The Streets of Guatemala

 

Locked Up

You know I quit

I quit sniffing glue.

Because you know,

it would stick to my face and that shit

would dry up around my mouth

and I would walk around looking

stupid.

(she laughs)

Like I was a baby and couldn’t

wipe my face.

(she puts her head down while shaking it)

I looked so stupid, you know.

Like a baby.

But a few months ago…

(pauses to take a sniff from a plastic bag)

A few months ago one of my companeros,

Giovani, got me hooked again, this time on solvent.

You know, poor Giovani, man he’s been in so

much trouble, and shit those damn police,

you know what they did to him, they

broke his ribs, shot him in the neck and in the leg twice,

man poor Giovani has always helped me out.

But now he got me hooked again and

I was clean too. But that’s when I ran away.

You know

it makes me feel good, I feel warm inside, you know.

But I was clean. I got clean because

at the shelter they watch you. You know

this is my fourth time running away.

(Her voice gets loud)

I don’t like being locked up.

You know I only go to the shelter

to get away from my father.

When it gets real bad with my father,

I love my father,

cause he taught me and my brothers how to work.

You know he used to dress me up like a little boy

so I could shine shoes with him and my brothers.

(Her glassy eyes began to wonder)

But you know when he started touching…

touching my parts that’s when I wanted to leave.

He wouldn’t give me money unless he did it with me.

So you know I started stealing his money.

Now I just leave.

I find my own jobs. You know but there’s

been some real bad ones,

bad jobs out here on the streets.

You know last week I went into a bar at night

to sell, (pause) shit I can’t remember what I was selling

anyway I ended up selling my body that night.

After you know the owner taught me how to come

onto a man and how to let him grab my breasts…

(Snapping her fingers and nodding)

It was tamales, yeah tamales that’s what I was selling.

But you know I couldn’t do that job.

I didn’t want some man grabbing and touching me.

On my first job I got burned by a cigarette.

(She slides her skirt up her thigh revealing the fresh scar)

That bastard, he burned me you know, because I

wouldn’t put his thing in my mouth.

Anyway that was my first and last job for the lady from the bar.

I guess tomorrow I’ll go out stealing

with Giovani, so we can eat and so we can sniff.

Sometimes I have to steal, you know.

But I wish I could see my father and

shit I wish I could get clean again.

You know what I mean, I just don’t like to be locked up.

She brings the plastic bag to her mouth and takes her last sniff for the night.  She lays down and falls asleep on the bench in Hipodramo Park.