by Susanne Beck
"My, my, my," came a dry as dust voice above us. "You really must tell me your secret, Rio. Flash a little brawn and you have women literally falling into your arms."
The woman beneath me flushed a brilliant crimson before scrabbling away from me as if I were the fire and she’d just gotten burned. She jumped to her feet, her eyes darting around the room. "I’m sorry. I . .uh . . I... "
Laughing a little at her expression, I hauled myself up with a little help from Corinne. "It’s alright, Rio. I’m sorry I smashed into you like that."
"Where’s the fire?" Pony demanded, rushing into the living room with Critter close at her heels. Sliding to a stop, she put her hands on her hips and stared balefully at us, obviously trying to piece together what had happened to leave the three of us looking so... rumpled.
"No fire," I hastened to respond. "Just a little accident. I... um... lost my footing."
My glare cut off Corinne’s snicker before it even left her lips.
A horn blaring ended our impasse and reminded me why I blew into the house like a fanged, flying mammal out of the kingdom of Hades in the first place. "Pony, I’m glad you’re here. I need your help."
"What’s up?"
I signed. "It’s Nia. She’s bound and determined to go down to Mexico and she’s not taking no for an answer."
"Mexico?! Why?"
"She’s bored. She wants to ‘party’." My fingers formed sarcastic quotes around that word.
"Damn. She won’t last two seconds down there."
"I know. That’s why I said I’d join her and came in here to find you."
"Shit," Pony replied. "Alright, Rio, you go out there and stall her. Tell her you’ll go with her. Just don’t let her leave till I get there."
"No way! You’re nuts, Pony! I’m tryin to get away from her, remember??"
"Rio... just do it, ok?"
"God damn it," she muttered. "You owe me big time, woman."
"Yeah, yeah. Put it on my tab. Just go stall her, alright?"
With a melodramatic sigh, Rio turned away, grumbling phrases perhaps best left to the imagination.
After the door slammed, Pony turned to look at Critter, who shrugged. "Well, we were planning on going down there anyway to pick up medications."
At my questioning look, Critter—bless her heart—stepped in to explain. "In Mexico, you don’t need a prescription to get prescription drugs. You can just go down to the local drug store and pick up what you need."
"And they don’t stop you at the border?" I asked, amazed.
Critter grinned. "Nope. They tell you you can’t bring back more than a month’s supply, but those guys don’t know what a month’s supply is, so it’s not that difficult."
"Interesting."
"Yup. So, I figure since we were planning on going down there anyway, we might as well kill two birds with one stone, so to speak."
"Great! Just let me get my wallet and I’ll meet you at the car."
"Hold up there, Angel," Pony stated as I turned away. "You don’t need to come down with us. We’ll keep an eye on Nia while you stay up here."
I turned back slowly. "Are you saying I can’t go?"
She sighed. "Look, Angel, I don’t want to fight with you about it. But face facts here. With your coloring, you just scream ‘American tourist’. They’d be after you like flies on horseshit."
"Wonderful image, Pony," Critter said, disgusted. "Thanks."
"Hey! I’m serious here! It’s the truth and you know it."
"What about her?" I asked, cocking my thumb at Critter.
Pony scowled. "That’s different."
"Yeah? How? Because her hair’s blonde and curly and mine’s blonde and straight?"
She sighed again. "Critter, you tell her."
"I would, if I knew what the answer was."
"Fat lot of good you are," Pony muttered.
"I try." Critter’s smile was sweet as sunshine.
After a moment, Pony threw up her hands in defeat. "Blondes," was all she said. Funny how she could make a color sound so much like a curse.
To her, though, it probably was.
* * *
Since my only knowledge of Mexico came from honeymoon pictures and episodes of "The Love Boat", I was expecting a country rife with pristine beaches and crystal blue Caribbean waters. In fact, on the way down, I cursed myself roundly for having neglected to bring along a bathing suit.
As is true with life, however, what I was expecting and what I received were two different things entirely.
My first surprise of the day came about when we walked across the border. Where I had expected a few somber looking guards with weapons and a snarling dog or two, I got instead a... turnstile. Unmanned. Apparently, in this part of Mexico at least, they didn’t care what you brought in with you; they only cared about what you brought out.
The second surprise came shortly thereafter, and almost made me turn and run back for the border.
Instead of white sand beaches and beautiful, tanned and oiled bodies, I saw something which could only be Timothy Leary’s version of a carnival midway. A riot of color and a cacophony of sound, streets too narrow for cars to pass through were lined on both sides with booths and hucksters as far as the eye could see in any direction.
Dark men in worn clothing beckoned from the front of each booth, using heavily accented and broken English to lure unsuspecting American consumers to part with their money on a wide variety of less than tasteful merchandise.
Pony was, of course, right, damn the woman. With my blonde hair and fair skin, I seemed to be a magnet for male attention no matter where or how quickly I walked. I was pinched, pulled, patted and prodded as I attempted to pass by inconspicuously.
I might as well have been naked and wearing a neon sign with the word "sucker" plastered across my chest. Things came to a head when two vendors, ostensibly selling woven horse blankets most likely made in Taiwan, each grabbed one of my arms and turned me into a rope in the game of tug-of-war they were holding at my expense.
Rio put an end to it all in her own special fashion, intimidating the hell out of both men (not to mention every single vendor on either side of the street we were on) by yelling something in rapid Spanish, relieving me of my human tethers, and cracking their heads together before dumping them, stunned, into the noisome street.
Then she used her bulk as a human battering ram and got us through the market maze with no further trouble at all.
It was almost as if we’d jumped from the frying pan into the fire, though, when we finally made our way safely out of the incredibly loud and confusing maze of stalls and into the more wide open areas of the town. I’m afraid I then became the epitome of every relatively well-to-do American tourist as I stared around me, slack jawed with shock.
Squalor and absolute, unmitigated poverty was all around me as I stared at the crumbling buildings which made up this small town. People shuffled to and fro, may with the kind of blank stares which only come from hunger and total despair. Many were half-clothed, and most were barefoot.
I suddenly felt very much ashamed of myself, spending long days in self pity while the people around me could only wish to have a life as good as the one I’ve led, rough spots and all. Tears sprang unbidden to my eyes, and I lowered my head so as to keep from drawing even more attention to myself with my unwanted emotional display.
"C’mon," Pony said from beside me, quickly grabbing my arm and hurrying me down a narrow, pitted side street. "There’s a pharmacy right around the corner. We’ll stop there."
Beggars filled the streets, many of them missing limbs, and others with a multitude of open sores running down arms and legs and faces. Several congregated outside the very pharmacy we were headed toward, just feet away from medication which could help them, yet without a penny to their name with which to purchase it.
The bitter irony of the situation caused even more tears to fall until I found myself blinded by them and stumbled along only by the grace of Pony’s firm support.
Turning my head slightly, I could just see Nia through the haze of my tears. She looked both frightened and repulsed by the scene surrounding her, and as I watched, she grabbed onto Rio in a white-knuckled grip that the larger woman didn’t even bother trying to draw away from.
"We need to help them," I whispered to Critter, who came along beside me and wrapped a compassionate arm around my waist. "We can’t just leave them like this. Someone needs to do something."
"We would if we could, Angel. But there isn’t enough money in the world to help these people, I’m afraid. We do what we can, but it’s never enough."
"God," I replied, shuddering.
The pharmacy itself was cool, bright, and surprisingly modern. The woman behind the counter smiled pleasantly as we entered, and greeted Rio with enthusiasm, obviously remembering her from a previous trip. With her clean, pressed clothing and carefully applied make-up, she stood as out of place among the town’s other denizens as a clock would if placed high in the crotch of a tree.
Part of me wanted to rant at the woman for having the audacity to be so well dressed and so well fed while right outside her door, people were suffering and dying in the most horrid of ways. But a bigger part of me kept silent and I damned myself, feeling more ashamed than at any other time in my life.
The transaction was quickly completed, and before I knew it, a box full of medical supplies was pressed into my hands. Pony, Critter and Rio each held their own boxes. Rio led the way out of the store, then did something I will never forget even if I live to be one hundred and ten.
She stopped.
Gently placing her box on the ground, she called to the people huddled in shop doorways. They flocked to her, faces wreathed in joyful smiles, seeming truly human to me for the first time since I’d set foot in the town.
They came to her as if to a Savior, reaching out with grimy, trembling hands to touch some part of her, be it skin or cloth or hair, tears brimming in their dark, shining eyes.
She greeted each by name and touched them back, enfolding some in delicate hugs, pressing kisses to weathered cheeks, and shaking hands with others.
Though I didn’t understand a word of what was being said, I knew in my heart I was witnessing a true miracle.
When she had greeted every last person, she knelt down and opened her box, then began distributing the medical supplies she’d just purchased to the people gathered around us. She seemed to know exactly who needed what and handed each item over with a kind word and a bright smile. There was no jostling, no fighting as each person waited patiently to receive Rio’s offering.
When one box was emptied, she beckoned, and another was placed on the ground until all the boxes, save one, were unloaded, the contents given to the people who needed them the most.
The rest of us helped pass out the supplies as Rio directed us, and were treated to our own smiles and softly spoken words of gratitude. I felt completely unworthy of such thanks, having played no part in this wonder happening around me, but I accepted the gratitude nonetheless, though on Rio’s behalf, rather than my own.
When we were almost finished, I felt a slight tug on my jeans, and when I looked down, a young girl was smiling up at me. Squatting down to her level, I tried my best to ask what it was she needed. Stick-thin arms flung themselves around my neck and a small body nestled into my own as a gentle kiss brushed the skin of my cheek. "Thank you," she whispered in heavily accented English before shyly pulling away and running off to stand behind her mother.
I almost lost it then, and probably would have if Rio hadn’t chosen that moment to stand and dust off her hands.
The small crowd cheered, and amidst many shouts of "muchas gracias!", they dispersed back into the crumbling bowels of the town to leave us standing alone on the street.
I looked over at Rio, a new-found respect shining in my eyes. She blushed a deep red and gave me the smallest of grins before hefting the lone remaining box and beckoning us to follow her yet again.
This time, I went willingly, a much humbled and wiser woman for the incredible gift I’d been given.
* * *
After leading us on a seemingly aimless trek through narrow, twisting streets, Rio brought us to an older, and paradoxically better kept, section of the town. The streets, while old, were for the most part clean and in good repair. The businesses lining those streets were brightly lit and pleasant to look at, with wonderful smells emanating from within some of them.
It was to one such building that Rio led us, and I grinned as I stepped beneath the brightly colored awning, its stiff cloth flapping in the mild, fragrant breeze. The entrance revealed a bar that was cool, dim, inviting, and crowded, mostly with men who’s attentions were drawn to a soccer game currently being broadcast on several televisions dotting the bar’s interior. Many of them turned to look at us as we entered and more than a few of the gazes lingered before Rio’s fierce scowl convinced them soccer was a much more important thing to watch than women.
For the first time in their lives, no doubt.
The bartender, a short, rather rotund man with a thick shock of black hair and a bristling moustache which hid half his genial face, came quickly from behind the bar and led us all over to a large, empty table, while speaking all the while to Rio in rapid-fire Spanish.
After we were all seated, he returned with several menus, then with two bottles of Tequila, six shot glasses, salt and a bowl of limes, which he set down on the table in front of us.
"Alright! This is more like it!" Nia crowed as she reached for one of the bottles, scowling as Rio intercepted it and deftly removed the top. Going around the table, she filled each glass almost to the brim before going back to her chair and resuming her seat.
After watching the others prepare the salt and limes, and copying their actions, I was ready as Rio lifted her glass in a toast. "Here’s to swimmin’ with bowlegged women."
Laughing, we touched glasses and, as they say, knocked the shots back after taking a healthy lick of salt. Breathing fire, my eyes watering, I slammed the glass down. Then I picked up the lime, shoved it into my mouth, and bit down, thanking god when the sourness of it cut through the taste of rocket fuel which managed to make its way up to my sinuses.
Bad as my reaction was, however, it didn’t come close to matching Nia’s. The young woman was receiving a thorough back-pounding by Rio as she lay half slumped over the table, choking and sputtering as the others looked on, laughing.
As soon as her breath returned to her, however, she reached out and swiped the bottle, pouring herself a healthy shot and downing it before anyone could think to stop her. Managing to keep her reaction to the shot somewhat under control this time, she sank back into the chair and smirked at the rest of us while wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. "Niiiiiice."
While Critter and Pony simply shook their heads and reached for the bottle, Rio looked as if she desperately wanted to throttle someone—preferably the someone sitting to her immediate left. Thankfully for Nia, however, she chose to drink instead.
* * *
Never one to feel comfortable in a crowd of men, especially boisterous men, I was surprised to find myself gradually relaxing as late afternoon turned into early evening. Whether it was from the effects of the wonderful dinner we’d been served, or the additional two shots of Tequila I’d managed to down, I wasn’t sure, but never being one to look a gift equine in the cuspids, I simply went with the feeling and didn’t ponder it overmuch.
My five companions were certainly feeling no pain, particularly Nia, who now viewed her little corner of the world through reddened, half-lidded eyes while a goofy, drunken grin seemed to have taken up permanent residence on her face.
Increasingly outlandish tales were being traded back and forth across the table, but rather than participate, I was quite content to sit back and relax, determined to enjoy my brief respite of good cheer while it lasted.
Which, as is almost always the case with me of late, didn’t la
st nearly long enough.
Seven men, the largest larger even than Rio, entered into the bar, their expressions belligerent. I found myself stiffening in my seat and was pleased to see my companions do the same, except for Nia, who was too far gone to be able to resemble anything other than a limp rag doll at that stage.
"Trouble," Critter muttered to my left, stating the obvious.
"Maybe now’d be a good time to leave," I replied, sotto voce.
"You got that right." Turning, she tapped a bleary Pony on the shoulder, then jerked her head toward the door.
Pony nodded and reached out to shake Nia’s arm. "Wake up, little Miss Sunshine. It’s time to head back home."
Lifting her head slowly off the table, Nia peered owlishly at all of us. "Wha--?"
"We’re leaving."
That woke her up fully. "What? No way! The party’s just getting started!" As if to prove her point, she grabbed the second (or was it third?) bottle of Tequila, brought it to her lips, and upended it, guzzling down a quarter of the contents in a single gulp. "C’mon ya bunch of old ladies! Drink up!! What are you waitin for? Christmas???"
Laughing uproariously at her feeble joke, she slammed the bottle back on the table, which, unfortunately, attracted the attentions of the goon squad steamrolling their way toward the bar.
"This doesn’t look like it’s gonna be fun," Critter whispered to me as they made an abrupt detour toward our table.
"Anyone ever tell you you have an innate gift for understatement?"
Her grin flashed. "A time or three."
"Good. Wouldn’t have wanted to be the first."
A second later, a hand the size of which would have put a Daisy Canned Ham to shame reached for Nia’s bottle and snatched it up, returning it a brief instant later, totally empty. A loud belch blasted over our heads and I swore I saw several carefully tended plants wither and die away under the assault.
"Hey!" Nia shouted as the bottle collided with the table. "Get your own bottle, you..." Turning, she craned her neck back as her chin lifted high, then higher. "Wow. Look guys! A walking mountain of shit!"