After preparing her cup of tea she boots up her computer. She hasn’t checked her e-mail since leaving home on Saturday morning so she feels completely disconnected. To be honest, it actually feels pretty good to unplug. Elsie scrolls through her e-mail, deleting all of the junk crowding her inbox. She sees something different and realized that it’s a response to one of her job inquiries. She opens it up and starts to read it.
Hi Elsie,
Thank you for sending your resume’ in to us. As a matter of fact, we are looking for a wardrobe supervisor. Could you come in this morning at 10? It’s a little crazy here, so I apologize ahead of time if you have to wait a little while. Your credentials look amazing. Can’t wait to meet you.
Jo McCafferty, Production Manager, Under the Dome
“EEEEEEEEEEK!” Elsie lets out a squeal of delight and bounces up and down in her chair, clapping her hands.
“Freakin’ Under the Dome!!! That is so cooooool!” she yells out to no one at all.
She quickly types out her reply, stating that she will be there at 10, and can barely sit still long enough to get it all written out.
“Chill out, girl, you’ve been on other big productions, you’ve so got this!” she reassures herself,trying tocalm down.
Elsie sends the e-mail, chugs her tea, then makes a beeline for the shower.
“Holy crap, what am I going to wear?” she exclaims pulling her clothes off on her way there.
CHAPTER 10 John’s past…“In the Fields the bodies burning as the war machines keep turning. Lyrics, “War Pigs” by Black Sabbath
“I hate this fucking place,” John grunts as he walks through the depressed Indian Reservation that his family called home. The structures, like his life, are crumbling around him from years of neglect.
Family, that’s a fucking joke, the words pass through his mind like poison in his veins. Whenever he thinks about family, rage and disgust fill him. He doesn’t know who his father is. John assumed he was just some john that his mother had years ago when she was still beautiful, before the booze and drugs seduced her into their clutches.
Hah, that’s probably why she named me John. The sick irony from the realization brings bubbles of laughter bursting from him, until he’s bent over in a fit of hysterics.
Holy shit, my mother named me after a trick, talk about a totally fucked life! I can’t even have my own identity. That’s so fucked up, it’s hysterical!
“John! What’s wrong with you?” booms the somberly powerful voice of the tribal chief, Standing Bear, or Billy, his birth name.
“I just realized that my mother must have named me after one of her tricks,” he laughs aloud. “She damned me to a fucked up life since the day she started self-destructing!” he howls in laughter.
Smack!
John is quickly sobered by the hard slap across his face from the chief.
“Do not speak of your mother like that, John. She’s your mother first and always. She was tormented by evil spirits that made her live life the way she did, do not blame her.”
The chief’s voice is very low, but his words resound like a yell within John’s mind.
John stands stoically, staring at the chief, torn between wanting to cry and wanting to scream. But he can’t do either one. Today’s his eighteenth birthday, he’s a man now, and men don’t cry. Instead he shoves all of the rage, and anger, stemming from a lifetime of pain, back down deep inside him, locking it away. He stands tall, squares the shoulders on his tall lanky frame, and the mask of calm reserve, which he’s nearly perfected, slips back into place.
“I’m sorry, Chief Standing Bear, my behavior is disrespectful and I am ashamed,” he bows his head in a show of regret and respect to the only person in the world that he admires. The old man stands in front of him, his wrinkled and weathered face a comfort to his lost soul.
“Come with me John, it is apparent that you are being attacked by evil as well,” Chief Standing Bear says as he places his hand on John’s back, then leads him towards the outskirts of their reservation. The chief seems to be communicating without words as they pass others on their walk, and they begin to join them. Lost in his thoughts, John is barely aware that they have arrived at the ceremonial grounds until the chief guides him into a fabric-covered dome structure. From his upbringing on the reservation, John realized that they were in a sweat lodge and his apprehension began to mount.
“Sit here, my son, let me cleanse you and ease some of your pain,” Chief Standing Bear tells John, as he spreads a woven mat on the dirt packed floor of the mud hut.
John sits and lets his eyes close. He’s so tired. He’s tired of this shitty life, he’s tired of living, he’s tired of hurting, but most of all he’s tired of being angry all of the time. Angry at himself, his mother, his unknown father, and angry at God. No young man should ever have such a deplorable life. For as far back as
