Gustaf was standing outside, putting a plug of chewing tobacco in his mouth and staring at the road we had just come from. “That was close,” I said. “If it hadn’t been for you …”
“Naah.” Gustaf waved me off. “I remembered that boy. Jimmy brought him to the ranch once. He was afraid of horses. He was just looking for a reason not to go in that trailer.”
I wiped the sweat from my forehead with my arm. “Where’s my father?”
“He’s coming. The Border Patrol pulled him to the side to search the van. I saw it in the rearview mirror.” We exchanged knowing glances. Gustaf didn’t want to say I told you so, but I knew what he was thinking.
I was glad I had resisted my father’s plan. I coughed and dug a strand of hay from under my collar. I looked around. Nothing but nothingness. A tumbleweed rolled across the road. This was it, then. Now it hit me that I would be living with my father for … who knows how long. I wondered if he and his new wife had plans about what I would do in Chicago.
“Things aren’t always as bad as they look,” Gustaf said, still watching the road. “Work with whatever life throws at you, good or bad.”
I saw the van, a white dot in the distance. “That’s your advice?”
“It’s worked for me, more or less.” Then he took two twenty-dollar bills out of his pocket. “Take this. I owe you much more for all your help around the ranch. This is just so you’ll have a little money in case of an emergency.”
“Thank you,” I said, taking the money. I knew Gustaf well enough by then not to argue with him. And I needed money to buy a burner phone as soon as possible.
When my father’s van pulled off the pavement onto the gravel side road, I said, “You should name the horse. He should have a name.”
“Name him. Go ahead.”
“Amigo.” It was the first and only word that came to mind.
“Amigo it is.”
My father got out of the van slowly. His shoulders were hunched. He had considerably less energy and bouncy optimism than when I first saw him earlier that morning. “I can’t believe they stopped me and searched the van. First place they searched was the tool compartment where Emiliano was going to hide. I guess you were right.” He looked at Gustaf. “I do look like someone who would sneak in a Mexican.”
“Don’t take it personally,” Gustaf said.
“Hard not to,” my father responded.
Gustaf winked at me. Apparently, he decided not to tell my father that they were stopping everyone that day. And I was all right with that.
“Ready?” my father asked.
I nodded. I turned to Gustaf, shook his hand, and looked into his eyes for the briefest of moments. Then I went to the passenger side of the truck to get my backpack.
“I don’t know how to thank you for all you’ve done for us,” I heard my father say to Gustaf. “I’d like to pay you.”
How could my father say something like that? Gustaf saved my life. He took care of me and made me feel like a member of his family. He showed me a way to live I had never known before, and just a few moments ago, he smuggled me into the United States at great risk to himself. How could you ever offer someone money for that?
“No,” I heard Gustaf say after a long silence.
“Here. Take my business card at least. If you ever need an air conditioner or anything.”
I came back with my backpack and saw Gustaf take the card without looking at it. Then he was opening the truck and getting in. He was moving uncharacteristically fast, like he was trying to keep me from rushing at him and asking him to take me back to the ranch with him—which is exactly what I wanted to do. And what I knew he’d welcome.
My father and I watched the truck and trailer move away in the same direction we were going. Gustaf was going to drive up to the next state road and then turn back to Sanderson a different way.
A knot inside me began to come loose.
We drove in silence. I was thinking about the close call I’d just had and how unexpectedly afraid I had felt when I thought I’d be found. Was it always going to be like that? That fear of being found out only a heartbeat away?
I looked out the window. What was the difference between the desert landscape I was seeing out the window and the landscape I saw on the drive to the border with Sara and Brother Patricio? The land was similar, but it felt different. It was like I was watching a movie instead of driving through the land. The windows of the van were closed, and the air conditioner blasted cold air into my face. In Brother Patricio’s beat-up Toyota, the hot air from the open windows was more real. There were smells back then: roadkill, burning brush, the magical odor of eucalyptus appearing out of nowhere. The only smell inside the van was my father’s cologne, a mixture of alcohol and something flowery that was making me nauseous. How is it that a person cannot smell himself? The height of the van, the cold air, the smell, these were not the only differences. Outside, the land was all fenced. There was no inch of territory that was not closed in by some kind of wire. Thin, green aluminum poles held the strands of wire, barbed and not barbed, in place. Somewhere back in that desolation, there must be a ranch with a few cows that are let out to graze; otherwise why the need for a fence? A few places had fences that were ten feet high and I couldn’t understand why until I saw the sheep and then I knew that the fence was not so much to keep the sheep in but to prevent someone from stopping by the road and putting one of the animals in their truck.
My father seemed preoccupied, upset about something. Now and then he would shake his head and whisper a word that sounded like “ship.” I smiled when I finally understood that he was swearing softly about being searched by the Border Patrol. Was he upset that his plan nearly got me sent back to Mexico or that he got treated differently than Gustaf? I wondered how my father saw himself. Did he see himself as fully American? Sara told me once that he had obtained a permanent resident visa through his new wife and had applied for citizenship. Was that enough to make you feel offended when the Border Patrol stopped you?
“Your English is pretty good,” my father said. “The five words I heard you say.” There was a slight, sarcastic grin on his face.
“You don’t talk much either.”
“I apologize.” He gripped the steering wheel tightly with both hands. “Those phone calls I got when I got to the ranch were from Abe.”
“Abe?”
“The owner of the company. My boss. You know Able Abe? On the side of the van.” A pause, then, “He’s also my father-in-law.”
It took me a few seconds to realize what father-in-law meant.
“Your suegro?”
“Yup. Mi suegro. Abe Gropper is Nancy’s father. Nancy, that’s my wife. Nancy Gropper. Gropper is spelled with two p’s.”
“Gropper,” I muttered. Nancy Gropper was his wife. Good for him. At least he didn’t say she was my stepmother.
“It’s also my name now,” my father said, interrupting my thoughts. The van swerved briefly onto the opposite lane as my father dug in his back pocket and pulled out a thick wallet. He held the wallet with the hand holding the steering wheel while he pulled out a business card. He passed me the card and I read.