After four buses and a taxi, the driver let us out on the side of a mountain road and pointed uphill.

The air felt cooler here than it had in San José.

The road was rough and patched, edged with grass and fences. My sandals slapped against wet grit.

I watched our small group stretch and bunch, then stretch again with the grade.

Chaló in front.

Sean behind him.

Me in the rear.

A sound came from behind us.

I turned, then stepped off the road to let a vehicle pass and my foot sank ankle-deep into a sticky puddle the color of old coffee.

I froze, then lifted my foot slowly, as if speed might make it worse.

The oil clung to my skin and sandal straps.

Ahead of me, my friends turned.

“You coming?”

I wiped at it with leaves that just smeared it around, then gave up.

“Yeah. Right behind you.”

My sandal squeaked faintly with every step.

~

The buildings appeared—first a corner, then a whole row.

Rusted roofs.

Twisted railings.

Windows with no glass.

A village that had stopped being a village and hadn’t decided what else to be.

“It was first opened as a tuberculosis hospital. Later it became a prison, an orphanage, and a mental asylum.”

Chaló repeated the facts to us, as if dates could make the scene feel orderly.

I looked around.

“Now its …”

Inside, the corridors ran on longer than I expected.

Light came in through broken windows in bright slants, cutting across peeling paint and damp plaster.

The walls were layered with graffiti—names, drawings, and jokes that had lost their audience.

Chaló snapped his fingers.

“I can’t believe it’s over. Four months. Like that.”

The sound bounced off the hallways then disappeared into the building’s hollowness.

Sean answered, turning a corner as he talked—his body suddenly disappearing into shadow.

“Next week. You ready to go home?”

My sandal squeaked as I followed, leaving a slick mark on the scratched wooden floors.

Ahead of me, Chaló laughed.

“It’s the food. Look, I’m Mexican, but there’s only so much rice and beans a person can eat. But seriously, I can’t stop thinking about the new iPad I have waiting for me at home. What about you?”

Sean ducked under a doorway.

“Church. Well, that and friends. I mean…”

He looked at Chaló and me.

He smiled back.

“I got your meaning.”

Then Sean paused to sit on the ledge of an open window overlooking the mountains.

“Hey Chaló, have you been home at all … during our stay?”

“Three times.”

Sean sighed.

“Four myself.”

Then they both looked at me.

I swallowed, then froze

“I— I haven’t been back at all.”

I stood in the doorway and watched dust turn in a beam of light as my friends moved to the next room.

Sean called at last.

“Are you coming?”

“Yeah.”

Then I followed them into the next corridor.