Juarez Square and Other Stories (12 page)

At the crest of a hill he stopped.
Oh, Jesus
.

Some hundred meters ahead of him, four kids were surrounded by several others who held torches and waved them menacingly. The girl he’d seen at his tent waved the pistol and barked orders. “Keep them moving! Don’t let them stop!”

Just as they’d done with the swamp rats, the kids holding torches herded the four others toward the border, forcing them to the red zone.
Four
, Rafael thought, dread twisting his insides.

Fourteen kids, and only ten scholarships.

He looked back toward the camp. How far away was it? Was there time to get help?

The kids marched their hostages further north. The children trapped inside the circle begged and pleaded, their voices mad with fear. Then one of them, a small red-haired boy, refused to move any further. He crouched down low and dug his heels into the ground. The kids yelled and poked their torches at him, but he slapped them away defiantly. The three other trapped children followed his example and began to swing their fists wildly.

“We’re not moving!” one of them shouted. “We won’t!”

A boy with a torch got too close and the red-haired boy punched him hard in the face, sending him to the ground. The sudden violence made the other torch-bearing kids waver. They seemed unsure what to do next.

The girl with the gun quickly stepped forward, leveled the pistol at the red-haired boy’s head, and fired. The boy’s body fell to the ground.

Rafael flinched at the crack of the shot. He turned and ran in the direction of Sanctuary City.

His mind raced furiously as he tore through the woods, the faint glow of the camp’s barrel fires slowly growing brighter. Death was everywhere—here in the woods, on the shores of Lake Conroe, the horror movie in his head that he couldn’t shut off. A man lying in the shallow water, his eyes open wide in a death stare. A woman shot through the neck, making strange gurgling sounds, then falling silent. He couldn’t stand it any longer. He’d do anything to be free of it.

Rafael stopped running.

Fourteen kids, ten scholarships.
Four would have to stay behind
.

He couldn’t be one of them. He wouldn’t.

Rafael sat on the ground, closed his eyes, and waited. A minute later, three more gunshots rang out.

The night air was cold. He shivered and watched his breath, short-lived puffs of frost disappearing into the blackness. He wanted to cry for the children, but something inside him had moved beyond crying.

He stood and walked back to Sanctuary City.

* * *

Early the next morning, a search party discovered the naked bodies of the four missing children. Shot and killed for their clothes by bandits: that was the immediate conclusion.

Rafael meandered through the camp in a daze, his eyes cast downward. The rows of tents and people milling about seemed far away, like in a dream. He wasn’t sure how long he’d been wandering when he felt a hand on his shoulder.

“There you are,” said Miss Hathcox. She leaned down to make eye contact. “I’ve been looking all over for you.”

She brought him to her tent, sat him down on a cot, and handed him a breakfast plate of bread and beans.

“You need to eat something, Rafa.” At her insistence, he forced down a few bites.

She sat on the ground and watched him. Lines of worry creased her forehead.

“Did you hear about what happened?” she asked.

Rafael nodded.

“Do you know what they were doing out there?”

He didn’t respond.

For a long moment the teacher watched him. Then suddenly she asked, “You were at Lake Conroe that day, weren’t you?”

Rafael stiffened. He didn’t say anything, but his reaction must have been answer enough. The teacher nodded grimly.

“I grew up in south Texas,” she said. “Coming up from New Caney, you’d have to pass through Conroe.”

Rafael stared at the floor.

“Factions have been fighting over control of that lake off and on for years,” she said. “I’m so sorry your family got caught up in it.”

The teacher tilted her head. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Rafael said nothing.

Miss Hathcox leaned in and placed her hand on his shoulder. “I can’t imagine what you’ve been through, Rafa. But you survived. And I know it may be hard to understand right now, but you survived for a reason.”

* * *

Rafael kept to himself for the next couple days, staying in his tent. The U.N. staff came and questioned him. He shrugged and said little, answering with as few words as possible. Four days after the incident, Miss Hathcox brought lunch to his tent and told him the investigation was over. None of the other kids knew why the four children had wandered off that night. Such a terrible tragedy, she said, shaking her head.

The following day a U.N. staffer, a woman with a ponytail who’d been one of the test proctors, lifted the flap on Rafael’s tent. “Can I come in?”

He nodded.

She entered and knelt down. “Are you all right? You look tired.”

“I’m fine,” he said.

The woman smiled stiffly. “I’m sure it’s been a rough week for you. It’s been a sad time for all of us.” Her face then brightened a bit. “But I’ve got some good news for you. In a couple days you’ll be in the States. It’s official, you’ve qualified for a Carter scholarship. Isn’t that wonderful?”

Rafael said nothing.

“Sweetie, did you hear me?” the woman said. “You’re going to be leaving for the States. Aren’t you excited?”

He forced a smile. “Yes,” he said. “That’s great.”

The woman stood and puzzled over him for a moment. “Well, get some rest, pack your things, and say your goodbyes. The scholarship coordinator will stop by in a bit with some paperwork and information about your host family in Oklahoma.” She smiled awkwardly and left him alone.

Rafael sat for a long time, contemplating the reaction he should have had, but didn’t. The feelings that should have come, but hadn’t. The unfelt relief, the unshed tears of joy.

He tried to picture Oklahoma, tried to see himself there with a nice family in a safe neighborhood. But all he could see was Mami lying face down in the lakeshore mud, her shirt soaked with blood. Dark spots on her back where the bullets struck. He saw Papi and baby Gabby sprawled out on the grass, their arms and legs frozen in strange positions. Gabby’s shoes missing, lost or blown off in the chaos of flying bullets. And he saw four kids, lying on the cold ground, stripped of their clothes to make it look like bandits had attacked them.

You survived for a reason, the teacher had said.

No, he thought. It was the other way around. He’d survived for no reason.

Rafael got up, put on his shoes, and took out the pencil and notebook Miss Hathcox had given him. He wrote her a note, first thanking her for being so nice to him. And then he confessed he knew what had happened to the four children. He’d been there, he’d seen everything. And if they took out the bullets from the kid’s bodies, they’d find a match with the U.N. pistol that had gone missing.

He hoped it was enough. The nine kids who’d done it didn’t deserve a better life. They didn’t deserve sanctuary.

Neither did he.

Rafael left the tent and walked to the edge of the camp, where he climbed a ridge and took a last look back at Sanctuary City’s countless rows of tents.

The air was clean and clear as he entered the dense thicket of piney woods. He thought about his family at Lake Conroe and the kids at the border. So many ghosts. Far too many to carry. The sanctuary he needed couldn’t come from winning a scholarship, and it couldn’t be found on the other side of the border. But he knew where he could find it.

He just had to keep walking north.

The Gianni Box

At first Marcos took little notice of the small black device sitting atop the mahogany desk. It was just one of dozens of items scattered around the studio in the chaotic aftermath of last-minute preparations: shears, sewing gear, abandoned high-heeled shoes, reams of fabric, overflowing ashtrays. Marcos had come back for one last check to see if Don Derecho had left anything behind. The Don tended to forget things, especially when he was stressed. And there was nothing more stressful than the last few hours before a show during fashion week.

As he ran his eyes over the cube-shaped device a second time, he stopped. He’d never seen it before, this strange whatever-it-was sitting squarely in the center of Don Derecho’s desk. He stared at it for a long moment.

On a hunch he blinked up his cousin’s number in Milan. A few seconds later Antonio’s icon, a cartoon Einstein, popped up in the lower corner of Marcos’ specs.

“Hey, Marcos!
Tanto tiempo
. How are things going with the fashion big shots back home?”

“Good,” Marcos said. “I’m on my way to a show right now, in fact.”

“Nice.”

“Antonio, remember that research project you told me about? That prototype thing?”

His cousin didn’t answer for a moment. “The Gianni Box,” he said, his voice dropping.

“Yes, that’s it.”

“Marcos, I’m not supposed to talk about it,” Antonio whispered.

“What do you mean,
primo
?” Marcos lifted his hand and touched the Saint Francis pendant that hung on his necklace. He knew the answer before his cousin said it.

“Marcos, someone stole it.”

The device began to vibrate, causing Marcos to jump.

“Hello?” Antonio said. “You still there?”

Marcos swallowed. “Sorry,
primo
. I’m late. I have to go. I’ll talk to you later, okay?”

He grabbed the device and shoved it into his jacket pocket.

* * *

Marcos’ mind was a blur as he weaved his way through the crowded, tree-lined walkways of Masaryk Avenue. The device buzzed and vibrated incessantly in his jacket pocket, like the doorbell chime of an impatient guest. He checked the time superimposed on his specs. Only half an hour until the show.

On a normal day the trip to The Lexington, the four-star hotel that had hosted Don Derecho’s runway shows for twenty years running, was a five-minute walk from the studio. But during fashion week, when Mexico City’s Polanco neighborhood became clogged with press,
telenovela
stars, retail executives, Texas socialites, and wealthy customers from throughout the country, it took much longer. For nationally-prominent designers like Don Derecho, the crowded streets of Polanco marked the most important days of the business year. Sleepless days of promotional hustling and deal-making, when reputations and careers could be made or destroyed with a single runway show.

The Prado boutique bustled with activity as Marcos pressed his way past. The shop’s patrons overflowed onto the sidewalk, chatting away excitedly, anxious for the shows to start. Everyone was sharply dressed in high-end designer wear. There was couture everywhere he looked, and a few of the more adventurous sported pulsating nano-tattoos, the latest craze, on bared arms and legs. White-gloved waiters darted in and out like worker bees servicing a hive, filling wine glasses and offering Saint-Nectaire cheese and foie gras on silver trays.

Marcos stopped for a moment and took a few deep breaths, trying to push down his growing panic. He darted into an empty alley, took a furtive look around, then peered down into his pocket, spreading it open with his fingers. The device looked a bit like a portable archive, the really expensive ones you could talk to through your specs. Maybe that’s all it was, some kind of fancy new archive. But then why would the Don even need something like that?

Marcos tapped and double-tapped the corners of the device, turning it over in his hand while keeping it hidden in the pocket. After a few attempts, a link icon flashed a green connection at the edge of his specs.

“
Buongiorno!
” Marcos winced as the device’s voice boomed into his earpiece. “Hello?” the device asked. “Is someone there?”

“Yes, someone’s here,” Marcos answered, lowering the volume in his earpiece. “I’ve got questions.”

For a moment there was no reply. “Ah, of course,” the device said. “You must be the young man. Marco, no? Don Derecho’s
studente
, no?” The Southern Italian accent certainly sounded authentic, but that kind of thing could be faked, couldn’t it?

“How did you…” Marcos began, then stopped. “I mean, how did—”

“Don Derecho told me about you. He say you have a big talent, very bright future. I think you have a big surprise when you find the Gianni Box, no?” A tinny, digitized chuckle filled Marcos’ ears.

Marcos’ heart sank. This was no portable archive. He ran his fingers through his hair. “I can’t believe this.”

Again the chuckle. “Well, that make two of us. Now, can you turn on the opticals,
per favore
? I don’t like being blind, Marco.”

Marcos pictured the hands that would have gone along with the voice, gesturing passionately. And he imagined the man the hands would have been attached to: the short frame, the intense eyes and hawk-like nose, the salt and pepper stubble-beard. The fashion legend who died back in the 1990s. And now fifty years later he’d been digitally resurrected, using some crazy technology his science geek cousin had tried to explain using terms and words Marcos didn’t understand. All he really remembered was that the project was top secret and wildly expensive.