jparker1861

“Half-breed – he called me a half-breed!” Liah Cloud tore open the pouch of Sweetarts and spread them across the small desk in front of her. She slowly separated the candies into five assorted colors, and as usual, the majority were red. She hated the red, and sometimes she would throw them away. But Labor Day had passed, and football was about to begin – and she needed the red ones so she would have enough to set up two teams in formation on her desk. The orange and green candies made up the Miami Dolphins side – she loved the Dolphins, mainly because she loved the ocean – plus they had won the last two Super Bowls – and it’s easy to cheer for a winner. Thankfully, her mother hadn’t withheld her thirty cents allowance, and she even took her by the 7-Eleven on the way home from school. But now, Liah was confined to her room. Her performance on her first day of middle school did not make her mother happy – and now she was incarcerated with her stuffed animals waiting for supper. “Half-breed.” Brett Sullivan had been calling her that since the third grade. Since that day she proudly presented a poster and report on her Cherokee heritage dressed in full costume. Ms. Hammett had given her an “S+” for the project, but the teasing on the playground sent her home to cry into her pillow. That was the very same day her mother taught her to be proud of her heritage and to wear it like a ball gown. It was also the day that she unknowingly began to realize the inherent strength that came from being an integral part of a tribe. The first day of her life at Wallace Middle School in the West Ashley borough of Charleston had been uneventful – that is until roll call in Home Room happened. “Lee Cloud,” the teacher called. “It’s pronounced “Lee-Ah”,” she had answered. She hated having her name said incorrectly. Then the torment came from Brett Sullivan who was seated directly in front of her. It came quietly enough so that only she could hear. “Half-breed.” Liah would forever claim amnesia for the events that followed, but apparently, she stood up and swung her three-ring binder hard enough to knock Brett Sullivan out of his desk and onto the floor. He snapped back up from the floor quickly, slid back into the desk, and started laughing, but Liah could tell his ears were ringing like a five-alarm fire bell as he tried desperately to save face. So, Liah’s mother, Dr. Mina Cloud, received a phone call downtown at Roper Hospital, and Liah went home for two days to think about her “violent behavior”. It was starting to get dark outside now, and Liah pressed the righthand button on her fluorescent desk lamp. Then she waited…nothing. She held the button down again and then let go quickly…nothing. “Third times a charm” she thought as she pressed and held the button again…the tubular light flickered and clicked once, then twice, then came on with a loud hum. She tapped the hood over the light and the humming subsided to a low buzz. Then, she opened her desk drawer and pulled out a wrapped plank of Bazooka Joe green apple bubble gum. It cost her ten cents, but she could cut it into twenty pieces and sell them all day long for two cents apiece at school. She reached over and rattled her Tootsie Roll bank and listened to the quarters clanking together. This was her savings to get SCUBA certified when she turned fifteen in four years, because her mother was “not paying for that in my lifetime.” She loved the ocean. Liah used her steel rounded safety scissors to cut the gum into small squares, and then she placed them all neatly into a sandwich bag, folded over the top, and tucked it in. Then she placed the little bag in her Grimace backpack…why did she still have to carry a Grimace backpack? Wasn’t it free from McDonalds? God! Her Mother was a cheapskate. She hated that too. There was a small tap at the door as it was being opened, and her mother stuck her head through. “I’ve got some supper ready,” she turned on the overhead light. “Kevin will be home soon…and I have to go back to the hospital for a couple of hours. I can bring your supper in here, but no T.V. tonight.” It was Tuesday night so there was a bunch of crap on anyway, and Kevin would probably be watching PBS on their only television because he’s “so smart”. Liah hated Kevin. Things were so much better when he was not around. She took the brush from her desk and pulled it through her long dark hair as she pretended to ignore her mother. Then the doorbell rang, and her mother walked away from the door but left it cracked. Liah hated that. For crying out loud close the door. Then she heard her mother’s voice…and it was soft, sweet, and sounded apologetic. She heard her mother coming back toward her room. “It’s Brett Sullivan and his mother,” Mina pushed the door all the way open. “He would like to apologize.” “Oh God, Mom! No!” “Just come out and get it over with.” “I hate him!” “Make the peace so we can move on.” Liah hated it when her mother said that, but she stood up anyway, and walked over to her closet to look for a better shirt to put on. Anything would be better than the tank top she was wearing with that stupid 1972 Smiley face covering the front. She hated that shirt. Her mother bought glasses with green and yellow Smiley faces on them too. She hated those – who was that happy all the time? A cream-colored turtleneck was better – so she slipped it on over the shirt and pulled her hair around to the side, so it flowed down her chest almost to her waist. “Really?” her mother said. “Let’s get this over with,” Liah brushed past her mother and went into the living room where Brett and his mother were seated on the Cloud’s hard, itchy, gold colored couch from Dixie Furniture. Yikes, she hated that couch. She plopped down in the matching chair on the other side of the room and leered at Brett. “Nancy, would you like some tea?” Mina asked as she strolled back into the room trailing her daughter. “Mom…I have stuff to do.” “In the breakfast room – so these two can talk it out?” Liah’s mother led Brett’s mother out of the room through the folding doors and Liah heard her mother move and then fill the tea kettle before dropping it back down on the stove with a clang. “Why are you here, Butt Sullivan?” “I deserve that I guess,” the boy took both hands and pushed his blond Prince Valiant hair back above his forehead where it hung in clumps – Liah fought the urge to fix it. “I’m sorry,” he said with a small sigh. “Okay – you did what your mom made you do – so you can leave now,” Liah started to stand up. “No, Liah. I mean I’m sorry for all of it,” Brett clasped his hands in his lap and folded the gaze of his blue eyes in the same direction. “It’s tiring,” she sat back down. “I’m sorry for all the times I have called you, um…you know - that word, and I’m sorry for letting the air out of your tires at the park this summer.” “That was you?” Liah groaned. “I had to walk home in the dark…pushing my bike with a flat - after the streetlights came on. I was soaking wet from the pool. You got me in trouble!” “I’m sorry…and it won’t happen again,” Brett looked up at her with a slight grin, and his blue eyes caught her off guard. She was most surely blushing – but her olive skin would never give it away. He was the cutest boy in school. She hated that about him. They sat in silence until the tea kettle started to whistle and then they both smiled. “What are you doing this Saturday?” Brett spoke again – finally. “Why?” “Bunch of us meeting at the Ultravision to see the Love Bug again.” “Seen it.” “Me too, just gonna see it one more time…it’s been held over one more week.” “So, you can make fun of me in front of your friends some more?” Liah smirked in his general direction. “I said I was sorry – and I mean it,” she thought he looked a little sad for a brief second or two. “Truth is…” Brett looked down again, “I like you a lot…always have.” “You’ve got to be kidding.” “My mom says that I’m being mean because I like you.” “You really think that?” “It’s true.” “So, I should give you a chance?” “I don’t know why I act the way I do sometimes,” Brett looked down at his Keds. “I’m stupid.” “Because you are a boy…and boys are idiots,” Liah wondered for a moment if Brett was the one sixth grader who had figured out that acting like a horse’s ass toward girls was no way to make them like you. Some boys thought that the meaner they were – the more the girl would care. Liah hated that. “Okay…I’ll go,” she said. “Really? that’s awesome,” Brett smiled. “If you are tricking me, I’ll give you a wedgie so bad you won’t be able to walk until eighth grade,” Liah laughed, but she meant every word of it. Mina closed the front door behind the Sullivans and watched them as they went down the walk and turned to head up Dartmoor Circle. When they reached the first yellow streetlight, she flipped off the front porch light. Kevin Porter was just swinging his ugly green Chevy Impala station wagon into the driveway as its’ lights splashed out onto the street across the front yard and rolled quickly past the massive hedge of azaleas across the street and behind the neighbor’s house. He jumped out of the car without noticing the movement of the bushes as he hurried through the side door, and then he let the screen door slam behind him. The old man had turned his back to the light and pushed further into the dense patch of azaleas. He did not mind mosquitoes so much, but he was not used to the fire ants, which had unfortunately found him many times. He hated the ants. It would be a long humid night, but sleeping outside was nothing new to him. He knew how to be patient. He could wait – he had done it before many times. The man watched Liah’s window until her light went out. She was going to sleep. He knew right where she would be for the night, so he closed his own eyes. Maybe tomorrow would be the day. But he was a patient man. It would not be long now before he caught Liah Cloud all by herself.

Adding setting example: Tilly Fountain ran barefoot across the rocks, logs, and grass that lined the Yellow Medicine. The water was high, but it ran silently toward the Minnesota, which she could hear roaring over rapids in the distance. She wanted to go home – back to her grandmother’s house in Massachusetts. Why did they bring her here? Why did they leave her alone? She tripped and gashed her left knee on a rock. Blood formed in droplets on her skin, and she used her filthy dress to make one pass over the cuts. To the left of her she heard horse hooves pounding along the edge of the riverbed and she instinctively dove beneath the prairie grass overhanging the wall of the ridge that had been cut by the river. As soon as she had pulled her rabbit under the grass, she saw the first of what seemed to be a hundred horses come crashing down into the gully as they turned to ride down the creek bed toward the north. It was a small miracle of God that she wasn’t trampled to death. The Indians where hooting and hollering as they went, but some appeared to be barely hanging on to their horses as their blood dripped into the water. Many carried the white sacks she knew to be flour and sugar. She waited until she heard only the sounds of the plains before she rolled out from her hiding spot and began to walk again. Tilly knew it would be dark soon and the night air would grow cooler. She headed along the creek in the same direction the Indians went, until it grew too dark to see in front of her. She drew one last drink from the river and curled up between two dry logs, pulling her knees up to her chest and dragging her dress down over her sore feet. Her father taught her never to sleep in a ravine, but this just felt safer to her. Somehow…she quickly fell asleep. Sleep was easy for her…it was her only escape. She was instantly transported back to Rockport, Massachusetts and the smell of the sea. She would never see…or smell the ocean again.

Good afternoon, everyone - I am traveling from Charleston, SC for this fantastic opportunity and looking forward to meeting everyone... Story Statement: Is there any hope of stopping a not-so-self-inflicted generational cultural genocide? Antagonists – as with my debut novel Beneath the Draper Moon, I have two parallel stories running across different timelines. This is a description of the two “heroes”: Dragged westward by two naive parents looking to improve their lot in life, eight-year-old Tilly Fountain finds herself orphaned along the banks of the Yellow Medicine River in the Minnesota Valley in 1862. A raging war between Little Crow's Santee Sioux and the United States government thrusts her into the hands of the Oceti Sakowin - the Seven Council Fires of the Sioux tribe. Witnessing her being shunned by her own people, the Wasi'chu, the Lakota Sioux carry her North to their winter hunting grounds and away from the fighting. Tilly's red hair, green eyes, and fiery temper make her a legend in the Sioux tribe and earn her the name Prairie Fire. But it is the mystery of her centuries-old American lineage that has the most important impact on her new people. Twelve-year-old Liah Cloud is finding difficulty growing up with her single mother in the suburbs of Charleston, South Carolina in 1974. Her dark hair, dark skin, and deep brown eyes have other kids calling her "half-breed". Liah knows she is a full-blooded Cherokee, but the bullying still makes her feel isolated and alone. The most important thing running through her sixth-grade mind is meeting her father...but that secret is kept hushed and hidden by her mother. Liah suffers through vivid and violent dreams that torment her waking mind, but the promise of a stranger may hold the power to change everything. Titles Current working title – Lakota Skies Others - Winter Count; the Destruction of the Lakota Moon Calendar Dismantling the Lakota; the Systemic Ending of a Beautiful Way of Life Comparable: The Berry Pickers – Amanda Peters Native American Literature Western Historical Fiction Lonesome Dove – Larry McMurtry Native American Literature Western Historical Fiction Primary Dramatic Conflict: Despite her mother’s refusal to cooperate, twelve-year-old Liah Cloud is determined to find her birth father at all costs. Though separated by a century, her story runs parallel to that of Tilly Fountain who has been left utterly alone in the wilderness at the age of eight. Their divergent journey is one of adventure, danger, and heartache at every turn, but their devotion to their family could save an entire culture from extinction that looks inevitable. Hook line: Two disillusioned young women born more than a century apart may hold the key to saving an indigenous tribe on the verge of cultural and societal extinction. Other matters of conflict: Secondary – Liah Cloud is socially isolated in her current environment, and she is convinced that finding her father will resolve the turmoil in her life. She cannot comprehend the reasons why her mother feels she must keep this from happening at all costs. Tertiary – Liah has dreams that turn into nightmares. She keeps this to herself, but when a man from one of her dreams suddenly appears in her life, she begins to doubt the nightmares are just simply fantasy. Settings: The story runs in parallel with the two protagonists. Liah’s journey begins in the 1970’s in Charleston, SC – it is a scene of friendship and staying outdoors until the streetlights shine, where personal relationships mean more than anything else. Her journey moves westward and eventually arrives in Western Canada just prior to winter setting in. Tilly is left alone in a wilderness filled with hunger, danger, and heartache. The irony of snowcapped mountains and lush meadows filled with flowers and butterflies is the harsh reality that death is just the next step away.