The Round House

by Louise Erdrich

the old days when Indians could not practice their religion—well, actually not such old days: pre-1978—the

Sometimes we square-danced, said Mooshum, our highest Mide’ priest was a damn fine caller.

The old ceremonial place had told me—cried out to me in my mother’s anguished voice, I now thought,

the rapist—except I didn’t use that word: I used attacker—the

There are Indian grandmas who get too much church and Indian grandmas where the church doesn’t take, and who are let loose in their old age to shock the young.

Maybe we should leave this to the police, I said. If we tell them, then we have to say we were here, said Zack. They will figure out that I listen to Vince’s radio and phone calls. I’ll be in deep shit.

That I had said those words now made me furious and that my father had not responded singed my soul. A red cloud of anger floated up over my eyes.

The kitchen was a shambles, so they’d probably fixed themselves a snack.

But the round house. Symbol of the old pagan ways. The Metis women. Setting it all on fire together—the temptation and the crime all burned up as in a fire offering

It sounded like Dad put a dish or two in the sink, but then quit cleaning.

Even when one of my parents had the flu or a cold, they slept in the same bed. They never sought protection from each other’s illnesses.

my father hadn’t even made sure I was home. He’d forgotten all about me. I lay in my bed, sleepless, outraged.

wanted to move back through time and stop her from returning to her office that Sunday for those files. I kept thinking how easily I could have gotten in the car with her that afternoon.

The file itself. No one had mentioned it. Why had she gone back for a file?

There’d been a call and the sound of her voice answering the call. And then she’d walked around, cleaning things, clattering dishes, agitated, though I hadn’t connected it with the call until now.

But the patient recognition with which she watched, not barking, wakened me entirely.

Where do you think I slept last night? On the couch, he said, surprised. You were snoring your fool head off. I covered you up with a blanket. Oh, I said.

The ghost was standing at the edge of the yard, I said. It looked almost like a real person. Yes, they’re out there, my father answered.

Either he had purposely not cared to quiet my fear by challenging me, or he had not listened to me at all. And had he really covered me with a blanket?

She would have said to watch for that ghost. It could be trying to tell you something.

The air was heavy with her breath, as if she’d sucked out the oxygen.

Can’t you . . . come back to life? No, she said immediately, as if she’d thought about this too. I can’t do it. I don’t know why. I just cannot do it.

You can’t stop me because you’re here in bed. You can’t get out. You’re trapped in here. And it stinks. Do you know it stinks in here?

Who is he? You have no idea. None. You don’t know. And you never will.

I had a sense that she knew who had done the thing. For sure, she was hiding something. That she knew who did it was a kick in the stomach.

At this point im wondering why she's not thinking hes going to try to murder her again. This better not be Joe's bio dad with the file as evidence

Also, I am pretty certain that if I did tan your hide the hiding wouldn’t work. In fact, it might set your mind against me. It might cause you to do things secretly.

wanted all of a sudden nothing else but to escape from my father, and my mother too, rip away their web of guilt and protection and nameless sickening emotions.

I was allowing the tree to help me think.

To refuse to shake a person’s hand on the reservation was like wishing them dead.

the white man appeared and drove them down into the earth, which sounded like an Old Testament prophecy but was just an observation of the truth.

to be afraid of entering the cemetery by night was to fear not the loving ancestors who lay buried, but the gut kick of our history,

grabbed up a heavy stick, thinking of how Pearl hated it, and why.

:(

So that’s how we finally saw Alien—standing at the window behind the young priest we suspected of an unspeakable crime.

Besides that there was the deft speed with which he’d caught Angus, the free weights beside the television, the fancy Michelob. It was almost enough to make a boy want to be a Catholic.

Lol

And here was the thing I didn’t understand then but do now—the loneliness. I was right, in that there was just the three of us. Or the two of us. Nobody else, not Clemence, not even my mother herself, cared as much as we did about my mother. Nobody else thought night and day of her. Nobody else knew what was happening to her. Nobody else was as desperate as the two of us, my father and I, to get our life back. To return to the Before.

Huh bthats kind of objectifying

Those long fingernails on the stubby fingers suddenly struck me as sinister, though they were painted an innocent pink.

fighting weapon.

As opposed to a peace weapon?

The rain was that endless, gray, pounding kind of rain that makes your house feel cold and sad even if your mother’s spirit isn’t dying right upstairs.

When you are little, you do not know that you are screaming or crying—your feelings and the sound that comes out of you is all one thing.

You’re gonna see things sometimes, Mom told me once. Your soft spot stayed open longer than most babies. That’s how spirits get in.

A view of disability thats neutral and not bad

When I asked why she’d blamed me, Sheryl gave a hateful look, and said, Because you’re white. I didn’t hold anything Sheryl did then against her, and we became close later on.

But I didn’t want to know anything about them. Why would I? Everything I did know hurt and I have always avoided pain—which is maybe why I’ve never married or had children.

I’ve noticed people on the reservation don’t go toward women of her sort—I can’t say why. A mutual instinct for avoidance, I guess.

Linden Lark’s kidney failure is his own fault. He’s had not one but two restraining orders taken out against him. He also tried to suicide with a massive dose of acetaminophen, aspirin, and alcohol.

I knew their lives so well. Their habits. Every detail. I could have committed the perfect murder, you know?

Nothing against you, he said. This was my mother’s idea. I don’t want your kidney. I have an aversion to ugly people. I don’t want a piece of you inside me. I’d rather get on a list.

He gave to charity cases, and sometimes he decided on a whim, I guess, that I needed his charity.

he cracked again, or so I heard. Cracked? I asked. What do you mean by that? He did things, said Linda.

Damn it wouls ave been more noble to lwt him die lol

He also had an ice chipper, a hoelike instrument with a blade that ran straight down instead of curving over. He sharpened this one with a file until it was so keen it could easily slice off a toe.

He gon murder somebody

It’s not a ghost, then, Mooshum said. What is it, then? Someone’s throwing their spirit at you. Somebody that you’ll see.