MISSION TRAILS
Judy
The following week, I called the new apartment. Alepho answered. “Would you guys like to go on a hike?”
Silence. Maybe a hike wasn’t enticing for guys who’d walked a thousand miles.
“It’s a park near you. A beautiful place where we can walk.” I sensed that still hadn’t sealed the deal so I added a white lie. “Please. I’m really not comfortable hiking alone.”
“Okay,” he said.
“Do you want to ask Benson, or any of the other guys to join us?”
“No one is here.”
“Okay, that’s fine. Wear comfortable shoes.” Who was I kidding, he always wore the same shoes, the ones we’d bought at Walmart that first day. Pretty much the same couple of shirts and pants too, always clean and pressed. “I’ll be there in an hour.”
Getting out of the city would be good for him and his PTSD or depression or cultural adaptation struggles, whatever it was that had him hiding from life. Technically, the park wasn’t outside the city, but the biggest one inside a city in the country. Five thousand acres of wild hills and canyons. Convenient, yet it felt remote.
Alepho was waiting out front in his sweatshirt with the hood up over his head when I arrived. He climbed into the front seat and sat with slumped shoulders. I ignored his lack of enthusiasm—at least he wasn’t wearing earphones—and pulled out of their driveway.
We left the car in a dirt lot and started out along a path cut into the side of the hill. We’d gone about a half mile when I stopped at a spot where steep, rocky slopes framed rolling hills that were not yet terraced for homes or crisscrossed by poles and wires. Even the air was untainted by the out-of-sight, highly populated valley below, and mountains fifty miles in the distance could be seen. I loved that middle-of-nowhere feeling. “This is my favorite view,” I said. “From right here I can only see nature. Not one sign of humanity in my entire field of vision.”
Alepho didn’t respond at first and then turned to me with a look of surprise. “This looks like Sudan!” he burst out as though he were suddenly somewhere else.
“Really? I pictured it flatter.”
“The south has many hills. We crossed Imatong Mountains on the way to Lokupar.”
Lokupar? I hadn’t even read about that one yet.
“Everywhere is green. Huge mango trees.”
“Must be beautiful. I can tell you miss it.”
“I smell water.”
“Smell water? How can you—”
Without another word, he bounded off the trail and down into the steep ravine like a California mule deer.
“You have to stay on the trails,” I shouted. “Watch for snakes.” What was he doing? He could fall, get lost, get bitten, or surprise a mountain lion. Besides, the water was up ahead, opposite the direction he just took off in.
Damn it. I waited a few minutes, deciding what to do. Why couldn’t he just follow the rules? I looked around—no rangers or witnesses—and took off in the direction he’d gone. The descent was steep. Dirt and loose gravel crumbled beneath my feet. I took small steps, sliding with each one, even in my hiking shoes. How had Alepho run down so fast in his crummy ones?
He was nowhere to be seen. I followed a sort of animal trail, no wider than what rabbits might use, overgrown and disappearing in places, pushing through bushes that scraped my legs and made snakes invisible. About halfway down, I came out on the top of a large boulder. Any detour around was too steep and overgrown with impassable shrubs. Alepho must have gotten down though. Determined not to be shown up by youth or gender, I sat and scooted. The last part was vertical, and I jumped to the dirt below.
I called out. No answer. I continued downward, pushing through shoulder-height sumac bushes. Near the bottom, the ground flattened out and knee-high grass grew beneath oak trees. From somewhere within, I heard the gurgle and trickle of a stream. He’d been right about the water.
Downstream a few yards, Alepho stood next to the creek, his sweatshirt hood off, his head tilted back, his arms in the air like a sun worshipper.
“You were right. How did you smell this?” I puffed, trying to catch my breath.
“You don’t smell it?”
“Uh, no.” I didn’t think a colorless, odorless liquid could be smelled.
“Stand right here.” He stepped aside and took in a deep breath as though the aroma rivaled that of baking pizza.
I took his position, closed my eyes, flared my nostrils, and gave it my all. At most, a faint whiff of sumac baked by the hot sun. Fresh water didn’t stand a chance of triggering my olfactory system. I was about to ask him if he’d smelled the sumac when he turned and hurtled back up the ravine in the same fashion he’d come down. So much for restful contemplation. I took a moment to recover and started back up at my own pace. He’d have to wait at the top because I had the car keys.
My footholds gave way in the loose dirt and rock, quadrupling the effort. I stopped about a third of the way to the top to let my lungs catch up. When I resumed, the way grew steeper. At the halfway point, I reached the boulder. Oh crap. In my haste, I’d not given a thought to getting back up.
Tall, thorny bushes hugged both sides. I wasn’t climbing through that. A small crack on the lower vertical face looked like a potential foothold. I crammed in the edge of my shoe but it slipped out. A higher crack looked promising as a handhold, hopefully too small for a nesting rattler. I tried pulling myself up, but my arms weren’t strong enough and my feet just couldn’t get any purchase. I picked the pebbles from my bloodied palms. I would have to be Spider-Man to get up that.
Why couldn’t he have stayed on the paved trail? Another crazy escapade, exactly what I’d been doing too much of recently. I closed my eyes, gritted my teeth, and held in a frustrated scream.
“Hey.”
I looked up. The blinding sun silhouetted Alepho lying on his stomach at the top of the boulder with his arm extended toward me.
“Take my hand,” he said.
I hesitated. He kept his hand out. I gave in and reached up. He grabbed my hand and pulled me upward. I tried to help with my other hand and both feet and still didn’t find much traction. He was surprisingly strong and lifted me anyway. He wouldn’t let go until I stood safely on the top of the boulder.
Depending on him felt foreign. How awkward to be so out of my element.
“Thank you,” I said, averting my eyes, which were instantly awash in a confusion of feelings. I sorted through regret for my exasperation, thankfulness, forgiveness, and something else. Discomfort with being dependent on him? His whole life in America had been out of his element. Did he feel like this all of the time?
“Ready?” he asked.
I pretended to gaze at the view. If I looked at him at that moment the moisture already in my eyes would well over, and he wouldn’t have any idea why. Nor did I exactly, but I began to think the overwhelming feeling was shame for not understanding and stepping away from someone in greater need than myself.
“We’re already halfway,” he insisted.
He was encouraging me. “Okay. As Benjamin would say, ‘we go.’ ”
Alepho stayed beside me and told me stories. There was a bounce in his walk that I hadn’t seen in a long time. If I were ever in trouble, he was the kind of person to have around when the going got rough. Exactly like I needed to be for him and his brothers and cousins. Not a quitter and a coward in the hard parts.
In the car, I turned on the air-conditioning and handed him a bottle of water. A grin that he couldn’t seem to contain spread across his face. I hadn’t seen that smile in such a long time. He’d come far, but he still had a long journey ahead of him. If he was willing, so was I.
“Hey,” I said. “Tell me how we wire the money to your uncle so he can return to his family.”
Policies and plans had thei
r place and time. So did tolerance, flexibility, and compassion.
SMELLING WATER
Alepho
I don’t know why Judy thought about doing it, but she asked me to go for a hike. I wasn’t sure what that meant, but it sounded like we would drive the car somewhere to walk, and she didn’t like to go alone.
She drove us to a place where there was nothing, and we left the car in a field. As we walked toward the hills on a small road, she showed me the plants that were poisonous, the ones that were good, and the ones I shouldn’t touch. There was a lot of learning, but at the same time I began to feel a sense of freedom. I was liberated, no longer locked in a tiny place of worrying about sweating all the time.
We came to an area that looked out through the hills to the valley below and she stopped. “This is my favorite place,” she said. She just stood there looking at the hills.
I closed my eyes and felt the earth under my feet. Instead of streets and cars, I smelled leaves, dirt, and flowers. For the first time in so long, I could breathe. I opened my eyes and looked out at the hills. “This is like Sudan,” I said.
Between the earth, dried weeds, and sun-cooked leaves, something smelled familiar. Water. “I smell water,” I shouted and ran down the hill like a young goat released from its corral. I touched rocks. I hugged a tree. I ran through the bush. So many good things out there.
At the bottom, I reached a small stream. I closed my eyes. The smell of the water, the trees, the wet earth was alive, and it brought back my good memories of Sudan. I felt completely free and happy. And strong, like the day I’d been the boy who found water on our journey. I lifted my arms. At that moment, a new spirit entered me.
After a while, Judy came down to the water. She still could not smell it. On the way back up the hill, she couldn’t climb a rock. I went back to help her, but when I reached her I could see that she wasn’t happy. I gave her my hand, and she climbed up but she still seemed upset. Maybe that was why she didn’t like to go out there alone. I hadn’t seen other dangers, like lions or hyenas, not even snakes.
Judy remained quiet on our walk. I wondered if she felt badly that she couldn’t smell the water or maybe that she couldn’t climb the rock. “Once in Sudan,” I said, “when we escaped Palataka, we were walking and didn’t have water. We became so thirsty we couldn’t talk. Then, I smelled it. The water. Like today. I told the other guys. Just like you, they couldn’t smell it either. But they didn’t want to listen to me because they were older.”
“What happened?”
“I convinced them to follow my lead. We came to a stream in two hours. I laid down in that water and drank like a cow.”
“You saved their lives,” Judy said.
“Many times we helped each other to cross streams or climb rocks.”
Judy smiled.
I said, “My father could smell water.”
“What was your father’s name?”
“Deng. Deng means ‘rain’ in Dinka. Very popular name.”
“What does Awer mean again?”
“In Dinka language it mean window, like where the light comes in. Dinka is like English, some words have many meanings. In Bar el-Ghazal region where I am from, Awer also mean ‘lovely wild dove.’ Names are very significant in Dinka culture. There is legend in my subclan that an ancient spiritual prophet named Awer Jongar conquered and subdued the lion’s kingdom and brought back the durra crops hidden in his long African hair. I also heard the midwives gave me the name Awer because they saw something in me like that prophet at the delivery time.”
“I bet you have many amazing stories.”
“I have many,” I said. “But some I will never tell.”
• • •
Back at the car, Judy gave me a bottle of water. She looked happy again. She must have liked the stories I told her. Then she told me that she wanted to send the money to help my uncle get back to his family in Sudan. That gave me so much relief. I’d been the lucky one to come to America. But I hadn’t been able to help my family back home. I had not even helped myself. I put myself into darkness.
Now I felt life coming back into me. I saw that there was much more for me to do than just hide in that small cage I had created for myself. Judy came as a rescuer. She opened the door. She’d opened the door many times before. This time I was ready to move ahead through that opening.
AMERICAN BOY
Judy
A week after our hike, I stopped by the guys’ new apartment. Alepho was in the front room on the new sofa reading Of Mice and Men. He could have been reading Goosebumps and I would have been thrilled. Although still quiet, restored curiosity lit his eyes.
On my way home that afternoon, Judy Bouley called. “Benjamin is doing great. He was made captain of the cannon and received an A in rowing. Do you know of any other Sudanese who would like to join the core group?”
I hesitated. “Let me give that some thought. Can I get back to you?”
“Sure. No later than tomorrow, please. We need someone by next week.”
I’d learned that Benjamin’s travel document wouldn’t arrive for months and even that was uncertain. He couldn’t come back into the US until it did. Judy Bouley had assured me they would have access to good health care. But what if someone needed to return sooner for other reasons? Also, many guys had just started jobs or classes. Running off to be in a movie wasn’t necessarily a smart choice.
Cliff, Paul, and I sat down to dinner. “Judy Bouley called me today,” I said. “She needs another actor. Everyone is in classes or something, so I was thinking it might be an opportunity for Alepho.”
“Cool,” Cliff said.
“There’s a lot to consider.” I explained the dilemma of the delayed travel document.
Paul said, “If I were twenty years old and fit the bill, I’d jump at it. What’s the worst that could happen?”
Cliff said, “Doesn’t she want an American boy too?”
• • •
I called Alepho the next morning and explained the opportunity. He expressed interest. There wasn’t much time for decisions. I headed down to their apartment so we could talk in person about all the things that would need to be done, including speaking to Bob Sullivan at Ralphs about getting his job back in six months.
Alepho met me at the door in mirrored sunglasses. He must have been wearing them inside. His latest device to hide from the world?
When I’d finished explaining the details, he said, “It would be good to see how they make the movies. In the videos in the camp, I didn’t know what was real and what they made up. Now I can learn about that.”
I called Judy Bouley and let her know Benjamin’s cousin was available. “Can I audition him on Friday?” she asked. “If it works out, can you get him down to the set soon?”
“Sure,” I said, not having any idea how we’d arrange everything, especially transportation. I wasn’t comfortable driving in Mexico, and Rosarito was a long taxi ride from the border.
Right after I hung up, Sharon called from the IRC. “There’s a reporter in town from the Los Angeles Times on Friday afternoon. Would you mind bringing Benson and Alepho to the office for an interview?”
CORE GROUP
Alepho
Judy came to me at our new apartment. “There’s another job on the movie Benjamin is working on. You would be in the core group.”
I didn’t know what that meant. I’d seen movies, but what would a movie job be?
Judy said, “You will live in a nice hotel and they will give you the food.”
If there was food and a place to sleep, that was great. Those were the things I always worried about.
She said, “You will get paid about the same as at Ralphs.”
That sounded good because all the money from my Ralphs job paid for food and rent. What I earned on the movie would be extra if they paid
for the hotel and food. I could send some to my friends and family like I had promised them.
Judy said, “Sometimes you will be working on a ship for fourteen hours a day. If you work those extra hours, they will pay you more money.”
My excitement really built then. I’d been thinking about how to move my life forward, and I recalled the elder back in Kakuma camp who’d told us that we needed education to change our lives, to change the situation in Sudan. Education had the magic power that would let me do those things. It was clear to me after nearly a year that I needed education to improve my own life in America and to help my family and friends back home. I understood now that to go to school, I needed money. The movie job was a life surprise that I had never expected. My opportunity to move forward had arrived.
On Friday morning Judy picked me up in her car. “They might be auditioning lots of people,” she said, “so don’t be disappointed if you don’t get chosen.”
I understood. I would do my best even though I did not know what a person did for an audition. Would it be like the Ralphs interview?
“And, if you have any doubts about doing this, now is the time. Once you are down in Mexico you can’t come back until your travel document arrives.”
“Yes, I know.” If I got the movie job, I didn’t need to come back until that work was done. That was okay with me, but Judy seemed to be worried.
We arrived at some offices and a lady named Judy Bouley, who looked like Judy Bernstein, took me into a room. “Take off your sunglasses, please,” she said. She turned on a video camera and wanted me to pretend that I was a sailor and a captain on a ship. I repeated the words she asked me to say. I’d never been on a ship so I wasn’t sure if I did it well.
We went back out where Judy Bernstein was waiting. Judy Bouley asked, “Can you have him on set Sunday?” I wasn’t sure what the set was, but I thought that meant I had the job.
Disturbed in Their Nests Page 32