WEBVTT 00:00:06.360 --> 00:00:13.259 Piss-legged, drag-assed khakis tucked into jump-boots, 00:00:13.259 --> 00:00:19.019 a sleeping-bag coat torn by river-bank blackberries— 00:00:19.019 --> 00:00:24.525 parks himself across on the bench opposite the man 00:00:24.525 --> 00:00:29.136 writing at a riverside picnic table. Clears his throat: 00:00:30.905 --> 00:00:38.605 "Asking you a favor—guess my age. Close enough. 00:00:38.605 --> 00:00:43.310 Thirty-eight this year, okay. Ask me a question, 00:00:43.310 --> 00:00:49.449 any question. Know I’m Indian, yeah? Cheyenne, 00:00:49.449 --> 00:00:54.226 Montana. Damn Indians, all they know is how 00:00:54.442 --> 00:00:59.972 to do one thing: drink. Okay, here’s the joke. 00:01:01.095 --> 00:01:06.147 How do you track an Indian? Go on, guess— 00:01:07.055 --> 00:01:12.551 I’m listening. No? Put your ear to the wind 00:01:12.551 --> 00:01:23.383 for the sound of the guy crying, 'Hey bro, I’m thirsty!'" 00:01:23.383 --> 00:01:26.720 He unstraps a sweaty watchband, pushes the watch 00:01:26.720 --> 00:01:33.182 across the table. Digs one pocket for change—nickels, 00:01:33.182 --> 00:01:39.844 pennies, a dime—pours them around the watch. 00:01:39.844 --> 00:01:44.771 Three knuckles are bloody, the forearm protruding 00:01:44.771 --> 00:01:50.411 from his sweatshirt scored with long cuts, some scabbed, 00:01:50.411 --> 00:01:56.016 some fresh. He parts the midnight hair over his eyes: 00:01:56.419 --> 00:02:02.456 "Hey bro—another favor: drink with me? Take 00:02:02.456 --> 00:02:06.660 that watch for a dollar or two, go up to Hop Sing’s 00:02:06.660 --> 00:02:10.964 and get us a beer. You got to get it, bro, 00:02:10.964 --> 00:02:15.369 Hop Sing won’t dispense to me, damn Indian. 00:02:15.369 --> 00:02:21.346 So ask me a question, I’m listening. Name’s Wolverine. 00:02:22.423 --> 00:02:25.984 Only know how to do one damn thing—" 00:02:28.169 --> 00:02:34.146 He raises two fingers, points at a clutch of children 00:02:34.269 --> 00:02:40.384 in a wading pool. Cocks his thumb, cradles one arm 00:02:40.384 --> 00:02:45.661 like a gunstock, squints through an invisible scope. 00:02:47.515 --> 00:02:53.254 The neck tightens, pulling his lip into wolverine snarl; 00:02:53.900 --> 00:03:01.972 then rifle-recoil. Then the benign gaze of a full-time drunk. 00:03:05.034 --> 00:03:10.885 "My first rifle? Pellet gun. Plinking quail. Plink 00:03:11.131 --> 00:03:16.177 the rancher’s chickens when they strayed. One day 00:03:16.177 --> 00:03:19.775 saw this hippie thumbing on the highway 00:03:19.837 --> 00:03:23.414 while I was beating through sagebrush. Thought, 00:03:23.414 --> 00:03:27.245 Why not? Just a bigger sort of target. Didn’t guess 00:03:27.608 --> 00:03:31.977 I’d score at that distance, but plink—he claps 00:03:32.523 --> 00:03:36.735 his leg like a big horsefly nailed him, Ow! 00:03:36.828 --> 00:03:41.797 Goddam Ow! No idea who ambushed him. 00:03:43.191 --> 00:03:50.187 So I see I got a gift to sell to Uncle Sam." 00:03:50.187 --> 00:03:56.699 Groomed as a marksman, flown to Kuwait. Sniper duty 00:03:56.699 --> 00:04:02.011 plinking Saddam’s waterboys wading the dunes. Their hair 00:04:02.027 --> 00:04:09.395 black as his, heads poking out at sunrise in the crosshairs. 00:04:09.395 --> 00:04:14.643 They don’t fall to be found, pocketed like quail, they fall 00:04:14.951 --> 00:04:21.260 away behind dunes, unconfirmed kills. He can hear 00:04:21.260 --> 00:04:28.784 their water-cans leaking through the sand of his dreams. 00:04:28.784 --> 00:04:33.465 "Push the shirt up my arm. Farther. You got 00:04:33.527 --> 00:04:37.888 to push, bro, this other arm’s broke. Yeah, 00:04:37.888 --> 00:04:42.665 see that? Dog soldier. That’s the mark, 00:04:42.972 --> 00:04:47.103 like a crosshair, north east south west, 00:04:47.472 --> 00:04:53.048 grandfather’s four directions. Cut it myself. 00:04:53.432 --> 00:05:00.215 I’m a killer and I’m hurting. I can see you’re scared, 00:05:00.215 --> 00:05:03.223 a quail in the sage—don’t know which way 00:05:03.269 --> 00:05:08.464 to run. No fear, bro, my woman outranks me. 00:05:08.787 --> 00:05:13.759 Traded my rifle for Uncle Sam beans and cheese. 00:05:13.759 --> 00:05:17.320 He’s got a warehouse in Montana where 00:05:17.320 --> 00:05:22.043 our women line up to change bullets into beans." 00:05:24.160 --> 00:05:28.864 He wants the white man to rouse himself, take coins 00:05:28.879 --> 00:05:34.706 and wristwatch, raise him by his good arm to see Hop Sing 00:05:34.768 --> 00:05:39.671 about a canister of eight percent oblivion. He wants 00:05:39.671 --> 00:05:45.287 the invisible woman to trade him back one bullet full 00:05:45.287 --> 00:05:50.104 of all the water telescoped in the desert to plant 00:05:50.104 --> 00:05:56.384 beneath his wolverine chin. He wants a quail to claw 00:05:56.430 --> 00:06:02.975 his eyes, a mother to say No, a grandfather to sing 00:06:02.975 --> 00:06:12.407 West South East North, raising burnt sage in his palm. 00:06:12.407 --> 00:06:16.650 "Hop Sing’s is two blocks south. Drink a beer 00:06:16.650 --> 00:06:20.960 with me or walk me home, I’m hurting. 00:06:21.021 --> 00:06:24.936 This park’s a graveyard where clouds bury 00:06:24.936 --> 00:06:27.431 old water. Don’t turn round, bro, 00:06:27.431 --> 00:06:31.789 the black and whites are talking about us— 00:06:31.820 --> 00:06:37.228 —guess Hop Sing told them I was on the way, damn Indian." 00:06:37.228 --> 00:06:42.187 A police cruiser idles across the street. It’s a good day 00:06:42.187 --> 00:06:46.234 to walk away, the white man thinks. Then hands back 00:06:46.234 --> 00:06:54.589 the watch he has bought, and helps Wolverine to his feet. 00:06:54.589 --> 00:06:57.957 "My woman outranks me. Should I snipe her? 00:06:57.957 --> 00:07:03.024 Yes or no. Tell me my mother says No, tell me. 00:07:03.024 --> 00:07:07.520 Can you feel the shotgun pellets in my shoulder? 00:07:07.520 --> 00:07:11.850 Like stars in the river of grandfathers. Go on 00:07:11.850 --> 00:07:17.130 and touch them, bro, keep your hand there—" 00:07:17.176 --> 00:07:22.294 When their feet reach the edge of the park, jump-boot 00:07:22.294 --> 00:07:26.919 and sandal, black and whites bracket them. “Hold up, 00:07:26.919 --> 00:07:33.964 chief,” one blueshirt says. Another bends to his shoulder-radio, 00:07:33.964 --> 00:07:38.783 hand on holster. “Hands out of pockets. Sit on the curb. 00:07:38.844 --> 00:07:46.502 Name?” The white man expects to hear "Wolverine;" 00:07:46.563 --> 00:07:57.971 the answer is "White Crow, Leroy." Date of birth? "1967." 00:07:58.033 --> 00:08:04.994 Home? "The riverbank." The blueshirts ask the white man 00:08:04.994 --> 00:08:11.270 the same questions; the radio pronounces him free to go. 00:08:11.270 --> 00:08:19.139 “Walk away, professor,” the blueshirt advises. It’s sunny, 00:08:19.139 --> 00:08:25.208 mayflies unregulated as a drunk sniper’s thoughts blow east. 00:08:25.208 --> 00:08:30.787 The writer walks north to his car, the black and whites 00:08:30.787 --> 00:08:36.960 separate, east and west, and Leroy White Crow, 00:08:36.960 --> 00:08:41.517 a fresh ten in his pocket, alone again on legs 00:08:41.517 --> 00:08:47.549 too thin for his jump boots, wobbles south. 00:08:47.549 --> 00:08:52.221 His father is jailed two counties south for stabbing 00:08:52.221 --> 00:08:57.276 a logger in the cheek; he could use a visit. 00:08:57.276 --> 00:09:01.475 Somehow Leroy must get there—burrowing 00:09:01.475 --> 00:09:07.220 through roadside nights like Wolverine, or floating 00:09:07.220 --> 00:09:11.745 above Interstate 5 fog like White Crow-- 00:09:11.761 --> 00:09:17.109 and he will. Even if his good arm breaks 00:09:17.109 --> 00:09:21.123 against some windshield, even if he’s knocked 00:09:21.123 --> 00:09:25.366 out of piss-legged khakis by a logging truck 00:09:25.366 --> 00:09:31.568 and reduced to a cloud of mayflies over a ditch, 00:09:31.598 --> 99:59:59.999 he will go south to bring drink to his father’s lips.