30

Sonny’s eyes fluttered open, and he looked at the blurred shape in front of him. Death was in the room; he could feel it. Not the death of the old penitentes of New Mexico, not la Muerte, the friendly doña Sebastiana, the skeleton in the cart who came with her bow and arrow to claim her victims, but a cold, detached death. Cold space, cold air, the kind of death one might expect in a laboratory. Disembodied, without mercy, without feelings.

A cold death. He felt cold. He was shivering. Death was the presence the baboon felt as it huddled in its cage, whimpering.

Sonny tried to turn his head, but his neck muscles were stiff, locked in place.

“Agh—ah—” he called. Help.

The baboon responded with a guttural cry.

Sonny closed his eyes and allowed a cold, sleet-driven wind to envelop him. He was too weak to resist. He could hardly breathe; the cold seemed to freeze his tongue. Whatever blood was left in his veins had turned to ice. His body was a mass of trembling convulsions.

A glowing light drew his attention, a luminous ball of light rising over his body. He smiled when he recognized his soul rising from his body. His body was growing cold and dying, but the warm ball of light rising above the body was alive. It could look down and see the body it was leaving behind. He was no longer in the mass of quivering flesh, he was rising above the world of the flesh, into the whisper of the wind.

“Better to die,” Tamara whispered, her voice a flutter in the wind. Yes, better to die, he agreed. The release of the soul was so pleasant.

He looked down and saw a spring of fresh water by the river, green with watercress, the tunnel into the world of spirits, there where his guardian spirits waited. So dying was a dream, a return to childhood, a return to the world of nature he had known along the river as a child.

He saw Lorenza. She was waiting for him, her arms open to receive him. “The medicine,” she whispered, “use the medicine of the guardian animal. Fly with Coyote.”

“Trust her,” Rita said.

“Trust us,” he heard his mother’s voice.

Ah, they were telling him to take hold of the guardian spirit, the coyotes that had helped him defeat Raven. There was help in the world of spirits, guides waiting to take his hand.

Pozo, he thought. The hole into the underworld was also his grave. Better to die.

Let me die, he screamed, but only a growling sound came from his lips.

Something that he thought was his heart opened like a red flower, a pomegranate, red-seeded and juicy, bleeding. From the wound his soul was rising into the air.

“Brujos can fly,” don Eliseo said.

I am a brujo, Sonny thought. For my spirit to fly is nothing new. I fly in dreams, I fly in love, I fly in the morning when the light of the Señores y Señoras de la Luz fills my soul with clarity. I fly in beauty, the beauty of the land I love, the people, the sounds, sights, and smell of all that I am. I am beginning to find my power.

He had found it when he faced Raven; he could find it again.

“The medicine,” Lorenza called again.

He reached for his leather pouch that contained the coyote hairs, and for the Zia medallion. His medicine was intact, it was with him.

He looked down and saw the medics working over his frozen, naked body. Garcia. Diego. Someone was leading Madge out of the room. Head bowed. He smiled in relief. Garcia had come in time, just like a good cop should. Like old Elfego Baca had always done.

Sonny’s soul was in the room, looking down at his body from this distance, with a clarity of light he knew don Eliseo would appreciate.

No more worries, only the transcendent bubble of light he had become. He was watching his death and he was smiling. Images. Good thoughts. A buoyant feeling, like a bright yellow hot-air balloon, a sunflower caught in the breeze of October, a bright marigold, everything suddenly not separated but together. Thank you, don Eliseo, for bringing me along this path of light. Thank you, Lorenza, for leading me into the world of my guardian spirits, the world alive with talking trees, river murmurs, mountain advice, butterfly souls, bluebird songs of wisdom, seeds of grass, words of the poet, cry of child, sound of door banging.… He had become a ghost, and the ghost was overcome by the beauty of colors and sounds all around him. Death, if that’s what had crawled into his body, was not fearful. Death was a light that released the soul, death was a wind mourning around the corners of the earth, singing around the four cosmic corners of the universe. Far beyond the sun the wind blew and carried the souls. Somewhere in the soft breeze he saw the image of his father. He wanted to reach out and embrace his father, but the spirit of the man drew back.

Sonny’s soul rose like a gold balloon into the light of the sun.… And there, coming toward him, also smiling, was Rita. She was dressed in white, the flowing silk of a bridal gown, the lace on her head flowing in the wind as she ran to meet him. She was shining bright, her lips as red as the succulent prickly pears of the New Mexican cactus. Her eyes full of light, honey light, her hair dark as a summer night, glistening with moonlight, the drone of cicadas her music. He opened his arms to greet her. Yes, it was time to marry her, time to settle down. He had come home. She stood in front of him, smiling, asking how she looked, looking at him shyly, and he told her she looked beautiful as a summer morning in the Jemez Mountains, and the wedding party laughed, called him a poet, needling him. Sonny Baca, the great all-time bachelor, lover of the North Valley women, he who had lived hard, loved hard, and danced hard, was finally getting married. Even his ex-girlfriends were there, standing like good losers in the background, for after all, they respected Rita. She had won, fair and square, or maybe not so square because they suspected she had used some of Lorenza’s love potions to land him. But they stood quietly, remembering perhaps a long-ago night they had shared with Sonny.

“You look beautiful, too,” Rita said, and Sonny looked down at his pants, his tuxedo jacket, the white silk shirt, his favorite turquoise bolo tie, the tie his father had given him long ago.

“I should be wearing my black hat,” he joked.

“I brought your hat,” she said.

“You think of everything,” he said, putting on his hat.

“Now you look like one of those cowboys in the movies,” she teased.

“The only dogie I want to rope is you,” he teased back. Lordy, Lordy, he was happy.

He looked from her to the people. Everybody was there. Everybody he knew and loved. Howard and Marie and their daughter. Diego and his family, the chief, all the old compañeros. Even los vatos locos from the South Valley, the old veteranos who had taught him that life was to be lived hard.

Now the party turned solemn. Don Eliseo, dressed in a dark suit, stepped forward, cleared his throat, uttered, “We are gathered to join Elfego Francisco Baca and Rita Lopez.” He paused. “If there is anyone present who thinks these souls should not be joined, let such a pendejo step forward,” don Eliseo intoned.

“His soul belongs to me,” la Muerte said. Don Eliseo and the wedding party turned to see the figure of Death, radiant in white, far more luminous than Rita. She held out her hand for Sonny to take. “We will walk this path.” She smiled, a smile so lovely that any man would have gladly followed. She was the spirit who launched a thousand ships, souls sailing the universal waters.

She pointed at the path of souls.

Better to die, Sonny remembered Tamara’s words, and reached for la Muerte.

“No!” Rita shouted. “I won’t let you have him! He’s mine! I worked hard for him! You have no claim to him! He belongs to me! I want to marry him, to grow old with him, to have his children! He will get well! I promise God and all the saints. His is the path of the sun, not the path of death!”

She pulled, and don Eliseo pulled, and Lorenza, and his mother, and Diego and his family, and old friends, all pulled, all formed a wall of protection around Sonny until la Muerte backed away and laughed. “You win! You win!” she cried. “It’s not his time to die!”

And Death turned and disappeared down the path of souls.

“Don’t die! Don’t die!” Rita cried. “I won’t let you die,” she whispered in his ear, her tears wetting his face, her arms cradling him. “Wake up, Sonny! Open your eyes! Don’t die!”

“Sonny! Return to this place you know!” don Eliseo commanded.

“The coyote spirits can help,” Lorenza whispered in his ear.

They were pointing the way. It was time to gather his soul and return to earth, this place, this love, this spirit living in the flesh.

In the dark whirlwind the coyotes appeared, dancing around his body, filling his soul with the energy it needed to return to the world. No, it was not time for him to die. Sonny entered the tunnel, returning from the underworld like a shower of golden light.

His eyelids fluttered.

“He’s opening his eyes!”

“Gracias a Dios.”

“Call the doctor!”

“Sonny?”

Sonny smiled. The icy cold in his muscles was gone, and in its place a fever. The coyotes cried in the distance.

He could hear Rita.

His eyes twitched again, blinked open. The tunnel was behind him; he was returning to the world he knew, the world of people. He was falling back to earth, back into his body.

“Sonny, oh, Sonny.” Rita soothed his forehead.

For a moment there was no pain, then the pain returned, like fragments of broken glass, glittering spears deep in his head. A headache. His eyelids fluttered, shut, desiring to turn off the exploding pain. The glare of light was intense. Returning to the body on the bed was to return to the world of pain. Even the light was painful.

“Better to die,” Tamara whispered.

“I won’t let you die,” Rita replied.

Not time to die, he tried to say, moving his lips. She touched a wet cloth to them. Dry, cracked, stiff, immobile like the rest of his body. He sucked, she touched a plastic straw to his lips. He gulped. Air and water. He was back on earth. His toes twitched, then his fingers.

“Oh, thank God, thank God!”

He couldn’t stop his eyelids from fluttering, blinking. The glass cut through his eyes.

“Ri—”

“Yes.”

“Wah—”

She gave him more water, and he sucked deep, emptying the large plastic cup, spilling it down his chin onto his chest. Cool. He gasped for air, farted, felt pee wetting the bed. God, I peed, he thought, smiling.

“Oh, Sonny, you’re back, you’re back,” she cried, and pressed her lips to his, warming him, wetting him with warm tears.

Earth could be so good. Painful, but good.

Figures appeared behind her. Ah, yes, the wedding party. Did we get married, he tried to ask, but no words came.

The doctor who entered the room pulled Sonny’s eyelids back one at a time and shone a light in.

Hijo de tu chingada! Sonny tried screaming—but it came out a growl. He struck out with his right arm; instead, he felt the toe in his left foot wiggle. He cursed again and heard only a grunt. Damn! Nothing was connected! Nothing!

The doctor put a cold stethoscope to his chest, felt his pulse, poked. “Squeeze my finger.”

“Nagggh—”

“He spoke!” someone cried.

“He said something!”

“What?”

“Good sign, good sign.” The doctor patted him. “Now remember”—he was speaking to Rita and the others—“it’s going to take time. We don’t know what he can coordinate. His brain received a hell of a shock. It’s like a power surge hitting your computer, everything gets jumbled up. Understand? I’m not making any predictions, but with therapy and time …” He shook his head and walked out.

That’s where he was. In a hospital room. Alive. An image of Stammer applying the paddles to his head flashed through his mind. Madge. The baboon. Images flashed, jumbled, but a memory nevertheless. Tamara had saved him.

“Sonny,” don Eliseo whispered, “you’re alive, hijo. No te tocaba.” The old man kissed his forehead.

His mother was at his side, crying, leaning over him to touch him, to be close. “Gracias a Dios …”

Lorenza, the curandera who had been his guide into the world of the guardian spirits, stood by Rita.

“Who-ooooo,” he said.

“He’s trying to talk!”

I am talking, he tried to answer. His eyelids had quit their trembling, but the rest of his body was alive with twitches, hot pin pricks that made his nerves spasm, muscles jump.

“Sonny, can you hear me?”

“Yaaa.”

Don Eliseo looked from Rita to Lorenza and bent close to Sonny’s ear. “What’s your name?” he asked.

“Agggh,” Sonny replied, the sound wrapped around his thick, dry tongue. But there was another sound, a clearer, more distinct sound. In his heart. In his soul. He had to reach for that. He had to try hard, concentrate all his energy, reach to join the sound in his soul with the stiff flesh of tongue, lips, throat.

“Saw—” he said with all his might. “Saw-ny.”

“Yes!”

“He said it!”

“Where do you live?” don Eliseo asked.

Sonny smiled. God, that was so easy. Everybody knew he lived in the North Valley, in Alburquerque, in New Mexico. Oh, the old man was playing games, testing him. Don Eliseo, after all, was a trickster. Okay. I’ll tell him where I live. He gathered the sounds in his thoughts and forced them to his tongue.

“Novo Mexic,” he said, and they cheered and kissed and hugged him.

“Yes!” Rita cried. “Novo Mexic! You live in Novo Mexic!”

He was returning to them.