28

Rufus heard the story of the second Indian told so many times in his first few weeks at the Harden School, he found himself wondering how it had even survived so long, and how much of it was true. Every time he heard it, some of the details were different, but the essential mystery of the story stayed the same: no one knew whether the second Indian had lived or died. And that left the possibility of making the leap across an open question. Not only an open question, but a tantalizing one.

Rufus quickly discovered all the kids in the school had one thing in common: they wanted out. The campus was surrounded by a twelve-foot-tall fence with electric barbed wire along the base and the top, making it a dangerous proposition to attempt to climb over or dig under. The gates were under constant surveillance, and rumors of cameras were prevalent. All visitors were closely monitored and vetted. That left the falls, and the single flat rock that was open to any and all of the more adventurous teens to stand on and to wonder if perhaps one of them had what it took to make the leap. As far as what the students believed about the second Indian, they were mostly split. Some swore he’d made it, while others expressed a well-earned cynicism.

For his own part, Rufus wasn’t so sure. He often spent his break time standing on the rock, trying to judge the leap. He was of two minds about it. First, it was probably technically possible for a man in good shape, with good timing, and a good wind to make the leap. Second, anyone who tried it would almost surely be committing suicide. There were just too many factors that had to go exactly right.

It was on one of these breaks, standing there, thinking about the Indians flying across in the dusk so many years ago, that Harriet approached him. Rufus wasn’t completely sure where she fit in at the school. She was about three or four years older than any of the other students and did not attend classes. In fact, he rarely saw her but had heard that Harden and Deloach forced her into special sessions daily in which they counseled her in how to be heterosexual. The rumors about these sessions were as wild and varied as the rumors about the falls. She was servicing both men. She wasn’t a lesbian at all but instead a nymphomaniac who simply had to have it every day. Others claimed they were making her watch videos of women performing cunnilingus while making her bathe in the blood of dead pigs as a means of aversion therapy. The less radical rumors held that she was simply being counseled on the error of her ways. Rufus tended to believe this last one, but he still didn’t like it. He’d increasingly come to wonder why it was any of Harden’s or Deloach’s business if she was a lesbian or straight. Yet he lacked the courage of his convictions to do anything about it. Hell, he was still Harden’s—and to a lesser extent, Deloach’s—lapdog. He wasn’t sure why he wanted to please the two men so much, but he did. Their praise seemed to fill up a hollow place inside him, much like the old preacher’s had done before he saw the lies the man told, the deceit on which his whole ministry had been founded.

Since Rufus had arrived at the school a month or so earlier, he and Harriet had had minimal contact. Rufus was a classroom aide, which meant he was to help ride herd on the boys when they acted obnoxious during lessons. There were only two real teachers at the school—Deloach and an old man named Irvin. Deloach didn’t need the help, but Rufus was told to go to his classes anyway to pick up tips about discipline. Irvin was close to eighty and going blind, so Rufus found himself very busy in that classroom. It was a shame, because when the kids did settle down enough to listen to Irvin, he was a hell of a teacher. Looking back on it now, Rufus realized being in Irvin’s classroom, listening to him teach history, was one of the only good things to come out of his time at the Harden School. At least one of the only good things that lasted. But neither room allowed Rufus to see Harriet, because she wasn’t permitted to attend classes with the boys.

“Hey,” Rufus said when Harriet climbed onto the rock.

She was upset. That much was clear. She didn’t speak; instead she just sat down on the edge of the rock, her feet dangling off over the river.

“You doing okay?” Rufus asked.

“I hate this place.”

“Well, maybe you won’t have to stay too long.”

“Yeah, I could leave tomorrow if I wanted to. Today even.”

Rufus couldn’t tell if she was kidding or not. He sat down beside Harriet. “What are you talking about?”

“It’s real simple. My father wants me to be something I’m not. If I want to leave, all I have to do is go to Harden and tell him his stupid therapy worked, that I’m normal. I’m a real woman. I want to go clean the kitchen and keep my mouth shut except when it’s time to stuff a dick in it.”

Rufus winced. He’d never heard a woman speak like this.

“Well,” she said. “What do you have to say to that?”

He shrugged. “I don’t think that’s how you become a real woman.”

“Okay, then tell me. How do you do it?”

He shook his head, confused. “I think you already are a real woman, Harriet.”

She opened her mouth, as if to argue with him, and then his words seemed to register. “Oh. Well … damn right I am,” she snarled. “But don’t tell that to my father or to Harden. You know Harden has all of the boys calling me Harry, right? They all do it. How is that supposed to ‘help’ anyone. Not that I need any of their fucking help.”

“Don’t listen to them.”

“That’s easy to say, harder to do. It’s all I hear. Besides, I’m not the one who needs the help.”

“I’m sorry,” Rufus said. He didn’t know what else to say or do, so he just sat there, looking down at the river a hundred yards or more away. He could see the whitewater, moving fast over the rocks. It was moving on its own accord, oblivious to the whims of the foolish and inescapable human world.

“It’s true, you know,” she said after a time.

“What’s true?”

“Are you stupid?”

Rufus flinched, a little hurt. He was trying to be a friend. And now he was stupid?

“I don’t understand.”

Harriet shook his head. “The only person that knows the truth about me is Savanna. Everyone else is just assuming the thing that makes it easiest to hurt me.” She closed her eyes, as if the next part was especially painful. “I think this was her idea.”

“Wait. Her idea? You mean to send you here?”

Harriet nodded, her eyes still closed. “It had to be. I mean, she was the only one I’d ever told. And I only told her because she figured it out. I thought if I explained it to her, she’d understand. But she didn’t. Wasn’t long after that everybody knew. My father was so pissed, I think he wanted to just get rid of me somehow. He wouldn’t look at me for days, weeks, and then it was like he had an idea. But it wasn’t his idea.”

“You think it was Savanna’s?”

“Yeah. I know it was.”

“Why?”

“Because my father’s an idiot. He doesn’t think of ideas. Savanna, though …” She trailed off.

Rufus looked down at the river again, as if there would be some guidance there, some hint of how to navigate this new and treacherous territory. He saw the tiny rocks that had probably chewed up those two Indians so long ago. He didn’t like hearing bad things about Savanna. As much as he felt Harriet had been mistreated, Savanna was … God, his mind went blank when he thought of her. She was so beautiful, everything Rufus had ever wanted but had never known.

“Savanna’s a good person,” he said quietly. He would believe that.

“That’s what everybody says,” Harriet replied.

“Maybe they say it because it’s true.”

Harriet ignored him and pushed on. “I need somebody I can be honest with.”

“You can be honest with me.”

“I’m trying to be.”

“I don’t understand,” Rufus said again. And looking back on it, he saw he was a fool in so many different ways, that sitting there on the rock beside Harriet, he’d actually believed he had a better grasp on not just the situation but the world than she did. He actually believed she was just confused, not gay, that the whole thing was just the product of some obscure envy she felt for Savanna. But he’d been so wrong, so devastatingly wrong.

“I am a lesbian,” Harriet said. “I’m gay. I like women.”

“No,” Rufus said. “Don’t say that. You aren’t those things.”

She just looked at him. “You really don’t get it, do you?”

“Get what?”

“I like women. I want to kiss them. To touch them the way you do.”

Rufus shook his head. “You’re confused.”

“No. I’m not.”

Rufus stood up. “I think you are.” He wasn’t being purposefully obstinate. The idea was so foreign to him then, so outrageous to his sensibilities, that he just slipped back into his past, toward the stuff he knew best, the lessons he’d learned at the Holy Flame under RJ Marcus. Even though he’d renounced all of those beliefs, his subconscious self, when faced with something he’d not had time to truly consider, still returned to those teachings.

That was the only way he could explain it to himself later.

“I’m not confused. Please, Rufus. Don’t do this. I need somebody to accept me. I need to know I’m not alone here.”

Rufus backed away. He felt weird, as if everything he knew about the world had been wrong. It was scary and he didn’t like it. The world was just straightening itself out for him, and now this? It couldn’t be happening.

“Look,” Harriet said. “You don’t have to understand it, okay? I just need a friend, okay?”

“I think maybe you’re just jealous of Savanna.” As soon as he said it, he realized it was the worst thing he could have said.

“I might as well jump,” she said.

“What?”

“I’m thinking about jumping across.”

“To the other side?”

“Why not? The Indian did it.”

“That’s just a story.”

“And this is just life. Stories are truer than life.”

“You don’t believe that.”

“Yes, I do.”

“You’ll never make it. You’ll die.”

“I’m already dying.”

“No, you’re alive. You’re here, right now.”

“You’ve got a lot to learn.”

He sat down again. He reached for her hand and turned to face her. “Promise me you won’t hurt yourself.”

She met his eyes but said nothing.

“You can’t die, okay?”

“Okay,” she said.

At the time, he thought he’d gotten through to her. It was only later that he realized how much it had actually been the other way around.