American Dirt : A Novel (2020) (15 page)

In the backseat of Papi’s orange Volkswagen Beetle in Acapulco, Luca had his own little safety harness system. A bright blue cushion with monkeys on it that Papi had unfolded and somehow permanently affixed to the seat. When he was little, Luca liked the monkeys, the cushioned straps that went over his head and then around his waist. He felt snug in there. But last summer he started begging to be rid of the thing. It was babyish, he insisted. He was big enough to wear a regular seat belt now, he said. Luca watches the last hip of the now-silent train disappear around a distant bend, and cannot make sense of anything.

Chapter Twelve

Even if they knew how long it might be before the next
train, they cannot conceive of boarding La Bestia now that they’ve seen how it’s done. Lydia thinks it over while they walk the seven miles to Huehuetoca. Would she put Luca on the ladder first? She would have to; there’s no way she could jump on and leave him standing beneath the train without her. Could she run and climb on if he held on to her neck, his legs wrapped tightly around her waist? It seems physically impossible. Each time she tries to picture it, the fantasy ends the same way. Butchery.

Luca distracts himself from how tired his legs are becoming by looking at the unusual sights. They pass a place that’s full of every kind of statue: bears, lions, cowboys, dolphins, angels, crocodiles. They pass some men who are laying bricks to build a wall. They pass a woman who’s vacuuming instead of sweeping her front step, which makes Luca squeeze Mami’s hand so she’ll see it, too. When they pass a school and Luca sees some kids playing
f
ú
tbol
in the yard, he realizes it’s Thursday, and that he should be in school in Acapulco, and Papi should be picking him up this afternoon because Thursday is Papi’s day to pick him up, and sometimes Papi buys him
galletas
and they eat them on the way home if he promises not to tell Mami. After that, Luca doesn’t look at the sights anymore. He watches his feet even though the sun feels hot on the back of his neck, and it takes them almost three hours to walk to Huehuetoca.

When they arrive, they easily find the place they’re looking for, as it sits neatly beside the railroad tracks behind a wind-whipped green fence. The Casa del Migrante is a gathering of tents and simple structures on a large, flat parcel of land that’s saved from being beautiful only by the utilitarian character of its buildings. The wide road that separates the
casa
from the railroad tracks is of dirt and rubble, and it’s empty as far as Luca can see. It’s flat here for a long stretch, but in the distance, when he allows his eyes to follow the tracks to the horizon, Luca can see the landscape erupt upward on both sides. The clouds, puffy and brilliant, come down to meet it. There are bald fields all around and behind the
casa,
and on the far side of the tracks as well, but Luca can see that the soil has been tended, turned, striped with darker bands of earth where the farmers will sow their crops at the right season. There’s a rich mineral scent on the wind.

Luca and Lydia cross the parched road hand in hand and approach the chain link fence that’s been woven through with strips of green plastic so it’s no longer transparent. Three strings of barbed wire cut through the air atop the fence, and two signs hang beneath it. The first is a cloudy, sunstruck blue, and has a painting of Jesus and Mary, so Luca expects it to be a blessing, but it says:
Brother Migrant, we will watch over you and protect you from polleros, guides, and coyotes so that you may enjoy a happy stay here with our hospitality. Anyone found to be in transgression of these specifications will be handed over to the appropriate authorities. May God protect you on your journey!

The second sign is much less flowery, a list of rules written in
a plain black font, so long that its only decoration, a red banner at the very bottom, sits in direct contact with the dirt below:
welcome,
brother
and
sister
travelers!
Luca reads some of the rules at random.

•
Persons requesting admission to the casa must be migrants. From this country or other countries, or deportees from the United States.

•
Drugs and alcohol are prohibited. Anyone presenting symptoms of their use will be denied entry.

•
Please remember that this is a place of sanctuary. Here you may rest while God restores your strength for the journey yet ahead of you. Your stay here must, therefore, be transitory, and limited to a maximum of three nights.

Before he can finish reading the list, two men greet them from the far side of the fence. Only their heads are visible above the green plastic stripping. One is an older man with dark glasses and gray hair, and he does the talking.

‘
¡Bienvenida, hermana!
’ he says. He steps closer to the fence so now Luca can see his shoulders as well, between the strings of barbed wire. He’s wearing a dark blue cardigan and he smiles at them. ‘You’re in need of shelter?’

Luca nods.

‘You are migrants?’

Lydia nods, reluctantly claiming the word.

‘Here,’ the man says kindly, gesturing to his stocky younger companion to open a gate a few feet away. ‘Please come in.’

Inside the fence sits an unpainted cinder block building with open-air windows covered in sheets of black tarpaulin. It’s ugly,
and its bleak shadow steals into Luca and thieves the relief right out of him.

The older man folds his hands and speaks softly. ‘Are you in any immediate danger?’

Lydia thinks before she answers. ‘No, I don’t think so. Not right now.’

‘Do you have any immediate medical needs?’

‘No, we are healthy.’

‘
Gracias a Dios,
’ the man says.

‘Thank God,’ Lydia agrees.

‘Are you thirsty?’ He turns to walk, indicating that they should follow.

‘Yes, a little.’

They round the corner of the ugly gray building, and suddenly the space opens around them. Luca’s lungs fill up with the rush he’d been waiting for. The chain link fence that surrounds the entire compound is opaque only at the front, so he can see now, beyond its boundaries in the back, across the bare cornfields to the town of Huehuetoca nearby, its
houses clustering merrily up the hillside. Large prickly pear plants gather in clumps just outside the fence, their wide paddles cartoonishly green in the golden afternoon. The compound is much bigger than it looked from the road. There’s one white van, a small house, a chapel, a string of Porta Potties, and two gigantic warehouses.

‘Welcome to the Casa del Migrante, San Marco D’Aviano. I am Padre Rey. This is one of my helpers, N
é
stor.’

Néstor raises one hand in salute but doesn’t look at them. He keeps his eyes on Padre Rey’s black sandals.

‘We will get you something to drink right away, and you can freshen up for a few minutes.’

Luca tucks his thumbs nervously beneath the straps of his backpack.

‘Hermana Cecilia will get you registered after you’ve had a little rest.’

‘Thank you, Padre,’ Lydia says. ‘God bless you for your kindness.’

They step inside the first of the two warehouse buildings, and even though it’s well lit, it takes Luca’s eyes a few minutes to adjust. It’s the first time he’s been out of the stark sunshine all day. At a table, a boy and a girl, both younger than Luca, are coloring. The girl turns her head this way and that, admiring her artwork. A group of men and women sit at another table, some cleaning and sorting beans, others peeling carrots. Bright orange shreds collect in piles on the table. In the farthest corner of the large room, more men are watching
f
ú
tbol
. Luca and Lydia choose an empty table and sit on lime-green plastic chairs. A lady with a red coverall apron brings them two glasses of cold lemonade. It has an umber tint, but Luca gulps it gratefully anyway.

‘Dinner is at seven,’ the woman explains apologetically. ‘We can’t make any exceptions unless it’s a medical emergency.’

It’s after three o’clock in the afternoon, and they haven’t eaten since the tortillas beside the tracks early this morning. But ‘No, it’s okay, we’re fine,’ Lydia says. ‘Thank you.’

As the woman returns to the kitchen, Lydia is swamped with emotion. She swallows it with the lemonade. She examines the faces of the people at the other tables, but no one looks at her. Hermana Cecilia soon appears and brings them to her small office. She’s a tidy little woman, and her office is papered with children’s artwork. A pot on her desk holds a pink plastic flower. There are green chairs just like the ones in the big room. Hermana Cecilia’s voice is the most soothing sound Luca has ever heard, a peaceful, uninflected hum of determined protection, so that no matter what words she says, the words Luca hears are
You are safe here, you are safe here, you are safe.
From a shelf behind her desk, she produces a tub of crayons and a small stack of clean, white paper.

‘Would you like to stay here and draw?’ she asks Luca with her hum-voice. ‘Or sit in the big room with the other children?’

Luca’s hand shoots out and grabs Mami’s.

‘It’s okay,’ Hermana Cecilia says. ‘You can stay with your
mami
.’

Lydia stands to pluck the backpack from his shoulders. She encourages Luca to sit at the other desk, beside the door.

‘This way you can color,’ she says. ‘You won’t have to hold the paper on your lap.’

Luca sits, and Lydia returns to sit across from the nun, who has some paperwork and a file folder in front of her.

‘Before we begin, I want you to know that you don’t have to answer anything that makes you uncomfortable. I ask that you try, because the answers you give will help us assist more people in the future, to prepare for new patterns of arrivals. But all the information we gather here is anonymous. You needn’t give your real name unless you want to.’

Lydia nods her consent, the nun lifts the cap off her pen, and they begin.

‘Names and ages?’

Lydia gives a little twist of her neck before she responds. ‘I’m thirty-two and my son is eight.’

Hermana Cecilia writes down:
Mar
í
a, 32, y Jos
é
, 8.

‘Where are you traveling from?’

She hesitates, then asks a question of her own. ‘No one has access to these files?’

Hermana Cecilia folds her hands and leans slightly forward. ‘I assure you,
hermana,
whatever, whoever you’re worried about will never see these files. The only copy is kept locked in that filing cabinet, in this office, also locked, whenever I’m not here.’ Her eyes are blue, and they twinkle when she smiles. ‘I’m always here.’

Lydia nods. ‘We come from Acapulco.’

The nun returns to her writing. ‘What is your intended destination?’

‘We’re going to Estados Unidos.’

‘What city?’

‘Denver.’

‘A friendly city,’ the nun says. ‘Pretty there. Are you traveling for reasons of being reunited with a member of your immediate family?’

‘No.’

‘Do you have family members currently living in the United States?’

‘Yes, an uncle and two cousins.’ She hasn’t seen that uncle, Abuela’s younger brother, since she was a young girl. She’s never met his children.

‘They’re in Denver?’ Hermana Cecilia asks.

‘Yes.’

‘They are expecting you?’

‘No.’

‘Was your decision to migrate planned or spontaneous?’

‘Spontaneous.’ Lydia squeezes her clasped hands together between her thighs.

‘Was the primary reason for your journey financial?’

‘No.’

‘Was the primary reason for your journey medical?’

‘No.’

‘Was the primary reason for your journey domestic violence?’

‘No.’

‘Was the primary reason for your journey related to gang violence or recruitment?’

‘No.’ Lydia shakes her head.

‘Was the primary reason for your journey related to violence by a cartel or drug traffickers in your place of origin?’

Lydia clears her throat. ‘Yes,’ she says quietly. She can hear Luca’s crayon moving rapidly across the paper in silky strokes.

‘Are you currently in fear for your life from a specific individual or individuals?’

‘Yes.’

‘Have you received direct threats to your safety?’

Lydia nods. ‘Yes.’

‘Were the threats violent in nature?’

‘Yes.’

‘Can you describe the threats?’

Lydia scoots her chair closer and places her elbows on the edge of the desk. She folds her fingers together and lowers her head and her voice.

‘The cartel killed sixteen members of our family,’ she says, staring at the pen. The nun does not look up from her paper. ‘They came to a family party and they shot everyone. My husband, my mother, my sister, and her children. Everyone. We escaped.’

Hermana Cecilia’s pen is at a momentary loss. It hangs suspended over the page for a few seconds before the nun can make it move again. She scribbles everything down and then makes her voice go again, too.

‘Has your spontaneous migration resolved the immediate threat to your safety and well-being?’

Lydia hesitates, because everything she’s ever thought about protecting Luca has changed now. She doesn’t want him to be afraid. But she needs him to be very afraid. And in any case, how can anything she does or does not say make any impact on him after what’s already happened? She shakes her head. ‘No,’ she admits. ‘We are still in danger.’