Total pages in book: 113
Estimated words: 108242 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 541(@200wpm)___ 433(@250wpm)___ 361(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 108242 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 541(@200wpm)___ 433(@250wpm)___ 361(@300wpm)
“Lennix,” Jim says. “Would you like to say a few words?”
I nod and open my mouth to start my prepared remarks when the door at the back of the room opens. Maxim walks in, accompanied by Rick. I honestly didn’t expect him to be able to do GMA and his meeting and make it here on time. He smiles at me in that way that makes the rest of the world disappear for the space of at least one breath, and for a second, even with a roomful of people, it’s just us. He blows me a kiss and leans against the wall, pride all over his face. I drag my eyes away from him and address the crowd.
“My mother was a fighter,” I say. “Real fighters know you should never assume survival. She lived like every day was her last, being bold and loving loudly with no reserve, but she also lived like there were seven generations coming behind her. Always looking to the future and fighting to make it better. She lived for others. She fought for everyone who needed a champion.”
My voice wavers, and tears escape the corners of my eyes as I see her again, glowing with pride after my Sunrise Dance. Taking pictures and dousing me with her love. I’m teetering inside, and I scan the room until I find Maxim again, righting myself through the sheer, steadying force of love in his eyes.
“She was the most vital, vivid person I’ve ever known,” I choke out. “And for a long time, I had nightmares wondering how she died.”
I shake my head, heedless of the tears or the way my voice cracks.
“I don’t dream anymore about how Mama died. I celebrate how she lived. One of her favorite quotes was ‘They buried us, but they didn’t know we were seeds.’ My mother was a seed. She died when I was thirteen, but today, look at her harvest in this act that will search for, find, and save so many of our women in time. Look at her alive in me. Every morning I wake up and live with purpose, decide to make this world a better place, or decide not to just live for myself but to help those in greatest need, Mama lives on. I am her harvest.
“I used to despair that no one remembered her, that no one said her name or the names of the thousands of Native women who go missing and are never found. But today, I say her name. This act bears her name. Liana Reynolds.”
The applause of the crowd, the smiling faces fade for a moment, and I’m back on that open plain for my dance. When I was a girl, I ran in the four directions, gathering the elements to myself—everything I would need to become a woman. According to tradition, that day unleashed my ability to heal myself, others, and my community, but being a woman is more than making the pain go away. It’s living through it, learning from it, and putting it to good use, like we did today.
When Changing Woman heads east every morning, hoping to run into her younger self, I wonder what she would say if she ever did. Because now I know what I would say.
Nistan.
Run.
Keep running.
You don’t stop running because it’s hard. You don’t stop running because it hurts. Don’t you dare stop running because someone says you’ll never finish the race or even that it’s not your race to run.
Prove them all wrong.
Blaze your own trail.
Girl, woman, they’ll never give you the world. You have to make your own.
And then I know. That thing I’ve been wrestling with, in this moment it’s as clear as that girl running on a distant plain, cheered on by her community, by generations of ancestors.
Blaze your own trail.
Make your own world.
I won’t let anyone define who I am, who I love, how I live. I’ll do that. Will I have to make sacrifices? Of course. Compromises? Of course.
But will I have the chance to do something no one who looks like me has ever done before? And with a man I love more than everything else? A man who loves me the same way?
I signed on for you, whatever that means, wherever that takes us.
Maxim’s words land on my heart, plant seeds, take root. All these years, I’ve been searching for the once-in-a-lifetime candidate, and I’ve found him. Maxim is my once-in-a-lifetime, and I’m his. Once in a lifetime and for the rest of our lives.
I excuse myself from the group of well-wishers and rush to the back of the room. Maxim leans against the wall, his smile spreading wider the closer I get, and the closer I get, the harder my heart pounds. Not caring if there are cameras or what people will say or what anyone will think, I reach up to take his face between my hands and kiss him long and possessively, claiming him. He shifts, his hands sliding down my back, tightening at my waist. He groans into the kiss, breaking away to bury his face in my neck.