The old woman said something and gestured for Evan to come join her where she sat. When he hesitated, she pointed to his hand and then removed a piece of cloth and a small jar from the bag next to her. When he hesitated again, she repeated the same line, but this time with more command, clucking and tsking. “I think she wants to wrap your hand,” Noelle said.
He glanced at her and then stood, mostly crouched over, shuffling the few steps in the swaying truck and then sitting next to the woman. She took his hand gently in hers, and when he hissed in pain, she said something low and under her breath. He sensed sympathy, and so he didn’t pull away. His hand had swollen and was twice its normal size, the skin angry red and cracking in places where it stretched tight. His fingers looked like five fat sausages.
He watched Noelle as the old woman put some kind of clear salve onto his skin, clucking some more and muttering under her breath. He felt like he was floating out of his body and had the strange urge to laugh suddenly as he and Noelle stared at each other from a few feet away, knees bouncing along with the other riders’. A man had taken out a very small guitar and begun to sing, and it was just all so surreal and hilarious. Evan’s lips trembled, and he looked away, out to the brightening horizon. He knew that if he started laughing, he wouldn’t stop, and would eventually end up a howling, writhing nutcase on the floor of this truck.
The woman said something else, patting his hand very lightly. He caught the word médico and figured she was telling him to see a doctor.
He nodded. “Gracias.” It was about the only word he knew in Spanish. He was taking German in school, of all things. That suddenly seemed hilarious, too, but he couldn’t for the life of him explain why.
The truck came to a stop, and Evan turned. He could see the roofs of buildings. It looked like a small town. His heart quickened, but it felt far away. He was numb, and half out of both his body and his head.
The little boy pointed to the town and said something, and then the man jumped from the truck, reaching his hand up to help Noelle down. Clearly, they were dropping them off at the edge of whatever town this was. The man pointed. “Vamos,” he said.
Evan stood and followed Noelle as she sat on the edge of the truck and hopped down. They both turned around. “Gracias,” Evan said again. “Uh, police?” he asked.
They all looked at each other, their expressions filled with wariness. He heard one of them say the word policía.
“No,” the little boy said. “No policía, no bueno.”
The police are no good?
Before either of them could try to communicate any more, the truck began moving, leaving them in a cloud of dust.
They walked again, skirting the streets, moving behind buildings. Evan didn’t know if the people in the truck didn’t trust the police in this town just on general principle, or what. Maybe they were involved in organized crime of some type. He’d heard stories about corrupt departments in foreign countries. Who knew if they were true. They wouldn’t risk it.
“Look,” Noelle said, her voice slurring. She was pointing at a building with a sign on the front. He recognized a word: MOTEL. It wasn’t like any motel he’d ever seen, but it looked like it might rent rooms. She stumbled, and he grabbed her arm, practically dragging her there. If they didn’t make it somewhere, she was going to fall down in the street.
A young girl sitting behind a desk stared when they walked in the door. A ceiling fan turned above, rattling slightly with each rotation. Evan blinked, working to keep himself upright. A small TV set played behind her, the picture zigzagged with static. The young woman greeted them in Spanish.
“Do you speak English?” Evan asked.
She stared again. “A little,” she finally said.
He let out a long breath. “We need a room,” he said. “A room with a phone. We’ve been robbed. My father will pay double for the room, but I need to get a hold of him first. He’ll call the front desk with his credit card if you could show us to a room. Please.” He didn’t know if he could trust her with the truth, but he had to tell her something. They desperately needed her help.
She stared again, her eyes darting to Noelle and then back to him. “Please,” he said. “Double. Quadruple. Anything.”
She stared for another beat but then turned, taking a key from a pegboard behind her and handing it over along with a business card. “This number,” she said, tapping the card.
“Thank you,” he breathed. “Thank you so much. My father, he’ll call.”
She nodded, pointing to a side door, and Evan led Noelle back outside to a walkway that led to the three rooms along the side. The key had a two on it, and Evan began moving toward that door when Noelle stumbled, almost going down. He grabbed her before she hit the ground and then picked her up and walked with her toward their room.
He could hardly feel his left hand anymore. It’d gone numb, maybe from whatever the woman had applied to it but more likely because he was going into shock.
His hand shook as he finally got the key in the lock on the third attempt and then entered the room and placed Noelle on the bed, less than gently. She didn’t seem to notice, though. He shut the door behind them, locked it, and closed the curtain on the one window before sitting down on the bed himself and picking up the receiver of the old-fashioned phone on the bedside table. It took him a minute to figure out how to place a collect call to the US. Later, he couldn’t have said how he did it. His body was shutting down. His brain was foggy, thoughts disjointed. His voice shook as he gave his father’s cell phone number to the international operator, and he started to fall forward but caught himself as the phone began to ring.
“Hello?”
“Dad?” His voice cracked.
There was the briefest of pauses. “Evan? Holy shit, Evan?”
His voice must have woken Noelle, because she sat up groggily, dragging herself from the bed and shuffling into the bathroom. How, he did not know. He realized also that he’d never known a stronger person than Noelle Meyer.
“Yes, Dad, it’s me.”
“Where are you?” His dad’s voice cracked now too. He sounded desperate.
“Mexico.” He read the address from the card he’d been given by the woman at the front desk. “I don’t know if we should go to the police. I don’t know if it’s safe.”
He heard the shower turn on and then the sound of the clips sliding on the bar as she pulled the curtain aside.
His dad swore, and there was much movement in the background, as though his dad was hurrying somewhere as he spoke. “Stay there,” his dad said. “I’ll pay for the room, so no one should come knocking. Lock the door and stay put. Don’t let anyone in. I can be there in four hours.”
“Four hours?” It seemed like a lifetime. Too long to endure. But what other choice did they have? Were the people who’d taken them looking? Hunting them down? Evan’s eyes flew around the room, looking for potential weapons. An iron on the shelf in the open closet, a chair leg . . .
“Thank you, Dad.” His voice was fading.
“I love you, son. I love you. I’ll be there soon. Don’t let anyone in. Not anyone, you hear?”
Evan dropped the phone back in the base on the nightstand and then pulled himself to his feet. He began dragging the larger items of furniture in front of the door, grunting with the effort. He heard the squeak of the pipes as the water turned off in the bathroom.
A moment later, Noelle emerged, a towel wrapped around her body and her hair hanging, partially wet. She’d been slender before, but now there was nothing to her. She looked dead on her feet, but he understood why she’d stayed conscious long enough to cleanse her body. “Help is coming,” he said.
“I need to call my dad,” she slurred.
He picked up the receiver, going through the same process he’d just gone through to call his own father. She gave him her father’s number, and when it began to ring, he handed her the receiver. She held it to her ear, a small sob emerging as he heard it go to voice mail, and the call was disconnected.