Fifth Saturday Fiction

Chapter 16. Santa Teresa, from the novel Boystown: The Cocaine Highway

By edRogers

[The first-person narrator is James Hamilton, a Vietnam draft dodger and entrepreneur. In this chapter he’s flying with his friend Jay, who sometimes flies for the C.I.A., to pick up product and distribute cash. Previous excerpt, "The Hippie Experience," published here on March 15.]

Behind us the demons wrought hell on earth, but once again the jaws of death hadn’t closed fast enough. The night sky was clear and beautiful. I looked at Jay—his shirt was black from the sweat. My own shirt clung to me and sweat ran down my back, and the top of my jeans felt wet. “I’ll bet we lost ten pounds fighting that damn storm.”
    Jay reached behind him and pulled a towel from a cloth bag. He wiped the sweat from his face and handed me the towel. “I wasn’t this scared when we went down in Panama. I have to tell you, James, we are lucky as hell to be here. There is nothing you or I did that saved us. That monster just let us go.”
    My hands shook as I wiped the moisture from my eyes. “It wasn’t our time. I believe when it’s your time to die, nothing you do will stop the event. That tree that took off Pete’s head—it could have come through your side of the plane just as easy.”
    “You may be right, but I didn’t think I was going to make it in Panama, and I knew we weren’t going to make it back there. So how do you know which one is real?
    “You don’t.”
    “What kind of a bullshit theory is that?”
    “I’m just saying what I believe. If you can explain why we’re still alive, I’d like to hear it.”
    “I don’t know why we’re alive, but I know if we don’t get our bearings it may only be temporary.”
    I looked out my side of the plane, but couldn’t see any lights. “Do you see anything from your side?”
    Jay looked out his window. “Just black, everywhere. I’m back on our heading of north by northwest. If we were pushed too far to the south, this heading could carry us into the Baja.”
    I had no idea that the storm blew us so far off course. To be honest, I didn’t know where the hell we were. I tried to calculate our location with the little information I had on hand.
    “That must have been the Cerro del Escuadra Mountains, where we almost crashed. We weren’t scheduled to cross out of them until halfway to Santa Teresa. Right now that mountain range should still be below us. How do you work your directional radio?”
    Jay turned on the radio and flipped down a small handle from the overhead console. “The handle will turn the antenna.” He pointed at a gauge. “That will tell you the strength of the signal. The indicator under the dial will give you the direction.”
    It didn’t take long before the station in Del Rio, Texas came through loud and clear. I marked its position on the map and began to search for El Paso. The signal was harder to find. The mountains and the fact we flew below the radar didn’t help. Then a crackle and squeal. I backed the dial a little and a country station from El Paso blared out of the speakers. I marked its location and pulled out the ruler. I drew a line from Del Rio and one from El Paso. Where they crossed was our little piece of heaven. I handed Jay the paper with my calculations. “Here, correct to this heading. We’re about seventy-five miles south of where we want to be.”
    “That’s not as bad as I thought it was going to be. That wind could have pushed us all the way to Mexico City. We’ll still make Santa Teresa before daylight.”
    Jay looked whipped. The storm had drained him. His hair was dark, wet, and matted to his head from sweat. His face was long and haggard from the strain.
    “Why don’t you take a nap?” I said. “We have a long flight to Colombia. I’ll need you fresh after we drop in Santa Teresa.”
    “You sure you’ll be all right?”
    “Don’t worry, if this damn plane could make it through that hell back there, nothing I do to it will mean shit.”
    “Okay, you’ve got the stick.” Jay crawled back onto the pile of coke and within a few minutes, he was snoring.
    Two hours later I could see brightness on the horizon. Several hundred miles to the north, the sky was lit up by the lights from El Paso. It wouldn’t be long before we’d be out of the mountains, and we should make Santa Teresa in about two hours. I thought to wake Jay, but I looked back at him and he hadn’t moved. I decided to let him sleep for one more hour. I could sleep on the flight to Mexico City. Besides that, I loved too fly at night. The moon sat and the stars were bright beacons in the sky. I wondered how many people in the past had looked at these same stars, many of them lost at sea or in the desert. For some reason, it felt safe to know the stars were there.
    Suddenly, the darkness lit up with a blinding light. The interior of the airplane became as bright as day. A black cloud appeared in front of us. Then the concussion knocked the plane sideways. Another blast to the right and below, bounced the plane from side to side. A second search light panned across the sky, and zeroed in on us. “Jay, Jay, get the fuck up. The goddamn Mexicans are trying to shoot us down.”
    Jay fought to get back to the front. “Why are they shooting at us?”
    I banked hard to port and dropped into a hard backward dive. Jay, pushed to the side and up against the ceiling, cried out, “Goddamn, James let me back at the controls.”
    “We stay in that fuckin’ light, we’re dead.” I pulled out of the dive and cut back to starboard. I came close enough to one of the mountain peaks to see the sagebrush growing on its rocky cliffs.
    Jay was able to strap himself into his seat. “Do you want me to take the stick?”
    “I’ve got the plane. See if you can spot their guns.” The lights crisscrossed the sky in search of us.
    “What the hell are the Mexicans doing out here in the middle of nowhere, with anti-aircraft guns?” Jay screamed.
    “Would you like me to land and ask the sons-of-bitches?” I turned and made a long swipe across the mountaintops. With our silhouette below the crest, we flew low and fast. I hide in the darkness of the mountain—the night was now our friend. At some point, we needed to get out of the valley. Unfortunately, that was when they would see us.
    “Jay, I need to know where those guns are located!”
    “There’s some kind of a military base down there, the guns are on the high ground west of the base. If they lower those search lights, we’re dog meat.”
    The thought crossed my mind that this may very well be the time and place Jay had wondered about. When we came out of that storm, we became invincible. Look death in the face and walk away, and you get that cocky feeling. Face it once more and the old fear coats your throat, your hands sweat, and your mouth goes dry. Death is the only thing that is invincible.
    “Hold on. I’m taking her to the ground. We’re going right across the base and right up those gunners’ asses. They shoot at us they’ll hit their own men.” I slid down the face of the mountain and pulled up at thirty feet. I prayed there were no tall telephone poles in the compound. We screamed over the rooftops. I could see men out in the open run for cover as we passed. We zoomed over the top of the AA guns. Two of them fired, but the shells missed and exploded high above us. We topped the ridge and were out of sight of the gunners.
    Jay beat on the dash. “Holy shit, holy shit! Goddamn, James I’ve never seen any flying like that in my life. Those motherfuckers had us! I mean we were fucking dead! Holy shit!”
    “Jay, will you take the stick.” I reached for a bag. As Jay flew us away from the Mexican Army, I threw my guts up in a paper bag.
    “Are you all right, James?”
    I opened the little side window and threw the bag out. My insides shook with fear, my right leg jumped, and I held it down with my hand. We had been so low I saw the gunners eject the spent shell and shove a fresh one into the breach. I needed to put it behind me and pull myself together. Jay wouldn’t understand my fear. Nor, did I understand it.
    “Yeah, I’m fine. It must’ve been something I ate.” I turned on the dash light and pulled out the map. “I don’t see anything about a restricted area. The whole mountain range is a free-fly zone.”
    Jay cleared his throat. “James you might want to check the date on those maps. The hanger I got them from—well, it hadn’t been used in sometime.”
    I turned the map over and on the bottom was the date, January 1951. “You idiot, how could you do this? We’re flying around up here blind—this map is worthless.”
    “I’m sorry. The old man that owned the plane died. I picked up the maps that lay around the hanger, got in the plane, and took off.”
    “You stole this plane from a dead man?”
    “No, I borrowed it. He hadn’t flown it in years. I’m sure, if not for a heart attack, he would have loaned it to me.”
    I folded the map, opened the compartment door, and put it away. “We’ve got to get new maps before we fly into Mexico City. Do you think the Mexicans will send fighters after us?”
    Jay thought for a minute. “No, those Army guys, they won’t want the Air Force to know they missed us. Besides, those World War Two planes the Mexican Air Force fly would never be able to find us before we made the border.”
    The rest of the trip was quiet. I leaned my head on the window and drifted off.
    We were both thankful to be alive.
    My eyes had no more closed, when I felt a tap on the shoulder. Jay hollered, “Wake up, James. There’s our airfield.”
    I straighten myself in the seat—damn I wanted a beer. To the east, the sun cracked the horizon—we needed to hurry. Jay landed and we taxied toward the hangers that set midway of the airport. We flashed our lights twice, and from the side of one of the hangers came the flash of headlights. We pulled close to the hangar and turned off the engines.
    As I stepped onto the tarmac, I recognized the bulky figure that got out of the van. “How’s it going, Leon?”
    “We’re hanging good. You’re running late, though—the damn sun’s almost up. We need to get on the road.” Leon motioned the man with him forward. “Get this shit on the van.”
    I took the small seaman’s bag full of money from Leon. As the three of them unloaded the airplane, I counted the money. Torrijos’s share I placed in an overnight bag or AWOL bag, as the soldiers around San Antonio called it. Leon started the van. He was loaded and ready to leave. “Leon, where is Norman? I thought you would bring him with you.”
    “It would seem he and his hog went off the road at Big Sur. Hell of a drop, but I think it was the stop that killed him.”
    “It was bound to happen. He was a man looking for a place to die. Listen, could you tell Buddy we’ll fly the next load out of Colombia. I’ll let him know when and where.”
    Leon nodded his head and started to pull away, but he stopped and put his head out the window. “There’s an all-night gas and eating place at the highway. You want a ride up there?”
    “No, there’s a little airport outside of El Paso, and we need new maps and a shower. They have it all. We’ll eat once we get there. Thanks anyway.”
    “You need to come back to San Francisco for a visit. Your friend Victor keeps asking what happen to his Texas Hippie.” Leon laughed at his joke and drove away.
    “Who the hell is Victor?” Jay straightened the back seats in the plane and crawled up front.
    The sun came over the hills and lit the small airport. “He’s the king of the hippies. I think you and him would get along real will. Now, let’s get the fuck out of here.”
    By noon, we had new maps, a shit, a shower, a shave, and clean clothes. With a full belly, we taxied down the runway. It was a three and a half-hour flight to the little airfield south of Mexico City. The owners were friends of Antonio, and spent a few weekends at the Golden Palace. I put the seaman’s bag against the window and went to sleep.
    When the wheels smacked down on the hard-packed dirt, I jumped out of my skin. That was a fast three hours. I gave the family that owned the airfield a hundred American and they filled the plane with fuel as Jay and I went in search of a place to take a shit. The breakfast outside of El Paso moved rapidly toward the exit. We bought a six-pack of cold beer and I took the controls. The afternoon sun came into Jay’s window, so he crawled in the back and crashed. I opened a beer and settled in for a long flight. Next stop: Colombia.

Copyright © 2014 by Ed Rogers