When Dad Came Back

by Gary Soto

  “Lucky,” Gabe called. “I got a treat for you.” He walked to where he had chained the dog to the clothesline, but he was gone—chain and all. Gabe froze. He looked around frantically. Most of the yard was hidden in darkness. Frankie, he thought. He's got Lucky! And I'm going to get him back!

  Gabe peered over the fence into the alley—Lucky wasn't there. His dog was gone. Dejected, he sat on a rickety wooden chair and lifted the first slice of bologna to his mouth. He would need all the strength he could muster if he was to corner that little rat, Frankie.

  When his mother came home at 10:17, Gabe was on the couch, feeling more like a parent than a teenager.

  “You said ten, Mom.” He lifted his eyebrows at the clock, indicating that she was seventeen minutes late. The first rush of anger about losing Lucky had run through his veins. He was emotionally depleted. Now he was more relaxed, as he had plans for rescuing his dog a second time.

  “You're worse than me.” She was in a dress—not the usual jeans and T-shirt—and was weighed down with jewelry—a bead necklace and a copper-colored bracelet. She wore lipstick which made her mouth resemble a red carnation when it was closed.

  “What's his name again?” Gabe asked. He had every right to pry. He didn't want his mom dating just anybody.

  She ignored the question. In front of the mirror in the hallway, she took off her jewelry and checked her lipstick. “His name is Bobby,” she finally answered when she pulled away from the mirror.

  “He looks OK,” Gabe agreed.

  “A little fat, but who isn't?” His mother rubbed her own stomach.

  “You said he has a job. What does he do?”

  “Risk management.”

  Gabe didn't bother to ask what that meant. As long as he had a job, he was an all-right guy.

  “I'm going to bed,” his mother announced, dismounting from her platform shoes, again becoming just an inch taller than Gabe. “Dating makes me tired.”

  His mother vanished into the bathroom, and Gabe made his way to his bedroom. He plopped down on the bed. He waited for his mother to call, “Good night, Son.” When he was certain that she was in bed, he put on his shoes, changed into a dark T-shirt, and quietly climbed out his bedroom window.

  He made his way towards Frankie's house, a six-block journey. Dogs barked at him as he came near. But as soon as he passed, they lay back down.

  Gabe stopped at the end of Frankie's block. He could see cop cars, their lights spinning and shining up into the trees. The neighbors had come out to watch. Some of them were in pajamas, others half-dressed in jeans or sweats. The commotion had excited them.

  At first, Gabe thought there must have been a fire. But he didn't smell smoke or see any fire engines.

  “They got busted,” Gabe figured. The items in the garage loomed large in his mind. He pictured stolen computers inside the house. A friend must have snitched—or the family had just gotten so bold stealing from stores that they had been caught in the act. They weren't known for the brain matter between their dirty ears.

  Gabe ventured toward the crowd, but he kept himself in the dark, half-hidden by a tree. He didn't want to risk being recognized. He spotted Frankie and Tony—and their mother, he believed—on the front lawn. The father, shirtless and displaying tattoos on arms and belly, was handcuffed and seated near them.

  Gabe sped away. He had a plan to rescue Lucky. As everyone was in the front of the house, he wouldn't be noticed if he moved quickly.

  He sprinted around the block and into the alley. His lungs burned from the burst of exertion. He rested until his breathing slowed to something close to normal. He peeked through the slats of the tall redwood fence: no cops, no family, no Lucky. When he tried the gate latch and found that it was locked, he boosted himself over the fence. As he plopped silently into the yard, the safety light came on. He froze, with his jaw open.

  He jumped into the shadows of the garage that ran along the house. He could hear the squawk of a radio from a patrol car and the voice of one of the cops up front, but he couldn't make out what he was saying. He glanced around the backyard—junky car parts, old tires, a turned-over barbecue with its legs in the air, a shriveled summer garden—but he couldn't locate Lucky. He whispered the dog's name twice. He made a light smooching sound.

  Then Gabe heard a single bark from inside. He waited for a second bark, but it didn't come. He pushed away from the garage and sneaked to the darkened side of the house. He peered in a window: there was Lucky, playing with a sock.

  Gabe's mind whirled. He decided that he would just walk in and claim the dog. After all, the family was in the front. What would they know about his entering the house by the back door and snatching Lucky away?

  Gabe crept to the kitchen door. He touched the doorknob with a single finger first, as if it might be hot, and then with his whole hand wrapped around the knob. He opened the door, peeked in, and, seeing no one, entered on tiptoe. He moved quickly through the kitchen—dirty dishes were piled high in the sink—and stopped as he looked in the living room—no one. He sped to the back bedroom.

  When Gabe entered, he encountered a large cop going through a cardboard box. The cop slowly raised his face and set the box down. His rough face said, What do you want? His even rougher voice said, “You're not supposed to be here.”

  Gabe took in everything about the cop: the two stripes on his sleeves, the holstered gun, the mace and handcuffs, the row of bullets attached to his belt, and the thick-soled shoes—one was scuffed and the other shiny. Gabe considered backtracking out of the bedroom, but he had unfinished business. He stood his ground. He and the cop looked at each other, like David and Goliath.

  Finally, the cop asked, “Did you hear me? You're supposed to be outside.”

  “My dog,” Gabe replied. “Let me get him.” Gabe figured that the cop would think that he was one of the sons of the man on the front lawn. What would be the big deal? Let the boy have the pup.

  Lucky had risen, tail wagging. The cop jerked his head at the dog. The gesture said, Go ahead, take him. The cop returned to examining the contents of the box.

  When Gabe called his pooch, Lucky ran into his arms.

  At home, Gabe drank from the garden hose in the backyard and held out the hose for Lucky to drink. Water splashed off the dog's snout. Gabe threw himself on the lawn, and Lucky leaped into his lap.

  “You're a brave dog,” Gabe told Lucky.

  Lucky licked Gabe's face, wetting it with affection. Gabe chuckled when the licking ventured behind his ears. He had figured it out: Frankie would find the dog gone and blame the police—a door was left open, and Lucky trotted off to freedom. Gabe would just have to keep off the streets until Heather came. That would be easy. He would hunker down and watch television, play his Game Boy, and do chores for his mother. He decided to be a very good son.

  In the darkness of the yard, Gabe watched the sky and counted two shooting stars within minutes of each other. When the cold began to seep into his body from the dewy lawn, he rose, brushed grass from his pants, and boosted Lucky through his bedroom window.

  The next morning, Gabe grubbed on soy chorizo with Egg Beaters, imitation egg.

  “It's better for you.” His mother placed a plate in front of him. “It doesn't have so many calories.”

  Gabe realized that his mother was serious about losing weight. And she was dressing better. Because of the man in her life? He would ask more about Bobby in time. For now, he praised the meal, including the imitation chorizo, on his plate. He tore a piece of tortilla and pinched up some egg.

  His mother left for work, but not before running a finger across the coffee table and showing Gabe the dust that covered her fingertip. She posted a smile on her face. “The house needs a little TLC, don't you think?” She gave him a list that included mopping the kitchen and bathroom, vacuuming the living room and hallways, and mowing the front lawn.

  The chores were OK by him. After all, he was under self-imposed house arrest. He wasn't going to be se
en on the streets. And Heather wasn't due until late afternoon tomorrow.

  He mopped and vacuumed, did the dishes, and took damp paper towels and wiped the dust off the television screen. He ran the same paper towel along the windowsill, gathering up dead flies. He untangled the vacuum cleaner from the hall closet a second time when Lucky toppled a small planter. Lucky galloped from the room when the vacuum began to howl.

  The phone rang. A dark, skinny image rose in his mind: Frankie. But when he answered, it was Uncle Mathew, who had called to ask how he was holding out.

  “Everything's cool,” Gabe answered. He had a damp sponge in his grasp, as he had started to clean the stains around the light switch in the kitchen.

  “Did you call Heather?”

  The real reason for the call, Gabe figured. At that time of day, Uncle would have already spent a couple of hours in the garden patch or in the barn. Sweat would have lathered the hair under his cowboy hat.

  “Yeah, she's coming to get Lucky.”

  “Who?”

  “Lucky. I told you about him. She's going to take him.” Gabe lacked the energy to explain how Lucky had been nabbed. Instead, he said, “I think she likes you.”

  “What? Who likes me? The dog?”

  “You heard me. Heather, she likes you. And you like her!” Gabe had to smile—Uncle Mathew's in love!

  His uncle laughed falsely. “Yeah, right,” he said, with lightness in his voice.

  Gabe couldn't help grinning. He pictured his uncle in the kitchen, the big black telephone to his ear. Uncle Mathew wanted to be encouraged and, Gabe thought, I may as well make up some stuff.

  “She thinks you're handsome. She says that you're naturally intelligent, that you can do anything.”

  “You're such a little liar.”

  “She said that you had bazookas for arms.” Gabe willed himself not to crack up.

  “Don't be funny, boy.” Uncle Mathew told Gabe that he would make a good Cupid, and then he hung up, happy.

  Gabe beamed happiness at Lucky, who was pawing at the roll of paper towels. “He's in love,” Gabe said.

  They went to the backyard. While Lucky sniffed for a place to mark with a quick spurt, Gabe ventured to the front. He strode to the curb and gazed up and down the block. Sprinklers were going. Some kids were in those sprinklers, playing. It seemed like a day on the move. Soon the old folks would come out to putter in their yards.

  Gabe didn't relish cutting the lawn. It wasn't so scraggly as to be an embarrassment on an otherwise tidy street. Still, he brought out the mower from the garage and was about to start it up when Pablo rode past on his bike.

  Pablo saw him and circled back.

  “Hey,” said Gabe, walking out to meet his friend in the street.

  “Hey, did you hear about Frankie's dad?” Pablo straddled his bike. He was breathing hard.

  Gabe feigned ignorance.

  “He had stolen goods piled to the ceiling, Nikes and Hollister stuff.” Pablo raised a hand over his head to show how high the stuff was piled. “Now he's got a bus ticket to Happy Valley Prison.”

  Gabe pretended to be surprised. “Oh, wow.”

  “The family's moving out.” He pointed over the rooftops, toward Frankie's house. “I was just riding by and there were like three vans out in the yard.”

  Pablo rode away, neither hand on the handlebars, a balancing act that was a cinch for a jock like him. He said he was off to Holmes Playground to play a pickup softball game.

  For Gabe, this was the best news since the beginning of time—Frankie and his family moving away! He sprinted to the backyard and whistled to Lucky, who was pawing at a deflated soccer ball. The two climbed the stairs and went inside. Gabe called Heather on the landline telephone. She picked up on the third ring.

  “Heather, it's me,” he began, his hand on Lucky's scruff. “I have something to tell you.” Gabe figured that if Frankie was gone—out of the neighborhood, out of his life—he could keep Lucky. Heather would understand. She had owned dogs before and would know the pain of giving up a dog.

  “And what is that?” Heather's voice was light, full of happiness.

  “You know that boy that was bothering me? The one who took Lucky?” He explained that the cops had hauled the father away and that the family was packing up as they spoke. He was direct: “Heather, if it's OK with you, I can keep Lucky now.” He felt guilty about retracting his promise.

  “Oh, that's good,” she replied.

  “You're not mad?” He was surprised. “You sure it's OK?”

  “I'm sure,” she answered, then giggled. “It's OK. I got another dog.”

  “Another dog?” Gabe became confused and suspicious. He pushed Lucky off the couch and wagged a finger at him to behave. “What do you mean?” he asked Heather.

  “I have a new dog. He's not yet house trained, but he will be.” She chuckled and added, “He needs a flea bath, too.”

  Uncle Mathew, Gabe guessed. The guy's already at her place! Gabe looked up at the clock on the wall. It had been—what?—less than an hour since Uncle had called? Gabe realized that he had teased his uncle into action. For the sake of romance, he hoped that his uncle had at least brushed his teeth and changed clothes.

  “That's cool. But tell Uncle to get a TV,” Gabe said. “That's the least he can do for you.” He hung up, the picture in his mind of his uncle scratching fleas—the dog!

  Gabe went back outside, pushed the lawn mower into the garage, and made his way over to Frankie's house to see for himself. The last van was leaving, a heavyset guy at the wheel. The van rode over the curb, springs squeaking, and slowly drove away. Things clunked inside the van when it turned the corner.

  Gabe could have danced in the street. Instead, in spite of the heat, he walked eight blocks to Holmes Playground, with the hope of joining the softball game that Pablo was playing in. But he stopped in his dusty tracks. Pablo was sitting with a girl in the kiddie swings. They were sharing a bag of sunflower seeds and laughing.

  Dang, Gabe thought. That dude gets them all.

  From the playground, he wound his way downtown, kicked through the Fulton Mall, and crossed the railroad tracks. He considered splurging on churros from a street vendor, and a soda to wash it down. But when he pushed his hand into his pocket, he fingered only forty-three cents. Plus, he had promised himself to give up sugar.

  Across the tracks was Chinatown, a once-booming district that had fallen on hard times. Most of the buildings were boarded up. The vacant lots were weedy places to dump refuse. Ranchero music blared from passing cars or trumpeted from bar doors as Mexicanos spilled out onto the sidewalk.

  “Hey, boy,” a man called from across the street. “I know you.”

  It was the brother who had saved him from the vampire gangsters. Instead of the sombrero he had been wearing before, he sported a do-rag at an angle that seemed hip. He strode over, pulling up his pants.

  “Hey,” Gabe greeted.

  “Hot, huh?” the brother remarked. He grimaced as he wiped his neck with a thick finger.

  “It's going to get hotter.” Gabe pulled at the collar of his T-shirt to show his agreement.

  When the brother said that he was thirsty and could use a soda, Gabe gladly held out the forty-three cents pulled from his pocket. They slapped palms, and each went his way.

  Gabe strolled past a few stores—Central Fish was bringing in both flies and customers—and crossed Ventura Avenue. If his dad was anywhere, it would be near the freeway, where the homeless made their camps. The street shimmered with yellowish heat, and the cars didn't make things any cooler. They blew out exhaust and heated arguments.

  Gabe noticed a man with an unlaced sneaker on one foot, a boot on the other. When another man, well-dressed and carrying religious pamphlets, approached him, Gabe scampered away. He didn't bother to look back when the man yelled, “I just want to talk to you.”

  For an hour, Gabe ghosted through Chinatown, before boarding a bus on Tulare Street. He patted his pocket
s, forgetting that he had no coins to deposit. The bus driver waved him in and said, “It's too hot to walk.”

  I'll remember that, Gabe promised himself. It was a nice thing to do. He strode down the aisle and took a seat in the back of the nearly empty bus. Now that he was sitting still, he began to sweat. He wiped his face on the front of his T-shirt. All his energy had been used in trekking to a part of town his mother had warned him against.

  At a red light, Gabe glanced out the window, which was smeared with fingerprints, and noticed a man bent over a city trash bin. He was going through it, roughly pulling out plastic bottles and aluminum cans: garbage to some, a treasure to others. The man was dirty; his clothes seemed to have been dragged through a field. He wore no socks.

  Gabe clicked his tongue at the disheveled figure. At least it's not my dad, he sighed. But when the man turned—the bus now beginning to move—he saw that it was his dad. He was holding up two plastic bottles, shaking out their contents—drops of liquid falling like tears on the hot cement.

  The image burned into Gabe's memory.

  For days, Gabe wondered what his dad was doing at the trash bin. Was he one step from living in the gutter, or was he already there? He didn't inform his mom about the sighting. She was too happy starting a new romance. Gabe liked her boyfriend, Bobby, a regular guy with a job.

  His mother was shedding the weight around her middle, whole handfuls disappearing weekly. She joined a gym. She and Bobby had taken up walking in the evening, wearing sweats that were the same color: pumpkin orange.

  Gabe smiled at their outfits and felt joy for them. The first time he spied them holding hands, he had been a little embarrassed. But by the end of summer, it seemed a natural thing.

  When school started, Gabe and Pablo joined a soccer team called the Renegades. One Saturday, after an away game, the team stopped at a supermarket to buy snacks. The store was in North Fresno, which just about everyone claimed was the better part of the city.

  The team, still in cleats, strolled through the supermarket. Gabe went in search of beef jerky, his favorite snack. Then, to offset the salty treat, he made his way to the produce section for something sweet but healthy.