Amigoland Part 12

"Only enough for a little while, for a few days, until we get back from the trip."

"At a great risk, and not just for him - for you, for me," Chayo said. "Tell me what you are going to do if he gets sick anyway or if I give him the wrong medicines and they do him harm. Then what?"

They both turned when the door chimed. The security guard smiled briefly as he held open the door for a young pregnant woman with two young children, then he went back to crossing his arms over his flak jacket. Chayo excused herself to attend to some of the other customers that had entered the small pharmacy. She left Socorro waiting at the end of the counter near the display of mentholated lozenges and the long gla.s.s case containing various brands of condoms and contact solutions. A string of Telmex phone cards, each wrapped in plastic, dangled from the register inside a Plexiglas booth. The cas.h.i.+er girl counted off the colorful bills in front of her, arranging them into disheveled stacks. At one point she looked up at Socorro and gave her the pa.s.sive smile of someone who isn't paid enough to be genuinely pleasant. Then she entered an amount into an office calculator and waited for the machine to produce a receipt before sticking it and two of the stacks of bills into a metal box beneath the register. The pregnant woman was now lingering near the booth, holding one child in the cradle of her right arm and carrying another in a stroller. She wanted to know what size diapers she should buy if she needed one that fit both a seven-month-old and an eighteen-month-old. Chayo told her that, unfortunately, she would have to buy different sizes, but today she would make her a special price on the Pampers.

Once she had taken care of her customer, she and Socorro walked to the counter where she kept the pharmaceutical book.

"Just tell me how you want me to feel doing something like this?"

"If we have to, we can find a doctor," Socorro said.

"The doctor you should have found before you brought him here. Before, not later. That's how it is supposed to happen. These medicines are not for taking chances."

"And if he goes with no medicines?"

Chayo turned toward the center of the store as the old man was trying on a pair of dark sungla.s.ses and crouching to see himself in the tiny mirror. The squared frames were the kind his doctor had given him years ago after removing his cataracts. He held them against his brow, then stared up at the fluorescent lights as if he were staring into the sun. When he looked back down, he lost his balance and staggered forward, in the direction of the sungla.s.s rack, but at the last second grabbed hold of the walker to correct himself.

"Only so you can go for a few days," Chayo said, shaking her head, "and nothing too strong. After that you have to promise to take him to a doctor, with someone who can prescribe some real medicine. A man his age and in that condition needs special care."

She reached for the beaded necklace that held her gla.s.ses, sliding her fingers down it as if she were counting off each bead on a rosary. Then she walked around to the other side of the counter and opened the big red book.

The old man clung to his brother's arms as he made his way down the three steps from the pharmacy. The security guard was kind enough to carry the walker and open it again on the sidewalk.

They were about to walk back to the taxi when Don Fidencio noticed an old india sitting in the shade near the bottom step, her cupped and pleading hand stretched out in their direction. The frayed rebozo draped the edges of her withered face and then stretched out to cover what at first appeared to be a child but was only the swollen curve of her back. He reached into his pocket for some change, but all he found was his lighter.

"Here," Don Celestino said, and handed him the change from the medicines.

The old man dropped a few pesos into the india's hand and she hid the coins somewhere under her rebozo. Then she nodded and, raising the same hand, said, "May G.o.d bless you with a long life."

The old man stared at her, wondering if he shouldn't take his money back or at least ask for a more useful blessing. He was about to say something to her, but he could feel his brother tugging at his arm.

26.

Now he sat in a plastic chair with a Carta Blanca beer logo against the backrest. His brother and the girl had helped him get to the little cafe and bought him a bottle of water so he could take his medicines while they went to buy the tickets. Don Fidencio's job was to keep an eye on his plastic bag with the medicines and his brother's leather pouch that had his insulin, making sure n.o.body ran off with them.

Dust swirled through the open doors at either end of the central station. Down the middle of the lobby, a young man, maybe only as tall as his dust broom, plowed the never-ending trash, which included receipts, cigarette b.u.t.ts, and candy wrappers that people preferred to toss on the floor rather than into one of the nearby trash cans. Where the old man sat, the s.p.a.ce was lined with a tiny convenience store that appeared to sell only frozen treats and s.e.x magazines, a pharmacy offering minor travel remedies along with an a.s.sortment of salty snacks, an open-sided cafe serving quick meals already under the heat lamps, and, just beyond the front doors, a counter where a porter would store luggage for a small hourly fee. On the opposite side, the eight bus counters, each with its own set of uniformed attendants, stretched the length of the lobby. So far his brother and the girl had stopped at three of the counters.

When he turned back, a barefoot little boy was standing next to the table. Several dime-size patches blotted his thick crew cut. A smear of yellowed mocos had dried under his nose.

"Buy my Chiclets, sir," the boy said, extending a grubby hand with several packets of fluorescent-colored gum.

"No," the old man answered.

"Buy my Chiclets, please, sir." He tilted his head to one side.

Don Fidencio lifted a finger and wagged it at the boy.

"Come on, sir, buy my Chiclets."

"I don't want any Chiclets."

Don Fidencio looked back across the lobby. His brother and the girl were talking to an attendant behind one of the counters.

"Buy my Chiclets, sir."

"Are you one of those little deaf boys? I told you, 'No Chiclets.' "

The little boy stared back for a second. "Are you blind?" "Do I look blind to you?"

"You wear those dark gla.s.ses," the little boy replied. "The same as Macario The Blind Man wears."

"I'm not blind. Now go, leave me alone."

"People say Macario is not blind, but they still call him Macario The Blind Man, and the other people who don't know give him money."

"These are called sungla.s.ses," Don Fidencio said.

"But we're inside, where the sun never comes out." "Leave me alone already."

"Buy my Chiclets."

"I have no money."

"But, sir, the Chiclets cost nothing, only four pesos."

"Go away."

"Then I will give them to you for two pesos."

"Already I said no."

"But why?"

"Finally," Don Celestino said, walking up to the table. "None of them have direct service to Linares. We had to buy tickets to Ciudad Victoria, and from there we can make the connection."

Don Fidencio spread his legs so he could begin to stand up. "I was thinking I was going to spend the day here, sleeping in this bus station."

"You made a friend?" Socorro said.

"Please, lady, buy my Chiclets." The boy tilted his head to one side.

"Ignore him. If not, he'll follow us all over Mexico," said Don Fidencio.

"What flavors do you have?" She bent down to look at the packets.

"All the best ones," the little boy answered, opening his carton the whole way.

She plucked out four packets, two white and two purple, then handed him the money. The little boy thanked her and ran off.

Don Fidencio shook his head. "I never would have bought from that boy."

"I know," Socorro replied, "but you got your Chiclets anyway." She pulled open his s.h.i.+rt pocket and deposited the four packets.

Don Celestino helped him get to his feet before grabbing the plastic bag and his pouch. They were halfway to the terminal when Socorro stopped to look back.

"Your walker, Don Fidencio."

His brother rushed over to get it for him.

"Leave it," the old man said. "I can make my way without it." He continued to hobble along, his body leaning forward as if the walker were still in front of him.

"And if you fall?" Don Celestino moved the frame toward him.

"How's that going to happen, sitting inside a bus station?" he said. "You two are worse than those women at the prison. I could walk fine before they left me with this thing."

"What if you use the walker just for now and later I go buy you a new cane?" Socorro said.

"And where are you going to find a cane?"

"Anywhere, on the street or at the mercado, then you can have a brand-new one."

The old man considered the girl's words.

"Then I can use just the cane and no more walker?"

"Yes, just the cane, no more with the walker," Don Celestino said.

"And how do I know you won't make me use it again later?"

"We can give it to somebody or throw it away if you want."

The old man leaned his weight back on the walker. "This better not be a lie," he said, "just to fool an old man."

Don Celestino held open the gla.s.s door, and his brother shuffled down the narrow hallway. A large gla.s.sed-in bulletin board covered the section of the wall that travelers were most likely to see upon arriving at this northern border. Pus.h.i.+ng the walker in a straight line required too much of the old man's attention for him to read any of the notices or catch a glimpse of the black-and-white photos of dead bodies strewn across the scrubland, one revealing only her face inside the unzipped body bag. Up ahead he could make out a sign directing them to their next stop, INMIGRACIoN INMIGRACIoN.

A digital clock was blinking in one corner of the small, dark office. Through a missing section of the blinds, Don Celestino could make out the desk and chair where somebody should have been sitting.

"The security guard says they have different hours every day," Socorro said as she walked up. "That we need to wait a few minutes, but if they left for lunch, it could also be later this afternoon."

"And our papers to travel?"

Socorro answered with only a shrug.

Don Fidencio used the walker to steady himself as he stood up from one of the plastic chairs in the terminal. "I can just imagine if when I was still working we had opened the post office only when we felt like it."

"Where are you going?" his brother asked.

"I need to go make water, or do I need to ask your permission?" He pushed the walker ahead of him, taking one heavy step after another, as though he had one more acre to plow before the sun went down.

Don Celestino caught up with him as he was parking the walker to one side of the stairs. "You're going to kill yourself going up there."

"And tell me what choice I have," Don Fidencio answered, then pointed back in the direction of the corded-off elevator. "You want me to have an accident?"

He took a deep breath and, with his brother at his side, started climbing. There were eight steps between the ground floor and the first landing, and from there the staircase turned right and there was no telling how many more steps there were to the second floor. In between, a framed portrait of the Virgen de Guadalupe, adorned with a cl.u.s.ter of flickering candles and a display of plastic flowers set on a metal shelf, hung from the wall just above the landing. Below the shelf, a rusty padlock secured the collection box. Normally people about to travel to a nearby ranchito or as far away as Tuxtla Gutierrez would stop to ask the Virgen for providence on their journey, to keep their ailing mother alive until they were able to arrive, to keep the bus driver awake and alert, to keep any bandits from trying to stop the bus in the middle of the night, or just to keep the porters from searching through their modest packages for any valuables. But Don Fidencio asked her only to provide him with enough strength to make it up the remaining three steps to the landing, then the next flight, all of this without losing his balance and toppling backward down the steps, particularly because he could see himself getting entangled with his guide, who would most likely land on top of him, and then for sure he would crack open his old melon.

"That wasn't so bad," Don Celestino said as they reached the landing.

The old man looked at him and then up at the Virgen's compa.s.sionate eyes. If he hadn't already asked her for so much, he would beg her to find something else for his brother to do; if he was going to fall, he preferred to do this unaccompanied. Instead, he leaned against the railing with both hands and tried to gather the strength he needed for the remaining eight steps.

After more than a minute of standing there and people having to step around them, Don Celestino grabbed him by the elbow. "Ready?"

The old man yanked his arm away, again counted the steps leading to the second floor, and began climbing. He took the first three steps without thinking about them too much, simply lifting his right leg, pulling up his weaker leg to the same step, then repeating. His brother followed closely behind, ready to help should he need it. This time Don Fidencio kept his head down and focused on the motion of his legs and feet. He gripped the railing tighter when a young boy chased his sister up the stairs and they both brushed up against him. It was only a matter of time before he fell over: if his legs didn't give out on him, it would be on account of these people allowing their children to run loose like farm animals.

When they reached the second floor, Don Fidencio pushed open the gla.s.s door and then paused. He looked at his brother, standing next to him now. He knew there had to be a reason they had climbed all the way up the stairs. The girl, they had left downstairs, with the walker and the plastic bag full of medicines. The concession stand was downstairs. The guards were downstairs. The immigration office with no immigration officer was downstairs. He remembered it was urgent, whatever it was that had forced him up here. Why else risk his life climbing the stairs? A young man with white jeans and matching cowboy boots was walking toward him. He flapped his hands, then patted them dry on the sides of his jeans.

"And now what are you waiting for?" Don Celestino asked.

"I was just catching my breath."

"You want me to go the rest of the way with you?"

"So I can use the toilet?" he said. "No, I can go alone."

"Are you sure?" He was still holding him by the arm.

"For what, you want to take it out for me?"

His brother released him, and the old man continued down the hall. If he knew anything about his body, the urge to relieve himself would return momentarily; it always did. That merciless pecan or peach seed, whatever it was, would see to it.

A middle-aged woman wearing a green smock sat on a bar stool just behind the turnstile that led into the men's and women's restrooms. Her dark bangs hung in an uneven line that reached almost low enough to hide her furrowed brow. From her expression, it seemed something bitter had lodged itself between her molars. On the turnstile sat a cigar box where she kept her large bills, some of which stuck out along the edges. In front of the box stood a set of tiny columns made up of centavos and a few smaller pesos that a sly hand would be less likely to want to make off with. Hanging from the turnstile, a cardboard sign announced the DOS PESOS DOS PESOS entry fee. entry fee.

"Buenos dias," Don Fidencio said.

"Buenas tardes," the woman corrected him.

He glanced at his watch and smiled at her.

"You wanted to use the services?"

"Only to freshen up a little before the long bus ride."

She tapped on the cardboard sign.