by Tomás Baiza
Experimental
1. The night before his son died, Martín Ojeda dreamed of hummingbirds.
2. That frightened Martín, because his family had a recent history of turning into hummingbirds—this according to his Tío Chencho.
3. Poor old Tío Chencho was adamant that his daughter had returned to him as a rufous hummingbird after her car accident.
4. Everyone knew Martín’s uncle was crazy—in part because he called hummingbirds by their old Aztec name, huitzitzilin.
5. Some even believed that crazy ran in the extended Ojeda clan.
* * *
6. Martín regretted that he had not been able to bring his son into the world, as that was his wife’s gift and burden.
7. He would do his best to make up for that.
8. When informed of his son’s impending death, Martín Ojeda would tell the surgeons that if they didn’t let him into the operating room none of them would go home alive.
9. It had been a long time since Martín was angry enough to kill someone.
10. Martín’s wife melted into her mother’s bosom, lost in rage and grief.
* * *
11. Martín pushed away unbidden images of blurred wings as he held his son for the last time.
12. He thought that the beeping of the ECMO machine was not unlike chirping.
13. Martín hated the machine and everything it represented, but thought that maybe his son would find some comfort in leaving the world to the music of electronic birdsong.
* * *
14. Martín always thought it a miracle that he left the children’s hospital having refrained from throwing the head surgeon headfirst out the eleventh-floor window.
15. Martín was pretty sure that even world-renowned pediatric cardiothoracic surgeons are not so fucking amazing that they can fly when properly defenestrated.
16. In the hospital parking lot, clutching his son’s responsibly priced receptacle, Martín perseverated on the word “defenestration”—which he had learned in a writing class he took at SJCC the semester before he dropped out to paint cars.
* * *
17. The airbrush whispered over the candy apple red lowrider and Martín tried and tried and tried to not think of his son.
18. Martín’s failure to not think of his son showed in his work.
19. Even though the paint shop employed three airbrush artists, there was a two-month waiting list just for Martín.
20. Martín’s designs had begun to take on an avian quality, and one old-school vato customer swore on his blessed mother’s grave that his ’64 Impala Super Sport would fly away once Martín was done with the hood.
* * *
21. As he worked, Martín thought about how he and his wife hadn’t spoken to one another much since the hospital.
22. The now three-month waiting list for Martín’s airbrushing meant he worked long hours.
23. Martín used the tip he got from the old-school vato customer to take his wife to dinner.
24. Martín and his wife had an okay time, all things considered.
25. They did not talk about their son.
* * *
26. The morning after the dinner date with his wife, Martín saw a hummingbird in the backyard garden.
27. The hummingbird asked Martín what he was waiting for and Martín said, The fuck you talking about—chingao, now I’m fucking talking to hummingbirds.
28. The bird laughed.
29. It did not mind being mocked.
30. Martín’s wife watched her husband talking to the red-breasted hummingbird and then fumbled for her phone.
31. Martín’s wife cried on the phone to her mother while Martín argued with the hummingbird.
32. The hummingbird informed Martín that it would happen, sooner or later.
33. Martín went about his yard work, trying and trying and trying to ignore the terrifying message in the obnoxious little bastard’s strident chirps.
* * *
34. At work, the old-school vato customer called to report that his ’64 Impala Super Sport with Martín’s exquisite paint job had gone missing from his driveway.
35. Another painter, jealous of Martín’s newfound notoriety, joked into the phone that maybe the car had up and flown away, what with all of the wings and feathers and bird-kinda-shit Martín had put on it.
36. Martín’s colleague hung up when the old-school vato customer called him a punk-ass bitch and threatened to come down to the shop and cut his fool ass.
* * *
37. That night, Martín frowned as an Acura TLX Type S pulled away from the curb in front of his house.
38. Martín loved cars, but he did not love strange cars pulling away from his curb when he got home.
39. Martín’s wife said she had no idea what he was talking about and then took a long shower with the door locked.
40. In the bedroom, Martín tried to jerk off but was distracted by an itching between his shoulder blades.
41. It had been getting worse lately.
42. Martín could not allow himself to consider the possibility that the itch—a savage burning sensation that spread outward and across his shoulders—had anything to do with his son, or the hummingbird with whom he occasionally argued in the backyard.
43. Or the Acura TLX Type S.
44. Martín might be a community college dropout, but he wasn’t stupid.
* * *
45. That night, he watched his wife’s chest rise and fall as she slept.
46. It had been a while since Martín had touched that chest.
47. It occurred to Martín, there, in the dark, that his wife had been waxing her face and wearing more makeup lately.
48. He thought about the Acura TLX Type S.
49. Martín was not stupid.
* * *
50. On Sundays, when even Martín’s greedy boss wouldn’t make him work, Martín’s wife would watch from the kitchen sink as her husband crisscrossed the backyard, waving his hands and talking with the hummingbird that patrolled the Oregon sunshines, dianthus, Mexican hats, and purple penstemons he had planted in the exciting, anxious weeks before their son was due.
51. She watched Martín stop and point at one especially persistent hummingbird with a bright red chin.
52. She thought about how many times she’d opened the laptop to find that Martín had not, in fact, been looking at porn, but researching hummingbirds and eco-friendly hummingbird feeders and the best flowers for garden pollinators.
53. She watched as Martín engaged in a long and animated discussion with the bird.
54. She watched as her husband grimaced and rubbed his back against the trunk of the mugo pine tree that he always complained grew too close to the house.
55. She watched as her husband fell to his knees and began to cry to the hummingbird that he wasn’t ready.
56. She fumbled for her phone.
57. Ya es tiempo, Martín’s wife said to her mother.
58. It’s time.
* * *
59. A week later, Martín’s boss was on the phone all morning with customers complaining that their cars were missing.
60. Martín’s coworkers all stared at him.
61. Martín had painted all of the cars that had gone missing.
62. Martín had trouble caring.
63. Martín was preoccupied because his wife thought he hadn’t noticed her belongings beginning to disappear from the house.
64. Martín had been struggling with the urge to firebomb every Acura TLX Type S he saw parked anywhere near the East Side, but he loved cars too much.
65. Martín was also very clear on the matter that he never wanted to go back to jail.
* * *
66. Word spread throughout East San Jo about the crazy-good paint detailer whose work honored eagles and hawks and ospreys and peacocks and owls and quetzals and even hummingbirds.
67. The barrio cognoscenti opined about the airbrush artist whose paintwork made it look as if the feathers shivered and wings flapped, how those cars were now the most disappeared cars in all the West Coast, hotter even than untraceable catalytic converters on the black market.
68. Martín’s boss began to charge triple for Martín’s airbrush work, even as fewer customers booked time because no way did they want their cars to go missing, no matter how firme they looked, ese.
* * *
69. Martín’s boss, distressed over the loss of business, asked Martín if maybe he was getting too good at painting bird motifs on customers’ cars and couldn’t he maybe stick to the regular shit like: Mexican and American flags, 3-D geometric patterns, and Aztec princesses with round hips and big tits.
70. Martín tried and tried and tried, but could not keep his hand from crossing that threshold separating regular designs from fluttering plumage.
71. Martín was having trouble focusing on his work because his wife had left him.
72. He hoped that his wife and the driver of the Acura TLX Type S would fuck and screw and rail one another so often and so good that maybe his wife would find some happiness, and if the sex was good enough, maybe she’d forget about him, which would mean that she could not compare him to the driver of the Acura TLX Type S.
* * *
73. Then one morning the news reported that a ’69 Chevrolet Caprice, black vinyl top, metallic blue with exquisite airbrush work, had invaded Class B airspace.
74. Class B airspace is measured from 0 to 10,000 feet above airport elevation.
75. Cars violating Class B airspace was not normal.
76. Cars violating Class B airspace means that cars were fucking flying.
77. Upon hearing this news, the shop phone began to ring and all of Martín’s coworkers turned to stare at him.
78. Martín’s boss side-eyed him and said, Homie, tenemos un problema, wey.
* * *
79. Martín drove home, wifeless, jobless, and very likely, soon to be homeless.
80. Mortgages didn’t just pay themselves—and Medi-Cal didn’t pay every penny of a dead child’s hospital bills, no matter how shitty the circumstances were.
81. Martín stood in the garage of the home he suddenly could no longer afford, and which no longer felt like home, and hadn’t felt like home since the moment he and the woman who had been his wife returned holding a receptacle and not a baby.
82. Martín stood in that garage and shook with a fury he thought could only end in fire and annihilation.
83. In the corner of the garage was a five-gallon gas container of 93 octane unleaded that he kept for the backup generator, the lawnmower, and the leaf blower.
84. Martín cackled at how the woman who until recently was his wife but would always be the mother of his son would tease him when he used that leaf blower.
85. A Mexican with a leaf blower …
86. Martín grabbed the five-gallon container of 93 octane unleaded and a triple-flint spark lighter and walked slowly to the backyard.
* * *
87. The hummingbird drew close to the red gas can and recoiled at the fumes.
88. The fuck you gonna do with that? the bird said.
89. Martín uncapped the container and stared at the spark lighter in his right hand.
90. The hummingbird hovered a safe distance away.
91. Hay otro camino, the bird said.
92. A better way, you know this.
93. Martín, who’d always considered himself something of a coward, stood above the five-gallon container of 93 octane unleaded and began to cry.
94. Through watery eyes, Martín watched a ’57 Ford F-100, outfitted with a full Fatboy hydraulic system and 0.75-inch NorCal redwood truck bed, fly west, towards the setting sun.
95. To the hummingbird, Martín said, Tell me again.
* * *
96. The hummingbird perched atop Martín’s dashboard all the way back to the paint shop, occasionally glancing at the sensibly priced receptacle that Martín had placed on the passenger seat.
97. Martín fidgeted behind the wheel, barely able to withstand the itching between his shoulder blades.
98. Martín had been ignoring the itching for weeks.
99. Holding the box under one arm, Martín let himself in through the back door and turned on the shop lights.
100. Prop the door open, the hummingbird warned.
* * *
101. The hummingbird hovered over Martín’s shoulder as he examined the colors on the paint booth rack.
102. Red, of course, the hummingbird chirped, and green and gold and yellow!
103. Save the black for last.
104. Martín set out the paints and turned on the electric compressor.
105. Martín removed his clothes and laughed when he realized he was self-conscious about dropping trow in front of a hummingbird.
106. The hummingbird was nonplussed by Martín’s nakedness.
* * *
107. Martín began with the stomach and flanks, his airbrush hand moving in practiced swirls across his body.
108. The hummingbird whistled in approval as the man’s torso sprouted the first delicate traces of feathers.
109. You were born for this, the hummingbird said.
110. Martín closed his eyes as he worked, the itching in his shoulders now a flame that burned down to his core and made him want to scream.
111. He held his breath as the metallic red paint breathed across his chin.
112. Stunning! whistled the hummingbird.
113. Martín looked the hummingbird in the eye.
114. Ya es tiempo, the hummingbird assured Martín, and Martín knew the bird was right.
115. Martín loaded the paint cup with black mixed with a hint of pearlescent pink.
116. That was a bold touch, the hummingbird said. Your son would be proud.
117. Martín started just below his left ear, working downward past his trapezius and deltoid and tricep and then forearm.
118. Before it was too late, Martín tucked the receptacle beneath his right arm and began work on the second wing.
119. I’m sorry, Martín said, his new voice echoing across the deserted paint shop.
120. We’re all sorry for something, the hummingbird answered, leading Martín to the open shop door.
* * *
121. Outside the air was cool and carried a hint of rain.
122. Far above their heads, several cars flitted in and out of clouds fat with moisture.
123. The cars Martín had transformed did not give a flying fuck about Class B airspace.
124. In the empty parking lot, Martín stretched his wings, gazed upward, and wondered whether he would find a home in such a vast purple sky.
Tomás Baiza is originally from San José, California, and now finds himself in Boise, Idaho. He is the author of the novel Delivery: A Pocho’s Accidental Guide to College, Love, and Pizza Delivery (Running Wild Press, 2023) and the mixed-genre collection A Purpose to Our Savagery (RIZE Press, 2023). Delivery was selected as the 2024 Treasure Valley Reads featured novel, and Tomás’s writing has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, the Best of the Net, and Best American Short Stories anthologies. Tomás has fenced in Italy, been rescued by helicopter from the Sierra Nevada, fended off wild dogs while hitchhiking in rural Morelos, México, and once delivered a dozen pizzas to a Klingon-themed orgy at a sci-fi convention. When he is not writing, Tomás is running trails, sharpening knives, or obsessing over bonsai trees.