Other boys are between my age and Running Horse's age. Li'l Fox is close to Running Horse's age. Those two were most respected. Being with Li'l Fox meant I was given respect. Now, if I'm not with Li'l Fox, I'm with Running Horse, and the rest of the time, I'm with both of them.

Running Horse's hesitancy toward me has disappeared. He seems friendly to me now. At first, I wasn't sure we'd be friends. I would not want Running horse for an enemy. He is the most capable boy. He is smart, strong, fast, and the best hunter in the village. I admire him almost as much as I admire Li'l Fox. His friendship is a welcome change. He is no doubt Li'l Fox's best friend.

One afternoon, we sat up the creek from where we played. This is where we caught the best fish. I'd only go there with Li'l Fox, but Running Horse sometimes came with us to fish.

I'm under no pressure here to be anything but what I am. It seems to be up to me how I wish to be seen. I do not feel out of place. I feel welcome now that the boys laughed and joked with me like I'm one of them.

I never felt welcome at the cabin in the valley where the river ran. I feel as if I belong here.

When we emerged from the wigwam, after a meal, we went to find things to do to occupy our day. Running Horse would sit beside the wigwam, standing up when we appeared. He touched Li'l Fox and then me and we were on our way. We'd go wherever we'd decided to go that day.

We were like three Indians ready to play and do the things Indian boys do. I kept a half step behind to be sure I was able to follow them. In that way I didn't get sidetracked. They would decide where we would go and what we'd do once we got there.

I was happy to be with them. I was never with anyone at home. It had been a lonely place for a boy caught between two worlds, belonging to neither, and there was always the longing.

I can't say how close Running Horse was to Li'l Fox before I came, but they are close, and those dark eyes were often on me. I regarded Running Horse as a friend. I'm not sure how he regarded me. I didn't regard the other boys as my friends. We played and laughed together, but I did not know them. They didn't know anything about me, and no one asked why I was there.

Everyone knew I got a broke leg and Li'l Fox brought me home to heal. He was always bringing one animal or another home to nurse back to normal. It was the first time he brung a boy, but I healed and I was still there.

Birds with broken wings always flew away one day. The Fox with the hurt leg, healed and went back to being a fox. The white boy healed and he stayed, and stayed and stayed. Was they waiting for him to fly away?

Because of Running Horse's size and maturity, some play doesn't interest him, but he's always close enough to get a good look at our games. I notice his eyes following me, like you might measure a bird's flight or a rabbit's hop. There are a half dozen and sometimes more boys playing, but his eyes stay on me.

It worries me. What does he see when he looks at me? Does he look to see any sign of a limp? Is he looking to see where the white skin went? Does he watch me because I really don't belong here? At one time, I thought this, but no more. He was always warm and friendly to me. Why does he look?

When Li'l Fox and I left the group to walk up stream or to go to the wigwam, Running Horse left the group and followed us. He was with us. I listen and say little. I'm not comfortable with my doubts about myself. I'm even less comfortable with the identity I am hiding. If I was certain of who I am as Pawnee, I'd speak of it. I'm not ready to go into who I am.

I don't know why I'm afraid, after all this time here.

When I first came, I was as tall as Medicine Woman. Now, when we stand together, my chin is even with the top of her head after only a year. I am and have been taller than Li'l Fox. Running Horse was taller than me when I got here. I see him eye to eye now. I thought I was grown, but I must be growing.

Running horses was the tallest boy. He was the oldest boy. I calculated him close to twenty. Since Li'l Fox and him are close, him being with us much of the time seems natural. Coming and going with us was a regular thing.

Li'l Fox said, when he saw my eyes on Running Horse, "We are cousins. Dark Horse, brother Fleet Horse, uncle Running Horse. We cousin."

None of the other boys had any pattern to their names that I noticed. Li'l Fox wasn't in the same category as Running Horse and Dark Horse. I was told that Fleet Horse was dead. There was no details.

"He dead."

Did he die riding with Paw after the bad men who attacked their village? Was I Running Horse's cousin? Were these Paw's people? I wanted to ask Medicine Woman. If she knew what I was thinking, what would she say?

Today Medicine Woman asked us to fish. Running Horse went with us when we left to go up stream to where a bigger creek formed a pond where the two bodies of water met. Running Horse fished with us.

"Tall Willow kill griz," Li'l Fox said out of the blue.

He'd never told anyone how I got my broke leg? I thought everyone knew.

"No kill griz."

Running Horse wasn't sure he heard correctly.

"Second bear nearly eat Tall Willow. He fall. Break leg," Li'l Fox said.

"He kill bear?"

The falling and breaking leg part didn't interest Running Horse that much.

"Dead. Me see," Li'l Fox said with certainty.

"He follow one bear. Second bear follow Tall Willow," Li'l Fox was certain.

"Kill griz? Two griz there? You lucky."

"With Hawkin," I said in my Indian shorthand. "Rifle."

Running Horse's eyes were on me for a different reason now. He saw me as a hunter. While I was young, Indian boys hunt all the time. He had seen me growing. Did he see I was grown? Did he see Tall Willow kilt bear or have other thoughts about the boy he watched.

"Li'l Fox kill bear?" Running Horse asked.

"Li'l Fox no kill bear. Bears, Li'l Fox at peace. No bother bear. Bear no bother Li'l Fox. Tall Willow go mountain. Hunt bear."

Running Horse had a wide eyed look again. He sees new me.

"Hunt bear? You big medicine. You fool Running Horse. He no hunt bear. Let bear be."

"He white. White boy do like that," Li'l Fox explained in a mixture of Pawnee and English.

We laugh at description. Running Horse's eyes do not leave me today. It like he got bee in bonnet, he think it out.

The way Li'l Fox says it is funny, when I think of why I went to mountain. Not funny while I done it. I shot bear. I left bear. Not funny to have broke leg. Going after griz plenty foolish. I nearly got ate. Know now I'm not smart enough to go hunt griz. If I knowed that before, I not be here. That plenty to think about.

Medicine Woman say after we up, "Li'l Fox, Need fish."

"We fish today," Li'l Fox said when Running Horse stood to greet us.

Running Horse went with us after we left the other boys to fish. Now, he sit silent, seeing me shoot bear on mountain.

"Plenty big medicine, Tall Willow. Kill griz big Medicine."

I didn't ask Li'l Fox why he was talking about the mountain. He said that what happened there should stay there.

I was another hurt animal Li'l Fox brought home. How I got hurt might have been different, but results were the same. He let the other animals go. Would Li'l Fox let go of me one day.

Would Tall Willow fall if he did? Why did they continue to care for me? Why did Running Horse watch me? He was the oldest. I was one of the youngest boys. I had different life before coming to the village where the Pawnee lived.

By this time, I walk without limp. My right leg not as strong as the left by playing the games with the other boys. I didn't test it beyond the games we played, but if Medicine Woman saw the slightest limp, I could expect her to tend to my leg the way she had for so many months, after I came. She hardly tended to my leg at all any more. She watched how I moved, and it was good.

"How many fish?" Running Horse asked with a nice size fish in his hands.

"Few more. You take half. Make good meal."

Running Horse smiled. He seemed to have resolved whatever ideas that troubled him.

We sat side by side bring in a fish now and again as my mind wandered here and there.

I see Dark Horse sit beside Medicine Woman outside our wigwam. They watch me to see how I run and move. It is different from when Running Horse watches. Dark Horse speaks so seldom, the sound of his voice startles me. They don't speak to me about why they watch or what they see.

I've always been mouthy. The way most white boys are willing to talk at times they should listen. Now, I want be like Indian. No talk. Listen more. Indian boys have fun. They poke, jostle, and laugh with one another, always having fun. I don't think I had any fun. Life was a chore in the valley where the river ran.

I see Dark Horse's eyes on me. Not at all like Running Horse's eyes watch me. Dark Horse's eyes are deep thoughtful eyes. He sees without looking. He is there. The world flows around him. He doesn't object.

He's a wise Indian. He speaks seldom. Everyone listens when he does.

Dark Horse never uses English words. Medicine Woman and Li'l Fox use many English words. Dark Horse speaks to Medicine Woman. If it concerns me, Medicine Woman says so right away.

I hope to speak Pawnee well enough to seek Dark Horse's counsel one day.

At home, when Paw tells Maw something he wants her to tell me, I feel like I've done something wrong. When Paw does that, it's never good. I don't feel that way when Dark Horse speaks to Medicine Woman and she tells me. My Pawnee isn't good. Dark Horse wants no misunderstandings.

Teenage boys seem to be revered here. Is this because they'll become warriors in a village without warriors? At home I often feel like I'm in the way. The teenage boys hunt and would defend the village if necessary. Women speak of the things that need to be done. Men remain silent for the most part.

There are few men in the village. Why is that? There's much I don't know.

Like Maw says, 'Let it be,' and I do, but the questions don't go away.

Li'l Fox made things easy to understand. When he sees confusion in my eyes, he tries to explain what it is I don't see that a Pawnee does see.

I know I'm not going blind, but there is so much I don't see. There is so much I've never looked for.

Frustrated when I don't have the right word, I speak English. I still think in English, and if they picked up English from me, I wanted to speak the best English I could speak. I did my best to think in terms of the rules I knew and didn't use.

Li'l Fox laughed at me becoming agitated over not being able to come up with the word I was looking for. He'd give me the word with a smile. He didn't make fun of me, and I was trying not to speak the English shorthand the Pawnee learned from previous English speakers.

I was afraid the shorthand might infect my speech, and if I had to return to the English speaking world, I didn't want to sound like an idiot. As I tried to adapt to the Pawnee world I now inhabited, my one foot was still in the English world. It was a world I had no desire to return to. I feared one day I won't get a choice.

Li'l Fox doesn't hesitate to give me the word I couldn't find. I wanted to tell him I needed a few seconds to think, before he rescued me, but I didn't. If I didn't need to think about it, I took the easy way out. I still remembered the rules of English I learned in Mrs. Taylor's class. I tried to apply them to my thinking, even if I still spoke like I didn't learn my lessons at times.

English was a fussy language and there were times I didn't take my time. I am a novelty here. Someone who isn't like them. They accept me as is. I need to learn to do things the way a Pawnee does them. I watch, listen, and do my best with new ideas. No one says I need to be a certain way. This was the biggest change. I once did everything the way someone told me to do it. Here, I'm free to figure out the best way for me, and when I find my way of doing it, no one notices anything but how it turns out.

At home I didn't dare do things the way I wanted. I was shown how it was to be done, and if I didn't do it that way, I'd hear about it. I didn't know why.

Most stuff I learned by watching Li'l Fox. I can usually do things the way he does them. Li'l Fox hardly leaves my side. Is he protecting me from something? Did something happen on the mountain that makes him feel closer to me?

Yes, something did happen. I can't say how much of what happened I remember, and how much of what I think happened came from my dreams.

I owe a debt to Li'l Fox I'll never be able to repay. He saved my life.

No matter the reason, me and Li'l Fox is close. I've never had a friend before. Ain't no boys near the cabin in the valley where the river runs. Boys at school I was acquainted with, we weren't friends.

Living without other boys in my life, except at school. School was strictly controlled confinement. These free roaming friendship in and around the village suits me fine. The boys are fine. I find nothing objectionable about them. They seem to feel the same about me. When we get together the majority decide what we'll do.

Li'l Fox can make a bow and arrows. He can hunt for his food. He'll never go hungry. I watch him and I can do what I see him doing. Once I'm more comfortable here. I'll make a bow and make my own arrows.

Li'l Fox takes his time when he sees me watching. I learn much from him.

He knows the medicines nature provides. He cooks good rabbit stew when Medicine Woman is in the wigwam of someone who is ill.

Li'l Fox isn't big but he's fearless. When faced with danger, he doesn't hesitate. I'm afraid I would. I wait to see how a thing will turn out, so I don't anger anyone. Li'l Fox designs a response to fit the danger.

I watched him kill two men in the blink of an eye. He sensed the same danger I felt in my bones, but he did something about it. I couldn't do what he did because I had a broke leg, but broke leg or not, I couldn't do what he did.

If I'd met those men while I was alone on the mountain, they'd have used me up and left me for dead. My life has been filled with doubt and uncertainty. I need to be able to think as fast as he thinks. Waiting is a good way to get kilt.

I can see how the Pawnee, and Indians like them, are a threat to how white men see things. No one should do different things or be different if you're white. There are no such rules here. If you are a certain way, that's your way.

Grandpa Kelly, his kinsmen, want to do a thing a certain way. Grandpa would slice and dice everything, divide it into equal parts, and men with money buy it. Each owns one small piece of the whole. What made it worth owning is lost once you divide it up.

What becomes of the deer, the elk, the buffalo if they can't roam, once everyone fences his patch off to keep everyone out?

I knew only what I could learn on a farm near a tiny town. Going to school, I learned lessons they taught me. I knew or suspected the lay of the land. Men fancied they were in control. They were if no one objects. Like when Paw and I went to Lawrence's store, we never knew for sure we'd make it out alive. One of those white men had a bad day, and Paw might be in a fight for his life.

I'd say Paw could whip any of them. He couldn't whip them all at once. He knows it same as me, but the way they watch us. I'm out of it now.

I live on the far side of the mountain and I'm out of it. I wonder about Maw and Paw. Who feeds the chickens? Who goes into town with Paw?

Perhaps being on the outs with men in town was my imagination. I really didn't know them. Maybe I could turn my back on them. I never did. I heard, if you listened to what your body is telling you, you'll never go wrong.

Does it work with a griz? Works with mountain men. They were bad men, and it still seems like a dream. I never been as close to death as I was on that mountain, and a Pawnee boy saved my life, not once but twice. It was an accident those two men came across us. It was an accident Li'l Fox came across me.

I was alive and well and my leg gets stronger every day. I was where I wanted to be and learning how to be Pawnee.

I did wonder how many more accidents life had in store for me?

With a broke leg, it weren't up to me. I would have been kilt if Li'l Fox hadn't gone into action, and he'd already rescued me after my fall. He knew I was on the mountain. He watched me. Everything that happened came out of those facts.

Why did he watch me? Why did he save my life? Why take me to the village where he lived? How is it we'd become so close?

He seems to know what is going on inside my mind. It's like looking into a mirror, only instead of my own face, it's Li'l Fox's face I see. I've never felt as close to anyone the way I feel close to him.

When he was on the mountain and he became aware of me, how is it he stayed, waiting until he could rescue me once I fell? Did he have something in mind before my fall? Was a force holding him in place until I needed rescuing?

Did all of this take place because two lives crossed paths and everything else that happens is accidental? Now those lives were completely intertwined.

I was living a life I could only dream about at the cabin in the valley where the river ran. I couldn't have imagined what being Pawnee is like. I've found a place where I belong. It's difficult not knowing how to be Pawnee, but Li'l Fox is showing me. I watch him. I can make a bow. I can make arrows. I can hunt, which means I can live in this wilderness.

What he's given me, besides my life, is far more than I've ever had. What does he get out of it? Why does he teach me, stay close to me, take me with him everywhere he goes? He gives me much. I give him nothing. Why is it this way?

I feel so close to Li'l Fox, and now Running Horse is with us much of the time. He seemed to keep his distance at first. I did not know him. He was the oldest boy and if there was someone in charge of the boys, it was Running Horse. In the past month, he has become a constant companion.

I like seeing Running Horse when we leave the wigwam. I see his eyes on me and he touches Li'l Fox, and then he touches me. I'm still puzzled by what he sees in me. When he smiles, I smile, and before we know it, we're off to find the other boys for some morning play.

Running Horse smiles a lot and he says little. Li'l Fox has things to say to Running Horse, and I pick up on most of it. Running Horse takes Li'l Fox's counsel as if it is important for him to hear. When I speak, he watches my face, but he rarely comments on the random thoughts that come from inside my head.

One afternoon the Indians boys, Running Horse, Li'l Fox and me went fishing together. That means swimming. Most boys would rather swim than fish, but fish was needed for one of the meals today, and fish weren't hard to catch.

On the hottest days the boys suggested fishing. It gave them an excuse to spend the day in the shade of the trees and in the cool refreshing water.

The creek was wide and as we fished, a mess of mosquitoes came from the far side and found us. In no time we was covered in them.

The other boys ran for a muddy swamp nearby. Getting out of their breach cloth, they dove into the mud. They rolled, wrestled, and made a game of smearing mud on every inch of their bodies.

I wouldn't take off my breach cloth. I dove in with mine on. I was being eaten alive and the mud worked.

I wasn't modest. I wasn't fearful of touching other naked boys. I had something I wanted to hide. It ain't like we wasn't almost naked all the time, but the part of me that the breach cloth covered made clear my whiteness. I was as brown as some boys, but once they saw my white skin, they'd remember I was a white boy and the months of turning my skin brown would be wasted time.

The difference being me being brown from the sun. They took their color from being Pawnee. My white skin troubled me still.

I did everything with the Indian boys, but I absolutely positively would not do this. They could think what they wanted. They won't see my white skin. I won't remind them of the white boy Li'l Fox first brought home.

Nothing was said at first. Li'l Fox was plastering mud on me where he saw mosquitoes. Nothing I did bothered Li'l Fox, but something I did had a big impact on Running Horse. When he objected, I couldn't come up with a reason why.

Running Horse smoothed mud on my back and when he turned to face me, he smeared mud on my chest, my arms, my stomach, and then he came to my breach cloth. I was covered in mud. My eyes and below my breach cloth wasn't.

Running Horse smeared mud down my chest and onto my stomach. His hand rested on my stomach below my belly button, where it stopped.

I felt the heat coming off his body. Maybe it was the heat coming off mine.

"Take off," Running Horse said, pushing his hand down to the hair.

"No," I said as a reflex reaction to exposing my white skin.

He didn't know I wasn't reacting to where his hand touched me. His hand wasn't the problem. His hand might have been nice to feel there, but he wanted me to expose my white skin. I'd made up my mind. I won't do that.

He stopped. His hand came back up from where it sunk. He hesitated before removing his helpful hand all together. He looked into my eyes with his dark eyes. The look on his face turned cold. I already regretted my adamant no.

I need Running Horse's approval. I wanted Running Horse's approval.

My refusal brought attention to me. What did I have to hide? No one had seen me naked. Medicine Woman saw me naked. Li'l Fox slept naked under the same covering I slept naked under, but I put on my breach cloth before I got up.

Running Horse stared at me like he didn't know me. Who was I? I wanted to slither into the mud. I wanted to take it back. I couldn't. I done my best to get people in the village to forget my whiteness. It sounded stupid now. They all knew what color I was when I got there. No one forgot I was white but me.

They knew I was white. I was whiter than white when I arrived. In my boy's mind, I thought people could forget that uncomfortable truth. I didn't brown where the sun didn't shine.

I burnt and glowed red. My skin was on fire. As with most ailments, Medicine Woman knew what to do. She treated the burns. She used soothing grass and lotion. My skin healed, burnt, peeled, healed, burned, peeled, healed. After a month or two, I began to brown. Medicine Woman still kept my skin soft with the lotions she made. I didn't know if the Pawnee burnt, but as with most things, Medicine Woman had a treatment for most discomfort.

I couldn't face Running Horse and I turned away. He turned away and sat in the mud as boys began to get out of the mud to rinse in the pond. No one said anything. The laughing stopped. One by one, the boys disappeared.

Li'l Fox sat silently until Running Horse left the mud to go to the pond.

"What did I do?" I asked.

"You know. Li'l Fox know."

"Because I won't get naked?" I asked.

"You hide. Running Horse like. You snap. We know you white, Tall Willow. No one sees white. We know white."

"I'm sorry."

"No sorry me. Sorry Running Horse. He displeased. Li'l Fox not. You try hard. You start over."

"I'm sorry."

"No sorry me. Sorry Running Horse."

I was sorry. When we went to the pond, no one was there. Our fish remained where they laid when the mosquitoes showed up. Everything was happy and joyful before the mosquitoes came. I hadn't felt alone for a single minute since arriving in the village. I felt alone now.

Li'l Fox continued to stand by me. We were closer than friends. He didn't correct me. It was up to me to decide what to do. So far, I hadn't offended him.

To say I displeased Running Horse didn't cover it. If I could have slithered into the mud, I'd have done it.

I was ashamed of my white skin. I knew what white men did to Indians. I saw the way white men treated Paw. I wasn't responsible, but I didn't want to be seen as white, because I wasn't white. I had no part in the evil white men do.

Why didn't I say, "I am Pawnee."

It would sound like making stuff up to take the heat off me for being stupid. How could I explain the workings of my mind? How did it work? I wasn't sure it did work.

I'd complicated everything far more than it needed to be. These people had welcomed me no matter what I looked like. I felt closer to them than anyone in the valley where the river ran. How was that possible? Why did I fear telling them I was like them in spite of how I looked?

I heard the name Proud Eagle spoken in our wigwam. I didn't know who said it. My stupor from the brew I drank didn't encourage logical thinking.

I could have said, 'Proud Eagle is my father. Who is he to you?'

Then, everything would have been revealed, but I didn't know these people then. I was sleeping my life away.

I would do my best to undo what I did the day before, I decided after not sleeping the night before. I was glad to have the friendship of Running Horse. Now that I'd lost it, I saw the value of his friendship as greatly increased.

I made up my mind to greet Running Horse with a smile and I'd touch him the way he always touched me. When we went out, no one was there.

"Why wouldn't he be here to greet you? You're his friend."

"Running Horse not come greet me. He come greet you. He like."

"He hardly knew I was alive when I came."

"He know. He fear you. He like. You white. He like. You different."

I began laughing. This was all about my white skin. He wasn't put off by me, he was drawn to me because I was different. I've done all within my power to hide what it was that drew Running Horse to me. It was funny if not for what happened the day before.

"He thinks I'm angry with him?"

"Li'l Fox no know. I not see. Li'l Fox with you."

"What do I do?"

It was Li'l Fox who laughed now.

Me make mess. Up to me to fix mess.