“Aston, get away from there!” Mike yelled at the boy who was staring through the window. The boy took the stick he was holding and ran back toward him as if the trouble he had created for himself had not fazed him. The kid was stocky, oversized for the five years he had accumulated on earth. Though the tragedy of his life was obvious by virtue of him being there, his demeanor defied it. Instead of collapsing, he had turned into a brave little warrior, already at war with life. But, that warrior nature made him either a little hero or a bully, depending on the day.
When Aria and Taylor emerged from the vehicle they now called home, Mike motioned to them to join him by his army-green ridge tent. They made their way across the lot apprehensively.
“Hey, I’m sorry about that, I didn’t mean for him to wake you. He’s a little rambunctious sometimes.”
Aston had found a place in the dirt and was digging at it with his stick aggressively. “I heard you playing guitar the other day; you’re good,” Aria said.
“Oh thanks, it’s just something I picked up along the way. I’m not really very good, but I enjoy it. Would you like some coffee?” he asked.
“Um, OK,” Aria said, not because she actually drank coffee, but because the way he asked implied it would be a rejection of him instead of the coffee if she were to refuse.
Mike was a man of few words. He talked the way that Aria imagined the cowboys of Wyoming would talk. She liked it. She found herself asking him questions just so she could hear the way his voice sounded. He warmed up the coffee on a little Coleman gas camping stove and poured them each a cup in a pair of blue metal mugs. “Have you met Ciarra yet? She lives just over there,” he said, pointing to the purple van.
“Yes,” Aria said.
“She’s my daughter. We named her Cameron, but she changed it to Ciarra for whatever reason,” Mike said with a smile. Just peering out from underneath his trucker hat, he seemed simultaneously embarrassed and proud to claim her as his own. “I watch Aston for her when she’s on a night shift. She doesn’t stay here that often. Only when she breaks up with one of her boyfriends,” he said, making light of a situation that he obviously disapproved of.
Mike didn’t feel like he had the right to exert much authority over Ciarra. Aria gathered that this was because she had spent the majority of her childhood with her mother and had only reconnected with Mike after she dropped out of high school to live with him.
A large rectangle of cardboard was leaned up against the mouth of his tent. There were three lines written on it that read: No job. Willing to work. God bless. Mike noticed Aria looking at it.
“I’m not a beggar,” he said. “I only use it if I can’t find a job.” Aria smiled back at him to lessen his obvious shame about it.
Mike explained that he did not see himself as homeless any more than he saw himself as a beggar. As far as he was concerned, he was just a man without a job looking to get back on his feet. He took any work that was offered to him. The only problem was that not many people wanted to hire a man his age, especially for the manual labor jobs that were most widely available to people in his particular situation. For Mike, asking for favors was only a back-up when temporary work, pawning off possessions or collecting plastic bottles had failed. He was a proud sort of man. It was a trait that his daughter, Ciarra, had inherited. And part of that pride was evident in his decision to help raise his grandson Aston, despite having next to no experience in childcare himself.
Taylor was uncharacteristically silent that morning. Aria could tell by how slowly he was sipping his coffee that he, too, was drinking it out of courtesy.
Two men approached the tent. Mike greeted them submissively and, obviously wanting to make them feel welcome, motioned to them to sit down on two foldable camping stools. They said hello and waved at Taylor and Aria without introducing themselves, and began to talk as if the young people weren’t there.
“You wouldn’t believe the line down at JWC yesterday,” one of them told Mike. He was an older man, whose toothless mouth was drawn into a smile that paled in comparison to the smile of his eyes. They gleamed with pleasure under the gray whiskers serving as eyebrows. His nose was bulbous and far too big for his face. But it made him all the more endearing to look at. Silver stubble covered his chin and what was left of his hair was wafted into Einstein-like tufts on top of his head. Even though she had only just met him and had not yet even been introduced, Aria knew she could love this man. She had an image in her head of a grandpa bouncing his two grandkids on his knee with a Christmas tree glittering in the background. This man looked like he had come straight out of that vision and into real life. The instant affection that she felt for him made her all the more shy toward him.
Mike became uncomfortable with Aria and Taylor’s exclusion from the conversation. “Hey, let me introduce you to these guys.” He pointed first at the less vocal of the two of them. “This is Darren, and this is Bob.”
“Robert, but you can call me Bob,” the older man corrected him with a humble wave in Aria’s general direction. Darren just nodded his head, obviously leery of the youngsters’ sudden presence in
