CHAPTER 21

Back at Paradise, I sleep away the rest of the day.

I wake up as dusk falls and go next door to check on my friends.

Coming into their cozy boudoir, the television is chatting loudly, both Tommy and Rocco are curled up on the bed engrossed in the television.

Between the two of them lies a greasestained brown paper wrapper of fresh fried pork skin—or chicharrón as Tommy called it.

Rocco looks up and winks at me quickly patting the bed beside him.

The program has gone serious, at least according to the music.

It appears to be a black and white dramatic reenactment.

A fallen beauty queen, some type of tragic accident.

"What are you guys watching? Want to go drive around and look for Mozey?" Rocco winks again only to look back at the screen and Tommy bites his knuckle nodding, on the brink of tears.

"What the hell are you guys watching?"

"Laura," they say in unison not breaking hypnotized eye-contact with the television.

"Who's Laura?" I ask, grabbing a crunchy pork skin.

"Kind of like, Cristina, but even better!" Tommy says and sips an orange soda through a bright green straw.

"Talk show? The only Spanish one I know is the gossip one with the fat guy and the skinny lady that's actually called "the fat guy and the skinny lady."

"El gordo y la flaca," they say in unison again.

Their eyes are all glassy.

They must be on something.

"I guess I'll see if Coco is around.

Hey, what's the deal? Are both of you totally fluent in Spanish?" The two of them nod, not taking their eyes away from whatever they're watching.

I can't help but think it must be a really good one and maybe I'm missing something.

"So what's it about?"

"An orphaned Mexican beauty queen who needs a new kidney," Rocco says licking his fingers.

"Sounds fascinating," I say sarcastically realizing there's no way to get their attention.

My new best friends are special and they do come with certain proclivities, especially when they're as high as they are now.

Maybe they'll help me tomorrow.

"Okay.

I'll check you two later.

I'ma drive around in circles and see if I can find Mozey."

The next morning at the front desk, Claudia—in a flowered housecoat and curlers—comes up with a list of ferreterías or hardware stores in the area that likely sell spray paint.

Tommy is hell-bent on searching today.

He dragged me out of bed at six in the morning.

Rocco agreed to stay one more night, and Claudia told them they can have the room for free.

I'm not quite sure how I met up with these men or who the hell they really are or why they're agreeing to be my friends, but I take a deep breath and thank God I met them.

I love that they love me and are eager and willing to accommodate my infatuation and fully encourage what may, for all they know, be a completely delusional fantasy.

Back in the room, Tommy styles my hair with an ungodly amount of hairspray and applies more dark eye shadow to my lids in one sitting than I've worn in my lifetime.

"So glamourous," Tommy drawls as he fluffs my bouffant.

"I look like a drunk panda bear.

It's too much.

He'll never recognize me."

"That's the point.

We're making this memorable.

Can we get a little cooperation for the memories?"

"You can get the same effect with the contrast by manipulating the photo," Rocco chimes in, defending my case.

"Let me do my part.

Acknowledge that it's important," Tommy says with a sternness I haven't seen from him before.

I don't know what Rocco does for a living, but I get the idea they've had this argument many times and it's important to Tommy that Rocco see the value in what he does.

I get it.

I've been in a relationship before.

"It's fine, Rocco, let him play.

Does me good to switch it up.

Bring out my inner whore."

"Mmmmhmmm," Tommy says, pleased with his win.

They make up with a pat on the ass and a quick kiss on the cheek.

Rocco gets a few shots from his iPad until he's happy with something that will work for a stencil.

I'm about to become street art.

It's kind of exciting.

It's really sheer genius.

The idea is so simple—just tag back his artwork to let him know I'm here and I'm looking.

We find a FedEx store with Coco's help, and on one of their computers, Rocco enlarges the image and then darkens it until there's nothing but bold shapes made from the contrast.

Then we get it printed out onto thick paperboard, where we'll cut out the negative spaces with a box cutter to make the stencil.

Rocco downloads large, gothic font letters to trace for the message.

As soon as we cut them out, Rocco and Tommy start to argue about what the tag should say.

Rocco wins the battle with the "Lana's in Paradise."

"It sounds kind of dramatic.

What if he can't figure it out?" I say, scratching my head.

"The reunion is going to be epic, and the wording is appropriate in this case," Rocco says.

"And besides, if he can't figure it out then he probably doesn't deserve your vajay," Tommy says with a smirk.

I throw him the stink-eye.

"What? Sorry if I'm the only one who thinks it's worth something," Tommy says, feigning offense.

"We could put my cell phone number on it and get straight to the point."

Meanwhile, Rocco has already begun to stencil out his idea around my face.

"If we put down your number, you'd be filtering calls from every jackass in Tijuana.

Tommy is right.

We want this to be epic.

Let Mister Cruz do a little bit of the work.

He needs to prove he's worth it."

In the end we have a stencil that looks pretty much like me give or take a little allotment for artistic license and also perhaps for Tommy's flair for drag queen styling.

"My eyebrows look epic."

There I am looking morose and maybe a little too mean, with the words stenciled above me, "Lana's in Paradise."

Then below it reads: "Please come find me."

I get a little teary-eyed looking at it.

I never could have made something like this on my own.

I'm so lucky I found these guys.

If anything will work to find him, this will be it.

I know it; I can feel it down in the marrow of my bones.

"Thank you guys for sticking around to help me.

I'm so glad I met you.

I honestly don't know what I would have done without you," I say, breaking into tears and a smile.

"Come give us some sugar," Rocco says, beckoning me toward them for a hug.

"I don't think I've ever had such great friends."

"And certainly not such good looking ones," Tommy says through our three-way hug.

"Lana, have you ever thought to search social media? A lot of artists use Twitter and Instagram to document and announce their projects, especially if it's illegal street art," Rocco says, pulling away from the hug.

"Oh, I am on Instagram with my brother!"

"Maybe Mozey follows your brother.

Didn't you say they're friends?"

"Well, I know for a fact that they don't because Lex and I only follow each other."

"What do you mean?" I grab my phone and open Instagram to show them my home screen with my one follower and my one person following.

I'm kind of proud of it in a silly way—like it somehow exemplifies my unique bond with my brother.

To other people it might just seem like I'm a misanthropic antisocial weirdo—which I guess is true to some extent too.

"You're right.

I should look on here.

He probably does have an account.

What about hashtags? Should I just search for street art?"

"Give me his full name, girl genius.

I'll do it for you.

You and Tommy go spray paint and try not to end up in a Mexican jail," Rocco says, warmly winking at Tommy.

"Check the Dibujeros too, Rocco.

He's definitely one of them."

Tommy and I hit up the store to buy cans of black spray paint, and ask around about Mozey.

The cashier is wishy-washy and won't give us a straight answer.

He does have an amazing mullet and some of the longest, yellowed fingernails I've ever seen on a man.

He casts dirty looks at Tommy, feigning offense at his femininity, but I feel like it's just a cover for what appears to be deep interest.

He's definitely checking Tommy out while pretending to be disgusted by him.

He explains that he doesn't work everyday but that someone who looked like Mozey maybe did come in and purchase because his coworker may have told him about a customer with a similar description.

Of course, he paid in cash and gave no indication of where he was headed or staying.

I pass him a quickly scribbled note to give to Mozey if he shows up again.

He practically snatches it out of my hands with his freakshow fingers.

He's either got a bit of a tremor or else he's hung over.

The note quivers in his hand as he nods at us with hooded eyes.

I can see him tossing it into the garbage can before we're even out the door.

"Everyone in Tijuana is on drugs or possessed by demons," I say as we walk down the steps of the ferreterría.

"No.

They're just scared of narcos and a lot of people are on drugs.

It's a border town for Christ's sake.

A last resort and a dead end for most.

Here you find desperate people taking desperate measures to survive."

"And then there's the influx of hedonists that just come here for the sex and prescription drugs," I add, taking a jab at his and Rocco's odd penchant for South of the border getaways.

"Speak for yourself, slumdog.

I come here for the food.

Want to go get some tacos before we head back to the murals?" Tommy and I spend the day spray-painting the stencil onto both of Mozey's murals, right by his own signature.

We also find a few spots that seem like they'd be hard to miss if you were scouting for urban canvas.

All day long, I hope and pray we'll just run into him.

I feel more connected to him with the can of paint in my hand, and I like how the undersides of my fingertips are black like I'd sometimes see his.

Tommy is right about the food.

We eat a late afternoon lunch of tacos al pastor and some incredible, crazy looking soup with red broth that supposedly contains cow stomach.

I have no fear of food, and for that I can thank my paternal grandmother.

She had me plucking chickens in her back yard from the early age of seven.

She taught me to boil the feet and heads to create a rich broth.

I've known from a young age it doesn't have to be pretty to taste amazing.

I tell Tommy what I know of how Mozey lost his sister here almost fifteen years ago and how he doesn't think she's dead.

He believes she was kidnapped—so that's why he's here—trying to find her.

"What's he got to go on? How old would she be?" Tommy asks as he spoons out a large wedge of avocado and drops it in his soup.

"She was a baby, really.

I think eighteen months or so.

That would put her at about sixteen or seventeen.

He knows the name of the crooked coyote that escorted them, and he knows her name, according to my brother."

"What was it?" Tommy asks, squeezing in lime.

I copy exactly what he does because he knows the ins and outs of how to eat in Mexico.

"Brisa," I say through a sip of sweet, gritty rice milk laced with cinnamon.

"Oh, like the wind," Tommy says thoughtfully and flags the waiter down for the bill.

Tommy's Spanish is pretty great, and even though I tease him, I'm actually impressed with his great affection and knowledge of this place.

We get in some sidewalks and telephone polls before it gets dark.

We're having so much fun with the project we keep joking about becoming full time street artists.

Tommy has already invented a tag which he's practiced in a hundred places.

It says simply Tommy, but he's managed to get the whole thing looking like a giant, abstract penis.

It's also kind of fun sneaking around trying not to be seen or get caught.

As the sun sets, I'm disturbed by my super-contrast stencil face peeping out sadly from so many Tijuana cement walls.

I'm scared to be left alone here without Rocco and Tommy.

I'm scared to have my haunted face left lingering here, attached to walls for decades without knowing the future of how or when I'll leave.

With or without Moisés? What if I don't make it out at all? My scowl will stay here, frowning onto eternity once my body becomes dust.

We trudge back to the hotel when we run out of paint.

The sound of the bead banging against the tin of the empty can has got me melancholy and deflated.

Tommy insists on stopping at the super market where he buys me a pi?ata and a shit-ton of spicy Mexican candy to fill it.

He gets so many looks here for being flamboyant.

He's dressed in a flowing, canary yellow, silk shirt that now boasts drops of black spray paint.

His hair is feathered dramatically, and his tan is insane.

He's like a Technicolor gay dreamboat that belongs on the big screen.

I smile like a maniac at him while he loads my arms with bags of candy.

"Lana," he says, grinning.

"You're moody, brooding look suits you better.

Somehow that smile catches me off-guard."

"What are we celebrating?" I ask him.

There's so much candy in my arms I can't imagine it all fitting into our small, six-pointed star pi?ata.

"Meeting each-other, saying goodbye and your reunion with your lover," Tommy says as he stacks mineral water and some type of orange drink into our cart.

"But what if it doesn't happen? What if celebrating early jinxes it?"

"Positive thinking, my dear, will get you everywhere in life.

If you want it badly enough, think it, and the universe will deliver."

We push our cart to the checkout, and Tommy buys spearmint gum for Rocco.

He throws in some Spanish language tabloids and some chocolate marshmallow ghosts.

"Can you read those?" I ask, sucking on a chili spice covered lollipop that is scorching my throat and making my eyes water.

"Not really.

I just like the pictures."

"Tommy, you called Mozey my lover, but just for the record.

I've never made love to him."

"What?" Tommy says, his eyes bulging at my confession.

I cough on my lollipop.

I kind of like the idea I can say that out loud at the check out and maybe no one besides Tommy understood what I said.

"Remedy that, baby girl! As soon as we find him.

No use in searching him down if you haven't even tried his lollipop.

What a waste that would be! What if you don't even like it?"

"Oh, I'll like it!" But Tommy's attention is elsewhere; he's already lost interest.

At the store entrance there seems to be some sort of commotion.

We push the cart laden with things we don't really need past a cheapsuited store manager barking loudly in Spanish at a lower-lever parking lot employee.

As we step out into the night, the ground in front of us illuminated by large halogen parking lot lights holds the most beautiful design painted all in white.

They appear to be gravestones, deeply contrasted and glowing against the black tar, some of them hold skulls on top with illegible scripture.

Other stones have soft flowing blurs escaping them, wafting off into nothingness—spray-painted spirits escaping woefully into the air.

This isn't a happy picture; it's full of fear and despair.

It's small and only a humble collection of a few lines, but with this man's talent, the rudimentary becomes sublime.

The lower corner bears his signature and next to it is a likeness of my contrast stencil-face, but it looks even better than the one we made.

This one really looks like me.

Tommy marches ahead with the grocery cart and pops open the trunk.

I strain my eyes through the dark to try to see him—maybe he's nearby watching my reaction.

"Don't bother.

He's long gone by now.

He's teasing you at this point, really.

He's playing a game of cat and mouse.

He'll come out when he's ready."

I slump into the passenger's side seat and reluctantly pull on my seatbelt.

"I've been waiting so long.

It's making me crazy.

I've been waiting three years, Tommy, not just three days in Tijuana."

"I can't believe you haven't done him yet.

I had a whole different vision going on."

"I'm not planning on doing him.

I'm going to find him and then deliver him to Mexico."

"Why do you say it like that? He's a person, not a pizza.

What if he doesn't want to go?"

"He told me he did.

He has family there.

I saw him in detention before he was deported.

I promised to do something for him."

"So you're not in love with him?"

"I am.

I think I am.

I don't know what love is.

I'm his social worker.

I could never sleep with him."

I stare out the car window at the white spray-paint softly glowing against tar-black of the parking lot and the blue-black of the night.