The Influence

ONE





Karma? What a crock of shit.

When his sister Alma and her husband Jay had needed a co-signer so they could buy a house in Mesa, Ross had been there for them. He’d even ponied up $5,000 he couldn’t really afford in order to help with the down payment. And when his brother Rick’s pothead son Kevin was arrested for attempted arson in Texas, Ross had cabled the boy the money for bail and paid for Rick’s plane ticket to Austin, as well as a significant percentage of the lawyer’s fees. Not to mention the loan he’d given to his Aunt Melissa when her husband ran off with his secretary, or the “presents” he’d given to far-flung relatives who’d fallen on hard times, or the many instances when he’d picked up barely known offshoots of his family tree at the airport and given them a place to stay.

So when he lost his job at Air Research, Ross naturally thought that everyone would be there for him. But when a year passed and he still couldn’t find another job, when he began gently hinting that he could use a little help to tide him over, his brother and sister suddenly started making themselves scarce. And all of those other relatives? Conspicuously absent.

Even his parents.

So much for the idea that sending out good stuff brought back good stuff in return.

It was his cousin Lita who finally came through for him.

He hadn’t seen Lita in probably ten years, although they’d been close as children. She’d lived in New Mexico, but every summer, her family would come out to Phoenix for a week or two. They’d spend hot afternoons in air-conditioned movie theaters, and have evening picnics by Canyon Lake or the Salt River. They would always set aside one morning for the zoo and botanical gardens, and one day they would always spend at the amusement park Legend City. It was vacation-as-routine, but to Ross, as a child, there was something comforting about that. He knew what to expect and he looked forward to it. Lita did, too.

He’d been in seventh or eighth grade when Lita and her family had stopped coming, at an age where he didn’t want to acknowledge that he even had a family, let alone spend time with them. Even so, though he’d never admitted it to anyone, he missed her, and the subsequent summers had never seemed as magical or fun. He’d seen her periodically after that—at her mother’s remarriage, at their grandmother’s funeral—but while they spoke and were cordial, the closeness they’d once shared was no longer there.

So it was a surprise when, one early October morning, out of the blue, she called to check up on him. She’d heard from her mom, who’d heard from Ross’ mom, that he’d lost his job and had been out of work for the past year, and unlike the other selfish, self-involved narcissists who called themselves his family, she actually seemed concerned. He didn’t want to burden Lita with the full extent of his financial problems—his savings were practically gone, his unemployment checks were scheduled to stop soon, and he was going to have to sell his condo (if he could in this market) and move to a smaller apartment in a cheaper area of the Valley because he couldn’t keep up the payments—but under her determined questioning, he buckled, confessing all.

“I have an idea,” she told him when he was finished.

“Yeah?” he said wearily.

“You should take a few months off and come visit.” There was a teasing quality to her voice that he remembered from childhood and that made him feel as though no time had passed and they were both ten years old. She wasn’t joking, however, and while her approach was playful, her intent was to give him some financial breathing room. She suggested renting out his condo in order to earn some extra money to help keep up the payments. That way, he’d still have the place when he did find a job. In the meantime, he could spend a few months in Magdalena with her and her husband. They had over an acre, and there was a shotgun shack on the property where they’d lived while they were building the house. He was more than welcome to use it.

Ross demurred. “Thank you,” he said sincerely. “That’s very generous of you. But I can’t—”

“This is me you’re talking to.”

“I still need to look for work,” he told her. “And I don’t think I’ll find too many engineering positions in…Where do you live? Magdalena?”

“What are you talking about? We have train tracks not twenty miles from here. Joking! I know what kind of engineer you mean. And I also know that you’re not pounding the pavement for a job like that. You’re emailing resumes. You can do that from here. We have internet access.”

“I have to show up in person to get my unemployment.”