He shunted himself down quickly; leaping soundlessly to the hard mud. I thanked him so much he burst out laughing, wrapping his arm around my waist as we walked down to the shore to rinse the bag clean.

Doña Antonia looped the rope leash Omar had fashioned for Charlotte around the center pole of the longhouse. “You know what they call you in the village? Señora de Cerdo.” The pig lady.

“Fine. They can call me anything they like,” I said. “Will you watch her, please?”

“Of course.”

“Maybe take her down with you when you do the washing, or to the chacra?”

She grunted her assent, already on to some other task. I’d been setting aside a lot of my food for Charlotte, until I figured out she’d eat absolutely anything, any gross thing at all she could root up with her snout: worms, bugs, larva, rotten fruit, frogs, and so on. She even ate some dried pig some kids tossed at her. Still, I left her a bowl of yucca peels just before I left, if only to distract her from my departure and spare myself the resulting hysteria when she realized I was gone.

I ran to the chicken coop, flinging the door wide and throwing down some feed for the birds. The wire door slammed behind me. Feet loose in my decaying sneakers, I hustled to meet Omar and For God’s Sake at the mouth of the Fire Ant Path, our agreed-upon meeting place to bring supplies to the Frannies, a half day’s journey through the jungle.

Omar’s face was serious and purposeful, For God’s Sake smiling as always. “I’ll be in the lead. Then Perla, then you, Lily. For God’s Sake will be last. Lily, don’t fall behind. Don’t speak unless you have to.”

“Why can’t I talk? What if I have a question?”

“Later for questions. Talk if you have an emergency, or if we’ve all decided to stop and talk. I need to listen to the jungle, understand?”

“Whatever.”

“Not ‘whatever,’ Lily. Do you understand or not?”

“Okay. I understand.”

“But if you see something, of course tell us,” For God’s Sake added. “Like a snake, or a snakeskin, over.”

“Why a snakeskin?”

“It’s protein. It gets eaten right away,” Omar said. “If the skin is still there, it means the snake has shed it minutes ago, seconds ago maybe, and it’s still close by, claro?”

I nodded.

“We stay close together when we walk. Tell us if you have to pee. Don’t fall back, don’t wander away, even a little, even to look at something. Don’t lean on anything, don’t touch anything. There are poison ants everywhere, wasps, spiny plants, okay? Do what we tell you,” Omar said sternly before turning and plunging through a mat of hanging vines.

Perla stood planted with her rump toward me, furry triangle ears rotated toward the jungle, her soft nose already snuffling at the subtle parting Omar had left in the curtain of vines. She brayed and stamped, rectangular yellow teeth gnashing, her heartbreakingly bony ribs quaking. Smart girl, she had no interest in entering that place, but For God’s Sake smacked her hard on her fly-bitten flank, and she hazarded a few steps in. Resigned, she dropped her head and kept on walking.