Skeleton Dreams

Prologue

Sherman Misty is the antichrist. He can feel it in his fingers. He can taste it on the roof of his mouth. A sort of good kind of evil that shakes his veins and calms his soul. Who'd of thought that a nerdy Spokane boy with dirty braids and acne scars could amount to something magnificent. What started out as an innocent game of Apples to Apples, has led to an evening of woeful, drunken storytelling.

Two hours ago...

"Ok, so the word is 'glamorous'," Sherman says. A rude power outage has showed up uninvited to the Saturday video game night. The Res radio station says that a lightning storm is the cause. Now Sherman and his homeboys are sitting Indian style in his grandmother's living room playing a kiddy card game. Because he is the judge, Sherman sits crisscrossed on the sofa while the others are on the floor picking which card best represented 'glamorous.'

"Ok losers, time's up!" Sherman exclaims. "Show me your cards!"

"Peanut butter!" Lackey sings proudly waving his red card.

"Star Wars!" Bear says flashing his red card with his Darth Vader keychain flashlight for emphasis. It is one of the self-made cards the group put together before playing. Most of the real cards got lost during a camping trip five years ago.

"Beyoncé!" Ferrer exclaims as she dramatically flips her hair then winks. As the only girl in the group it is her informal job to sass things up.

"Ferrer, the point of Apples to Apples is to connect adjectives to inappropriate nouns," Bear says to his younger sister. Bear and Ferrer look nothing alike. While Ferrer looks like a Teen Vogue model, Bear is a little too short for his age, a little too chubby for his height, and a little too brown to be Native American. If it weren't for his long hair and animal name, he'd be easily mistaken for a cholo. Bear continues, "It's like positive plus double negative. Don't try to make things relevant."

"Yeah," Lackey agrees. "Stop trying too hard to be relevant. That's my job." It's true. Lackey takes his nerdiness to an extreme level by bringing up irrelevant facts at the most unnecessary times.

"Bear, Lakota chill," Sherman laughs. Though the vanilla scented candle barely lit the living room, Sherman can see the struggle in Ferrer's face. He knows that she just wants to fit in, but her blonde hair and blue eyes make it difficult for the other Spokane teens to accept her. Sherman looks at her and frowns. Her beauty could be worshiped in magazines or movies, yet it is ridiculed in the Spokane Res.

"This game is fuckin' lame," she murmurs.

"I've got a fun idea!" Lackey says. "Let's invite Junior and his gang!"

"Which Junior?" Sherman asks. "I don't want Drunk Junior coming here and pissing up my place."

"Tattoo Junior," Lackey replies. "I hear he's got a new drug."

"Fuck yeah," Bear shouts throwing his cards in the air. "This game is so gay. And not the fun kind of gay where your cool uncle fills you up then slips you $5. This is the dumb, kiddie kind of gay. Like seriously the more we play this I think we'd start to develop hipster slang and country club memberships."

Lackey pulls out his Samsung and calls Junior's girlfriend Emma. "Hey cousin! I'm at Sherman's place and his grandma went out. We're about to party. Bring your boys."

"And girls!" Sherman says. "Tell her to bring some of her girls."

Lackey nods. "And bring some of your girls. Also I heard Junior's got a new drug. Bring it. We need to try tonight."

Thirty minutes later everyone from Res school is there. Daniel Eaglefeather, the school DJ, has brought a battery-powered boombox blasting Brandon Flowers' album "Flamingo." Alice Sequoia, who is running for class president, has brought a hundred cupcakes. The basketball team arrives covered in feathers and glow sticks- Sherman isn't even sure if they're trying to look like ravers or Indian gods. Sherman's little H.U.D. house is full of every Spokane teenager. Even some dropouts are there. Sherman can't believe it all that he's having a party. Sure, he had fantasized about having parties like this when he was a hopeful ten-year old hooked on MTV but he had abandoned those dreams after being labeled as a geek in middle school.

"This place has gotten too crowded," Ferrer says to him. "Wanna go somewhere more quiet?"

"Junior is here! Junior is here!" Lackey yells as he leads in the handsome star of the party. "He's brought the magic! Whooohooo! He's brought the key to another dimension!"

Sherman goes up to Junior and shakes his hand. "Thanks for coming! Sorry for the darkness and the cold."

Junior laughs. "It's cool." Junior is sexy in a Hollywood bad boy kind of way. His arms are covered in art that accentuates his sexy muscles. He could have any girl yet he is with Emma. She is plain and short and looks like a lesbian. "So, how you wanna try the new drug?"

"Hmmm...blissfully," Sherman replies.

"Got it." Junior leads Sherman and his homeboys to the backyard. Although it is still raining, Ryan Little Owl hoses down the yard for mud wrestling. Already a group of cheerleaders are throwing mud balls at each other. Junior takes the nerds to the roof and they each swallow a piece of the new drug.

"Hey Ferrer," Lackey says, "What do you see?"

Ferrer smiles. "We are salmon swimming down the Spokane River...Sherman is glorious and silver and meaty. The river is icy yet flowing. We fly through the stream and crash into our dreams. We are free."

...the water is brutal and freezing, yet they gracefully swim through like they are a part of it. There is no fear. There is only the craving for the journey. They surge with the stream toward forever. Forever is the answer. The question is where, when, and why...it is forever, forever, forever.

Emma has gotten on the roof. She pulls a piece of the drug from Junior's pocket and swallows. Even in the delicate moonlight Sherman can tell that she isn't pretty enough for Junior. She isn't ugly, but her butch haircut and pierced face don't make her hot either. She looks like a criminal wanted for elder abuse or check fraud. She looks like a devil.

Ten minutes into the buzz, Bear exclaims, "I want this drug to take us to outer space!"

Ferrer laughs and waves her arms around. "Ok, ok. I'll take us there...close your eyes and listen. You are your name. You are grizzly and majestic. You're made of stars. I am the Coyote. We float about the blackness into infinity. We see Whitman's face carved into the moon and listen to his lament for democracy. A shooting star passes us by singing "Spaceman" by the Killers. The universe isn't ours. We are of the universe."

...Ferrer and Bear are stick figures made of lights wandering the sky. They glide the sky and absorb the cosmos, becoming more of the universe. They watch stars die and form new worlds. Instead of Whitman's face on the moon, it's Crazy Horse. He is solemn and tired. In outer space they are not brother and sister. They are constellations of a bigger story.

"So this is what you fuckin' like?" Emma screams. Sherman opens his eyes and sees Lackey vigorously kissing Junior. Junior's hand holds Lackey's chin while his other hand squeezes Lackey's thigh. Emma stands there shocked and disgusted, but there is not anger in her face. "This explains a lot! Screw you." Emma shimmies down the roof so easily like a trained thief or a lifelong circus performer.

Sherman turns away from the Indian boys kissing and says to Ferrer, "I want this drug to take me to hell."

Ferrer smiles. "Alright...You are anger in the form of romance. You are the embodiment of every Lana Del Rey song. You hurt and inflict hurt like it's some kind of religion. The Devil loves you. He is a white man with a hipster beard and reeks of Voltaire #6 perfume. He looks like he works for NPR. He is NPR. You and him are more than friends."

...Sherman sits at a Tiny Desk Concert and sips his Starbucks green tea from his reusable cup. Father John Misty is performing today. He sings "Only Son of a Ladies Man." Sherman has never told anyone but he has always related to that song. As Father John Misty gets to the last verse that's when Sherman realizes that that is his father. Father John Misty is his dad and Sherman is the antichrist.

Sherman cannot take it anymore and pushes Ferrer off the roof. She somehow safely lands in the middle of a mud wrestle. She survives and she still loves him. He shimmies down the roof and kisses Emma. He holds her long and hard to make sure Ferrer sees.