The air is laden with moisture and the trees are still shaking off the earlier rainfall, so I avoid walking under any branches as I make my way toward the tarp-covered caravan. It’s smaller than I’d initially thought, and hemmed in on all sides by what looks like a load of old junk: wooden crates and pallets and a bunch of rusty old farm machinery. It’s easiest to access the corner where the tarp lifted in the wind, so I move some crates out of the way before lifting up the cover.
Wow. It is definitely an Airstream: it says it right here on a long rectangular silver badge, printed in faded capitals. I wonder how old it is. It looks vintage, but I can’t be sure until I get a proper look.
I continue moving crates and pallets and other bits of junk until I can see where the tarp has been attached to the caravan. The rope is slippery with grime and my fingernails are coated with green-and-black goo by the time I manage to release it. I repeat the process at the other end of the caravan before plucking a tissue out of a pocket in my shirtdress and cleaning off the tips of my fingers. There are more pallets leaning against the side of the van, so I move them, one by one, and then peek under the tarp, hoping I’m at the right end for the door. I am. It’s there in front of me and on a badge to the right, written in silver cursive, is the model name:Bambi.
My heart jumps with excitement. I’ve heard of this model. I think Airstream does a modern version, but what I have infront of me is definitely old. Getting my phone out of my other pocket, I do a quick Google search and discover that Airstream launched the Bambi model in 1961. At sixteen feet, it’s one of the smallest they ever made, but that size must refer to its overall length including the hitch, because the actual body is tiny.
I pocket my phone again and tug on the tarp, feeling it give a little. Checking that there’s nothing else resting against it, I return to the side and tug even harder. Slowly, the tarp comes off toward me, bringing a shower of grimy water down with it. I’m splattered, but I’m far too full of anticipation to be put off at this stage. This dress is going in the wash later anyway.
The Bambi is small and perfectly formed, although its silver aluminum color has been muted by dust and age. It is single-axle, so it rests at one end on a stand fixed to the hitch. Two rusted propane tanks sit atop the hitch, in front of an old spare tire. There’s a large rectangular window at this end, and when I step on my tiptoes and peer inside, I can make out two more large rectangular windows on the side that backs into the black barn wall.
I stand and stare, drinking it all in. It has tear-shaped indicator lights and domed silver hubcaps. The door is arched and curves inward to follow the rounded line of the body, and it has a tiny matching arched overhang above the door to stop rain from running down the sides and falling straight inside. The metalwork all over is a bit dinged-up and dented, but the beauty of the overall object is undeniable. The Bambi is a work of art.
I walk forward and try the door. It doesn’t budge. Damn.
I head inside to ask Dad if he knows where the key might be and find him flat out on the sofa, watching TV.
“Check the desk drawer in the office,” he tells me absentmindedly.
The office is a small room adjoining the kitchen and the desk has six drawers in total—three on either side. I start with the top left, moving past stationery and various bits and bobs before coming to the deeper bottom drawer. There are no keys visible, but an old and familiar smell wafts out and I pause for a moment, staring at the photo album.
It’s brown with a decorative gold trim. Mum and I have one identical to this at home that contains my baby and childhood photos up until I was about the age of three. It even smells the same. I’ve always wondered if it’s what our home in Phoenix smelled like.
I gently lift out the album and open it up. There’s a flimsy sheet of soft paper at the front, and then next, in my mum’s handwriting, are the words:Elmont Family.
The same words appear in the album we have at home, although that one has a three-year date span. Here, there’s only one year listed, the year I turned four. There’s a dash beside it, as though the album was never finished, and when I flip to the back, I see that the last six sleeves are empty.
Returning to the front, I study the first two photos, secured behind yellowing film. The top shot shows me wearing a lime-green swimsuit and standing on the lawn of our old house back in Phoenix. The sprinkler is on and I’m laughing, my arms spread wide and my chin dripping with water as I’m caught in the spray.
Behind me are the three fat cacti I remember so vividly, and, in the distance, Camelback Mountain rises up beyond the brown rooftops of the bungalows across the street. The sky ispale blue and my shadow is cast long across the muted green grass.
Below this photograph is one of our house, squat and cream, with a red-tiled roof and matching red awnings above the windows. It has an archway leading to a porch and front door. The lawn spans the width of the house and is bordered by a gravel pit housing the cacti and various other shrubs. The white stones in the gravel pit were too sharp to stand on, but all the other plots in the neighborhood had them in place of lawn.
Mum once told me that we were the only family in the local area who had grass—she wanted it to remind her of England—and every evening the sprinklers would go on to keep it alive. I made the most of the regular outdoor showers.
I remember the feeling of that grass beneath my feet, coarse and prickly, unlike the soft, lush lawns back home or the one planted in front of this place.
I turn the page and find a photo of Dad and me at the man-made city beach in Phoenix. He’s standing beside me in bright orange swimming trunks, his body tanned nut-brown and wet strands of his longish hair sticking to his cheeks. There’s a row of fake rocks protruding from the cloudy pale blue water behind us, looking like the spiny back of a stegosaurus, and beyond them is a large lagoon dotted with people. Farther still is a white sand beach and a row of tall, skinny palm trees. The whole scene feels achingly familiar.
Another photograph shows me perched on a stone wall in a red dress with the striped creamy-orange-and-yellow layers of the Grand Canyon laid out behind me. In another, I’m sitting on Dad’s shoulders beside a wiggly-limbed Joshua tree,and in another, I’m standing in front of a giant cactus outside a restaurant in Rawhide. I remember the restaurant’s brightly colored candleholders on the outdoor wooden tables.
At least, I think I do. I’m not entirely sure whether I’m reliving memories or have simply seen these photos before.
Wedidhavesomegood times as a family, didn’t we? How did it all go wrong? What was it about Sheryl that Dad couldn’t live without? She’s so different from my mum. Mum isn’t ambitious or particularly well educated, but she’s warm and unguarded. Loving. Why wasn’t she enough for Dad?
These photographs show so many of our happy times. Were there lots of bad times that I don’t remember?
Maybe my parents simply weren’t a good match. But on paper, surely they—a groundskeeper and a fruit picker—made more sense than a groundskeeper and a professor.
For some reason I think of Scott and Nadine.
“Any luck?” Dad asks from the doorway, making me jump.
Reflexively, I snap the album shut.
He smiles and nods at it, either ignoring or not noticing my guilty expression at being caught snooping. “I found that in a box when we were packing up the house in Bloomington.”
“Mum has one that’s identical, only it contains photos from earlier years.”
