They approached a river, and the colors of the landscape became richer, more lovely.
“Because . . . the violence?”
“Our manufacturing is weak. Only about half of children are enrolled in school. But, yes, the violence makes it worse. Criminals raise the costs of legitimate business, push people into the illegal economy, which makes them dependent on the gangs.”
“Or the guerrilla.”
“The guerrilla have lower taxes,” Luisa chimed in, “so they are bad, but not as bad as the gangs.”
“We’re going to a town . . . the control is by Los Mil Jesúses, yes?”
This, Luisa didn’t like. She eyed Agudelo, who shrugged.
“How do you know them?” Luisa asked.
“They’re interesting.”
“No. These groups are not interesting.”
Luisa fixed her eyes on the road. A new tension hung in the already suffocating air of the van.
“Lina said you were writing an article about the foundation,” Luisa said. “Is that true?”
“I am interested in your group.”
“My group.” Luisa shook her head, then pulled over to the side of the road and slowed the van to a stop. She turned to fix her glare on Lisette. “Listen to me. You are here because national wants you here. Because publicity for us can drive money, and we are always starved. Starved. Not because interesting groups like Los Mil Jesúses need more attention. If you’re not going to write about us, get out.”
The students in the backseat had their mouths open. Lisette sighed and glanced at Agudelo, who merely raised his eyebrows, as if to say, It’s a good point, why don’t you respond?
“Okay,” she said. “I already told you. I am interested in your group.”
Luisa stared at Lisette, then shifted the van into gear and pulled back onto the road. They drove for a long time in silence. One of the students fell asleep. Lisette stared out the window. A brown river slouched beside the road—thick green vegetation to their right, brown and desiccated trees to their left.
There was little talk for much of the rest of the trip. Lisette closed her eyes and tried to sleep, waking only as they approached La Vigia, the town that Diego had assured her the U.S. military was unusually interested in, and which had experienced a power shuffle after the Colombians, using U.S. tech and tactics, had killed some high-ranking muckety-muck in one of the bigger Colombian drug gangs. If Diego was right and it was indeed a place where the second- and third-order consequences of the use of force were playing out in ways that made people in Bogotá nervous, then it was as good a place as any.
The outskirts of La Vigia were simple houses, earthen construction haphazardly placed that slowly yielded to a more orderly grid pattern of roads lined by white cement houses with metal bars on every door and window. There was road construction ahead, limiting the road to one lane, and Luisa slowed to a stop behind a line of cars and trucks. As far as characters went, Luisa wasn’t a bad one, and maybe there would be a role for her in whatever story Lisette ended up telling. Surely worth profiling, if she could get on her good side. Which she was certain she could. The ones who were the most theatrical about how tough they were usually cracked easy.
Luisa, noticing Lisette’s eyes on her, gave one loud sniff. “Violent people are boring people.” She said it as if responding to something Lisette had said. “Broken children who can only do one thing. Crap-asses who could never work a real job. Set them on good land, already tilled and planted, they’d sit around, stroke their guns, and cry as they starved.”
The line of cars moved forward and then stopped in front of a shuttered store on the side of the road. Without the breeze from the windows, the van quickly became unbearable.
“We have a bakery here,” Luisa said. “A bakery is a good place to train them to be human beings. You have to get up early. Work with your hands, but also talk with real people. Customers. Some townspeople don’t go to our bakery. There’s a lot of stigma against ex-combatants. But what are we going to do? The paramilitaries killed my father, now I give them jobs baking bread.”
That was interesting. Lisette made a note to run that down. A woman who worked to rehabilitate the kinds of combatants who had killed her father held a natural appeal. Add that to her “I’m such a tough cookie” swagger . . . She’d come off well on the page.
“Do you rehabilitate guerrilla also?”
“More, now. It is harder. This was a paramilitary town. One ex-guerrillero who went through our program, oh, five years ago? He was killed. Of course, we don’t know why, but there is more hatred against the guerrilla here and now we have more of them and it makes it difficult.”
“How many get other jobs outside of the bakery?”
“Real jobs?” Luisa said. “Hard to say. We don’t let them stay at the bakery too long. They have to go out, find other employment. And it’s hard, because the economy here is not very good, there is a lot of poverty. And there’s always more ex-combatants than we have positions. We try. Some businesses help, some don’t. The success rate is not that good. But we have to grow a human being out of a pile of shit, so what do you expect?”
Lisette laughed at that, and heard Agudelo let out a sigh from the backseat. The construction workers started waving more cars through and Luisa started the car again, air moving into the vehicle.
“You know,” Lisette said, “you should sell me your work. Not tell me it doesn’t always work.”
Luisa smiled. A real smile. She knew she was being complimented.
“In Bogotá, they can afford lies. Here, we cannot.”
• • •
Despite Luisa’s bluster, La Vigia
