Sarah Scott Journalist

126 days before the meet

I had to pull over. I was starting to lose consciousness. The last thing I remember was the car, so how did I end up in a derelict barn with my shoulder bandaged up? I couldn’t have done this because I had no bandages. The piece of my father’s top that was originally around my wound is on the other side of the barn, hanging over a rusty bicycle. That couldn’t have been me! I then realise that I am sitting on an old blanket and there is a cushion placed behind my shoulder. There are a few antiseptic wipes on the floor next to me and a glass of water placed on a table. What the hell happened?

I immediately scan the room, looking for another person but find myself relieved and disappointed. Whoever this person is, they’ve saved my life. Of course, this could be that the friends of the man I shot have found me. I know he wanted me alive and maybe they are just waiting for me to heal before they try and take me away again.

I stand up only to find myself immediately sitting down again. I have to take a few moments for the dizziness to wear off. I could seriously puke right now. I wonder how long I’ve been here. I notice the bandages on my shoulder could do with a change or there is a chance of infection.

Standing up slowly I hold on to the table to stabilise myself. When I have caught my breath, I walk towards my father’s top placed on the bike. The thought of my father makes me even weaker, so I turn to that dark part inside a human that wills me to place one foot in front of the other.

On the work-surface next to the bike there are a few metal objects that I could use as a weapon to get out of here. I look back to where I was just laying and a glimpse of a shiny, black metal catches my eye. The gun.

I leap for it even though there is no real sense of danger at this moment. I even think to check the ammo but it’s all there. If these people work for the man who killed my father then why would they let me keep my gun with all the ammo in it? Had they not realised I had it? Did I fall on top of it and they didn’t notice?

There is an obvious exit out of the front that requires me to pull the huge door. Due to my current state, I will not be able to do that without passing out. After suffering a gunshot wound though I thought that I would be in much more pain than this. Have the life saving strangers given me something to help with the pain as well?

I walk towards the second possible exit which is a small door at the back of the barn. I get my gun at the ready in case my suspicions are true. I slowly approach the door, waiting for someone to jump out, but no one does. I can feel my heart beat in my fingers as I clutch my protection even tighter. I slowly twist the doorknob so it doesn’t make a sound, pushing the door ajar so I can see what waits behind it.

It looks like someone’s living room. There are three pictures on the wall, and from what I can see, they look like young children. My hand is now slipping on the gun from sweating so much. The barn looked derelict or at least I thought it did. I’m not in the right frame of mind for this.

I creep through the door, holding my gun even tighter, expecting the worst.  I can hear the gentle sound of tinny, Spanish music being played in the distance. But how far away?

 There are two options from here: a left or a right. I go left which is in the direction of the music. It’s getting louder which means I’m getting closer to it – to them.

When I eventually get to the source of the music, I see a little radio with an aerial sticking up from the top. I press a button which looks like the power off button. When the music goes dead there is a chilling silence in the air, now revealing some mumbling upstairs. The language I’m assuming is Spanish gets closer to me. With each muffled footstep, I have less time to move and hide. A part of me doesn’t want to hide. I almost want to meet the person whose voice is behind the footsteps and possibly the saving of my life.

I don’t steady my gun or hold it up to face them. I don’t want to hurt someone who saved my life although I don’t try and hide the fact I have a weapon.

To my surprise I come face to face with an elderly Mexican woman. To her shock she drops the silver tray she is carrying, letting it fall to the floor with a gut-wrenching crash! The silence breaking noise makes me step back, as does she. She takes a few moments to take in an intruder standing in front of her, but eventually she relaxes and a smile beams across her face. From the looks of it, I am no intruder or stranger. I relax a little and thank god that it is someone Mexican instead of a Russian-Mexican hybrid trying to kidnap me.

The woman stares with concern when she sees the gun in my hand. I awkwardly place the gun on the side next to the radio, and whisper, “sorry,” but I have no idea if she even speaks English. Some more muffled footsteps edge down the stairs at a slow pace. I’m guessing another elderly person, probably her husband. A tired-looking man appears and his eyes instantly come to life when he sees me. I can see a tired-looking door over the other side of the room. I could make a run for it, but that won’t do me any good. By the looks of it, I am in no threat here.

This silence is killing me. I have so many questions but I will start with the basics. I smile at the lady. “Do you speak English?” I ask her. Her smile beams back but she says nothing. The elderly man steps forward to speak instead.

“You stumbled into our barn,” he says. “You were injured so we gave you some medicine. You slept for a day and a half.”

“That’s very kind of you. Where am I, may I ask? . . . I err . . . I ran into some trouble,” I say. What am I meant to tell them? I hardly believe it myself.

“We know. We know all about it. To answer your question, you’re in the village of Perdido,” he says.

She offers me a hot drink and I take it. I may be in a hot country but it is wonderful. They sit me down in their living room and replace my bandage with a clean one. I wince when I see the bloody skin. The wound has barely started healing. Just the thought puts lumps in my throat. I will have to wait till I can get to a proper doctor when I find my mother and Ben.

 The room I’m sitting in has pictures of children on the walls. They are the cleanest things in this room, especially the one of the girl. Everything else seems old and tired. The elderly couple walk in and sit on their designated arm chairs. The man sips his tea and gestures me to talk. Trust is a strange sensation they have somehow earned already. I then tell them everything. Everything about my father, the bearded man, and the shooting. The elderly man is shocked that I didn’t kill him and he starts to explain why.

“A couple of years ago strange things started happening to the towns around here. The people grew quieter, their smiles became sadder, and the streets seemed lonelier. The first girl to go missing was looked into, but the police took the investigation no further after three of their own were killed in a mysterious explosion in the house where the girl used to live. The police then received a message from an anonymous sender explaining that the girl was still alive and she would remain that way as long as the police minded their own business. Well, events spiralled and the police intervened which resulted in the girl’s death. Many girls have gone missing after that and the police have just ignored the cases and have blamed it on some petty excuse.”

“How do you know all this?” I ask, surprised at how much I sound like my mother.

“I was in the force myself when our granddaughter Carla went missing. I tried to get the force to see sense and help track down the group of kidnappers, but they decommissioned me because they said I was too involved in the case. But worse, they gave up on Carla.”

His eyes are filled with tears now. Being in situations with emotional people, especially people I don’t know, renders me uncomfortable. I have never been in this kind of situation before, where I am expected to offer comfort to a foreign man, crying about his lost grandchild after I have slept for over a day in his barn, on the floor with a bullet in my body.

“I’m so sorry,” is all I manage to say. There’s nothing else I can say that will help his pain. The same goes for me now as well I suppose. Nothing can bring the dead back. “I don’t mean to be rude, but what does this have to do with me?”

“It has everything to do with you, don’t you see?” he says as if I’m stupid. “These people who take innocent girls off the street tried to take you. . .”

 “And? It doesn’t make me any different.”

“And. . . You are the only one who has escaped.”

“I wish I could say the same for my dad.”

“I know, but you are alive for now and that is what he would have wanted.”

“For now? What is that supposed to mean?” I say suddenly wanting to stop talking to the man I’ve just met.

He looks at his wife and sighs. “These people, they’re afraid of you. They don’t like people messing with them. When I was decommissioned I did my own research into the disappearances, you know things like: talking to the parents of the girls who went missing, and investigating gangs and organisations in the area. ‘These people’ I keep referring to are part of an organisation whose main focus is women and how much money they can make off them. The police weren’t allowed to release this information to the public and I was sworn to secrecy not to breathe a word to anyone. But you’re different.”

“What makes you think that?” I ask.

“You’re the only person to escape from them. This has never happened before! This has changed everything now that someone is out there and knows what they look like and who they are.”

“I only saw one man. . .” I begin to explain. The man jumps out of his seat and I can’t tell if it’s out of anger or excitement.

“They don’t know what you’ve seen! You saw a van didn’t you? That’s something.”

“Why would they care? I’m not going to hunt them down, and they know if I go and tell somebody the police won’t do anything about it.”

“See some sense child! You are the first to escape them. You can tell the police something that nobody else can. You can tell them what happened and who they are!” he squeals.

“Even if that were true, what happens then? That just puts me and my family in more danger. I’m not going to get involved in something as dangerous as this. I don’t even live in this country, so when I get back to what’s left of my family, we will leave Mexico and never come back.”

Andrea tells me that he has dedicated the last few years of his life trying to find answers about the disappearance of his granddaughter Carla. She and her best friend went missing on the way home from school one night. Carla was only ten.

Looking through Andrea’s research, it does suggest that I am the only one known to him that has survived these people. He believes that the gang won’t allow me to survive. He suggests that I go off-grid for a while, but I don’t know what the best thing to do is. I need to speak with my brother and ask for his advice. I will also have to tell him the news about our father. He used to be so close to him. This will devastate him. I need to turn to that darker part of me again to be able to pick up the phone and deliver news that will crush them both.  

Once the elderly woman has seen to my wound, we go in search of the car I had been driving. It isn’t parked too far away which is good because it means I don’t have to walk far. I find my father’s phone in the car so I can call my brother. What am I going to tell him? I don’t even know how far the hotel is from here. When I look down at the phone, I see a red warning light appear. The battery is about to die! This will have to be a quick call then.

I click ‘call Ben’ and wait for his innocent voice to answer. My father had saved Ben’s contact photo as a picture of them both. Seeing them staring through me, I begin to well up. Nothing will ever be the same again. I wonder what is going through Ben’s mind. He’s bound to be worried because we have been missing for a long time.

When his sleepy voice answers with a brief but alert “hello,” I just freeze. I feel sick because I am about to wound him. I start to speak and he sounds ecstatic to hear my voice, but then he goes quiet after I tell him what has happened. The phone line is silent as he drinks in the horrific couple of days of my life. He is winded.

He is crying, silently to himself. I am crying. We are both mourning the loss of a man who only wanted the best for his children. Ben will have to break the news to my mother. She will be distraught. I can picture their deflated bodies in our hotel room that was filled with laughter only forty eight hours ago.

I tell Ben that I am somewhere I think is safe. I try to tell him of Andrea’s plans, but he cuts me off at just the idea of me going off-grid, completely alone. He tells me I am ridiculous and that I should be with him and Mum at a time like this. He threatens to drive around Mexico looking for me. Eventually I get so frustrated with him that I hang up. It isn’t what I should have done, but this isn’t easy for me to process either.

A day or so after my phone call with Ben, we hear on the news that two bodies have been found in a village not far from us. The report shows that the man I shot has died and my father’s body has been found and identified, presumably by my brother. The report said that they were looking for me. Andrea is now frustrated with my brother because he has just given the gang a key as to who my family are.

I ring my brother again and tell him to get on the next flight home. I explain what will happen if he doesn’t. With a lot of convincing I persuade him to tell the police everything and to go straight back home so they’ll be safe. I tell him I will try to stay in contact with them as much as possible, but because I am going off-grid it will be quite difficult.

The man I shot died of several bullet wounds: one to the shoulder, one to each knee, and one right through the middle of his skull that was not put there by me. Andrea explained that if the gang’s leader doesn’t need one of them anymore, they simply dispose of them. The man I shot was clearly no use to them paralysed so his life was terminated. I should have killed him there and then. It might have been hours before anyone found him and when they did, they just killed him anyway. He will have suffered for a long time, and that shouldn’t bother me but it does.

A sudden rush of guilt falls over me and I find myself having to sit down. That was my fault! I just ended someone’s life and I’m sitting here drinking some tea that will supposedly heal my wound. Nothing will be able to heal the wound through that man’s head. He’s dead because of me. I can see Andrea’s wife looking at me with concern so I stand up and start towards the door to get some fresh air, but the air is just as thick and dry outside.

Andrea guides me back to the house because I am starting to feel dizzy. He says it’s normal with the amount of blood I lost. I lie down on a made bed I’m guided to and wait for the blackness to descend so I’m put me out of this surreal hell for a few hours.

My conscious mind replays my nightmare as I lie awake, staring up at the ceiling. How can this be happening?

In the protection of the darkness, I allow the part of me that is distraught with grief and fear to emerge and take over. It’s night-shift lasts as my conscious mind slips into the unconscious, and projects the terror into my dreams. Dreams that continue even when I open my eyes again.

This is what genuine fear must be.

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Read Chp.4 – Jack