by Diana Renn
“Could this thing get violent?” I asked as a soldier brandished a rifle at a small crowd.
“Mostly these protests are peaceful,” said Santiago, slowing down. “They try to make the roads inconvenient for travel. Sometimes they can shut down Quito for days.”
“Days?” I thought of the shipping container, which had to be trucked from the Port of Guayaquil on the coast, over the mountains and into Quito.
Santiago made a vague gesture. “Days, maybe weeks. And sometimes, yes, protests can become violent. A match can strike, and then we have riots.”
Fabulous. I’d been in Ecuador for less than two hours and landed in a sandwich of angry protestors on one side, possible drug cartel enforcers on the other. Spin the wheel, take your chance!
A man in gray camouflage waved a rifle in our direction.
“He is a military man,” said Santiago. “He is wanting us to turn around and go back.”
But Santiago kept the car rolling forward. Near the military guy, he stopped and rolled down his window.
Their Spanish was rapid-fire, but I got the gist of the conversation. Military Man yelled at Santiago for ignoring the detour signs. Santiago apologized. He explained we were being pursued by robbers, and we’d stayed on the highway to escape them. He reached into his pocket and handed Military Man a twenty-dollar bill. The guy pocketed it and pointed to a hill off to our right. He explained something in Spanish. The next thing I knew, Santiago was throwing the Pathfinder into reverse.
I gripped my seat belt. “Are you going through the blockade?”
“No. Off the road. This man has shown to me a place I can safely drive. There I can connect with another road into Quito. He will offer us protection if we do it fast.”
About a football field’s length back from the blockade, Santiago turned the car to the right. And floored it.
My teeth clacked as the wheels left the pavement. My stomach churned, and my mind flashed back to the last off-road ride I’d taken: with Jake, at Chain Reaction, on bikes.
Yet as the car wheels churned on the grassy road shoulder, and the car rumbled over bumpy terrain, I didn’t feel as scared this time.
Santiago leaned his head back on the headrest and flexed his fingers on the wheel. “¡Que raro! I cannot believe only one hour ago, I have been studying verbos for the TOEFL exam. Now I am driving a—what do you call it?—a getahead vehicle.” He flashed me a grin. “I admit. That was fun. I hope these people will now forget they ever saw you. This is a big city. You will not be troubled.”
I wasn’t so sure, but I smiled back. “You went above and beyond. Thank you. And it’s a getaway vehicle. Let me pay you back for the bribe.” I reached for my backpack.
“No. I cannot accept payment. Tranquila. Sit back and relax. We will be at the Ruiz house in no time.”
Santiago turned the merengue music up loud. We merged with light traffic on a quiet road, smooth asphalt thrummed beneath our wheels, and the gold lights of Quito beckoned.
34
THE RUIZ family greeted me with hugs and besos. My host sister, Amparo, gave me a huge white stuffed bear with a red heart necklace, in case I missed my family and needed something to hug. Andreas gave me Ecuadorian magazines “for practicing in Spanish.” I thanked him, trying to ignore the fact that Juan Carlos was on the cover of almost all of them, with teasers for stories about la tragedia ciclista. Hugo carried my suitcase and backpack to the room I would share with Amparo. Lucia served me a late dinner: steak with eggs cooked over it, and a heaping plate of papas fritas. Peludo the poodle covered my arms and face with sloppy licks.
I was beyond tired. And sleep should have come easily. For the moment anyway, I was safe. The Ruiz house was tucked away in a maze of hilly streets, all lined with elegant homes—fresh white paint, red tile roofs, gracious arched brown doorways. The homes, including the Ruiz casa, were also heavily barricaded: ringed by cement walls iced with glass shards.
The Ruiz house was further guarded by a man in a booth at the gate. He wore a beret, fatigues, and a semiautomatic weapon slung across his chest. After Santiago had pulled up at the curb, we’d had to pass by that booth. As the guard tipped his beret and murmured, “Buenas noches, señorita,” I’d actually felt grateful for that gun. Especially now that I was thinking Darwin and those guys were involved with international drug trafficking—and with Juan Carlos’s murder.
Not so long ago, when I couldn’t sleep, I used to lie in my bed back home and let my thoughts drift to Jake. I’d replay our good times—like biking out to Cabot Pond on hot summer nights and swimming to the far edge to kiss—and more—beneath a willow tree, whose gracious branches offered a private room. Sometimes, when things weren’t good with Jake, my thoughts would drift to Juan Carlos instead. To our halting conversations in Spanish, to the slow spread of his smile, to the way he said to me once, almost wistfully, “Jake, he is lucky to have a girlfriend like you.” I’d replayed that memory so much I’d almost worn it out.
But now, lying between crisp pink sheets in Amparo’s spare bed, my thoughts veered away from both of them . . . to Santiago. He had risen to the occasion, driving that “getahead vehicle” like a pro—and he didn’t even know me! He’d also given me his cell number before he left. “If you need anything, call,” he said to me before he left. “And I will see you on Monday?”
“Monday?”
“At Vuelta. I’m working for my dad at the headquarters, part-time, for my summer job.”
“You’re working at Vuelta, too? Doing what?”
“Updating their website. So if you need to have another high-speed chase or something, I am your guy. Chao!” He waved—no attempt at a beso this time, as he rubbed his nose and winked.
“Chao,” I replied, remembering, with a pang, that chao was the last word Juan Carlos and I had exchanged.
I tossed and turned, trying to plump up my flat pillow. I took off Juan Carlos’s crucifix and set it on the nightstand so it wouldn’t dig into my skin. I still couldn’t sleep. Amparo’s snores were fearsome. And now the airport chase haunted me. All the emotions I’d fought to quell on that ride came flooding in.
Darwin and his cohorts had wanted to talk to me. They’d made no effort to hide. Only after I ignored them did Darwin press the pedal to the metal. Maybe I should have just talked to them in the parking lot and asked them directly what was going on, instead of having to wonder. By ignoring them, I’d pissed them off.
Anyway, how did they know to find me in Quito? And at the airport? Aside from my host family and the Vuelta office, no one had my itinerary. Except Mari.
I sat bolt upright in bed. Mari. We’d exchanged a few emails in the past two weeks. One had my flight times and my host family’s address. Maybe Darwin had somehow intercepted our emails. Or maybe one of Darwin’s spies had gotten information out of her, about when I was coming. I had to know who she’d talked to lately—and if she was okay.
I grabbed my laptop from my backpack and turned it on. I padded softly through the house, trying to find an Internet signal, until I came to the open-air patio in the middle of the house.
This patio was the best part of the Ruiz house: a secret square, protected from the streets, surrounded by the walls of adjacent rooms. In addition to the washing machine and clothesline, it contained a large collection of potted plants, some with elaborate vines creeping up the wall and some with strange, bulbous fruits. And above: nothing but sky. Just those brilliant stars, so close they seemed like I could reach out and grab them.
I found a blanket folded up on the washing machine, drew it around my shoulders for warmth, and breathed in the rich scent of dirt and flowers. Then I sat cross-legged on the cool tile and fired off a note to her. She’d been quiet on email, not responding to my last few messages. I hoped she’d reply to this one. I kept it simple.
Arrived. In Quito. We have to talk. You might be in danger.
When & where can we meet up tomorrow?
I sent it and waited for what I hoped would be an almost instant response. No response came. It was almost midnight. I hoped she was having some party at her cousin’s hip bachelorette pad. Dancing. Living la vida loca. Safe.
I sent quick emails to my parents, and to Kylie and Sarita, letting them all know I’d safely arrived. I kept those emails breezy and brief. I couldn’t alarm anyone. I wished Kylie extra good luck on her Lane Scholarship interview.
I checked my inbox again. Still nothing from Mari.
To distract myself from compulsive email checking, I surfed to the Team Cadence-EcuaBar website and looked up the latest stats on the Pan-American Cycling Tour. I learned that without its star rider at the helm, it had won two circuit events and some time trial events in Bogotá, but placed fourth in the Bogotá one-day classic, with the favorite Ecuadorian team—Equipo Diablo—taking a solid first. Cadence-EcuaBar was suffering without its star climber. In Venezuela this week, the team was now doing a weeklong stage race, La Vuelta a Venezuela, and performing somewhat better, the strongest North American team in the tour—but three strong riders from Ecuador’s Equipo Diablo were surpassing them at every leg of the race.
Thinking of that Ecuadorian team made me think of their soon-to-debut rider. El Ratón. My quick search on him led to an interview posted a month ago on an Ecuadorian TV station’s website. A local reporter asked him how his friend Juan Carlos got started in racing.
El Ratón hesitated, his brows furrowed. “Juan Carlos?” he asked.
“Yes. You are good friends.”
If el Ratón was at all annoyed that the interview was more about his friend, he didn’t show it. He nodded and launched into the story, in Spanish, as if he’d told it a hundred times before. “
“One day an American businessman—Preston Lane, of EcuaBar—noticed Juan Carlos competing in an urban downhill race, and he got him into the Vuelta Youth Racing Club. He believed Juan Carlos had what it takes for road racing. And he was right. A few years later, with many prizes under his belt, Juan Carlos was recruited for the EcuaBar junior development team. And he spent very little time there before he went pro. He’s an inspiration to us all now, about what is possible if we push ourselves, and if someone believes in our talents.”
“How did that feel, seeing your friend go off to the United States to start a racing career?” asked the reporter. “After all, you used to ride together.”
“We did ride together. Since we were nine years old,” said el Ratón with a smile. “We grew up in the same south Quito neighborhood. Juan Carlos and I found abandoned bike frames in parks, or around the city, and we learned to put them together. We learned about bikes and improved. Then we spent all our time in the mountains, riding. When we were fourteen, we started racing urban downhill. But are you asking me if I was jealous of my friend, for all his opportunities?”
“It would be natural, wouldn’t it?” said the reporter.
El Ratón chuckled and shook his head. “He is like my brother. We are from the same place. His success is my success. Jealous? Me? Never.”
I wondered if that were really true. I had flashes of envy when Sarita got higher grades than me, or won academic awards that I didn’t. I also wondered what this urban downhill thing was. I’d never heard of a specific downhill racing event for cycling, let alone an urban one, but maybe that was some specialized term here. A background in downhill racing could explain why Juan Carlos was fearless on hills. So why did he end up fatally crashing on a descent? It just wasn’t fair.
I checked my email again. Nothing from Mari. I snapped my laptop closed. If I didn’t hear back from Mari first thing tomorrow morning, I’d go to her apartment. There had to be some reason she’d ignored my last few emails. I really hoped she was okay.
I headed back to Amparo’s room, then realized I’d opened the door to a different bedroom off the open-air patio, not the door to the hall. This room was hardly bigger than a walk-in closet. It had a green shag rug and a twin bed in one corner. Beside the bed was a nightstand with a phone and a lamp; the lamp had plastic figures of Mary, Joseph, and the baby Jesus affixed to the base. A small shuttered window faced the courtyard.
I sat on the bed. Then lay down. Aside from the faint smell of damp earth—like a basement that had flooded once—the room was cozy. And, like the patio, it felt safe. No windows to the outside world.
I pulled the scratchy wool blanket up around me and drifted off to sleep.
I dreamed of Juan Carlos. He was riding the ghost bike. He wore an all-white cycling outfit, matching the white frame, the white handlebars, the white wheels. Turning his head to look back at me, he flashed me his most dazzling smile. “Tessa Taylor!” he called to me. “Can you catch up?”
I was cranking along on an old beater bike. The downtube was rusted. Wheels squeaked and pedals jammed. I looked down and saw I had training wheels, one of them coming loose. “I’m trying!” I called back. “Hey! Come back!”
But he didn’t come back, and I couldn’t catch up, and the distance between us yawned. Only once did he look back at me. When he did, his face was covered in blood.
35
“¡AY, PELUDO! ¿Qué hicistes? ¿Pipi aquí? ¿Qué bestia!”
I awakened to Lucia Ruiz’s shrill voice. I rubbed my eyes and opened the shutters. I peered out into the open-air patio, now awash in sunlight. Lucia was berating the poodle, who had just peed all over the floor and was now munching on that white stuffed bear Amparo had given me. Lucia yanked the bear from the dog’s jaws and muttered something, in Spanish, about how the crazy dog was always chewing everything in sight.
Amparo rushed in, dodging the puddle. “¡Tessa no está aquí!”
For a moment I enjoyed the drama as she explained to her mom—and then to Hugo and Andreas, who came into the courtyard—that I wasn’t in bed. It was almost like being a ghost.
When I realized the Ruizes were seriously freaking out, though, I burst out of the room.
“Buenos días,” I said shyly, suddenly aware that I was the only one not yet fully dressed. They were all staring at my right arm. The bandage was off, but a big angry scab—a memento of Chain Reaction—remained.
Since I was still holding the blanket I’d found on the patio last night, I covered my arm with it, and my thin nightgown, and explained how I’d wound up in that bedroom by taking a wrong turn on a nighttime walk through the house.
Everyone laughed, and Hugo told me it was the room of their former maid.
“We haven’t found a replacement as good as her,” Lucia added. “This is why the house is not so clean. I apologize.”
Not clean? It was spotless! I took a step backward and looked at this family, especially Amparo, through new eyes. These people had had a live-in maid. Their life seemed so different from that of the people by the blockade we’d passed by last night.
“I like the room,” I admitted. “Could I stay in here?”
“This room?” Lucia’s eyebrows shot up. “Ay, no, mi hija. This room is not so comfortable, not for you. Besides, Amparo would be lonesome.”
Amparo looked hurt. “My room—our room—is so much nicer than this one, Tessa.”
“Of course. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to sound ungrateful. Your room is great.”
She beamed. “Thanks. I have to show you all my photo albums, and my pageant trophies. Will you help me with a speech? I have to write a new one for Miss Tierra Ecuador.”
“Who’s she?”
“Not a she. A what. It’s the Miss Earth Ecuador pageant.” Amparo’s eyes lit up as she spoke. “This contest, it combines beauty with awareness of environmental concerns. I thought because you worked in television, you would be the perfect person to help me. Maybe today?”
“I’d love to help.” I smiled back, suddenly aching for Kylie and Sarita—and panicking,
in the next moment, about getting to Mari. “But today I have to see my friend from back home. She’s working with Vuelta, too.”
“Another day, we would love to include her,” said Lucia. “But it is Saturday, and Hugo is not working, so we have our actividades familiares already planned.”
Family activities. I managed a weak smile. I was seventeen. Couldn’t I have any say in my schedule? I hadn’t felt so programmed since kindergarten.
After breakfast, I checked email again. Nothing new except a note from my mom. (We’re so proud of you! Work hard, wear sunscreen, have fun!) I’d just have to get the Ruizes to route our actividades through Mari’s neighborhood and make an excuse to go see her.
I pulled out the map from my Vuelta welcome packet and located the address of her cousin’s apartment, in a neighborhood called La Mariscal, more commonly known as La Zona. That was easy enough to remember.
/////
LATER THAT morning, Hugo backed the car down the driveway with the whole family and me inside. He stopped at the booth by the gate and introduced me to Paolo, the day shift guard.
“Buenos días, señorita,” he said with a friendly grin, touching his beret and displaying silver-capped teeth with his smile.
“So the guards will just let me in if I knock at the booth?” I asked my host parents as we continued down the driveway.
“Let you in? Of course. But from where?”
“I thought after our sightseeing you could drop me off at my friend Mari’s place. I can find my way back here.”
“Mari. This is the girl who lives alone? In an apartment?”
“Yeah. Her cousin’s place. It’s in some area called La Zona—”
“La Zona!” Amparo exclaimed, clapping her hands together. “Mami, I want to go with Tessa. Can I?”
“Absolutely not. It’s a nightclub scene.”
“Sounds fun,” I said. My mind flashed to my red sundress, folded neatly in my suitcase. Sarita had taken me shopping in Harvard Square the day before I traveled. She’d ordered me to buy the dress and find a hot guy to dance with. “One salsa,” she’d commanded. “To shake Jake out of your head. And Juan Carlos, too, while you’re at it.”
