Caught up in the convulsion of whatever carnal instinct had been triggered, the man said nothing to her. He spoke only with the terrorism of his body. His fingernails carved red marks into the skin of her hips as he tried to rip and pull her pants away from them.
The frenzy was interrupted by two of the men running toward them across the street. “Para ahora! Para ahora!” one of them yelled over and over.
When they pulled the man off of her by the back of his t-shirt, he wouldn’t let go of her jeans. Aria’s legs were pulled high into the air before he let go and they smacked the asphalt hard enough that her heel was badly bruised.
Her attacker swung a punch through the air at one of the men who had come to her rescue, but because he ducked, it only grazed his arm.
“Go on … Go on, get outta here!” the new arrival yelled defiantly in her attacker’s face. Both of the men stood ready for a fight. Instead of taking them on, the first man ran. “Go on, get outta here!” the man yelled again, hoping the words would chase him even further from where they stood.
He reached down toward Aria. “Hey, you OK, miss?” he asked in a heavy Mexican accent. “You’re cut up pretty bad.”
Aria let him pull her up to standing position and she adjusted her clothes, which had been twisted by the scuffle. She was too shocked to respond. Her body started to process the trauma by shaking.
“Hey, you need to call somebody?” he asked, still holding her arm and worried. Aria shook her head no. “Hey, I know somebody who could help,” the man said, still waiting for any verbal sign from Aria.
Aria wanted to run away from this place. She wanted to take care of the aftermath herself and unburden the men who had come to her aid. But she thought about the fact that should any concerned passerby or cop drive past her, a bloody face would draw attention to herself, which just might land her in more trouble than she was already in. So she said “OK,” expecting them to point her in the direction of whatever place they were about to suggest. Instead, the man began to lead her away from the building and down the street. The other man followed them at a short distance, looking less than thrilled by the idea of leaving the opportunities they might miss at the Home Depot parking lot.
“I’m Pedro,” the man eventually said, pointing to himself. “This is my brother Consuelo.”
“I’m Aria,” she said, trying to meet the man’s friendliness with welcome. “Where are we going?”
When she snapped out of the shock of what had happened, she was surprised at herself for simply deciding to blindly trust these men.
“We know somebody who owns a store up there,” Pedro said, pointing further up the street. He seemed mildly insulted by the sudden distrust in her voice. He imagined her distrust owed itself to the fact that he was brown and she was white.
The men led her to one of the little authentic Mexican stores that Aria had come to notice littered the city. Case upon case of cakes and breads were displayed in front of her. Half of an entire wall was covered with a succession of fresh and dried green and red peppers of every different size and shape. The entire ceiling was cluttered with piñatas, their tassels reaching low enough to brush Aria’s forehead.
The smell of the place was overwhelming: a congregation of scents, from the sting of industrial cleaner to the hearty scent of Maseca corn flour, all of which were smuggled into the scent of cardboard boxes whose contents had leaked through them in the heat, permeating the trailer of whatever semi truck they had taken to get there. The slightly cheesy accordion strokes of an upbeat Mexican norteño band was playing across the speakers. Aria stopped to listen to the basic and repetitive guitar notes and the voice of the man singing passionately over them in Spanish.
When they entered the store, Pedro greeted an older woman who was fussing over an assortment of tamales that were being held in a heated metal basin. They greeted each other with such geniality that Aria imagined them to be related. “Hey, come over here,” Pedro called to her. “This here is Doña Lolita. She’s a good woman. You can trust her.”
It was obvious that Pedro had told the woman what happened. Concern and anger were evident on her face. “Come here, mija,” she said, leading Aria behind her through the crowded aisles. She opened a door to a tiny bathroom in the back of the store and ushered Aria inside, closing the door behind her as if she alone were taking charge of Aria’s chastity.
Aria looked at herself in the mirror before cleaning herself off. The damage done to her face looked to be just on the surface, despite the blood and split in her lip. She waited for a while for the water to run hot, before deciding the place probably had no warm water. She wiped her face clean with the cold, chemical city water being pumped through the pipes, then rejoined the woman outside.
“Have some pozole, mija,” the woman said, setting a steaming soup down in front of her on the table with a little side plate of raw, shredded cabbage, raw onion, dry oregano and a golden plain tostada. Guessing that Aria had no idea what to do with it, she took her hand and sprinkled some of the cabbage and onion into the soup and stirred it around with Aria’s
