“I suppose so, but that’s war.”
“It’s already war.”
He stared at her. Maite didn’t know what to say, and he’d gone quiet too, pulling his shoes on and tying the laces.
They drove to a restaurant where he said they made very decent milkshakes and they also served great burgers. As they sat there, waiting for their order, she tossed a coin in the jukebox sitting in a dusty corner and “At Last” began playing.
She felt like swaying to the music. If she’d been at home, she would have done it, her bare feet against the floor, her arms wrapped around an invisible lover. Because there was never a real lover for Maite. No flesh-and-blood man.
Except there was a man with her now, sharing her booth. She touched the back of her neck, her fingers sliding down to brush the top button of her dress.
The waitress came by with their food, and Maite busied herself with her hamburger; she’d ordered the same thing he had, feeling it was the safest choice. One time she’d ordered a pineapple carved and filled with shrimp at a restaurant, and Cristóbalito had chided her because it was the most expensive item on the menu. Between taking sips of her soft drink, she glanced at Rubén. He still had feelings for Leonora. He’d said as much. But he’d slept with her, and now they were sitting there together, all friendly-like.
She didn’t want to ask, but she had to. She took a breath. “You’re not sorry?”
“About what?”
“You know. About sleeping with me.”
He blinked, confused. “Why would I be sorry about that? I told you, it’ll make a nice memory.”
“Oh, don’t joke like that.”
“Overthinker,” he said, tapping his head with his index finger and smiling. He had a decent smile, all warm.
She blushed again and figured by now he thought she was a complete fool. But it wasn’t like she did this regularly. She was angry at herself for not having the composure of the women in the stories she read, for not being the sophisticated lady. Instead, she was a stupid, blubbering spinster.
He took out a cigarette, lit it, and leaned an arm against the back of the booth as he took a drag. “Can you call in sick tomorrow?”
“Why?”
“For one, I’m still a bit nervous and don’t want to have you out of my sight in case, you know, that DFS agent tries to speak to you again. Second—”
“I can’t skip work all week because of that.”
“I know. But you didn’t let me tell you the second thing.”
“What’s that?”
“Second, you’re pleasant and I don’t mind spending time with you,” he said, reaching for the ashtray and placing it in the middle of the table. “I’ve been so stressed I thought I’d have a damn heart attack, but I feel relaxed around you.”
“Do you, really?”
“Yeah. I’m not sorry at all.”
He stretched a hand and caught her own, his thumb rubbing circles against her wrist, and he was looking into her eyes with such interest Maite felt herself blushing again, like a girl. With her free hand she touched her neck, a finger pressed against the hollow of her throat.
“So you want to lie low tomorrow?”
“Yeah,” he said. “What, is that really bad? I can teach you how to shoot too.”
“In my apartment? Are you crazy?”
“Without bullets, of course. Or maybe how to punch a guy. I bet you don’t know how to make a fist and throw a punch without breaking your fingers.”
“It sounds like you want me to become a guerilla fighter,” she said. “I take dictation.”
“Well, you never know.”
He wasn’t astonishingly handsome like Emilio, nor enthralling like Cristóbalito, but Maite figured he was something. Right? He was at the very least courageous. She could picture him with a machete, deep in a jungle, carving a path through the greenery and leading his men.
There wasn’t a jungle in Guerrero like the ones in Secret Romance, lush and filled with toucans, but there was some vegetation. Mountains, caves, rugged trails. And if they did connect them to the dead man, then that definitely would be a better location than Mexico City, rugged trails or not.
She imagined herself as an outlaw, far from civilization, while the moon, like a single unblinking eye, stared down at her. A man stood up and picked a song from the jukebox. “Blue Velvet.” She adored that song. The music made her wish to dance, again, while wearing a long velvet dress.
Maite raised her chin, glancing at the man who had thrown a coin into the jukebox, and he looked back at her—his eyes were black, not the blue of the song, but they did resemble the soft velvet upon which you could pin jewels. No one ever looked at Maite for too long, but the man was staring at her. He had a cigarette in hand, but he wasn’t smoking; instead he leaned an arm against the jukebox, looking terribly thoughtful, and he slowly pressed the cigarette against his lips and smirked, his lips curling a tad, before he smoothed his expression and walked back to his table, breaking eye contact.
The song was brief, filling the diner for three short minutes, before the place plunged back into silence.
Maite frowned and opened her purse, looking for a coin. When she found it, she stood up and walked to the jukebox. She went over the song list, nibbling on a nail. Maite picked “Can’t Help Falling in Love.” As she walked back to her table, smiling at Rubén, the young man’s black eyes turned toward her for the briefest moment before he looked down and pressed his cigarette against the bottom of an ashtray.
25
THEY DROVE BACK to the apartment, and Elvis pocketed El Gazpacho’s gun and stuffed a bunch of bullets and the speedloader in a worn leather messenger bag. Then he went into El Güero’s room, looking for his gun and ammo, because even if he wasn’t allowed to have one, Elvis was sure El Güero secretly kept a firearm in there. He found it pretty quickly. El Güero had hidden it in a tin box in the closet. He handed it to the Antelope.
“Those bastards from the DFS have firepower.”
“We’ll show them next time, put a couple of bullets in their ass. I never get to shoot anyone,” the Antelope replied. He blew a bubble of gum and popped it, making a mocking motion with the gun, as though he were shooting across the room. “And I feel like shooting someone today.”
“Man, don’t play with that,” Elvis muttered.
“Chill. I know weapons,” the Antelope assured him, and he blew an even bigger bubble.
He wasn’t in a mood to lecture anyone. If the Antelope shot himself in the dick by accident, so be it. Elvis went to the bathroom, cleaned up the new scrapes he’d acquired, and washed his face. When he was done, he tried phoning El Mago, but the old man didn’t answer. Elvis didn’t want to swing by his place unannounced a second time, so he told the Antelope that they were going back to the woman’s apartment building, to keep watch as usual.
“You sure about hanging ’round that building? You know, those guys could come back and grab you again,” the Antelope said.
“I’m pretty sure they have what they want. And that’s why we’ve got the guns. Bullets up their ass, like you said.” He wasn’t confident about anything, but he also wasn’t going to tell the Antelope that.
“First chance I get I’m shooting them trice. For El Güero, you know. Poor fucker’s gonna lose an eye, I bet.”
“We’ll see.”
“I mean it,” the Antelope said. He had a hungry look on his face, like he sometimes got when they were beating someone, and Elvis knew he was for real. He was out for blood.
“Yeah. I get it.”
The waiting game went as usual. Apparently Elvis had been right and the DFS agents had what they wanted, because they didn’t show their faces. Elvis chain-smoked, since there wasn’t anything else to do, and listened to the radio. The Animals strummed their guitars while he blew smoke rings and the An
telope chewed his bubble gum. He still hadn’t picked a word of the day, and it bugged him.
When the woman and the man exited the building, they followed them into a restaurant. The Antelope and Elvis grabbed a table, ordered a couple of beers and a couple of daily specials. There was a jukebox in a corner, and the woman stood up and picked a song. It was “At Last,” and he mouthed a line from the song. He knew this song, he knew what it meant. Outside it was starting to rain.
They were too far away from the woman’s table to hear what she was telling the man, but he was leaning forward and smiling, and she blushed.
Elvis wondered how people did this. This being normal and going out together. He couldn’t remember going out with many girls. Fucking, yes, and chasing skirts in the noisy, wild way boys from his neighborhood did. But he hadn’t gone out much with the older gringa—he was private entertainment—and with Cristina there were always the other members of their fucked-up cult milling around. It wasn’t ever him and a girl, together, out like this, drinking and eating while the jukebox played its tunes.
He didn’t even know why he was thinking about this since the woman he was looking at wasn’t particularly pretty, not the kind of woman to inspire a man to fantasize. Yet there was something about her. It was that air of tragedy, that’s what it was, the way she sat, with one hand constantly pressed against her neck. And her eyes were dark and deep, slightly lost and unfocused.
He wondered if he had met her in another way, in another place, whether she would have accepted an invitation for coffee. If Justo was right, there weren’t going to be Hawks soon anyway. He didn’t know what he’d do then. Join another group of goons? Fuckers who hungered to shoot someone, dogs who had acquired a taste for blood. The more he thought about that, the more he hated the idea. But he wasn’t sure what else he’d do.
And what if Justo was right and El Mago had killed El Gazpacho?
“No fucking way,” he muttered.
“What?” the Antelope asked.
“Nothing,” Elvis said, and he stood up and walked to the jukebox. He tossed a coin in and picked “Blue Velvet” as a joke, a little secret chuckle lodging in his throat, and turned his head to look at the woman.
She raised her head and looked at him, her eyes fixed on Elvis for a few precious seconds. She seemed a little confused. When the song ended, she stood up, walked daintily toward the jukebox—as if she could not let him have the last word—and picked another song: “Can’t Help Falling in Love.” Her lips curled into a tiny smile. When she smiled she looked almost pretty, like someone had struck a match and lit a veladora and the light was streaming out, but the glass colored it. Made it yellow or red or blue, like you could see the colors of her soul.
There he was thinking stupidities again. Elvis put out his cigarette and hoped the Antelope hadn’t noticed he’d been staring at the woman. But the Antelope had glued his gum under the table and was cutting into a bistec, terribly indifferent to anything that wasn’t the meat in front of him.
They drove back to the apartment and watched the couple walk into the building arm in arm. Elvis pushed the car door open.
“Where you going?” the Antelope asked.
“Gonna try to get in touch with El Mago again,” Elvis said. That was true enough, but he also wanted to walk. He felt irritated from being cooped up in the car, and his body ached. Plus he was a little pissed off because that fucking hippie put his arm tight around the woman, all romantic, and meanwhile the Antelope kept blowing his bubble gum and popping it. It was annoying.
It was raining, and he walked with brisk steps toward a public telephone booth, tossed in a couple of coins and waited.
“Yes?” El Mago said.
Elvis braced himself against the plastic wall of the booth and pressed the receiver close to his mouth. “It’s Elvis. We need to talk.”
“Where are you?”
“Girl’s place.”
El Mago mentioned the name of a nearby intersection and told him he’d drive by in half an hour, which was more than enough time for Elvis to walk back, tell the Antelope he was meeting El Mago, and then head to the intersection.
He was running low on cigarettes, so he wandered into a pharmacy and bought another pack. He stood under the green glow of the store’s sign for several minutes, thinking of nothing, watching the rain trickle down the awning. Persistent, this rain. All day long it had fallen slow and steady.
El Mago was punctual, and as soon as he rolled around the corner, Elvis tossed his cigarette away and hopped into the car, setting his leather bag on his lap. For a couple of blocks Elvis didn’t say anything, hypnotized by the back-and-forth of the windshield wipers.
“What is it?” El Mago asked.
“The mole knew how to get in touch with the girl with a code in the classifieds, so I used that, thinking I might flush her out. But nothing so far.”
“You have a new scrape on your brow.”
“Yeah,” Elvis said, touching his forehead and glancing at the rearview mirror. “Sócrates is dead. Anaya and his buddies thought we did it, so they gave us a beating. El Güero was pummeled pretty bad and I had to take him to the doctor. Everything else is pretty much the same.”
“There is no sign of the girl?”
“No. But as you can imagine, I’m a little short-staffed right now,” Elvis said, trying to keep a very formal, straightforward tone about the whole thing. It made no sense to wriggle like a worm in El Mago’s presence. It would make it worse.
“What, did El Güero lose a hand?”
“Almost lost an eye. He’s too mangled, can hardly move. Maybe you could get El Gazpacho back to us?” he asked, managing to maintain that same neutral tone. He sounded casual.
El Mago frowned. Elvis stared straight ahead, looking at the big billboard with a picture of a woman inviting everyone to drink a tall glass of Jugo V8.
“El Gazpacho has his walking papers.”
“But this is a special situation. El Gazpacho—”
“El Gazpacho is not part of this.”
Elvis watched the raindrops slide down the windshield and thought about Gazpacho’s body in a ditch. But maybe Justo was a liar. Maybe he’d made all that up. Still, Elvis didn’t get why El Mago wouldn’t bring him in to assist them if it was necessary.
“What about one of the other Hawks? El Topo or El Tunas?” he asked, remembering two of the other men they’d sometimes collaborated with. Men who were also under El Mago’s watch.
“Damn it, Elvis. You cannot see what is happening?” El Mago asked, surprising Elvis by the way he raised his voice. The light ahead of them turned red, and El Mago hit the brakes so quickly Elvis was jolted forward and had to grasp the dashboard to steady himself.
El Mago muttered something under his breath and turned a corner, parking the car in a random street, in front of a stationery store that was closing its doors. For a while they sat there, in front of a sign that clearly said “no parking,” both of them watching the rain slide down the glass and listening to it pound on the roof of the car. In the distance there was the rumble of thunder, slowly rolling closer.
“You know how the Hawks came into existence? It was the mess of ’68. Students wanting to vandalize the new subway line, painting graffiti, organizing protests. And after Tlatelolco, we decided you could not break down protests with military men. It was a task better suited for other kinds of people. But the problem is that everyone is always thinking small.
“Thugs. That is what they wanted. Thugs who could beat and who could spy on young students, but not much more. What use is teaching a man to beat another one if you are not going to aim higher, I say? So I asked to lead a few small units that had more refined personnel. But people like Anaya do not like that sort of thinking, they do not like you stepping a little higher. They abhor competition, they need to own the whole ring. You get it?”
>
“Kinda,” Elvis mumbled.
“There is talk about a new unit, this time under the command of the DFS. A ‘special brigade.’ ” El Mago snickered. “Special. Younger, that’s what they mean. Young idiots leading other young idiots. Anaya is thirty years old.”
“They’re thinking about replacing the Hawks with that brigade?”
“Now you’re getting it.”
“But we’ve done what they wanted.”
“It is a turf war. On many levels. The president was probably killing two birds with one stone: flexing his muscles and showing the lefties who’s boss, and kicking Alfonso Martínez Domínguez out of the way by pinning this on him. Meanwhile, people like Anaya see a chance to cut a few heads and gain a bit more power. With the Hawks gone, he and his men will swoop in to deal with the radicals once and for all.”
“But it’s not fair!”
“I think this is what I like most about you, Elvis, how you are still, at times, capable of being such a child. A big, giant baby. I wonder how you do it, that you can look at the world and manage to think there is a speck of fairness to it when all that the eye can see is garbage from here until forever. What a fool you are.”
Elvis stared at El Mago’s reflection in the rearview mirror. The man looked older that night, the wrinkles under his eyes were deeper, and even with his round, black-rimmed glasses, he did not resemble a retired professor. He looked like a bitter, worn soldier.
El Mago smiled a crisp, small smile, his eyes fixed on Elvis in the rearview mirror, as if he could guess what he was thinking.
“It is just us, dear boy,” he said. “Just us. There is no cavalry. If we can solve this mess, if we can find the girl and get those photographs, then I might be able to save our hides and steer us into a safe harbor. Anaya thinks he has me, but he does not have shit.”
It’s not like we have shit either, he thought.
Velvet Was the Night Page 24
