Cost of the Dead

Cost of The Dead

Author Juan Hinestroza explores the violence epidemic in Quibdó through magical realism.

Short story by Juan Alexander Hinestroza

Images by eon_seven

Coffins. They were gathered, huddled in the funeral home, dead after dead arriving; it was a massive wake. The mourners, recognized by the number of wine glasses collected around them, were all together, trying to console each other and measuring each other's pain based on the number of bullets the deceased had taken:

“Resurrection of the Flower Child”
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"Hey, how many bullets did yours take?"Asked one mourner.
"Mine? Four, the first time."
"The first time?"
"Yes, because they went back to the hospital to make sure he was dead. They also hit a nurse who was caring for him. And yours?"
"38 shots they pumped into him, can you believe it?I didn't believe it until I heard the scream, a fearful girl screaming for help because they had killed my boy."

More and more coffins were arriving. At La Costa funeral home, they closed the street from Carrasquilla to IEFEMP because space was needed to accommodate the mourners; coffins coming in and coffins going out. People no longer differentiated which one was their box, to the point that they no longer knew which dead person they were mourning:

"Hey, buddy, that dead person crying is not yours, look, see yours over here."
While some mourned others' dead, on the other hand, there were disturbances claiming the coffins:
"That's my dead person!" Said one of the mourners.
"Look, see, that's mine, I recognize it because it had a purple ribbon at the bottom, that mahogany-colored coffin we made at home."
"That's mine, damn it, I'll have a vigil wherever they take him!"

Cries. As the hours passed, those who had made a marathon of crying began to faint; they had started with timid tears, tied with the same pain that made them come out, and gradually mutated into uncontrollable gasps and streams of saltwater wandering over faces that couldn't bear the pain of bitter reality.

“Ascension of the Flower Children”
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There were those who cried over the coffin, with tears so acidic that they removed the varnish covering the wood, to the point that it faded and became soft. There were others who cried with hiccups, the pain had choked them. Some did it without noise, an art mastered over the years, especially those who already had experience bidding farewell to their own.

Shouts. As night fell, when they evacuated coffins, the atmosphere was revived, those who were once tired had rested, and their main mission was to recall the pain by reviving the heavy atmosphere with disorganized shouts, louder and louder.

There was the mother who complained of not having done enough, the father who saw a lawyer lying in the coffin, the aunts and cousins who consoled, and the grandmothers smoking calao' tobacco, to see if the dead would stand up and shake off the bullets; among the shouts, one lady's voice stood out strongly, who had been robbed of her innocent daughter passing by the corner where they fired the shot.

But who were innocent and who were guilty? That was the great dilemma. They were born with a death sentence rooted in the word poverty, or what was the same, Chocó.

“Funeral Procession of the Flower Children”
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Stubbornness. Around eight o'clock, everyone had gone inside; there was no need to show oneself like that when darkness fell, that's where tragedies were gestated, that papaya couldn't be given.

In La Playita, while closing and securing windows, they heard the complaints of Mr. Jacinto at full lung capacity: "Oh, Lord, listen to my pleas! For God's sake, send us a new mayor, it's time to sell our votes again, this burial of the dead has already emptied our pockets!"

That's how the city was for three months; it was the cleaning season until no one was left in that town, they killed them all. It was a matter of time for each one to receive their bullet.