I OPENED MY EYES in the ambulance. I was wearing a clear oxygen mask over my nose and mouth, and the sound of a siren was screaming through my brain.
Nacho was there with me, squeezing my hand and praying in Spanish.
Looking up at him, I’d noticed for the first time that his eyes were the exact same shade of brown as Mom’s.
The next time I regained consciousness was in the hospital.
It was just doctors and nurses around me. I guessed they’d pumped me full of drugs, because I wasn’t feeling any pain. And when I shut my eyes, I felt like I’d just jumped from Bad Boy’s back and was still flying.
When my head finally cleared, I felt Tammie’s lips go flush against mine.
“You’re going to be all right, Gas,” she said, with her eyes full of tears.
I had to focus hard to figure out if that kiss was real or part of some dream. Cap was there with her. So were Nacho, Rafael, and Anibal.
I was dressed in a blue hospital gown, with my right arm in a sling and a wide bandage wrapped so tight around my chest and ribs that I could barely breathe.
“The protective vest you wore most likely saved your life,” said the doctor on duty. “A hoof hit you directly over the heart. Without that protection it probably would have penetrated into the chest cavity. As it is, you suffered a bruised heart, some cracked ribs, and a broken collarbone. You’re a very lucky young man.”
The EMS workers had cut Dag’s silks off of me when I got brought in, but on the nightstand to my left were El Diablo’s boots, with the flames beginning to peek through the black polish.
“Why’d you do it, Gas?” asked Cap. “Why’d you jump?”
“I couldn’t win that way,” I answered. “Not like that.”
That’s when Tammie pulled the fifty-dollar win ticket from her pocket.
“The doctors told us this was inside your boot,” said Tammie, crumpling the ticket in a fist.
“Dag bet it for me,” I said. “With whatever money he put on Bad Boy for himself.”
“Well, Bad Boy Rising crossed the finish line first,” said Tammie. “It’s too bad for Dag the racetrack doesn’t pay off on a horse that finishes without a jockey on its back.”
“How’s Bad Boy?” I asked.
“Good. Still mean. Thinks he won race,” said Nacho.
Dag never showed his face at the hospital, or even called once to see how I was. But that first night, way past visiting hours, I looked up and El Diablo was standing in the doorway.
“I see you earn your badge of honor,” he said, pointing to my collarbone as he stepped inside.
I started to explain why I’d jumped. But El Diablo broke in and said, “No matter what anybody say. No matter what stewards do. You’re a winner. No one ever call you bug again in front of me.”
Then he reached over to the nightstand and picked up one of the boots. His eyes ran up and down it like he was looking for something lost.
“I know you’ll be needing those back,” I said.
“No more borrow,” he said, scratching away some of the black polish with a fingernail. “Boots yours to keep.”
“Why?” I asked. “Nobody’s ever gonna let me ride again.”
“Not important now,” El Diablo answered. “They needed clean start. That you already give.”
By the middle of the next day, Tammie told me, all the TV stations had played the video clip of me jumping, and there were pictures of it in all the newspapers, too.
The stewards pulled my jockey’s license and ordered that Bad Boy Rising’s urine be tested.
“Yeah, but the only way they can prove a milk shake is to test for carbon dioxide. The one test they don’t give here,” Tammie said in a frustrated voice. “So Dag’s gonna come off smelling like a rose.”
Cap and the police got to the hospital at about the same time that afternoon. And I saw that one of those officers was wearing a Texas Lone Star badge.
They talked in the hallway for a while with Cap.
I figured that Dad had seen me on TV and I was about to get nailed for being a runaway.
But Cap came into my room alone with a sad look on his face.
“Gas, I’ve got some bad news for you,” he said, removing his Kangol. “Your father’s passed away. They say he’s been gone about a week. Neighbors found him in the house a few days ago.”
For a minute or two I sat up in bed, stunned. I guess my brain was busy searching my feelings from top to bottom.
Then all at once the tears came.
I loved Dad, and losing him shook me hard.
But I started thinking about another side of it too.
Dad had drunk himself to death, almost like he wanted to. And maybe he was finally going to find some peace.
I didn’t think about the times he hit me, or everything he’d taught me about how “beaners” were ruining our lives.
Instead, I remembered him leading those two big horses around the riding stable, with them acting like they loved him to death. And how happy it made Mom to ride again.
Then I wondered how long he’d been watching Nacho and his brothers look after me, and if Dad had learned as much as I did.