Sherman Alexie - The Toughest Indian in the World

Low Man could feel the Indian woman’s eyes on him, but he didn’t return the stare. He watched the road moving ahead of them.

“Sara, let it go,” said Tracy, and there was something else in her voice then. “Remember, you’re the one who used to sleep with guys.”

Tracy put her hand on Low’s knee.

“Sorry, Low,” she said. “But these born-again dykes can be so righteous.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m sorry, Low Man,” said Sara. “I’m just nervous about my ma and pa.”

“So, you’re a new lesbian, huh?” asked Low Man.

“I’m still in the wrapper,” said Sara.

“She’s still got that new-car smell,” said Tracy.

“What made you change teams?” asked Low.

“I’m running away from the things of man,” she said.

At dinner, Low Man sat at the small table between Tracy and Sara. Directly across from him, Sid Polatkin, longtime husband, held the hand of Estelle Polatkin, longtime wife. All five of them had ordered the salmon special because it had just seemed easier.

“Do you think the salmon will be good?” asked Estelle, her voice thick with a reservation accent, much thicker than her daughter’s.

“It’s the Holiday Inn,” said her husband. He was president of the Spokane Indian Reservation VFW. “The Holiday Inn is dependable.”

Sid’s hair was pulled back in a gray ponytail. So was Estelle’s. Both of their faces told stories. Sid’s: the recovering alcoholic; the wronged son of a wronged son; the Hamlet of his reservation. Estelle’s: the tragic beauty; the woman who stopped drinking because her husband did; the woman who woke in the middle of the night to wash her hands ten times in a row.

Now they were Mormons.

“Do you believe in God?” Sid had asked Low Man before they sat down.

“Sure,” said Low Man, and he meant it.

“Do you believe in Jesus?” asked Sid as he unrolled his napkin and set it on his substantial lap.

“How do you mean?” asked Low Man.

“Do you believe that Jesus was crucified and rose from the dead?”

“Come on, Daddy, leave him alone,” said Sara. She knew how her father’s theological conversations usually began and how they often ended. He’d always been a preacher.

“No, Sara,” said Low Man. “It’s okay.”

“I think Mr. Smith can speak for himself,” said Sid. He leaned across the table and jabbed the air with a sharp index finger, a twenty-first century Indian’s idea of a bow and arrow.

“Low speaks too much,” said Tracy. Sure, it was a lame joke, but she was trying to change the tone of the conversation. Hey, she thought, everybody should laugh. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! Let’s all clap hands and sing!

“Hey, Mr. Smith, Low Man,” continued Sid. “Why don’t you and I pretend we’re alone here. Let’s pretend this is a country of men.”

Low Man smiled and looked at the three women: Estelle, Sara, and Tracy; two strangers and his unrequited love; two Indians and one white. If asked, as a man, to rush to their defense, what would Low Man do? How far would he go? If asked, as an Indian, to defend Jesus, what could he say?

“Please, Low, tell me what you think about Jesus,” said Sid, moving from question to command somewhere in the middle of that sentence.

“I don’t think it matters what I think,” said Low Man. “I’m not a Christian. Let them have their Jesus.”

“How vague,” said Sid. “Tell me, then, what do you think their Jesus would say about lesbian marriage?”

Tracy and Sara sighed and leaned back in their chairs. How often had men sat around dinner tables and discussed women’s lives, their choices, and the reasons why one woman reached across the bed to touch another woman?

“Mr. Polatkin,” said Tracy. “If you want to talk about our relationship, then you should talk to Sara and me. Otherwise, it’s just cowardly.”

“You think I’m a coward?” asked Sid.

“Daddy, let’s just order dinner,” said Sara. “Mom, tell him to order dinner.”

Estelle closed her eyes.

“Hey,” said Sid. “Maybe I should order chicken, huh? But that would be cannibalism, right? Am I right, Tracy, tell me, am I right?”

“Mr. Polatkin,” said Tracy. “I don’t know you. But I love your daughter, and she tells me you’re a good man, so I’m willing to give you a chance. I’m hoping you’ll extend the same courtesy to me.”

“I don’t have to give you anything,” said Sid as he tossed his napkin onto his plate.

“No,” said Estelle, her voice barely rising above a whisper.

“What?” asked Sid. “What did you say?”

“We came here with love,” said Estelle. “We came here to forgive.”

“Forgive?” asked Tracy. “Forgive what? We don’t need your forgiveness.”

Low Man recognized the anger in Tracy’s eyes and in her voice. Low, she’d said to him in anger all those years ago, I’m never going to love you that way. Never. Can you please understand that? I can’t change who I am. I don’t want to change who I am. And if you ever touch me again, I swear I will hate you forever.

“Hey, hey, Sid, sit down,” said Low. “You want to talk Jesus, I’ll talk Jesus.”

Sid hesitated a moment — asserting his independence — and then nodded his head.

“That’s good,” said Low. “Now, let me tell you. Jesus was a fag.”

Everybody was surprised, except Tracy, who snorted loudly and laughed.

“No, no, no,” continued Low. “Just think about it. I mean, there Jesus was, sticking up for the poor, the disadvantaged, the disabled. Who else but a fag would be that liberal, huh? And damn, Jesus hung out with twelve guys wearing great robes and great hair and never, ever talked about women. Tell me, Sidney, what kind of guys never talk about women?”

“Fags!” shouted Tracy.

“This isn’t funny,” said Sid.

“No, it’s not,” said Sara. “Tracy, let’s just go home. Let’s just go. And Low Man, you just shut up, you shut up.”

“No, Sara,” said Tracy. “Let them talk. Let them be men. And God said, let them be men.”

“I don’t like you this way,” Sara said to Tracy. “You’ve been different ever since Low showed up. You’re different with him.”

Low Man wondered if that was true; he wondered what it meant; he knew what he wanted it to mean.

“Please,” said Sara. “Let’s just go, Tracy, let’s go.”

“Nobody’s going anywhere,” said Sid. “Not until this is over.”

Estelle’s eyes glowed with tears.

“I’m being dead serious here, Sid,” said Low. “I mean, Jesus was an incredibly decent human being and they crucified him for it. He sounds like a fag to me.”

“Jesus was a human being,” said Sid. “At least, you’ve got that much right. He didn’t rise from the dead. He wasn’t the Son of God. He was just a man.”

“No, Sid, you and me, we’re just men. Simple, stupid men.”

“Yes, yes, I’m simple,” said Sid. “I’m a man who is simply afraid of God. And next to God, we’re all stupid. That much we can agree on.”

“Fine, fine, Sid, we agree.”

Sid stared at Low Man. The question: How does any father prove how much he loves his child? One answer: the father must hate his child’s enemies. Another answer: the father must protect his child from all harm.

“Listen to me,” said Sid. “I’m being terrible. I’m not being good. Not good at all. We’re all hungry and angry and tired. Why don’t we eat and then figure out whether we’re going to stay or go? How does that sound?”

Because they all loved one another, in one form or another, in one direction or another, they agreed.

All five of them ordered soda pop, except for Tracy, the white woman, who ordered red wine. Low Man wondered what would happen when every drunk Indian quit drinking — and he truly believed it would someday happen — when Indians quit giving white people something to worry about besides which wine went with fish and which wine went with Indians.