Authors: Jinx Schwartz
“
Mañana
.
Mañana
...” They howled the chorus as if baying at the cloud-shrouded moon, then stopped to share a hit from a large bottle of Sauza Commemorotivo Tequila. As they passed the jug, distant coyote howls echoed across the desert, as if in response. This sent the two men into spasms of laughter. “What time is it?” Freddie gasped, wiping tears of glee from his cheeks and squinting at the moon.
“Hell if I know. I don’t even know what
day
it is. Shit, we been drunk since last Thursday.”
The two friends, after a long weekend in Sonora fishing and drinking, were returning to the States via Douglas when they took a wrong turn onto a dirt road and rolled their Jeep. They tried, unsuccessfully, to push the heavy vehicle back onto its tires, gave up, and thanked their lucky stars the tequila didn’t break. After walking in circles for an hour, they spotted two burros in a rickety corral and Freddie, a farm-grown New Mexican, rounded up the friendly beasts and fitted them with rope halters.
The ever-so-gay caballeros were just breaking into another song when they were blinded by enough candlepower to light the desert for miles, and automatic weapon-brandishing soldiers in desert fatigues surrounded them.
Freddie stared dumbly at the guns and wheedled, “Shit, man, don’t shoot. We was gonna give the jackasses back.”
Fifteen miles from the great burro bust, two men and a woman shrouded in dark clothing neared the border. They had traveled north for ten days on foot, by bus, and cadged rides in the beds of decrepit pickups. Even though they were extremely penurious, their meager stash of pesos dwindled until they could no longer afford food at the last border town, nor a place to stay. They had money, though. A cashier’s check in dollars they'd cash at a convenience store—and they knew which one—in Sierra Vista.
A kind priest gave them tortillas and beans the day before, and offered to pay their bus fares back to southern Mexico, but they refused. They were too near their goal to give up now.
They had a plan, and a promise of work in a place called Maria-lan. They were to take a bus from Sierra Vista to a city named Boltimora where they were promised employment paying thirty dollars a day! For only ten hours a day of easy work: Isabel sewing and her husband packing boxes.
Isabel, so fatigued that her legs were numb, barely kept pace with her husband, Miguel, and her brother, Jorge. Unknown to her traveling companions, she was experiencing stomach pains. “Jorge,” she called softly, gritting her teeth against a sharp cramp, “Are we near?”
“I think so. Stay close behind me. I found a coyote trail. We will be across by dawn.” Jorge heard the strain in his sister's voice and wished he had water for her.
How does she stay on her feet?
he asked himself. But he knew the answer: sheer determination.
Miguel was very worried about his wife, as well. They had eaten nothing since the day before, and their water ran out twelve hours ago. He stopped and patted her shoulder, but she gently pushed him forward.
Thank the saints it is not summer
, he thought.
Dios mio, please let there be water in the river. But not too much.
Isabel grunted as a spasm hit her.
Please God, let us find the river soon.
Jorge knew they were somewhere near the San Pedro River, for he had carefully plotted their route on the ragged 1995 AAA road map in his pocket. He planned on following the riverbed until they crossed the border, and then continuing north along the banks until they were even with Sierra Vista. Only then could they brave the road. He prayed all night that the clouds gathering over the mountains were not dumping rain, water that might rush down arroyos into the river. He knew about flash floods.
Isabel longed for the comfort of her home in Chiapas, the family she’d left there, and her mother’s soft touch. Mama protested long and loud against this trip, even calling in the priest to plead her case.
Now, as she plodded painfully after Jorge, Isabel could almost hear her mother’s plaintive cries. “Isabel, this is
loco
,” her mama wailed when she heard of their plan. “You’ll never make it. And if you do, the
norteamericanos
will arrest you. They are animals who hate small brown people. I have heard this. And there are Mexicans...Mexicans! who do worse. You might die.
Jesús, Maria y Jose
, please make this child listen to her mother.”
“Mama,” Isabel said, “I am not a child. Jorge knows the way so we won’t have to pay a coyote, and Miguel will take care of me. And we will be very careful, I promise. We must go.”
“Let Jorge and Miguel go,
hija
. When they have jobs they can send for you.”
“No, Mama, Miguel is my husband and I will follow him.”
Isabel’s eyes stung as she thought of her mother’s sobs, then Jorge’s voice broke the desert silence.
“Isabel. Miguel.
Dios mio
, we have found it. We have found Rio San Pedro,” he whispered.
The three young people slid down a steep embankment and landed in a puddle of water. Quenching their thirst, then filling the plastic bottles dangling from the men’s belts, their spirits soared. The river was a major landmark, a milestone in their trek to the land of promise. They took a minute to pray, thanking God for their good fortune.
As they followed the riverbed, Miguel’s confidence rose. They would indeed make it to a new life, a life free from the hardships of the past few years. When the Mexican economy took a downward turn and the peso devaluated against the dollar, the small factories in his town suffered losses, and jobs were lost. Miguel’s family, as well as Isabel’s and Jorge’s, were forced to sell their homes and combine their meager assets. They built a complex of scrap wood and sheet metal on an unimproved lot owned by Miguel’s father. Fifteen members of three families lived there, waiting out the Mexican recession.
When Jorge and Miguel, the only two family members who still had jobs, were laid off from the shoe factory, the situation turned from uncomfortable to desperate. Isabel, Miguel and Jorge decided on going to the east coast of the United States, where Isabel’s uncle lived.
Boltimora, Tio Francisco wrote in his letters, was a wonderful place and his job, removing asbestos from old buildings, easy. For such easy work he was paid five dollars an hour. And sometimes they allowed him to work twelve hours a day! In one day a man earned more than he would for a week’s work in Mexico. It was the uncle who arranged for their jobs at a shirt factory in Baltimora, and sent them the cashier’s check for five hundred dollars. All they had to do was get to Sierra Vista, cash the check, get on a bus to Marialand, and start new lives.
The trio did not plan falling victim of either coyotes or the Border Patrol. Tio Francisco, a man wise to
norteamericano
ways, supplied the travelers with a stylish backpacks chock full of things needed to evade capture. At dawn, they would ditch their telltale plastic water bottles and dark Mexican clothes. From the carefully guarded packs they'd don black spandex shorts, Fila tee shirts, headbands, sunglasses, and tennis shoes. In the backpacks were brightly colored, insulated water bottles, and a pair of well-used binoculars to sling around their necks. They planned to walk boldly along the San Pedro, then the highway, and right into the heart of Sierra Vista, disguised as bird watchers. Jorge spent a great deal of time teaching his fellow travelers how to hold their heads high, look like they belonged.
Another hour passed in silence, the trio carefully picking their way along the steep bank, when, from the very desert sand, it seemed, armed people in uniforms materialized. Even though the soldiers told them to stay calm, that they would not be hurt, it was all too much for Isabel, who screamed and fell to the desert floor.
Startled soldiers and Border Patrol agents rushed to her side and, cradling Isabel’s head in the crook of his arm, a young soldier yelled, “Sir, this girl is really pregnant!”
“Oh, for God’s...” her superior started to say, but was cut off by an unearthly scream from Isabel.
A female Border Patrol agent wrapped Isabel in a blanket from their van, and a soldier offered water from his canteen. Miguel and Jorge, handcuffed and helpless, knelt by her side and softly whispered reassurances they did not feel.
Isabel screamed again, and a Hispanic medic bent to ask her a few questions. She gripped his hand and mumbled something in Spanish. He answered, “You are in Arizona,
señora
.”
Isabel crossed herself, smiled and said, “In that case, I will now have this baby.”
Lalo, Flaco and Franco—also known as Edwardo Robles, Dwayne Hicks, and Frank Stevens, in their hometown of Phoenix—cruised slowly through the small town of Palominas, Arizona, fifteen miles south of Sierra Vista. Less than five miles from the border, the dusty village boasted only scattered homes and few businesses. At four in the morning there was no other traffic on the highway dividing the town. Taking a right turn off the pavement, Lalo cut his headlights, geared down the little Toyota extended cab 4x4 pickup and guided his oversized tires along a rough dirt road that soon tapered off to a goat path.
“You sure that damned balloon is down?” Flaco asked from the jump seat behind Nacho.
“Shit, man, you saw for yourself. Damned thing looked like a pregnant whale sittin’ there on the ground.”
“How you know they ain’t got two?”
“There ain’t two,
stupido
. Just like there weren’t no cops in ole Sorry Vista,” Lalo bragged. He’d been warned to watch it in Sierra Vista, a small town teeming with cops on the lookout for trouble. And three young men—one white, one brown and one black—cruising around in a souped-up 4x4 with Phoenix plates fairly screamed trouble.
“Got that right, dude. Mexico, here we come.”
Thin clouds scudded overhead, giving the boys both a break and an added hazard. The moon, only a few days from full, was a little too bright for a successful covert run across the desert. But while clouds darkened things up, they also obscured Lalo’s vision. They knew they would probably be picked up on someone’s radar, but they were set to run a blockade if necessary. Envisioning themselves as modern day moonshiners versus the revenuers, they were heavily armed and ready for a confrontation with a couple of federales if necessary.
“Lalo, Jesus Christ, man, slow down,” Flaco yelled, when his head hit the pickup’s head liner.
“No can do,
hermano
. We gotta get across, dump the goods and get on back. Quit worryin’. Once we’re in Mexico we’re home free.”
“You gonna kill us before we get there.”
“Shut up and hang on. And get ready with them guns in case some shit comes down.”
“You got it, brother,” Franco grinned. “We gonna come back fuckin’ rich, man.”
“We ain’t gonna come back at all if we fuckin’ dead, man,” Flaco reminded him.
Lalo grunted. Driving without lights at a high rate of speed across the night desert took his complete concentration. Flaco just better hold on.
The Toyota went airborne, soared off the edge of an arroyo and landed in a dry creek bed. The big tires hit, bounced, and dug in, throwing up a hail of sand and rocks. Cresting the other side of the ravine, Lalo howled a curse when he saw a line of vehicles and armed men blocking their path.
“Shit, man. Blast their asses. We’re goin’ around ‘em,” he yelled, swerving the pickup so Franco’s side of the truck faced the blinding spotlights of the blockade.
Franco swung a sawed-off shotgun out of the open window and got off one shot before both the front windshield, and his head, exploded. Lalo, screaming as glass slivers hit his eyes, let go of the steering wheel and stomped for the brake, but hit the gas pedal. The truck skidded in several directions, broadsided a Border Patrol utility vehicle and shoved it twenty feet, sending task force members flying in all directions before it ground to a stop.
Flaco was the lucky one, suffering only a few broken bones. Lalo lived, but the last thing he saw in his life were those blinding lights before the windshield exploded. Franco died. And their cargo of stolen handguns never reached the cartel’s narco punks who ordered them.
Dawn found Don Vaughn and his wife, Sheran, waiting in a line of traffic at the Douglas, Arizona, border crossing. The night before, they parked their 32’ RV in the center of a small Sonoran village, stayed the night, and got an early start for the border. Completely self-contained, their RV needed neither electrical nor water hookups, and the Vaughns found that many small Mexican villages let them stay overnight near the town plaza in hopes they'd shop in the local
tiendas
and eat in the cafes. They did both.
“Would you look at that line?” Don groused. He specifically picked Douglas as their reentry point into the States because, unlike Nogales, there was usually little traffic. They had to be in Denver in two days for their daughter’s wedding, and he wanted to get on down the road.
“You threw away those hot dogs, didn’t you?” Sheran asked, checking her list of forbidden food items.
“Fed ‘em to that skinny dog last night.”
“Good. I put everything we bought in Mexico near the door for Customs. Let’s see,” she checked her handwritten list, “I have a ristra of red chile peppers for Anne’s kitchen, that three foot string of garlic you say stinks, five terra cotta pots, two hand-embroidered dresses, a silver bracelet, ten tee shirts from Acapulco for the grandchildren, and a set of painted dishes from Guadalajara. Can you think of anything else?”