1950s SMALL TOWN LIFE: SMUGGLING PEACHES

As usual, Mother wasn't taking my worrying seriously. There she sat at the kitchen table washing peaches. We were leaving this evening, going back to Texas. I was excited because I hadn't seen my older brothers and sister for almost three months, but I hated to leave our summer life too. Even Vance, possibly the meanest boy I had ever known.

Leaving as the sun was setting meant that we would cross the hottest parts of the desert while it was dark and cool. Also, I had heard my parents talk about us girls sleeping through a large part of the trip.

They had bought a little baby bed mattress for Jan to sleep on about six weeks into our stay in Calexico. That was purchased shortly after the night we were visiting the Whites, and Susan and I, asked by Mr. White how we liked living here, went into great detail about Jan sleeping so comfortably in the dresser drawer. My dad developed a coughing fit, and we stopped talking only when all eyes were on him, wondering if he were going to survive without choking to death.

The mattress fit snugly across the back seat and covered the back floorboard, making a large flat space. We could play and sleep on it, according to their plan.

But now I was secretly worried that we wouldn't make it across the border to Arizona. I say secretly because I had told Mother my concern, and after I cajoled, wheedled, begged, and whined for over half an hour, she finally tired of it and told me firmly to stop asking questions and to STOP worrying, that it was not a problem and that it was a grownup matter, and nothing for a six year-old child to worry about.

After that, my worrying took the silent interior route. My lips zipped shut, I would think about it, absentmindedly say "uh, what about...", get a glance from Mother, and immediately settle back into silence, difficult as it was for me to maintain.

My concern? Peaches!! I know I specifically overheard my parents discussing the trip and my father telling her that peaches could not be taken across the border because it was illegal to do so. Something about bugs hitching a ride in the seeds or some notion like that.

I didn't get all the details, but I knew one thing. I didn't want to be in the car with any peaches, not when we crossed the border anyway. The guards there wouldn't know my dad, and I doubted they would wave him across like the guards in Mexicali.

Most of the stuff we had used this summer belonged to Mrs. Bivens and the motel, so we only had to pack our clothes. Mother had started several days before and today had only to finish putting the final items in the bags.

The two suitcases I had seen under their bed were now filled with clothes and lying open on the bedspread. Two more bags were unfolded on the bed in our room. Our clothes were neatly folded and laid inside. Mother didn't want our help in packing. In fact, she had asked Mrs. White if we could visit over there for a few hours this afternoon so she could get most of the packing finished.

There had been almost no rain this summer. One day three drops fell as we were entering the grocery store, and when we got inside and turned to watch the rain out the large plate glass window, it had already stopped. We played with Andy and Vance inside because outside the temperature topped 105 degrees. Their housemotel looked just like ours, but no one had to sleep in a drawer because there were only two kids, not three.

Susan was deeply involved in reading Charlotte's Web, so she sat on the couch in the kids' bedroom reading. It looked like the thickest book she had ever attempted. The rest of us decided to play Go Fish, but I had to help Jan. Vance tried to help her, but I could tell he didn't really want to; he was just trying to make his mother think better of him. It was wasted effort.

His mother looked in on us frequently. Often, when Vance said anything, she rolled her eyes, or turned on her heel. Sometimes she spoke sharply to him. She told us over and over how much she liked our mother and how she hated for her to leave. They would be leaving soon, too, though; they lived in another part of California, up north. They could drive there in about four hours.

We had all hugged goodbye, including Mother and Mrs. White.

"Don't cry now, Elaine," Mother had said soothingly. "We'll write. Maybe someday we'll see one another again." I knew she didn't really think that. She had said she hoped Daddy never had to work so far away again, but she was just trying to make Mrs. White feel better.

"But I have just enjoyed this summer so much because of you," Elaine sniffed. "You actually enjoy playing with the children. And Vance minded you better than he ever does me."

At that, Vance looked up at Mother sort of sheepishly, and she smiled and patted his shoulder.

"Vance knows how to mind," she said, sounding more sure of it than I felt.

"Well, we'll try to keep in touch," Mother laughed. "Got to get back to my older kids. I think they grew up a lot this summer. Like it or not."

The four of us had crunched gravel all the way back to our house,melting like candles in the heat, and rushed into the cavelike interior where Mother went straight to the kitchen and started washing peaches.

When Daddy got home from work, he showered while Mother loaded the bags into the car.

"You girls get in the car," she said as she took the keys to the office where Mrs. Bivens stepped out in the withering heat and hugged her, telling her how much she had enjoyed getting to know her.

"Snake killers together," I thought, remembering the day the "cord" moved, and they had to kill it.

Susan looked over at me, as though reading my mind. "Mrs. Bivens is no sissy," she said, and laughed.

Susan lifted Jan up onto the mattress in the backseat, and we crawled up after her. We made a few bounces to check it out. This could be fun, we decided. Jan liked it the best, and we bounced her around a little until her arm got wedged between the mattress and the front seat.

About that time, Mrs. Bivens walked up to the car and stuck her head in.

"Oh dear," she said, pushing the mattress back and dislodging Jan's arm. "Are you girls going to be okay back here?"

"Yes ma'am," Susan answered. "We just got a little carried away."

"Ok, then. Be good. And write me. I've sure enjoyed having you here this summer."

Daddy had sat down in the driver's seat by then, and Mother opened the other door and glided into the passenger seat. As the car pulled slowly out of the parking lot, the three of us got on our knees,turned toward the back windshield, and waved sadly at Mrs. Bivens, who returned our melancholy expression.

"Let's play Battle," I said.

"Ok," Susan agreed, "But only for ten minutes. I want to read a little before it gets dark."

When we got to the border of Arizona, the sun was just setting, its broad red brushstrokes spread across the sky canvas. A man in a uniform stepped out and motioned for us to stop. I had planned to talk to Daddy, who was a rule obeyer like me, when he got home from work, but things had gotten chaotic, and I hadn't gottten a chance to tell him about the peaches. I thought Mother had put them in the trunk, but I wasn't sure.

I thought I could smell them every now and then. A faint whiff of peach scent wafting on the air. Maybe it was seeping through some hole from the trunk.

Daddy got out and talked to the man. They scuffed their shoes in the dirt and laughed a little. Daddy was gifted that way. He could immediately establish a rapport with people, no matter who they were or what they did. He just seemed to like them, and they seemed to know it.

I had always heard that if you approached a dog in a nonthreatening manner you would be more likely to make friends, but some of our dogs were just mean, so I didn't approach them at all. Still, it seemed like good advice. But now the man was pointing toward the car. Even my dad's winsome personality couldn't stop the inevitable search.

Mother seemed to take that as her cue. She hopped out of the car and stood by the right front fender, her slim frame silhouetted against the red sunset. The man tipped his cap toward her, and then she moved toward the back of the car as the two men approached.

Daddy had a key in his hand. The three of us turned again on our knees and looked out the back windshield, resting our chins on our crossed arms, observing. Jan was between us so we could guard the doors, making sure they were locked to keep anyone from falling out.

Daddy moved his hand below our line of sight to unlock the trunk, and the lid popped up, blocking our view. I had to dig my knees down into the mattress so I could squench down and look through the crack between the trunklid and the rear window.

"Susan! Susan! Do you think the peaches are in there? Do you think the guard will see the peaches? Would they arrest her? Could they take her to jail?" My voice sounded high and frantic, but I kept it soft for fear the guard would hear me.

"Shh," is all I heard in response.

My anxiety was rising by the second. I could barely see the fronts of Daddy's khaki shirt, the man's starched brown uniform, and Mother's white sleeveless cotton blouse. I couldn't see their faces now. A hand was visible every now and then, but it moved so quickly I couldn't tell whose it was or what it was doing. I figured she must have put the large plastic bowl of peaches under the suitcases.

"If that man raises the suitcases, he'll see the peaches," I whispered in a coarse, tight voice. My anxiety caused my throat to feel constricted and rough.

"Shhh," Susan said again, more emphatically this time.

"I want a peach," Jan piped up. I looked furtively toward the back windows which had been hastily rolled down when we stopped. Could he hear her?

"Shhh," Susan said, patting Jan softly on the back. "We'll have a snack later."

"Ok, should I just go tell him about the peaches" I asked, feeling like it was inevitable that the border guard would find them, and thinking it would be better to "fess up"; maybe he would forgive an honest person.

"Shh," Susan said, then, "Are you crazy? Don't say anything. Let Mother and Daddy handle this."

Just as I had my hand on the doorhandle, thinking seriously of getting out and setting everything straight about the little fuzzy orbs, Daddy slammed the trunk, and the three of them looked up at the three of us peering at them and started laughing.

Daddy shook hands with the border patrolman, walked toward his side of the car, and got in, as Mother did on the other side. The car rolled slowly through the border station.

"Lib, you surely didn't bring those peaches, did you?" Daddy asked. "I swear I keep smelling them. I'm not sure what would have happened if we'd had any with us crossing the border. It's strictly illegal to transport them across."

"I knew the kids would need something good to eat tonight," she responded unapologetically. "That's the silliest rule I ever heard," she said lightly, gazing out the window at the unending sand.

Looking up toward the rearview mirror, I saw my Dad's eyes open wide. Then he raised his eyebrows and rolled his eyes around quickly. He shook his head slowly side to side several times.

"Lib, lib, lib," he said, with slight amusement; then he started laughing quietly.

"I want a peach," Jan said again.

"Ok, honey, just a few minutes till we get out of sight of the border patrol station. Daddy will have to stop the car so I can get them out from under the mattress on the floorboard in the back."

All of a sudden the smell was overpowering. They were right under us all the time! My mouth watered, and I couldn't wait till we stopped and bit into those juicy peaches.

"Is it illegal to eat peaches in Arizona?" I started, but Mother held up her hand with the palm facing me and made little motions toward me.

We weren't allowed to say "shut up", but I felt like she had just said it to me in the nicest way.
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