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M Y N A M E I S N O T E A S Y
just to keep the general’s wife’s feet warm so the general can go about his business of giving numbered juice to the kids at Sacred Heart School. Sewing just so both boys can stand there in front of Father to fi nd out there’s no possible way Father will ever forgive them for being heathens, even if there were some reason they wanted Father’s forgiveness, which right now, they do not.
Right now both Sonny and Amiq are determined as hell to be the meanest heathens ever, burrowing down into their own dark hides.
Waiting for their time to come.
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PART III
When the Time Comes
1962–1963
Giant chunks of blue green ice drift in the water around us, alive with icy breath.
Along the shore, patches of gray green tundra fl oat off into the mist, as distant as dreams.
When the fl ash of light comes, it’s sharp as a punch, brighter than any sun we’ve ever seen.
And then it’s gone,
and it’s just us, skimming across the smooth black sea, silent as spirits,
pitching our tent in the midnight sun and eating duck soup until our bellies get warm and we dare to ask:
“What about that light?”
Uncle looks down, his face lit like a dark sun in the glow of the fi re.
“Light?”
And all we ever know about that light is that it’s something we aren’t supposed
to talk about, aren’t supposed to remember, but we do.
Maybe it was part of an old story, a story that starts with a nuclear fl ash too bright to
believe, a fl ash that changes
everything.
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Coupons and Bomb Shelters
DECEMBER 1962
CHICKIE
—
If somebody presses the button, the world is going to blow up, and that’s a fact. Th
e Russians have enough atomic bombs
aimed at us to blow our side of the world right off the map, and we have enough bombs aimed at them to destroy their side, too. All it takes is for one person on one side to press the button. Th
e button is red, and it doesn’t matter who presses
it fi rst, because as soon as it gets pressed, the bombs will keep fl ying until the whole world is blown to smithereens.
Th
is is true, and everybody knows it. We practice for the bomb in class by ducking under our desks and putting our heads between our knees, which if you ask me is stupid. What good would it do to have your head between your knees if a bomb blows you up?
Father Flanagan has brought an old magazine story to class with a big picture of an atomic missile on one page. Below that is a photo of President Kennedy, smiling, just like in the portrait we have of him that hangs in the hallway near the 139
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M Y N A M E I S N O T E A S Y
gym. Evelyn thinks President Kennedy is cute. Th
at’s Evelyn
for you.
Father tells Junior to read.
Junior is not a loud reader, but I hear him say it clear: “I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the Earth. . . .”
Junior looks up. “Father?” he says. But Father doesn’t hear him. Father is looking right at me. “What do you think, Chickie? Will the president achieve his goal? Will we beat the Russians to the moon?”
“Alan Shepard already went up into space,” I say. “We’ll beat the Russians for sure.”
Bunna, sitting right behind me, snorts. I turn around and glare at him. Who needs some stupid boy pig-snorting down their neck all the time? Father nods and looks at Bunna.
“Bunna?”
“It’s too late, Father,” Bunna says. “Th
e Eskimos already
beat everybody. Th
ere’s an Iñupiaq shaman who went to the
moon a long time ago.” He leans forward when he says it, drawing out the words like he’s trying to make sure I hear them.
“You know, when I was a boy growing up in Boston, my mother used to tell me stories about the man in the moon,”
Father says. “When you look at the moon, you can even see his face, can’t you?”
Bunna looks at me and makes his eyes go naku, which makes him look even goofi er than normal. I turn around.
Boys are so stupid sometimes.
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C O U P O N S A N D B O M B S H E L T E R S / C h i c k i e But I know about the Iñupiaq shaman who went to the moon. I heard Aaka Mae’s brother tell about it one time.
Swede says it’s just a story, all right, but there are some things Swede does not understand.
“Of course, if President Kennedy succeeds, the man in the moon story will take on a new meaning, won’t it?” Father says.
“If President Kennedy gets a man to the moon, that shaman’s house will have an American fl ag on it,” Bunna whispers.
His words tickle the back of my neck and make me itch.
“Why do we need a man on the moon?” Evelyn asks.
“We gotta
