by Yamaya Cruz
I wanted to argue with him and convince him to stay with me because I was scared, but I knew that he would get mad. I swallowed back a knot of fear and looked around the room. It was much prettier in the dark. I peered off in the kitchen. Old dishes were stacked and caked with grime. The tile on the floor that was once white was now pissy yellow with a pallet of food stains. Roaches, crawled around gallantly, and rats left their droppings wherever they chose.
“Hey, keep the fire lit.” He handed me a pack of matches. “And keep the food close to the fire so they don’t come near it,” he said, handing me a plastic bag.
I knew what he meant when he said they. I shivered from disgust. I looked outside and saw large cotton balls of snow blowing in the wind. They smacked into the window seal and dripped down the paneling. Shit, could this day really get any worse? Ali came back in, shivering while holding the dwindling flame.
“I don’t think that we will be able to go up any further. It just ain’t safe. I checked some of the rooms and I was able to find these,” he said, handing me some wool blankets.
“We are going to have to sleep in shifts, so one person can man the fire,” he said. I wrapped the blanket around me and looked outside again.
“It looks like we’re stuck here until morning,” he said.
“Are we the only ones here?” I asked. Ali took a fresh roll of newspaper and lit it again. He walked into the kitchen and rummaged through the drawers and shelves. He came out holding an old rusty knife.
“Just in case,” he said. He then walked over and made a bed by spreading newspaper on the ground.
“Am I going first?” I asked.
Ali looked up at me. “What to sleep?”
“No. Am I keeping watch first?” I said.
“No, this bed is for you, you’re going to sleep first,” he said.
“But what if you can’t wake me up again?” I said. “Well, then I just won’t be able to wake you up.” “Ali!” I whined.
“Shit. Just chill and get under the fucking covers so you can get warm. I got this,” he said.
I hesitated and then crawled into my makeshift bed. I rolled onto my side in the fetal position, tucking my hands between my legs. My teeth chattered and my body trembled. Man it was cold. I looked over at Ali, staring at his profile in the dim light. He didn’t seem worried, but I knew that he was.
“Good night, Ali,” I said while snuggling in the covers. He didn’t answer me.
~ ~ ~
Chapter Eight
I had a hard time sleeping. I kept tossing and turning; my body ached from lying on a hard cold floor. Then, I felt something thick and moist. I shot up. It was pitch black. Frantically, I felt all around me and cringed as I cupped a handful of mud. It felt like cake batter as it ran through my fingers and down my wrist. I couldn’t breathe. Fear moved in like a tidal wave, seeping into my lungs, nostrils and mouth.
I saw a light. It was a lantern. The lantern flung from side to side, revealing the dark contour of a woman. There was another light. There was someone who was trailing behind her. The lanterns danced in the night like two fireflies. Suddenly, they stopped almost twenty feet next to me. I wanted to call out for help, but something told me not to. The lanterns glided through the air. Then there was a sudden spark that illuminated two solemn faces that I instantly recognized. Oh my God! It was mommy and abuela! My heart began to pound. There was something inside of me telling me, no urging me to run away, but I seemed to be glued to the ground.
They ran towards me. There was something, chasing them! My mom got about four feet away from me before she stumbled. The mud splattered around her like an ash cloud. She was holding the lantern; the fire enlightened her face, unveiling the fear in her eyes. Her face was caked with grime and her mouth looked twisted and grotesque.
“Nelly, you got to run!” My survival instincts took over. With my spine erected and my legs in tow, I sprang up and ran as fast as I could. I saw my abuela’s heavy frame running ahead of me. I looked back and noticed that my mom was nowhere in sight.
“Momma,” I screamed. My voice echoed through the night. I watched in horror as my abuela’s black silhouette moved farther and farther away from me. I decided to turn around. I had to go back and save my momma. It was so dark. I ran, and I could not even see my feet moving, all I could feel was my mud-soaked shoes plunging into the earth’s soil. My body was leaner, and a lot faster than my momma’s. I stopped, my heart was pounding and I kneeled down, resting my hands on my knees while I struggled to catch my breath.
“Momma,” I screamed.
“Momma, where are you?” I whimpered.
It was then that I got a brief reminder of why I was running. It took me a while to
process what was happening because my sight and my mind were quarrelling in disagreement. I shook my head, wanting to tell myself that it was not real, but it was. Shit! It was so fucking real. It was the shadows, hundreds of them, and they were marching forward like angry soldiers on the brink of war. I tripped as I tried to run away. I was sacked, and then wrestled to the ground by a mysterious cloth covered being. It pinned my arms to the ground and then tugged and rolled me around like I was on fire. Then I felt hands, dozens of hands. They were turning me, rolling me around in the sludge.
I felt the imprint of one of their bare feet on my back as it forcefully shoved me forward. I rolled off a sharp edge. My arms and legs swung wildly. My heart stopped beating, and my lungs had stopped breathing. I was pretty sure that this was my body’s way of preparing itself for death. After what felt like a one hundred foot drop, my body slammed against a cold dark pavement. My rib caged ached. My body remembered to breathe, and I began to whiz like an asthma patient with no inhaler. I grimaced as I rolled over on my back. My mouth was wide open and my eyes soon followed when I looked up to see a fountain of dirt being shoveled into the pit. The soil smothered my face like a wool blanket. Its grains swelled into my mouth. I stuck out my tongue and used my upper lip and front teeth to sweep away the dust. I moved my arms to protect my face right before another patch of dirt was dumped on me.
“Leave me alone!” I screamed. The cloth-covered beings were now walking around my gravesite. They moved in formation, singing their own despondent cadences. Gigantic spoonfuls of soil were pouring down, covering my feet, and the lower half of my legs. The soil covered my whole body. It began to harden like concrete. I tried to turn around and shift to my other side, but I couldn’t. It was like I was paralyzed. I closed my eyes again, but I couldn’t tell if I was awake or sleep. I heard a chorus of voices in the distance.
“We are the shadows. The shadows. The shadows. The shadows.” We are the buried souls that live through you. Our pain is your pain.”
I screamed. There was something crawling on me. I felt around in the darkness and felt a long musky tail. I screamed again as I flung the rat off me. Oh my god. I jolted up into a standing position, flinging the wool blanket off me and using it as a whip to fend off the rat. It scurried away, realizing that it was no match for me. I took a few deep breaths, trying to process everything. I squinted like a submarine periscope and scanned the room. It was drafty, with icy cold winds. The fire had dwindled down to just a heap of black ash on the floor. The plastic bags were gone and so was Ali.
Oh my goodness. Panic struck me. Where could he have gone?
He wouldn’t have left me.
“Ali!” I cried.
But he was nowhere in sight or earshot. I was scared. I had woken up from one nightmare and had landed into another. Shit!
Living just to survive was just too damn difficult. I didn’t want this. I just wanted to be warm and clean and safe, and maybe part of a family that gave a damn. I was breaking down and I wasn’t sure how long I was going to last.
“Ali!” I screamed out again in sheer desperation.
I listened intently. Someone was coming. I looked behind me and caught a glimpse of a man in the doorway. The person was way too big to be Ali. Hurriedly, I ran in
to the bathroom and shut the door. I could hear the pitter patter of footsteps in the hall. I wasn’t cold anymore. My body was overheated from fright and my clothes were wet from sweat. I tried to control my breathing, and I pressed down hard on my nose and mouth.
Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang.
The person was knocking hard on the door like the police before a shakedown. I swallowed hard, and I could feel my heart running faster than a jackrabbit. I could only imagine who was behind that door, a psycho with an electric chain saw, who would rip my face off and wear it as his own. That would be okay, a little voice in my head said. There would be one less nigger in the world to worry about. I took a couple of steps back, lost my footing, and squealed as my behind sunk deeply into a seat less toilet bowl. I grimaced as I felt the water seep into my pants and cried like a baby wearing a shitstained diaper.
“Open up. I know you’re in there. Open up right now.” The voice commanded.
I didn’t answer. Instead, I shook my head from side to side, trying to convince myself that this wasn’t real. That none of this is real.
“Open up now. Or I’m going to break this fucking door down,” the voice continued. I couldn’t take it anymore; I broke down swinging my head from side to side. A part of me prayed that it would be over quick. Please dear God, don’t let him hack me up into little pieces and feed me to his dog. Oh God, please don’t let that happen. What are you afraid of? You don’t have anything to live for. Nobody wants you and the last person in the world that you have, left you for dead. Just let him kill you and be done with it. It would be one less nigger in the world to worry about.
I began to hyperventilate. Oh goodness yes, thank you God. Please let me die this way, without having to drown, be strangled or burned to death. I closed my eyes and continued to pray. I began to feel dizzy.
“Hey! Pitchy, stop fucking around,” Ali said from behind the door.
I paused. I couldn’t believe it. It was Ali, he was here and he hadn’t left me. I struggled to slow down my breath, and I slowly got off the toilet and peeled the door open. I saw a chubby boy in an oversized Nick’s jacket with saggy, baggy jeans. Then I saw Ali. He was looking at me in the most peculiar way. His face changed when he realized that I was scared.
“Hey, I just left to get some more stuff. I couldn’t wake you up, so I left without you.”
I couldn’t speak. I stood there motionless and wide-eyed like I was catatonic.
“I was trying to get back before you woke up,” he said.
I looked over at the boy who was named Pitchy. He waved an oversize hand in front of his nose.
“Ah man. Did you shit your pants?” he said.
I looked over at Ali, my eyes rolled in the back of my head and I hit the floor, hard.
~ ~ ~
Chapter Nine
The boys had gotten a lot of stuff. In just a few short hours, they had transformed a shit hole of an apartment into a ghetto suite. We were no longer freezing our asses off, thanks to a kerosene heater that was smack dab in the middle of the room. They had gotten a chewed up and smelly recliner from the trash dump, along with a crippled center table. They placed torn blankets over the windows, and there were thousands of candles of assorted colors and sizes lit. There were four boys in all; they were gathered around the heater, like it was a campfire, sitting in lawn chairs.
I could smell the greasy aroma of fast food. I eyed one of the boys as he chopped away on a fried chicken leg. My eyes opened wide, and my mouth began to water as I watched him lick the greasy residue off his fingers. Ali handed me a biscuit and two wings.
“Hey go wash up and then eat this. I got you another pair of pants and shirt.” “Wash up? With what water?” I asked.
Ali rolled his eyes and shoved a bar of soap into my hand. “The water that’s boiling
on the heater,” he said. We were all going to take turns washing up. Since I was the only girl, the boys elected that I go first. However, I don’t think that the boys were being chivalrous. I think it was because I smelled like shit. I took the pot into the bathroom and started to undress. The tiles were caked with soap scum and lined with slimy black grit. There was a huge ring around the tub that was missing a shower curtain. I decided not to use the tub. After all, I was trying to get clean. I went to shut the door when I heard the boys talking.
“Man, that was some crazy shit.”
“Yeah. Brother we did good tonight. We got enough to last us for a while.” “I don’t know man, I’m getting kinda tired of this nickel and dime shit. When are we
going to get some real money?”
“When you’re old enough to get a job bitch.” They all laughed. “Naw, I’m serious, I
hear that Nico got some shit going down.” “Nico, I ain’t fucking with that crazy bastard.” “Man. Nico ain’t crazy. He just acts that way to get respect, so people don’t mess
with him.”
“My momma used to tell me stories about that motherfucker.
He’s beyond crazy. He’s psycho.”
“Yeah, that bastard got more bodies on him than a cemetery. You fucking with him,
you know you got to come correct.”
“I don’t think that we should mess with him,” Ali said.
“Come on now brother, don’t tell me you scared. You’re my right hand man.” “Yeah, I am not up for being hacked up and cut up and shit,” Ali said. “ Man. Nico never cut up anybody. People just like to talk shit.”
“Just look at all the brothers that roll with Nico. They got girls, fucking gold chains,
clothes out of the ass. Now that’s the way to live, brother.
“Ohwee, and then there’s Blazen with her fine self.”
“Yes, that bitch is fine. She got an ass like this, titties like this, and I hear she’s real
generous with the fellows.” “Ali, Nico can hook you up with that brother.” There was
silence again.
“Alright, we’ll do some work for him, but if we end up drinking some fucking
poison cool-aid. I’m coming after your ass.”
They all laughed.
“Ali, I don’t know why you’re hesitating. You know Nico’s your daddy.” They boys
roared from laughter, but I got the weird feeling that Ali didn’t think that it was funny. I
closed the door. I didn’t want to hear anymore. Suddenly, I was sick to my stomach. I
washed up quickly, and then walked into the living room and forced the food into my
mouth. It felt like sandpaper going down my throat and into my stomach. For a couple of days, the boys talked about Nico. I was beginning to wonder if he
actually existed. It seemed that he was more like a mythical figure, like Bigfoot, or the
Jersey Devil. He was someone that no one had physically seen, but there were all kinds of
folktales and myths about him.
Nico had been in the United States for a little over thirty years and had very little to
be proud of. He had a police record that was ten inches thick, and he was wanted in four
Northeastern States and three third world countries. His career as a fugitive and as a petty
thief reached its height when he premiered in one of America’s most watched television
shows, Cops. Although Nico polluted his body with drugs and alcohol, he was inherently
fit. He could reach speeds of pivotal heights, especially when he was being chased by
patrol cars, and the barks of a K9 hound dog.
Nico’s words rolled out like a well-oiled machine when he was drunk. The infusion
of alcoholic beverages particularly top shelf vodka and dark colored rum would
exacerbate his temper, and much like a dragon, he would spit out curse words and insults
like a combustion of deadly flames. Nico would make his entrance into a bar quiet as a
mouse and exit loud and bustling like a wild bear. He was known to participate in many
&nb
sp; nightly brawls, and he was always the recipient of a royal ass whipping. In short, the man
was a lunatic and a loser.
Yet, he somehow managed to command respect. Nico had mastered the crime game,
and never spent a single day in a jail. There were rumors of his enemies being shot to
death, or dying from a mysterious disease. It was only the people who didn’t know about
Nico who dared to cross him, and they were the ones who were sorry in the end. Ali
seemed to run errands for him, but he never told me exactly what he did. I wanted to ask
him about Nico and if he was our father, but I knew that the topic was off limits. I didn’t
think that I was ever going to meet the man, until Ali told me that we were going to go
and stay with him for a while.
After hearing all the stories about him, I was a little scared. But nothing was scarier
than being a squatter, living in an apartment building, under a roof that was due to
collapse any day. I just wanted to be able to flip a switch and have the lights come on,
and turn a spigot and have water come out. One of Nico’s men came to pick us up. We all
gathered into the car and drove to Nico’s house. He had a driveway that was at least two
miles long, and a backyard that was as big as a football stadium. We all rushed out of the
car. It was spring and the air was warm with a slight breeze. We heard the music. “Papi Chulo, I want me a Papi Chulo.”
I looked around, trying to trace where the music was coming from, when I spotted an
old boom box that was wedged into a window. The music continued.
“I want me a Papi Chuuuulo, who will do, whatever I say.”
“I need me a Papi Chuuuulo, who can sex me up, and never sway.”
“I need me a Papi chuuuulo, who is lovesick, and will always stay.” People were running in and out of the house. There was a white screen door with a
rip mosquito net that flapped in the wind. Women of all shapes and sizes carried huge