The Story of the Youths Who Went Forth to Learn What Fear Was
Billy got a bag of beans in the mail. His brother Jack was a serial killer.
Billy wanted to plant the beans. Jack wanted to cut up drifters.
They went for a walk in the woods to see if they could talk it out.
A compromise was reached:
Jack would find a drifter and Billy would plant the beans inside.
(Outside the moon hung like a hang nail on the finger of night.)
Sure---let’s open her up and see how she shakes out.
…
Billy breathed out, and when he breathed in he tasted death.
They disassembled the girl and planted her in the earth.
Jimmy kicked some dust over the grave with the heel of his boot, while Billy smoked a cigarette.
Billy threw his tools in the trunk and pointed the car out into the desert. They were almost to Las Cruces by the time she began to bloom.
II
How Las Cruces Came to Be
(an interlude to provide some Historical perspective)
The most common theory is that in 1830, there was an Apache massacre of a party of nine travelers, including a Mexican Army General, a Priest, and five choir boys. Only one choir boy survived the massacre, and buried the other, marking the graves with three crosses. The area became known as "El Pueblo del Jardin de Las Cruces."
IIa
How History Would Have Liked to Record the Scene if it Had Been Given the Chance (Or the Story of How Shade Entered the World)
Jakob and Wilhelm hitched a ride with Don Fernando to Albuquerque.
In Albuquerque they took in the sites, prayed at the Mission and ate a stew
of Navajo and Apache. They trekked down the El Camino Real to Chaco and had their pictures taken among the ruins. In the photo Wilhelm has his arm around the shoulders of Jakob, they both are squinting into the sun and the photo captures the wind as it moves through the canyon. This is where Billy and Jimmy should have buried the girl. Placed her among all the bright things risen out of dust.
