Randy White - Night Vision

“But I need a bathroom,” Tula insisted as she watched Squires lift the driver’s seat and then open what appeared to be a hatch in the floor. He removed a canvas bag that was heavy, judging from the way he handled it.

Squires turned and began walking toward the cypress pond where Tula could see white birds suspended like flowers among the gray limbs, some on nests in the high branches.

“Get moving,” he said without looking at the girl. “And I’m warning you-I don’t want to hear another goddamn word out of you.”

Tula got out of the truck and realized that her legs were shaking. Staying calm when the man was angry had not been easy, but this different voice, so flat and dead, was scaring her. She walked around the back of the truck, wondering if she should risk telling the man that her bladder was so full that she feared wetting herself. But Tula stopped after only a few words when her voice broke, afraid that she would start crying.

The Maiden had never cried, even when tortured by her tormentors. Even as flames had consumed her, the brave saint had not wept, but, instead, had called out the name of her Savior.

“Jesus,” Tula whispered now, her right hand clutching her amulets, as she followed Squires toward the trees. “Please protect and keep me, Jesus,” she said in Mayan, and continued repeating the phrase as they walked along the edge of a pond that was cooled by cypress shadows and moss. The giant kept walking, far into the tree shadows, so far that Tula’s abdomen began to cramp because of the pressure in her bladder.

Finally, Squires stopped beside a tree at the edge of the pond, where water black as oil was flecked with leaves, white-feather down and long-legged insects that skated on the surface beneath cooing birds. For a time, the man stood with his back to her, and Tula realized that he was taking something from the canvas bag.

“Turn around and look at the water,” Squires said to her in the same flat dead voice. “Do it now.”

“Can I please go to the bathroom first?” Tula asked the man, frightened but also angry at herself because tears had begun streaming down her face.

Squires was looking over his shoulder at her. “No. Just do what I tell you to do. This won’t take long. Turn your back to me and look at the water. Hurry up.”

Tula could see that Squires had something in his hand. She got a look at it when she pivoted toward the pond.

It was a large gun, silver with chrome.

Tula had seen many guns during the fighting in the mountains, but she had never seen a gun so shiny before. The metal was hypnotic, it was so bright, which scared her.

Tula’s chest shuddered, and she couldn’t help herself. Urine dribbled down her leg as she began crying, but silently, keeping her weakness to herself as she sensed the giant walk up behind her, the gun in his hand that was soon a silver reflection on the black water, the man on the surface huge, the size of a tree.

“Get down on your knees, child,” said a voice in Tula’s head, and Tula obeyed instantly, overwhelmed with relief, because it wasn’t a man’s voice. It was the Maiden. The Maiden had returned to her in her moment of need, and Tula knew everything would be okay now.

Get down on your knees, the Maiden counseled, and pray.

Behind Tula, as she whispered a prayer, the giant stood in silence. A minute passed. Then two minutes, then three.

In the water’s reflection, Tula could see that Squires was pointing the pistol only inches from the back of her head. Occasionally, he would lower it, but then he would raise the pistol again. But Tula was no longer frightened.

Once again, she felt a serene immunity from fear. The amulets she clutched in her hand provided strength. What happened would happen. She was with God and she was content. The Maiden would not allow her to suffer pain, and, ultimately, Tula would be reunited with her mother, her father and family again, which was something the girl wanted more than anything she had ever wanted in her life.

Be at peace, child. I am with you always, the Maiden said, speaking as softly as the muted light inside the girl’s head.

For another minute, Tula waited, her head bowed. She felt so confident and content that she decided to help the man along by saying, “If this is what you must do, then I forgive you. If it is God’s will, then you are doing the right thing. Don’t be afraid.”

Tula waited for so long in silence that she had resumed praying before the man spoke to her, “It’s what I have to do. I don’t have a damn choice, and it’s your own fault. You’ll tell the police what you saw and they’ll arrest me. Even though I didn’t kill that girl, they’ll charge me with murder. Do you understand?”

His voice wasn’t so empty of emotion now. It gave the girl hope, but she was inexplicably disappointed, too. She had felt so peaceful and free kneeling there, waiting for it to end.

Tula considered turning to look at the man but decided against it. Looking into the barrel of the silver gun might bring her fear back, and she didn’t want that to happen. She didn’t want to risk crying or losing control of her bladder again.

“I understand,” she said to Squires. “I’m sorry I saw what I saw. I didn’t mean to be in the tree watching you, but I was.”

Tula glanced at the water’s mirror surface and saw that Squires was leaning toward her now. Then she felt the barrel of the gun bump the back of her head as the man said, “You told me yourself you don’t lie. Even if you promised me you wouldn’t tell the cops, I wouldn’t believe you. Do you understand now why I have to do this? Unless you promise me-I mean, really promise me-and mean it.”

The man’s voice was shaking, and Tula knew he was going to pull the trigger. She closed her eyes, pressing her chin to her fingers, as she replied, “I can’t promise you, I’m sorry. If the police ask me, I will have to tell them the truth. I won’t lie to you and I won’t lie to them. It’s because of another promise I have made.”

In Tula’s ear, she heard a metallic Click-Click and she knew that the man had pulled back the revolver’s hammer. On her cheeks, she felt tears streaming, but she wasn’t afraid. She was ready for what happened next.

What happened next was, in the high cypress limbs above them, there was a squawking, cracking sound. Then the fluttering of wings as a bird tumbled from the tree canopy and thudded hard on the ground nearby. Tula looked up, surprised. Then she was on her feet and running toward it without even thinking, tucking the jade amulet and silver medallion into her T-shirt as she sprinted.

“It’s a baby egret!” she cried, kneeling over a thrashing bird that looked naked because its feathers hadn’t come in yet. “I think it broke its wing.”

Carefully, the girl cupped the fledgling in her hands, using her thumb to try to steady the bird’s weak neck. And she stood, saying over her shoulder to Squires, “That must be her mother up there. See her?”

Tula motioned to a snowy egret that was hovering overhead, its yellow feet extended as if to land, excited by the peeping noises the baby bird was making.

“Yes,” Tula said, “its wing is broken. At the convent, we took care of many sick animals. We can help this bird, I think.” Then she looked at Squires, adding, “I can’t stand it anymore. I have to go to the bathroom now.”

Then she stopped because of what she saw.

Harris Squires was sitting on the ground. He was rocking and crying, his hands locked around his knees, making a soft moaning sound in his misery. If the gun was somewhere on the ground nearby, Tula didn’t see it.

The scene was even stranger to Tula because, the way the man was sitting, slope-shouldered and huge, reminded her of a bear she had seen begging for peanuts at the zoo in Guatemala City.