Rayona

My name is Rayona and I am the daughter of a native women, Christine, and a black man, Elgin. Because my father is black, I am discriminated against in my native community. I have low sense of self because my mother and grandmother do not tell me much of my heritage and background and sometimes I tend to judge people by the way they act, without taking the situation into account. Growing up was hard for me, as I was always put into difficult and dysfunctional situations. For instance when my mother was in the hospital, she decided to escape and with me in the Volare, she wanted to drive it over a cliff for insurance money. Fortunately, I persuaded her not to and we drove up to where Aunt Ida currently lives. There my mother ran away leaving me with Aunt Ida, who didn't speak much to me. Aunt Ida's is where I also met Father Tom. Father Tom and I were friends and went far away together, where he almost began to sexual abuse me, this is when he decided to stop and drop me off at the train station where I could go back to my father. I decided not to go back, and instead I found a job and Bearpaw Lake. This is also the place I found a true and ideal family. They welcomed me with open arms and really understood where I was coming from. Although I told lies to them, they still believed in me. That ideal family eventually drove me back to Aunt Ida's where I first stopped at the Rodeo, as that was the first place, where I think I could have found my mother. Unfortunately all that was there was my drunk Cousin Foxy, and my mom's old boyfriend, or Lee's best friend Dayton. Foxy decided that he was to drunk to ride the horse, so I took his spot. Even though I caused a huge uproar when they found out that I was a girl, that experience changed my life. I late was taken to Dayton's house where my mother was staying. I realized that even though my life and family may be dysfunctional, I still have a chance to change.

Aunt Ida

I am "a woman who's lived fifty-seven years and worn resentment like a medicine charm for forty. If I were to live my life differently, I would start with the word No: first to him, my father; to Clara, then to Willard, before they left me; to Lee, to save his life. I was different with Christine, but it turned out no better." In my stubborn isolation, I distorted the truth that in the end it was me who rejected Clara and Willard Pretty Dog, not vice-versa. I know many of the family secrets that have torn us apart for all these years. I am Christine's mother, although everyone (even Christine) calls me Aunt Ida at my request, so that I could protect myself from disappointment if Christine's real mother, Clara, ever came back to claim her child. When Clara returned four years after Christine was born and calls herself Christine's mother, I was so shocked that I instinctively brought my fingers, which were carrying a hot teakettle, to my ears, thereby burning a plum-sized hole on my cheek that serves as a permanent reminder of my secret burden. Clara wanted to give up Christine for adoption. To block her, I had arranged for Father Hurlburt to get a birth certificate that declared myself as Christine's legal mother. To seal Clara's fate, I threatens to reveal the truth about Clara's relationship to Lecon (my father).
I always doted on Lee, who was my illegitimate son by Willard, and so Christine often felt rejected. I decides to bring up Lee myself, just as I had brought up Christine, never revealing his true father. I persuaded myself that when I was with a man I always "pretended to be stupid" and that I wanted Christine "to see me smart, to know she could be that way herself in front of any man." My intelligence as I grew older is clear, for I successfully leased part of my land to make improvements in my own life. I have suffered a lot over the years; but by the same token i have perhaps earned the greatest portion of happiness, however small, having raised three children, to varying degrees, on my own and having achieved some financial stability in my life.

Christine

I am "the bastard daughter of a woman [Ida] who wouldn't even admit she was my mother." I also just recently found out that I am the illegitimate daughter of Ida's father Lecon and her sister Clara. However, I was brought up as "Aunt" Ida's daughter and never learned the truth about my real parents. As a child, I "was never satisfied," but I did develop a blind loyalty to my younger brother Lee and a strong faith in Catholicism, especially the martyred saints.
My faith reached a crisis when I thought the contents of the "Portugal letter" would determine the end of the world unless Russia converts to Roman Catholicism. When nothing happened on the appointed night, I becomes disillusioned with the Church. Another time, when I found out that Dayton Nickles didnt want to be my boyfriend, my self-esteem took such a plunge that "it took me years to forget." My one true friend was my younger brother Lee. "He wasn't just my best friend, he was the only one I trusted, the only one who never let me down." When Lee switched his main allegiance from myself to Dayton, an anti-Vietnam activist, I ploted successfully to separate them by telling Lee that being considered unpatriotic would end his political future on the reservation.
Angry at Aunt Ida's disapproval of my promiscuous social life, I left home and moved in with Ida's sister Pauline's family. I took a job at the Tribal Council, and continued my usual playgirl/party life, eventually leaving for Seattle. Distraught when Dayton writes that Lee is missing in action in Vietnam, I met my future husband Elgin in a bar. We got married but it didnt last, and by the time my daughter Ray was a teenager, I was told that I was dying from liver and pancreatic cancer. Angry because Elgin wouldn't take responsibility for Ray, I decided to commit suicide. But Ray foiled my plan, and I was forced to take her to her "Aunt" Ida's, then hitch a ride to Dayton's, where I decided to spend my final days. With the financial and emotional stability that Dayton offered me in his new life after prison, I was able to get Ray back into my life for a brief period. I taught Ray to drive and gave her my prized silver turtle ring. But having learned from Aunt Ida not to reveal painful truths, I could never tell Rayona that I was dying.