El Peso Hero

With no food, no money, and no prospects of that changing Victor Flores decided to cross the wire in order to support his mother and four younger siblings.  His father had undergone the journey several times until he died in an accident in South Carolina leaving the family with little source of income beyond what their mealy corn fields could yield.  Victor left home with a simple backpack and no clear plan on how to cross the border.  Having no money to pay the $1500 fee to the coyotes for crossing Victor’s plan consisted of heading north to a border town and tagging alongside a group, however things were not that simple.  Before Victor could even make it to a town he was kicked off the bus for not having papers.  Victor could not believe that he needed paperwork to travel inside his own country.  A fellow passenger on the train told him the police only do it to appease the border patrol agents on the other side.

Once escorted off the bus Victor ran and eventually ended up at the train tracks where he saw others hitching rides to towns up north.  He jumped on and held to the ladder all night before having to jump off at the next town.  Police officers were waiting to arrest those hitching rides on the train.  The train was moving fast and Victor took a leap only to stumble and black out where he later found himself in the hospital with stitches.  He slipped past the officer at his hospital door and head for the town.  There he partnered with a young boy named Julio who was his age also working to cross the wire.  They spent weeks eating at soup kitchens and trying to devise a plan to cross.  Julio had heard that there was a tunnel under the border, but was chained up on the American side.   The fence was only removed during rain storms to fervent people from drowning.  One day a storm arrived and Julio took his chance.  He purchased an inner-tube and made the jump into the flowing river through the tunnel.  Victor was too scared to make the leap.  He was left to wonder if his friend made it to the other side without drowning.

From there Victor teamed up with an elderly man, Miguel, who planned to cross the border through the mountains.  He was on his second attempt to cross the border for the season and had gotten beat up badly after his first attempt.  Victor asked if it was from the border patrol agents and Miguel explained that it was the citizens on the border who had beaten him so bad.  He explained that groups had taken it into their own hands to patrol the U.S. border with weapons.  They caught him, called border patrol and were rough in the process.  Miguel and Victor finally crossed the border only for the border patrol to catch up with them.  Affected by his wounds Miguel slowed down and told Victor to run ahead.  Victor continued to run until he reached a river.  He found a truck belonging to a fisherman and climbed in the back only to be caught, handed over to border patrol agents and sent back across the border.

It was back in Mexico on the border town that Victor found his childhood friend Rico.  Both had been attempting to cross the wire and both had yet to be successful.  They teamed up together to figure out a plan.  Rico found a man willing to help them cross with a group, but Victor did not realize the group of men were attempting to smuggle drugs across the border. By the time they realized the horrible position they were in it was too late.  The boys decided to run off through the woods while the men rested.  They finally escaped from the group and were on their way to the fields.  They migrated to where the work took them.  Victor was thrilled with the money he was making, but Rico struggled.  He finally decided the work was too much.  Rico wanted to return home and go to school.  He missed his family.  The boys parted ways and Victor acknowledge that this was the last time he would ever see his childhood friend.

Crossing the Wire . A literary analysis.

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Hobbs, North. (2006). Crossing the wire. New York, NY: Harper Trophy