Cold flesh pressed against her cheek. The distant, droning noise came closer. Metal sliced through air. Dogs barked as a blinding light cut through the sky. Sand pelted against her exposed skin—searing, burning.
The men leapt from a helicopter and lunged toward her, arms outstretched, heavy guns dangling from their shoulders. The dark-eyed man pulled her close, pressing her body against his chest. His uniform chafed against her hot skin. Into the heat that enveloped her, Alma screamed a silent scream.
“Alma, Alma, despiértate, hija.”
Alma flailed, pushing away the heat of the man’s hands—clinging to the cold.
“Es un sueño, hijita. Es un sueño. Solamente un sueño…”
Alma shot up in bed, disoriented. She flung herself away from the arms that encircled her. But these were not the arms of the dark-eyed man. It was her aunt, begging her to wake up, assuring her it was just a dream.
“Ay, pobrecita,” her tía Pera said, grasping Alma’s shoulders. “¿El mismo sueño?”
“Sí, Tía. No big deal.”
“I wish you would tell me, hija…”
“What? About the dream? Why would I tell you?”
“No sé, tal vez…”
“Tía Pera,” Alma said, sitting up on the edge of the bed, “dreams are just the random firing of neurons. Nothing more, nothing less.”
Tía Pera raised her eyebrows. “If they’re so random, then why do you keep having the same one, hija? Tell me that, sabelotodo.”
Her aunt was calling her a know-it-all, which she probably deserved.
“We’re going to be late for church,” Alma said dryly.
Tía Pera glanced at the phone on Alma’s bedside table and let out a squeak.
“Tienes razón, hija,” she said. “We have to pick up your tía Dolores from the plant on the way. Ya nos espera.”
Alma jumped out of bed and began to dress quickly. If Tía Dolores waited at the plant for even a moment longer than she had to, they would all suffer.
Alma’s aunt Dolores believed that all their relatives owed her their lives since she was one of the first to get a job at the poultry plant. Over the years, Tía Dolores had scored jobs there for most of her family members, which the family perceived as fortunate. They needed jobs, and the work at Silver Ribbon offered steady pay. She would never tell her family this, but Alma thought it sounded awful. She just couldn’t imagine pulling apart dead chickens all day. Or, even worse, chasing live ones. Her cousins who worked as chicken catchers spent all night scrambling after those birds—apparently they were more docile at night, but her cousins still came home in the mornings with bruised knees and less than a hundred dollars pay. No matter how desperate she got for work, she would never agree to work at Silver Ribbon. Never.
As Alma tugged on her jeans, Tía Pera shook Isa.
“¡Apúrate, hija! Hurry up!”
Not wanting to stick around for the theatrics of her thirteen-year-old cousin, Alma grabbed her phone and headed toward the kitchen.
A text:
It’s Evan. I miss you (but definitely not U).
Swoon. Again.
“Hija, let’s go,” her tía called from the front door.
Alma moved through the kitchen in a daze until Tía Pera grabbed her arm and yanked her toward the car.
* * *
Spooning a huge pile of grits onto his plate, Evan glanced toward Willis, hard at work in his puffy chef’s hat and white uniform.
“One western omelet for our soccer star!” Willis called out cheerfully as he slid a four-egg omelet onto Evan’s plate.
Willis knew everything about Evan and his family, down to the minute details of their favorite omelet ingredients: cheddar cheese, but not too much; two slices of crumbled bacon, extra crispy; red and green peppers. Evan liked Willis, but truthfully he knew virtually nothing about him.
“You’re holdin’ up my line, boy!” Willis called out, teasing.
Evan stepped back as Willis moved efficiently on to the next omelet.
Weaving his way through the crowded room, he wished, for a moment, that he and his rapidly cooling western omelet could become invisible. It always bugged him that Sunday brunch at the club seemed—despite the fantastic grits and expertly prepared omelets—to be more about chatting with the people at surrounding tables than eating. “Evan, my boy!” Mr. Watson’s booming voice dispelled his fantasy. “How are you this morning?”
“Great,” Evan replied. “I’m looking forward to graduating.”
“You planning to follow your uncle Sexton to Wake or your daddy to Washington and Lee?”
“I’m not sure…”
“Well,” Mr. Watson broke in, his face broadening into a wide grin, “if you decide to aim for a superior school, my offer’s still open to write you a letter for Vandy.”
“Thanks, Mr. Watson. I’ll keep it in mind.”
“The dean up there is an old tennis buddy of mine.”
“Great,” Evan said as he glanced involuntarily toward his heap of cooling grits.
“Well, go on, son. Don’t keep your uncle waiting,” Mr. Watson said, shooing him along with his hand.
“Uh, enjoy your breakfast,” Evan replied, turning toward his table.
Evan finally sat across from his uncle Sexton. Evan’s uncle was a U.S. senator. He spent most of his time in DC, but whenever he was back in Gilberton, he made a point of meeting Evan for brunch at the club. That was pretty cool of him since approximately ten thousand people sought a meeting with him every time he crossed over the Georgia state line.
“So what’s the plan, son?”
Evan didn’t have to ask for clarification. He knew this was to be another college talk. He decided to ease into it.
“I’m seeing some real interest from Wake Forest, which is great, and also from Chapel Hill. I’m pretty sure Georgia and Auburn are safety schools. The coaches like me.”
“Well, that’s just fantastic, son. I’ll go on and call John Stapleton. He’s a big alum at Wake. And I’ve got about a dozen Tar Heels up in DC that I’ll get to put in a good word.”
“That’s great, Uncle Sexton,” Evan said. But it wasn’t. If a dozen people wrote a letter, he’d be expected to accept an offer.
“What about your daddy’s school?
“W and L? Uh, it’s too small, and, uh, the soccer program…”
“No apologies needed.”
Evan took a deep breath and launched into the hard part.
“Uh, Cal’s recruiting me, too, which is pretty exciting. I think I wanna go there.”
“To Berkeley, California?” his uncle asked, a bit too loudly.
“Yes, sir. Berkeley. It’s a great program. And, uh, the school is really good, too.”
“And I’m guessin’ your momma’s not too pleased?”
“No, sir.”
“Well, you know she could hardly survive livin’ out there after she married your daddy.”
“Yes, sir, I know.”
Evan’s parents met when she was a sophomore at Sweet Briar College. She and her sorority sisters spent many evenings at the University of Virginia libraries, working on what they actually called their “MRS degrees.” Most of her friends liked to hang out at the law school, looking for future husbands, but Evan’s mom preferred the medical school library—she thought there were already too many lawyers in her family, and the last thing she wanted to do was marry a politician. Her family line was filled with them.
As soon as his mom graduated, his dad gave her what she thought she wanted: a husband as far away from the world of Southern politics as possible, and a ticket to join him in Northern California, where he had begun a medical residency. She didn’t last long in California, though. Californians, she learned, lacked Southern manners and courtesy.
Still, the “left coast” (the disparaging phrase Evan’s dad always used when discussing the San Francisco area) seemed to have a magnetic pull for Evan. Evan wasn’t really sure why. He just knew that the world was a whole lot bigger and more interesting than this town, and he needed to see for himself. For years, he had watched cousins and friends go away to college a couple of hours away and then come back to marry the girls they grew up down the street from. They all just settled so easily into their parents’ patterns—same club, same neighborhood, same church, same vacation spots, same lies. It made him sad to think that all those people couldn’t come up with anything else to do with their lives—anything even remotely original. He would do something else—anything else. He was absolutely sure of it.
Evan’s uncle took a bite of his omelet and chewed slowly.
“Damn, son,” he said, letting his fist fall to the table, “I don’t think I can help you out there.”
“It’s OK,” Evan said. “I mean, I understand if you don’t support my decision, Uncle Sexton.”
His uncle leaned back in his chair. “Well, of course I support you, son,” he said. “I can handle a little grief from your momma. I’ll even run some interference for you.”
Evan felt his shoulders relax as relief coursed through his body.
“I just don’t think I’ve got any good connections out there.”
It came as no surprise that a conservative U.S. senator from the South was not well loved in Northern California.
“I’m gonna do my best to come up with somebody to call, but you may just have to wow ’em with your fancy footwork.”
“I can do that,” Evan said, smiling.
“Oh, I know you can, boy. I’ve seen you out there enough times to be absolutely sure of it.”
That was another cool thing about Evan’s uncle. Every season, he made it out to at least a couple of home soccer games, which was always a couple more than Evan’s dad.
His dad preferred baseball.
* * *
Crammed into the bench seat of the minivan with her cousins, Alma watched as they turned the corner and entered the country road that led to the Silver Ribbon chicken processing plant. Dozens of American flags flew on the corner, lining the property of U.S. Auto Sales, a used car company that sold junky cars under the bilingual motto, “Buy here, pay here/Compra aquí, paga aquí.” Its location a block away from the plant gave U.S. Auto a brisk business among the bone poppers, cartilage removers, breast cutters, chiller hangers, and backup killers.
Alma knew the details of every job at the plant since members of her extended family had done almost all of them. She knew that it was always freezing cold inside, that workers had to stand still on their feet for hours without talking or listening to music; she knew cleanup was one of the worst jobs, but that skin puller was one of the hardest. She knew that machine operators had the best jobs, and that working as a thigh inspector was unusually exhausting. But she also understood that this plant was the reason her family even knew that Gilberton, Georgia, existed. Without it, and without Americans’ apparently inexhaustible appetite for chicken parts, they might all still be farming the rocky soil of San Juan, their little town in Oaxaca, Mexico.
Alma usually heard the plant before she saw it. A loud horn would announce the opening or closing of the gate in the barbed wire fence that surrounded the entire facility, and then another high-pitched bell would signify the end of the night shift.
But something was wrong: she heard none of the normal sounds today. Smokestacks rose above the scrubby pinewoods that surrounded the plant, but no smoke rose from them.
They pulled to the edge of the fence. The gate remained closed. Normally workers would be spilling out by now, and others would be lined up to enter.
“Alma, look,” Raúl said. Her brother nodded toward a line of buses inside the empty yard. They were dark blue, with a gold seal on the side.
Department of Homeland Security.
Alma suddenly felt dizzy, as if she were standing on the edge of a cliff, looking down.
“Madre de Dios,” Alma’s tía Pera whispered.
The buses stood empty, and so did the yard, eerily empty. Men, still as statues, lined the perimeter of the gray building. They wore dark-blue uniforms, black pith helmets, and tall combat boots. Three letters stretched across the back of their bulletproof vests: “ICE.” And below those letters: “POLICE.”
Alma swallowed hard and squeezed her eyes shut. Was this really happening?
Raúl leaned forward. “Keep driving, slowly,” he said to their dad. “Don’t stop.”
Alma forced herself to open her eyes and watch.
They drove by, in heavy silence. Alma’s cousin Selena crawled over her to press her face and hands against the window. She stared out the window, mesmerized. At six years old, even she knew exactly what this was. How many times had they seen it on television? How many times had it haunted their dreams? An ICE raid. Immigration and Customs Enforcement would put anyone working at the factory without a legitimate Social Security number onto those buses, take them to detention, and then send them out of the United States.
When they passed the building, Alma’s father pulled into an empty driveway and turned the car around. They had to go back. They had to see with their own eyes what they all felt in the pit of their stomachs.
They drove by a second time. The metal doors of the plant rolled open, and the workers emerged in two orderly rows. The poultry plant seemed like a prison already, except that the inmates still wore their white hairnets, long white coats, and knee-high waterproof boots. The yellow cloths that covered their mouths when they worked hung limply around their necks. Handcuffs bound their wrists, and they walked flanked by more men in dark combat gear—dozens of them, with guns and sticks slung low around their waists. But no one struggled, no one ran, no one even tugged against the handcuffs. The workers all walked slowly, eyes down, staring at their rubber boots. They boarded the windowless buses that awaited them.
Alma felt tears sting the corners of her eyes. Maybe a hundred workers. Maybe more. Something about their lack of resistance made her feel helpless, too.
“I see her,” Isa called out. “Tía Dolores. There.” She leaned forward and pointed toward the long line of workers.
“She’s coming through the door.”
Tía Dolores emerged, barely distinguishable from the others, hunched over, deflated. Alma saw that she was crying. Her hands were bound, so tears flowed freely down her cheeks, nothing to catch their fall. Alma felt the tears on her own cheeks, but she couldn’t bring herself to wipe them away.
They watched Alma’s proud tía Dolores, always in charge, always right, step onto the bus without resisting. An ICE agent took her elbow and led her up the stairs. She never even looked up from the ground.
Tía Pera released a deep sob. It tore through the car.
One cry of agony, and then silence.
“We should go,” Raúl said.
If they drove by once more, they would recognize neighbors, cousins, friends. They would recognize too many of them. It would be too much to bear. So they pulled away.
Selena’s head fell onto Alma’s lap, and Alma stroked her hair softly.
“¿Adónde?” Alma’s father asked. Where would they go now? The question seemed to carry more meaning than he may have intended.
“A la misa,” said Tía Pera.
“Mom,” Isa called out, “you want to go to Mass now? We need to do something.”
Raúl nudged her sharply in the rib. “Shut up, Isa.”
“Tienes razón,” Alma’s dad said. “You are right, hermana. Padre Pancho will find someone who can help us. Padre Pancho will help.”
The parking lot of Santa Cruz was full. Families rushed into the building, heads down and shoulders hunched, as if they were avoiding a heavy rain or a worse catastrophe. Today the church was a safe space, a place where no dark buses would arrive bringing ICE agents in combat gear.
The scene inside was pandemonium. Children darted around the room unattended, while adults sought friends and consulted one another, sharing whatever information they had. Selena clung to Alma’s leg and watched, in awe, as Alma’s father and aunt disappeared into the mob.
“Muévanse adentro del santuario, por favor.”
Señor Fernandez, who usually served as an usher for this church service, had climbed onto a table at the back of the hallway. He clutched a microphone attached to a portable speaker and begged for order.
“Por favor, la misa va a comenzar.”
He repeated a string of gentle commands in Spanish, again and again, but the anxious frenzy did not subside. The hallways continued to pack with people.
“Señores y señoras, siéntense por favor.”
He jumped down and started pushing people through the doors and into the sanctuary.
Alma watched people jam into the space around her and glance nervously at the large doors that separated them from the dangers of the outside world. She knew what they were feeling because she felt it, too. Suddenly, their own neighborhood seemed threatening, and their lives seemed dangerously precarious. Alma followed the crowd into the pews of the church and knelt beside her brother.
When the scripture readings started, Raúl took a pencil from the pew in front of him and scribbled on the back of an offering envelope. He showed the envelope to her.
Chino
Javier
Susie?
Xiomara
Loyda
Rafael?
Arturo
They were the names of cousins and friends who were probably working the first shift at the plant. Tía Dolores’s two sons, her niece, Alma’s cousins on her mother’s side, and her brother’s friends from the soccer team. Thank God Chino’s wife quit work when her first child was born a few years ago. Otherwise, what would happen to the kids? Alma felt her body slump. She studied the names. Would they all be deported? Then she remembered.
“Loyda quit, remember? She’s working with her mother-in-law, at the Chinese restaurant.”
At least there was that. At least he could cross one of them off the list.
Just as Padre Pancho was heading to the podium to begin the Gospel reading, Alma’s phone vibrated, heavy in her pocket.
Are you in trouble?
It was Evan again.
Another text came in.
I’m really sorry if you’re in trouble.
Alma’s marathon day of yard work and household chores seemed insignificant now, and the month of restrictions that lay ahead was the least of her concerns. Yes, she was in trouble, but this wasn’t the sort of trouble Evan had in mind.
It was impossible to concentrate on Padre Pancho’s homily. A woman wailed in the pew in front of her, and Alma wondered: Could Evan even imagine this scene?
She had to reply, but she had no idea what to say.
A few minutes later, her brother nudged her sternly and glared at the phone. She shoved it back into her pocket, and went forward for the Eucharist. Then Padre Pancho began his announcements. Usually, he talked about church picnics and free English classes. Not today. Instead, he explained that he was gathering volunteers to help families find the locations of their loved ones and seeking attorneys to answer their legal questions.
Padre Pancho offered a final blessing, and the Mass ended.
As Alma walked out of the sanctuary and into the crowded vestibule, someone shoved a blue flyer into her hand. There were so many people mobbing the stairway that she just grasped the paper and pushed her way out into the fresh air.
She and Raúl stood together, blinded by the bright August light. Her eyes came into focus, and she saw Mrs. King standing among the crowds gathered in the parking lot, waving her arm above her head and calling out Alma’s name.
Oh, crap. Alma had forgotten all about Mrs. King.