the living room working the phone, talking to men as they jacked off. Carlos, as usual, wasn’t home. Vanjii was in the kitchen drinking coffee and staring at the table. She hadn’t told Jaimie anything, and didn’t think she was going to. She didn’t even know how to tell it to herself.
A fly landed on the table. It sat there, eyes sending images to the brain, lungs receiving oxygen, heart beating with certainty. Vanjii didn’t think, she just slapped with her hand, coming from behind so the fly saw nothing, and then the fly was crushed flat, just a stain on the wood. Vanjii washed her hands and made more coffee. She wondered when she’d be able to cry.
When Luis left the bar, he walked around for a few minutes. At 1 in the morning, it felt hardly less warm than a summer afternoon in Santa Fe. A person slept in every other doorway. Luis wanted to walk farther, but he could find nowhere to head to, so he went to his car.
He was almost out of gas. He stopped at a Circle K on First Avenue and Van Buren. As he was pumping the gas, a guy came up to him. “Hey. Excuse me …”
Luis looked at him and didn’t say anything.
“Listen,” the guy said. “I need a favor. My little girl’s sick, and she’s on East Fillmore, and I need to go there and see her tonight, but I got no car. If you can just give me a ride up there, I’ll give you five bucks for the gas.”
Luis didn’t question the guy’s story, because he could see right through it. The reason the story wasn’t more credible or better explained was because the guy was junk sick, and he wanted to go visit his dealer.
“I been asking lots of people, and they all said no. I really need to see her, man.”
“Okay,” said Luis. “I’ll take you there, but I ain’t got time to wait for you and bring you back.”
“That’s okay, that’s no problem. I just need you to take me there. Thank you.”
The drive took about five minutes. The guy clumsily tried to make conversation, and Luis went along with it. “Okay, right here,” the guy said, pointing to an apartment complex. Luis slowed down and the guy got out. “Thanks a lot, man. Really.”
“Sure,” said Luis. The guy tried to pay him for the gas, but Luis shook his head and drove away.
The neighborhood was nicknamed Gangs R Us, and the cops were going there more and more often, trying to show a presence. Luis passed a police car waiting at a corner. When the cop saw the New Mexico plates, he thought Luis might be either a visitor who’d gotten lost or a drug dealer doing some interstate networking. Either way, he fell in behind him and turned on his lights.
When Luis saw the lights, the panic rose up inside him like vomit, and he fought to control it. He knew Miguel hadn’t reported the car stolen yet, but even if it was just that he had a light out or something, the cop would ask to see a driver’s license.
Luis pulled over and turned off the engine. He watched the officer get out of the car and walk toward him. When the cop was almost to his window, Luis started the car and took off.
He turned a corner, hit the brakes, jumped out of the car, and ran. He heard the cop car approach behind him. Luis ran harder, shrieking air into his lungs, looking for cover, a place to hide. There wasn’t any.
“ Hey, asshole! Stop right now or I’ll shoot!”
Luis stopped. Raised his hands. Turned around.
The cop had gotten out of his car and was pointing a gun at him. “Lie down and put your hands behind your back.”
The concrete warm against his cheek. The handcuffs closing around his wrists.
Madison Street Jail was only a short distance from the bar where he’d spent the evening. He was booked in and finger-printed and put in a cell.
It was known as the Horseshoe, and it was like no jail Luis had ever heard of. People would be rotated from cell to cell so that they lost track of time. The cells they put him in were completely covered with men. There were men sleeping curled around the toilet that had shit dripping off the sides and piss all around the floor. Men were sleeping on top of other men. Some were