Fragmented Lives of Inez Wick

By Aaron M Wilson

Inez Wick returns in these fragmented lives to fight against those who would destroy the environment, to travel into outer space, to dodge drone attacks, to practice yoga, and to ride and fix bikes.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Oct 2, 2015
• ISBN: 9781329594623

Book preview

Fragmented Lives of Inez Wick

Fragmented Lives of Inez Wick

AARON M. WILSON

Copyright

ISBN: 978-1-329-59462-3

Published by Everything Feeds Process Press, Beloit, WI

Copyright © 2015 by Aaron M. Wilson.

Fragmented Lives of Inez Wick by Aaron M. Wilson is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300, San Francisco, California, 94105, USA.

Nova's Cycles. Taking the Lane: Bikes in Space. Vol. 10. May 2013. Ed Elly Blue. Print.

Cover Art: Copyright © 2015 by Aaron M. Wilson

Disclaimer:

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, or events is entirely coincidental. 

For

All those who dream of lives different than their own, may they find peace.

Acknowledgements

Work. Fiction is work, hard work. I would like to thank my wife and creative partner, Jessica Fox-Wilson, for giving me the space to write and for believing in me. Others who had a hand in this book include Darci Schummer, MP Johnson, and Alicia Finn Noack who read drafts of a few of the longer stories by which those tails are much improved. Lastly, I would like to acknowledge that this book would not have seen light if not for the freelance war stories told over unnamed beverages with Matt Forbeck, Jeff VanderMeer, James Lowder, and Will Hindmarch, especially the one involving the Tree of Life, Hipster Adam, and a Marlin’s baseball cap wearing Snake.

Introduction

I've been trying to get my writing out from under a very demanding character. I want to write about other characters, but every story I write ends up an Inez Wick story. This is frustrating to me. She finds her way into everything I write.

In an attempt to move-on, break-up with Inez Wick, I've written several shorts. These shorts range in length. Some are very short and some are longer.

What I hope is that you enjoy these stories, and I get to work on writing a different type of fiction.

Wish me luck, and enjoy!

Table of Contents

Riding Around Direct Action

Namaste

A Hot Day’s Ride

Custody

The Golden Toad

Audition

Eviction Central

Antelope Valley Trail

Flat Tire

Food Truck

Gas Powered

Junkyard

Reclamation Tattoo

Fat Tire Bikes

Penny Magic

Drone

Too Much Money

Tree Line

Strawberry Fields

Video Games

Sign Says

Dream

Salutations to the Moon

Bleach

Finished

Inez in Space

Nova’s Cycles

Partner

Meddlesome Mechanics

Things Get Weird

The Dig

Blade of Grass

Snow Shovel

Pea Pods

Riding Around Direct Action

Namaste

Inez Wick slithered up into cobra. She held the position for a count of five inhalations and five exhalations. Then she transitioned to downward facing dog. She pedaled out her legs and found some stillness in the position.

Sleeping on the ground had become second nature to her. She did not really remember the last time she slept in a bed. Yoga before she shut her eyes for the night. Yoga when she woke in the morning. Yoga before she ate her midday meal. Yoga fixed all aches. Bike lubricant for bikes, yoga for people.

From down dog, she raised her left leg then cycled it forward between her hands. She stood up into warrior-two, arms outstretched. She focused her thoughts on her body, her movements. She let the stress of running, of fighting, and of losing slide from her muscles and joints.

She pulled her back foot up and stood in tall mountain. Then forward bend. Next, she flowed through plank, cobra, and ended in down dog before switching sides and repeating on the right.

Thirty minutes of total breath and body concentration was all Inez needed to refocus and recharge. Yoga had nothing to do with her life's mission of decoupling corporate greed from the political system so true environmental advocacy could occur.  Yoga was a skill one of her daycare providers passed on to her, while her father was off on some oilrig.

Inez had tried to teach yoga while she had been in college. The campus club paid her for three sessions a week, but only at half the rate she would have earned at a studio or a YMCA. The small town had too many studios and too many teachers, but she was glad just to make the extra book money.

Now, as she flowed into her favorite inversion - wheel - she thought that if she ever had the opportunity to go legit that opening her own bike and yoga shop sounded like heaven. As the blood filled her head, she could see the shop clearly. It was beautiful. It was hers. It had nothing to do with bombing and bomb making. It had everything to do with love. All that extra blood did funny things to Inez, but she eased down out of the pose and fought her way back to her reality. There were simply too many things she had left to do.

So she finished by lying as still as a corpse in the grass feeling the wind on her skin. Then, she stood and looked into the sun and said, namaste.

A Hot Day's Ride

Inez Wick coasted down the street. Her electric blue hair matted against her forehead and neck. The sky was clear. The sun was hot. The headwind that had slowed her ride had all but stopped. It was a good day for staying in the shade and drinking, but it was also a good day to remind corporations that they were accountable for their actions.

She rolled up to a gate house.

The guard stepped out. He eyed her, as men were apt to do. He saw her blue hair, tattoos, and athletic body draped in white sweat soaked cotton. He did not see the cone wrench she pulled out of her seat bag coming, as it caught him between the eyes, or the u-lock she pulled out of her hip-pouch that she brought down upon his head. And he certainly did not see the concrete as his head bounced off it.

She collected her tools before dragging the guard into the gate house. She found the leaver for opening the gate. The gate opened enough for her and her bike to slip through. Getting in was always the easy part.

She pedaled. The road was long and twisted. Trees lined the road, hiding evil and greed. The place had a nature preserve kind of feel to it. No