Page 20 of Uncharted Desires
“Stereotypes and clichés aside, I learned with my grandmother from our Indigenous ancestors,” she said, almost with a sigh.
“What?”
“I’m Native.”
“Like Native American?” He stared at her questioningly. “You don’t really look Native.”
She glanced up at him before averting her gaze. “It’s not like you look Irish,” she said sarcastically.
“Probably because I’m no’ Irish.” He smirked at her, speaking in his best Irish accent.
She pushed at him lightly, not wanting him to fall over from his precariously seated position. “That’s why, right there. I got sick of defending myself because I could pass for White, or people thought I was Jewish, or Hispanic. It just became easier to stay quiet and not openly claim my heritage all the time.”
For the first time, he truly studied her: the high cheekbones, the aquiline nose, the darker shade of her skin, and suddenly he could easily see her proud Native features, not that she needed validation from him, or anyone. “Why not? You are who you are. You shouldn’t let others stop you claiming that just because you may not look the part.”
She sighed, staring off into the distance. “That’s easy for you to say. Too many people try to take ownership of a Native culture they know nothing about, claiming their great-great-great-great-whatever was some Indian princess, which isn’t even true. We don’t have princesses. Besides, I’ve spent most of my life feeling like an outsider looking in. I’m used to it.”
“Why?” West slowly rotated his body and shifted his weight, bringing his face close to hers. It had been a long time since a woman had been open with him, not just being who they thought he wanted them to be. He was seeing her for the first time in all her vulnerability—something she had never done with him before. Not that he hadn’t made their relationship more guarded in the first place.
“My grandmother was orphaned at a young age and was put into an Indian boarding school—those places were awful. If you’ve been paying attention to the news lately there have been a lot of mass graves found at those ‘schools.’” She put her fingers in the air to make air quotes on the word schools. “Places that forced Natives to assimilate into White culture.” Kat’s voice trembled. “My grandma was young, and they whipped all the Native out of her. She still, to this day, is a mix of god-fearing Christian with a complicated relationship with patriotism, who occasionally prays to the Creator but, more often than not, can be found in church on Sunday. The only thing she ever fought back on at first was modern medicine. Together we spent years going to the reservation and learning about tribal medicine.”
Kat nudged his shoulder. A mix of sadness and pride warred within her. “You’re alive because she wanted to learn about the old medicine, and I wanted to go with her. That, and I sucked at the tribal softball tournaments, so medicine seemed the better bet for me.”
She smiled wistfully as she remembered her past. “At first, we went to the powwows and I tried it all. Basket weaving, quilting, cooking, and dancing. I was too old to learn the ceremonial drums, so in the end, I took a deep interest in medicine with my grandma. She eventually found some cousins at a powwow, but she always struggled to fit in with them.”
“She sounds like a remarkable woman.”
Kat shrugged. “She could’ve been, but she married a White army man who drank too much and didn’t embrace her true culture.”
“What about your parents?”
“My dad met my mom in college at a person of color community event. I’m still surprised they even went. There was an entire population of five Indigenous people at their large university. Both are mixed with parents who grew up in boarding schools. My dad was raised completely in White society, so I know nothing about my paternal grandmother who passed away when my dad was two, and my dad died four years ago, so all of that culture is long gone, but I mean, it was the seventies. It was easier if you could pass White, and my parents just went with it, never realizing how both their mothers were just married off to these White men. I loved my grandfathers, but the older I get, the more I realize how complicated those relationships were.”
West had never thought about his race or his background that much. He fully recognized that the music he played was rooted in Black culture and that his musicians were mostly Black. And although he enjoyed learning and developing musically with them, he thought little about the implications of race in his daily life. He acknowledged the world’s problems, but as a privileged White man, he didn't feel it was his place to take the lead on those issues.
The more he was with Kat, the more he was finding he was lacking in a lot of areas, and he didn’t like it. While it may not be his fight, maybe he should be doing more.
“So, what about you?” he asked her.
“What about me?”
“You’re not much different from them. Your parents, I mean. Seems like you’re hiding who you are too.”
“I am not,” she said, anger in her tone.
“Yes, you are. Not once have I ever heard you embrace your culture or who you are. Sounds like you hide behind your Whiteness too.”
“It’s not like that. I grew up in a very blue-collar, middle-class family. I didn’t live the rez experience. I may be that race, but I still don’t grasp all the culture and have had to work hard to learn about a life I’ve missed out on, a life a lot of us have lost. I get weird looks from some people trying to figure out what I am, but to most people, I just always seem tan, have high cheekbones, and a prominent nose. I’m what they call racially ambiguous, and since I didn’t get to grow up in my culture or experience it until high school, I just feel like an imposter. I used to be really proud when I was a kid. But year after year of being told I didn’t look Native wore me down.”
“I’m the last person who should say anything about this, but just be who you want to be, Kat. You’ve clearly worked hard to understand your culture and your people, to get back to your roots. You just saved my life with a bunch of plants, for fuck’s sake, so next time you feel like an imposter, just remember that.”
Kat looked down, and he lifted her chin. She’d mastered the art of hiding, and it had extended all the way to her culture. Hell, she had been hiding behind him for years. He just didn’t know how to help her.
“Promise me you’ll remember how badass you are,” he said.
Kat nodded.
“Good girl.” His hand moved up her face and cradled it in his palm. He was captivated once again by the swirling colors in her eyes.