illuminación

Every night at midnight, the purple clouds came out to dance with the blushing sky. Tonight, Vuela would dance too.

She loved the way Mexico City came alive with the clouds – slowly, ponderously, like a child meeting her sibling for the first time. Electric lights flickered among a legion of flat rooftops that stretched across the grassy plains and toward the foothills of Popocatépetl. Tiny, scattered shapes – the Enlightened Ones – took to the skies with the advent of the Hora Morada. On starry nights, pinpricks of distant suns filtered through the clouds and spotted the slopes with hazy circles of illumination.

Sometimes, when she was sad, Vuela would picture her mother’s face in the snow, and it made her feel warm. But she had no time for sadness tonight.

Her alarm clock offered a feeble buzz when the Hora Morada arrived. Already awake, Vuela swung her legs from the shallow bed. She doffed her tattered nightgown in favor of a soot-stained school uniform. The stains weren’t her fault; two sisters had owned this jumper before her, and Caída had never been one for cleanliness.

In the kitchen, Vuela threw open the blinds that covered the narrow window over the sink. Purple light revealed the cramped room in all its dingy glory. Ignoring the dirty dishes in the sink and the crumbs on the counter, Vuela rifled through the fridge to find her last apple. If she hid her fruits in the fridge, Papá wouldn’t take them.

“Hija,” came a voice from the couch. “The blinds.”

“Sorry, Papá,” Vuela whispered, whisking the curtains back to douse the cloudlight. Papá worked the afternoon shift, toiling under harsh sunlight starting at two o’clock in the afternoon while most of the city was heading to bed. He often crashed on the couch, listening to the radio until he fell asleep. The broadcast pattered on the background, and Vuela heard the weatherman’s voice announce the waxing and waning cloudheights for the week.

Vuela finished her routine in darkness, feeling her way to the front door. Breakfast in one hand, backpack in the other, she skipped onto the dusty street and joined the morning crowds.

The Hora Morada was Vuela’s favorite part of the day for three reasons.

One: the colors made her feel seen. On the outside, Vuela was soiled denim and ratty whiteness, smothered by her uniform and blouse. On the inside, colors cascaded and burst against her skin like waves against the rocky shore. Like a storm building in her soul. Her classmates couldn’t see it, Papá couldn’t see it, but the clouds…they knew what she felt like.

Two: the people made her feel connected. Suits, dresses, and school jumpers passed in a bleary stupor above her head. Vuela whizzed by them, gazing at the lilac skies. She had grown a full two inches in the last year, which made her only three inches shorter than most of her classmates. Like the clouds, she went unnoticed by most people, which was too bad for them, as she was rather awesome.

Three: she could watch the flyers. Above the tenements, men and women soared with the wind, riding the currents with casual ease to their jobs in the city center. The Enlightened Ones, they were called – those who had touched the clouds and received their blessing of flight, if only during the Hora Morada.

Vuela hoped to join them soon. More than hoped – she had a plan.

“Are you ready for the plan, Nubarrón?” she whispered, sliding into her desk next to a boy with black curls streaming down to his shoulders. The schoolroom sat in near darkness, lit only by a tinge of purple from outside. The electricity would turn on when classes began in ten minutes. Vuela and Nubarrón were alone in the room; as usual, they’d beaten Miss Sabida.

“You keep talking about the plan, Vuela,” Nubarrón said, not bothering to keep his voice down. “It’s barely an idea.”

“Hush!” Vuela hissed. “And it is too a plan. Climb the mountain, touch the clouds, get the blessing.”

Nubarrón rolled his eyes. “All the details. You’ve planned for everything.”

Vuela beamed, ignoring the sarcasm. “You’ll thank me when we’re flying, Nubo.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Nubito.”

Nubarrón’s retort died on his tongue as the teacher strode into the room, followed by a handful of straggling students – the early ones, excepting Vuela and Nubarrón, of course.

“It’ll work,” Vuela said, leaning close to his ear. “Weatherman said cloud height has been waning for a week. It’s our chance.”

Nubarrón grumbled something under his breath, and Vuela loved him for it, because most of the children had stopped responding whenever she talked.

As the clouds receded north, toward the Estados Unidos, the school day began. Classes passed in a haze for Vuela, who dutifully scribbled in her notebook with her stub of a pencil as the teacher spoke. If Miss Sabida had checked, she would have seen that very little of Vuela’s writing was related to the lessons. School was important, but not as important as the Story.

The Story had been coming to Vuela for months. It was the journey of her future, of the things she would do and the places she would see as an Enlightened One. She knew flying was only possible during the Hora Morada, but her heart told her that she would be different. She would be special.

After school, as the feeble flickers of dawn crept over the horizon, Vuela ran down the cracked concrete stairs that led to the street. The clouds were long gone, but they would be back, and she would be ready. With her backpack resting precariously on one shoulder, she flew across the pavement.

“Wait up!” Nubarrón called. He hobbled after her, his stiff left leg padding along in stilted steps. He wasn’t very fast, but Vuela didn’t mind, because you didn’t need strong legs to fly.

“I can’t!” Vuela yelled back, running in wild circles around the patio that bordered the street. “I’m too excited to wait!”

Her path took her directly into a pair of tall boys that had just descended the stairs. Vuela fell with a puff of breath, landing squarely on her bottom. The boys barely seemed to notice the collision, but they did notice her. She smiled at them.

“Hello!” she said.

“That’s her, Rico,” one of the boys said, nudging the other’s arm. “The girl who’s gonna fly.”

They both laughed, and Vuela laughed too, because it was the polite thing to do. She stopped when they turned their gaze to Nubarrón, who’d come to a panting stop behind her with hands on his knees.

“And hey!” Rico said. “Her boyfriend’s here too.”

Nubarrón’s face turned crimson, and Vuela stomped her foot, as much from indignation as from a desire to turn the bullies’ attention back to herself.

“He’s not my boyfriend,” she said, staring up at the boys’ thin, gaunt faces. “I haven’t asked him yet.”

For some reason, they laughed even harder, and Nubarrón reddened even further. Vuela didn’t understand why. It was the truth, and why would people laugh at the truth? She was going to fly. She was going to be Nubarrón’s girlfriend. These were facts as unchangeable as the Hora Morada.

She turned, reaching for Nubarrón’s hand, but Rico grabbed her arm before she could. When Vuela twisted away, her backpack fell to the ground, spilling scraps of paper, pencil stubs, and—

“No!” she screamed, but it was too late. Rico picked up the notebook – her notebook – with ungentle hands, tearing one of the pages as he perused the cover.

“The Story,” he read out loud. “Ernesto, look! She’s a writer.”

Now Vuela’s cheeks burned as she watched the boys pore through her life’s work, stopping every few seconds to chortle at each other. She glanced at Nubarrón, whose gaze darted from Vuela, to the boys, to his own lame leg, and back to her. His eyes betrayed his shame. I’m not strong enough, they said.

“Fine,” Vuela muttered. She tugged on Ernesto’s sleeve, but he waved her off without looking. So she punched him in the face.

It was a good hit. Vuela’s knuckles stung with the impact, but she’d connected with Ernesto’s cheekbone. He stumbled back, nearly knocking his friend to the pavement. When he regained his balance, a trickle of blood leaked from a razor-thin cut beneath his left eye.

Vuela blew on her fist. “Leave us alone,” she said.

Then she saw her notebook, still in Rico’s grasp. Ernesto stomped toward Vuela, hissing threats under his breath, but Rico held out a hand to stop him.

“We don’t hit girls,” he said, voice firm. Then he ripped the notebook in half. Vuela could only watch, her heart caught in her throat, as crumpled pages fluttered to the ground. Some floated on the faint breeze, and others picked up clods of soot as they scraped the concrete.

She sniffed, once. She couldn’t let them see her pain. She couldn’t let them know how they’d destroyed years of her life and scattered her dreams down the street in one smooth motion.

Rico dropped the remains of The Story – a ragged canvas spine, spare pages hanging from it like overripe fruit – into the dust.

“Let’s go,” he told Ernesto, who was glaring at Vuela with hateful eyes. The blood still dripped from his cheek. “Now.”

Ernesto obeyed, but Rico stayed a moment as his friend stalked away. He leaned in close to Vuela, who fought back tears as she met his stare.

“You’re never gonna fly,” he hissed. “You’re stuck on the ground like the rest of us. So grow up.”

Only when he had disappeared, lost in the crowds that flowed past them in an endless wave, did Vuela let the tears go free. No one had spared a glance for scuffling schoolchildren on the sidewalk, and no one cared about the crying girl. She was beneath them in every way, in stature and significance. Rico was right.

A painful grunt turned Vuela’s attention to the ground. Nubarrón was kneeling on the pavement, gathering the scrappy remnants of The Story. His left leg stretched awkwardly behind him, and Vuela knew that the posture was hurting him. But she made no move to help. Her feet betrayed her shame. She wasn’t strong enough to face her own tattered pages.

Finally he stood, presenting the disordered stack of paper to Vuela like a hastily wrapped birthday present. “Maybe I can read it,” he said, staring at the ground. “Once you finish.”

Vuela shook her head. “It’s done,” she whispered. Then, more loudly, “I don’t have time for stupid stories.”

“Vuela, those boys—”

“I don’t care about them.” Vuela looked to the south, past the thousands of squat buildings that made up her city, toward the snowy peak of Popocatépetl in the distance. “I’m going to the mountain.”

Ignoring Nubarrón’s slack-jawed surprise, Vuela picked up her backpack and brushed off the dust before reaching inside. Thankfully, the bullies had been too preoccupied with her notebook to dig any deeper. She removed the roll of bills, carefully compressed with a rubber band, from their nook in the bottom of her pack.

“This,” she said, waving the pesos in front of Nubarrón’s face, “is enough to get us to Popocatépetl. You coming?”

He nodded, making Vuela wonder when his voice would start working again. Slinging the backpack over her shoulder once more, she headed south, toward the bus station. As she walked, she made a resolution: she would never again waste words on the unimportant parts of her story.

Their bus reached the base of Popocatépetl at three o’clock in the afternoon. That story wasn’t worth telling.

Their hasty dinner of antojitos for two drained what little remained of Vuela’s savings. Though the elote was tasty, that story wasn’t worth telling either.

Their trek up the mountain trail lasted eight hours, and though the sprawling hills looked lovely in the sunset, that story wasn’t worth telling. Once Vuela learned to fly, she would take in a world of sunsets.

She picked up the story at Popocatépetl’s peak, just before midnight. Her electric torch flickered on low battery, and her stomach grumbled, but she didn’t care. They’d arrived.

Next to her, Nubarrón collapsed onto a nearby rock, rubbing his stiff leg. He’d only complained fourteen times during the climb, but as Vuela didn’t intend on telling that story, she didn’t bother thanking him for holding back.

“Any minute now,” she said, smiling at her friend. “The clouds will be here.”

She gazed into the starlit sky, waiting for midnight. From a dark corner of her mind, a voice whispered threats of disappointment, of failure. The clouds were always here, but what if they refused to come? What if her story needed her to fall short?

“They’ll be here,” she said again, steeling her resolve.

And then they came.

In a single brilliant moment, the purple clouds burst to life overhead. Swirling condensation flashed all around them, and Vuela gasped as the full force of the Hora Morada washed over the peak. Nubarrón stood, his pain forgotten, and they watched the clouds together.

The wind blew over the mountain, whipping waves of moisture into Vuela’s face. She kept her eyes open, daring herself to witness the advent of the clouds. From nothing they arose, drawing together in puffs of energy that sizzled and cracked like a thousand leathery whips. In moments, they consumed the sky and its stars, thickening and roiling with bassy, thunderous tones.

Rays of cloudlight bathed Vuela’s skin, bright and daring and closer than ever before. She could touch them.

She could touch the clouds.

“Nubarrón,” she whispered, the name rasping against her dry windpipe. “You…you go first.”

The boy jolted. “What do you mean?”

Vuela’s toes trembled, then her feet, then her entire body. “Touch the clouds. Get the blessing.”

Nubarrón strode to her side, wincing at the pressure on his tired leg, and grabbed her hand. He smiled. “Together.”

To the east, a gleaming purple haze formed from the morning mist that had gathered by the precipice. Sparks danced in the cloud as it condensed into a lavender ball of light, like a seed. A cloudseed.

“It’s coming,” Vuela tried to say, but her throat had closed up. She could barely breathe.

“We’re ready,” Nubarrón said, squeezing her hand.

The cloudseed broke open, spilling steam and electricity in billowing waves that quickly took on the familiar shape of the Hora Morada. Part of the cloud split off, drifting toward the slopes below, but the remainder rode the wind and blew toward the children on the mountaintop.

“Hold on!” Nubarrón shouted.

The cloud enveloped the peak.

Vuela let go.

She dropped to the ground, covering her head and screaming as the purple haze swallowed Nubarrón whole. Her mouth gaped long after her lungs gave out, and when she finally looked up, the ground was drenched in rainwater and cloudlight.

And Nubarrón was flying.

He hung twenty feet above the ground, pedaling through the air like a child riding his first bicycle. The shock on his face gave way to pure elation as he tasted the breeze that ruffled his thin cotton shirt. The cloud that had transformed him, blessed him, carried on its way toward Mexico City.

“Come on!” Nubarrón yelled down. He gave Vuela a toothy grin the likes of which she’d only ever imagined. It was adorable.

“I can’t!” Vuela called back. “I missed it!”

Not even that surprise could dampen Nubarrón’s enthusiasm. “Get the next one!”

Vuela looked east. The part of the cloud that had split off now drifted toward them, carried on a fresh gust of wind. As it drew near, beams of pure blue energy emanated from its heart.

“I’m ready,” Vuela told herself, because this was her story. Her moment.

Nubarrón flew closer to the ground, moving with the effortless grace of a seasoned flyer.

“That one looks different,” he said, but Vuela barely heard him through the wind howling in her ears.

The new cloud hummed in its approach. Electricity crossed its surface in jagged arcs.

“I’m ready!” Vuela yelled, closing her eyes.

As her outstretched fingers brushed against the cloud, she thought of Papá and how proud he would be of his Enlightened One.

The cloud devoured her and bestowed its blessing upon her.

Only later would she learn that hers was not the wind.

Hers was the lightning.