From This Wicked Patch of Dust

The War in Ysleta

203 The War in Ysleta March 2003 The song from a detergent commercial startled Pilar awake. She immediately felt the hardness of the black rosary beads she clutched in her hands, the dull, throbbing pain of her sixty-eight-year-old knees, the spasmodic flutter of her heart. Glancing around their living room, dark except for the bright flashes of the giant TV screen, she saw Cuauhtémoc was gone. He must have walked back to their bedroom by himself. How long had she fallen asleep on her knees? Pilar pushed herself up. A sharp pain rippled up one leg and then just as suddenly disappeared. She walked, half-hunched, through the kitchen and to their bedroom, fearing Cuauhtémoc had fallen down again. Slowly she pushed open Julieta’s old bedroom door. They had moved their bedroom there years ago, for it was the biggest and quietest room in the house, and also next to the furnace. She saw Cuauhtémoc’s walker reclining against the wood paneling. Her husband was lying peacefully asleep in their bed. Pilar closed the door as softly as she could and walked back to the kitchen. The television was on CNN again; it was three in the morning. The United States had given Iraq’s Saddam Hussein an ultimatum earlier this month: step down, disarm, or face immediate, catastrophic consequences. The United States, Great Britain, and other allies had landed troops in Kuwait, near the border of southern Iraq, after Turkey had denied the United States use of its airspace for what appeared to be the invasion of Iraq by the U.S. Army. The United Nations, agreeing with President Bush, had declared that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction. These myriad television abstractions 204 puzzled Pilar for only a few moments. Weapons of mass destruction? Nuclear bombs? Who were they targeting? Israel? Saudi Arabia? The United States? Why were they working themselves into such a frenzy on Iraq and Afghanistan? Sometimes Pilar turned to Juárez TV stations for clarification. Ominous national news rarely touched Ysleta. The news from Washington was about as relevant as the news from Europe. Today, however, the news ripped her heart to pieces. Pilar sat in the kitchen, ignoring the blow-by-blow of the ground assault through southern Iraq. The air strikes were like red and green fireworks. Marcos is not there yet, she repeated to herself. He is in Arkansas, training. He is not there, dear God. Maybe this war will end quickly. Dios mio, please let it be quick. Please protect him, mi Virgen, protect him like your own son. Pilar wiped the rivulets of tears from her face. Light-headed, she almost slipped off the high kitchen stool she sat on. She needed to get some sleep. Pilar walked to the living room, clicked off the TV set, and turned off the lights. Lori and the kids were coming for dinner. Pilar had promised to cook them flautas. After she woke up she needed to go to Walmart for the brisket and help Cuauhtémoc get dressed. She hadn’t cleaned the dog’s doings in the backyard in three days. She needed to pick up the rents from the Olive and Magoffin departamentos and see whether don Manuel had swept the hallways as he had promised he would. There was so much to do! What would happen to this family if she fell apart, if she didn’t get enough sleep, if she smashed the pickup on Socorro Road because she fell asleep at the wheel? It was time to rest her body for tomorrow’s battles. ~ At a few minutes past 5:00 p.m., Lori’s red Subaru stopped on San Lorenzo Avenue. Noah and Sarah jumped out of the car, both with blue backpacks in hand. Lori carried a stack of dark brown accordion folders, for both her course at UTEP and her teaching job at John Drugan Elementary. Pilar lifted the brisket slab with tongs and a 205 fork and checked if it had simmered enough in its onion broth and was ready for shredding. She could smell the cloves of garlic she had embedded in the meat and the salt mixed with pepper, a sharp, tangy scent. She stuffed strands of meat inside corn tortillas, lanced them with a toothpick to keep the roll from popping open, and quickly fried them in vegetable oil...