The Passenger (The Passenger, #1)(36)

He sat for a long time in the wooden pew, bent forward like any other penitent. The women moved softly down the aisle. You believe that the loss of those you loved has absolved you of all else. Let me tell you a story.

There were thirty-seven of her letters and although he knew them each by heart he read them over and over. All save the last. He had asked her if she believed in an afterlife and she said that she did not discount such a thing. That it could be. She just doubted that it could be for her. If there was a heaven, was it not founded upon the writhing bodies of the damned? Lastly she said that God was not interested in our theology but only in our silence.

When they left Mexico City the plane lifted up through the blue dusk into sunlight again and banked over the city and the moon dropped down the glass of the cabin like a coin falling through the sea. The summit of Popocatépetl broke through the clouds. Sunlight on the snow. The long blue shadows. The plane swung slowly north. Far below the shape of the city in its deep mauve grids like a vast motherboard. The lights had begun to come on. An edge to the dusk. Ixtaccihuatl. Dropping away. The coming darkness. The plane leveled off at twenty-seven thousand feet and headed north through the Mexican night with the stars milling in the sternway.

She was eighteen. It had rained all day on her birthday. They stayed in the hotel and read old Life magazines they’d found in a junkshop. She sat in the floor and turned the pages slowly and drank tea. Later when she went down the hallway to knock at his door the hall lights were on at mid day. At the end of the hall the curtains were lifting in the wind. She walked down and stood looking out. A gray and empty lot. The curtains were heavy from the rain and the windowsill was wet but the rain had stopped. There was a fire escape outside the window and the iron slats were a dark purple in the wet. In the yard below a shed made from roofing tin. A dog barking. Cool and troubling the air, the light. Voices in Spanish.

When he woke she was leaning against his shoulder. He thought she was asleep but she was looking out the plane window. We can do whatever we want, she said.

No, he said. We cant.

In the dying light a river like a frayed silver rope. Lakes deep in the stone coulees white with ice. The western mountains burning. The portside navigation lights came on. The starboard lights were green. As on a ship. The pilot would turn them off in the clouds because of the reflection. When he woke later far to the north a desert city was passing under the wing and sliding off into the darkness like the Crab Nebula. A cast of stones upon a jeweler’s blackcloth. Her hair was like gossamer. He wasnt sure what gossamer was. Her hair was like gossamer.

It was cold in Chicago. Raggedy men standing around a steam grate in the dawn. She had nightmares as a child and she would crawl into bed with her grandmother and her grandmother would hold her and tell her that it was all right and that it was only a dream. And she said yes it was only a dream but it was not all right. The last time they went to Mexico City he had left her in the hotel while he went to the airline office to confirm their reservations. When he came back to the hotel he had to tell her that the airline office was closed and that the airline had gone out of business and that their tickets were worthless. They went to El Paso on the bus. Twenty-four hours. The smoke from the Mexican cigarettes like a burning landfill. She slept with her head in his lap. A woman two seats ahead kept turning and looking back at her. At the golden hair spilling over the armrest.

Mi hermana, he said.

She looked back again. De veras?

Sí. De veras. A dónde va?

A Juárez. Y ustedes?

No sé. Al fin del camino.



* * *



—

His father was born in Akron Ohio and his grandmother Western died there in 1968. His sister called from Akron. She wanted to know if he was coming to the funeral.

I dont know.

I think you should come.

All right.

He showed up late in jeans and a black coat. The whole family was long dead and the funeral consisted of him and his sister and eight or ten old women and one old man who wasnt sure where he was. He met his sister at the door and walked her out to the street.

Are you going to the cemetery?

I’m going where you’re going.

Why dont we just leave. Do you have a car?

No.

Good. Come on.

They drove to a cafe out on Washington Street. You didnt bring that black dress with you.

I dont own a black dress. Well. I do now.

How long have you been here?

About ten days. She didnt have anybody, Bobby.

Provide, provide.

I’m supposed to tell you that there’s a bunch of gold buried in the basement of the house.

Gold.

She was quite serious. She wouldnt let go of my hand.

And lucid?

Yes.

They’ve torn down the house. They’re building the freeway through there.

I know. But they havent torn down the basement.

You’re serious.

Can we get some tea?



* * *



—

He put her on a plane that evening and then drove back to the motel and the next day he drove to the house. The only thing left was the driveway. He sat studying the ruins of the old neighborhood. At least there was no one around. It was a Saturday and the roadgraders were parked in a mud cut about a mile to the south. He walked up the old ribbed concrete drive where he used to play with his toy trucks and he stood looking down into the basement. The walls were gray rubble limestone. The wooden stairs rose into the empty gray sky. The floor itself was concrete but it was badly cracked and it didnt look too solid. All right, he said. What the hell.