“Victor?” Even though he stayed to help me dig Guillermo out and brought Belén home, I still kind of figured he’d make himself scarce. He left, after all. And I’m sure he could still get in trouble if people started asking questions about why he was on the mountain and the landlord figures out he got into his old home.
“What are you doing here?” I ask, glancing around. “Is it just you?”
“Yeah. I scouted around a bit too. I didn’t see anyone else.”
I relax. I don’t want any more surprises.
“Francisco and Guillermo are gone,” Victor says.
“Wait! What?”
“The miners dropped Guillermo off at the health center this morning. His legs looked bad, but it turns out the cuts were mostly shallow and only one leg was broken. They were able to set it cleanly. When they went home for lunch, they left him sleeping there, but when they returned, Guillermo was gone. I asked one of my buddies who works at the bus station, and he says he saw a man and a boy on crutches get on a bus headed for Uyuni. I don’t think they’ll be back.”
Some surprises, I realize, I don’t mind as much as others. I’m glad that I won’t have to face Francisco again. I imagine the vast salt flats of Uyuni and wonder what Guillermo’s life will be like there. It’s not an easier place to live, trading rock for salt, but it makes sense that’s where Francisco took him: Uyuni is where they mine lithium for cell phones and electronics. It should be easy enough for Francisco to get a job there. Plus, it’s over two hundred kilometers away—far enough that no one from here is likely to chase him down to make him sorry for what he did.
I’m glad, for Guillermo’s sake at least. Miners can be as unkind to thieves as they are to guardas.
But even though I’m relieved, a cold dread washes through me. If Francisco’s gone, then the small hope I had that the cooperative would make him pay for at least half of the repairs to the mine is gone too. It will be all on me and my family. I sigh. There is no path out of our debt now but to find a way to earn the money the slow way. The hard way. The cooperative will dock César’s paycheck, and we’ll pull a little out of what we need each week until the debt is paid down, like we did after Papi’s burial. It’s a hungry road back from disaster. I’ve traveled it before.
“That’s good to know,” I decide. “But what are you doing up here? Surely you didn’t come all this way, at night, just to tell me the news.”
“I was actually visiting your place.”
“Oh?”
“I wanted to make sure Belén was better,” he says. “And your grandma told me you’d come up here for the night, so I thought, since I was nearby, I’d come say hello.”
“Oh. Well, hello, I guess.”
“Hi.”
I look at him carefully. “And you? How are you doing?”
Victor gives a half laugh. “Oh, you know me, a Sánchez always lands on his feet.”
I stare at him until he gives me a real answer.
“I’m okay,” he says. “No one figured out I broke into my old house, so I haven’t lost my place in mechanic training.”
“Wait!” I squeal. “Mechanic training? You got in?”
Victor gives a shy smile. “Yeah. You were right. Joaquín was able to get me in at the garage. I have to work for free, but they’re willing to teach me. If I don’t ditch, and I prove to them I’m not an idiot or a criminal, they’ll let me start as a paid apprentice in six months.”
“Victor, that’s great!”
His smile stretches. “Yeah,” he says again. “It kind of is.”
Something occurs to me and I dig in my schoolbag, glad I used it to carry my stuff. Sure enough, there at the bottom is Victor’s notebook.
“Here,” I say, I pulling it out and handing it to him.
Victor runs his fingers over the pages, pausing when he sees his note.
“I didn’t think I’d ever see this again,” he says softly.
“Well, I’m officially giving it back. You might need it for taking notes on cars.”
Victor grins. “Thanks, Ana.”
We sit in comfortable silence for a few minutes. Then something else occurs to me.
“Are you still staying where you were before?”
He nods. “It’s the only place I can afford. Even to stay there, I still have to do fights to make rent. But once I get through my apprenticeship, I should be able to move into a better place.”
“Good.” My cheeks actually hurt, I’m smiling so hard. “That place is a dump.”
Victor laughs.
I hate to think that Victor will have to keep letting himself get beaten up for money, but I’m glad to know that he has a way out, a plan for when it will end.
“I’m not sure which is worse,” I joke, “being a human punching bag or being a guarda. I guess in the fight ring you at least sometimes get to punch back.”
“Oh, I don’t know.” He winks at me, and I see a bit of the sparkle of the old Victor, the one I knew before his papi pulled him out of school to work in the mine. “I hear that sometimes a guarda hits back too—except she does it with dynamite. There’s this one girl I know who nearly brought the whole mountain down last time someone snuck up on her . . .”
“Ha. Ha. Ha,” I say. “Victor Sánchez, you’re soooo funny.”
“Well,” he says, tucking his notebook under his arm and getting to his feet, laughing, “I gotta get going. Catch you later, Ana.”
He turns away, and I realize I have one more thing I need to say to him.
“Victor!”
“Yeah?”
“Thank you. For what you did last night. Thank you for staying with me when things were bad, and for taking care of Belén.”
Victor smiles his big crooked smile.
“You’re welcome,” he says simply.
And then he’s gone.
* * *
I sit there for the rest of the night, alone with the stars.
On the Mountain That Eats Men, hope is a tree from which life slowly snaps off all the branches: it dies a little at a time, year by year, piece by tiny piece. Some days I feel like there aren’t enough branches left to keep my tree alive anymore.
I remember the hopes Daniel and I used to pass back and forth like a bag of candy. We will run away together. Far away from here. Far away from the mountain and the mines. Far away from the rocks and the cold. For what seems like all of my life, I have wanted nothing more than to leave this mountain. And yet . . . and yet.
As I stare down at the twinkling city of Potosí, I hear the echo of Padre Julio’s reedy voice in my head: Again, the devil took him to an exceedingly high mountain, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. He said to him, “I will give you all of these things, if you will fall down and worship me.”
It was the Gospel from church that day I sat between Mami and César, just before he got sick. I had thought, at the time, that it was a judgment on me for wanting a nice life I didn’t have. But now I hear it differently. It’s not a verse saying the kingdoms of the world and their splendor are bad . . . it’s saying that sometimes there is a wrong way to get even the best of things.
The devil knows better than to offer you bad things, I think. He offers you good things, the wrong way. Get money by stealing. Feel better by drinking. It’s only after you take the bait that you see the trap.
Recently, so much has happened that I haven’t really had time to think about anything more than solving the next problem in front of my face. But now, with the icy stars above me and the sleeping city below me, I have plenty of time to think about my life.
I think about mountains filled with devils and darkness, and of sparkling, unreachable cities. I think of Francisco and Guillermo, willing to steal from people poorer than they are, putting my family into even more debt. I always thought I wanted to leave th
is place no matter what, but now I know that I will not leave those I love to struggle by themselves. I will not steal my future from anyone.
Staring down at the city of Potosí, I trace the stripes of light that outline the roads and count the dark patches of parks and graveyards. Two main roads intersect at Potosí: the 1 and the 5. They loop around a bit in the middle of the city, but the 1 runs in from the south and leaves to the north, stretching all the way to La Paz, one of our capital cities. It’s up on the Altiplano and is the seat of the legislative and executive branches of the national government. The 5 comes in from the west from the salt flats of Uyuni, and leaves to the east, looping its way to Sucre, the judicial capital. From there, it meets up with the 7, which takes it to Santa Cruz in the lowlands, the biggest city in the country and our business center, a third capital city in all but name. Yenni’s mami is to the north, in La Paz, searching for better work. Guillermo and Francisco are to the west, living off their stolen silver in Uyuni. Daniel is to the east, somewhere along the 5 before Sucre, breathing better air.
The cold wind whipping over the mountain takes my exhale with it, whisking it off to horizons I will never see. I force myself to let go of my sadness. And in the stillness of the hours after midnight, I think. I think about La Paz and Sucre. Of the 1 and the 5. I think of Abuelita handing me an acetylene helmet when I soaked a box of matches.
This is my country and it has more than one capital.
This is my city and it has more than one main road.
This is my home and there is more than one way to light a cook fire.
This is my life. There must be more than one way to live it.
The Inca constructed wonders without the wheel or steel or money or writing or horses, I remind myself. It’s time I stopped focusing on all the things I don’t have. It’s time to start building anyway. And so, instead of resting my head on my crossed arms and letting my thoughts chill me until dawn, I stand, and pace, and find a better way.
* * *
When I get home, Mami is waiting for me, as she has been every morning I’ve worked as a guarda. I’m exhausted, but when I walk in the door, I’m instantly cheered to see that both César and Belén are up and sitting at the table. With a few days of rest and medicine, César’s cough is settling. He’s hunched forward, cradling his cup of tea, and Belén is still pale and is wrapped tightly in a blanket, but just seeing the two of them up lifts my spirits.
I sink onto a second bucket that has been placed beside Belén. Mami puts a cup of tea in front of me.
“How was your night?” asks Belén.
“I’m okay, and nothing else was taken,” I say, and leave it at that. Abuelita drapes a blanket around my shoulders and gives me a one-armed hug. I feel warmer already.
I sip my tea and consider my new family. Mami, willing to remarry to protect her children. César, willing to leave his sickbed to rescue me. Belén, willing to give up on her dreams to help out. Abuelita, willing to tell me every story she knows until I can stitch together a new truth for myself.
I remember what Victor said at the mouth of the mine: I won’t leave . . . If it caves in again, I’ll stay here and dig you out. I promise.
Maybe it’s true that none of us can stop the avalanche of bad things that will try to crush us. But the true tragedy is not the avalanche, it’s when each person runs away, trying to get what’s best only for themselves, leaving others to die in the rubble. I think of the sacrifices Mami and César and Abuelita and Belén have already been willing to make for me and the sacrifices I’ve made for them. If we all commit to digging each other out, no matter what, we can make sure that no one gets buried.
I take a deep breath.
“So,” I say, “I’ve been thinking.”
* * *
Three days later, Belén is well enough to return to school. Mami lets her go because it’s a Friday: if it exhausts her, she can rest up over the weekend.
Even after spending the night awake as a guarda, I walk with her. Though she no longer has constant headaches, she does sometimes get dizzy, and I won’t take the chance of her stumbling off a cliff if I can avoid it.
Belén’s friends chirrup with happiness to have her returned to the flock, and we walk in a companionable group over the rocky path from the houses to the school. When we arrive, the little kids knock and are let in by Doña Inés, like always. She has her baby in a sling around her body. We all pause to look in and coo at the beautiful, healthy little girl.
I give Belén a quick hug, and she scampers after her friends. To my left those same boys are still wrestling ore carts in and out of the mine by the school, just as boys have been doing without a break for the past 471 years. It’s not going to change, I think. Ever.
But instead of filling me with sadness, today it fills me with fire. I’m done waiting for the world to change, to give me what I want. It’s time to build my future using what I’ve got now. It’s time for me to change. I turn to the gate just as Doña Inés is about to close it.
“Wait!” I say. “Please.”
Doña Inés is surprised but lets me in with a smile.
I haven’t been to school in over a month, but the morning routine hasn’t changed. I go and sit in Don Marcelino’s office while he sings the national anthem with the kids and gives his daily talk. I can hear him through the open door. Today’s topic is Resilience.
Yes, I think with a smile. Exactly.
When the talk is done and the kids have surged off for their breakfast, Don Marcelino returns to his office.
“Ana,” he says, surprise clearly written all over his face. “How are you?”
“I’m well,” I say, gathering my courage for the speech I’ve rehearsed. “But I was wondering something.”
“Yes?” he says, settling himself behind his desk and pushing his square glasses up the bridge of his nose. “What can I do for you?”
They’re the same words he used when my request was for him to drive my father’s corpse down the mountain. I swallow. All my well-rehearsed words vanish, scattering like rice spilled on a rock floor. When I open my mouth, my old hopes come out instead.
“Someday, I want to leave this place,” I confess in a whisper. “Someday, I want to have a nice house in the city and make enough to support my family. I don’t want to stay here and marry a miner. I don’t want my children to have to live the lives my parents did, and their parents before them.” I feel raw, exposed. “But I’m not willing to allow my family to suffer to do that. I won’t leave the wrong way. To leave the right way, I need to bring them with me. I need a job better than the ones I can get on this mountain. And to get that better job, I need to finish school.”
Don Marcelino smiles. “I’m glad to hear it, Ana. We’ve missed you.”
“Th-thank you,” I manage. “But that’s only half of it.”
He sits quietly, polishing his glasses on a handkerchief, and lets me gather my thoughts.
“Someone once told me that dreams are for little kids,” I say finally. “And in some ways, I think he’s right. Believing that good things will happen because you want them to is a way only little kids think. Everyone else on this mountain knows better.”
Don Marcelino grimaces when I say this but doesn’t contradict me. Even though he’s from the city, he’s worked up here long enough that he knows the rocky outlines of our reality.
“Which is why I need your help,” I say. “It’s no good to sit and wish for something; you have to work for it too.”
Hope kindles in Don Marcelino’s eyes. I wonder, for a second, just how hard it must be to choose to run a school and see all your students vanish, one at a time, year after year after year without end.
“Yes?” he prompts.
I take a deep breath.
“I can’t come back to school.” Don Marcelino’s face falls, and I rush on before he can end the convers
ation. “My family needs the money I make, especially with the robbery and Daniel’s medical bills. But . . .” And here I pause, gathering my courage. “But if I’m a guarda, I’m alone and it’s quiet and I’m not allowed to fall asleep all night long. So . . . maybe . . . I could study then?”
Don Marcelino looks slightly stunned. Stunned, but not angry. I go on.
“You could give me books to read, and exercises to do. I could write them on my overnights and give them to Belén in the mornings. She could bring them in to school . . . if someone was willing to mark them . . . maybe I could eventually learn enough to take the secondary school entrance exams . . . ?”
I trail off.
Don Marcelino starts nodding enthusiastically.
“Yes!” he says, beaming. “Ana, what a great idea! I can certainly arrange that for you. You might need to come in every now and again to have something explained to you or to sit for an exam, but I can arrange this with your teachers.” He grins at me. “You’re creating your own night school.”
My smile is wobbly. I can’t believe he said yes. I can’t believe that there is a possibility I can still reach for my dreams.
“You really think it might work?” I ask again, just to be sure.
“We’ll make it work,” he says.
* * *
Half an hour later I’m standing outside the peeling blue metal door, my arms full of textbooks and supplies. But though the door has clanged behind me, I don’t feel shut out. Instead, I’m grinning like a maniac.
I puff a breath out and turn. There is one more thing I have to do.
It hadn’t been until the day after the robbery, when César, Belén, and Abuelita were sleeping, that I finally admitted to Mami about the forty-eight bolivianos and fifteen centavos heavy on my conscience. I begged her to let me keep working as a guarda until I could earn it back. Mami had thought about it for a few moments, then agreed.
Treasure of the World Page 28
