Charlie Huston: Six Bad Things

The rain is coming down hard and people are coming out of the park, climbing into their cars and refilling the tour buses. I look at the sky, look at Mickey.

– Might not stop for awhile.

– I like it, let’s go.

He reaches in his pack and pulls out his poncho and rain hat. I do not have a poncho or a rain hat. We get out of the truck and I am soaked through before we get halfway to the main building. Once we are safely under cover the rain slackens to a gentle drizzle. Fucking Caribbean. I have to buy Mickey his ticket. He tells me he owes me. We go through the turnstile, past the gift shop, the bookshop, the coffee shop, through another turnstile where they snap on our wristbands, and then into the park itself. You walk through a little tunnel of trees. Into a clearing, and there’s Kukulkan. And you know, it is pretty cool.

I’m not big on sightseeing, but I’ve been out here a couple times in the last few years, enough to pick up some details, and now I play tour guide for Mickey. He wants to save the climb up the temple steps for last, so we start with the Ball Court. We stand at one end and look down the length of the stone stadium. Mickey nods his head.

– Big.

– Two hundred and seventy-two feet by one hundred and ninety-nine.

– Big.

We walk down the court and stand under one of the stone hoops mounted at midpoint on either side of the Court. Mickey leaps and tries to touch the bottom of the rim, but can’t get close.

– That is where they put the heads through to score?

– Nah, they used a rubber ball.

– I thought heads?

– No. The Toltecs, when they took over, there’s some evidence that they might have sacrificed the losing team.

– And they played like soccer.

– Any part of your body but your hands.

– See, soccer rules. Much better than American football.

I can say it now.

– I don’t like football. I like baseball.

– See, you know, I know this about you also. But still, soccer is also better than baseball.

I turn my back and walk toward the rest of the ruins.

WE DO the Temple of Warriors and the Thousand Columns and the smaller features of the main clearing, and then Mickey is ready for the climb. Kukulcan, aka The Temple, aka The Castle, aka The Pyramid, aka El Castillo: it’s why people come here. The seventy-nine-foot ziggurat built over a smaller pyramid that is still housed inside. There’s debate over whether it was built by the Mayans or the Toltecs, but they both seem to have used it as a place of worship and sacrifice, and also as a calendar of some kind. There are ninety-one steps on each of the four sides and a small temple on top representing a single giant step. Do the math: three hundred sixty-five steps altogether. Neat. There’s more! Kukulcan was a golden serpent god, and on both the spring and autumnal equinoxes, shadows that look like writhing snake bodies play on two of the staircases. No shit. But mostly, mostly, it’s a long fucking climb up a stone staircase on something around a forty-degree incline. A climb that will be made in the rain today. Rain that is getting harder.

Mickey trots up, of course. I keep a pretty brisk pace, but, having a stronger sense of my own mortality, I take time to plant each foot firmly on the rain-slick steps, gravity tugging at my back the whole way up. We’re climbing the west stairs, which have been restored and even have a handrail running up the center. The north stairs have also been restored, but only have a rope strung from top to bottom. The east and south faces have been allowed to erode so tourists can get a sense of the condition the place was in when it was found. I pass a couple people crawling down backward on all fours, but nobody going up.

Mickey is waiting for me at the top, arms thrust up in a V. He wants me to take a picture of him like that with the jungle in the background. I do. A few people are up here, hiding just inside the temple, waiting for the rain to ease off before they go down. Mickey wants to go inside the temple and see the Jaguar Throne.

– You go ahead.

– No, but you must go with me.

– I’ve seen it.

– You can show me then.

– Look, it’s tiny in there and I don’t really like tiny places. Besides, it’s smelly.

He steps a little closer to me, still smiling.

– No, but, you know, you really must go with me because I do not want you to be alone.

Jesus H.

– Mickey, can I have a word with you?

We edge around the outside of the temple, away from most of the people, to the east face of the pyramid. Looking out over the endless jungle.

– What is it?

– I’m not going anywhere. What I am going to do is keep our bargain. I’m gonna give you a million dollars to keep your mouth shut because I don’t want to die. I’m not looking to ditch you, so just go poke around inside and then we can look at the Observatory if you want and then we’ll drive back to the beach and I’ll give you your money.

He squints at me.

– We will go to Merida and you will get me the money.

Sigh.

– The money’s not in Merida, it’s at my place.

– You said Merida.

– I lied.

– Why?

– Because.

His mouth tightening into a straight line.

– You wanted to take me to Merida, for what? To do something. To do something to me.

– Look.

– No! You cannot fuck with me. I know what this is, what you were trying. My father was in “business,” I know about “business.” You were thinking to kill me.

And funny as it may be, him saying it fills me with shame.

– Yeah. Yeah, I was.

– Fucking, fuck. I cannot trust you.

– Let’s just.

– I will tell you what we will just do. You, you will take me to the money and you will give me two million. No, you will give me three million.

He’s getting loud and spittle is flying from his lips. I look around to see if we’ve drawn an audience, but the rain is letting off and the other people are moving to the north and west sides to climb down.

– Mickey.

– Do not call me Mickey. That is for my friends. You now call me Mikhail, like my father named me.

– You need to settle down, and we’ll work this out.

– It is worked out, you will give me three million or I will tell where you are.

I can keep my cool here. I know I can.

– You’re going to get a lot of money, but I will not give you three million. I can’t.

He throws up his arms in disgust.

– You are wanting, you know, to bargain with me? You are selfish. Yes, because this is not just about you.

– What do you mean?

– A selfish shit dog of a man.

– What do you mean, not just about me?

– My father’s friends, they are not stupid, they know where your family lives. And you, selfish man, want to bargain with your family’s life?

– No, I don’t.

And I push Mickey down the rubbled east staircase of the Temple of Kukulcan. The first human sacrifice here in nearly a thousand years.

ON THE way home I stop in town to pick up a few things at the store. I go to the Chedraui, Mexico’s version of Costco. I find the tape gun and reinforced packing tape I want, but none of the cardboard boxes they have for sale are big enough. I grab some cat food and a few other things, then go outside and pull around to the loading dock. They have a big pile of discarded boxes and the guys let me take my pick.

It’s after ten when I get to The Bucket. There must have been a couple folks hanging out late because Pedro’s just locking up the booze. I turn off the Willys and walk over with a huge sack of limes from the Chedraui.

– Sorry I’m late.

He takes the limes and stuffs them into one of the cabinets.