I peeked around my dad’s body. The leader rested his hand on the nose of the rifle, which was lazily pointed toward my dad’s head.
My dad reached for the glove compartment and the teenager on my side raised his rifle. The barrel was inches from my face. My dad spoke to the leader in Spanish and pointed to the glove compartment. The barrel dropped and I peed in my pants. I held my breath so I wouldn’t cry. I didn’t move and the piss ran down my leg.
The leader asked my dad about the washing machine. My dad showed him the Sears receipt. My dad and the leader seemed to argue.
The leader grabbed the door handle and I gasped. The teenagers laughed at me. The leader opened the driver’s door and looked behind the bench seat. He yelled to the guy on my side, who opened my door and rummaged through the glove compartment, scattering papers onto the floor and the road. One of them grabbed my dad’s guitar. The guy holding the flag made kissing gestures to me. My dad put his hand over my hand and I stared at the black floor mat and the papers.
The soldiers took money from my dad’s pockets, then one of them threw the guitar case into the truck bed and a sound rose from my dad’s gut. The leader yelled to the kid with the flag and he pulled back the two-by-four. It slid off the sandbags and when there was enough space my dad hit the gas hard. The teenagers whistled and called out.
My dad did not speak. His arm muscles were taut from gripping the steering wheel. I spoke and it startled him.
What? he snapped.
Nothing, I said.
About ten minutes later he pulled over. He told me to change my shorts and I was amazed he had noticed. He fixed the tarp and inspected his guitar. His face looked angry. The vertical crease between his eyebrows cut deep into his skin and it looked like he had a scar there.
Was that all our money?
Almost, he said, then pulled the poker winnings from the sound hole of the guitar.
Ha! I said.
You hung tough, he said.
He kissed me on the cheek.
I love you, he said.
I love you too, I said.
Later that day we came upon another checkpoint. This time I saw only one teenager. He was in uniform like the others had been. He was tall with very dark skin and pimples. He rested something against the sandbags in the shade, and his long spine hooked like the handle of a cane. Gangly legged, he strolled to the truck. He spoke in slow Spanish. He pointed to the washing machine. My dad grumbled and pulled the receipt out of the glove compartment again. On cue the teenager said tax in perfect English. My dad pointed back from where we had come and seemed to recount the heavy tax we had already paid. The teenager looked startled. He craned his head and peered beyond the road into the jungle. Sitting in a folding chair was an older man in uniform with a toothpick in his mouth and a magazine in his hands. The boy whistled and the man tore his eyes from the magazine and shrugged his shoulders, as if bothered. The boy waved the man over.
My dad’s eyes darted around. They landed on the sandbags. Suddenly he hit the gas. The tires squealed, then bit, and the truck lurched and charged the barricade. I ducked and heard the wood ping off the grill.
Stay down! he yelled.
He tucked his head between his shoulders like a pigeon and kept the pedal to the floor. I heard a loud pop.
Stay down!
I crouched into the leg space under the glove compartment. I felt the truck pull as we rounded a turn. The truck righted and he looked back.
We’re clear, he said.
Holy shit Dad!
I wasn’t going to play that game again, he said.
What was that noise?
A gunshot.
Crouched under the dash I stared at his knee thinking about a bullet puncturing his skull.
They don’t have a car, I said. Right?
No. They probably get picked up and dropped off.
What about a radio?
Maybe. But probably not.
What if they do?
I didn’t see one. I think we’re lookin’ good.
I crept onto the bench seat and panted like a dog.
Ollestad. Take it easy. We’re fine. They’re long gone.
I looked at him and he saw the fear and disappointment in my eyes.
I didn’t think he’d get to his rifle so fast, he said. He seemed slow.
That was stupid, I said.
He nodded and ran his hand through his curly brown hair. He stared out the window and his eyes were lost in the beaten blacktop. He looked regretful, sort of confused.
I hated being put in this position—shit-in-my-pants scared. Now something worse was happening. Dad looked scared.
What’s going to happen? I said.
Nothing.
What if there’s another checkpoint?
I’ll just have to pay a bigger tax, he said with a smile.
It’s not funny, I said.
It was tense for a second there, he said. But we’re lookin’ golden now.
I kept imagining the bullet tearing open the back of his head. I kept thinking about the checkpoint guards tracking us down and torturing us. The more relaxed my dad became the faster bad scenarios flooded my mind.
I’m never going anywhere with you again, I said.
Ah come on, Ollestad.
I shook my head and we both stared out the windshield. That’s how it was for a long time.
I heard thunder crawl over the mountains and soon afterward it started to rain. The road began to descend. I glimpsed the metallic ocean over the tops of the green maze. The view was eclipsed by a canopy of overhanging branches with leaves so thin they looked like paper cutouts veiling the sky beyond.
We hit the coast a few minutes later and pink veins of electricity zapped on and off like neon lights gouging the ocean. I couldn’t see the immediate coastline through the jungle, just intermittent swells of ocean out by the horizon.
Silver-dollar raindrops splattered the windshield, drumming the roof, and the swollen ravines on the sides of the road occupied my attention. Suddenly, the truck was skating across the road. My dad braked and the truck tailed out, then the wheels bit and the truck tipped like it was going to roll over. Dad corrected the steering wheel and we waggled back to our side of the road. He glanced at me and smiled like it was nothing.
Curtains of rain moved like giant spider legs across the oily blacktop, trampling into the jungle. The tarp clung to the washing machine. My dad clung to the steering wheel, his knuckles turning white. I mulled over all the bad things I had done in my life. The lies. I wished I hadn’t done anything bad because it seemed like that would help us now. I promised not to tell any more lies if we managed to get out of this.
The windshield wipers stopped. My dad wiggled the lever but nothing happened.
