Robles' Ghost

By Chuck Wlliams

Do you know what you’re doing? She asked. What about  Juanita? What about your children? Who exactly are you helping? Miguel Robles is dead. You can’t help him. Señor Mota? At least he’s still alive.

A state senator makes a large bet on stocks with borrowed money, backed by embezzled funds in a Pana

• Language: English
• Publisher: charles williams
• Release date: May 5, 2016
• ISBN: 9780990665359

Book preview

Chapter 1

No more Mustang convertible. I sold it to a guy who wanted to fix it up for his son. Good luck, I told him. If it were a horse, not a Ford car, it would be sway-backed, half crippled, and with its teeth worn down to nubs. I was honest and told the buyer all that. It would be safer for a teenager to just sit in it and pretend he’s cruising. Maybe if he’s smooth about it, he could still get his girlfriend into the back seat some night even if it’s not running.

Nowadays I’m looking down the hood of a Volkswagen Jetta, the most undistinguished, anonymous vehicle on four wheels in Mexico. If you ask what kind of car just ran that red light, they’d probably say, I don’t know, I wasn’t paying attention, might have been a Jetta. You could paint one pink and no one would care. Boring, I know, but I can live with that. I haven’t stayed up to midnight in six months, except once, and that was for my daughter, because we thought she might have appendicitis and took her to the hospital. The last time Juanita and I had a night to ourselves, one where we could go crazy, I can’t remember the last time. I don’t miss my Mustang, but I do miss my old life, or parts of it, anyway. I never thought I’d say that. Never. It seems that happiness comes with some inevitable boredom.

I looked at Lydia in the passenger seat, beautiful Lydia, Juanita’s best friend. She had a grim expression, so I glanced at the clock on the dashboard, and made a calculation. I’d picked her up thirty minutes ago, and I could guess what she was going to say. I silently mouthed her words while, staring grimly at the trunk of the car in front of us she said, I hate this traffic.

I agreed with her, but I didn’t say so. There are only so many ways to say it, and I had said them all, and she had heard them all. The traffic one minute was crazed like a crowd fleeing a theatre fire, then the next like one of those African nature shows where the Wildebeests are jammed together on a river bank, not wanting to be the first to jump in with the crocodiles. And it would only get worse as the Audi plant got closer to opening. That’s where we were headed, like a pack of dogs, sniffing the exhaust fumes from the ass of the car in front of us.

Lydia had followed Juanita and me from Oaxaca to Puebla. They’ve been best friends for years. Our daughter then was three years old, and Juanita had her hands full, with no time to make a new best friend, and Lydia needed a little daughter, since she hadn’t found the right man with whom to start a family. She had no problem getting a job, since she’d been an administrator at the university in Oaxaca. Now we commuted together to the Audi plant. She is an administrator and I’m an engineer.

I’m no longer a cop, out until the wee hours of the morning, worried about people who want to cut off my fingers. When I graduated from university there weren’t any engineering jobs in Mexico, but my degree got me half way up the hierarchy of the police department, and after that, personal inertia kept me there. Oh, I made friends on both sides of the law, so it was interesting at times, but in the big picture the switch of professions was what restored my marriage, the most important thing. Now I worry about car payments - one for my commuter, and one for Juanita’s minivan so she can shuttle the kids around - the rent, the phone, the electric bill, and things like will Enrique need braces in a couple of years.

With one last turn of the wheel we are approaching the Audi grounds, and I roll down my window so the guard can get a good look at us. We hold up our ID badges. The guard recognizes us. Despite his potbelly he leans over to look in the window, hopeful, I suspect, he might chat up Lydia, who, kind person she is, leans forward to smile and say hi. I’ve got a business-like expression, nod and let the car roll on through without coming to a complete stop. Not that there’s a lot to guard at this point. This is a multi-year, multi-billion dollar project that’s just getting started. The site has been surveyed, scraped level, and prepped with the tons of gravel and earth upon which all the buildings will rest. Looking out on it, it’s awesomely huge. I mean, it dwarfs the site of Teotihuacan, outside Mexico City, where you need binoculars to see from the Pyramid of the Sun to the other end of the plaza. So far here at Audi where cars are the gods, there’s only a few lonely buildings, looking tiny and lost in a vast level plain. There’s my insignificant planning/engineering building and a couple of two-story administration offices. I pull up to Lydia’s building and set the brake, but leave the engine running. As she got out Lydia said, Thank goodness you’re willing to do the driving. I’d kill somebody if I had to do it everyday.

I watched her disappear through the double glass doors, trying to imagine her killing somebody. I couldn’t picture it. It’s not so easy, or rather, it’s too easy to kill. One moment they’re alive, the next they’re gone, and there’s no bringing them back. Back when I was a cop I shot a guy, but I was careful not to kill him. It just makes more trouble for yourself. It was an easy, can’t miss, up-close situation. I just leaned over and shot him in the gut. If you aim low at the level of the belly button you’re going to miss vital organs like the liver and spleen. Of course some heavy drinkers have a big liver that may hang down a little, but not as far as the belly button. The slug is going to punch a few holes in the intestines as it passes through, but that’s not fatal. Painful and incapacitating for sure. I never heard if they took the guy to the hospital. I hope so.

I parked in front of my engineering building, rolling down the windows a bit before locking up. It’s a futile gesture, because even with the windows opened, by the time I’m ready to leave you could roast a chicken on the dashboard. I hope the next thing we build is a covered parking garage.

In the minute it took to reach the building entrance, sweat was oozing from my skin like I was crispy chicharrones. I hurried into a chamber with a double set of doors designed to keep the heat outside from rushing in. The outer doors closed behind me with a soft, sighing breath and I was instantly flash frozen by the air conditioning. By the time I walked a few feet into the lobby, my goose bumps were gone. Only by the entrance is it so cold, maybe something to do with air pressure and the door opening and closing all the time.

My friend and coworker Fredi asks those kind of engineer questions, and looks the part as well, complete with pocket protectors, thick black glasses frames, and a crew cut. His look is definitely dated. He must shop at vintage stores. Where else can you buy a slide rule these days? He doesn’t use it, of course, although he once showed me how it works. It sits on his desk in its leather case like a homage to the nineteen fifties, when men built bridges with a hammer and their own two hands. Most people who see it haven’t a clue what it’s for. Fredi let’s them take it out of the case, and they turn it around, and pull out the slide, look at all the tiny scales, and they still have to ask what it’s for.

Hey Fredi, I pulled my shirt away from my body to let it dry. Fredi has a routine to quickly explain a slide rule, he’s done it so many times. If it’s a woman he’s explaining it to, his tone changes, like it was a pick-up line. Not that Fredi needs help with women. He’s tall, muscular, late twenties, with a big confident smile. I never asked, but I think he must work out in a gym to look like he does. He looked up from his computer screen, and greeted me with a friendly grin.

He said, Ich bin ein Mexicano. He said it with his index finger waving at the ceiling, like it was the beginning of a speech, but I knew that was all, for now at least. The day Audi announced German language classes he signed up. Audi believes in training for its employees, and for some complex, technical subjects, if they can’t do it here, they send you to the Audi plant in Germany. Fredi would go to the moon strapped to a rocket if Audi asked him to. But his wet dream is to drive on the autobahn, and to do that he’s got to get to Germany. He can drive me crazy. What’s the speed limit on the autobahn? he’ll say, and before I can answer, he says, There’s no limit! Then he’ll rattle on with facts and figures, all excited like only an engineer can be by facts and figures.

A job at Audi is a dream come true. A full time, permanent job is hard to come by. Nobody cares that the pay is a pittance compared to German or US auto worker salaries. It’s full time, with vacation, and health care, and if you don’t screw up you can keep working there as long as you want. Fredi lives with his mom and dad, and would like to marry his girlfriend. His family is upper middle class, so living in the spacious family home isn’t a burden. Now that he’s working for Audi, though, he’s looking for a house to buy.

I patted him on the shoulder as I walked past to our little office lunch room, where I placed the lunch Juanita had prepared in the half-size refrigerator that sat on a countertop. I poured myself a cup of coffee from the pot Fredi had already prepared and carried it back to my desk which faced his. I pulled back the wheeled office chair, spinning the seat around so I could sit, then spun back around to face the desk, where I opened my laptop to confirm the quadrant we needed to visit this morning. The work day for Audi is under way. The steel beam skeletons of buildings are beginning to pop up all over. They are being conjured into the air by engineers and tradesmen. This kind of construction isn’t simple, not like the old ways where you pound four wooden stakes in the corners where the building will go and connect them with a string. Dump trucks have been running for months, pouring meters of soil over the earth fundament to build up the kind of surface needed for construction. In fact, you could say nothing is left of what was here before Audi arrived. These buildings when they are filled with the assembly robots, and all the tools, tracks, utilities, cafeterias, water coolers, you name it, they’ll weigh as much as a small pyramid. The plans have all been made, as carefully and in as much detail as you would need to invade a small country. Germany is good at it, not invading, they don’t do that sort of thing anymore. I mean engineering, planning. That’s why they’re an industrial powerhouse. Mexico welcomed them with open arms.

I graduated with a degree in civil engineering, an honorable and ancient profession. Think Mayans and pyramids, Romans and aqueducts. Before the Mayans started on a pyramid they had to make sure it wasn’t going to sink into the ground once it was built. That’s my job. I go on site to evaluate what is required for drainage, confirm that the gravel and rock to support the weight of the building are in place as required. I verify these things before the next stage can proceed. A program on my laptop gives me the parameters, and I walk it off, eyeball it, use a laser surveyor, talk to the construction supervisor, take samples, because I like my job and want to keep it.

I learned how to ask questions when I was a cop. I can’t just take somebody’s word for it that everything’s okay. Of course I ask more nicely now, but I keep pushing, keep coming back to the facts, until I know some asshole isn’t bullshitting me. Is the sand really a foot deep, or did he deliver half of it to his own home addition? If I can’t get a straight answer I order a sample trench dug to confirm it’s one foot deep. Doing my job doesn’t always make me popular, but I’m used to that. Tomorow Fredi and I are going to look at the final prep for the Just in Sequence assembly building. This should be our last visit. Over the last couple of months we’ve been there at least once a week. First to okay the makeup of the fundament of crushed rock, then to check the sand and gravel for drainage, then the thousands of square meters of soil, and tomorrow we’ll look over the last of the compacted soil laid down earlier in the week. Fredi helps me with the technical stuff, which he’s better at, and together we make a great team.

I spent the morning loading my laptop with all the programs and specifications I’d need on site tomorrow, and stuffed my head with a mental roadmap for the day, noting where there could be potholes in my plan. Finally I wrote reminder notes in the little notebook that I always carry in a shirt pocket, sans protector. Fredi had offered me one, but I gracefully declined. I can only go so far down the nerd path and remain true to myself. I might need a pencil and paper for a security blanket, but a pocket protector, I couldn’t do that. And I knew why, but it’s embarrassing to admit it. I’m a guy afraid some of my former distasteful associates might see me with a pocket protector. I know an encounter with those hoodlums is highly unlikely, and ridiculous to worry about, but still.

We ate lunch at our desks, Fredi and I, talking football and hot starlets who hosted TV shows, agreeing that the latest Shakira lookalike was a total bust. Then back at work. I was ending the afternoon, studying the rest of the week’s projects, when I heard the wheels of Fredi’s chair rattle as he pushed away from his desk. I looked up, not at Fredi, but in the direction of the office doorway, where Lydia stood looking like a full-length framed portrait of royalty, just in the way she held herself. Relaxed and assured. You didn’t notice her hair was slightly wind blown from the walk to our building, or care that her blouse was damp in the armpits. The queen vanished and Lydia emerged into our world as she spoke, Hey guys! I had absolutely nothing left to do, and I hate just sitting there pretending, and I’m not gonna surf the internet on company time, so I walked over since it’s almost time to quit anyway. She lifted an arm, tugging at the damp fabric there, then did the same with her other side. She gave Fredi a friendly smile. I hope I’m not disturbing your work. The smile slipped into a question that pursed her lips and raised an eyebrow.

Naw, said Fredi, standing up, I’m glad to see you. It’s time I was closing up, too. I’m pretty well caught up and ready for tomorrow. He put his hands on his hips, rotating his torso in a circular motion, and when he came to a stop facing her, said, I can only sit for so long. You must be really itching to get home to walk over here in the heat.

The heat doesn’t really bother me. she said, After breathing the same office air all day, I need a change, heat and dust and all. Lydia finally looked at me. I’m in no hurry, go ahead and finish what you need to. She turned in the doorway to look back down the hall. I’ll just walk around for a minute, if there’s no state secrets I might stumble on. Audi made it clear that security was very important, on signs, in memos, and the guards checking IDs.

I have some mineral water in the break room fridge. Help yourself, Fredi said. Still standing with his hands on his hips, he bounced on his toes, and added, I think I’ll get a bottle myself. I’ll walk with you. I watched the two walk down the hall side by side, exchanging a few words. I wondered about them. What if something was going on between them? Nothing that I could tell.

By the time they came back I had logged out, closed my laptop, and was sitting with my butt on the edge of the desk, car keys in hand. The three of us fitted into the antechamber with its double set of doors. Fredi led the way, pushing open the outer doors. The warm air rushed in, battling to gain entry, but the inner doors held firm with just a momentary, small movement. We stepped out into our world near the Tropic of Cancer. It was hot and dry with the sun still well overhead. We were on the edge of the rainy season, but so far nothing. Our cars were parked together. Fredi and I rolled down the windows to let out the heat of the day, and tossed jibes over the roof while we waited for the interiors to cool a bit. Fredi said, Aren’t you embarrassed to drive that thing? Lydia waited patiently for us to do our guy thing, and when the last ripostes were spent, Lydia and I got into my Jetta, Fredi settled behind the wheel of his Ford, and we headed off. The commute from the Audi plant in San Jose Chiapa to Puebla was a mishmash of narrow two lanes through settlements, four lane divided highways, and toll roads. The combination made the commute seem longer than any one type of road would have.

The drive home always seemed longer than the drive to work. That’s because I like Audi, but it’s my job, not my life. At home Juanita and Enrique and Xochi await. Juanita and I have been married twelve years, and after all those years I still can’t wait to get home, to see her and talk to her. She’s like my other half. Not that it’s some kind of fairy tale. My hands were on the wheel, but my thoughts drifted off into the past, where good and bad days were always waiting for me. I shook my head from side to side to get back to the present.

Okay! Time to turn off the rambling thoughts. It’s amazing how easy it is to drive on auto-pilot. When I glance at Lydia I see she’s surrendered to the monotony as well, staring unseeing at the stop and go traffic, focused on an inner vision that carries her somewhere else in her life. With our street visible ahead, I flick the turn signal for a left, glance in the rear view mirror, slowing as I approach - nobody riding my rear bumper, no car coming ahead- I turn onto our street, breathing a silent sigh. The street was made just for our development. There are eight houses, all the same size, separated by a space between each one to park a car. A wall at the back joins the houses, so you can store stuff in your parking space. Each house has a small walled-in yard in the back. Cozy and private. The property was probably a farm or a pasture before the houses were built. We’re on the outskirts of the city, a twenty minute drive to the zocalo. Suburban pioneers.

I pull into our parking place to the sound of gravel under the wheels. Beside our front door Xochi’s tiny bike leaned on one of its training wheels. I stared at it until I missed the sound of the car’s engine, and saw I had the keys in my hand. I sighed, half embarrassed. One summer when I was a kid a butterfly landed on my sleeve. I didn’t want to move for fear it would fly away, but knew I couldn’t stand there forever. Before I could do anything it beat its wings with a silent, sudden snap and floated away. I still remember that moment. What will Xochi remember when she’s grown?

Lydia opened her door, and began walking towards her apartment six doors down, saying with her back to me, See you in the morning. Some days the commute home seems endless, pointless, and infuriating, but today I hardly noticed anything. It’s like you don’t know how long you slept because you can’t really remember when you fell asleep.

I closed the door behind me and stood in our entry way, where in addition to the usual clutter of kid’s toys, shoes, and drooping house plants I was startled to see Juanita facing me with a sour expression. She yelled, I can’t take much more of this, Baltasar! Driving Riki here and there, taking care of Xochi, the fucking traffic.

She screamed, but it wasn’t the kind that scared me. This was the kind that made me want to put my arms around her, but the timing for such a move is critical. Too soon, and she’ll think I don’t take her problems seriously, that I want to cut her off on the topic. Wait too long, same thing, she’ll think I don’t care. It takes many years sailing these turbulent seas to learn to recognize the right moment, and I stood on my toes like a matador, waiting for the right moment to strike.

I saw her shoulders sink down, and I went for it. I put my arms around her. I