Robberies in Mothers Home, Robbery in Mine
My mom doesn’t care about physical things. Each Christmas, before she even opens her gifts, she says, “I love it!” I never really understood why. It was only when I asked about the time her family was robbed that I learned.
“So which robbery do you want me to talk about? The one that happened in the United States or Mexico?” my mom asked. She was wearing red pajama pants covered with teddy bears, and a matching shirt.
“The robbery that happened in Mexico,” I said.
“Okay, well, it’s a long story. So get ready for it.” She had a small grin and began throwing her hands up in the air as if she was trying to catch a fly.
❧
I was about eight years old and hiding under a king-sized bed. It was horribly hot; Mexico’s summers were never easy. My three sisters refused to get under the bed with me. They did not want to move. The bed covers were pulled completely over their heads. We heard someone knocking on our window, telling us to open it. But none of us responded–no one moved. We just tried not to cry too loud.
We were watching what was happening in the room next to us, my sisters peeking through the fabric of the sheets. Our room was connected to our parents’ room through a door frame, which had no door. The light was turned on in their room, something which was unusual this late at night. We saw a hand pointing a black pistol through a tiny window. My mother, who was just thirty years old, was standing in front of the gun–but the gun wasn’t pointed at her. It was pointed at the crib next to her, towards the newest addition to our family, number eight. His name was Roberto, and he had just turned six months.
Then, I heard a voice coming from the gun, it was deep, but loud. “GET UP RIGHT NOW, YOU MOTHERFUCKER, OR I’LL SHOOT YOUR SON AND WIFE.”
Whenever someone raises their voice at me now, it reminds me of those deep but loud demands. Although–you do know I am the person who’s usually the one yelling in this family.
Well, anyways, I heard the mattress in my parents’ room creak, and I saw my dad jump to his feet. He was quieter than the thieves. Much calmer. At least, that’s what I thought–he was taking deep breaths, which were louder than my own.
Then, he said, a bit groggily, “Okay, okay, I’ll give you whatever you want, just–please, don’t kill my wife or son.”
I tried to move my head to get a better angle of the man at the window, but I couldn’t. I felt paralyzed. I was so scared. My body was shaking. I’m fine talking about it now, but at the time–it was so hard to watch. I just wanted to cover my eyes and pretend it wasn’t happening. My father walked closer towards the window with his hands raised like a criminal. The gun shook more as he got closer, aching to press the trigger.
I heard another voice coming from the window. “Open the window, open the window, I know you’re in there …” the voice continued. It was a small voice, much quieter than its counterpart, but this one rang in my ears like when someone whispers right next to you.
“Open the window and no one gets hurt,” the voice whispered.
“Don’t open it!” my mother shouted.
“Shut up! Shut up!” yelled the man holding the gun.
“Open the window!” the first voice demanded.
“NO!” screamed one of my sisters on the bed. I watched as the gun turned to point in my sister’s direction. Right above the bed. And despite the fact that I was under the bed, it felt like I was the one in front of the gun. As if my sisters being shot would cause the same pain to me.
“Point the gun at me, I’ll give you everything. Leave my wife and kids alone,” my father begged.
The gun aimed back to him and in an instant, my mother grabbed Roberto and ran into our room. As she stumbled in, I could see Roberto cradled in her arms. I could feel them entering the room. I felt–a sense of relief, hearing my own mom cry. I don’t know if that’s a weird thing to say, but I felt nothing but grateful knowing my mom and baby brother wouldn’t get hurt. Even when Roberto cried, a cry that probably woke up the entire neighborhood, I felt grateful.
❧
“Wow, you know, talking about this reminds me of the time when some guy broke into the same house in Mexico and almost violated one of my sisters,” my mom said.
“HUH?!” I managed.
“Yup, we stopped him before he could do any harm since we heard her screaming and crying. But I think that was the second break-in? Not sure.”
“What?! When was this?!”
“Stop yelling! And that happened a couple years after the first robbery. But let me get back to the story. It’s getting to the good part.”
I stared at her in awe. How many times has my mom’s house been broken into?
“Alright, stop daydreaming and listen. I have to wake up early tomorrow for work.”
“I’m not the one stopping you. You were the one who interrupted yourself. But okay–please continue.”
❧
I watched as my father gave everything we owned while being held at gunpoint. Jewelry, cash, car keys, and even when he said there was nothing left, the robbers told him they knew he kept stuff under the mattress and made him give up the guns he had stashed away. The robbers knew where our things were, and once they took everything, they rushed to leave. They ran and left the house the same way they had entered, climbing the twelve-foot-tall, metal gate.
My father closed the window that led to their room and my family came together, hugged, and cried–but that is not where the story ends. I was told the rest of it by my father a week later.
You see, the neighbors could hear Roberto’s crying coming from our house, and not only that, they could hear our screams and the robbers demands. One of our neighbors was a cousin. He had called the police, then waited outside the house with a handgun and started to shoot at the thieves when he saw them jump over the front gate. He shot one of them in the leg, then he himself was shot in the stomach by the second burglar. As the second thief was pulling the other one up to his feet, he was shot in the leg by another person.
This person would never reveal themselves until years later, since she did not want to get detained by the Mexican police, the police that were known to do whatever they pleased without evidence or justice. She left Mexico the following day and went to live in the United States for a few years. But when she came back, she told me how she was the one who shot the thief. How it was her, a lady in her thirties, on a balcony, holding a revolver–because of her, the robbers did not escape.
The police eventually came. No one was sure how long it took for them to arrive, but when they did, they detained everyone who had been shot, as well as my father. The cousin who shot the thieves was let go because he did not kill anyone, and after a year his body would make a full recovery. The thief that was shot on the leg was not so lucky–he would never walk again. Both of the thieves would never leave prison. And my father was released but never given back our family’s possessions. The police had taken everything.
❧
“That’s horrible, I’m so sorry … Wait, Mom? Why do you think your family got robbed?” I asked.
“Robbed by the police or the thieves?” She was laughing.
“The thieves.”
“Money. People have broken into my house six or seven times. I can’t really remember the exact number–but the point is, four of the break-ins have been because of money.” She said this with none of the enthusiasm she had before.
“Wait. You’re telling me you’ve been robbed six or seven different times?!” I couldn’t tell if she was being serious.
“Yeah, and for this time, apparently the maid had told her nephews that my dad had just saved enough cash to buy a truck–you know debit cards weren’t used back then. So her nephews were the ones that robbed us. We ended up having to fire her, even though we didn’t want to. She was a nice lady who made really good tamales.”
“Wait, could you tell me about the other times you were robbed? If you can talk about them?”
“No, I’m going to bed now, I have work tomorrow. Maybe another day. Goodnight, I love you. Don’t stay up too late. Sleep is important for someone your age.”
“Okay, goodnight, Mom, I love you, too.”
❧
I stayed at the kitchen table, thinking about my mom and her break-ins. And only now did it make sense why my mom reacted the way she did when our house was robbed.
Her most recent break-in was five years ago, and it was the only time she’s been robbed in the United States. We had gone to Las Vegas for New Year’s to visit our cousins, and we noticed it almost as soon as we came back from the road trip. This drive should have been four hours but had turned into seven: we were low on gas, hungry, frustrated, and tired. We all groggily got out of the car to enter the house.
Our house has a lock on the front door that can only be unlocked from the inside. My mom and I walked to the front porch as my dad entered the house through the side door to open the front door for us. When we got to the front, the door was already slightly open, so we went in. Inside she turned towards my dad, who had only just entered the house.
“You opened the front door really quickly. Thank you,” she said.
“What do you mean? I haven’t opened the door …”
As his words trailed off, my mom looked up into our living room and noticed the TV was missing. I watched her face, and there was almost no reaction, only tired eyes from being a passenger on the road trip. My dad started freaking out about money–he knew they had taken everything. But my mom showed no emotion from the stolen TV, furniture, or cash. It was only until she saw her Christmas tree lying sideways on the floor that she showed emotions. It had been pushed over. She was (and still is) very fond of decorating for Christmas. She starts decorating every year during November, sometimes even in October. It was her favorite hobby. We always had an artificial Christmas tree, but my mom prided herself in the colors she decorated with. This year, the tree’s theme was purple and silver. Hundreds of spherical purple ornaments and an infinite number of crystal ornaments that looked like icicles, rows of silvery garland, and at the top: a giant yellow star the size of my head. Under the tree was a toy train that would go around and around the tree trunk and play Christmas music.
Now, the tree was almost naked, left with just a few rows of silvery garland. None of the ornaments, crystals, nor star or train were there. My mom slowly went towards the tree and held some of the branches with the carefulness someone would have holding a dead pet.
I ran past her towards my room. As I jumped over the shattered family portraits in the hallway, I prayed that they hadn’t taken my gaming consoles. When I pushed the door to my room, the Xbox, Wii, and TV were missing. They had taken everything. I fell to the ground, punching the hardwood floor. I checked in my drawers for my video games discs–all of them were missing. I ran towards the living room to tell my mom what they had done. As if stealing my video games was the worst thing that could have happened.
When I entered the living room, I could only see her back and the side of her face. She was still holding the branches of the Christmas tree. I stopped myself from telling her about how they had robbed all of my belongings. This robbery had meant much more to her. It was the only time I saw real sadness and frustration. She had tears on her face. Despite the fact that they had taken all her shoes and clothes, this is what saddened her the most. My mom no longer cares about physical things, because she knows they can be taken in a blink of an eye. She only cares about the things with sentimental value and her family, because she knows the feeling of almost losing them. When she retells the story of her most recent robbery, she does not talk about the money that was lost. She talks about how they destroyed her Christmas tree, and how the robbers stole the First Communion necklaces of both her sons.
Kevin Robles is a junior at University of Southern California, CA, pursuing a degree in Pharmacology and minoring in Narrative Structure. He usually writes fiction, but this creative nonfiction piece is special to him as it reminds him of his initial shock when his mother told him how many times she’s been robbed. His fiction has appeared in Beyond Thought Journal, The Blue Route, and Dark Moon Rising Publications. He works as an ornithology assistant where he does taxidermy and a whirlpool of different tasks. When he’s not writing he’s either playing tennis or reading his favorite author, Stephen King.
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