11
After several trips to the wagon, my father and brothers moved on to other piles. My job was to stay and guard the wagon, neatly arranging all that went into it. When I remembered, I took the jug of water and buried it in the earth to keep it cool. Eager for their company, I waited for my brothers to return with their newest finds.
From where I stood guard, I could see my father and brothers hurrying toward a truck that had just arrived. It was rumbling toward a dump area just beyond me. The men on that high, wobbly truck were pointing, nodding, waving—gestures signaling my father and brothers to follow because they carried a rich load. Directed by a man who advanced slowly and seemed to walk on his knees, the truck waded into a heap of garbage, dumped its cargo to the whir of a hydraulic mechanism, and was pulling out as my father and brothers drew close enough to express their gratitude with a slight movement of their heads.
12
Now my father waved to me. It was a call to join them before others arrived. As I started toward them, my brother Lázaro foundered on a spongy mass, fell through it, and disappeared. I stopped in my tracks, stunned. “Buried,” I whispered, “he’s buried!” My father saw him fall, bolted to his side, and thundered a command, “Alzate, Lázaro, get up, get up!” and in seconds he had raised him. Unsteady on his feet, Lázaro shook himself off like a wet dog and then brushed away scabs of rotting stuff that clung to him. Suddenly the stench of decay, the idea of grabbing something that might crumble into muck, the thought of losing my footing in all that garbage, filled me with terror. On tentative feet I went forward cautiously, expecting the ground to give way beneath me. My steps were becoming steady when one of them set off a long, frenzied squeak. A rat sprang from under my foot and retreated grudgingly, black eyes unblinking, sharp teeth flashing beneath bristly whiskers, long tail stiffly trailing its fat body. I did not move until my father’s shrill whistle roused me; then he called me in an angry voice and I moved on.
Working in silence, we gathered what we wanted from that mound. Now and again the sun’s oppressive heat was dimmed by clouds that seemed to come from nowhere, bringing us relief.
13
By noon the sky was overcast. We pulled the wagon away from the dumping area and sat on the ground to eat what we had brought from home. By then the stench no longer bothered us. My father handed us bean and potato tacos that were still warm. Hunger made them exquisite, and I sat there chewing slowly, deliberately, making them last, too happy to say anything. We shared the jug of water, bits of damp earth clinging to our hands after we set it down.
Before us was the coming and going of trucks, the movement of men, rats scurrying everywhere, some dogs, and just beyond us, under a tentlike tarp, a big gas-powered pump that was used to drain water from that whole area, which flooded easily in a heavy rain. Behind us was a tiny shack, crudely assembled with cardboard, wood, and sheet metal, home of the dump’s only dweller, Uñas. He was nowhere in sight, but my mind saw him—a monstrous dung beetle6 rolling balls endlessly, determination on his pockmarked face, jaws in constant motion and his hands thrashing nervously, searching the grounds with a frenzy unleashed by the appearance of intruders.
14
By 12:30 the sky’s blue was completely eclipsed. Above us an ugly gray was pressing down the sky, flattening it by degrees. My father stood up and looked hard at the sky as he spun on his heel. The temperature dropped abruptly and a strong wind rose, blowing paper, cans, boxes, and other objects across the grounds in all directions. He issued orders rapidly: “¡Pronto! Block the wheels and cover the wagon with the lona! Tie it down!” Then he took a sack and hurried off to a heap he had been eyeing while we ate.
We leaped forward, the two youngest scurrying in search of something to anchor the wheels with, while the two eldest raised the wagon’s sides and unfolded the tarp my father had designed for such an emergency. The wheels blocked, we turned to help our brothers. We had seen our father tie down the tarp many times. We pulled it taut over the wagon and carefully drew the ends down and under, tying securely the lengths of rope that hung from its edges.
Huddled around the wagon, we watched the day grow darker. Big black clouds, their outlines clearly visible, scudded across the sky. It was cold and we shivered in our shirt sleeves. Now the wind blew with such force that it lifted things and flung them into spasmodic flight. We moved in together and bent down to shield and anchor ourselves. Frightened, we held our silence and pressed in closer until one of us, pointing, gasped, “Look! No one’s out there! No one! Jus’ look! We’re all alone!”
15
A bolt of lightning ripped the sky and a horrendous explosion followed. Terror gripped us and we began to wail. The clouds dumped their load of huge, cold drops. And suddenly my father appeared in the distance. He looked tiny as he ran, flailing his arms, unable to shout over the sound of wind and water. He was waving us into the shack and we obeyed at once. Inside, cowed by the roar outside and pressing together, we trembled as we waited for him. He had almost reached us when the wind sheared off the roof. Part of one side was blown away as the first small pebbles of ice began to fall. He was shouting as he ran, “Salgan, come out, come out!”
We tumbled out, arms extended as we groped toward him, clutched his legs when he reached us and pulled us away seconds before the wind leveled what remained of the shack. A knot of arms and legs, we stumbled to the wagon. There was no shelter for hundreds of yards around and we could not see more than several yards in front of us. The rain slashed down, diminished, and hail fell with increasing density as the size of the spheres grew. Now we cried out with pain as white marbles struck us. My father’s head pitched furiously and he bellowed with authority, “¡Cállense! Be still! Don’t move from here! I’ll be right back, ahorita vuelvo!”