Juventud. Vanessa Blakeslee

on the valley road. Every time we creaked to a halt, I swallowed and tried to squelch the nausea brought on by the diesel fumes, cow manure, and fear. We passed where the bandidos had set up their roadblock, and I raked my sweaty palms over my thighs. My friends and I were forbidden to even ride the city buses in Cali’s center because armed bandits hijacked those, too, despite the police. But today the only presence blocking the road was a herd of cows. The driver honked, the cows trotted to the side of the road, and I exhaled in relief.

      Manuel met me at the bus stop, on the corner of La Maria church where we had first kissed. He steered me across a courtyard with well-manicured rosebushes and into a smaller makeshift outbuilding—no more than a frame constructed of two-by-fours with plastic sheeting for sides and a roof and a few dozen folding chairs arranged in a semicircle. Young people streamed in after us. He refused to tell me what the meeting would be about, just said, “You’ll see,” and nodded toward the front. A young man dressed in a collared blue shirt and jeans stood there, hands on hips. He surveyed the assembly similar to the way Papi observed our alpacas from the fence. “My brother, Emilio,” Manuel said.

      But for subtle differences, I might have guessed they were twins: Emilio stood a few inches taller and broader than Manuel, whose build remained slight, more boyish. Yet they had the same soft black hair, the same delicate jaw line and cheekbones, the same eyes.

      Emilio called the room to attention. Bodies squeezed together; a faint odor of perspiration and cologne filled my nostrils. Carlos took the last chair by the entrance, and Ana slid onto his lap. Those gathered fell quiet.

      The meeting turned out to be an open forum on how the Catholic Church advocated that the local community might peacefully defend itself against the two dominant rebel groups, the ELN and the FARC. Since January, attacks and kidnappings on the Church and civilians had sharply arisen across Colombia, but especially in the Andes region—incidents like the bus hijacking, as one young man brought up in a quivering voice, toying with his ponytail as he stood above the crowd. “How is turning the other cheek going to faze these so-called revolutionaries?” he said. Emilio reminded everyone that it wasn’t just the leftist guerillas who terrorized civilians, but the paramilitaries who infiltrated villages controlled by the ELN or the FARC, then rounded up and assassinated anyone deemed “sympathetic” to the guerillas’ cause. Despite the fixation of the politicians and media on the guerillas, the paras were responsible for a majority of the violence and horrific civilian massacres. “Sympathizers” included pharmacists who filled prescriptions for guerilla leaders, doctors who treated them, even bus drivers who had provided transport—ordinary citizens just doing their jobs who faced torture or death at the hands of the paras if they didn’t comply.

      I had listened to enough of Fidel’s radio broadcasts to know both factions caused most of Colombia’s unrest. But I had never paid much attention to exactly what occurred in which province or town—now I wondered why I hadn’t. Had I believed our military and the paras a lesser evil, if such a thing even exists? Emilio was correct—the media focused mainly on the threats posed by the guerillas. “The private armies of the Autodefensas only protect the wealthy,” Emilio was saying. “Some of you may even know those who fund the AUC. But we must stand against them as well as the guerillas.” Military patrols had cut through our hacienda on their way into the mountains, and Papi invited them to stay for dinner, spend the night. The soldiers who had shown up last year—hadn’t Fidel been one of them? He’d been in uniform when he asked Papi for a job after returning from their mission; Papi even addressed him as Captain. Had the troops been military or paramilitary, and what had been the lettering on their uniforms? Was Fidel, with his Virgin Mary figurine on the dashboard, capable of slitting a bus driver’s throat for giving a guerilla a ride? Maybe Papi had just been polite in housing them—or they didn’t give him a choice. Emilio said the Colombian army and paramilitaries were one and the same, that the paras simply carried out the dirty work of human rights abuses that the army wanted “taken care of” but didn’t want to be responsible for.

      Manuel leapt up. “How much longer will it be before the Church toughens its stance against both insurgencies?” he asked. “Archbishop Duarte states that it is his personal duty to take on the risks himself in trying to protect his people. Why don’t the rest of us do the same—isn’t it our right?” But his words only met a silent room, with heavy looks exchanged over clasped hands and the creak of chairs. No one agreed with or challenged him, not even Emilio.

      After the meeting’s close, Emilio walked toward us. The two brothers exchanged a quick embrace. “What’re you doing up there, Professor? Trying to put the audience to sleep?” Manuel said, brushing his brother’s shoulder in a playful jab. Emilio, grinning, shook his head and clicked his teeth. “You just better stick to building cabinets.” Their easy way with each other made me yearn for a sibling. Manuel introduced us, and when Emilio’s lips brushed my cheek my stomach flipped. I hoped Emilio had not felt anything.

      Emilio ushered us over to a table and folding chairs in the corner, away from the young people chatting in clusters—a small relief. Dampness chafed my underarms. Ana waved, exiting the tent behind Carlos. Manuel disappeared and returned a moment later, handing us each a cup of lukewarm water; I managed a few tiny sips, the water too chlorinated for my taste. A street lamp lit the worn face of the courtyard Virgin, her robe and feet hidden by roses, in full bloom and deepest red. “So tell me what it is you do again,” I said to Emilio. “Besides studying to be priest. Since you don’t build cabinets.”

      “Cabinets, no,” Emilio said. He and Manuel exchanged small smiles, and Manuel chuckled in his throat. “Only one of us is handy with a saw, I’m afraid. Hmm, what to call my current duties? A peacekeeper, of sorts?”

      “More like a go-between,” Manuel said, adjusting his seat. “Right? A liaison.”

      “That’s it.” Emilio nodded, sipped some water. “I’m a representative for the diocese between the guerilla leaders and the government. So I have access to diocese records going way back. The Church is rather excellent at keeping records. Among other things.” He rolled the cup, light now, in his slender fingers; his hands lacked the musculature of Manuel’s.

      “What does that have to do with anything?” I asked.

      Emilio removed a folder and legal pad from a backpack, placed a document before me. Even in the dull light, the seal glimmered; an ink smudge marked the tail end of a signature. He said, “I don’t suppose you know that your father, Diego Martinez, was formally excommunicated in the early nineties? Or what might have led to that?”

      I lifted my cup and let the water touch my lips but didn’t drink. “His divorce,” I said. “He says the parish priest won’t even look at him if they run into each other—that he crosses the street.”

      “Divorce? That’s what he told you?” Emilio’s remark sounded more a statement than a question. “According to church records, he and your mother were married in 1982, divorced the following year, and he received an annulment a few months after that. He had to be in good standing at the time to get an annulment.”

      “What does that mean? He got into an argument with the priest or something?”

      Manuel leaned forward on his elbows and lowered his voice. “The Church mandates excommunication for a variety of things.” He closed his hand over mine and squeezed, the coarse warmth of his palm jarred me ,but I didn’t pull back. “In the case of your father, for very specific reasons. It was the eyewitness testimony of a former cartel operative that turned him in.”

      “Cartel?” I said. “That’s impossible.” Somewhere in the middle of the tent a cell phone rang. The young man with the ponytail answered it, talking excitedly. His group rocked with laughter. “If you’re going to make accusations like that, you’d better have proof.”

      The brothers exchanged knowing looks. Manuel nodded toward the manila folder, and Emilio withdrew a stapled packet. “This is the testimony of a dear friend, Father Juan. Only much later in his life did he find the Church. Before that, he was a subordinate in the drug war until after the collapse of the Medellín cartel. This is far too long for you to read tonight,” Emilio said, and tucked the packet back