We realize then that they in fact have been listening, more attentively than we thought, to the stories of Chief Nana, Chief Loco, Geronimo - the last of the Chiricahuas- as well as to the story we are all following on the news, about the child refugees at the border. But they combine the stories, confuse them. They come up with possible endings and counterfactual histories.
What if Geronimo had never surrendered to the white-eyes?
What if he’d won that war?
The lost children would be the rulers of Apacheria!
Whenever the boy and girl talk about child refugees, I realize now, they call them 'the lost children'. I suppose the word 'refugee' is more difficult to remember. And even if the term 'lost' is not precise, in our intimate family lexicon, the refugees become known to us as 'the lost children'. And in a way, I guess, they are lost children. They are children who have lost the right to childhood.