The Tortilla Curtain

América thinks about how she had “closed her mind down till the world went from a movie screen to a peephole” after she found herself back in the canyon (281). She desperately missed her family and hated Cándido for taking her away from them. However, one day, she started to feel better, roused by a beautiful bird song and the feeling of her baby growing inside her. When Cándido returned with the turkey, she forgave him, and her newfound joy means that she does not register the danger of the fire at first. But when she understands what is happening, she wishes “she’d been strong enough to let the peephole close down forever” (283).

Cándido experiences a “pure gut-clenching terror” when he sees the flames. Sure that he and América are going to die, he pushes her up the canyon, screaming at her to climb. Miraculously, they reach the road, which swarms with emergency vehicles. They drink from a hose behind the grocery store and watch the planes and helicopters flying over the fire. Cándido is terrified that someone will learn that he started the fire and kill him. He tells América they have to keep moving, but she refuses. He asks if she wants to burn, and she replies, “Yes, […] yes, I do” (286).

For hours, they wander through the dark hills. The power is out, and all the houses have been evacuated. América complains of pains in her stomach and finally announces that her water has broken and the baby is coming. Cándido thinks it is “just his luck” and wonders how he can possibly deliver a baby. He tells América to wait and goes to search for resources. He walks into the darkness, counting his steps and calling out so he does not lose América. Finally, he reaches a “white stucco wall”: the edge of Arroyo Blanco. Cándido works his way along the wall, thinking of his bad luck and how he has let América down. He comes to a shed where he finds a lantern and hose and hurries back to find América.

América cannot believe she is having her baby now, in this place, so far from home. She hears the fire crackling outside and knows Cándido is wondering how they can run with the baby on its way. She hears another sound and sees a small Siamese cat mewing at her side. It is Kyra’s cat, her last surviving pet.

Delaney, his family, and their friends and neighbors are gathered outside the canyon, making a group of “refugees in Land-Rovers, Mercedes-Benzes and Jeep Cherokees” (293). He makes a sarcastic joke about the turkey being ruined, and Kyra scolds him for trying to be funny while everything they own is being threatened. In the 10 minutes the police had given them to pack up, Delaney grabbed his computer and backup disks with his writing and is “frozen with grief and anxiety” as he watches the fire (294). A neighbor offers Delaney a drink of an expensive whiskey he “couldn’t let […] burn,” and as he sips, Delaney sees two men coming out of the canyon. He immediately recognizes José Navidad and his friend. Jack curses, saying the men must have started the fire “cooking their fucking beans” (295), and Delaney feels a surge of “pure hatred.”

An officer is already questioning the men, but Delaney butts in, announcing that he has seen the men camping in the canyon. A small crowd forms, demanding to know if arsonists started the fire. The suspects are handcuffed, and Delaney feels José Navidad looking at him with “contempt and corrosive hate,” which he returns without “even the slightest tug of common humanity” (298). José Navidad spits in Delaney’s face as he walks toward the police car, and Delaney loses control. He rushes at the man who is put into the police car as the crowd shouts insults.

The winds shift, and the fire changes course. The residents of Arroyo Blanco return to their homes in the morning, and Delaney is ashamed of his outburst. He thinks about the abuse he received at the hands of protesters outside an abortion clinic with his first wife, and now he feels he has become “the hater, […] the redneck, the racist, the abuser” (299). He wonders if he would have felt the same if the men had been white, but he has no answer.

Back at the house, Jordan worries about the cat, Dane Edith, who vanished during the evacuation. As the boy searches for her, Delaney pulls the turkey out of the oven, thinking it is “the worst” Thanksgiving of his life. Kyra is on the phone, checking on the state of her listings. Someone in the office says the Da Ros place has burned, but Kyra cannot confirm the news. She wants to check on it, but Delaney reminds her that the roads are closed. Just then, Kit comes in, holding up a little back box that she found in her purse. It is Dominick Flood’s ankle monitor, which he dumped in her bag while flirting with her so he could escape during the confusion of the evacuation.

Cándido watches América hold the cat as her body seizes with contractions. Finally, late in the night, América delivers the baby. Cándido cuts the umbilical cord, thrilled with the birth of his son. However, cleaning the baby, he discovers that the baby is a girl. América announces that her name is Socorro and holds the baby close.

By dawn, the danger of the fire passes, and Cándido faces the reality of feeding América and the new baby. He climbs over the stucco wall and into the back garden of the nearest house. Although he “would never” enter the house, he fills sacks with vegetables from the garden and “borrows” tools from the shed. He sees a large plastic bucket filled with dog food and eats a handful before bringing it with him, too. Then he hoists himself and his loot over the wall. He scours the surrounding area until he finds a hidden rock ledge where he can build a temporary shelter and goes to gather more supplies. Using a stack of pallets taken from nearby the shed, Cándido frames a small house. For a roof, he slips back over the wall again, even though the residents are already starting to return. He takes a dog bed and the animal’s dishes, wondering if it is “morally indefensible,” and finally snatches a large sheet of corrugated plastic that covers a greenhouse. People begin appearing in the nearby houses, and Cándido starts to panic; he cannot find a way back over the wall. Then, he spots an aluminum stepladder, the very one Kyra gave to Delaney, leaning against the wall. He is safely over the wall in another moment, thinking he does not care what people think; he will take what he needs from here on out.

He moves América and the baby to their new shelter despite América’s protests that she wants to return to Mexico, and he falls asleep. When he wakes, he sees that América has eaten many of the oranges he returned with and thinks she needs meat. He is wondering where he can get some when the Mossbacher’s cat reappears.

Kyra drives out toward the Da Ros place, worried by the scorched land on either side of the road. She thinks about what to do if the house is damaged. The fire flattened the house’s gate, and Kyra must continue on foot. She thinks that the house still could have been spared, but as it comes into view, she sees it is completely gone. She tries to absorb the reality of “all that perfection, all that exquisite taste” (319) and is furious that a place as beautiful and unique as the Da Ros place is gone. She thinks it is the fault of “the Mexicans.” The two men arrested at the canyon have been released, but Kyra is sure of their guilt. 

Back at home, Kyra tells Delaney the news about the lost home. He has been shaken by the fire and the threat to his house, filling him with a hate that frightens him. Delaney suggests a walk to calm them down, saying they can look for the still-missing cat. As they walk through the neighborhood, Jack Jardine pulls up behind them. He tells them there is something they might want to see and invites them into the car. He drives them to the Arroyo Blanco gate, where someone has spray painted large black hieroglyphs on the wall. They cannot read the message, and Jack asks Kyra if it looks similar to the graffiti outside the Da Ros house. Kyra says it is different, something “like their own code” (325), and Delaney feels the hate rising in his throat. Jack reflects that the writing is “an animal reflex” like “marking their territory” (326), but Kyra counters that Arroyo Blanco is their territory. Delaney speaks up that he is not “so sure.”

December arrives, the rain begins to fall, and Delaney discovers “his mission.” He becomes obsessed with catching whoever is responsible for the graffiti on the wall, setting up cameras, and staking out the gate at night. He shortens his hikes and cannot focus his usual interest on the natural world. As he hides in his blind one rainy night, he thinks of the Siamese walking catfish, an invasive species in Florida that is “unstoppable, endlessly breeding, straining the resources of the environment and gobbling up the native fishes like popcorn” (328).

One night, Delaney skips his vigil and discovers the next morning that the cameras have been tripped. Hoping to catch the two men from the canyon, but assuming it was a coyote, Delaney is shocked to see Cándido’s face looking up at him from the developed film.

América nurses the baby in Cándido’s makeshift house. Their savings burned in the fire, except a couple of dollars in fused change, and Cándido is looking for work again. He feels cursed and considers leaving América and the baby, thinking they might be better off without him. She demands that he buy her a bus ticket, determined to return to Mexico, and he reveals the fate of their savings.

América is delighted with her baby. Socorro is “her creation, beautiful and undeniable” (334), but there is no one to admire her. As the glow of the birth wears off, however, she realizes that there will never be a life for her in the United States. She wants to return to Mexico, thinking her daughter, born on American soil, can return when she is older. However, it occurs to her that no one knows Socorro has been born, and she asks Cándido if they can register the birth with the village priest. He scoffs at her but suggests they take the baby back to Canoga Park to find a priest.

The rain turns the dry ground into thick mud, and sitting outside for a bit of air, América notices that Socorro stares off into the distance and does not blink when América passes a hand over her face. She remembers the burning pain after José Navidad raped her and worries that some disease has been passed to her daughter.

Cándido stands outside the post office in the rain, hoping for work but receiving only “look[s] of unremitting hate” from passersby (338). That night, América insists that the baby needs a doctor, even though she seems in perfect health to Cándido. He reminds her that they have no money for a doctor and goes back out looking for work the next day with no luck. After an entire day waiting outside various establishments, Cándido is walking along the canyon road, wondering if he can scrounge anything from the grocery store dumpster when a car swerves onto the shoulder. He is overcome with déjà vu as a white man climbs out: it is Delaney who shouts at Cándido to stay put.

Driving up the canyon road, Delaney is amazed to see “the man who’d invaded his life like some unshakable parasite” walking along the side of the road (342). He races to call 911 but sees that Cándido is running away, stepping into traffic and narrowly avoiding being hit. The truck that avoids Cándido crashes into Delaney’s new car instead. As Cándido jogs away, Delaney exchanges insurance information with the furious driver of the truck and speaks with the police. He tries to explain about Cándido, but the police officer is not interested. When the tow truck comes, Delaney doesn’t get in, saying he will walk home. He quickly crosses the road and follows Cándido’s muddy footprints.

Kyra gets caught in the rain on her way to pick Jordan up from a friend’s house. She has to pull over but is not bothered; work is slow, and she is in no hurry for the first time she can remember. As the rain lifts and she sets off again, Kyra is amazed by the rural setting and wonders what the real estate is like in the area. She sees a for-sale-by-owner sign at the end of a driveway and cannot resist looking. Kyra is shocked when she finds a huge three-story mansion. She approaches the place, considering how much it could sell for and if the surrounding area could be developed into an exclusive community. She thinks she has no reason to share the listing with her boss and smiles at the man who answers the door.

Delaney continues following Cándido’s footprints through the mud, but the night is falling. He is nearing Arroyo Blanco, and he sees that fresh graffiti has appeared on the wall. He takes this as “the declaration of war” and runs toward his house with the tripped camera (351), thinking of the gun he had bought at Jack Jardine’s suggestion. At first, the gun had made him feel “ashamed of himself,” but now he is glad of it. He loads the gun, changes his clothes, and heats a can of soup. As the rain continues, he wonders about the possibility of mudslides, thinking the hillside is particularly vulnerable after the fire.

When Delaney develops the photos, he is shocked to see that the culprit is not Mexican; rather, Jack Jr.’s face looks up at him. Delaney is shaken but sure that Cándido is still guilty of something. He throws the evidence away and leaves the house. He heads back into the dark hills, slipping in the mud despite his expensive boots. He thinks he is a true pilgrim, stalking an animal in the wild; he catches a whiff of smoke and moves toward it.

Cándido’s face alarms América when he returns to their shelter. He is wet and muddy, and looking at him, América begins to cry. He tells her that he saw Delaney, that the man is “like a madman” and frightens Cándido. He has no idea what he has done to make Delaney so angry and wonders if he could know about the fire. América suggests that the man is just “a racist,” but Cándido doubts it.

After he eats, América again tells Cándido that Socorro needs a doctor. She gathers her courage and tells him that she is worried that the baby is blind, that her urine burned after the men assaulted her, and that she thinks some sickness was passed on to the baby. Cándido never has the chance to reply, as they are interrupted by Delaney’s face in the shack’s doorway.

Delaney recognizes the stolen materials that the shack is made from, and he is “outraged” by the continued “destruction of the environment” (362). However, he is surprised by the addition of América and the baby. A sudden roaring sound grows louder, and Delaney feels the ground moving underneath him.

As Cándido imagines his daughter’s future as a blind woman, he tries to process the appearance of Delaney and the mountain crumbling around them. The shack dissolves around them as the ground “turn[s] to pudding,” and all four are swept toward the stream that has become a raging river. Angry and miserable, Cándido thinks that “all he wanted was work” (364), and now he and his family are going to drown. He loses hold of América and goes under the water. When he surfaces, América calls to him, holding out her hand, and pulls him onto her perch on the post office roof. She is crying so hard that he almost begins to cry, too, even though “men didn’t sob.” Cándido asks her where Socorro is, but she does not answer. Cándido feels “numbed right through to the core of him” (366), but when he sees Delaney’s hand reaching out of the water, he bends down and grasps it.