My name is Franco. Or Leo.

A guy named Pedro has no idea how he got here.

I’ve been stuck in this tiny Mexican desert town since August 2021. Someone Tboned me on a long desert highway on my way north and flipped my van. I was taking a long adventure or going to drive off a cliff in early 2021. I drove from Veracruz to Oaxaca to Michoacan to Queretaro, Puebla, Guanajuato to Jalisco, Nayarit to Mazatlan, Sinaloa to Guaymas. I had sold everything, house and all. Old dog and what could fit in my minivan. Vamos. And after 5 months it was all over. No one on the highway, high noon, one intersection. The stop sign was down, the lady didn’t stop at all… I had barely started out of my stop and she was probably going 70mph. Then it was all over.

The dogs disappeared and miraculously someone found them the next day. I lived, obviously, and no major injuries. All the rest of my belongings did not fare so well. Now on foot in a pretty awful place, alone with some limping dogs, in 110 degrees, I rented a place. A lot of strangers helped me out, gave me a ride, helped me collect my things on the highway, translated my kitchen Spanish into Insurance Spanish. My van was towed away as totaled with irreparable damage.

I waited for the insurance money in this weird town on the Sea of Cortez. There’s a handful of fishermen, old pirates and some new cartel transport. There are no services and no restaurants. A couple tiendas. I’d just buy a car and get the hell out of this place. Rapido. But I cannot. Gotta go to the US to buy a car gringa. I can buy one, but can’t get plates, or can, but not for all states and can’t cross border. So an option if you want traffic cop problems or can leave $5000 at the border. No way to get there. There’s a bus that goes to Hermosillo, but no dogs. There’s no van, no courier, no taxi——it’s literally the middle of nowhere. There’s no delivery, no mail, no Amazon even. There’s a few people shipwrecked here but I’m the only American. Some appear to be hiding out, some dumped. Some don’t know where they are because they’re tripping on drugs or were reprogrammed by the CIA. Some were born here and never leave. Some are here because they’re hunting wild boar in the mountains there’s a beer store. No one is here on purpose.

“Frank” is one such dude. Depending on the day, his name changes, but I call him Frank. He’s told some folks he’s Leo. Pedro. Jose. Everyone says be careful and that he’s killed with a machete before and I don’t ignore the advice but I feel better talking to him when he hits me up for money or food in town. Make eye contact. Also, if that’s true, why isn’t he in jail? He walks around so filthy he looks like he crawled out of a coal mine. Almost theater “dirty”. Rub this charcoal on your face and be barefoot. With clothing ripped and tattered like a high school role in "The Vagabond”. Some notorious characters in this town and actual hitmen who are fresh out of prison say he’s a spy and they aren’t buying his Crazy Man Lost angle. I’m not sure what to think.

Everyone here is a little paranoid. Light money laundering and fraudulent clothing businesses and produce sellers who run pills inside of coconuts. I keep to myself though. Walk with 10 dogs and don’t go out at night. I don’t plan on staying here forever, but I’ve got all these orphaned dogs now and all things being equal, my sorta below average apartment is cheap, the weather is dry and sunny well over 350 days a year and well, I don’t really have anywhere to be, I sold everything, left everything, dumped real estate and went on a very long road trip. It’s easier to do that in Mexico. In the US you have to do that in hotels or Airbnbs and it gets expensive with pet rent and such. Either way, the lack of commitment and freedom is intoxicating. I likely wouldn’t have stopped had I not lost my van.

For 14 years I was upside down on a big farm property in Georgia and then a series of crappy rentals where I had to listen to domestic violence of neighbors through the walls for $1200/month (Florida). I figured I’d take my chances in Mexico. This is my 50th time in country and my second time driving cross country. As long as I’m in picturesque charming towns with great food, it’s a blast. But once I got out of my cherry picked fantasy Mexico and got into the rural forgotten parts where everything is soda, Taki chips, and dead dogs, it’s sobering. Or maybe this is the first time I’ve been in Mexico as a non drinker…I find that it’s definitely easier with the tequila goggles on. Just a nip of Mezcal to round out the edges.

I don’t think this is a good time in life to drink. I let go of the Wine Time habit 5 years ago and that got rid of the “I only smoke when I drink” trope too. And here we are. I’m not saying it’s better, but I believe it is in the big picture. I can get a little loose with the decisions if I’m lubricated. We’ll call it impulsive. Sobriety in Mexico is terrible for your social life and sex life— but again, I think in the long haul, it’s safer.

Since I’m here (and rescuing dozens of street dogs) I talk to locals and write stories about shit that happens and weirdos I meet. There’s a LOT of characters. People can be a little suspect of me. Why haven’t I left yet? Why hasn’t someone (a husband presumably) come to pick me up? Don’t I want to go back to the US? What will I do for the holidays? Why don’t I drink? Why don’t I date? Meh. But the really crazy street people don’t give a shit about my reasons and they’ll talk.

I have changed names as I’m not investigating anything or anyone and not trying to get “disappeared” by the cartel like journalists do. I don’t care what people do as long as it’s not against anyone’s will. I’m fascinated by all kinds of business. How things get from point A to B and the money game. And really, in this day and age are we really clear on good guys and bad guys? I’m not.

My novelty has worn off in town because I’m not American like they think of Americans. I’m always surprised in Mexico that despite our intermingling Tex Mex swilling mix north of the border no one here gives a fuck about America. Outside of the cousin who landscapes or cooks or how the dollar will affect the peso, they’re not into American “culture”. No American brands are sold unless you go to specific stores like Costco, even Walmart is called something else here. They get excited by Little Caesars and Pollo Kentucky (kfc) in the big cities but there’s an anti-American sentiment for sure. At best, they’re ambivalent. They don’t speak English, they don’t care. If there’s no tourism in a Mexican town, Americans are just assholes with money. At first I was interesting but now I’m just the Gringa Dog Lady. I speak Spanish, let’s say intermediately, but there is a dialect in Sonora I do not recognize, so I make small talk, ask for produce, help people with their dogs and keep to myself until I figure out how to get transport, adopt all the doggos, get a ride, I have no clue. In the meantime here’s an intro to Frank.

*****************************

On August 12, Francisco Lawrence Castillo Moreno woke up in a ditch in San Diego. On August 15, at 845am he was in the trunk of a bronze Toyota Celica. It was 112 degrees F in the desert on Hwy 6. He could see out of one eye. Duct tape mummified his head, he could taste it through a tiny spit hole he made with his tongue. Hwy 9 goes in Mexico past Ensenada, crosses eastbound into Sonora. Down the Sea of Cortez and past the tourist destinations where red faced alcoholics from Phoenix owned condos in Puerto Penasco. They stopped at mile marker 187.

"Leave him here", said Pecho from the passenger seat, "this is 4 hours from anything both ways".

ChacoChaco pulled over. After 5 hours of a two lane highway with Saguaro cactus in animated poses and twisters of beige sand, they popped the hatch, picked up the body like a bag of golf clubs and hauled it 50 feet from the road behind a boulder.

"Cut the bag open so the vultures eat him," said Pecho.

"They won't eat him if he's not dead."

"Shut the fuck up, Chaco. You got a cuchillo?"

"They're carrions. Mostly scavengers. An eagle is a predator as well as a Carrion, but the Turkey Vulture for sure only eats dead stuff. Their head is featherless so they can stick it up the rectum and eat them from the inside out. Ever see them just hanging out on a line? They're waiting for shit to die. The coyotes will get him first. Maybe even a mountain lion. It's a very diverse eco system out here. At night especially. In about 4 hours shit comes out of the ground, man. Have you ever tried the Bufo Alvarius toad venom? My tio smoked that in Puerto Cana and tripped for 3 days. He's in a monastery now. A real epiphany." 

Chaco got a box cutter out of his pocket and cut open the bag. He nicked the legs a bit and his sweat dripped into the bag. The salt felt like acid everything was so amplified. Echoes doubled the conversation. Efficient but sloppy kidnappers they had hit him over the head with a tequila bottle at a party--- just enough to knock him out and muddy his hearing. 

Frank could hear parts of the conversation but the duct tape covered his ears. He kept his one eye shut. They wrapped him before checking vitals. Pendejos. The trash bags made a sauna. They sliced it open to pull one foot out for coyotes and he could feel the breeze on his balls.

A SAG card blew out of the hatchback with a fistfull of pesos. Pecho tossed the wallet on the other side of the highway. Stitched in colored thread, THE DONKEY SHOW. 

They drove off. The car was a distant fart can muffler. Beaners love the noise, he thought. The first vulture landed nearby and with his wingspan cast a welcome shadow. A tarantula walked across his eye. 

At mile marker 45 Pecho sliced the carotid artery of Jose Jumillo "Chaco" Fausto Garcia with the box cutter and left him in a hole he had dug 2 days before. The sun had set and the desert was coming alive in the shift change of the nocturnal. The Toyota rattled into Tijuana. Pecho grabbed a duffel bag with 234,000 usd from under the spare tire and walked over the border to San Diego. 

Frank didn’t die in that plastic bag. He freed himself that night and scared off the coyotes and started walking south. He found some agriculture corral and took a bath in the water barrel. He looked rough but the blood was washing out. A lot of people on this part of the Devil’s Highway look like this and worse. The bulls stared at him without concern. He hitched a ride on flatbed full of watermelon and went to sleep. They turned off at an arrow barely visible on the highway, Puerto Libertad read the handmade sign. It was the first sign of life they’d seen in 5 hours. It’s a desert where they grow asparagus oddly. All you’ll see are Saguaro cactus and Guatemalan pickers. And then this place on the Sea of Cortez. Frank couldn’t answer where he was going or where he’d been to the truck driver. Still drugged, dehydrated, blurry. Frank looks like a soap opera star who’s been put through the spin cycle. His hair sticks up in quadrants, his eyes are light, his hair black, he has dimples and a great smile and a very expressive angry resting face. A range of characters from the Villain Vallejo to Pedro the Payaso. Very fit and muscular but thin.

When he stops to talk, he is in a constant state of searching for the plot. Where was I? He never finds it and keeps walking. He is terrified by dogs and yells at the street mongrels like he’s got a specific beef with each of them. No one in town has any information on him. Some think he’s been here 15 years, others say he just arrived. He’s around and then he disappears for weeks. He demands food from vendors and kindly residents and has an endless array of hand me down clothing from an unknown source. He’s been in DKNY blouses and Celtic basketball jerseys to YouTube tank tops and stripey holiday sweaters. He doesn’t know where he gets them, he says. And he lives, over there. No matter where he’s standing he will point somewhere and say…that side. He speaks Spanish until you talk to him and then he’ll speak English until you respond in English and then he just stands there.

That’s Frank.