“Can we stop?” Lony says, out of breath.
They stop halfway around the parking lot.
“I gotta ask you guys something,” Lony says.
“Just ask then, homie,” Loother says.
“Shut up, Loother. Whatsup, Lony?” Orvil says, looking at Loother.
“I been meaning to ask,” Lony says, “like, what’s a powwow?”
Loother laughs, takes off his hat and hits it against his bike.
“Lony, we’ve seen hella powwows, what do you mean what’s a powwow?” Orvil says.
“Yeah, but I never asked nobody,” Lony says. “I didn’t know what we were looking at.” Lony tugs at the bill of his black-and-yellow A’s cap to pull his head down.
Orvil looks up at the sound of a plane passing overhead.
“I mean, why does everyone dress up, dance, and sing Indian?” Lony says.
“Lony,” Loother says in that way an older brother can take you down by just saying your name.
“Never mind,” Lony says.
“No,” Orvil says.
“Every time I ask questions you guys make me feel stupid for asking,” Lony says.
“Yeah, but, Lony, you ask hella stupid questions,” Loother says. “Sometimes it’s hard to know what to say.”
“Then say it’s hard to know what to say,” Lony says, squeezing his hand brake. He swallows hard, watching his hand grip the hand brake, then leans down to watch the brakes grip the front tire.
“They’re just old ways, Lony. Dancing, singing Indian. We gotta carry it on,” Orvil says.
“Why?” Lony says.
“If we don’t they might disappear,” Orvil says.
“Disappear? Where they gonna go?”
“I mean, like, people will forget.”
“Why can’t we just make up our own ways?” Lony says.
Orvil puts his hand across his forehead the same way their grandma does when she’s frustrated.
“Lony, you like the taste of Indian tacos, right?” Orvil says.
“Yeah,” Lony says.
“Would you just make some food up of your own and eat it?” Orvil says.
“That actually sounds pretty fun,” Lony says, still looking down but smiling a little now, which makes Orvil laugh, and say the word stupid in the middle of his laugh.
Loother laughs too, but he’s already looking at his phone.
They get back on their bikes, then look up and see lines of cars streaming in, hundreds of people getting out of their cars. The boys stop. Orvil gets off his bike. These are other Indians. Getting out of their cars. Some of them already in full regalia. Real Indians like they’d never seen before if you didn’t count their grandma, who they probably should count, except that it was too hard for them to tell what was specifically Indian about her. She was all they knew besides their mom, who’s too hard to think about or remember. Opal worked for the post office. Delivered mail. She liked to watch TV when she was home. Cook for them. They didn’t know much else about her. She did make fry bread for them on special occasions.
* * *
—
Orvil pulls at the nylon straps of his backpack to tighten it and lets go of the handlebars, lets the front wheel wobble, but balances by leaning back. In the backpack is the regalia that barely fits, his XXL black hoodie, which was too big for him on purpose, and three now squished peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in ziplock plastic baggies he hopes they won’t have to eat, but he knows they might have to if the Indian tacos are too expensive—if food prices are anything like the food at A’s games when it’s not dollar night. They only knew about Indian tacos because their grandma made them for their birthdays. It was one of the few Indian things she did. And she was always sure to remind them that it’s not traditional, and that it comes from lacking resources and wanting comfort food.
To be sure they’d at least be able to afford an Indian taco each, they rode their bikes up to the fountain behind the Mormon temple. Loother had just been there for a field trip to Joaquin Miller Park, and he said people threw coins in for wishes. They made Lony roll up his pants and gather all the coins he could see, while Orvil and Loother threw rocks at the community building at the top of the stairs above the fountain—a distraction they didn’t see at the time might have been worse than the fountain scraping itself. Going down Lincoln Avenue after that was one of the best and stupidest things they’d ever done together. You could get going so fast down a hill there was nothing else happening in the whole world but the feeling of the speed moving through you and the wind in your eyes. They went to Bayfair Center in San Leandro and scraped out what they could from that fountain before being chased off by a security guard. They took the bus up to the Lawrence Hall of Science in the Berkeley Hills, where there was a double fountain, which they knew would be practically untouched because only rich people or monitored kids on field trips went to that place. After rolling up all the coins and turning them in at the bank, they came away with a total of fourteen dollars and ninety-one cents.