Santiago's Road Home

by Alexandra Diaz

  Instant silence.

  Señor Dante nods. “I’ll check with the board about additional teen readers, and, if approved, anyone else can apply. Until then, Santiago will work the reading program.”

  Listo opens his mouth but then huffs off to the TV room. He probably never even wanted to read to the little kids; he just didn’t like not getting something. Herrera leaves the classroom and yells across the main room for the rest of the afternoon pupils.

  A boy Santiago has seen around but who hasn’t received a nickname yet approaches Señor Dante. “I’d also like to read to the little kids if you’re allowed more than one helper. My hermanito is there. He was sick when we came. I’d like to make sure he’s okay.”

  The boy’s words pierce Santiago’s heart. The thought resurfaces of Alegría in the little-girl section, alone. Not knowing what was happening to her or even if she was okay had been torture. After all these months, the memory of feeling powerless to see her still haunts him.

  “You should read to the chiquitínes for now,” Santiago says, stuffing his hands into his full pockets. “I can read to them later.”

  He has five more years here before they kick him out. What’s a few more weeks?

  “Santiago,” Señor Dante says. “I offered you the job because you’d be best for it.”

  Santiago stares at the floor. Just because he would be the best doesn’t make it right. “I can’t keep him away from his brother.”

  “Don’t do it,” Sumo argues. “You wanted this so bad. You fought for this. At least alternate days.”

  Alternate? The weight of self-sacrifice lifts. Go once a week instead of twice? Air fills his chest once more. A look toward Señor Dante says it’s Santiago’s choice. He turns to the other boy, who looks hopeful.

  “Yes,” Santiago says. “Let’s share the job.”

  The other boy’s brown eyes widen then quickly narrow. “What do you want in return?”

  Santiago exhales and smiles. “Nothing. I got separated from my family too.”

  CHAPTER 38

  Stand straight. Be polite. Try not to attract too much attention.

  Holding three books tightly to his chest, Santiago waits while Señor Dante convinces Herrera that Santiago does have permission to leave the big area with him.

  “I have a letter from the board of directors saying that I can delegate one of the teen boys to join me for the story time.” Señor Dante shows the guard a letter. “I did this with Pablo a couple of days ago; today’s Santiago’s turn.”

  “I don’t care about the letter. I’m saying we’re short staffed. I’m on my own at the moment, and there’s no spare guard to escort you two.”

  “With all due respect, Señor Herrera,” Señor Dante says in Spanish with a slight edge to his voice. “What kind of trouble do you think he’s going to get into in the hallway? Neither of us can leave through the windowed door without getting buzzed through.”

  “García’s a criminal.” Herrera spits on the floor. “You can’t expect me to trust him.”

  The muscles around Santiago’s mouth twitch. A criminal? This guard should be locked up for his criminal treatment of them—kicking them and calling them names any chance he gets. Though he can’t remember, Santiago’s willing to bet Herrera was the one who kicked him in the back when he had hypothermia. But Santiago says nothing. Nothing to upset Herrera more and keep Santiago from reading to the kids.

  But Señor Dante is not a “criminal”; even as their former teacher he has power. “Santiago is a refugee, not a criminal. And I’d advise you stop treating him and the others as such. Now, are you going to let us through, or do I need to contact your supervisor?”

  Herrera’s jaw clenches. Tall and skinny like Santiago, Señor Dante is no match for Herrera, whose pimples don’t hide the fact that he’s been in fights before. But unlike Santiago, Señor Dante doesn’t falter under the threat.

  The guard finally relents, scanning the pass around his neck to let them through the door.

  “Thank you,” Señor Dante says courteously while Herrera scowls.

  And as a final blow, Señor Dante places a hand on Santiago’s shoulder, fully violating the “no touching” rule, and guides him through the door. Part of Santiago cheers for Señor Dante. The other part wants to warn his compañeros to stay clear of Herrera today.

  The hallway leads past several closed doors. At one point Santiago sees the windowed door that goes to the intake room, then to the office, and finally to freedom, if he could get through the gates before they shut on him again. So close.

  They come across one person in the hallways: a tall, gringa-looking woman in a nice green-and-gold pantsuit that definitely isn’t part of a guard’s uniform.

  “Señora Mariño.” The teacher greets the woman in Spanish with the traditional kiss on the cheek. “Still making deliveries?”

  “Sadly, yes,” she says with a sigh, holding up two baby bottles full of milk. “I’m hoping this is the last day.”

  “Good luck.”

  As soon as she disappears into a room, Santiago asks, “What’s that about?”

  Señor Dante takes his time answering but doesn’t hide the bitterness in his voice. “She’s an immigration lawyer. Every day for the last week she’s been delivering breast milk from her client to her client’s baby.”

  “They took a baby away from her mother?”

  “Everyone is separated.”

  Like him and Alegría. Like Pablo, the boy who wanted to check on his brother.

  Señor Dante stops walking and glances around to make sure they’re alone in the hallway. “Most of your compañeros were traveling alone, trying to escape violent drug gangs, political conflicts, or extreme poverty in their country; a lot have had to rely on no one but themselves.”

  Gangs? Politics? Yeah, Guanaco, his Salvadoran friend, mentioned something like that. But most of the boys don’t talk about their past. Not that he hangs out with them to know. Sometimes, when Chismoso’s bored, he fills everyone in on arrival gossip—some boys get caught while trying to cross the border or very close to it; a few, like Santiago, are rescued from the desert; others come from different facilities, where they were housed in massive cages or tents. But a lot of the boys seem to come to the center because they turn themselves in at the border, in hopes of asylum.

  The hallway remains empty, and Señor Dante continues in a lower voice. “But most of these younger kids we’re going to see were traveling with their parents, adults who shielded them from the horrors you well know. They get here, and suddenly they’re alone. They don’t know why, and they think they’ll never see their family again. No one takes care of them, and they feel like no one cares about them. That’s why this reading program is so important. To show we care.”

  Santiago clenches the books tighter to his chest. It must have been horrible for Alegría. She wouldn’t have understood. Just like he hadn’t when Mami got taken away. “Why do they separate us?”

  “Because they can.”

  * * *

  The little-kid area looks the same as the one for the older boys—one main room with doors to one side and access to the bathrooms. Like the older kids, they have no toys.

  The main difference is the noise. Two kids scream nonstop. Several huddle against the walls crying hysterically. One boy stops banging his head against the door because they enter. And only some of the ten- or eleven-year-old boys (but no adults) do anything to console them.

  “I can’t do this.” Santiago’s voice croaks. It’s too much. It’s one thing for Santiago to feel this pain—he’s used to it; he knows how to live through it. But these boys, some as young as three, away from their parents, being in this prison… It’s not right. They shouldn’t have to endure this.

  Señor Dante grabs his hand. “I know—it’s heartrending. But for a half hour, as you said, you can help them forget and give them comfort they haven’t felt since their arrival.”

  Santiago strokes the back of his book, the
one Mami read to him. When Mami died, she left memories. Those memories still offer Santiago comfort all these years later. If anything, these boys need happy memories and comfort. Darn Señor Dante for always being right.

  “Está bien. I’ll stay.”

  More than fifty boys, ranging from three to eleven years old, notice the arrivals. They rush toward Señor Dante and Santiago in gray blurs.

  “Walk!” one guard shouts.

  “Stop it!” Another claps his hands in a poor attempt to maintain authority.

  A third guard—they have three apparently, though could use several more—grabs one of the running boys by the arm and lifts him off the ground, hissing at him to stop being a pain in the behind. Except he doesn’t say “behind.” Whatever these guards are trained for, childcare isn’t it.

  Señor Dante places one finger on his lips, raises the other hand in the air, and makes a V (or bunny ears) with his fingers. He waits patiently, and within five seconds the crowded room falls quiet as the boys sit on the hard floor. Even the two screamers and a couple of the criers cease their outbursts.

  “Buenos días, chicos,” Señor Dante calls out.

  “Buenos días, Señor Dante,” they respond, twitching and waiting in their spots.

  “The other day we had Pablo, and today my friend Santiago will read to you. He also lives here in the center with you guys.” Señor Dante gestures toward him.

  Santiago waves while the youngsters gawk at him like he’s a movie star. Heat rises up from the back of his neck. How embarrassing.

  The kids divide into two groups: Santiago will read picture books to the younger kids in one area of their main room and Señor Dante a novel to the older ones.

  Miraculously, they remain quiet, waiting. Santiago takes a deep breath.

  He fumbles over the words in the first two pages of La princesa y el viento even though he knows the story by heart. The kids still stare at him. All thirty-some. He turns the book around and hides behind the cover while showing the boys the illustrations.

  “Is this a girl’s book?” a four-year-old asks.

  Santiago shakes his head. Maybe Llorón would listen now. “It’s a people’s book. Everyone can read it.”

  The boy crawls closer. Santiago reads the next page perfectly. The boy continues to come closer and tries to climb into Santiago’s lap. Two others lean against his shoulder to get a better look at the pictures. Immediately, a guard is at their side.

  “Get to the back,” the guard yells. “No touching.”

  Santiago bites his lip. What he would give to have Alegría or his little cousins sitting on his lap during story time. How he misses that.

  He rises to his knees and holds the book out so even the castigated boys in the back can see the illustrations and feel the story’s invisible embrace. From memory he recites the princess’s admonishment to the wind for scattering her villagers: “There’s no place you can send us where we won’t belong.”

  He doesn’t know the other books by heart but makes sure to stop and point out illustration features for everyone to see. The lap climber somehow wiggles his way back to the front of the group through the course of three books.

  “Again, again!” the boys call out when Santiago finishes the last book.

  Santiago smiles and hugs the books to his chest. Comfort and escapism. He can do this. “I’ll be back—I promise.”

  CHAPTER 39

  Santiago and Pablo continue taking turns reading to the little kids. When Señor Dante gets permission for an extra reader, Listo joins them once before declaring the kids are brats, malcriados. Santiago silently thanks whichever “brat” scared him off.

  Unlike the older boys, most of the little kids leave the center within a week. Still, it’s way too long. A lot happens in a week. Señor Dante says that being forcefully separated from a parent for a day can traumatize a child for life. Just seeing his buddy, the lap climber, called away during story time, tears Santiago up. Too much like Alegría—even after all these months, he can’t forget her.

  By his calculations, considering he arrived in the fall when the nights were getting colder and it’s almost spring now, he’s been at the facility for about six months. No one besides Chismoso has been in the older-boy section as long as him. Many only stay a few weeks; several others board the bus that takes them back to México.

  Each time the bus pulls into the parking area, Santiago’s throat goes dry. Heat, dehydration, memories. Santiago remembers Chismoso saying it costs over seven hundred dollars per person per day to keep them at the center. Sooner or later the officials will do the math and figure out he isn’t worth keeping five more years. Then his name isn’t called for the bus and he breathes again, remembers he will be here until he’s eighteen, and forgets about deportation until the next time.

  The bus doesn’t come regularly, never even on a specific day. But instinct says it’ll be here soon. What felt like a packed space with ninety-some teens when he arrived now threatens to burst with almost double the amount. So when the bus comes, his gut says he’ll be on it. The tightness in his throat agrees.

  “Who’s on the next bus, Chismoso?” Santiago breaks down and asks. After all these months, the secret to Chismoso’s information is still a mystery. Maybe Chismoso bribes (or blackmails) a guard, or provides him with favors in exchange for all the intel. But who knows which guard. However the job gets done, Chismoso is more reliable than a weather vane.

  From where Santiago stands with his fingers laced through the chain-link fence in the outdoor area, no bus is visible in the parking lot. But tomorrow…

  “How badly do you want to know?” Chismoso grins, leaning his back against the fence Santiago grips.

  “Forget it. Forget I asked.” Santiago walks away, shoving his hands in the pockets stuffed with his metallic blanket, toothbrush, and mitten socks.

  “According to a little bird I know”—Chismoso baits him—“the officials made contact with a woman called Agracia Reyes de la Luz.”

  Santiago stops cold, his heart racing. He can’t believe it. That woman has no telephone, no actual address, and yet they’ve found her. Eyes narrowed, he turns slowly back to Chismoso.

  “Looks like you’ve heard of her.” Chismoso strolls toward him, arms swinging casually. From across the yard, Sumo raises his eyebrow. Santiago shakes his head. This he has to do alone.

  “You’re incorrect. I don’t know anyone by that name.” Santiago’s lips barely move. The rest of him can’t either.

  “Really? Isn’t she your abuela?”

  A muscle in Santiago’s neck twitches. “No, I don’t have a grandmother.”

  “Interesting. She tried to deny knowing you, as well,” Chismoso mocks.

  A spark of hope. If she claims not to know him, then he can’t be sent back to live with a “stranger.”

  “But when they threatened her, she admitted being related to you,” Chismoso sneers.

  Fine, so not the best news. What is Chismoso’s point? What does he gain from all this? He’s just a nobody.

  “She’ll take you,” Chismoso says in one last stabbing remark. “Even though she wishes you were never born, Santi.”

  Santiago gives the gossiper a cold stare. The center has made him hard, and Chismoso himself taught him how to inflict pain. “But at least I have family willing to take me. And my name is Santiago.”

  Yes, she’ll take him. Especially if officials threaten her. She’ll complete her duty, as much as he wishes she wouldn’t. He thought he would never have anything to do with that woman ever again. Except now that she’s been located, he’ll have to soon enough.

  * * *

  Soon enough comes the next day. The outside temperature matches the inside one. Santiago shuts his eyes, leaning into the fence and enjoying the sun warming his back. He hears, or rather feels, the bus’s vibrations before it drives into the parking area. He cracks one eye open. Sí, there it is. A white bus, but other than that, completely nondescript.

  Th
e guards let them spend their whole recess outside, and when they return indoors, there’s no list of boys to line up for the bus. Santiago saw the bus, heard it. So why’s everything going on like a regular day? And if it is a regular day, why’s his stomach aching with nerves and fear?

  “García?” Castillo calls out after a few minutes.

  Santiago refuses to look up from his book. It’s not for him. At least two other Garcías reside in their area at the moment. If he ignores the guard, he’ll go away.

  “García Reyes?”

  Slowly Santiago stands, his finger marking the page of his book he knows by heart.

  “Leave the book behind,” Castillo says.

  What? No! Santiago grips his book, Mami’s book, tighter.

  “Señor Dante gave me this book—gave it to me,” he stammers. A total lie. The book was donated to the center, and Señor Dante had nothing to do with the donations. But… “It’s mine—I have to take it with me.”

  “No, everything that comes in belongs to the facility,” Castillo says. And Santiago always thought of him as the “nice” guard.

  He could refuse. Refuse to give up the book, refuse to leave the center. Except they would drag him out anyway. After taking away his book.

  He removes his finger marking the page where he stopped and strokes the cover one last time. The edges firmed up a bit after that day in the rain but are still fatter than normal. The spine also shows signs of having been opened too many times. He traces the title written in wind puffs. Just as well. At least here someone else might enjoy it. At la malvada’s house it would only be used to feed the fire.

  He turns to Pablo—both he and Sumo came to his side when Castillo called him—and hands him the book. “The little kids like it when you howl like the wind and make special voices for the other characters.”

  Pablo accepts the book with a nod. Santiago then turns to Sumo, who’s lost some weight but looks more deflated than healthy. With his back to Castillo, he offers the big guy his hand. Sumo’s eyes widen as Santiago inconspicuously passes him a packet of (wheat-free) fruit gummies in the handshake.