A Story Idea Each Day for a Month — Day 22

This is the eighth year in a row I’ve run this series in April.

Today’s story: Documenting the Undocumented — The borderlands of southern Arizona have become a death zone.

Death assumes many different forms in the desert. Humane Borders counts the ways. The primary mission of this Tucson, Arizona-based humanitarian group is to maintain water stations throughout the remote reaches of the deserts of southern Arizona just north of the border with Mexico. These water drops are for the living. For those who don’t survive the perilous crossing, there is the Arizona OpenGIS Initiative for Deceased Migrants, a.k.a., the Death Maps.

Humane Borders, also known as Fronteras Compasivas, uses data from the Pima County Medical Examiner’s Office to publish a spreadsheet of the unauthorized border-crossers who have died in the desert. Each entry includes precise GPS coordinates of their remains, the date of discovery, gender of the decedent and, if possible, a name and cause of death. The entries are then marked with a red dot on a map that is posted on the HB website.

Those who study borderlands migration point out that the official tally underestimates the actual number of people who have died. Not all remains are located. Vultures can pick a body clean down to the skeleton in only a matter of days. Coyotes and other mammals scatter the bones. Residents living in the remote corners of the Tohono O’odham Indian Reservation, a well-trafficked corridor that accounts for about half of all annual migrant deaths in Arizona, have reported their dogs returning with human skulls after a morning’s romp in the desert.

My mind went in several directions with this backdrop. What if one of these volunteers found intersected with an illegal alien attempting to cross into the United States? What would the volunteer do?

Another angle: What if local law enforcement finds a body in the desert. Looks like just a typical example of an illegal alien dying as a result of exposure to the elements. Upon closer inspection, it appears to be murder. Then another body killed in the same manner. And another. And another…

But what I fixed on was this: Meet Jake. He is part of a radical right-wing anti-immigrant group who ‘patrol’ the Arizona desert searching for illegal aliens. When they find one, they turn them over to U.S. authorities, but not before they torture their victim. Send a message to potential illegal immigrants.

One day, Jake is out on his horse, his usual mode of transportation. He’s spotted an illegal some distance away. He rides deep into the desert, then some sort of incident occurs in which Jake loses his horse and along with it his supplies, severely sprains his ankle, and basically finds himself stuck.

As he limps in the direction of the nearest town which is 20 miles away, he intersects with the illegal he was tracking.

Cut to the chase: These two are forced to ‘partner’ in a journey of survival. What each learns about the other, that’s the central thematic point of the story.

It’s 127 Hours meets The Defiant Ones.

There you go: My twenty second story idea for the month. And it’s yours. Free!

Each day this month, I invite you to click on RESPONSES and join me to do some further brainstorming. Take each day’s story idea and see what it can become when you play around with it. These are all valuable skills for a writer to develop.

See you in comments. And come back tomorrow for another Story Idea Each Day For A Month.

For other posts in my A Story Idea Each Day for a Month (2017) series, go here.