We swayed in silence as the train eased on down the tracks.
An unsettled feeling was poking at my newfound relief, and again I remembered. “Manuel,” I asked timidly. “That man . . . did I kill him? ¿Está muerto?” I looked up into his face to see his immediate response. If he tried to lie, to protect me from the truth, I would know it. But what I saw was not what I expected. First his eyes, then his face, then his whole body shaking—with laughter.
“No, pobrecita, no, you did not kill that pendejo, though you may have destroyed the hearing in his ear,” he said between chuckles.
“What do you mean?” I asked, confused. I’d heard the gun. I had seen him fall.
“It was not a real gun, Alma. My uncle used it to start dog races. I took it my last time home. I knew it might serve me well—and it did. You saved us from a beating—or worse.”
“You mean they might have killed us?”
“Well, I suppose it depends on how drunk they were, but I meant more . . .” He looked down at his hands. “. . . what they might have done to you and Rosa.”
My heart pounded and my hands turned prickly cold.
“I’m sorry I didn’t trust you, Manuel,” I whispered.
He shook his head. “You have nothing to be sorry about. How could you know? I might have been a thief. You have to be careful on this journey. Don’t trust anyone—especially people of authority. And anyway, if you hadn’t chased me away, those two could have snuck up on us all, taken our gun, and the ending might have been much worse.”
Suddenly he sat up and looked around. “The train is slowing again. It must be the checkpoint. Listen, this is the plan. I’ve already discussed it with the boys and Rosa.” Then he proceeded to tell me that if the train did slow for a stop, he and the boys must run or they’d be caught by the Mexican authorities and sent back, once again, to Guatemala. Rosa and I were safe, of course, being Mexican citizens, and the officials might let us go; however, sometimes the authorities were not so honest. There was a chance we could be robbed or, as he put it earlier— worse, so he advised that we all stick together and run, and Rosa had agreed.
This time I chose to trust Manuel.
“Come,” he was saying. “Follow me down the ladder. Hold tight and stay quiet.”
“Will the boys know to leave now?”
He nodded toward the field beside us. “You’ll soon see people leaping off this train like fleas off a dog. They will know.”
I slung my pack onto my back and crawled behind Manuel. My thigh throbbed where I had scraped it climbing up. I could see a slight tear in my pants, encircled by a reddish stain. I took a deep breath and waited, as Manuel slid over the edge and down to the top rung. Looking down now in the bright light of day, I trembled. How had I gotten up there? The ladder ended far below the top. How had I managed to propel myself those last few feet? Perhaps Rosa’s Virgin of Guadalupe was with me after all.
Manuel had climbed down a few rungs and held his hand up toward me. “Slide down, I’ll help you.”
I could see the ground between the cars moving swiftly past and the massive wheels of the car behind turning and spitting up gravel in its wake. There was no way I could do this. Not until the cars stopped. They’d have to go on without me.
I shook my head at Manuel. “¡No puedo! I can’t. Not while it’s moving.”
“Hold tight to the top, and there’s a foot hold here and here. You can do it.” He glanced to his right around the corner of the car then back up at me. “Let it slow a bit more. Then try.” Reaching up, he added, “Give me your pack.”
I slid it down to him with only a moment’s hesitation. The thought entered my mind that he could run with it—my few meager belongings. My little box of stars. But I knew he wouldn’t. He secured it over his shoulder, then smiled up at me. “Relax. We’ll give it a minute. You can do it, you’ll see.”
I turned around on my knees and placed my toes over the edge. The car lurched from side to side, rocking my body unsteadily. I thought of my shoes that my mother had gotten from the church. “They’re from America,” she had said, donated from some church in el norte. But they were not shiny or sleek, or colorful or new, like I imagined an American teenager’s shoes would be. These were dull, round, and brown, with laces and a thick sole, but so far, they had served me well. I thought of Tito crying out as I stomped on his ankle, and right now, they were clearly a godsend: The sole could grip, and the shoes would not slip off.
I closed my eyes and waited for the train to ease up, but even as it slowed, the force of the rocking was still too much for me.
“Alma,” Manuel’s voice rose up from below, “we have to go now. If we wait, they may catch us. Please!”
Just as he spoke, I heard shouts from the ground. Glancing over my right shoulder, I saw Rosa and the boys running along a slight bank beside the car. Behind them several others were running through the field away from the train. Rosa stopped and put her hands to her face. She looked frightened for me. “Oh Alma!” she cried, scaring me even more. But
