Leaving Arizona

Stephanie McCrummen: It is a bright afternoon early in the month, a moment of anxiety at a sun-faded apartment complex in north Phoenix. Down a dusty breezeway, workers are painting white a recently vacated unit. A few doors away, the power company has posted a shut-off notice for a family that left rather suddenly, in the middle of one recent night. And across a barren courtyard, the blinds are drawn over the only window of another apartment, where a conversation is underway.

A week has passed since the state's controversial new immigration law took partial effect, since its supporters began waving signs - "Adios, illegals!" - and since the woman inside the apartment decided the city has become so dangerous for her that it is best to keep hidden inside.

"We are thinking she could go in the back of her uncle's truck - he drives an 18-wheeler," says the woman's husband, John, a U.S. citizen, suggesting how his wife, Viridiana, who is Mexican and crossed the U.S. border illegally eight years ago, might leave Arizona.

"I'm scared of that," says Viridiana, who has a disabled 5-year-old son and a 2-year-old daughter.

"We could all go in the van," John suggests. "But then I could be arrested for harboring . . . "