"...coming to America." excerpt from Inside your Shadow (c) 2024 (full story)
...and the black and white television was difficult to watch.
Time was running out as Donald Trump yelled “Make America Great Again” the streets back home
seemed to elevate that thing called ‘Crime’ was in everything. The sound of the inhale is screaming and crying. The sound of the exhales is houses boarded up and dilapidated buildings. Gangs took everything. Her father was supposed to come
back. She dared not to sleep because she knew they would come.
Her eyes were dry. Didn’t want to close her eyes. Yet she knew it wouldn’t make a difference when they came. She could hear her mother through the thin uninsulated walls cradling her baby sister, while she sang those timeless lullabies. She heard the roar of a big truck. A particular roaring she had not heard before. She heard a heavy door opening. Feet heavily stomped on the ground. The door closes, A key goes into the lock. Tears stream down her cheeks. The door swung open. Then a large imposing man stood in the doorway, “We have to go now!”
She walked passed her oldest daughter with her baby daughter
cradled in her arms “Tell Govan,” then she looked at her oldest daughter,
nodded her head in that special way. Daughter went into the closet and grabbed
that one suitcase. The suitcase had enough in it to last twenty four hours:
cans of tuna, noodles, and diapers. She didn’t want to leave without her
father.
Full of blind faith. Better than no faith at all. Mr. Govan
rode through the broken town. She noticed that her sister wasn’t crying. Maybe
that meant that a better life was closer. The huge Ford truck smelled of body
odor, cigarette smoke, and carburetor fumes. Govan turned on the radio. A news
report of Donald Trump vowing to stop immigrants from going into the country.
Govan looked over at the oldest daughter. She had a frightened look. So, he
changed the channel to Neil Diamond singing “They’re Coming to America.”
"You’ll never see anything anymore, like this again,” Mr. Govan told the older daughter. The drive was long.
“The rain,” her mother said and paused. “I heard once. That it is good to cry during the rain. Maybe the last time you cry.” Govan added.
“Here,” her mother handed her a can of tuna. Govan pulled into a gas station. The oldest daughter feared the worst, regardless. He smiled as he put the car in park near Rio. Her mother reached from the seat and comforted her with a pat, “Don’t worry they’ve all been paid.” It was well known about their relatives and friends that didn’t have enough. There was a girl named Melissa. Who fell in love with all the things she saw of the US through the reality television shows and the talk shows.
“Here ya’ go,” Govan came back with two dozen boxes of
donuts. “See, we’re going to be all right,” Her mother replied. She knew the
price must have been expensive for them to make their exodus. She stayed awake
as long as she could. Not enough sugar or soda pop could keep her awake. The
setting sun looked like it was being pulled into the land between the
mountains.
“There’s two ways to get to the promise land,” she thought it was strange that hearing those words woke her from sleeping. “Don’t worry by this time tomorrow we’ll be home,” her mother said. “We either go under the ground, or by water, above the ground.” Govan said. “What did my husband say?” the mother asked. A few minutes later they followed Govan into an abandoned warehouse that had spray painted windows. One wouldn’t even guess that this would be a collection point. They were waiting on a group of men that would take them to another collection point near Texas. The inside of the warehouse was half the size of a football field. Families and groups of people were huddled together awaiting the dream. They waited to get on board.
“Follow my directions. Do exactly what I say,” the captain of the ship ordered. “We only have certain hours to get to the corner of Texas. If we get stopped all of you have less than five minutes to hide in the cargo area. And not even that is promising. As part of what Carlos paid, you only have one day supply of food left so eat wisely.” Her mother begged for her daughter to sit above, by the captain. In less than a minute, she vomited three times. “Save some of your energy, we have a long trip” She noticed the lightning blanketed across the sky for hours. “There’s majick in the sky tonight. Connect the dots.”
So, the oldest daughter connected the dots of the lightning
flashes. She saw Mayan warriors long forgotten. They were clothed by the skins
of panthers. Their bodies seemed chiseled from stone. “You see! Those are you
and your family’s protectors. She shut her eyes, then opened them again. Looked
in the water and saw a serpent, “That is Chaac.” She looked at the captain and
wondered if she had seen and said any of that. “Get your mom and sister. Your
freedom is beyond that gate. Then she heard a cell phone ring. The captain took
the phone out of his pocket. “Okay,” then he hung up and put the phone back into his pocket. “We have ten minutes to get passed the gate.” The guards on duty
were on a fifteen-minute break.
She didn’t remember what happened after she was staring up at the tall gate- “Come on! Come on! Come On!” A skinny mid twenty year old man yelled motioning them to get into the back of what appeared to be a construction company’s minivan on the outside. Her baby sister cried; until her mother put the baby bottle to her lips. “Listen to everything I tell you! If we get stopped hide yourself underneath the blankets. Lay down. Don’t move."
“The Meeting House” was about two hours from “The Wall.” It only had two bedrooms, a bathroom connected
to a den. The bathroom only seemed just to have enough room for a toilet, a
sink, and small shower. The house had forty immigrants crammed inside. There’s
a police scanner that’s being monitored 24-7 to ensure they’ll know when the
authorities come. The mother spoke on the cell phone. All the daughter could
hear was, “Be here in thirty minutes.” Seconds later, everyone seemed to be
nervous. She learned that the authorities were on their way. Where could they
go?
“God please, God please,” she heard her mother say. Then she
looked at her mother, and tried vainly to not show her worry.
Sanchez was sitting passenger. Detective Smith was driving; leading the five car convoy. Sanchez was on his first outing, Was very excited about it. “How long?” “Bout ten minutes to Make America Great Again,” one of the trainings there involved a burley man as the main instructor. He was very aggressive because of his rumored steroid abuse.” The training module one involved twenty detainees in a space about as big as a single storage garage. “So always remember that you are never to assume any of them will come quietly. You must be aggressive…”
She remembered
lightning flashing across the sky, ‘Connect the dots,’-and hoped the panther
skinned warriors would descend from the heavens and protect them. She heard her
mother continue to pray. She knew that because she kept hearing the word ‘God.’
Then the dots that connected and formed warrior morphed into a giant serpent
‘Chaac.’
The thunder was so powerful that it shook the papers on the
patrol cars dashboard. “Relax Sanchez, its just rain.” Sanchez replied by
rolling his eyes, “This ain’t nothing to me I was trained by Captain America,”
Sanchez added. “Oh you mean, Stan,” Smith replied.
“We’re almost there?” Sanchez asked as he felt on his cold
steel revolver. “Yep. You ready?” Smith replied. “Oh yes.” “We’re about five
minutes out.” Meanwhile in the safe house, her mother handed her younger sister
to her. Her sister rocked her slowly in her arms. As the mother did her best to
keep her composure. The radio alert system had them hear, “You know you’re five
minutes out.” “Copy.” Feedback came through the system. The feedback got
louder, as the daughter squeezed her eyes shut and prayed for her father to
join them before the police did. The feedback got louder and the daughter heard
someone say, “Do you think God cries?” She opened her eyes to see who said it.
“You look worried. Keep your faith.” An old Mexican man stood over her. She
looked up frightened, “It’s okay. I want you to have this. He extended his
right hand. Gave her a s statue of a figure with what appeared to be a large
basket on their head. As he extended his hand again to wipe away her tears she
saw a tattoo of a serpent. She saw the tattoo move as he wiped away her tears.
She closed her eyes again. Felt leathery on her face. “Just because we stopped
believing in God. Doesn’t mean that God stopped believing in us.” Another loud
clap of thunder came. The lights blinked three times. Smith’s car was fifty
feet away from the second street exit when the baseball sized hail began to hit
the roof of the patrol car. “What the ##%%%!”
Before Sanchez could finish, “What is happening?” it was
like buckets of water hitting the windshield. The driver of the car in front of
them hit their brakes. Ten feet away from the exit there was a ten car pile up.
The oldest daughter walked outside. It was sunny. But as she looked to the
south the darkest storm clouds formed. Then she looked up at the sun and
thanked God. She didn’t question why she felt everything was alright for now,
at least- and that was enough.
Five minutes later, their father pulled up in a minivan,
“Come on.” She got in last, after her mother. Her mother still holding her baby
sister so close to her bosom. “We have a new home better than before.”
The oldest daughter saw the silver minivan coming from fifty
feet away. “We don’t have much time.”
“This is ours,” she
followed his mother. They both followed her father. Her father was holding her sister in his arms. It was on the second
floor. In the den, the first room was the picture of Jesus that she always
remembered seeing when she walked into their home. She smiled. Maybe everything
in her life would be better for a while. They all had a huge hug. Her room of the
two bedroom, apartment had a view of the sign ‘The Pines,’ the entrance of the
complex. There was a small bed and dresser with a fifteen inch television,
“Selina, here’s the remote,” her father said coming into her room, “We got
cable here.” He turned on the television and put on a Spanish speaking music
channel. The program on was a documentary of the musicians of their former
homeland. A loud banging came from the front door. Selina flinched. She wanted
to find somewhere to hide. “Baby it’s
okay. Come with me.” She shook her head, “No Papa.” Selina’s mom answered the
door. “Hello maam. Large meat lovers pizza and a two liter of Pepsi. That’s
fifteen dollars and thirty seven cents,” The pizza man said. The mother smiled.
She didn’t understand much of his English. “Here’s twenty five.” Then her
father smiled toward his daughter and said, “See, it’s okay. Everything is
okay, Selina.”
“Do you really think this is a good idea?” The mother,
Daniella asked her husband, Ricardo. “There’s no other way for now,” he replied
as he lowered the mattress to conceal the opening that had a large steel case,
where he kept most of their money. He couldn’t use a bank because he had no
identification card, had no social security card either. “We’ll be fine,” he
assured her. “What’s wrong?” Selina stood in the doorway.
They heard a
loud bang at the door, “Just who could that be?” “Probably Miss. Jenean.” “Just
a minute,” he had it set up perfectly to grab the incense and light it. Then
lit a cigarette. The two teenagers grabbed the weed and cigarette butts. Put it
on a dinner tray-and put it underneath the leather couch in the entrance room.
Many apartments away on the second floor, she looked at the small statue. Then
fell to her knees and prayed again for God to protect her and her family.
She felt
something was wrong. Regardless of the big meal that her father paid for. She
stayed up all night and early morning looking at the handheld statue. She heard
them outside the door. “I don’t think this is a good idea,” one of them said.
Earlier that day, “Break that sh#t up. Hurry up!” “Alright.” Jayquin was in the passenger seat, breaking up the buds. One bag was nasty wets. The other bag was the creeper. “Five O. Five O,” he said nervously, causing Jayquin to drop some of the buds on the floor board. Next they heard the siren, saw the lights, “Relax man. Act cool.” He kept picking up the buds. “Stay down. Stay down,” Greg instructed. So he contorted himself as much as he could into a human ball. Greg laughed as the policeman passed them, “He’s gone. It’s cool. It’s cool.” Jayquin didn’t realize that he mixed the good weed with the nasty weed. The nasty bag had a bad hallucinogenic dried into it. Neither one of them had been wet before. Greg and Jayquin smoked the blunts on and on, “Just kick it in.” “Naw. We got a key.” Dude what are you looking at?”
“Ain’t no body awake at this hour,” Jayquin urged Greg, as he stuck his key in the lock. “Man, there’s a reason that they call it the dead of the night,” she heard Greg say. She looked at the red digital numbers of her clock. It was two twenty two. The numbers glowed and streamed red beams on the statue. She heard the metallic click and for some reason, that she wondered why, she was not afraid. She stood up and quickly lit the candles that were on the den book case shelf, in between two pictures of relatives. She’d ask her mother who these relatives were. Her mother always replied, “I’ll tell you when you’re older.
“It’s so close to getting the checks. We really don’t need this,” Greg said. As Jayquin pushed the door open. He was the first to see the shadows from the candles flame spread to the corners of the room. Then seemed to form figures. And she remembered, “Fear not. Something will protect you,” as two Mayan warriors dressed in panther skins, “Some bodies here!” They held large spears and lunged forward as gust of wind came through the doorway, and circled around the room. The warriors lunged forward as the gusts blew out the candles flame. Greg and Jayquin stepped back haphazardly falling backwards, and landed head first on the concrete below. The blow instantly killed them. She shut the door, as her father opened his bedroom door, “What is happening here?” “Nothing papa, I lit a candle to find a book I left in here. Then flipped the light switch. “I didn’t want to wake you. I know how bright the light gets. Her World History book was opened to the page that described the feathered serpent God Chaac. Her mother then came out of the bedroom and coyly nodded to her daughter.
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