Hostage Zero

Oscar responded in Spanish. Evan couldn’t understand the words, but the hand gestures said he was talking about a long damn walk through the jungle. The angry man just seemed to get angrier. He turned to the gathered crowd of workers and barked something at them. A few seconds later, someone hurried over with a white block in his hand. The man snatched it away.

He handed it to Evan. “Here,” he said. “It’s soap. Go use it.”

Evan stared. He understood the words, but they didn’t make sense to him.

The man took a step closer and shoved the bar at him again. “Take the soap and go wash all that shit off your face. Your hair, too. Before I cut it off with a pair of scissors.”

“What’s your name?” Evan asked.

It was the man’s turn to look confused. Then he laughed. “My name? Dios mio, did I forget to introduce myself?” He bowed deeply from the waist. It was an exaggerated motion that Evan knew was designed to embarrass him in front of people. “ Me llamo Antonio. But you can call me jefe.”

It sounded like “heffay.”

“Now, por favor Mister Evan Guinn, would you please be so kind as to wash that shit off your face and hair?”

Antonio had dead eyes that scared Evan. He decided it was not a time to argue. “Where?” he asked.

Antonio laughed again. He pointed out to the rain. “Welcome to the jungle,” he said, “where you never have to find a bathtub because a shower finds you every day.”

Was he kidding? He was supposed to just stand in the rain and scrub himself down in the middle of everyone?

Antonio leaned down to look Evan square in the eye. “I have a job to do, Mister Evan Guinn, and it requires you to be clean. If I have to do it for you, I will use a wire brush, and you will not like it.” His breath stank with an odor that Evan had never smelled before-sort of like medicine, but not really.

Not seeing a choice, Evan turned. He walked back into the rain and down the stairs, the bar of soap clutched in his hand. What the hell, he figured. Water was water, right? He could keep his pants on like he did in the dorm showers at Resurrection House (okay, that was a swimsuit, but still) and wash around them. As he started scrubbing his chest and his face with the soap-it was Ivory, his favorite-it actually felt pretty good. He did his arms next, but decided to forgo his legs and feet. Didn’t make a lot of sense when you were standing in a mud puddle. He finished by lathering up his hair, and then put the soap on the step while he allowed the rain to rinse him.

When he was done, the ground around his feet frothed white, and he felt a lot better. It wasn’t until he started to climb the stairs again that he realized how many people were watching him, and how desperately filthy they all were.

Antonio noticed it, too, apparently, because when he barked out an order, they all went back to work.

Under cover again and out of the rain, Evan handed over the bar of soap and stood there, dripping onto the floor. “Better?” he asked.

Apparently not, judging from the look on Antonio’s face. He barked another order, and a towel appeared-a ridiculous purple one with a picture of Mickey Mouse on it. “Dry yourself off,” he ordered. “And come with me.”

He led the way to the middle of the big covered platform, where an area had been cleared. Grateful for the opportunity to at least try to be dry, Evan employed the towel and watched as Antonio opened up a three-foot-long black tube and removed what looked like a stack of aluminum rods with black plastic on the ends. Evan was fascinated, in fact, as Antonio pulled on the rods and they expanded to form a tall framework of aluminum that stretched to six feet tall when it was set on its end. With the framework erected, Antonio reached into the tube again and unrolled a picture onto the frame. When it was all done, they had a tall picture of a seaside resort, with lots of buildings built into the side of a steep hill and impossibly blue water in the foreground.

“That’s the Amalfi Coast,” Antonio said. “Very beautiful.”

With the picture set up, Antonio opened a padded envelope and removed a royal blue T-shirt with a Puma logo on the front, under an embroidered green, white, and red shield that sat dead center, just under the collar ring. The middle of the shield featured a stylized soccer ball with the letters FIGC in the middle.

“Put this on,” Antonio said.

“Why?” As soon as the question escaped his mouth, Evan pulled it back. He slipped the shirt over his head.

“You recognize?” Antonio said. “That’s the shirt for the national futbol team of Italia. ”

Evan didn’t care. He didn’t even know that they played football in Italy.

Antonio pointed to a spot on the floor in front of the picture. “Stand there.”

Evan did as he was told while Antonio produced a little camera and a newspaper from the padded envelope. The paper was called Il Golfo, and it featured a picture of a man Evan had never seen before.

“Hold the paper up next to your head and smile,” the man commanded.

Evan remained stone faced.