Landreaux needed the pickup to haul tipi poles, hay bales. He needed it for dump runs or just to be a man. But he made Emmaline drive the pickup to work because it was safer, and he took the magic Corolla—the car that would not die. They had inherited the Corolla when Emmaline’s mother moved into the nursing home. Beyond the suggested upkeep, which Landreaux himself could do, the car never broke down. Compared with the other cars he’d had in his life, this car seemed mystically dependable. It was a drab gray color and the seats were worn, the padding crushed. Landreaux couldn’t push the driver’s seat back far enough to accommodate his long legs, but he liked driving it. Especially after the first snowfall, when he put on the snow tires, he took pleasure in growling around on the back roads to visit his clients.
Ottie Plume, a foot lost to diabetes, lived with his wife, Baptiste, a few miles out of town on a coveted section of the lake. Bap didn’t want her husband in the rehab, so Landreaux came over there to do physical therapy, shower, toilet, count pills, give shots, feed, trim nose and ear hair, clip nails, massage Ottie, and swap bits of gossip with the two. He also drove Ottie to dialysis and stayed with him while he got recirculated.
Bap opened the door when Landreaux tapped.
I didn’ know if you’d show up, she said.
Life stops for nothing, even what I done, said Landreaux, and his saying it like that, taking it on, calmed Bap. She called into the other room.
He showed up, Ottie!
She stayed, though she’d ordinarily have left to do her own things while Landreaux worked with Ottie. Landreaux knew they’d been discussing him and that Bap was staying so she could tell her relatives how Landreaux behaved. What signs he showed. Emmaline said it would be tough going back to work. The story would be around him for the rest of his life. He would live in the story. He couldn’t change it. Even LaRose won’t change it, she said.
But Landreaux knew that wasn’t exactly true. LaRose had already changed the story.
Oh, I’m glad you’re here, said Ottie. His brown-gold cherub face, round and worn by suffering, brightened. Once a powerful wrestler, Ottie hadn’t quite softened. His pounds went on sleek, like seal fat. Most people in his family had died more quickly of diabetes’ complications.
I was saying to Bap, life don’t quit.
It don’t quit until it does, said Ottie. I managed a shit on my own the other day. Nearly fell off the fucken stool.
Jeez, Ottie, said Bap.
Let’s get it done, said Landreaux, wheeling Ottie down the short hall.
The tribe had sprung for a disability bathroom and Ottie had a shower chair. After Landreaux helped Ottie into the chair, he scrubbed Ottie’s back and hosed him off. The door opened a crack. Bap’s arm came through with a set of clean clothes. When they came out to the kitchen, there were blueberry pancakes with fake maple syrup, cooked up with powdered commodity eggs. Landreaux could taste the familiar flat chemically dry eggish quality and the aspartame over the maple. It was good.
So how’s everybody dealing? Bap sat back from the table. She was a small, husky woman who still kept up the fiction that she was jealous as hell of other women, had to keep them from pursuing Ottie. She wore makeup all the time for Ottie. Eye shadow a different color for each day of the week. It was Purple Tuesday. She pulled her hair back in a scrunchie and sprayed her bangs in a massive pout over her plucked-skinny eyebrows. Her nails were lacquered an innocent pink. One finger tapped her lips.
Maybe I shouldn’t say nothing. Keep my trap shut?
Nah, said Landreaux.
Emmaline was her cousin.
You’re family, he said.
Emmaline’s real strong, said Bap.
Real strong, said Landreaux. His head began to buzz. I wanna establish a fund, you know? When they get better, when our families get more healed.
Bap and Ottie nodded warily, as if they might be asked to contribute.
Everybody makes a fund up now, said Bap.
Me, said Ottie, I know this is a sad time. But when I go, I want my fund to be a high-heels fund for reservation ladies. I sure like it when Bappy dresses up for me and does her thing. I’d like to see a few more ladies make that click sound when they walk. Drives me fucken wild.
Bap took Ottie’s hand in hers.
You don’t need no fund, babydoll. You ain’t gonna die.
Except piece by piece, said Ottie.
Hate diabetes, said Landreaux.
We gotta get him ready for his appointment, said Bap. You gotta test his sugar.
Already done, said Ottie.
Landreaux didn’t say he’d tested Ottie’s sugar when he smelled the pancakes, knowing the carbs would spike Ottie’s blood up no matter how much fake sweetener Bap threw at the problem. They were liable to hallucinate on that aspartame shit, he sometimes thought. He and Ottie were in the car, wheelchair folded in the trunk, before Landreaux realized he’d escaped without really answering Bap’s question about how they were dealing. Ottie had deflected that line of inquiry with his high-heels death fund.
Thanks, he said to Ottie.
For what?
I didn’t know what to say to Bap. How we’re doing. We’re still in that phase where we wake up, remember, wanna go back to sleep.
I spose you won’t never hunt no more.
Burnt my gun. Well, what much of it that would burn.
That don’t do nobody no good, said Ottie. Now who is gonna get your children the protein they need to grow big and strong?
We’ll set snares, said Landreaux. Fry some waboose.
That would be on my diet, said Ottie. I’ll trade you some a them pills you like.
Landreaux didn’t answer.