Chapter Eleven
I wasn’t even sure what we were graduating from: Eighth grade? Middle school? Elementary school? So I would have been ambivalent when it came to the ceremony, anyway. But with the foreclosure signs staked out around our neighborhood, with the distance between The Ranch and The Barrio seeming to lengthen with each parent that re-emerged, and with the guarantee of everyone having to flee within the next few months, our commencement turned out to be a sad little affair, even more sad than most people would assume about any attempt to celebrate inside a building that looked like our school.
As we sat in a row behind our teachers while they made up nice things to say about us, I glanced around at the faces of my classmates and saw their eyes either wide open rimmed with tears that occasionally broke free to run down a cheek, or their eyes being pressed down upon by their furrowed brows. A few just stared, such as Blaine, and none were content.
Most of the parents in attendance were those starting to re-populate The Ranch, and they either misinterpreted our expressions, thinking us overcome with happiness, or they characteristically ignored what was happening right in front of them. They beamed and gave us condescending pouty faces that were intended to be compassionate, accompanied by “aww” sounds. It served to me as something of a clue that while they could no longer pretend to afford a home, they were now pretending they could comfort a family. But what they were most interested in doing was comforting themselves.
For example, the big surprise they had planned for us was a banquet at the truck stop down the road by the freeway ramp. This would have been a paternal enough action, as it was the only restaurant space available to rent in light of everything else being a fast food franchise, but lining the rear of the buffet table were cases’ worth of wine and beer, which I assumed were cheap. They drank immediately and heavily, despite the fact it was barely noon when the graduation had ended and we had taken the forty-five second drive from one cinder block bunker with the playground equipment in front of it to the other cinder block bunker with the diesel pumps and weigh station in front of it. After everyone had rummaged through the line of potato salads, cold pasta salads, and jello salads, the room gradually became partitioned with parents imbibing on one side, and children studying them on the other. We laughed at them at first, their slurred toasts to the future and teary paeans to their sons and daughters, which tended to include the phrase “I may not have always been there” (as opposed to the more apt “I may have never been there”), and which served more as confessions for them than tributes to us (though each tapping of a glass with a butter knife did help us connect yet another parent to their corresponding child). By mid-afternoon, however, we started to fret over them; not because we were concerned about getting home safely, as the road to The Ranch was wide open and sparsely traveled, but because we started to ponder the larger navigational problem we faced: who was steering our lives.
Some fathers were drifting through the vinyl curtain that hung from a track nailed to the ceiling that divided the rental space from the daily use area and inviting truckers to come and join them. Mothers posed for pictures with the drivers who did venture over, grabbing the hats off the truckers’ heads and making funny faces and the horn-honking hand gesture while hugging them; some drivers took advantage of the situation to cop a feel while posing for the pictures, which induced braying laughter from all.
Some of the kids from The Barrio whose parents couldn’t attend the graduation were there, and they would occasionally tear their gaze away from the spectacle in front of them and look at one of us, and that person would shrug.
“I wish I had gone home with Miggy’s or Chuy’s parents,” Shay said to me at one point, and before I could answer, three other classmates said, “Me, too.”
“Maybe we could give one of them a call,” I offered. “Anyone have a phone?”
Nobody did, so we exhaled back into our chairs and looked into our glasses, at the ice melting into our flattened sodas.
“Let’s just get out of here,” Shay said. “I still know some of the ladies my Mom worked with over at the franchise. Let’s walk there and tell them we’re worried about being driven home by a bunch of drunks and maybe they’ll take us home after their shift. Even if we have to wait a bunch of hours, we won’t have to watch anymore of this crap.”
Those of us sharing a table with Shay agreed that was a good idea, and we asked the others in the children’s viewing area if they would like to join us in abandoning our view of the adults’ staging area. The movement grew, and each of us with parents approached them and told them we were heading out under the overpass.
“You are?” Mom said, her physical teetering now paired with confusion.
“But we did this for you,” Dad gestured around the room as though presenting me with a kingdom I would someday inherit. “For all of you. We all pitched in.”
“I know,” I said as agreeably as I could muster. “And it’s great. But it’s just getting a little long.”
Mom and Dad looked at each other for a moment. “Well…” Dad started, seemingly testing out an idea telepathically with his wife before verbalizing it. “We’d like to stay a little longer. Do you need some money? We’ll swing by and pick you up.”
Mom gave no indication that she disagreed with his plan. “Sure,” I said. “Some money would be good.”
They seemed to like the idea even more now that I accepted their terms. Dad pulled out his wallet and handed me a ten dollar bill. “Buy a few rounds for your friends,” he joked, and they grabbed one another and spun around a few times back toward the buffet table.
“See you in a little bit,” Mom said, trying to regain her equilibrium while fending off being goosed by Dad.
I nodded and joined the procession gathering at the door.
Not all of us made it. A few parents took our action as a hint and decided it was time to go home. But most of our guardians stayed at the party. We trudged along the desolate road in our graduation outfits, more dressed up than we had ever seen each other as we marched dolefully underneath the freeway. Occasionally a car carrying some of the parents who left would pass by, and they would honk their horn and wave hysterically while their son or daughter sat in back and wished they wouldn’t.
After we emerged from the other side of the overpass, the last car passed by, horn honking as usual, only this time instead of waving hands, a mom’s bare ass was pressed against the backseat window. We weren’t sure whose mom it was, as our classmate had buried himself or herself out of sight, presumably in the fetal position, and we were too fixated on the flattened cheeks to notice the driving dad. We also weren’t sure how to react. We paused for several moments, a few snickered, a few simulated vomiting sounds, and then we pressed on, slowly storming the fast food restaurant and eliciting the same befuddled stares from the well-spaced patrons that we must have worn on our faces upon seeing our friend’s mom’s butt crack.
Shay found a familiar face behind the counter and explained the situation. That lady then translated for the rest of the employees behind the line operating the fryers and grills, and a disbelieving series of yelps filled the service area. We were treated to free drinks and a couple orders of large fries to share, then we filled a corner of the dining area and began to speculate on whose mom it was. The consensus deemed Nub’s mom as the most likely candidate.
Within an hour some of the parents started to pick us up from our exodus. The stray Barrio kids asked for rides and were sporadically granted them. The ladies behind the registers and behind the line glared at each arrival, pitching especially dirty looks and even some verbal abuse at Shay’s mom, since they were no longer co-workers and could jettison decorum and unbridle their feelings about having had to work with her, their disgust regarding today’s action providing an excuse to vent.
Shay enjoyed the razzing, while her Mom was belligerent about it. She launched into a sloppy “fuck you bitches” routine characteristic of drunk girls at dances and partie
s.
“Don’t worry, Mom,” Shay assured her while guiding her toward the exit. “You won’t remember any of this tomorrow. Let’s not keep Dad waiting.”
Shay flashed me an eye-roll after forcing her Mom through the door and said, “So much for the bare-assed mom being the most embarrassing.”
I laughed. “It’s going to be a long summer.”
She switched to seriousness, and asked that I never tell anyone about this, as I was the last member of our wandering tribe left in our convenient portion of the desert.
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” I said.
“I love you,” she blurted out, then took a few breaths to convince herself it was okay that she said it.
Meanwhile, I convinced myself that it was a friendly version of love, and said “I love you too.”
Her Mom was pacing back and forth outside the front window, her curses and epithets muffled by the glass, looking like a furious talking fish in an aquarium. Shay looked very grateful that I had returned her declaration before she went outside to corral her mother into the car, where apparently her dad sat and waited.
It took another hour and a complimentary burger for my parents to finally arrive.
“We met the most interesting trucker,” Mom said.
“This guy could have a PhD if he had grown up in a different environment,” Dad added.
“Plus we helped clean up a little,” Mom piled on.
I felt like a parent whose kids had broken their curfew.
“Can we just go home?”
“Sure”, “Yeah” they said more or less in unison.
The employees stuck with visual darts as we left and withheld any verbal ones, allowing Mom and Dad to remain oblivious to any of it. I nodded in the direction of the front counter and thanked them en masse for everything as I walked behind my soused parents.
“You’re welcome,” Mom said. I briefly considered explaining that I was thanking everyone else in the restaurant other than her, but didn’t want to expend the energy.
We drove home towards a setting sun and Dad managed to keep the car remarkably straight considering his condition. Nonetheless I was relieved that no other cars approached from the opposite direction. They joked about forgetting the code to the gate, and then as it swung open, Dad drove through too soon, the edge of the left gate swiping the driver’s side of the car with a metallic screech, leaving the gate to bounce and quiver and my parents to laugh and rejoice that the damage wasn’t any worse.
“Especially the gate,” Dad said, wiping tears of laughter from his face. “How would we keep out the Mexicans?”
They both started laughing even harder. “Oh, God,” Mom found the breath to gasp. “If the Mexicans ever get in, then we’re really screwed.”
Dad had to stop the car and compose himself before driving on. Just when their laughter was fading and he seemed ready to continue, Mom shrieked, “Eek! The Mexicans!” and they started laughing all over again.
We finally got the car moving. They were still giggling but Dad was able to maneuver the turns well enough. When we turned onto our street they fell silent. Their abrupt shift caught my attention. Were Blaine’s parents throwing a party of their own that we weren’t invited to? They had all disappeared after the ceremony, with Lana in tow. I leaned over to look between them through the windshield and didn’t see it at first since I was focused on a few doors down from our house, but then it jumped out at me from our front lawn:
The sign with red letters hanging from a white cross had arrived. We were official. Our territory had been marked.
I leaned back and fought feeling too smug so that I could think of just the right thing to say. My satisfaction was so great that I found it difficult to decide which scathing one-liner was best to lead with, which self-righteous speech was best to fill the middle, and which devastating tag line would ring in their ears for the rest of their lives. I had practiced them all before, but now realized I had too much material and needed to whittle it down. Then again, if I had them sufficiently paralyzed with my opening remarks, I could very well let it all out, every bit of it: from their stupid decision, to their denial of it, to their covering of it; from leaving us on our own, to allowing us to grow attached to it, to taking it away; from being there, to being absent, to being there but absent.
They pulled the car into the driveway but didn’t get out. We sat there and I decided it would work best to make the first move before they could say anything. I got out and strutted toward the sign, imagining that my diatribe would be enhanced by standing in front of it for dramatic effect. I could even use it as a prop when inspiration dictated.
I heard their car doors slam as I took my place in front of the cross and pivoted, ready to breathe fire. But what I saw froze me and wiped all rehearsed vitriol from my mind.
They looked as though the only thing they had left in the world was their vulnerability. They reminded me of cartoon field mice in a children’s picture book, the daddy mouse wearing a felt vest held together with a big safety pin from the human world, the mommy mouse wearing a babushka made from the corner of a checkered tablecloth they had nibbled off together. Their eyes were sadder than any of my classmates’ had been during graduation. I could no more verbally whip them as I could club a couple of baby seals to death.
We stared at one another a short while before Mom fell to the grass crying. Dad quietly said “We’re sorry” to me and kneeled down to comfort his wife. I stood still for some time, unsure which way to go, and finally decided to walk over and join them on the ground. Dad started sobbing as soon as I touched him.
I managed to stave off any tears of my own. I was too stunned by what was happening to feel much about it.