Andrew Klavan - If We Survive

I laughed. “That’ll teach him.”

“Don’t worry, Jim,” said Meredith. She reached across the table and touched Jim’s hand. She could see he was afraid of the upcoming plane flight as well as I could. “I have a feeling Palmer could fly that plane safely in his sleep.”

Jim took a deep, unsteady breath. “Yeah, well, I hope you’re right because it looks like—”

And that’s when it happened. Just like that, out of nowhere. The door to the cantina opened again—I didn’t see it, I only realized later I had heard it.

And then the cantina—the world—our lives—exploded in a single gunshot—and I turned to see Mendoza holding the smoking pistol while Carlos the waiter tumbled down to the floor and died.

Then everything happened like I said before: the thundering footsteps, the armed men charging in and flooding the cantina, lining the walls, blocking the exits, blocking the stairs. A woman started to scream, then stopped. It was Nicki, her hand covering her mouth, her eyes starting to glisten with tears. The people at the other tables leapt to their feet. The men at the bar froze. The whole cantina went weirdly quiet—silent, except for the faint hiss of cheering coming from the soccer game on the TV.

And then I heard someone, a man, speak two words in a low whisper, his voice trembling with fear.

“Los Volcanes,” he said.

The Volcanoes .

Then it was over. Really, it all took no more than a second. Carlos was dead on the floor and the rest of us were completely surrounded by grim-faced men with machine guns. We were totally trapped before any of us could even react.

And then someone did react: Meredith.

She got up out of her chair. My hand went out to stop her, but too late. She was already moving quickly across the room toward Carlos.

Mendoza caught the motion out of the corner of his eye. He turned to Meredith quickly, fiercely, his craggy face pulled tight in a dangerous frown.

“Sit down, señorita!” he barked. “Don’t go near him!”

Meredith ignored him—totally. She didn’t even look at him. She didn’t even pause. I sat there helplessly, as if nailed to my chair. My guts twisted as I watched her hurry to Carlos’s side and kneel down beside him. She put her hand on the waiter’s neck, searching for a pulse.

“I said sit down!” Mendoza shouted. His deep, rough voice seemed to make the walls shake.

And still, Meredith paid absolutely zero attention to him. As I watched—as all of us, even the gunmen watched—she knelt there pressing her fingers into the fallen man’s neck for what seemed like a long, long time.

Then she looked up at Mendoza. Her face was calm and still, her eyes as clear and direct as ever.

“You’ve killed him, señor. He’s dead.”

Mendoza looked at her a long moment, as if trying to decide whether to answer her or to kill her too. Then, in a quick, businesslike manner, he slipped his pistol into the black holster on his belt. One corner of his mouth lifted in a sneer.

“He was an enemy of progress,” he told her.

Slowly, Meredith removed her hand from Carlos’s neck and lifted it to his eyes. The dead man’s eyes were still open, still staring at the ceiling with that expression of terror and sadness he’d had at the end. Gently, Meredith pushed his eyes closed.

Slowly—as we all watched her—she rose to her feet, to her full height. She was wearing khaki slacks and a white blouse. She had a full, sturdy figure and she had never reminded me more of a statue than just then, as she faced Mendoza. She gazed at the killer for what seemed like forever. Then, quietly, she said one word:

“Progress.”

Well, you had to have heard the way she said it, the tone of voice; so help me, she might just as well have slapped Mendoza in the face. It would’ve been less insulting.

At the sound of her contempt, the sneer vanished from Mendoza’s lips. His dark eyes smoldered with rage. His hand went back to his holstered pistol. I caught my breath, nearly certain he was about to shoot Meredith the same way he’d shot Carlos. But instead, he stepped forward. He stepped up to Meredith—close to her—inches away. He was about her height, maybe six feet, and they were eye to eye.

He stared at her. And I probably don’t have to tell you that Meredith didn’t flinch, didn’t quail at all. Then, suddenly, Mendoza’s hand flashed up. He grabbed Meredith by the hair—hard, so that she gasped with pain.

That broke the spell that held me to my chair. I leapt to my feet, ready to rush to Meredith’s defense. Pastor Ron leapt to his feet at the same moment. So did Jim.

And on the instant, men with guns surrounded us, pointing their weapons directly into our faces.

No one had ever pointed a gun at me before. It’s not the sort of thing that happens a lot around Spencer’s Grove. It’s an interesting experience too, if interesting is the word I want. Seeing that black barrel trained on you— knowing that sudden death could spit out the bore at any moment—it does something. It takes your will away. If this had been one of my daydreams, where I’m always the hero, I would’ve knocked the gun aside and rushed to Meredith anyway. In real life? The power to move seemed to drain right out of me. I stood there motionless, looking from the gun in my face to the place where Mendoza held Meredith by the hair, twisting his fist to make her gasp again with pain.

He looked at us—me and Pastor Ron and Jim—standing there helplessly under the machine guns. He flashed us a smile.

“What’s the matter, gentlemen?” he asked. “Is chivalry dead? Does America have no more men in it? No one to help a lady in distress?”

“Let her go!” I said.

One of the gunmen standing next to me jabbed the barrel of his rifle into my forehead. The pain rattled me, knocked me back against the table.

“Easy, boy,” Mendoza said to me through his gritted teeth. “You want to live to be a man, don’t you?”

“Really—Mr. Mendoza, isn’t it?” Pastor Ron said in his calm, come-let-us-reason-together voice. “There’s no need to—”

“Shut up, priest,” Mendoza said.

One of the gunmen emphasized the point by stepping closer to Pastor Ron, raising the barrel of his weapon to Pastor Ron’s forehead.

Pastor Ron shut up. And I didn’t blame him.

“What about you, Señor Dunn?” Still clutching and twisting Meredith’s hair—so hard he nearly dragged her off her feet—Mendoza raised his eyes to Palmer. I turned to Palmer too.

And do you know what Palmer Dunn was doing? You are not going to believe this, but I swear it’s the truth. Palmer was watching the soccer game. So help me. Standing at the bar. Drinking his beer. Watching the soccer game on the TV on the wall. Just as if nothing had happened. Just as if nothing were happening now.

When Mendoza spoke to him, Palmer glanced his way, pausing with the beer half lifted to his lips as if he’d only just noticed the other man was there.

“You talking to me?” he asked.

Mendoza laughed and shook Meredith in his grip, hard, the way a dog shakes a rabbit he’s caught in his teeth.

“I asked you what you are going to do, señor?”

Palmer considered Mendoza—and then Meredith—as if he were trying to figure out what all the fuss was about. Then he reached out along the bar. There was a wooden bowl there, full of macadamia nuts. He took a handful.

“I think I’m gonna have some of these nuts,” he said. He popped a few into his mouth and chewed. “Mm.”

Mendoza laughed. It killed me the way he wouldn’t let Meredith go, the way he went on gripping and twisting her hair, sort of pulling her this way and that, displaying her to his gunmen like some sort of trophy. “You surprise me, Señor Dunn,” he said—but he was talking to his soldiers as much as to Palmer. He was entertaining them. They laughed as they looked on, cradling their guns. “You are big strong American soldier, no?”