“Listen, everyone,” Estelle said as we lurched into second gear, “from now on, we have to start acting like a team in which every member is valued and respected. We’re heading into dangerous territory and we need to be able to depend on each other.”
Allen leaned over and whispered, “Does that mean no more Susan jokes?”
“Well, at least less,” I whispered back.
“In Ocotal,” Tim was saying, “we’ll be very close to the border. We’ll probably hear some sporadic gunfire throughout the night, which doesn’t necessarily mean anything. The Contras keep it up as a form of psychological warfare. The townspeople are used to it, but they’re also ready for an attack at any time. Since the revolution, the Contras have made three serious attempts to take Ocotal, establish it as their capital, and then call for international recognition.”
“And so it’s really important,” Estelle continued, “that we stay calm but vigilant, that we look out for one another, and that we’re able to reach consensus quickly when necessary. Do you all understand?”
Everyone nodded. Solemn-faced, we drove the next hour and a half in silence, each person lost in the jungle of their private thoughts. Eventually, we turned off the Pan American highway and headed east on a smaller road to Ocotal. At the outskirts of the town, we heard a loud bang and Tina gasped in horror. The truck veered onto the shoulder of the road and then stopped. There were no further bangs.
“I believe our tire just blew out,” Lenny said, mostly for Tina’s benefit.
We all jumped out of the truck to examine the tire, which was as flat as a tortilla. Naturally, there wasn’t a spare. After a few minutes, the driver whose name was Enrique motioned everyone to get back in.
“
Está bien. No problema,”
he said, lighting another cigar from the stub of the one he’d been smoking since we left Esteli.
“I think he means to drive on it,” Allen said. “Won’t that damage the rim?”
“You’re thinking like a North American,” I told him.
Richard sighed. “We have no way to fix it out here.”
“Well, how far is it to the hotel?” Liz asked.
After a brief discussion, we reached consensus. We would leave our luggage on the truck and walk alongside it into town.
Finally, we were beginning to act like a team.
***
I guessed the population of Ocotal was around fifteen thousand and was surprised when Tim said it was at least twice that. Some of the bigger streets were paved, but all of the smaller ones were still dirt. We were clearly in Sandino country now, his silhouette stenciled on houses, stores and restaurants. Pro-revolutionary graffiti declaring allegiance to the Sandinistas and that Nicaragua was not for sale and would not surrender was scrawled across almost every adobe house we passed. On the side streets, many of the buildings were riddled with bullet holes or had large chunks of plaster missing. Red and black FSLN banners were tacked over doorways fluttering defiantly in the breeze. Live free or die, the official motto of New Hampshire, took on a whole new meaning here.
As we crossed the main square, we saw a number of civilians with knives or guns tucked into their waistbands hurrying to their various destinations. No one dawdled in Ocotal. Even the children seemed unnaturally alert, as if they were ready to drop whatever game they were playing to run home and help defend their families. At the edge of the square, a group of impossibly young soldiers in full camouflage were laughing and smoking cigarettes. Tim told us the locals referred to them as
los cachorros
, Sandinista “wolf cubs.”
As we drew closer, two soldiers wearing heavy looking ammunition belts across their chests approached Veronica and offered her a cigarette, which she politely declined. As we proceeded past them, they whistled and clapped. Tina stumbled self-consciously and they clapped even harder, grinning without a hint of malevolence. In a country at peace, they would be teenagers hanging on a street corner, sharing a bottle of rum, and whistling at every female no matter how old or young, plain or pretty.
According to Estelle, the last attack on the town had occurred a few months ago, but in the past week the Contras had booby-trapped the door to a kindergarten which exploded when the teacher opened it, killing her and injuring the students who were with her. As I walked along, I thought I knew how someone from Boston or New York might have felt entering a town like Tombstone, Arizona in the mid-1800s: excited, fully alive and a little bit scared. Ocotal was a town where anything could happen at any time. In other words, it was my kind of place.
Our hotel was a large dilapidated house that had once belonged to a Somoza supporter who’d fled the country. There were five bedrooms on the first floor arranged in a semicircle around a crumbling courtyard. The upstairs was empty and unused. The only available bathroom was in a separate outhouse that could, if necessary, seat up to three people at a time.
After a late supper, we returned to the hotel and agreed we’d be ready to leave at six in the morning. We had no idea when our army escort might arrive, but we didn’t want to hold them up.
The room I shared with Liz had two sagging cots and a bureau that was missing half its drawers. My cot was even more uncomfortable (if that was possible) than the one I’d slept on at Sonia’s. I had no illusions, however, about sleeping on the floor. I’d already seen three scorpions and a tan-colored tarantula the size of my fist in the hallway.
We turned the light off at ten thirty. I flopped around on my cot, trying to find the least unbearable position to sleep in. At midnight, I heard a single gunshot followed by a succession of rapid bursts that sounded like a machine gun. A moment later, I heard three more shots, and then another round of bursts. Both Liz and I sat up in bed.
“Would you characterize that as sporadic?” Liz asked.
“Define sporadic,” I said, turning on the light.
“Occasional.”
There was another volley of shots followed by a small explosion. We both jumped out of our cots and started getting dressed.
“How far away do you think it is?” I asked.
“I can’t tell from here. Let’s go out into the courtyard.”
“Okay, let me just find my sandals.”
When we got outside, most of the group was huddled around the empty fountain, their faces pale and serious. Allen and Lenny were still buttoning their shirts and zipping up their pants. Tina was hunched over, holding her stomach as if she might throw up. Richard was trying to comfort her. I noticed Susan’s shirt was inside out and her sandals were on the wrong feet. A few yards behind them, Veronica was walking in a circle, praying quietly.
“Has anyone seen Tim and Estelle?” I asked.
Susan pointed across the courtyard to the front of the house. “They’re over there, conferring.”
The gunshots sounded louder out here, but I still couldn’t tell how close they were. There was another small explosion that lit up the sky, followed by more gunshots. A few townspeople were shouting in the street. Tim and Estelle finished talking and hurried back to us.
“We’re going to run over to the mayor’s house,” Estelle told us, “and see if we can find out what’s happening. Everybody needs to stay put until we get back. Okay?” Both she and Tim were dressed in dark green shirts and pants that they must have bought at the army store in Boulder.
“Oh my God,” Tina whimpered.
“Do you think we’ll have to evacuate?” Lenny asked. His face was lined with worry. All our faces had aged a little in the past few weeks. The day I left Colorado, Vickie warned that I was jumping from the frying pan into the fire. “In which case,” I joked, “I’ll probably feel right at home.” She’d sighed and then wished me good luck, which I now thought for the first time I might need.
“I have no idea,” Tim was saying. “Right now, the fighting is at least half a mile away. If it gets any closer, we’ll consider it.”
“Isn’t this close enough?” Tina asked, her voice quivering with fear.
“Jesus, get a grip,” Susan muttered.
Richard turned to his wife and said, “Shut up, bunny. I mean it.”
“Well she doesn’t belong here,” Susan said.
“Maybe not,” he conceded, “but she’s here anyway.”
Liz put her arm around Tina’s shoulder. “What should we do in the meantime?” she asked Estelle.
There was a long burst of machine-gun fire that seemed to last forever. When it stopped, Estelle suggested we all find hiding places until she and Tim returned.
“But don’t leave the grounds,” Estelle repeated. “Unless it’s an emergency.”
Veronica looked pale and scared, but was staying calm. “My bedroom door is so warped, it won’t even close.”
Richard took her hand. “There are plenty of places to hide upstairs.” He turned to the rest of us. “Come on, let’s go.”
Liz began pushing Tina toward the front of the house. “I need to find my first-aid kit. I think it’s in the kitchen. I’ll take Tina with me.”
There was more shouting in the street and a couple of neighborhood dogs had begun to howl. Estelle and Tim rushed off, and then everyone else ran toward the house. I was standing alone in the middle of the courtyard watching the sky, wondering why I wasn’t scared. Maybe it was too unreal, or maybe I’d lost the ability. I knew it wasn’t smart to remain outside, but I didn’t think I was in any imminent danger. A few minutes later, I heard a couple of sirens going off and wondered if they signaled something new or if they’d suddenly just started working. There was so much noise now that in an odd dissonant way it seemed eerily quiet, almost peaceful. My heart was beating faster than normal, but it wasn’t an unpleasant sensation, more like a state of high alert, as if I’d just downed a twenty-ounce cup of coffee.
Then the night lit up with another explosion that sounded closer than the ones before. I thought of Sonia and decided to hide in the outhouse. I crossed the courtyard and tried the outhouse door, which was locked. I knocked and heard Allen ask, “Who’s there?”
“Me,” I said.
A second later, I heard the door unlock. “What if I’d been a Contra?” I asked, sitting down on a plank of wood between the toilets.
Allen sat down next to me. “You wouldn’t have understood my question.”
“Right, but then I would have shot you.”
Allen thought for a moment. “You’re not supposed to shoot North Americans.”
“Gee, I’m really sorry.”
We heard a large boom, more shouting, and then people running through the courtyard. Allen grabbed my hand as we propped our feet against the outhouse door. We paid close attention, but no one seemed to be lingering. Eventually we relaxed a little, but continued to sit without speaking, listening intently to the erratic sound of gunfire, of rockets exploding in the air, and imagining various scenarios that might or might not be happening. After about forty minutes, the gunfire began to subside.
Allen broke the silence first. “There’s a huge hairy spider on the wall across from us.” Although it was dark, our eyes had adjusted and we could see more than we wanted to.
“I know,” I said. “I’ve been watching him.”
“He’s really enormous.”
“I know.”
“Bigger than a catcher’s mitt.”
I nodded. “Maybe we should go outside. It’s probably safe now.”
Allen hesitated. “I think we should wait a little longer, although if he comes any closer, I’ll probably change my mind.”
“All right,” I said, “but don’t wait until he’s within striking distance.”
Allen let go of my hand. “Rachel?” He sounded very young.
“Yeah?”
“I think I might not be suited to a long-term commitment here. I think maybe I’ll stay for another month and then go to law school and become a public defender. Like you were.”
“It’s a plan,” I said.
“What about you?”
I shrugged like a native. “
No se.” I don’t know.
“Do you think I’d make a good public defender?”
“Yes, but don’t stay too long.” I paused. “It’s amazing, isn’t it, how we can choose to come here and put ourselves at risk and how we can decide to leave whenever we’ve had enough.”
Allen blew out a long breath. “Whew, that’s pretty privileged, isn’t it?”
“Obscenely privileged, but don’t waste your time feeling guilty. It doesn’t help.”
We could hear Estelle calling everyone to come out of hiding. As if we’d been playing an extended game of hide-and-seek and it was late now, time to go home and be somebody’s kid again. Time for supper and then a bedtime story with a happy ending.
Come out, come out, wherever you are.
“How will we get past the spider?” Allen asked.
“I don’t know. Let’s just make a run for it.”
After we were all together again, we learned that the Contras had attacked a farming co-op on the edge of town and destroyed their grain silo. Eight people had been killed, five had been wounded. A woman and her teenaged daughter were missing.
“It was terrible,” Tim said, shaking his head, “but as a group we were never in immediate danger.” He looked at his watch. “It’s almost two. We should all try to get a few hours of shuteye.”
Liz and I both fell asleep with our clothes on. When my alarm clock beeped at five thirty, I wanted to smash it against the floor. I felt dangerously tired. My eyes burned as if I’d spent the night in a sandstorm. My limbs refused to obey even the simplest command.
Liz groaned as she sat up. “God, I dreamed I was working at the hospital and everyone on the ward had a heart attack at the same time.”
“What did you do?” I asked, my face still pressed against the mattress.
“I think I was running around trying to decide which patient to save first.”
“Do you think you could peel me off this mattress?”
Liz helped roll me out of bed, and then we packed up and walked out into the courtyard. The sun was just beginning to rise against a pink and orange sky. Tim and Estelle were sitting cross-legged on the ground, leaning against each other, looking tired but resolute. They’d been holding hands, but stopped when they saw us.
As soon as everyone was present, they shared the bad news: the Contras had taken over a stretch of road between Ocotal and Jalapa. Nobody was allowed to go through until the Contras were driven back into Honduras. The army wanted us to wait at least another week before escorting us to Jalapa. Everyone was silent.