{"id":2505,"date":"2013-03-25T11:54:43","date_gmt":"2013-03-25T19:54:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/onelife\/?p=2505"},"modified":"2013-03-25T11:54:43","modified_gmt":"2013-03-25T19:54:43","slug":"fiona-does-the-desert-the-town-sluts-daughter-novel-excerpt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/?p=2505","title":{"rendered":"FIONA DOES THE DESERT-“The Town Slut’s Daughter” novel excerpt"},"content":{"rendered":"
1<\/div>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

1<\/div>\n

Dennis convinced Fiona they had to visit Joshua Tree on their way to Los Angeles.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want you to see the real desert. This is the best time to go. Early spring. Everything\u2019s in bloom.\u201d<\/p>\n

They stopped for gas, kitty corner to the Oasis of Love Wedding Chapel. Dennis pointed to an uneasy and checkered queue of couples clad in black and white lining the block.<\/p>\n

\u201cLet\u2019s get married!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAre you crazy?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou still need a green card, don\u2019t you? Isn\u2019t that the best way? Marry a citizen?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou mean you?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy not?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBecause, green card marriage or not, you\u2019ll take it seriously. Besides, I\u2019m too young to get married. You\u2019re too young to get married.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat am I to you?\u201d<\/p>\n

Fiona groaned. \u201cYou\u2019re a friend, Dennis. One of my dearest friends. A friend with privileges. Take it or leave it.\u201d<\/p>\n

I\u2019m such a bitch. A mile down the road, she slid her hand between his legs, stroking the denim taut over his balls. Moaning, Dennis pulled the van over. They did it in a plume of red road dust.<\/p>\n

The lovers gradually eased into au naturale<\/em> mode, more serene with each mile of desert highway kaleidoscoping past. They motored through gorges and coulees vaguely familiar, like a Roadrunner cartoon, SIDEWINDER CAFE, BORAX, LOST HORSE MINE road signs riddled with bullet holes. The Mohave was a shock of alien beauty, teeming with life. In bloom, indeed. They stopped, got out, waded through bellflowers, asters and fuchsia sand verbena, beavertail cactus sporting coral red blossoms like hats. Dune primroses reminded Fiona of the Alberta wild rose. Dennis laughed at her wide-eyed, gaping mouth astonishment.<\/p>\n

Finally they reached Joshua Tree National Monument. She\u2019d been expecting a phallic wonder rising off the desert floor but realized the Americans used \u2018monument\u2019 to mean \u2018park.\u2019 Dennis photographed her in relief against a horizon of softly sloping stone hills, sporting her new, fifties-circa straw flying saucer hat. She struck a Bono pose under a Joshua tree, which was not a tree at all. Lightheaded and languorous in the balmy air, Fiona stretched out movie star-style, hands on her hips, looking directly into the lens, studly paramour documenting their euphoria for all posterity.<\/p>\n

They came upon a thick stand of Bigelow chollo cactus harbouring nests of Sage sparrows.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe balls of their spines break off and stick to your skin like magnets,\u201d warned Dennis. \u201cDon\u2019t get too close.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Yucca plant produced strange fruit, clusters of pale blossoms exuding a warm, waxy scent, but the most sublime desert plant must be the ocotillo, she thought, a tangle of towering, quivering green stalks like tentacles, gilded with scales and topped with scarlet arrow tips.<\/p>\n

Dennis\u2019s sharp eye spotted all manner of lizard; banded geckos, iguanas, chuckwallas. They saw silver spotted grasshoppers and a Walking Stick suspended from a Mormon Tea branch. Down the road, they were forced to stop the van, agog at the sight of kamikaze caterpillars crossing the asphalt in a shuddering river. Dennis bent down to examine the freaky, fetid stew of yellow, black and lime.<\/p>\n

\u201cMan! This was a wet winter. This only happens every seven years or so.\u201d<\/p>\n

They climbed Jumbo Rocks, huge boulders suggesting rising dough or the granite buttocks of sleeping elephants. At the crest, the rock face resembled skin, lined and pockmarked. In close, the surface was pebbled, filled with cracks and crevices. Elated, Fiona photographed Dennis beneath a large, round boulder miming Atlas supporting the earth. He snapped her standing inside the huge eye socket of a rock skull. They nearly fell into sinkholes, perfectly rounded basins carved into rock by water. Dennis invited her to sit.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat about scorpions?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNocturnal. We probably have more to fear from rattlesnakes. Just don\u2019t put your hands on any ledges you can\u2019t see.\u201d<\/p>\n

They sat, nestled, gazing down the valley of saltbush and smoke trees. Dennis pointed to a jet etching contrails upon a gradient blue sky. Cap Rock jutted out, a visor of stone.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can see all the way to Mexico from here.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201c<\/em>It\u2019s easy to see why this place became sacred.\u201d A breeze cooled her skin, prickly from too much sun. Fiona turned. \u201cAnd the air up here is making me randy.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is?\u201d Dennis was hard in an instant. Panting.<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah.\u201d She avoided his eyes, resting her chin on his shoulder as if studying the lengthening shadows. Fiona allowed a few seconds to pass, then stroked the length of Dennis\u2019s cock, relishing the teasing, never having felt her powers quite so absolutely. \u201cShould I have my way with you?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cPlease. Do.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2019The sun\u2019s going down. Maybe we should go back?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s okay. It won\u2019t be dark for a long time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat if somebody sees us?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWho? The birds?\u201d He winked. \u201cThe carpenter bees?\u201d<\/p>\n

Dennis always smelled so clean, so pure, she thought, plying his neat, compact balls, smooth, hairless, cool, even in such heat. She squeezed. He gasped, Fiona scaling his erection with accelerating kisses. Eyes closed, head thrown back, Dennis balanced his weight on his palms, Fiona nibbling, licking, hollow of her mouth soon filled with a moan. Oh oh, he\u2019s going to blow. She stilled her jaws. One second, two seconds, three seconds . . . then depth-charged with her tongue down so low her lips were gripping the base of his cock. Dennis groaned. She found the presence of mind to slow down, enough so that she was able to suckle them both into a trance, adrift as tumbleweeds . . . Slowly, almost imperceptibly, gentle, primal suckling escalated into feverish thrusting . . . He came. Fiona took the sperm, swallowing most of it, allowing a dab to dribble down onto the warm rocks.<\/p>\n

HOT MAMA, YOU\u2019RE THE DEVIL\u2019S SISTER! <\/em>A heavy metal dirge started up, scuttling across the valley floor, bouncing off the distant wall of the Orocopia Mountains. Fiona looked up at Dennis blissed out against a blind of clouds. Why ruin it? It\u2019s funny, in an absurd way, but how can you listen to anything but the sky out here?<\/p>\n

They set up camp at Black Rock Canyon; pitched a tent, built a fire, flame-roasting a supper of hot dogs and marshmallows.<\/p>\n

\u201cLook at the stars!\u201d The constellations leapt off a velvet drape of deep purple.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re positively glowing!\u201d Fiona opened her mouth, craned her neck, as if to drink in the air. \u201cIt tastes! I swear the air has a taste.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lolling about the fire, Dennis suggested Strip Poker.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo cards!\u201d<\/p>\n

They laughed. He retrieved her guitar from the van, enthralled during the entire two-song concert. They retired, Dennis as excited as a Cub Scout, zipping their sleeping bags together. Fiona laughed. You\u2019d think it meant we were engaged. They didn\u2019t get much rest. Finally, exhausted by the hiking and extended lovemaking, the two passed out, Fiona sleeping fitfully, caught up in sordid dreams, one of a small, black bleeding bear, stomach sliced open, ear lopped off, tongue dangling out of its mouth serpent-like. She lied awake, listening to coyote howls, imagining psychos and snakes. He did say they\u2019re nocturnal. Oh, there\u2019s nothing to worry about. What\u2019s that noise? Right in her left ear. Some kind of animal just outside, snuffling about. Oh, it\u2019s just the air mattress rubbing against the tent pole. <\/em><\/p>\n

In the morning Fiona woke, startled to find Dennis gazing down at her. \u201cI dreamed you were singing. The voice of an angel.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m no angel, you know better than that. And how do you know what an angel\u2019s voice sounds like?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI can imagine.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes, you can. You do. That\u2019s what I love about you.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou love me?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cDennis, you know I love you. I\u2019m just too confused. I can\u2019t get serious about anybody.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cDo I make you happy?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes! You make me happy. But it\u2019s not that simple. Besides, it\u2019s not your job to make me happy. It\u2019s mine.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFiona. It is that simple! I love you. You love me. Why can\u2019t we be together?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are together!\u201d They argued. \u201cI don\u2019t care what you think! I know what needs to be done.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cLove, Fiona. What else is there? Friends, family. Love. Right?\u201d<\/p>\n

Yeah. Right. People. That\u2019s who I write all these bloody songs for. Fiona shuffled through her funny black feelings.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m on a different path. I\u2019m just a white trash harpy, hell bent on a happy childhood. Better late than never.\u201d<\/p>\n

1<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

1 1 Dennis convinced Fiona they had to visit Joshua Tree on their way to Los Angeles. \u201cI want you to see the real desert. This is the best time to go. Early spring. Everything\u2019s in bloom.\u201d They stopped for gas, kitty corner to the Oasis of Love Wedding Chapel. Dennis pointed to an uneasy […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[10],"tags":[126,149,210,321],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2505"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2505"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2505\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/heatherhaley.com\/hh2\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}