A Funky Government Car

...the mysterious Iniga Baker
listed as his mother...

Nick secretly longed for what social workers would call "a masculine role model". He was eager to follow this man anywhere but he had mixed feelings. He now had a mother and a father even though they had abandoned him and his mom was dead. He had something to go along with this surname that had been attached onto his birth certificate... the mysterious Iniga Baker listed as his mother…. and this Harry Baker as his dad.

Nick was elated as they rode, father and son, cruising from the camp in a sedan… even if it was a funky government car. He had arrived at the camp in a County Sheriff’s van with a half-dozen other juvenile delinquents. This car was a step up from that.

“So, are you going to tell me more about my mom?” Nick hesitantly probed this strange giant of a man.

“Your mom had been given Baker as a surname. I managed to do that for her… I owed her that much.”

“What do you mean, ‘owed her’?”

“It is too complex to tell you all of it… maybe later. We have more important things to take care of for now.”

“Like?”

“Your education…” He passed a cigarette to Nick. “I knew you wanted one pretty bad, eh?”

Nick muttered, “They had a school at the camp.”

“No, I meant, a cigarette.”  Harry let it soak in that the boy, who had nothing but adversaries up to now, had a friend as his father, if not a good father… perhaps a friendly hand. “The camp has a pretty good school but it won’t look so good on your resume, yes?”

This guy was cooler than he thought, “True that, I guess so.”

They drove in silence a few more miles, headed for Lompoc, before Harry spoke, “I haven’t been much of s father and I know it. I’m not even going to try to make it up to you because there is nothing I can do for the past… but I owe you this much… your future.”

Nick had never heard anyone talk to him this honestly. The events of the day were overwhelming and this Harry dude’s tone put him in the mood to listen. He wasn’t speaking down to him the way parole officers and yard supes did.

“I gave your Mom my name even though we weren’t on the record as married until I found out she was pregnant.” He pulled the car into a convenience store in Buellton, “Need a sandwich or anything?”

"I'd just as soon you tell me how you got me outa camp?" this question had bothered him ever since Harry'd come out of the office... you don't get cut loose when the judge sentences you to sit in Juvie 'til you're eighteen. "You know, just like that?"

"Let's just say, I have sand," and they both laughed at Harry's awkward use of the jailhouse term for influence.