The M.I.L.F. Man

"Woe be unto women like you..."

I watched him for a few seconds...and then smiled and said, "Nope."

And I loved the big laugh it got. And how he touched my face again and said, "Paper thin, these walls. Priests skulking around, too."

I shuddered. "Okay, that's creepy."

"Not how I meant that, either, but it's probably best we behave accordingly."

He kind of loved me up with his eyes then. Gives me the shivers when he gives me that gaze. "I couldn't function properly with you gone. I found myself unable to form a proper sentence or...follow a thought. You're like water or food or...that sort of thing to me. I waste away..."

I was about to leap on him, thin walls be damned, when there was this huge BANG--Chas leapt up just as the door flew open, off the hinges, actually.

And this camo-covered dude with a ponytail and a long, braided beard pointed this massive AK at us and barked, "Let's roll! Now!"

Something sent me rushing to grab my bag--he turned that gun on me when I dove for it. And when Chas leapt right between that gun and me, Beard Man smiled, poked the barrel of the gun into Chas' chest and chuckled, "Lookit this pretty mother fucker here! Wha'chu gon' do, son?"

Chas shoved the barrel away and Beard Man snatched my bag and looked in, sniffed...and frowned. Because I'd done this thing some of my women friends did when they knew Customs might search their luggage when they were traveling between countries.

I was heading toward the border on a day when the checkpoint agents just outside of town might not just wave me through as usual. So I took all but one row of the big sanitary pads out of the package, stuffed the baggies full of Maria's herbs down in there and put the pads back just like they were arranged at the factory.

And then on top of the pads I'd put a couple of pairs of soiled panties. Gross, but in this day and age nobody wants to be touching anything with blood on it, even with gloves on. If they look at you funny, you just say something like, "Caught me off guard," like there'd been no time to rearrange things in a more sanitary way.

Cause after a long day rooting through all kind of luggage, some agents decide it's just not worth the trouble. Though some of them take it as a signal to dig even deeper. But I've never had one reach into a package of pads or tampons so far. Not at the little checkpoints outside border towns, anyway. At the actual border they'll tear a whole car apart if they get suspicious.

Beard Man grimaced and shoved the bag back at me so roughly that Chas bristled. But I caught hold of his arm and said, "Papi, just go."

And Beard Man snorted, "Yeah, Papi better go. Let's move!"

Chas put an arm around me as we stepped into the chaos in the hallway. Four camo guys were throwing the student volunteers up against the walls, bleating orders and threats, patting them down, "confiscating" cells and everything else they found. Beard Man raised a hand when one guy got to my bag. But the guy unzipped it, screwed up his face and shoved it back at me.

The students, three women and eight men, were kind of shivering and exchanging terrified glances—Chas wasn't shaking, though. His "inner sociopath" takes over in situations like these, so he goes still and chill in a way that could trigger guys like the ones shoving us around. They don't want chill. They want scared.

But I knew his mind was recording everything and everyone. He'd tell me things, later, that no one else would've noticed or thought of. It was partly the training he'd had and partly just the way his mind works. Would've been a badass spy, Chas. Diabolical mind.