt. There was a little dirt and some dried leaves in it, but after they crumbled the charcoal into the mixture, it began to resemble paint.
Both boys realized if they were going to paint Vin's hair black, they needed something to spread the paint through his fine curls. Red Cloud's sister, Sings-With-Bells, was always combing and braiding her hair, even when it looked perfectly fine. She had a fancy brush and comb that her father had brought from a trading post. A mirror, too. Red Cloud ran to fetch them. Then they set to work.
The brush didn't work as well as the comb. It got clogged up with black bear grease, so they tossed it aside. The comb worked much better, and after spreading the paint all over his head and combing it through, Vin looked in the mirror. Not only was his hair now as black as Red Clouds, it was straight, too. Red Cloud was pleased with it. Vin was too, almost, except it felt kind of sticky, not like real hair. That would probably go away when the paint dried, Red Cloud theorized. Then suggested that they hasten the process by adding a little dust. That sounded good to Vin, until Red Cloud dropped a whole fistful of dirt on his head and some of it got in his eyes.
He pushed his friend away and tried to rub the dust out, but his hands were covered with ash and grease and it made his eyes sting. He was starting to think maybe this idea wasn't going to work when Sings-With-Bells snuck up on them.
She picked up her brush and mirror and snatched to comb from Vin's hand. She was as mad as a hornet and Red Cloud told her that her name should be "Screeches-Like-Old-Goose." He and Vin laughed at that joke until she pinched them both until they screamed. Then she ran off to show her mother what had happened to her brush and comb.
"Let's go get melons," Vin suggested, not really eager to be there should Sings-With-Bells return. Red Cloud readily agreed, and they climbed through a rocky crevasse to a sandy spot where some watermelons grew. Vin knew how to pick the good ones by the way they smelled, but Red Cloud just grabbed the first one he saw. They used their knives to cut them open and Vin laughed when Red Cloud's was green inside. Red Cloud pretended not to notice and took a bite. Vin laughed again when his friend made a face.
Red Cloud reached into the center of the melon and scooped out the runny seeds and threw them at him. They hit Vin in the chin and then dripped down his bare chest onto his leggings, leaving a wet spot between his legs so it looked like he made water in his pants.
Red Cloud pointed at the spot and it was his turn to laugh. Vin scooped the seeds out of his melon and retaliated, and the exchange continued until they were out of seeds.
Vin offered Red Cloud half of his fruit, which was ripe and sweet. They pretended the green melon was a buffalo, killing it with their knives.
They were sitting in the sun, and by the time they had finished off a second melon, Vin could feel something thick and warm running down his face and back. He wiped at his forehead with his arm, and it came away slick with black bear grease. The stuff started to get in his eyes again. As he rubbed it away, Red Cloud began to laugh some more and told him he looked like a raccoon.
That would have made Vin mad, but his eyes were really starting to burn. He couldn't even keep them open.
"Look at this crazy boy!" Vin heard Corn Woman, even though he couldn't see her. She sounded mad, but he was glad she was there. She'd know how to get that stuff out of his eyes.
He felt plump arms lift him from the ground as she continued to scold him, telling him she was an old woman but had never seen a boy as crazy as he was.
She carried him to the creek that ran past the settlement. She wet her long skirt with the cool water so she could wipe his face off. After a few times, he was able to open his eyes, but Corn Woman wasn't done with him.
She pulled his leggings off and made him sit naked in the cold water while she cut a yucca root. She made him lie back so she could wet his hair. Then she scrubbed at it with the root until it was covered with foam. She rinsed it out and repeated the process over and over again until Vin thought surely she had scraped all the hair off his head.
Finally, she appeared to be done, but to Vin's horror, she took a rag from her belt. She made some lather with the yucca root and then began washing him all over like he was a little baby!!
That would have been bad all by itself, but now that he could see again, he spotted not only Red Cloud, but several of his other friends who had gathered to watch the spectacle. Vin wanted to sink under the water and drown, but it wasn't deep enough.
Someone had washed a blanket and hung it over a tree limb to dry. So when Corn Woman had finished scrubbing him from head to toe, she wrapped him in it and carried him back their tent.
Running Deer looked at her as she set him down on more blankets. "That boy has good legs. He should walk," he told her.
Corn Woman didn't pay any attention to his remark and began to tell her husband what Vin had done as she dried his hair.
Running Deer didn't laugh, but Vin could tell he wanted to. So he hung his head, feeling really stupid.
"Think about this question, crazy boy," Running Deer said. "And when you have had time to think, I will ask you to tell me the answer. . . ."
Vin looked up.
"Which is better, the brown horse or the spotted horse?"
Vin frowned, but before he could speak, Running Deer silenced him with a finger to his lips. "You must think to know the answer."
So Vin thought. He thought the whole time Corn Woman was working the tangles out of his hair and arranging it in two neat braids on either side of his head. Where he lived before, only girls had pigtails like that, so at first he wouldn't let her do that with his hair. Now, though, he kind of liked it, because . . . well, he knew Corn Woman liked doing it.
She tied the ends of the braids with rawhide strips and then got him another pair of leggings – the ones with real arrowheads hanging from the waist. Those were his favorites.
Vin still thought about the horse question while he sat beside the cooking fire watching Corn Woman melt grease in a pot. She reminded him that it was lard from the trading post, not the good bear grease he had used to make paint, but she didn't sound really mad.
His mouth began to water in anticipation as he watched her prepare the other ingredients: corn meal, dried cherries, honey, and pecans. She put them all in a bowl, adding a little of the melted lard and some water to make dough. Then she mixed everything together and formed the dough into little balls that she dropped into the hot lard. They bobbed on the surface, turning a golden brown color. Vin could almost taste them. They were his favorite.
When the dough-balls were done, Corn Woman set them on a straw mat to cool. Vin wanted to grab one, but he'd tried that once and burned his fingers, so he waited patiently. He hoped Corn Woman had some sugar to sprinkle on them, but they were good even without sugar. While he waited for them to cool, he went back to thinking about the horse question.
Corn Woman did have sugar, she sprinkled them on the corn balls and then piled them in a wooden bowl which she handed to Vin. She waved her cooking spoon at him, indicating he was free to return to his friends.
Vin wasn't sure he wanted to. They were probably still laughing because he had been washed like a baby.
He discovered that Red Cloud's mother had made her son sit on a small mat by the cooking fire and told him he had to stay there until it was time to sleep. It was for taking Sings-With-Bells' hairbrush and comb. Since Red Cloud had done it to help him, Vin sat down with him and shared his food.
Sings-With-Bells was still mad. She reminded Vin of the demon buffalo Running Deer had told him about. The buffalo had fire for eyes and breathed smoke out of its nose.
He didn't give her any dough balls.
Later, when it was night and Vin was tucked between the soft old blankets and bear skin that were his bed, Running Deer asked if he had learned the answer to the question.
Vin had pondered it, and had some questions of his own.
"Is one horse bigger than the other?" he asked.
Running Deer took a puff on his pipe. "They are the same size."
"Is one stronger or faster?"
"They are the same, but one is brown and one is spotted."
"Then neither is better," Vin shrugged.
Running Deer nodded. "The spirit of the horse does not care what color horse it lives in. That is not what makes it a horse."
Vin frowned, but suddenly, he understood. It wasn't how he looked that made him the son of Running Deer and Corn Woman... it was the way he felt, inside where no one could see.
And besides, Corn Woman liked his blue eyes, and didn't care what color his hair was, so long as it didn't have bear grease in it.
His spirit was where it belonged.
As dusk fell, the party ended and parents arrived to retrieve their children. When the town's seven peacekeepers said their farewells, Billy gave each of them a stick of candy and thanked them for coming, just as Mary had prodded him to do with his other guests.
As they headed for the saloon, JD looked back at Billy and pulled the candy from his mouth long enough to ask, "Ever wish you were that age again?"
"Nope," came Nathan's quick reply.
"Never," Josiah agreed.
Chris only grunted.
"God forbid," Ezra intoned.
"Maybe ten years older. . . ." Buck winked and JD shoved him.
Vin just smiled and said, "I reckon a little bit o' that age stays with a man."
The others ponder this until Josiah summed up their thoughts for them.
"Amen to that."
The End
