Take Me to the River

by Will Hobbs

  “The Chisos. Along with the Rio Grande itself, they’re the heart of the Big Bend.”

  At last we rolled into civilization, a town, or maybe just a haphazard collection of buildings strung along the road on the hardscrabble flats below Bee Mountain. The sign on the post office said Terlingua, but it wasn’t the Terlingua I was looking for. This one had a couple of motels, the state highway department, a quilt shop, a café with gas pumps, and somewhere up ahead, the Terlingua School and a small grocery.

  The cost of gas was a jaw dropper. Back home it was pushing $4.40, the worst ever. Way out here it was $5.19. At the only intersection in town, with the national park posted straight ahead, L.B. took a right. We passed between two river companies, Rio Bravo Adventures and Blazing Paddles. It was nearly eight PM local time, and both were closed. My stomach, still on Eastern Time, was declaring mutiny. A road sign promised relief: TERLINGUA GHOST TOWN—5 MILES.

  “Don’t expect things to be like they are back home, like supper at suppertime,” I remembered my mother telling me. What was the plan, I wondered—eat at the Starlight or at Uncle Alan’s?

  We were headed west, directly into the setting sun. The pavement was rough, and the road traveled the contours of the desert like a sidewinder. The sun-tortured landscape looked like it had been dumped out of a sack after the rest of the world had been made.

  Chapter 3

  Burger Night at the Starlight

  WE CREPT PAST THE ghost-town cemetery. The graves were mounded with bare dirt and flat stones. Rio’s mother was buried here, I remembered. When Rio was only three, she died somewhere along those eighty miles I had just traveled. She was on her way back from grocery shopping in Alpine.

  As we rolled past the rocky ruins of old buildings, the rounded facade of the Starlight Theatre came into view. “Where’s the ghost town?” I asked.

  “You’re in it,” Cannon replied.

  “Where do people live?”

  L.B. pointed at the hillside beyond. At first glance it looked more like a rock pile than anything else. On second glance, below the mine tailings that crowned the hill, small rock houses came into focus. Scattered across the slope, they were camouflaged uncannily well by giant prickly pear cactus, ocotillo, creosote bush, and half-fallen stone walls from the mining era. Vehicles were sprinkled here and there. I made out a few people moving around on foot.

  Cannon hawked out the window again. “Back in the 1970s, that’s when the artists and river runners and what-not started moving into the ruins. Generally people without two nickels to rub together, mostly Texans who wanted to get away from it all and didn’t mind cohabitating with the snakes and scorpions. For years they had no electricity, no running water—some still live that way.”

  As we pulled into the Starlight’s almost empty parking lot, Cannon told me that the store on the left, the Terlingua Trading Company, was the modern-day incarnation of the company store from the era when the quicksilver mines here produced nearly half the nation’s mercury.

  The pickup rolled to a stop. My eyes were on the Starlight in search of my cousin and my uncle. The only people in sight were two guys on the bench at the back of the long porch that connected the store and the restaurant with an art gallery in between.

  L.B. wished me luck as he drove out. The two men at the back of the porch came to the rail, not to greet me, but to gaze into the distance.

  I turned around to see what they were looking at, and there were the Chisos Mountains, bigger than life and all lit up by the setting sun, their battlements aglow with brilliant reds and golds.

  I climbed the steps to the porch, dropped my stuff on the bench, and went into the restaurant. This time I was keeping my expectations in check. Something told me this wasn’t going to work out, either. Maybe there would be another message.

  Folding metal chairs, concrete floor . . . there was nothing fancy about the Starlight, but it was loaded with atmosphere. I felt like I was five hundred miles deep into Mexico, in the time of Pancho Villa. The plastered walls were watermelon red giving way to mango gold. If I wasn’t mistaken, some of the plaster was pocked with bullet holes. Up toward the ceiling, the plaster had fallen away, revealing the bare stones. The walls had to be massively thick to be able to soar that high and support the rafters running clear across. “On the Road Again” was playing on the PA to a nearly empty house. Only three tables had customers, and the bar stools were empty.

  I stayed planted for a minute just inside the front door. I was thinking of what to do when a lanky kid with shaggy brown hair appeared at the kitchen doorway. He was wearing an apron. At first I wasn’t positive it was him. This kid looked like he might be older than Rio’s fifteen, and was taller and more muscled than I was expecting.

  Yep, it was Rio. Soon as he had me spotted, my cousin broke into a big smile and gave a couple of fist pumps. He called my name as he was closing in, and I called his. He grabbed me with a bear hug. I was pretty well shell-shocked.

  “I can’t believe it!” Rio exclaimed. “I can’t believe you’re actually here!”

  “Me neither. You’ve shot up since your last Christmas card.”

  I looked around for my uncle, but I didn’t spy any candidates. “It’s been a long day,” I said.

  “I’m so glad that you came, Dylan.”

  What came out of my mouth in return was, “Can I still get something to eat?”

  “Not a problem. I was hoping you’d get here before closing. It’s two-for-one burger night.”

  “But you’re working, right?”

  “My boss said he would finish the dishwashing when you got here.” Rio took off the apron, folded it, and placed it on the side of the bar. “No more pearl diving until August.”

  Rio led the way to a table. I asked if my backpack and duffel were okay where they were, outside on the bench.

  “Sure thing—this is Terlingua.”

  Just then a very attractive waitress came around from behind the bar and headed our way. She was my mother’s age, but she didn’t dress anything like my mother. She wore black, with lots of silver and lots of style. “Howdy, boys,” she said. “Who’s your friend, Rio?”

  “This is Dylan, my river-crazy cousin from North Carolina.”

  The lady gave me a big smile. “Lot of rivers back in North Carolina, Dylan?”

  “Yes, ma’am, and lots of trees.”

  “Been out here before?”

  “No, ma’am, I haven’t.”

  “What does it look like to you?”

  “Huge. Empty. Dry. Snakebit, I guess.”

  “Never heard it put better.”

  By this time I could have eaten the menus for an appetizer, except the waitress had them tucked under her elbow. Rio looked at me strangely, like I was staring at the lady’s elbow, then introduced her. Ariel was her name. She was his neighbor in the ghost town, and she was also an artist.

  Ariel asked if we were up for the two-for-one burgers with fries. Rio recommended the guacamole topping. “Perfect,” I said. We both ordered large Cokes.

  “Back to our trip,” I said. “I Googled four different canyons in Big Bend. What stretch of the river are you and your dad talking about?”

  “We were going to do the Lower Canyons.”

  “Now we’re going to paddle somewhere else?”

  All of a sudden, Rio looked real uncomfortable. “Guess I might as well spit it out. My dad isn’t around.”

  “Where is he?”

  “He took off a few days ago for Alaska.”

  Chapter 4

  Underwhelmed

  “ALASKA?” I SAID. “YOU’RE putting me on.”

  “I wish I was. It came up really fast, Dylan. My dad said to tell you how disappointed he was, after expecting to finally meet you and run the river with you. He didn’t really have a choice.”

  I was awfully slow to process what I’d just heard. It was like I’d suffered a concussion.

  “He asked me to explain, Dylan. Dad thought he was going to be
able to work here this summer, guiding on the Rio Grande. Even though the river runs highest in the summer—when the rains come—summer is the low season for the river companies. The tourists aren’t too keen on the heat. Most of the guides leave to work on rivers in Colorado, where it’s nice and cool. As of last week Dad was the only guide left in town, but he thought he had work. He had three bookings in August lined up for after our trip.”

  Rio’s eyes were flitting this way and that with barely a bounce off mine. He took a quick breath and kept talking. “The economy is killing us, Dylan, especially the cost of gas, and the fear factor about Mexico isn’t helping. Tourist visits to Big Bend National Park are way down, and business for the river companies has cratered. Those three bookings for August I just told you about, they all canceled. My dad found out only four days ago. Well, he had to get work, and fast. It’s always hand-to-mouth around here. An old friend who owns a river company out of Haines, Alaska, offered three trips on the Alsek River—each one eleven days long—if he could get there in twenty-four hours. Dad threw some stuff in a bag, drove to El Paso, and jumped on a plane. He’s going to make some good money up there.”

  Rio leaned back, waiting for me to say something. I was still too dumbfounded, just trying to stay calm and not say anything I would regret.

  “I know, Dylan. This sucks.”

  Ariel brought our burgers, two apiece. They were huge and looked delicious, but as I started in on the first one, I was so distracted by the grinding of my mental gears I couldn’t even taste it.

  I was hungry, though. I kept chewing and swallowing. Between burgers I said, “How come you didn’t let me know before I left home?”

  “My dad was on the fly. He asked me to take care of it and I told him I would . . . I came down here to the Starlight and started to punch up your number. I just couldn’t do it.”

  “Uh, why not?”

  “Well, I knew your bag was probably already packed.”

  “It was, but still—”

  “What I mean is, I knew how much you were counting on it. I was counting on it myself, like you wouldn’t believe. Summer around here is deadly dull. The kids from school are scattered all over the desert. There aren’t any even close to my age who live in the ghost town. I figured we could go ahead and have a great time doing whatever.”

  “You could’ve told me when you called the hotel in Alpine. I mean, I was right there.”

  “I know. I’m really sorry about that. I figured that if I filled you in, you would’ve phoned home and that would’ve been the end of it. Don’t you think?”

  “Probably so.”

  “Look, I’m really sorry. I’ll understand if you scratch and do a U-turn. I can see how annoyed you are.”

  “More like disappointed.”

  “I thought the chance might never come again. You know how long we’ve been talking about it. Well, not literally. You know what I mean.”

  “Your dad actually left you here for more than a month, alone?”

  “He was away for a month last summer, working in Colorado. It’s not as bad as it sounds.”

  “It’s not?”

  “It’s not easy, but I can handle it. And people in the ghost town look out for each other. Really, I’m sorry. I had this whole image of how it was going to be. I realize how weird this must seem.”

  I was at a loss as I tried to sort out my feelings about his deception. Here’s what made it so difficult: My cousin seemed so sincere and so honest, if that’s the right word.

  One thing Rio was right about—how long we’d been looking forward to this. He might be correct, too, that it was now or never. My mother thought of her brother as flaky enough as it was. Would she be willing to make like this snafu didn’t happen and try again the following summer? Send me all the way back to run the river?

  Maybe not. Well, probably not.

  “Don’t beat yourself up,” I told my cousin. “I understand, sort of. What will we do if I stay, besides hang out?”

  “We can paddle Santa Elena Canyon for sure. It’s the closest and shortest of the four canyons. The put-in is only ten miles away. Ariel can drop us off and pick us up. The canyon is real narrow, real deep—an incredible place.”

  “Lots of rapids?”

  “Only one, called Rock Slide, but it’s a big deal.”

  “How long of a trip is it?”

  “Just one day . . . you look disappointed.”

  “I guess I am. I mean, we were going to have a week on the river, and that sounded awesome. But, okay, we could paddle Santa Elena Canyon for a day—then what?”

  “We could do a lot of mountain biking . . .”

  “I’ll have to sleep on it,” I said. “Sleep on the whole deal.”

  “Fair enough.”

  On our way out of the Starlight, we collected my stuff off the porch. Rio asked if I wanted to climb to the top of the hill by the water tower and throw fireworks into an eight-hundred-foot-deep mineshaft. The fireworks bouncing off the walls all the way down made for “an insanely spectacular show.”

  I was dead tired and asked for a rain check. I followed Rio across the hillside into the residential part of the ghost town. There weren’t any streetlights but the moon was up. My cousin told me to watch where I stepped; the rattlesnakes were active at night. Lights twinkled here and there from dwellings scattered amid the ruins. I felt like I was sleepwalking in a postapocalyptic world.

  We came to an iron gate in a stone wall. The gate squeaked open to a patio and Rio’s front door. I took note that my mother’s brother and his son didn’t live under a rock after all, though their house was made out of rocks. “Welcome,” Rio said. “Mi casa es su casa.”

  Chapter 5

  Kissed by an Assassin

  THE HOUSE WAS SMALL, with only two bedrooms, a small living room, and a small kitchen/dining room. Rio showed me to my crash-landing site, his father’s bedroom. I made a thorough search for scorpions, even pulling back the sheet. Just in case, I got my camping flashlight out of my stuff and placed it on the nightstand before I turned out the light and got into bed.

  I slept like the dead until I was awakened by the rapid beating of my heart. The room was pitch-dark. It was the middle of the night.

  I flicked the flashlight on, pointed it all around. Not a scorpion in sight. My heart was still racing. Bad dream? Suddenly I remembered: bad dream, indeed, and it came rushing back. I was perched at the edge of a vertical mineshaft while Rio was lighting Roman candles and tossing them in. Suddenly I had lost my grip, and was falling, falling, falling.

  Now that I was awake, my lower lip was itching something awful. I kept touching the spot to try to figure out what that was about. It was all I could do not to scratch it. At last my weariness won out and I was able to fall back asleep.

  I slept well enough until the stillness of the night was shattered with what sounded like the wails of a lunatic. I bolted upright like a caveman with a lion at his throat. What was it, and where was I?

  As the wails were followed by yips and barks, I came up with the answers, which were (A) coyote, and (B) my flaky uncle’s place in Terlingua, Texas.

  It was a quarter after five. Dawn was beginning to filter through the screen window along with the bedlam. My lip still itched, and it felt swollen. I tried to get back to sleep but no such luck. Half an hour later the lunatic coyote was still carrying on.

  Rio had left the door to the bedroom open so the cool air entering through the screens could circulate through the house. A coffeepot began to burble.

  The bathroom was attached to the house, but you had to go out the front door to get there. “There’ll probably be a scorpion in the sink,” Rio called as I stumbled out the open front door. “Go ahead and annihilate it.”

  His prediction proved correct. I looked for a weapon and found a book on the back of the composting toilet. It was entitled The World Without Us. No doubt it said that scorpions would do nicely in a world without people. “This one won’t get the chanc
e,” I muttered as I mashed it with the spine of the book.

  The scorpion dispatched, I checked myself out in the mirror. My lip was swollen something awful. I washed my face and hands with less water than my mother uses on one of her African violets. A gallon or two was all you really needed for a shower, Rio had told me the night before. The ghost town had finally gotten a water supply, but his house wasn’t hooked up to it. Too expensive, Rio said. They collected rainwater from the roof and hauled water when their cisterns ran dry.

  Rio and his dad had enough electricity to power the lights, the stereo, a TV, and a DVD player. They didn’t actually get TV; the TV was for watching DVDs. The electricity came from solar panels on the hillside behind the house. They cooked on propane; their fridge and their hot water heater also ran on propane.

  As I returned from the bathroom along the edge of the flagstone patio, I was keeping my eyes down on account of my bare feet and the scorpions. I didn’t see any, but I did notice a huge, hairy tarantula climbing onto the threshold of the open door.

  “Annihilate it?” I asked. Rio was sipping coffee from a Mexican mug and watching the arachnid come in.

  “No way,” he said. “That’s Roxanne.”

  I soon learned that tarantulas make excellent houseguests, are virtually harmless, and pay for their lodging by eating insects, flies, conenose bugs, and sometimes scorpions. “I’ll show you what happens if I put her out,” Rio said. He carried Roxanne outside on the palm of his hand and gently set her down on the far side of the patio. “You drink coffee?” Rio asked as he returned.

  “Not really. Gimme some.”

  We sat at the kitchen table, drank Zapatista Blend, and watched the huge black spider turn herself around. She began to march back to the front door. Rio said that a tarantula moving indoors was a sign that the thunderstorms would come soon.