The Voting Machine

Los Desaparecidos

We all have a vision of the happy life. We want a future with love, success and security. But I didn't have any delusions. I always knew it could go the other way.

My mother was one of those who always tried to focus on the silver lining. She would walk me through the storms of life with tales of sunshine on the other side. She'd risked everything to make it to this country, never looking back. Pull yourself up from the depths, she said, keep climbing. Someday the angels will reward you. At the very end of her life, when she was stage four and dizzy from the meds, she told me dark memories from her past.

"There are things I've never told you about my home village in Sinaloa, Temo. I wanted you to have a brighter view of life. It didn't seem right that you should have to carry such a burden, knowing how hard it was for those who came before you. Now I realize I was wrong. It's better that you know about the desaparecideos. The men and women who vanished without a trace."

"Who were they?"

"They were people in our family. My uncle. My grandfather. But it wasn't just us. It could have been anyone in the village. Didn't have to be a bad man. It might just be an unlucky man, someone in the wrong place at the wrong time."

"Who would disappear them?"

"You could never be sure. It might be la policia or los narcos or maybe the army. It was like the same monster just wearing different masks."

"And the people who disappeared, they never saw it coming?"

"For most of them it was too late. But some knew the monster was coming for them. And there was only one thing they could do."

"What was that?"

"They could try to disappear themselves before the monster disappeared them. They could slip into the shadows of the forests of Durango. Or hide in the lonely canyons of Sonora. An innocent man might have to leave his entire life behind: his name, his home, his family. But at least he would still have a life."

"Is that why you came to LA, Mom? So your family would never disappear?"

"Of course. I wanted you to grow up in a better world than the one I was born into. But maybe I was too hopeful. The world doesn't always get better, Temo. Sometimes it gets worse. You need to think about your dreams, but you also need to think about your nightmare. What kind of man will you be on the worst day of your life? Will you be ready?"