Free Zera and the Green Man by Sandra Knauf Page B

mingling with fragrant pines. In some areas it was beautiful. In others, where they’d had wildfires over the last few years, blackened sticks of trees covered hundreds, sometimes thousands, of acres. The sight of that devastation made Zera shudder, especially when she thought of how Nonny said it was mostly due to global warming and that it would get worse. As she spotted the white tip of Pikes Peak, the tallest mountain in the Chipita Range west of Ute Springs, her mood changed again. A wave of happy anticipation coursed through her. Home. It’s been so long. Will it all be the same? 
    Two hours after leaving Piker they arrived. Driving under the street-spanning “Welcome to Ute Springs” banner, Zera remembered that the small town had been named for its mineral springs. They were called “healing waters” by the Ute and other nearby Native American tribes who sought them out eons before white settlers arrived. Back then, the site had been a sacred place. Now it was a popular tourist town, though remnants of its mystical past clung to it. Many artists and musicians, including Zera’s own parents, had made Ute Springs their home, and most of them said they could “feel the energy” in their surroundings.
    As they drove into town via Ute Avenue, Zera took in the familiar landmarks: brick and clapboard buildings lining the streets and hilly side roads, the town clock, cast iron streetlights that looked a hundred years old but were actually installed during the previous summer. Townspeople worked in flower-filled yards, walked down the sidewalks, visited with neighbors. She found herself smiling, and couldn’t stop. There was Nell’s Coffee House, on the corner of Ute and Pawnee. A huge coffee cup, made out of wood and tin with a swirl of carved steam, hung above the door. Across the street, on the roof of Doc Dennin’s Western Wear, reared a full-size fiberglass palomino horse, golden with white mane and tail. The horse’s mouth was open, as if snickering with the same glee that bubbled within her. She saw Sadie Hawkins’ art gallery, the Carnival Arcade, the Hemp Shop, the Happy Goat Cheese Store, and the Hopi Age Bookstore. On Canyon Avenue was the burnt-orange tiled roof of her old brick elementary school. It’s all still the same! Zera glanced up at The Toad and Tiffany, to make sure they weren’t looking at her in the rear-view mirror. Years of memories flooded her mind, memories of her mother and father, her grandmother, her home .
    They were driving slowly when she heard Tiffany’s comment. “Here we are, Hippie Town.”
    “You know,” quipped The Toad, “in New York City they like to carry Gucci bags, but in Ute Springs, they carry bags of goat cheese.”
    Tiffany laughed and Zera couldn’t help cracking a grin in spite of herself.
    “It’s been a while,” said Tiffany.
    “Yes, it has.” Her uncle’s expression was now somber. “Now, when I come into town, it always makes me think of . . . Sally and Ewan’s memorial service.”
    “I remember it well,” said Tiffany. “Guinevere nowhere to be found, off on one of her ‘spiritual quests.’ It’s lucky you were there for Zera.”
    Zera stared hatefully at the back of Tiffany’s blonde, ponytailed head. Lucky? she thought. The only luck I’ve had since that day is right now, getting the chance to get away from you.
    The Toad made a left turn and the Barbie-Mobile crept up seven blocks of steep gravel road, past a candy box assortment of Victorian homes in various stages of grandness or dilapidation, to Nonny’s home. Zera’s home.
    Hidden from the street by a wild tangle of chokecherry shrubs and evergreens, the property came into view as the car turned into the driveway. The landmark of the grounds was Cache Mountain, a nine hundred-foot-tall colossus in back of the two acres. The mountain gave the space a protected, nest-like feeling. A sense of well-being swept over Zera as the car edged into the driveway.
      Details of her home