The Coyote's Bicycle (39 page)

“Last week you crossed four
pollos
that first came to me. I did not go hunting you with a pistol. You did me a favor—a load was lifted from my back, and people who wanted to cross were able to do so. Those people will call their village: ‘I went to Tijuana,' they'll say, ‘and two coyotes worked together, and here we are.'”

“
Puto
,” Ratón spat.

“Then I crossed some of your
pollos
, a favor. And you present this.”

The attendant heard sobbing. Roberto said, “Okay, let's go.” And then, “
La puerta, por favor
.”

Negro unlocked the bathroom door. The men walked out holding Ratón by the arms. He didn't appear beaten, but simply smaller.
Roberto stepped out last, wearing his Stetson again. He stuffed some bills into Negro's tip cup. He said, “Thank you,
amigo
.” And then he and El Oso walked off to the pickup alone as his men whisked El Ratón in the other direction.

El Negro never heard the report of a pistol. He never saw El Ratón again. He never asked after him.

29

Marta asked Solo to help her make a migrant pickup at a location near the San Ysidro port of entry. This was the busiest land port in the world. Cars and trucks often waited for two to three hours in order to enter the United States. Knickknack shops dense with goods lined the idling thoroughfare. Pixilated billboards flashed. Engines revved and horns honked. The spaces between vehicles were populated. Street performers juggled colorful illuminated balls. Ragged street vendors paced, hawking peanuts, gum, chips, tacos, fruit, churros, paintings of Christ's last supper, ceramic pitchers, blankets, soccer jerseys, and ice cream. Many of these workers had been deported and now lived in the river. They received a small commission for their sales. Self-appointed line bosses decided where freelancers could operate, reserving the cash-fat beginning for themselves. This meant that the vendors grew increasingly desperate approaching the border markers. This was where the beggars and nuns and sellers of plaster Bart Simpson statuettes worked.

Roberto did a lot of business in the area. For his high-end clients—whom he passed right through customs with counterfeit documents—he kept an apartment above one of the central pharmacies. The building was big and pink and garish. Inside the apartment,
however, the atmosphere was surprisingly tranquil. Sunlight filtered in through curtains. The noise of the borderline was dampened to a low bubbling buzz.

Marta surveyed the room and asked the ten or so
pollos
who were there to ready themselves. In her new look—work slacks and sensible flats—Marta was businesslike and efficient. The
pollos
tended to mind her commands as they would their eventual
mayordomos
. Maybe it was her posture, but Solo noted her field-manager-like effect on the
pollos
.

He stepped through the kitchen and between rooms to help with whatever bags they might have. At one point, Marta slumped into a living room loveseat, a shift in her bearing that caught his attention. This wasn't a job for sitting—a poor representation for the migrants, something she normally would have stressed. They'd been going hard lately. Solo wasn't the type to judge. But she must have opened the curtains and window, too—not a load-house practice. A view of the traffic and the customs booths loomed beyond. It looked like one of those paintings made exclusively of dots, but shiny and brighter. On second glance, the cityscape took on a boiling aspect. It was a cauldron of refracting light and movement. The vehicle exhaust could be nauseating, too. Marta looked suddenly blanched, a pallor that worried Solo. He could handle the
pollos
alone, but how could he care for the boss as well? They needed to get a move on. He directed his attention to the migrants.

Moments later, Marta called out to Solo. She'd withdrawn her cell phone and was dialing. The clients perceived that something was amiss and suspended their packing—they seemed to track him, but watch her.

“
Mi amor
,” Marta said into the device, “can you come to where I am right now?” Obviously, it was El Indio at the other end. She gestured for Solo to wait.“Roberto's apartment at
la garita
. I'm feeling really bad,” she said. “Just . . . different. Awful, I don't know. Please come here right now.”

Her figure slumped then. Solo dashed, but she quickly slid off the chair and onto the floor.

El Indio arrived fresh out of the canyons. The police officer who had driven them, his siren splitting traffic, trailed the young
pollero
into the apartment. They found Marta on the floor, a pillow positioned beneath her head. Solo crouched at her side.

“She fainted,” he said. “She came back, then in and out.”

Indio bent to her, as well. Marta's complexion seemed almost translucent—a milk bottle emptied of milk. One of her eyelids was not quite shut. He placed the back of his hand to her lips. Her breath was slight but steady. He touched her forehead. It was not hot. Migrants occupied the doorways of adjacent rooms—the energy of their preparation withering in the presence of the policeman, and the possibility of a derailed crossing.

Two uniformed paramedics arrived and pulled Indio and Solo from Marta's side. One kneeled to check her vitals; he opened her mouth and peered in. With a thumb and forefinger, he parted her eyelids. The other uniformed man peppered Solo with a series of questions about Marta's condition before the loss of consciousness. A gurney was brought in. The paramedics lifted Marta onto the stretcher and carried her out. Those remaining—Indio's police guard, the migrants, and Solo—looked to Indio for direction.

“Take the people to Los Laureles,” he said. “Javy is there. Tell him and the others that everything is fine. Be alert and do your jobs.”

As Solo moved them into action, Indio dialed his cell phone.

“Roberto, I need a favor. Can you meet your sister and me at the hospital?”

The doctor was young-looking and seemed to choose his words with care. “From what we can observe, Marta's circulatory system—her blood vessels—relaxed and widened, as part of her condition,” he
said. “This increased blood flow to the womb but slowed its return to the brain. The lower-than-usual blood pressure reduced oxygen to the brain and she fainted.”

“‘Womb'? ‘Condition'? What do you mean?” asked Indio.

He and Roberto stood with the doctor in the tiled hallway of Hospital General de Tijuana. Marta had regained consciousness and had since been subjected to a number of tests. Feeling well enough, and propped up by pillows, she wanted to assert her independence and go home, maybe even catch up on the work they'd lost. The incident for her, it was clear, had been an embarrassing one.

Alone with the men in the hall, the doctor responded, “I say ‘womb,'
Señor
, because the patient is pregnant—likely a factor in her loss of consciousness.”

Indio regarded Roberto, he outstretched his arms for an embrace.

“
Compadre!
” Indio said. “You know you are going to be the baby's
compadre
, right?” Indio's face beamed.

“Congratulations,
amigo
,” Roberto said. “Of course I will be godfather to the little one.”

Indio couldn't seem to contain himself. He raced off to share the news with Marta. Roberto began to turn as well, but the doctor caught his arm.

“Apologies. You are the brother, correct?”

“Yes.”

“I wasn't finished with the assessment. We believe we've identified something of concern in Marta's right hemisphere. Unfortunately, we can't make a diagnosis at this time.”

“Something of concern?” Roberto asked.

“A spot,” the doctor said.

“What do you mean, ‘a spot'?”

“A tumor.” The doctor made a grave, affirmative nod.

“In her brain?”

“Marta's emotional state, given the pregnancy, is our highest priority. It is extremely important not to add stress. If it is a neoplasm, it may be benign. The condition is treatable. In my opinion, it's best that she not be alarmed. After we receive additional test results, there is a chance that I will recommend a specialist. This might take time. In the absence of further fainting or nausea, she will be free to go tomorrow.”

“Thank you, doctor,” he said. The men shook hands.

Roberto walked to the open doorway of Marta's room—four green walls and a high window that allowed a raking light into the small space. The metal bedframe was bookended by cabinets that held monitoring equipment. Indio kneeled at the bedside, his hands clasped over Marta's, which she rested on the blankets over her belly. Marta's long dark hair lay slack on the pillow, framing a face just a shade off her normal energetic self. On catching her brother in the doorway, Marta raised her eyebrows and mouthed the words, “I'm pregnant.”

A dull, throbbing headache roused Marta most nights.

“What can I do for you?” Indio would ask.

“Nothing, I think.”

In the rare moments that she did complain, Marta described a pressure on the right side of her head that felt like a pulsing balloon. Rubbing her temples with her fingertips alleviated the pressure at times. Painkillers did not prove useful, which was okay, because she did not want to take medication for the sake of the baby. In the daytime, she admitted, there was occasional nausea and vomiting—a natural symptom of pregnancy.

What followed was a state of blankness that wasn't sleeping or unconsciousness but a feeling of having gone away and returned without knowing where from. A length of time couldn't be assigned to the absence—if one could think of it as such. Better to think of the
moments as spells, “pregnancy brain,” and wave them off as a kind of aftereffect of the fainting.

When Indio raised concerns Marta hushed him and admonished him to get some sleep. She was still able to perform some of her duties with the
enganchadores
via cell phone, but Indio needed his feet on the ground and his wits about him. For her, the coming baby only heightened a palpable sense of risk in their work.

There hadn't been an occasion, given her fainting spell, to discuss the problem of finding reliable pickup drivers. Indio listed those from his contacts in the Zona Norte who failed to show, or those who made excuses at the last minute. And he explained how he increasingly tapped his brother Martín, who brought in the other siblings.

“Good,” she said. “If you have to count on someone, count on family.”

“It puts everybody in danger,” he said. “And plus, the price is, maybe, too high.”

“They want more than the others?” she asked.

“I promised to buy my mother a house in exchange for her cooperation.”

“Oh,” Marta said.

The ensuing silence, Indio believed, was occupied with her estimations of the cost, as well as the resources that would not be going to their own start in life. She knew the books better than he. But maybe it was the idea of things going unsaid that concerned her, because what she said next was: “I think a house for your family is a good idea. Your mother would always have a place, and when you and I are ready to cross over, so will we.”

“Listen, Indio,” Roberto said over the cell phone, “your business is never going to have this moment again.” The old coyote had seen enough ups and downs to know, he said. This was El Indio's high
water and he'd better haul some goddamned buckets. “Me, I can afford to take the time.”

The specialist recommended for Marta's care practiced at a research clinic in sprawling Mexico City—1,700 miles south of Tijuana. Roberto did not inform Marta or Indio about the true nature of the recommendation. Neither did he want to give Marta the opportunity to decline the trip as trivial, so he purchased the airline tickets immediately.

Indio's resistance was unexpected. Impending fatherhood seemed to have sparked a protective streak in him.

“I don't feel right about you going; the obligation is mine,” he said.

Roberto could hear the voices of the
pollos
and workers on the other side of the line. “
Amigo
, my little sister's welfare was my obligation long before it was yours,” he said. “Let's make a deal. Including travel, the doctor said to plan on three days. I'm certain the fainting and headaches are just a part of the process for her, and the tests just a precaution. We'll shoot back right away. On the chance that she requires more time with them, you and I can swap, and you can fly to Mexico City to be with her.
Está bien?
”

Indio was hesitant. “Okay,” he said, “that's fair.”

“All right, go make some money.”

To Marta, Roberto pitched the trip as simply going the extra mile for the health of the baby, something people did in
el Norte
all the time. To his surprise, Marta proved receptive to the idea. She wanted the best possible advice, and a thorough exam might relieve her needling fears. Roberto asked her to pack for the week, just in case.

Many of Roberto's international clients arrived in Mexico City. An underground network of fixers, drivers, and safe houses ushered them north. In this instance, Roberto simply reversed his well-oiled machine.

When they arrived at the hospital, Marta was assigned a locker for her things and given a flimsy hospital gown that tied in the back and a cheap pair of earplugs. The
MRI
machine was described to her
as a giant magnet. She was allowed to wear underthings but not her bra, which contained a metal underwire. Checking again for her usual thin chain, Marta touched her neckline. She then handed the locker key to the technician. He helped her to lie down on the sliding table where her shoulders fit into a plastic brace. She'd been told a couple of things: not to move and that it would be loud. But no one mentioned the impossibility of modesty in the presence of the male technician and her brother. He'd been allowed to accompany her into the room for the test, provided he remove his significant belt buckle, and he stood to the side—a rigid figure dressed like a cowboy.