Little Brother of War (4 page)

Just then I heard my mother's voice call from over near the back door of the community center.

“Randy?” she shouted. “Are you out here?”

“Yeah, Mom,” I answered. “I'm over here.” I waved so she could see me in the middle of all the players. She walked over.

“What are you doing?” she asked, and then looked at me harder. “What happened to
you? You've got cuts and scrapes all over you. Are you all right?”

I looked down at my legs and arms. There were little cuts here and there. My elbow was scraped. One knee was bruised.

“Oh, that,” I said. “I hadn't really noticed. I guess those happened while I was playing.”

“Well, it's way past noon,” she said. “We were supposed to have lunch together.”

“I'm sorry,” I said. “I lost track of the time. We only need two more points to win the game. Can I stay a little while longer?”

Mom looked a little surprised and worried. “I guess so, if you want to,” she answered. “Aren't you getting hungry?”

“Yeah, but I can wait to eat.” The referee called for the players to gather for the next round.

“I've got to go,” I told her as I walked back onto the field. “But you can't watch. That'll make me nervous.”

“Okay, I'll go back inside,” she called.

I ran to get my place in line. I didn't want to miss a single minute of the game.

We played on for another hour. When the game ended we had lost by only one point. The final score was ten to nine.

Our team gathered on the sidelines to drink some water and talk.

“Guys, that was a hard-fought game,” our team captain said. “The score was close and could've gone either way. I'm especially proud of how our new player, Randy, handled himself.” What? Did I hear that right? Who was he talking about?

He looked at me. “You have some natural skills, young man. I don't think you even realize it.”

He started clapping and everyone on the team did, too. I blushed.

“Okay, we're done here,” he finished up. “Be back here next Saturday at ten o'clock if you want to play again.”

The guys gathered their gear and the group broke up. The team captain walked with me as I headed back to the community center.

“My name's Charley Rabbit, by the way,” he said. We shook hands. “You're included in that invitation to play next week, you know.”

“I don't even have my own sticks,” I answered. “I just borrowed these from Mr. Isaac.”

“Who's Mr. Isaac?”

“The old man inside the center,” I said just as we arrived at the back door. “He was in the back hallway here making sticks.”

Charley opened the back door and we went inside. I looked for Albert, but there was no sign of him.

“He was sitting at a table right here making ball sticks,” I said. I was confused. Where could he have gone? How was I going to return the sticks to him?

I noticed a janitor sweeping the hall. I approached him.

“Excuse me. Do you know what happened to Mr. Isaac, the elderly man who was here before?”

“I'm sorry but I didn't see anybody,” the janitor replied. “I got here about an hour ago and there wasn't anyone in this hall.” He went on with his sweeping.

“I guess you've got yourself a brand new pair of kapoca,” Charley said. “At least for the time being.”

Just then Mom came around the corner and into the hall.

“There you are,” she said. “And are you ever sweaty and dirty. It's the shower for you when we get home.”

“Can we eat first? I'm starved,” I said. “This is Charley. He's the captain of a toli team.” I saw Mom's puzzled look. “Stickball,” I explained.

“Oh, right,” she said. “Nice to meet you.” Then to me, “Give the man back his sticks so we can go.”

“Those are Randy's sticks now,” Charley told Mom. “Maybe I'll see you next week,” he said to me as he walked away.

Now it was Mom's turn to be confused.

“What's going—?”

I interrupted. “Can we go eat? I really am starving.”

As we ate our Indian tacos, I told Mom all about Albert Isaac and the sticks he'd loaned me. I also told her about Carl and James Tubby and the game we'd just played.

I think Mom found it all surprising and a little puzzling. She just listened to me. She didn't ask questions or say anything. But I could see the gears in her mind turning. She seemed to be taking it all in and thinking about it. But what would Mom do with this information?

“Well, when we see this Mr. Isaac again you'll have to give him his sticks back,” she said finally.

“Of course,” I said.

When we got home, Dad was watching a college football game on TV. The University
of Mississippi was playing the University of Tennessee. In his lap sat the family photo album with all of Jack's football and Army pictures. Dad's eyes were red. I think he'd been crying.

“Jack could've been playing college football right now if he hadn't joined the Army,” he said. “I never really understood why he wanted to be a soldier.”

I saw Mom get a worried look on her face. She patted me on the arm.

“Randy, you go on and take a shower,” she said. “I'm going to talk to Dad for a little bit.”

I went for the shower. I'd seen Dad get like this more and more since Jack died. He starts thinking about what could've been. What if Jack had gone to college instead of enlisting in the Army? What if Mom and Dad had saved enough money for Jack to go to college? What if Jack were still alive?

It's the kind of thing you think about when life doesn't go as you planned. What if, what if, what if.

After the shower I went into my room. I picked up the ball sticks that were resting on the bed. I decided to do some digging.

I turned on my laptop and clicked on my Internet browser. When the tribe installed cable TV in our neighborhood, they also included Internet access. I navigated to the Wikipedia site and typed “Mississippi Choctaw Stickball” in the search field.

A page came up that had several paragraphs on the game, along with an old picture. I read about the history of the game and saw that other tribes in our area of the country also played the game. This included the Cherokee and Creek tribes.

Then I clicked on a link on that page that said “lacrosse.” That took me to another Wikipedia page about this modern game. It said that some of the tribes in the northern part of the United States play stickball with one stick. That game has a longer stick with a bigger net. French explorers saw Native people playing this game more than two hundred years ago and brought it back to
France. From there it became the worldwide sport known as lacrosse.

After a short while, Mom came into my room to talk.

“Randy, I'm sure you're a little curious about what's going on with your father.”

“Yeah, I guess,” I said.

“His mind is sort of stuck. He can't move on with life. And he gets these headaches. They sort of flash through his brain. He can't see for a minute or two,” Mom explained. Her voice was filled with worry.

“Those things sound serious,” I replied.

“I've finally talked him into seeing a doctor, a specialist, about it. So he can get help.”

“What kind of doctor?” I asked.

“Two different doctors, actually. First, a brain specialist to see about the headaches. The other one is a doctor for the mind. He's called a psychologist.”

“I've heard of that,” I said. “Does that mean Dad's crazy?”

Mom laughed. “No, not at all,” she said. “Lots of people have trouble with something
that's happened in their lives. Maybe they get depressed. Or have trouble controlling their emotions. Things like that.”

“Okay. I get it,” I replied.

“There may be some medicine your father can take that will help him,” Mom said. “We won't know until he sees the doctors in a few days. In the meantime, we need to try to be patient with him. Okay?”

“Sure. No problem.”

I needed to think about all this, so I told Mom I was going for a walk in the woods behind our house. The outdoors always had a way of clearing my head and making me feel better.

I followed the path I always took. I had no idea who or what created the path. It was just there, winding its way through the trees. These woods were filled with jackrabbits, squirrels, and all types of birds. They scattered and hid when people showed up. Too bad.

I kind of wished I knew more about the plants and animals that lived there. When I was little, my grandma would tell me that
we Choctaws had a use for every plant in the forest. And we knew every animal that walked on the land. But she got really sick. She asked for certain herbs from the woods that could heal her, but nobody knew what they were. If someone in our family had known what those plants looked like, she might have lived.

Thinking about Grandma made me remember Mr. Isaac. Who was that old man and where did he disappear to? I had heard some strange stories about old Indian beliefs. Things you couldn't explain. Some people called them mysteries.

The next Monday I was back at school and in my homeroom class. Mrs. Sanford was telling us what she expected us to do the coming week.

The classroom door opened and in walked Principal Gilroy. Uh-oh, I thought. They've come for me.

“Sorry to interrupt,” Mr. Gilroy said. “I need to borrow the Cheska boy for a few minutes.”

Mrs. Sanford really had no choice. She nodded and the principal signaled to me. “Coach Boles and I would like to have a few words with you,” he said. I followed him out the door.

The coach was already waiting in Mr. Gilroy's office.

“Randy, so good to see you,” the coach said. “Have you been thinking about which sport you want to play for us?”

“Can I see a list of sports you have available?” I asked. “I haven't had time to think about it. I've really been busy getting used to high school.”

“Oh,” Mr. Gilroy said. “Coach, give Randy our list of sports. He needs to be fully informed before he can make his decision.”

The coach left for a few minutes and came back with a computer printout from the school athletics department. I took the paper from him and gave it a quick look. There were seven team sports on the list. Of course the big three were there: football, basketball, and baseball. But also softball, soccer, track, and even golf. No stickball.

“I'll take this list with me so I can think it over,” I said. “Give me a week.”

“All right,” the coach replied. He wasn't too happy about it. “A week. But no longer. We need to get you started with workouts and practices right away.”

“Sure,” I said and left as quickly as I could. I needed to stall for time. I had to think of a way to tell them I wasn't interested in any of the sports on their list. I wasn't any good at them either. And I had to think about what I was going to tell Dad.

I couldn't talk to Jennifer or her mom about any of this. They might accidentally spill the beans to someone. And that someone might blab to the coach or my dad.

The following Saturday Dad had to work. That made it easy for Mom to take me back to the Red Water Community Center for another game of toli. And Dad wouldn't have to know about it yet.

Charley said he was happy to see me back again for another game. Mom agreed to come and pick me up in about three hours.

James and Mr. Tubby were there, too, all set to go.

“Ready for another beating?” James asked as a taunt.

“You only beat us by one point,” I said sharply. “That's not a beating. That's just squeaking by.”

James smiled. I knew this was part of the fun of it all. Teasing each other.

“We'll just see who's going to beat who this time,” I said with a smile of my own.