Hello. I am Emiliano Zapata from Ciudad Juárez. Sara Zapata is my sister. She worked with Ernesto (the Jacquero) at El Sol. Ernesto told us to get in touch with you when we got to the U.S. Ernesto said we should give the phone to you. Can you help us? Can you give me an address where we can send you the phone?
I read the message one more time. I wasn’t sure whether it was can or will you help us? I didn’t know whether I should say more about the cell phone, like the kind of information it was likely to contain and also that people had already tried to kill us for it. But those were things I could tell Yoya later, if she had questions. After reading it a few more times, I added the following line:
Can you respond right away if you are there? It’s urgent.
Then I hit SEND.
* * *
I sat there staring at my list of e-mails. For a moment I was tempted to read the last e-mail I had received from Perla Rubi, but I stopped myself when I saw that I had a new e-mail from my best friend, Paco.
Estela Gómez from the State Police told us not to try to communicate with you, but I’m going to do it just this once. I know you man. I know you’re probably going to try to come back from wherever you are. Don’t do it! You’ll be killed if you do!!! Bad people have been asking everyone around here about you and Sara. There’s a black car on your block with some nasty dudes inside just waiting to see if someone shows up. Please listen to me for once. You’re a dead vato if you return.
Okay man, this is my last communication. It’s better if you don’t try to get in touch with anyone here.
Tu carnal,
Paco
I had never read anything from Paco that did not contain a single attempt at his silly humor. I could only imagine how afraid he was to write what he did, and I felt responsible for what I was putting him through. Paco knew me better than anyone other than maybe Sara. He was right that there was a part of me that was still hoping to return to Mexico. When Gustaf talked about knowing where you belonged, it was my run-down house in Juárez that immediately came to mind.
I was daydreaming about my room back home, the posters of Mexican fútbol players on the walls, when the phone rang. I don’t know why, but I was certain that the phone call was for me. It was probably my father again. I let it ring one more time. What was my decision? Chicago or no Chicago? Going back home was out of the question. Give that dream up along with all the other dreams you’ve had to give up, I told myself.
“Hello,” I said, expecting to hear my father’s voice for the first time in five years.
“Emiliano?”
I was momentarily stunned by the sound of a young woman’s voice.
“Emiliano!” This time the voice was like a sharp slap, waking me up.
“Yes,” I said cautiously.
“This is Yoya. You just e-mailed me.”
“How did you get this phone number?”
“That’s what I do, and I’m very good at it. Now, you said Ernesto gave you my e-mail address and told you to call me. What’s this about?”
“You haven’t talked to Ernesto?”
“Not in a long time. But he’s a friend, so I’m listening.”
“I have the cell phone that belongs to a very bad man in Mexico. His name is Leopoldo Hinojosa. He was involved in kidnapping young women and using them as slaves. Ernesto told my sister to contact you when we were in the United States so that we could give you the phone. That you would know how to open it and use the information in it. It must contain important information. His men almost killed us trying to get the phone back. I’m sure they’re still looking for it.”
There was silence that lasted so long that I thought Yoya had hung up.
“Hello. Hello.”
“I’m still here. I’m thinking.”
“If you give me an address, I will send you the phone as soon as I can.”
“No, that won’t work. I see that you’re in Sanderson, Texas, at the home of Gustaf Larsson. Is your sister with you?”
“No. She sought asylum. She’s in a detention center at Fort Stockton.”
“All right. Emiliano, I need to do some research now. I’ll try to find out if there is any chatter on the web about you and your sister. A couple of things. Don’t ever e-mail me again. It’s dangerous to me and to you. Do you have caller ID on the landline phone you are using?”
“What?”
“Can you see my telephone number on your phone?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, write it down as soon as we hang up and use that number to call me, but only from a burner phone. You know what a burner phone is?”
“Yes. One with prepaid minutes.”
“You got it. Buy a cheap one so you can throw it away after a few calls. Are you going to be at this location for a while?”
My mind froze. Was I going to be with Gustaf Larsson for a while?
“Emiliano?”
“I’m not sure.”
“If you have the option to go to a metropolitan area, that would be better. We have more resources and can work better with you in a big city.”
I had to decide. Now.
“I can go to Chicago with my father.”
“That’s good. We’ll get this done in Chicago. And if people are after you, you’ll be safer in a big city like Chicago. Your sister should be safe in that detention center. Call me tonight or tomorrow. Day or night, it doesn’t matter. I’ll answer. But remember, burner phone only. Bye.”
I sat there with the phone against my ear for a few moments. What had just happened? When Yoya asked me if I was staying with Mr. Larsson for a while, what came to my mind was Sara’s words out in the desert when I was thinking of going back to Mexico: You can’t let all that I’ve done be lost. And then when Yoya said that a big city would be better, it was clear to me that I must go to Chicago. Because all that Sara had done to save the missing girls, all that she had sacrificed, all that she was going through at the detention facility, all that could not be lost.
Brother Patricio claimed that we all had an invisible moral compass inside of us that pointed us in the right direction if we but let it. I had been struggling with whether to go to Chicago for days, but it seemed that, when I finally let it, my invisible compass pointed north. Yoya saying that I would be harder to find and that she could help me better in Chicago confirmed that it was the right thing to do.
I picked up the phone and dialed the number that Gustaf had written on the small piece of paper.
“This is Emiliano,” I said, when I heard the voice that, despite the years, I recognized as my father’s.
“Oh, thank goodness, son. I’ve been waiting for you to call.”
I had no words. Not one word came to me.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t come before.” My father spoke quickly, as if trying to fill the awkwardness of my silence. “I had to go all the way to Odessa to borrow money for the bond we thought Sara was going to need and then I had to meet with Mr. Morgan, Sara’s lawyer. He’s appealing the decision to deny Sara a bond.”
There was a pause.
“I’m glad Mr. Larsson found you.”
There was warmth and concern in my father’s voice. It was the same voice that used to comfort me when nightmares woke me in the middle of the night.