by Layla Wolfe
“Come for me, Fremont. Come all over me. I want to feel you submit to me. I want to see you lose your load, to submit to my dominance, to feel you like jelly in my hands. Come on, baby. That’s right. Let my hand bring you to climax.”
I don’t recall what else I may have said, because soon his warm semen was dripping from my wrist. He shot against my abdomen, milky streams hitting me as he threw his head back to loll on a rubbery neck.
I kissed his bared throat, sucking on his Adam’s apple. This was serenity, pure and simple. Achilles had been right. A club full of satiated men was the most peaceful, contented spot on earth. Fremont and I were nearly glued together, our half-mast penises sticky with ejaculate, our mouths and faces with spit. We panted into each other’s mouths and licked each other’s chins, jaws.
Most men fell back eventually, but a few wants to swap dance partners. Fremont and I broke apart, panting. He looked lazily up at the ripped otter whose silken chest hair did look soft and inviting. Just not now. Or maybe ever.
“No thanks,” Fremont said drunkenly. “I’m with my man.”
My man. Now I felt my mouth curl into a smile. I sucked on Fremont’s earlobe, feeling the gooseflesh rise on his biceps. “That’s right,” I whispered. “Your man now. Forever.”
I wasn’t sure if he heard me, really. Achilles and another worker helped us to our feet whether we wanted to or not. They led us half-asleep into the showers, stocked to the rafters with soap products. A couple of guys were in the private stall. Their feet indicated they were slowly soaping each other up, but there was no urgency in their movements.
It was dreamlike, putting Fremont under the shower head and filling my palms with soap. At last, I could touch every inch of his delicious body. No one hovered nearby threatening me with undying flames. I delighted in savoring his sweet skin, the striations of his fit muscles, the roundness of his ass.
At one point he grasped me by the back of the neck again. Only this time, he put his lips close to my ear.
“Your man,” he repeated.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
FREMONT
F Fredericka said, “Joe Bloodgood will be cut in here, saying Mother Earth is holy and should not be messed with.”
Ormond said, “The problem is how to explain radiation to Diné who never went to high school. As you know, some speak no English and read nothing at all.”
Fredericka went on. “Leetso, the yellow dirt, is an important arm of nature. So how do we depict the hazards it poses?”
Ormond was a special Fx guy who often worked in Hollywood. He knew the most about the ins and outs of putting together a documentary, so the teens had elected him as editor. Other than him, all technical roles for Listen to Us were filled by the kids. Ormond said, “We, or the kids rather, decided to use the idea of leetso as a monster. Monsters are a main part of the Navajo Way mythology, stories that connect with The People.”
Fredericka pointed at her laptop screen. “Ormond is going to splice some of your footage in between these scenes here.”
I said, “I’m sorry I couldn’t give you the release for the films showing the Geiger counter going through the roof. Those are the property of U-238.”
Ormond said, “Yes, but he cannot stop you from creating new narratives, and that’s what we’re about to do. Are you satisfied with your script?”
I sighed. We sat at a folding table alongside a road in Salomé Valley, our equipment hooked up to a generator. Weather had cooperated the past couple weeks, the pits-turned-lakes were finally drying up, and a deeply Egyptian blue bowl of sky above cradled us. I was overjoyed to be back in my element, out from behind the desk, even though Ozzie Avery had sent me at least twenty-seven threatening texts. Mostly he yelled in caps lock that I had an ironclad confidentiality agreement. He’d even tweeted about me a couple of times. Ridiculous, since I was hardly yet a well-known household name.
The wacky and unbalanced @FremontZuckerman is at it again! Making up lies and fake stories about things he’s too low IQ to know about! Miserable!
He probably knew that anything I “discovered” while working for the EPA was fresh intel, especially if I turned the data over to them for their numbers crunching. I mean, it was evidence anyone with a few pieces of equipment could figure out, if they looked in the right places.
“If I’m not squinting to see these cue cards.” I had written them so as to make them more legible to me, but I still frowned at some words.
Fredericka grinned. “You look simply dashing. You’re the perfect spokesman for this. Serious, knowledgeable, manly as hell.”
I wasn’t sure how I felt about a seventeen-year-old transgender kid admiring me, a thirty-nine-year-old Jewish scientist. But things had been strange lately. Everything was new to me. The jackoff club was the start of an entire new me. I had become more submissive toward Noel, allowing him to take his natural role of the dominant. We hadn’t bungholed yet—we were saving, and savoring, that for some future celebration—but I’d allowed him to do things like handgag me while dry humping me and spanking me, turning me on no end. He’d been teasing me with dildoes, rimming me with their bulbous heads, talking about “training” me to accept his girth.
He didn’t have to be in his priestly garb—but it helped—to turn me on beyond belief. Noel was a natural born chieftain and commander. I could now see how he’d changed from a small-time thug into a priest. The flow of events made sense. Sometimes I didn’t feel up to the task. I wasn’t good enough for him. I pictured his lover Antonio as this dashing Antonio Banderas type in a cassock with a giant horse cock and an accent to die for. How did I measure up to that, literally and figuratively? I had a flat New York accent, if anything, and I was a dull scientist.
I’d been a spokesman for U-238 before, on the news and documentaries. This should’ve been a piece of cake, but I didn’t have Father Noel Moloney watching me critically.
“Manly as shit,” agreed Noel, standing up holding my cue cards. On this warm day, he wore only his dog collar, 501 jeans, and his clerical shirt. This had become his “field” uniform, and the curve of his round ass under the tight jeans drove me to distraction. We were supposed to be working hand in hand, the scientist and the priest, both working for the good of the rez. We were, but damn, other lewder thoughts intruded from time to time.
Like now. It wouldn’t do to sport a hard-on in front of the camera. This was serious business. But I was absolutely, fatally enamored with Father Moloney. I was a storyteller, telling the tale of Joe Blackmountain, Cecil Blackmountain’s father. I was a down-home prospector, holding a piece of leetso in my leather glove-clad hand while strolling on the edge of a pit. The cameraman tracked me, and I hoped I wasn’t squinting at the cue cards. I had a horrible memory even for things I’d written myself.
“In those days, treasure was determined by your count of lambs, horses, and goats, cattle drinking from ponds. The giant blood-red sun rose right here behind Salomé Valley. You can see there the bleak, gnarled rock formations that fringed the bowls of the desert. Once in a while, Joe Blackmountain would notice a different sort of rock, just like this one here, hunks of stone dotted with daffodil yellow veins. One day white men came to Blackmountain’s valley and he met with them. When they told him what they were looking for, he realized they wanted the special yellow stones.”
Oh God, why did I have to look at Noel? His grin was beyond adoring and proud. I should never have brought him along! I hated public speaking!
I pivoted a bit, forcing the cameraman to follow me. “Blackmountain recalled The Long Walk, still spoken of around fires in hogans every winter. Colonel Kit Carson, helped by longtime tribal enemies such as the Ute, Comanches, and Mexicans, had corralled up the Diné, ruined their crops, animals, and cooking vessels. Carson told his men to chop down every single peach tree in orchards the Diné took pride in. Through ‘64 and ‘65 the army marched nine thousand Navajos away from their homes. Decimated by dysentery and famine caused by cutworm to corn, the
y bought rations by selling their women to soldiers. They took on the last name Bia, an acronym for the Bureau of Indian Affairs.”
Fredericka asked me questions that later might be edited out, to keep me lively and on my toes. “When did the bilagáana take away our ore?”
I rattled the rock in my glove. “Around 1917 they hauled a wagon to Flagstaff. Joe Blackmountain was told it was heading for France. Marie Curie would extract their new discovery, radium. It didn’t seem like such a big deal to Blackmountain. Nobody on the rez could use the stuff, or so they thought.”
I was a star! Maybe forty, fifty people conglomerated at the taping site. Students, video production folk, Diné, Bent Zealots. It was a motley crew of colorful people from a wide variety of backgrounds, but everyone seemed to blend, in a strange way. The seamed, sun-wizened faces of the older Diné, cracking smiles next to the idealistic faces of the high schoolers. Anson Dineyazzie, Ormond’s partner, was a strikingly handsome half-Yazzie with cheekbones so sharp they could flay a bull. Ormond was a European Spaniard whose beauty could knock you flat. They stood in stark contrast to a few local bilagáana, maybe ranchers who wanted to get in on the action, but in a way, they meshed.
Only one guy really stood out. And he stood out because he wore giant Frankenstein boots.
Dragan.
At first, the Eastern European giant looked just like a hulking silhouette. The way the sun and cameraman were positioned, I only had a vague hint that this cardboard cutout was wearing aviator shades.
I moved. Again. Now there was probably just harsh sky behind me, not the best for the camera, but I wanted to check out this silhouette.
And I stumbled on my words. “Blackmountain planted an orchard of squash trees.” Squash trees? Seriously? “They bore apricots, and the tribe had Navajo staples of corn, melons, squash.” Better.
Fredericka reminded me, “He planted everything right in the uranium rubble.”
“Right. Each time it rained, water sluiced through the old mining site, rushing downhill to soak the ground. When it dried, the soil looked yellow. Blackmountain shared his produce with everyone in the valley.”
Oh, Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ. The guy I called a Russian hitman stood smack next to Ahiga in his wool blanket and silver jewelry and Anson Dineyazzie, who normally loomed. But today Anson’s respectable height was no match for the hulking, square man.
“Cut,” I muttered, and stepped forward. I squinted up into my own reflection mirrored in Dragan’s shades. “Dragan. What’re you doing here?”
Surprisingly, he answered my question from between gnarled, root-like teeth. “I work for Ozzie Avery. You know that. I am here to see what’s going on.”
Well, that was logical. By now, Anson and Ormond had turned toward Dragan, their arms folded across their chests. And nearly all forty, fifty people were squinting accusingly at him.
“This is a private filming,” I said, poking the air in front of his bulletproof vest. “On a private Indian reservation.”
“It is my job,” Dragan repeated stubbornly. “I have been instructed to follow you.”
“Well, get the fuck out,” said Anson.
“Yes,” said Ormond. “If you want to see the film, pay money in a theater.”
That’s when Fredericka stepped in. It was her film, after all. “You following our Pathfinder?” She liked to use the old-timey nickname for John C. Frémont, the famed and fated explorer and politician. “Why you spying on him?”
For some reason, this rendered the brute speechless. He looked down at least a foot at the top of Fredericka’s head, his livery lips moving, no sounds coming out.
I said, “I don’t appreciate being ghosted. Go back to your fake tanned boss and tell him I’m doing the will of the people, unlike him. I’m not looking out for his rich buddies anymore. I’m looking out for the downtrodden.”
“Well,” said Ahiga. “We’re not all that downtrodden.”
“Some more so than others,” said Toby Bloodgood.
“Leave,” I said. “And if anyone sees you on this rez again, we’re having the rez cops arrest you.” The second I said that, I regretted it. The image of a voracious Leroy Sinquah inhaling my cock flashed through my mind, making me feel like an adulterer. Noel had never brought that name up again, and I assumed it was fine since it happened before we hooked up. Still, I always dreaded the day I’d see Leroy again. My face reddened heatedly, and Noel busted calmly through the crowd.
He even took Dragan by the arm. “Good afternoon, my good man. Which vehicle is yours? That Prius? However do you fit in it?”
Noel actually started steering the hulking man toward the car, which was parked anonymously among our vehicles. The expert hitman suddenly seemed in awe, or overwhelmed, or hit with a sudden injection of Rohypnol. “I try to save Ozzie Avery . . . money . . . “
“Well, that’s an admirable thing. My constituents are always thinking of ways to save money. Why, one year all of these bad-ass bikers you see here got together and did a charity run to buy toys for the rez kids . . . “
Brilliant. It was Noel’s sly way of reminding Dragan we had bad-ass bikers on our side. I gave some side-eye to Anson and Ormond, and they were both grinning with admiration too. Noel actually walked the goon to the tiny car and packed him inside. I halfway expected the guy to fix his mirrored eyes on me and intone, “I’ll be back.” That’s how strange the whole thing was.
Did he have respect for Christian priests? Anything to get rid of him.
“Weird,” said Fredericka, standing next to me. “Your business sure attracts some weirdos, like out of a thriller movie.”
“It just never stops, does it?” I marveled.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
NOEL
“Who was that guy at the filming?”
It was the question that had been foremost on my mind since the incident. It wasn’t every day a guy straight out of a Terminator film, a Bulgarian came to visit a Navajo rez. The guy plainly looked about to batter whoever his target was, and it turned out to be Fremont.
It’d been a madhouse since the filming, too. The EPA had vans with radiation equipment crisscrossing the rez, more detections coming up high. The tribal council was attempting to nullify Avery’s checkerboard leases on their land. Ahiga said, “The powers that be committed genocide by allowing uranium mining on this rez.” Meanwhile, the price of uranium had gone up.
Fremont opened one eye to look at me. “You probably guessed. He’s a sort of hitman paid by Ozzie Avery.”
Already a drip of sweat rolled down his cheek. He was the one who had gotten this sweat lodge together for us, not me, surprisingly. A grateful Diné medicine man had shown us where it was, a low, earthen structure lined with upright poles of gnarled olneya tree. Ray Manygoats had told me, “The world is finally hearing my voice. Now another new generation asks questions. I’m concerned because I’ve got this terrible cough.”
Only then did I realize the Diné were seeing Fremont as a sort of savior. My pride in him swelled, if such a thing was possible. We crawled into the sweat lodge in an entirely different head space, returning to the womb. Manygoats put stone slabs into the central fire pit where they hissed and smoked when he drizzled water from a bucket. I identified the handfuls of wood he tossed on the fire as cedarwood. The smoke filled my nostrils with pungent memories of working as a cooper for wineries as a youth. My last legitimate job before going off the grid as a street punk had been to fashion wooden wine barrels in New York. Those were glorious, uplifting days where the possibilities were endless, and life was long.
Breathing in deeply, I tried to keep those wholesome memories alive instead of what came after. Loving Fremont was a whole new start for me. Sure, we hadn’t exactly come “out” yet. After the debacles with Antonio and Teetonka, I wasn’t prepared to trust my church or maybe even the people around me. Diné were very squeamish about homosexuality, for one. Then the bilagáana ranchers surrounding us were the same way. We weren’t geographical
ly positioned for the optimum optics, you might say, the way we would’ve been in San Francisco, Portland, or New York.
But I had no plans to move, and Fremont’s job had quite a way to go.
I said, “Didn’t strike me as terribly intelligent. There was a gun in a holster sitting in plain sight on his passenger seat. Seemed to have a thing for Fredericka.”
Fremont, who had been leaning on his elbow like some kind of casual God of the Garden of Eden, tried to sit up straight. His head would’ve hit the ceiling, though, so his neck was crooked. I, too, tried to take it casually that we were both naked. Of course you were going to be naked in a sweat lodge. But I could not help but note that even in such severe steam and smoke, Fremont’s long, thick penis was still at half-mast, the ballsac plumped, his nipples taut. How I would’ve loved to have leaned over and taken a nubbin between my teeth! But the sweat lodge was a serious business. Already, outside the lodge for privacy sake, Manygoats was drumming away furiously.
“Fredericka, are you serious? Do you think he knew she’s a he/she?”
I chuckled. “I doubt it. But he sure couldn’t take his eyes off her. When I escorted him back to his rental car, he said ‘that girl, directing . . . is she over eighteen?’”
Fremont stopped chuckling. “Wow, he’s serious then. And yeah, she’s over eighteen. Like most Diné, it’s taking her forever to graduate. This film will help.”
I said, “Maybe we need to keep an eye on her too. I already got your boyfriend Leroy Sinquah to keep an eye out for your Russian friend’s license plate.”
“He’s not my boyfriend,” Fremont teased.
“Oh yeah? You sure didn’t hesitate to pump his gullet full of your giant load a few weeks back.” Remembering it turned me on. It would not have had the same effect if it had happened a week ago. But the distant memory meant I could relish watching that toothless old sheriff gumming Fremont’s juicy dick, and from what I’d heard, he was a pro. “He better than me?” Yes, I let that immature question through that displayed my utter lack of confidence.
