Mosquito Read online

  You can say it cowboy and Indian, she says, taking a forkful of salad.

  I starts to tell her I was always cheering for them Indians myself, but then she be thinking I’m just trying to brown-nose her, ’cause she a Navajo. So I just drinks my Coke and don’t say that. The cowboys was always the heroes, though, and you always got to know the cowboys as individual people and the Indians was just Indians. If they was individual Indians, they was always played by white people. I think even Elvis played a Indian. Or they’d be white women playing Indian women and they’d always be in the Pocahontas mode. I only seen one movie that weren’t the Pocahontas mode, a television movie about Crazy Horse, where the Native American woman loving a Native American man. I know some of y’all knows what I means when I says not in the Pocahontas mode, but a lot of y’all I gots to explain.

  Then I notices some whites come in McDonald’s and look toward me and Leonora, like they is asking theyselves whether we is wild or tame. Maybe I’m just thinking that, though, ’cause I’m thinking about them cowboy and native peoples movies. The whites they goes up to the McDonald’s counter and orders something, then they sit in one of the booths. Then the clown peeks in McDonald’s and looks at Leonora like he thinks she’s “wild and gorgeous” like she Pocahontas ’cause I usually ain’t stay in McDonald’s that long, so I waves at him, then I tells Leonora that I gots to drive these men into Albuquerque. She sits eating her salad and I drinks my Coke and then gets up. Leonora wearing blue jeans and one of them cinnamon-color blouses, the same cinnamon color them Buddhist nuns wears, and she got Navajo ornaments on and that big turquoise bracelet. She got a scarf around her hair with geometric-type designs and she got long, clean, black, straight and braided hair. I pictures her riding on a horse through the Arizona desert.

  Please to meet you, she say.

  Same here, Leonora. I starts to put a tip on the table, but then remembers this McDonald’s and you ain’t supposed to tip no McDonald’s. I’m used to them truckstops where I always puts a tip on the table. You got you a way into Albuquerque? I asks.

  Yes ma’am, she say, and stay there eating her salad.

  You ain’t hitchhiking, is you? I asks, still standing at the booth.

  No ma’am.

  I seen some of y’all college types out there hitchhiking, and I wants to make sure you ain’t no fool.

  She kinda smile. No ma’am, I ain’t hitchhiking. I got me that jeep out there.

  Ah, yeah. That’s a nice-looking jeep. That your jeep?

  Yes ma’am. She wipe the side of her mouth with her napkin. She sit up straighter.

  Seem like I might have even seen that jeep when I was in Arizona, ’cause I remembers seeing a jeep like that and thinking it a nice-looking jeep, Arizona license plates, then I was noticing the jeep as I was coming in McDonald’s and was thinking if I wasn’t driving no truck I’d like a jeep like that jeep. That looks like a genuine Army jeep.

  I got it at the Army surplus store, she say. She say she got it real cheap, otherwise she couldn’t afford a jeep like that and would be having to hitchhike. Naw, girl, don’t play that kinda fool. You is too gorgeous. Promise me you ain’t going to play that type of fool. You got enough gas to get you to Albuquerque?

  Yes ma’am. She straighten one of her braids and the geometric scarf. Then she take another nibble of salad. People that is new to the Southwest don’t know ’bout the vastness of the land. I don’t give her no lecture on the vastness of the land and all the undeveloped land between here and Albuquerque and sometimes they ain’t another gas station for hundreds of miles or what seem like hundreds of miles. But she from Arizona and she know the landscape, so I don’t lecture her on the landscape. I don’t pick up hitchhikers, and the only reason I lets them undisciplined disciplined mens ride in the back of my truck is because I knows who they is.

  As I’m going out the door, someone hands me a flyer that says, UNA UNIÓN FUERTE INCLUYE A TODOS. I folds up the flyer and puts it in my shirt pocket. The man that gives me them union flyers knows that I’m not recruitable, but he gives me them union flyers anyway. The mens is standing around the back of my truck, ’cause it hot in New Mexico, and the air-conditioning only starts when the truck starts and air-conditions the whole truck. They spots me and climbs in the back of the truck. One of them opens the skylight and I latches the truck. Then I unlatches the truck again and reaches in and one of them hands me they hooch, which I carries for them in my glove compartment till they gets into Albuquerque and helps me unload at the warehouse, then I drives them to the center of town and hands them they hooch. When they wives is waiting for them at the warehouse, I keeps the hooch. When they’s on they own in town, I gives them they hooch. ’Cept sometimes I forgets to put the hooch in my glove compartment. When I forgets the hooch, sometimes they drinks the hooch before us gets to Albuquerque; other times they keeps the hooch till we gets to Albuquerque.

  Anyway, I takes the hooch, then climbs in the cab, puts the hooch in my glove compartment, and heads toward Albuquerque. I knows the black cowboy started to ask me if he could ride in the cab, but he knows I’m like that squaw when you calls her a squaw. I don’t let nobody ride in the cab of my truck but me.

  One of them rap on the cab. Who the gorgeous gal?

  Your wife, I say, and keeps driving.

  Why they be changing colors like that? I be asking, standing up close to the glass of that glassed-in ropewalk and be wondering what kind of glass that is, able to hold back the ocean. I’m talking about Marineland. Got to be a mighty powerful glass to hold back the ocean like that. I poke my nose up against that glass and be looking at them marine animals and some of them marine animals be looking back at me like they ain’t never seen a African nose. I know it’s my African nose they’s looking at. I should call it my West African nose, ’cause them East Africans, most of them, they ain’t got noses like that. Them Caucasians likes to claim the refined features for theyselves, and I know in them early literature they is them that claims the Ethiopians as Caucasians on account of them refined features. And even likes to refer to it as refined; otherwise broad features would be considered the good features to have, or the features of universal man and woman. I ain’t think about a lot of that stuff myself, though, till Delgadina start taking them courses in Cultural Anthropology and even got a course called the Politics of Race. She the one showed me that book that claimed the Ethiopians as Caucasians because of they refined features and they literary history. Because they is amongst the Africans to have a literary tradition. While she were taking that course, she would talk the politics of race, and how in some cultures people negotiates they identity. I have had people to even ask me if I’m African. Ain’t mean I don’t know who I am, though. You don’t have to take courses to know who you are. Or who you is, neither.

  Then one of them Rajiformes it swim up close to the glass and seem like it be wondering what kinda substance that is that hold back the ocean too.

  That’s their way of communicating with each other, say the marine guide.

  What they be saying? I asks, stepping away from the glass.

  He be looking at me like I’m some ignorant and crazy woman, the marine guide not that Rajiform. He a slim young man with thick brown hair and got the physique of a swimmer and he nose even look aquatic. I guess that’s how come they uses noses to stereotype people. They always uses the distinctive features of a people to stereotype them. And that makes it so you think that they’s the norm. And then you have people that don’t want to be who they naturally is, ’cause they’s been stereotyped. The ruling peoples makes the norm into who they is and how they does things. Anything that diverges from the way they does things ain’t the norm. Biko talked about that in that movie we seen, that movie about Steve Biko, the South African freedom fighter. Delgadina say he reminded her of el Ché, ’cept she say his real name Ernesto, Ernesto Ché Guevara. She say that her favorite name, that Ernesto. ’Cause it mean earnest. But it also got a nest in it. What else she say a
bout that Ernesto? Something about the CIA and the Bolivian government conspiring together. That’s what I mean about them legalized outlaws. Every country got they legalized outlaws, and ain’t just the CIA and government outlaws. He wearing blue jeans and one of them sweatshirts with a dolphin on it, I mean the marine guide. I don’t know what they be saying, er, I don’t know what they’re saying.

  Well, how come you knows they’s communicating, and ain’t just camouflaging theyselves?

  Delgadina were with me at Marineland, ’cause she the one convinced me to come to Marineland to learn about them marine animals, but she were just observing them marine animals, and reading them brochures and the Marineland literature and weren’t asking no questions. She probably knew all them answers to them questions about them marine animals that I were asking, ’cause she is always taking courses. I seen the way the marine guide looked at her, though, like he thought she were one of them hoochie women, you know, the stereotypes they has of them women they considers exotic looking. Like them Asian women, even them Asian-American women. They’s people just see a woman who to them is a exotic and think she a hoochie, even them that looks high class. They be looking at her and thinking about “that sex thing.” Ain’t nobody think I’m exotic looking. They might think I’m a nut. But not even no exotic nut.

  He smooth back his thick brown hair and kinda hunch his shoulders, the Marineland guide. We have scientists who study them and have certain generalizations about what their chromatics mean, I mean, what their color changes mean, however only generalizations—that is, the general subject matter, but not the specific vocabulary. Professor Hauberk Honeyeater, the renowned oceanographer and psychologist of color, has written a book on the subject, but it’s not for a popular audience . . . And then he show me Professor Hauberk Honeyeater’s picture ’cause it on the brochure ’cause he one of the Marineland advisers. He don’t look like no honeyeater, though, he plump and long-necked and look more like one of them bustard birds.

  Say what?

  For example, what you see now is probably some sort of mating ritual, he saying. When he mention that mating ritual them other marine tourists, they be sticking they noses up against that glass. Ain’t I said that sometimes them color changes is a mating ritual?

  So you mean they be courting, they generally be talking ’bout love? I asks.

  Yes, but we don’t know the specific vocabulary. What color changes correspond to a specific vocabulary, a specific amorous word, that is.

  Say if that turquoise mean yes? I read somewhere they’s certain women when they’s in a yes mood they puts on certain colors. Seems like I read that somewhere, or men thinks that certain colors means a yes mood. Seem like if there ain’t a article like that, there oughta be one, in one of them Cosmopolitan-type magazines.

  Yes, but not just these primary colors, the light and the colorant primaries, er, but. . . . He got them blue-green eyes the same color as the ocean. He look at Delgadina again like you would look at somebody you think is a hoochie woman, and then continue to lead us through the marine tour and introduce us to some more of them marine animals. Then when we’s emerging from the glassed-in ropewalk, somebody hand Delgadina some literature on worker ownership of Marineland, ’cause I guess she must look like somebody that work there.

  Changing colors, though, for them, then that gotta be both, seem like that gotta be both intelligence and instinct.

  I flashes the flashlight again, and gets the stun gun ready—it ain’t the kinda stun gun where you can set and reset the power on it like in the movies or on television, or like that Star Trek—and then I turns like I’m going out, and then I turns back, and then I sees the guaraches first, what I think they calls guaraches, them straw-type sandals, you know, ain’t them traditional woven leather, and then I shines the flashlight on them guaraches. I think them sandals made of that straw. And they got some other fiber they make them sandals out of. That raffia. My African sandals made out of that raffia, supposed to come from one of them African palm trees with them large leaves, but I guess that a kind of straw. I got them from one of them little import shops when I was in Canada once. I don’t wear them, though. I keeps them as art. Probably in that Old World Africa they call it raffia, but in New World America it’s straw. And then they got that wicker that they makes chairs and furniture out of—is it raffia in the Old World and wicker in the New?—probably they can make them wicker guaraches, but I don’t know whether them guaraches made out of straw or wicker or raffia.

  I know you ain’t no coyote, I says. Coyotes and foxes don’t wear no guaraches.

  ’Cept maybe them human coyotes. And they’s plenty of them human coyotes and coyote humans too. And I ain’t talking about just them tricksters neither. They’s biggish feet and biggish toes, but you can still tell they’s women’s feet. Slender ankles though. And them guaraches looks like they’s full of bird guano or bat guano. My friend Delgadina she tells me about that guano, ’cause me I just calls it bird shit and bat shit myself. ’Cept when I first heard that word guano, I thought it was some kinda caviar. She say you can buy you that guano to use as fertilizer. And she the one told me ’bout them human coyotes too, Delgadina. Trickster stories she call them and nayatls or some shit, ’cause she say they’s humans that can really change theyselves into coyotes and coyotes that can change theyselves into humans too. And that ain’t just no imaginary tale either, it ain’t just folklore, she say, ’cause they’s them that say the nayatl is real and she even sculpted one of them looking part coyote and part human. All over Mexico people tell you them tales of them nayatl and probably be pointing out people and tell you they a nayatl. She even pointed one of them out to me, say in Mexico people say he a nayatl, and supposed to be able to turn into everything from a jaguar to a spider crab, but just look like a ordinary man to me.

  He come into the cantina where she work and she say, You remember when I was telling you about them.

  Yeah, I says, sipping on my Budweiser.

  That one of them, she say. I ain’t want to turn around and look at no nayatl, ’cause I ain’t know what kindsa powers they has. And I ain’t want no nayatl to catch me spying on him, so I ain’t turn around to look immediately, but when she go over there to serve him, I kinda glance over there. He just look like a ordinary Mexican to me. But I guess that the power of them nayatls. They just is supposed to look like ordinary peoples.

  They call it folklore, say Delgadina. She ain’t talk nayatl while he in the cantina. But then some woman came in and the nayatl and the woman went upstairs to the little hotel above the cantina. But what’s folklore but people’s knowledge, people’s learning? said Delgadina. She says the people the types of people that believes in them nayatl, they ain’t always politically correct, but they’s got true knowledge. They’s got they own truths and knowledge. And sometimes they even starts rumors about people to say they a nayatl when they ain’t. But she say she know for true that that’s a true nayatl, though she ain’t never explained to me how she know he a true nayatl; she ain’t never explained to me that. But they’s villages in Mexico where they starts rumors about people being nayatl, like they usedta start rumors about people being communists when they wasn’t, like them Hollywood people.

  Maybe the people that is real nayatl they don’t even have no rumors about, I says.

  She have sculptured a nayatl that she have in her apartment. She ain’t no artist, though, Delgadina, and say that just a hobby. Or maybe she the kind of artist I heard somebody call a half-artist. But then maybe everybody got some degree of artist in them. Maybe some be one eighth of a artist or some shit or one sixteenth of a artist like with them musical notations. But then if you gotta be a artist, maybe it better to be a whole artist. Look like a whole artist make them guaraches, though they don’t call people that makes guaraches artists. The more pure the art, I guess, the more they refers to it as art. ’Cause them guaraches looks like handmade guaraches, they don’t look like no store-bought guaraches, no machine-m
ade guaraches. Them smugglers, they call them coyotes too, don’t they? Wonder if some of them smugglers consider theyselves to be true artists?

  Don’t look like no coyote feet, I says out loud, signifying, you know. You better come on outta there, gal, whoever you are. Them’s guaraches, ain’t they? Gal, this ain’t no game of hide and seek. Though it might be a game of “hide” if you don’t come outta there.

  The guaraches they disappears behind the detergent tin and me I heads back there with my stun gun ready, ’cause ain’t just mens that’s dangerous, like the poet Guillen say, they’s knife-toting womens too. And womens got as much coyote in them as mens, though from the point of view of the mens they got more. And from the point of view of the womens, the mens got more, ’cause that’s just human nature, or how people maintains they sense of who they are, though everybody always likes to think that they’s superior to human nature—coyote and chameleon and maybe even them prairie fox and that horny toad too. You know, how when the mens sings they blues songs they’s always singing about how the women’s done them wrong and when the womens sings they blues songs they’s always singing about how the men’s done them wrong. Don’t know if there’s a blues people talking about how they done each other wrong or how they done each other right. Or maybe that’s just love. Though the best thing for the mens and the womens to do is what that other song say—If you don’t want somebody peaches don’t shake they tree. And that’s for the mens and the womens too.