Into the Beautiful North(29)

“It’s beautiful,” she said.

Tacho made a rude noise with his lips.

“?Ahora tú vas a empezar con tus babosadas!” He moved down the street. “Parece que ando con una bola de pendejas. Ay, sí. Todo el día con chingaderas. Pos, ?estoy harto con esta mierda! ?Me oyeron? HARTO. Hasta la chingada. Hasta la madre. Con esta MIERDA.”

All the girlfriends noted that Tacho was venting his profound disquiet over their recent spate of bad luck and trouble.

“Wow,” Yolo said. “What’s his problem?”

“Look at Mister Snotty,” said Vampi.

An ice cream man walked toward them, tinkling his little bell as he pushed his cart down the street.

“Early for ice cream,” Nayeli said.

“It is never early for ice cream, amiga,” the man replied.

Tacho was steaming, with his arms crossed and his spikes drooping.

“Your boyfriend needs some breakfast,” the ice cream man noted.

“He’s in a bad mood.”

“I see that. He has a bad haircut, too. If you don’t mind my saying it.”

Nayeli made a command decision—her troops needed a morale boost.

“Four paletas, please,” she said.

The ice cream man opened the lid, and the Camarones crew looked for their favorite flavors. Even Tacho slunk over and angrily grabbed a strawberry bar and gobbled it in big bites.

“What is that?” Nayeli asked, gesturing at the barrier with her frozen treat.

“Are you kidding?” the man asked.

She shook her head.

“Where are you from?” he asked.

“Sinaloa.”

“Ah.”

He nodded.

“That,” he said, “is the legendary border fence.”

Everyone stared up at it.

The man dropped his lid and accepted Nayeli’s coins.

“Ugly, don’t you think?” he said, and walked on, tinkling, tinkling, tinkling.



They went east along the fence. They picked that direction because west veered sharply uphill, and they were tired. East was flat.

It was already hot from the sun. The fence smelled like rust. Yolo ran her hand along the metal. Her fingers came away tainted orange.

They got to the barbed-wire edges of the fence.

“It stops!” Tacho noted.

They climbed up a steep bank and found themselves on the edge of a concrete flood control channel. Kids sat in groups and watched the other side. Masses of cars were already twinkling in the border lines at the international crossing. Below them, the Tijuana River was a narrow green smear of water. Clumps of grass and weeds rose from islands of deposited sewage and runoff mud. Nayeli saw a tattered pair of corduroy pants and one running shoe in the muck. They filled her with dread.

They could see a huge American freeway ahead, and beyond it, dead hills covered in rough trails. Boxcars stood on tracks along the base of these mounds, and a red trolley moved away from the borderline like a model train. All over the hills, they glimpsed white vehicles. They were close enough to the US to see burger joints and discount shopping strips.

Yolo said, “The Mexican border is the only major border on earth where huge cities sit across the fences from each other. It’s true! Look on a map. All the countries in the world keep their big cities far from the border. Not here.”

“She’s so smart,” Vampi said.

“San Diego and Tijuana. ?Qué no? Look at a map. El Paso and Juárez. Brownsville and… whatever. And Nuevo Laredo, too.”

“She got all A’s,” Nayeli said.

“Show-off,” Tacho said.

“That’s why it’s such a big problem. Nowhere to hide. Capitalism has to do its work in the light, instead of in the shadows.”

“Thank you, Fidel Castro,” said Tacho.

“I’m not wrong,” Yolo replied.

On the opposite slope of the channel, Nayeli saw a Border Patrol SUV. The agent was standing outside his truck in his green uniform. He was watching her. She nudged Tacho and pointed. The Border Patrol agent raised his hand and waved at her with a cutesy fingers-only gesture. She waved back.

“Don’t be stupid,” Tacho said.

“Really!” scolded Yolo.

But Nayeli couldn’t help it—she started to smile at the agent.

He lifted a pair of binoculars and looked at her. She could see his mouth under the lenses. He was smiling back.

She pointed at herself and pointed to the USA.

He shook his head.

She put her hands before her face as if in prayer and pantomimed begging.

He laughed loud enough that they could hear his voice.

Then he shook his head again and got into his truck.

“He wants to date you,” Vampi said.

“If we follow the fence west,” Tacho suggested, “won’t it run into the ocean?”

“Are we going to the beach?” Vampi asked.

“Don’t be dumb,” Tacho said. “The ocean—like, the fence stops here. Won’t it stop there? We could swim around it and walk up the beach into Los Yunaites.”

The poor boys sitting on the slope started to laugh.

They spoke in a bizarre code that took several moments to decipher: “Nel, socio, la frontera ’sta gacha, guey, hasta las playas, guey, orale, pos la onda es que la wall esta se avienta al agua, guey! Me entiendes, yes or no? Tienes que echarte, vato! Swim, loco! Swimeando pero la wall no se acaba!” The one talking had tattoos and a fedora. He rose and dusted off his butt. “Ahi te wacho, homeboy!” He rocked and rolled on down the road.