Exilio

Para ser alguien muerta, mantenía su viva presencia en todos lados. Su imagen brincaba y retozaba ante los ojos cansados de María todo el día entero, y el eco de su voz retumbaba, rebotando de las paredes de la casa tan vacía.

"Estás muerta. Eres un asunto cerrado, una puerta que no volveré a abrir, y has salido de mi corazón para siempre. No te volveré a ver."
Habiendo dicho eso, María regresó a sus quehaceres. Tenía mucho trabajo: su pequeña vivienda se llenaba diariamente con viajeros en ruta al sueño americano, viajeros hambrientos que llenaban sus estómagos con arroz y huevos con chile, y sus botellas con agua antes de emprender vuelo.

Como mucha gente en Juárez, María debía su estabilidad a esta población flotante, personas desconocidas en tránsito a un destino incierto. Juárez, el purgatorio, lugar de paso entre la desesperación y la gloria. Juárez, el purgatorio, donde las almas penaban a veces mucho más tiempo que lo planeado cuando las cosas no salían...

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Fool's Gold

"It's smaller than I remembered," Juan thought as the car lurched over the uneven surface of the old rock streets, springs who in their short life had never squeaked complaining loudly now. He was disappointed. It was not supposed to be like this; this was not the way he had dreamed it on the cold empty Northern nights when he had felt so outside.

Acámbaro, population 50,000. The houses of adobe, dirt-colored like the unpaved streets, like the brown and ageless woman passing by, her inevitable rebozo a bright and striped splash in a dusty void. The odor of fresh bread, proud trademark of a town where bakeries reigned absolute and lonely kings of industry. He remembered leaving that odor without regret. He was no baker.

The jardín was as beautiful as he remembered, the flowers and lush greenery shocking to his winter eyes. Here was paradise where the harsh barrenness of the biting North was unknown and the perpetual crowd of Sunday lovers took for granted sunshine, laughter and sweet uncovered flesh in January…But the teenage girls in their jumpers from the secundaria looked so much younger, and he recognized no one. No one recognized him either, he realized with a certain bitterness. Was a year so long?

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