The Jaguar's Children (7 page)

It is a dangerous moment. The federales are outnumbered and the people are not stopping. The woman officer is watching César, but she must also watch the calenda and her men. Everyone is watching the monos too because not to watch is impossible. They are giants, six meters tall and very colorful, also very particular because many people make their own how they want. Mister Peanut is my favorite, and when you're inside that mono loaded with mezcal you are not really you anymore. You are something else because what is the mono really but a kind of spirit—nothing more than empty clothes on a bamboo frame. To such a one the bullet can do no more damage than to a ghost or a cloud. So the monos keep coming, spinning in circles with their long arms flapping and their giant heads nodding this way and that like they are saying hello to everyone in the houses along the street where the shutters are now opening, to the birds in the trees and the stars in the sky, to the radio towers blinking across town on Cerro del Fortín.

The lady mono with the yellow hair is still in front and her chichis are even more wonderful up close, bouncing around in her red dress, balloons of helium filled with so much love by the mono dancer. At the same time, Benito Juárez—our great hero and liberator, el Mono MaxiMex—is bending over like he is inspecting the two federales below him and asking them some question like, Do you know whose street you're on?

In between the monos comes now the mezcal man with his big bottle and who knows where the top is? Over his shoulder is a string bag and in this are some tubes of bamboo about as long as your finger. These are the cups for the mezcal and he is taking some out to offer the federales who are serious men, but they are also young and even la policía can be believers—maybe some are even Zapotec. It is hard to be completely angry in such a situation—after all, the nights in the truck can be so long and boring. But these are thoughts happening inside and their guns are happening outside, still on their hips and pointing into the heart of the calenda. This is how they confront the monos and the mezcal man, who stop now about twenty meters down the block from César and me. From behind are still coming las chinas oaxaqueñas and the musicians, and now everyone is bunching up behind the monos and spreading onto the sidewalks and the air is getting thick and loud with the smoke and music and rockets launching with loud screams that are imitated by some of the men so it sounds like twenty rockets going up at once.

César is standing by the side of the taxi, watching all this like a man in a trance and I am a couple meters behind him. There is a soft wind blowing and with it comes the smell of smoke and sweat and lilies and mezcal. It is at this moment that Axl Rose, who is still spinning in circles, trips on the sidewalk. He is a tall one and he goes down slow like a big tree falling. When finally he hits the ground, he blocks almost the whole street like a barricade, and his giant papier-mâché bandana rolls away leaving only those crazy eyes made of broken mirror glass staring through a mess of orange yarn. Everyone is cheering for the fallen mono and another rocket goes up. Then, one more time, the lights change—the red man turns into the green man and, very loud, someone starts singing “Sweet Child o' Mine.”

This is the signal for César. Juquila has heard him.

The green man is running and now César is running too—for his life—down the sidewalk and into the calenda. The female federale brings up her gun, but there are too many people so she is shouting instead. The two federales in front go after him, but Axl Rose is still rolling around and the mess of bamboo and giant clothes slows them down—only for a moment, but it is sufficient. Everyone is looking at César now, pointing and shouting, and then I am running too, behind the taxi and the truck to the other side of the street and into the crowd. By the time the two federales get through, César is down at the corner and I am past the calenda, maybe twenty meters behind. César takes a last look over his shoulder and one of the federales stops to aim his gun. There is the scream of a rocket and then a shot. There is the puff of smoke as the rocket explodes above the street and a cloud of dust as the bullet hits the adobe wall by César's shoulder. But César doesn't notice and he is faster than he looks. Juquila is with him, and around the corner he goes. All the federales are chasing us now, but the band is going crazy, playing many songs at once, and the dancers are getting in their way. The shooter in front turns and sees me on the other side of the street, but fear makes you faster and I make it to the corner. There is one more shot and then only shouting, music and rockets.

César is ahead of me running and he seems to know where he is going. He disappears through an open gate, and I follow him—across a courtyard, up a fig tree, over the wall of an abandoned house. I am trying to keep up with him, but he is fast and I am still half a block behind. We make it to Guerrero, heading for Bustamante and the market on 20 de Noviembre. I hear more sirens, but César has wings on his feet and—he told me later he can feel this—Juquila is guarding him with her tiny cloak. Police cars speed past a block away and all the time we are moving—south and west because already César knows where he must go. For ten blocks we travel like this—invisible—until César sees a taxi. I can tell by how he whistles and waves it down that he knows the driver, and he jumps in the back. He's pulling the door closed when I catch up to him and pull it open again.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” he says.

Well, this is my question also.

“Get out!” he shouts.

“No!” I say. “You can't leave me here!”

He tries to push me out the door but I grab on to the headrest in front and will not let go and now the driver is shouting, “No fighting in my taxi or you both get out!”

Well, César wants to get away more than he wants to fight. “¡Abastos!” he says. “¡Pronto! But for God's sake don't run any lights.”

And then we are driving with me closing the door and both of us breathing hard. I turn around to look for the police, but César pushes my head down. After maybe one minute with no sirens César lets out a long breath and looks over at me. “I can't believe we got away from those chingados.”

“Why did you run?”

“Because it's worse if I don't. It's dangerous to be near me right now. When we get to the market you must leave.”

Jesucristo—qué demonios—

Thu Apr 5—22:08

 

There was some fighting in the front of the tank. By their accent it is the Nicas who started it. I think they had only one bottle of water for the two of them and when they tried to get some from la Michoacana—the baker—she would not give it. They insulted her then and the baby-face man and his friend said they are also from Michoacán, and they threatened the Nicas. No one can see anything in here, but one of the Nicas followed their voices, punching into the darkness. I heard grunting and swearing and I think the baby-face man or his friend caught the Nica's arm and did something to it—I heard the sound of wet sticks breaking, and the Nica screamed and cursed for a long time after.

How can Hell be worse than this?

But it is quiet now and I can't think about them. Only César and the story—

We are going to the part of the city where no tourist wants to go. There are no cafés or pretty plazas around Abastos market, only broken cement and sheet metal, dead cars and sex clubs and shops of Chinese clothes with not a tree in sight. Es una Oaxaca paralela where people like me live when we move to the city. Very hot there in the day. But now it is dark and the night is growing damp and old around us. Even down on the floor of the taxi, which is tight for the two of us, we know where we are. We know it by the smells coming in the windows—yesterday's chocolate from the mills on Calle Mina—and by the rattle of the wheels crossing the rail lines on Mier y Terán, that wide right turn onto Mercaderes, and the next one, left onto Cosijopi. I can see César smiling to himself.

“You drive like a professional,” he says to the back of the seat.

“Por supuesto,” says his friend. He does not ask us why we are back there hiding. He knows as much as he needs to know. Sometimes these things happen.

In this moment, César told me later, he felt more free than any other time he could remember—floating almost. Who knows what los pinches federales will do to him if they catch him and find out who he is, but thanks be to la Virgen de Juquila bendecida he escaped from those pendejos. It was sooner than he planned, but he knew what he must do.

The taxi stops on the west side of Abastos near the river, what is left of it. It is not even four, but already the first trucks are coming in from the coast with fish and oranges, seashells and coconuts, maybe a special order of turtle eggs hiding in the belly of a tuna, or a crocodile skull with all its teeth. And from the south they come with coffee and mangoes, chocolate, iguanas and velvet huipils, and from the Sierra with calla lilies, beef, pots in all sizes still scarred by the fire that made them, maybe even the skin of a jaguar, and from the north with a saddle for the horse, or a yoke for the plow hecho a mano from the trunk of a tree. Maybe you need an ox to go with it, a burro, a goat, some turkey chicks or birds that sing. Maybe corn, mole, mezcal, vanilla, worms or chapulines—sí, those are grasshoppers, amiga—big or small as you like. The ladies from the pueblos catch them in the grass—my abuelas did this. And if you're lucky there will be huitlacoche—that fungus in the corn that makes the seed explode—con la bisteca es perfecto. All the things that make Oaxaca famous, you can find them in this market and most other things too, even la última cena—the last supper—not the holy picture for the wall but a poison for the rats. Not even the big box stores in Gringolandia have such things, and the prices are better, but only if you bargain.

Abastos es una paradoja—here you can find anything, but you can also lose anyone, and this is why César comes here. Abastos is the biggest market in the state of Oaxaca and it is a labyrinth—who knows what's at the center or even where the center is. You can live your whole life in here and some people do. It can be frightening for a güero or a campesino who is not used to so many people and so many things all in one place together. Because every kind of person is here from every tribe—Zapotec, Mixtec, Mazatec, Trique, Huave, Chinanteco—so many different faces and clothes and dialects and so many ancient products—copal, cochineal and bark paper for medicine bundles, herbs and seeds, mushrooms and magic ingredients and witch supplies—mango-color beaks from the toucan and black hands from the monkey. All this you can find next to action figures for the Undertaker and the Blue Demon, or a statue of Santa Muerte, or blades for the fighting cock, and every kind of mezcal. There is magic here for everyone.

For César, it is the magic of disappearing. Because running from the federales is a serious thing. These ones will not forget you, they will hunt you like dogs, and if they can't find you they will find your family. The taxista pulls into the market, past the delivery trucks, nosing in as deep as he can go under the patchwork roof of plastic and canvas and old Sol and Corona banners. There, he stops with the engine running. “Arriba.”

César lifts his head to see where he is and with his messy hair and careful eyes he looks like he did some mornings at school when he came in late for class. But the moment passes quickly and when he reaches into the top of his sock and pulls out a bill the driver shakes his head. “Next time.”

César pats his shoulder. “Claro, caballero.”

Then he gets out of the taxi and disappears into the maze. I follow him—I'm not sure why exactly, but I know I will need to hide for a while also. “Where are you going?” I ask his back.

“To find a gown for Juquila,” he says without turning around. “She saved me tonight. It is a miracle to get away like that. She saved you too, which is interesting.”

“You think so?”

“Maybe she has a plan for you.”

“What kind of a plan?”

“How should I know?” he said. “You must go away now.”

“Where?”

“That's not my problem.”

I am running to keep up with him as he twists and turns through the dark market, down tight walkways between covered stalls and tables, ducking to miss things hanging overhead—piñatas and baskets and leather bags, a plastic tricycle, communion dresses. “It wasn't me driving the taxi,” I say. “And you ran away. They saw both of us. I can't stay around here now.”

I never knew César to be without an answer, but he was quiet after this, just walking fast and swearing to himself. “Nothing's open. I'm going to have to wait.”

This is a dangerous thing to do, but César does it because Juquila is a local virgin and he won't find a gown her size—made only for her—anywhere else in Mexico. When he comes under a light in the market, he notices dust on his right shoulder, the kind that comes from adobe bricks mixed with plaster, and he brushes it away. “Un otro milagro,” he says, shaking his head and crossing himself. Then he looks into a dark corner, finds a table with a cloth over it and crawls under. I crawl under the table next to it. I'm thinking César is bad luck for me, but I don't know what else to do.

“After you find her gown,” I whisper, “where are you going then?”

“It's no concern of yours. Now leave me alone.”

I don't know how he does it, but he's asleep in five minutes. I can hear him breathing one meter away, deep and steady in the dark, and it makes me more calm.

 

Sometime after sunrise, I am kicked awake. At first I am confused and afraid, but then I am happy because the foot that is kicking me has no boot on it and belongs to an old lady. But she is not happy and kicks César also. “This is not a hotel,” she says. “Get up.”

“Lo siento, doña,” says César. “I need to buy a gown for the Virgin Juquila.”