Burro Genius

by Victor Villaseñor

  But when I got to school the next day, the strangest thing happened. I was immediately called into the principal’s office and told that several parents had come to school complaining about my hitting their children.

  “Me? Hitting their kids!” I said in astonishment. And I tried to explain to the principal that they’d attacked me, but he got real angry and just cut me off, saying that I had to stop hitting and biting people at his school.

  “Maybe this is normal behavior where you came from, south of the border, but here it isn’t!” he said, yelling at me.

  “But they’re the ones who picked on me!” said I, beginning to cry.

  “Listen here!” said the principal, getting out of his chair and coming around his desk. I crouched down, expecting him to hit me, but he didn’t. He just shook his finger at me and said, “Four boys can’t all be wrong, and you right! You ever hit anyone again, and I’ll personally take a ruler to you! Get it?”

  The tears were pouring from my eyes. This felt so totally unfair. But the principal just couldn’t seem to get it through his head what I was trying to say. Then I couldn’t believe it. He told me the very same thing that the kids had told me.

  “Next year more of you Mexicans will be coming to this school, and your kind of people need to know your place!”

  That morning, I was crying when I walked out of the principal’s office. And who could I talk to? No one. My parents were down in La Jolla with my brother and they had no time for me.

  Then I saw them, the guys who’d beat me up, including Dennis. They were across the asphalt waiting for me. But when they saw me crying, they started laughing, and making catcalls. At least they didn’t beat me up that afternoon.

  The following day, Dennis and Judy came up to me. I was sitting by myself. School wasn’t the same anymore. It had all changed in just three days. Now I kept away from everyone, or more precisely, everyone kept away from me. I sat by myself, eating lunch. After all, I was the only Mexican at school who looked Mexican. The other kid who I knew was a Mexicano was light-skinned and kept telling everyone that he was Spanish just like those other kids had done across town.

  “Dennis has something to say to you,” said Judy to me.

  I could see that Dennis really didn’t want to say it.

  “Dennis, you do it!” said Judy. “Or I won’t be your girlfriend anymore!”

  “I’m sorry that I hit you,” said Dennis to me. “It was wrong for us to gang up on you. It’s really not your fault you’re Mexican or that other Mexicans are coming to school next year.”

  “That’s not what I told you to say!” snapped Judy. “I told you to tell him that he’s a good, decent person and you were all cowards to gang up on him, and you’re sorry and you’ll never do it again!”

  He glanced at her, saw her anger, then turned back to me. “Judy’s right,” he said. “We were cowards to gang up on you and you’re a good, decent guy, and I’ll never do it again.”

  Judy now came forward and hugged me. “I talked to all of them,” she said. “They’re never going to pick on you again.”

  “They’re not?”

  “No, I blackmailed them,” she said with excitement.

  “How’d you do that?” I asked.

  “I told them that I’d tell our teacher that they all pulled my underwear off of me if they didn’t do as I say.”

  “Did they really do that?” I asked, my heart suddenly exploding, because Judy was my friend, and so I’d really fight them all now!

  “Do what?”

  “Pull down your underwear?”

  “Oh, no,” she said, “they wouldn’t dare! They’re cowards. I only said that I’d say that to get them to obey me.”

  I laughed. Judy had just used the word “obey,” too! And, also, she’d taken blackmail to an all-new level. I’d never thought of just making up stuff, when you couldn’t find what you needed so you could blackmail people. She was really smart. Her dad could learn a lot from her about passing the basket on Sundays.

  A few days later, another big surprise came to me. This kid named Gary, whose father was an ex-Marine and was now a local fireman, came and asked me if he could fight with me. I’d never had some one come up and ask for permission to fight me. I didn’t know what to say.

  “Look,” he said, “my dad explained to me that a sneak attack like those guys did to you is only for cowards. So he told me that since I’m a new guy at school and you’re the strongest and toughest kid in school, I should see if I can beat you, but you know, in a fair fight, then everyone will respect me. But no biting or pulling hair. Just wrestling and boxing.”

  “You mean, your dad told you that you should come to school and fight me?”

  He nodded. “Yeah, sure.”

  This was all so different from everything I’d ever been told. My dad had told me that only fools fought, because there were no odds or money in fighting, and that real men only did it as a last resort.

  “You see,” he continued, “it’s our duty, as Americans, to put your people in your place, but not by a sneak attack like at Pearl Harbor.”

  Suddenly, I knew that this guy Gary was being truthful with me, because I knew about Pearl Harbor, and I also knew that most of these kids’ fathers were ex-Marine or ex-Navy men who’d been involved in the war, and so they probably all thought the same way.

  I suddenly felt so bad for all these kids, and for me, too. Maybe my mother was absolutely right, and we not only got our parents’ sins passed down to us, but also their way of thinking.

  “Okay,” I said, “I’ll fight you, but it’s got to be a good, fair fight. Nothing dirty. And just the two of us and no one watching.” I didn’t want to take a chance of some other guys watching and then jumping in to help him when I started winning.

  He put out his hand to shake on it. I took his hand, and we shook on it. That same day, I met Gary by the tall eucalyptus trees at the far southeast corner of the school grounds. School was over. Gary had waited for me to do my half hour of reading after school.

  Immediately, Gary took off his shirt, I guess to show me how muscular he was. But I thought that this was a dumb thing to do, because once we got down on the ground, rolling in the dirt and rock and leaves, it was going to hurt his back. But he didn’t seem to care and he came at me with his fists up in front of him like he knew how to box. I didn’t, so I didn’t even try. I just kept my hands open, palms out, and took his first few punches in my open hands.

  Then I grabbed his next hit, jerked him to me—which surprised him—and the moment that we tied up, I could feel that he was way stronger than the other guys that I’d fought, but I could also tell that, compared to me, he had no real strength.

  I guess that all those afternoons of moving hay and feeding livestock had turned me into a very strong kid. Quickly, easily, I took him down with a headlock and I could’ve finished him off just like that, making him cry, but he was trying so hard, grunting and pushing, trying his best to get free from me, that I finally let him go. Instantly, he came alive!

  I let him get on top of me and beat me up, and why I did this, I had no idea. But then, within a couple of days, I realized that I’d been a real genius to listen to the Voice inside of me that told me to let him beat me. Now he was telling everyone that he was the champ, the strongest, toughest kid in the whole school all the way up to the fifth grade. And when people doubted his word, that he’d beat me in a fair fight, I’d backed him up, saying that he really had, that he was the champ, and everyone was now so happy to have him as their champion that I was forgotten.

  It was beautiful. I was free. And I guessed, that I was freed, because they figured that I’d in been put in my place, and so now everything was as it should be. But what my place was, I still didn’t know, so I just kept to myself, watching and learning. I even stopped playing marbles.

  CHAPTER sixteen

  Howling! HOWLING! My brother Joseph’s dog Shep was going crazy-loco, racing around and around the house, howlin
g to the Heavens! It was late at night and I was sound asleep. Both our father and mother had now been down in La Jolla with our brother for days on end.

  I could hear Shep racing around and around the house, howling like crazy. Finally, I got up to go see what was the matter. After all, Shep was a very smart dog and didn’t bark just for the hell of it. I pulled on my cowboy boots, and reached for my big, new long bow, but then settled on my trusty, old Red Rider BB gun instead, and ran out the front door.

  The Mother Moon was full, and I knew that when the moon was full like this, wild animals often came down from the hills and went to the sea through the canyon below our home. But Shep wasn’t barking at the canyon behind our home. No, he was howling as he raced around our casa grande, and I couldn’t see anything going on near our home. As far as I could tell, Shep was just chasing after his own shadow.

  “Shep!” I shouted. “It’s all right! Calm down! Nothing’s going on, boy!”

  I wanted him to calm down so I could pet him and he’d feel better, but he wouldn’t come near me. He just kept racing around and around, howling like he was crazy-loco. Shep was always so smart, so levelheaded, and usually listened to me, so I couldn’t figure out what was going on. He was acting really strange. No matter how much I called to him, he just ignored me and kept racing around and around the house, howling something fierce.

  My little sister Linda finally woke up and came outside to see what was the matter, too. Then Rosa came outside to check on us.

  “Is everything all right?” asked Rosa in Spanish. Linda and I spoke only Spanish with Rosa.

  “Yes,” I said, “it’s just that my brother’s dog has gone crazy. He’s barking at nothing, and won’t come to me.”

  “He’s not barking at nothing,” Rosa said to me. “He’s barking, because”—tears came to her eyes—“your brother is dying.”

  “You mean, like at this very moment?”

  “Yes,” she said.

  I was shocked. I didn’t know what to think. “But how can Shep know that my brother is dying right now?” I asked. “My brother is all the way down in La Jolla, more than thirty miles away. You got to be WRONG! YOU JUST DON’T KNOW WHAT YOU’RE TALKING ABOUT!” I shouted at her.

  Rosa’s husband Emilio suddenly came out of the darkness, and I could now see that several of our other ranch hands were all sitting quietly under the huge pepper tree, poking at the dirt with sticks as they sat on the ground.

  “Rosa is right,” said Emilio to me. “It’s time that you know. Your brother is dying. That’s why his dog is going crazy. He’s always loved your brother very much, so his heart is breaking.”

  “But Emilio,” I said, “only yesterday, I talked to our dad on the phone and he told me that our brother is getting better, that he’s eating again for the first time in weeks,” I added.

  My heart was pounding a million miles an hour. Seeing how upset I was, Emilio glanced at his wife Rosa, then he came close to me and squatted down so we were at eye level. He put his hand on my shoulder.

  “Listen closely,” he said, “animals don’t know how to lie, or how to pretend. And the soul, she knows no distance, and love speaks through the heart, and this dog is telling us of his heart breaking for your brother, because he is dying.”

  “OH, NO!” I yelled. “PLEASE! MY BROTHER ISN’T DYING! Please, Shep has got to stop howling, and saying this! SHEP!” I screamed. “You stop telling people that my brother Joseph is dying! You hear me, you stop saying that or…or…or I’ll shoot you!”

  But no matter how much I yelled at Shep or threatened him, he wouldn’t stop. I began to cry, too. Now my heart was also breaking, just like Shep’s.

  The workmen never said a word. They just sat there under the huge pepper tree, poking at the dirt with sticks. Finally, Rosa took my sister and me back inside.

  All that night, Shep kept howling and howling in a ghostly, eerie howl, and twice, I swear, the Mother Moon came down from the Heavens, and she poked her face right up close to my window.

  Then, in the early morning hours of the night, Shep suddenly stopped howling, just like that, and when I went outside to see what had happened, I was told by Rosa and Emilio that my brother had just died at this exact moment, and so Shep had taken off for the hills to intercept his Soul.

  I started crying like I’d never cried before. And I didn’t go back to bed. I was feeling too scared and all confused. The whole night had been like a crazy, wild dream.

  Later that same morning, our parents came home. Our mother hadn’t been home to see us for nearly two weeks. All this time she’d spent with our brother down in La Jolla. My sister and I rushed out, being so happy to see our mama. But when I saw how swollen her face was from all her crying, I stopped dead in my tracks. My little sister Linda didn’t. She ran up to her mother with her arms open. Our mother never saw her. She just walked right past us and went into the house without saying a word. Our father, he was the one who stayed outside with my sister and me. He told us that our brother Joseph had died.

  I SCREAMED at the top of my lungs! Our dad took my sister and me in his arms. My sister Linda and I cried and cried. And years later, my sister would tell me that no, she hadn’t really cried. That she’d only pretended to cry because she still hadn’t really known what people were supposed to do when they were told that someone of the familia had died.

  All morning, my sister and I stayed outside by the apricot tree, being quiet and real sad. Our dad went inside the house to be with our mother. Later that same day, I told Emilio and Rosa that they were right, that my brother had died as they’d said. But they told me that they already knew.

  “When we saw Shep take off this morning for the far hills to intercept your brother’s soul,” said Rosa, “we looked up and sure enough, a little while later, we saw a shooting star going across the heavens, so we knew that like all good dogs, Shep had caught his master’s soul, guiding him back up to God,” she said, making the sign of the cross over herself.

  Hearing these words, I got a powerful image of Shep, my brother’s dog, running up to the highest hilltop that he could find and leaping into the Father Sky and becoming that Shooting Star, as he joined in with my brother’s Sacred Soul, so that together they could make their way back to Heaven.

  Late that afternoon, I saddled up to go and look for Shep’s body. Emilio sent two of our cowhands with me, and all afternoon we kept looking, but we never found his body. One of our vaqueros told me that animals didn’t necessarily leave their bodies behind like humans, that often animals took their Earth Bodies with them when they passed over to the Spirit World, just as they’d taught Our Lord Jesus how to do.

  When I heard this, a great peace came over me, and the three of us rode up and down the hills and down into the deep canyons until it was dark. We were on that tall mesa just south of the railroad tracks and west of the cemetery on El Camino when the first star of the night came out. We hadn’t been able to locate Shep’s body no matter how hard we searched. The Mother Moon was out, too, and she was looking so close and all alive. My eyes started watering, but I wasn’t crying inside. No, inside I was happy, because I just knew that this was the exact spot where Shep, the smartest human being that I’d ever met, had leaped into the Father Sky to intercept my brother Joseph’s Sacred Soul.

  I rubbed the tears out of my eyes and that little, quiet humming began behind my left ear. Then I saw it, I saw it so clearly, that this was now a Sacred Place, too, just like that Golden Eye-Opening in Heaven, or that pew in church where I’d sat listening to the Silence of God all around me.

  I took a deep breath and glanced around at the dark land and the sky lighting up with stars and the Mother Moon. I came to realize that the mesa we were on had to probably be the highest point in all of South Oceanside. My eyes continued watering—I was so sad, and yet also happy.

  “Thank you, Shep,” I said. “Muchas gracias for guiding my brother Chavaboy back up to Heaven. Also, thank you very much for taking the time to
befriend me while you were here on Earth. I’ll never forget you, Shep, I’ll never forget you. And thank you, too, Joseph,” I said, making the sign of the cross over myself, “for being the greatest brother anyone could ever have. I love you. I love you both with all my heart and soul!”

  Having said this, I just knew that my brother had kept his word and he was here, right now, just above me, watching over me. All the way home that night, I could feel Joseph and Shep staying real close to me, guiding my every step in the darkness.

  I wasn’t traveling alone. I’d never be traveling alone again no matter where I went for the rest of my life, because my big brother Joseph had kept his word and he would now always be here with me, just above me, as I’d been above myself when I’d jumped out of that speeding car.

  Getting home, I immediately tried to explain to my parents what had happened on the tall mesa east of us, so that they could feel better, but they wouldn’t hear me.

  But when I told Emilio and Rosa what had happened—at the stables before going home—they quickly understood and told me that Shep’s body had probably gone up in smoke when his Soul had gone over to the Other Side to be with my brother’s Soul, because this was what Souls did, working together in Harmony just like all the rest of God’s Creation.

  “Animals, you see,” Rosa explained to me, “they can still do this at will, much easier than humans, because they still haven’t learned how to question, and so amor de la alma is still their basis for living, just like as it was for Lord God Jesus,” she added, making the sign of the cross over herself, then kissing the back of her thumb, which was folded on top of her bent index finger.

  The day of my brother’s funeral, Colonel Atkinson brought a busload of uniformed cadets from the Army Navy Academy in Carlsbad to march at the funeral and blow the bugle. Well over five hundred people attended my brother’s funeral. I got to wear the little gray-and-maroon suit that my godparents Manuelita and Vincente had given me for my first communion. One cadet, a friend of my brother’s, tied my tie for me. They buried my brother at the north end of the Oceanside cemetery on El Camino, just a little way away from a great big white cross with Jesus. His mother Mary was praying at the foot of the cross.