With her cut arm stinging, Bugz stood and walked to the tallest cottonwood tree at the edge of the clearing. She looked up to the branches. She’d expected cutting to make her feel so much better. That’s what her cousin told her—that it felt good to feel something—but all Bugz felt now was guilt and sorrow. It didn’t make anything better. This felt nothing like the sacrifice she’d seen her father and others make at the Sundance. When they were cut, the whole community watched. It became holy, a selfless act. What she’d done here alone felt only selfish. Bugz’s world continued to spin out of control around her.

Bugz took the rope she’d made and tied it in a loop. She suddenly recognized what she’d created—she’d braided a noose. The realization scared her.

As though on autopilot, Bugz walked to the tree, wrapped the free end of the cord around the tree trunk, and threw the noose over a thick branch. She stared at the rope dangling from the monstrous cottonwood. It looked so ominous. She trembled. This isn’t who I am.

In the ocean of her heart and in the land of her spirit, a deep rumbling began, and it drove Bugz forward. Her brother. Her father. Feng. Stormy. Mishi-pizhiw. The nest. Clan:LESS. All of her feelings cascaded and roiled with an unstoppable momentum. In her head, she knew she didn’t want to harm herself any more than she already had. But the force of this moment in her life propelled Bugz on. She held the noose in her hands as she walked backward, away from the tree, like a child playing tug-of-war.

Bugz looked up at the branch and took a deep breath. She closed her eyes and tried to picture the end result of the course she was on. She could not. Teardrops raced down her cheeks. She wondered whether anyone was looking for her and whether they would find her in time. Who will it be?

Bugz said a prayer in Ojibwe. She mumbled the words as her breath shuddered under the weight of tears. Ni-noonde-pimaadiz, I want to live. She completed her prayer and spoke to Waawaate.

“I want to see you again.”

Bugz stood motionless. The evening summer breeze picked up and rustled through the tall grasses on the edge of the clearing.

“Brother,” Bugz said.

CHAPTER 60

Sister, Waawaate replied in his mind, miles away. They’d sedated him and moved him into an intensive care unit. To the nurse caring for him, he appeared as though in a fever dream. Though intubated, he tossed and turned in the hospital bed. The nurse checked his vital signs. He grimaced.