UnDivided (Unwind Dystology 4)

“No,” says Lev, happy for the unintentional setup. “This is the nightmare.” Then he reaches into his backpack and pulls out sets of bound printouts. Reams and reams of paper as heavy as phone books. He quickly hands them out to Chief Quanah and the council members all around him. “The names of the unwound are public record, so I was able to access them. In these pages are the names of everyone subjected to ‘summary division’ since the Unwind Accord was signed. You can’t look at all of those names and not feel something.”

“We never signed the Unwind Accord, and never will,” says one of the elders. “Our consciences are clear—which is more than I can say for you.” He points a crooked finger. “We took you in two years ago, and then what did you do? You became a clapper!”

“Only after this council cast me out!” Lev reminds him. It gives everyone pause for thought. Some of the council members leaf through the pages, shaking their hands sadly at the sheer volume of names. Others won’t even look.

To his credit, the chief takes some time to flip through the pages before he says, “The tragedy of unwinding is beyond this council’s control. And our relations with Washington are already strained, isn’t that true, Chal?” The chief looks up to the gallery.

Chal stands to respond. “Tense, not strained,” he offers.

“So why add even more tension by throwing down a gauntlet to the Juvenile Authority?”

And then from a councilman behind Lev, “If we do, other tribes might follow.”

“And they might not,” says the chief with a finality that leaves no room for contradiction.

“There are plenty of people who are against unwinding,” Lev tells the council, no longer addressing just the chief as he was instructed, but turning a slow pirouette, making sure to make eye contact with every council member around him. “But a lot of people won’t speak out because they’re afraid to. What they need is something to rally behind. If the Arápache make a stand against unwinding by giving official sanctuary to AWOLs, you’ll be amazed the friends you’ll find out there.”

“We’re not looking for friends,” shouts one of the elders, angry to the point of spraying spittle as he speaks. “After generations of being abused, all we want is to be left alone!”

“Enough!” shouts Chief Quanah. “We’ll put it to a vote and end this once and for all.”

“No!” Lev shouts. He knows this is too soon for a vote, but the chief, offended by this show of disrespect, leans forward and locks eyes with him.

“It is being put to a vote, and you shall abide by the result, boy. Is that understood?”

Lev casts his eyes downward, humbling himself, giving the chief the respect due him. “Yes, sir.”

The chief raises his voice to a commanding volume. “All in favor of adopting the petition to publicly and officially open the reservation to all Unwinds seeking asylum, affirm with a show of hands.”

Three hands go up. Then a fourth.

“All those opposed?”

Eight hands rise in opposition. And just like that, AWOL hope among the Arápache is lost.

“The petition fails,” the chief says. “However, in light of extenuating circumstances, I move that we officially and publicly accept Levi Jedediah Calder-Garrity as a full-fledged child of the Arápache Nation.”

“That’s not what I asked for, sir.”

“But it’s what you’ve received, so be thankful for it.”

Lev is admitted to the tribe by a unanimous show of hands. Then Chief Quanah instructs the council members to return the books of Unwind names to Lev.

“No, keep them,” Lev says. “When the Cap-17 law falls, and when the Juvenile Authority starts unwinding kids without their parents’ permission, you can add the new names by hand.”

“We will do no such thing,” says the chief, insisting on the last word, “because those things will never happen.” Then he calls for the next petitioner.

• • •

The walls of Lev’s room are undecorated. The furniture is well crafted but understated. The bedroom is just as it was when Lev came to the Tashi’ne home the first time, the same as when he returned six weeks ago. He now knows why he feels so at home here: His soul is a lot like these Spartan walls. He tried to fill the emptiness with the angry graffiti of the clapper, but it washed clean. He accepted being a shining god for the ex-tithes in the Cavenaugh mansion, but that chalky portrait wiped away. He tried to draw himself a hero by saving Connor’s life, but even after he succeeded, he felt no glory, no sense of honorable completion. And he curses his parents for raising him to be a tithe—for no matter how he runs from that destiny, it is imprinted so deep in his psyche that he will never be free of it. He will never feel complete, for there will always be that unwanted, uncomprehending part of himself that can only be completed in his demise. Far worse than his parents disowning him was that: raising him to only find satisfaction in the negation of his own existence.

On the evening of the day Lev fails to change the world in council, Elina comes to his room. She rarely does that, for she is a woman who respects privacy and contemplative solitude. She finds him lying on his stomach atop his tightly made bed. His pillow is on the floor because he doesn’t care enough to pick it up.

“Are you all right?” she asks. “You ate very little at dinner.”

“I just want to sleep tonight,” he tells her. “I’ll eat tomorrow.”

She lingers, sitting down in the desk chair. She picks up the pillow and puts it on the bed, and he turns to face the wall, hoping she’ll just go away, but she doesn’t.