I woke up to the sound of screaming in the distance. I looked over to see Peoria sleeping next to me. I lifted up a corner of the tarp just in time to see the last glimpse of the sun before it sank below the horizon. I gently shook Peoria by the shoulder to wake her up. She sat up slowly, sleepily, trying to remember where she was. When she heard the screaming, she looked at me with terrified eyes.

“You look awful,” she said.

“I don’t feel very good,” I told her. “We need to find the others,”

One by on we climbed down out of the wagon. My leg throbbed. I could feel every heart beat like a thunder bolt through my body. The pain made me nauseous and I feared I would be sick. My leg was so stiff I couldn’t bend it. I was able to stand, but immediately fell over when I attempted to walk. Peoria helped me get back on my feet. I put my arm around her shoulder and we slowly made our way back to Los Olvidados. I caught a glimpse of myself in the side mirror of a pick-up truck. I’d lost all color in my face. I looked like death it self.

As we neared the center of town the screaming became louder, angrier, like a cloud of drunken aggression. One voice was the loudest, yelling over and over again “Johnston Lewis! Bring me Johnston Lewis!” I immediately recognized the voice to belong to Scotty.

When we reached Zacatecas Cathedral, Peoria leaned me up against the wall and the two of us peered around the corner to see what was happening. Scotty and the rest of the Yuls were in front of Los Olvidados turning over wagons and setting them on fire. They were firing their guns into the air and describing at the top of their lungs the gruesome atrocities they planned to do to us once they found us.

A young boy rode up with a wagon full of lumber. One of the Yuls shot the horse in the head, while the other pulled the boy down and slung him to the ground. They kicked the wagon over and dosed it with tequila and whiskey, before setting it on fire like the rest.

Peoria put her hands to her mouth as tears rolled down her cheeks. I handed her the gun and slumped down against the wall. She sat down next to me and grabbed my hand. My head became heavy. I could barely keep my eyes open.

I woke up to a sharp searing pain in my leg. I tried to sit up but a hand calmly pushed me back down. An old man was standing over me with a knife and a bloody rag.

“Tranquilo,” he said. “Estoy intentando salir la bala de su pierna,”

He handed me a bottle of mescal and continued to work on my leg. I was lying on a small bed in a dark windowless room. Peoria was sitting at a desk in front of me.

“This is Rafael. He found us sleeping against the wall. He helped me carry you inside.”

“Where are we?” I asked.

“In the cathedral, down in the basement.”

“Oh.”

“…y en diecinueve catorce Pancho Villa derrotó los federales en El Toma de Zacatecas.”

Peoria and Rafael were standing at the other side of the room, reading from one of a dozen spiral bound notebooks piled up on a chair. I looked up at them through hazy, half awake eyes.

“What are you reading?” I asked.

“Police reports. Rafael has friends in the Federale,” said Peoria.

She walked over to the bed and handed me a water stained spiral notebook that was folded open. She pointed to a section on the page that had been circled furiously in red.

“There are records here that go back a hundred years.”

I stared blankly at the page. My Spanish had gotten weak since my mother passed away. I tried to make sense of the words in front of me.

(translated from Spanish into English)

February 6th, 1951: John Flowers, 38, from Detroit Michigan, arrives in Zacatecas. He rents a room at Meson de Jobito and is seen drinking at Los Olvidados.

March 8th, 1951: John Flowers is seen crossing the desert on a stole horse. It is believed he is headed to the town of Saltillo.

When I finished reading, Rafael walked over to me and put his hand on my shoulder.

“It is my greatest regret,” he said in broken English. “I was young…stupid. I will never forgive myself.”

John Flowers, where had I seen that name before? I paced back and forth across the room with my eyes. Then it hit me. I reached into my pocket and pulled out me wallet. I took out my mother’s parchment and opened it carefully. At the bottom of the page on the right hand side was a list of names. The second to last name was John Flowers.

“Peoria! Come and look at this,” I said.

I pointed to the list of names on the parchment.

“What is this?” she said. “Where did you get it?”

“It’s this thing I have..My mother gave it to me.”

I hesitated telling her the full story behind how I got it.

“I have seen this before,” said Rafael, “It was once with my grandfather’s fish.”

Peoria turned to me.

“Lewis why have you not told us you have this?” she asked angrily.

“I, I don’t…” I stopped myself, trying to decide what to say. “ I don’t know why I never told you. I don’t know what this means.”