Eartheater

by Dolores Reyes

  Ana looked possessed. I begged her to let go but she hauled me to the open door. She told me to have a look, and I glanced inside. I saw a hand holding a knife. My heart lurched. I shook so hard I had to grab onto the door frame. Even with eyes shut I could still see a man’s veiny hand gripping a knife pointed at my brother.

  I started to weep. I would’ve begged Ana to stop, except I couldn’t speak. If we stayed a second longer, I thought, Walter was going to be stabbed.

  “You’re not allowed near Tito el Panda land. Got it?”

  I woke up, wrists sore like I’d been cuffed.

  I walked down the first of seven blocks to the train station. It was still early. Hanging outside the small houses were clothes folks had forgotten to bring in, dampened by the morning dew. My old lady never liked for us to be out and about so early. She said there were guys still on the prowl from the night before, and that they were the worst kind.

  Yesterday, somebody had left a bottle with a printout of a smiling boy. “Dypi” it read, followed by an address, a phone number, and the question: had anyone seen him? Something in his smile told me he was still alive, so instead of scarfing earth, I decided to pay a visit.

  When I left the house, it didn’t look like rain. Not a drop had fallen and yet the sky had grown dark. I hurried to the corner. One block to go, then I’d take the diagonal street and cut through there. I could’ve gone down the street that ran parallel, which was faster, but I never liked it there: that was where they tossed out the dead roosters.

  Those roosters were burned into my memory. At first folks had arranged them on street corners alongside red candles, corn, a whole display, but then they started wrapping them in black trash bags that didn’t cover them properly, so that it was impossible not to see them: dried-up feet or a crest poking through, bringing to mind petals torn from a cranesbill.

  The diagonal street was usually busy, and at the end was a block of silk floss trees. I’d been nuts about those trees ever since I was knee-high and used to slop around the mud after a storm, the ground a carpet of pink flowers that colored the muck and made it look beautiful to me and my brother.

  I was almost at the boom gate when it started coming down hard. I sprinted, the scent of wet earth rising. I passed the tortilla stand, which closed on rainy days, its trestle and bench chained to the lamp post. Though I went as fast as I could, it wasn’t fast enough. Then it hit me: no matter how much I ran, I wouldn’t make the train.

  I stopped at the railroad crossing. The rain, a beautiful curtain. On the other side of the tracks, beyond the curtain, I saw a boy walking toward me with a massive dog. We were alone: he and his dog on one side, me on the other. The train rushed past, and I glimpsed them in the second it took each car to pass, a blink between train cars. I heard the kid calling desperately for his dog. It’d got away from him and was threatening to dive under the train. The kid yelled at the dog to come back, but it wouldn’t listen.

  He’s not gonna cross, I thought. He’s got to know he can’t cross.

  Another train car hurtled past and the dog kept on trying. The kid got as close as he could without risking being pulled under the train. But the dog wouldn’t let up. He was waiting for the right moment.

  He’s not gonna cross, I thought.

  Another train car had barely passed when the dog spotted a wider opening and dove in.

  I don’t think half his body got through before the train snatched him. The dog was dead in under a second. The train left him crumpled, a few feet to the right of the track.

  I waited for the train to pass and crossed the tracks. The kid knelt by the body, its head turned back owl-like in the rocks. There was no blood, but the dog’s fur was like torn cotton. He must have been a beautiful creature.

  “Why did you want to die?” the boy asked.

  The rain fell so hard I was scared the boy wouldn’t see the next train coming in the state he was in. I had to get out of there. I was out of time.

  “It’s over, kid. The train got him,” I said in a last-ditch attempt to get him to stand up, but the boy carried on like he hadn’t heard me.

  “Why did you want to die?”

  I walked off under the rain, which by then had left me sopping wet. I reached the ticket booth. Stuck to the window was the printout of Dypi, who was laughing so hard in the photograph that his cheeks dimpled. I once again had the feeling he was still alive. The man behind the glass looked asleep and I didn’t want to wake him. No ticket then, I thought, and walked to the platform.

  The only good thing about that trip was the train pulling up to the station half-empty so that I got a seat. I rested my head on the window and ran through the list of stations, timed the distance between each, and worked out how long the ride would be. I set an alarm on my cell phone and nodded off.

  I couldn’t even rest while asleep. I dreamed I opened the door to my house and took a few steps in, then stumbled on something hidden in the crud of the sidewalk. It was small and I had to crouch to get a good look. A tiny, fallen pigeon. It opened its beak but made no sound. I wanted to help, except I didn’t know how. I just stared. The alarm rang a few minutes before we reached the station where I had to get off.

  Though the rain had let up, the sky was still overcast. Rug rats messed about between puddles on the dirt road. There were no cars. I walked a couple more blocks to the address I was looking for. There was no doorbell, so I clapped my hands. A girl opened and I asked for Eloísa. A man came in and had me sit down.

  “Eloísa’s not home. Probably on her way now.”

  The man’s eyes drooped.

  On the sides of the property were woven wire fences like the ones around a soccer pitch, but in front, at the entrance, just three rows of thin wire strung between wood posts. Because the house sat in the middle, you could see everything. Every once in a while, I’d peer out to check for the doña. Resting against a post was a cage with a parrot in it. A caged parrot is as good as a dead parrot. Bad luck, I thought. And the parrot, as though hearing me, squawked: “Wino, wino, to bed with you, wino.”

  The old man looked like he wanted to crawl into a hole.

  I pretended not to hear the bird. Every once in a while, I turned to watch a yellow horse chomping on some grass. I’d heard once that horses that color had a special name, but I could never remember what it was.

  Soon two women turned up.

  “Eloísa’s a fucking mess. She’s on the street all day looking for her kid. Last time I saw her, she’d wrapped herself up in trash bags to keep the rain off. She’s losing her mind.”

  Beside us, the horse chomped grass like it was nothing.

  One of them said:

  “You’ve got to catch whoever took the kid.”

  The other nodded in agreement.

  Then they pulled up a couple of stools to sit with us. Eloísa showed about a half hour later. She walked in, then stood eyeing us. All those people must’ve seemed strange to her. She hauled a couple of huge bags behind her. The ones she used to keep the rain off, I thought. But no: inside were printouts of Dipy’s face. She’d been putting them up around the neighborhood.

  The woman said her kid had been missing for twelve days. She said the cuffs had given her the brush-off. Searching the woman’s eyes, I said:

  “Doña, I’ve come to eat your earth.”

  The skinny gal who’d been playing dumb while eavesdropping on us brought out a plate of dirt they’d fixed up hell knows when. I grabbed a pinch, pressed it against the plate, lifted it, and put it in my mouth. I shut my eyes.

  First thing I saw was Dipy driving the cart. Though the yellow horse clomped steadily, there was something wrong with the kid. He kept rubbing at the fly of his pants the way kids do when they’ve got to go to the bathroom but keep screwing around till they can’t hold it in any longer.

  Dipy needed to take a leak and pulled over next to some trees on the side of the road. Wanting to give the horse a break too, he unhitched it from the cart, patted it on
the neck a couple of times, and gave it a good rub. The horse hoofed toward the grass. It took a couple of steps then stopped. Dipy stood and peed. He was ready to hit the road but the horse wouldn’t listen. The boy rounded the beast to check what was wrong. Just then, spooked by something it saw, the horse kicked its back legs and cracked the boy on the head.

  I opened my eyes, dizzied. My first thought was that they would beat the horse to death. I didn’t want to be around for that.

  “Señora, a word. Alone.”

  The woman looked at me and said:

  “Let’s step outside.”

  I explained the accident to Elisa. She said nothing. Just stared at the beast Dipy had taken with him on his rounds. The horse grazed, offering its neck to the sun breaking through the clouds. Again, I said: an accident. But Eloísa wouldn’t listen and instead muttered:

  “I’m gonna tell the other women not to let the kids out on their own. Someone might steal ’em.”

  Tears dribbled down her cheeks as she spoke.

  I didn’t want to talk anymore. I took the woman’s hands; she refused to look at me. She said again:

  “There’s a man out there taking boys who go out on the cart on their own.”

  “I’ve got to go,” I answered.

  I said a quick goodbye to everybody then headed out of the shack. I didn’t want to be the one to tell the abuelo; I didn’t want to tell anybody. I walked down the dirt road. Pulled out my cell phone, called Ezequiel, and told him the boy’s story. Let the cuffs handle it. Dipy was dead. Then I asked him to come by the house. I had to see him.

  I’d been waiting for about a half hour by the time Ezequiel showed. He came in and started talking, but I was hardly listening.

  “What’s up with you?” he said, and he carried on talking, sending stuff my way that I couldn’t connect with.

  I made this clear by touching his cock over his pants and using my other hand to grab his fingers and bring them to my scalp. Only when I started stroking him did Ezequiel relax and smile. He held me, pressed me against him. I loved the smell of him. There was no one else home and it was like nothing mattered but us and our kissing. I kissed then licked his neck, which cleared my head. All of a sudden, his hands released me and undid the button on his jeans, unzipped his fly, pulled out his hard cock.

  Blowing Ezequiel was like a game to me. As I ran my tongue down his shaft and kissed it, I thought of ice cream. Ezequiel let me mess around a bit then grabbed me by the hair and stood me up. His hands undid my pants and yanked them down, as though tearing them off, then bent me over the small sofa in my suite. Facedown, his fingers fondled the place where his cock would penetrate me. He stroked me for a long while, like we had all the time in the world. Above all, I felt his heat. It hurt when Ezequiel first thrust into me—a split-second of pain—but then he was moving inside me and I was going nuts.

  Two nights later, I dreamed of Ana. It’d been a while. I was starting to think I would never dream of her again but there she was, asking if I was angry.

  I didn’t say.

  She said she hadn’t come earlier ’cause she’d thought I was mad. I lied and said I was happy to see her, that I wasn’t pissed or anything.

  Now I was the one who didn’t trust her. She had asked me to taste her earth and, when I did, had lost her shit. I didn’t want her yanking at my wrists either, like last time. But Ana was my friend, and I never wanted to lose her.

  I said:

  “Let’s have a beer?”

  “It isn’t allowed,” Ana answered, opening her eyes real wide.

  And we both burst out laughing.

  Even though I nearly always realized it was a dream, I never asked her: Who took you? But I thought about it more and more.

  She didn’t bring it up either, though I had a feeling she knew. And the thought of it made me ache.

  That time I ate dream earth I saw a man drag Ana by the hair and heard an awful cackling sound. Everything but her had gone shadowy. The white of her body seemed to glow in the dark night and between dark hands that heaved her and tore off her clothes. Terror nipped at my spine and I had to stop watching. Seeing as she’d told me off afterward, I’d decided not to mention it.

  We were silent.

  In my dream, Ana had a small purse. She glanced at it and at me, then said it would’ve been her birthday. She asked if I knew and I shook my head. Then she opened her purse and pulled out a can of beer.

  I eyed the can, a pitiful amount for the two of us, but she smiled so hard I didn’t care.

  “On birthdays,” she said, “it’s allowed.”

  And the can popped open with that sound I loved.

  It was Friday evening. Ezequiel was on duty and would only visit on Sunday. Thinking of all the time left until I’d see him felt like walking blindfolded through La Salada. I sat on the suite sofa, got up, strolled around, sat back down; I couldn’t stay still.

  Walter and his buddies were pre-gaming in his room before heading out to El Rescate. Ever since the combat-boot girl had stopped staying over, my brother loved clubbing and being out all weekend. I wasn’t about to stay home on my own, locked up.

  Somebody knocked again. I got off the sofa to answer the door. Some of my brother’s friends were like aliens. They’d come in and not even say hello, just “Where’s Walter?” then “What about the games?” and head straight to his room.

  But this time when I opened the door, one of them asked if I wanted a chocolate.

  I laughed and said no.

  Then he pulled something out of his pocket that I thought was chocolate but was actually a joint, offered it to me and said:

  “Smoke?”

  We sat at the door and lit up facing the weeds. The paper smelled chocolatey and let off a sweetish smoke as it burned. I spaced out watching the plants. Neither me nor my brother had tended to the garden and the passionflower looked ready to swallow the house. Most of the flowers had opened, though a couple of orange buds still hung around. Beyond the branches, my barrio stirred the way it does at nightfall. And I didn’t mind thinking that one day, if Ezequiel, Walter, and me all went to shit, the passionflower would swallow up our crib like a carnivorous plant.

  A house can die, too.

  We took our time getting up and it was like stretching awake after a nap. We laughed across the suite. The kid stole into the room, and I went to the bathroom to splash my face. I didn’t want to be alone. I had to work on Walter, so he’d let me come to El Rescate with them. I ran my still-damp hand over my hair, and try as I might I couldn’t wipe away my smile. It was tattooed on.

  When I walked into the room, the kid was sat with the rest of them on the floor. The room was mobbed.

  “What’re you up to?” I asked from the doorway.

  Walter didn’t answer.

  Some kid I didn’t know asked:

  “Anything to drink?”

  “Nothing, I don’t think. We can grab some beers on the way to El Rescate. I’ve got cash,” I said, glancing at my brother.

  Walter peeled his eyes from the PlayStation for a second and looked at me.

  “Fat chance,” he spat out. “No way am I taking you.”

  His answer got me riled up. He hadn’t even looked like he was listening!

  I left the room and went to the kitchen for a drink. I opened the fridge, more out of habit than the hope that I would find something. I spotted two beers, snagged them, and grabbed two tankards from the cupboard. I walked back to the room balancing it all. As I nudged the door open with my foot, one of the beers slipped from my hand and smashed on the floor.

  I smothered a laugh. The sight of those shards scattered all over filled some part of me with joy. I went to the kitchen for something to clean it up with and, on my way back, thought of my mamá. Mamá had been nuts about those fused glass animals. She used to buy them for peanuts at the market, and the colorful critters slowly took over the top of the fridge and the rest of the house. My old man started laying into her about it,
asking why she kept burning money on that junk. Until one day he lost it and broke every single one of them. The day after, my old lady swept up all the pieces and put the little critters back together with Poxiran. I’d admire them now and then. No longer see-through, the brownish glue had turned them dark, like monsters.

  The reason I was so tickled by that broken bottle, I thought as I swept glass into the dustbin, was because I was Mamá’s daughter. Walter came into the kitchen, alone.

  “Sis,” he said, his hand on my shoulder. “Let’s head out.”

  El Rescate was slammed.

  Boys and girls passed each other plastic liter-cups of beer, hands held high like suns to keep them from spilling. The floor thumped to the beat of miniskirts. Just seconds after we got there, Walter melted into them like a zombie. I thought it was the music, but his eyes were lost in the colors of their skirts.

  It isn’t just love that makes the heart race, but music too.

  Everybody smiled and reached for one another. Everybody touched and danced. Cigarette smoke curled up to the ceiling lights mixed with fumes that seemed to rise from the bodies.

  I didn’t expect to see anybody. But as I watched people hugging and cheering, I bumped right into Hernán.

  “I’ve got an old lady now,” he yelled so I could hear him. “Her name’s Yésica.”

  Only after hearing her name could I picture Hernán, the boy I hadn’t heard from in years, with another chick.

  “We’ve got a two-year-old girl,” he added.

  Nearly knocked me on my ass. Hernán, in Dad pose, smiled and puffed out his chest.

  It was nice seeing him again.

  “You’re not a brat who scares off anymore,” I said, taking a long swill of beer.

  I didn’t want to but for a second my mind drifted to Ezequiel. Then I took another swig, emptying the cup, and had the urge to chase after the music and the other kids.

  “Che, can you dance? Don’t want some chick to come yank me by the hair!”