“Are you okay?” His voice rolls over me, deep and husky with the slightest trace of a drawl. Texas, maybe? Did he come all the way from Texas to join us?
“Uh, yeah.” I rub my eyes again. “I will be.”
I’m dragged back, figuratively, also literally, kicking and screaming, into this nightmare scene with frothy-mouthed dogs and masked cops wielding tear gas.
“Shit!” The curse comes from my right, and a grimace of pain skitters across the face of Jason Paul, one of the protesters and my teacher from fourth grade. He struggles to shake his hand free of a dog’s lockjaw bite. My heart leaps to my throat when a growling dog comes right for me. The really tall, great-smelling guy jerks me back and out of harm’s way, but gets bitten on the arm himself before the cop jerks on the leash. I don’t have time to thank him for sparing me or to apologize that he got caught in the cross teeth, as it were. I’m shoved forward, my arms wrenched behind me, plastic handcuffs drawn tight at my wrists.
“What are you doing?” I shout over my shoulder at the officer cuffing me. “This is a peaceful protest. We have every right to be here.”
“Private property, lady,” he murmurs close to my ear, spite slickening his voice. “Apparently your permits weren’t in order.”
“This is a mistake,” Tall and Good-Smelling says when they slip plastic cuffs on him, too.
“You’ll get a chance to have your say.” The officer shoves him toward a police van. “Call your lawyer.”
“Trust me. You don’t want my lawyer involved,” the guy says, his voice as cutting as the glance he shoots the cop. “Let me go. Let them go, and don’t give me that shit about permits. I know what this is.”
“This,” the officer says, pushing the guy’s head down to clear the van, forcing him inside, “is you having the right to remain silent.”
Six of us fill the benches lining the van interior, three on either side and facing each other. The cops give us bottles of water to flush the tear gas from our eyes as much as possible. We prepared for this moment, but I don’t think any of us actually expected to be arrested. Even if we had, none of us would have done anything differently. Everyone in this van has a vested interest in what happens with that pipeline. It would endanger the reservation’s water supply. It would desecrate sacred burial grounds. We all grew up drinking from that stream. Dipping in it for ceremonies that mark pivotal moments in our lives. Each of us has a reason to be here.
Except him.
Now that we’re not surrounded by dogs and choking on tear gas, I study him more closely. In all the confusion, I only had time for a general impression of hotness, but now with us both shackled in the paddy wagon, I have all the time for a closer examination. Or at least as long as it takes to get to the police station.
He has one of those magazine faces. Not exactly like a model, but a “someone” face. An “I should know you” face. It’s not about how handsome he is, really. Though, I can’t overstate the impact of dark, mahogany-dusted hair licking around his ears and down his neck. Or his green eyes, the color of the peridot stone we mine in our holy hills. Precious metal eyes. And seriously. The Creator must have used a protractor to achieve a jaw so perfectly angular. But there’s something more, like if you get caught up in that face and what is, admittedly, a fantastic physique, all lean muscles and a “from here to there” chest, you’d be missing the whole point of him.
“So you came al
l the way from Cali for this?” I ask, nodding to the Berkeley T-shirt straining across his pecs.
“Uh, yeah.” He shifts in his seat.
“That’s great that people all across the country are hearing about the pipeline,” Mr. Paul says, smiling at magazine-face man. “And coming to stand with us. Thank you.”
“Yeah,” he says again. “So how long have you guys been fighting, um . . . Cade on this?”
He spreads the question to all five of us, but I answer first.
“Last year, Senator Middleton sold the property to Cade Energy,” I offer, gritting my teeth. “Of course, as usual, disregarding that it was supposed to be protected. Not theirs to actually sell.”
“Their promises,” Mr. Paul says, with a bitter twist to his lips, “are worth no more than the paper every treaty they’ve ever broken was written on. Senator Middleton got this pipeline passed by tacking it on at the last minute to another bill that already had support.”
“It was done before we even knew about it,” I add. “We started organizing immediately, but at every turn, Cade has politicians, the Army Corps of Engineers, local police, everyone on his side and in his pocket. The worst part is he could re-route this thing.”
“What makes you say that?” Berkeley T-shirt asks.
“The original proposal ran the pipeline near a suburb about ten miles north,” I answer, “not near a water supply or anything, but the people there didn’t want it. So guess what? They didn’t get it. They didn’t even have to protest. Just said no.”
“Guess their voices are louder than ours,” Mr. Paul mutters.
“Basically, environmental racism.” Berkeley T-shirt sighs and shakes his head.
“No, exactly environmental racism,” I correct. “But we won’t take it.”
“We’re not going anywhere. We know how to last,” Mr. Paul says, a proud set to his head. “We were the last tribe to surrender. We have warrior in our blood.”
“What do you mean?” Berkeley asks.