Hooking Trout - 11. Chihuahua Papa

Not often does a nocturnal phone call disturb my eight hours, especially now my stepmom is back from England, but why is it always during my most graphic dreams? The ones where I'm pulled in at the eleventh hour by the Giant's manager and about to make a touchdown in the final seconds of the championship, which means Jimmy Garoppolo's gonna have to make good on a bet to blow me if I scored. Or where the Staten Island Ferry takes an unlikely detour and, now, on a golden shoreline shaded by gently swaying palm trees, I'm about to offer emotional support to a bunch of hot, hunky, horny—and recently out and proud—Olympic swimmers.

"Peter? Is that you?"

Even with sleep funk crowding my head and a telephone line hissing and crackling like frying breakfast, I recognized the voice instantly.

"Dad? It's three in the morning!"

"I know. I'm sorry, son, but I got myself into a little spot of trouble." From the way he says 'little spot of trouble,' two syllables at a time, sliding down in his sing-song voice, I know it's serious. "I need you to come down to El Paso."

"El Paso? What the—? What kind of trouble?"

"I can't explain over the phone. We booked you a flight out of JFK, leaves six this morning. If you get going now you should make it fine. Go straight to the Delta counter."

"This morning? Are you kidding me?" I jump out of bed and take the cordless with me into the living room. I'm suddenly wide awake. "Dad, it's Thursday. I gotta work."

"Take a couple of personal days. And bring your passport. You'll be in before midday. Uncle Willy'll be in the arrivals hall to pick you up."

"Dad, what kind of—? Passport? Why do I need—?"

"Willy'll explain everything when you get here. Get your ass in gear, son. Bye."

The line goes dead before I realize I didn't get his number. I stand in the living room, still hugging my pillow, the phone sticky against my ear, staring at the outline of the painting on the wall. Somehow it looks better in the gloom.

A round of jackhammer snuffling from the sofa bed reminds me that Tommy's still in residence. I wonder fleetingly how long a stretch I would get for smothering an unwanted guest who has overstayed his welcome.

This is all I need. It's three twenty Thursday morning, and Saturday is our engagement party. I ought to have refused, but although he's rarely around, he's always been there for me when I needed him most.

I stuff a change of clothes into my sports bag and think back on something Doug once told me. In one of his lucid, rarely remembered epiphanies, reserved for the end of an alcohol-laced Friday evening, he confided about Stew's mother, 'Buddy. Friends we choose. Family, we're stuck with'.

These days, if anyone asks, my father refers to himself as an entrepreneur. Twelve years ago, he held the position of chief financial officer for a family-run investment bank, let go just before the global meltdown after twenty year's service with a substantial but undisclosed golden handshake. Since then, nobody's quite sure what he's been doing, and twelve years on, some of us are afraid to ask.

I wonder whether to wake Amanda and decide to leave a note instead. She'll be pissed, but the truth is she has all the party arrangements in hand, and I'm sure I'd only get in the way.

As I'm closing the front door, Tommy rolls over and moans. "Mmmnnng. Again, Mr Cavill, sir? Not sure I can get it up again. Oh, fuck. Go on, then." A twinge of jealousy trickles through me like an icicle.

How come he gets to enjoy his dream to the end?

*******

Willy MacDougall—or Uncle Willy, as he is known to June and me—is dad's business partner. He's not a blood relative, but he's been around the family since mom—my real mom—was still alive. Of Scottish descent, he sounds like Scotty from Star Trek but resembles a ginger-haired Colonel Sanders, complete with mustache, goatee, and wide, thick-framed glasses, much favored by Larry King. Unlike Larry's, they are held together at the hinges by Blue-Tak, Elastoplasts, and prayer. Uncle Willy has never had a problem with me being gay. More importantly, he has stuck by my father's side through my mom's death, and since he decided to step out on his own.

At the arrival hall in El Paso, I spot him instantly, standing out like a cameo actor in his trademark powder-blue leather jacket with white sleeve tassels, faded Levis and crocodile cowboy boots with spurs. By-passers stumble sideways a step and ogle, as he plucks off his off-white Stetson and hobbles forward to give me a hug.

"Good to see you, laddie. Sixty degrees and not a cloud in the sky. You picked a fine day to come visit."

"I didn't pick—!" I check myself, deciding to save my irritation for my dad. "Hi, Uncle Willy, how you doing? Where's dad?"

"Uh, he ain't here. It's just you and me." Quickly, before I can catch his expression, he turns to the exit and begins to shuffle off. "Come on, I need you to wait outside. We got a long drive ahead of us."

I stand my ground and call after him. "Hang on. Drive? Where the hell to?"

He turns back, a shadow of dismay flashes across his face. He sighs. "Mexico. Chihuahua City. You did bring your passport, didn't you?"

"Chihuahua City? What the heck's in Chihuahua City?"

With a quick look to the heavens, he turns and heads unsteadily towards daylight, calling over his shoulder.

"Your father."

*******

Shading my eyes from the glare of the sun, I wait outside the El Paso terminal building in the dry mid-morning heat, a very different story to what I left behind in New York. Thumbing my cell phone on, I realize with dismay that not only is there no signal, but the battery is running dangerously low. I switch it off and decide to try again later.

Away to my left, like something straight off the cover of a cheesy Country album, a two-door, open-top, heap of rusted scarlet and chrome glides towards me. As the beast shudders to a halt near the sidewalk, something indistinguishable hisses from beneath the chassis and dribbles into the curb by my feet.

"Ta-da! Meet Delilah."

Grinning up at me, Uncle Willy leans across and tries to open the passenger door, which refuses to budge.

My patience is wearing thin. "What the fuck is this?"

He appears hurt.

"Delilah? She's a '56 Plymouth Belvedere convertible, is what she is. A classic. A true legend."

Despite another pull at the handle, the door refuses to give.

"She's a true piece-of-shit, is what she is. How in God's name is this pile of junk going to get us all the way to Chihuahua City?"

"Relaaaaax," he says, drawing the word out in an effort to calm me. "She runs just fine, laddie. She may not look sexy right now, but all she needs is a bit of love and trust. And at some point, a fresh coat of paint."

"All she needs is a breakers yard. Why didn't you rent?"

With an exasperated grunt, he yanks hard, and this time, the silver lever comes off in his hand.

"I wanted to, okay, but your father insisted I take her, give her a run." He throws the handle over his shoulder into the back seat. "Now, jump in, will ya."

Opening the door from outside proves just as problematic.

"How do you propose I jump in if the freakin' door won't open?"

"You got legs, ain't you? Jump!"

I toss my bag into the back and clamber with graceless ceremony into the passenger seat. Before I've even begun to buckle up, Uncle Willy sticks Delilah into gear and, after a few initial jolts and jars, cruises her smoothly into the stream of midday traffic.

"I hope this top works," I say. Despite my foul mood, Uncle Willy's irrepressible good humor combined with the sensation of riding in a soft-top are already conspiring to seduce me.

"Sure it does, laddie. But you shouldn't worry about a thing like that. Not on a glorious day like today."

*******

Apart from a few amused glances at Delilah and Uncle Willy from customs officials, we have an otherwise uneventful crossing at the Bridge of the Americas, after which Uncle Willy cranks the car into top gear, and we slipstream down Route 45.

Leaning across me, one hand on the wheel, he flips open the glove compartment to reveal an untidy stack of what appears to be mini video-tapes, but what he calls eight tracks. He grabs one at random, stuffs the large casing into the Kyoto player on the dash and, as the first track hits the chorus, starts singing along in an odd, but pleasantly melodic Scottish brogue, one that isn't as evident when he speaks.

"Ventura har-wee, in the suuuun-shane, where the days are longer, the nates are stronger than moo-oooon-shane, you're gonna gooo, ah nooo."

Two-hours, twenty-minutes, three classic West Coast albums, and forty-winks into our six-hour journey from Ciudad Juarez to Chihuahua City, the skies darken, and a few ominous droplets speckle the windshield. Willy turns to me and shakes his head.

"Just a spit. It'll be over in a second."

Barely has he finished speaking when the heavens open with what grandma would call a real turd floater or a gulley washer. By the time Uncle Willy pulls onto the hard shoulder, we are both drenched.

Over the sizzle and clatter of the hood, he shouts and points to a nearby tree. "Give me a second. I'll have the top up in no time." I dive into the shelter leaving him to fiddle at the back of the car.

Ten minutes later, with no sign of the rain letting up and getting more and more frustrated at doing nothing, I go over to see what's happening. The convertible top mechanism has rusted into a solid lump, and no amount of WD40 can free the damn thing up.

"Let me see what else I got in the trunk," Uncle Willy mumbles, rivulets flowing from his saggy red whiskers, the man now bearing a remarkable resemblance to Yosemite Sam.

I follow him around the back, half expecting the trunk to be stuck too, but it opens easily with a gentle metallic yawn. Apart from a mess of oily rags and tins of used gloss paint, we discover a golf umbrella, waterproof sheeting, and a couple of alligator clips. With a quick nod to each other, we decide to improvise.

Trucks and cars honk as they pass us, drivers leaning out and laughing, or calling something in Spanish as we crawl along in the slow lane. Uncle Willy sits beneath the blue plastic sheet clipped to the top of the windshield, draped across the back of his seat, while I hold the rainbow-colored umbrella above my head.

Twenty minutes later, as quickly as they came, the rain clouds depart. We pull over and dry the seats off as best we can.

"There y' are, laddie. Just a fluke rain cloud. Nothing more."

Rather than putting them back in the trunk, however, Uncle Willy chooses to leave the items for our make-do covering on the back seat, within easy grasp. When we set off again, Uncle Willy slips in another tape and begins to hum along to strains of Don Henley, his mood undaunted. I decide to take advantage.

"So, what are you and dad up to these days?"

"Huh?" He glances briefly my way. "Oh, this and that. You know."

"No, I don't know. Why don't you fill me in?"

"Buying and selling, import and export, that sort of thing. Very lucrative." He stretches across and turns up the music volume. "So I hear you're getting yourself hitched to—"

I reach over to turn the volume down.

"Buying and selling what, exactly?"

"All sorts, whatever's profitable. So what's he like, you're new—?"

He reaches over for the volume control, but this time I stay his hand.

"Willy! What are you two buying and—"

"Ask your father," he says, his tone is final.

Somewhere, a distant memory flashes back, of Dad, Uncle Willy, and Uncle Bob at Grandma's Texas ranch, hooting with laughter and firing shotguns at empty beer bottles lined up along the perimeter fence. By the time we get to the outskirts of Chihuahua City, I am convinced my father and Uncle Willy are involved in something illicit like smuggling arms across the border.

Reflecting my mood, the sun begins to sink as Uncle Willy pulls Delilah off the main route and onto the forecourt of a motel.

Motel Mirador is a simple two-story affair, the façade painted brilliant white and punctuated by dark windows and pine doors. A single ceramic tile in blue and yellow stuck to the right of each doorframe indicates the room number. Rows of terracotta pots filled with various species of dusty flora, mostly cacti, decorate the exterior balconies.

Uncle Willy eyes the place with congenial familiarity. "It's nothing special, but it's clean and comfy." He tosses a key to me. "You're in eleven. Go freshen up. We'll meet you in the lobby bar at eight."

"Is dad here?"

"Not yet. But he should be here around eight," Willy shrugs, "but you know your father."

*******

The so-called bar is no bigger than a storeroom, barely large enough to house two tables. When I enter, refreshed, after a cool shower in orange water, Uncle Willy is on the telephone at the counter, nursing a bottle of Dos Equis. With the lip of the bottle, he points to the earpiece against his ear and mouths the word 'dad.'

I motion for the phone, but Uncle Willy holds up his hand.

"Hang on," he says, into the handset, "I'm putting you on speaker."

He reaches confidently for a button on the phone, and I finally hear my father's voice at the other end.

"Son, thanks for coming. Now I have a little favor I need to ask. Just need you to make a little delivery for me. I wouldn't normally ask, but this one's somewhat special."

Somewhat special? I hear the sing-song voice again and ponder whether it is guns. Or drugs. Or both. The odd thing is, the father I knew as a kid would never have considered anything even vaguely illicit. But with the present-day father who only makes the rare guest appearance in my life, who knows? Taking a breath, I pause, perhaps a little too long.

"Son? Are you—?"

"Deliver what, dad?"

Now it's his turn to pause.

"I'd rather not discuss this over the phone, son."

"Then, it's not gonna happen. Look, I agreed to fly halfway across the country, because I thought you were in trouble. I thought you might be in prison, or hospital, or—worse. We're planning an engagement party this Saturday, which, by the way, you should be attending. Now, are you gonna tell me what the fuck is going on or not?"

At the other end, except for heavy breathing, the line goes quiet.

"Okay, son, you have a point." He clears his throat. "Will, are you there?'

Uncle Willy steps forward. "Yep, I'm here."

"Looks like we've got no choice. Better bring him in."

Uncle Willy frowns at me then, his surprise plain.

"Are you sure, Jimmy? When?"

"Right now. The sooner we get this sorted, the better."

*******

Half an hours' drive from the hotel, heading out of town on a remote road, Uncle Willy pulls into a dirt track and after a bumpy ten minutes, stops in front of a long, narrow building of rust-burnished corrugated iron. The structure resembles an old airplane hangar, but lower, not high enough to house a plane.

When he switches off the headlights, we are plunged into complete darkness. Outside the car, he pulls a flashlight from his jacket pocket, and I follow his shaky beam of light along a path around the side of the building. Apart from crickets and cicadas in the bushes around us, buzzing incessantly like an orchestra of chainsaws, it's just the stars, the jagged silhouette of Copper Canyon and us. The only thing missing is Sam Spade and a murdered corpse. Heaven help me.

Behind the building, he hands the flashlight to me, directing me to shine the beam on the lock of a small metal gate. Once Uncle Willy has the door opened, he retrieves the flashlight and stands back.

"Go on in, laddie. I'll get the lights."

A handful of cautious steps inside, I halt and take in the darkness. There seems to be a faint glow from the far corner of the warehouse. For what feels like an eternity, I stand there, sensing something amiss, an odd cloying smell reaches my nose.

"Uncle Willy?"

Silence.

"Uncle Willy? This isn't funny. Turn the freaking lights on."

Neon tube lighting fizzles and pops into radiant life across the room. Blinded for a second, my eyes adjust to the stark light, and I shift my gaze to the array of objects hanging from the roof and walls. Startled, I stumble back a step.

"Oh, my God!"

I barely notice my father step out of the back office. Uncle Willy's spurs clip the metal door as he clumps in behind me and clangs the door firmly closed.

"Welcome to the Pleasure Dome, son," says my father, grinning broadly and holding his arms out in greeting. I am too astonished to move.

"What the fuck have you two gotten yourselves involved in this time?"