Look Both Ways in the Barrio Blanco

by Judith Robbins Rose

  THE VAN ROCKED as it pulled off the highway. Light streamed through the sunroof, making me blink.

  Ethan yawned. “Where are we?”

  “Whites City,” said Miss.

  I sat up.

  The sun felt closer somehow, beating down on the highway, telephone poles, rocks, and dirt. The Middle of Nowhere.

  Then Miss turned into the parking lot of a yellowing building with faded blue awnings. The sign read BUSY BEE MOTOR INN, but it looked like the least busy place in the world. The dog on the stoop didn’t raise his head when we drove by. His eyes flicked over to the van, then closed again. He let out a breath that made his jowls flutter. Then he was still.

  “Jacinta, what room’s your mom in?”

  I pulled the soggy envelope from the pocket of my jeans. It was sweaty from my hand gripping it through the night — to reassure myself that Mamá would be rescued. But I didn’t need to unfold it.

  “Seven.”

  Miss pulled up in front of a door. She didn’t turn off the motor, which continued its repertoire of gurgles and moans.

  “All right.” She looked at me, and I realized I was supposed to get Mamá.

  And for some reason, I was afraid.

  Will Mamá even know me? Maybe she’s changed, too.

  My heart thumped in my ears. When I opened the van door, everything moved in slow motion. Even though it was still morning, heat coming from the pavement made the air look wavy, like in the movies.

  A dream sequence.

  Tar oozing from cracks in the asphalt stank and stuck to the bottom of my flip-flops, holding me back. Mamá’s sweater was sticking to my skin, but it wasn’t time to take it off. Not when I was so close. I staggered around a cleaning cart to stare at the chipped blue number 7. My hand moved to the door and tapped.

  Nothing.

  I knocked harder.

  After a million years, a voice came through the crack of the door.

  “¿Hola?”

  “¡Mamá! ¡Soy yo!”

  The door opened. A pair of brown eyes. “¿Sí?”

  But the woman in the maid’s uniform wasn’t Mamá. I struggled to breathe, but the oxygen had been sucked out of the air. I was dizzy. “¿Dónde está mi mamá?”

  “No sé.”

  The world grew dark.

  And through the darkness, Miss’s voice. “Grab her. Like this.”

  My face hurt. The pavement burned. I didn’t know I’d fainted until I felt arms around me, hands pulling on me. Miss and the stranger in the maid’s uniform half carried, half dragged me back to the van.

  “She okay, Miss?”

  “Gracias, señora. Está bien.”

  Ethan’s face. Reaching for me, pulling me up. Miss heaved me onto the seat with him. Cold air welcomed me. I closed my eyes.

  “Is she okay?” Ethan’s worried voice.

  “Slide over.”

  “I’m driving?” I heard Ethan scramble over the hump to the other side.

  “Keep the air running. I’ll pay the motel bill and get some water.” Miss slammed the door.

  “J.J.?”

  My hand moved to my throbbing temple. It was tender. I winced and pulled my hand away, blinking the world back into focus. Ethan’s concerned face stared at me sideways.

  This can’t be right. Mamá said she would wait. Why didn’t she wait?

  Ethan asked my next question aloud. “Where’d your mom go?”

  Slowly, testing myself, I sat up. Hammering continued on the inside of my skull. I glanced around. The hotel maid looked back over her shoulder as she pushed her cleaning cart to room 8. She gave me a tenuous wave before letting herself inside.

  Ethan and I scanned the emptiness around us. Where could she go? Rocks and weeds baked in withering heat — it felt more like August than April.

  And I knew.

  I threw open the van door, my feet already moving before they touched the pavement. Around to the back of the crumbling motel. The shady side.

  Still faint, I stumbled, my ankles twisting in my flip-flops, over stones and trash clinging to the clumps of dead grass.

  A dented green trash bin.

  “Mamá?”

  The rattle of newspapers. A sun-weathered face peered from around the side of the bin. Before she could struggle to her feet, I was in her arms.

  I didn’t know if the tears were hers or mine, if she was shaking, or if I was. I smelled her hair. The smell wasn’t flowers. It was cigarette smoke. I didn’t care. I tasted her salty, wet cheek as I kissed her again and again.

  She whispered, “Mija.”

  We were together. Time passed — a year, or maybe just seconds. I clung to Mamá. She was mine. I was safe. I promised myself I’d never let her go again. No matter what.

  The sound of the wheezy van made Mamá startle. We turned as it rumbled around the corner, bumping over rocks and weeds — Ethan at the wheel, Miss riding shotgun.

  I’d forgotten Miss and Ethan. Forgotten everything. Mamá and I scrambled to our feet, bumping into each other.

  Miss climbed out and gave Mamá a weak smile. “Hola. Fernanda? Vámonos, por favor.”

  Mamá nodded, wiping her tears with her hands. She agreed in her little bit of English. “Yes, Miss, we go. Thank you, Miss.”

  Miss and Mamá acted like they knew each other, but with both of them right in front of me, I wasn’t sure who I was. Mija or mentee?

  My mentor waved me into the van, so I climbed into the middle seat and extended my hand to Mamá. Miss closed the door behind us and jumped into the front passenger seat. “Drive.”

  The van belched a cloud of smoke as we lurched away.

  That should have been the “Happily ever after.” The part of the movie where the credits roll. What Ethan calls a Hollywood Ending.

  RED LIGHT. BLUE LIGHT. The side of the patrol car said NEW MEXICO STATE POLICE. Right there on the side of the two-lane highway that had brought us here. To get home, we’d have to drive past it. At a crawl. Traffic was backed up in both directions.

  My pulse throbbed in my neck. Mamá squeezed my arm.

  With his hands and legs apart, a dark-skinned man leaned against the roof of a battered white pickup. An officer kept one hand on the man’s back while talking into a radio attached to his shirt. Drivers craned their necks trying to get a good look. Some were even taking pictures with their cell phones.

  I gulped. “Is he being arrested?”

  No one answered. Mamá shrank in her seat. We hesitated in the exit of the motel parking lot, staring at the blockage in the T-intersection off to our left. Ethan’s white-knuckled hands gripped the wheel.

  Miss’s voice was calm. “Just turn left.”

  The car rolled forward and turned. To the right.

  “Left! I said left!”

  “Really? You wanted me to drive into that mess?” Ethan asked.

  “We’ve got to. Turn around,” Miss ordered.

  Mamá’s violent trembling made me afraid. I didn’t want to drive by a squad car and that man getting arrested. “No, Miss! This road will come out somewhere, won’t it?”

  Ethan continued to roll away from the flashing lights. A siren screamed behind us. Miss, Mamá, and I whipped around to see a second patrol car edge around the highway traffic on the shoulder.

  I looked ahead to see Ethan crane his neck, checking the rearview mirror.

  “Mom?” Not his usual voice. The voice of a little kid.

  Concern flickered across Miss’s face. After a pause, she said to Ethan, “Okay. Just drive.”

  Relieved, I told Mamá, “We’re going to find another way home.”

  Mamá breathed, “Thank you, Miss.”

  Her normally soft skin was rough and leathery — parched and peeling — and almost as dark as mine. The yellowing shadow of a bruise lingered on her cheek, just below her eye. Her lips were purplish black and cracked.

  I didn’t recognize the ripped and grimy pants and shirt she wore. They hung on her, just as the skin seem to
hang on her bones. There wasn’t enough of her to fill them out.

  Cuts covered her arms. Another cut on her neck oozed, as if it wasn’t healing just right. Had she been this beat up when she returned from Mexico the last time? I couldn’t remember. I wanted to find the people who’d done this to her and show them I knew how to use a baseball bat.

  But Mamá was the whole world, right there in my arms. Safe. After more than a year, I was finally safe.

  She kissed my forehead over and over. Angel kisses.

  Miss watched from the front seat with a small, sad smile.

  It was too much.

  Tears burst out. Happy, sad, angry, afraid. Too much. Too, too much. A swirl of Mamá’s and Miss’s faces. I squeezed my eyes shut, but the flood kept coming. My heart. So full, exploding. My mouth, open and gasping. Air, I need air.

  Mamá’s arms tightened around me. Her worried voice traveled through my haze. “Jacinta?”

  Then Miss. “Jacinta!”

  No, don’t! Don’t say it. Whatever it is, don’t say it. I can’t think. I can’t breathe. Please, please, don’t say anything.

  “Drink this, or you’re going to get a headache.”

  I opened my eyes a crack. Miss held out a bottle of water.

  Oh. Okay.

  Mamá brushed my hair away from my face, soothing the ragged edges of my nerves, as the water bathed my raw throat. I drained the bottle.

  Then I struggled out of Mamá’s sweater. She helped pull it off me. I thought she might ask why I wore the filthy thing, but she said nothing and dropped it on the floor of the van. I felt silly for all the times I’d insisted on wearing it. But the charm had worked. Mamá was back.

  Her eyes darted from Miss to me. The three of us exchanged looks.

  Miss must have realized she was staring at something private. She blushed and turned to face forward. She asked Ethan, “Where are we?”

  “You said, ‘Drive.’ I drove.”

  Miss pulled her phone from its holder, looked at it, then groaned. “The battery’s dead.”

  “Use the car charger.”

  “The lighter doesn’t work. The van’s electrical system is shot.”

  Ethan sighed. “You should’ve bought me a smartphone. At least then we’d still have GPS.”

  “Does it occur to you that we’re living on one income? That we can no longer buy whatever our little hearts desire?”

  “Did we ever?” Ethan steered the van around winding curves.

  We were on a twisting road. Wildflowers, cactuses, and other plants dotted the landscape. It was kinda pretty, but not familiar.

  “Should I —? Do I —? You want me to turn around?” he asked.

  “Not here. It’s too dangerous.”

  I glanced around. A line of cars snaked behind us. What are all these people doing here? I faced forward — just as we passed the sign.

  “Oh, my goodness,” said Miss.

  “Oh, wow!” said Ethan.

  Mamá asked in Spanish, “What did the sign say, mija?”

  “No sé,” I told her. Then we were in a parking lot. A parking lot in the Middle of Nowhere? A man in a uniform, wearing a badge, waved Ethan into a space.

  Mamá gripped my arm.

  “Miss, where are we?”

  “What should I do?” asked Ethan.

  “Go ahead and park.”

  He moved to pull into a space, but Ethan was new to parking. It looked like he might hit the car next to us. Miss shouted, “Crank your wheel!”

  He slammed on the brakes instead. We lurched forward in our seats. The man in the uniform got that “patient” look on his face.

  I tried to hang on to Mamá, feeling her panic, but she slipped to the floor, cowering behind Miss’s seat.

  “What is this place?” I asked again.

  Miss pulled her eyes from the parking space while Ethan eased the van forward. She looked from me to Mamá. A gentle smile broke through Miss’s look of concern. She touched Mamá’s hand.

  “Está bien, está bien,” said Miss.

  “Where are we?” I insisted as Ethan switched off the engine.

  Miss’s eyes sparkled. “Tell your mom we’re in Fairyland.”

  WHEN ETHAN SAID we were at Carlsbad Caverns National Park, the words meant nothing to me. But he was excited. “Mom, can we go inside the cave?”

  “No, I’m supposed to anchor the show tonight.”

  “Stick your finger down your throat and tell them you’re still vomiting.”

  Miss glanced at me, to see if I was listening. She lowered her voice and said to Ethan, “It’s still lying.”

  “No, it isn’t.”

  They argued across the parking lot, up to the visitor center. I practically had to drag Mamá, reassuring her as Miss had, “Está bien, está bien.”

  Mamá’s eyes darted to the park ranger directing traffic. To his uniform.

  I called out to Miss, “Can’t we just go?”

  “I need to use the restroom,” she shouted over her shoulder.

  Since I’d chugged a whole bottle of water, a bathroom break seemed like a good idea. Even if yelling it all over the parking lot wasn’t. I whispered to Mamá, “El baño.”

  She stopped resisting.

  An older lady in the women’s room stared at Mamá. At her wounds.

  “Rough trail,” I told the lady.

  She nodded and backed out the door. I imagined her running to the cashier, trying to get her money back.

  I helped Mamá clean up a bit, lending her my hairbrush.

  Miss looked almost as bad, in her own way. She glanced in the mirror and started digging around in her purse as Mamá and I left the bathroom.

  Ethan grabbed my arm. “This is perfect.”

  “What’s perfect?”

  “This place! This is our alibi! If we get stopped by police on the way home, we say we came for spring break! We’ll have the tickets to prove it!”

  “But this place scares Mamá.”

  “There’s only one road in or out. We’ll have to drive by those cops if we leave now. Don’t you wanna see the cave?”

  And I realized I did. I wanted this educational opportunity. Who knew when I might have another chance? Miss’s year as my mentor was nearly over.

  And I’d just spent nine hours in her stupid van.

  Miss emerged from the ladies’ room looking more like her regular self.

  “Are we going in?” Ethan asked her again.

  “I told you, I need to get back to my job.”

  Ethan whined. “Even if we left this minute, you’d never make it for the five o’clock show. And we’re hungry. There’s a cafeteria inside the cave.”

  Mamá looked from Ethan to Miss. “What are they saying?”

  “Ethan says there’s a restaurant inside the cave.”

  Mamá shook her head. “No, we need to go home.”

  Miss frowned. “What did your mom say?”

  I wound my hair around a finger. “She hasn’t had anything to eat today.”

  Using Ethan’s disposable phone, I called Rosa. I wanted to be the one to say we’d rescued Mamá. Rosa was so excited that she couldn’t stop shouting. After she talked to Mamá, I got back on the line and told her to call Tía. I’d wanted to tell my aunt myself, but Miss said we needed to save Ethan’s phone battery since we didn’t have the charger for it.

  Ethan and I ran ahead on the trail, to look into the gaping mouth of the enormous cave. Staring down into it, little bumps popped out on my arms, despite the hot dry air. I stepped away from the stone wall. It felt like I might fall in. Mamá walked up behind me, then gripped my arm with both hands.

  Even with a spring break crowd descending into the massive opening, we felt like the only ones there. The cave is that majestic. That awesome.

  Once again, Miss was right. Awesome is a word to save for when you need it.

  You might think people would shout inside a big cave to hear the echo. That didn’t happen. The horde of people approa
ching that emptiness made almost no noise. As if none of us wanted to wake the sleeping beast and get swallowed in one gulp. Maybe we’d all watched the same kids’ movie, where the guy is trapped in a cave of wonders and finds a genie.

  I looked at Mamá and was surprised to see that I was taller than she was. It shocked me again, to see her cuts and bruises. “How’d you get so beat up?”

  She shook her head and wouldn’t look at me. “It is not for little ears.”

  At the word little, I pulled her around to stare down at her. My glaze slipped past her eyes, into her soul. Pain. Too much pain.

  I looked away, feeling sick.

  Who did this to her? Vigilantes? Americans who try to stop illegals from crossing? Or was it Mamá’s own coyote who hurt her? I’d never know. Mamá wasn’t going to tell me. And I could never bear to hear.

  Rage. Impotence.

  I wanted to punish Mamá for allowing herself to get hurt. For what her scars were doing to me. For leaving me for more than a year. I thought about walking with Miss, rubbing it in Mamá’s face while I held Miss’s hand, my pinkie wrapped around her finger.

  But I was angry with Miss, too. She was leaving me. No. I’m leaving her.

  I shoved my hands in my pockets and walked by myself down the zigzag trail.

  But as I moved into the darkness, Carlsbad proved it was a cave of wonders. Nature had carved gardens and castles, animals and faces, out of the rock. I glided past unchanging worlds. Cold, restless air whispered stories I could almost understand.

  I felt my anger slipping, so I tried to pull it tight around me. Like a shroud.

  But in all that peace, my rage came unraveled and fell from my shoulders in rags. As I moved along the maze of trails, my mind worked through the labyrinth of my own thoughts.

  Why do I pull away from the people I love? It’s kinda stupid.

  No. It’s REALLY stupid.

  Because what I want — what I really want — is to be close.

  My hand moved out of my pocket, searching. And found Mamá’s warm, rough one. I thought we’d come to the caverns by accident. A wrong turn. But maybe there’s no such thing as coincidence. Maybe there’s a plan.

  Is this grace?

  THE DRIVE FROM Carlsbad Caverns to Roswell took two hours. Two long, boring hours. I was glad I’d slept the first time we drove through it. But Ethan was excited. As we rolled into town, he said, “Keep your eyes peeled for aliens!”