Waubgeshig Rice - Moon of the Crusted Snow

It was cold outside, and the scent of the withering leaves on the ground was potent. A fire burned somewhere nearby. Evan instinctively looked to the south for any signs of movement or life. Everything was still except for the sound of an engine in the distance, a four-wheeler, approaching from the heart of the village that lay to the north of his home. Soon the vehicle came into view and he recognized his friend Isaiah North in full rez fall fashion — neon vest over a camouflage jacket. Isaiah pulled into the driveway, parked beside the blue pickup, and turned off the engine. When he stood to dismount, his tall, lean frame towered over the truck’s roof. “What’s goin’ on, bud?”

“Not much, Izzy,” Evan replied. “Was just going out to the shed. Got a moozoo yesterday.”

“Good. Bull?”

“Yep.”

Isaiah took off his cap and ran his right hand through his short, thick hair as Evan walked down the porch stairs. Side by side, Evan was a head shorter than his friend.

“I figured you musta shot something,” Isaiah said. “I didn’t hear from you all day. I was gonna text you this morning, but I got no service.”

“Yeah, me neither,” said Evan, pulling his phone out of his pocket to check again. Still nothing. “I was gonna text you too, but figured you’d just come by anyways.”

“Can’t keep me away when you got a big ol’ bull nearby!” the friend proclaimed, stretching his arms wide.

“Alright then, you can help me finish him off. Maybe I’ll let you have the back strips.”

“Pffft, ever cheap!”

Evan chuckled and gave Isaiah a punch in the shoulder as he walked past him to the shed.

The days were growing shorter. But it had been a mostly sunny fall and the unusual run of blue skies had so far kept winter at bay. Deep into the afternoon, it was another vibrant day. Evan grabbed his sunglasses that lay beside his useless cellphone and perched them on top of his mesh fishing hat. He caught a glimpse of his reflection in the television on the wall. It had been off for almost two days now. He thought of how much he had paid for both the phone and the TV on a trip to the city back in the spring, and he was annoyed that he currently could use neither.

“Think it’s the weather?” Evan had asked Isaiah while they worked on the moose.

“Doubt it. Probably just bad receivers. We can never have nice things on the rez!”

Evan smiled remembering the conversation. He turned to the kitchen and opened the fridge to grab two large bags of moose meat. Each clear bag contained a large shoulder cut, with the date scrawled on the outside in black marker. He went outside to his truck, opened the door, and threw the meat on the passenger seat. He hoisted himself in and started up his vehicle.

The drive to his parents’ place was short. He tuned in to the community radio station, Rez 98.1 on the FM dial. A bluesy song filled the cab. Well, at least we still got the radio , he thought. We may as well be going back in time . Rez 98 transmitted from a portable outside the band office, and it mostly broadcast generic, preprogrammed playlists interspersed with community announcements and weather updates. The live stuff depended on when Vinny, the resident radio personality, was in the office.

Gravel knocked into the truck’s wheel wells as Evan drove through the quiet rez. It was too cold for baseball or fishing but not cold enough for ice at the outdoor rink, so he figured that most of the kids were indoors, playing video games or watching DVDs. He passed the rink on the right, empty and dark under its grey sheet-metal roof. The rink was another recent addition. If that was here when I was younger , he thought, I mighta made something of myself in hockey .

But in truth, Evan had never really wanted to leave this place. The comfort and familiarity of his community and the pull of the land made him a proud rez lifer. After finishing high school, he’d had no desire to go on to post-secondary education, even to a community college in one of the nearer towns, let alone any of the small northern cities like Gibson or Everton Mills. Job opportunities on the rez were few but neither was the competition stiff, especially in maintenance and infrastructure. His father, Dan, worked for the roads department, so he started there. Evan had worked part-time at first and spent the rest of his time hunting and fishing.

Evan turned right onto the third road past the rink, then pulled into the fourth driveway on the left. He had checked that they were home before leaving, amused that he had resorted to the landline instead of the usual one-line text to his dad. He parked in front of the bungalow with red vinyl siding and a high basement — the same house he’d grown up in. He got out of his truck and walked around to the back, where he knew his father was tanning a moose hide.

“Careful bent over like that,” Evan said as he approached his father. “It ain’t good for your back. Plus one of them bulls might see his chance and get his revenge!” He laughed loudly.

Dan kept scraping the thick yellow hide tied to a rectangular stretcher. “Make yourself useful and grab that scraper down there,” he said. Evan saw another scraping tool on top of the large blue plastic bin that his father often used for soaking hides. He picked it up and took his place to Dan’s right.

They worked silently at first, as they often did. It usually wasn’t until a job was done that they spoke. Whether tanning a hide, cleaning a haul of fish from a net, or tackling repairs around their homes, they were business first and fun later. Evan believed that it had taught him about working hard and getting the job done.

Evan dug the fleshing device hard into the softening hide, scraping flesh and fat away from the skin. Dan had been at this since the evening before and was nearly finished. He didn’t really need Evan’s help, but moments like this were special; it was an intimacy they kept to themselves.

When the hide was completely cleaned, the two men stood back to look at their handiwork — future moccasins, gloves, and pouches. The thick brown hair on the hide still needed to be pulled, so the job wasn’t done yet, but it wouldn’t take much longer.

Dan turned to Evan. “Smoke break?”

“Yeah, good call.”

They each pulled a red rectangular box out of the left pocket of their hunting jackets that were identical except in colour. Almost simultaneously, they each removed a cigarette, lit it, and put the pack and a lighter back in the jacket. Evan inhaled deeply and tipped his head back, exhaling up into the cool November air. Dan sat down on one of the log stools close to the plastic hide containers.

Dan brought the cigarette to his heavy lips. His black moustache tickled the top of the smoke as he took a drag. He looked at the ground between his heavy boots and pushed the smoke out of his nose. Then he looked up at Evan. “So how much meat you got then?”

“Enough.” Evan paused. “I got another one yesterday.”

“Yeah, that’s what Izzy said. He was by here just about an hour ago.”

Evan should have known the moccasin telegraph would have been active. He wasn’t surprised that his father had already heard the news.

“I brought some for youse guys,” he said.

“Better bring it in to your mother then.”

They finished their smokes in silence, taking turns looking up from the ground to examine the land around them. Each had nothing to say, and that was fine. They said what they needed to when they needed to.

“’K, I’m gonna take that in to Mom then.”

“Yeah, go ahead. I’ll start a fire, then we’ll finish cleaning that hide.”

“Alright.”

When Evan walked into the house, the entire main floor smelled like the moose roast that was in the oven, a familiar and comforting aroma. His mother, Patricia, was sitting at the desk on the far side of the living room. She rapped the black computer mouse loudly on the desktop. “The goddamn internet isn’t working!” she announced without turning around. “Come here, Ev. Fix this for me!”