Entre Nogaleses
Zeke Gerwein
Zeke Gerwein
Tucson Arizonan
Thursday, September 9, 2049
15 dead in Earp, California bombing
Thursday, September 9, 2049
15 dead in Earp, California bombing
This Wednesday, the Earp, California port of entry station on the Arizona border was exploded when a customs agent opened a small envelope containing a bomb carried by one Alex Mizrachi, 27, of Oakland, California. Mizrachi is among the 15 killed in the explosion and his motives for the attack remain unclear. In addition to the 15 killed, 47 civilians, including many Arizonan citizens were wounded. The envelope was purportedly addressed to Californian Prime Minister Erin Gardner. Neither California’s Prime Minister Gardner nor Arizona King Maximilian has released a statement on the attack.
The Nogales Central bus terminal is empty and oddly sterile. There’s an automatic ticket machine in the corner closest to where the buses load or unload but there’s no one standing next to it, no one getting off of the night bus from Chihuahua City except for me. My backpack feels awkwardly light and my eyes are bleary, dimming the bus terminal to monochrome, the uncomfortable seats found in every bus terminal in the world faded to the same grey of the strangely spotless floor. I pause, staring somewhat aimlessly at the shutdown breakfast station, past the bearded man who rests his feet on a rolling bag, Breakfast. I should get breakfast.
“Oye!” the bearded man calls. “What’s your name?”
I try to pretend I don’t hear him, that I think he’s to talking to someone else, though I am the only one in the bus station. I have two hours before I have to meet the person who asked me to take a bus here in the first place.
“I’m talking to you,” the man says. “There's nobody else here.”
“May I help you?” I say in what I hope sounds crisp and professional. I make sure that he hears my use of the formal you. Don’t call me “tú” beardo. I don’t know you. We’re not friends.
“I would like to buy you breakfast,” the man says, using the informal you. He’s not going to call me “usted”. “You’re Alex Mizrachi, no? The Canadian author?”
“Californian,” I correct him. I’m supposed to meet a man named Jaime here and he’s the only person in Nogales that I can think of who would know my name. But why is he so early?
“Yes, the Californian author. Did you take the bus here from Chihuahua City?”
“No, I’m just visiting the bus station,” I say. The Spanish sounds awkward coming out of my mouth. I decide not to speak too much until I’ve had at least a small cup of coffee. “Of course I took the bus here. I didn’t sleep for the entire trip, either. The driver was playing some loud and horrible hybrid of country music and American rock and roll.”
The man ignores the comment. “Pleased to meet you, I’m Jaime.” He extends a hand and I shake it.
“Pleased to meet you. I thought we weren’t meeting for another couple hours.”
Jaime shrugs. “Carmen told me to meet you at the bus station at six thirty. Are you hungry?”
“A little.” I say. I’m starving, but Jaime is making me a little nervous and I don’t want to say that.
“Follow me,” Jaime says, getting up and pushing open the door.
Early morning Nogales is pleasantly cool, the impending heat lurking behind the thinning wall of cool air, waiting patiently to suffocate the city in three or so hours, tops. Traffic roars down the main street like a fast flowing river and a few commuters jog by on foot, the occasional person leaning against a street sign outside an imported American donut shop, but the narrow sidewalk is mostly empty. Jaime walks fast, as if we’re late to something. I have to jog to keep up, my backpack rubbing uncomfortably on my back. My legs are numb sticks that seem to have no connection to the rest of my body and my mind dulls with every step, adenosine receptors screaming for caffiene. Jaime stops suddenly and at first I think he’s waiting for me to catch up but he turns and dashes across the street, seizing a fleeting break in traffic. Cars rush back down the street almost as soon as he reaches the other side and he disappears behind an empty, expansive parking lot bordered by scraggly bushes.
I cross a few minutes later, pausing on the median strip. The green building opposite the parking lot has a small sign in mosaic tile that reads ‘Café Alto Nogales’. Is this where Jaime went? There’s nothing else here, but did Jaime come in here? I can get coffee there anyway.
“Hi,” I say. Jaime isn’t here but most of me doesn’t care. I’ve been second guessing my decision to go to Nogales anyway. “Can I buy a coffee? It isn’t instant, is it?”
“It’s brewed coffee,” the waiter says, and I collapse into a booth that faces the window and pull out my cell phone.
The charge is precariously low but there’s no outlet in the café so I decide that a charge isn’t worth anything unless used and call my boyfriend, Takumi. He picks up almost immediately.
“Alex!” he says from a thousand miles away. “How are you doing? How’s Mexico?”
“Fine,” I say. Outside the window the parking lot extends to the main street and a small woman storms up it, slamming the door to the café as she walks in. “I’m in Nogales to interview a group of writers called Nogales Escribe. I wish I was home, though, making this appointment was a mistake. I miss you.”
“Where the fuck is that goat bastard Jaime?” the woman yells at the waiter. He says something in response but he’s speaking too fast for me to catch it.
“I miss you too,” Takumi says. The waiter places the coffee in front of me and I take a long drink. There’s a menu on the table and I page through it idly. “When are you coming home?”
“No later than tomorrow evening,” I tell him. “But maybe early. It’s a twenty hour bus ride from Nogales to Oakland, but I’ll be there as soon as I can. How have you been?”
“Are you ready to order?” the waiter asks me.
“Yeah, I’d like the huevos revueltos with toast. Sorry Takumi, I’m just at a café.”
“Your Spanish is really good.”
“I can order eggs and toast anyway. How are you?”
He talks and I half listen, watching as the small woman drags Jaime out from a back room. Do they work here? Is Jaime going to buy my breakfast?
“I have to go, Takumi,” I say. “I’ll see you soon!” I press the red button and Jaime sits down.
“Who was that?”
“My boyfriend,” I say, then wonder if it’s safe to be out here. If Jaime is homophobic it’ll at least give me an excuse to go home early. “Thanks for buying my breakfast.”
Jaime seems taken aback and the woman walks back into the room and kicks him. “You fucking goat bastard, what the FUCK were you doing in Bajo Nogales?”
“There’s no need to be so nasty, Carmen. I’m trying to be a hospitable host for Alex. What do you think he’ll tell all of his friends in Canada about Nogales if you talk that way?”
“He can tell them that you’re a son of the fuck you goat bastard shit. I TOLD you that you are not to go to Bajo Nogales without me or Alejandra. You could give everything away and destroy Nogales Escribe. And your fucking friend naming this café Alto Nogales, as if there is no one depending on the secrecy...”
“You’re yelling loud enough for people to hear you in Sinaloa, right in front of Alex, and you’re talking to me about secrecy?”
Carmen softens her tone a little. “Alright. We’ll continue this later. Alex. I do hope you’ve enjoyed Mexico.”
“I’ve definitely enjoyed it,” I say, finishing my coffee. The waiter returns with a plate of scrambled eggs and toast. “You’re Carmen, right? The director of Nogales Escribe?”
“Yes, I’m the director. This worthless piece of shit is one of its members.”
I wonder vaguely what I’m supposed to ask her. I had read the zine that Nogales Escribe publishes monthly and was impressed enough by the stories that I had asked to meet them. It’s only now that I’m struck by how awkward it is. I don’t really know Carmen at all.
“You’re a journalist?” Carmen asks.
“No,” I say. “An author. I write novels and short stories.”
“Good,” Carmen says. “Where in Canada do you live?”
“I don’t live in Canada,” I reply. Do I have ‘ask me if I’m Canadian?’ tatooed onto my forehead? “I live in Oakland, California.” Oakland comes out sounding strange is Spanish and I add, “Near San Francisco.” Carmen is scribbling all of this down in the same notebook that the waiter was using earlier. Her cellphone rings and she picks it up, her face clouding slowly. The phone case is gray, fraying. I can’t catch any of the conversation, it’s rapid, barely intelligible.
“Jaime!” Carmen barks. “Go…. Go show Alex Bajo Nogales.” Jaime stares at her. “You heard me,” Carmen snarls. I slide back in my chair, wishing I could melt through the window pane into the street again. Across the street is the Tufesa bus station, the place where my bus will leave from. In two and a half hours. “I’ll be down there soon.”
Carmen gets back and violently pushes her chair in, as if she’s trying to maim the table, then slams the door and disappears into the street. Jaime gets up nervously.
“Mr Mizrachi,” he says. “Ms Carmen Vasquez has instructed me to show you Bajo Nogales.” Jaime’s using “usted” now, and I can see him fiddling with something on his wrist. The whole thing feels so surreal. Is this a drug syndicate? I’ve heard of the tunnels below Nogales but hadn’t thought that Nogales Escribe would be involved in anything like that. Jaime walks briskly into the bathroom and motions for me to follow him.
“The entrance isn’t behind a satin curtain in a backroom?” I ask.
Jaime laughs nervously.
“No. It was my idea actually. Amusing.” Jaime flushes the toilet five times, the water swirling furiously in the porcelain tank.
“Isn’t that a waste of water?”
“It’s recycled,” Jaime says. “This is the desert. We don’t fuck around with water here. Definitely not as much as you do in Canada.” There’s a palpable edge to his voice, but I still snicker when he says that I’m Canadian. The water drains suddenly out of the toilet and doesn’t come back. Jaime reaches to touch the bottom of the toilet bowl and the toilet begins to retreat into the wall.
“Jaime, what is Bajo Nogales?” I ask. My palms are sweaty, I notice. The light in the bathroom seems to glow iridescently. The faucets are decorated in the same mosaic as outside.
“The way that we fund our work.”
“Is Nogales Escribe working with the narcotraficantes?” I was on a hiking trip in las Barrancas del Cobre, in the remote mountains of Southern Chihuahua, and it almost feels comical that I’ve run into the narcotraficantes further north, the place where the weed and cocaine and heroin is funnelled, across the steep impenetrable mountains to a dusty frontier city on the edge of the desert. I don’t feel scared, per se. My mind is floating above me, suspended from the ceiling. Jaime laughs, barks almost.
“We pay the narcotraficantes so that they won’t bother us. Now come on. Follow me.” Jaime stomps on the orange tile where the toilet once stood. It falls away, disappearing down an empty shaft, darkness radiating out into the bathroom. “After me, just jump down. The shaft seals automatically.”
Jaime jumps and I’m alone. I take out my phone, half wishing that I had a text or a missed call from Takumi. My phone just shows the time and the screensaver, the two of us on top of a cold mountain in Northern California. He always said that I take too many risks. That I put myself in dangerous situations so that I can find something to write about. That I take stupid cures for writer's block. I put my phone in my pocket, watch as the toilet slowly begins its advance toward the shaft and I jump, the darkness consuming me, the rush of air as I fall through nothingness and then… water.
It feels like concrete but it’s there. I swim, dog paddle, and then stand. My clothes are heavy with it and I shiver a little in the darkness. The air is cool, humid, like smoke issuing out of some sort of drug made out of half liquid mold.
“Is this the sewer? Is this Bajo Nogales?” It was all a practical joke. An elaborate one, though. Who goes to the trouble of creating a toilet that folds into the wall just to play a joke on me?
“No,” Jaime says. I can’t see him but his voice sounds close. “It’s an aqueduct.” There’s a grinding sound, the sound of huge machines pushing the water eastward. “Follow the water. See where it goes.”
I reach for the damp wall and walk, taking long steps in the neck high water. My phone case is waterproof, luckily. I just ruined about 500 pesos, something like 30 US dollars. I feel a ladder on the wall.
“Go up,” Jaime commands. “You’ll find dry clothes at the top. Change and I’ll be up in two minutes.”
I stumble in the dark, clutching at the wet metal. I emerge in a dimly lit room to find stacks upon stacks of sets of dry clothes and a looming tower of towels, neatly folded and piled upon each other toward the ceiling. I remove a towel from the bottom of the pile and dry off, then change into a plaid shirt and pressed jeans. I wait in the nearby corridor for Jaime, who emerges three minutes later, in a pressed business suit.
“Jaime,” I say softly. “What is Bajo Nogales?” He doesn’t answer.
“Follow me,” he whispers sharply. “And do not speak a word of this to your friends in Canada.”
I follow him as he jogs down the corridor and stops at a huge concrete door marked in huge letters Prohibido El Paso. Propiedad de Departamento de Sueños y Utilidades de Bajo Nogales, Sonora. No Tresspasing. Property of the Dreams and Utilities Department of Bajo Nogales, Sonora.
“Jaime, why is there a department of dreams and utilites?”
“Be quiet, Alex.” He uses the word calle te, which could also be translated as shut up but he sounds nervous. Jaime opens his palm and takes out a miniscule key, then passes it to me. “Open the door.” I walk slowly to the door and search for a key hole. What is this? Is this something that everyone knows about. What are they doing with this much water?
I accidentally touch the key to the concrete and the door begins to retract upwards.
“Welcome,” comes a metallic voice from the ceiling. “To Bajo Nogales, the city of dreams and stories! If you are seeking citizenship Ms Carmen Vasquez, the director of Nogales Escribe or Ms Alejandra Perez, the respected director of the Department of Discretion will direct you to the Department of Public Relations and Citizenship. If they have allowed you to view the Department of Utilites and Dreams, please consider yourself honored. Do not repeat a word of what you have seen here without their explicit permission, for fear of betraying the lives of half a million people. Welcome again and please enjoy your stay in Bajo Nogales, the city of dreams and stories!” Jaime snickers.
“That’s not a computer. Carmen recorded it herself. The city of dreams and stories! You would think we were a fucking tourist attraction. Follow me. Ms Carmen Vasquez herself should be here soon.”
Jaime walks through the opening to stand on a high balcony, overlooking a huge body of water, a lake, a sea, a bay. The dark water stretches unimaginably far to the distant lights of a city, twinkling in the darkness. The air is drier here, more like the desert above. On the shore below us are tents clustered along the water’s edge, each glowing fainty. A boat approaches us from the far side, a pinpoint of blue light against the water, the growl of the motor roaring over the gurgle of the pipes, the soft lapping of the water against the shore. The boat docks and a figure climbs the side of our platform, swinging over the railing.
“Mr Alex Mizrachi. I’m so glad that you were able to be here.”
I squint in the dim light. The figure is tall, with a broad brimmed hat. “I’m Alejandra Perez, the director of our Department of Discretion, in Bajo Nogales. Carmen couldn’t be here, but on her behalf I would like to offer you an excellent opportunity.” Her voice sounds like a tour guide to Disneyland, the Spanish words said with an unspeakable enthusiasm. Una oportunidad excelente! La directora de nuestro departamento de discresion!
“Ms Perez,” I say. “What is Bajo Nogales?”
“This is it!” she says quickly. “Have you read the stories that Nogales Escribe writes?”
I nod. “They’re amazing. Crazy. More interesting than anything I could have imagined.”
Alejandra smiles. “That is what most authors say. Now, have you heard the new science around why and how we dream?”
“No.”
“A new study revealed that with precise technology we can see what others have dreamed.” Her voice radiates with an overwhelming smile. “We at Bajo Nogales have this techonology! Now, this is where you come in. We will give you as a fellow scientist, the technology of dream science, if you due us a small favor.”
“Ms Perez, what is Bajo Nagolas?”
“Bajo Nogales is a city of refugees. With the droughts, the heat, the dust storms, the war over the waters of the Colorado between California and Arizona, many refugees have come to the city that we have built here.” She points to the row of tents by the water and then gestures toward the glimmering lights on the lake’s opposite shore.
“And this lake is the water supply.”
Alejandra laughs. “Oh no! You came here through the water supply. These are the dreams of our citizens. They are siphoned to a computer and then lead to the writing of the stories that Nogales Escribe creates.” Jaime fidgets with a piece of dead skin on his ring finger. I stare out at the lake. “In any case, the favor is this. To help us create an aqueduct to here from the Colorado River. To take a little water that no one will ever miss and deliver it to us for the sake of story.”
“That’s highly illegal though,” I say, backing away from the railing. “The Colorado River is so heavily monitored. I never could.”
“All you need to do is present this letter to your prime minister in California. Prime Minister Gardner.”
Jaime bows suddenly and produces an envelope from his suit.
I hesitate. “What does the letter say?”
“It begs Prime Minister Gardner to realize the importance of story and grant us rights of water.”
I laugh. “Prime Minister Gardner doesn’t even have control over that! The aqueduct would run through Arizona.”
“Yes, but California has much more water than Arizona. I beg you to just take it to her. We’ll get you your dream technology.” I think of having unlimited story. Being able to write pieces as amazing as those published in the Nogales Escribe zine. I imagine Pulitzers.
“Prime Minister Gardner doesn’t even give up water to Nevada and Arizona,” I say. “She won’t give it to you.”
“We must hope,” Alejandra says. “Please take the letter. I beg you.”
I deliberate for a second. “OK. I don’t see why not.”
“Then on behalf of Bajo Nogales I thank you,” Alejandra says, bowing. I take the envelope from Jaime. “There’s an easier way out if you wish. I’ll come with you in the elevator. Jaime will have your belongings once you reach the cafe.”
We don’t talk much as the elevator makes its slow way up to a backroom in the Alto Nogales Cafe.
“So why did Jaime have me enter through the toilet?”
“Jaime is stupid and immature,” Alejandra says, sounding almost like Carmen. “I should just tell him that we’re cutting off that passageway. If the narcotraficantes find it… Anyway. It was a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”
And then I’m back in the bathroom, changing into my wet clothes, crossing the busy main street and buying a ticket on the Tufesa bus to Oakland. The bus eases out of Nogales and I press my face against the glass, watching the city roll slowly by, houses crowded on hills, distant dry mountains scraping the horizon. The Mexico-Arizona border is low security, the customs agents frowning at my California passport and then waving me through. The bus rolls on, the desert passing by silently. We roll through the capital, Tucson, the King’s Palace dulled by the perpetual dust, silvery skyscrapers giving way to Joshua Trees and distant mountain ranges. We pass the ruins of Phoenix, driving northwest on a two lane highway and finally arrive at the Colorado River, the muddy trickle, drained by the dams, a whisper of its former self. This part of the river hasn’t been bottled yet but it will be. Water is too precious a commodity to be subject to evaporation.
The bus crosses a high arching bridge and then pulls off the highway to the California Customs Station. We line up, the three Californian citizens in the shorter, express lane.
“What’s that in your pocket?” asks a customs agents. She’s wearing the gold uniform of the California Border Patrol, a cap tipped sideways.
“Oh, just a letter.” I pull the envelope out of my pocket. I’ve completely forgotten about it.
“To the prime minister, eh? I’m curious.” She slices the envelope open. I glance out the window for a second, the parking lot of the small customs station bordered on by the highway and then the endless expanse of the Mojave. A ticking sound issues from the envelope. “Shit. Is that a bomb?” I stare at the small device inside the envelope. 00:05. 00:03. 00:02. In the last few seconds I wonder, irrationally, why the fuck Alejandra gave me a bomb. To punish me? To explode Prime Minister Gardner? 00:01. 00:00. The customs station erupts in flame.
←
The Nogales Central bus terminal is empty and oddly sterile. There’s an automatic ticket machine in the corner closest to where the buses load or unload but there’s no one standing next to it, no one getting off of the night bus from Chihuahua City except for me. My backpack feels awkwardly light and my eyes are bleary, dimming the bus terminal to monochrome, the uncomfortable seats found in every bus terminal in the world faded to the same grey of the strangely spotless floor. I pause, staring somewhat aimlessly at the shutdown breakfast station, past the bearded man who rests his feet on a rolling bag, Breakfast. I should get breakfast.
“Oye!” the bearded man calls. “What’s your name?”
I try to pretend I don’t hear him, that I think he’s to talking to someone else, though I am the only one in the bus station. I have two hours before I have to meet the person who asked me to take a bus here in the first place.
“I’m talking to you,” the man says. “There's nobody else here.”
“May I help you?” I say in what I hope sounds crisp and professional. I make sure that he hears my use of the formal you. Don’t call me “tú” beardo. I don’t know you. We’re not friends.
“I would like to buy you breakfast,” the man says, using the informal you. He’s not going to call me “usted”. “You’re Alex Mizrachi, no? The Canadian author?”
“Californian,” I correct him. I’m supposed to meet a man named Jaime here and he’s the only person in Nogales that I can think of who would know my name. But why is he so early?
“Yes, the Californian author. Did you take the bus here from Chihuahua City?”
“No, I’m just visiting the bus station,” I say. The Spanish sounds awkward coming out of my mouth. I decide not to speak too much until I’ve had at least a small cup of coffee. “Of course I took the bus here. I didn’t sleep for the entire trip, either. The driver was playing some loud and horrible hybrid of country music and American rock and roll.”
The man ignores the comment. “Pleased to meet you, I’m Jaime.” He extends a hand and I shake it.
“Pleased to meet you. I thought we weren’t meeting for another couple hours.”
Jaime shrugs. “Carmen told me to meet you at the bus station at six thirty. Are you hungry?”
“A little.” I say. I’m starving, but Jaime is making me a little nervous and I don’t want to say that.
“Follow me,” Jaime says, getting up and pushing open the door.
Early morning Nogales is pleasantly cool, the impending heat lurking behind the thinning wall of cool air, waiting patiently to suffocate the city in three or so hours, tops. Traffic roars down the main street like a fast flowing river and a few commuters jog by on foot, the occasional person leaning against a street sign outside an imported American donut shop, but the narrow sidewalk is mostly empty. Jaime walks fast, as if we’re late to something. I have to jog to keep up, my backpack rubbing uncomfortably on my back. My legs are numb sticks that seem to have no connection to the rest of my body and my mind dulls with every step, adenosine receptors screaming for caffiene. Jaime stops suddenly and at first I think he’s waiting for me to catch up but he turns and dashes across the street, seizing a fleeting break in traffic. Cars rush back down the street almost as soon as he reaches the other side and he disappears behind an empty, expansive parking lot bordered by scraggly bushes.
I cross a few minutes later, pausing on the median strip. The green building opposite the parking lot has a small sign in mosaic tile that reads ‘Café Alto Nogales’. Is this where Jaime went? There’s nothing else here, but did Jaime come in here? I can get coffee there anyway.
“Hi,” I say. Jaime isn’t here but most of me doesn’t care. I’ve been second guessing my decision to go to Nogales anyway. “Can I buy a coffee? It isn’t instant, is it?”
“It’s brewed coffee,” the waiter says, and I collapse into a booth that faces the window and pull out my cell phone.
The charge is precariously low but there’s no outlet in the café so I decide that a charge isn’t worth anything unless used and call my boyfriend, Takumi. He picks up almost immediately.
“Alex!” he says from a thousand miles away. “How are you doing? How’s Mexico?”
“Fine,” I say. Outside the window the parking lot extends to the main street and a small woman storms up it, slamming the door to the café as she walks in. “I’m in Nogales to interview a group of writers called Nogales Escribe. I wish I was home, though, making this appointment was a mistake. I miss you.”
“Where the fuck is that goat bastard Jaime?” the woman yells at the waiter. He says something in response but he’s speaking too fast for me to catch it.
“I miss you too,” Takumi says. The waiter places the coffee in front of me and I take a long drink. There’s a menu on the table and I page through it idly. “When are you coming home?”
“No later than tomorrow evening,” I tell him. “But maybe early. It’s a twenty hour bus ride from Nogales to Oakland, but I’ll be there as soon as I can. How have you been?”
“Are you ready to order?” the waiter asks me.
“Yeah, I’d like the huevos revueltos with toast. Sorry Takumi, I’m just at a café.”
“Your Spanish is really good.”
“I can order eggs and toast anyway. How are you?”
He talks and I half listen, watching as the small woman drags Jaime out from a back room. Do they work here? Is Jaime going to buy my breakfast?
“I have to go, Takumi,” I say. “I’ll see you soon!” I press the red button and Jaime sits down.
“Who was that?”
“My boyfriend,” I say, then wonder if it’s safe to be out here. If Jaime is homophobic it’ll at least give me an excuse to go home early. “Thanks for buying my breakfast.”
Jaime seems taken aback and the woman walks back into the room and kicks him. “You fucking goat bastard, what the FUCK were you doing in Bajo Nogales?”
“There’s no need to be so nasty, Carmen. I’m trying to be a hospitable host for Alex. What do you think he’ll tell all of his friends in Canada about Nogales if you talk that way?”
“He can tell them that you’re a son of the fuck you goat bastard shit. I TOLD you that you are not to go to Bajo Nogales without me or Alejandra. You could give everything away and destroy Nogales Escribe. And your fucking friend naming this café Alto Nogales, as if there is no one depending on the secrecy...”
“You’re yelling loud enough for people to hear you in Sinaloa, right in front of Alex, and you’re talking to me about secrecy?”
Carmen softens her tone a little. “Alright. We’ll continue this later. Alex. I do hope you’ve enjoyed Mexico.”
“I’ve definitely enjoyed it,” I say, finishing my coffee. The waiter returns with a plate of scrambled eggs and toast. “You’re Carmen, right? The director of Nogales Escribe?”
“Yes, I’m the director. This worthless piece of shit is one of its members.”
I wonder vaguely what I’m supposed to ask her. I had read the zine that Nogales Escribe publishes monthly and was impressed enough by the stories that I had asked to meet them. It’s only now that I’m struck by how awkward it is. I don’t really know Carmen at all.
“You’re a journalist?” Carmen asks.
“No,” I say. “An author. I write novels and short stories.”
“Good,” Carmen says. “Where in Canada do you live?”
“I don’t live in Canada,” I reply. Do I have ‘ask me if I’m Canadian?’ tatooed onto my forehead? “I live in Oakland, California.” Oakland comes out sounding strange is Spanish and I add, “Near San Francisco.” Carmen is scribbling all of this down in the same notebook that the waiter was using earlier. Her cellphone rings and she picks it up, her face clouding slowly. The phone case is gray, fraying. I can’t catch any of the conversation, it’s rapid, barely intelligible.
“Jaime!” Carmen barks. “Go…. Go show Alex Bajo Nogales.” Jaime stares at her. “You heard me,” Carmen snarls. I slide back in my chair, wishing I could melt through the window pane into the street again. Across the street is the Tufesa bus station, the place where my bus will leave from. In two and a half hours. “I’ll be down there soon.”
Carmen gets back and violently pushes her chair in, as if she’s trying to maim the table, then slams the door and disappears into the street. Jaime gets up nervously.
“Mr Mizrachi,” he says. “Ms Carmen Vasquez has instructed me to show you Bajo Nogales.” Jaime’s using “usted” now, and I can see him fiddling with something on his wrist. The whole thing feels so surreal. Is this a drug syndicate? I’ve heard of the tunnels below Nogales but hadn’t thought that Nogales Escribe would be involved in anything like that. Jaime walks briskly into the bathroom and motions for me to follow him.
“The entrance isn’t behind a satin curtain in a backroom?” I ask.
Jaime laughs nervously.
“No. It was my idea actually. Amusing.” Jaime flushes the toilet five times, the water swirling furiously in the porcelain tank.
“Isn’t that a waste of water?”
“It’s recycled,” Jaime says. “This is the desert. We don’t fuck around with water here. Definitely not as much as you do in Canada.” There’s a palpable edge to his voice, but I still snicker when he says that I’m Canadian. The water drains suddenly out of the toilet and doesn’t come back. Jaime reaches to touch the bottom of the toilet bowl and the toilet begins to retreat into the wall.
“Jaime, what is Bajo Nogales?” I ask. My palms are sweaty, I notice. The light in the bathroom seems to glow iridescently. The faucets are decorated in the same mosaic as outside.
“The way that we fund our work.”
“Is Nogales Escribe working with the narcotraficantes?” I was on a hiking trip in las Barrancas del Cobre, in the remote mountains of Southern Chihuahua, and it almost feels comical that I’ve run into the narcotraficantes further north, the place where the weed and cocaine and heroin is funnelled, across the steep impenetrable mountains to a dusty frontier city on the edge of the desert. I don’t feel scared, per se. My mind is floating above me, suspended from the ceiling. Jaime laughs, barks almost.
“We pay the narcotraficantes so that they won’t bother us. Now come on. Follow me.” Jaime stomps on the orange tile where the toilet once stood. It falls away, disappearing down an empty shaft, darkness radiating out into the bathroom. “After me, just jump down. The shaft seals automatically.”
Jaime jumps and I’m alone. I take out my phone, half wishing that I had a text or a missed call from Takumi. My phone just shows the time and the screensaver, the two of us on top of a cold mountain in Northern California. He always said that I take too many risks. That I put myself in dangerous situations so that I can find something to write about. That I take stupid cures for writer's block. I put my phone in my pocket, watch as the toilet slowly begins its advance toward the shaft and I jump, the darkness consuming me, the rush of air as I fall through nothingness and then… water.
It feels like concrete but it’s there. I swim, dog paddle, and then stand. My clothes are heavy with it and I shiver a little in the darkness. The air is cool, humid, like smoke issuing out of some sort of drug made out of half liquid mold.
“Is this the sewer? Is this Bajo Nogales?” It was all a practical joke. An elaborate one, though. Who goes to the trouble of creating a toilet that folds into the wall just to play a joke on me?
“No,” Jaime says. I can’t see him but his voice sounds close. “It’s an aqueduct.” There’s a grinding sound, the sound of huge machines pushing the water eastward. “Follow the water. See where it goes.”
I reach for the damp wall and walk, taking long steps in the neck high water. My phone case is waterproof, luckily. I just ruined about 500 pesos, something like 30 US dollars. I feel a ladder on the wall.
“Go up,” Jaime commands. “You’ll find dry clothes at the top. Change and I’ll be up in two minutes.”
I stumble in the dark, clutching at the wet metal. I emerge in a dimly lit room to find stacks upon stacks of sets of dry clothes and a looming tower of towels, neatly folded and piled upon each other toward the ceiling. I remove a towel from the bottom of the pile and dry off, then change into a plaid shirt and pressed jeans. I wait in the nearby corridor for Jaime, who emerges three minutes later, in a pressed business suit.
“Jaime,” I say softly. “What is Bajo Nogales?” He doesn’t answer.
“Follow me,” he whispers sharply. “And do not speak a word of this to your friends in Canada.”
I follow him as he jogs down the corridor and stops at a huge concrete door marked in huge letters Prohibido El Paso. Propiedad de Departamento de Sueños y Utilidades de Bajo Nogales, Sonora. No Tresspasing. Property of the Dreams and Utilities Department of Bajo Nogales, Sonora.
“Jaime, why is there a department of dreams and utilites?”
“Be quiet, Alex.” He uses the word calle te, which could also be translated as shut up but he sounds nervous. Jaime opens his palm and takes out a miniscule key, then passes it to me. “Open the door.” I walk slowly to the door and search for a key hole. What is this? Is this something that everyone knows about. What are they doing with this much water?
I accidentally touch the key to the concrete and the door begins to retract upwards.
“Welcome,” comes a metallic voice from the ceiling. “To Bajo Nogales, the city of dreams and stories! If you are seeking citizenship Ms Carmen Vasquez, the director of Nogales Escribe or Ms Alejandra Perez, the respected director of the Department of Discretion will direct you to the Department of Public Relations and Citizenship. If they have allowed you to view the Department of Utilites and Dreams, please consider yourself honored. Do not repeat a word of what you have seen here without their explicit permission, for fear of betraying the lives of half a million people. Welcome again and please enjoy your stay in Bajo Nogales, the city of dreams and stories!” Jaime snickers.
“That’s not a computer. Carmen recorded it herself. The city of dreams and stories! You would think we were a fucking tourist attraction. Follow me. Ms Carmen Vasquez herself should be here soon.”
Jaime walks through the opening to stand on a high balcony, overlooking a huge body of water, a lake, a sea, a bay. The dark water stretches unimaginably far to the distant lights of a city, twinkling in the darkness. The air is drier here, more like the desert above. On the shore below us are tents clustered along the water’s edge, each glowing fainty. A boat approaches us from the far side, a pinpoint of blue light against the water, the growl of the motor roaring over the gurgle of the pipes, the soft lapping of the water against the shore. The boat docks and a figure climbs the side of our platform, swinging over the railing.
“Mr Alex Mizrachi. I’m so glad that you were able to be here.”
I squint in the dim light. The figure is tall, with a broad brimmed hat. “I’m Alejandra Perez, the director of our Department of Discretion, in Bajo Nogales. Carmen couldn’t be here, but on her behalf I would like to offer you an excellent opportunity.” Her voice sounds like a tour guide to Disneyland, the Spanish words said with an unspeakable enthusiasm. Una oportunidad excelente! La directora de nuestro departamento de discresion!
“Ms Perez,” I say. “What is Bajo Nogales?”
“This is it!” she says quickly. “Have you read the stories that Nogales Escribe writes?”
I nod. “They’re amazing. Crazy. More interesting than anything I could have imagined.”
Alejandra smiles. “That is what most authors say. Now, have you heard the new science around why and how we dream?”
“No.”
“A new study revealed that with precise technology we can see what others have dreamed.” Her voice radiates with an overwhelming smile. “We at Bajo Nogales have this techonology! Now, this is where you come in. We will give you as a fellow scientist, the technology of dream science, if you due us a small favor.”
“Ms Perez, what is Bajo Nagolas?”
“Bajo Nogales is a city of refugees. With the droughts, the heat, the dust storms, the war over the waters of the Colorado between California and Arizona, many refugees have come to the city that we have built here.” She points to the row of tents by the water and then gestures toward the glimmering lights on the lake’s opposite shore.
“And this lake is the water supply.”
Alejandra laughs. “Oh no! You came here through the water supply. These are the dreams of our citizens. They are siphoned to a computer and then lead to the writing of the stories that Nogales Escribe creates.” Jaime fidgets with a piece of dead skin on his ring finger. I stare out at the lake. “In any case, the favor is this. To help us create an aqueduct to here from the Colorado River. To take a little water that no one will ever miss and deliver it to us for the sake of story.”
“That’s highly illegal though,” I say, backing away from the railing. “The Colorado River is so heavily monitored. I never could.”
“All you need to do is present this letter to your prime minister in California. Prime Minister Gardner.”
Jaime bows suddenly and produces an envelope from his suit.
I hesitate. “What does the letter say?”
“It begs Prime Minister Gardner to realize the importance of story and grant us rights of water.”
I laugh. “Prime Minister Gardner doesn’t even have control over that! The aqueduct would run through Arizona.”
“Yes, but California has much more water than Arizona. I beg you to just take it to her. We’ll get you your dream technology.” I think of having unlimited story. Being able to write pieces as amazing as those published in the Nogales Escribe zine. I imagine Pulitzers.
“Prime Minister Gardner doesn’t even give up water to Nevada and Arizona,” I say. “She won’t give it to you.”
“We must hope,” Alejandra says. “Please take the letter. I beg you.”
I deliberate for a second. “OK. I don’t see why not.”
“Then on behalf of Bajo Nogales I thank you,” Alejandra says, bowing. I take the envelope from Jaime. “There’s an easier way out if you wish. I’ll come with you in the elevator. Jaime will have your belongings once you reach the cafe.”
We don’t talk much as the elevator makes its slow way up to a backroom in the Alto Nogales Cafe.
“So why did Jaime have me enter through the toilet?”
“Jaime is stupid and immature,” Alejandra says, sounding almost like Carmen. “I should just tell him that we’re cutting off that passageway. If the narcotraficantes find it… Anyway. It was a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”
And then I’m back in the bathroom, changing into my wet clothes, crossing the busy main street and buying a ticket on the Tufesa bus to Oakland. The bus eases out of Nogales and I press my face against the glass, watching the city roll slowly by, houses crowded on hills, distant dry mountains scraping the horizon. The Mexico-Arizona border is low security, the customs agents frowning at my California passport and then waving me through. The bus rolls on, the desert passing by silently. We roll through the capital, Tucson, the King’s Palace dulled by the perpetual dust, silvery skyscrapers giving way to Joshua Trees and distant mountain ranges. We pass the ruins of Phoenix, driving northwest on a two lane highway and finally arrive at the Colorado River, the muddy trickle, drained by the dams, a whisper of its former self. This part of the river hasn’t been bottled yet but it will be. Water is too precious a commodity to be subject to evaporation.
The bus crosses a high arching bridge and then pulls off the highway to the California Customs Station. We line up, the three Californian citizens in the shorter, express lane.
“What’s that in your pocket?” asks a customs agents. She’s wearing the gold uniform of the California Border Patrol, a cap tipped sideways.
“Oh, just a letter.” I pull the envelope out of my pocket. I’ve completely forgotten about it.
“To the prime minister, eh? I’m curious.” She slices the envelope open. I glance out the window for a second, the parking lot of the small customs station bordered on by the highway and then the endless expanse of the Mojave. A ticking sound issues from the envelope. “Shit. Is that a bomb?” I stare at the small device inside the envelope. 00:05. 00:03. 00:02. In the last few seconds I wonder, irrationally, why the fuck Alejandra gave me a bomb. To punish me? To explode Prime Minister Gardner? 00:01. 00:00. The customs station erupts in flame.
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