At Night We Walk in Circles (29 page)

Nelson nodded, and I pressed Stop. I peeled off the headphones and the world dropped to its regular volume again.

He smiled. “This is better, isn't it?”

“Sure,” I said.

“We can just talk now.”

I nodded.

“Can I hold it?”

I gave him the tape recorder, then the microphone. I handed over the headphones too. He left it all in his lap.

“What if I did kill Mindo? Have you thought about that?”

There was something very cold in his voice.

“You didn't.”

“What if I did? What if I were that kind of person?”

Nelson had been inside for thirty-odd months, studying this very sort of performed aggression. And he was good. He let the questions hang there. I knew it couldn't be true, but then he shifted his gaze, and part of me wondered why I thought that, why I was so sure. I felt a chill.

“All right,” I said. “Let's suppose.”

“So what do you think I would do to someone who was outside while I was in here, and had decided he had the right to tell my story? If I were the person capable of killing a man on a dark street?”

I didn't know what to say.

“Just think,” Nelson said.

I smiled, but now he didn't smile back, and for a few long moments nothing was said. He'd made his point, and while I mulled it over, he busied himself examining my tape recorder and the microphone. He pressed Record, and pointed the mic in different directions. He snapped his fingers at the working end of the mic, and watched the needle jump.

“It's not recording yet,” I said. “It's on pause. If you want to . . .” I said, and reached for the machine. There was a button he hadn't pressed. That was all I wanted to show him.

But he pulled the recorder away from me. It was a quick gesture, very slight. “I'll hold it,” he said.

“I just . . .”

“You're fine.”

I could feel myself turning red. I understood what was happening.

“You're robbing me?”

Nelson gave me a disappointed look. “Is that what you think?”

“Well, I . . .”

“Let's just be clear about who's been robbing whom.”

When I didn't respond, he stood. He took my tape recorder and the microphone and placed them on the table behind him. I could have tried to grab them, I suppose, but Nelson set his body between me and my equipment, as if daring me to take them back. And I thought about it, I did. We were the same size, neither of us particularly imposing, but my last fight had been in middle school. And now I was in Collectors, which was, for better or worse, his home. His two friends, the ones who were protecting me, stood just outside the cell. As if to underline the point, Nelson pushed the door open, and all the noise from the block came rushing in.

“Do you understand?” he asked.

“I do,” I said. “Thank you for your time.”

I stepped out, and he closed the door behind me.

The two shirtless men had gone, and I found myself in the middle of the block, buried in sound. I had nowhere to go. I was in no hurry. I stood there for a moment, trying to pick out a voice, any voice, from the din.

I would like to thank the Lannan Foundation, the Headlands Center for the Arts, and the Guggenheim Foundation for their support. Mark Lafferty, Lila Byock, Joe Loya, and Adam Mansbach all stepped up at various points in the process to give me insight and encouragement on a manuscript that seemed, frankly, impossible to resolve. I am forever grateful.

This novel, like almost everything I write, is the product of a meandering, limitless conversation with my friend Vinnie Wilhelm. Thanks, brother.

Collectors is an invented place, but I owe a debt of gratitude to Carlos Álvarez Osorio, who first took me inside Lima's prisons in 2007, and who has, on each subsequent visit, helped me understand what I was seeing. The men I met inside Lurigancho and Castro Castro trusted me with their stories, and for that I will always be grateful. My editors at
Harper's
, Claire Gutierrez and Chris Cox, were very supportive of the research that became first a piece of nonfiction, and eventually part of this novel.

I'd like to thank Gustavo Lora and the Collazos family, who helped me discover T——. Walter Ventosilla's play
El Mandatario Idiota
served as an early inspiration, and with his permission, I have adapted it here. Both Walter and Gustavo were members of Setiembre, the theater troupe on which Diciembre is based, and I have borrowed liberally from stories they shared with me.

My agent, Eric Simonoff, was helpful every step of the way. My editor, Megan Lynch, offered great advice, patience, and generosity, and helped make this book better in innumerable ways. Thank you.

Most of all, I'd like to thank my family—my parents, my sisters, their partners, their children, and especially my wife, Carolina, who made me laugh when I wanted to give up, gave me love when I needed it, and space when I was scared to ask for it.

Gracias, mi amor.