FOREIGN VIOLENCE

Short Story #3 — FOREIGN VIOLENCE (5300 words)

*All stories are protected under the © Seal of the Copyright Office of the United States. April 27, 2023 and May 01, 2023

An unfortunate accident forces Pablo to flee from Mexico to the United States, where he begins to adapt and love his new country. When his cousin Julian decides to emigrate and join him, things get more entertaining and complicated.

I’m an exile.

I fled from Mexico in a hurry. The reason was just a tragic, unexpected accident. I didn’t have time to pack anything. Straight from the accident, I ran away to the US. I couldn’t say goodbye to anyone, not even to my mom.

I was riding a crowded bus with my girlfriend. We were standing in the middle aisle when a man started groping my girl from behind. He was near the exit with his back closed to the door. When I saw him touching my girl, I pushed him so hard that the doors opened, and he fell out of the moving bus, and then a truck ran over his head when he hit the pavement. It was an awful sight, his brains scattered all over. I can still hear the cracking sound of his cranial bones.

My first reaction was to escape the scene, the town, and even the country.

I moved to the US without any chance to return to my family. It’s been a few years since then, but it feels like an eternity. Years later, I found out my girlfriend got married and had two kids. I bet she doesn’t even remember my face.

My name is Pablo. I live near Fresno in the Central Valley, Visalia, CA. I’m not legal in the country. I shouldn’t be spreading this information because they charge over two thousand dollars to help you cross the border.

I live on the second floor of a twelve-unit apartment building on Houston Street in a run-down neighborhood. I’ve been working at the Rescue Mission for the last three years. I drive a forklift, separate donated items, and put price tags on them. I used to live in LA, but rent and expenses were too high for my budget.

Recently, my cousin Julian called from Mexico to let me know he wanted to join me. He’s four years younger than me. I agreed, and next week, I’ll pick him up at a McDonald’s in San Isidro, on this side of the border. He’s twenty-four years old.

When my neighbor Mark heard I was going to Tijuana, he asked me for a favor, to get some weed from a friend in LA. Being a nice guy, I agreed.

I brought Pink Floyd, The Beatles, Bob Marley, and The Doors for the six-hour trip.

In a way, the bus incident pushed me to reach my goal of moving to LA. Having lost Mexico forever made it easy to adopt LA. Now, I love LA even more than Randy Newman does.

The freeway was an ocean of cars. You could see lots of beautiful girls everywhere. Magic Mountain to my right, Universal Studios, the Hollywood Hills, Griffith Park, the Observatory, the Zoo, and the cemetery on the hill. What a great trip. Even the San Onofre nuclear plant seemed friendly.

Julian has gained some weight and muscles since I last saw him. His skin was dark, not the burnt kind, but the tanned kind. He was close to six feet tall, and his eyebrows were heavy. He said he crossed on his first attempt. Did I mention he was lucky, too?

We still had to go through another checkpoint in San Clemente. I told him we needed to stop behind a warehouse or somewhere dark so I could hide him in the trunk.

The immigration checkpoint was closed, so I kept driving. I thought about playing a little joke on my cousin. I got off the freeway in a rest area and looked for a place where nobody could see us.

I parked the car and got out, I went to the rear and slammed the trunk, I yelled out loud in Spanish, ‘No señor oficial, no hay nadie en la cajuela se lo aseguro por favor déjeme pasar soy ciudadano americano.” (“No, officer, there’s nobody in the trunk. I assure you, please, let me go. I’m an American Citizen,”) When I opened the trunk, Julian looked terrified. He was shaking. His pants were wet.

“Eso no es nada gracioso.” Julian said, “That’s not even funny.”I kept laughing until my jaws hurt.

To get Mark’s weed, I had to drive through Topanga Canyon, from the valley to the ocean —a few miles of beautiful curves, mountains, deep green canyons, and precipices. The weather gets cooler as you get closer to the sea. The area was famous for its laid-back, hippie-style community and its marijuana crops.

Mark’s friend, Pete, was already a little high when we arrived. He met us with a friendly smile and two beers. He rolled a fat one while inquiring about our mutual friend.

I figured Pete would look like a Cheech and Chong type of guy, but I was wrong. He was a short white guy with eyeglasses and long hair. He was very friendly and funny.

He said Mark used to live there. Until one day, Mark burned the weed patch. He said Mark was so high he accidentally pushed the barbecue grill to the ground and started a fire.

That day, Pete was making a delivery in Van Nuys. When he came back, the firefighters had the fire under control. Pete thought they would call the cops, but they told him never to leave the barbecue grill unattended. He mentioned that one of them said, “Sorry about your loss.” Pete said they were high and in a good mood. That was the last time Pete saw Mark.

We were also high and in a good mood when he finished the story. I commented on his marijuana, ‘Powerful shit, man, powerful shit.’ Julian asked me, ‘qué quiere decir eso?’ (what does that mean?) and I told him in a mellow way, “caca poderosa hombre, caca poderosa” and we started to laugh.

When I told Pete the story about the fictitious Immigration officer, he laughed so hard he dropped the joint he was rolling.

After three more joints and three more beers, we took off.

It was getting dark, and I was high as a kite. My mouth was dry, and I couldn’t stop smiling. Julian was smiling, too, and that made me smile. I was happy.

But I couldn’t concentrate on the road. My eyes were squinting. I had my face close to the steering wheel like an old lady. Instead of watching the road ahead, I followed the line in the middle of the road with so many curves. I was concentrating on the double yellow line rather than on the traffic.

What a strange trip it’s been. I felt comfortably numb. I was driving on the long and winding road. I smoked two joints before I smoked two joints. Wait a minute, is that music coming from the radio or inside my brain?

Wow, I needed my normal brain back. I just wanted to get out of those curves. I was thirsty.

I wished we were in Visalia, at the Green Olive, with a beer in hand and my normal brain, but we were at the Top of Topanga, the highest point between the ocean and the valley.

I thought my fears would disappear once we reached the city streets, but I encountered a different fear—a million red lights.

Not all red lights were traffic lights. Confused, I wanted to use the breaks constantly.

Panicked and desperate, I pulled over at a liquor store to get snacks and a six-pack of sodas. After a while, I felt brave enough to continue, and I said to myself, “I’ll be fine once I get on the freeway.” Julian was talking to himself, too.

I felt much better when we reached the freeway, but a new problem emerged immediately. The car was not moving. The freeway was! We were floating in the car! The earth was circling fast. I kept the car in the center of the lane, watching the world come at us.

It was the weirdest feeling. I was hallucinating. Fuck! Potent shit, indeed. Julian couldn’t notice the kind of trip I was having.

After what seemed like an eternity, we reached the Frazier Park mountains, another fantastic area at the other end of the valley. We could see the San Joaquin Valley, two straight lanes of black asphalt as far as I could see.

The effects of “la caca poderosa” were fading away. My brain began to function again. Gaining control of my tiny shitty cerebellum was good.

For the first time since Topanga Canyon, I heard Julian’s voice saying, “. . . and that’s how they got my partner and put him in jail.”

“Oh, that’s very interesting,” I replied.

We still had time for a couple of beers. So we went to my favorite bar, the Green Olive.

We ordered two beers and sat at the end of the bar. I noticed a beautiful white girl. She had gray skintight gym pants adjusted to her fine-looking body. You could see the delicate curves of her ass. Anybody could tell she wasn’t wearing any panties.

After our third beer, Julian asked me how to say “me gusta como se te ve tú pantalón” in English (I like how you look in those pants), but instead of the correct translation, I told him, “You have a lovely camel toe.”

He practiced the sentence a few times, and after gulping the rest of his beer, he gathered all his courage and approached her.

I couldn’t hear Julian’s voice from the end of the bar, but I saw her slapping Julian on the face.

I was still laughing when he sat on his stool.

When I translated what he had just told her, he said, “pinche cabrón pendejo.” Then he returned to her and said, “Sorry, amiga.” I’m sure she knew Julian was just an innocent victim.

While smoking outside, in a dark corner, I saw some guys coming out of the bar, too. I recognized one of them from my apartment building. He lived right below my unit. We’ve seen each other, but we have never spoken.

I didn’t like him and was sure the feeling was mutual. He had a swastika tattooed on his neck. The other guy looked like his replica: baggy black pants, boots, and a white tank top—big muscular guys.

They were half drunk, and they stumbled a little. Before crossing the street, they pushed a black guy with a shopping cart into the path of an oncoming car without apparent reason. The car ran over him, and the driver never stopped.

My downstairs neighbor saw me before he ran away. They both stopped and stared at me for a couple of seconds. I knew I was in trouble.

I went inside to tell Julian we needed to leave right away. I didn’t tell him what I had just witnessed.

I was in deep shit. I was sure I’d be the next victim no matter what. Unless I got him first.

I drove around my apartment building twice to check for signs of danger. We went in until everything was safe and quiet.

His apartment was dark. I assumed he wasn’t back yet.

The first thing I did when we went inside my apartment was get a little jigsaw and make a small round hole on the wood floor under my couch and another hole in the ceiling of my downstairs neighbor.

“What are you doing?” asked Julian.

“I’ll tell you later. Let’s go to sleep. We need to find you a job tomorrow.” I replied.

In the morning, after I pushed the playback button in my brain, I got a blurry vision of past events. Julian was lying on the floor next to the couch where I slept.

I felt a cold sweat when I remembered about the supremacist piece of shit downstairs.

I looked through the little hole I had made the night before. The spot was about the size of a quarter. When I looked through it, a sudden shiver ran through my body.

My downstairs neighbor was inside the little hole. He was sitting on his couch. He was looking up in my direction. He had drywall dust on his hair. His eyes were squinting, full of curiosity.

My immediate reaction was to get the gun I kept under the sofa cushion. I put the barrel in the hole and pulled the trigger. When I looked back, my neighbor was motionless and had blood in his left eye.

My cousin woke up with a look of terror.

“Qué pasa, qué pasa?” (what’s going on?) he said.

I told him to look through the hole, and then I covered the hole with a sock. I told him what I had witnessed the night before in the bar and all about my neighbor.

“Good, it was either you or him,” he said in Spanish.

Julian was like one of those friends you can call at three in the morning to get you out of jail, take you to the hospital, or even at more critical times when you need help to kill your worst enemy. He would never question your motives. If you’re lucky, you will only get a friend like that in your entire life. At the same time, you wouldn’t like guys like him as your enemies.

When he was a teenager, a stray dog bit his ankle right above his shoe. He was bleeding and in pain, but he followed the dog and kept going for miles relentlessly until the dog couldn’t go on any longer. The dog was so exhausted he just gave up and accepted his fate with resignation. Then Julian knelt, grabbed the dog by his mouth, and forced it open until he broke his jaws.

The dog kept wandering around the neighborhood for days. Unable to control its mouth, the dog died of thirst and starvation in less than a week.

Half an hour after I shot my neighbor, someone knocked on the door. Two cops were investigating a shooting downstairs and asked if we heard or saw anything. I told them I heard a gunshot and saw a guy running from the building. I described the skinhead’s friend.

“Thank you, guys, you’re good citizens. Thanks for your cooperation and your valuable information,” they said.

After the cops left, I said, “I’m glad I killed that mother fucker.”

Julian liked the sound of my words because he kept repeating, “Maaddaa faackaa, maddaa faackaa.” I knew he’d be saying those words all day.

After we left the apartment, we stopped next door to give the weed to Mark. He asked us if we wanted some, and we declined.

Just thinking about it made me shiver.“Caca poderosa, hombre, caca poderosa.” Julian kept saying as we left.

*****

One day, after I came back from work, Julian gave me a big surprise.

He had a thick wad of hundred-dollar bills. He was fanning his face with them.

“Where did you get that money?” I anticipated an incredible story.

“Robé un Banco.” ‘I robbed a Bank,’ he said.

“What?” I replied.

“I went to this bank—I think it’s called Bank of the Sierra—and I gave a note to one of the tellers. But she couldn’t understand it because I wrote it in Spanish, so I called a Mexican-looking guy waiting in line to come and translate it. Then, she gave me all this money, almost seven thousand dollars. I gave the guy who helped me three hundred dollars and left,” he said in Spanish.

“What did the note say?” I asked him in complete disbelief, and he gave me a crumpled note.

The note said: “Este es un robo dáme todo tú dinero o exploto toda la dinamita que traigo bajo mi ropa.” [translation] “This is a robbery; give me all your money, or I’ll explode all the dynamite under my clothing.”

“You crazy mother fucker! We need to do something right away.” I said.

After a long lecture (possibly in vain), I made him wear sunglasses and a baseball cap and gave him another shirt. I burned the note, threw away the T-shirt, and took him to the barbershop.

When the barber finished, Julian looked in the mirror and said, “I like it, I like it.”

He was completely bald and unrecognizable but still handsome.

At work, I asked the trash collector driver if he could find a job for Julian.

“Yes, they need another driver,” he said.

“But my cousin doesn’t have a driver’s license,” I replied.

“No problem, neither do I,” he said.

“And he has no papers or a work permit,” I answered.

“No problem, neither do I,” he said.

Julian insisted I take half the money he ‘collected’ from the bank.

“I didn’t participate in the robbery. I wouldn’t have, even if you asked me.”

“While I’m living here, half of what I make is yours,” he said.

It was useless. He’d get mad if I refused.

While having breakfast at Denny’s, I was reading the paper and came across an article about a black homeless man hit by a car. ‘A hit and run,’ they claimed.

There was another article about the shooting in my building and the killing of my neighbor. Next to it was a picture of the ‘killer’ (his friend) and a picture of the detectives receiving a medal from the Mayor for their excellent investigation leading to his arrest.

Another article mentioned a bank robbery, including a blurry picture of Julian taken by the surveillance cameras. It said they arrested one of the robbers.

A lot of shit has happened since my cousin arrived.

Across from our table, a woman, probably in her early 40s, kept staring at us. She was attractive and elegant. After a while, she approached our table. I thought she was rude when she sat at our table without our permission.

Pointing her finger to Julian, she said.

“I know you! I know it’s you. Even without hair, I know it’s you.”

“Excuse me, lady, what are you talking about? I’m sure you’re mistaken,” I said, not knowing what she was talking about. “My friend doesn’t even speak English,” I continued.

“I knew I was right! I just knew it!” she said.

Then, with her index finger straight up against her mouth and nose in a softer voice and looking at me, she said, “Shhh, don’t worry, I’m not going to say anything to anybody, but this guy just robbed my bank last week.” she continued, “I’m the manager. Listen, I want to make a deal with you guys. I need you to rob the bank again, but this time, there’s 25,000.00 dollars involved.” She grabbed the newspaper, pointed to Julian’s picture, and said, “That’s him.”

“Okay, let’s say for a moment that you’re right,” I said, knowing there was no use denying it, “what’s your proposition?”

“Okay, here’s the deal. I have a gambling habit. I gamble with our customers’ money. I go to a casino in Lemoore all the time. I’m in deep shit now. Sooner or later, they’ll find out I’m swindling money from the bank. I keep returning to the casino, thinking I can win the money back, but I keep losing. I swear if I get even, I’ll quit for good,” she leaned closer to the table and continued.

“You both show up at the bank and use the same method, and no one gets hurt. I’ll make sure everything goes smoothly. I’ll make sure the teller has 25,000.00 dollars ready for you. You just come with your little note. But this time you must write it in English. I’ll report a higher amount, and we all win. My name’s Linda. I don’t even need to know your names.”

Her plan sounded safe, and I agreed. We exchanged numbers, and she said she’d get in touch. When I translated everything for Julian, he got excited and said. “I like it.”

Julian started working for a waste management company in Dinuba, collecting trash around a rural area. Julian had always had enormous self-esteem. He would often get any job he applied for, and he could even apply for a job as an astronaut.

Anything was better than passing notes to bank tellers saying he wanted to blow up their banks.

Linda called to give me some instructions.

“Okay, everything is ready for tomorrow at 5:55 P.M. Make sure you’re our last customer. I’ll be working on register number four, so don’t worry about anything. It’ll be fast and easy,” she added, “we’ll meet after the operation, and I’ll give you your part.”

We showed up as city workers. We wore brown boots, yellow helmets, yellow safety vests, and dark sunglasses.

We left the car half a block away from the bank. I was a little nervous, but I didn’t show it. There was no need to carry guns.

I heard it was easier to rob a bank than a 7-11 store. They were right. It was a piece of cake, in and out in two minutes. Linda was at the cash register. We just gave her the note, and she gave us a white canvas bag with a lock. It must have been the easiest bank robbery ever.

Boom, just like that, we were out of there. A second after I started the car, I heard an alarm.

The next day, we met with Linda and gave her the canvas bag, and she gave us twenty-five thousand dollars in cash. Sweet!

A few days later, I grabbed a hamburger from Carl’s Jr. on my lunch break and went to the Green Olive for a beer to celebrate my growing bank account.

I watched a patrol car pass by when I drove out of the driveway. The cop turned around and followed me. He put his lights on and pulled me over.

A tall, bald white guy with a menacing look came out of the patrol car.

“Driver’s license and registration, please,” he said.

He walked back to his car and checked my record.

I wasn’t worried. I knew I was clean.

“Are you drunk?”

“No,” I replied.

“Well, I just saw you coming out of that bar. I know you weren’t drinking milk. I will ask you again; are you drunk?

“I just told you I’m not drunk!” I replied.

Damn! I raised my voice a little, and that’s a no, no. I regretted it right away. And I interrupted him, too. I knew that was rule number one. ‘never interrupt a cop if you don’t want to end up in jail.’

“Step out of the car motherfucker. I think you’re drunk,” he was insanely pissed off.

“Officer, I just told you I’m not drunk. I only had one beer with my lunch.”

“Shut the fuck up motherfucker. You’re going to be drunk in fifteen minutes,” he said while handcuffing and pushing me to the back of his cruiser.

He drove behind a boarded-up warehouse with a vacant parking lot. He parked, went to the trunk, and returned with a bottle of whiskey.

“Drink it, you piece of shit, or I’ll kick the shit out of you,” he said while putting his baton against my neck. Knowing I had lost the battle, I obeyed him and drank.

“Look all around you, not a soul in sight to save you.” then he pushed the play button on his radio, and Freddy Mercury started singing, “Thum, thum, thum, another one bites the dust, another one bites the dust, and another one gone and another one gone,”

Mother fucker! He just ruined one of my favorite songs.

I told Julian the whole story when he came to bail me out the next day.

“Maaddaa faackaa, we need to find this maadda faackaa,” and added, “We’ll get him ‘primo,’ I swear, we’ll get him.”

The next day, I found the stupid cop on the newspaper’s front page. Some ladies from MADD (Mothers Against Drunk Drivers) were honoring him. The Visalia chapter was giving him a medal for the most drunk driver arrests in Tulare County. I felt my blood boiling inside my veins; his name was everywhere. Good.

Another article in the paper caught my eye, “Another bank robbery, this time they escaped with 125,000.00 dollars.” Oh, Linda, you’re such an intelligent woman.

*****

It was easy to find the cop’s address on the internet.

In the morning, we drove by his house. He lived near Farmersville in a new housing development. We found him mowing his lawn, and his patrol car was in the driveway.

With his broken English, I sent Julian to tell the cop that he had witnessed a drunk driver crashing his car into a tree.

Nearby, in a secluded empty field, I had the front end of my car leaning against a tree as if I had just crashed. I was still in the driver’s seat with my chest against the steering wheel. I had my gun hidden between my legs.

When the cop got there, Julian was behind him.

“Are you okay? The cop asked.

Gun in hand, I exited the car and pushed him to the back seat.

“If you don’t do as I say, you’re dead in a second, motherfucker.”

We tied him up and covered his mouth with duct tape. As I drove away, Julian kept him down with the gun against his head.

“If he moves, even a little bit, shoot him in the head, Julian.”

The cop knew I meant it because he stood still. Then, we headed for Dinuba, where Julian worked.

We didn’t go through city streets. Instead, we took a longer route through the fields. We drove across cornfields and orange trees on a two-way highway. When we arrived, the sweet taste of revenge filled all my senses.

The enclosed big yard with a chain-link fence had several trash trucks parked neatly inside. Julian had the key to the locked yard.

“Look all around you. There’s not a soul in sight to save you.” I proudly told the cop when we got him out of the car.

He wrestled and complained when we put him in a residential trash container. He calmed down a bit after Julian hit him on the head. His body barely fitted inside.

I gave Julian the signal to operate the controls. The cop looked terrified when the thick metal arms slowly approached the container.

His muffled screams and expressions seemed to be coming from a silent film. I especially enjoyed it when the container was horizontal just before he went down.

A heavy, muted sound was barely audible when his body hit the truck’s metal floor. When Julian turned the compactor on, I put my ear close to the vehicle to hear the cracking sound of his bones.

The sound must be similar to the sound you hear when you step on a cockroach, only a million times louder.

Julian needed to make many more stops to fill the truck with three tons of garbage. I envied his job. Which must be highly satisfactory.

One slow weekend, Mark showed up while I listened to classic rock and had a few beers. I offered him a beer, and he offered me a toke. He accepted my beer, and I declined his toke. As I was narrating my trip to Tijuana, including my out-of-body experience while driving back, Julian stepped into the apartment with none other than ‘Miss Camel Toe’ herself.

We introduced ourselves. Kim was her name. After a while, I blinked an eye at Mark, and we moved to his apartment. I was sure those love birds wanted to be alone.

Mark was amazed at Julian’s progress. He wondered how he already had a job and car and dated gorgeous girls after only a few months in the country.

*****

A few days later, Kim showed up with a bloody nose. Her upper lip was split open and swollen, and she had a black eye. She said her ex-husband beat her.

“The fucking bastard can’t leave me alone. It’s not the first time he hit me, but it sure was the worst,” she said while looking at herself in the bathroom mirror.

“If I call the cops, he’s gone by the time they come,” she sobbed. “He lives in Madera, but every time he comes to Visalia to visit his buddies, he gets drunk and ends up in my house. And then he begs me, ‘Come on honey; take me back. I know I can make you happy. You know you need me.’ Stupid asshole, I need him like I need a dead rat in my ass.” she said.

We all laughed, but she immediately complained, “Ouch,” cupping her jaw with her hand.

“I’ve seen many movies about abused women, and most end up dead. If I try to defend myself, he hits me harder. I don’t know what to do anymore.” she said.

“You’ll be okay, Kim. We’re going to help you. He’ll be out of your life soon. You’ll see,” I said.

Julian was mad as hell but kept quiet. After we fixed her a little, we gave her two shots of tequila and four aspirins. Then, we left her to rest.

“I think we can plan something around this fog we’re having, like, for example . . .”

In ten minutes, Julian found three ways to get rid of him.

In the morning, I explained our plan to Kim.

“Call him and say that you’ll give him another chance. Tell him to come to your house to celebrate the reunion. But just get him drunk and bring him to us.”

“Okay, that shouldn’t be so hard, and then what?”

“Just get him drunk and bring him to us. But he needs to be all fucked up drunk, okay? It’ll be foggy tonight. Bring him around midnight, when the fog is at its heaviest.”

After she left, I saw Mark and asked him if we could use his van.

Sure enough, Kim showed up at midnight. “Okay, guys, I got my ex in the car. He’s all fucked up. Now what?” she said, full of satisfaction.

Julian and I carried the son of a bitch to the van’s rear. Kim was driving, and we headed to Delano, a small town thirty miles south of Visalia.

The fog was so heavy we could only see about a hundred feet ahead. Julian and I were in the back of the van, keeping an eye on the stupid guy.

A couple of miles past Delano, I told Kim to pull in front of an eighteen-wheeler, and then, we just pushed the guy out of the van.

As simple as that, the motherfucker won’t be hitting any defenseless girls anymore.

When I closed the van’s back door, I saw Kim’s eyes in the rearview mirror. She didn’t seem surprised by what we had just done.

During breakfast, I commented on a story I read in the paper. A funny story, well sad, but also funny.

“A basketball player from a local high school team was surfing in Australia. He was floating on his surfboard face down and pushing the water with his hands. And then, a shark bit off his left hand. Somehow, he managed to swim back to the beach and survived.

After spending a week in an Australian hospital, he returned to his hometown.

Hundreds of students received him on the baseball field, where they brought him from the airport in a helicopter. When he came out, he saluted the crowd with his right hand and got his hand chopped off by the helicopter blades.”

Then Julian made one of his typical silly comments

“Man, how is he supposed to wipe his ass now?”

The End

Originally written May-30-2011

First posted on Blogger Feb-27-2017

Posted on WordPress Sep-27-2020 / Reposted Mar-8-2023