The Dead Women of Juarez (9 page)

“You ever come to the
palenque
, Kelly?” Ortíz asked.

“No,” Kelly said.

“
This
is fighting,” Ortíz said. “You know I love the boxing, but there is nothing better than this. Even when
los perros
fight… it’s not the same.”

Kelly smelled blood, but in the bar there was too much smoke, beer and the odor of bodies and the whiff of blood vanished. Ortíz paused to talk here and there, but never for long. Kelly waited, and soon they were at the bar itself. Ortíz got two bottles of Tecate and presented one to Kelly.

“
Salud, dinero, amor y tiempo para disfrutarlo todo
,” Ortíz told Kelly, and it was bottoms up. This was the first beer Kelly had tasted in over a month. Ortíz wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “I have six cocks fighting today. Good animals, the best money can buy.”

Kelly nodded. It was possible to see from the bar the head of the judges in the fighting pit, but not the battle itself, though occasionally a feather flew loose, or there was the sudden, visible flurry of dark wings.

“I like the pure fighting, you know?”

“That’s what you said.”

“How much fighting are you doing these days, Kelly?”

Kelly shrugged. “Not much. I’ve been training.”

“And you look
muy bueno
, Kelly. Better than ever. Listen, my friend, I know you like to fight and that you want to earn some money, so maybe you want to hear about this. I have some clients that like the pure fighting. Not boxing, but traditional. You know what I mean?”

“Not really.”

“Bare hands. Like they used to do it in the old days.”

The beer didn’t taste right to Kelly. A bowl of lime slices was close at hand. Kelly took one and sucked the juice. He shook his head. “There’s no sanction for fighting like that,” he said.

Ortíz spread his hands wide. Around them, men were filing out
of the bar area and down to the terraces. Kelly saw one of the men from the truck down by the pit talking to one of the judges. “You think everything that happens has to have paperwork? This is a good time, Kelly. Lots of money. You can even get your dick wet; lots of girls at these things. Pretty girls. Young girls.”

“I got a girl.”

“Yeah, you got a ballbusting
puta
,” Ortíz said. He made a face. “Some people, they think maybe
she’s
the one with the cock, you know?”

Kelly pushed the limes away sharply. “Don’t talk about Paloma like that.”

“Nothing personal.”

“Okay, then let’s talk about business. I want to fight. Real fights.”

“I got nothing like that.”

“You can get something.”

“How? There’s nobody backing you, Kelly.”

“You are.”

“Sure, sure. I mean who gave you all those fights when you came to Juárez?
Me
. I watched out for you, kept you in the ring.”

“I know. That’s why I wanted to talk to you.”

“About a real fight.”

“That’s what I said.”

Ortíz finished his beer and signaled the bartender for another. “You’re reliable, Kelly. I don’t care about what happened in the past. This is now.”

Kelly took a deep breath. He felt light headed, but it couldn’t have been just the beer. “I’d like to see about getting into some sanctioned matches. I don’t have to fight under my name. We can work something out, get me in under the radar. Little fights, you know? Four-rounders to start. I don’t care who you put me up against.”

Ortíz’s beer came. He turned from Kelly and rolled the cold
bottle between his hands. His expression was pensive. He glanced sidelong at Kelly. “I’m not sure what you’re asking me, Kelly.”

“We’re talking about a real fight.”

“And I’m telling you I don’t got nothing like that for you. I got something better.”

“I’m not fighting nobody bare-knuckles,” Kelly said. “A
real fight
, okay?”

“What do you think I’m saying, Kelly? I’m talking about real fighting without all those gloves and all that
huevadas
. You don’t need to get some paper from some
burócrata
behind a desk.”

Kelly thought about taking another drink, but the taste for it was gone. “No, I’m telling you that’s not my thing. I’m not that kind of fighter. I want to
box
. It’s not like I don’t appreciate what all you’ve done. I mean… that’s why I’m talkin’ to you now. I know you can get me in the ring legit.”

The bar area was almost empty now. The bartender took Kelly’s bottle away. Ortíz was quiet for a long time. Another cockfight started and the spectators cheered.

“I want to get back up there,” Kelly said finally.

Ortíz shook his head slowly. He half-smiled, took a swig and then laughed out loud. “I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about, Kelly. You look all right; did you get hit in the head? Maybe that’s it.”

“I’m just saying—”

Ortíz waved Kelly silent. “I hear what you’re saying.”

“So—”

“Don’t you get it? Nobody wants to see some washed-up
bolillo
in the ring with decent fighters. You get paid to
bleed
. You ain’t any kind of contender. This is
it
, okay? Nobody in Juárez would touch a fucking junkie gringo but me.”

“I’m not a junkie.”

“Whatever you say, Kelly. You think I don’t know those marks on you? Huh?”

Kelly crossed his arms unconsciously. He was short of breath. Kelly forced himself to inhale and exhale.

Ortíz went on: “I always gave you what you could get. This is what you get.”

“I can do better than that,” Kelly returned.

“Who says? Is it that fucking Urvano feeding you this shit? That
puto
doesn’t know nothing I don’t know, Kelly. Where was he when you wanted to fight back when? Huh?
Huh?
You tell me!”

Kelly wanted to be angry. Ortíz advanced on him with his hands waving. He spilled his beer. The few men left near the bar moved away fast. Kelly backed off. “I’m clean and I’m not playing,” Kelly said. “I know you done right by me before. We have respect.”

“‘Respect’? When you got respect for
me
then you do me a favor after all the favors I’ve done for you,
naco
. Where do you think I get the money to pay you? You think I’m some kind of asshole you can take for a ride, like those fucking
turistas
you and that
zurramato
Estéban peddle dope to?”

“That’s got nothin’ to do with nothin’,” Kelly protested.

Ortíz ignored Kelly as if he hadn’t said a word. “You stupid
fuck
. Talk about respect to
me
? This is
my
country,
pendejo
, this is
my
city. You want to talk your white bullshit to me? Is that it?”

“I get it,” Kelly said. “All right? Fuck it. I don’t need anything from you.”

He left the bar. Ortíz kept close behind. “Don’t you turn your back on me,
cabrón!
You don’t got nothing in Juárez without me. You think Urvano can get you into real fights? They’ll find out all about where you been, what you done.”

“You don’t know what I did.”

“Fucking
bolillo!
”

Kelly saw the way out and picked up the pace. One of the big men from the truck stepped in his way. The man still wore his Gargoyles. He was tall and wide and hard as cement beneath his black T-shirt. A tattoo of
La Virgen de Guadalupe
stood out in blue and red on his forearm. “Out of the way,” Kelly told him.

The big man didn’t move. Ortíz caught up. “Let him out,” he told the man. “He can
walk
back to his fucking hole in the wall. I should have Lalo run your white ass over.”

Enough
. Kelly whirled on Ortíz and the smaller man took a step back. He still held his bottle, but by the neck like a weapon. “Goddammit, you little son of a bitch,” Kelly said. “You want to fight with me? I don’t give a shit how many guys you got with you, I’ll tear you a new asshole!”

Kelly felt Lalo move behind him. Ortíz put his hand up. “No,” he said.

“You find somebody else to bleed for you,” Kelly told Ortíz. “I’m out.”

He left the arena and exited into the hot, clean sunlight. He skirted around the big pick-up and headed up the dust-heavy street. Ortíz didn’t follow, nor Lalo or any of the other men from the truck. Kelly was alone.

O
N THE DAY AFTER HE SLEPT
late instead of getting up for roadwork. He ate a healthy breakfast, but his heart wasn’t in it and he went to a
taquería
for something greasy. There he ate until his stomach started to feel all wrong and before he walked half a mile he puked his guts out against the side of a building. He wandered after that, not sure where to go or what to do. He didn’t like what he was feeling, which was angry and sad and lost all at once.

It occurred to him to call on Paloma, but he didn’t. Nor did he make the trip to Urvano’s gym. A part of him felt like he should work out harder than before and prove something, but another part urged Kelly to simply be. He bought a liter-sized bottle of cheap beer and sat on the edge of an overpass watching buses go by. When he finished the bottle, he dropped it over the side into a concrete-lined ditch and smiled at the sound of shattering glass.

He misspent the time until well after noon. When he got back to his apartment he was suddenly tired and took a nap for nearly three hours. He was aware of raised voices outside, a man and a woman squabbling and plainly audible through the open window, but they didn’t wake him; instead he dreamed about arguing with Paloma until she turned her back on him and disappeared.

Kelly woke up sweating and smelling like beer. He showered and put on fresh clothes, but then he just sat on the couch in his living room staring at the blank television. “Fuck you,” he said to
no one, though maybe he was talking to Ortíz. He gave the TV a middle finger.

The walk back from the
palenque
was long, even with a bus hop along the way, and Kelly was aware now of how his feet hurt. He foraged aspirin from the bathroom, chewed two and waited half an hour for them to kick in. A half-hour after that Kelly still felt the ache. He forced himself to be still for another hour because he knew he shouldn’t go out the door to do what was on his mind.

He went back to a little
norteño
bar and found the woman with perfect white dentures again, tucked away in her little corner under the Christmas lights. Aside from the bartender, they were alone; shift change was still an hour away. The woman looked at Kelly suspiciously when he sat down across from her; she didn’t remember him, or maybe she just didn’t recognize Kelly when his face was healed.

“What do you got?” Kelly asked her.

“
No sé de lo que usted está hablando
,” the woman said, and she made to get up.

Kelly reached across the table. He put his hand on her forearm. “Hey,” he said. “I thought you said you liked
boxeadores
.”

The woman paused. She looked Kelly over again. Seeing her up close and without a film of exhaustion, Kelly realized she was older than he thought before. Maybe she was close to fifty, the extra weight she carried pushing out the deep lines that formed on the faces of lean, worked-raw mothers in the city. He still didn’t find her attractive.

“Why don’t you say you were that white boy?” the woman asked finally.

“How many white boys you see in here?”

The woman shrugged and settled back into her seat. She smiled her denture smile again. “You want to get more
hierba
? You don’t look so beat today.”

“I’m not fightin’ today,” Kelly said.

“Maybe you come around for something else?”

“What else you got?” Kelly asked.

“Come back and see.”

She took him to the ladies’ room and got on her knees. Kelly let her take his cock out. She jerked it and sucked it and though it took a while to get hard, she still managed to make it happen. Kelly turned her around and took down her pants. The woman grabbed the sides of the sink and Kelly fucked her without looking at her flabby ass, the flesh stitched with dark spiderweb veins. She didn’t ask for a condom and he didn’t use one. He came inside her and when he backed off she dripped on the dingy floor.

“Again,” the woman said. “You can put it my ass if you want.”

“No, thanks.”

Kelly was the first one out of the restroom. He went to the bar and drank two beers in a row. The bartender gave Kelly a look he couldn’t read, but whatever the man was thinking it couldn’t be any worse than what swirled around the drain in Kelly’s mind. He heard the ladies’ room door creak, but he didn’t look over; he felt the woman watching him. It seemed like forever before Kelly could go to her.

“You want some hard-on medicine?” the woman asked Kelly when he sat down again. “A young
boxeador
like you should be able to fuck longer than that.”

“I got pain,” Kelly said.

“Okay. I’ll fix you up.”

She gave Kelly something wrapped tightly in plastic film. Kelly put it in his pocket without looking at it. The thing weighed almost nothing; in the back of his mind Kelly could calculate a packet like that down to the milligram, or damned close. He felt hot and he was sticky under his arms.

He offered the woman money. She waved it away. “Not today,” she said.

“I’m gonna go,” Kelly replied.

“Next time I give you something to keep your
aparato
working,” the woman told Kelly. “You don’t last long enough, white boy.”

“Maybe it’s your fat ass I don’t like.”

“
¡Bolillo!
”

“Like I ain’t never heard that before.” Kelly turned his back on the woman. She said something else, something about how he had a little white prick, but Kelly wasn’t listening. The woman was still yelling when he hit the street. By then Kelly’s mind was somewhere else completely.

H
E SMOKED THE FIRST BATCH OF
the stuff because it was low-grade heroin that wasn’t worth fucking up a syringe to shoot. The whole time he argued with himself about it, but he knew his conscience was just going through the motions; after a while even the best herb couldn’t do what the cheapest brown could.