Mother worked at Big Al’s diner for the last twenty years, over on Cole Street and 2nd, right across from the police station. Daddy was an outlaw of some kind, the last sort of man like that to kick up dust around Lamesa. Having your Daddy be a dirtbag meant I ain’t never got to be friends with no one at school. He tried once to start a Baptist church but couldn’t get no followers on account of him swearing and cursing every other word during the sermons. Kids is always judging other kids based on what their parents think about a family, thinking the only thing that makes you you is the blood you get from your kin. 

My folks named me Josephus, taken from my Mother’s daddy’s daddy. Mother told me her Papa used to walk out into the woods with no clothes on singing gospel songs since Jesus told him it would save his wicked soul. Never could figure out why she’d want to curse me with the name of some crazy man, but it was better than naming me after my daddy’s daddy Ulysses. Her Daddy is buried out in Durham cemetery, over there by Gail, where some man invented milk. We visited Papa’s grave once. I remember his gravestone rhyming, saying something like, so you must be and prepare for death and follow me.

My Daddy tried keeping in touch, calling me from prison to chew me out about this or that, trying to give me some kind of virtuous morals he never thought Mother could. Mother didn’t want me talking to him so much, wanted me to be on the straight and narrow or at least talk crime to someone that ain’t never been caught. Daddy would start every call the same way, saying he ain’t got much time on the phone cause quarters ain’t so easy to come by and this time was no different.

‘Now look here Josie. I ain’t got much time. Them guards stole my quarters again. I buried a treasure for your Mother the day before those goddamn cops found me. Ain’t no normal treasure son. Listen to me. Ain’t nobody knows where it’s buried but them Apache boys that live out west of Tahoka. Somehow somebody in here figured out about it and now they’s blackmailing me. Them Apaches ain’t gonna know you’re coming to get that treasure since I can’t get no message to ‘em. They is gonna kill your ass quick as a prairie dog gets into its hole if you don’t play your cards right. Seeing as you is my only blood, it’s your god given destiny to go get that treasure to save my life. You hear me Josie? You owe me.’

I asked my Daddy how the hell I was supposed to get some made up treasure from some Apaches without getting killed when he was probably too drunk at the time to recall where he buried it and he told me, ‘Look we’s running out of time. Get that goddamn treasure to your Mother by Sunday or these boys in here is going to kill your Mother and me, and then you’ll be an orphan just like your Daddy.’ 

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Mother couldn’t help but tell stories about my Daddy when she started drinking, worried I’d end up like him if she made ‘em sound too good. She’d try to give the stories some lessons about what not to do in life, but I couldn’t help but wanting to have those same adventures as my Daddy. It’s boring in Lamesa when you’re an outcast with no prospects for nothing but being poor or being in jail. 

One time, she said all the rich folks were having a grand ol’ soiree outside of town, out by highway 137 on the way to White City. Judge Davis’s daughter Lucinda Davis was getting married to one of R.V. Smith’s sons. She didn’t remember his first name since he flew in from somewhere east and that she ain’t never met a man that flew in from the east.

Way Mother she tells it, my folks met the day of the party, making up the plan as they walked along the aisles of the H-E-B. Mother said my Daddy walked right up to her and asked her if she wanted better clothes than them tattered old jeans she was wearing. Said my Daddy knew about some party at a big wig’s ranch and that he could get her a job serving food if she helped him steal something. Promised her riches she said. Liked the thrill of an adventure and the thought of making money.

Mother worked at the party for Lucinda Davis and the Smith boy, passing around trays of bacon-wrapped jalapenos stuffed with cream cheese. Mother said Daddy told her to make a big scene sometime during the party to create a distraction, to give my Daddy time to sneak into R.V. Smith’s study. See, R.V. Smith owned enough land in Dawson county to feed the whole town. He always won the annual Dawson County Chicken Fried Steak Cooking Contest because he bought up all the best cuts of steak and all the best flour and all the best spices and all the best fry oil. Mother said none of them other boys in town never had nothing to show for cooking them chicken fried steaks every year, and one of ‘em deserved a trophy. I heard from one of Lucinda Davis’ cousins the judges at the contest, who came from all around Dawson county, ain’t never even ate the damn chicken fried steaks from anybody else, ‘cept Judge White. Way Mother tells it, my Daddy ain’t have no other choice but to steal one of them trophies, saying Daddy would be a hero for the county.

Mother did what my Daddy told her and spilled a mess of jalapenos on Lucinda Davis, getting a whole pile of them jalapeno seeds into her eyes. Mother told me Lucinda Davis let out such a cry all the cows out in the pasture started to moo, thinking they were getting the call to dinner. I reckon them cows ain’t fed but once a year cause they ended up breaking through the fence and stampeding right through the middle of the party. Mother said Daddy watched them cows run over Mr. Flowers who ran First Bank of Lamesa from Mr. Smith Sr.’s second-floor study. Said the cows even killed some innocent man who was working at the party handing out little brisket sandwiches. 

Daddy was surrounded by trophies from the chicken fried steak cooking contest for the last sixty years. All the prizes had the same parts, a gold chicken fried steak topped with diamond gravy, attached to a gold spire that was real thin at the tip until it touched the base where some words was written. Dawson County Chicken Fried Steak Cook-Off First Prize 2001. I reckon my Daddy looked at the plaques for a long time, thinking about all them times that R.V. Smith cheated him and feeling some kind of revenge was needed to make things right in the world.

Swept up in all the commotion, Mother helped Daddy flee the party, camping out underneath the stars and making love to celebrate the successful caper. The next day, Mother left to go back home, so the police wouldn’t think she was an accomplice in case things went south. 

The police found my Daddy hiding out by Tobacco creek up near where the Colorado River gets real thin, pointing guns at him since he had the highest bounty out in the county. Texas Rangers don’t fool around none when it comes to high rewards, seeing as they got reputations to uphold. Judge Davis made damn sure he sent my Daddy off to prison for a real long time since Daddy ruined his daughter’s big party and embarrassed Mr. R.V. Smith and his son. Nine months later, Mother had me while Daddy ended up getting twenty-five years at the state penitentiary in Huntsville.

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After a time, Mother moved on from my Daddy, falling in love with Eliza Franklin, who worked at the taxidermy shop skinning bucks every hunting season. Eliza was tougher than a bag of nails, the toughest person in the whole county as far as I knew and she seemed to actually like me if only to please Mother. I figured I’d ask her to come with me to meet the Apaches. She ain’t one to make a fuss or ask a boatload of questions, and truth-be-told I ain’t have no other soul to ask.

On the drive out west, Eliza Franklin started to tell me about my Daddy. ‘Your Daddy told your Mother he buried something in the ground years back. Claimed it was some kind of treasure that would change your Mother’s life, change the world even. Thought it was him trying to make her stay in love with him myself. Your Mother ain’t never paid it no mind, seeing as he was a lying son-of-a-bitch his whole damn life. Still don’t believe there’s treasure out there, but if he’s telling his son to go out to some field and dig it up. Well, I don’t see how no man can send his son out on a suicide mission for no good reason.’

‘Daddy made it sound like he was gonna get killed by some boys in jail if he didn’t get the treasure. You think he’s lying?’ I asked Eliza Franklin.

‘Only thing your Daddy done with his life is lie. Only reason I’m coming out here is to make sure you don’t get yourself killed Josie,’ she told me back. 

Eliza Franklin and Mother always seemed suspicious of me, thinking my Daddies blood was gonna make me turn out just like him no matter what I did. She said she was coming out here to protect me, but I suspect she was coming out here to give Mother what they thought was owed to them just the same. 

‘You bring that gun with you?’ I asked.

Eliza Franklin showed me the gun which made me feel a bit nervous and safe, like I was nearer to heaven while walking through hell. It was all silver and snub-nosed so it could fit in her pocket without drawing no prying eyes.  

We made it to Arledge road out near Sanco, where all the Apaches lived and where they had a roadblock up so no outsiders could get in without permission. When we got up to the gate, Eliza told me to keep quiet.

The big Apache at the gate ain’t have no emotion, asking Eliza Franklin, ‘What you want here?’

‘We came out here to talk to Slippery Star. He ain’t know we’re coming, but he knows me. I skinned deer for him sometime back,’ Eliza Franklin said.

‘Slippery Star don’t take visitors no more. Go back down the road you came.’ 

‘Now you listen here. We done already drove 120 miles to get out to this god-forsaken-place. We didn’t come all this way just to be told by some fat-assed footsoldier Slippery Star wasn’t taking guests no more. I’d be willing to bet my left eye if he done found out that you weren’t letting us in here, you’re going to hear more than an earful from Slippery Star and that big ol’ buck knife of his. Don’t be acting like you don’t know the one I’m talking ‘bout. It’s got a black and red buckhorn handle and a blade that goes from here to Lubbock. If you don’t let me in there, I’ll make goddamn sure that Slippery Star shoves the business end of that knife right into that big ol’ gut you thought right to put on the door of my newly washed Chevy here. Now get your goddamn belly off my door and let us through or I’ll get out of this truck and show you what for.’

We went through the gate. Eliza had her hand on her pistol the whole time she talked to the man at the entrance, keeping it there while we drove through the sorry looking town. 

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Slippery Star came out of his house. We waited in Eliza Franklin’s truck, by sixteen cars in a row that all looked like they seen better days. I don’t know what it is about Apaches, but they loved having a pile of cars at their house.

Eliza Franklin told me to stay in the car while Slippery Star walked towards us in nothing but a pair of shorts that looked like he got them from some thrift store fifty years ago. He looked like how a man named Slippery Star would look. His face was weathered from time and being deadly broke his whole life. 

Slippery Star looked right at me when he was walking up to where Eliza Franklin was standing like he was trying to put something in my mind, not a warning but not a trick neither. Those goddamn Apaches is always being mysterious with their motives. She was fussing with some grass between her fingers, looking more nervous the closer he got. Them two talked for a time, smiling only once to each other during some story I couldn’t hear.

They done a whole mess of pointing in every direction while they were talking, I reckon to try and figure out which direction the treasure was buried. After about fifteen minutes, they shook hands, and Slippery Star yelled back towards his house. Two younger boys, looking about fourteen years old, came running outside. They didn’t say nothing while Slippery Star talked to them, pointing towards the shed, past where all the cars was parked, and yelling something to the both of ‘em. One of the boys, the taller one, ran towards the shed while the second boy hopped in the back of the truck bed. The taller boy returned after a time with two shovels, handing them to the other boy in the truck bed and jumping into the bed himself. Eliza Franklin and Slippery Star shook hands one last time, and we drove past Slippery Star’s house, deeper into his land.

‘He told me your Daddy said it was somewhere yonder, past his house and them derricks in the horizon. Your Daddy told you the particulars, right?’

‘Daddy told me there’s gonna be three cedar trees in a triangle. One of them trees is dead. Always has been, he said. He said drive past the nodding donkeys for six miles, then look to the west, and you’ll see them three trees.’

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All four of us was out there digging where them three trees was. I went over near the truck because I thought I heard a whisper tell me to move from where I was, thought it might be Slippery Star finally giving me some kind of clear direction. Eliza Franklin hit something with her shovel that made a sound like metal on metal.  She dug with her hands to remove the dirt from the trophy, a bag, and a box. The two Apache boys and Eliza Franklin looked at the little blue box wrapped in purple twine like it was the angel Gabriel coming down from heaven, asking them to gather arms for the last battle. The three of ‘em drew on each other as soon as the shorter Apache boy resurrected the little blue box from the ground. Act of God if you ask me. Wasn’t no use trying to cover up the scene, seeing as every Apache and law and Smith in the state would be coming after me soon, and no one would believe what happened out there was fate. I ain’t one to test.

Drove out of Sanco fast as Eliza Franklin’s truck would let me, passing Slippery Stars house before breaking through the wooden barrier where the fat guard kept watch. I figured I needed to get a headstart on whatever would be coming for me next so there wasn’t no point in stopping for nothing. Riding shotgun was the trophy my Daddy stole from R.V. Smith, $10,000 cash, and the little blue box wrapped in purple twine with a note tied to it, saying it was for Mother. What I thought was my Daddy wanting to do something nice for Mother ended up being another lie. That box he stole from R.V. Smith had something in it, something unexplainable ‘cept it just made three people kill each other, either through its mystery or some kind of power. Either way it had me in its grips now and was telling me to go south. 

I left Mother the trophy, hiding it behind the old bourbon barrel she kept on the porch. Didn’t know what was lie and what was truth from my Daddy no more, so I played both sides and left Mother the only thing I thought she knew about from that caper at R.V. Smith’s house all them years back.  Me, the money, and the blue box took Eliza Franklin’s truck south, making it to Big Bend that night to rest and plan how we was gonna make it to Chihuahua in the morning. The law would take longer than normal to get on our trail since the scuffle happened in a town of Apaches and all. I tucked the box underneath my pillow made out of my rolled-up pants and fell asleep in Eliza Franklin’s truck.

Me, the money, and the little blue box wrapped in purple twine were walking towards Mexico at the roosters' cry. I asked the box if it would keep on protecting me, seeing as I got it out of that hole in the ground and that it would only be fair to do so. The little box told me it had big plans for us. We both soaked in the desert sun, watching the critters move out of our way like we was Moses parting the sea.

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