ESCUDEROS
Licensed obtained through Adobe Stock. Edited.
Caracas, Venezuela
“Silencio, everyone, listen,” Señor Mejias said, looking across his living room filled with young men and women holding the materials to make shields, masks, and banners. Sheets covered most of the furniture and newspapers lay on the floor.
“Muchachos, I don’t want anyone bringing Molotov cocktails. I don’t want to see slingshots. I don’t want any David versus Goliath heroes. No. I don’t want rocks. If they shoot you with perdigones, you protect your group. If they shoot you with teargas canisters, you give them back to them—no more!”
Antonio sat at the back of the living room with part of a wooden fence. He saw a girl across the room with long, flowing black hair and an olive complexion. She was thin and boyish looking. He could not help but notice her shy demeanor, how she moved her hair out of her face. A woman called her name and it echoed in his head. Alejandra. Alejandra.
Most of the other girls were more voluptuous, with their hair done up—even though they were there preparing for a march—their lipstick perfectly applied and their clothes immaculate. No, Alejandra looked like the oddball there. A strand of purple hair came down in-between all the black tresses—something more commonly seen with artist types. Antonio couldn’t stop looking at her and several times their eyes met.
Doña Manuela called everyone and said that she had made tequeños. People got up from their places and moved towards the kitchen.
“Where did you get the flour?” one of the girls asked. With so much scarcity, the conversation gravitated to what market had the quickest lines, the best time of day to show up, and what they might find that day. Others complained that it didn’t matter, things had deteriorated so much since Maduro got into power. When you arrived, even on the days you were allowed to shop, the managers of the markets had already sold what was available to people connected with the government, and there was no food left.
Antonio picked two tequeños and took a bite of the crunchy fried dough. The white cheese made a long string as he pulled it away. He went back to the living room, and sat next to his wooden fence. Alejandra came out of the kitchen, blowing steam off a tequeño. They noticed each other. She smiled and came to where Antonio sat.
“How’s your tequeño?” Antonio asked.
“It’s too heavy.” Luis, Señor Mejias’ son, barged in, looking at the wood. “Maybe you can cut it in half.”
Antonio looked at Alejandra then Luis and smiled, puzzled.
“Remember, escuderos have to be able to carry this thing for many kilometers and not be too tired to move it around. This is a shield, not a barricade.”
“What do you recommend?” Antonio asked.
“Take it to the back, to the laundry area. This here is my good friend Alejandra. Would you like to give him a hand? And you are?”
“Antonio, my name is Antonio.” He lifted the wooden piece of fence. Luis smiled and moved to another group.
Alejandra held the fence while Antonio sawed it to a manageable size. They painted the front with the three colors of the flag—yellow for all the gold of the land; blue for the deep blue ocean that separated them from the mother country, Spain; and red for the blood of all the people who fought the battles of independence against a superior army and won. Then she applied in white, not the eight stars the dictatorship had decreed the flag should have, but the old seven stars representing the different provinces of the country that signed their declaration of independence.
He put his initials on it like it was a work of art. Alejandra drew her initials on it as well. They smiled at each other. Their eyes locked for what seemed like a long time and all chit chat and room noises faded away into nothing.
“I haven’t seen you around here before,” Alejandra mentioned, moving her brush to touch up some of the paint.
“Nah, this is my first time here. I’m from way south of the city.”
“Really. Where?”
“Oripoto.”
“Wow, that’s way down. Super fancy, where the rich people live. How do you make the commute?”
“I don’t. I stay in the city most of the time.”
“How? Why?”
“I work just a few blocks from here and heard one of your guys talking the other day.”
“They don’t participate in your part of town?”
“They do. But not in an active way. I want to be part of change, not just watch it on Facebook.”
“You came to the right place.”
Before the end of the work session, Antonio asked Alejandra for her phone number. They left the shields in Señor Mejias’ apartment, to be moved at night to a safe place. It was important not to be seen on the streets carrying them. Who knew what could happen if the Guardia Nacionales or colectivos paramilitary spotted them.
Antonio called Alejandra and invited her to meet in front of the San Jose bakery. She agreed.
While waiting, he remembered the times before the dictatorship when the displays of the bakery were replete with bread, sweets, palmeras. Now they were all empty.
People gathered around the counters facing the street.
“Hola,” Alejandra said. “Why did you want to meet over here?”
With a loud thunk a bucket began to fill. The deep smell of freshly baked bread filled the air, followed by the lingering smell of something more succulent—ham.
“Cachitos,” she said, smiling.
People standing around rushed to the counter. Antonio worked his way through to get to the front.
“Dame dos!” Antonio yelled to the baker. The crowd barked give me one, two, three, four cachitos.
Antonio paid and received a hot brown paper bag, steam coming out of it. He moved back through the crowd to Alejandra and gave her a cachito.
“Que cosa más linda,” what a gorgeous thing, she said.
They took bites, slowly savoring the taste of the hot bread and the pieces of ham inside the dough.
“How could you afford this? One cachito is practically a week’s salary when you include inflation.”
“Our company gave us bonuses in dollars—five dollars.”
While inhaling the smell of the bread and yeast, they chewed through the different textures, the soft dough, the sweet ham, the crusty outside.
People gathered around the baker until he screamed, “Sold out! That’s all we have. Come over the day after tomorrow. Unless we can’t find flour.”
As they strolled towards where she lived, Alejandra told him that she used to go to La Universidad Central to study economics and literature.
“What happened?” Antonio asked.
“After my dad died. I had to drop out to help my mom.”
Because she knew English, she got a job with an import/export company processing invoices in English and talking to their suppliers in the States.
“How about you?”
“Architecture. Had to drop out too.”
He wanted to continue school, but between the demonstrations, times the university was in lock-down, and his dad’s insistence that he should be studying something the family could use, like business administration or engineering, he just let go.
They arrived at her building. Caoba trees as wide as a car stood in the middle of the road with vehicles parked between them. Antonio looked all the way up and realized they were as tall as the thirteen story buildings. Alejandra motioned to the guard in a booth to open the gate.
“This was very nice,” she said, giving him a kiss on each cheek. As she pulled back, Antonio grabbed her hands. They stared at each other without saying anything, mimicking each other’s gestures, holding hands, fidgeting with their fingers. The guard watched them.
“Get a room,” the guard said sarcastically, hitting the electronic mechanism unlocking the gate. Antonio let go of one hand and as Alejandra spun around to go inside, turned around, kissed him, and walked to the other side of the gate.
A large crowd chanted in unison,“Y va a caer, y va a caer, este gobierno va a caer!” It’s going to fall, it’s going to fall, this government is going to fall!
Antonio, Luis, and several of the guys from Señor Mejias’ workshop climbed on top of a van and looked down the spacious avenue filled with people between the five-story buildings. The march the week before had close to a million people and Antonio was sure there were more people at this one. He felt goosebumps as if he were in the final game of the World Cup, or the Caribbean beisból championship when the Leones del Caracas won. The chant and screams echoed across the buildings up and down the avenue. People had painted their faces in yellow, blue, and red. They waved flags of all shapes and sizes. Antonio wore a skateboarding helmet and a scarf with the colors of the flag. His backpack contained a first-aid kit, a gas mask, and his shield strapped on the back. It made him feel like a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle.
Juan Carlos and a couple of their friends arrived and told them that the Guardia Nacionales were moving forward by an avenue several blocks ahead. Antonio’s group ran single file by the side of the crowd. People let them pass, knowing they were escuderos. They ran underneath a flag longer than a school bus. Antonio saw the legs of people marching, the distortion of the light as it filtered through the cloth. The chant got more intense. The escuderos emerged from beneath the long flag and were at the front. In the distance, the line of black uniforms and helmets held clear plastic shields and batons. Behind the soldiers stood a large white urban assault vehicle, the tanqueta with its cannon, shooting water at the crowd. Antonio came into the opening. He fitted over his head the teargas mask, made from plastic Coke bottles. One arm went through the straps of the shield. The other escuderos pulled their shields, put their masks on, formed a line and moved forward. He thought of the movie with the Spartans fighting the Persian army. Behind the black helmets’ line, the loud pop of what looked like a shotgun launched tear gas canisters. They hit his shield and landed next to him. He picked one up and threw it back at the line. The Guardia Nacionales hit his group with rubber bullets.
“Coño e la madre!” one of the guys screamed as he turned his head in pain, his cheek turning purple and red. A hailstorm of rubber bullets hit the wood, the metal, the plastic. More canisters with teargas landed around, releasing the choking smoke. They picked them up, ran toward the line of Guardia Nacionales and threw them back, then ran back to the protection of their own line. From one side of the avenue, people threw rocks. The tanqueta moved in that direction and sprayed the crowd. Water hit with such force that it threw some of them ten meters back. Rubber bullets hit Antonio. He had worn several layers of clothes for extra protection, but they still stung.
At the end of the march, they went back to the street they had started from and placed their shields in the trunks of several cars. Antonio glanced at Juan Carlos, Luis, and Marcelo, still panting. Antonio felt a sense of euphoria. He wanted to do more. But it was not a good idea. The colectivos and the Guardia Nacionales in plain clothes used this time to target them, sometimes beating people, other times taking them away. They went their separate ways towards their homes.
The next time he met Alejandra, they walked through one of the avenues that only several days before had been covered by people marching. The avenue had wide sidewalks with restaurant tables, benches and some small trucks selling street food. A mass of people walked up and down. Cars and small buses honked, motorcycles weaved through the traffic. They sat on a bench trying to ignore all the activity.
“It was intense, all the chanting, all the shooting, all the smoke,” Alejandra said. “Scary, but exhilarating.”
“Where were you?”
“Holding the long flag, pushing and pulling. It was alive.”
“Yeah, we ran under that flag, going to the front.”
“I’d like to be at the front with you.”
“Are you sure? It can get brutal up there.”
Antonio lifted his sleeve and showed her the welts and black bruises. Her eyes widened and met his. Neither of them said a word. Alejandra touched his arm. He turned his palm up and felt hers. He could not resist, leaned forward and kissed her on the mouth, in front of all the people, the traffic, the street commotion. He felt a sense of euphoria, like in the demonstration, when the whole world came to a standstill. He pulled back and focused on her eyes, her lips, her hair, the long strand of purple coming down almost over her face. He wanted to kiss her again but noticed a strange look on her face. “So many people,” she whispered, and kissed him, then pulled back and looked all around. People glanced at them and then away. Alejandra and Antonio embraced and kissed like it meant everything to them and the world should stop and allow them that moment.
On the way back to her place they held hands, walked through the busy avenues and turned towards the mountain, the smaller streets, the tall trees, the old buildings. This time at the gate, they kissed passionately.
“Vamos, vamos, keep it kid-friendly,” the guard said, winking, as he pushed the buzz to unlock the gate.
That night Antonio wanted to dream of being together but instead his thoughts went dark. Alejandra and Antonio came from totally different backgrounds. Both had to drop out of the university. His dad didn’t exactly approve of him taking a menial job in an American company instead of following the family business. They asked with suspicion about his new friends or going to the demonstrations. Would they like Alejandra? They barely approved of him staying in the city during the week, sleeping in a cot in the utility room of a Primo’s apartment.
They went together to the next march. When it was time to go to the front, Alejandra kept pace with Antonio and all the other escuderos running through the crowd. At the front, flames consumed a car, dark plumes of smoke rose into the sky from burning tires. Demonstrators threw Molotov cocktails and rocks at the Guardia Nationales. They hit back hard with rubber bullets interspersed with what looked more like glass marbles. To the side, white helmets—medical students—carried injured protestors to the rear. Alejandra got swallowed by a mass of people and was separated from Antonio’s line.
Antonio looked around frantically for her. All he could see were people chanting, screaming, covering their faces as teargas smoke engulfed them. The tanqueta hit a mass of people with the water gun, washing them several meters back. A line of soldiers isolated a group to the side. Antonio spotted Alejandra with them, getting hit with rubber bullets, tear gas, and water.
Fear and rage filled Antonio. He picked up rocks and threw them at the soldiers, hitting them on their helmets. Several of the Guardia Nacionales motioned among themselves and pointed in Antonio’s direction. That allowed Alejandra’s group to move back into the crowd and away from the line of fire. The soldiers unleashed mayhem on Antonio’s group. A barrage of deep booms, thump-pop-pow sounds exploded around, reaching Antonio and cracking holes in his shield. He got hit on the shoulder and back as he retreated.
He grabbed Alejandra. As they ran back, she let go and picked up a canister from the ground and threw it at the soldiers. They both held to the tricolor shield. As the smoke dissipated, she looked at Antonio with red, tear-filled eyes. Cracks ran across her gas mask where it had been hit—probably saving her skull.
At the end of the day, they met the rest of their group at the rendezvous point. While placing the shields in the truck, Juan Carlos pointed at a couple of places on the shields. “These are real bullet holes,” he said. They looked at each other with intensity, but nobody said anything.
Antonio accompanied Alejandra to her neighborhood with the towering caoba trees. They stopped by a Fiat parked at the end of the street. The car had been vandalized several months back and was without rims, tires, battery, or stereo. They sat inside and tried to catch their breath, still under the intense adrenaline rush of the demonstration.
Alejandra had bruises on her face and a black eye. Antonio moved the purple hair to the side and touched her.
“Where does it hurt?”
“Here,” Alejandra said, pointing at her cheek and then her own lips.
Antonio gave her a kiss. They noticed the now-forming bruises, the numbness turning into pain. Through the dense foliage of the trees, lights blinked from the different buildings. A gun blast made them jump. They realized it was a motorbike misfiring. The honking sounds of the city faded away. Every now and then cars came up the street lined with the huge trees in the middle. They sat there, exhausted. A TV played in the distance under a symphony of chirping frogs. As night came, they held to each other, listening to their heartbeats, breathing in tandem, sharing their own heat.
The following day, Alejandra invited Antonio up to her ninth-floor apartment.
“Wow, what a view,” he said in awe of how close they were to the mountain. Her mother asked a million questions about his family, all his last names and what area of the country they had come from. At one point, her mother looked tired and left to take her nap. When they heard no sounds, they tiptoed to Alejandra’s room. They caressed and slowly removed their clothes. Bruises covered both their bodies. While it was difficult and painful, they kissed, explored, and in spite of the pain, made love.
That night, in his own bed, Antonio could not get the images of Alejandra out of his mind: her eyes filled with tears under the cracked gas mask; her subtle smile, holding the pain as he carefully touched her; her fragile body, as he embraced it in his arms; her fingers prodding his back as they touched landmines of pain from the rubber bullets. She was delicate, yet strong, reserved, yet courageous. He’d never met anyone like her before.
They got together more often. Antonio would pick up Alejandra in his mom’s old Mercedes and go to his house, where his mother and father would produce fake smiles of approval. Sometimes they stayed for supper. Alejandra looked uncomfortable watching the maids serve dinner.
When they wanted to be intimate they went to her condominium. Little by little the bruises dissipated, the purple turning into yellow, to a dark shadow, to then just their skin and the soothing sensation of each other’s touch.
When they were not together, they called each other before going to bed.
“You miss me?”
“I miss you.”
Sometimes they did not even talk but listened to their breathing over their cell phones. In Antonio’s house, frog whistles filled the night. Dogs barked on occasion, echoed by other dogs in the distance. Wind flowed through Alejandra’s ninth floor, cut by wailing sirens, motorcycles rushing down an avenue.
People filled Señor Mejias’ living room. He pulled out a book with black and white photos of Selma, Alabama.
“Saben qué es esto?” You know what this is? he asked them. “This is the civil rights movement up in the United States. Do you know what was at the center of it, what made it possible? Why they succeeded?”
They all looked at each other but said nothing.
“Non-violence. But to be non-violent, you have to have a lot of discipline. You must take the beating, you must not strike back.”
“I’m sorry, Señor Mejias,” Marcelo said, “How do you expect us to do that?”
“We’re dealing with monsters,” Antonio vented. “They enjoy it when they fire their rubber bullets straight at your face.” Antonio remembered what happened when Alejandra got separated at their first demonstration.
“We need to bring the fight to them!” Marcelo shouted.
The rest of the evening was nothing but an argument between those who believed that what was needed was plomo, lead, and those who believed that non-violent democratic change was the only way it would work.
Antonio walked Alejandra back to her building. Different motorcycles seemed to be following, some of the drivers wore the usual red shirts and bandanas of the colectivos. They arrived at Alejandra’s building. They sat at her small dining table looking outside. A cool breeze came in. The sunset reds, yellows and oranges streaked across the sky as the colossus of the Avila Mountain faded into black and the buildings and shanty-covered mountains around the city illuminated the night.
Alejandra told Antonio about a cousin living in the States. Her husband worked in construction, not making a lot, but at least they felt safe in North America. Alejandra was thinking about following in her cousin’s footsteps. Antonio listened. He mentioned that he had some relatives in Houston, but he didn’t feel like giving up. There was still hope.
“How could there be hope when we can barely buy a cachito, yet you see government people drive down the street in their brand-new Mercedes? Or expensive restaurants with valet parking, and homeless kids eating out of garbage containers?”
Waves crashed into a jetty throwing water and foam into the air, sending a mist of sea salt over a sandy beach filled with sunbathers. Salsa, merengue, reggaetón, and hip-hop emanated from speakers that people kept next to their towels. Coconut suntan lotion permeated the air. Alejandra lay on her stomach on a towel. Antonio rubbed lotion on her back.
“No bruises. This is good.”
“I like what you’re doing. Don’t stop. Right there,” Alejandra replied.
Next to them, Luis and a couple of their friends rested on towels over the sand. They had packed Señor Mejias’ car that morning and driven across the mountain to the beach. The cool mountain forest climate of Caracas turned into the semi-arid dryness of the coast. The waves on the sandy beach were not as strong, so small kids and their parents swam and splashed. Two well-tanned older men with large stomachs, wearing Speedos, played beach racquetball with women in bikinis. A group of young girls barely covered in small bikinis walked in their direction. Luis stared at the girls. Antonio gave them a quick glance.
“Tangas,” Juan Carlos said.
“No, those are called dental floss,” Luis said.
Antonio glanced up again and went back to applying suntan lotion to Alejandra’s back.
“Keep wishing,” Alejandra said.
“You would look hot in one of those,” Antonio said.
“That’s not for me. Call me a vieja. I prefer this. Besides, look at you guys, you’re wearing shorts instead of Speedos.”
They all laughed.
“Que mierda! I had to park two blocks away,” Marcelo said, arriving with a couple of girls and several of their friends. They laid their towels down, and placed a small cooler and a beach bag in the middle.
“You wouldn’t think we are in the middle of an economic crisis,” Alejandra commented.
“We’re Venezuelans! At all cost a rumba party and going to the beach must go on,” Luis said.
“I got us a treat,” Marcelo said, hovering over the small cooler he brought.
They all looked up as he opened the cover and pulled out three Polar beers.
“Chamo, where did you get those?” one of them said.
“El enchufado,” the connected one, Juan Carlos exclaimed.
“Not really. We don’t have connections with the government. My dad, however, has always kept an extra refrigerator in the garage, and I found these.”
“So, you stole them from your own old man, right?” Antonio said.
They all laughed. Marcelo pulled out a stack of small plastic cups, poured beer into each one, and passed them around. People close by pretended not to stare.
Several kids came down the beach, screaming and banging on large aluminum pots.
“Cocadas.”
“Pastelitos.”
“Tequeños.”
“I love this,” Alejandra said. “So resilient. You may not find a single thing in the supermarkets in Caracas, but these kids somehow find a way to survive.”
Antonio and Alejandra ran to the water and floated around. They noticed a group of about seven men in uniform walking along the beach, nodding at the bathers, picking up a rolling volleyball, throwing it back at the players, and waving. They disappeared towards the back, behind coconut trees into the parking area.
Back at the towels, Alejandra told Antonio to get close and she applied white sunscreen to his nose.
“You’re getting red.”
A couple of sunbathers that had towels next to them came back holding green coconuts with a straw in it, dripping with cold moisture.
“That’s what I want.” Marcelo pointed, getting up, heading toward the parking area.
Two of the guys came back from the water and opened the cooler.
“Where’s the rest of the gang?” Juan Carlos asked.
“They went to get coconut water.”
Their eyes brightened. They walked in that direction, stopping and looking back.
“Go,” Antonio said. We’ll guard the stuff.”
Antonio took this opportunity to lie next to Alejandra and look at her all covered in suntan lotion, glistering in the sun.
“It is so nice to actually get out and do something,” Alejandra said.
After a while Antonio could not stand the heat. He wanted to get into the water, but someone needed to guard their stuff. He looked in the distance toward the parking lot.
“What’s taking them so long?” Alejandra asked.
They waited, but feeling the heat, gathered all their stuff and walked back looking for their group. Alejandra stopped Antonio and gave him a kiss on the lips. They wobbled through the sand. People gathered around the place where they sold the icy coconut water. A crowd of people stood around men in uniform hovering over someone. The two girls they knew walked hurriedly towards them crying. As Antonio and Alejandra got closer, Juan Carlos came into view trying to stop Luis.
“I’ll beat the fuck out of them!” Luis kept repeating.
Antonio and Alejandra’s eyes widened. Antonio was about to say something, when Juan Carlos motioned with one hand to stop. “We need to get out of here.”
“But they took Marcelo down!” Luis half-screamed, then whispered to Juan Carlos.
“No, you saw what Marcelo said, leave, or they’ll take all of us.”
“What the hell is going on?” Antonio asked.
“Marcelo got in a fight with the national police, said his keys are in the cooler,” Juan Carlos mentioned.
“Can we help?” Alejandra said.
“We have to go, now,” Juan Carlos blurted. “Or else.”
Antonio had to take the stairs up the nine floors to Alejandra’s apartment since a power outage had hit the city. He got to the door and called Alejandra. The door opened slowly and Alejandra came out. They kissed in the hallway. She giggled and started to laugh but then shushed and whispered “My mom is in the middle of her nap.” They went to her bedroom. He embraced her from behind and unbuttoned her blouse. She told him to be quiet, since there was no TV to buffer their sounds. Parched skin peeled off their backs and shoulders from the trip to the beach the week before. They made love and stayed entangled with each other for a while. They dressed and went to the balcony, peering out on the city to one side, the mountain on the other.
“Do you think la dictadura is ever going to end?”
“It will. It must,” Antonio responded.
“But it’s been how many years? Look at all the people that have left the country. Look at the streets with homeless people begging for food. I can’t even buy food with what I make. And next week with inflation, our money will be even more worthless. It’s crazy.”
“Change is not easy. We can’t give up.”
“I can’t take it anymore. My cousin in the States has offered to help.”
“Help with what?”
“Getting a plane ticket. They cost more than I make in half a year.”
“You seriously want to leave? Who is going to take care of your mom? You can’t give up, Alejandra. History is on our side. Democracy is on our side. You’ve got to be strong.”
“I’m exhausted. I have so much anxiety. I shiver with fear sitting in this balcony thinking about the colectivos with their red berets on their motorbikes following us. I can do better from up there. Buy her meds online. Give her money to live. I can’t do that here. I’m scared.”
“Don’t give up. We need to be positive.”
“There’s nothing positive about this mess, only more misery. More fear. And at the beach, it’s like they knew who to target. They found Marcelo, beat the crap out of him and took him away.”
“Marcelo is a hot head.”
“It doesn’t matter. They did it to Diana two weeks ago. A group of men on motorcycles came over, picked her up, and sandwiched her between two soldiers and took off.”
“How could you possibly give up and run away to the States? We have to be strong. Don’t be a coward. There’s so much that still needs to be done.”
“I’m not a coward!” She paused. “Many other people are leaving too.”
Antonio moved closer to hug Alejandra, but she pulled away and held to the balustrade. A few tears fell on the round metal, one bouncing into the void, disappearing down the nine floors below.
Antonio met with Juan Carlos, Luis, and other escuderos to collect some of the shields and put them in the back of a van for a march taking place several days later. Antonio asked about Marcelo. They argued that Marcelo had brought it upon himself, while Luis was convinced that he was targeted.
He said goodbye to the guys and walked to Alejandra’s neighborhood. He felt bad about how he had left his discussion with Alejandra. His feelings for her were like he had never felt for anyone before. He could say he loved her, and imagined himself with her like he saw his own parents. But what type of future could they have under this turmoil? Graffiti on a wall read Abajo con la dicta… then a brush stroke, paint all over the sidewalk, and the wall splattered with fading red and holes. Was that art or something that really happened? As he walked, motorcycles followed him. He needed to see Alejandra and tell her that she was not a coward for wanting to leave the country. He was sorry he said that and wanted to apologize. Many people they knew had left already, and he could see through social media the bridge with Colombia with masses of people moving on foot with only what they carried crossing the border. The motorcycles with colectivos stopped by motorcycles with Guardia Nationales. He ignored them. He arrived at the street where Alejandra lived, pulled out his phone to call her. The motorcycles with Guardia Nacionales surrounded him.
“Escudero de mierda!” one of them screamed at him and punched him in the face. They got off the motorcycles and as Antonio fell to the ground, they kicked him.
He heard screams coming from the buildings. A kick hit him on the temple and ear. A Guardia Nacional pulled a gun and waved it at him. Antonio stared into the man’s pupils under the helmet. The soldier’s nose flared, in and out. The gun shot.
Antonio’s heart felt like it was exploding and adrenaline filled his body. He realized that he was not dead, but a burst of pain stung his leg. People screamed, “They shot him! They shot him!”
The Guardia Nacionales got on their motorbikes and left. Antonio couldn’t move, his hands shivered and he heard his own heartbeat. He looked down at his body, wondering where exactly they had shot him. The pain came from his right knee. Blood pooled around his leg. Oh my God, he thought, this is how I’m going to die. He was going to bleed to death while people watched from the buildings. The shivers went away. He felt sleepy, tired. He no longer felt pain. The asphalt pressed the side of his cheek and he drooled. He could not keep his eyes open. Then, he heard a voice.
“Aguantate carajo, we’re not going to let you bleed to death on the street.” It was the guard from Alejandra’s building.
He was lucky to be alive, his dad had said, showing Antonio the video that someone had recorded with a phone and posted on social media. He had lost a lot of blood and could not remember much, but was told that he was taken to a public hospital, and since it was a gunshot, a soldier wanted to put him under arrest. If he remained at the public hospital, he was going to lose the leg and who knows what else if it got infected. Fortunately, someone went through his phone and called his dad. He was rushed to a private clinic, where he should have gone in the first place. They saved his life. If he ever wanted to walk again, surgery was needed. At the clinic, his dad made an appointment with a specialist in Houston.
When Antonio was coherent enough to talk, he asked his mom where Alejandra was.
“Her?” his mother said. “I don’t know.”
“Has anybody contacted her, let her know where I am?
“Look, a little distance may be good.”
“Mom, please.”
Eventually, visitors were allowed and Alejandra came into the room. Antonio missed her and had run through his head a million times what he felt for her.
“Took a while to track you down,” Alejandra said. “Señor Mejias is having all of us over for a Sancocho, next week. Luis and Juan Carlos are leaving as well.”
“Funny, you were the one who wanted to leave the country, but I am the one leaving.”
Antonio wanted to tell Alejandra how sorry he was for even thinking that she didn’t care, that she was giving up. He wanted to tell her how much he loved her and how all this time all he could think about was her. He started to talk, but family came into the room, followed by his mom and sister. Alejandra placed her finger on his lips and then held his hand.
“Soon,” Alejandra said, “we’ll be together again.”
L. Vocem's work is forthcoming in Bellingham Review and Tint Journal, other works have been published in Acentos, Azahares, Carve, Litro, riverSedge, Touchstone, Tulane, Westchester, Zoetrope. He's a finalist in the 2023 Rash Award in fiction, Editor’s Choice Award 2020 Raymond Carver Short Story Contest, First Finalist 2018 Ernest Hemingway Prize, and Shortlist London Magazine’s 2018 Short Story Prize. He lives in Johns Creek, Georgia.