Concord Tells His Story

The twins were playing outside. They had been out there all afternoon. It was our routine. The kids would play outside while I cooked supper. I made sure to have it ready by six o’clock every night. I was about to set the table when I called them in.

“Rickey… Ramsey… come eat!” I yelled.

I always gave them a few extra minutes to get inside. While I waited for them, I worked to set the table and fixed their drinks.

Minutes later, they still hadn’t come inside. I was getting angry. They knew better than to go to far where they couldn’t hear me call. It was then, also, that I began to worry. They had never done this before. What was keeping them?

My brother and I had been playing outside all afternoon. It was our favorite time of the day. School was out, and our homework finished. It was great. Ramsey always wanted to ride the horses, but it was my turn to pick our game. I wanted to play indians, because I always wanted to live like they used to live before they got put on reservations and were forced to live like us.

At the time, I really didn’t know much about the indians other than they lived next door to us, and they lived organic lifestyles. So we was pretending that we were indians. We got out our bb guns and went hunting for squirrels. We already had a shelter ready from the last time we played indian. Ramsey was making the fire while I hunted the squirrels. I got one, and headed back. It was always so much fun to sit around a fire skinning and cooking our squirrels. I loved it.

Late in the evening, as we were packing up, a young man approached us. I recognized him as one of the indian boys from across the street. He walked up to us, and asked if we wanted to know how the indians actually lived. We nodded eagerly.

“Follow me.” he said in a deep gruff voice.

“This is going to be so fun.” I whispered to Ramsey.

We followed him deep into the woods. When he finally stopped, we were deep in the forest with no hope of hearing our mother. This was forbidden and we both knew it.

“Clear up these leaves, and sit down.” he commanded.

After we cleared the leaves from the spot, we sat down as he said. He came into the clearing moments later with some twigs and dry leaves. We watched as he built a fire. I was sure that it took us longer to do that then it did for him.

He began to tell us his stories.

“My name is Concord. My father taught me how to hunt with my bare hands. He had me a month alone in the woods until I was a man. I had to learn how to survive on my own. Our family believe a man is led by nature. Some are led by the wind or fire, others are led by different animals. My spirit guide is the barn owl. I was to follow this owl and learn how to be still and listen. This owl is about inner knowing. Your kind calls it, intuition.”

“That’s cool.” Ramsey whispered. I had the feeling he was nervous about something.

“It has been a year since I found my spirit guide. It’s been a hard road since. My father thinks I lied about. He believes that I am still not a man. At least, not a man by his standards. It is so frustrating. Life of our kind isn’t easy. They are so set on holding on to the traditions of our people. But is it so wise to make a fourteen year old boy stay alone in the woods for a month? I could have died. I guess that is their point though. If I were not a man, I wouldn’t have come back. Building my own shelter, and junting for my own food. Pull a rabbit off the fire too soon, and I would have died of food poisoning.”

“Wow that is insane.” I said. “Why wouldn’t you want to live like that? I mean I do?”

“Really? You think you could survive a month on your own?”

“Well no. Not yet, anyway. I mean, I have dreamt of it my entire life. All I have ever wanted was to live free. I have a bit of a different viewpoint for survival that that of normal kids our age.” I told him.

Concord smiled.

“Perhaps I could teach you what I know. That way you can live your dream, and learn how to survive in the wild.”

My brother jumped up suddenly. “It’s late. We should be going.” he said.

“Yeah we should go. Our mother will be mad.” I told Concord.

“Of course, brothers. We shall meet again. We can start your training Rickey.”

“Yeah sure.” I said. “I can’t wait.”

We hurried off towards home. When we barged through the door, I could tell that my mom was definitely angry. I knew I had to calm her down, or we would be grounded. “Mom. We are really sorry. We got lost in the woods. It was terrifying, and we are sorry. Won’t happen again.”

My brother just nodded.

“Alright boys. Next time don’t go so far. Let’s eat our supper and get ready for bed.”

I was so happy when I laid my head down to sleep that night. I couldn’t believe my luck. As I fell asleep, I knew that my life would be different now.