LAST Saturday one of the boys hanged himself in the tek, where the boys do woodworking. His name was Leo. He was in grade four, so I didn’t know him. They say he was playing Zorro with some friends. He hanged himself but someone was supposed to cut him down. The bell rang for supper, and whoever was supposed to rescue him didn’t get a chance to go back. We are going to have a special Mass for Leo, but no funeral because he will be buried at home.
Now I found out that Charlie died too. One of the girls from Lillooet told Cookie. It was last summer. He was fishing, and he fell into the Fraser River. At first I didn’t believe it. I thought it was just a story. I didn’t think I cared, because it was just skinny Charlie with his hair sticking up like a rooster tail at the back. He used to make me cards on St. Valentine’s Day. He told Cookie I was his girl. What if no one ever calls me their girl again? What if he was the only one?
I’m glad now that Sister makes us dancers practise and practise for concerts. It helps me forget about Charlie. I don’t even mind when she locks me in the linen room to learn folk dances out of books and teach them to the other dancers. She doesn’t want anyone to know she’s not the dance teacher herself. Dorothy used to do that too when she was an intermediate, but now she’s a senior. Cookie said it isn’t right for Sister to say she’s the dance teacher but I don’t care. I just want to keep busy.
I’m kind of mean now too. I told Edna to shut up because she was singing “Chinky Chinky Chinaman, sitting on a fence, trying to make a dollar out of fifteen cents.” She used to sing that to Charlie because his eyes slanted up. I don’t know why, but I wasn’t as scared of her anymore. So I said, “Edna, shut up.”
“Make me,” she said. Then she ran off laughing. It’s the Irish in me that gets so mad, just like Dad. His grandfather was Irish. I know it’s not the Indian in me that’s mean because Yay-yah is kind and gentle, like Mum. She has no white in her.
Sister Theo is Irish too. She calls the boys those dirty boys.
She talks about the sin of being boy crazy and how it’s bad to even think about boys. She says never to get in a car with a boy. When Emma told Sister that her brother got married to a Protestant, Sister bawled her out like it was Emma who married a Protestant.
When we have dances in the gym, we’re only allowed to have three dances with the same boy. Once a grade four boy called Peter wrapped his arms around one of the girls and waltzed real close. Sister went marching over and split them up. Peter asked why. She told him he was too young. She said Peter was wicked. That’s why I don’t want to think about Charlie anymore, or boys. I didn’t sin, but I could have.