Playing for the Devil’s Fire. Copyright © 2016 by Phillippe Diederich. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in case of brief quotations for reviews. For information, write Cinco Puntos Press, 701 Texas, El Paso, TX 79901 or call at (915) 838-1625.
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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Names: Diederich, Phillippe, 1964- author.
Title: Playing for the Devil’s Fire / by Phillippe Diederich.
Description: First edition. | El Paso, TX : Cinco Puntos Press, [2016] |
Summary: Thirteen-year-old Boli lives in a small pueblo near Mexico City, a landscape destroyed by drug crime, where one day a severed head is found in the plaza, then Boli’s parents leave town and are not heard from, then a washed out masked wrestler turns up and Boli hopes to inspire the luchador to set out with him to find his parents.
Identifiers: LCCN 2015024951 | ISBN 9781941026311(e-book)
Subjects: | CYAC: Coming of age—Fiction. | Criminals—Fiction. | Mexico—Fiction. |
BISAC: JUVENILE FICTION / Social Issues / Violence.
JUVENILE FICTION / Social Issues / Drugs, Alcohol, Substance Abuse.
JUVENILE FICTION / Social Issues / Emigration & Immigration. | JUVENILE FICTION / People & Places / Mexico.
Classification: LCC PZ7.1.D54 Pl 2016 | DDC [Fic] —dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015024951
Book, illustration and cover design by Antonio Castro H.
FOR FINN
Contents
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Acknowledgements
Glossary
It was a hot Sunday morning when we discovered the severed head of Enrique Quintanilla propped on the ledge of one of the cement planters in the plaza.
Father Gregorio had just finished mass. His congregants shuffled slowly out of Nuestra Señora del Socorro. The men, dressed in pressed polyester slacks and shirts and shiny cowboy boots, put on their western hats and gathered in groups while the women waited under the ovals of shade cast by the small bay trees near the fence.
Mosca, Pepino, and I ran to the opposite side of the church where the ground wasn’t paved and the hard dirt was perfect for playing marbles. Mosca had been bragging all morning about the devil’s fire marble he’d won the day before from some kid in his neighborhood. The devil’s fire was a legend—el diablito rojo. None of us had ever seen a devil’s fire marble before. I thought it was a myth, one of those lies older kids tell to tease the younger ones. But Mosca was one of the best marble players in Izayoc. And he wasn’t a liar. If he said he’d won a devil’s fire, it had to be true. I wanted to see it. Pepino wanted a chance to win it.
Mosca was my best friend. His real name was Esteban Rodríguez, but he was short and tough and fast and had big round bug eyes like a fly. That’s how he got the nickname. He didn’t always come to church because he didn’t have a mother and his father left town after the brick factory closed, crossing over to el Norte. Now he worked at a meat plant in Kansas.
Pepino moved quickly around Mosca and patted my shoulder. “Make your line, Boli.”
That’s what they called me: Boli. It’s short for bolillo. Since my parents own a bakery, I guess it makes sense. I don’t mind. It’s better than my real name Liberio, which is so old fashioned.
I marked a straight line on the dirt with the heel of my shoe. Pepino tore a branch from a bush and started to draw a circle, but Mosca stopped him. “I’m not playing for the diablito rojo. Just so you know.”
Pepino dropped the stick. “You chicken or what?” He was older than Mosca and me. He had bushy eyebrows and small
