Beto and Luca are sitting on one of the black leather couches behind them, playing some game about cars, but they can feel the strange tremor of agitation in the room, and they are drawn to it. They appear magnetically, one on each side of Lydia.
‘What’s wrong, Mami?’ Luca asks.
‘Nothing, amorcito, no te preocupes.’
But Beto, who’s accustomed to having to work things out without people explaining them to him, looks at the stacks of money on the counter, and then at Lydia’s face, and then at El Chacal, and says, ‘How much is she short?’
El Chacal lifts his phone from the counter and reads from the screen – ‘Three hundred and seventy-two dollars’ – and then sets the phone back down.
‘How much is that in pesos?’ Beto asks.
The coyote does the math. ‘About seven thousand five hundred.’
Beto goes into his pocket and flicks out his wad of cash while Lydia watches. He already paid for his crossing and still has money to burn. We just met this kid this morning, she thinks. He doesn’t even understand how much money this is. She rejects her misgivings instantly. He covers it.
She draws him in and hugs him. ‘Thank you.’
El Chacal tells them they’ll cross when the other pollitos arrive, and they should make themselves comfortable while they wait. He leaves them with almost no instruction, and after he’s gone, Lydia wonders if he’ll ever come back. They’ve given him everything, their very last chance of escaping to el norte. He doesn’t seem like a thief, but what if he is? Or what if he gets hit by a bus? She balls her hands into fists and tells herself to shut up. Don’t think.
They all take their shoes off as soon as the coyote is gone, and it’s incredible what a pleasure it is to be barefoot. To wiggle your toes freely without constraint. Con un olor a queso. Luca and Beto run up and down the hallway between the kitchen and the bedrooms, feeling the cool tiles beneath their sticky feet, and making tiny footprints of phantom condensation along the floor. Soledad tucks in her T-shirt and shows them a trick she can do: a handstand against the wall, her arms strong beneath her. The boys applaud. When they try to watch TV, they discover that the flat screen doesn’t work. Lydia finds a dog-eared paperback in one of the kitchen drawers and reads while the boys and sisters nap. It’s an older novel, a Stephen King book Lydia read many years ago, and slipping back into it is briefly transporting, like she can reach back through time and commune with the person she was when she first read it. That act of communion feels both lucky and holy. When the others awaken, she abandons the book with some reluctance, leaves it facedown on the couch, cracked open at the spine to page 73. They all look forward to taking showers, and are disappointed to find there’s no hot water. There’s also no food or pots, and only one frying pan in the kitchen, but Lydia heats up what little water she can in that, so they can sponge the dust and the sweat from their skin. They eat nothing, contenting themselves with the relatively recent memory of the birria, and fall asleep as the sun sets.
Early the next morning, just as they’re discussing how and what to eat, the door opens, and Lydia buckles with relief when El Chacal descends the four steps, followed by two men and an older woman. He’s still here. He hasn’t abandoned them. This relief is soon followed by fear: Who are these people? Lydia watches them for clues, for recognition. The men seem to know each other. They are young and wear their baseball caps low over their eyes, talking quietly together while ignoring the others. Long sleeves and jeans hide any possible tattoos. Lydia experiences a trigger-wash of nausea, but it’s chased off by her hunger.
‘Don’t go far,’ the coyote says. ‘If you’re not here when it’s time to go, we won’t wait.’
It’s tense in the apartment after El Chacal leaves. The sisters and Luca retreat to the bedroom where they slept last night, and the new woman locks herself in the bathroom. Lydia wants to find out all she can about the newcomers, but she also wants to keep her distance, to remain imperceptible and vague. And anyway, she’s hungry. Luca is hungry.
‘Are you hungry?’ she asks the new men, who are seated on the couch.
They are.
‘I will cook, if you have money for food.’
She will make omelets. A warm morsel of familiarity for Luca. The men give her some pesos, and she and Luca set out to find a grocery store.
‘Wear your new boots,’ she tells him. ‘Let’s break them in.’
They’re only a half a block from the apartment when they hear someone calling out behind them.
‘¡Hola! Perdón, señora, ¡disculpe!’
Lydia turns with trepidation and finds the new woman from the apartment hurrying toward them. ‘I thought I might come with you if you don’t mind,’ the woman says. ‘I need to get a few things myself.’ She carries a purple handbag and is dressed as if going out for a nice meaclass="underline" black trousers, an oversize blouse, and wedge sandals. She’s slim and dark-skinned with short-cropped hair, black with sparks of silver. A gold bracelet on one wrist is too understated to be fake. She looks nothing like a migrant, Lydia thinks, and then remembers that neither does she. Or at least she didn’t when first they embarked on this journey.
‘I’m Marisol.’ The bracelet dangles when the woman extends her hand for Lydia to shake.
‘Lydia.’
‘Mucho gusto.’
‘And this is my son, Luca.’
‘Hello, Luca!’
At the corner, an elderly gentleman sits in his doorway, and Lydia asks him to point the way to the nearest shop. He does.
‘I need to buy fruit,’ Marisol says as they walk. ‘I’m used to eating salad every day, and my stomach has been all messed up since I got back.’
‘Back?’ Lydia asks.
‘From California.’
‘Oh! You were in California already?’
‘Yes, sixteen years,’ she says. ‘I’m practically a gabacha now.’
They both laugh.
‘But then why did you come back?’ Lydia asks.
‘Not by choice.’
Lydia winces.
‘My daughters are still there, in San Diego.’ She reaches into a side pocket of her purse and draws out an iPhone with a shiny case. She unlocks it with her thumb and scrolls to a photograph of two beautiful young girls, perhaps close in age to Soledad and Rebeca. She shows them to Lydia proudly. The younger one is wearing a quinceañera dress.
‘That’s my Daisy,’ she says. ‘She wanted to wear a Chiapas dress for her birthday, even though she was born in San Diego. She doesn’t even speak Spanish!’ She closes the phone and returns it to her purse. ‘And my older one, América, she’s in college now, trying to take care of her younger sister, trying to take care of the house.’ Marisol’s voice sounds thick and tired.