Danny knew bringing Jeff to help with his and Mike’s summer job was a bad idea. They could use the help because the railroad ties were heavy, but Jeff was the kind of kid who was always getting his friends into trouble while avoiding most of the heat himself. If he pulled some stupid shit today and got Big Mike—Mike’s perpetually pissed-off father—mad, that would be the end of the lucrative summer job.

Big Mike had about 100,000 acres of ranch land. Half was on US soil; half was leased from the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. Running through the cream-colored grasslands dotted with cow pies was an abandoned railroad meant to serve the next booming metropolis, Oelrichs. However, the town never materialized. The leftovers of the ghost town had burned to the ground in a grass fire so many years ago that the only thing left was some charcoal and rusty nails around the old foundations.

The boys’ job that summer was to go down the railroad tracks with one of Big Mike’s ranch trucks and pry loose the old ties. Big Mike had a deal with some landscaper who was paying twenty bucks a tie. Big Mike got 10; the boys split the rest into two 5s.

But with Jeff here to help, the math was about to become trickier.

“Hey, so when do we get paid for this?” Jeff asked as the truck bounced along the already stripped section of tracks.

“When my dad hands us the money,” Mike replied. He seemed mostly focused on keeping the truck balanced on the loose spoil he was driving on.

The truck came to a stop, and the boys piled out of it to grab their tools. Jeff was the last to pick a tool, a pickaxe, which he looked at with some confusion.

“You swing it at the spots that are too hard to get with a shovel,” Danny explained with an eye roll.
Mike laughed but was already marching to the next stuck tie in line.

A few backbreaking and infuriating hours later, the boys were interrupted by the sound of an approaching motor. Jeff dropped the pickaxe to watch the dust cloud grow as it approached. Danny and Mike hurried to wrestle the tie they were working on out of the ground. They knew it was Big Mike, and they didn’t want to be caught not working. Jeff didn’t seem to care as he sat on the stack of loose ties to finish watching. Danny knew that tonight he was going to have a long talk with Mike about Jeff and splitting money with him. He hadn’t done shit all morning except distract them every five minutes. He had spent about 10 minutes being useful on a few exceptionally stuck ties, but other than that, Danny couldn’t stop thinking about $5 vs $3.33.

Big Mike came to a sliding stop on the railroad spoil.

“Hey, ladies, pile in. You gotta help me cross some cattle… Who’s the asshole sitting on my money?”
 

“Jeff, he’s helping… for today anyway,” Mike told his dad.

Maybe the talk Danny was going to have to have with Mike wouldn’t be that long after all.

Jeff tossed some rocks at a blackbird, oblivious to the fact that he’d just been fired.

“Huh,” Big Mike grunted and started his truck back up, signaling to the boys it was time to go cross some cattle

.
The herd of cattle waiting to cross the highway to the South Dakota side of the road was massive. It reminded Danny of the history books with all the buffalo blocking out the prairie. It was no surprise that Big Mike was a millionaire. Danny thought that even if he charged 10 bucks a cow, he would have seven figures many times over.

“You two take my truck and go over the hill behind the trailer. There’s a little tin shed full of signs just before the cattle guard. Grab the two signs with those damn blinking orange lights and the two batteries on the charger. They’re the only ones that say ‘CATTLE CROSSING AHEAD,’” Big Mike barked over the purring of his 4-wheeler.
“OK,” Danny said, trying to sound confident. A summer job as a ranch hand would be way more lucrative than prying up old railroad ties.

Jeff looked confused and annoyed.

Big Mike’s truck was a standard, and Danny was struggling to get it into first. He ground the gears and feathered the clutch, but it just wouldn’t engage. The look on Big Mike’s face told him ranch hand work might be a summer or two away. Finally, the gears matched up, and the truck lurched forward.

The signs were exactly where Big Mike said they would be, but as Danny was loading them up, Jeff distracted him again.

“Hey, what the hell is that?” Jeff asked from behind the sign shed.

“What?”

“Uhh, the only patch of green I’ve seen all day.” Jeff was pointing as Danny rounded the corner.
He didn’t need to point.

The dark green patch stuck out like a sore thumb. The eight-foot-tall fence topped with concertina wire didn’t help disguise it.

“I have no idea.” Danny was curious but knew wasting any time investigating it would piss Big Mike off.
Too late.

Jeff was already running down the hill. And, despite his reservations, Danny wasn’t too far behind. Plus, what the hell could it be?

They both vaulted the heavy ag pipe lying on the ground and reached the mystery fence at the same time. They stood shocked at what they were seeing and, in their disbelief, scanned the hills and prairie to make sure they weren’t being watched.

After a lengthy investigation and some evidence gathering, the boys felt giddy. They couldn’t get back to Mike fast enough. The only thing that snapped them out of their trance was the signs. Big Mike had already headed to the far side of the herd to get the cows moving. Danny could almost hear him cussing them as he sat waiting for the crossing signs to finish his day’s work.

The pickup grabbed the gear almost instantly this time, and within a couple of minutes, the boys were back on the South Dakota side of the highway, running up to Mike to tell him the news.

“Dude, you’re not going to believe this,” Danny started excitedly, signs forgotten for the moment.

“WE FOUND A WHOLE FIELD OF POT!” Jeff yelled, even more excited than Danny was.

The other two boys looked at Jeff like he had a dick on his forehead as he stood there holding out two handfuls of fresh pot leaves.

“What?” Jeff looked insulted.

“Why don’t you tell the whole prairie, asshole? I don’t think they heard you down at Prairie Winds,” Danny insulted him, mentioning the bizarre casino that was hidden 10 miles down the road from them.

The casino never made any sense to Danny. There was no drinking because it was on the Reservation. Plus, it was in the middle of nowhere. The closest US town was 30 miles away, and the closest Rez town was even further. The only indication that there was anything around was the highways on the US side. For ten miles leading up to the border of the Reservation, there were millions of beer cans and liquor bottles filling the ditches. The Rez being dry meant booze was illegal. So, visitors to the casino and Indians who liked to drink would all get their fill on the drive over. Then, before crossing the border with contraband, they would toss the evidence out of the window of their car. Danny and Mike had seriously considered putting a cage on one of the ranch trucks so they could collect the cans and trade them in. However, railroad ties paid better.

“Oh, Jesus Christ. You guys didn’t go down there, did you? That’s tribal stuff. They can grow all the pot they want ‘cos it’s not part of the US, so federal laws don’t apply. But the elders hate it and only let the medicine men grow it on patches they hide on the Rez. They only put that one there ‘cos they know my dad, and they know nobody will fuck with it if it’s by his place… at least not any Indians would, but this dumbass.” Mike tossed a handful of rocks at Jeff.

“No way, man, there is a whole entire field. They won’t notice. I just took this.” Jeff’s full hands were still outstretched and full of pot leaves.

The sound of a motor screaming down the highway broke up the argument.

A red car was racing down the highway at what looked like 100 mph. The boys all watched it crest the hill from the US side. Danny only briefly noticed that Big Mike had started crossing the cattle a couple of miles down.
The car never even touched its brakes.

The sound of the impact was sickening. The loud, wet thud hit the boys’ ears the same time they saw a cow get tossed 30 feet in the air. It landed hard, its neck obviously busted, its loose legs spinning against each other. Then four more cows exploded from the pack, tumbling away from the highway. The first cow had absorbed most of the impact, but the vehicle still had plenty of momentum to toss a few more cows aside.

“The signs,” Danny said after the vehicle came to a stop.

Mike looked at the blinking lights in the back of the truck and gave Danny a look that made his throat tight.
“My dad’s going to kill us.”

They could already hear the 4-wheeler weaving its way through the cattle to the wrecked vehicle and dead cows.

“Get in,” Mike ordered.

Jeff, for the first time that day, didn’t have something stupid to say and was already shutting the door to the truck by the time Mike had it in gear. He struggled a bit with the clutch, and it made Danny feel better despite everything else.

“As soon as we hit the highway, you jump out and put a sign out.” Mike was already trying to minimize the blowback.

“Uhhh, are you sure?” Danny asked, not feeling great about messing with a crime scene.
“You want to ask my dad what he wants to do?” Mike asked.

Danny jumped out and spread the sandwich board sign apart so it would support its own weight. He knew it was wrong.

“Hurry up. He’s already at the crash.”

They pulled up in front of what was left of the car less than a minute later. The windshield was busted, and the hood was smashed up, but amazingly, it looked like if you popped the broken glass out, you could probably drive it home.

Big Mike was in the field assessing the cows. This confused Danny until he looked into the driver’s-side window while he approached the scene.

An Indian man was still sitting in the driver’s seat, but his entire face was gone. He had come to such a sudden stop that the top half of the steering wheel had caved in his face. The steering wheel was still stuck in his face all the way back to where his ears should have been. Danny could see brains and blood oozing from the massive hole. The man was dead.

Danny felt dizzy. All he could hear was the drip, plop, drip of the Indian’s memories as they oozed out and gathered on the floor mats of his cheap town car.

“Where the fuck were you boys? And where the fuck is that other sign?”

It was the closest thing to fear or panic that Danny had ever seen on his friend’s dad’s face. He was usually just a prick.

“They couldn’t find the batteries, so they took a while,” Mike lied.

Big Mike didn’t question them further. The look on his face told them that he knew he had fucked up too.
“Well, you and that other moron take that sign up to the crest there… and you help me drag these two off the road. Grab that tow strap and choke their legs. I’ll get the 4-wheeler and pull.” Big Mike was furiously trying to regain control of the situation.

“Aren’t we going to call someone?” Danny asked, feeling bad for the dead man behind them.
Big Mike gave him a look that wasn’t subtle as he unholstered his pistol.

“Of course we are, you fucking idiot, just as soon as Mikey gets that sign put up… now grab that fucking tow strap.” Big Mike pointed to the back of the pickup with his pistol.

Danny couldn’t get away fast enough, and he ran to grab the strap. His breathing was ragged, and his lips felt numb. The world was moving in slow motion for a few seconds, and then everything would catch up in fast forward. The sound of Mike and Jeff leaving to put up the sign terrified him. It meant he was alone with the dead Indian and Big Mike.

CRACK CRACK CRACK

The three reports from the pistol focused Danny’s whirling mind.

He spun around to see Big Mike holstering the pistol and the cow that was now bleeding out from the massive .357 Magnum-sized holes in its head. The tow strap had somehow found its way into his hands, and before he knew it, he was choking the feet of the now-dead cow. The 4-wheeler struggled, but once the cow started moving, it picked up speed quickly until it was no longer on the road.

By the time the road was cleared of cows, the other two boys were back. Mike was gray and sick-looking, but Jeff had his hands jammed into his pockets, probably holding his stolen pot, and had an almost excited look on his face.

“Did you guys use the truck phone to call it in?” Big Mike asked, dismounting from his 4-wheeler.

“Yeah, but they made us call the Rez cops instead, and they said it was going to be a while,” Mike explained with a shaky voice.

“Well, fuck. I guess we just pull the car off the road and get the rest of the cattle across while we wait.” Big Mike was a business-first kind of prick.

They spent the next two hours nervously crossing the cattle, watching and waiting for the Reservation cops to show up. Big Mike was pissed, Mike was quiet, and Jeff couldn’t shut the fuck up. Danny couldn’t tell if it was nerves or if Jeff was just excited about the pot or even the dead Indian. Either way, Danny didn’t think he would be spending much time with him in the future.

By the time the cops showed up, the sun was setting. The blinking yellow lights on the crests of the hills on either side of them were haunting. Each blink reminded Danny that this was his fault. If he hadn’t followed Jeff to the pot field and just hurried with the signs, the Indian man would still be alive, probably.

The Rez cop was even more nonchalant about the dead Indian than Big Mike had been. He walked onto the scene looking annoyed, took a few notes, made a comment about how many drunk drivers had died on this road and that if we were to look at the DNA on the bottles filling the ditches, we’d find the one belonging to the dead guy. Hell, he could even smell the liquor coming from the puddle of blood outside the driver-side door. The last question he had for the group of white men was who had put the cattle crossing signs up.

Big Mike, without hesitation, pointed at Danny.

“He had them out early this morning. Everyone in the county had an 8-hour warning that we’d be crossing ‘em sometime today. Best little ranch hand I ever hired.” Big Mike gave Danny a wink that made him feel slimy.

“That right, boy?” the Indian cop asked Danny with a smile.

The lie stuck in Danny’s throat, so he just nodded in agreement.

Ten minutes later, the Reservation cop was gone. He explained that someone needed to stay at the ranch house and wait for the Tribal coroner in case he had trouble finding the body. The cop turned on the hazard lights on the dead Indian’s car before leaving and tied a piece of crime scene tape to the mirror.

Danny was shocked that they were just going to leave the body on the side of the road, but Big Mike explained that sometimes they just did stuff differently on the Reservation. He also explained that he had to get home for a meeting with the county commissioners in the morning about noxious weeds. This meant that Mike had to stay at the ranch trailer and wait for the coroner.

The logical side of Danny was screaming at him to get in the truck with Big Mike and get a ride back to town, but the best friend side of him couldn’t let Mike stay alone after the day they’d just had. So, against his better judgment, Danny found himself back at the ranch trailer watching Big Mike’s taillights disappear past the dead Indian and back toward the US.

“You guys wanna get high?” Jeff asked as soon as the lights crested the hill by the blinking yellow lights from the crossing signs.

“Jesus, Jeff, are you retarded? I don’t want to get in any more trouble. Plus, that stuff is still all wet and green. How the hell are you gonna smoke it?” Mike seemed annoyed.

“I already thought about that.” Jeff ran into the empty kitchen.

He came back out with an ancient piece of Tupperware. The insides were bubbled from a too-hot liquid being warmed up for too long in the microwave. A red-ringed tomato stain had remained to remind whoever used it next not to do the same.

“We use this…” Jeff displayed the bowl and then reached into his pocket and retrieved some foliage. “Then we put this in here…” He filled the bowl. “Then we just microwave it.”

“Dude, that’s not going to work.” Danny felt annoyed already and could only see Jeff’s plan getting them into even more trouble.

“Yes, it will. Watch… unless you guys are fuckin’ scared?” Jeff hesitated after testing their manhood.

Without waiting, he grabbed the extension cord that was providing all the power to the trailer and unplugged the lights. He pulled the cord into the kitchen, and before long, a series of beeps came from the darkened room, and a soft yellow glow followed after.

“Did you guys see that guy’s eyeball stuck to the speedometer? That was fucking crazy, man.” Jeff’s excitement was disturbing.

“Dude, I don’t want to even think about it. That was the grossest thing I’ve ever seen, and I castrate cows for a week straight every spring.” Mike was relaxing a tiny bit—maybe the prospect of some pot was helping.

Danny couldn’t join in relaxing. His stomach was still in knots from feeling like he might have killed someone.
“Hey, man, do you have a cup in there I can use for water?” Danny was dying of thirst.

“Nah, man, you can’t drink the water here; it’s sulfurous. But there are some pops in the cooler in the truck,” Mike explained.

Danny didn’t want a pop, but if he didn’t get something to drink, he was going to puke. He made his way out to the truck and looked around for the cooler. He found it behind the seat, and as soon as he opened the lid, he knew he was screwed. The heat radiating from the cooler was not a good sign. The can of root beer felt like it had just recently been on the boil. There was nothing worse than warm root beer. The second it touched his tongue, it turned to foam, doing nothing to quench his thirst. In fact, the syrup had tried to mix with his foamy spit and left him wanting water even more.

Danny looked toward the highway halfway between the sets of blinking lights. He expected to see the cheap town car or possibly that the coroner had finally shown up. But where he expected to see the blinking hazards of the car, there was nothing.

Maybe in the time they spent arguing about the pot, the coroner had showed up, signed off, and had the car towed away?

“JESUS, JEFF, MY DAD’S GONNA KILL ME,” Mike was yelling from inside.

Danny ran inside to find out what was up, and instantly, his nose told him. The entire trailer smelled like pot. It was heavy like a fog—Danny could almost taste it.

“We can open some windows, man. Chill out,” Jeff was trying to calm Mike down.

“No way, dude. You know my dad. If he smells this shit, he is going to kill me, and not in the jokey kind of way.” Mike was sweating.

“OK, man, sorry. It’s almost done anyway. I’ll buy some air freshener before we come out next time.”
“No next time. We were doing awesome until we brought you along and now we killed someone and stole pot from the Tribal Elders or medicine men or whatever.” Mike was starting to panic.

Thump, thump, thump… da dump, ba dump.

A noise from the back of the trailer broke up the argument.

“What the hell was that?” Danny asked, feeling uneasy.

“It was back in the bedroom,” Jeff pointed out obviously.

“Well, go check it out,” Mike said, sounding scared.

Danny surveyed the situation and could sense the standoff.

“Let’s all go.”

Nobody could argue with that, so the boys made their way through the dark trailer to the bedroom. Another series of thumps and bumps from the closet told them they were more hot than cold.

“Probably just a rat or a prairie dog or something,” Jeff said, trying to sound brave.

“Well, then let it out, tough guy,” Mike challenged.

There was a second of hesitation, but rather than look like a coward, Jeff took two big steps into the room, grabbed the closet’s doorknob, and twisted it. He slammed it open, hiding himself behind the door and between the wall.

A giant gust of wind hit the room like a microburst. Suddenly, there was movement all around them. A whooshing and fluttering filled the room. There was enough ambient light coming through the window that, after a few seconds of being terrified, Danny could identify the threat.

It was a gigantic horned owl. Somehow, it had gotten itself trapped inside the trailer and found its way to the closet.

Jeff was screaming from behind the door, and Mike was nowhere to be seen. The owl stopped flapping and landed on the floor. It stood waist-high to Danny, but somehow, it was looking him right in the eyes. It took two steps toward Danny and stopped. It eyed him up and down. Its head spun around on its neck, looking like it was making a detailed map of his body. Then it casually walked past him and down the hallway. Danny took a step into the hallway to watch it as it made its way to an open front door.

Headlights filled the space, and the owl spread its wings and disappeared into the night. The sound of a motor turning over and spinning tires on gravel came next. By the time Danny reached the front of the trailer, Mike was already halfway to the highway. Jeff was close behind him, yelling for Mike to wait for them. It was no use. Mike was gone.

“What the fuck was that?” Jeff asked, still in shock.

“It was an owl that got stuck in there. It must have scared the shit out of him, so he bailed.”

“Of course he did. That kid’s always been a chicken shit,” Jeff chided.

“Well, you’ve always been a fucking moron, so I guess you’re even.” Danny wasn’t in the mood for his shit.
“Keep it up, buddy. We are out here alone; there isn’t anyone to save you if I kick your ass—”

“Shut the fuck up… Do you hear that?” Danny asked with fresh goosebumps.

A very subtle humming sound had crept into his ears while listening to Jeff’s bullshit.

“Hear what—”

“SHUT UP.”

Danny could hear it more clearly now. It sounded human.

Jeff seemed to sense that Danny was serious and got quiet to listen as well.

“Ninkha sunwin sungmanitu thanka. Ninkha sunwin sungmanitu thanka. Ninkha sunwin sungmanitu thanka.”
It was chanting. From a few men.

“What is that… what are they saying?” Jeff suddenly got serious.

“I don’t know, man. I can’t make it out.”

“Where is it coming from?”

Danny pointed toward the sign shed they had visited earlier in the day. The pot field came to mind.

“Holy shit, man. What if it’s the chiefs or the medicine men or whatever… what if they found out you stole pot from them?” Danny’s mind was racing.

“Oh shit, the pot.” Jeff was running back to the trailer.

Not wanting to be alone, Danny was close behind. As soon as they hit the front door, the smell of smoke was choking them. A few beeps came from the kitchen, and Jeff came running out with the tomato-stained Tupperware. It was smoking like mad.

“Oh, man, his dad is for sure gonna smell that.” Danny was worried for Mike, and the chanting was temporarily put on the back burner.

Jeff dumped the burnt leaves on the ground in front of the porch. They both stood there for a minute, silently listening for the chanting to return. Instead, they heard the crunch of gravel beneath tires. Their eyes followed their ears, and they looked toward the gravel road leading from the highway. A car was making its way toward them with its hazard lights blinking. One light was the standard yellow, and the other was blood red.
“Must be Mike. I bet he felt like a chicken shit and came back,” Jeff rationalized.

“I don’t think so. It’s too low to the ground to be a truck; it looks like a car,” Danny explained and then paused, “…like the car that hit the cows today.”

“Shut up, man. Don’t say that,” Jeff said, looking worried.

“Well, I don’t know. Let’s just go inside.” Danny didn’t know what else to do.

“OK.”

The boys went back into the trailer and shut the door, though the lack of a knob or lock made it mostly a symbolic act.

“Hey, grab the couch,” Danny said, blocking the door with his back.

Jeff didn’t argue about whose job it was and grabbed the couch. He slid it over toward the door, and Danny helped him push it into place.

The sound of the approaching car was close. Right at the edge of the driveway.

“Who is it?” Jeff asked, sounding like he did in the second grade.

“I don’t know, man. Just stay quiet… why don’t you take a look outside?” Danny said.

They were both breathing hard, pushing hard against the couch and the door. The lack of movement from Jeff told Danny that it was going to be his job to look outside. He took one more ragged deep breath and took a step toward the window next to the door. Slowly, he poked his eye past the cheap frame and looked outside.
The red and yellow hazard lights were parked at the edge of the driveway. The constant flashes were enough to get into a rhythm so he could survey the area. There was no one on the porch. No one in the driveway. His eyes scanned further. Then, between the lights, right in front of the car, Danny saw a pair of legs. Whoever they belonged to was standing motionless between the blinking lights, staring at the front of the trailer, right at Danny.

In the blinking lights, Danny could make out a small dark spot between the legs slowly getting bigger. Every other flash of light, Danny could see clumps of something dripping and gathering at the feet of the stranger.
The Indian dripping his memories onto the floor mat of his cheap town car came to mind.
“Who is it?” Jeff probed.

Danny couldn’t find an answer. His brain whirred and found the first thing it could.
“It’s the owl.” It was the only thing that made sense to Danny at the moment. “We have to hide.”

The confusing answer didn’t confuse Jeff at all—it only prompted him to follow close behind Danny as Danny felt his way down the dark hallway toward the empty bathroom. They shut the cardboard-feeling door as quietly as they could.

Now they could hear footsteps on the front porch. They paced back and forth a few times and stopped.
“You think it’s gone?” Jeff asked.

CRUNCH CRUNCH CRUNCH

Danny’s eyes widened as he realized the footsteps were coming from right outside the bathroom window. Between the sound of his own breaths, Danny could hear the wet drip, drop, drip of the Indian’s brain matter on the gravel.

Jeff reached out and grabbed Danny’s hand. Danny didn’t fight it.

CRASH

Shards of glass rained through the cramped bathroom. In the moonlight, Danny could make out part of the shiny vinyl steering wheel from the cheap town car. The hole where the Indian’s eyes used to be pointed directly at Danny, and a chunk of what must be tongue fell out of his mouth along with some gurgling sounds.

Danny squeezed Jeff’s hand so he didn’t lose him in the dark and pulled him through the bathroom door and into the hallway with him. Danny couldn’t hear anything over Jeff’s screaming, but he held his hands tight and made it to the side door of the trailer on the opposite side of the house. The yellowish lights from the hazards on the car seemed more intense now, and the house was flooded with their rusty hue, only now it was constant and not blinking. Danny didn’t have time to question it. The crashing from the bathroom had stopped, and he could hear the sounds of an adult running at full speed around the trailer. Danny knew they either had to make a run out the side door now or stay trapped and face the man he killed earlier in the day.

Jeff didn’t leave the decision up to him. His screaming stopped, and he ran full speed at the unused door. It exploded outward from his weight, and Jeff disappeared. Neither Danny nor Jeff were aware that there were no stairs on the side door. So, to both of their surprise, Jeff fell 3 feet onto the recycled railroad spoil. Danny was close behind but made a more graceful leap to the ground. Danny could see that Jeff was hurt, but he didn’t know how bad. There was blood, and Jeff was still making noise, but Danny couldn’t make out the sounds because the chanting they heard earlier was right on top of them now.

“Ninkha sunwin sungmanitu thanka, Ninkha sunwin sungmanitu thanka, Ninkha sunwin sungmanitu thanka…”
It continued to grow in intensity and sounded like it was coming from every blade of cream-colored grass on the prairie.

The orange light was more intense on this side of the trailer as well, bright enough to see the dead Indian come sprinting from behind the trailer. The hole in his face was locked onto Danny. For an instant, Danny considered leaving Jeff to moan and writhe on the gravel, hoping the Indian would stop to deal with him before coming after him. Instead, he grabbed Jeff and held him as he braced for impact with his eyes closed.

Danny could feel an intense heat, which forced his eyes to open. The orange light was right in his face now, burning hot. A loud thump came from behind him, and Danny turned his head to see the Indian man lying steering wheel up, on his back, with a pool of blood gathering around his head.

Danny turned back to the orange light, but now it was joined by more. There were at least ten of them. And the chanting finally had a source.

It was a mix of flashlights, torches, beaded vests, feathered headdresses, long wooden pipes puffing smoke, burning sage, Nike shoes, and Bugle Boy blue jeans.

Danny had been to a couple of Pow Wows and rodeos that felt a lot like this.

“Ninkha sunwin sungmanitu thanka,” an old Indian man said more softly now into the ears of the dead Indian. He followed the whisper with a toke from his pipe and a blow of smoke into the dead man’s ears. A couple of younger Indian men joined him with bundles of burning sage in their hands. The sweet smell of the burning weed hit Danny’s nose and brought some relief to his dry throat.

“You boys can’t be here tonight. Go to the highway and wait for a ride; someone is on their way.” The old Indian never looked up.

Jeff seemed to have recovered enough to want to get the hell out of there and was making his way back to a standing position. He dusted himself off and walked up to the old Indian. He reached into his pocket, pulled out a handful of pot leaves, and dropped them at the older man’s feet.

“I’m sorry I took it from you,” Jeff explained.

The Indian man let out a belly laugh.

“You think I’m here because you stole some hemp? That isn’t marijuana, kid, and it sure as hell isn’t buds. It’s just a leaf from a plant we use to make traditional rope for ceremonies.”

The other Indians all joined him for a laugh.

“Now get out of here. This wandering spirit needs to find his way to Wakan Tanka.”

The boys almost held hands again but thought better of it as they made their way down the gravel road to the highway. Neither one of them had much to say, and their heads were on swivels looking for more wandering spirits.

Not too far down the road, they heard the familiar crunching sound of gravel beneath feet from behind them. Jeff started to sprint, but his limp slowed him down. Danny looked back before he started to run to see it was the old Indian man trying to catch up with them.

“Boys, wait a minute. Did you see anything else tonight or just a dead man?” he asked, still a few feet away.
Danny didn’t even have to think about it.

“The owl.”

The Indian didn’t question it. In fact, he nodded and looked worried.

“Don’t worry, boys. Sometimes, spirits get lost on their way home, and they need some help getting back. And sometimes those lost spirits were very powerful men. The man that died on the highway today was one of those men, a Wichasa Wakhan, like a powerful medicine man.” He smiled and gave the boys a look. “Any idea why he was coming after you two?”

Danny knew, but he couldn’t say it out loud.

“Nope,” Jeff offered for him.

“OK. Good. If he didn’t have a reason to come after you, you don’t have anything to worry about. But if he did have a reason to come after you, I’d watch your backs. There’s only so much sage smoke and chanting can do.” He smiled wryly and winked at the boys.

The smile and wink offered no comfort.

Danny and Jeff ran the rest of the way to the highway and were shocked to find an old woman sitting behind the wheel of a huge Lincoln Continental. She was unfriendly and quiet, but Danny had never been more grateful for a ride in his life.

The beer cans and liquor bottles in the ditch lulled him into a kind of trance, and he thought about his day. He wondered how he was going to keep the secret about how he and his friends killed an Indian and then got chased by his corpse. He wondered what Big Mike was going to say when he pulled up to the ranch trailer and saw the wrecked town car and the pool of blood and the burnt pot leaves in the cheap Tupperware. He wondered what the Indians did with the wandering spirit. He wondered how he was ever going to close his eyes again.

As they crossed the border between the Reservation and the US, Danny was yanked from his trance by a terrifying sight.

Perched on the Reservation side of the sign sat the owl. It watched the car Danny was in approach, and as the vehicle passed, the owl hunched over to get a good look in the window. Danny and the owl locked eyes for just an instant, but it was enough. The message was clear.

No amount of sage on Earth was going to help him.