by Sand, A. J.
“Where’s Miguel?” I ask her, looking around. “And what the hell happened?”
She shakes her head. “A guard shot someone.”
“What? Why?”
“I was looking for a sprinkler system, but then I remembered that these buildings aren’t connected to anything, and it sparked the thought that they shouldn’t be on the power grid, either, but they always have lights. It’s portable generators, Miguel told me. He said one time he was at a fight and the lights went out because it was low on fuel—I guess some cartel guy forgot to do it—and people got pissed that they couldn’t see the fight and weren’t willing to wait around. They got antsy, so the guards had to let them out. That’s when we got our idea. I made sure no one was looking and he climbed out a window and did something to the generator.
“When he climbed back in, people were pretty anxious and pissed like we assumed they would be. Miguel and I went to the door and someone was angrily yelling in a guard’s face, trying to get him to let us out. He wouldn’t at first. Another guard came and they spoke back and forth about what to do, and the second guy went outside to check on the generator. The guy from the crowd was still antagonizing the guard the whole time. When the other guard came back, they talked some more, but they opened the doors. On the way out, though, the angry idiot grabbed the muzzle of the guard’s gun, and the guard shot him. Then all hell broke loose.” She looks at me with guilt and tears in her eyes.
I squeeze her hand, and we both flinch when someone slams into the table. “Where the hell is Miguel?”
“I thought he was right behind us…” She pulls her cell phone out again. “Maybe he went outside. God, I hope he did. I’m going to text him. Hopefully, he’s somewhere he can answer.” She taps out a text and her phone beeps back within a few seconds. “Okay…he’s still in here. I’m going to tell him where we are. Do you think you can climb up and wave the cell in the air? You’d be above everyone else and maybe he’ll see.”
“Tell him I’ll do that,” I say.
“Uh…he’s in the cage,” she says in a confused whisper.
“What? Why the fuck is he still over there?”
“I don’t know but he just asked if I can see him…” she says anxiously as she inches forward. “Maybe if I get on the table…” There’s a split second when I notice where one of her hands is, how far out it is.
“Drew, no!” There’s nothing but a wave of feet in front of us, and her fingers are mashed under the frenzy. As she screams, I grab her wrist and yank it backward.
She hunches over, still screaming and trembling, with tears falling. “I think they’re broken,” she says, in shock. “They’re fucking broken.” I keep my reaction to myself as I stare down at her hand, but I’m horrified at the unnatural angles her fingers are in.
“I’m so sorry, Drew. Shit. Hold on. I’m going to get us out of here, baby.” We both glance down at her phone when it beeps with another message from Miguel:
You see me?
I type back I’ll try. There’s an ache in my stomach, like an instinct, that tells me something is very, very wrong with these messages. There’s a little tunnel of space on either side of the table, the short ends, because most people are starting to realize there’s an object in their path and are diverting to the left or right. So I carefully slide out from under the short side, gripping the legs to steady myself and hop up onto the surface to kneel. Drew manages to do the same thing, and I hoist her up, too. The table is secure but a few people are still inadvertently bumping into it as they run by, so we have to cling to the edges to stay up. It leaves Drew unstable, though, because she can only hold on with one hand.
I raise the cell phone and wave its flashlight function at the cage. Carlos is still inside, standing in a ray of moonlight that is shining into one corner. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.” He’s turning slowly like he’s looking for something. “Carlos is in there.” He stops when he sees the swinging light. He can’t make us out with this much darkness, but I can tell he knows who he’s looking at.
“What about Miguel?” Drew asks, panic pushing through the anguish in her voice.
“I don’t see him. But if Carlos comes, you run, Drew…”
“Without you?” She speaks with clenched teeth. “Jesse, you can’t take many more hits.”
That’s true, but I don’t respond; I just focus on Carlos. He hasn’t moved toward us, though. He’s just standing there, staring at us. Finally, he looks to something on his left, and I decide that Drew and I should duck into the crowd.
But she yells, “They have Miguel! They have him!” Two men bring him into the sliver of moonlight, right up to Carlos. Miguel looks like he’s taken far more punches than he can handle, too, and he’s not even trying to get away.
“He wants to trade me for Miguel,” I say. He’s determined to finish our fight, and I’ll go save my friend. No matter what. “I’m gonna…” I trail off when one of the men in the cage hands Carlos something from his pocket, and we watch in horror as he drives it against Miguel’s abdomen. Once. Twice. A third time. Then I stop counting. But he doesn’t stop.
With the same amount of maniacal fury, he stabs Miguel in the throat, grinning at him as he holds whatever he’s using in place. Miguel’s mouth is locked in a silent scream as he writhes in agony, fighting for what are probably the last moments of his life. Something inside my chest breaks down and dissolves along with any good that might have still been left in the world tonight. I want to look away, but I can’t. I won’t let him die alone. It’s my way of being there for him from where I am. I swear I hear the final rasp he breathes right over the chaos, right before he falls to the canvas.
“Fuck!” I yell out. That is supposed to be me. It should’ve been me. Carlos aims a proud look in my direction and then they all flee the cage.
“No! No!” Drew cries out. I grab her before she falls into the ruckus surrounding us. Infuriation flares up in her face as she tries to pull away from me. “We have to get him!”
“Stop! Stop! We can’t do that. He’s dead, Drew,” I say, still holding her. “He’s gone.”
“No. Don’t say that! Don’t even say that. Don’t…” She breaks down, falling against my chest, shivering and wailing.
“I’m sorry. He’s gone. We’re not safe here, and we need to get you help for your hand. If we stay, they’ll come for us. And they’ll do that to you. In front of me. They’ll make me watch you die…” My voice starts to crack. “We have to go. We just have to go!” As if to prove my point, someone stumbles and crashes to the ground right in front of us. “Drew. I have to get you out. There was an empty factory. You remember? I’ll come get you. I’ll whistle four times in a row so you know it’s me.”
“We can’t just leave him. Please. We can’t.”
“Drew, listen to me,” I say, cupping her face, “you have to get out.”
Understanding and acceptance finally pass through her eyes. “Okay. Okay. Yes. But what are you going to do?”
“Make a way. Just get out. No more questions.” I kiss the top of her head. “Ready?” After she nods, I launch myself off the table, slamming into a few people, and clearing just enough space for her to jump down into the mob. Holy fuck, I hope she can stay on her feet. She probably thinks I want to use myself as a diversion to stop Carlos from coming after her, but I’m staying behind for something else.
I don’t see Carlos or his friends anywhere so I weave carefully through the crush and crawl up into the cage to be with my dead friend. To thank him for saving my life. To apologize to him for having to give his to do it. I can’t help wondering if he stayed behind to distract Carlos and his friends, to give Drew and me a chance to get away. It’s hard to look at him without screaming, but I suppress the urge, even though it feels like I’ve swallowed razor blades.
His shirt is soaked with blood, his empty stare nailed to the ceiling. I close his eyes, and check his wrist and neck, just in case. Nothing. Miguel is dead. He is dead, cabrón. Maybe he would
n’t have been if I had gotten to him sooner or made sure he was behind us, but I can’t dwell on what I can’t change. I will carry it, though, and it will stain my soul. I choose to let it.
There’s so much blood, and it has spread out around his body like dark, wide wings. Someone else might’ve seen an optimistic sign in this, but I know better. The only message here? Good perishes and evil is immortal.
I pick up his cell phone, and I tear his gold cross off his neck. I have never met his mother, but I take it as a silent promise to get it to her. As I stuff it into my pocket, the building gets even darker suddenly.
My brain fires off a warning.
It’s not the room.
There’s a shadow looming over me.
“Pinche idiota,” Carlos swears in an amused tone. I wince, bracing myself for what’s coming next, fully aware that it’s going to hurt.
Badly.
Pain rips through my shoulder, like lightning is striking inside my body, and I shout. I’ve been stabbed, and I can see the handle of a short, thin screwdriver still wedged in my skin.
He pulls it out and wipes my blood on his side, and I dive away as he swings it again. He tackles me and I land on my back with him straddling me, the bloody screwdriver raised over my head. His eyes are just voids. No empathy, no mercy, no humanity. No hesitation, as he brings the weapon down. I catch his wrists before he can plunge the metal shaft into my chest. He gets close, though. Way too fucking close. The tip drills into my collarbone as I strain to push him backward, because he knocked the wind out of me when he sent me flying. He raises it again, misfires his aim during our struggle, and carves a gash along my forearm, all the way from my wrist to my elbow.
Miguel’s body is still in my line of sight, and I refuse to die and let his death be in vain. I move past my physical pain, pushing Carlos back with every bit of power I have. My strength overtakes his and he growls as he pulls away on his own, but his anger makes him faster. I only have time to twist my body as he brings the screwdriver down once more. It slams into my upper arm nearly to the hilt, sinking like a knife through butter, and it feels like I’ve been lit on fire. When he yanks it out, the handle separates from the shaft, leaving the sharp metal embedded in my flesh. Carlos stares at the handle in his hand, and I use these split seconds of distraction to hammerfist his nose, punch him in the throat, and throw him off me.
I don’t want to leave Miguel in here with the madman who killed him. There’s a moment of reluctance once I’m outside of the cage, where I imagine myself carrying Miguel’s body out on my back and allowing his family the chance to give him the burial he deserves. But Carlos is almost on his feet again, and there’s nothing more I can do, except leave an invisible trail of silent apologies for my fallen friend.
WHAT’S LEFT OF US?
“Come on…almost…got it,” Drew whispers. I wince as I apply pressure to a spot below the edge of my collarbone, trying to push the metal rod’s broken end farther out of my shoulder so she can grab it. Finally my fingers find the pointed tip beneath my skin and I press it. “Got it!” she says with excitement, and I bite back my yelp as she pulls the broken screwdriver piece out. We’ve been trying to dislodge it for close to twenty minutes now in an alleyway under the glow of a streetlight. My shoulder still hurts, even without it, but it’s soreness and not blinding pain, and it’s not bleeding enough to be worrisome.
“Thanks,” I say when she hands it to me, but our victory is bittersweet. This is the same weapon that killed our friend, and I can’t bring myself to just toss it. I pull a shirt off someone’s low balcony and tie a towel around my forearm.
“No problem.” There’s no expression on Drew’s face. My own emotions are dull, too, even though my mind seems to be permanently paused on the moment of Miguel’s death. I think we’re both in survival mode right now, which has left us numb.
Hopefully, we can find a safe place to stay until morning. Miguel drove us to the fight site and his car keys are still on his body. We have some cash on us, but I don’t think it’s enough to get us back to our hotel if we can track down a cab.
I wrap my arm around Drew’s shoulders, conscious of where her injured hand is, and pull her to my chest. She hasn’t been complaining about her fingers but while we were walking, I saw her clenching her teeth and wiping tears from her eyes as she cradled her hand. She leads the way out of the alley and past the flimsy houses haphazardly built from cinderblocks, metal scraps and plywood. We’re deep in one of Ciudad Neza’s shantytowns, trying our best to be inconspicuous, which shouldn’t be terribly hard in a city where more than a million people dwell.
We emerge on a street cluttered with low rent brick apartments and colorful bodegas shuttered for the night. All the buildings have graffiti on them, and the homeless are bundled up on nearly every store step. Laughter crackles through the air from a group of people playing a game of dice near an old car with missing tires. We catch the attention of a few passing people but no one’s eyes really linger. Once, when Sandrine was telling us about possible fight locations, she described Neza as a part of Mexico’s megaslum, the biggest one in the world, with a frighteningly high crime rate. So, I’m cautious but not jumping out of my skin, because after a night like the one we’ve had, I’m not sure my heart has a place for fear right now.
I pick a direction and we just start walking. The neighborhood shifts gradually the farther we go—parks, tree-lined streets, offices, and gated apartment buildings with newer cars parked out front. We’re moving toward a city center that is revealing a more modern cityscape, without any of the colonial structures we’ve seen in other places. We come upon an aging mansion behind a brick wall, with its gate propped open and a sign advertising rooms available for rent. Sandrine told us about these places, which were abandoned years ago and then turned into hoteles de paso.
The woman inside, Carmen, receives us without any questions, though, I see her occasionally gawking at our injuries. She’s young, maybe a few years older than we are, pretty, and talkative. When she hears that we’re Americans, she explains that she went to high school in New York. Apparently, a lot of people from Neza end up there, but the recession forced her back to her hometown.
There’s very little evidence still here that this house was once a real home. The downstairs is arranged like a hotel lobby—there are worn couches and coffee tables, with a reception desk just past the foyer, and two sets of staircases curve up to the second floor. We check in with a man behind the front desk, paying for one night, before Carmen leads us upstairs to an empty room. Inside there’s a queen bed with an ugly floral comforter set, lounge chair, and a bureau with a television on top.
“We need to stabilize my fingers,” Drew says. Her hand looks worse than it did before; it’s completely swollen and bruised. I’m not naïve enough to believe that I’m invincible purely because I’m young, and I knew this quest was completely dangerous and reckless going into it, but Miguel dying and Drew getting hurt were the furthest things from my mind. “Think you can grab some liquor?”
I cock my eyebrows but I go downstairs and buy a miniature bottle of vodka. When I return to the room, Drew has torn the sleeve off her shirt and ripped it into smaller strips. When I hand her the bottle, she drinks it all down in one gulp.
“Ready?” I ask. She nods confidently but there’s nothing but sheer terror in her eyes. Shoving a corner of a pillow into her mouth, she extends her fingers to me. She handles the pain like a champ as I use the cloth to bind her fingers together. And after I’m done she tries to get some sleep.
We need a doctor, I think as I grab her phone from her pocket. There’s barely any charge left. Sandrine. I walk out into the hallway so that I don’t disturb Drew. Sandrine answers on the first ring. “What the fuck? What the fuck?” she shouts.
“I take it you heard?”
“Yes, about thirty minutes ago…are you guys okay?”
“Miguel’s dead—”
“Oh God. Oh my God.” She sucks her
teeth and her voice falls into a whisper. “No matter how many times you hear about this happening, it’s completely different when it’s someone you know. Sixteen died last year in a fire during a fight after some dumbass guard tossed a cigarette onto generator fuel. Jesus. Miguel was a good guy. A great guy. I’m so sorry to hear. How’s Drew?”
“We need a doctor. Someone who can treat broken fingers and stab wounds. We’re in Neza. Stranded. But I think—” A man’s raised voice from downstairs cuts me off, and I pick up another voice, too: the woman who gave us the room. I creep down the staircase as quietly as I can and peer over the banister. The two of them are arguing in Spanish in the lobby. The conversation is too fast for me to even attempt to follow the few words I know, but I comprehend one clearly. Policía. He’s saying something about the police. My gut says it’s about us, and I clench my jaw as cold fright bites down my back. I wonder how long we have?
“Shit,” I whisper as I walk up backward.
“I have a doctor friend who can probably help you. Majandra Tippetts. Bleeding heart American type. We worked at the same NGO years ago, getting HIV-positive pregnant women on antiretroviral meds. She runs a small clinic for low-income people now. Cash only. Up front. She’s nearby…not walking distance, though. Maybe half an hour by car. I’m nowhere near you right now.” My shoe hits a creak on the landing and Carmen’s gaze lifts. Fuck. “Jesse? You still there?”
She and I only hold eye contact for a beat before I turn for the door to my room. “I think I can get us a ride. Emphasis on think. Text me the address. Hurry, phone is dying,” I say to Sandrine as I end the call.
The toilet flushes and Drew comes out of the bathroom wiping her hand across her mouth. “This shit hurts too much to sleep…and more bad news, the liquor didn’t let dinner stay down.” Her brown eyes narrow on me. “What’s wrong?”
“We gotta go. I think the cops are on the way.”
“How do you know?”