Suzy droned on. “... he belonged ...”
Jack caressed his wife’s shoulder. I wonder what Carol got me. She won’t even let me touch that big blue package in the back. Maybe it’s a …
The doorbell rang.
Jack jerked, spilling hot cider on himself, Carol and the couch. “God da—” he clamped his teeth together to strangle the oath. “Who in the world ...?”
“Some people have the nerve,” Carol seethed, dabbing at her stained slacks with a napkin.
He carefully placed his cup on the coffee table, wiped his hands on his pants and started for the door.
Carol grabbed his arm.
Startled, he turned to her.
“You don’t have to answer it.”
“But it could be a last-minute delivery.”
Her eyebrows arched. “At this hour?”
“I bet it’s the paper boy,” Suzy declared, loudly. “Collecting.”
“Yeah.” Bobby slipped his fingers under the fold at the end of the package. “He just wants more of Mom’s fudge.”
“Shhh,” Carol said. “He collected last week.”
The bell rang again. Jack pulled his arm out of his wife’s grasp and moved toward the entryway.
“For Pete’s sake,” she hissed. “It’s Christmas Eve. Whoever it is ought to know better than to interrupt our celebration. They’ll go away.”
“But, what if someone needs help or is having car trouble. It’s cold out there.”
“Jack ...” Her green eyes chilled to steel gray. “You always think of everyone else but us. Is once a year too much to ask? This is our time. The kids will have a fit if they have to wait to open gifts while you’re out playing mechanic again. As it is, we started late because you stayed at the store so long.”
“Yeah,” Bobby and Suzy chorused.
The bell rang again.
Suzy found her place. “Expecting a child ...”
Bobby rotated the box and slid his finger through the other end of the wrapping.
Jack hesitated.
Carol tapped the couch cushion with her finger. “Sit down. They’ll leave.”
“I ...”
“It’s okay. They’ll understand.”
He looked at the sofa then started for the kitchen. “I’d better find something to take care of that spot before it dries.”
The doorbell rang again.
He stopped.
“No, Dad.”
“No, Jack.”
He stood in the middle of the living room, looking from the entryway to Carol and back again.
“Dad, please,” Bobby whined. “Please sit down.”
Jack walked over to a chair. He sat on the edge of the seat. Everyone held their breath and stared at the entry. The fire sputtered and popped.
And, again, the bell rang.
Bobby swore.
“Bobby!” Carol reprimanded.
Suzy continued. “The time came for the baby ...”
“I can’t take it.” Jack stood to his feet.
Despite his family’s groans, he stepped to the door and opened it. A hint of roses and a spark of sunshine colored the cold air that blew through the screen door. He flipped on the porch light and saw a solitary man wearing simple but warm clothing.
The stranger smiled. “Hello.”
“Hello.” Jack glanced toward the curb.
“That’s right. No car.” The man grinned. “I’m Jesus Christ. I don’t usually drive one.” He lifted a glove-covered hand. “I’d like to celebrate Christmas with your family this year.”
Jack recoiled. Jesus? Impossible! Absurd.
“Dad—hurry up!”
Jack continued to gape at the visitor, whose open gaze seemed to radiate love, compassion, joy, peace, mercy—and much more. He saw a depth in the man’s eyes he knew he could never fathom.
“May I come in?” His smile was warm, inviting.
Jack heard Carol’s voice. “Close the door. You’re letting in the cold.”
“I, uh, well, you see—we’re right in the middle of reading the, well, actually—your story in the Bible, and ...”
“Come on, Dad. We’ve got to get this religion stuff over with.”
Jack grimaced. Maybe he’s come to preach at us. Bobby will gag.
“No,” Jesus said. “I’m here to love you and to celebrate with you.” He winked. “Like you’ve never celebrated before.”
Yeah, sure. Jack cleared his throat. “I’ve got to consider my son. You see, he’s at that age ... I mean, well, everything has to be, you know, cool. And my wife—she, Carol, she really wants just the family to be together tonight. It so rarely happens ...” His voice trailed away.
“Da-ad!”
“I understand.” Jesus turned to go then looked back, his eyes filled with tender pain. “I love you.”
“I, uh, love ya, too. Maybe—maybe next year would be a, a better time for you to visit.”
“Maybe.” Jesus descended the steps to trudge through a walkway burdened with snow.
Jack watched the lone, slumped figure slog into a flurry of flying flakes and disappear in the darkness. A terrible emptiness flooded his soul, and a shiver shook his body. He shoved the screen door open and stepped onto the porch in his sock-covered feet to call Jesus back.
But Carol was tugging at his arm. “Good grief, Jack. You’re going to give us all pneumonia.” She pulled him in, closing the door behind them.
“What did that man want?” Suzy asked, once again bent over the Bible, searching for her place in the passage.
“Oh ...” He cleared his throat. “Not much. He just wanted to celebrate with us.”
Bobby snorted as he loosened the final piece of tape.
Carol rolled her eyes. “Can you believe it? Christmas, no less.”
Suzy’s finger finally found the words. “Because there ... was no room ...”
Down the street, around the corner, another doorbell rang.
Also by Rebecca Carey Lyles:
It’s a God Thing: Inspiring Stories of Life-Changing Friendships
On a Wing and a Prayer: Stories from Freedom Fellowship, a Prison Ministry
Paul Levine
The author of 14 novels, Paul Levine won the John D. MacDonald fiction award and has been nominated for the Edgar, Macavity, International Thriller, and James Thurber prizes. His critically acclaimed and bestselling Jake Lassiter novels, originally published in hard cover and paperback in 21 countries, are now available as eBooks. A former trial lawyer, he wrote more than 20 episodes of the CBS military drama JAG and co-created First Monday, starring James Garner and Joe Mantegna. He is also the author of the Solomon vs. Lord series and the thriller Illegal. His next novel will be Lassiter, due in Fall 2011 from Bantam.
El Valiente
I AM NOT AFRAID.
That is what I tell myself.
Just after midnight, five hundred meters from the border fence, I keep still, squatting on the ground beneath a mesquite tree. Buried in the sand are motion sensors and infrared cameras.
My name is Victor Castillo. I am 13 years old.
Back home, in my village, a man warned me not to do this.
You are looking for el cielo. Heaven. But you will find only el infierno. Hell.
Still, I am not afraid. In a matter of minutes, I will be in the United States. By breakfast time, I will be with my Aunt Luisa in a little California town called Ocotillo. She is a nurse, but an even better cook. The best huevos rancheros in the world. Homemade tortillas, the eggs not too runny, the red sauce spiked with jalapenos. We will have a cry about my mother, then mi tia will put me on a bus to Minnesota, where my father works in the sugar beet fields.
But first, there is the fence. It slithers down a rocky slope and disappears between distant boulders, like an endless snake. We move from the cover of the trees to a ravine filled with desert marigolds. I hope the golden flowers are a good omen. We climb out of the ravine and up to the fence, the links glowing like silver bullets in t
he moonlight. The man who calls himself El Leon – “The Lion” – snips at the metal with wire cutters. He wears all black and his long hair is slick with brilliantine.
In the States, they would call El Leon a coyote. In Mexico, he is a pollero, a chicken wrangler. Which makes the rest of us – Mexicans, Hondurans and Guatemalans – the pollos. The chickens. Hopefully, not cooked chickens. If we are caught and turned back, I don’t know what I will do. All my mother’s savings – $2,200 – are paying for my passage.
The wire cutters fly from El Leon’s hands, and he curses in Spanish.
This is taking too long.
Above us, a three-quarter moon is the color of milk. Under our feet, the earth is hard as pavement. Somewhere, on the other side of the fence, La Migra, the Border Patrol, waits. I listen for the whoppeta of a helicopter or the growl of a truck.
El Leon, please hurry!
He keeps working and keeps cursing. I sit on my haunches, inhaling the smell of coal tar from the creosote bushes. From a pocket in my backpack, I take out a photograph of my mother, her face pale in the moonlight.
El Leon works quickly now, the links cra-acking like bones breaking. Finally, he says, “You first, chico.”
I duck through the opening, then hold the wire for a Honduran girl. Maybe I should say a Honduran “woman,” because she is pregnant, her stomach a basketball under her turquoise blouse. But she is probably only seventeen or eighteen and is traveling alone, and she looks too young and too scared to take care of a child. On her feet, huarches, sandals made from old tire tread. I hope she can keep up with us. A selfish thought, I realize, and immediately feel ashamed. My mother taught me better.
The pregnant girl places two hands on her stomach, bends over, and squeezes through the fence. Following her are two campesinos from Oaxaca who smell like wet straw. The men wear felt Tejana hats, cowboy boots, and long-sleeve plaid work shirts. Then the rest, fourteen in all.
***
Ten minutes later, we are climbing a dusty path, moonbeams turning the arms of cholla cactus into the spiny wings of monsters.
Los Estados Unidos. I am here!
Do I feel different, changed in some way? I am not sure. The rocks on the ground and the stars in the sky all look the same as in Mexico. Maybe mi mami is looking down at me from those stars. Her weak lungs gave out five days ago, and I recited the oraciónes por las almas over her grave.
“Let me see her again in the joy of everlasting brightness.”
The stars have “everlasting brightness,” so yes, I pretend she watches me, even though I never believed half of what the priests said.
I travel alone to find my father. My two older brothers have been with papi for nearly a year, carrying their weeding hoes all the way from our village in Sonora to a town called Breckenridge in Minnesota. Beets, strawberries, cabbage. Melons, corn, peas. Whatever is in season and requires hands close to the ground. The work is hard, but the pay is good, at least by Mexican standards.
Now we walk along a rocky path that crawls up the side of a hill sprouting with stubby cactus like an old man who needs a shave. El Leon yells at two Mexican sisters, calls them parlanchinas – chatterboxes – tells them to keep quiet. He has a rifle slung over a shoulder. But why? Who would he shoot?
The older sister is still babbling, something about every house in California having a swimming pool, when El Leon hisses, “¡Cállense la boca!”
He cocks his head toward the hill. I hear something, too.
A clopping.
Growing louder. Horses!
A gunshot echoes off the hillside.
“Vigilantes!” El Leon yells.
My stomach tightens. Our village priest warned me about the vigilantes. Not policemen. Or National Guard. Or Border Patrol. Private citizens, gabachos, calling themselves the Patriot Patrol. Maybe protecting their country or maybe just taking target practice with their friends. Maybe one day shooting Mexicans instead of road signs and cactus.
“Run!” El Leon screams.
But where? On one side of the path, a steep upward slope. On the other, a creviced, dry wash.
The two campesinos leap into the wash and take off, the spines of prickly pear tearing at their pant legs. El Leon leads the others back toward the border. But I cannot follow them. ¡Mi papi está en los Estados Unidos!
I scramble up the steep slope, grabbing vines, pulling myself hand-over-hand. The horses are so close now I can hear their hooves kicking up rocks on the path.
“Yippee ti-yi-yo, greasers!” A gabacho’s voice. Gruff and mean.
Two men on horseback in chaps, boots, and cowboy hats. One man holds a large revolver over his head and fires into the air.
“Git on back to Meh-ee-co! Look at ‘em run, Calvin.”
Calvin, a big man with a belly flopping over his jeans, coughs up a laugh. “Whoa, what do we got here, Woody? Looks like a piñata on Michelins.”
I see her then, too. The pregnant Honduran girl in her tire-tread huarches, trying to hide in the shadow of the hill.
“Someone aims to have herself an anchor baby,” Calvin says.
I know what the man means. Anyone born on this side of the border is automatically an American citizen. Doesn’t matter if you’re from Mexico, Guatemala, or Mars. If Osama bin Laden fathered a child in Los Angeles, the kid would be an American.
“Welfare and food stamps and diapers all on the taxpayer’s dime.” Woody spits out the words.
Gripping a vine at its root, I keep still. Afraid to dislodge a stone. Afraid the gabachos will see me. And ashamed of my fear.
On the path below me, the girl tries to run back toward the border, but the best she can do is a duck waddle. The two men cackle and whoop. Calvin grabs a lariat from his saddle. “Where you goin’ chica? The amnesty bus already left the station.”
He twirls the lariat and tosses it over the girl’s head, where it settles on her chest. He pulls it tight, nearly yanking her off her feet.
“No!” she screams, clawing at the rope. “¡Mi bebé!”
“If there really is a kid...” Calvin hops off his horse. “Let’s have a look, chica.”
He struts toward her, bowlegged, his belly jiggling over his wide belt, which is studded with silver buttons.
I want to fly down the mountain and take the gun away. If they give me any trouble, I will shoot one in the kneecap and the other in his big, fat belly. Isn’t that what a valiente – a courageous man – would do? Take any risk, fight any foe, protect the weak, punish the wicked. But I am a boy. And they are grown men with guns.
“You with that coyote calls himself ‘El Leon?’” Calvin demands.
The girl’s head bobs up and down.
“El Leon’s a narcotraficante. You carrying his cocaina instead of a kid? You a mule?”
“No! Mi bebé!”
“C’mon. He always uses kids and women to carry his drugs.”
“Not me. ¡Te lo juro por Dios!”
Calvin slips the lariat off the girl, then yanks up her blouse.
Even from this distance, I can see her bulging stomach, creamy white in the moonlight.
“She ain’t lying,” he says to Woody, patting the girl’s belly. “Maybe we should deliver the baby right now. Save the county some money.”
The girl screams.
“You got a knife, Woody?”
“You know I do. Bowie knife.”
I must do something, but what? My arms feel like they’re dipped in boiling water. I try to get a better grip on the vine, but it tears from the dry earth. I dig my sneakers into the slope.
Calvin says, “Who’s gonna operate?”
“You do it, Woody. I can’t stand the sight of blood.”
The girl chants in Spanish. Asks God to take her own life but save her baby.
I do not expect God to answer her prayers. He did not answer mine when my mother was sick. It is up to me.
Can a valiente be afraid?
I tell myself yes. If he acts with courage, desp
ite the fear.
I grip the vine with my left hand, pick up a rock with my right. Round and jagged, the size of a baseball. I throw the rock at Woody, the gabacho still on his horse. It sails past the man’s head, clunks into the dry wash.
“What the hell!” Woody turns in the saddle, faces the slope, revolver in hand.
“Up here, pendejos!” I yell.
“It’s a kid,” Calvin says, pointing. “Right there, Woody.”
“C’mon down here, you little jumping bean,” Woody orders.
“Come and get me, culero!” I throw another rock, adjusting for the downward arc. Woody never sees it coming out of the darkness, and it plunks his shoulder. He yelps and his horse does a little dance under him. He turns the revolver toward the slope and fires. A bullet pings off a boulder. Not even close. I think maybe he is not such a good shot.
“I work for El Leon!” I yell, waving my backpack in the air. As if I’m carrying cocaine and not just a pair of jeans, two t-shirts, and a first baseman’s mitt.
“Little greaser’s the mule!” Calvin sounds as if he’s just made a great discovery. Now, I think maybe the men are not too smart, either.
“I may be a mule, but you’re nothing but chicken-hearted banditos!”
I start up the slope again, clawing at rocks to make my way.
“Stop, you little punk!”
I keep going, hoping they will try to follow.
Another gunshot ricochets off a boulder far over my head.
“C’mon down here, you little peckerwood!” Woody shouts. “Give us the coke and we’ll let you go.”
I reach the top of the slope and look down toward the two vigilantes. “So long, pendejos!”
“Go around that way, Cal,” Woody orders, tugging the reins and pointing into the darkness. “We’ll meet up on the far side.”
The vigilantes turn their horses and take off in opposite directions. They will try to cut me off on the other side of the hill. And they may succeed. But at least, they have left the girl alone. I glance one last time down the slope. The girl waves and says something to me I cannot hear, but in my head, I think she is chanting a blessing for me. I wave back and scramble on hands and knees over the top of the hill.
Intrigue (Stories of Suspense) Page 12
