Wonder Valley

by Ivy Pochoda

  “I’m trying to summon his second sight,” the intern said.

  “He sees just fine,” Grace replied, scattering the rest of the group as she climbed the porch and took the glider next to James.

  She and James rocked in silence watching a lizard chase the interns toward their cabins.

  Patrick was already waiting at the fire pit, sitting on the tallest tree stump. The interns arranged themselves around him on the low logs that served as benches. The sharing session started before James had time to disappear into the house. He hated this nighttime ritual that somehow managed to seep in through the closed windows and past the sound of the swamp cooler chugging away in his bedroom. Sometimes James could even hear these nightly sessions in his sleep—those same three questions chanted over and over, followed by the escalating anger and the inevitable tears.

  The intern sharing was the guy who had turned up with Cassidy.

  Why are you here? the group bellowed.

  James couldn’t make out his response. But the voices of those attacking his answer cut clear across the driveway. Gideon confuses kindness with truth. Gideon thinks his words are kind but they echo false. Gideon thinks his fancy words disguise the fact that he hasn’t said anything honest. Gideon expects us to believe that he cares for the rest of us as much as he cares about himself. The interns’ voices grew louder until they were shouting, until their rebukes and criticisms became one furious torrent of noise. As always, when it seemed the sharer couldn’t take it anymore, Patrick silenced the other interns.

  Have you learned something? he asked. Have they brought you closer to the truth? James always wondered what would happen if the sharer said no. There was a moment’s silence before the group launched into their next question.

  What do you want? For the first time all day, James wished Owen were around to answer, I am here to get fucked up in the desert with a bunch of dirty hippies.

  Even the black-and-white TV that could barely tune in a channel was a better option than listening to the interns rip one another apart. But before James could get out of his glider, Grace reached over and wrapped her calloused hand around his wrist. “Let’s go dancing,” she said.

  Sometimes Grace took the twins to the local inn—a collection of wood-framed cabins and adobe bungalows clustered around a restaurant—where the boys would swim in the deep, clean pool and listen to whatever musicians were passing through Twentynine Palms. The boys ate hamburgers while Grace drank colorful drinks out of curvy glasses and let the marines from the base twirl her around the pool deck.

  WHEN THEY GOT TO THE INN, A TWO-PIECE BAND WAS SETTING UP—a couple in their early sixties. They wore bright western shirts. The man played guitar. The woman sat behind a portable keyboard craning her neck toward a microphone. They played Patsy Cline, Johnny Cash, and Hank Williams.

  After two drinks, Grace started dancing with a marine—a master sergeant, she told James. The marine was strong and square, with a regulation flattop. His wide chest tapered down to his belt. He could have lifted Grace with one hand, but instead he looped an arm around her waist and spun her around the small dance floor. James watched them from the bottom of the pool in the shallow end, his eyes open despite the chlorine.

  The water and the colored lights above the pool made his mother shimmer. They smoothed the harsh lines the sun had carved into her face so she looked almost as she had before they’d moved to the desert.

  James came up for air. His lungs were pinched and tight. His breath came out raw. He grabbed the rough concrete and pulled himself halfway out of the water. His mother had gone back to the bar. The marine was ordering her another drink.

  James wrapped himself in a towel and sat on a lounger. Grace had left her last drink half full. The band took up a new song. His mother and the marine emerged poolside.

  “You’re not ready to go home, are you, James?” Grace asked.

  After two more songs, Grace took a break and stepped out of the pool area onto the lawn. James overheard her say she wanted to see the stars undisturbed by the light bouncing off the water. But there were stars enough back at Howling Tree Ranch—stars and stars and stars and a sprawling night sky.

  The inn was crowded for a Wednesday—German and Nordic tourists, guidebooks open, planning hikes in the national park. Their pink skin and hiking shorts stood out from the desert natives and grizzled artists.

  “You guys do ‘Only the Lonely’?” A man in a battered black Ranger hat had stretched out on the adjacent lawn chair. He cupped his hand over his mouth, as if he was calling across a great distance instead of over a small swimming pool. “I said, ‘Only the Lonely.’ You can do it?”

  The woman at the keyboard pointed at a straw hat at her feet. “Put your requests in there. We’ll draw them for our last set.”

  “Maybe I want to hear my song now.” The man turned to James. His face was creased like tree bark, but his voice was young. He pulled back, eyes wide. “You gave me a start there,” he said. “You look like someone I know.” In the low light his eyes seemed flooded with black ink. “You here on vacation?”

  “I live here.”

  “Well, I’ll be damned. Must be some kind of punishment to grow up in this particular desert.” He wedged a dirty fingernail in the space between his front teeth, scraped, and spit. He crossed his ankles and put his hands behind his head, staring up at the sky. He wore jeans so dirty it was hard to tell if they’d ever been blue, and a pair of chunky, white leather high-tops.

  “Is your mother that pretty lady dancing around the pool?”

  “I guess.”

  “You guess she’s your mother or you guess she’s pretty?” He laughed before James could answer. “So you’re one of them base kids. Pretty momma. Marine daddy. Got to be a hell of a way to grow up. Lots of rules and no dating.”

  “He’s not my dad,” James said. The marine was sitting on the opposite side of the pool talking to two men from the base. “My dad’s back home.”

  “That so? You think your momma’ll let me take her for a spin?”

  “She usually dances with the marines.”

  “Well, we all have our particularities.” He patted his jeans. “I don’t suppose you want a cigarette.” He fished a crushed soft pack from his pocket. “Hell, don’t look at me like that. I started way younger than you.”

  “I’m fifteen.”

  The man narrowed his eyes. “Well, I’ll be.” A breeze lifted, rippling the aquamarine surface of the pool and raising gooseflesh on James’s skin. “I remember fifteen, although I’d rather not. Now am I right in guessing you don’t have a light?”

  Across the pool the master sergeant and his friends got up. They shook hands, clapping each other on the back, before heading toward the parking lot.

  The man stood up so he could dig into his pockets. He pulled out a white chessman, a pawn. “The stuff you find when you ain’t looking for it.” He put the chessman on the table next to James. From his back pocket he dug out a battered matchbook. He lit his cigarette and flopped back on the lounger. He picked up the pawn and held it toward one of the colored lights that hung from the palm trees around the pool. It looked carved from wood and had an oriental face. “You play?”

  “Sort of,” James said. “My brother’s better.”

  “Is that so?” the man said, twisting the pawn before folding it back in his palm.

  “He’s not a prodigy or anything. But he won the regional middle-school tournament last year.”

  The man rubbed a grimy thumb over his lips and exhaled a long stream of smoke. “Ain’t that something?”

  The door to the pool area reopened and Grace appeared. The man stood up. He swiped his Ranger’s hat from his head, revealing tufts of greasy black hair. He offered his hand. “Ma’am. I’m wondering if I could interest you in a dance.”

  Grace looked across the pool to the empty chair where her marine had been sitting with his buddies. She scanned the bar and the other loungers.

  “They left,�
�� James said.

  “Ma’am?” the man said.

  Grace drained her drink and put the glass down on the edge of the table. James caught it before it crashed to the ground. “I’m not sure,” she said.

  The man pulled back his hand. “You are an excellent dancer and it would be an honor.” The band struck up “Only the Lonely.” “They’re playing my song,” he said.

  “In that case,” Grace said.

  The man put his hat on and led her over toward the pool.

  They danced slowly, mostly moving side to side. Grace tucked her head into his shoulder, letting him guide her. But every once in a while he’d spin her across the pool deck, before pulling her back.

  The song ended and the man stepped away. He gave Grace a little bow and lifted his hat.

  “A pleasure,” he said, bringing her back to the lounger. “And a pleasure to meet you,” he said, extending his hand to James. His palm felt like sandpaper.

  The man headed for the bar. James felt something pressed into his hand. When he opened it, he saw the wooden pawn with the oriental face.

  JAMES STEADIED HIS MOTHER ON THE WAY TO THE CAR. HE HELPED HER behind the wheel. She opened the sunroof, letting in the night air and revealing the web of stars. The tires crunched over the sand and rock of the inn’s driveway. James rolled the chessman around in his hand.

  They took side streets back toward the Twentynine Palms Highway. They emerged past the Circle K—the last business for a hundred miles. The road was dark—the only illumination came from their headlights, which rose and fell with the blacktop’s undulations.

  “Where is he?” Grace took her eyes off the road and the car swerved. “Where’s your brother?”

  “I don’t know,” James said. He’d been waiting for her to bring up Owen since they’d left the ranch.

  Grace righted the wheel. “Where would you go?”

  “Anywhere,” James said.

  They passed the tiny airport and its winking purple lights.

  “Your father isn’t easy,” Grace said. “The life we’ve chosen isn’t easy. Sometimes I wonder.” She trailed off. The car drifted toward the opposite lane. James reached out for the wheel. “He would have come out to the desert if I’d wanted to or not. He would have left.”

  “But you wanted to come, right?” James said.

  “James, you of all people should understand that no one wants to be left behind.”

  “We could go back,” James said.

  “Not without Owen.”

  “What if he doesn’t come back?”

  “He’s coming back.”

  “Just what if he doesn’t?”

  At night, the stretch of highway east of Twentynine Palms was usually empty and dark enough that approaching headlights would be visible far ahead. Whenever his mother felt a little unsteady, she let the car straddle the yellow line in the middle of the highway, using it to help her guide the wheel. Now she pulled into the middle of the road.

  The road was straight until just before the turnoff for the ranch where it hooked to the right. Grace kept in the middle of the highway as she took the curve. It was a tight turn and she made it too fast. The station wagon fishtailed and screeched. She struggled to straighten the wheel. Before she regained control, they were face-to-face with the high beams of an approaching semi. The truck had a large LED cross on its grill that towered over their windshield.

  Grace stretched an arm over James’s chest, trying to pin him back as she yanked the wheel to the right. The nerves in his stomach and legs tingled, anticipating the impact. He held his breath, tensing against the crash.

  They careened off the road and barreled into a ditch. The sound of squealing rubber drowned the wail of the truck’s horn as it disappeared west.

  James’s shoulder slammed against the window. His mother doubled over the wheel, then rocked back, colliding first with the headrest then with the driver’s-side window. The car shuddered, then hissed, before settling into its lopsided resting place.

  Grace gasped and shook James’s arm. For a moment he was too stunned to speak. But she didn’t let go until James made a sound. Then she turned on the light over the dash. Her breath smelled sour and smoky. There was a thin trickle of blood on her temple. The headlights caught the steam snaking from under the crumpled hood. James’s heart was in his ears. His blood pressed hard against his wrists. The LED cross was burned into his vision.

  “Promise we can go if Owen doesn’t come back.”

  Grace was crying.

  “You have to promise.”

  “I promise,” she said. “You and me, we can go back.”

  10

  REN, LOS ANGELES, 2010

  Day broke early and hard, bringing with it the ripe smell of everyone and everything left on the streets. All night someone had been coughing like a stalling car engine that turned over and over. Twice someone had nudged Ren awake. The first person had mistaken him for a dude called Baby Ray. The second just wanted to mess with him. Ren mumbled that the man should back the fuck up or else. After that, sleep was slippery.

  Morning brought the sound of people shouting down the street, the slow roll of cars, a dirty glint of sun. Ren kept his eyes shut, hoping if he slept or at least pretended to sleep, he might wake up somewhere else.

  He could feel the camp around him shifting, preparing, readying for the day whatever that meant. He rolled onto his side, pulling himself inward, trying to disappear into his bruised body.

  “So you’re not too good for these streets now?”

  Ren cracked a swollen eye.

  “Seems like just yesterday you were saying something like how the fuck it was possible to sleep exactly right there.” The man who’d been listening to the radio in his camp chair was squatting down at Ren’s side. “Times change quick.”

  “Leave him.” A woman’s voice—Laila’s but not quite. A little raspier, a little thinner, without the indignant anger that used to rock their small apartment.

  Ren flung an arm over his battered face.

  “Yesterday this boy was shocked as shit that people could live on the street. Now he sees fit to make his camp next to ours.” The man nudged Ren’s sore ribs with the toe of his shoe.

  “Darrell, I said leave him,” Laila repeated before she was swamped by another bout of coughing.

  “Last guy who bedded down in this spot you had the police remove,” the man said.

  “Well, the last guy wasn’t my son.”

  Ren removed his arm, opened his eyes. Laila was standing over him. She wore a different tracksuit than yesterday—still velour, still missing a bunch of rhinestones, but this time purple. Up close, she was even thinner than she’d looked from across the street. The whites of her eyes had yellowed. Her skin was ashy pale.

  “’Cept yesterday his face didn’t look like he was in a one-way fight. That’s right, Renton,” Laila said. “I saw you watching me. Saw that you were too chickenshit to come say hi to your mother. Just ’cause I live in the elements doesn’t mean I’m blind or stupid.” She turned away, barking a sharp, dry cough. “Or maybe you think you’re too good for me because I’m living outside.”

  “No, Ma, that’s not what I think.” Talking busted open the split in his lip and Ren could feel a trickle of blood drip toward his chin.

  Laila put her hands on her hips and puffed out her cheeks, then gritted her teeth. Ren recognized the gesture, the canary before the explosion. That look had sent him to his room too many times when he was small. And when he was bigger, it’s what sent him out into the courtyards where he met the older ballers.

  “So what all happened to your face?” she said.

  “Got beat.”

  “I can see that. Who and where?”

  “Some crew speaking Spanish over on Fifth Street, I think,” Ren said. It had to be some sort of badge of dishonor getting jumped after barely twenty-four hours.

  “Must have been the Eighteenth Street crew,” Darrell said. “Were you trying to cut thei
r turf?”

  “Hell no,” Ren said. “I was just minding my own.”

  “That’s the way to be down here,” Laila said, “though it sometimes doesn’t work out.” She handed him a bottle of water and a small towel. “Keep it clean. If the beating doesn’t kill you, the infection will.”

  Ren sat up and began to tend to his cuts. Compared to the days before, the street was quiet. No one was packing up, no one moving on. In fact, except for the group on the corner, it seemed like folks were sleeping in.

  “What’s going on?” Ren asked. “Seems quiet.”

  “Nothing’s going on and that’s a damn blessing,” Laila said. “It’s Sunday, so the cops and the boys on the bikes let us sleep.”

  Ren finished with his battered face and handed Laila the rag.

  Laila was taking down her tent. Her sleeping bag was already neatly rolled on the sidewalk next to three large, ripped plastic shopping bags filled with clothes. “What’re you doing down here, Ma?” Because even though she was right there, as real and solid as his own arm, Ren couldn’t quite believe what he was seeing. Laila, a woman who put on her tightest jeans and brightest shirt to go to the budget grocery store, who ran the power bill up beyond imagining because she couldn’t live without the AC on full blast, day and night, May to October.

  “Mind your own damn business.”

  “It’s—”

  “Lemme tell you something, Renton. If you stick around long enough, you’ll learn quick that your story is the only thing you have that belongs to you proper.” Laila reached into one of her plastic bags and pulled out a big, fake leather purse. She slung the bag over her shoulder and walked to the corner.

  Ren watched her check up and down the street, glancing in cars. She crossed her hand over her chest, tapped her foot on the curb. A bus passed and stopped. When it rolled away, Laila shouted something at its back that Ren couldn’t hear. She glanced over her shoulder at the encampment. “The fuck time is it?”

  “Too early,” someone shouted.