Healing Sands (13 page)

“Oh—thank you—gosh, I did plan to station myself out there with the goalie and get a few shots. Now I won't.”

I continued to stare at her until she huffed and looked away. “I was just saying—”

“Yeah. Got it. Thanks.”

Before she could just say any more, I turned and climbed up the bleachers and dug in my bag for a longer lens. By the time I was assessing the light, Poco, Victoria, and J.P. had settled in with the other mothers in another section. I felt like a piece of mold that had cleared the Petri dish, and I was fine with that.

The sun was so bright I could practically feel freckles popping out on my arms, and there wasn't a cloud anywhere in sight to subdue it. One thing I had to say for New Mexico, it could produce a sky-blue like nowhere else I'd ever been, and I had made pictures on every continent except Antarctica. Here it was a flawless bowl that met row after row of distant, dusty hills unfazed. Behind me, the Sacramento Mountains rose to it. Before me, the San Andres did the same, as if they all must pay homage. New Mexico made it clear why we look up to find God.

Which made it all the more frustrating that I wasn't finding him these days.

Photographing in that light was a challenge, but I played with it until I got some good contrast and began to shoot the minute the ball was in play. The Las Cruces Winds' bright red shirts flashed across the field, scattering and clumping and spreading out again like confetti tossed in the breeze. Even after sitting through daily practices and taking lessons from Alex each evening until dark, I still had very little idea what was going on down there. I just tried to capture the intensity on their little faces and the boy-power in their legs and the unharnessed grins that followed every Wind tackle. At least I knew what that was.

And I knew what it was when Alex drilled the ball past the other team's goalie and scored the first point of the game. I must have made fifteen shots before I saw him look up from the field and into the bleachers, straight at me.

It was such a normal thing for a ten-year-old boy to do—seek out his mom in the stands and make sure she had seen. But it wasn't normal for us. For me. It was like a gift I didn't deserve, that he was giving me anyway. A piece of me melted as I waved to him.

We won two to one, with Cade allowing a goal by the other team but scoring the point that made up for it. J.P. probably would have grounded him if he hadn't. It occurred to me even as I shot the celebration going on below that in one week Cade had gone from the kid who couldn't dribble two feet without messing something up to the hero of the moment. What was that about? Did he just figure he'd better improve if he knew what was good for him with his mother?

But as I lowered my camera and watched the boys fling themselves at Dan, I had to begrudgingly consider the possibility that it might have something to do with the coaching. I'd caught Dan in my sights several times during the game. Once he was grinning and pumping the air and shouting, “Way to be there, Felipe!” which was the little guy's fifteen seconds of glory, as far as I could tell. Another time, Dan had his hand on Bryan's back as they both stood on the sidelines, Bryan nodding, Dan coaxing a smile from him, even though at that point he had yet to get into the game. Right now the team was dumping a cup of ice on Dan's head, which he obligingly lowered so they could reach it. I got a picture. For Alex.

My throat was parched by that time, so I bought a pair of large Cokes from the concession stand and went in search of the boy. He broke away from the pack and hurled himself toward me, stopping just short of giving me a hug. I remembered from Jake at ten that it was not cool to touch your mom in front of your friends.

“Did you see me?” he said.

“Uh, hello, you were amazing.”

“Yeah, well, y'know, I can't help it.”

He grinned. I loved those two front teeth, big as a rabbit's in his small face.

“I got you a Coke,” I said.

He took it with another grin, gulped about half of it, and then and only then said, “I'm not supposed to have something carbonated right after the game.”

One more thing I didn't know and should have. I looked around to make sure J.P. wasn't watching. Alex looked around too.

“What?” I said.

“When Dad's done, can you ask him if I can hang out with you for a while instead of going right home?”

I almost dropped my cup. “Of course. You can ask him yourself if you want.”

“He might get mad.”

“Your dad—mad at
you
?” I said.

“No.”

“At me.”

He nodded and took a long drag through the straw.

“You know, Alex, even if he does get mad at me for whatever reason, it wouldn't be your fault.”

Straw still in his mouth, he turned his huge brown eyes to me. He didn't believe that for a second. He just sucked noisily at the now-empty cup, making that disgusting noise boys seem to love. When he cocked his head to look at me, to see if it was bugging me, another piece of me melted away. If he did that sounds-like-a-fart armpit thing, I would dissolve completely.

Because of the win, the mood in the van was lighter than I'd feared it would be after J.P.'s and my little camera conflict. She was the one, in fact, who suggested we stop at Plateau Espresso to celebrate before we headed for Las Cruces.

The Plateau was perched on a hillside and made excellent use of the brilliant, airy light with tall tables and bright metal chairs and wind chimes singing in the windows. The boys clumped at a table in the corner, too worn out to indulge in any shenanigans, and drank lemonade. J.P. parked us several tables over, where I was the only one with coffee. The three of them were having smoothies, as if they, too, were in training. I felt deliciously wicked ordering an extra shot of espresso.

“When can we see the pictures?” Victoria asked. She had apparently missed the earlier confrontation. I'd learned that Victoria missed a lot.

“Let me weed out the bad ones,” I said, “and we'll do a little slide show for the boys—whenever.”

J.P. pumped her straw up and down in her cup. “When Cade first started sports, back in T-ball, Mike had the camcorder at every game. I finally said, ‘Are you going to watch our son's entire childhood through the lens of a camera?'”

“He must have said no,” Poco said quickly, “because I've never seen him with a video camera.”

Actually, I'd never seen him at all.

J.P. just guzzled her smoothie and silently insinuated yet again that I was a caffeine-addicted unfit mother. It was time to break out the hourglass. Instead, I squeezed my cup until the plastic lid popped off. Coffee startled out and onto her khaki knee.

I didn't mean to do it, and my apology was genuine. She ignored the napkin I offered her and rushed off to the bathroom, leaving the three of us in an awkward silence I couldn't sit through.

“Look, Poco,” I said. “I appreciate you trying to make me feel welcome, but it probably isn't a good idea for me to hang out with the three of you. You have a nice little friendship circle going here, and I'm messing that up.”

Victoria gave me the expected long, blank look as if I were speaking in Sanskrit.

Poco put her hand on my arm. “No, Ryan,” she said. “I think you're good for us.”

“I don't know that much about coffee klatches, but I don't think this can be considered good.”

“I didn't say comfortable. I said good.”

“Whatever it is, I think you'd be better off without me. I'm fine with just doing my own thing.”

Poco exchanged glances with Victoria, who actually seemed to be tuned in. “But we're not fine with J.P. doing
her
own thing, all the time, and trying to make it ours. You're the first person to come in here and stand up to her.” Poco glanced around the coffee shop. “You don't see any of the other moms hanging out with her, do you?”

“So why do
you
?” I said. “Did you get assigned to her or something?”

“In a way.”

I looked at Victoria in surprise. “By whom?”

“Well.” She stared at me full on with her fluid eyes. “By God.”

“She means it's the Christian thing to do,” Poco said. “J.P. has a good heart, and she can actually be fun.” Her lips twitched. “When she isn't telling us how to be mothers.”

“When is that?” I said.

“The thing is, she's a great mom, but she's way too protective of—”

She sneaked a look at the boys' table and lowered her already soft voice so that I had to lean in to hear her.

“Just about the worst thing Cade has ever had to deal with is losing to a team that plays a little dirty.”

“And his mother.” I put up my hand. “See, I'm not as nice as you two.”

“J.P. doesn't need nice,” Poco said. “She needs real. But she sees you as being way too worldly for us. Especially with what you're going through, you and Dan and your boys.”

Victoria leaned in, too, until I could hardly see her face for the hair.

“You make her feel frumpy,” she whispered.

I laughed out loud.

“Okay, so she is a little frumpy,” Poco said. “Just don't leave us yet, okay?”

“Here she comes,” Victoria hissed.

They went back to their smoothies with too-obvious concentration, and I felt like I was back in middle school, which was where I'd abandoned girl drama in the first place. But I sighed and made sure there were no coffee drippings on J.P.'s chair and tried to smile at her when she sat down.

“Did you get it out?” I said.

“Oh yeah. I always carry a Tide to Go in my purse.”

Of course you do.

She didn't have much to say for the first few miles of the trip back to Las Cruces. The kids bantered about boy things, and Poco kept up a running commentary on the scenery, as if I were a visitor from a foreign land.

“Have you been to White Sands, Ryan?” she said as we approached it outside of Alamogordo.

“Once,” I said, “and that was one time too many.” I winced. “I hope that isn't anybody's favorite place in the world.”

“As a matter of fact, it is,” J.P. said.

Why did I know that?

“I love it too,” Victoria said, voice dreamy. “It's so easy to get lost there.”

I had no doubt Victoria could get lost in her own house. I couldn't help saying, “You can get lost in the sand?”

“No,” she said. “In yourself.”

“Oh,” I said. “That's about the last place where I want to get lost.”

Poco blinked at me in the rearview mirror. “Why didn't you like it, Ryan?”

“It feels like a wasteland.”

Victoria shook her head. “You have to slow down when you're there. That's the only way you see the hidden beauty of the dunes. It's the absolute stillness of it.”

“No offense,” I said, “but I found it eerie.”

“Not comforting?”

“Uh, no.”

“I don't find it comforting either.” J.P. turned in her seat. “I find it scintillating.”

She pronounced it
skintillating
. I wasn't about to correct her.

“We should take you there.” Poco nodded, as if she hoped I'd start nodding with her. “One morning early, before it gets crowded.”

“No. Overnight camping trip.”

I stared at J.P. Poco went slightly off the road.

“We're going camping?” Cade said behind me.

“Not you. Us. Moms only. Full moon is the best time to go, so we'll do it Friday night. Backpacks only—it's backcountry camping.” J.P. narrowed her eyes at me. “Have you ever actually roughed it?”

Until then I'd already been planning how I was going to turn her down flat. But had I ever roughed it? Oh, please.

“What's the date?” Poco said.

“September 25. We'll come back Saturday afternoon. The boys don't have a game until Sunday that weekend.”

She must have her child's entire schedule committed to memory. I might make her feel frumpy, but she made me feel woefully inadequate. And that was not something I was used to feeling.

“You're on,” I said.

J.P. gave a satisfied nod and turned back around. Poco beamed at me in the mirror. GH

Alex and I spent the afternoon at the movies and the evening at the bowling alley. He was nodding off before I got him back to Dan's, and I nearly was too. So it was the next day before I slid the card reader into my laptop to look at the soccer pictures. The photos of the crime scene popped up first.

I hadn't submitted any of them to Frances, and I'd forgotten to delete them. A knot formed in my chest as I clicked on the first one to get rid of it. Whether it was the photographer in me or the desperate mother, I wasn't sure, but I clicked to the enlarged views instead.

The first one was of the paramedics surrounding Miguel Sanchez. Detective Baranovic's words came like an assault. Two broken legs. Serious internal injuries and a fractured skull. A coma he might never come out of.

I rushed to the next one, and then the next, of the truck bumper. I was still close in when I shot that one, before the officer shooed me behind the tape. My biggest concern had been getting a good angle for the story. Before I'd found out it was
my
story.

I put my finger to the touch pad, but a flash of bright orange caught my eye, something out of place on the faded blue and rust of the old truck.

I clicked on the orange and zoomed in on it. And felt my mouth drop open.

Next to the Land of Enchantment license plate was a bumper sticker. LCYS, it proclaimed in proud orange letters. Las Cruces Youth Soccer.

I sat back, eyes still glued to the screen. The sticker showed no wear, so it hadn't been on that rusted bumper for too long. The detective told us the truck belonged to Miguel's mother. Did somebody in the family play soccer?

Did Miguel?

Did he don a bright uniform on Saturday mornings and chase a ball around on a field and look up in the stands for his mom when he scored a goal?