Coyote blue

trying desperately to stay out of Hell. It was unfair, she thought, that her new faith was being tested before the paint was even dry.
    She wanted the owl to go away and take her bad luck with it. But to a good Christian, an owl was just an owl. Only a traditional Crow believed in the bad luck of owls. A good Christian would just go out there and shoo that old owl away. Of course, it wouldn't bother a good Christian.
    Adeline had come to Christianity the same way she had come to sex and smoking: through peer pressure. Thinking about her six kids and her smoker's hack, she wondered if perhaps peer pressure didn't always lead to the best habits. Her sisters had all converted and they had referred to her as the heathen of the family until she caved in and accepted Christ. Now, only three weeks after being washed in the blood of the Lamb, she was already backsliding like a dog surprised down a skunk hole. The owl.
    Adeline looked out the front window to check on the owl; he was still there. Had he winked at her? She had pinned up her hair and was wearing sunglasses and a pair of Milo's overalls, hoping the owl wouldn't recognize her until she figured out what to do. She was tempted to pray to Jesus to make the owl go away, but if she did that, she would be admitting that she believed in the old ways and she'd go to Hell. There was no Hell in the old ways. Then again, she could load up Milo's shotgun, walk out in the yard, and turn that old owl into pink mist. She couldn't see herself doing that either – no telling what kind of trouble that would unleash. And she couldn't wait for Milo and ask him for help: not after weeks of working on him to leave the Native American church and trade in his peyote buttons for wafers and wine.
    She ducked away from the window. One of the kids coughed in the other room. Eventually she was going to have to take them down to the clinic for treatment. But she was afraid to pass by the owl. According to the priest, God knew everything. The sunglasses and hairdo wouldn't fool God. God knew she was afraid, so He knew she still had faith in the old ways, so she was going to Hell as sure as if she'd been out all morning worshiping golden calves and graven images.
    "I got bad medicine from being Crow," she thought. "And I'm going to Hell for being Christian. I should have let that old liar Pokey freeze to death." She slapped herself on the forehead. "Damn! Another Hell thought."
    ~* * *~
    A nun with an Uzi popped up on the parapet of Notre Dame like a ninja penguin. Coyote shot from the hip, winging her before she could fire. She tumbled over the side, bounced off a gargoyle, and splattered on the sidewalk below. A synthesized Gregorian chant began to play as her spirit rose to heaven, a steel ruler in hand. Coyote strafed a stained-glass window and took out a bazooka-wielding bishop for two thousand penance points.
    Sam walked into the bedroom, hair wet, a towel wrapped around his hips. "Nice shot," Sam said.
    Coyote glanced up from the video game. "The red ones have killed me three times."
    "Those are cardinals. You have to hit them twice to kill them. Wait until you get to the Vatican level. The pope has guilt-beam vision."
    Before Coyote could look back to the screen the cathedral doors flew open and St. Patrick fired a wiggling salvo of heat-seeking vipers.
    "Hit your smart bomb," Sam said.
    Coyote fumbled with the control, but was too late. A snake latched onto his leg and exploded. The screen flashed GAME OVER , and a synthesized voice instructed Coyote to "go to confession."
    Coyote dropped the control onto the bed with a sigh.
    Sam said, "You did good. Gunning for Nuns is a hard game for beginners."
    "I should have brought some cheating medicine. My cheating medicine never fails."
    "This isn't like the hand game. This is a game of skill."
    "Who needs skill when you can have luck?"
    Sam shook his head and turned to go back to the bathroom. During the night something inside him had changed. Each time he thought things had reached a plateau of weirdness, something even weirder had happened. The result, he realized, was that he was now accepting anything that happened, no matter how weird, without resistance. Chaos was the new order in his life.
    The phone rang and Sam, hoping it was Calliope, grabbed the receiver off the vanity. "Samuel Hunter," he said.
    "You low-life, scum-sucking shithead!"
    "Good morning to you too, Josh."
    "You win, dickhead. There'll be a meeting of the co-op