Every story has its place.
EZRA MOUNTAIN
I got my first guitar at twelve and immediately knew what the future held for me. After a few detours, including a brief stint in juvie and many years on the other side of the law, I moved to Nashville and signed a staff songwriter deal with a major indie publishing company.
I had more to say than what could be contained in a “three minute manuscript“ so I began to explore writing short stories and then my first novel in 2023, entitled "Repercussions." I write fiction, mostly from the back porch of my Nashville ranch, usually with a chihuahua or two in my lap. My writing favors outsiders and place as a main character.
When I am not writing, you can find me volunteering with senior dogs, fighting for basic healthcare for disadvantaged humans, and umping softball games for trans youth.
Fresh out of a North Carolina women’s prison after being wrongly convicted of killing a man, Deanie Bowen is struggling to move on. She was a gifted child who once aspired to become a veterinarian. But a troubled adolescence fraught with violence and neglect derailed her dreams. Now Deanie barely scrapes by as a vet assistant in Asheville, living in a roach-infested motel, popping the Pirate’s xannies and drinking Holly’s homemade hooch poolside with the other “permies,” or permanent residents. When her father drinks himself to death, Deanie’s estranged younger sister Callie summons her back to the hometown she fled at nineteen. After making tremendous sacrifices to raise Callie, Deanie left Georgia to try and save herself, leaving a distraught Callie behind. Despite this and having grown up struggling through the same shared trauma, Callie seems to have emerged unscathed. Reunited for the first time as adults since dropped out of college and took off in a jam band groupie van, the sisters are forced to reconcile the balance sheet of their relationship. What do they owe each other? Has the bill come due?
At 31, Abby has yet to start living her life. She had to leave Long Island. Her family was cruel, especially her sister who took everything precious for herself. Abby wanted to start over, so she threw a dart at a wall map and followed it to the small town of Crawford, Georgia. While still getting her bearings, she found her self in tiny Philomath, and as a lover of learning herself, Abby knew she had found home.
Despite her brilliant mind, Abby feels defeated and takes a job in the business office of a small senior living center. She is content enough in her little shotgun shack, with her new friend Jimmy the dog. They watch documentaries, eat junk food, and Abby tries to forget what she had left behind. But trouble soon finds her in the middle of nowhere, in the form of a prison pen pal named Gary. He shows up and upends her life, forces her backwards, possibly too far for her to recover. Abby is in trouble, and must learn how to navigate a very serious situation that will either make things worse, or make her whole again.
ORLO
by Ezra Mountain
The loneliness is visceral. It aches my aged bones deeper than the depths of this wretched cave. I huddled in my lair, dreaming, while a blizzard pounds the world outside. I am supposed to be asleep, but my depression urges me on. Bleary eyed, I crawl to the opening, and peer through the cracks in the slick, icy rocks. I see nothing but white, a wall of white. Nevertheless I am compelled to emerge, emerge into the wintry day, against the will of my ancestors, into the depths of this isolated quarry. I should look for her again. Her voice whispers gently, “I am here, I am here.” But I know it is just the wind.
Weeks pass. My sleep has been fitful and I am hungry, I should have predicted this and fattened myself when I had the chance. But I didn’t expect to live this long. I made my way into the cave with the expectation it would be my last slumber, the final extinguishment of a flame that survived through the ages against all odds. I venture out into the wild blue yonder, sating myself with acorns that the hasty squirrels reliably drop, too lazy to retrieve once they are nestled in the treetops.
It is blackberry winter now, and the first spring shoots are glazed in irridescence. They are beautiful. I search for her face, but all I see is my own image refracted dozens of times onto the icy leaves.
Where are you? The breeze bellows soft as a tumbleweed, I can hear her calling, “I am here, I am here.” No, it’s only a bluebird, whistling for its own mate.
I travel further west through the valley, through the farmers’ fallow fields, browned vines of tomatoes and beans and summer squash still waiting to be tilled under and replaced by new crops, I don’t know where I am headed. I am old, my fur is threadbare, my back is bowed and my longing is strong. But the truth picks at me like a scab; I am the last of my kind.