Tantric Coconuts Read Free Page A

indulging his aunt’s crazy gene. “Yes, Lilly, I would like to wear your harness and charge.”
    The old woman rose. “Good. I’ll make us tea while you charge.”
    Larsen’s uncle Harry, who had been divorced from Aunt Lilly for several years, had counseled Larsen against the visit. “She’s packing heat, crazier than a rabid skunk, and twice as mean. Be careful of that she-wolf, No Barks. It does not like men.”
    When Lilly slipped off her harness and handed it to Larsen, he noticed bruises on her arm. When he asked her about the marks, she said, “Man trouble.”
    Later that afternoon, after he finished his visit with Lilly, he called his uncle, whom he barely knew, and they discussed whether it was safe for Lilly to live by herself, isolated in the remotest corner of the already remote, desolate, heartbreaking, and poverty-stricken reservation. Like most of the othersin the rural part of the reservation, she had neither electricity nor adequate water. “I bring her food once a week,” Uncle Harry said. “She won’t spend her Social Security checks. She’s crazy, but what can I do?”
    Larsen hesitated but decided to confront his uncle. “She had bruises on her arm. Do you know where she got them?”
    “She probably fell. She drinks. Too much.”
    When Aunt Lilly had called him three months ago, it had surprised and embarrassed him. To the best of his knowledge, his aunt had never owned a phone. He had ignored the poor woman for too long.
    “Larsen,” Aunt Lilly began, “you have not come to see me in a very long time and I’m afraid that I am going to have to move. I want to give you my land, Bertha the Bookmobile, my dog, No Barks, and my new address at the women’s home in Pierre.”
    A gentle breeze blew open the gauze curtains, and Larsen wondered, as he peered out at the fields of wheat ripening under the summer sun, whether Aunt Lilly was thinking clearly. “Why do you have to move to Pierre, Aunt Lilly? Are you sick?”
    “No. The rez police came from Pine Ridge and took me away.”
    Larsen Two Sparrow became worried. “Why?”
    “I had a dream vision. My bear told me that your uncle Harry would come and try to take my home, my money, No Barks, and my land from me. So when I next saw him, I shot him. It was him or me.”
    Larsen wanted to believe that his aunt had slipped into some state of delusion, a natural by-product of the crazy gene, but still he asked, “Whom did you shoot, Lilly?”
    Her voice grew louder, like she thought Larsen was growing deaf. “Your uncle Harry. I shot him dead.”
    “Are you sure?”
    “He didn’t move for two weeks. I’m sure.”
    “I see.”
    “Larsen,” Aunt Lilly continued, “will you take care of Bertha and No Barks? They’ve been good to me. No Barks is part wolf, but so am I. So is that daughter of yours. What do you call her?”
    “Angel.”
    “Yes, that’s what you call her. You’re a good human, Larsen. I want you to have these things. Now find a pencil.”
    She gave him the address for the South Dakota Women’s Prison in Pierre, and then the line went as dead as Uncle Harry.
    Now his only daughter was ready to leave in Lilly’s bookmobile to start this rather dubious enterprise as a spiritual consultant journeying across America. In the old days, his ancestors had hunted buffalo and families had stayed together, kept warm by the fire, and told stories. Now it had come to this: fixing old trucks, murders, runaway daughters, and crazy genes.
    He dug in his pockets until he found the keys. He hesitated. While Angel was old enough to make her own choices, he didn’t want to enable the bad ones. Crazy gene or not, hewas proud of his daughter. Her spirit was unique and she loved the world in ways that most would not understand.
    Larsen took Angel’s hand and pressed the keychain to her palm. “I love you very much. I know it has been hard since your mother died. Take Bertha and paint her however you like. Put mountains on the side.