CHAPTER 6

They arrived in Capaz around three o’clock in the morning. Santiago held the sleeping Alegría with her arms draped around his shoulders and her head nestled into his neck. Even as he shifted her weight to follow María Dolores, who carried two of the three loaded backpacks out of the last bus, the little girl didn’t stir. For a second he missed his three cousins. Even when they would shriek and cause mayhem all day long, they would always cuddle against him at night.

Then he remembered the screams and continuous accusations from his tía. She never hugged him. No adult did anymore.

The bulbs in many of the streetlamps had burned out, while others had been smashed, making the trek through the unfamiliar town unnerving. From what he could see, the town was nothing more than run-down shacks closed up for the night. Heavy iron grates or sheets of metal blocked the storefronts. Santiago started scouting for a safe place for them to stay until sunup, some alleyway or even a dumpster if it would keep the ladrones away. Two gunshots went off close by. Santiago huddled closer to María Dolores, half wanting to protect her, and half to be protected by her.

María Dolores looked at her phone for directions. She seemed to have a plan, even though Santiago didn’t know what it was. They turned down a street to a tavern with a flickering green light that alternated between half-lit words. If it was anything like the tavern his uncle frequented, the place probably offered beer and beds.

The inside smelled of spilled alcohol, vomit, and unwashed humans. The bartender, bald except for some tufts of gray hair above his ears, looked up from his conversation with the only patron and jerked his chin upward to ask what they wanted.

“A room,” María Dolores said. Santiago noticed the lone man on the bar stool eyeing them. Or more specifically, eyeing María Dolores. Hopefully this would be a place where rooms came with locks.

“How many beds?” the bartender asked.

“Two.”

The bartender grabbed keys from under the bar and told his comrade he’d be back in a minute. As they walked away, Santiago still felt the other man’s eyes on their backs.

The stairs creaked. Any second they’d fall through and land right back in the middle of the bar. Santiago shifted Alegría to keep her from slipping.

On the landing the bartender pointed out the bathroom and then the shower room. “Showers are extra, and you have to borrow the key from the bar. This is my place, so if you need anything else, the name’s José.”

Don José opened the door to a bedroom with two beds squeezed together in the shape of an L and no room for anything else beyond the space needed to enter. They received the key, and María Dolores handed him a folded banknote. Already what she’d paid for Santiago racked up to more than he remembered any family member spending on him.

María Dolores dumped the bags on one of the beds and eased Alegría from Santiago’s arms to carry the sleeping child to the bathroom.

“Dead-bolt the door behind me and don’t let anyone in,” she whispered. “A place like this, bedbugs will be the least of our worries.”

Santiago took off his shoes and plopped onto the free bed. It creaked when he shifted, his bottom sank into a hole in the middle of the mattress, and it smelled of old cigarettes. But it had a pillow. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d slept with a pillow, even a flat one like this one. He stayed awake long enough to see the two return from the bathroom and hear the click of the door lock behind them.