No Good Deed...

word count: 858

    The stranger handed the Fedrali a six-pack of Budweiser.  My heart slowed to approximately its regular rate, but I was still sweating.  Crossing the border that morning I'd known I was unprepared.  I didn’t take any beer, no girlie magazines and enough cash for a taco and a beer only.  But the clean right waves would be worth it I decided.

    The Fedralis stopped me just after turning onto old Highway 1 towards San Diego.  They didn’t have a reason for stopping me, they didn’t need one.  They wanted American beer or a Playboy magazine.  Sometimes they wanted cash, but they knew that surfers didn’t usually have much cash.  But they didn’t usually find a surfer alone either.  As I continued to deny the joint they had planted in my truck it was becoming obvious to the Fedralis that I did not have anything to give them and they were in fact going to have to take me into custody to save their system.  They couldn’t very well let one guy go and expect the constant supply of beer and skin mags they were accustomed to, to continue.  I was scared.  I’d never been in a Mexican jail before, but I knew the stories.

    Then, this guy in an old Chevy van had pulled over, it was an oxidized red, with spots rusted through on the fenders.  The guy was four or five years older than me, twenty-two or twenty-three and smooth, real smooth.  He gave them two Hustler magazines and a six-pack of Bud. 

    I rested my forearms on the bed of my truck, hung my head and heaved a relieved sigh.  Looking up I shakily said, “Thanks, man it was looking pretty scary.  Thanks.”

    He looked at me for a moment, then said, “No problem amigo, you owe me though.”  He wasn’t smiling; his pockmarked face was cast in granite.  Cold eyes.

    “Yeah, that I do,” my voice was settling a little, I almost sounded like I wasn’t going through puberty.

    “I could use some help myself at the moment.”  His voice made it sound like a question, but his eyes left little doubt.

    “What?”

    Again, he was silent for a moment, measuring me.  “I have something that needs to be in San Quintin, but I have to be back in La Jolla tonight.  You take it down there for me?”

    “I barely have enough gas to get back to San Diego.”

    “I can give ya gas money.”  We locked eyes.  “I really need this done and you owe me.”

    “What is it?”

    “She won’t give you any trouble,” he laughed softly as he handed me a hundred dollars in tens.

    The money was in my hands when what he had said registered.  He opened side doors of the van, there was a girl awkwardly lying on a filthy mattress.  She was maybe sixteen.  Her face was dirty and tear streaked, her sun bleached hair a mess.  A white breast visible through her torn blouse and a skirt and torn panties were around an ankle.  She was doped to the gills.

    “I can’t do this, you can’t do this, this is…it’s wrong…”

    He turned on me, “Listen kid, because of me you aren’t on your way to jail in Ensenada.  You know what they do to a blonde surfer kid like you there?  Do you?”  He paused, “It’s not nice, you wouldn’t last a month, and this is your only option.”  He took the girl by an arm and her hair and slid her out of the van, dumping her in the dirt and gravel on the side of the road.  “She is yours now, stop at the Pemex station just this side of San Quintin, ask Alberto for directions to ‘Muerta de Fiestas’, take her there and leave.”  He got into his van, “Make sure she gets there.  People are waiting and I’m the nicest guy you're gonna meet today.”  He started the van and headed north, to the border. 

    I looked at the girl sprawled at my feet; a deep tan line was visible on her legs and waist.  I knelt and pulled her panties and skirt on as best I could.  I stood, knelt again and vomited.  Then, as gently as I could I got her into the truck and more or less safely buckled in.  There was a cantina up Highway 1 where the guy would wait and see if I tried to go north.  I could head south to Ensenada and go east and north from there, but maybe somebody would be looking for me in Ensenada, there was an old road at La Fonda that went over the hills and came out at Francisco Zarco.  I could get there on the gas I had and go north to cross at Tecate.  I would be driving the rest of the day and most of the night.  I’d be in serious trouble with my parents when I got home, but that was the least of my worries.  They would understand when they found out what was happening.

    I turned the truck around and headed south to La Fonda, Francisco Zarco and Tecate.

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