Until now. This was one of those moments everybody would talk about for months, maybe years. I wasn’t going to let it pass me by. I ran after Pepino and Mosca, but just as I was about to cross the big iron gate of the church and cross the street, my mother grabbed my arm.
“Liberio!” She pulled me back to her side. “Where do you think you’re going?”
“To see. It’s el profe Quintanilla.”
“This is not for your eyes.” Her voice seemed to splinter into a zillion pieces. My sister Gaby was standing behind her, an arm around my grandmother who was looking up at the sky, her face covered by a black mantilla. My mother and Gaby were staring at my father. He was standing in the middle of the crowd. He turned and gave us a sad nod: up and down real slow as if relaying a secret message, letting us know it was true, that it was el profe Quintanilla’s head.
And then, just like that, my mother released my arm and covered her mouth with her hand, her fingers trembling over her painted lips.
El profe’s head had been severed clean across the neck, just over the Adam’s apple, so there was very little neck. His black hair was slicked back the way he used to wear it in class when he taught us civics and lectured on history or marched us in parade before the flag on patriotic fiestas. Except for the big black flies buzzing and crawling into his nostrils and ears and his open mouth, he looked just like when he was alive, his glazed eyes staring up at the empty bell towers of the church across the street.
He looked sad.
The men removed their hats. Everyone crossed themselves.
My father shouted, “Someone get the authorities.”
Ignacio Morales, the big fat man who owned the Minitienda, a small grocery store near my house, flipped shut his cell phone and shoved it back in his pocket. “Captain Pineda’s not answering.”
“He’s probably sleeping it off,” one of the street vendors said.
Father Gregorio, still dressed in his elaborate chasuble, came forward and carefully plucked a folded piece of paper from el profe’s mouth.
“What is it, Father?” Don Ignacio asked.
“A note.”
“Well?”
Father Gregorio lowered his head and read the note in a trembling voice: “He talked too much.”
The gate at the Secundaria Vicente Suárez school was closed. The groundskeeper sat on a chair inside, his big straw hat pushed back on his bald head, his arms crossed. He smiled, showing us his rotten teeth. “Haven’t you heard, niños? El Profe Quintanilla is dead.” He slowly ran his thumb across the front of his neck from ear to ear. “They cut off his head.”
Classes were cancelled for three days. I ran home, changed out of my uniform, grabbed my shoeshine box, and went to the Minitienda to meet Mosca. Three days without school meant three days to polish shoes and earn some cash. The feria was coming to Izayoc in a few weeks. Mosca and I had to make some serious money.
A lot of us hung out at the Minitienda on Avenida Porvenir, one of the old cobblestone streets between my house and the plaza. Don Ignacio was cool with that. He didn’t have a problem if we brought bottles to redeem the deposits or just hung out on the narrow sidewalk in front of his store, even if we didn’t buy anything.
I set my shoeshine box down and sat on the sidewalk when Edwin Contreras walked up. He was seventeen, fat, and wore clothes that were too small for him. He was always hanging around: all talk and no action. That’s why he got the nickname Zopilote, the vulture.
Zopilote’s parents owned Dos Caminos, a big open restaurant with a palm-thatched roof. It was on the outskirts of town near the new highway. On weekdays, it was popular with truckers, and on the weekends people from Izayoc would spend the afternoon there drinking and eating seafood cocteles and grilled meats.
“What’s up, pinche Boli? No work?”
“At least I work, no?”
“Take it easy, güey. I was just saying. You look bored. Where’s your girlfriend?”
“Shut up.”
He laughed and walked into the Minitienda.
Zopilote was a fool. His father resented him because he never helped with the restaurant, but his mother gave him money. I actually felt sorry for him. He was always alone. Everyone laughed at him behind his back, but he didn’t seem to care. He was a jerk, always acting like he was too good for the rest of us.
He came out of the store with a caguama of Carta Blanca and leaned back against the wall. The big bottle looked huge in his hand. “Too bad I’m wearing sneakers, otherwise I’d ask you for a shine.”
I glanced at his shoes.
“They’re the new Nikes,” he said and took a long drink of his beer.
“They’re fake.”
“What are you talking about?” He looked at his shoes and turned his foot to examine the logo. “My mother got them in Toluca.”
“Real Nikes don’t have that stitching around the logo like that.”
“Bullshit.” He turned to the side, holding his beer between his arm and chest, and texted someone on his smart phone. Then he grinned at me as he put the device back in his pocket. “It’s the latest model. You can’t get them around here. Or even in Toluca.”
A group of girls was walking toward us on the opposite side of the street. They were still in their school uniforms—blue skirts, white blouses and tall white stockings, their black hair in braids and ponytails. They stopped to look at the fabric in the window of Telas y Novedades Virgo. The store belonged to Bonifacio Cruz. All the girls in town, including my sister Gaby, bought material there to make their quinceañera dress. My father always said Don Bonifacio had a sweet deal. Unless people were willing to make the trip to Toluca, they had to buy from Don Bonifacio.
“Check it out.” Zopilote pointed to the girls with his beer. “Here they come, Boli. Get smart.” He stepped away from the wall and squinted. “Ay güey, that one looks like Ximena.”
It was. Ximena Mata and her best friend Regina Martínez and three other girls from the secundaria. Ximena was a princess. She never braided her hair like the other girls. She kept it loose so it sailed across her face whenever the wind blew. She had high cheekbones and sleepy eyes. I swear that was what drove us all crazy. That, and how she wore her stockings rolled down and always kept her uniform blouse unbuttoned down to the middle of her chest.
“That Ximena’s a real doll,” Zopilote said. “Look at how she swings her hips when she walks. “Qué nalgas, no?”
Then we heard the pounding of a deep bass at the opposite end of the street. A late model black Ford Expedition Max with pitch-black windows and spinning silver rims was coming slowly down the hill.
Zopilote gawked. “That’s a fine truck right there. One day I’m gonna get one just like that, but red with gold rims. Or a pickup.”
The sound of the cumbia got louder as it got closer. When it passed, the bass shook all the windows on the street.
“For real, cabrón. You all think I’m wasting my time, but I’m making friends in important places. That’s how it’s done. You’ll see.”
I