the Pacific. Nothing green except
pipelines and BC flags.”
“Yeah, well, I’m looking for
someone,” Thomas said.
Thomas started a fire while José
pulled out a chair and took in the
view. To the southeast was the
deserted town. Row upon row of
dilapidated pipelines snaked over
the plain to the north. Farther out,
one of the solar fields that populated
the wastelands radiated immense
heat even under cover of fresh dust.
The landscape was blackened ash,
colored by the Great Fires. If there
was any life left, it was underground.
“So, what’s your story, José?
Where’d you come from?”
José decided there was no harm
in telling the old man, because soon-
er or later he’d probably kill Thomas
anyway. He hoped for later – he
wanted to use the old man and his
rapport with the BC as his passport
out of the wastelands and into the
north.
José said he was born in
Chihuahua, years before The
Change. “Yes, I’m older than I look.
I’m in good shape, no? Legend had
it that my great uncle’s uncle rode
with Pancho Villa during the heyday
of the Mexican bandito,” he boast-
ed. Although he didn’t know his
father and money had been scarce,
José cherished the memories of his
early years with his young mother.
She took him with her to the small
Mexican cafe where he toyed with
lizards and learned the art of knives
from the cook.
“I learned English, there, too,”
José said.
An old man, perhaps not so old
when he came but old to José, had
come in every day for breakfast and
stayed for lunch. “His Spanish was
no bueno,” José said. He had taken a
shine to José and his mother and so
language barriers fell away.
“I wanted the man to marry my
mother, but the fates did not allow
that.” José said. “Mi madre grew tired
of waiting – waiting on the
American, waiting on the tables. She
ended up marrying a reliable cartel
captain. That was long before The
Change, before the Cartel joined
forces with the Border Patrol,” José
said, now irritated by the flashback.
José unbuttoned his shirt and
pointed to an unusual tattoo.
“See this, ese?” he said, steering
the subject away from his mother.
“This is a tatuaje like the American
had. He called it lechuguilla. I got it
to remember the pinche gringo who
couldn’t even stick around for his
own son.”
“The old man was your father?”
Thomas asked, looking away.
“Sí.”
“Where is your mother now?”
Thomas asked, as he unwrapped a
small package and placed it on the
fire.
“Dead. Killed during the Cartel
Wars in the early days of The
Change.” Thomas choked. He
pulled out another flask from the
box and swilled it.
“What’s that?” José said, nod-
ding towards the undistinguishable
meat sizzling over the fire. He
drained the last of his flask to wash
away the bitter memories.
“Turkey.”
“Oh yeah? Where’d you get it?”
“Turkey buzzard. Hardly any
left. A rare treat.”
Thomas and José talked and
drank long into the night as the
Milky Way continued its eternal
migration across the sky.
José was the first to wake as the
sun rose, metallic dust in his mouth,
a sledgehammer inside his head. I
will talk the old man into going
north, he decided. And why not?
Two were better than one these
days. Besides, Thomas might drop
dead soon – let the fates decide his
destiny – then I wouldn’t have to kill
him. And, I kinda like the old dude –
he reminds me of happier times for
some reason.
José sat up, ignoring the pound-
ing in his head. Thomas slept, muy
crudo, his shirt partway unbuttoned.
José cursed, and yanked Thomas’s
shirt wide, revealing a faded
lechuguilla tattoo. Thomas opened
his eyes, the same grayish-blue as
José’s, and cold as ice.
~ El fin … for now…
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Cenizo
Fourth Quarter 2015
17