The Devils Highway - Luis Alberto Urrea [45]
They moiled around. In small groups they wandered to “La Central,” the bus station, lines of travelers converging in noisy tumult. Children scattered, mothers scolded. Old men stood on crutches. A small girl could not hold her water any longer and peed on the floor, between her mother’s great bundles of clothing. The walkers stuck together, nervous and lost in this strange place. Outside, buses rumbled in their berths, destinations tattooed on their brows: TIJUANA, MAZATLAN, CIUDAD JUAREZ, MEX D.F. Voices blasted over the buzzing speaker system.
“Attention, please. Gate five. Gate five.”
It was 11:45.
“Gómez-Palacio and points south. Now boarding at gate five.”
Mendez appeared and told them to get it together. Don’t look ragtag, man, don’t look lost. Look NORMAL, cabrones. Don’t draw attention. Get in a line! Lines don’t catch anyone’s eye. Look like you’re going somewhere, boys!
He put them against a wall and told them to wait there.
He had his baseball cap off. The walkers didn’t know what to make of the Mendez forelock. It hung down to the bottom of his nose, and he delighted in whipping it back over his head.
It made him look like a pendejo.
Oh, well. They didn’t have to love the guy. They just had to follow him.
Mendez rushed outside and made his way down the line of buses. He stepped into a Pacifico bus and had words with the driver. Mendez and the driver shook on their deal, and he collected the boys and told them to hustle. Fifty pesos each. Everything in Sonora cost fifty pesos! Some of them thought he was going to handle the fares—they’d paid enough—but, like the cost of Nelly’s rooms, it was their problem and not his own. They dug into their meager funds and paid the driver.
The bus driver pocketed the money and didn’t say a word. He closed the door and backed out. The group watched through the dusty bus windows as the shadowy travelers in the station watched them back. The bus sighed into the sun, then hove down the driveway and into the streets. The boys were sightseeing, thinking, Adios, México! Many daydreams about the United States, daydreams about the walk ahead. Jokes. Daring boasts.
The walkers had bags, or small backpacks, and an average of eight liters of water each.
The driver took them down the highway at top speed. Mendez told them to say nothing when they got to the checkpoint. Soldiers stopped the buses and inspected them for … what. They didn’t know. Drugs? Whatever. “Look like you’re going someplace,” Mendez said. He told one of the guys to tell them he was on his way to San Luis, which was a smart suggestion, since they were going in the direction of San Luis.
The soldiers boarded the bus and snooped around, then waved them on. They never said a word to the walkers.
The driver only went a few kilometers beyond the post, to the little patch of dirt known as El Papalote.
Mendez said, “Pull over here.”
“Here?” said the driver.
“Right here. Drop us off at this sandy spot.”
“Want me to take you up to the rest area?”
“No. This will do. Drop us off right here.”
“Whatever you say,” the driver replied. It wasn’t his business if these guys wanted to hop off a cool bus in the middle of nowhere.
It was now about 1:30.
The walkers stumbled off the bus. Some of them were already hitting the Pepsis.
“Get your things and let’s go,” Mendez said.
They got all their bags together and choked as the bus pulled away, washing them in fumes and dust. They waved their hands before their faces and waited for a truck to scream by going the other way. The driver knew what they were doing. The United States was less than one hundred yards away. He raised one hand and was gone.
They trotted along the road, Mendez in the lead, the other two gangsters taking up the rear. Nobody told the walkers anything. They thought they were going to jump a big fence and hide