Please note the people and places mentioned in this story are entirely fictional. Trigger warning: This story touches on residential schools, and MMIWG.
Jake could not believe his luck when he finally bid into the job as a brakie on the passenger run through the whispering pines. Being a straight run it seemed a lot better than switch-dogging the yard, so it was strange nobody with real seniority wanted it. He rarely needed to jump out of the engine to throw switches and even if he did, the train was short enough he could swing up on the ladder of the last car and make it back to engine in a couple of minutes. The conductor might frown if he tracked any mud past the passengers but never said anything. Then again, nobody on this crew said much of anything. It was liked the gloomy run through the trees had stolen their voices.
Wind-a-go was the only whistle stop on the six-hour run up from Carmichael to Sioux River. Once or twice a month the flag would be up and they would hit the brakes to park by the rough platform with its sagging lean-to shelter. A handful of passengers would line up to get off, anxious for a smoke, but the crew had to warn them not to leave the platform since there was not much time for stretching their legs. Often after catching a whiff of the swamp gases the passengers thought better of stepping off the train to light up.
Every now and then, as the train rolled along on narrow ribbons of light running into the setting sun, a small band of women would edge out onto the narrow gangway at the back of the train. Standing in their long dark coats with their ribbon skirts fluttering above their tall moccasins the women would throw small bundles of fruit and nuts into the bushes. They would wipe tears off each other's cheeks and retreat inside before it was fully dark.
Jake asked around at the bunk house but nobody could tell him about the aunties, not even guessing which of the small tribes along the bay they may have come from. The waiter finally told him to stop asking. "Look boy if they are school survivors just let them be. They have been through enough without your white-ass nosiness stirring things up."
Jake was offended. He wasn't like that. His best friend all the way through school had bused into town from the reserve. They hadn't seen much of each other since Tommy did a stint in the penitentiary but they were still friends. He decided the next time he had a furlough in Carmichael he would look up Tommy and his sister. Jake remembered the girl fondly even if Tommy threatened to break his legs if he ever when near her. The visit started out fine, at least until Jake asked about Suzy. Tommy howled like a wounded bear and came after Jake with the only handy weapon, a stout piece of firewood he tried to slam into Jake's head. Tommy's uncle intervened before things got too far out of hand or the neighbours called the cops.
"Haven't you seen the red dresses?" Uncle Kyle asked. At Jake's blank face he explained the commemoration for the missing girls. Five gone in the last two years, two found dead, three still missing, Suzy among them.
"Oh God. I am so sorry." Jake sat on the sagging porch with his head in his hands. He had heard mentions about the murdered-and-missing on the news, but it had seemed like a city problem. If he thought about it at all, he put it down to drugs and maybe bad tricks. Not young girls being taken on their way home from a friend's party. "I'm such and idiot. I don't know why I didn't know."
"Yeah, well you ain't been 'round in a while, now have you," Tommy's muttered from behind him. "At least not since you took up the forest run. And how is that working out for you?"
Jake shrugged. "It's a bit of a strange ride some days. Gloomy."
"I'll bet," Uncle Kyle said. "None of our folks willing take that route. Not ever, but you do it pretty much everyday."
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Scribbles & Prompt Responses
Short StoryThis is a place for short stories and other experiments. Some of these are responses to prompts and/or suggestions from other sites. Nothing too serious.
