Broken Ground (28 page)

I do a quick calculation. Only eighty-five years ago, I would have been the immigrant, the alien here, perhaps in need of my own set of legal documents in order to stay.

I sit down with the youngest children, who are, with great care, passing around the book of fairy tales, poring over the illustrations. “
Por favor?
” one boy says, holding the book out to me. “Please,” a girl adds for good measure. “What? No math?” I exclaim in mock horror, and to a child, the group exchanges worried glances: That's exactly what they mean. “No math,” I agree with a sigh, though of course I want to return to the fairy tale as well. “But tomorrow night,” I add for good measure. “
Math
.”

And so we finish the story of Rapunzel, and gradually reach the happily-ever-after end. But the children aren't really interested in that; they seem suspicious of it or disregard it altogether. They want to talk about the beginning again—the hunger and need and what it can drive the most moral of human beings to do. The danger and repercussions of getting caught.

“Should we make up our own fairy tales and illustrate them?” I ask.

Some of the children gasp with delight, others clap or jump up excitedly; a few others are quiet, their expressions doubtful. “
No hay papel, no hay lapices,
” a boy flatly states. Even the giddiest children, and those most proficient in English, don't bother to translate as this irrefutable fact sinks in.

“Don't worry.” For once I can say this with utter conviction. Other than for necessities like food, there's never been a better reason to spend my money. “I'll get the paper and the pencils. There will be plenty for everyone.”

Tonight, parents seem to whisk their children home more quickly than usual, and I suddenly find myself alone with Thomas. We have avoided this moment until now. But here we are by the lowering fire. His thick hair has grown longer and wilder since my arrival: a lion's mane to match his eyes.

“You can go back.” His voice is quiet. “I'll stay with the fire until it goes out.”

In spite of myself, my vows and reservations, I go to stand beside him. “I'll stay, too.”

We sit together on the ground and talk about the children—the ones who show particular promise and confidence, the ones who show less promise because of a lack of confidence.

“There's a fine line between helping them learn how to survive in the United States and encouraging them to forget Mexico,” Thomas says.

It takes me a moment to put into words one of the many things that's been troubling me in the past days. I take a deep breath. “I'm afraid they'll be caught between here and there, unable to call either home. Many of the children are already acting as translators for the parents, you know.”

Thomas shrugs. “The children are the best chance the parents have to stay here. They're the reason the parents are here to begin with. And many of them are U.S. citizens after all.”

A lock of my hair has slipped from the pins I use to keep it out of my eyes. Thomas reaches out and tucks it behind my ear, then quickly draws his hand away. But still I feel the pressure of his touch where his fingers grazed my ear.

A hard, loud clatter makes us both jump, and then sparks rain down close at hand. Something went in the bonfire, and went in hard. An ember has snagged on Thomas's shirtsleeve; he swiftly brushes it off. The smell of singed cloth—my throat clots with that smell. For a moment I am back in East Texas, and there is a blowout. I jump up and turn toward the fire. A patch of flame has leaped over the stones set in a ring to contain the blaze; the flames lick at the grass, spread. In an instant, those few inches of flame have turned into several feet. Thomas runs to try and stamp it out as a lithe figure darts from the other side of the bonfire—a slip of a boy, trying to run away.

“Stop!” I lunge after the child, seize his arm, drag him back into the light. Daniel, eyes wild behind his broken spectacles, hair wild about his head. He struggles against my grasp, shoves at me, knocks the wind out of me, nearly pushes me down. So I do the same to him, only my weight and force overpower him and we fall on the ground. I leverage myself up and pin down his arms. Behind me, Thomas shouts for help. The flames are leggy, moving ever more speedily through the tall, dry grass and weeds, heading toward the line of trees that borders the field, and toward Kirk Camp. Beyond, all around, stretch farms. What will happen to us if the camp burns down? What will happen to us if the fields catch fire and the crop is ruined? I try not to imagine. I try to keep hold of the boy who is twisting, spitting, and clawing now—a wildcat of a boy. A hot wind gusts, invigorating the flames. From the corner of my eye, I see Thomas rip off his shirt. He uses it to beat down the flames. But it won't take long, it's clear, before the fire will be more than any person, any group of people, can handle.

A man cries out—not Thomas.

I see them then, running toward us from the camp, men, women, and children. They carry blankets, and the slower ones, far behind and emerging from the darkness, lug buckets. The fire is so close to Daniel and me now that Thomas has dropped his shirt; he's pulling me, pulling Daniel, up and away. My exposed skin feels tight and swollen, blistered hot. The thought of Charlie flashes through my mind—what he might have suffered in his last moments—and sets me retching. I stumble over my feet, over Daniel's legs, and wheel away from the fire, sucking in smoky breaths that burn my lungs.
Charlie
—my grip loosens on Daniel, and he wrenches himself away with such force that now he entirely slips my hold. Like a wraith, he is lost in the smoke, lost as Charlie was. But there is Luis. And there is Thomas, the fire dancing too close to his bare chest as he wields a blanket, beating at the flames, trying to snuff them out. And there are two elderly women struggling to carry a bucket of water. I recognize them from the river and try to help.

IT TAKES NEARLY
two hours, but finally, the blaze is out. People exchange words of exhausted relief; those who've suffered injuries return to camp to tend to them. Soon most everyone begins to drift in that direction, and once again, it's Thomas and me, only this time we're standing by the wet, smoking remains of the fire.

“Daniel's gone,” I say.

Thomas, still bare-chested, looks up at me. His skin is soot-stained, his eyes bloodshot. A purpling burn slashes the back of his hand. “Did you see where he went?”

I shake my head. I am drenched in sweat, my hair plastered to my forehead and neck. “We could try to find his aunt and uncle again.”

“You really think they exist?” Thomas rakes his fingers through his hair, then lets out a sharp yelp and gazes, stunned, at the ugly burn on his hand. It's oozing now.

“Silvia should take a look at that.”

“Is she strong enough?”

“She can look. Then she can tell me what to do.”

Thomas shakes his head. “But Daniel—he's somewhere, yes? Something's wrong with that boy. I don't want him doing worse harm to himself or anyone else.”

“Silvia first. Then Daniel.”

“Daniel first. Then Silvia.”

Thomas starts walking, and I fall in beside him. I glance down. “You're limping, too. Don't be foolish, Thomas. She needs to tend to your leg as well. Otherwise you won't be looking for anyone or going anywhere at all.”

With each step, Thomas's pace increasingly falters. At the edge of camp, he stops walking altogether. He turns to me, his eyes suddenly wide and frantic with pain. “Ruth?” he says, but he's unable to finish the question. He sways, and I manage to catch hold of him, wrapping my arms around his waist. His body is less lean than Charlie's, less lithe and long. His body is denser, more compact, like mine. I am able to support him, bear up under his weight.

Our arms around each other, we move through the camp. The place seems strangely quiet after the chaos. The others must be getting cleaned up, recuperating from the fire inside the privacy of their cabins; tomorrow morning comes earlier than early for them, after all. And so Thomas and I lean in to each other, so close that we move almost as one. But we are not in love. We are not. We are simply trying to keep each other upright and alive. We are simply trying to find the way home.

At last we reach Silvia and Luis's. I can't let go of Thomas to open the door, so I give it a sharp kick. The rope handle jiggles, and there is Luis, peering out at us, his face, like Thomas's—like mine, too, I suppose—blackened with soot. He takes one look at Thomas and opens the door wide. He opens his arms, too. I release Thomas. He falls into Luis's arms. Luis maneuvers him inside and lays him down on the dirt floor. I follow.

“My book—get it,” Silvia says from her bed. I go to where she likes the book kept—a high shelf on the wall farthest from the stove, where grease and smoke are least likely to penetrate its pages, and thieves (though I've never heard of thieving at Kirk Camp) are least likely to locate it. I take the book to Silvia. She is sitting up in bed, her hair loose and long, shielding her face as she sets the book on the mattress—her belly is far too big for her to open the book on her lap—and begins to turn the pages.

“Aloe leaves?” I blurt. More than once these last weeks, Silvia has sent me out to her garden to take cuttings from the thriving aloe plant there. The thick, serrated leaves with their small white teeth release a sap that she uses in any number of ways: to soothe Luis's skin at the end of a blistering-hot day, or to heal the calluses that sometimes tear open on his hands. She's applied aloe to my perpetually sunburned face, neck, arms, and legs. But no, not this time. This time Silvia tells me to collect three eggs from the basket by the stove and separate the yolks from the whites. When I've done that, she tells me to take the bowl of egg whites and then, as gently as possible, dip a clean rag into the viscous substance and spread a thick layer of it over Thomas's burned hand. “This will dry,” she says, as I carefully follow her instructions. “Then we will peel it away and do it all over again. We will keep doing it until the burn begins to heal. Egg hastens the healing and lessens the chance of scarring. Is he with us?”

I look at Thomas, lying still, eyes closed. But for his breathing, I'd fear he was dead. “He's unconscious, I think. His leg—”

Silvia asks Luis to roll up the leg of Thomas's trousers. She has seen the bloodstains there, blacker than dirt and ash. I have to force myself to look. It's not because I'm afraid to see his injury; it's because I've never see his leg bare. Almost, I feel I'm about to see him naked. I suck in a breath and hold it. Here is his black leather boot, tied on to his metal foot, which is latched at the ankle to his wooden shin. Here is the slight swell of his wooden calf—for some reason, this lifelike attention to detail brings tears to my eyes. I blink them impatiently away to see here, where the tan cloth of his trousers is most stained, the bottom of the thick rubber cup that secures the prosthesis to Thomas's knee.

A smell like iron rises from Thomas's leg, and there the blood is, oozing over the rim of the cup.

Calmly, Silvia asks Luis to remove Thomas's prosthesis. Luis hesitates for only a moment, and then he does so. And there: Thomas's wound. A long splinter of wood juts out of his stump, just above its rounded tip, which is already mottled with scars. I clap my hand over my mouth to muffle my cry.

Silvia turns to me. “Boil water.”

I hurry to the stove, where a large covered pot of water always sits. I light the stove. When I turn back, Luis, instructed by Silvia, is beginning to ease the splinter of wood from Thomas's flesh. “Clean rags,” Silvia snaps. I get them, turning just as Luis gives a last sharp pull, and the splinter—perhaps five inches long, half an inch wide, and jagged at the edges—dislodges. Thomas moans, his eyelids flutter, but then he slips into unconsciousness again. The piece of wood was originally part of the prosthesis, I realize, seeing it on the floor. This will probably cause Thomas the most pain. The new device, which allowed him such facility of movement, is badly damaged.

By the time water boils on the stove, Silvia, seated in a chair now, watches as Luis does his best to pluck any last bits and slivers of wood from Thomas's skin and the fleshier part of the wound. “There will be infection if we're not careful,” Silvia tells me as I lift the steaming pot from the stove.

We soak rags in the boiling water, and when they're cool enough, we use them to clean Thomas's leg. Luis lifts Thomas's thigh so Silvia can swab it, and then she applies salt to the area. She has stirred together the honey and the little bit of sugar on the shelf, and now, much as she did with the whites of the eggs, she slathers on the mixture. Then she swaddles Thomas's knee with the remaining rags, which are clean enough without being boiled, I hope, because Silvia says they must first and foremost be dry.

“That is all we can do for now.” Silvia holds out her hands so that Luis can lift her from the chair and help her onto their bed. “We must do it again soon. We will need more honey, sugar, eggs, rags, and water from the pump to boil, and we will need these things quickly.”

Without a word, I go to my cot and pull some money—ten dollars—from where I've tucked it, where the cot's heavy tarp meets the wood frame. I press the money into Silvia's hand.

“This is too much, Ruth.”

“No, it's not.” I look at Luis. “You'll go to the store?”

He nods. “
Mañana
.”

“Nothing is open now,” Silvia reminds me. “He will have to borrow the supplies we need.”

“Then please, let me pay for everything you have to borrow, then buy anything else we need for Thomas, and food, milk, coffee—
anything
we need.” I remember the children, the paper and pencils I promised them, but these things I'll purchase another time.