Thirteen Heavens

by Mark Fishman

  “Los barandales del puente,” “The Railings of the Bridge,” a canción mexicana, predecessor to canción ranchera, playing for Coyuco, nobody else could hear it, not that he could be sure, but Coyuco, his own radio available in his head at all times, day and night, and a voice telling him, just switch it on when you want it, it’ll help you live through whatever’s going on, and it was Los Texmaniacs, Max Baca Jr. on bajo sexto, David Farías, accordion, Óscar García, bass and drums, Lorenzo Martínez, guitarrón and drums, Los Texmaniacs, together, playing and singing “Los barandales del puente,” and the words bringing a warmth that was a kind of sanctuary to him, Los barandales del puente, se estremecen cuando paso. / Morena mía, dame una abrazo. / Dame tu mano, morena, para subir al tranvía, / Que está cayendo la nieve fría, “The bridge railings tremble as I cross. / My dark woman, give me a hug. / Give me your hand, dark woman, to board the streetcar, / for the cold snow is falling,” the song accompanying Coyuco and the other students, maybe they heard it maybe they didn’t, it was his music, and the two buses with the other students arriving, making the almost twenty miles in no time, everyone pouring out of their respective buses, the second- and first-year students with shaved heads, T-shirts and bandanas covering their faces, not much of a disguise but they had to do something, breaking a window in Coyuco’s bus to free them, Coyuco and the other students abandoning their bus, normalistas charging the station, commandeering three more buses, Coyuco, José Ángel, and the eight other students having left their bus behind, and not a creature was stirring except the normalistas, the students from Ayotzinapa, a Escuela Normal, no police, nothing, now they had five buses altogether, it was nine twenty-two, the students telling the drivers to get them out of there as fast as they can, the buses leaving the central bus station, two of them heading toward the highway, three others heading toward the center of Iguala, there still weren’t any police anywhere to be seen, five buses taking off, Estrella Roja 3278, leaving from the back of the terminal for Calle Ignacio Manuel Altamirano with fourteen students, heading for Periférico Sur and the road to Chilpancingo, Estrella de Oro 1531 with fifteen to twenty students onboard, heading for Periférico Sur and the road leaving town, two Costa Line buses, 2012 and 2510, and another Estrella de Oro, number 1568, these buses following Calle Hermenegildo Galeana, heading in the general direction of Periférico Norte, Coyuco sitting in that one, the Estrella de Oro 1568 bus with José Ángel riding in the seat across from him, and more than thirty students altogether, but the three buses weren’t going fast enough, the lead driver in the Costa Line 2012 was slowing down, a light foot on the accelerator, the students trying to get him to step on it, and he wouldn’t listen, somebody shouting, more than one, several voices saying the same thing at the same time, get a fucking move on! and the Plaza del Zócalo ahead of them, the three buses in a kind of convoy on Calle Hermenegildo Galeana, and at the central plaza—Estrella de Oro 1568 the last of the three buses, Costa Line 2510 and 2012 forming the column in front of the Estrella de Oro 1568 respectively—a municipal police truck cutting them off, blocking the way, bringing the buses to a halt, and the police firing shots in the air, and at the buses, too, the first calls going out to 066, the emergency services, at around nine fifty-three, shots being fired at the normalistas, students climbing down from buses, throwing rocks, trying to move the vehicle that blocked their way, army intelligence agents present, and the police firing at them, everything happening faster than their minds could grasp, but the students forcing the vehicle to pull back, enough rocks and the frightened driver, then the three buses starting off again, approaching Juan N. Álvarez and Periférico Norte, the police went on firing, the caravan of buses moving at a crawl, and now about ten police cars from Iguala in front of and behind the buses, and three units from Cocula, the municipal police forces, together, and the ministerial police and federal police, it was almost ten o’clock, then another police truck blocking the road in front of Costa Line 2012, this time the driver getting out of it and taking off, a few students, including Aldo Gutiérrez Solano, getting out to move the police truck out of the way, pushing the truck with other students, normalistas throwing more stones at the police, and in return more machine gun fire ripping through the night air, a bullet striking Aldo Gutiérrez in the head, falling sideways, hitting the ground, ¡cuidado, cuidado! blood pooling where he fell, Coyuco and José Ángel, with a couple of others, trying to help him, their hands and clothes stained with blood, they were trembling, students running for cover, ¡ya nos mataron a uno culeros! hiding behind the police truck or ducking behind the first bus in the convoy, Costa Line 2012, a wretched panic, understanding nothing, ¡bájense! they were hopelessly wiping sweat from their faces, a fraternity of sweat, or was it tears, ¡güey, hay que tomarle foto a lo otro! filming with their cell phones, it was night, raining, others crawling under buses, ¡bájense! ¿y los demás?¡ let’s get out of here! they’re still shooting at us! ya mataron a uno, háblale a la ambulancia! call an ambulance, you’ve killed my friend! Coyuco and José Ángel, icy veins, adding their voices to the plaintive cries, voices shouting at the police, shouting at the emptiness inside of them, ¿por qué recoges los casquillos cabrón? ¿sabes lo que hiciste verdad, mierda? ¿por qué nos andan buscando? why are you picking up the casings, asshole? you know what you did, don’t you, shit? why are they after us? fury in the darkness, ¡pinche perro lame huevos! and words that wouldn’t come out burned their tongues, but a sentence written by Ignacio Manuel Altamirano, from his book, El Zarco, refusing to be contained, more powerful than fear, pouring from someone’s lips onto the street, diluted by spilled blood and falling rain: “By now the moon had appeared on the horizon and was rising majestically in the sky among clusters of clouds,” but there wasn’t a moon, or if there was they couldn’t see it, there wasn’t any room for poetry in language, nothing beautiful or fine, just ugliness, with nothing left to believe in, no dreams or future for anyone crouched behind a bus or truck in a rainy mist, under fire from the municipal police, the ministerial police and federal police, too, firing at the inside of the buses, and window-glass shattering, bullets skipping off the road, Coyuco and José Ángel, without El Santo or Blue Demon to help them, Coyuco and José Ángel, and the others, too, carefully backing away from the fallen body of Aldo Gutiérrez—his spirit like a paper kite floating up to the sky—alive but suffering, ¡cuidado, cuidado! giving up, there was nothing they could do but join him, “they had nowhere to go except Mictlan, the underworld which lay beneath the great steppes of the north, in the cold, twilit country, Mictlantecuhtli and his wife Mictlancihuatl reigned there: the Mexican Pluto’s face was covered with a bony mask, and he sat among owls and spiders,” the place one goes after death, the next world, or a better place, and a line from John Marston’s play The Malcontent present for an instant in Coyuco’s mind, “Death’s a good fellow and keeps open house,” and still there was no ambulance, the police doing nothing but shooting at them, and when the ambulance arrived, the police, not letting the emergency vehicle get through to where Aldo Gutiérrez was lying, breathing but not really there, unconscious, by that time a coma, lost, at last the ambulance circling back, making its way close enough to help, paramedics putting Aldo Gutiérrez Solano in the ambulance, a martyr, and prayers on Coyuco’s lips, the other students, too, then words from the New Testament mixed with the rain wetting the lips of dry mouths, Y Dios limpiará toda lágrima de sus ojos, y la muerte no será más, ni existirá ya más lamento ni clamor ni dolor, porque todo lo viejo ha desaparecido, “And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain, for the former things are passed away,” first- and second-year students from Raúl Isidro Burgos Normal Rural School, scurrying phantoms trying to get away from the municipal police, the ministerial police, and federal police, too, Coyuco joining José Ángel, maybe Cutberto Ortiz, Leonel Castro, Jorge Luis González, Emiliano Alen, Marcial Pablo, César Manuel, and the othe
rs, victims feeling that moment with fear, a fear that went on and on, those seconds, minutes and more, the whole thing lasting roughly fifty-five minutes, from nine forty-five until ten forty, they were surprised at how much time and no time at all had passed with nothing but death snapping at their heels, rabid dogs wearing uniforms, and about seventy students altogether at the crossroads of Juan N. Álvarez and Periférico Norte, the police arresting as many as they could get their hands on, hitting the driver of Estrella de Oro 1568 over the head, pulling students off the bus, the aisle stained with blood, broken glass, or the police dragging students out of hiding, making them lie facedown on the street, hands behind their heads, Coyuco and José Ángel, together, lying on the street, looking at each other with their cheeks pressed against the ground, and a male mosquero cardenal, a vermillion flycatcher, Pyrocephalus rubinus, or tlapaltototl in Nahuatl, a small passerine bird, bright red with dark-brown plumage, landing near Coyuco and José Ángel, hopping first in one direction, then another, there was a lot going on around him, confused, not nervous, and a miraculous change occurring through divine or supernatural intervention, a vermillion flycatcher becoming a cuervo llanero right before their eyes, a Chihuahuan raven, Coyuco and José Ángel seeing it clearly even though it was night, lying on the street in a light rain that seemed unnatural, a kind of drizzle more like tears than moisture condensed from the atmosphere falling visibly in separate drops, and the raven jumping with two feet at once, a nice move to within reach of Coyuco and José Ángel, if they didn’t have their hands behind their heads and the police around them, Coyuco and José Ángel, staring at the bird, blinking their eyes, trying to shake off the transformation they’d seen, witnesses to something rare, once in a lifetime, but under the circumstances, not so unusual, vermillion flycatcher to raven, who could’ve dreamed it, and the Chihuahuan raven’s dark-brown eyes watching them, eyes shifting from one to the other, calling a high-pitched a-a-rk, approaching Coyuco, extending its neck as far as it could go, then pruk-pruk, a sadness in its voice, carrying a message from Ernesto, Coyuco shutting his eyes, seeing his father and mother on the lids of his closed eyes, seeing Irma, too, Coyuco, no longer afraid, but sorry for them, all of them, everyone, full of the feeling of sorrow and compassion caused by the suffering and misfortunes of Ernesto, Guadalupe, Irma, and all the others, his eyes weren’t shut anymore, but looking twice, the raven was still there, no conjuring trick, no sleight of hand, but he couldn’t speak the bird’s language, only a taste of its mournful voice in his mouth, the raven nodding its head, saying, I know what you don’t know yet, but the conversation was interrupted, a policeman seeing the raven, walking over to it, standing above Coyuco and José Ángel, and since all birds speak to each other, the flycatcher returning to itself, a male mosquero cardenal, of a large order distinguished by feet that are adapted for perching, including all songbirds, the policeman aware of nothing, reaching out and swinging his stick at a bird, large or small, black or bright red, it didn’t make a difference to him, a goon in a uniform, trying to chase it away, the mosquero cardenal, a vermillion flycatcher, looking up at him, a menace of bodily harm, such as may restrain a bird’s freedom of action, then lifting off the ground, and the policeman pulling Coyuco and José Ángel off the street, throwing them into a truck with the others, a real tragedy, not out of a book, but right there in Iguala de la Independencia, and the vermillion flycatcher, a red dot, circling above the truck, then disappearing in the night sky, its wings moist with rain the color of blood.

  Rubén Arenal starting off for his sister’s house, going to see Luz Elena, Avelina, Perla and Cirilo, and a freezer full of paletas, his way of walking an irregular gait, accompanied always by Little Pascuala, she’s strolling through his mind, a picture of her on his eyelids when his eyes were closed, and some music, it wasn’t an irregular gait but moving with the rhythm of a song, “Jacinto Treviño,” a corrido, Los Pingüinos del Norte, Rubén Castillo Juárez, Hilario Gaytán Moreno, Ricardo Escalante, and Rumel Fuentes, but now only Rubén Castillo, the only remaining original member, playing with Raúl Torres on bass and Antonio Pérez Rodríguez, bajo sexto and second voice, he’d seen them in Piedras Negras, in the state of Coahuila, Piedras Negras, more than eight hundred feet above sea level, at the northeastern edge of the state, across Río Bravo del Norte from Eagle Pass, Texas, Rubén Arenal visiting the Catedral de los Mártires de Cristo Rey de Piedras Negras, erected by Fray Raúl Vera López, but now, on his way to Calle Álvarez de Arcilla, heading for Luz Elena’s house, a small two-bedroom house not far from the Parque San Filipe, not much of a park, but something green, and the Parish Church of San Felipe Apostle, around a three-minute walk for Avelina, Perla—not Cirilo, he was too young—Rubén Arenal’s nieces and a nephew, coming home from school, Avelina, Perla and Cirilo, music in every name, Rubén Arenal looking forward to seeing them on a scorching afternoon, and Rocket, I’m crushed by the heat, but love is a sun that revitalizes with its beams all that exists around us, La Pascualita, it’s too hot, and the wind, a poet’s nightmare, Rubén Arenal in love, and that accounted for everything.

  But Rubén Arenal, his stride now half-sluggish and half-deliberate, no more music, indicating that something was wrong, the beams of love not sufficient for stamping out the suppurating wound, a weeping wound on behalf of Ernesto, Guadalupe, and Coyuco, whose homeless ghost was likely drifting about in an unwanted daze, with the other missing teaching students from the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Teachers College, known as Ayotzinapa, a college founded in 1926, Rubén Arenal hearing a Mexican jay, grajo mexicano, or chara mexicana, a large songbird with a blue head, blue-gray mantle, blue wings and tail, a bird of the crow family, calling quenk, quenk, coming all the way from Nogales, a passing car with a broken muffler drowning out the bird’s call, Rubén Arenal hearing his own scraping footsteps, really dragging his feet, and Rocket, the word, which is memory’s strongbox, how much more how much more, something’s happened, something that wasn’t written, except by God, Rubén Arenal’s vision got blurry as if his eyes were full of splinters, seeing everything in a blur, then a few more tears, his anxiety reflected in the windows of a passing bus, reflections in glass, or a window of a taxi gliding in close to the sidewalk, but reflecting his uneasiness, anyway, rubbing the calluses on the palm of his right hand with his right thumb, taking a turn at Domínguez de Mendoza, not so far from Hundido Park, a playing field on the opposite side of the street, hot air burning his lungs as he reached the gate to the entrance of Luz Elena’s house.

  Avelina and Perla, playing outside with another girl from the neighborhood, Cirilo, on the living room floor, surrounded by building blocks in half-a-dozen colors, Cirilo placing one block on top of the other, making towers and barriers, then knocking them down, Cirilo turning his head, eyes blinking at a familiar face, but that was all he gave his uncle by way of greeting, Rubén Arenal, used to it, touching the boy’s thick black hair, ruffling it, Luz Elena shaking a chubby finger at her son, but the boy’s back was already turned, Cirilo’s eyes fixed on the developing construction site, quick fingers capable of stacking at high speed, a wall of blue with yellow trim, meandering like a Great-Wall-of-China snake on the living room floor, Luz Elena tugging her brother’s sleeve, a sleeve rolled up to the elbow, pulling him toward the kitchen, and Luz Elena, with respect to the sun in the sky which is roasting us, and the wind, one of the six pernicious influences—let’s take a look at your tongue, is it red or is it wearing a yellow coat? are there thorns on the lung area?—we’d better have a cold drink, Xihuitl, my comet, my brother, with respect, of course, to the weather we’re having, and Rocket, you’re talking Chinese medicine, and I’ve been waiting all day for a popsicle, I know you’ve got them in the freezer, I wonder if I’m dreaming, without knowing I am, and Luz Elena, stop talking nonsense, have one if that’ll make you happy, what’s got into you lately? and Rocket, it’s Coyuco, and Ernesto and Lupe, all of them, but Coyuco and the other students, it’s the kind of thing I can’t shake off,
a heartache, a new denial each morning, then a quick glance at the mirror—bang! a truth too much to take, a complete loss of hope exploding in my face, and Luz Elena, with respect to the awful truth, a pitiless situation, and the Cisneros family, of course, little by little, your thoughts are yielding to sensations, and Rocket, you aren’t kidding, it’s more than Ernesto and Lupe can stand, and me, too, all of us, Rubén Arenal taking a deep breath with the admission, the depth of it, as deep as a bottomless well, and a feeling that pulled him below the surface of the earth, straight into a hole with dirt thrown over him, the emotion this revelation created in him, it wasn’t a sequence of resignation, acceptance, and peace, but an irritating, chafing emotion of helpless frustration which made him want to crawl around his sister’s house rubbing his back and the side of his body against her furniture to ease the discomfort.