them in a slot by the office door. He thinks about the Cadillac as he gets in his Jeep Cherokee and turns the engine over, the same late 80s model he has been driving since the early 2000s. The old man, whenever he sees Jim pull in, asks how the vehicle’s Injun is running. The old man has locked himself away. The old man lingers here for long hours. The old man seems to always be home, whether at the scrap yard or Sod House, or anyplace else. The old man stakes a claim on this world. Indian Jim’s vehicle gets eleven miles per gallon. The engine burns a quart of oil every month. He drives along the main drag, past the Olive Garden, the Home Goods, and the city’s mall. The radio is turned to the local news. There is a story about a group of families who lost their homes in the recession and lived in tents they pitched in a wooded area a mile or so south of town. They stayed there for nearly a year. The reporter is amazed that such a lifestyle could be maintained for more than a few days. This is followed by a weather report. More heat. More sun. Soon Jim sees a tall denim figure walking along the shoulder of the road. He slows to pick up the boy but is honked at by the truck behind him as the boy waves him along. Indian Jim has three cans of chicken noodle soup and half a jar of peanut butter in the cabinet at home. He counted over 2,500 parts today to make sure none had left the Brady’s lot. All the pieces were there, each one accounted for, and it was as if his numbering of things had reinvented the place, renewing the existence of that small world the old man holds sacred. The stoplight ahead burns red and he stops, shuts off the radio. The old man needs a name. Sleeping Bear. Wobbling Horse. Cadillac Man.
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BELMONT STORY REVIEW / SPRING 2016
ERIC LLOYD BLIX’S writing has appeared in such journals as Western Humanities Review, Caketrain, 3:AM magazine, and others, and it has been reprinted at Longform.org. He teaches creative writing at Minnesota State University, Mankato.
SPRING 2016 / BELMONT STORY REVIEW
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