World's Scariest Places: Volume Two

by Bates, Jeremy

  I closed the Porsche’s trunk with a heavy thud, slung my daypack over my shoulder, and went to the docks.

  5

  The boardwalk along the canal was filled with people and a general air of festivity. Gondola-type barges called trajineras lined the bank for as far as I could see. Most were the size of a large van, featuring a roof for shade, open-aired windows, and tables and chairs for picnicking. They were painted a spectrum of colors, ornately decorated, and for some reason bore female names.

  I scanned the crowd for Pita—I had little trouble seeing over all the dark-haired heads—but I didn’t spot her anywhere. I wasn’t too concerned. I had my cell phone. If I didn’t bump into her sooner or later, I could call her, or she could call me.

  I started along the boardwalk. Merchants called to me from their market stalls, hawking wares that ranged from handicrafts and T-shirts to embroidered clothing, linens, sandals, and other souvenirs.

  A walking vendor fell into step beside me. He was short and wore white pants and a white shirt over his padded frame. Smiling, he asked what I was looking for.

  “My friends,” I said.

  “You want watch? Rolex? You want Rolex?”

  “No, thanks.”

  “What you want? Marijuana? Pills? I get you anything.”

  I shook my head, pulling away from him.

  “Hey, man!” he called after me. “Girls? You want girls? I give you my sister! Cheap!”

  Another fifty yards on I came to two old women selling banana-leaf tamales. I realized I hadn’t eaten anything all morning, and I bought two, one stuffed with chicken and salsa, the other with refried beans.

  I found a bench to sit on and dug into the tamales. Two of the best things about living in Mexico, I believed, were the weather and the food. It was pretty much spring-like year round with zero humidity, and the greasy street meat was made with crack or something it was so addictive.

  I gave the last bite of my second tamale to a flea-riddled mutt that had been eyeing it hungrily, and I was thinking about getting a third when the vendor who tried to sell me his sister spotted me and came over.

  “My man!” he said, sitting next to me. “How’s the tamale? Good, yes? You like Mexican food?”

  “I’m not a tourist,” I told him. “I live here.”

  “You live here? Where?”

  I wasn’t going to tell him my neighborhood, as it was one of the pricier ones in Mexico City, so I simply told him the name of the general borough.

  “So what you do?” he asked.

  “Listen, I don’t want to buy anything.”

  He smiled. “No problem. No problem. But where’re your friends? Maybe they want a watch? I have Cartier too. Anything they want.”

  I stood and continued along the boardwalk again. The tout caught up to me.

  “So you and your friends going down the canals, huh?” he said. “You need a boat? I get you good price.”

  “My friend already organized one.”

  “Your friend, huh?” I felt him looking at me like he didn’t believe me, or like I was brushing him off, which I was.

  “Yeah, my friend. He’s filming that island with the dolls. He’s organized everything. The boat. The tickets. We don’t need anything.”

  “You go Isla de las Muñecas?” he said.

  I realized I’d said too much, and I was planning to ignore the tout, keep walking, but the expression on his face caused me stop. I couldn’t tell if it was fear or anger.

  “What?” I asked.

  “You go Isla de las Muñecas?” he repeated.

  “No,” I said. “We’re not going to it. We’re going around it.” I made a curlicue gesture with my finger. “Take some pictures, come back. Just tourists, okay?” I started away, but his hand seized my wrist tightly.

  “You don’t go there.”

  “Let go of me.”

  Passersby were looking curiously at us, and I was starting to get angry myself. I tried pulling my arm free from his grip. He wouldn’t let go.

  “Why you film there?”

  “Let go of me.”

  “Why you film there?”

  “Last warning.”

  “You go,” he said, lowering his voice to a threatening whisper, “you die.”

  I stared at the guy, wondering if maybe he was crazy. Perspiration had popped out on his forehead. The cheerfulness was gone from his face, replaced with tension. He black eyes held mine.

  My cell phone rang, breaking the terse moment. I yanked my arm free and took the phone from my pocket.

  “Yeah?” I said, moving again, blending into the flow of traffic on the boardwalk.

  “Where are you?” It was Pita.

  “I just got something to eat.”

  “Everyone’s waiting for you.”

  “Everyone’s here? Where? I didn’t know where you went.”

  “About four hundred meters east of where we parked. You’ll see a restaurant with a green awning. The trajinera is out front.”

  “I’ll be there soon.”

  We hung up.

  Stuffing the phone back in my pocket, I glanced over my shoulder, expecting to see the nut job staring after me.

  He was gone.

  1950

  1

  María Diaz was born premature at thirty-two weeks via an emergency caesarian section. She weighed three pounds thirteen ounces. She passed all the typical tests and was deemed a perfectly healthy baby. When she was one week old, however, her heartrate skyrocketed. Her parents rushed her back to the hospital, where she suffered twenty-two seizures over the next twelve hours. As epilepsy was not well understood then, her pediatrician assumed hemorrhaging in the brain and confidently told her parents she wouldn’t survive the night.

  María was now four years old. She knew nothing of what happened during that eventful first week of life, of course. Like most four year olds, her knowledge was largely restricted to her immediate environment, which included her house and the street out front of it.

  Currently María stood before a shelf in the house’s playroom, deciding which dolls would participate in her morning tea party. Her first choice was Angela, who was dressed in a lacy blue dress and bonnet. She was a Rock-a-bye Baby, which meant at nighty-night time you had to rock her until her eyes closed and she fell asleep. María carried her carefully to the small table and set her in a chair. She flopped forward, her heavy rubber head clonking the tabletop. “No more sleeping,” María told her sternly and sat her upright. She waited to make sure Angela wouldn’t move on her own again. Satisfied, she returned to the shelf. Eight dolls stared back at her, but there were only two available seats at the table. After some contemplation, María decided on Miss Magic Lips. She was wearing her pink dress with glitter-net trim, and she was smiling, showing her three front teeth, which meant she was happy. When she was unhappy she pressed her lips together and cried.

  Not wanting to make a third trip to the table, María also grabbed Teddy, who wore nothing but an apricot-colored sweater. He was a bear and not a doll, but he was a friendly bear and got along with everyone.

  At the table she sat Miss Magic Lips to the left of Angela, and Teddy to her right. They were better behaved than Angela, and neither of them tried to go to sleep. Pleased, María went to the chest in the corner and mussed through the toys for the necessary saucers, tea-cups, and kettle. She set the table, then said, “Thank you everyone for coming to my tea party. Who wants some tea?”

  “I do!” Angela said, though it was really María speaking in a higher pitched voice.

  “Here you go, Angela,” María said, reverting to her normal hostess tone. She poured imaginary tea into her cup. “Who else?” she asked.

  “Me!” Miss Magic Lips said.

  “You’re happy today, Miss Magic Lips,” María observed, pouring tea into her cup.

  “I want a cupcake,” Angela said.

  “I don’t have any cupcakes.”

  “Can you bake some?”

  Marí
a looked at the pink stove by the wall and said, “Well, maybe. But Teddy still needs his tea. Right, Teddy?”

  “Yes, please.”

  She filled his cup.

  “Can I have honey with it?” he asked.

  “I only have sugar. Is that okay?”

  “Yes, please.”

  She picked up an imaginary cube of sugar and dropped it in his cup.

  “I want a cupcake!” Angela said.

  María sighed and went to the oven. She turned some knobs and said, “Okay, they’re baking.”

  Back at the table, she took her seat opposite Angela, poured herself a cup of tea, then raised it to her lips. “Oohh. It’s very hot! Be careful every—”

  She never finished the sentence.

  2

  María’s mother knelt before her, a worried expression on her face. María blinked, slowly, torpidly, like a housecat after it had been fed. When did her mother arrive? Was she here for the tea party too? She was speaking to her. “Answer me, María,” she said. “Are you okay? Can you hear me?”

  “I’m having a tea party, Mom,” she said.

  “I see that, sweetheart. But just now, what were you thinking?”

  María frowned. “That the tea was hot.”

  “That’s all?”

  She nodded. “Why?”

  “You didn’t answer me when I came in the room. You were staring off into space.”

  “I was thinking the tea was hot.”

  “That’s all?”

  “That’s all.”

  Her mother seemed relieved and hugged her.

  “Are you here for the tea party?” María asked into her shoulder.

  Her mother released her. “No, honey. It’s lunchtime. I made you tortillas.”

  “I love tortillas.”

  “Then let’s go eat.”

  “What about my tea party?”

  “You can finish it later. Your dolls won’t mind, will they?”

  “Angela might. She doesn’t like waiting.”

  “That’s part of learning how to become a little lady. Sometimes you have to be patient.”

  “Angela,” María told her, “you have to be patient.”

  Angela stared back at her.

  “Be good while I’m gone,” she added. Then she followed her mother from the playroom to the kitchen for lunch.

  Jack

  1

  I saw Pepper first, then Elizaveta. They were standing next to a tree on the bank of the canal.

  “Jack!” Pepper said, opening his arms wide. “Bienvenidos Xochimilco!”

  He was smiling broadly at me, and I couldn’t help smiling back. He was one of the merriest people I knew with a cherub face and sparkling eyes to match his go-happy personality. He was also one the most fashionable people I knew. Today’s statement was a banana-yellow Oxford shirt open at the throat, a purple blazer draped over the shoulders, a polka dotted handkerchief poking from the blazer pocket, fitted purple slacks creased and rolled up at the cuffs, and a white belt and matching loafers, sans socks.

  We embraced, patting each other on the back.

  Pepper always liked people commenting on his outfits, so when I stepped away I said, “I like the jacket, just on your shoulders like that. Very Ralph Lauren.”

  “Jack,” he said, clearly thrilled with the compliment, “the chicest way to wear a coat is not to, don’t you know that?”

  “Hi, Eliza,” I said, pecking her on the cheek. She smelled of flowers and still wore the sunhat and oversized sunglasses. Combine those with her pink top, white shorts, bangles, wedge heels, and leather shoulder bag, and she and Pepper could have just come straight from lunch at the St. Regis.

  Elizaveta slapped me lightly on the chest, then waggled her index finger. “You are crazy,” she said in her Russian accent, which was slightly masculine, broad and bold. She dropped the cigarette she was smoking and toed it out. “Do you know that? Very crazy.”

  “So I’ve been told already.”

  “You want to kill us?”

  She was trying to be mad at me but failing. She clamped her lips against a silky smile.

  “Jesus challenged me,” I said. “Did you get mad at him too?”

  “Very mad. I think he’s crazy too.” Very med. I zink ees crazy too.

  “Where is he, by the way? And Pita?”

  “They went to restroom.” Elizaveta frowned in concern at the bandage on my forehead. She took off her sunglasses to see it better. She had emerald-green eyes, aristocratic features with prominent cheekbones, thin lips, and long dark hair. While she was likely white as a snowflake when she’d lived in Saint Petersburg—or “Sankt Peterburg,” as she would pronounce it—her skin was now brown from the tropical sun.

  She’d been in Mexico for four years or so. She worked as a governess for a wealthy Russian family, homeschooling their two daughters. Her employer, a consultant for a Mexican state-owned oil company, ran in the same circles as Jesus, who she met at a neighborhood picnic. Jesus spent several weeks wooing her before they started dating roughly one year ago.

  Sometimes I thought Elizaveta and I would have made a good couple had I not been engaged to Pita, and she not seeing Jesus. She was smart, fun, cheeky—my type, I suppose. I felt guilty when I caught myself contemplating the two of us together, but they were thoughts, that was all, I couldn’t control them. I had never cheated on Pita, and I never would.

  “Is your head okay?” Elizaveta asked me, frowning at the bandage on my forehead.

  I lifted my baseball cap and ran a hand through my hair. “I’m fine,” I told her.

  “What happened?” Pepper asked.

  “He tried jumping from balcony to swimming pool last night and fell,” Elizaveta said. “See, he is crazy.”

  “I agree with Eliza,” Pepper said. “Anyone who chooses to drive a car around a track filled with other cars at two hundred miles an hour has to be crazy.”

  I switched the topic and said, “So this place is pretty spectacular. I had no idea it would be so busy.”

  “Weekdays aren’t,” Pepper said. “But weekends, yes, especially Sunday.”

  “So which one is our boat?”

  We turned to face the canal, the gondolas lining the bank. With their garish colors and kitsch decorations, they were the amphibious equivalent to the Filipino Jeepney. Pepper pointed to the one directly before us. “Lupita” was painted on the back arch.

  “What’s up with the female names?” I asked.

  “Some refer to someone special,” Pepper said. “Maybe a wife or a daughter. But some, I think, are just the name of the boat.”

  “I never knew there was anywhere so green in Mexico City.”

  “We call Xochimilco the lungs of the city. Xochimilco means ‘flower fields.’ Wait until you see some of the chinampas. They are beautiful.”

  I frowned. “Chin what?”

  “The island gardens that separate the canals. The Aztecs made them.”

  “To grow flowers?”

  “And other crops. There used to be many more chinampas, but after the Spanish invasion, and the lakes dried up, these canals are all that remain.”

  I looked at Pepper skeptically. “Lakes?”

  “Oh my, Jack,” he said. “Didn’t you know Mexico City was once surrounded by five lakes?”

  “I had no idea.”

  “You Americans,” Elizaveta said.

  “You knew?” I asked her.

  “Of course. I am Russian, and Russians are not ignorant Americans. I learn about the country where I choose to live.”

  I rolled my eyes. “So where did the lakes go?” I asked Pepper, still not sure he wasn’t having me on. “How did they just dry up—?”

  “There he is!” a voice called from behind us, cutting off my question. “Mr. Days of Thunder himself!”

  I turned to find Jesus and Pita approaching—along with Jesus’s new best friend, Nitro.

  2

  To say Nitro and I didn’t get along was a gross unde
rstatement. The animosity between us started because of a screen door. One of Pita’s friends threw a party a couple of months back, and as expected at any decent party, there had been a copious amount of boozing going on.

  Around 2 a.m., after most guests had left, roughly ten of us remained behind. Pita’s friend was renting the penthouse unit in some old Art Deco building. We’d moved to the patio to take in the city views. At one point I went inside to the kitchen to get another beer, and when I returned to the patio I walked straight into the screen door, knocking it off its track. I picked it up and set it aside, given I wasn’t in any condition to figure out how to replace a screen door. No harm done, I thought. But Nitro seemed to take the whole thing personally. He started railing on about me in Spanish. I didn’t know what he was saying, but it was clear he was insulted. I asked him what his problem was. He told me to fix the door. I told him to mind his own business. He got up in my face, reeking of testosterone, so I clocked him. He came back at me like a loosed pit bull. We pin-balled around the patio, toppling plants, smashing bottles and glasses, breaking a glass coffee table—in other words, causing much more damage than a dislodged screen door.

  When people pulled us apart, Nitro had a busted lip, and I had a black eye. Pita and I took a taxi home, and I figured it was the last I’d see of the guy. But the fight seemed to have endeared him to Jesus, because Jesus began inviting him everywhere after that. He even showed up to Pita’s birthday party in July. I did my best to ignore him when we crossed paths, but he was as adept as Jesus at pushing my buttons, and we’ve come close to blows on a few more occasions since.

  Looking at Jesus and Nitro now, you’d think they were complete opposites. Jesus was his typical preppy self with a tweed jacket over a white button-down shirt, khaki chinos, and oxblood penny loafers. Nitro, on the other hand, was dressed like me in a tank top and shorts and flip-flops—the difference between us being his arms were brocaded with ink and his hair was tied back in a ponytail.