Heading Home

I love Mexican airlines. They could give a shit who you are, what you have with you. I get the feeling that if you had fertilizer and diesel fuel in two separate carry-ons that they would help you jam them in the overhead.

We literally pour Mike and Andy out of the cab and have to shoulder the both of them onto the plane. The two of them got into a tangle with that margarita machine last night and they won... if you could call it that. I do remember Mike making calls to the front desk for packages of Jello, which they delivered. I also remember everyone being way to impatient for it to set up and the ensueing slurping of half stiff jello shots had us all laughing like idiots. Before we retired for the evening there was enough colors either choked up from laughing or puked up due to overload on that balcony than you would find on a Jamaican street corner.

I did wake up in one of the rooms, as did Jerry. The rest of those idiots were sprawled on that balcony as though they had taken heavy artillery fire. Some of them on their stomachs, others on their backs. Hell, Chris ended up under a couple of loungers at the far end of the balcony away from everyone. His prosthetic foot sat on a table not far away, the top of it filled with salsa where his stub would normally fit in. Around the fake toes are piles of tortilla chips. Pretty fucking funny. Looks like Lou's handy work. I am pretty sure Antonelli won't see the humor in it.

After we get the boys on their flight and make sure it leaves for good we head over to the G-4 and make our getaway. Not a word is spoken. In fact the only voice we hear for the next several hours is the pilot announcing our take off and Chris' personal flight attendant making sure we were buckled up for the event. The rest is lost to an agave dream, seas of green and blue Jello, Mike poking a brahma bull with a big meat fork, and Lou killing everyone in a Cheese Cake Factory restaurant. It wasn't a bloody dream, he snapped all their necks. Lou hates the Cheese Cake Factory and the yuppy bastards that eat there. His words, not mine. I have no idea what dreams Antonelli or Lou had. None of us shared. I just made a mental note to never mention the Cheese Cake Factory or take any suggestions to go there.

We land uneventfully in Puerto Barrios. Abigail is fueled and ready for the run home. When we were thirty minutes out Jerry asked Antonelli to call in a special grocery order to be loaded onto Abby. Although the order seems a little strange the stuff is available and that bit of business is taken care of. I wouldn't have thought you could get some of that stuff in this place but Jerry knows what the town has to offer. The call ahead will save us the time going in and getting it ourselves. He wants to get rolling while we have daylight left.

Puerto Barrios is a blur. We hop out of the G-4 and into Abigail. I don't even have time to take a piss. Jerry says the door is always open. I guess I will piss out of it when we get in the air.

Lou's pockets rattle when he climbs on board. Turns out he found a whole cabinet of mini's on the G-4 and decided to pilfer a few. The damn plane has a full bar stocked with fifths of everything, so these little mini bottles must have been left over from some catering mistake or something. Never-the-less Lou is a walking Long Island Ice Tea.
"We got any Coke?"

Abigail speeds down the runway and we lift off with little effort. She is nearly empty save the small amount of grocery items that Jerry called ahead for. It is shortly after noon that we are airborne, heading to Tapia's for a quick visit, then home.

I wait until the city is behind us and we are out over the jungle before I relieve myself out of the cargo door. Lou is forward rummaging through a couple of flight bags until he finds an old and dented can of cola.
"We have any glasses... or cups, a cup will do."

It turns into a dangerous game. No cups, no glasses, just five little mini bottles; Tangauray, Cuervo, Bacardi, Stoli, and Jack Daniels. That and a warm can of cola.
"Want one?" Lou asks, opening each of the bottles and snapping open the can of soda, slurpping the foam off the top as it boils out. Once it has subsided he sets it next to the bottles on the deck.

"One what?"
"A Long Island."
"There isn't any whiskey in a Long Island."
"There is in mine."
"What are you mixing it in, your boot?"
"Look, Nancy, either you want one or you don't. Observe."

Lou pours a little cola in his mouth first. Then he splashes a little of each bottle in until finally he has a mouthful. A quick shake of his head to mix and he swallows. He doesn't outwardly grimace, but I can see his eye twitch. He points to the bottles and then me.

"Pass."
"Come on you pussy, try it."
"Pass."
"You fucking Nancy, TRY IT."

I follow his lead and do a little mix, shake my head and swallow it down.
"Not bad."
"See, I told you."
"We need a barber chair."
"Now you're talking."

Before we make Tapia's we have decided to make a trip in Naomi out to Lou's bar and settle things. His "wife", who is a local and they are just shacking up and not really married, has probably taken over the place and is running it. She and her family had done it when Lou was on walkabout a year or two ago. But he has a few things he wants to get before he lets her have the bar. For one thing we need to get the stock of liquor. Lou paid for some top dollar supplies and he isn't willing to part with them. Then there is some "ass kicking" that he wants to accomplish. There is a little bad blood that is leaving a bitter taste in his mouth. That little shoot out when we left Santa Cruz Hautulco with him on board was with some of his "patrons". He wants to get even.

We doze on and off until Jerry puts Abigail on her starboard wing and makes the turn to line up on Tapia's dirt strip. He is wide awake, the power thrumming through Abby's fuselage is charging him like the Energizer Bunny. He talks to her as she levels out, like a man coaxing his horse toward home after a long, hard ride. As he lines the wings up with the horizon I straighten up in the right seat and watch as Tapia's ranch passes beneath us.
"Lou... terra firma." I turn to see him sprawled out in his hammock. One eye opens and he locks a firm hand on the hammock line as we hit the dirt with a thump.

It turns out that Tapia is in the next village and won't be home until late in the evening. Mari is home to feed the ranch hands, and now us. The normal crew of workers seems thinned a bit. He has some of the men with him to aid another rancher.

Mari is excited to see us. Over a sumptious goat stew we tell her of all that has happened and is going to happen in the next month... what we know anyway. She asks about Ollie and is troubled with the news that he is still in the hospital.

Jerry has some of the boys unload the small cache of groceries and Mari looks like a kid at Christmas. These are special things that the two of them don't have at the ranch. Things that they wouldn't buy for themselves... like bubble bath, fresh high thread count cotton sheets, some special food items that they just can't get out here, like peaches and pineapple, smoked oysters and cans of chocolate syrup. It is a weird combination of things that Jerry pulled from memory. Things that he had heard both Tapia and Mari mention in passing. Things that he kept on a mental list until the time and location were right.

We are only there for an hour or so and we say our goodbyes. Jerry promises to stop on the way back in thirty days. There is an impatience to get back to El Corazon. We can all feel it.

The setting sun is bright in our windscreen. Jerry's gone Hollywood and is comfortable behind his RayBans. I have lost my good sunglasses in the Amazon and have to wear a scratched up pair of aviators while I am in the right seat.
"She's ready for a good servicing when we get back." Jerry tells me.
"I know... I owe her some time."
"Make me a list of what you need." He drops down to about five hundred feet and we ride the mist that is over the top of the hot jungle terrace.
"Not a problem. Lou and I are flying Naomi to the coast to close out his bar and I can replenish our servicing stock while I am there."

Everything I will need we have at the compound. But once that stock is used we have to build time into a delivery route to get supplies to replenish that stock. I usually can give Abby a filter and fluid change, plugs and a few other items three times before stock is depleted. I have one more change out and then I will have to restock.

Time passes. Lou joins us in the doorway and minutes later a beautiful sight appears. El Corazon... it really isn't much to look at from up here, but it is home. We buzz the runway to get the goats to move. That is a good sign though. When there are goats on the runway, that means some of the woman from town have probably been at the compound taking care of things for us.

After we scatter the livestock, Jerry tips her on her wing and we line up for our approach. The sun is down and the air is strangely cool for this time of year. By cool I mean high seventies... low eighties.

One thump later and we are down. I help Jerry with the switches and we make the turn at the end of the strip and taxi back toward the gate. Jerry stops short of the entrance and Lou bails out, opening the sliders to let us in.

As the taxi lights pan across the compound and hit the main building we see monkeys scatter like pigeons in the park. It is going to be a mess... I just know it.