Under the Trees
An Excerpt from Chasing the Captain
When Jessica Ramirez was sixteen, her church youth group went camping. Jess had never been outside of Paloma and only knew the comfort of sleeping in her own bed.
The days in the wild end with the sunset and begin well before dawn. The forest awakens before you can see. The ground is an unforgiving mattress. Primal instincts pulsate beneath a phalanx of trees, reaching upward in search of nourishment from the sky. Existence is reduced to the basics: food, rest and surviving the day. You miss the perceived tranquility of your bed, realizing that the walls that protect you are thin.
It was a lesson Jessica remembered during a decade of broken dreams, lying perps and chauvinistic cops who lived Voltaire: “Those who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities.”
The rules are simple in the wild. The Universe is unconcerned. It has no opinion. Success is survival. Each morning is a new beginning, each evening an achievement.