Day of the Dead

‘I’m not sure I …’ She felt herself flush. ‘He got hurt last night, and I was wondering if …’

‘Danny got hurt?’ He sounded concerned.

‘Is he okay?’ a blond woman sitting across from him asked.

‘I think so,’ Michelle said, and then Charlie patted the empty chair next to him.

‘Sorry, my dear, I didn’t mean to make you just stand there. You want something to drink?’

She sat. He seemed nice. Harmless at least. And he knew Daniel.

‘Thanks. Yes, I would.’

‘I wouldn’t have the margies here,’ he confided. ‘They use Sprite.’

‘Have the piña colada,’ the blond woman said. ‘Two for one during happy hour.’ She was large, on the far side of middle age, the blond an obvious dye job, wearing a Hawaiian shirt patterned with orange and white hibiscuses.

‘Piña colada, I guess.’

‘I’m Vicky.’

Her smile, unlike Charlie’s, showed gleaming white teeth.

‘Smoke?’ Charlie asked.

‘No, thank you.’ Not surprising that he smoked. She could smell the cigarettes on him, layer upon layer of smoke on his T-shirt and shorts that no amount of washing would vanquish, on his index finger and thumb as well, browned and baked by burning tobacco.

Their drinks arrived, Michelle’s piña coladas coming in two large plastic cups. She sipped one. The rum cut through the sugar with a tang of kerosene.

‘What happened to Danny?’ Charlie asked.

‘It was a robbery.’

‘Oh, my God,’ Vicky said with a gasp. ‘That’s terrible!’

‘He’s okay,’ Michelle said quickly. The more Vicky reacted, the less she wanted to talk about it. ‘But I have some of his things.’

Both Charlie and Vicky had Daniel’s cell number, but no landline. No address.

‘You know who I bet does?’ Vicky said suddenly. ‘Gary. He told me he was stopping by tonight, and if he doesn’t, I can call him.’

‘Great,’ Michelle said. Maybe she’d get her phone back. That would make the evening worth it.

‘Oh, Gary. He’s delightful,’ Charlie muttered.

Vicky grabbed her wadded-up napkin and tossed it at him. ‘Now, come on,’ she said. ‘Gary’s … a good person. He really likes to help people.’

‘He’s not my sort,’ Charlie said in an exaggerated whisper. ‘He golfs.’

Michelle smiled, for a moment forgetting that she didn’t want to be here.

She’d waited for almost an hour, listening to the blur of small talk around her and sipping her piña colada, when Vicky said, ‘Oh, here’s Gary.’ She waved in the direction of a man who’d just come in. He wore a neat, expensive Lacoste shirt and khaki shorts, Ray-Bans pushed up onto his forehead.

‘Well, hey there, Vicky,’ Gary said. He made his way up to the table, next to Michelle, and gave her a long, thorough look. ‘I don’t believe we’ve met.’

Michelle wasn’t sure how old he was. He had a face that seemed out of balance, his cheeks and lips plump like a baby’s, the knowing eyes above peering out from wrinkled, puffy lids, all framed by blond curls.

‘Michelle.’

He took her hand, gave it a little squeeze. ‘Can I get you a drink, Michelle? You look practically empty.’

He signaled to the waiter before she could say yes or no.

‘Michelle’s a friend of Danny’s,’ Vicky said. ‘Did you hear … ?’

Gary found a chair and pulled it next to Michelle. ‘Oh, man, I sure did. So that was you in the hotel with him?’

She’d thought she was beyond embarrassment by now, but she wasn’t. She kept her voice level. ‘It was.’

‘I’ll tell you, this town …’ He shook his head, his bow lips curved in a little smile. ‘It’s getting kind of crazy here.’

‘What happened to Danny?’ an older woman a few seats away asked. Karen, or was it Kathy? Michelle had been introduced to too many people to keep track. She was thin, tanned almost as dark as the waiter, her hair in a long gray braid.

‘Oh, well, the way I heard it, some narcos tried to rob him, cracked him on the head.’ Gary spoke loudly, so that others sitting at the table could hear him, even over the blare of Steely Dan playing on the bar’s speakers.

‘How do you know they were narcos?’ the older woman asked, but no one paid attention.

‘The narcos are out of control,’ said a middle-aged man sitting two seats over. ‘Did you hear about what happened by Bucerías yesterday?’

Everyone started talking at once. A battle with machine guns and grenades, between drug gangs and police. Narcos incinerated in cars. Police ambushed at a crossroads in retaliation.

Michelle felt dizzy. She closed her eyes. Clutched her drink. Took another long sip through the plastic straw. Like a pineapple milkshake.

‘Fucking Sinaloa cowboys,’ someone said. ‘They ought to put an electric fence around that whole shithole state. Save us all a lot of trouble.’

‘Guerrero,’ Michelle said. ‘They were from Guerrero.’

‘It’s just really sad.’ Vicky’s eyes glistened. ‘I hate seeing this kind of thing happen in Vallarta.’

‘If this were St Louis, or New Orleans, no one would even blink,’ Charlie said. ‘But here in paradise we expect everything to be perfect.’

‘Oh, come on,’ the Asian man said – American, Michelle amended, from his accent. ‘Machine guns? Grenade launchers?’

‘I’m talking about a few robberies, not narcos killing each other.’

‘This town depends on tourists and foreign residents. If crime gets out of control and people stop coming here, everyone is fucked. Right down to your favorite Babaloo on the beach selling shrimp on a stick.’

Michelle’s head hurt. Probably from all the cheap rum and sugar. She really wanted to go back to the hotel and sleep, even though the sun had barely set.