Nominated for a Pushcart Prize, this excerpt from my upcoming novel Innermountain appears in the spring 2018 issue of High Desert Journal. With a stunning painting by Ric Gendron.
Take AIM
Eddie watched them arrive. Seven men emerging from two snowy cars in front of Building One with the grey mountains pocked white behind them. Six wore Levi jackets and aviator sunglasses, the young ones, with hair down their backs, hair in braids wrapped with leather, hair bound with bandanas and beaded headbands. They looked cool as a hippie militia from Life Magazine. Eddie stood there holding the school’s front door, feeling like a chump in his small orange parka and pleated khakis: football star, Diné student, your average junior, gawking.
The seventh man, the elder of the AIM pack, wore no coat at all. He simply stepped out of the sedan with his calico shirt open at the neck, the feathers dangling from his braids whomping his chest hard in the breeze. Like they were living. Like something was about to take off. Like it wasn’t even winter. The gray hairs threading his head tethered the frantic birds in place. He had a wide face, did not smile. He could have led a hundred-horse outfit into battle, he seemed that invincible... READ MORE
Eddie watched them arrive. Seven men emerging from two snowy cars in front of Building One with the grey mountains pocked white behind them. Six wore Levi jackets and aviator sunglasses, the young ones, with hair down their backs, hair in braids wrapped with leather, hair bound with bandanas and beaded headbands. They looked cool as a hippie militia from Life Magazine. Eddie stood there holding the school’s front door, feeling like a chump in his small orange parka and pleated khakis: football star, Diné student, your average junior, gawking.
The seventh man, the elder of the AIM pack, wore no coat at all. He simply stepped out of the sedan with his calico shirt open at the neck, the feathers dangling from his braids whomping his chest hard in the breeze. Like they were living. Like something was about to take off. Like it wasn’t even winter. The gray hairs threading his head tethered the frantic birds in place. He had a wide face, did not smile. He could have led a hundred-horse outfit into battle, he seemed that invincible... READ MORE
