Crazy for the Storm: A Memoir of Survival

Isn’t that against the law?

Sure is. But he is the law.

He’s the police?

Basically.

If the police break the law then who arrests them?

I don’t know. Good question, Ollestad.

He let me stew over the paradoxes for a while. Then he spoke.

In a poor country like Mexico people try to get money any way they can. They even do it in a rich country like America. It’s not right. But sometimes—like with that guy—you play along because you understand the circumstances.

He checked on me a couple of times as we wound out of Tijuana and back along the coast. It was black outside. A few lights scattered around in the distance.

He’s a liar then, right? I said.

The border guard?

Yeah.

Uh-huh. That’s right.

I wanted to blurt out that I had lied too, about skateboarding, about where I got my scrapes. I pressed my forehead against the passenger’s window. I could feel my dad’s eyes on my back. I flashed on Nixon, his saggy jowls and hunched shoulders, and the policeman’s gold teeth, and him sitting in his box all night and him taking money from people and stuffing it in his pocket.

Take it easy on that window, Ollestad, said my dad.

Sorry.

You want to rest your head in my lap?

Yeah.

I swiveled around and put my cheek across his thigh and my bent knees up on the seat so my feet could fit against the door.

Sunlight poured in the truck’s window onto my head. I sat up and wiped my forehead with my T-shirt.

Buenos dias, said my dad.

I noticed the creases under my dad’s eyes—they were lined in an olive yellow, standing out against his smooth honey-brown skin. He looked older and more tired than I had ever seen him look. He drank coffee out of a Styrofoam cup.

Where are we? I said.

Just pulling out of Ensenada.

One eye was still blurry and I looked out the windshield. The sun cut across the sagebrush and the sage climbed the hills, spotting them with dull greens. It reminded me of Malibu. I looked west out the passenger’s window beyond the bald headland cliffs, and the Pacific Ocean spread as far as my eye could see, the water tinted peach in the morning light.

My dad yawned.

Did you sleep? I said.

Yeah. I pulled off to the side of the road in Rosarito and took a nap.

Why didn’t Sandra come?

His smile drained away like water seeping into sand. He stared out along the highway and his eyes narrowed.

She was pissed off at me about something, Ollestad.

What?

It’s complicated.

Did you fight?

Yeah. But that’s not why she’s mad.

Why’s she mad?

Nick’s brother. You know Vincent, right?

I nodded.

Yeah well he thought it was funny to take Sandra’s bird.

He took her little parrot?

Yeah.

Why?

To play a joke, he said shaking his head.

What kind of joke?

He pretended to be a birdnapper I guess. We even left money in that phone booth by George’s Market. We didn’t know it was him until he showed up with the bird.

My dad moved his puckered mouth from one side to the other just like Grandpa did sometimes.

Sandra wanted me to call the cops, he said.

Did you?

Naw.

So she left?