Chapter Eight
Immediately after they saw B. Body chopping at the safe, he burst through a gap in the oleander hedge.
Close up, B. Body was a scary looking man with a Mohawk and tattooed arms that looked as though they were strong enough to squeeze cold steel into mush. He was swinging that big heavy ax in his strong arms as he and his horribly scarred pit bull, Bunny, jumped out of the gap in the hedge. Luckily, Bunny didn't get too far, because he was tied to a chain. Then Juan’s cousin came out of the little green adobe house and started yelling at her boyfriend to leave them alone because Juanie was her favorite cousin. Of course, that was considerate of her, but a little late, because B. Body had already axed the side window of the car and the glass shattered over both Juan and Willy’s collars in an uncomfortable shower. Seconds before B. Body smashed the window, they had collapsed at the side of the car with their arms thrown over their heads.
Juan and Willy jumped into the car after that. Yesinia came after them, chasing their car down the alley, yelling for Juan to stop and pay her a visit. At the end of the alley, Juan decided to listen to her. Yesinia ran to the broken side window and apologized for B. Body’s ill-tempered actions. After Juan backed the car into an alley-facing carport and got out, he asked Yesinia about that truck he was looking for and she told them the truck they wanted was at her little brother’s house.
B. Body turned out to be generous after he realized Juan was his girlfriend’s cousin and he had no reason to fear them. He’d thought they were police or some snoopy people trying to see what he was doing in the backyard to that safe.
In fact, he was so nice to them, after he realized his mistake that he paid them in cash for the broken window of the car that they had borrowed from Willy’s sister-in-law and then he gave them $800 to help him break the door of the safe. It took hours to pry and hack at the door and Juanie nearly chopped Willy’s knee cap off once. When it finally opened, B. Body took a lot of money out of the safe. Juan and Willy didn’t ask anything about where that safe came from, but Willy didn’t believe B. Body’s story that it was his and he had forgotten the combination because he looked surprised when he saw exactly how much money was inside.
After that, they felt pretty lucky and they went straight over to this other cousin’s house, which was near the Air Force Base and they found the truck, an old Ford F-150, which was the one they had been looking for all along. It was okay except for needing a tranny again, but this one turned out to be easier to get.
The cousin who owned the house where the truck was parked agreed to give it up to Juan, because his wife was tired of looking at it in her backyard and this cousin didn’t think he’d ever get around to replacing the tranny himself. After a couple of days working on the truck on their days off, Juan and Willy were happy because this truck was just what they needed to get to the gold Juan was so sure about, but the tranny job was not going right. Neither of them had paid much attention in auto mechanics class in high school and now it was showing. The instructions in the book they borrowed were so much meaningless nonsense to them. And boy, that tranny was heavy, too. Moving it around wasn’t easy, especially for Willy with his messed up shoulder. They didn’t have tools or jacks that were worth a damn. Every bolt on the truck was nothing but rust and what bolts they didn’t sheer off, they lost in the weeds. They had some great fights in the backyard, but that wasted more time. The upshot was a job that should have taken a weekend lasted four.
Their work situation at Bess Tacos wasn’t too good either. Jipson said they needed to work harder and he was only just covering his ass as it was. Of course, they didn’t tell him they had other plans, plans about finding gold, and they would soon be leaving town.
Juan and Willy broke tool after tool working on the truck and had to borrow them off people who did not trust them with their tools because they thought they would break them or lose them.
Then one afternoon while Juan and Willy were working on the tranny, Juan came out from under the truck.
“Esta chingadera no fuciona,” he said and he began itching all over his arm as though he were on fire. After he had scratched from his elbow to his wrist, he began to dig at his neck. He started groaning with the aggravation.
“I am burning up,” he said to Willy, shaking his head. He got up and ran into the house to talk to his cousin who was watching his wife cooking macaroni in the kitchen.
“I’m flaming,” said Juan.
“I don’t know why,” the wife replied.
“I mighta sprayed the weeds to make it easier for you guys to work,” said the cousin apologetically. Willy, who had followed Juan inside, felt real sorry for Juan’s cousin because it was clear he didn’t mean to have done anything bad and he only wanted to help Juan, who Willy found out later was his all-time favorite cousin. He wanted nothing better than for Juan to be his best friend, because he was awfully lonely.
“You mighta? Did you or didn’t you?” demanded Juan.
“I did. I did spray those weeds.”
“Dang!” shrieked Juan.
“Don’t panic. Let me go to the wash shed and see what he used,” said the cousin’s wife, trying to be super-helpful. “It’s something we just had around. Just around for a long time, that’s all.” She was so eager to help her husband get out of trouble; it was kind of depressing in Willy’s opinion.
“Dang!” said Juan, following her. “Chingadera!”
Everyone went with her across the little Bermuda lawn to the laundry shed and Juan was scratching himself all over and cursing like crazy. It turned out the stuff he got on him was giving him a rash. It sure seemed like the cause was the junk his cousin had sprayed on the weeds a day earlier.
“I’m flamin’,” he said. “What the fucking hell is all over me? What is it? What’s on me?” Juan started twisting and turning and stomping his feet. His face was contorting in all sorts of ugly ways. Willy didn’t like what was happening to his friend any more than his poor cousin did.
“I’ll tell you,” Willy said, taking the spray bottle when his cousin’s wife handed it to him. The dark brown bottle of weed killer was all filthy, and there were spider webs clinging all over it. The label had faded and puckered up with heat from being in a window for many summers, and, no doubt, from having the weed killer dribble over it. That was nasty stuff. There were little skulls here and there on the label and lots of fine print to read. “Oh oh,” Willy said finally reaching the bad part of the label. “It’s real dangerous. ‘No skin contact under any circumstances.’ We better get you to urgent care.”
“Wait,” said the wife of Juan’s cousin. “I’ll hose you off first,” she offered.
That sounded sensible, so Juan stood still while she ran around the yard following the hose to the nozzle, meanwhile she pointed frantically to the place on the wall where Willy could turn on the water. Her husband was no more help than Juan because all he could do was apologize. The wife sprayed Juan everywhere it hurt, sprayed him over and over.
“It’s worse!” Juan began screaming after a while. “My skin feels like it’s coming off! Caramba!”
“Oh...,” Juan’s cousin said, turning the bottle of weed killer so that he could read more of the small print, “‘it says to avoid washing the victim’s skin after contact. Seek the assistance of your nearest emergency care provider!’ Ay!” screamed his cousin, “I’m sorry my wife is so stupid!”
“Urgent Care!” said Juan, stumbling toward his cousin’s car. “Urgent Care, please!”
After a day in the emergency ward of the hospital, and an expensive lotion, Juan got most of the rash calmed down. Willy laid a heavy plastic tarp down under the car to cover the weeds and together they finished the tranny job, but Juan’s skin wasn’t a pretty sight for at least a week.