Saskatoon berries

Here's a little clip from a story I've been working on lately. <3

Ruby glanced up at the bright blue sky and felt her heart lighten as she walked along the trail beside their neighbour’s field. Her dad had mentioned that the saskatoon berries were ripe for picking up by the northern swamp this week, so her plan for the morning was to pick berries until her basket was full, and enjoy some time alone. At least in the bushes it was sometimes a bit cooler than out in the field, she thought, as she wiped her sweaty brow.

Her dad had been right, it was a great year for berries. The saskatoons were full and juicy, and Ruby quickly had her basket over half full. She sat down on a large rock to rest and enjoy some as a treat, and hummed a song she had heard at the Caroll’s last week. As the words came back to her she started to sing.

 

Come and sit by my side if you love me,

Do not hasten to bid me adieu..

 

She couldn’t remember the next line, but jumped in surprise when she heard a voice sing,

 

Just remember the Red River Valley

And the cowboy that’s loved you so true.

 

Her heart pounded as she crouched and looked around to see where the voice was coming from. She thought she had been completely alone, but apparently not. She held her breath as she heard a twig snap to her left.

 

A young man stepped out shyly from behind a tree, and raised his hand in a slight wave with an apologetic-looking smile. Ruby’s eyes widened and she stared at him as she crouched by the rock. He took a small step closer and held up both his hands as if to say he was harmless.

 

“I was passing by and heard your song in the trees. I’m sorry to frighten you, but I had to finish your song,” he said, with a smile.

 

Ruby’s words were frozen in her throat as she stared at him standing before her. She had only seen one other person that looked like him before. He had darker skin than hers, and his long black hair was gathered behind him in a braid. He had gentle brown kind eyes.

 

Ruby tried to speak. “How…who…where…how long?” She stood slowly and shrugged at her inability to speak. His eyes lit up a bit at her discomfort.

 

“I’m Patrick. I live with my family a few miles east of here. I used to be a guide for a fur trader, and he taught me English. I was out hunting for pheasant when I heard your song.” His eyes wandered to the basket of berries at her feet, which had turned on its side and spilled some of its contents on the ground. Ruby quickly knelt to scrape some of them back into the basket.

 

“Let me help you refill that basket?” he asked.

 

Ruby couldn’t help herself, as she slowly nodded in agreement with a smile.

 

“You must tell me your name, my lady,” he said, as a regal knight would.

 

She took a breath and found her voice again. “I’m Ruby. My family lives south of here, and I’m just out picking berries alone for the morning, or at least that’s what I thought,” she joked.

 

He offered his hand and she shook it. Their eyes met and she couldn’t look away for several seconds.

 

Patrick broke their locked gazes and looked around at the bushes. “So, let’s pick some berries.”

 

They picked saskatoons until her basket was full. Patrick talked about his family and the land they lived on. His father was trying to learn about growing grain and raising cattle. They were used to hunting and living off the land in a whole different way, following the herds of buffalo, surviving from what the land provided. But the government wanted his people to settle down.

 

Ruby shared that it was similar to her family. They had come to the area and spent everything they had to purchase their land in a government deal. They were barely getting by from the land, but her father really didn’t know how to be a farmer and wasn’t exactly cut out for it. Her mother and brothers did a lot of the work.

 

They walked to a grassy area and sat down to continue talking, the conversation flowing easily between them. Ruby couldn’t believe how comfortable she felt around him, as she had never been able to find her words around boys or men. She discovered he was 16, two years older than she was, and the oldest of six siblings, the same as she was.

 

Patrick noticed a plume of smoke rising in the distance and pointed it out to Ruby. “That’s a symbol to me that I had better head back. Good thing I caught a couple pheasants before I heard the songbird in the berry bushes,” he said affectionately.

 

“Can I see you again?” Ruby asked bravely. The morning felt like a dream.

 

“I might need to check for pheasant again in a few days, and this seems to be a good area,” he said with his eyebrow raised.

 

Ruby nodded and agreed, “I think in three days we will still need more berries.”

 

Patrick took her hand and looked into her eyes. “Farewell Ruby.” He grabbed the mane of his horse and boosted himself up, with no saddle and the two birds tied together with a piece of leather, slung across the horse’s back.

 

As he started to ride away, Ruby stood up and called his name. He turned toward her. “What’s your actual name?” she called. “The name you were given at birth?”

 

He paused and his face softened. “I’m misāskwatōmin, they call me Misa,” he said. “It means saskatoon berry.” He smiled tenderly down at her. “Thanks for asking.”

 

Ruby watched him ride away, shielding her eyes from the sun with her hand, breathless from the wonder of what had just happened to her.

 

Her mom gave her a reproachful look as she set the berries on the floor by the door and washed up her hands for lunch. “Get lost in one of your stories again, dreamer girl?” her mother asked, loud enough for everyone to hear.

 

Ruby shrugged. “Kind of I guess. It was my best one ever, I’ll say that for sure.” She winked at her little sisters, who giggled, knowing she would tell them a great bedtime story that night, of princesses and knights and kings and queens and fairies and heroes. And pheasants and berries and horses and sunshine.

 

Three days later, Ruby was up early with the sun, leaving a note for her mother that she was off to pick berries. She skipped a little on the path, her heart light and the skin on her arms all tingly as she swung the basket at her side. Even the birds seemed to be singing ‘Misa, Misa, Misa’.

 

Ruby saw the horse up ahead and broke into a run. Patrick turned and smiled from ear to ear as he waited for her. She wanted to hug him but it didn’t really seem like the right moment. “You came,” she panted from her running.

 

“You didn’t think I would?” he asked.

 

“I hoped you would,” she replied. “But I couldn’t be sure.”

 

“I keep my word, Ruby. Above all things, I keep my word.”

 

“I didn’t mean to insult you, I just…sometimes I hope for things that don’t happen for me.”

 

Patrick took her hand in his. “You deserve many good things, my Ruby. And I will always come for you.”

 

Ruby looked into his eyes, intently looking at her. Her stomach flipped over and she smiled shyly.

 

“I have a question for you Misa. Do you..um..do your people…does your culture…I don’t know how to say this.”

 

Patrick lifted her chin with his free hand, leaned in and kissed her on the lips. It was just a quick touch but it was enough to know his breath smelled like summer and herbs and his lips were soft and perfect. Ruby thought her heart might burst with happiness. They stood there, breathing the same air, hearts pounding. He kissed her again, longer this time, and Ruby knew it was a moment she would never forget as long as she lived.

 

“I learned about the kiss from the stories of the fur trader I worked with,” Patrick admitted. “But I had not appreciated its wonder,” he grinned.

 

They did end up picking berries and quickly filled her mother’s basket. They sat in the grass and talked again, all about their families and their daily life. Patrick was worried about some rumours his father had heard about the government moving his tribe again to another area with the new treaty. They were just starting to figure out the crops and the equipment and the farming routines, and he didn’t want to have to start over. He also didn’t want anyone to tell him how and where to live.

 

Ruby had never heard anything about the government telling people where to live, and she was disturbed by the stories Patrick shared with her. They talked about their dreams and the future. Something had been bothering Ruby ever since their first meeting, which she could hardly believe was only three days ago. Could she and Patrick ever have a future together? Would her parents ever accept him? Would she even be allowed to meet his family?  Would he even want to be with a white woman who knew nothing about his history and people and culture? She could learn, she was a hard worker and would love to experience a new culture! At least, she thought she would. Would she really leave her family and everything she knew for him? Her heart felt brave and in love and was feeling like yes, she would.

 

Patrick leaned over and nudged her shoulder. “Your mind is racing like a horse breaking free, come back to me,” he said quietly.

 

“That’s just it, Misa.” He smiled when she used his given name. “Can I come back to you? What happens to us now?”

 

He sighed. “I’ve been thinking about that too. I heard once of a brave bringing a white woman home as his wife.” The silence hung between them. “But I’ve never seen it myself.”

 

“I want to be your white woman,” Ruby said quietly. “I know I’d have a lot to learn, but would you help me?”

 

“I would help you, and my mother and sisters would help you. I want to be with you too,” Patrick said with a smile. “I’ll talk to my father and see what we would have to do. Can you meet me back here in three days again?”

 

Ruby nodded. “Wild horses couldn’t keep me away.”

 

Just then they heard hoofprints of a racing horse. A man passed them, his hair flying in the wind. Ruby wasn’t sure if the man had seen them or not, but suddenly she felt like maybe they should hide. “We aren’t doing anything wrong,” she told herself, and stayed put beside Patrick on the grass. A moment later, the man returned, with his horse walking slowly this time.

 

“Hey there little lady,” he said. “This Indian bothering you?”

 

Ruby coughed in surprise. “What? No, not at all. He’s my friend. We were just…just picking berries,” she said as she motioned towards the basket.

 

The man looked at the basket and at Patrick and back at Ruby, his face scowling. He pointed his finger at Patrick. “I’m watching you boy. Miss, you get on home with those berries, this ain’t no friend to have.”

 

Ruby felt Patrick tense beside her, but he looked at the ground and said nothing. “I’ll go in a few minutes, I’m good. Thank you sir. Good day.”

 

The cowboy stared down at them from up on his horse for probably at least a minute, before he pointed his finger at Patrick again with a glare and turned to go the direction he was originally racing off toward.

 

Ruby realized she had been holding her breath. Hot tears filled her eyes and her heart raced in shock at what she had just witnessed. That man knew nothing of Misa and his people, nothing of love, nothing of her. He made her feel ashamed, but she didn’t even know what she should feel ashamed about.

 

Patrick shook his head. “Don’t think about him, he knows nothing. It happens all the time, Ruby,” Patrick said to try comfort her, while he looked away with angry eyebrows.

 

“Patrick that was wrong, what that man did,” Ruby insisted.

 

“I know.” He sighed. “Are you sure you want to sign up for this?” he asked with a half-joking, half-fearful tone.

 

“Listen, that man was a jerk, but he isn’t me. And he isn’t my family. This, between us, it’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me. And I will wait for you Misa, as long as it takes us to figure this out.”

 

“OK, my white princess Ruby. I will figure this out and we will be together.”

 

After that, they moved to a more private spot behind the bushes, and Patrick braided her hair while they sat in the sun and listened to the birds and animals all around them. Patrick made her laugh in his imitation of a wolf, and told her stories about the sheep that thought it was a wolf and the turtle that made a foundation for the land to grow on its back.

 

The sun was high in the sky when they realized they should head home. With promises to meet again in three days, and a few more sweet innocent kisses, she watched him ride his horse across the field before picking up her berry basket and heading for home.

 

That was the last time she saw Patrick, as when she returned in three days, he was not there. She looked all around the berry bushes and nearby small hills, but her Misa did not return. Just as she rose to go home, she noticed some flowers on the spot where he had first kissed her. She wandered over to the sentimental spot and realized that the flowers had been picked and were arranged in the shape of a heart. He had been here! This was a message to her. She would return in three days and hope to see him then.

 

She made the trip to the berry bushes long after the berries were dried up and gone, but there was never another sign of Misa. She asked her father one night about the nearby tribes, and he said he had heard they had moved a few tribes further north in order to facilitate the railroad and development.

 

Had Patrick gone with them? He said he’d always come back for her, so Ruby clung to that thought as she went about her daily life. She left a few notes in the bushes for him, hoping he’d find them. She didn’t even know if he could read or write, but thought that maybe the furtrader had taught him that too.

 

As time went on, and winter came, her hope began to dwindle. Most weeks she couldn’t make the trek out to the berry bushes but every now and then she walked or rode their horse out there to see if there were any signs of Patrick, trying to keep their love alive.