Espresso Cups (Southwest Border Fiction-- draft)

E wore his Christmas lights over his apron, and they were blinking away as he ground coffee in the new burr grinder. The espresso machine was already hissing behind him. The sun rose over the Rincons, East of Tucson, Arizona. It looked like a lovely day at Casas Blancas, E's gated little liberal community.

Life in the foothills of the Catalina's was a welcome change from all the noise and crime of downtown living. 

"You know the optimum temperature for espresso is below boiling, so I got this new digital thermometer that just came out. So much better than the stock thing that came with the machine. Now I can pull really premium shots. Better than the cafe downtown."

His guests all agreed. The coffee was rich and aromatic, the best they had tasted in a while. He served the coffee in petite ceramic cups.

"They are so lovely," his guests cooed. "Where did you get them?"

"Oh, I was shopping in Nogales ... you know it's so depressing across the border. Anyway, his guy selling portraits of tourists sitting on a burro told me about this hole-in-wall shop up an alley. There was great stuff there, and I got such a deal on these. I love supporting their economy."

It was the day after Christmas, and they were all planning departures back to Phoenix, Flagstaff, San Diego, and points east. A few were going to take a road trip to the border and then to the tourist towns of Bisbee and Silver City. Talk turned to travel.

"You know I just don't know how best to use all those frequent-flyer miles I built up last year. I mean with the trip to Spain and all the work flying I have been doing, I have enough for a pretty good trip. I don't know where to go or what to do," E lamented.

Meanwhile down at the border town of Nogales, D was dressing up his burro for another day of taking photos of gringos. It had been a rough year, and now that Christmas was over, the gringos were staying home, out of money, waiting for the coffers to refill.

He had a little tequila left in the plastic bottle he had tried to pass off as Herradura Reposado to a family of gringos the day before. They had asked him where they could buy tequila, and he had gone to his brother to get this cheap stuff to sell them for ten dolares.

They didn't buy it. 

Oh well... Asi es...Cheap drink is better than no drink.

He knew the streets like no one else and spoke pretty good English. He took a cut when tourists went to The Hacienda del Rancho Grande for breakfast or bought a blanket in one of his compadres' curio shops.

He knew Nogales. People here respected him, even if the tourists looked down on him, that is, until they got drunk enough to see the humor, if that's what you could call it, in sitting on a hobbled burro in downtown Nogales.

Tourists would ask him, once they heard the English that he acquired during his years in San Diego, about where to find the best deal on this or that.

What a difference between there and here, D thought. Nogales was a scramble. Mangy dogs wandered the street. Smells of cilantro, diesel fumes, and rot filled the air. Everything was so close, so tacky. But it was the best people could do with what the world offered them.

The pinche border divided two worlds. They thought about different things over there, moved with an ease beyond comprehension of his paisanos. He hoped that some of those gringos would come across today, in spite of the bad stories they heard on the news: robberies, narco wars, kidnapping, stinking, abject misery.

He saw some of them coming now, and they had that hungry look in their eyes. The day after Christmas and they were already hungry for more.

"You guys want a photo on the donkey?" he asked, half ironically, sounding exactly like one of them. "You looking for something special? Maybe I can help."

After a moment of searching his face, as if seeing in him something not visible at first glance, one of them asked "Do you know where we might find some espresso cups?"