They went to a coffee shop a block away. The walls were lemon yellow, as were the booths, and the pictures on the walls were shabby black-and-white photos of Italy. She didn’t like the place, but it was better than heading into an ice cream shop, as though they were boyfriend and girlfriend.
She asked for a coffee, he ordered a Sidral Mundet. Rubén had changed from his overalls into a t-shirt and jeans. He looked more presentable this way, though he’d hardly qualify for the role of the hero in any of Maite’s comic books. He had that Che Guevara style that was popular with students of the UNAM. It was unappealing.
“Then she hasn’t come back?” Rubén asked, taking a sip of his soda.
Maite reached for the sugar basin, which had a crack clearly showing where it had been clumsily glued back together, and measured a spoonful of sugar. “No. Did you go to that place? The Asterisk?”
“She hasn’t been there. I’m worried. I talked to Jacqueline, who sort of runs Asterisk, and she said she talked on the phone with Leonora, and Leonora told her she had information on the Hawks.”
“Who exactly are the Hawks?”
“Don’t you read the paper?” Rubén said, looking scandalized by her lack of knowledge.
Maite picked up her coffee cup daintily and took a sip. “Excuse me, I work all day long.”
“So do I. I still find the time to glance at a paper, especially these days when we’ve got the government engaged in vicious repressive activities.”
“I bet you’re one of these people Leonora likes to bail out,” she said, trying to guess how many mug shots they’d taken of him.
Rather than appearing abashed, the young man looked proud, raising his hairy chin. “Yeah, she’s helped me out,” Rubén said. “So what? I print leaflets with political cartoons on them. The government? They’ve got roving gangs of thugs beating students up. Who do you think attacked us when we were demonstrating?”
“I thought those were your anarchist buddies.”
“Very funny. So you don’t read the papers but you still spout the government’s line? It figures. How are you even hanging out with Leonora, anyway?”
Rubén gave her a suspicious look, as though he thought maybe they were in one of those James Bond films and Maite was a spy.
“We’re not best friends, if that’s what you’re wondering,” Maite said. “We know each other from the building.”
“Then why are you so interested in finding her?”
“Because I’m watching her cat. What? Do you think I’m one of your Hawks?”
“You never know,” Rubén said. “But no. They’re all men, and they’re all thugs. They were under the command of Alfonso Martínez Domínguez, our recently ousted regent—in case you were too busy working to know that name. They like to sic them at us when they think we’re getting out of line.”
“Yes, I know what you mean now,” she said, her spoon rattling against the cup as she added more sugar. The coffee was sweet enough, but she was trying to do something with her hands. This man was terribly irritating. She felt like slapping him. “But the Hawks are not supposed to be real.”
“Who told you that?”
“It’s what they say around my office.”
“The Hawks are the ones who attacked the people outside the Cine Cosmos. Someone decided to massacre students. It wasn’t ghosts,” he said, sounding petulant.
“I didn’t say it was ghosts, just that they’re not supposed to be real. Anyway, Leonora had information on the Hawks. What kind of information?”
“We don’t know. It was photos.”
“Her ex-boyfriend was looking for her camera,” Maite muttered, the memory of Emilio Lomelí burning bright in her mind. Now that was a real man, not this print shop employee moonlighting as an activist.
“Emilio?” Rubén asked. He looked pretty shocked by her words.
“He stopped by to see her, and I let him into her apartment because he wanted her camera, but he couldn’t find it so he left. But it doesn’t really mean anything.”
“You think it’s a coincidence? Leonora goes missing after she tells us she has some photos and Emilio is asking about her camera? What do you think are the odds?”
Well, when he put it like that, it didn’t sound very likely, but she detested the tone he was using. As if Maite was an idiot because he bought a paper now and then.
“I don’t know. He seemed like a decent guy. He left me his card, in case Leonora stopped by. If he had anything to do with her disappearance, he wouldn’t have left his card.”
“I bet he knows something. And it’s a place to start digging. Maybe you should give him a call.”
“Me?” Maite asked, the spoon slipping from her fingers. She gripped the sugar basin instead.
“You just said he gave you his card.”
“Yes. But—”
“People don’t go vanishing off the face of the Earth for no reason. Leonora must be in some kind of trouble, and we need to help her. Now this guy, maybe he knows something.”
“Fine, let’s say he does, and then let’s say it’s our business—”
“Of course it’s our business.”
“But if it’s a missing person case, then the police—”
“The Hawks work for the government. The police and the army, they let the Hawks shoot at us. There were police cars all lined up nicely down the avenue with their megaphones, but they weren’t there to stop them. They were there to ensure they could kill with impunity.”
“But they ousted the regent over that business, didn’t they? You said he was ousted.”
“The president kicked him out, yeah, but it was so he could blame all this on someone. Fuck, maybe he even wanted the beatings to get out of hand precisely so he could oust Martínez Domínguez. Or maybe Martínez Domínguez fucked up, but you can bet that the president was aware of what the Hawks were going to do and he told the cops to stand down. Anyway, it’s a repeat of Tlatelolco, and those pigs can’t be trusted.”
In the papers, columnists accused communist foreigners of corrupting Mexico’s youth and attempting to destroy the nation. The cops were innocent, lawful citizens doing their jobs. Perhaps it wasn’t true, but it made Maite’s skin prickle with dread, because no one wanted a repeat of ’68. That had been a bloody mess. People whispered snipers hired by the government had opened fire. Student riots had threatened the Olympics, and the government had quelled them by force. People whispered, and Maite tried not to listen. But still she heard things here and there. She couldn’t drown out reality.