The Border

by Steve Schafer

  “I think I want a sports car when we get there,” Arbo says.

  “Where did that thought come from?”

  “Right over there,” he says. “I want something like that one.” He points several cars deep in the line on the other side of the border. I have no idea what kind of car it is—it’s shiny, red, and much lower than everything else. “Only I want it in yellow,” he adds.

  “You’d barely fit in that thing.”

  “Shut up, flaco.”

  “Well if you get that car, then I’m going to get a truck.”

  “We have a truck here.”

  “No. A really nice one. Like the kind that has a back seat.”

  “That’s just a bigger truck.”

  “I like trucks,” I say.

  “Why not get something better?”

  “Why?”

  “Because you can.”

  “Okay. Then you can. Have your fancy yellow car. Just don’t park it behind my truck. I’ll run it over.”

  “We’ll need a house with a big driveway then.”

  “And a swimming pool.”

  “And a huge yard.”

  “And statues.”

  “And a big gate.”

  “And guard dogs.”

  “And a butler.”

  “And a maid.”

  “Who only wears bikinis.”

  “Then we’ll need two of them.”

  “And a helicopter.”

  It’s my turn. I pause. “Seriously, we’re not going to have anything. We’re going to get there with nothing.”

  “Like I said, I don’t know anything about the country, but why do you think so many people try to get over there? Maybe not everybody is rich, but”—he turns toward the line of cars at the border—“a lot of them are.”

  We spend well over an hour in banter between reality and fantasy, at times pleasantly unsure of which is which.

  Arbo checks his watch.

  “Time to go?” I ask.

  “Sí.”

  We’re the first to arrive in the alley. Within a few minutes, Gladys appears. She’s alone, holding a small plastic bag looped around one of her wrists.

  “Where’s Marcos?” I ask.

  “Who knows,” she says.

  “What do you mean?”

  “He said he had something he wanted to do.” Her eyebrows push together and slant down, forming a V.

  “Like what?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “So you’ve been by yourself the whole time?” I ask.

  “For most of it,” she says. “It was okay. I like exploring.”

  “What’s in the bag?” Arbo asks.

  “Wouldn’t you like to know,” she says.

  “What, are you trying to imitate your brother?”

  “Ha, ha,” she says in a dry tone. “It’s something for Pato.”

  Arbo turns to me with an annoyed expression.

  “And nothing for me?”

  “Well, I almost got you a wrestling outfit. You know, to cross the desert in style.”

  “Ha, ha,” he says.

  “So, you want to see it?” she asks me, as she dips her hand into the bag.

  “Sí.”

  She pulls out a book and hands it to me.

  “Las aventuras de Huckleberry Finn,” she says.

  “What is it?” I ask.

  “It’s a gringo book. I think it’s about a boy who leaves home to go on an adventure. It’s not exactly the same as us, but what is? I thought you might like something to read.”

  It’s beyond thoughtful. If Arbo weren’t here, I might have teared up. We’ve passed the it’s-okay-to-cry phase, but not when it comes to something like getting a book from a girl.

  “Thank you,” I say.

  Wait. Something occurs to me—and because we share a brain—Arbo asks the question before I can.

  “How did you get this? I thought none of us had any money.”

  “I just did,” she says.

  “What do you mean you ‘just did’?”

  “I mean, you don’t need to know about everything that I do.”

  “You stole it?” Arbo asks.

  “No, I didn’t steal it.”

  “Well, then how else did you get it?”

  “That’s none of your business.”

  “Dios mío, you’re just like him,” Arbo says.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “What do you think? Full of secrets, just like your brother. Pato and I sat on a bench and laid low for three hours. And, by the way, our pictures are still all over the newspaper. But that didn’t stop you. You were off robbing bookstores and doing who knows what.”

  Throughout our time at Sr. Ortíz’s house, there wasn’t much space to hide emotions, whatever they were. But I’ve never seen Gladys truly angry. Until now.

  And in this anger, I see something else for the first time—Marcos. She doesn’t look like him, and it’s not just that she’s being secretive. She projects him. Her jaws press together, pulsing her cheeks outward. Her pupils dilate and she stares at Arbo as if the rest of the world doesn’t exist.

  I hold my breath.

  Then, as quickly as he arrived, Marcos vanishes, like some inner demon she has learned to control.

  “Okay. You really want to know how I got it?”

  Arbo nods. He’s as taken aback as I am.

  “Here’s what I’ll do. I’ll tell Pato. But he can’t tell you anything, except that I didn’t steal it.”

  I both love and hate this plan.

  “He’ll tell me,” Arbo says.

  “No, he won’t.”

  Both look at me. This is the part I hate.

  “I…” I freeze. There is no right answer. Either choice is wrong. Still, they stare at me, each expecting me to support their side.

  Arbo finally does the humane thing and bails me out.

  “Fine. Tell him. I’ll let it go.”

  He’s lying. We all know it. But it gets me off the hook.

  I follow Gladys around the corner. Her eyes, which had been so fierce only a moment before, now look at me playfully and send my stomach into a free fall. In an instant, I forget about Arbo. I forget about the deal. I just want to be here.

  “So, you want to know?” she asks eagerly, suggesting that all along, she really wanted to tell.

  “Of course.”

  She checks in both directions to make sure no one is around, then smiles somewhere between bashful and proud.

  “I showed my boob,” she says.

  “You what? To who?”

  “To the guy at the bookstore.”

  My mouth hangs open, but nothing comes out.

  “Well, he wasn’t a guy,” she continues. “He was a kid. He was about twelve.”

  “Why?”

  “Duh. To get the book. I didn’t have any money. He said I couldn’t take it. It was a store, not a library. So…”

  “So, what? Did he ask you to do it?”

  “No. There wasn’t anybody else around so I made a deal. He was just a kid, and I’m never going to see him again. And you got a book!”

  I’m part touched, part flabbergasted, and part…envious.

  “I can’t believe you showed your boobs to a twelve-year-old.”

  “Just one.”

  “One what?”

  “One boob.”

  “Why?”

  “I didn’t need to show both.”

  “Don’t they look alike?”

  “Wouldn’t you like to know.”

  I look right at them. Then I look back up at her eyes, unsure of what’s going to happen next. I can feel each beat of my pulse surge through my body.

  She simply shak
es her head. “You got a book out of it.”

  I’ve never felt worse about literature.

  Gazing at her, I’m struck by how differently we reacted to this day. I hid. She exposed herself—literally. We faced danger in opposite ways.

  I think back to when we were outside the wall that night, Gladys pressing against my back, listening to Arbo scream in the backyard. There was comfort in having two of us there, both afraid to run into the madness. It was an unspoken empathy. And, apparently, one that I had only imagined.

  I had been holding her back, wet leg and all.

  This is the second time I see Marcos in her. Only this time, it makes me want her. In a way that I shouldn’t, just days after losing my family. And it makes me want to be someone different, someone more than I am.

  “Remember. You can’t tell Arbo. Promise me.”

  “I won’t.”

  She walks past me and I follow her back into the alley. As we turn the corner, she gives me a smug grin, half for me and half for Arbo. Arbo eyes me like he can’t wait to get me alone. Fortunately, before we get close enough to speak, Sr. Ortíz drives into the alley.

  “So?” I ask.

  “Good news and bad news,” he says, stepping out of the truck.

  “What’s the good?”

  “They looked at the truck and said it’s probably enough.”

  “Probably?”

  “That’s the bad news. I didn’t talk with our coyote. But I did find some people who know him and can get in touch with him,” he says.

  “So what do we do?”

  “We wait.”

  “In Sonoyta?”

  “Or we drive back. I don’t know which is better or safer.”

  Both the narcos and the police have been known to stop people on the highway, for no good reason. All of us are aware of this.

  “How long do we wait?”

  “They think they can reach him by mañana.”

  Tomorrow. Arbo and Gladys deflate, the same as me.

  Mañana doesn’t usually mean mañana. Just like un momentito can stretch into hours. It’s a lie we tell ourselves and others when we don’t know.

  Still, it’s tempting to believe. It’s what I want. Today I saw the United States. I was close enough to breathe the foreign air. And in my mind, I’ve already said goodbye to Mexico. I’m ready to start the journey.

  “Where would we stay?” I ask.

  “They gave me the name of a motel.”

  “How much is it?”

  “It’s not much,” he says. “Don’t worry about the money. My family has been good to me.”

  “We’ll pay you back for all of this,” Arbo says.

  “Get across safely. That’s all you have to do to pay me back.”

  We wait another thirty minutes for Marcos, until Gladys finally gets concerned. She and Sr. Ortíz leave the alley to see if he might be somewhere nearby, which gives Arbo his opportunity to corner me.

  “So?” he asks.

  “So, what?”

  “Come on.”

  “She made me promise not to tell you,” I say.

  “So that’s how it’s going to be now?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Is she your new best friend?”

  “Come on,” I say.

  “What?”

  “You want me to break my promise?”

  “I don’t have any secrets from you,” he insists.

  “None?”

  “None.”

  Our eyes lock. He’s telling the truth, which makes me feel that much worse about what I’m about to do. I’ve never lied to him. Never. Until this moment.

  “Sr. Ortíz gave her some money.”

  “So why didn’t she just say that?” he asks.

  “Because he asked her not to tell anyone. I guess she looked hungry. I don’t know. I wasn’t there.”

  Lies. Mentiras y más mentiras.

  Arbo cocks his head slightly and bites his lip. He’s trying to read me. “You remember I told you that I like her, right?”

  “You said you liked her.”

  “What’s the difference?”

  “As in, you used to like her.”

  “Well, I still do.”

  “Okay… Well, I still didn’t do anything.”

  “Well, you’re not acting like that.”

  “She got me a book. I didn’t ask for it.”

  “Right.”

  There isn’t a good, natural end to this conversation, so I’m thrilled when an unnatural one turns the corner.

  Marcos walks toward us. Gladys and Sr. Ortíz are at his side.

  “Did you get done what you needed to do?” Arbo asks in a bitter tone, still riled up.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Gladys said you had something you wanted to do.”

  He glances quickly at Gladys.

  “No. I didn’t think we should be walking around together,” he says.

  We all know it’s a lie, but his tone makes it clear that this is the end of the conversation.

  We return to the bed of the truck and huddle in a hot, agitated mass beneath the tarp.

  Coyotes Are Dogs

  After less than five minutes of driving, the truck stops.

  A half-dozen men line the porch of the motel. They watch us climb out of the truck, as if it were nothing out of the ordinary. They smoke cigarettes, talk quietly, and mostly ignore us.

  I take one look at the motel and have a good idea why they are on the porch and not in the rooms. It’s filthy. Most of what could be broken is. Railings bow outward and dangle from the second floor, one threatening to fall with the next gust of wind. Whatever paint remains on the outside is coated with uneven splotches of dirt. Several windows are busted out, leaving empty frames with a few lingering shards of glass. Boards are rotting or already rotted. This isn’t a motel. I may not have stayed in one before, but I’ve certainly seen them, and they don’t look like this. This is somewhere you’re told to wait. For as little time as possible. A place so unwelcoming you can happily walk into a miserable desert and never look back.

  I look again at the men on the porch. They are us, and we are them. Our stories are different, but we are the same. We are all waiting to cross.

  Sr. Ortíz waves us toward what should have been the front door but is only the front doorway. The door itself is gone.

  As we approach the steps, a truck pulls up behind ours—a flatbed—the kind usually used to haul equipment. The porch empties quickly, leaving only one man behind. The men pile onto the back of the truck, pull their hats low, and ride away. I watch them with envy. I want to start this trip now, not wait around this…whatever this place is.

  I make eye contact with the one man remaining on the porch. He nods, and I nod back.

  We get a key and climb the stairs to the second floor.

  The inside of the motel matches the outside well. There are two mattresses, both of which lack frames. Lying on the ground, they’re more inviting to bugs than people. A lone bulb dangles above our heads. I’d sooner cross the border twice than touch the wires that support it. And the toilet, it flushes. That’s the nicest thing I can say about it.

  We open a door to a balcony, which overlooks an alley behind the building. The whole balcony slopes downward toward an iron railing with flakes of rust that flap in the wind. None of us step outside. We keep the door open for the breeze.

  We return to the truck to gather our supplies and carry them to the room, unsure of when mañana might arrive.

  Marcos and Gladys lie down on one of the mattresses, eyes closed, surely trying to imagine they are elsewhere. Arbo does the same, though I think he’s mostly trying to avoid talking to me. Sr. Ortíz takes the truck to get some food from a market we passed a few blocks away.
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  Which leaves me alone with my new book. I can’t concentrate, with the heat, smell, and mood in the room, so I leave to find a better spot.

  I walk downstairs to the porch. The man I had nodded to earlier is still there, alone. I walk to the opposite end and take a seat on the floor, settling into a creaky wooden plank. I open the book.

  “¿Qué lees?” he asks.

  “Las aventuras de Huckleberry Finn.”

  I know I shouldn’t be talking to anyone, but it seems more suspicious to get up and leave.

  “Never heard of it,” he says.

  “Me neither. A friend got it for me.”

  “Well, it’s good to have something to do out there. Something to take your mind off the heat.” He crosses to my side of the porch and holds out a pack of cigarettes.

  “No, thanks.”

  He lights one.

  “You’re young to cross.”

  “How do you know I’m crossing?”

  He laughs. Quietly at first, then louder, turning his head from side to side as if wishing someone else might appear to share in this gem.

  “Claro. You’re on vacation and this is your favorite hotel.”

  “Are you waiting to cross?”

  “I’m waiting to meet up with a friend. And then, yeah, we’re going to cross. This is number four for me,” he says.

  “Wow.”

  “Do your parents know what you’re doing?”

  I don’t answer.

  “Mine didn’t the first time I went,” he follows up. “I was older than you, but I wanted to prove I was a man. Send them money, you know. Prove I could make it. On my own. I did.”

  “My parents already crossed over,” I say.

  “Both of them?”

  “Yeah.”

  “They left you here with other family?” he asks.

  “Sort of.”

  “That’s rough, but it happens.”

  “So why are you crossing for the fourth time?”

  “It happens too. I’ve got a wife. And a daughter.”

  “So I guess the trip isn’t that bad?”

  “No seas pendejo. It’s an hijo de puta.” All pleasantness falls from his face as he chides me. “People die. You’ve got a guía, right?”

  I lower my voice. “We’re waiting on a coyote to take us across.”

  He takes a long drag on his cigarette.