Into the Beautiful North(26)

“We can buy new clothes, can’t we, Nayeli?” Vampi asked.

“Don’t worry, morra. I’ll take care of you.”

She looked at Tacho. His face was without expression.

The waiter put the sweating bottles of Corona in front of them.

“That’s urine,” Tacho noted.

Nayeli kicked him under the table.

“I’ll have shrimp, please,” she said.

“We’ll share an order of spaghetti,” Yolo said, leaning on Vampi’s shoulder.

“We’re on a diet,” Vampi announced.

“Do you want garlic bread?” the waiter asked.

Vampi stared at him for a moment.

“It’s good,” he promised.

“Yes, please.”

She beamed at him.

Tacho said, “Carne asada, amigo. Lots of salsa.”

“Corn tortillas or flour?”

“Corn, of course! Who eats flour tortillas?”

The waiter studied them.

“You’re from the south.”

“So?” said Tacho.

“So be careful,” the waiter said.

He walked away.

“What’s his problem?” Tacho groused.

The girls took long pulls from their beers. Yolo felt the bubbles burn up into her nose and sneezed. Vampi was dizzy immediately. She looked at all of them, opened her mouth, and belched noisily.

“Piglet!” Tacho scolded.

When the waiter came back and started to set their plates down, Nayeli said, “Is there a pay phone here?”

“By the bathroom.”

“Gracias.”

“Don’t be calling your coyotes here.”

“Coyotes?”

“You won’t make it across without a coyote, chica. But the management doesn’t like them coming around here. They give the gringos the creeps.”

“How do you know we want to go across?” Tacho asked.

“Everyone in Tijuana will know what you want as soon as they see you,” the waiter said. He was more than bored with pilgrims. “They have seen you a thousand times a week, brother.”

“Oh.”

“Can I bring you anything else?”

Nayeli shook her head and got up to find the phone.

“Your food will get cold,” the waiter said.

“I’ll be right back.”

Tacho said, “Do you have any advice for us?”

“Get a passport,” the waiter said.



Nayeli asked the cashier to give her some coins for the phone.

“Mexican or American?” he asked.

“What’s the difference?”

He shrugged.

“American money is boring. All the same color, and the coins are dull. But it’s actually worth something. Keep your pesos—give me dólares any day.”

Nayeli suddenly remembered Aunt Irma telling her that’s where gringo came from—from the English word for green.

“It’s for the phone,” she said, handing over a few limp Mexican bills.

He dug out fat Mexican coins for her.

“Over there.”

She stepped into the hall between the bathrooms. American women were laughing and chatting in the doorway. They looked so tall. So glamorous. They smelled good, unlike her, smelled of vanilla and fruit and white musk and shampoo.

She turned her back on these giantesses and dug out her card. Chavarín’s number was a little streaked but still legible. She had the coins on the metal shelf in front of her. She fed a few into the phone, until she heard a dial tone. She studied the number and punched the LIB digits in. The phone made a weird noise, an ascending scale of derision, and a robot voice told her there had been an error. The phone clicked, and she heard her coins drop into the coin box. She dug through the coins and found enough to get the dial tone again. Again, she was kicked off and lost her coins. The third time, she dialed O and told the operator the number. The woman sounded offended. “There is no such number, miss,” she said. Nayeli repeated it. “I’m sorry. There is an error on your part, miss.” Nayeli tried to argue with her, but the operator informed her there hadn’t been a phone number like that in Tijuana since 1964. And there was no listing for a Chavarín. Not in Tijuana, Tecate, Ensenada, or Mexicali.

Her stomach was tight. It started to hurt. She pressed her hands to her face and breathed. She had to keep her wits about her.

She went back to her seat and stared at her food.

Tacho was eating a carne taco and swallowing his second beer. Yolo and Vampi were laughing helplessly. They each had two bottles in front of them.

“We are so drunk,” Vampi noted, and they both snorted and fell on each other.

“They’re weak,” Tacho said.

Nayeli picked at her shrimp.

She looked at Tacho.

He raised his eyebrows at her.

She shook her head.

He closed his eyes, just for a moment.

He turned away from her and watched the bodies moving down the street.





Chapter Eleven



They stood on the street in the dark. The sound was relentless yet somehow flat. There were no echoes in Tijuana. Car horns were sour brays. Cops blew whistles, and they fell dull and bitter on the ear.