Thirteen Senses by Victor Villaseñor
“Lupe,” she said, shaking like she was freezing to death, “my husband used to beat me, too, but at least I knew why. Domingo just attacked me like a wild dog! Oh, my God, my God! What did I ever do to deserve such abuse! All I’ve done is give him love and money!”
“You did nothing to deserve this beating,” said Lupe. “My mother always told us girls there’s absolutely no reason for a man to ever beat his wife. Do not twist things around and blame yourself. You are a fine, generous human being, Socorro, and I recommend that you get away from Domingo right now, while you still have some money left.
“Look, I was born in a gold mining town,” continued Lupe, “so I know how men’s minds get wild and twisted with the thoughts of getting so rich that now they are above all the realities of life. You need to get away from Domingo immediately, before it’s too late!”
“Then you don’t think there’s really a gold mine?”
Lupe could see that this woman just didn’t understand what she was saying. “Socorro, it doesn’t matter if there is a gold mine or not. Men go crazy when they get to thinking of gold.”
“Then I should leave him now?” asked Socorro.
“Yes,” said Lupe. “And I’m going to get Salvador to take us back to the United States and I’m—I’m—I’m going to tell him that he can no longer do any more bootlegging, either. That I’ve followed him long enough, and now it’s time for him to follow me, and I say that we are going to be law-abiding people and have a normal life, so help me God, or I will leave him and take my daughter and this child I carry here inside of me, and return on my own to my family, and that’s that!”
Socorro was no longer shaking or crying or even seemed concerned with her bruises and pains. She was just staring at Lupe in utter shock. “You’d do this,” she said, “you’d really face your husband and tell him everything to his face that—that you’ve just told me?”
Lupe nodded. “Of course, why not?”
“Oh, Lupe!” said Socorro, and both women now took each other in their arms, holding Heart to Heart.
Outside, Domingo was down on his knees, hugging his brother and crying with all of his might! “We had EVERYTHING, hermanito! Don’t you see, we had EVERYTHING when our beloved father was alive! So how could you and mama have left him!”
“Domingo, I’ve told you a thousand times, we didn’t leave our father,” said Salvador.
“Of course, you did!” said Domingo. “Don’t you see, or we’d still have everything, if you hadn’t left him.”
And in that moment, Salvador finally saw in a flash what it was that his brother was really saying. Domingo was confusing God with their own father. He had the story of Adam and Eve being put out of the Garden all mixed up with his own story of coming back to Los Altos and finding everything gone.
“Yes,” said Salvador to his brother, “I can now see that we did have everything when our father lived and you’re right, we did leave our father. We went down the mountain to find food and he chose to stay up on our rancho drinking and racing off on his horse to the distant mountaintops, screaming that God had abandoned him and all of his sons were dead!”
“See!” yelled Domingo. “You could have helped him if you hadn’t abandoned him!”
“Domingo, I don’t have blue eyes like you. He never acknowledged me as a son. It was you he wanted, it was you that he screamed for on every mountaintop!”
“Then I did it?” asked Domingo, his snake eyes suddenly being able to see in a whole new way. “Then I’m the one who abandoned our papa!” said Domingo, “and all I’d been trying to do was good!” he yelled. “To surprise him where he was working with a team of horses on that new highway that they were building from San Diego to Del Mar, but those rinchi bastard Texans beat me, arrested me for a crime they knew that I’d never done, and shipped me to Chicago to work in the steel mills! I LOVED OUR FATHER, Salvador! I never meant to abandon him!
“SOCORRO!” he then screamed. “SOCORRO! I didn’t mean to hit you! I’m sorry! I only meant GOOD! My mother didn’t abandon my father! She, too, only meant GOOD!”
And Salvador could now see so clearly that at this moment, Domingo was forgiving—not just his own mother—but all women, including Eva. our original mother, for having lost the Garden of Eden for all Mankind!
Inside the hotel, Lupe couldn’t believe it, hearing Domingo’s shouts of agony, Socorro forced herself up from the bed. And against all the pain she felt from the beating, she began to grip the walls as she made her way out of the room and to the door so she could go and be with Domingo.
And when Socorro opened the door, there was Domingo kneeling on the ground by his brother with his arms open to her, shouting to her with all his heart. “Socorro! SOCORRO! Forgive me! Forgive me! I DIDN’T KNOW!”
“Domingo!” she yelled, staggering with pain as she went to him.
And they were then hugging and crying and kissing.
Domingo was begging for forgiveness, and she was saying yes, yes, yes, she’d forgive him, and he was saying that he loved her.
Lupe was enraged!
Salvador had tears running down his face.
And above both couples, hovering in the Sky, were Jesus and the Virgin Mary and Doña Margarita along with Moses and Lucifer. The Mother Moon was coming and the Father Sun was going. Another Day had come to pass Here on this planeta, passionately situated between Hell and Heaven!
24
The SIXTH SUN was now arising fast for an All New Day. People would no longer be able to tell where the Heavens ended and the Earth began.
LUPE DIDN’T WAIT. That very night she kept her word that she’d given to Soccoro and she told Salvador, “No, not only don’t I want us going any further into Mexico, but when we return to the United States, I also want you, Salvador, to not do any more of your bootlegging, or any other illegal activities!”
Salvador was stunned!
“What in God’s name has gotten into your mind, Lupe? Have you gone completely crazy-loca? How in the world do you expect us to return to the United States and make a living without my bootlegging? Everything in the U.S. is stacked against us, los Mejicanos, from the word go. And Father Ryan told you that—”
“I DON’T CARE about ANY of THAT!” shouted Lupe. “This is our life! Not his!”
Salvador couldn’t believe what he was hearing. She was flying beyond reason.
“Look, Salvador,” she now continued more calmly, “I want us to be legal and have a home where we are no longer running from the law. I will not bring another child into this world of violence like we did with poor little Hortensia! She has nightmares, Salvador!”
“Lupe, you were born in the middle of the Revolution. You saw much more than our daughter has seen, and you’re fine.”
“And because I had to witness our village being burned to the ground time and again, we need to do this to our daughter, too?!? Oh, no, Salvador, WE WILL NOT!” shouted Lupe. “Because before we married, Salvador, I asked you if you were a bootlegger, and you told me that you were not a bootlegger, and I took you at your word with ALL MY HEART and SOUL, and so now you will make that word of yours COME TRUE, and that’s that, do you hear me!” she yelled. “I have spoken!”
Salvador looked at Lupe, not knowing what to think or do. It was true, she had, indeed, spoken. He could well see that she wasn’t a woman who would be moved anymore. No, she was now a woman who’d taken up ground like he’d seen his own mother do so many times, declaring that this piece of Mother Earth where she stood was Holy and she, the Tree of Life, would move Earth and Rock with her roots and do whatever it took to Live.
But, also, he truly wondered if Lupe had any idea with whom she was dealing. He was also a man who wouldn’t be moved! Did she really think for a minute that she could tell him how to run his life? If they were giving up a gold mine and returned to the United States, then bootlegging was his only possible livelihood. It was what got him—not just money—but RESPECT in a country that looked down its nose at
“All right,” he now said, “I quit my bootlegging like you say, Lupe, then how in the name of Hell do you propose that we make our living in the United States, eh?”
“Well, we can work in the fields like everyone else, Salvador.”
He took a big breath, and blew out. “Lupe, a depression is going on. Our people are being run out of the country. Your own family would be starving if I hadn’t given money to your brother to buy that truck. And that truck, remember, I bought with my BOOTLEGGING MONEY!” he shouted into her face!
“Salvador,” she said, closing her eyes so she could avoid his wild intimidating look, “we will find a way. God will provide.”
“Sure,” he said, “but also God needs a little help in life, damnit!”
And saying this, he stopped talking, stepped back, and just stood, looking at this young wife of his. Long ago he’d learned that all demands in life, la vida, had a price, and most people weren’t willing to pay that price. It took real tanates to put your life on the line day in and day out.
He now wondered if Lupe—for all her talk—was really willing to pay the price if she didn’t get her demands. For to make any demand, without being willing to pay that price tag, then that demand was just a hollow and empty voice of a chickenshit, all-talk pendejo!
“All right, Lupe,” he now said in a calm voice, “if I don’t agree to your demands, then what?” He was feeling so damned tired of this whole conversation that he wasn’t going to take Lupe seriously anymore unless she was really willing to pay the full price of being taken seriously. And to be taken seriously carried a formidable price tag, and this price tag had to be paid in full just as Jesus Christ, Himself, had paid it in full on the cross so that every mortal since then could feel it down here in his guts that Jesus was, indeed, real and not just talk.
This, one’s wedding vows never addressed.
This had nothing to do with whether two people loved each other or not.
No, this, of being the lead horse of la familia, was not just an automatic part of the honeymoon package.
He took a deep breath. “So come on, Lupe,” he repeated himself as he saw the tears streaming down her face, “speak up, what will you do if I don’t agree to your demands?”
It was stuck in her throat. She didn’t really want to say it, but here it came at last.
“Salvador, I will leave you,” she said, finally stepping forward into the darkness of the unknown and becoming her own self lead horse and now each shadow, each fallen branch, every puddle along the trail was looking dangerous, but she still wasn’t going to be stopped.
“I will take Hortensia,” she continued, “and this child I carry here within me, and I will survive without you, somehow, so help me God!”
Seeing her face and knowing how she’d risked her life by going back into the burning infierno to save him, Salvador now knew that this woman, this girl, standing before him had truly come into her own. For she was now, indeed, willing to pay the price for the Song she wanted to Dance to in Her Life.
He blew out. And she wasn’t just wild in her assessment of herself. No, instinctively she’d taken his gun and their money out of that burning Hell and had the presence of mind to put them up in a fork of a tree, so if they’d gotten caught driving off, their money and gun would still be safe. She was brilliant! A genius! And tough! She didn’t panic when the chips were down! Rich or poor, in sickness or in health, this woman could be the best lead horse around!
“Okay,” said Salvador, “so then what you are saying, Lupe, is either we now do things your way, or that’s it. You will leave me and go home to your parents.”
She nodded, and nodded again. “Yes, Salvador, that’s it. I’ve made up my mind,” she added calmly.
Salvador took in a big breath. He really couldn’t believe all this that was happening to him and Lupe. They’d been to Hell and back, and yet the power, the strength, the conviction that was now radiating from this young woman before him was so great that most men would feel the need to slap her face and bring an end to this Formidable Force that Lupe now Possessed!
And a man could do this, a man had the brute strength within him to put the fires out of almost any woman, but then what would this man have—a shell. A frightened gun-shy horse.
And so no, he, Salvador, wasn’t about to slap Lupe. For to do this, he fully realized that he, Juan Salvador Villaseñor de Castro, would be slapping his very own mother. And his mother had warned him that this day— where he now stood—would come to be. And his mother’s voice now RANG OUT IN HIS HEAD like a great DRUM, saying:
“And when God comes asking who ate of that forbidden fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, you will not blame Lupe as Adam blamed Eva! Do you hear me, you will take it like a man, un Mejicano de los buenos, and with your tanates in hand you will say, ‘God, I did it! I did it!’ And you will take full responsibility, for believe me, this young bride of yours will then rise up with the Love of the Night Star and make all the lessons that you’ve taught her seem small by comparison to the great lesson that she will then teach you in ONE GREAT STROKE!
“And this will happen to you when you least expect it, and it will drive you to the wall! And all this I know, for when your father and I reached this point in our marriage—as all couples do—my poor lost husband, didn’t hit me as so many men do, but he lost his love for me, and started blaming me for all of his problemas, saying that all these misfortunes had come down upon him because he’d married beneath himself.
“I was Eva being blamed all over again! But you will not do this, mi hijito, do you hear me, you will understand that at this moment—with your tanates in hand—you can now step forward and ARISE CON AMOR! Do you hear me, no slapping, no blaming!”
Salvador burst out laughing!
What else could he do? Here was his mother inside of his head, having brainwashed him, on what to do and what not to do ever since he’d been a child, and here was his wife, standing before him, and giving it to him right in the face with both barrels. He was trapped between two women. He was engulfed by WOMEN-LEAD-HORSES!
He laughed until his belly ached!
He laughed until he had tears rolling down his face!
He laughed until he was hopping about from one foot to the other, doing a little crazy-loco dance!
And he Knew to the bottom of his Soul that this was the exact Power that he’d been looking for in a Woman all of his Life! And that this was the Power that every healthy macho-cabrón searched for, too, whether he knew it or not.
“Anything else, Lupe?” he asked.
“No,” said Lupe, “that’s all I can think of right now.”
Hearing this, he started laughing all over again, and this time she was laughing with him, too.
“Okay, Lupe,” he said, “I don’t know how, but we’ll do it your way! Hell, my way hasn’t turned out so good lately anyway.”
The joy, the gusto, that erupted from Lupe’s Heart-Corazón as she heard her husband’s response was so great, so wonderful, that she didn’t really know what she, Lupe, was doing until she realized that it wasn’t Domingo and Socorro’s headboard that was pounding against the wall!
It was theirs, Salvador and hers!
Why, she’d thrown him across the bed, and she was now on top of him, skin to skin and trying to get all of him up inside of her as deeply as she could!
She was a Wild Woman in HEAT!
She was a Wild Woman who’d come into her Own!
And she was starving, wanting to DEVOUR the WORLD!
Salvador’s eyes opened wide and he now knew where the old Mexican saying came from that said, “Men do it until they can’t do it anymore, but a Woman does it until she DIES!”
For the screams that Lupe now heard weren’t Socorro’s, either. Oh, no, Lupe was now screaming WILDLY with LOVE, and it was her husband, her esposo, for whom she was WILD con AMOR!
The headboard was Beat, BEAT, BEATING! POUNDING!
The One Collectiv
25
All was back in Balance, All was back in Harmony and at peace, generating Wisdom through our Thirteen Senses from HEAVEN to EARTH —ALL ONE SONG!
THE NEXT DAY each couple was ready to go their own way. Domingo had ripped the trunk lid off their beautiful new Packard and piled up everything in the trunk like it was a pickup bed.
“If you two change your mind, you know where to find us,” said Domingo. “Just outside of Navojoa.”
“Thank you,” said Salvador, “but I think this is best for Lupe and me.”
“You’re giving up millions in gold!” said Domingo.
“Yes, we know,” said Salvador. “But, well, we’re already rich with something no money or gold can ever buy.”
“Damnit!” said Domingo. “But what the Hell! Cada cabeza es un mundo!”
Salvador smiled. This was a saying that their grandfather Don Pio, on their mother’s side, always used to say, each head was a different world.
They parted with a big abrazo, hearts pounding with love between brothers. Then Domingo and Socorro, who was wearing so much makeup that you couldn’t see her black and blue bruises, headed south, and Salvador and Lupe headed north.
Getting to the border, there were a few cars in line ahead of Salvador and Lupe. The United States authorities weren’t allowing anyone to cross anymore who wasn’t an American citizen or couldn’t show a means of support. Lupe could see that Salvador was getting very uneasy. She took his hand.
“Lupe, do you really realize what you’re asking of me? To give up a gold mine, to return where they don’t want us, and then to give up the one trade that I know can make us a living.”
Lupe took in a large Breath of Papito. “No, Salvador,” she said, beginning to feel much more comfortable with this word no. “I’m not asking any of that. What I’m asking is for us, simply, to have more Faith that everything is going to turn out well for us, because we have health and we have love and we have one beautiful child here and another on the way We’re a familia, Salvador. And familias have somehow been making a living since the dawn of time!”