“This has to be it,” Ava rasps. She puts her hands on her knees and tries to clear her throat. “West of Route 385, north of Ranch Road 767. We passed both,” she barely manages to finish.
“You should sit . . .” I wheeze into my sister’s ear, placing my hand on her shoulder.
She jerks from my touch like fire licked her skin and looks up at me, instantly forcing images of last night’s torment to reflect in both our eyes. Lucía steps forward, saving us from having to talk. To acknowledge what happened.
“¿Crees que es la casa segura?” You believe this is the safe house?
I turn my gaze back to the stone homestead. Still there. It shimmers in the scorching air.
It could disappear at any moment.
Ava rises, her nod of assurance nearly imperceptible. I watch her scan the large property guarded ominously by high barbed-wire fencing and warning signs. Leery, Lucía surveys the land with a hunter’s eyes, searching for a target. You don’t have any more bullets. We’re the prey, I want to remind her. But if I talk, I will fall.
She seems to hear me.
“¿Cómo podemos estar seguras?” she asks. How can we be certain?
Her body teeters dangerously, and I know her fixation on this assumed refuge is the only thing keeping her upright. Ava gives Lucía a look before setting off to meet what might merely be an illusion on the horizon.
“Nunca podemos estar seguras,” I interpret Ava’s expression aloud. Nothing ever is.
As we walk closer, I discern a row of crumbling limestone buildings neighboring the main residence. Fractured deer antlers are mounted above several doors that appear sealed shut from sand and time. This must have been a hunters’ lodge in the ranch’s past life.
There’s no one in sight.
Ava keeps her eyes right, Lucía fixes hers dead center, and I watch the left. A few yards beyond the fence, I spot a water-pumping windmill working hard above a well. The multiple blades catch the strong wind just like the sails on a boat, sending the wheel into a dizzying eternal spin. There’s a meter near the base of the well that monitors groundwater withdrawals. Surely no water pushes through these pumps. The source of this well, undoubtedly the Ogallala Aquifer, has been sucked dry for years. But I’m tempted to see. Tempted to unscrew that well cap and dive headfirst into its concrete tube. To dig and scratch until I unearth the treasured aquifer itself.
It’s the smell that stops me. A pungent, musky odor blended with the sharp scent of dung, blown to us from the house by the sudden shift of wind.
Animals.
Massive holding pens line the gravel path leading up to the main residence. Cattle? Sheep? Horses? I can’t tell from this distance, but all three seem unlikely to survive in these hellish conditions, out in the center of nowhere.
We keep our line and inch deeper onto the grounds. We move slowly, but I feel my heart racing. There are a hundred yards of gravel road before us. I hold my eyes open and slap my sunburnt cheeks, willing myself to concentrate and fully awaken from my muddled haze.
As we draw closer to the pens, a distinctive curry-like smell hits my nostrils, overwhelming my senses. When I peer through the metal bars, I think the sun must be deceiving me again. I swear I see a mob of furry creatures hopping languidly on two legs. Or is it three legs?
Kangaroos.
The acre-wide fencing that borders either side of our pathway houses at least fifty or sixty of the massive brown and gray creatures. Most rest in shallow holes dug alongside the shadowed edges. The two nearest me lick their front paws and rub the moisture onto their pale chests in what I can only guess is some sort of cooling technique.
The rocks crush and grind beneath our feet, openly announcing our arrival. The kangaroos are taking increasing notice of our presence, several disgruntled ears twitching at the sound of our intrusive approach. I turn my gaze to the house but find all doors and windows closed and empty. Cold sweat slides down my body. I know eyes are on me somewhere close by.
“A man,” Ava whispers.
I snap my head right and spot a lone figure standing among the kangaroos. Stained denim covers his six-foot frame from wrist to ankle, disrupted only by an oversized silver buckle dividing his thickset waist. His feet sport worn leather boots with rounded tips, and his head is crowned with a spotless western hat as white as the clouds that never seem to form above this roasted piece of land.
A living, breathing cowboy.
He tilts back his wide brim, revealing his weathered eyes. Yards stretch between us, but his message still reaches me. So loud and clear I can almost hear his thoughts shout above the shrieking wind: Get out.
I hesitate, but Lucía pulls me forward. “No tenemos miedo.” We show no fear.
The cowboy walks relaxed and unhurried to a gate near the end of the holding pen, his gaze never leaving our pathetic party. Filthy and possessionless, we must look like nothing more than beggars. Ava lifts a feeble hand to the man, a greeting the cowboy does not return. Instead he pushes down his hat, blocking his face, and shuts the gate behind him with a deliberate bang. Several kangaroos slam against the fence, causing the three of us to jump. A male who’s been stalking our path punches and kicks the metal barrier, a number of his lethal jabs making it through the bars, nearly striking my head.
No fear.
We huddle close and continue our laborious quest forward as the man moves onto the gravel road. He stops a few feet from his front porch, turns, and holds out a commanding hand: we’ve come close enough. His massive palm is calloused and red, and I note how easily it could wrap around my throat.
“Those signs said this here is private property,” he growls, his voice every bit as threatening as his appearance.
Barely able to raise her head, Ava clears her throat and pushes out a plea just above a whisper. “We were sent here . . . We were told this is a safe house . . .” Her voice trails off and I wonder if he heard the last few important words.
I lock eyes with the man and conjure up my last fighting vigor. “Safe house!” is all I manage to shout before my voice vanishes with my strength. My body sways and my vision blurs.
The cowboy tips back his hat, and I see a dark warning in his glare as his eyes study each of us in turn. He locks his thumbs around his buckle, emphasizing a giant knife sheathed at his waist.
“You three better leave this property. Now.”
My knees give, my will breaks, and I drop to the ground with a resounding thud. The grit and sand fly up around me, and I hear the shrill scraping of the kangaroo’s talons ripping at his cage to my left.
I, too, will be inside a cage soon. Death or capture. The only two things that await us. I’ll be trapped inside a box either way.
Lucía looks back at the endless inferno. “No puedo volver. No puedo . . .” I can’t go back. I can’t . . .
Ava turns to me, and her eyes find mine through the dust and despair. A light of conviction still burns in her eyes. It’s dim and fading, but the flicker is there. She straightens her weakened frame and takes a step toward the man, who moves to unsheathe his knife. Ava continues to advance, nothing left to lose.
“Resist much, obey little. Once unquestioning obedience, once fully enslaved. Once fully enslaved, no nation, state, city, of this earth, ever afterward resumes its liberty.”
The man stares at Ava in uncomprehending silence. Lucía stops breathing beside me, and even the kangaroo ceases his incessant rattling.