“I call this song ‘Bring It On,’” Lulu says, and continues to strum her guitar.
If today doesn’t kill me, tomorrow might.
But I won’t go easily—just ask last night.
Yes, I slayed yesterday, and I defeated the day before.
When I got knocked down, I got back up and asked for more.
I massacred Monday, I tore apart Tuesday
I buried Wednesday with Thursday
I finished Friday, and drowned the weekend in the creek
And all of that was just last week.
Right now is upon me, the past is dead and gone
And I’m staring at my future, singing “Bring it on” …
As Lulu sings, my eyes start playing tricks on me. Maybe because the room is dimly lit and there’s so much nervous energy, but I keep thinking I see the stuffed animals begin to move. I know it’s impossible, but from the corners of my eyes I see an ear twitch, then an arm move. But as soon as I shoot my eyes to each animal, they stop moving. And then moments later, it happens again. A tail wags, a head nods. But every time I try to catch them in the act, they go still again. It’s always in my peripheral vision. Maybe I’m just tired or hungry or something. But I notice Lulu’s eyes widen, and she nearly gasps every time her eyes meet her audience. Are we both seeing this?
Lulu stops playing and sets the guitar down. Hands shaking. Niimi and I, and all the stuffed animals, sit in silence as we watch Lulu cry. After a few beats, Niimi stands up and claps. I do the same, half expecting the stuffed animals to join the standing ovation, but they don’t move. Lulu smiles and wipes away her tears.
“Your superhero is waking up,” Niimi says.
Lulu can barely speak. “How did I … I mean, how did you…”
“It’s simple,” Niimi says. “I realized to look forward, we must look back. The Anishinaabe have thousands of stories to help people bloom. We’ve heard many of them growing up. And you know why they are effective?”
“Why?” Lulu asks.
“Because many times, we use animals to tell them. We speak of wolves, moose, bears, eagles, foxes, snakes, and bees. Those animals become real in our head. They teach us lessons. Real life lessons. So, I used our ancestors’ methods to help you. These animals became your audience. They became real and became part of your story. You’ve always had an audience, because your ancestors are always with you. Sometimes we forget that. These animals here were just to remind you that you’re never alone.”
How does a twelve-year-old girl know so much? Is it because her father is a chief and she was raised learning all about our Ojibwe culture? That’s so strange to me. I was raised on Nickelodeon and Sesame Street.
“But how did they move? I saw them move. That bunny. It was dancing,” Lulu says.
Whoa. She saw them moving too. But wait … Dancing? Did she really see them dancing?
“Music is magic, and that magic moved the crowd,” Niimi continues. “Now all you’ve got to do when you’re singing in front of people, is see them as a bunch of animals. After a few performances, you’ll no longer care who or what they are. You’ll only care about one thing—making them move,” Niimi says.
“What if she doesn’t believe in magic?” I interrupt. “What if they were just off balance and fell over? Maybe the wind moved an ear or tail. But it wasn’t magic.” I shrug. “It was just music.”
“Can you see music? Taste music? Touch music?” Niimi asks. “No. It’s weightless. Odorless. Invisible. And yet it can break a heart and melt a heart and put a heart back together for millions of people in a matter of two minutes. If that’s not magic, I don’t know what is.”
“So, my stage fright is dead?” Lulu asks, rushing up and hugging her.
“Your stage fright isn’t dead. But the superhero inside of you is now challenging the villain to a fight. But you must keep playing. The more you play, the more you fight. The more you fight, the more you bloom,” Niimi says through the hug.
Then she slips out of her pig costume and tosses it to me. I remove the turkey garb and place them both on the couch. I follow Niimi outside, and we walk to our bikes.
I need to process what just happened. I need to think logically here. All Niimi did was give Lulu a way to not think about her fear. It wasn’t supernatural. It was simply a friendly game of manipulation. She tricked her. She’s making Lulu think that her fear was an enemy that needed to be defeated, when really all Lulu needed was a cute little distraction to make her forget about being afraid. Maybe that’s all that this Native boot camp really is. A distraction from reality. Maybe she’s distracting me right now. I can’t steal if I’m off pulling stunts like this all day. Boot camp, my butt! She’s just keeping me busy so I don’t raid the mall. Little does she know that a thief will always find a way to steal. The joke’s on them. And I have a microphone in my backpack to prove it.
“There was someone in the crowd you were trying to avoid,” Niimi says as she climbs onto her bike.
“Someone in the crowd?” I laugh. “They were stuffed animals.”
“I watched you. There was one section of the audience you refused to look at. I’d like to know why,” she insists.
Ugh. I don’t know how she was able to pick up on that. She’ll make me pretend the bear is my best friend or something. But Niimi can’t change me, no matter how convincing her charade is … It’s still a charade. I see through her mask.
And that weird daydream of me getting punched in the face never really happened. It was just a blip of feeling guilty, but now that feeling’s gone. I feel fine.
“You’re not ready to talk about the makwa yet … That’s okay,” Niimi says.
“I have no clue what you’re talking about. In fact, everything that happened back there, that was—”
“Awesome?” Niimi tries to finish my sentence.
“No. You convinced a singer to sing. Big wow. What’s next? You going to convince a comedian that he’s funny?” I say.
“Still in denial, I see. That’s okay. I expected as much from you,” she says.
“Oh yeah, and why’s that?”
“Because, Benny … You’re a slow learner. Like how your dad was,” she says, and rides off, leaving me in Lulu’s yard.
A quick burst of anger flares through me. I’m nothing like my father. I am a winner, and he is a loser. I must never forget that. “Wait. I don’t know how to get back!” I shout.
“You’ll figure it out, tough guy!” she yells, and speeds down the street until she wraps around the corner, out of my view.
I get on George’s bike and pedal in the direction she rode in. I wonder why she didn’t want me to ride with her. Did I offend her? Or is this another one of her tests?
Even though it only took about thirty minutes to get to Lulu’s house, it took nearly two hours for me to finally find my way back home. Well, not home, but to my dad’s house. I hop off the bike and quietly sneak it back into the garage. They can hardly call me a thief for it, I mean, I am returning it—but I should sell it soon, before someone else steals it.
George is standing in the Australia section of the living room, holding a book. He sees me and rolls his eyes.
“What are you reading?” I ask.
“Nothing,” he says, and puts it back on the shelf.
I see the book before he pushes it in, blending it with all the rest. The cover has a huge hairy spider on it. “Australia’s Deadliest Animals, huh?”
“Wow. You can read. I owe my mom ten bucks,” George says.
“Didn’t they make this cute little travel room for you, to try to snap you out of your funk?” I ask.
“What’s your point?”
“How in the world would that book ever make you want to go to Australia?” I ask.
“Maybe, unlike you, I’m not afraid of spiders,” George says.
“Right, you’re only afraid of sunshine and fresh air,” I say.
George doesn’t like that. He puffs out his chest and walks up to me.
“Say that to my face,” he says, and each word sends tiny little spit missiles onto my face.
“I would say, ‘You wanna take this outside?’ but I know you’re too scared to step—” But before I can finish my sentence, George throws a quick jab, hitting me directly in my nose—the exact same spot where Lulu hit me in my strange daydream.
My head jolts back. But unlike the daydream, I don’t lose my footing and fall. My adrenaline kicks in, and I charge him, wrapping my arms around his body. I lift him up and slam him against the wall.
Something breaks and crashes to the floor with us. We must have traveled quite a distance, an ocean to be exact, because while we’re wrestling on the floor, we end up all the way in Japan by the time we stop. Bamboo shelves, tiny ninja figurines, and cherry blossoms are scattered everywhere.
Before George can pound my head into Tokyo, Wendy barges into the room and yanks him off me. “What the hell is going on? I want answers now!” Wendy shouts at us.
“Nothing. We were just messing around,” George says.
I think for a moment, realizing it’s far better for the both of us if I agree with him.
“Yeah. He was just showing me some karate moves in Japan. Sorry,” I say.
She takes a hard look at George, then back to me. She knows we’re lying. “Well, since you’re so buddy-buddy now, then you can clean up this mess together. Another stunt like this, and no video games for a week.” She points to George. “And you”—she turns to me—“your mother will be notified next time. Along with that handsome judge!”
Why do they keep saying that? “He wasn’t even that good-looking!” I say.
Wait. Does Wendy talk to my mom too? That’s wrong on so many levels. You don’t speak to the home wrecker. You hate them forever. Maybe my dad told Wendy about Judge Mason. But why would he mention that? This isn’t Grand Portage; this is straight-up Grand Pour Out Everyone’s Business. No one minds their own around here!
Wendy walks out of the room. George and I look at each other. He probably wants to finish what he started, but instead, he starts laughing. And so do I. I guess it is pretty funny. Two boys fighting all over the world.
“You leveled Japan like Godzilla, dude. Not cool,” he says.
“I think a temple fell and hit me in the temple,” I add, while rubbing my head. “And for the record, you didn’t win. You sucker punched me.”
“Keep telling yourself that, Benny-hana,” he snaps back, in between his laughs.
“Whatever. Where does all this stuff go?” I ask.
George begins to clean up the mess. I scoop up all the fallen ninjas from the floor. A few moments pass. I’m not sure what to say. “So … you never leave the house, like, at all?” I ask.
“I don’t really want to talk about it,” George says.
“Okay, but what about school?”
“I was homeschooled last year. But that got expensive. My mom tries to teach me, but now I mostly do online classes,” he says.
“Don’t you miss other kids?” I ask. “Why don’t you just take the bus? Buses are safe.”
“You know what else starts with B-U-S? Business. So, why don’t you mind your own?”
Wasn’t I just complaining about people sticking their nose in other people’s business? And here I am, sticking mine into his. But to be fair, he punched me in mine, so I deserve a few answers.
Still, I take the hint, get up, and head into the garage. If annoying him gets me out of cleaning, well, then I did my job.
I close the garage door and wonder for the fiftieth time what the heck I’m doing here. I could be home, hitting the malls with my friends, making money. Where’s the drill sergeant? Where’s Dr. Phil? Where’s the family intervention or the cops who take you to visit a jail to show you how awful it is there in an attempt to scare you straight? Where is this stupid boot camp?
Instead I’m forced to watch a masked girl pretend to heal people. I can’t believe Lulu fell for that stuffed animal stunt. Sure, it would be super cool if magic was real. But it’s not. I thought my dad would magically appear for me every birthday and Christmas … But it never happened.
Believing in magic will only let you down.
People like Tommy Waterfalls don’t change. They just learn how to hide it better. I just need to expose him.
I wait to hear George’s bedroom door shut before I venture back into the living room. All three watch dogs are now sleeping in Jamaica, underneath a Bob Marley poster. I sneak past them and make my way down the hall. My dad’s office door is shut. I don’t know where he is, but if he was home, he probably would have come out when George and I had our scuffle. If I’m going to do this, now is the time.
I open his door and walk in. It’s like a sleeping zoo. Dozens of animals, some painted some not, lie perfectly still in their ceramic poses as I approach his desk. I open his desk drawers and rifle through them. There’re Post-it notes, stamps, pens, markers, glue, carving knives, rubber bands, coins, and takeout menus … But no signs of alcohol.
At home he didn’t even attempt to hide it, but here he has Wendy, and I doubt he wants to lose her like he lost my mom, so I just need to think like him. He thinks everything is a joke, so his stash must be somewhere he thinks is clever or witty. Hmm … Where can it be? Maybe behind a ceramic deer? Deer rhymes with beer. That’s clever. I check behind the deer, but nothing … Maybe the moose? Moose sounds like booze. Nope. How about the rhinoceros? Wine-oceros? I peer behind each one but come out empty-handed each time.
“It’s extinct,” a voice says from behind me.
I turn around and see my dad standing there, arms crossed, eyes disappointed. All three dogs are at his feet, staring at me. They must have told on me. They’re nothing but big rats after all.
“What is?” I ask, buying time to come up with an excuse as to why I am snooping around in his office.
“The western black rhino. It went extinct in 2011,” he says. “Very sad, isn’t it?”
“How?” I ask.
I look at the rhino sculpture. It looks gentle, strong, and overall harmless, despite its horns.
“There are some people who believe the ivory from their horns has medicinal powers,” he says.
“I believe those people are called idiots,” I say.
“Doing something wrong only makes you an idiot if you know what’s right and continue to do wrong. If they don’t know it’s wrong, they’re not idiots. They just need help. I know what I did wrong, Benny. I am no idiot. I learned from my past. No matter how hard you search this house, you won’t find what you’re looking for,” he says, and begins to walk away.
No. He doesn’t get to be the perfect role model now. Where was this guy when I needed him? The air in my lungs becomes steam. Angry steam. He doesn’t get the last word. Why are my hands shaking? Or are my legs shaking so much that they’re rattling my hands?
As he reaches the door, I can’t help myself. “But you are an idiot,” I say.
He stops but doesn’t turn around for another three seconds. He commands his dogs to leave the room. They obey him and go back to their vacation. My dad finally turns to me and looks me in the eyes. “Give it to me. You’ve earned that.”
My stomach drops. I’ve wanted to say so much to him for years. I’ve wanted to scream at him. I’ve pictured his face every time I would punch my pillow. But now I can’t find the words. I can’t even open my mouth.
“Ikidon,” he says. “Say it. You need to release it from your body, son.”
I take a deep breath and let it out. “Only an idiot would leave Mom. Only an idiot would throw everything away. Only an idiot would forget that he has a—”
“Son. I never forgot about you, Benjamin,” he says, using my first name for the first time in a very long time. “I left for you. I was toxic, and I didn’t want you to see me like that anymore. It killed me every day you had to see your father like that. I needed to leave. You deserved better.”
“You were my dad. Dads aren’t supposed to bail on their family. They are supposed to be there,” I say, choking on my words. “E-even when it’s hard.”
“You’re right. I let you down. I let your mother down. I let myself down. You may not see it now, but leaving was the best way to protect you and your mother. I was in a bad place. And the thought of dragging my family down with me scared me. So, when your mother asked me to leave, I did. I wasn’t strong enough to stay and work through it. But never once did I forget about you. I just needed to get my life back into a good place before I reached out to you. You don’t need to be sneaking around searching for the past. That man is long gone. I lost your mother, but you didn’t lose me. I’m right here,” he says.
I feel the tsunami rise somewhere from my gut and engulf my throat. I close my mouth to dam it, and the surge shoots north, stinging my injured nose and pushing against my eyes. I have seconds to escape before it all pours out of me. I tilt my head back slightly. “Too late,” I say, and rush past him.
As our bodies nearly touch, the dam breaks and tears flood down my face. I look away and bury my face into my hands as I run out of his room, down the hall, and into the living room.
I stop and take in all the countries surrounding me. My dad did all this for George, who isn’t even his son. He did this for Wendy, to make her happy, and he already had a wife he was supposed to make happy. He may have “straightened” his life out, but he still abandoned the people who loved him. He doesn’t deserve happiness and, most of all, forgiveness. He is still the villain, no matter how many times he pretends to be the hero.
I want to go home. I want to run out of this house and never see it again. I never want to see my dad, Wendy, or George again. They don’t need me or want me. They have each other. All I need right now is the only thing that makes me feel special. I need to steal something again. Right now. I need to remind myself I am better than him. I am not weak. I can walk into a store empty-handed and come out with my hands full. That’s my superpower.
I rush into the garage, and grab George’s bike. I need to find my way back to the mall. It was far, but I don’t care. The thought of shoplifting already gets my blood pumping and my heart beating faster. I choose a direction that feels vaguely familiar and pedal as hard as I can away from the house. Away from my dad. Away from all of this.