This Side of Night
Chapters (110)
- Cover
- ALSO BY J. TODD SCOTT
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- PROLOGUE
- I
- II
- PART ONE
- ONE
- TWO
- THREE
- FOUR
- FIVE
- SIX
- SEVEN
- EIGHT
- NINE
- TEN
- ELEVEN
- TWELVE
- PART TWO
- THIRTEEN
- FOURTEEN
- FIFTEEN
- SIXTEEN
- SEVENTEEN
- EIGHTEEN
- NINETEEN
- TWENTY
- TWENTY-ONE
- TWENTY-TWO
- TWENTY-THREE
- TWENTY-FOUR
- TWENTY-FIVE
- TWENTY-SIX
- TWENTY-SEVEN
- TWENTY-EIGHT
- TWENTY-NINE
- THIRTY
- THIRTY-ONE
- THIRTY-TWO
- THIRTY-THREE
- THIRTY-FOUR
- THIRTY-FIVE
- THIRTY-SIX
- THIRTY-SEVEN
- THIRTY-EIGHT
- THIRTY-NINE
- PART THREE
- FORTY
- FORTY-ONE
- FORTY-TWO
- FORTY-THREE
- FORTY-FOUR
- FORTY-FIVE
- FORTY-SIX
- FORTY-SEVEN
- FORTY-EIGHT
- FORTY-NINE
- FIFTY
- FIFTY-ONE
- FIFTY-TWO
- FIFTY-THREE
- FIFTY-FOUR
- FIFTY-FIVE
- FIFTY-SIX
- FIFTY-SEVEN
- FIFTY-EIGHT
- FIFTY-NINE
- SIXTY
- SIXTY-ONE
- PART FOUR
- SIXTY-TWO
- SIXTY-THREE
- SIXTY-FOUR
- SIXTY-FIVE
- SIXTY-SIX
- SIXTY-SEVEN
- SIXTY-EIGHT
- SIXTY-NINE
- SEVENTY
- SEVENTY-ONE
- SEVENTY-TWO
- SEVENTY-THREE
- SEVENTY-FOUR
- SEVENTY-FIVE
- SEVENTY-SIX
- SEVENTY-SEVEN
- SEVENTY-EIGHT
- SEVENTY-NINE
- EIGHTY
- EIGHTY-ONE
- EIGHTY-TWO
- EIGHTY-THREE
- EIGHTY-FOUR
- EPILOGUE
- I
- II
- III
- IV
- V
- VI
- VII
- AUTHOR’S NOTE
- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
- Excerpt from LOST RIVER
- LITTLE PARIS
- DILLON
- ABOUT THE AUTHOR
- What’s next onyour reading list?
Cover
ALSO BY J. TODD SCOTT
The Far Empty
High White Sun
Dedication
For Mom and Dad
Sorry it took so long.
Epigraph
Lo malo de la muerte no ha de ser más que la prima noche.
The only bad part of death must be the first night.
—JUAN RAMÓN JIMÉNEZ
PROLOGUE
NOCHE
I
CHAYO & NEVA
When they shot Castel in the face, Chayo knew they were going to kill them all.
Castel had just pulled off his dirty T-shirt and was waving it over his shaved head, screaming they were students, normalistas, all unarmed, when the shot rang out. It was a high sound, clear and cutting, nothing like Chayo had ever heard before.
A church bell ringing.
Castel looked surprised, staring upward into the softening sky, when he fell.
Moments before, he’d stepped off the bus right into the burning bright headlights of the municipal police truck that had blocked their way. Chayo had marveled at how pale Castel was in those lights, his skin smooth and perfect and shiny like a new peso. How small and thin he looked, too, though he was three years older and ready to graduate. His glasses had sat crooked on his face as he yelled, big old ones his abuelo might have worn, and they were just as shiny as his skin, reflecting everything and nothing at all, since beyond that circled glow the intersection—the whole of the world—was nothing but shadows. Shadows so deep that the men surrounding them were only the barest hints of secret movement.
It was like the night itself was sweating, breathing hard: black lungs and an open, swallowing mouth.
Chayo knew that some of those men circling them in the dark wore uniforms, their faces covered with bandannas or old shirts, in shame and fear, and that unlike the normalistas, all of them were armed.
Everyone was then yelling, warnings and names that made no sense. All these policía or men pretending to be so, and the students they threatened.
At the next intersection, so far away it was like looking up to the moon, a red streetlight blinked on and off.
On and off.
A heart beating.
Despite the calming words of their own driver, when the other truck had first appeared, Chayo and Castel and some of the older students—Ernesto, Iker, Juan Pablo—had been angry and eager to pile out of the bus and confront it, make it get out of their way. But it was Neva who’d held him back, her small hand trembling yet holding his tight. Whispering, “No, please,” begging him with her eyes to stay, so that when he looked down into those eyes that for weeks had been making his heart trip and stumble—always tying his tongue—he’d hesitated.
He’d sat back down. For her . . . for them both.