Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Behold: a strange, angelic woman wrapped in vibrant, ethereal colors. Tendrils of being swam through the space surrounding her, enveloping her in a calm eerie glow. Laughing, she reached out to him and smiled warmly. The woman looked like his mother. Jesus had never met his mother. Reaching his hand, he strained to her fingertips, slipping just out of reach. The space between them extended impossibly far, and she was crying now, falling away into darkness. Jesus tried to run after her, but his legs were paralyzed. He couldn’t run. He couldn’t move, he couldn’t even breathe. When he opened his mouth, no words came out. He was suffocating in the ether that surrounded them both. She was falling away into nothingness, and he was helpless. He tried to speak, but water filled his lungs. He was drowning, choking, and trying desperately to swim, but he couldn’t move a finger. He would die in this place, trapped and forgotten. Darkness closed in as death prepared to take him, and here it was.

Soft rays of morning sun crested over the windowsill of Nueva Casa’s orphanage, gently awakening Jesus Castillo, a skinny, fair skinned Mexican teenager. He stirred, not yet ready to be reminded of his morning duties. A mess of straight black hair tumbled over his face as he sat up and prepared to face the day. His features were slight and boyish, just shy of the cusp of manhood. His eyes, however, were strikingly blue, sparkling with intelligence. The others in the boy’s dormitory, a plain, cramped room lined with bunk beds inside thick adobe walls, remained blissfully unaware as he slipped out of bed and gingerly crept outside to begin. There too were Enrique, Rico, and Juan. Christian had already begun work opening the bakery. Jesus washed the sleep out of his eyes and prepared himself for another day in his predictable life at Sophia’s orphanage in Nueva Casa.

Several miles inland from Mexico’s Pacific coast lies Nueva Casa, a small town of sorts, home to wayfarers and simple folk, a patchwork mix of pueblos and homesteads. It held some six thousand inhabitants, spread evenly out over wide swaths of farmland and concentrated in a modest downtown area. Great blocks of farmland dedicated to a hardy strain of maize surrounded the city, radiating outwards alongside cattle ranches and swaths of unconquered wilderness. The city itself was not unlike other Mexican towns in the 1960’s, full of traditionally minded folk just now waking up to the productions and culture spurted out by the tail end of the industrial revolution.

Sophia’s orphanage was located on the outskirts of the town, on what was once an empty plot of land adjacent to the Catholic Church, whose steeple overlooked the orphanage and its inhabitants like a watchful monolithic eye. She kept the orphanage and school alive by running a bakery. Fernando, a burly ex-revolutionary turned family man ran the bakery, although everyone called him Osito.

He had arrived in town from the north, accompanied by Sophia, and erected the orphanage out of a kind of vision. All of the residents helped in some capacity to run the bakery and maintain the communal orphanage.

Jesus fixed himself a cup of coffee and carved a chunk of bread out of a roll, dipping it in the muddy brown liquid before eating. Breakfast usually consisted of whatever bread was left unsold from the previous day, and so, it tended to be on the stale side. Sometimes, they were lucky enough to have cake and sweets from the day before, although Sophia rarely approved of sweets for breakfast.

“Where’s Miriam?” Jesus asked Sophia, the caretaker of the orphanage.

“She went down to the bakery to help Christian. Rosa is having a fiesta tonight. There’s a lot of work to do,” Sophia said. Jesus nodded and hastily finished his coffee and breakfast. “Don’t keep her too long,” she added.

Jesus found her outside, walking on the short dirt path worn from the back door of the orphanage to the bakery, only a short distance away. Miriam stood much shorter than Jesus, a smiling trapezoidal frame with curly black locks of hair flowing down to her hips.

“Good morning, Miriam,” Jesus called out.

“Hi Jesus. It’s the most beautiful day I’ve ever seen today,” she replied, smiling. It was a picturesque day, indeed. A couple unblemished cotton clouds drifted in a clear sky and a gentle breeze rustled the birds and critters out of the tall trees that surrounded the orphanage.

“I wish we weren’t stuck inside working,” Jesus said.

“I don’t mind it. I had the most wonderful dream last night, too.”

“So that’s why you’re so cheery. What was it?”

“That’s the thing,” Miriam said regretfully, “I can’t seem to remember it. Just that it was sweet and good.”

Jesus thought of his own dreams, of which Miriam was often a part of. “Sweet and good, just like you,” he said.

Miriam giggled girlishly, “Oh, stop that. You don’t mean that.”

“But I do.”

She dismissed it with a wave of her hand. “I think I have to get back to work now.”

“What’s the rush? It’s a beautiful day, after all.”

“And we’ll have plenty of customers today with this weather,” she replied.

“I won’t keep you any longer, then,” he said, although he wanted to.

“The darkest evening of the year,” dictated Sophia, in finely articulated English. The class responded by repeating the phrase in unison, brokenly. “Eve-en-ing,” called out the teacher, this time taking care to enunciate each syllable separately, clapping her hands three times. Then she pointed at the class, “Eve-en-ing,” they obliged.

Sophia taught classes at the orphanage during the day to any children that would come in. Those days, education was a hard thing to come by in rural Mexico.

“Eve-en-ing,” mouthed Jesus, wordlessly chewing over the syllables like rich morsels of food. The words of Hemingway, Frost, and Shakespeare had a certain cadence and rhythm different from the familiar flow of Spanish. He carefully wrote down the words in his notebook, filled with passages and terms. Some of them he didn’t yet fully understand, but their sound appealed to him. Their texture and taste felt beautiful to his ears. Sometimes he imagined a dancer moving in time with the words. She would be in an empty room, illuminated by candlelight. Her form was muscular and athletic, dressed in a flowing black skirt and a floral yellow shirt, tight around the shoulders and forearms. She turned away from him before he could make out her features, long black hair obscuring her face, coming to rest in a neutral pose, legs and shoulders relaxed, arms dangling weightlessly at her sides. A moment of rest, and she inhaled visibly, filling her chest with oxygen as her chin tilted slightly up, pulled her shoulders back, and primed her body like a spring- “But soft!” The words rang out like the staccato trill of a flamenco guitar player in his mind. The dancer shot up, directing her outstretched fingers towards the ceiling. Her other shoulder dropped low, allowing her to fall like a counterweight as her calves exploded upwards. Her body was full of potential energy, ready to be transferred into kinetic motion across the smooth hardwood floor. “What light from yonder window breaks?” She allowed her body to fall low, bending her knee as she arced her limbs in a circle. Her arms, outstretched, trailed the fingertips of her left hand across the wood, and just as she had let her weight drop, it sprung back up, and she accelerated her turning, twisting her torso forcefully. The dancer’s legs kicked up and switched in midair, like a butterfly, and for a moment her body suspended, frozen in time, nearly horizontal to the floor. The guitarist played a low, thumping passage on the bottom strings, fingers climbing across the fretboard, spiderlike and deft.

“It is the east,” played the musician, a series of three notes in an arpeggio, scaling the guitar before the clause ended in a chime. To Jesus, the vowels in the word, “east,” sounded like two notes played together on adjacent strings, a partial chord. The dancer landed lightly and took a pose, her gaze following her own hand towards the window, as if it was pointing at some distant location.

“And Juliet,” the guitarist’s fingers rolled, “Is the sun,” the dancer turned around, slowly, casual and playful, allowing her hair to tumble around her. A sensual sideways glance escaped her before she gracefully exited.

Jesus had never yet been with a woman. Not for lack of trying, but because there were very few young women in Nueva Casa, and even fewer without boyfriends interested in a poor orphan. Andrea had kindly turned down his advances in the past, probably on account of Rodrigo. Carmen was young and held no interest for him, but Miriam… What was there to say about Miriam? She was beautiful, with round, womanly features, and dark, shallow eyes. Her disposition was always bright and sunny. Jesus loved to be around her, and harbored a secret admiration for her quick, playful responses in conversations and thoughtful comments in class. Yes, if there was a young woman in Nueva Casa who held Jesus’ affections, it was Miriam. For that precise reason, Jesus was terrified of revealing his true feelings for her.

Besides, they lived in the same orphanage, sleeping in adjacent rooms, only feet apart.

“Are you lost in thought again, Jesus? Do we need to send out a search party?” Jesus blinked and looked blankly at Sophia. He had completely missed the last few minutes of whatever she was talking about. “What does Frost mean by taking the road less traveled? Was it literally a road, or is there something else?”

“Ahh… ” Jesus replied, nervously glancing at the poem written in front of the room, but the words were hieroglyphics. He scanned the text, looking for clues, but choked. He hadn’t been paying attention, and now that he was put on the spot, his mind locked up, refusing to function.

“Well, no, he doesn’t literally mean a road; it’s more like… ” Jesus trailed off, grasping for words.

“He’s talking about the decisions we make and their consequences on the course of our lives. It’s symbolic,” offered Christian. Sophia smiled and continued.

“Most great writers leave underlying themes in the events of their stories, or between the lines of their poems,” Sophia said. Jesus’ cheeks burned with embarrassment, and he resolved to begin paying more attention. “Ask yourself, is the author trying to say something about human nature? What are the causes of the major conflicts in their work? What insight can we hope to gain from it?” She was slowly pacing around the classroom and its four wooden tables.

“These!,” she smacked the table in front of Jesus, causing him to jump in his seat, “Are the questions we must ask ourselves when we read.”

After school, Christian, Juan, Enrique, Carmen, Andrea, and Jesus headed off to the field on the other side of town to play football.

“Christian sure loves to play teacher’s pet. You just like to show us how smart you are,” said Enrique with a cheeky grin. He dribbled the ball with his feet, slid his shoe up on top of it, pulled back, and propelled the ball into the air.

“Shut up, Enrique. Everyone knows you’re just waiting to join the church so you can get your chance with her,” Andrea said.

The ball came down on Enrique’s knee, and he let it bounce to the ground. He looked over at Andrea and made a cross motion over himself, like a priest. Then, he mimed taking a rosary from around his neck and kissed it, instead directing the cheeky gesture at Andrea. She made a disgusted face. Jesus couldn’t help but smirk.

“What does symbolic mean?” Asked Juan. Christian side stepped in front of Enrique and stole the ball.

“It’s something that means something else,” Christian said, dancing around the ball, “Like a sign.”

“So, if you see one, you’re supposed to stop?” Asked Juan, eliciting a halfhearted laugh from some of the others. Enrique darted forward and tried to regain the ball.

“Well, remember when Osito said that God sent his son to die for us?” Offered Jesus. Christian backpedaled, keeping the ball out of reach of Enrique. He was taller and more dexterous than Enrique, and juggled the ball just out of his reach. Juan nodded. “That was symbolic of his love. He used it like a sign to point us to heaven.”

“You know that stuff isn’t real,” said Carmen.

“It is if you think it is,” said Jesus.

“Well, I don’t think it is,” replied Carmen.

“Some people do,” Jesus said. He wondered if he was one of those people, “You can’t tell someone that their belief is wrong. That’s just your opinion.”

“As a matter of fact, I can. Do you still believe in those children’s stories they told us when we were young?”

“Well, no, but that’s different.”

“Is it really that different?” Carmen said.

“Will you guys just shut up? No one cares! We’re almost there,” interrupted Andrea.

Ahead, in a wide open field, people were already playing. Six or seven of them ran between the makeshift goals. Immediately, Jesus recognized Rodrigo and his two brothers, both of the local meatheads.

Rodrigo himself was skinny as a rail. It was hard to believe they had come from the same mother. It was hard to believe that they had come from a mother at all, the way they acted.

Rodrigo jogged up to the approaching entourage. “Hey babe,” he called to Andrea, “Come on with us; now the teams are even.”

Andrea joined Rodrigo. He pecked her cheek and began to lead her away from the others.

“Field’s closed. Come back later, guys,” he called over his shoulder.

“Like hell it is,” said Enrique, still approaching.

Rodrigo ignored him. “Anyway, babe, you gotta try this new stuff, it’s great,” he said, ostentatiously ignoring the others.

Enrique shot Christian a sideways glance, as if to say, “Are we really going to let that go?”

Christian nodded, and with that, Enrique maneuvered himself squarely in front of the ball and lined up the shot. The ball pegged Rodrigo squarely in the left asscheek. Carmen and Juan roared with laughter, and Andrea turned to shoot daggers at him with her eyes.

Rodrigo turned to face them. Now, his two overweight brothers were approaching. Jesus felt nervous. This was not going to end well. Juan stared forward blankly. Jesus wasn’t sure if he had grasped what just happened. Carmen watched excitedly. Christian and Enrique had stopped and stood their ground as the trio approached.

“Listen to me, I’m going to let you go home now and forget that happened. But we’re keeping the ball,” Rodrigo said. The larger of his two lackeys laughed.

“Shut up, fatass!” Rodrigo snapped at his brother.

“Fuck you, man!” said Enrique, taking a step forward.

“Fuck you!” said Rodrigo, taking a step towards him. They were face to face, noses practically touching, staring each other down like two lions on the savannah. A circle had formed, surrounding the five of them. Rodrigo towered above Enrique’s stocky frame.

“Kick his ass, Rodrigo,” whispered Andrea.

Enrique hit first, a surprise left hook. Rodrigo reacted quickly, and the blow caught him in the shoulder instead of the chin. Rodrigo stepped back, regained his footing, and shot two punches at Enrique’s face, but Enrique parried them with his hands. He did not, however, parry the heavy overhand right from the larger of the two goons. It landed squarely on his eye, knocking him back flat onto the ground.

“Enrique!” shouted Carmen. He toppled to the ground, shook by the blow.

Christian took a running start, lifted his knee, and drove his heel straight into the sternum of the thug who had struck Enrique. He followed up with a few hard, straight punches to the head and chest. The huge man was stunned, walking backwards to regain his balance. The circle opened up and Christian continued forward, grasping the back of his opponent’s neck, and drove his knee into his gut twice. The thug tried to pull away, panicking, but Christian regained control, pulled him closer into the clench, and dropped his right elbow over the temple of the wounded man. The strike shook him, and his head dropped down, hunched over in pain. Christian took the opportunity to roundhouse kick him directly in the face and turned to face the second goon.

The second brother’s hands were up in a boxer’s stance, shoulders squared to Christian’s. A left jab caught Christian with surprising speed, right in the nose. Christian responded with a quick left, and a right hand to follow it, but the brother spryly slipped and returned with a hook punch to Christian’s gut. If the punch had hurt him, Christian didn’t show it. He responded with a flurry of blows, pushing his opponent back. The larger man tried to parry and block Christian’s attack, but he was too slow, and backed up, trying to cover his face. Christian rushed forward, battering his opponent’s ears and pushing him down.

“Christian, please stop!” pleaded Carmen. She ran in between the two fighters, trying to break them up. Rodrigo’s remaining brother pushed her out of the way, and she fell to the ground.

“Hey! Come on man!” yelled Jesus, suddenly angry. He ran up to punch the offender, but went high, allowing the brother to duck under Jesus’ shot and drive a fist into his belly. Jesus felt the air leave his lungs and his body collapse underneath him.

At that moment, with his back turned, Christian came up from behind the attacker and put him in a chokehold, right arm snaked around his neck and left folded onto the back of Rodrigo’s brother’s head.

Jesus gasped and watched Christian drag him back while he struggled to break the grip around his neck.

“That’s enough, asshole,” Rodrigo said. He was holding up a knife. “Let him go.”

Christian eyed the knife, weighing his choices. He could probably hold out the choke and keep his distance, using the fat man as a human shield, but there wasn’t really a point. The fight was over. Christian had already proven himself, and at least two people were definitely done playing soccer for the day. Enrique was back on his feet, but wasn’t in any condition to play. Jesus was still doubled over, his body reeling from the hard shot. He suspected that the others had seen their share of action for the afternoon as well. As soon as he released his victim, Christian knew, the large man would try to turn and strike to get even. Christian shoved him hard, releasing the held man from his grip. He stumbled, gasping, towards Rodrigo. The other brother was still on the ground.

Hope I broke his rib. Christian thought. The circle had broken apart into two lines. Everyone kept his or her distance from Rodrigo when he approached.

“Get the fuck out of here,” commanded Rodrigo. There was an element of shaky uncertainty to his voice despite the knife in his hand. Or maybe because of it.

Have you ever even used that thing? Christian thought, but he didn’t want to find out or test him. Rodrigo looked wild-eyed, like a Chihuahua backed into a corner.

“Let’s go, guys,” Said Christian. A tacit truce reached, the defeated crew began to shuffle their way back down the street, “And we’re keeping the ball,” He added.

“How are we going to get back at him?” Asked Enrique a couple minutes later. They had turned the corner and were heading back to the orphanage.

“We’re not going to do anything,” replied Christian, “He’s going to get what’s coming to him on his own.”

“What are we going to tell Sophia?” said Carmen.

“Probably the truth,” suggested Christian, a suggestion that would not be followed.

“We should get some ice for your eye, Enrique,” said Jesus. It had already begun to swell up. In the morning, it would be black and blue.

“Why didn’t you jump in, Juan?” asked Enrique.

“I didn’t know what to do,” said Juan.

“That’s bullshit. If you had been in the fight, we would have won,” said Enrique.

“Rodrigo would have pulled that knife anyway,” said Jesus, “Besides, we did win.”

But it didn’t feel that way. There was a sense of defeat. Jesus’ body still hurt. He felt like throwing up now, but his stomach hadn’t quite made up its mind yet. Enrique was still angry and full of energy, but when the excitement wore off, he would probably feel sore. Carmen was visibly shaken. Juan didn’t show any emotion, but he was probably pretty scared, Jesus figured. Christian’s expression stayed serious and pensive.

“You okay, man?” asked Jesus to Christian.

“Yeah, I’m good,” He said, then added, “I’m going to go get some tacos at Oscar’s.”

Oscar Martinez ran the restaurant closest to Sophia’s home. His daughters went to her classes at the orphanage. It was usually a safe bet that they could get free food from there. Jesus had a couple pesos in his pocket, but didn’t really want to spend them.

“That sounds good,” Jesus said, and looked over at the others.

“I have to go home and study,” said Carmen.

“Me too,” said Juan.

Enrique didn’t say anything.

“I’ve still got a couple more hours before I have to go back to the bakery,” said Christian, “We should hang out there for a while,” he said to Jesus. The throbbing pain in his abdomen had subsided. The prospect of some al pastor or carne asada sounded appealing. They approached the fork, where the group would split and go their separate ways.

“Christian, you need to stop doing these crazy things,” said Carmen.

“Enrique started it,” he replied with a shrug.

“No, that pendejo Rodrigo did,” said Enrique. “And I would have ended it if his brothers hadn’t cheap shotted me.”

“Yeah, pendejo,” Repeated Juan.

“Don’t say that word!” Christian exclaimed.

“Either way, you guys need to be careful for a while. Rodrigo is going to be looking for a way to get even. He’s not going to let this go,” she said. “And you too,” she nodded towards Jesus.

“I barely did anything,” Jesus said.

“Are they going to give us our ball back?” asked Juan.

“No. They won’t. We’ll get a new one,” said Christian.

Oscar’s taqueria was a decent sized restaurant decorated with sports memorabilia. Oscar had been an avid footballer back in his day, but when he was injured, it didn’t slow down his passion, and he began collecting autographed jerseys, photographs, and the like, proudly displaying them in frames on the walls. The shop was getting full when Jesus and Christian walked in. The dinner crowd was growing. The duo spotted a free table and quickly sat down before the seats were stolen. A heavyset young woman with her hair up in a bun came over to their table a few minutes later.

“Hey Jennifer,” Jesus said, smiling.

“Hey, boys,” she said, “You’re not playing soccer today?”

“No, the field was still muddy from the rain last week. Who’s working right now?”

She glanced back towards the kitchen, “Oscar’s out doing something. Hector and the new guy are back there. If you want me to hook you up, you’ll have to wait for a while. We’re busy right now.”

“That’s okay, we can wait,” Jesus said.

“Alright, I’ll bring you guys something to drink in a couple minutes,” she said, and walked off, not bothering to take their orders.

Jesus looked around the room. There were a couple groups of men drinking, and a family waiting on their food. On the other side, he spotted some guys that he recognized.

“Hey, isn’t that Alejandra’s brother?”

Christian looked up. He had been intensely studying the lines on the table.

“Yeah, that’s Milo. I heard he just got back from The United States,” Christian said.

“Why’d he go there?”

“I think he has an uncle there or something. Runs a construction business. Their family has some money.”

Jesus nodded thoughtfully, “You ever want to go there?” he asked.

Christian gave him a quizzical look, “America? What for?”

“Travel, I guess. Get out and see the world. Have some adventure.”

“I don’t know, maybe. I’d never really thought about it. Not that I would be able to get a visa,” Christian said. “The only reason he,” Christian motioned over to the table where Milo and two others sat enjoying tortas and guacamole, “Could go was because of his uncle.”

“Here’s your drinks, boys,” Jennifer said, depositing two cups filled with bright red juice on the table. Christian and Jesus attacked the beverages with ferocity. Jesus didn’t realize how parched he was until now. What happened at the field had left him thirsty.

“I want to go someday. Go up there and live for a couple years,” Jesus said.

A moment passed between the two in silence.

“You can do that if you want. I’m going to play football and become a doctor here,” Christian said.

“A doctor? You can barely read,” joked Jesus.

“What about you, genius. What do you want to be?”

Jesus had to think for a moment. “Maybe a poet, I guess.”

Christian laughed heartily. “A poet? You’re gonna end up picking up garbage on the side of the road.”

“Hey, those guys aren’t bad. At least they’re not poets.” Both of them laughed.

“But seriously, what do you want to do?” asked Christian again.

“I am serious. I want to be a poet.”

“You can’t just be a poet. You have to go to school or something for that, and not one of the ones around here. You have to go to one of them in a big city,” he said, “Have you even written any poetry?”

“You have to go to a university to be a doctor. It’s easier to be a poet than a doctor. And yes, I have, if you believe it.”

“Being a doctor is actually worth going to school for. Doctors can buy a house, raise a family, everything. What can poets do?”

“I don’t know, get laid?”

“Yeah, and how’s that working out for you?”

He was right. Jesus considered this for a moment. “Poets reveal the deeper truths of the world. It’s an art form.”

“Alright DaVinci, while you’re perfecting your art form, I’m going to be getting ahead in life,”

They both took a sip from their drinks.

“When did Andrea start dating Rodrigo?” Asked Christian.

“Maybe a couple weeks ago. I don’t think it’s anything serious.”

“What does she see in a guy like that?”

Jesus shrugged. “He’s got money, I know that. He sells weed.”

Christian nodded. “Maybe I should start selling weed,” he said, grinning.

“Nah, sell coke. You’ll make more money.” Jesus imitated doing a bump off his fingernail.

“Have you ever done coke?” Christian asked.

“No.”

“Neither have I.”

“You boys are in luck, the new guy messed up an order,” said Jennifer. She had suddenly appeared holding an appealing plate of carnitas. The two boys devoured the food readily, and went back to the orphanage.