Chapter 14
“Shit!” yelped the driver. Hernán looked out the back and saw two police cars gaining on them. The pollo Hernán had jostled earlier leaned over the driver’s shoulder and yelled at him to go faster. The van lurched, gears ground, but it burst ahead.
The driver took a sharp turn, causing Hernán to smash up against Isela and Andrea. Albert began to cry and Hernán held onto him as best he could with the van careening down a dark road. The police lights were still behind them, though the van had gained some distance.
The driver yelled, “Hold on!” and took another sharp turn, and then a third. Through the windshield Hernán could see a dirt road stretching straight ahead until the headlights switched off.
The teenager drove in darkness for another few minutes, leaning so far forward his head almost touched the glass. Abruptly he slowed and turned off the dirt road. The van bounced along a rutted path for another hundred yards and came to a stop. A smallish house with a fenced garden stood in the middle of a moonlit field, soft lights glowing through its curtains.
“Go,” their driver barked. “Get inside. Now.”
Everyone scrambled out of the van. No sooner had Hernán closed the sliding door than the driver took off again. He made a wide circle to get back to the rutted path, flicked on his headlights, and screeched away in a cloud of dust and exhaust. When he rejoined the dirt road, he turned back the way they had come. His shrinking taillights still glowed red when two police cars flashed by in the same direction.
The convoy disappeared into the darkness.
Hernán turned around again to see a woman ushering the pollos inside. A man waited there, maybe her husband, and guided them all to place their bags in a corner. After showing them the outhouse and a water pump, he turned to a large pot simmering over the fire.
Hernán took Albert with him to the outhouse, and when they returned Isela took Andrea. Shortly, they sat cross-legged as the woman passed out bowls of chicken soup. The homey smell awakened his appetite and he finished two helpings.
Their hostess seemed quite taken with Albert and Andrea as they ate. She kept offering the children bread and fruit to go with their soup. Albert shied away from her, but Andrea happily took the proffered plum. “Thank you,” she said seriously to the woman, who stroked a hand down Andrea’s black hair.
“Two hours you sleep,” the man croaked, so the travelers found places against the wall to settle down. The children drifted off immediately and Hernán followed right behind.
All too soon, the woman shook the travelers awake, gathered them and led the way outside. The man who had been their host held up a lantern and strode away through the near-darkness, further from the dirt road.
When Albert stumbled, Hernán picked him up. His head fell against Hernán’s shoulder as they walked; eventually he fell asleep again. Andrea kept up, little legs marching steadily, her hand in Isela’s.
They had probably walked for thirty minutes when the man brought them to a halt. Silver glinted at his back; Hernán realized it was moonlight reflecting on a river.
“I hope you can all swim,” the man said with a chuckle, but it sounded kindly. He took off his clothes down to his underwear and stuffed them in a plastic sack. He passed out more bags.
Shyness be damned, apparently. Hernán stripped to his jockey shorts, bagged the clothes, and then helped Albert take off his shoes, pants and shirt. When everyone was ready, packs on their backs, bagged clothes in their hands, the man led them down the riverbank.
Hernán couldn’t tell how deep the water was or how strong its current, but it looked wide. How would Albert and Andrea manage? How would he hold on to all their clothes and keep them afloat if they had to swim?
The man walked right into the water, and then Hernán breathed easier. The eddies around his legs were gentle when he followed. Even ten yards out the water wasn’t as high as his knees. Isela held Albert’s hand and he took Andrea’s as they waded forward. Silt squelched under their bare feet as they moved deeper, but the water wasn’t cold.
Perhaps thirty yards from shore, the man held up a hand in warning. “You have to swim a little here. Not far.” He kept going, his plastic bag held over his head, and in a few more feet the water was to his waist, and then his chest. With his bag aloft in one hand, he paddled with the other. After a few yards, he seemed to have his feet on the bottom again and he walked until the water came no higher than his knees.
Hernán said to Isela, “You take the four bags of clothes. I’ll get the children across.” She nodded, gathered the bags, and soon was across the deep spot. Hernán took Andrea first and told Albert, “I’ll be back in a few minutes. You don’t move until I’m back. Okay?”
The little boy nodded, eyes shimmering in the moonlight, but he didn’t cry again. Hernán felt Albert’s gaze on him as he waded deeper with Andrea. She clutched his neck tightly as the water rose over her legs. He leveled them out and dog-paddled with one arm. Andrea began to stroke too, helping to pull them across.
When the river was shallow enough for Andrea to stand, he said to her, “You’re so brave. I’m very proud of you.”
Leaving her with Isela, he hurried back for Albert. He peered across the water, but his stomach gave a lurch He couldn’t see the little boy. Craning his neck left and right, he sucked in a trembling breath. He wasn’t sure it was safe to call out.
Where was he?
Finally he hissed, “Albert.” Some reeds moved to his left, parted, and the boy stepped into view. Only then did Hernán realize a slight current had pushed him a short way downstream as he crossed and so he was looking in the wrong place.
With a great sigh of relief, he paddled over. Albert splashed forward to meet him and gave a yelp as the water closed over his head. Hernán was there in an instant and pulled him up. Albert hugged his neck so hard Hernán was afraid he would choke. He shuddered in Hernán’s arms but he still didn’t cry.
“Good boy,” he whispered. “Let’s go find your sister.”
Across the river, the guide gave them a little time to rest. They had no way to get dry and it was unpleasant putting on the clothes from their bags. Albert and Andrea were dead on their feet when Isela asked the guide, “How much longer?”
He shrugged. “Two hours.”
“The children will never make it,” she protested but he shrugged again and turned away. Isela stalked back over to their little group, fuming but helpless.
“Can you manage all the packs?” Hernán asked her. “I’ll carry them both.”
After just ten paces, his arms ached from the weight of the two sleeping children. The trip became a walking nightmare. Isela stayed slightly ahead, glancing back often with a worried expression. Blisters formed and broke on Hernán’s feet. His arms and shoulders burned and throbbed.
He tried to recite poetry in his head. He prayed. Anything, to keep his mind off his body.
His only break came when the guide called a halt so everyone could step into bushes to relieve themselves. Andrea tried to stretch out on the grass to sleep and Hernán had to scoop her up.
“I can walk,” Albert said sleepily. He stuck close to Isela as they resumed the march, Andrea asleep in Hernán’s arms. Albert made it almost twenty minutes before he grew too tired to continue. He sank down, his face crumpled and forlorn in the scant moonlight.
Hernán had to wake Andrea and put her down. “I’m sorry, little one, but you need to walk for a while on your own. Okay? Hold on to Isela.” He shook out his arms, desperate for a rest, but the guide and the rest of the pollos already moved on, the distance between them growing. Hernán scooped Albert onto his shoulders and held his wrists for security as they tried to catch up.
Finally the guide brought them to a ramshackle building surrounded by weeds, where he opened a door and ushered everyone in. The shed stank terribly, like something had died there and been left to rot.
“Sleep,” the guide said. “A car will pick you up in a few hours.”
“Where are we now?” Isela asked.
The guide answered, “Guatemala.”
Hernán talked quietly with Isela as they arranged their packs. “I think that’s why we used the river,” Isela guessed. “So we wouldn’t go through a checkpoint as we crossed the border from El Salvador.” Hernán nodded.
The group huddled together. For warmth, for comfort—he didn’t even know.
A pickup pulled to the door of the shack a few hours later. The burly man who entered the shack was gruff as he rousted everyone and pushed and cajoled them toward the truck bed. Hernán got the children situated on either side of Isela, with their backs to the cab of the truck. He climbed in himself with the other two travelers in their party.
Albert said plaintively, “I’m hungry.”
The burly man took in Albert and Andrea. He made a face and disappeared, but returned in a few moments with some pieces of fruit, a bottle of water and a few corn tortillas for the children.
The man traveling with them looked greedily at the food. Ignoring his own thirst and empty belly, Hernán positioned himself so he was between the man and the children, and gave his flattest, most dead-eyed stare. The pollo shifted around and muttered to the woman with him.
A three-hour drive brought them into the capitol of Guatemala. The pickup stopped at a house where an old woman who reminded Hernán of Abuela herded them inside. She had two pails of water and cups; everyone jostled to drink. A table was strewn with simple food but it looked like a feast by that point.
“You buy from me. What you don’t eat you can take with you,” the old woman said. The pollo with them pulled out a twenty-dollar bill and swept a big pile of tortillas into a plastic bag, his eyes daring Hernán to stop him.
He was too tired to fight, though. He pooled money with Isela, and helped her bag up what remained. Isela made sure the children drank but they had nothing they could use to take water with them.
Hernán asked the old woman, “Can we get some bottles?” She stared at him, her cold gaze chilling him to the bone. He could almost hear his own grandmother’s voice telling everyone what a disappointment he was. The woman snorted and left, returning with four empty plastic bottles. “Thank you,” he muttered.
Soon they were directed onto a very old bus, joining perhaps thirty other people. Many of the seats were already claimed, and over half of the riders looked to be indigenous. They found no seats together so Albert sat on Isela’s lap and Hernán took Andrea a few rows back.
The bus creaked and tilted to the side as an extremely fat man, mustache covering his mouth, climbed to the driver’s seat.
They drove for hours, stopping only when the driver needed to relieve himself. The woman who shared a seat with Hernán and Andrea kept looking obsessively at a piece of paper on which Hernán could see a name and address. When she wasn’t looking at the paper, her lips moved as if she were reciting the words over and over, a magic spell to get her out of Hell.
The rattling bus, the smell of so many bodies in a cramped space, and the lack of enough food and water gave Hernán a terrible headache. Andrea seemed to sense it and patted his cheek sweetly. He gave her a wan smile.
More hours passed, and a stupor came over Hernán he couldn’t shake. His arms and legs hurt from the long trek the night before. He began to wonder whether he had made a terrible mistake, starting this journey.
He lost track of the times they stopped, the places their handlers hustled them in and out of. Somehow he remained mindful of his little group, always with an eye on Albert and Andrea, and a helping hand for Isela. The responsibility he felt for them was loaded with fear, but, he thought, perhaps it gave him a reason to keep moving as well.
He ate or drank when he could, and ignored his empty belly and dry mouth otherwise. Albert replaced Andrea and huddled as close as he could every time they stopped, clearly worried. Isela gave him some of her food at one of the driver’s piss stops. He tried to push it back but she said, “We need you. Please, Hernán.”
He ate the food.
The driver finally left them huddled in a bus station with as many as fifty people milling around. The place stank of urine and feces. An underfed dog trotted around outside and collapsed in the sun, panting.
Two prostitutes worked their way around the station; occasionally one would go off with a man around a corner. The sounds of grunting and flesh slapping on flesh filled the air. Isela tried to cover Andrea’s ears as she hunched over the girl.
A man with a glass eye shambled by, muttering a list of drugs. He leered at Albert and caught Hernán’s eyes. “I’ll give you a dime bag for that one.”
Hernán shook his head fiercely and tried to marshal his strength in case it came to that. “Go away,” he croaked out. “Just go away.”
The drug peddler laughed and shuffled on.
They moved again, ten or twelve of the travelers flocking onto another bus. Hernán remembered a man with a wooden leg holding up the line as he tried to climb in. The handlers muttered curses and threatened to leave his ass behind. Isela helped the man up the stairs finally.
The bus carried them through what looked like a banana plantation. That night they slept in a barn, in hammocks hung from the rafters. The slings were big and sturdy, and the four managed to claim one hammock for themselves.
Isela and Hernán lay with their heads at opposite ends, Albert and Andrea between them. Albert had grown hollow-eyed and quiet, but Andrea scooted up toward Hernán’s head.
“Is this what camping is like?” she whispered, sounding more excited than at any point in their journey.
Hernán managed to return a small smile. “Sort of. I went camping with my uncle and my cousin Rudy once. We had to sleep in bags on the ground and I told my cousin to watch out for snakes. He screamed and couldn’t rest all night.” Andrea giggled and snuggled in against Hernán’s chest.
They woke to growling stomachs and parched mouths. Albert stayed close to Isela wherever the young woman went, and sat at her feet when Isela was still. Andrea explored a little more, but never wandered far from Hernán’s sight.
Around midmorning, a woman entered the barn with a tray in her hands and a plastic bag over her shoulder. The tray held packets wrapped in foil, which she offered around for a dollar each. Bottles of water were also a dollar. Hernán pulled some of his carefully hidden money out of his underwear and bought four packets and two waters.
Peeling open the foil, he found a tamale filled with a little shredded chicken. He ate it quickly, and then helped Albert and Andrea get theirs open. Isela split her tamale in half, and divided one portion between the children. Hernán immediately felt guilty, but he was still hungry. He turned to ask the woman if there was more food, but she set aside her empty tray.
The day dragged slowly, listlessly. The four sipped carefully from one of the bottles of water, unsure when they would find more.
The barn erupted into unexpected movement around mid-afternoon. Suddenly handlers began jostling and herding a group of about fifteen passengers—including their little family—onto a boat. It sat low in the water as they climbed on, one at a time.
Hernán was last. When he stepped from the dock to the stairs, water sloshed over the edge. The boat had a small pilothouse and a single cabin below deck, which the coyotes claimed for themselves. Hernán told the children to stay close and maneuvered his brood to the stern, where a few ragged life preservers hung.
One of the handlers passed around damp blankets that smelled of mold, and they managed to claim two. Isela tucked the children between Hernán and herself, blankets around them.
The boat roared away from shore and cut into the night. Hernán had only been on a few boats in his life, and this one seemed to him to be going too fast. It was so dark he couldn’t imagine how the captain knew where he was going. He began to wonder what would happen to them all if the boat were to capsize far from shore. He looked around for more life vests or preservers but spotted nothing.
It began to rain, and Isela tugged one blanket up over their heads to try to keep them dry. Hernán muttered thanks and she nodded. The boat roared on and on through the dark and the rain. It began to feel like a terrible dream from which he couldn’t wake.
By the time the rain ended, Albert was asleep but Andrea sat rigidly against him, trembling. He put an arm around her, trying to convey calm he didn’t feel.
It had to have been midnight when the engine cut low and motored to a small dock. They seemed to be in a desolate stretch of jungle, with no sign of habitations around them. One of the coyotes began to refuel the boat from canisters lodged in the sand, while another led the pollos in among the dark and menacing trees. They didn’t go very far, however, before their path opened into a clearing and a small house.
The handler ushered them all inside and gestured at jugs of water and bags containing rice, beans and a few vegetables. “Cook outside only,” he growled before returning to the boat.
One of the women strode over to the supplies and hefted a bag. She gave the few other women, including Isela, a challenging glare. Obeying her silent command, they scurried over to gather the remaining supplies, and then followed the natural leader outside. The men shifted around bags and blankets, making nests. Hernán took Albert and Andrea a few steps into the jungle to use the bathroom.
Later, the women served up small plates of rice and beans. It wasn’t much food, but Hernán was grateful to have it. Isela sat next to Albert with her own little plate.
“Thank you,” he whispered to her.
She gave him a little smile. “It’s nice to do something normal like cook.” She tilted her head at the woman who had chivvied the others into helping her prepare food. “That one reminds me of my aunt. Bossy but usually right.”
Morning brought strange birdcalls and slight rustlings in the brush near the clearing. No animals appeared though. The pollos wordlessly prepared themselves for a departure. They waited. And waited. Once again they were subject to the handlers’ pleasure, with no clues or explanation. Hernán took the children into the jungle to explore and keep them busy, while Isela tended to their meager belongings and prepared more food with the other women.
The morning gave way to stifling heat, with their group napping fitfully. The jungle had begun to darken around them once more when the handlers stirred everyone up. “Let’s go, let’s go,” they said loudly, tugging and pulling until everyone reloaded the boat. The engine fired up and they roared off again.
Isela had managed to fill their water bottles from the jugs in the little house, so the second trip was a little less miserable. They roared over the waves, hour after hour.
Hernán somehow slept. He woke when the pitch of the engine dropped, to find the handlers guiding the boat toward a dock lined with warehouses. Wherever they were, it seemed more industrial than other places they had stopped.
The boat veered off and puttered toward a dark shore instead of the dock, away from lights and, presumably, naval checks or a coast guard patrol. When the hull scraped on sand, the coyotes emerged from below deck and started pushing the passengers off.
“Where are we?” Hernán asked one.
“Oaxaca” was all the answer he got.
Their shoes and pantlegs got wet because the boat was still several yards from shore. A coyote led the way from the water and to a street, where a series of taxicabs pulled up to take small groups. Another handler herding pollos into cabs grabbed Isela and Andrea, trying to shove them into a back seat.
“No!” Andrea screamed, kicking and writhing. She got away from the smuggler and ran to Hernán, but the door slammed and the cab pulled away with Isela inside. He saw her pale face looking back at them through the rear window, mouth open, tears on her cheeks. Andrea sobbed against his leg.
He had no time to react.
He looked around wildly for someone to help, but the next cab pulled up and the smuggler angrily waved Hernán and the children into it. Guilt choked him. Hernán tried to ask for Isela but the smuggler shoved him down and into the back seat, and then slammed the door.
The taxi drove through the night and eventually pulled up to a small house at the edge of a field. A votive candle glowed and flickered on a low table near the door. A small statue of a human skeleton, draped in a red cloth, stood propped next to the candle.
Hernán stiffened. Even from outside, he read the signs.
This was a house where Santa Muerte was worshipped.