Last Summer of the Death Warriors

by Francesco X Stork

  Men are such assholes, he thought, even though he was a man himself.

  “You did that on purpose,” Marisol said to him when they were a block from Casa Esperanza. He had not put up the new umbrella yet. He was going to take the rickshaw a couple of blocks first so that Kelly could see it was the same old rickshaw she had been riding in all along.

  Pancho adjusted the right-hand mirror on his handlebars so he could see Marisol’s face. “Did what?” He knew that if he could see her, then she could see him.

  “You asked him to pick up Kelly and bring her to you just so he would look bad in front of Laurie.”

  “I wish I was that smart,” he said, laughing. He saw her looking at him in the mirror as if trying to gauge how smart he really was, and added, a mocking tone in his voice, “I’m no genius like Sal back there.”

  “That guy was a pendejo,” she said.

  He agreed with her, but for some reason felt like contradicting her. “He wasn’t a pendejo,” he said conclusively. “He was just a menso.”

  “Oh, yeah?” she said, picking up on his tone. “What’s the difference, according to you?”

  “A pendejo is a jerk on purpose. A menso can’t help himself.” He thought that was a very smart response under the circumstances.

  “And Sal simply couldn’t help being obnoxious?”

  “How was he obnoxious? Just because he nearly dropped Kelly on her head, that doesn’t mean he was obnoxious.”

  “That’s not why he was obnoxious and you know it.” She was getting irritated.

  He thought of Sal’s comments about Marisol. “He was just being a normal guy,” he said.

  “Just being a normal guy?” He saw her eyes in the mirror questioning him.

  He didn’t answer her, but instead, pulled the rickshaw to an empty parking space on the street and got off. He walked to the side and opened the umbrella slowly.

  “Balloon,” Kelly exclaimed, delighted.

  “Where?” Pancho looked up at the sky.

  “She thinks the umbrella looks like a hot air balloon,” Marisol explained.

  “Can we go to the fiesta?” Kelly asked.

  “What fiesta?” Pancho said.

  “Albuquerque has a hot air balloon fiesta every October. There’s hundreds of hot air balloons, all different colors and designs. It’s an amazing sight. You and D.Q. should come.”

  He climbed back on the bicycle seat and began to pedal. He didn’t want to talk about the future.

  They rode in an uneasy silence. Marisol seemed deep in thought. Pancho felt bad for teasing her about Sal, so he asked, “How did you get involved with children who have cancer?”

  She turned her face in the direction of his voice. “I have a cousin who’s a pediatric oncology nurse. I’ve always wanted to be like her.”

  “Why?”

  The question seemed to surprise her. “Why?”

  “Why do you want to be like her?”

  Marisol considered it for a few seconds. “Aurora, that’s my cousin’s name, she has this inner strength. It’s like nothing can shake her because she’s found out who she is and what she wants to do.”

  Pancho remembered a term his father liked to use. It was the highest praise he ever gave a boxer, for fighting with pride and dignity. “She has coraje,” he said.

  “Coraje,” she repeated. “That’s a good word. I haven’t heard that in a long time. I like it.”

  When they turned back toward Casa Esperanza, he heard her ask, “Do you have any plans for what you’ll do after you finish high school?”

  Here we go again with the future, he thought. “I liked working with my father in carpentry,” he said after a while. “It was fun.”

  “I saw the perico you did for D.Q. That’s amazing.”

  “I seen it too,” Kelly said. “Want me to tell you what colors he is?”

  “Sure.” Marisol hugged her tighter to her body.

  “He’s green all over, except for a little blue under his wings and some red on top of his nose, and his beak and claws are gold.”

  “What color are his eyes?” Marisol asked.

  Kelly stuck her index finger in her mouth. “I forgot.”

  “They’re purple,” Marisol said.

  “They’re not purple, they’re black,” Pancho stated.

  “Sorry,” Marisol said, “but you don’t know your colors. The parrot I’ve seen has purple eyes.”

  “Purple!” Kelly shouted and laughed.

  “I know. Whoever heard of a parrot with purple eyes?” Marisol joined in the laughter.

  “They are not purple!” Pancho turned around to look at them in pretend anger and almost crashed into an oncoming car.

  “Okay, okay,” Marisol said. “Just don’t kill us.”

  “Sorry, but the eyes are black.”

  The silence after that was comfortable, and Pancho did not expect anything more to be said. But about a block from Casa Esperanza, Marisol asked, “Do you really think that guy Sal was just being normal?”

  Pancho smiled when he thought that all along she had been thinking about his remark. He said without hesitation, “That guy was a number one pendejo.”

  He looked in the mirror and saw her smile back. They were in complete agreement.

  CHAPTER 22

  Two days later, Marisol, Josie, and Pancho waited in front of Casa Esperanza for D.Q. to get back from that morning’s treatment. As soon as he returned, they planned to set off for the zoo. But the moment D.Q. got out of the van, Pancho could tell that he wasn’t doing too well. His skin was pale yellow, the color of the liquid they were pumping into him, and his legs trembled when he walked.

  “I’m okay, I’m okay,” he told the group. “I just need to splash some water on my face and I’ll be all set.” Pancho knew that D.Q. had a couple of good hours before the nausea got really bad.

  After D.Q. came out of the house again, he and Josie settled into their wheelchairs. Marisol pushed Josie and Pancho pushed D.Q. slowly up Yale Street to University Avenue. Josie filled the silence with chatter about the animals she wanted to see. She hoped to be there when the seals got fed so she could see them clap and hear them honk. Every once in a while, Marisol would turn to check on D.Q. and D.Q. would assure her that he was perfectly fine. Then, as soon as she turned away, he would cover his mouth with his hand. I sure hope he doesn’t puke in front of her, Pancho said to himself.

  He tried not to look at Marisol walking in front of him, her black hair tied behind her back and swaying softly. So far, he was succeeding in keeping his distance from her. Whenever she approached him, he stiffened and put on a stern face. He even resisted smiling at the small jokes she made as they loaded and unloaded kids from the rickshaw. There was no single point in time when he had decided to keep his distance. He was just following an instinct he didn’t understand. Part of it was the ridiculous feeling that Marisol belonged to D.Q. She was like the only thing the kid had. He didn’t know why he should care, he just did. And part of it was a feeling like kindness or forgiveness that came over him whenever he was near her. He needed to keep that feeling away from him. It made him soft and he didn’t want to be soft.

  Still, his eyes were drawn to her. Her beauty was a puzzle he couldn’t figure out. Today she was wearing a white polo shirt and blue shorts. The hands that gripped the handles of the wheelchair were firm. She was tall for a girl; the top of her head reached his nose, and he was five foot ten the last time he got measured. He had not seen any boredom on her face. He remembered what D.Q. had said about her the first night at the hospital. She’s not someone you can be crass about. He wasn’t sure what “crass” meant, but he thought it meant something like “cheap,” and if it did, then D.Q. was right. There was nothing cheap about her.

  They reached the bus shelter on University Avenue. D.Q. and Josie got out of the wheelchairs, and Marisol and Pancho folded them. A woman holding a green pillow on her lap scooted along the bench, and D.Q. sat down. Josie went up to him and stood
by his side as if to give him strength. D.Q. whispered something in her ear and she giggled. He had purple circles under his eyes and an ugly cold sore on his bottom lip. Even though it was hot, he wore a blue Windbreaker with the collar turned up and a blue cap set as far down on his head as it would go. There was no way he should be going to the zoo now, Pancho knew. But it was impossible to keep him from coming either. The only glimmer of the old D.Q. that Pancho had seen in the last five days was when they made plans for the trip with Marisol.

  “Maybe this isn’t a good day for the zoo,” Marisol said to Pancho. They cast a sidelong glance at D.Q. Josie was demonstrating the flight of a butterfly with hiccups with her fingers.

  “He gets worse as the day goes on,” Pancho responded, not looking at her.

  “We won’t stay too long then.”

  “You shoulda just taken the girl.” He sounded irritated. The traffic on University Avenue was heavy, but there was no sign of a bus anywhere and the wheelchair did not want to stay folded.

  Marisol waited for a truck without a muffler to pass by before she spoke. “I know you’re not as big a grouch as you pretend to be, so just stop it.”

  Pancho managed to chuckle. No one had ever talked to him that way before. She was serious, but there was the beginning of a smile on her face. Pancho shrugged his shoulders. I don’t care what you think about me, is what he meant to communicate to her.

  “Here comes the bus!” Marisol suddenly exclaimed, and she went to grab Josie’s hand.

  They entered the bus through the back door. Marisol helped Josie climb the first step and then she followed with the wheelchair. Pancho tried to grab D.Q.’s arm to help, but D.Q. shook him off. He winked and smiled as he did so, letting Pancho know that there was nothing personal in the gesture. D.Q. climbed the steps slowly. Josie and Marisol had taken a seat near the back. As soon as Pancho and D.Q. were on the bus, Josie said, “Can I sit with Pancho?”

  “Are you sure? He’s in a real bad mood today,” Marisol said teasingly. Josie jumped out of the seat next to Marisol and went to a seat in the last row. She looked at Pancho and patted the seat next to her. D.Q. sat next to Marisol.

  “Excuse me, is someone gonna pay or what?” a woman’s voice shouted. It was the bus driver.

  Marisol reached into her pocket and took out a twenty-dollar bill. She offered the money to Pancho, who was still standing up. D.Q. pushed her hand down. “Pancho has money. He’ll pay. Right, Pancho?”

  “Yeah,” Pancho said. He went to the front and paid the bus driver.

  “Thank you, Pancho,” Marisol said to him as he walked by. D.Q. was holding Josie’s wheelchair. He handed it to Pancho. Pancho took the two wheelchairs and laid them on an empty seat. The only people on the bus were the four of them and the woman with the green pillow, who had also gotten on the bus.

  As soon as he sat down next to her, Josie began to talk. She knew all there was to know about the Rio Grande Zoo and she could not keep all of that information inside of her. She told Pancho about the enormous tongues of the giraffes. Then she caught her breath for a fraction of a second and asked him if he had ever ridden a camel.

  “Nope,” Pancho said distractedly. He wanted to hear what D.Q. was saying to Marisol. He heard the word “family” and saw Marisol lower her head, as if to consider D.Q.’s words carefully.

  “They have camel rides at the zoo. Can you get on with me?” Someone was punching his leg. “Pancho, will you get on the camel with me?”

  “No way.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t know how to drive one.” It was the first thing that came to him. He could not picture how one could sit on top of a camel with those humps in the way.

  “Someone leads the camel with a rope while you ride on top of it. Silly.”

  “Oh.”

  “Now will you ride one with me?”

  “No.”

  Marisol leaned into D.Q.’s shoulder and laughed. He was probably trying to impress her with how smart he was. Maybe he was telling her about that other dimension he was so familiar with.

  “Even if you fall into the pit where the tigers are, they won’t eat you because they get fed lots of meat every day. They’ll only eat you if they’re hungry. Still, I’m going to be afraid when I see them. What animal are you the scaredest of?”

  “What?”

  “I think snakes are the scariest because you can’t see them. If a lion tried to come into your room at night, you could hear him most probably, but a snake could slither into the room and then climb into your bed and you wouldn’t even know it.”

  Pancho was about to tell her that snakes also made noise if you knew how to listen for it when the bus stopped and the doors swished open. Three boys got on. They were Pancho’s age, but their baggy blue jeans and loose-fitting long-sleeve shirts made them look older. One of them wore a red bandanna around his head. He swaggered onto the bus like he was in charge. The last one had a cell phone he was holding close to his mouth and talking into like a walkie-talkie. Pancho noticed that they didn’t pay. The bus driver looked like she wanted to say something, but then changed her mind.

  The boy with the red bandanna scanned the bus. He bobbed his body up and down as he walked down the aisle. Pancho could see him focus on the folded wheelchair and then on Marisol. He walked slowly to the empty seat across the aisle from D.Q. and Marisol and lumbered into it. He slid to the edge and stretched his legs across the seat. The other two sat in front of him, each taking a full seat.

  The boy with the phone was yelling into it, and the voice coming from the phone was yelling back. Every other word in the conversation was a swear word of one sort or another. Josie covered her ears with her hands. Marisol and D.Q. stopped talking. The boy with the red bandanna kept his eyes fixed on D.Q. and Marisol. He licked his lips, and his eyeballs drifted from side to side as if he were falling asleep.

  D.Q. swung his legs out of his seat, leaned over as far as he could, and tapped the arm of the boy with the cell phone. Marisol tried to pull him back, but he just tapped the boy again. Pancho took his hands out of his pockets. He finally managed to catch the eyes of the boy with the bandanna and now they stared at each other.

  “Do you mind very much not talking on the cell phone?” D.Q. asked. “The volume and the language you are using are offensive.”

  The boy looked disgusted, as if D.Q.’s touch on his arm had infected him with some deadly disease. He kept that look for a few seconds and then he turned around and continued to talk. Marisol grabbed D.Q.’s arm and pulled him back into the seat. The boy with the red bandanna and Pancho were still in a contest to see who would look away first. Pancho could feel adrenaline warm his arms, and his heart began to pump at a faster rate. He smiled at the boy.

  D.Q. raised himself up and, grabbing on to the handles of the seats, shuffled a few steps until he stood next to the boy with the phone. “Please, there are children and women,” he said. He placed his right hand on the boy’s shoulder.

  The boy with the phone jerked his shoulder away from D.Q. “Don’t touch me,” he snarled. Josie buried her face in Pancho’s arm. Marisol scooted to the side of the seat where D.Q. had been. The boy with the bandanna slowly shifted his gaze from Pancho to Marisol. The bus stopped and the momentum threw D.Q. into the boy with the cell phone.

  “Watch it, asshole!” he shouted, pushing D.Q. away.

  “I don’t want any trouble here! I’ll call the cops right now!” the bus driver was shouting. She held a yellow cell phone of her own in her hand. “Do I need to call the cops?”

  “It’s inconsiderate to the other passengers,” D.Q. was telling the boy with the phone. The boy waved the phone in D.Q.’s face. From inside the phone, a crackling male voice called, “What’s goin’ down, dude?”

  “Okay, that’s it, I’m calling the cops,” the bus driver said.

  Marisol stood up and grabbed D.Q. by the arm. “That’s all right, we’re getting off real soon,” she said. The boy with the red bandan
na said something in Spanish to Marisol. It made the other two roar with laughter. “Pendejos!” Marisol said to the boys.

  “Ooooh!” they all moaned at once.

  Pancho studied D.Q.’s face. There was no fear there, he was sure of it. There was anger—well contained, but it was still anger. And there was frustration as well: Here was yet another situation he could do nothing about. Pancho felt a sudden pride and understanding for D.Q.; he had the spirit of a fighter even if he did not have the strength to go with it. He smiled as he saw D.Q. loosen himself from Marisol’s grip and reach for the cell phone. The boy stood up and kept the phone out of D.Q.’s grasp. It was a situation that could end very badly, Pancho knew, and yet it was still funny. Boys horsing around, having fun, that’s almost what it looked like.

  He heard Josie sobbing next to him just at the moment the boy with the red bandanna stood up. Marisol turned toward Josie. The boy with the cell phone grabbed D.Q.’s hat and flipped it to the front of the bus. It landed at the feet of the lady with the green pillow, who had a look of terror on her face. Pancho lifted Josie from her seat and put her in Marisol’s arms. Marisol pleaded silently with him not to do anything, and he nodded that he understood but it was out of his hands now. The boy with the cell phone puffed his chest and began to bump it against D.Q. He pushed the talking phone in and out of D.Q.’s face.

  There was nothing aggressive about Pancho’s movements. He acted as if he were amused by the goings-on and wanted to join in the fun. He simply stood behind the boy with the cell phone and when the phone came within his reach, he grabbed the boy’s wrist and took the phone out of his hand. Then in one continuous motion, he dropped it and stomped it with his right foot. There was a crack and the noise was over.

  Everyone in the bus was silent. Even Josie held in her sobs. They all looked at the mangled phone as if surprised that it could ever be quiet. Then there were a series of sounds all at once: swearing in Spanish, D.Q. calling out “Pancho!” as if to warn him. Then he felt a burning sensation in his ear and he turned to see the boy with the red bandanna clenching a fist. He heard the sound of sirens, but maybe the sound came from inside his head. He had time to swing and the boy with the red bandanna was within easy range, but the image of Marisol pleading silently kept his arms still. Then he felt the boy’s hand around his throat, the wetness of spit on his face, a thud in his groin, and a sinking feeling that rose up in his stomach as if he were on a roller coaster. He saw a flash of white light and then darkness.