Charlene’s Daughter

Tom Hanson arches his stiff back and lifts the faded shirt off the fencepost to blot his damp forehead, watching a cloud of dust boil from the rear wheels of an approaching pickup truck.

It’s been a while since anyone’s paid a visit.

He lifts his sun-bronzed face to the sky.  Mid July in southern New Mexico; the sun has browned his skin above the waist, and grit clings as the warm dry air evaporates the sweat on his body.  He’s been setting new fence posts off the south side of the barn.  He doesn’t recognize the truck.  Whoever it is, their cautious driving tells him they’re not familiar with the gravel roads around here.  Maybe they took a wrong turn.

Tom heads across the crusty earth to the pump, reaches for his drinking cup, pumps the handle, pours the first cup down the back of his neck.  He downs the second in two gulps.  The third cup goes on the ground for Lady, one of seven born to a Collie.  Her daddy must have been Labrador, those irresistible, attentive eyes.  The dog becomes alert as the truck draws closer.  The sound of the tires crunching over the gravel reaches his ears.  Still doesn’t recognize the truck, a Ford, late eighties model, lot of miles according to the sluggish whine of the engine.

Some twenty feet away, two females pull to a stop, suitcases and boxes piled in the bed.  The driver’s side door opens.  A foot in brown sandals, a long thin leg, blue jeans too tight for a decent woman.  She’s aged.  Lot of miles etched on her face.  The girl stays in the cab, her feet propped on the dash.

“This place ain’t easy to find, big brother, not after all these years.”

He remembers how youthful she looked at their father’s funeral.  She looks harder now, too many trips around the block.

“You grew up here, Sis.”

She looks the place over.  “Nothin’s changed.”  She grabs hold of the front of her blouse, puffs it up and down to fan her neck.  “Reminds me why I left,” she says looking toward the river; she sees just a glimpse.  Between here and the river, the land, grown over with scattered creosote brush and yuccas, drops several feet.  She remembers the day she got caught swimming naked with Juan Garcia.
Continue reading →