Chapter 20

23:40 Saturday, July 13th, 1991
Zapata, 93 Cr, 13 Cl
Chapinero, Bogotá, D.C. Colombia

"In the Sixties, again."

Ruben acknowledged his brother with a nod. It's always in the Sixties here, though they'll tell you it's the 'upper teens'. It's the altitude, or something ... it's higher than Flagstaff.

Ruben gestured around the small house, located in a residential fringe on the northern edge of the industrial Ciudad Kennedy. "This place is plenty fucking strange, Joachin..."

His brother ignored the tone in his voice, instead agreeing, giving Ruben a rare glimpse of his brother as he was when they were boys in Hermasillo. Ruben treasured the moment, though his hopes that Joachin would regain his senses and leave this place were let down, again. "And it's fucking cheap, too. We can live for a while, if we're careful here, before we return to Mexico."

Ruben knew better than to ask about returning to Arizona or California. "We should have new clothes, for this meeting." I left the shirt Maria embroidered for me in California. I'll probably never see it again. Regrets, Ruben would keep to himself. "Careful? This place makes Juarez look like a walk in the park."

Joachin nodded agreement again. "Bodies in the streets, for the wild dogs to eat." His tone was more of wonder than of sharp disapproval. On their way into the city, on the wheezing diesel bus that barely made the climb to the 8600 foot elevation of the city, a city wrapped in smog and cloud, the dirt-poor neighborhoods were much in evidence. Since then, the two of them had talked with bartenders and cab drivers, passengers on busses, and today, the laundress.

All, universally, were proud of the modern gem of a city they inhabited, eager to compare it to world capitals none had seen. Each, universally, was perversely proud of the murder and terror crimes the city was infamous for.

"Alguien más", someone else. It was Alguien who was blown up on the Autopista, starting his Empresario's car, or it was Alguien who was gunned down, or garroted, or hung...

The glee with which the locals repeated the stories and the sincere shudders and self-crossing were getting to Ruben, and Joachin, too. Each spoke to the other in English, though neither would question why aloud. Their Mexican Spanish worked for those they would talk to on the streets, and went uncommented on.

Tonight, they would speak as if they were in the court of the King of Spain.

Joachin was nervous, and in pain. No guns, he'd said, until they got employment, and maybe not even then, if they got places high enough in a cartel. Ruben didn't want to think about that, but there was no denying that Joachin didn't feel comfortable in Bogotá without one. I hate the things, and I'd feel better with one. The bigger, the better.

The busses wouldn't run to Ciudad Kennedy after 10 PM, though they might convince a taxi to take them back and drop them off a few streets north of the house on Avenida de las Américas. That they had to take a bus to where they could get a taxi to take them uptown seemed unnecessarily stupid to Ruben, but he didn't think he could figure out the bus system well enough to get them there anytime in the same week. Maybe by August.

"Showtime," Joachin sighed, again in English. Ruben followed him out of the taxi, and onto the sidewalk under the tall red-brick building. The ride had been harrowing, the driver, if not quite reckless, choosing the shallower sections of crushed road surface – hard to call them potholes when they were half a block long – with great skill and élan, coupled with a casual disregard for his passengers' teeth or Joachin's hisses.

Once on the street, Ruben saw they were in a somewhat-modern section of the city, with upscale restaurants and bars. Could be in Hollywood or LA, but the signs are in Spanish. Joachin sucked his teeth in pain as he opened a heavy glass entrance door. Ruben watched, as his brother would have shaken off the attempt at help. Inside, the foyer was granite and brass, art-deco brass sconces providing the lighting. Joachin led them to the stair to the right of the elevator, and silently they climbed.

On the second landing of the open stair, their steps echoing off the marble floor and bare walls strongly, Joachin paused, the sweat beaded on his forehead. Silently, Ruben extended a cloth from his pocket. Silently, Joachin accepted it, blotting the sweat from his face.

Instead of climbing further, Joachin led them to a door on the left. Like the other office doors on this floor, it was a heavy, opaque walnut, without a window. Also like the other doors on the floor, it was unmarked. Whether this was a sign of vacancy, Ruben could not say.

When Joachin knocked, the ring on his finger he had taken in payment from a 'customer' clacking on the hardwood, the door opened to reveal a short, swarthy man with a round face and unkempt hair. After a slow study up-and-down, with an obvious pause at the armpits, the other grudgingly moved aside, opening the door further. "Entrar."

If I'm going to play the part of bodyguard, I should be a bodyguard. Without a fucking gun. Ruben touched Joachin's elbow, and when he had his attention, slipped past to enter first. A quick scan of the room showed more austerity in the plain white walls, a hardwood floor, and sparse, Spartan furniture. A black-leather couch without arms against one wall, a massive dark wooden desk, mahogany, perhaps, and a matching hard-backed wooden chair, with a large man sitting on it made the room seem emptier than it might have. Sitting in the window recess were two men in suit pants and vests, the brown leather of their shoulder holsters standing out against the grey vests. Ruben felt his eyes narrow at the sight of the pistols the men wore openly.