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II. The Long Way to Santa Mierda
Even if, I repeat, even if, you are dying of thirst, you stay out of Santa Mierda. You get tempted, boy, you sure get tempted. Your mouth is dry and your body is aching, and everything that functions calls out to Christ almighty to let it stop needin’ to work. But you just let those legs keep breaking and those feet keep blistering, because there is positively nothing for you in Santa Mierda. The desert is angry, an inferno during the day and an icebox at night, and I’d tell you to stay out of it, if I really thought you could.
When I was your age, the desert had just appeared. There were those who thought that it might have been raining sand, or that the Pacific Ocean was starting to dry up , but, far as I know, a desert just came to be, and I, a curious young man like yourself just had to know exactly what was out there. My father had tried to convince me I was a damn fool to try. My mother broke down crying. But, I couldn’t think about them and what they needed from me, I could only think that there was a desert and that desert might need me. Or I might need the desert, that is. (How could I have admitted that, though?) I ended up leaving them there and never seeing them again.
When I went out into the desert, at first I found other young men and women who had come to see where it came from and what there was to gain from it. But, after a few long days of travel, I found myself quite alone. Everybody else was too cowardly or too smart to venture so far out into the desert. It didn’t suit them at all to be out there finding only sand. Truth is, there is only sand to find, until sooner or later, you come upon Santa Mierda.
I know you’ve heard rumors by now, about folk who’ve set up shop out there, a group of intrepid pioneers continuing the ancestral tradition of manifest destiny. The young folks in the desert had talked about it, saying that it must be something, all the way out there and still stores and bars and a zoo. They said, “it must really be quite a zoo, all the way out there. I bet they’ve got animals we’ve never even heard of.” I had visions of pygmy elephants, of dogs the size of horses, and of birds of colors that had not yet been named. So distant, so far flung, so exotic was this place, that even after I ran out of water and food, I had to make my way to Santa Mierda.
Some cultures say hell is hot, others say its cold. I wondered if this indecisive desert just didn’t know what kind of hell it wanted to be. Blistering, dying of thirst, I had wandered three days before I saw the sign. Santa Mierda, ten miles. My beaten body suddenly got some vigor in it, and I took off in a run until I couldn’t run anymore and then I took off walking fast until I couldn’t walk fast anymore and finally I walked until I found myself at another Santa Mierda ten miles sign. I wanted to lay down and die by that sign, until, in the distance, I smelled food cooking.
The signs were a trick, made to separate the dedicated from the merely curious. I was dedicated. Starving and beat and demoralized though I was, I knew in the distance there was food and there was Santa Mierda, the city of joy in the desert. And sure enough, another hour and a half of walking and I was there. A neon sign shined the desert pink and made it glow with hope and promise. If I were a religious man I would have stopped and thanked god, but as I’ve never been one, this was all my triumph and I bathed in the neon glow, all warmth and brightness.
A sweet looking brunette placed a gentle hand on my shoulder and whispered with hot teasing little fingers of words:
“Congratulations, brother. You’re here and that makes you one of the elect.”
Tickling caressed me as I took in the words and her company. I turned around, and without a word, my lips were wrapped in a kiss. And one thing led to another. Soon my weak body felt strong and the growlings in my stomach were starting to vanish. The smell of the food in the distance seemed to by itself be enough to fill me, and filling her was filling me, too. Time disappeared and we rolled around and enjoyed each other, until we slept, and though the neon sign blazed hot it was easy.
I woke up in the morning and she was gone. I feared that at the end of the desert, I had encountered my first mirage and the night of pleasure was just insanity creepin’ in. I got up and followed the food smell to a little diner. You’d think from all the tricks and the girl who greeted me that there would be temptations and perfection and the most wonderful food you could ever smell. That ain’t true. There wasn’t a waitress under fifty, and the food was nothing but grease. The people couldn’t be the elect. Fat, sad, quiet, shoveling food down wide, joyless throats. I sat down and ate three of the worst cheeseburgers I’d ever had. My empty stomach was far from happy.
But I was determined that I my fate wouldn’t be the same. I was determined to make myself happy. I wouldn’t admit to myself that I should go home or that my days of wandering in the desert were a bad idea. I decided that perhaps I should try and do everything I loved from civilization here, since the desert would eat civilization anyhow. There were abandoned storefronts that looked like they might have once sold nice things, jewelry stores that had no jewelry, bookstores that collected dust, and a library whose doorknob had rotted clean off .All kinds of nothing to do that I had to convince myself could not be allowed to kill my spirit. At last, there came promise; at the edge of town stood the zoo.
I entered, crushed by row after row of empty cages, up until I heard the roar of the tigers. The zoo was made up only of two white, pristine Bengal tigers, noble and satisfied. With these two tigers was a surprisingly cheery looking old man who safely slid juicy steaks between their bars. I marveled at how much better the animals ate than the people. A smile
“Well, boys,” he said to the tigers, “I’ll be damned. I don’t know who looks hungrier. Maybe we should grill up one of these for this here stranger.”
I almost felt like cryin’ when he served me that steak. We sat and we talked for a few hours about things outside the desert and about what made us come to Santa Mierda. He had lost his wife to cancer and his children to apathy and he had nothing left but the two tigers. And when he heard that Santa Mierda had a zoo , he thought that maybe he should come out to the desert and see if they could use a pair of tigers. When he got there and found out that the last zookeeper had taken his menagerie and walked, he decided to settle in and do his best to give Santa Mierda a zoo. I wish I hadn’t asked what I asked him next. I asked him:
“What do they do in this town for fun?”
He looked at me awfully funny, and he said that everybody goes down to the saloon and they drink and mix and dance. That seemed as nice a prospect to me as it would to any other young man. I walked in and there were quiet, sullen young women seated all around and fat, balding men at the bar waiting for them, with weak attempts at lecherous looks. But things changed when I caught the eyes of every young lady in the bar. I danced with girl after girl after girl , danced until I was dizzy and then drank myself dizzier. I ended up going back to a round, friendly blonde’s apartment and staying the night. It was then that I realized I would never need to pay rent in Santa Mierda. After that, life was apartment after apartment , girl after girl. In the mornings, I went to the zoo and at night I danced.
After awhile the girls were starting to repeat. I was surprised that I was coming full circle, but on the other hand I wasn’t.
The real surprise came one morning when the zookeeper was leading the tigers through town. I ran up to him and asked what was happening.
“I’m leaving,” he said, “there’s gotta be a better place for me.”
“I hear the desert’s spreading. I hear it’s probably not safe to leave.”
The old man shrugged, took the tigers and ventured out into the miles of sandy oblivion. I never found out where he ended up.
I was sad to see him go, but I figured life went on and I went back to my apartments and my girls and my dancing. I found myself getting fat and I wondered where my hair was going. I realized with a heavy heart that the zoo was the only reason I stayed in Santa Mierda. The girls looked on me sadly and marveled that somebody else was going to leave and that they would have to wait for not only another zookeeper but another young man .
Last time, I checked boy, you’re not a zookeeper.
“So what do we do,” you ask.
Near as I can figure, we’ve got wood and nails and we’re just about strong enough to build us a town. I know the desert’s coming, I know it’s the future, but I say we try anyhow. And after that, we just wait for a man with two tigers.
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