Border Crossings

by Michael Lee Weems

  “Tio? You mean Ortiz?” asked Catherine. Miguel nodded. “He’s your uncle?” Catherine asked again to confirm.

  “Yeah,” Miguel confessed. Then he shook his head with a painful smile, “fucking millions of dollars on the line and all the guy would talk about was getting laid with an American chick. He just went on and on. He wouldn’t shut up about it.”

  Catherine and Matt exchanged a look. Some of the pieces were slowly coming together. Miguel was just a glorified errand boy. “Go on,” said Matt.

  “Tio told him we could go party at some of the clubs and maybe he’d get lucky. Throw around some coke and cash, you know, but Arismendez wouldn’t listen. He was high as hell. Plus the guy’s a real ugly, fat bastard. There was no way he was picking up any of those chicks. He told Tio to either go get a girl or to go back to Mexico City. So Tio told me to go find a girl so he could Arismendez to shut up about it. Tio needed some new supply and better transport up North and Arismendez had it. Fuck, man! I’m dying. You got to get me to a hospital, man.”

  “No. No hospital for you, amigo. Not until you tell us everything. Keep talking.”

  “If I die, you won’t get shit,” he told them.

  Matt grabbed him by the throat. “If you don’t talk, then you’re no good to us alive anyway, and I’ll just kill you right here.”

  Miguel managed to talk despite the python of a grip Matt had on his throat. “You’re just going to kill me anyway,” he gasped, his face turning red.

  “That’s probably true,” said Matt. “But there’s an easy way and a hard way.” He grabbed Miguel by the knee and dug his thumb into the bullet hole. Miguel’s eyes went wide in pain. “You don’t even want to know what we did to the guys you sent after us in Cancun. I skinned one of them myself, tore the flesh right from his bone.” He let go of Miguel’s knee and throat, and Miguel immediately vomited on himself. He’d never imagined the human body could hurt so much. “I’m just getting warmed up,” Matt told him. “You’d better keep talking or I’m really going to do some damage.”

  “What happened to Kelly Woodall?” asked Catherine. “What exactly happened.”

  Miguel was nearing semi-consciousness and Matt untied the gag that had fallen around his neck and used it as a tourniquet on one leg, then he used his own belt for the other. A large pool of blood was already forming and he was worried Miguel might bleed out from the second shot sooner than he thought. Why is he bleeding so much? He wondered. “You were drinking tonight, weren’t ya?” he told Miguel as he tightened the belt around Miguel’s leg. “Tsk, tsk. Your blood’s all thinned out, but these will let us keep you around for hours.” It was an over-exaggeration, but he needed Miguel to believe his hell could go on indefinitely.

  “Go on,” said Catherine. “Tell us the rest.”

  Miguel winced in pain as the belt cut off the blood supply to his legs, but he spoke. By now, he would have done anything to avoid being shot again. “Tio told me to go out to the clubs and find a girl that fit the bill.”

  “Why Kelly?” asked Catherine.

  “Arizmendez was being picky. He wanted an American girl with blonde hair and green eyes, tan and pretty. He wanted the hottest girl we could find. If we didn’t find the right girl, we could fuck off, that’s what he said. She just had the look, that’s all.”

  “She just had the look?” Catherine asked. “Is that what you’re telling me? You raped and tortured that poor girl because she just had the look?”

  “I didn’t do any of those things! It was him. We didn’t know what he was going to do. We didn’t know any of this shit was going to happen. We just wanted to make a deal.”

  “What’d you put in the drink?” asked Catherine.

  Miguel started moaning again. “Speak up,” said Matt, holding him upright by a handful of hair.

  “Ribs.”

  “Ribs? You mean Rohypnol?” asked Catherine.

  “Yeah, Arismendez had some. He’s got everything. Tio told me to use ‘em so we could knock a chick out and make it quiet.” Catherine clenched her jaws. Her anger was building rapidly again and she pressed her will against it to keep from raging out of control. “But that other chick saw me. I knew we should have just bailed.”

  “Why didn’t you?” she asked him.

  Miguel looked her in the eyes. “I couldn’t,” he said. “There were millions of dollars on the table. If I came back without a girl, we were fucked. I was fucked.”

  “So you kidnapped her. You shot her friend and you snatched that poor girl right off the street . . . all because you were told to go find a pretty girl?”

  “I had to,” said Miguel.

  “Bullshit,” said Catherine. “You didn’t have to do any of it. But you wanted the money. What’d you do to Kelly after you snatched her away from her life?”

  Miguel sighed and turned his head away, but Matt was quick to grab his leg again, sending spears of pain shooting up his nerves. “I brought her back!” he said, Matt releasing. “She wouldn’t stop fighting in the car so I pushed a few ribs down her throat. Then we took her back to the villa. She was out of it by then and Arismendez was pissed. He mixed up a shitload of coke with water and made her drink it. Then he took her to a bedroom and told us all to go have a drink by the pool, stay in the guesthouse if he didn’t come down. I don’t know what happened. I think the coke hit her system and she starting fighting like crazy. It was quiet first, but then we started hearing shit, even from outside.” Miguel began to sway his head back and forth.

  “What’d he do?” Catherine asked, but Miguel began moaning again, this time in choking breaths.

  “I’m dying,” he began to cry. “I’m going to fucking die.” Tears began to roll down his cheek. “Don’t kill me. Please, just drop me at the hospital. I’ll tell you whatever.”

  Matt grabbed his leg again, and Miguel jerked and twisted. Then Matt let go and grabbed Miguel by his chin, “Hey. Hey, look at me. You tell us everything you know until you’re done and we’ll decide then,” he said, releasing his grip.

  “He just lost it, beat the shit out of her. When he was done he came outside, he told Tio he’d agree to a deal, but that some shit had happened. He wanted the girl gone. He said he’d killed her but that it was her fault. She’d attacked him or something, tried to bite his ear off and his eye was all bleeding. We didn’t even know what he did until we went upstairs to get her. She’d been tied down, bleeding everywhere. He’d fucked her up.”

  “What were the burns from?” she asked, remembering the marks on Kelly’s arms and chest.

  “His cigar?” Miguel guessed. “I don’t know. The guy’s crazy. Even his own people say he is.”

  Catherine sat against the wall of the rail car to the right of Miguel. She couldn’t help but to see images of Kelly’s last moments. It’d been a long and drawn out death. “How long did he torture her?” she asked.

  “I don’t know,” Miguel said, now sobbing miserably. “He had her up there a couple hours, maybe, I don’t know. I don’t want to die, man. Please. I don’t want to die.”

  “You should have thought of that before you let that girl die,” said Matt.

  Catherine began to cry. She knew what had happened to Kelly, but hearing it now conjured such a horrific attack. She could more than see it. She could feel it. “Who shot her?”

  “Tio told me to make sure she was dead,” said Miguel.

  Catherine looked up again, and Matt caught her glare. “So it was you who killed her?” She stared down at the gold medallion hanging around Miguel’s neck. It had five exes etched on its face. “Which one is she?” Catherine asked. She grabbed the medallion in her hand and slapped Miguel hard across the face, “Which one is she!?”

  Miguel shook his head. “No, man. She was already dead. You should have seen her, she was dead. Maybe it was all the drugs. He’d made her drink down a shit ton of coke. I shot her like I was told, but there was no way she was still alive.”

  She might have been, Catherine thought.
She might have made it! She stood up and clenched the gun in her hand, wanting so badly to use it now.

  “Why the cemetery?” asked Matt.

  “Heat was everywhere. Tio left and told me to handle it, so we tossed her in a bathtub in the guesthouse until we could figure out what do to do. We decided to wait until the next night when there wouldn’t be so many cops all over the place. The cemetery was close by and Tio said we should take her there, dump her in a fresh grave. He told me Arismendez was going to bring us all down with this shit.” He laughed in spurting breaths. “He was right, huh?”

  “And then you went after the kid,” Matt reminded him.

  “Yeah, those fucking kids,” said Miguel, still chuckling pathetically. “We thought the cemetery was empty.”

  “Who killed the other kid? The one named Juan?” asked Catherine. Miguel began shaking his head. Catherine kicked him in one of his knees, “Who!?” He looked down at his medallion and Catherine knew the answer. “I see. Who gave the kid up?”

  “Some cop.”

  “Vargas?” Catherine asked.

  “I don’t know. Just some cop Tio bought.” Miguel was beginning to fade in and out. “Let me have some water, man. Come on, get me some water.” His eyes rolled around and he could no longer focus on anything. They rolled upwards and his head lolled. “Just a little water, man, come on.”

  Matt pointed to his watch and made the international death sign to Catherine, an index finger crossing his throat, to indicate Miguel was likely not going to be with them much longer. The alcohol in his system had thinned the blood so much the tourniquets couldn’t keep him from bleeding out. Even if they had decided to let him live, it was too late. There was nothing they could do to stop it now. He wouldn’t make it to a hospital even if they were so inclined, which they weren’t.

  “Where’s Ortiz?” asked Catherine.

  “Just a little water,” Miguel mumbled.

  “Come on, Miguel. Where’s your Tio?” asked Matt.

  “Tio?” Miguel asked, dazed.

  “Yeah, Tio. Where does Tio live?”

  “Tio’s rich,” he mumbled. “He lives in a fucking mansion.”

  “Where?” asked Catherine.

  “Tio, Tio, Tio,” he mumbled. “Good ole Tio. ‘Trust me,’ he said. Now look at me. And Arismendez, that fat, fucking asshole.”

  “Where’s Tio, Miguel?” Matt asked. “Where’s his mansion?”

  “Fat fucking asshole,” he mumbled again, this time barely audible.

  Catherine knelt down by him and held his hand. “Tell me how to find Tio, Miguel.”

  “Fuck you,” he said, his eyes rolling around like marbles. “I don’t care anymore. Fat fucking asshole,” he said melodically, as though it were his new favorite rhyme.

  Matt looked at Catherine. They were about to lose him. “Tell me where Tio lives and I’ll kill the Fat Fucking Asshole for you, Miguel,” said Matt.

  Miguel stared up at the railcar’s metal ceiling, and then he coughed and made a gurgling noise.

  “Miguel!” Catherine yelled, kicking his leg again. “Where’s Tio? How do I find Arismendez!?”

  His eyes settled on her for a moment, and he smiled. Matt was still holding him upright, but he felt the slack weight and tried smacking Miguel on the cheek. “Come on, Miguel. Wake up. Miguel? Wake up!” But Miguel didn’t move. He just lay there staring upward blankly. Matt looked at Catherine and his eyes told her they weren’t getting any more out of Miguel.

  “Damn it,” said Catherine.

  “It doesn’t matter,” said Matt. He let go of Miguel’s head and he slumped to the side.

  “What do you mean ‘It doesn’t matter’?” she asked angrily. “He didn’t tell us where they are.”

  “You think all those officials back in Cancun don’t know where this Arismendez guy is? You heard him, he’s right in the heart of the city. Everybody there knows who he is.”

  That wasn’t a comforting thought. “Okay, but what about Ortiz. Here’s somewhere here in Mexico City.”

  “We have Miguel’s cell phone. I’m sure Uncle Ortiz is in here somewhere.” He pulled out the phone and began going through the address book. “Bingo!” he said, turning the phone to show Catherine. “We got Tio home and Tio cell. These guys aren’t worried about hiding. They don’t think they have to. He’ll be easy to find.” Catherine looked at him with a smile, but it turned into a worried curve of her lip after a moment. “What’s wrong?” He asked. But he had an idea of what it may be from her expression, “Are you up for more of this? We can stop any time. Pass this along to someone else.”

  “Who?” She asked. Matt said nothing, only looked back at Miguel’s blank stare. “Exactly,” she said. “It’s us or it’s nobody.” The idea that Arismendez had been sitting in Cancun this whole time was making Catherine’s innards boil. And he’d just been left to carry out his business, murdering people left and right, untouched by anyone.

  Matt turned back to meet her gaze. “Then it’s us.”

  “Yeah,” she said. “I guess so. But how the hell are we going to be able to keep this up?” She was daunted. Miguel was supposed to be the last link in the chain, but now they’d found out he was just a rung in a ladder that still kept going. She wasn’t cut out for the running around killing people for more names to run around and kill. It was all starting to seem like a bloody road with no end. How long before a Mac truck bowled them over, just two more carcasses on this highway of death? Even if they did make it through, avoiding all the dangers involved, how long until she no longer recognized herself?

  Matt put his hand out and cupper her chin, “We can do this,” he told her. “If you want to keep going, I’m with you. But if you’ve gotten the answers you were looking for and are done, I’m with you there, too. We know who did it and why now. That’s something. It’s a big something. I don’t think anyone could more of you that what you’ve already done. And I don’t think the Mexican government will look the other way if they find out Arismendez is the one who killed Kelly. They’re not going to give up their tourism.”

  Catherine held her hand up to his and turned his hand over, kissing it affectionately. How thankful she was he was here. She thought for a moment and then said, “Nobody is asking me to keep going, but I just feel like I have to. I couldn’t go back to my life knowing these people were out there despite what they’ve done. They can’t get away with it,” she decided.

  Matt smiled at her warmly. “Then we won’t let them.”

  Yesenia had lain under the plastic lawn pool for hours; too scared that the moment she came out from under it Jose or Hector would be waiting for her. She had listened to the sound of the vehicles in the alley and heard people talking, but kept herself as quiet as the leaves of grass upon which she lay. Her terror and tears had exhausted her and for the space of but a few precious hours, she allowed herself to feel safe in her hideaway as thought it were a fortress beneath a mountain, drifting to sleep somewhere along the way.

  When she awoke several hours later it was well past midnight. She poked her head out and saw there was nothing but the night and a few ruthless mosquitoes around her. She crept out from underneath the child’s play pool to see the yellow tape and masked outline of a body in the alley, a Rorschach, rusty stain of blood on the concrete. She’d heard the gunshots and the sound of a strange voice yelling something in English, but she did not know exactly what had happened. Did Jose and Hector kill someone else? Did someone kill them? That was too much to hope for. She walked towards the marked outline of body in white spray paint upon the dirt. Someone did get killed, she thought. She hoped it wasn’t someone trying to help, someone else like Armando. She felt a hole rip in her gut at the mere thought of him.