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Back Trinity Sight Save as PDF
Chapters (41)
  1. PART ONE
  2. ONE
  3. TWO
  4. THREE
  5. FOUR
  6. FIVE
  7. SIX
  8. SEVEN
  9. EIGHT
  10. NINE
  11. TEN
  12. ELEVEN
  13. TWELVE
  14. THIRTEEN
  15. FOURTEEN
  16. FIFTEEN
  17. PART TWO
  18. SIXTEEN
  19. SEVENTEEN
  20. EIGHTEEN
  21. NINETEEN
  22. TWENTY
  23. TWENTY-ONE
  24. TWENTY-TWO
  25. TWENTY-THREE
  26. TWENTY-FOUR
  27. TWENTY-FIVE
  28. TWENTY-SIX
  29. TWENTY-SEVEN
  30. TWENTY-EIGHT
  31. TWENTY-NINE
  32. PART THREE
  33. THIRTY
  34. THIRTY-ONE
  35. THIRTY-TWO
  36. THIRTY-THREE
  37. THIRTY-FOUR
  38. THIRTY-FIVE
  39. THIRTY-SIX
  40. THIRTY-SEVEN
  41. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Chance was praying in Zuni again and Eunjoo was screaming Old Lady Salt’s name as Calliope stared at the unclouded sky, New Mexico blue. Again, she thought of the middle of time, how she would soon rejoin Bisabuela, in afterlife or nothingness. She would join the lifeless matter of the universe. The sky so bright. What relief—giving in. Unloading the burden of this wasteland. This world without Phoenix. Or the rest of her family.

Salt grained against her palms. She scooped a handful and threw it above her like rice at her wedding, like sand on Boca Chica beach.

Then, whether Old Lady Salt was with her or not she couldn’t say, only that the bleeding staunched, the nausea faded away, a hurricane passing the Gulf, and she was determined to stay alive. To give these babies light—then find her son.

Eunjoo was laughing, tears streaming down her face.

Chance hoisted Calliope unsteadily back to the truck and she heaved herself in, relieved she could once again lean back without searing pain in her abdomen or tailbone.

From the back seat Mara asked, less ironic than crestfallen, “None of that miracle water for me?”

Eunjoo handed her the bowl. But it was empty.

TWENTY-SEVEN

TWENTY-SEVEN

THE ONE WHO HAS ME

The rez was not what Calliope had expected. The bleeding had stopped, her contractions had eased, and her vision was less blurry, salt restoring electrolytes.

She stared out the window as Chance pulled into the village center.

When she was a senior in high school, Bisabuela had taken her to the lake—not really a lake but a dam, the ice cave only green sludge. A tarantula smashed on the doormat outside the gift shop of Clovis points and other disillusioned gimcracks. Zuni then was gas station corn dogs, cardboard pizza, and tinfoil nachos. Kivas, shacks, sheds, mattress beds, and tires in front yards, basketball hoops without nets. Empty mouthwash bottles splayed in the parking lot because the rez was dry and there was alcohol in mouthwash. The Bureau of Vital Records & Health statistics. Mangy dogs outside the rolled-up windows. She knew they were rez dogs, and she should have been kinder. She’d worn her mother’s critical eye, tattered heart, the wind yelping with trickster coyote dogs that looked like they’d eat a stranger. She felt strange and out of place. That dry lake followed by the shock of the rez—not much different from where she lived. Poverty is poverty, anywhere.