Somewhere in the back of Mom’s mind, when she picked him out of the litter, the fattest puppy, she knew this.
I think.
We ramp onto Interstate 25 and bomb north. I can see the first snow on the Spanish Peaks—the Breasts of the World, as Grandpa Spencer likes to call them. Fresh whiteness sparkles through the layers of gray afternoon. The peaks look both near and far. Real and fake.
El Guapo doesn’t like the cold air blasting his back, so he burrows under the plastic sheet. I don’t blame him. If I’d thought of it first, I’d have done the same. But there’s only room for one of us.
I turn up my collar and settle back for the ride to Rio Loco Field.
Chapter 11
“HEY, WHAT THE . . . !”
Dad rips off the plastic sheet and glares at me.
Turns out El Guapo wasn’t snoozing after all. Nearly half of our hot dogs are gone. We’re down from ten dozen to six dozen, if you count the partially eaten ones. Also gone are the plastic wrappers, except for a few shreds. Guapo was just beginning to sample the tamales when we pulled up to the Snack Shack.
Dad lunges at Guapo, who darts away.
“Thief!” he shouts. “Bastard!”
He opens his wallet, pulls out some cash.
“Arlo, fire up your bike and buy me all the hot dogs you can. Quick.”
I crank my 125 and blast off. My old dirt rider feels good. How could I even think of selling it? I can’t—I won’t.
At the Super 24, I ask Tony the clerk if he’s got any hot dogs without nitrates.
“Say what?”
“How ’bout veggie dogs?”
“Not in this lifetime.”
I buy the whole stock of hot dogs, six packs, and button the bag into my shirt. The traffic heading back to Rio Loco Field is heavy. I weave in and out and ride the shoulder.
As I cut through the parking lot, I notice that Dad has moved the pickup to a better spot to beat the crowd. I can see El Guapo sitting on the driver’s side and Siouxsie sitting next to him. It’s funny in a way, because Guapo’s such a clown that even his sad face makes me laugh. But Siouxsie—there’s nothing funny about her.
I brake to a stop and ponder whether I should sit with her for a minute. But just then Winged Victory—the bus carrying the Jeopardy Saints—pulls into the lot. The players clatter off amid cheers from Jeopardy fans and hoots from Clay fans. Tonight, these players are big stars. They clop across the parking lot, their ’nads clacking in time with their cleats.
This stardom would make sense if they were saving lives or curing cancer, but all they’re going to do is crack their helmets and catch a few passes.
No, I’m no football fan. I glance again at my sister, grind my throttle, and am gone.
“Quite a crowd,” Dad says when I hand him the shopping bag. He’s got the coffee brewing, the cider steeping. He’s got both grills fired up, and he’s filled them with two dozen dogs each. They’re beginning to glisten. The Snack Shack is really cooking.
“I’m worried about your sister, Arlo.”
“Me too,” I say.
A minute later we’re too busy to worry. People are lining up outside the Snack Shack, blowing on their fingers, eager to wrap them around something warm.
I do my hot dog dance:
Tong it,
bun it,
drop it in a trough.
Ring it!
Ching it!
“Mustard on your left.”
About every third dog, I glance into the bleachers, searching for Lee.
At kickoff, everybody goes drunk on football. Two great teams, sworn enemies. Jeopardy hasn’t beaten Clay in five years. This is the high noon of county football.
We are the Outlaws, dressed in black.
Jeopardy is the Saints, dressed in white.
At the half, Clay leads 24 to 14. Now it’s time for “the show.” I have witnessed “the show” nearly every year of my life. It might even be my earliest memory. It’s definitely the high point of the football season. Better than any Christmas pageant or Fourth of July parade.
The mascots take the field. The “Outlaw Clay Allison” wears fringed buckskin chaps, a black leather vest, and a black cowboy hat. The “Saint” wears a white robe with coat-hanger wings and a Styrofoam halo. She carries a giant papier-mâché Bible.
This year, Clay Allison is played by senior Ben Gigliano. He saunters about twirling six-shooters, pausing to swig from a bottle he keeps in his chaps.
The Saint is portrayed by Ramona Solaño, Latoya’s cousin. She’s a senior at Jeopardy High School.
Clay shoots up a storm, each bullet exploding out of the loudspeakers, but nothing hits the Saint. So Clay reaches back and fingers the last bullet from the loop in his belt, kisses it, chambers it, cocks, aims, and fires. The Saint snatches the bullet in midflight, holds it up for all to see—an oversized Styrofoam bullet she has slipped from her sleeve. Clay drops his head in defeat.
The Saint pulls the smoking guns from his fingers, flings them away, and raises the Bible over Clay’s head. She says into her mike:
“Will you mend your ways and grace your days?”
Clay bows his head. “Sure will.”
“Will you take the path of the pure and follow in the footsteps of the Lord?”
“Sure will.”
The Saint touches Clay’s shoulders. He falls to his knees and says into his collar mike:
“Praise the Lord in the highest! Amen.”
Everybody at Rio Loco Field loves it, because Clay gets to ham it up and shoot all sorts of blanks, and the Bible-toting Saint gets to cast a spell over him.
But as the Saint leads the Outlaw off the field in victory, a posse of cowboys races out from the sidelines twirling lassos. They rope her. The Bible falls to the ground.
Will Clay stay redeemed? Hell, no!
He picks up his guns and shoots up a storm all over again. Somehow, he has found more bullets.
And that is how the halftime show ends: Clay yipping and kay-yai-yai-ing, and the Saint hogtied and helpless. Next year, Jeopardy will host, and Clay won’t be so lucky.
Ben Gigliano and Ramona Solaño have done a bang-up job, one of the best. They have caught a truth, and that’s probably why we’re all so mesmerized, even me.
Their little performance is all about Orphan County’s two most powerful urges—the urge to be purified and the urge to follow a wild hair up your ass.
We all feel those urges, that conflict.
I sure do.
DURING THE THIRD QUARTER, the Saints fight back. The score is now tied 31 to 31. A hush falls over the bleachers. Everybody stops breathing. Business at the Snack Shack goes slack.
Dad bumps me. “Better go check on your sister.”
“Good idea,” I say.
I flip open the counter hatch and hike through the pedestrian tunnel to the parking lot. Closing in on the pickup, I can see El Guapo sitting behind the wheel but no sign of Siouxsie. I open the door thinking she’s lying down, or maybe curled on the floor, trying to return to the womb. But she’s gone.
Guapo ducks between my left arm and the hand brake.
Slips out of the truck.
Trots a few yards, turns, and grins at me.
There’s a moment when I might be able to entice him back—if I had a chew stick or cheese snack. Or better yet, a hot dog. But I don’t.
“Get back in, you bum!”
Guapo tilts his head. I soften my tone.
“Hey, when we get home, I’ll give you five chew sticks—original bacon flavor. Just get in the damn truck.”
But he sniffs freedom and bolts, his white flanks and fluffy ears strobing between the parked cars. He’s headed for the pedestrian tunnel to Rio Loco Field.
“GUAPO!”
I take off after him. See his tail bob into the tunnel. There’s still a chance he’ll come back, if I don’t chase him. So I slow down. And pray this thought:
Please, God—please! Don’t do this to me.<
br />
I rush into the tunnel, and about midway the walls begin to buzz. By the time I step into the stadium the buzz has morphed into a gigantic, cackling groan.
At first, I can’t bring myself to lift my eyes and look out at the field. I would give anything to be dogless. Guapo-less.
Then I look up.
There, under the bright glare of the football night on the too-green field, El Guapo is darting about. Uncoiling all his wound-up energy.
He is doing this in front of twenty-two players and three refs. Plus the students, faculty, staff, and parents of two high schools sardined into the Rio Loco bleachers. Plus all the grandparents and other fans—all the anybodies and nobodies who could make the game tonight. About two thousand people.
El Guapo is out on the field expressing himself.
Several players go after him. In Guapo’s mind, this is like an invitation to celebrate. He switches to goof mode. Dodges, leaps, and even appears to buck. No player can catch him. El Guapo is by far the best athlete on the field.
Dad is screaming at me. It’s way too loud to actually hear him, but I feel his screams in my bones. When I look in the direction of the Snack Shack, he’s flailing his arms at me.
Get out there—and get that dog!
Every fiber of me says “No!” But El Guapo is my dog. He was Mom’s, but he’s mine now. Not that I asked for him, but he latched on to me. Made me his primary human. You can’t go against that grain.
I step across the sideline into the harsh lights.
“Hey, Santiago! Get your stupid-ass dog off the field!”
I whistle. “Guapo! Hey!”
He stops. The players stop, sensing a plan.
I fist my hand and crank it to my shoulder. “Sit, Guapie!”
He sits obediently on the Jeopardy thirty-five-yard line. As I amble closer, he tilts his head and grins, his tongue looking surrealistically pink under the Friday-night lights.
“Who’s a good boy, good boy, good boyyyyy.”
I ease across the Clay thirty to the forty. Then I cross the border into Jeopardy country. Here the grass looks different. An ominous shade of green.
I keep my arm bent and fist raised—the sit command—and stroll toward El Guapo as casually as if I’m strolling along the banks of the Rio Loco itself, hearing the water gurgle and smelling the prickly pear. Because if Guapie senses a trick, he’ll be off again. That’s how his brain works. Life is a game. Gnaw the bone. Chase the squirrel. Hump the knee.
“Hey, Guapo,” I say, striding closer. “You’re the greatest thing on four legs.”
But he’s past the point of flattery. His eyes glaze. His grin fades. He looks at the laughing bleachers.
He rises up and shakes himself. Yawns. Sniffs the grass. Circles.
Arching.
Sniffing.
Rocking on bowed legs.
Dilating.
Crowning.
Spreading.
Hunkering.
He plants himself just south of the Jeopardy thirty.
Closes his eyes.
Squeezes out a load.
It’s a big one.
Chapter 12
EVEN THE BLADES OF GRASS groan.
It’s time to die.
I dive and catch Guapo by the collar. Referee Ray Sandoval rushes up with a bucket of cleaning products. Somebody else is beside me with a scrub brush, Windex, and plastic bags.
Everything is thrust into my arms. Every voice howls in my ears.
It’s the worst day—the worst!
No, not the worst.
Ray grabs Guapo’s collar, leads him away, shouting: “Clean it up!”
I melt to my knees and go to work. Just south of the Jeopardy thirty-yard line. In the deepest level of hell, where the devil himself craps.
Two thousand sets of eyes watch my every scoop, swab, scrape, and hand rotation.
One giant mind with one puny thought: how big a fool I am.
Never has so much brightness felt so dark.
I try to shut them out—to find some kind of wisdom inside me to get through this. What would Socrates do? Mahatma Gandhi?
Cackling loudest of all, halfway up the bleachers, on Clay’s side, are Lobo and Uncle Sal. Somehow, the familiar sound of their idiocy comforts me.
A chant is born: “Scoop the poop!”
It swells until both sides are united.
“SCOOP THE POOP!”
Only not everybody’s saying “poop.”
The spirit of Charles Darwin must be hovering over Rio Loco Field. Because you can feel evolution at work. Or more accurately, reverse evolution.
“Scoop the poop . . . Scoop the poop . . . Scoop the . . . !
“Scoo-PER! . . .
“Scoo-PER! . . .
“Scoo-PERRR!”
The announcer crackles through the loudspeakers.
“Uh, ladies and gentlemen, uh . . . Clay Allison’s very own Arlo Santiago is . . . uh . . . proudly taking care of business on behalf of the family dog. Let’s hear it for Arlo.”
I hear it.
Man, do I hear it.
I’m pretty sure they hear it in Texas, too.
And western Louisiana.
NOBODY SCORES AFTER THIS. Both teams tiptoe around the spot where El Guapo unloaded. Even though I super-buffed the grass with Windex.
The game ends in a 31 to 31 tie.
Clay’s die-hard fans shove by me. But the non-die-hard fans seem upbeat. Nobody wants to shake my hand, but I get clapped on the back a lot. The mood is that it’s Clay’s victory, symbolically speaking.
Over and over, I get called “Scooper.”
“Hey, Scooper.” “Yo, Scooper.” “Scooper-duper-dude.”
Already it feels permanent, like an epitaph. I smile and roll with it. But if my gut were on my face, my jaw would be dragging on the ground.
At the Snack Shack, everything that was so organized and careful before is sloppy now. Dad hurls stuff into the pickup, including the hot dog grills. El Guapo sits at the wheel, looking sheepish and scolded.
“Once upon a time,” Dad says, jerking open the door and shoving Guapo to the passenger side, “my name in this town was not associated with dog shit.”
He points to the bleachers. “Take your sister home. Do you both good.”
He gets in, slams the door, and peels out.
Maybe it is the worst day.
No, it will never be that.
I scan the bleachers for Siouxsie and spot her a few rows up, wedged between Lupita Fields and Lupita’s niece, Lee, of the cascading red-gold hair and pink Pumas. A blue and red Navajo blanket covers all three laps.
I cruise over on my Yam. Stop just below them. Pull off my helmet.
“Arlo!” Lupita calls down. “Get up here.”
I cut the ignition, hop the rail, and climb the bleachers. Lupita stands and throws her arms around me. She’s a great hugger—smells of lavender and bucked hay. If only I could stay here, wrapped and warm, for a year or two.
“Way to go,” Siouxsie says, breaking the spell. “Now we’re all famous.”
“Yeah, well . . .” I aim a finger at her. “You’re coming home with me.”
“Wait!” Lee says. “Aren’t you gonna show me your bike?”
She looks at me like nothing just happened. But everything happened. Her shimmering blondness falls flat.
“Nah,” I say. “Gotta get home.”
“Oh, go on, show her the bike,” Lupita says. “Siouxsie and I’ll wait here. We still have some catching up to do.”
It’s nice that Lupita uses the word “wait,” because Siouxsie’s not about to jump off the bench.
Fact is, I haven’t seen Lupita Fields for five months, not since Mom’s service. She wrote me a letter—so short, I haven’t forgotten:
Dear Arlo, If ever you need to talk, laugh, cry, or just sort it out, you let me know. I am here. Love, Lupita
As far back as I can remember, Lupita’s been a loner up in Chicorica Canyon, preferri
ng life with her thirsty cows and dusty horses to hanging out in town.
She’s actually a nice-looking woman, tanned with peppery-dark hair and glowing dark eyes, slim but strong, no-nonsense in business, somewhat cold if you don’t know her, but easy and warm around friends. She’s part denim and leather, part turquoise and silver. Basically, she’s Orphan County royalty.
Overall, though, she’s a bit too sun-dried from living with herds at nine thousand feet. She was married a couple of times—and kicked both her husbands out. Then she decided, to hell with it, animals are better than people.
When the town dammed her creek and stole her water, she kind of disappeared. But having her niece here means Lupita’s starting to come to town again.
Before I can say no, Lee slips out of the Navajo blanket and grabs my hand. We go down the bleachers and hop the rail.
“Say hello to six gears of greatness,” I say, introducing Lee to my Yam 125.
“Hello, six gears of greatness,” Lee says.
I mount up, fire up, and pop a wheelie, rolling down the track, U-turning, spinning into a three-sixty, tricking it all the way to a five-forty, never once touching my foot to the ground. Very few riders can do this—Cam and Lobo sure as hell can’t. Then I roll back, all on one wheel.
Up in the stands, Lupita claps. “Ride ’em, cowboy.”
Siouxsie lifts her voice: “Somebody’s showin’ off again.”
Behind us, we hear: “Hell, that ain’t showin’ off.”
Chapter 13
“SCOOPER!”
It’s Uncle Sal. He and Lobo stride over. “That was one helluva show,” Uncle Sal says. “I’ll never forget it. Not as long as I live.”
He shakes my hand, then, remembering, wipes it on my shoulder.
“Scoo-PER! . . . Scoo-PER! . . . Scoo-PER!” Lobo chants. “Nobody’ll forget it, dude. Watching you scoop, man, that was the high point of my life.”
“Shut up, man,” I grumble.
Dirt Bikes, Drones, and Other Ways to Fly Page 7