You aren’t being careful, not watching where you’re going, and so it comes as no surprise when you try to lift your foot and find it isn’t easy. You pull it up with difficulty, and sure enough, you have stepped in gum. You stop at a trash can placed conveniently right outside the grocery store. You set down your iced coffee and the organic salad you bought for lunch before attempting to stand on one foot while lifting up the other one to inspect the bottom of your shoe. As you feared, the damage is excessive: your shoes have that certain type of rubber sole with way too many tiny recesses and grooves. The gum, or bits of it, will be stuck in them forever. You try to remove the gum with a paper napkin that’s tucked neatly in the bag that holds your salad, but that only makes things worse. The gum stays firmly attached, only now it’s trailing wadded bits of paper napkin. Defeated, you go to sip your latte and realize you forgot to grab a straw.
By the time you get to work, your coffee is long gone, though the evidence is not. No, the plastic cup and lid and straw—they are sure to last forever, far beyond the temporary caffeine pick-me-up, which you fear is starting to fade already. You take the empty cup and the organic salad, which is warming rapidly in the bright May sun, and you escort them to the break room. The salad you stow away in the refrigerator, and the cup you toss into the trash as you eye the coffee pot with its nearby stack of pods in several different flavors, including hazelnut, your favorite. But before you can brew yourself a cup, your supervisor pops his head in. Oh, great, just the person I was looking for, he says. So much for the second cup.
He informs you with a disapproving frown that you have amassed too many vacation days, and if you don’t take some of them by the end of June, you’re going to lose them and it would be a shame to waste them. You ask him how many you need to take, and he says at least a week. It could be worse, you think, and you decide to take them, though what on earth you’re going to do with them, you really can’t imagine. You have no kids, no spouse or partner, no one to bum around with. Sure, you have a friend or two, but they work just as much as you do. Before you tackle this unexpected problem, you grab a pod of hazelnut and brew up another cup of coffee, which you take back to your desk before you think much more about it. By the time you head off to get your lunch, you still have no solution, no ideas.
I have to take vacation days, you tell your friend as you fight to spear your salad with a plastic fork that’s sure to break before you’re finished.
Your friend smiles as though this didn’t pose a problem. So where are you headed off to? The beach? Someplace exotic?
No, you start to object, and then it hits you, the place you want to go. Quartzsite, Arizona, the place where you were born. The place where you grew up, well, mostly. You moved away when you were twelve, up north near Canada, and you’ve never been back. But you have memories of the desert, of the sun, the heat, the lizards, and suddenly you want to go back and see it all again, now, in the summer, when the place is most itself.
The desert in the summer, your friend asks as though you must be crazy.
You shrug and go back to your salad, at which point your plastic fork breaks off, the missing tine lost somewhere amid the iceberg lettuce that dominates the salad, the few bright green pieces of romaine up at the top having been consumed within the first few bites. When you finish eating with the broken fork, you can’t help but notice that the bottom of the clear plastic container is empty and you wonder whatever happened to the little plastic tine.
◊ ◊ ◊
A few weeks later, you step out of your car and grab your latte. You made it just in time to pick up your nephew. The problem of your vacation has been solved. Your sister, who lives one town over, could not take time off from both her jobs, but she has a son, your nephew, who is only too happy to go somewhere, anywhere, away from Idaho. He’s nine and you’ve taken him out camping several times before. He runs out of the house to tell you he’s all ready, his duffel bag in tow, so excited that he nearly spills your latte.
Your sister smiles and thanks you, grateful to have a week alone. At least that’s how she puts it. You suspect she’s seeing someone, though she hasn’t told you yet.
In the car, your nephew lines up the other members of your party upon the dash. There’s a Lego sheriff, a large stuffed Garfield, and a robot, which he tells you when you ask is Megatron, one of the Transformers, a Decepticon, he informs you and launches into a lengthy explanation of the character’s unusual powers and his prominent place in the history of some imaginary world. You marvel at his knowledge. Did you know this much when you were nine? If you did, you don’t remember.
But you do remember breakfast as your stomach starts to grumble. As usual, just like a working day, you were too rushed to make anything for breakfast, but you picked up some baked goods with your coffee. You interrupt the story of Megatron’s ascent to power. Is he hungry? He shrugs and asks for what. A chocolate chip muffin, you say, and with that, you have won him over. He tears off the plastic packaging and removes the muffin in a single stroke, and you ask him to do the same for you. When he finishes, he puts the plastic wrapping back into the paper bag and crumples it neatly into a ball. Then he uncrumples the bag, as though thinking better of it, and adds your empty latte cup.
The drive down to Arizona is leisurely. You stop along the way to see a waterfall, a crater, and other assorted natural features. And of course you stop to eat and purchase a full assortment of pens, postcards, foil stickers, plastic figurines, hats, and t-shirts, souvenirs of every imaginable kind. You’re not sure whom you’ll send the postcards to, but you suppose you can always hang them up at work to remind you of that time you went somewhere.
In Nevada, as you drive down Highway 93, the landscape becomes featureless, unchanging. Your nephew stops looking out the window, and instead, he shows you how Megatron can transform into a jet.
Though you plan to spend most of the week in the area around Quartzsite, you stop off first for a night at the Grand Canyon, a visit that seems obligatory. Your nephew is not impressed. He’s seen it already on TV and in pictures. You camp in a campground in a designated space. There is no wildlife to speak of. When you go out for a hike, he tells you the plot of his favorite action movie, one you haven’t heard of.
When you leave the Grand Canyon, you spend the rest of the nights camping off the beaten path, and your nephew’s interest grows as he discovers all the lizards. Look, there are different ones, he tells you. That one’s spotted all over, but this one’s striped.
You set up the tent with difficulty. The ground is hard in places here, and rocky, and the large tent pegs take a lot of pounding. You work alone out in the heat as your nephew chases lizards. At last he captures one and brings it to you. It’s at the bottom of a plastic cup and though it tries, it can’t climb up the slippery sides. When you ask him what he plans to call the lizard, he tells you, he’s not a superhero, he doesn’t have a name.
The wildlife is present, but unimpressive. The next day you spot a deer, a single deer, just walking slowly through the wash. There are deer in Idaho, your nephew says, I didn’t know they could live in the desert. You didn’t know this either, and you wonder what on earth they eat. A few days later you see a cat, an ordinary housecat, skulking about your camp. The cat doesn’t come close, and you assume that it’s feral. Your nephew is disappointed. He likes cats well enough, but he wants to see a Gila monster and he asks you if you’ve ever seen one.
No, you tell him.
What do they look like?
I don’t know, but I think they’re pretty crazy-looking.
How do you know if you haven’t seen one, he asks you, if you don’t know what they look like?
You shrug. He pulls out his phone and shows you several photos of them.
No, you confirm. I’ve never seen one.
What’s that spotted lizard called, he asks you, you know, the long thin ones?
I don’t know, you tell him.
But I thought you grew up here.
He isn’t frustrated, just confused. You don’t know how to answer.
In Quartzsite, you take your nephew to the biggest rock shop, the same one you used to go to when you were about his age. You tell him about the rock and gem show they have each winter, and all the snowbirds and RVs. He seems interested as he wanders along the rows, running his hand down all the rocks as though he was absorbing something from them.
Where do they find all these rocks, he asks.
They’re just out there, in the desert.
How come we don’t find rocks like these? Is it because they stole them all? To sell?
They didn’t steal them, you explain.
How do you know, he asks. How can you be sure?
The next stop is Tucson, where you visit a place they call The Boneyard. On the way, he places the rocks you bought up on the dash, right next to Megatron and Lego Sheriff. You notice Garfield isn’t there, and you ask where he went off to.
Oh, I left him at the campsite. He can be friends with that other cat.
You don’t know what to say to this nine-year-old logic. You wonder if he’ll be upset later, but he doesn’t seem upset about it now.
At Tucson, you take a bus tour through The Boneyard, an enormous aircraft graveyard with acres of endless planes, lined up in perfect rows. It’s hard to believe there are so many, and you wonder if the place will grow and grow until the whole desert is covered with neat rows of broken planes.
There are 707s and B1 bombers and all sorts of other planes. Your nephew nods as the tour guide ticks off their names as though he were familiar with them all. You aren’t sure if he really knows them or if he’s faking it. But one thing you’re sure of, the place is a success. Your nephew seems almost entranced, ignoring Megatron, which he brought with him. At several points in the tour, you’re allowed out of the bus to get a closer look. Your nephew is always the last one to return. After the tour, as you head back toward your car, you notice his hands are empty, and you ask about Megatron.
I put him with the B1 bombers, he announced, rather proudly, and rather like a parent whose son just got into Harvard.
You shake your head in disbelief. You ask him if he wants some ice cream, and he eagerly agrees. You haven’t bought an ice cream out for years. The cone comes wrapped in paper, and you find it difficult to remove. While you’re trying to take it off, you drip chocolate ice cream on your shoe. Part of the paper wrapper takes off and blows away.
Next on the agenda is another rock shop. You decide if your nephew finds something he likes, a nice big rock, a geode maybe, you’ll buy it for him, a replacement for Megatron and Garfield. He picks one out, a giant one that shimmers, and the shopkeeper wraps it up carefully in paper. Can’t I carry it, he asks, but you insist it will travel better wrapped up and in the trunk. He loses interest and walks outside as you wait for it and pay. When you emerge into the blinding sunlight, you don’t immediately see him. Eventually, you spot him half a block away inspecting a giant cactus that has toppled over across the sidewalk.
Look, he says when you walk up next to him, they cut it into pieces, just like you would a log.
He’s right. It looks like someone used a chainsaw and cut it into twelve-inch rounds. He doesn’t ask you what it is, but you tell him anyway, the one and only fact about the desert that you seem to know: the cactus, it’s a saguaro.
Yeah, I know, he says, but not sarcastically. The iconic cactus. The cactus with the arms.
How does he pick up these things? Maybe somewhere on a plaque?
They’re cool. Can we take one of them, he asks.
Without conscious thought, you envision several different scenarios all involving one of you covered in cactus spines.
That’s not a great idea, you say. I think those spines are deadly.
Yeah, he says and sighs, as if they were full of venom.
You decide to camp somewhere nearby, and you head on down the highway. You drive past a sandy hill with trucks going up and down it. What’s that, your nephew asks. You tell him it’s just a landfill, but still he wants to go there. It’s not a tourist attraction, you tell him, not that he believes you.
You pass a sign for the road to Castle Dome, the location of a ghost town, one you seem to remember going to. You weren’t going to do any more sightseeing today, but you offer it up as an alternative to the landfill. Your nephew grudgingly accepts, but becomes more enthusiastic as you approach. The first thing he says when you arrive is, I don’t see any ghosts. Of course not, you tell him, but that doesn’t mean that they aren’t here.
There’s a saloon, a sheriff’s office, and a tiny church. The decaying wooden buildings stand out against the rock called Castle Dome. Your nephew kicks a rusty Pepsi can, part of a growing pile of litter being swept there by the wind.
Why don’t they put in a trash can, he asks absentmindedly.
No one lives here, you remind him.
I mean for visitors. He pauses. I guess it doesn’t matter. I mean the whole town’s been thrown away.
Inside the buildings, there are artifacts from the time: old lamp stands, discolored bottles, and broken crockery. A sign states that most of these artifacts are not only from the period but are most likely relics of this actual place, having been scavenged from an abandoned dump nearby.
You walk back outside, and your nephew asks, why are the sidewalks raised? You try to explain about the horses and the cattle without saying the word “shit.” You finally settle on “manure,” and he turns up his nose. He jumps down off the wooden sidewalk and announces there’s no poo here anymore. Why isn’t there any left, he asks, and he seems sincerely baffled. Did someone clean it up? It’s natural, you explain. It decomposes. But watch out for rusty nails, you add, as he starts to remove his shoes.
Before you leave the ghost town, he runs back to the building marked Sheriff’s Office and sets something down outside it. You can’t see it clearly, but you’re pretty sure it’s Lego Sheriff.
Later when you’ve found a campsite, you send him off in search of rocks.
They’re no good, he tells you, not like the ones we bought.
Well, get some big ones then to go around the fire pit.
He wanders off while you fight once more to set up the tent. The pegs go in easily this time, but as soon as you get it raised, a whirlwind blows through, depositing a layer of dust. A few minutes later, a stronger one arrives, and this one rips the bottom corner of the tent. You re-stake the corner and figure it will be alright for a few more nights, at which point the vacation will be over. You walk over to your nephew, who is finishing up the fire pit.
Did you see that last whirlwind? It must have been seventy or eighty feet high.
I guess so, he says.
What do you think of all this nature?
Nature’s boring. It isn’t like the movies. Suddenly his face lights up and he asks, do you think we’ll see a snake?
You tell him you aren’t sure, and then he’s off on something else. He’s spotted what looks like a golden coin upon the ground, but turns out to be a chunk of sap fallen from a tree.
Cool, he says. What kind of tree is this? It’s weird.
You don’t know.
It’s June, he says, why doesn’t it have leaves? And why is the bark that neon shade of green?
Your ignorance is astounding. You’ve seen the tree before, familiar with its strange propensity for blowing giant bubbles of hardened sap, but somehow that doesn’t translate into any useful facts, any semblance of knowledge. You are forced to admit that you know nothing about the desert, this place where you grew up, chasing lizards and throwing rocks.
You look down at the rocks that line the fire pit. All of them are different colors, different textures, but you can’t name a single one. You see something next to them and pick it up, a piece of plastic, which upon closer examination turns out to be a marker from a nursery that gives the name of a plant and its watering instructions. This one is for agave. Water sparingly, it says.
That night, you cook hot dogs over the open fire, which you keep burning as you eat. The sun sets behind the mountains, and the moon is rising. You aren’t sure if it’s full or only close, but you hear coyotes howling in the distance. Your nephew asks if you think there are ghosts out here. You tell him you don’t see any. But, he says, that doesn’t mean that they aren’t here. You can’t exactly contradict him, and so you pull out things for s’mores.
You unwrap two Hershey bars and pull out the top pack of graham crackers wrapped in cellophane. You’ve roasted marshmallows all week, and your bag is almost empty, but you have enough for three s’mores apiece. As you pop the last one into your mouth, the wind picks up and whisks off the lightweight trash that you hadn’t bothered to weigh down. It’s not a whirlwind, just an ordinary gust, and so you try to chase it, but after fifty feet or so, you give it up as lost.
Why did you run after it, your nephew asks when you return, as if puzzled by your action.
You shouldn’t litter, you tell him. If everybody did, the whole desert would be full of trash. And you try to summarize the principles of treading lightly, of packing in and packing out.
But if you put it in a trash can, it just ends up at the landfill, which is in the desert too. How’s that any different?
You don’t know what to say to this. The kid, he has a point. That nursery tag could easily have blown here from the landfill. After all, a potted plant is not exactly the type of thing you take with you when you’re going camping.
Before you can answer him, your nephew spots a large bug running round in circles.
Is it a scorpion, he asks?
You look down. No, you tell him. It’s not a scorpion. It doesn’t have a stinger.
But as he watches it in fascination, you decide to get out the duct tape and tape up the rip that’s on your tent.
The next morning, you make a hearty breakfast in the heavy cast iron pot: crumbled sausage with scrambled eggs and onions, which you scoop into corn tortillas and top with sour cream and salsa. As you settle down to eat, another whirlwind comes and sweeps up the Styrofoam egg carton, which is nearly weightless now that it is empty. Your nephew jumps up and takes off after it.
Don’t worry, he yells back at you, I’ll get it.
But the whirlwind is too fast for him, and when he returns, he looks upset.
There’s something poking through my shoe, he says. I think I stepped on a little cactus, you know, those tiny little ones.
He takes off his Crocs and then he gasps. There’s like a hundred of them in here, he says, and he shows you. It isn’t exactly a hundred, but there are dozens of thorns and spines lodged inside the sole. He turns up the other shoe and finds it’s like that too.
But how did they all get in here? I didn’t know I was stepping on them. And why are there so many?
And he gives you a look of horror and consternation.
You don’t know what to tell him although this time you know the answer. He’s been stepping on them all along throughout the entire trip. The thorns and spines are everywhere, reminding you to keep your distance.
In the end you tell him, it’s just the desert fighting back. That’s the only way it can.
JENNIFER HANDY’S fiction has been published in The Examined Life Journal, Great River Review, Twisted Vine Literary Arts Journal, The Windhover, and elsewhere.
