Chapter Nine: Settling In
They spent the next five days at their camp, Monica in her tent, grieving, Gibson wandering around their small open space, bored and on a constant lookout for more scorpions, John doing his best to give them both the attention and care that they needed. He would take the boy with him on short excursions into the woods, searching for a water source and keeping an eye out for wild animals, the submachine gun in his hands, the pistol in Gibson's with the safety on. "I'll train you one day how to use it, just not now. Don't need to create any noise that might signal to someone where we are."
The predators were few and far between – the black form of a jaguar slipping by 300 meters ahead of them, the distant roar of a what sounded like a bear, the clatter of monkeys coming from trees all around them. There was no nearby water source that he could determine, which was a blessing in that there were fewer animals to contend with, but not helpful in allowing them more time to stay hidden. He estimated that they would need to leave in two days, maybe three if they were more strict with rations. That wasn't going to be enough time for anyone to forget seeing their faces on TV, and he doubted that the story had been buried yet.
That night, as Monica lay in John's arm, staring at the darkness before her, thinking about John's warning that they would need to leave soon, while thoughts of her mother slipped in every few seconds, she suddenly stumbled upon something she'd forgotten for the last week.
"Oh my god," she exclaimed, sitting up suddenly.
"What's wrong?" asked John.
"Oh no, oh no, oh no. This isn't good."
"What?"
She flipped on a flashlight and grabbed her bag, hoping against hope that she was wrong, but when she found what she was looking for, she was only proven right.
"What's wrong?" John asked again, trying to see what she had dug up from her bag.
She held it out to him. It was a round plastic container. "I forgot to take them. I haven't… not since before. before she died." With that, her tears were triggered again. John pulled her into him and let her cry.
"I fucked up, I'm sorry, John. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to forget."
"Hey now, hush. It's my fault, not yours. You've had enough going on. I should have known that."
"What if I…?"
"Mon, we're not going to worry about things that haven't happened yet, ok? And I don't think it works like that, right? Barbara would forget sometimes too, but she said that the stuff kept so many hormones floating through her body that she didn't really, you know, ovulate. It took us five months after she stopped taking the pill just to conceive Luke."
"But what if?"
"I don't want to play the what if game. If something happens, we'll deal with it. Nothing's happened and it probably won't happen, ok?"
"How many days has it been?"
"Six."
She counted. "I'll know in three or four days."
"Ok. Why don't you take whichever one you're supposed to take for today and get back on schedule."
She nodded and accepted the water bottle he offered her. Sleep did not come easily for either one of them.
They broke camp two days later and started out towards the coast again. A tiny cluster of sod houses caught Monica's attention and she suggested they try their luck there.
A few large men rode past on burrows who barely looked strong enough to support them. The men eyed them suspiciously and did not reciprocate John's nod. A small group of children stopped their game and watched as they drove past; some of the older boys followed them.
"It looks pretty out of the way here. They might not know about us."
They parked the truck and headed into a little corner grocery. The woman working the till eyed them suspiciously. Gibson did not say a word, so it seemed that for now, they were safe. They picked up as many supplies as they could, which seemed to appease the woman – she didn't like them, she didn't trust them, but they were obviously rich and were buying as much food in one go as some of her customers bought in the span of three months. As she rung them up slowly (for she had to show her disapproval somehow), Monica asked about finding a place to rent nearby. The woman did not answer. Monica took out 50 pesos, about five dollars, and slid it towards the woman.
"My husband and child and I would appreciate your assistance in helping us to locate a place to live."
The woman looked her up and down critically. She ascertained that Monica was Mexican by the accent, she obviously had money by the amount of food they bought and the cash she so easily slid across the counter, and she looked like she hadn't seen so much as a basin of water to rinse her face off with in a week.
"My sister has a small house that she does not use. I could ask her. But I will not see her until this evening. If you will return in the morning, I will let you know."
"Is there anywhere we can stay for the night?"
The woman looked at the counter. Monica slid another 50 pesos across.
"I will close up early and go talk to my sister. If she is interested in renting to you, she will find you."
Monica nodded. "We will await your return in the square. And please, give our greetings to your sister," she said, pressing yet another 50 pesos into the woman's hand.
In the village square, which was just an open flat area of dirt and dust, the found a tiny restaurant and ordered tamales and ate in the cool interior underneath a rickety fan that John feared would fall on their head's at any moment. They stepped outside afterward and were beginning to wander towards the small church across the square when a small woman in a pink flowered dress and bright blue shoes came towards them.
The house was theirs. Her asking price was steep – obviously her sister had told her they were rich gringos – but Monica whittled her down and then decided not to pay until they had seen what they were renting. They drove the woman back. It was a good five minute drive to her house, and another five minutes past that to the unoccupied house.
It was certainly not a pretty sight, but it would do. There were three bedrooms, a large open space and a small kitchen in the back, with an afterthought of a bathroom affixed to the back wall of the house. There were only a few pieces of furniture. The soft curving adobe walls were all painted in a bright turquoise that was chipped in several places. Nothing had been cleaned in quite some time, and Gibson was quick to point out a scorpion hiding in a corner of one of the bedrooms.
"I'm not sleeping in here," he whispered to Monica.
But it was a shelter, and the woman finally agreed to a rent of just 1000 pesos a month, which was much less than her original asking price of 3000. For an extra 500 pesos, she would send her sons over with some extra furniture that they could use, including mattresses to go on the bed frames. Monica thanked her graciously and handed over 1500 pesos and offered to have John drive her home, but the woman waved it off.
They finally had their own home, and they were in a town where so far Gibson had been unable to identify anyone who recognized them. Senora Herrera, their new landlady was kind enough to include pots and pans in the delivery of furniture that her two sons brought over. They settled into their new life quickly and with great relief.
As they cleaned and set up their new home, Monica was being eaten with anxiety and a hint of eager anticipation. She was late. Three days now into the placebo pills and nothing had happened. But she was beginning to change. She had lost her mother, but the thought of having a child made her grief less painful. She began to smile again.
It was the next night, when she was four days late, that she thought she might mention it to John. He had been paying attention of course, but he didn't want to broach the subject, and he was hoping that there were other factors at work.
But when she went to bathroom, she realized that her hopes were in vain. She was not pregnant. She did what she had been doing for so long now, she responded by crying and sobbing. John grew concerned and knocked on the door. "Mon, you ok in there?"
She managed to get up and open the door. Her arms flew around his neck and she told him that she wasn't pregnant.
"I told you we didn't need to worry."
"No, I wanted to be pregnant."
This was news to John. "Monica," he said holding her face in his hands and trying to understand what was going on in her head, "There are a million reasons why it's a good thing you're not pregnant. You realize that, don't you?"
"But I wanted… she's gone, and I thought… I thought it was her way of saying she forgave me."
"Oh, Monica, of course she wouldn't blame you for what happened. But you don't need to connect this to her. You've been through so much, your body probably just stopped working, you know. That's all."
"I want to have children."
"Ok. But that's not an option right now. I have no doubt in my mind you'd be a good mother. I see you with Gibson, I saw you with William. You're a natural. But we have to keep Gibson safe, and until he is, we can't risk his life by having a child. I don't like that it's like that, but it is. At least we've got each other, right? You're happy I came to my sense, right?" She managed to give a smile through her tears. "Come on, let's go to bed now."