Your house is the third one down the narrow lane, the one with a cracked green door and a Virgin of Guadalupe sticker peeling at the corner.
You kick lightly at the threshold.
“Abuela!” you call. “Open! It’s me.”
For a second there is no answer.
Fear slices through you faster than any glass in the dump ever has. You suddenly see the little room inside as you left it: your grandmother at the table, breathing too hard, pressing one hand to her chest while pretending she only needed to sit down for a minute. If she is worse, if she has fallen, if she has died while you were out dragging a stranger from the garbage…
Then the bolt slides.
The door opens just enough for one dark eye and half your grandmother’s face to appear.
“Why are you shouting?” she begins.
Then she sees the man leaning against you.
Her whole body goes still.
