Coyote's Song, page 1
Coyote’s Song
GAIL ANDERSON-DARGATZ
Coyote’s Song
Copyright © 2012 Gail Anderson-Dargatz
First published in 2012 by Grass Roots Press
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.
Grass Roots Press gratefully acknowledges the financial support for its publishing programs provided by the following agencies:
the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund and the Government of Alberta through the Alberta Foundation for the Arts.
Grass Roots Press would also like to thank ABC Life Literacy Canada for their support. Good Reads® is used under licence from ABC Life Literacy Canada.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Anderson-Dargatz, Gail, 1963-
Coyote’s song / Gail Anderson-Dargatz.
(Good reads series)
ISBN: 978-1-926583-83-9 (Print)
ISBN: 978-1-927499-44-3 (ePub)
ISBN: 978-1-927499-45-0 (Kindle)
I. Readers for new literates. I. Title.
II. Series: Good reads series (Edmonton, Alta.)
PS8551.N3574C69 2012 428.6’2 C2012-902310-8
Printed and bound in Canada.
For my friends in the Shuswap
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Discover Canada’s Bestselling Authors
Good Reads Series
Tribb’s Troubles
About The Author
Chapter One
Coyote still walks this earth, stirring up trouble for us. I know that for a fact. He sure stirred up trouble for me.
Coyote is that trickster spirit my granny told me about. He was the most important of the animal spirits in my people’s stories. My people are one of the many First Nations who live in British Columbia. My ancestors were here long before anyone came from Europe or anywhere else.
Granny said the Old One, the Great Spirit my people believed in, put Coyote on this earth to help make things right. Coyote gave my people salmon and taught us how to catch them, for example. But Coyote also loved to play tricks on people, just like he did on me.
One minute I was happy enough. I was married to a decent guy and had a wonderful daughter. I liked being a stay-at-home mom. The next minute, well, let’s just say Coyote turned my life upside down.
I first saw Coyote at the big Roots and Blues Festival in the town of Salmon Arm. This festival attracts musicians and crowds from all over.
But I didn’t know the animal I saw at the festival was the Coyote spirit. At first, I thought it was a dog. Then I thought it was an ordinary coyote. But I soon found out how wrong I was.
My daughter Rose and I stood in front of a festival stage. We listened to Fred Penner, who played his guitar and sang for the children. My daughter danced to his music with some of the other kids in the crowd.
Young Rose was already a performer, like me. She loved to dress up. She loved to dance and sing, just as I once had.
Rose would start kindergarten in a month, in September. The thought of my daughter starting school made me sad. I would be all alone at home during the day. I wasn’t sure what I would do with my time. Sometimes I wasn’t sure who I was anymore. I was “Mommy,” I was Rob’s wife, and I liked being both. But what about me, Sara?
My daughter looked like me. She had the same long, dark hair. She had my dark brown eyes. Her high cheekbones were the same as mine. She also had my long arms and legs, a dancer’s body.
I took a photo of my daughter as she lifted her arms and danced to the music. Then I saw an animal trotting towards me through the crowd. It was a dog—no, it was a coyote. The other people at the music festival didn’t seem to see it. The coyote sat in front of the stage and looked at me.
“Do you see that?” I asked my daughter. I pointed at the coyote. But Rose watched the singer on stage. I couldn’t pull her attention away.
I saw coyotes all the time in the fields and on the golf course. I saw them in my backyard on the Native reserve where I live. I even saw them in town sometimes, trotting across lawns. But coyotes are wild animals; they run away from people. This one just sat in the middle of the crowd.
I snapped a picture of the coyote with my camera to show my daughter later. Then, through my camera lens, I saw my old friend Jim standing right beside the animal.
Jim and I were in a band years before, when I was in my twenties. The band played country music. Jim was the lead guitarist and singer. I was the backup singer. I hadn’t seen Jim for many years.
In the view screen of my camera, Jim hadn’t aged a day. His hair was black and shiny. His skin was brown and without wrinkles. He looked exactly the same as when I knew him nearly fifteen years before. How was that possible?
I took his picture and lowered my camera. I planned to wave at him. But he disappeared. I checked the photo on my camera screen. Jim wasn’t in the picture I just took. Neither was the coyote.
But the coyote was still standing right there in front of me. Why hadn’t the coyote shown up in my photo? Why hadn’t Jim shown up in the picture? Were they both ghosts?
I knew then that something really strange was happening.
The coyote nodded its head as if to say, “Follow me.” Then it trotted off.
Chapter Two
The coyote wove a path through the festival crowd. Its grey, brown, and yellow fur shone in the sun. Now, I saw that the coyote was a handsome animal. And it was bigger than any coyote I had seen before.
But no one except me seemed to see it. People walked by the coyote as if it wasn’t there. I was surprised that people in the crowd didn’t notice it. Then I lost sight of the animal.
I held out my hand to my daughter. “Come on, honey,” I said. Rose wore a bright red dress. I had picked it out so I could see her easily in the crowd. Her black hair was pretty against the red.
“Where are we going, Mommy?” Rose asked me.
“I just saw an old friend,” I said. “I want to see if I can find him.” I didn’t really believe Jim was a ghost. He had to be there somewhere.
“But Daddy was going to meet us here.” Rob, my husband, had gone to another stage while we watched the children’s show. He said he would return to Fred Penner’s stage to meet us.
“We’ll come right back,” I told Rose.
We made our way through the crowd. But there were so many people. I looked and looked. Finally, I realized I didn’t have a hope of finding Jim.
The music festival was spread over a huge field. Several bands played their music on different stages and under tents. The smell of hamburgers and fries floated through the air from the many food stands.
“I’m hungry,” Rose said.
“All right,” I said. “Let’s go find Daddy. Then we’ll grab some lunch.”
My daughter and I turned to go back to the stage where the children’s performer played. But I immediately bumped into Rob. He was following us, trying to catch up.
“Are you looking for me, Sara?” Rob grinned. He was sweating a little. The summer heat gave his handsome brown face a nice glow. He wore jeans and a T-shirt that showed off the muscles in his arms and shoulders.
“I thought I saw Jim in the crowd,” I said. “I went to find him.”
“Who?”
“Jim was the lead singer in that band I was in. We sang together in bars and clubs all over the province.”
“You dated this guy?”
“No. We were just friends.”
I did have a crush on Jim back then, though. Maybe I was even in love with him. But that was a long time ago.
“I take it that he didn’t see you,” Rob said.
“I’m not sure he would recognize me. He hasn’t seen me for years.”
Fred Penner started another song for the children. So we all went to watch the rest of the show. Rose danced in front of us, twirling in circles. Her red dress spread out around her as she whirled.
“Did you see that coyote running around?” I asked my husband.
“You saw a coyote? Here?” Rob laughed. “You probably just saw somebody’s dog.”
“No, it was a coyote,” I said.
“Maybe someone has one for a pet,” my husband suggested.
“Maybe,” I said. But I wondered if the animal was even real. The coyote hadn’t shown up in my photos. Could it have been the Coyote spirit from my grandmother’s stories?
I pointed my camera to take a few more pictures of Rose. Through the camera lens I saw the coyote sitting in front of the stage again! My old friend Jim stood beside the coyote. But when I lowered my camera, Jim was gone. The coyote was still there, though.
I looked over the crowd, trying to see Jim. But he had disappeared. The coyote nodded its head, once again telling me to follow. Then it trotted off.
“Can you watch Rose for a minute?” I asked Rob.
“What’s going on?”
I didn’t try to explain. If I told my husband I was following
Chapter Three
The coyote started to run. I ran after it, bumping into people as I went. Then the coyote was just gone! I stopped to look for it and found myself in front of another stage.
A band played country music there. I glanced up and saw my old friend Jim on stage. The coyote had led me right to him. That was so strange, I laughed out loud.
Jim played his guitar as a drummer kept the beat behind him. Another musician played bass guitar. They didn’t have a backup singer. The band was just the three men.
Jim stepped forward to the microphone and sang a love song he had written. The song was one of the old tunes he and I had performed all those years ago.
When I pushed though the crowd to the stage, he looked down at me as he sang. But I could tell he didn’t recognize me. Even back in the old days, he would often sing a song to one woman in the audience. This time he picked me.
All the same, the hair on my arms stood up. I felt as if I had made him appear, created him with my thoughts. Or as if the Coyote spirit had.
I stood there in front of the stage for three more songs. Then Jim announced that the band would take a short break. I waited by the stage while the crowd left.
Jim took the stairs down from the stage and headed towards me. He was probably on his way to grab some lunch at one of the hamburger stands. I could tell he still didn’t recognize me, not at first. I almost let him pass by without saying hello.
But then he smiled at me as he went by.
“Jim,” I said. “Is that really you?”
He turned and paused. “Sara?”
Neither of us knew what to say for a moment. Then he said, “Look what time has done to us.”
That hurt. I was feeling middle-aged. I had put on a little weight during my pregnancy with Rose. I never lost those pounds. And I had just found my first few grey hairs.
I knew I didn’t look like the young woman Jim once knew. Time had changed me. That was why I almost let him walk by.
Then I realized that Jim might feel the same way. He, too, had gained a little weight, and his face had softened with middle age. He wasn’t the young guy I had seen on my camera screen back at the children’s stage.
But until the moment he spoke to me, I hadn’t noticed he had grown older. While he played guitar and sang on stage, he was that young Jim. He was the musician I had known fifteen years before. I felt as if no time had passed at all.
“I heard your music on the radio,” I said. “And I saw you on TV once, talking about a new CD.”
“That must have been some time ago,” he said. “I haven’t released any new tunes for a while.”
He grinned at me and took my hand. When he did that, I felt all my old feelings for him flood back. “Gosh, it’s good to see you again,” he said.
I looked down at Jim’s hand holding mine. Jim’s hand was warm and soft, so unlike my husband’s rough hands. I noticed Jim wasn’t wearing a wedding ring.
“It’s good to see you, too,” I said. I tried to make my voice sound calm. I tried to hold in the excitement I felt at seeing Jim again. I was, after all, a married woman.
“So, what have you been up to?” he asked. “Are you still singing? You were always writing songs when we were on the road. But then you would never show them to me.”
“I didn’t want you to see them,” I said. “I knew they weren’t all that great.” I hesitated before telling him the truth of the matter. “I wanted to impress you,” I said. “I had a crush on you.”
In fact, I now knew that I had loved him back then. Then I realized that maybe I still did.
Chapter Four
Jim still had the rugged good looks that set the men of the Cowichan Tribes apart. The Cowichan Tribes is the name of a First Nations band on Vancouver Island. Jim grew up on the island, in Duncan, which calls itself the “City of Totems.” Last I heard, he had returned there.
“You still on Vancouver Island?” I asked him.
“Only when I’m not touring with the band,” he said. “These days I don’t get home much.”
“That’s good news, right?” I asked. “Your band must be doing well.”
“We play bars and clubs mostly,” he said. “This gig, this job at the Roots and Blues Festival, is a big one for us. How about you? Where are you living?”
“On the Lightning Bay Reserve. You remember Jenny Moses?”
“Sure.”
“We’re in her old place.” I glanced at the children’s area. “Were you over at Fred Penner’s stage just a few minutes ago?” I asked him. “I saw you there, in the children’s area. I tried to catch up to you, but I couldn’t find you.”
Jim shook his head. “You must have seen someone else. I’ve been on stage with my band for the last hour or so.”
“Now I know Coyote is playing tricks on me,” I said. The Coyote spirit had shown me Jim was there, and then led me to him.
“What was that?” Jim asked me.
“Nothing,” I said. I laughed. “I just feel so strange running into you here.”
“Hey,” Jim said. “Why don’t you join us on stage after the break, for old time’s sake? We sing a lot of the old songs.”
“Oh, I don’t think so,” I said. “I’m not dressed for getting up on stage.”
I looked down at myself. I had dressed up a little for our day at the festival, but these weren’t stage clothes. I wore a pretty cotton skirt and a T-shirt. I noticed my sandals were dusty from the festival grounds. I was glad I had at least painted my toenails that morning.
“You look great!” Jim said. “Beautiful, in fact.” He grinned at me. From the way he looked at me, I knew he was telling the truth. He did find me beautiful. All at once I felt like my young self again.
But I shook my head. “I haven’t sung on stage for years,” I said.
“You remember the old songs, right?” Jim asked.
“Sure, I do” I sang them all the time in the shower. But I hadn’t been in front of an audience for a long time. My daughter and my husband were the only ones who heard me sing now.
“Come on,” said Jim. “You know you want to.”
I did want to. The idea of singing on stage again with Jim thrilled me.
“I have to run it by my husband,” I said. “He’ll have to take care of our daughter. I’m not sure how he’s going to feel about that. We don’t get a lot of days together as a family. Rob must be wondering where the hell I’ve got to by now.”
“So you’re married?” Jim looked disappointed.
“And we’ve got a daughter named Rose,” I said. “Did you ever get married?”
“No,” he said. “But I’m tired of living alone. I’d like to find someone.”
I looked into his face a moment. “I’m sure you will find someone,” I said.
“It’s hard to keep a romance going when you’re on the road,” Jim said.
I knew he was right. Shortly after I married Rob, I gave up touring. I no longer took singing jobs in other towns. I quit because Rob and I fought every time I came back from a gig away from home.
Rob wasn’t jealous of other guys I might meet on the road. He trusted me. He just wanted me home. So I only took local gigs where I could come back to the house every night. I gave up singing altogether when I got pregnant with Rose.
“I’ll go let Rob know what I’m up to,” I said.
“Meet me back at the stage?”
I nodded. This was too good a chance to pass up. I was going to sing at the Roots and Blues Festival! But I knew I was in for a fight with my husband over it.
Chapter Five
I was right. I caught up with Rob and Rose back at the children’s area. When I told my husband that I wanted to sing with Jim’s band, he hated the idea.
“But we never get to spend a day together as a family,” Rob said. “You’ve been complaining about that for months. Now you want to take off on us?”
During his work week, my husband and I hardly saw each other. Rob worked as a faller for a logging crew. He spent his days running a chainsaw, cutting down trees. The work was dangerous. A tree had fallen on his buddy and broken the man’s back.
