Sovereign Ground (Breaking Bonds) Read online

  Sovereign Ground

  Hilarey Johnson

  Copyright © 2014 Hilarey Johnson

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems without written permission of the author, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in review.

  This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, incidents and the town of Salt Creek, Nevada are the product of the author’s imagination and are used fictitiously.

  Scripture taken from The Voice™. Copyright © 2008 by Ecclesia Bible Society. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

  Cover by Blue Azalea Designs

  Cover image: Ro Sen/Shutterstock

  Interior Image: Petrovic Igor/Shutterstock

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Book Club Questions

  A Note from the Author

  A Heart of Petra

  To any man or woman who has stood naked before the accuser

  Chapter 1

  Last night I dreamed about dancing. The images become more vivid with each slicing step. I twirled on a Heidi mountain, breathing in sunshine. That was last night—currently I freeze and watch drivers to see if anyone makes eye contact. They don’t.

  A blister grates my heel as though a shard of glass is wedged in my sneakers. It makes the weight of my book bag pull at my shoulder—the Hans Christian Anderson collection is a heftier volume than my normal library loan. I no longer count to make sure two steps fit in each sidewalk square. Just like the fabled Little Mermaid, I suffer with each step. It would figure that the prince loved to watch her, ignorant of her torment. Doesn’t it also figure she would dance for him in pain?

  I don’t think I’ll finish the story.

  An image of a real-life Barbie, stretched across a billboard, advertises a casino downtown. The billboard must work. Cars speed past, drivers desperate to leave this corner of Reno lined by single story motels, pawnshops and the promise of quick loans.

  I miss my green mountain. Though I rarely think about it in the day, I’ve had that dream hundreds of times since I was nine. I’m not always in the mountains; sometimes I’m at a great body of water. The dream started the night after I danced at a Powwow with my dad, two months before I got sent to Nevada. Dancing that night was the last time I felt free. Nearly seven years I have lived with my half brother, Thom, and his wife, Lorna. Nearly seven years I have known about the curse.

  I plop down on a graffiti-covered bus-stop bench. There’s a fading “you just proved this sign works” ad on the back. I stare at the brick building across the street where a tattoo parlor sign sways with the occasional biting gust. No one will hire me, a high school dropout, a Native American. I’m proud of my heritage—at least I’m practiced at saying I’m proud. But only in my dream of dancing do I lift my face with my arms. Only in my dream the spirits do not hunt me.

  Thom told me I wouldn’t find work. He probably hoped I would resurrect the stubborn pride he says I have inside, find a job, and prove him wrong. He would know. He’s great at finding jobs, just not at keeping them. I’ll just sit on this bench instead and let the pulse in my heel drum against my shoe. There isn’t a chance Lorna would come get me. If I don’t find a job, I may never leave their place. Still, I can’t muster any more effort.

  Too bad there isn’t a snack in my bag. I finger the book. I could use a little break from job hunting. Maybe I’ll see if the Little Mermaid ever gets an eternal soul.

  A motorcycle growls above the hum of car traffic. It’s a nice bike, shiny at least. The rider zips past me and wheels up onto the curb. She stops and lifts her helmet. Brown curly hair falls out, not the natural kind of curl, the permed kind. Still straddling the bike, she gives me a wink. It feels funny to get winked at by a woman who’s not much older than me. I laugh a little, and she smiles back showing a Madonna gap between her two front teeth.

  She throws a leg over and walks her bike through the parking lot of a building I hadn’t noticed behind me. A sign hangs above: The Wild Lily. The winter sky is dark enough to show lights burned out on the sign. The final “Y” pulses from dark to dull, and the lily is missing part of the stem. The building itself matches, a cement square with rebar protruding where the corner crumbles. Looks like someone drove into it. Bars hug a ground-level basement window, and huddled against the glass is a handwritten “Busser Wanted” sign.

  What are my options? If I looked like a cheerleader, I would’ve probably been hired at that tourist clothing store. Who am I kidding? Cheerleaders don’t get jobs. They don’t wear clothes from the Salvation Army or have shoes a half-size too small. I should have told that last store I would wear one of their “My-grandparents-went-to-Reno-and-all-I-got-was-this-lousy” T-shirts.

  Maybe it isn’t my clothes. Lorna is probably right, it’s me.

  I walk to the Wild Lily, no longer hungry. I really don’t want to walk into a building that has steps leading down, going below the ground. But I open the door and look inside. A cloud of smoke waits like a stalker over the bar. Even the gray January sky is brighter than it is in there. The door swings behind me, and I can’t remember if it’s day or night outside. The winter season is irrelevant.

  “We’re closed, honey,” A man stands behind a little round table covered with papers.

  I look up at the window and point to the sign with a sort of shrug. I’m a fool. I should go.

  “Are you here for the job?” His Santa Claus stomach strains against a thin white shirt tucked into shiny pants with a worn belt. Arms crossed and feet planted apart seem to declare that he is the one in charge. He grabs a jacket that matches his pants and stains to pull it up his arms. I want to laugh at the thought of him trying to button it.

  “Someone here, Buzz?” An older woman leans against the bar. Wrinkles of loose skin run like a river down to taut cleavage. She’s outlived her implants. Her Hawaiian print tank top is short enough to reveal a large rodeo belt buckle clasped over black Wranglers.

  “Just your new busser.” Buzz changes his mind about the suit jacket and lays it down over his chair-back again.

  “I’m Cassie.” She crosses her arms like Buzz did, but she has a wet rag in one hand. Maybe she’s the one in charge. “You got a high school diploma?”

  I nod. If they ask to see it, I just won’t return.

  “Are you eighteen?” Cassie’s teeth match a picture I once saw in a “reasons not to smoke” pamphlet.

  Again, I nod. I practically am.

  “Have you ever worked in a restaurant before?”

  “No. But I’m a fast learner.” I heard a teacher say that was the best response. I try not to laugh at the restaurant comment. In the middle of a dozen conspicuously small tables, which wouldn’t hold more than a plate, there is a twelve by twelve-foot stage with a pole—securing floor to ceiling.

  “Can you start soon?” She looks down and adjusts her tank top so the nec
kline shows more.

  “I can start now.”

  Cassie likes that. She uncrosses her arms and really looks at me. I use my thumb to tuck the hem of my shirt into my jeans, hiding the torn edge.

  “Let me introduce you to the girls.” Cassie walks as though each foot is on a spring. Even with a sore heel, I catch myself imitating it a little. We pass the stage and enter a door hidden on the right. The narrow room has mirrors and lights lining each wall. Someone tried to clean the mirrors, but gave up on smearing the wipe marks. Three twenty-something women look up at me. The first one to smile is the motorcycle chick. She winks at me again.

  “Brita, where are the waitress shorts?”

  “Here, I think.” Brita yanks open a plastic tub of drawers. A mound of bright satin expands. “Oopsy.” She chuckles in a manly way.

  “Get ‘er all taken care of.” Cassie waves, and Brita gives her a wink too. Brita holds a red bra up to me.

  “This color looks gorgeous next to your tan.” She scrunches her lips like she’s trying to drink out of a straw to her left. “Naw, you have such a baby face. Blue.” Brita lifts a handful of blue lace and holds it out.

  There was only one other time I touched something this luxurious. Right after Health and Welfare took me from my dad, Lorna had a pile of laundry on the couch. When she saw me looking at her unmentionables, she cried and cried. She and Thom had a bad fight that first night.

  I can’t resist. I touch the lace shoulder strap, the kind that would always “accidentally” peek out from under girls’ shirts at school. I let go.

  “Here’s your uniform.” Brita sets a pair of shorts and a thin white tank top on the counter.

  “Changing room?” I ask.

  “You’re in it,” the taller girl with thin, brown hair says. She has stripped to a bra and panties—so I feel stupid.

  I face the wall and slip my shirt over my head. I’m not that modest, I just don’t want them to see the bleach stain on the front of my sports bra. Lorna usually dumps bleach in my laundry. She thinks I bring—well, brought bugs home from school.

  “Oh, Baby.” Brita lifts my frayed strap. I didn’t realize it had gotten so tattered. “Take the bra. It’s yours.” Brita hands it to me.

  I won’t take it, so she holds up the scarlet bra. “Any color will look gorgeous on you. I can’t wear red; makes me look sunburned.” Brita shrugs and her robe slips from her shoulders like butter in a skillet. She catches it at the last moment and tosses it on the counter. Without turning, she dresses in the green bra.

  “It won’t hurt to try one on,” Brita says.

  I reach for the blue one again. Blue like the sky in spring, in Tahoe. She squeals when she sees it on me.

  “Let me put some makeup on you, Baby.”

  “Why not?”

  She winks, and this time I wonder if she has a tick. I try to hold still for the mascara brush.

  “You have a nice bike.” When I talk, the mascara brush hits my cheek. I take a deep breath when she licks her thumb to wipe it.

  “Thanks, my son hates when I drive it.” Brita reaches for a brush and pulls my hair from the ponytail. “Oh. My. Gosh. I have never seen such hair. Are you Pocahontas?” The other two girls giggle.

  I start to form a response for that, one I would couple with a slap, but she interrupts.

  “He acts like he’s nervous for me, but I know it’s just because he wants to use it to sneak out and see his girlfriend.”

  Ah, the bike. “Son?” She must have been twelve when she had him.

  “He’s such a brat. He isn’t even old enough to drive.” Brita laughs that same manly way and pulls me to my feet.

  “Who’s your friend?” Up till now, the other two gals were only concerned with their makeup. The taller one who spoke earlier walks forward and smiles like a social worker.

  “Lexi, this is Baby Face.” Brita winks again, and says to me, “We don’t use our real names.”

  “I’m Misti.” The one in the corner, with shoulder-length black hair, stops smearing cover up under her eyes long enough to wave. “Lexi. Misti.” Misti repeats while pointing.

  Lexi pulls a pink boa from the wall and throws it over my shoulders.

  “No way,” Misti says and laughs. “It doesn’t match.”

  I laugh too. I would never hold something that ridiculous.

  “How about this?” Misti joins in the decorating.

  “Fab-u-lous.” Brita mouths the word like it’s three.

  “Look at this color.”

  “I would kill for her skin.”

  “Do you work out?”

  “Isn’t she beautiful?”

  “So exotic.”

  My hair is tugged and played with as I become their doll. Churning colors of fabric rain on me with the compliments. I am Nevada desert, drinking it all.

  We’ve moved to the door on the opposite side of the room. I know what’s coming, what they’ve been doing all along. But I don’t care.

  When we leave the dressing room, I find myself alone on stage. Their cheering swells around me. The light shines bright on my face and heats my skin. Another man talks with Buzz. They are both in suits, and they hardly look at me. Cassie turns a dial for music behind the bar, and she waves like a ribbon in the breeze.

  I move. The women’s applause crests over me. I undulate like Hemmingway’s ocean, a lover under a frothy blanket. I am not a dropout. I am not a ward of the state. I am not cursed. I am a stormy sea.

  My heel doesn’t hurt. The fancy shoes I wear have straps that miss my blister. If the song never ended, I would be content. My foot slips. I grab the pole to keep from falling. The cheers rise with laughter.

  “I’ve done that too.” I think it was Cassie.

  The man with Buzz walks forward. He has a commercial smile and holds out a hand. We shake.

  “You are fab-u-lous. If you want a job dancing—we want you.” When he pulls his hand away there’s a bill pressed to my palm, a crisp one-hundred-dollar bill. I won’t have to walk home tonight. What will Lorna say if I show up in a cab?

  “Buzz, take care of this girl.” He speaks to Buzz, but looks at me.

  “Sure thing, Brody.”

  Brody is the one in charge.

  The girls twirl around the tables, laughing and talking about their plans for the weekend. Those plans include me if I want.

  Alone on stage, I dance with them. They have seen me in my underwear and they don’t even know my name.

  Chapter 2

  I’ve averaged a hundred in cash every night. Better than some waitresses, Brita tells me.

  Crazy Brita, she lets me crash at her place when it’s too late to go home to Thom and Lorna. Her son hits on me, but I think it’s cute since her guest room has a lock on the door. Tomorrow I’m going to get a place of my own, off the reservation. Thom never needs to know what I do. Dancing isn’t that big of a deal. It isn’t like I strip nude.

  There are a few regulars here tonight, men that make me laugh. They pretend that I dance for them and not the money. We all pretend. A tall, blonde man in a flannel shirt walks in. I recognize him as the truck driver, a big tipper. Good.

  He walks over to Buzz and shakes his hand. A folded bill passes from Buzz’s hand to the truck driver. Buzz looks at me and I turn quickly and grab the pole. I still feel a little silly holding on to it, but Brita coaches me once in awhile. I watch the truck driver; he smiles and the dimple in his chin deepens.

  A new song starts. The truck driver’s shaggy blonde hair is so oily it looks wet. I prefer to tell myself he went nuts with gel rather than consider it has been weeks since he shampooed. It isn’t long before he offers me the money. I know it’s the same bill because his hand never went near his pocket. My big tips come from Buzz?

  Lexi comes out just before the song ends. Must be time for my break. I walk to the back and grab one of the sodas that Brita brings once in awhile. We take care of each other like that.

  Diet grape fizz forces a pucker in the
corners of my mouth. I guzzle it like water, still remembering the first time I ever tasted grape soda—summer in a can.

  Since I’m alone, I flatten the hundred inside my rented hardback of Aesop’s Fables. What a disappointment the book is. I haven’t read a single happily ever after.

  The toilet flushes. So that’s where Brita went. “Hey, Copernicus,” she says when she walks in.

  Brita calls me that, or Einstein, because I’m always reading. I never told her I dropped out of high school; I don’t know how loyal she is to Cassie and Buzz—or their boss, Brody. I found the school library about eighteen months ago when I realized I wasn’t going to get anything out of my classes. It wasn’t until I discovered the public library that I stopped needing school. I put the book and hidden hundred into my pack.

  “Brita, have you ever noticed Buzz tipping the guys.”

  “What do you mean?” She adjusts her bra. I’ve gotten to where I no longer avert my eyes, but I still don’t look directly at her underwear. Instead I focus on her blotchy brown hair. Maybe I should offer to help her next time she dyes it.

  “I think I saw Buzz give a guy a bill.” I pause, waiting to see if she looks shocked. “…and then he gave it to me.”

  “I wouldn’t worry about it.” Brita looks away, and I can’t see her face.

  Why would she deflect me? “I wasn’t worried, I just wonder…”

  Splintering wood and glass interrupts me. Brita spins back, her eyes huge.

  A scuffling sound enters the space of our surprise, followed by a scream. I turn and race to the door, but she grabs my arm.

  “Wait, it might not be safe.”

  Another scream comes. It’s Lexi!

  I shake Brita loose and nudge the dressing room door open, leaning out. Brita presses behind me to see. She lets me shield her.

  The truck driver lies on the floor still in his overturned chair. A dark stain bleeds through his flannel shirt. On the other side of him, Buzz stares at me with eyes that seem to scream fear. Why doesn’t he speak?

  A man I don’t know pulls the door from my grip. With colossal arms, he reaches for Brita.