His Tita always took strides that were long and rapid. Her legs bounded past him; two slender stilts swinging in a perfect fulcrum protruding from her stout torso. Atanasio would emulate her stride, walking stiff-legged, until he fell hopelessly behind and then bound forward until he was a step or two ahead; repeating until the end of their twice daily migration.
The puncture on the bottom of Atanasio’s heel seared and popped at the conclusion of each step: without pain when he let it be, without pain when he applied pressure, it stung for only that half second immediately after he lifted it from the ground. About once a minute his Tita, would arch her neck to glimpse her grandson’s theatrical winces before exhaling a sharp if not equally theatrical breath through her nose. Atanasio would always later remember these as the sound of a horse blowing air through his lips.
“Tita, will you please, please carry me for a while?” Atansio begged, tilting his head.
“I don’t know, Nano. Will I carry you?” Without breaking her unusually stern forward gaze.
Atanasio didn’t press. It was worth an occasionally shot. Sometimes she said yes. Usually she said no. They passed a break in plants that usually signified that they were maybe two-thirds of the way to the hacienda. Typically, Atanasio would use that sign as a method of reinvigoration and the last mile and half or so daydreaming about the big blue can that made the water so cold it hurt your teeth. The water was never colder than it came out of that can without turning to ice. Today, though, all he could think about was the thousands of steps on his foot it would take before he could get that water.
When he had fallen behind again, he pled his case a second time. “But Tita, it hurts so bad, I’m not gonna make it!”
“You’ve made it a hundred times before, today is the same.”
“Today is not the same! My foot doesn’t always hurt this bad!”
His Tita ignored him. The monolith of tiny palm trees continued for all eternity in front and behind them. The soft grass Atanasio had been walking in for the past mile began to dissipate with each step: first becoming browner and harder and then giving way altogether until the banana plants were right at the edge of the road, towering over either side of the path like leafy, green prison walls. Atanasio took 3 steps on the ground before stepping on what he thought was a dirt clod but turned out to be a hard rock dug into his heel.
“OWWW-OOOOO! Atanasio howled, turning “Ow” into a two syllable word the way all children do when they think they’re tugging at an adult’s heartstrings.
“Are you good?” his Tita said with a frustrated monotone.
“No!” Atanasio’s voice squeaked. “My foot is hurting! And I don’t want to walk anymore because my foot is hurting me!”
“Well, you have to.” She extended her hand passively.
Atanasio violently pivoted his hips away from her flinging his arm towards his opposite shoulder as if it was suddenly limp. “No!” he yelped with a rawer squeak. His eyes were glossing over with the first, overflowing tears that were yet to stream down his face.
His Tita paused for a short moment and turned until she was squarely facing her grandson. In the same instant her lips closed, puckered and eyebrows raised even as her head lowered. She then maintained her posture for several seconds. Atanasio absently began to move his right foot backwards but before another second had passed she was hunched over and upon him with three long steps.
She wound up her hands like a sidewinder and snatched up his entire upper arm in her hard, crackled hand.
“No… Nooo-oooohhh!!!” Atanasio screamed again turning a single syllable words into a two syllable manifesto of dissatisfaction. He threw the entire weight of his 6 year old body backwards towards the earth and let his appendages go limp. His Tita, however, easily supported the weight even as Atanasio arched his back and swung his body in every conceivable direction trying to break her grip.
His immediate plan had been to slide out of his Tita’s grasp so he could roll under her legs and run away; the irony of running away because of a hissy fit to avoid having to walk having been lost on him.
Atanasio struggled and grunted melodramatically like a captured spy tied to a chair in a movie. Slowly and steadily, he felt his Tita’s hand close tighter and tighter around his skinny, light brown bicep. She lifted him off the ground slightly until his feet skipped out from under him and his was almost parallel with the ground and with one casual motion flicked him to the ground like a cigarette butt.
Atanasio collected himself with as much alacrity as he could, turning onto his back and sat up on his elbows with small, awkward movements of his shoulder blades. His tiny chest expanded and contracted in huge breaths broken up by smaller staccato sobs. His grandmother moved her body over him and slowly lowered her face which was full of lines and red with rage.
The stalemate continued for what seemed like hours for Atanasio but for what only amounted to a few seconds in real time. His grandmother’s breaths were deep, continuous and angry through her mouth, until suddenly, she closed her mouth, some of the white returned to her face and a tiny, upturned, almost smirk came to the left side of her face.
Then as quickly as it appeared, it vanished and before Atanasio could speak she grabbed the back of his neck lifted her right hand near her cheek and commenced the beating.
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