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sunny skies themselves were fine, though, once we were flying around in them. I put my headset on so my iPod could wash any thoughts out of my brain, drank a cola, normally against the law in our house, and had a few handfuls of salty peanuts. Kristy kept her word and checked in on me a few times.I always gave her a peanutty smile, like it was no big deal, what was I, a fifth-grader still? No, I was not, soon I’d be in middle school and flying by myself was a breeze.
    When I came out, there was a tall man in a blue shirt and cream-colored cowboy hat standing near the gate barrier, with a tag on that said MEETING ELLA MACKENZIE. He had kind eyes and walnut skin, and when he introduced himself as Miguel Aguilar, I knew right away that he was a good guy. My dad had been right about that, at least.
    â€œI know you have a travel buddy for us to find, too,” Miguel said as we walked through the airport, which in New Mexico they call a Sunport. So we went to the baggage claim area, where eventually Lou was led out on a leash by some handler and we had a movie-like reunion, with him jumping up and licking me all over.
    The whole day kept unspooling like a movie. Outside, the air was hot and bright like the desert, and there was a pink-colored range of mountains in the distance. When Miguel saw me looking at them, he smiled and said, “Say hello to the Sandias,” as if he were a host and those mountains were part of his family. By then I was climbing up into a huge red pickup truck with Lou and feeling like this was the only way to travel. I half hoped that we would never have to get to my grandmother’s house at all.
    â€œYou look like Mrs. Von Stern,” Miguel said, glancing sideways at me as we started jouncing away in the truck. “Do people say that to you a lot?”
    â€œNot so much.” My mom used to tell me every now and thenthat I looked like my dad—but in a tone that made it clear that it would have been better if I didn’t.
    So then Miguel asked how Dad was doing, and I gave my standard Dad speech about his fishing trips. Miguel asked about my mom, too, and I gave my standard Mom speech about cancer. And just when I was pretty much all speeched out, we rattled off the highway at an unpromising exit, passing some gray buildings behind high barbed-wire fences with signs that said WARNING: ELECTRIFIED FENCE. KEEP OUT. I saw a sign on the fence that said Juvenile Correctional Facility.
    â€œSo,” Miguel asked me, like these surroundings were perfectly normal. “How long’s it been since you’ve seen your grandmother?”
    â€œNever,” I answered. “I’ve never met my grandmother before.”
    â€œReally?” He frowned, and shook his head slightly.
    I wondered if maybe Miguel didn’t know quite what a weird family we were, all far apart and not talking to each other, but before I could think more about that, the truck suddenly took a sharp turn off a nothing-in-particular stretch of road into a hidden dusty drive. You’d never know there was a driveway at all—there were no other houses on the street we’d left, just weird industrial buildings and that big ugly fenced area.
    The truck shuddered to a stop on the gravel, under a high canopy of trees. Around us were tangles of bushes and a scurry of creatures running here and there, followed by a huge
thump
overhead. I jumped. Lou barked. Suddenly it seemed like we were on safari and some lion or an antelope had just landed on top of the truck.
    â€œDon’t worry, that’s just a peacock,” Miguel said with a laugh. I saw a blur of brilliant color by my window. “There are a lot of them around. You’ll get used to ’em. They don’t hurt anyone, they just make a lot of noise.”
    I looked through the window and saw that we were surrounded by birds. Dozens and dozens of them, with their beautiful blue necks and topknots and green, fanning