Andrew Valencia: Lord of California

Chris must’ve known something was up, cause he slowed his pace and set his hand between my shoulder blades. You impressed me with how you handled yourself today, he said. You got more sense than a lot of the hunters I’ve known. And they were grown men.

Thanks. I hope to keep getting better.

I know you do. That’s why I want you to have my spare rifle.

I stopped walking and turned to look at him. What do you mean you want me to have it?

Chris smiled. I mean it’s yours, he said. It’s a pain in the ass keeping them both hidden from the camp managers, and all I really need is the one anyway. I’d rather it go to somebody who’ll get some use out of it. And it looks like that somebody’s you.

I don’t know what to say.

Shit, say yes. That .22 was made before disbandment. I’d have killed to have a weapon like that when I was your age.

I looked down at the rifle and turned it over in my hands and felt a new sense of wonder about it simply because it was now my own. For my last four birthdays, Dad had gotten me the same thing—shoes. They weren’t fancy or unique or engineered for sports, they were just plain black sneakers for day to day use. But far more important than the shoes themselves was the fact that they were new. How many of your classmates have new shoes every year? he asked after the second pair. How many boys around here can feel proud of the things their parents give them to wear? Of course he had never been to my school in person or seen any of my classmates in the flesh. If he had, he would’ve known that every family in the valley bought their kids new shoes once a year for the same reason he thought it was important to do so. Now, after four years of walking with my father alongside me, of feeling his callousness with each step I took, it was amazing to be given a gift that actually made me happy, regardless of the circumstances that had preceded the giving.

This is the best present I’ve ever gotten, I said. I’m going to hold on to it forever.

That’s good to hear, Chris said. But hey, do me a favor. If your mother asks, tell her I loaned it to you for practice. It’s not registered, and I’m afraid she might not want it in the house if she found out.

You want me to lie to her again?

No, just keep it open-ended. Tell her what she wants to hear. You get me?

Yeah. I get you.

He started walking again. Good, he said. Now let’s pick up the pace. Getting late.

I kept the rifle in my closet, at the bottom of a duffle bag full of old clothes that were too small for me but not yet big enough for Sebastian. I took it out from time to time when I was alone, to clean and polish the barrel, or just to look at it and admire the deadly simplicity of its design. And of course I took it out in the afternoon to go hunting with Chris, to follow him in search of whatever prey we could find, which never seemed to grow beyond small birds and brush critters no matter how skilled I became at tracking.

I looked for the coyote. Every time we were out there, on the edge of the clearing where I first saw him, or in the stone fruit labyrinth across the road, I fixed my gaze far into the distance, just in case he might show. But he never did. It got to where I questioned whether I’d actually seen him it all. He had come into my mind and laid his bony tracks and then disappeared without yielding a second chance. I didn’t know what I’d do if I ever got him, if I’d try to have him stuffed like some wealthy sportsman, or if I’d simply stand over him a while reflecting on what I’d done and then leave the hairy carcass to rot. With hunting or with anything else, I never thought about what I’d do after the prize had been won. I knew there were some Christians who thought often about heaven and the glory that awaited them when they got there. But I could only focus on the journey, and all the pitfalls that awaited me along the way.

We continued bathing together in the irrigation ditch. Either Mom never put two and two together, and never questioned my wet hair and cleanliness at the end of the day, or she figured there was nothing strange about two men washing together and didn’t think to say anything. Not that there was anything strange about it, in that sense. Another couple of years and I’d be showering with up to fifteen boys at a time in the locker room after wrestling practice. Somehow, though, no matter how comfortable we became around each other, there was an uneasiness between Chris and me. It always felt like he was egging me on, pushing me to strip away even more layers until he could see me for what I really was.

One time we were in the water with a fresh bar of soap, luxuriating in the amount of lather it produced. The sun was so bright that every time I closed my eyes and opened them again the world seemed tinted blue like I was seeing it through colored glass. I noticed Chris had stopped scrubbing and was looking at me with his hands on his chest.

You’re starting high school soon, yeah?

In the fall.

You got a girlfriend in your class?

I shook my head. No. I’ve never had one.

Right, he said. But I bet you still get a little taste now and then.

I’m a Christian.

Does that mean your junk don’t work?

It means I haven’t done anything. With anyone.

Chris smiled. You got a nice cock for your age, he said. You’re saying no girl’s ever touched it or put it in her mouth? You’re saying you wouldn’t want her to?

He looked at me as I stood, my arms and shoulders drying quickly in the burning light. For the first time since the first time, I turned so he couldn’t see. I could hear him laughing behind me.

It’s okay, he said. No shame here.

There were other incidents after that where Chris overstepped his bounds or spoke too crudely and made me feel dirty inside my own skin. I learned to do a better job of laughing it off, of making like I enjoyed the vulgarity he inflicted on me the way fat kids at school pretended not to mind the jokes played at their expense. We still went out hunting at least three times a week, so much that halfway through the summer Chris had to buy another bar of soap. Then, one Saturday in August, we packed a cooler full of sandwiches and drinks and headed out farther than we ever had before, out beyond the boundary of the main parcel tract and into the bare country on the outskirts of Reedley. We dropped a few crows we found perched on telephone lines, but no larger prey revealed itself. Toward midday we stopped and rested beside an abandoned irrigation pump and ate two avocado sandwiches apiece. Chris lit a cigarette and put his boots up on one of the pipes. He was in a relaxed mood. He shooed a mosquito off his thumb and watched it fly away and didn’t wait to see if it returned.

Now that you know the basics of how to handle a weapon, he said, you can learn to hunt pretty much anything. Someday you should try your hand at hunting deer. Probably come away with a pretty nice buck.

I’d like to, I said. Been thinking about it since we first started practicing.

Should ask your father next time he’s in town. He might know some rich folks who’d let you use their property up in the mountains.

I took a drink of water from the canteen and wiped my lips and sat with my head low between my shoulders. He’s not much for the mountains, I said. But Mom might let us go camping sometime in the winter, when there’s snow in the hills. You should try asking her.

Chris took his feet off the pipe. He stood and dusted off his pant legs. You’re going to have to start making your own plans, he said. I’m heading out at the end of the month.

I rose to my feet slowly and came up close beside him. I could smell the cigarette smoke in his hair and on his skin and I could see the way he was trying to avoid looking me in the eye. Where are you going? I asked. What happened?