Happy Families_ Stories - Carlos Fuentes [63]
on the eleventh of December
they dragged us from the houses
gathered us together on the level ground in front of the Church of the Three Kings
kept us standing there for hours and hours
then they put the men and boys in the church
the women and little kids in an abandoned house
we were about six hundred people
they put us men facedown and tied our hands
and again they asked us about hidden weapons
and since we didn’t know anything the next morning they began to kill us
they cut off the heads of the men in the church with
machetes
one after the other
so we could see what was in store
then they dragged the bodies and heads to the sacristy
a mountain of heads looking without seeing
and when they got tired of cutting off heads
they shot the rest of us outside
leaning against the red bricks and beneath the red
roof tiles of the school
that’s how hundreds of men died
the women they marched to Cruz Hill and Chingo Hill
and fucked them
over and over and over again
and then they hung them stabbed them
set fire to them
the kids died crying hard
the soldiers said the kids that are left are very cute
maybe we’ll take them home
but the commander said no
either we kill the children or they’ll kill us
the children screamed as they killed them
kill all the bastards kill them good so they can’t holler anymore
and soon there were no more screams
my grandmother hid me in her skirts
we saw the slaughter from the trees
I swear that when the Atlácatl Battalion passed
the trees moved to protect
my grandmother and me
then it was known all over the region
that the soldiers of the regular army
came back to clean up El Mozote
from the farmhouses you could smell rotting flesh
they took the bodies out of the Church of the Three Kings
and buried them all together
but it still smelled of sweet corpse
pigs walked around eating the ankles of the dead
that’s why the soldiers said don’t eat that hog it ate human flesh
nobody picks up the dolls, the decks of cards, the side combs, the brassieres, the shoes scattered
all over the village
nobody prays to the bullet-ridden virgins in the church or to the heads of decapitated
saints
in the confessional there’s a skull
and on the wall an inscription
the Atlácatl Battalion was here
here we shit on the sons of bitches
and if you can’t find your balls
tell them to mail them to you at the Atlácatl Battalion
we’re the little angels of hell
we want to finish off everybody
let’s see who imitates us
me and me and me and me and me and me
the mara, the gang?
the children of the soldiers of ’81
the children of those slaughtered in ’81
nothing is lost in Central America
the slim waist of a continent
everything is inherited
all the rancor goes from hand to hand
The Armed Family
When General Marcelino Miles marched into the Guerrero Mountains, he knew very well what ground he was walking on. He was in command of the Fifth Infantry Battalion, and his mission was clear: to finish off the so-called Vicente Guerrero Popular Army, named in honor of the last guerrilla of the Revolution for Independence, shot in 1831. “His lesson was ours,” General Miles muttered at the head of the column struggling up the slopes of the Sierra Madre del Sur.
He had to persuade himself under all circumstances that the army obeyed, that it did not revolt. For over seventy years this standard had established the difference between Mexico and the rest of Latin America: The armed forces obeyed civilian authority, the president of the republic. That was clear as day.
But this morning the general felt that his mission was clouded: At the head of the rebel group was his own son, Andrés Miles, in armed rebellion following Mexico’s great democratic disillusionment. From the time he was very young, Andrés had fought for leftist causes, within the law and in the hope that political action would achieve the people’s goals.
“A country of one hundred million inhabitants. Half of them living in dire poverty.”
It was Andrés’s mantra at supper, and his brother, Roberto, gently took