The wide and rolling desert of the Mexican interior shone with intense colors of reds, golds, and browns in the mid-summer sun. Stories millions of years old are told through the various fluctuations of rock, sand, and cliffs. A cicada, lone and distant, hums its familiar sound as a large falcon searches for its dinner overhead.
The Mexico City airport is an eyesore, a child amongst prehistoric land. Aircraft fly in and out, breaking the ancient silence of the desert. They leave trails across the sky, only to be dissolved by the great blue expanse.
Zora Gomez stands in front of the small airport, her 85-liter backpack, empty, in one hand, and a duffle, quite full, in the other. She has long, snarly brown hair that hasn’t seen a pair of scissors since the third grade. A breeze blows through the terminal. Zora puts down the backpack to wipe the sweat off her small forehead and reads the large television above her brunette head. WELCOME TO MEXICO CITY. 95 DEGREES FARENHEIT. 2:30 PM. ALWAYS REPORT SUSPICIOUS ACTIVITY. ENJOY YOUR STAY. Before the screen has a chance to flip to Spanish, Zora picks up her pack and heads to the wait for the International flight booth for check-in.
Sitting down, the young traveler observes her surroundings. A restless infant squirms in his mother’s arms, yelling for chicle and galletas. An old man, travel magazine sprawled across his lap, snores loudly with a single drip of drool on the cusp of falling. Somehow, a bird flew into the airport, mocking two guards with yellow jackets as it flutters amongst the roofboards. 
Zora’s eyes follow the ceiling down to the beginning of the monster of a line, and she gives a sigh of relief that her flight doesn’t leave for another three hours. At the front of the line stands a young man, blonde, with Sperry boatsider shoes and bermuda shorts. He’s hunched over a Spanish-English dictionary and holding up his flight reservation. Zora perks up her ears to try to listen to what seems like a one-sided conversation.
“Uh, yo necesito una… una ticket? Ticket? Jesus, what did I… myself into? Hablas Ingles? Does anyone… English around here?”
You’ve got to be kidding me, thinks Zora. Who the hell comes to Mexico without knowing Spanish? Leaving her bags at her seat, Zora smirks and walks over to the helpless foreigner. She notices the travel agent on the other end of the counter with an impatient look, glancing towards the line which is now flowing out of the door and into honking taxis.
“Hay una problema?” asks Zora in a perfect Mexican accent. She turns to the boy and her heart sinks. She knows that expression and she knows that face.
“Nick?”

Warm tears cover Zora’s face until she can’t see what is taking place in front of her. Her room. Her bed. Her boyfriend. But not her. She rubs her eyes. Clenching her fists, she fixates on the expression sprawled across his face.
“Zora… Zora… it’s not what it looks like. Really, sweetie. Just go downstairs, and we’ll sort this all out.”
Her knees buckle and she grabs onto the frame of the door for support. Shock turns into anger as she gathers the strength to bolt down the hallway of their apartment and into the streets of Los Angeles.

 
“Ese gringo no hablas Ingles y está en Mexico.” The travel agent seems a bit more relaxed now that someone who speaks the native tongue is helping the problem.
“Zora? Where the f*** have you been? You just f***ing left. Answer me, Zora!”
“Creo que puedo ayudar, lo siento para ese gringo, no lo puedo ayudar si?” Now to Nick, “Do you have money?”
“What?”
“Money. Take out your god-damn money you’re holding up the line.” She can’t believe she is actually helping the source of so much pain and sadness.
He fumbles around in his backpack to reveal four crumpled 100-dollar bills and sets them on the counter.
“American bills? American bills in Mexico? You need pesos. Pe-sos. There’s some Spanish for you.” She turns to the travel agent and raises the bills. “Puede usarlos?”
The agent rolls her eyes but takes the bills and punches numbers into the computer. In seconds, a boarding pass and receipt print out of the computer and she hands them across the counter to Zora.
“Siguiente!”
Nick quickly grabs his belongings and begins to walk towards security, not taking his eyes of Zora. She holds up his boarding pass. He reaches out and takes the paper, crumples it, and stuffs it in his pocket.
“Listen, Zora, we should really get coffee and talk. When’s your flight-“
“Save it, Nick. If you wanted to say something, it would have been said months ago.”
“Come on, don’t be so uptight. My flight doesn’t leave for another two hours. Let’s meet at the coffee shop by gate nine in thirty minutes, okay?”
“Fine.”
Zora, back at her bags, closes her eyes to wait out the line. She remembers her home. Swirling meadows and wide prairies greet her body, stiff in the stale airport. As a little girl, Zora loved the outdoors. She hated being inside, even if it meant being out in the rain all day. She was never lazy and always helped her family, even if she was still in elementary school.
Zora hugs her bag closer to her chest. “I can’t believe I’m talking to you right now.” The coffee shop hugs Zora’s body as she does the same to her cup with her strong fingers.
Nick struggles to balance a cup of coffee on the arm of his chair as he takes out his laptop. He holds out the vessel, now dripping in Mexico’s finest hot beverage. “Do you mind?”
Zora rolls her eyes and takes the cup by the rim. “What, do I dare ask, are you doing in Mexico?”
“I’m going back to school at Northwestern in Illonois, but I had a couple days down here with some friends.” Nick starts licking the spilled coffee off his fingers. “How have you been?”
“How have I been? How have I been? What kind of question is that, Nick? Out of all people, it had to be Hailey. Hailey. Really? I didn’t know you were that stupid.”
“Things were complicated, Zora. You know I wanted the best for us. For you.”
“Oh, bullshit. We have nothing more to talk about.” Zora gets up from the table.
“Sit down, Z. Let’s just-“
Zora already is headed out the glass doors of the coffee shop. She pauses at a bench near the bathrooms and breathes deeply.

“Congratulations, Zora!”
No no no no. She can’t believe it. The sanitary paper under her body crinkles awkwardly as she sits up and faces Doctor Harmond.
“You’re kidding.”
“Not one bit! Want to set up a later visit?”
Thoughts rush through Zora’s head. No. He can’t know. No one can know. What did I do to deserve this?
“Absolutely not. I can’t to do this. I can’t to do this…alone.”

Businessmen hustle past Zora as she sits with her bags and lukewarm coffee. She wonders what they’re all in such a hurry for. Zora hopes they’ll take a moment sometime to appreciate what they have, or what they don’t have to deal with.
Zora stands up. She touches her lower abdomen gently. What was once a flat torso is now a small, yet noticeable bump that starts just below the bottom of her bra. She looks down. How are you doing in there? she asks silently. Looking ahead, Zora wears a different expression than Nick’s at the counter or in Los Angeles. I’m not alone, she thinks to herself.