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name, and a new beginning.
    “This is…I can’t
thank you enough, Alma. This means so much to me.”
    Alma nodded. Her
smile was a little troubled as she reached over and patted Vivian’s hand.
    “You are
welcome, my dear. Miguel has done me many kindnesses in these last few years.
It’s a small thing for me to help you. But…”
    Vivian waited
for her to finish. “But what, Alma? Go ahead.”
    “You are still
young. Why do you want this change? Are you unhappy with who you are?”
    Vivian pursed
her lips. She thought of Katie, of the terrible things she’d done in Colorado.
It seemed like so long ago, and she had a hard time reconciling that person
with the one she was becoming in Mexico. “I just need a change. That’s all. I
lost someone very dear to me, and it made me so angry that I became somebody
else. Somebody I didn’t like. Somebody that…that scared me.”
    “I understand.”
    “I can’t undo
the things I’ve done, Alma. And I can’t bring back the ones that I love.
There’s nothing left for me in the place that I used to call home. So now I’m
here, and I found Miguel. I want to be with him, and this goes a long way
toward making that a reality.” She tucked the envelope into her pocket. “Thank
you. Thank you so much.”
    “You’re welcome,
Carmen. I hope,” she patted Vivian’s hand, “that life is easier in your new
home.”
    “Me too, Alma.
Me too.”

TEN
    Terri was
completely unnerved. The further she pushed into the jungle, the more tenuous
the terrain became. The trail meandered almost exclusively over long, slick
portions of limestone, and she had to take careful, deliberate steps to keep
from stumbling. The damp seeped through the porous ground, and pockets of
sulfur-tinged water pooled every couple of feet.
    The Rio Grande
was hours behind her, and now she was alone with the symphony of jungle life
reverberating all around her. Iguanas and squirrels skittered from branch to
branch overhead, the limbs casting uncertain shadows on the jungle floor.
    She walked a
little quicker when something large—something barking an odd, primal
grunt—began to pace her from the brush; it was a few hundred feet behind her,
moving through the foliage like a miniature bulldozer.
    She started to
jog, and then there was a sudden, high-pitched squeal and she shrieked and ran.
    The creature
followed, and she sensed its pursuit; she watched in horror as palmetto fronds
shook in the wake of its passage.
    Terri dug deep
and found another gear, her boots skidding over shale and limestone as she put
her head down and pumped her arms.
    The razorback,
easily the biggest animal she’d ever seen in the wild, burst from the greenery
and onto the trail. She stopped for an instant, terrified as the behemoth
struggled to keep its footing on the slippery limestone. Its hooves clattered
over the surface, and it loosed another banshee squeal as it crashed down onto
its side and slid hard into the brush on the opposite side of the path.
    Then, its
powerful haunches pumping cartoonishly in place, it regained its footing and
surged after her. The thing stood taller than her, its tusks easily ten or
twelve inches in length.
    She sprinted
down the path, flying over rocks and roots, grunting as the trail angled
downward into a gradual depression. She thought about peeling off into the
brush, but she couldn’t convince herself to abandon the trail’s familiarity.
    And still the
beast charged. It was gaining, squealing and grunting all the while.
    The trail fell
into a wide thicket of cypress trees. They were covered in vines and brambles,
and she could hear something else.
    Rushing water.
    She ran toward
the raucous burble, flying through the trees, pumping her legs so hard she
almost couldn’t stop in time. There was an enormous sinkhole at the far end of
the cypress grove. Instinctively, she fell hard to the ground, stripping the
top layer of skin from the palms of her hands and knees as she skidded to a
stop on