The Middle of Everywhere Read Online Free PDF

in the worst snowstorm, they could find their way better than any gps system ever invented.”
    Some people at the front of the room laugh. Even if they don’t own cars, they all know about gps systems. Maybe they have seen Halloween .
    â€œAnd those dogs were strong too. They were bred for pulling. A team of sled dogs could pull hundreds and hundreds of pounds. They could pull five caribou carcasses or a polar bear.”
    This legend is going to take forever—and then some— to tell. I wish I could stretch my legs, but there isn’t any room.
    Charlie is still yakking away. I think he likes the attention. “But there was so much to bring when they moved that time, even the sled dogs couldn’t manage everything in one trip. So the elders had to leave a group of people behind. ‘Don’t worry,’ the elders told those people. ‘We’ll be back soon. We promise. Just wait for us here, okay?’”
    Charlie looks up at the audience, and I can tell he wants us to feel like he’s one of those elders and we’re the people he’s leaving behind. It’s not working for me. All I can think about is how bored I am. I don’t see the point of telling legends.
    â€œTwo days went by, then three days, then four.” Charlie’s getting tense. I can tell because he’s finally speeding up. Thank god for that. Maybe I’ll score a couple of those cookies in the next half century.
    â€œThe people that were left behind got tired of waiting. They were hungry too. They ate up all the provisions.” That gets me wondering some more about those cookies. Were any of them chocolate? I’ll eat chocolate anything. “The seal meat and the caribou. They shot some ptarmigan—”
    â€œPtarmigan?” Without meaning to, I say the word out loud.
    A woman in the front row turns and shushes me.
    â€œSorry,” I whisper.
    Celia leans over her mom to poke my arm. Once she has my attention, Celia bends her elbows and flaps her arms. A ptarmigan must be a bird.
    â€œThanks,” I whisper to Celia.
    â€œâ€”but a few ptarmigan weren’t enough to fill their empty bellies. So on the fifth day, a boy and a girl”—I notice Charlie’s eyes land on Lenny and his friends—“kids about your age—well, they started heading for the new camp. On foot.” I can tell from the way Charlie is shaking his head he doesn’t think that was a very wise move.
    A small girl sitting on the floor groans. “What did their anaana and ataata say?” she calls out.
    Charlie shrugs. “You know how young folks are. Those two kids wouldn’t listen to anybody, least of all their anaana and ataata . The two of them just headed out into the snow, following the tracks the dogsleds had made five days before. After they’d been walking for two or three hours, the snow came. At first, it was just light flakes, but then the sky grew purplish black and a storm—a fierce one—blew in. The tracks got covered in no time.” Charlie pauses, and when he starts to speak again, his voice is so low it isn’t much louder than a whisper. “And then, they heard a terrible sound.”
    One of the grownups actually whimpers. Sheesh, I think, what’s wrong with you? It’s just a story.
    â€œThe sound those kids heard,” Charlie continues, “was louder than a scream, deeper than a moan and higher pitched than a dog’s bark. It was the worst sound they ever heard, so they covered their ears.” Charlie covers his ears now too, then bends over a little as if that might also help protect him from the sound he’s describing. “But the sound went right through their mittens and their nassak s.”
    This time Rhoda translates. She taps the black and red wool cap on her lap.
    Nassak . I nod and mouth the word so the woman in the front row won’t give me the evil eye again.
    Charlie picks up even