I don’t understand you, she said. You’re my brother, but I don’t understand you.
I know, I said. But I’m asking you, as a brother, even though you don’t understand me, to trust that this is something I have to do.
All right. I can do that. Work your magic, padre. See if you can make a miracle happen.
There’s only one person who can make miracles happen, I said. And right now I’m hoping he loves Mexicans.
We each came out of the pantry carrying a bottle of wine in one hand and a pair of glass Mason jars in the other. Whatever qualms the widows had about us drinking were rendered moot by our introduction to the world of violence. We passed the afternoon sipping wine from jars right beside our mothers. No one said much of anything on any topic. We drank wine and stared at the walls and tried to ignore the groans of pain echoing softly from the far end of the hall.
And I have seen my father drunk and uncovered, the pale immensity of him turning pink in the heat of the sun. And I have tried to turn my head away and be respectful and ignore the wine soaking into his whiskered chin. My brothers will never know the shame and fear our father could cause in a child’s tender heart. To them he is already a shade and a memory, who can do no more harm to anyone. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, and there’s no greater absence than death. But to me he will always be close, terribly close, close and not forgotten. No, never that. And I have felt his breath on my neck from time to time when I’m alone. And I have heard his voice in the high narrow halls of our house, in places he never walked except that I walked there and he walks with me. Always with me. But if I am cursed then every part of me is cursed. My family is cursed and my nation, too, and even he, the curser, will feel the burden of his cursing words in time. A snake eating its own tail, a bear killing its cubs to keep the sow in heat. And I have been desperate in body and heart. And I have fallen for the fickle and depraved.
Chris taught me about killing before he taught me about shooting. The first time we went out into the orchards, he only brought one rifle. We walked along the edge of the fence posts and out past the end of the property line and onto the neighbor’s parcel. A brown hawk glided high overhead, rising effortlessly on the slope of the wind. Chris planted the rifle butt against his shoulder and dislodged the safety and fired a single shot into the air. The hawk seemed to shrink inside itself before rolling over and falling already dead through the barrier of leaves and creaking branches that separated sky from earth. Chris reset the safety and looked at me.
You think you could do that yourself?
I nodded.
All right then, he said. But we’re going to start you off on glass bottles, work your way up to targets that move and breathe.
A bird doesn’t look that hard to hit.
It’s not, if all you want to do is take it down. But I’m going to show you how to go for the clean kill each time, and that starts with practicing your aim.
The clean kill?
He pressed two fingers to the base of his throat. Through the neck, he said. That way you won’t have to deal with having a wounded animal on your hands. It’s less important for birds, but a bigger animal can make a real mess if you don’t put it down clean on the first shot. You get what I’m saying?
I nodded again.
All right then. I’ve got some bottles here in my pack. You count off twenty paces in that direction while I set them up. And try to keep each step the same distance.
He followed his own advice, positioning each bottle in the center of the post so they were all spread out evenly along the top of the fence. I would’ve recognized Mom’s brands of wine anywhere, but it didn’t stop me from firing when I was ordered to shoot. The first two shots sailed high, but then Chris adjusted the sight for me and afterward I hit four in a row, three dead-center through the labels. He brought out more bottles and had me try it again from fifty and a hundred paces, instructing me all the while about holding my grip steady and the difference between squeezing and pulling. On the final series I hit two bottles through the base and knocked another off its post without breaking it. Chris seemed pleased with the quick progress I was making. He reached over and touched my shoulder and squeezed it gently.
It’ll take more practice for you to really get comfortable with it, he said. But you’re on track to become one hell of a marksman, I can already tell.
I hope so, I said. Can we come out here again tomorrow?
If you like. But do me a favor. Don’t tell your mother about the bottles I got out of her recycling bin. I know she likes to turn them in for the deposit.
Don’t worry. I won’t say anything.
Thanks. You’re a good man. Proud of you.
He smiled and took a cigarette from his shirt pocket and lit it with a match. He took one drag and held it out for me to accept. No harm in it, he said. Long as you don’t make it a habit.
I held the burning cylinder between my fingers and breathed smoke into my lungs for the first time. I tried not to cough, but I couldn’t help it. As much as Dad enjoyed his cigars, he was never around enough for me to get used to them. I took a second drag, this time without inhaling, and passed the rest back to Chris. Thanks, I said. Wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be.
Chris smiled. Nothing ever is, he said.
He swung the rifle over his shoulder and started leading us back out the way we came. Now I had two secrets to share with him. I liked that, having a secret to hold onto with an adult. Sometimes it felt like everything I did was under the scrutiny of the older generation. If not Dad himself, then Mom, the teachers, the administrators, the priests, and all the clerks and busybodies in between. So having someone older around who knew how to do things, and was eager to teach them to me, and who confided in me like I was a grown man myself—it meant a lot to me. Maybe more than the shooting itself.
Next time we’ll try out some live targets, he said as we crossed back into the vineyard. You really impressed me today with how fast you caught on.
Thanks, I said. It felt good hitting the mark.
Always does, son. Always does.
The orchards became our private hunting ground, a poor man’s country club where the only leisure activity available involved pitting our skills and brains against the survival instincts of whatever smaller creatures came before us. Squirrels, gophers, hawks, even the occasional lanky brush rabbit. All that fell within our sights were taken down, through the neck, a clean kill to rid our lands, or at least the neighbor’s lands, of whatever minor nuisance the animals were capable of provoking. The first time I saw a coyote in the distance, slapping its flat paws on the gravel with its snout low to the ground, the rifle almost leapt out of my hands, I was so excited. From the shady blind of overgrowth I was in, I turned the bolt and drove a bullet straight into the chamber. But Chris stopped me before I could discharge the safety and send the bullet on ahead to do its work.
You don’t have it, he said, lowering the barrel with his outstretched hand. From this distance all you could do is wing it. Best case scenario it’ll take off running, and then bleed out a mile down the road. You don’t want it that way. Trust me.
I set my eyes on the dirt beneath us. Without having to see, I knew my opportunity had come and gone, that the coyote had scampered back behind the safety of the tree cover, oafishly unaware of how close it came to being fired upon.