Reservoir Bitches: Stories

by Dahlia de la Cerda

I sat on the toilet, peed on the pregnancy test, and waited the longest minute of my life. Positive. I had a panic attack and then felt almost happy; I rubbed my belly tenderly. Those scenes of girls in bathrooms waiting to find out if they’re pregnant had always seemed pretty lame to me. “This is pathetic,” I thought. To be honest, though, I’m used to being pathetic, which may be why I identify with characters like Jessica Jones, or Penny Lane in Almost Famous. I stood up, washed my face, and walked out of the bathroom. I collapsed on the bed.

I’m trapped in an infinite loop of bad decisions with consequences that are never not dramatic. I take the same road over and over, always forgetting it’s the wrong one, and even when it looks like I have things under control, something tells me maybe I don’t.

Misoprostol—according to Wikipedia—is used to treat gastric ulcers, but it also makes your uterus contract. It was Brazilian women living in favelas who discovered it could end pregnancies. The World Health Organization later studied the drug and authorized it as a safe abortion method.

Because I cared for my mom while she was sick, it’s helped to have someone who depends on me, someone who needs me to come home. It keeps me alive, away from temptation and ruin.

Imagine me getting together with some regular boy and then telling him, “By the way, my old man’s a drug lord.” Pfft, game over. Anyway, the tradition has always been to marry among ourselves, like royalty.

For security reasons. And sometimes they use us kids as peace offerings; like, marrying us off to seal a business

Women always speak, think, and act from the memory of our pain.

when your parents die, you get called an “orphan,” and when your husband passes to the next life, you’re a “widow.” But there’s no word for losing a child.

nature, by God’s law, it’s our children who should be burying us, not the other way around.

That’s why it makes me sad to see fancy malls and gated mansions where our home used to be. It makes me sad that they evicted us for being dark-skinned and working class, because you know that’s why they did it, right? The government called it “revitalizing the historic district,” but the honest-to-God truth is they wanted us out because we were ugly and poor. But we have a right to a roof over our heads, even if we are as poor as we look.

We turned our backs on marriage so we could tend to our parents, the most sacred thing a person has in this life. Our entire youth was spent caring for them, so we never did walk down the aisle. We’re the neighborhood spinsters.

Let me get this straight: they fought so I would have a choice, not so I would be forced to take a position just because they participated in the suffrage movement, right? See what I’m saying?

I, on the other hand, have always been what others expected of me. Friendly, not easy. Dignified, not proud. Sweet, not saccharine. Cheery, but never frivolous. I laugh, but never too hard—and I always cover my mouth. I observe, but discreetly. I converse, but sparingly. Yes, I know it’s a poem! I based my personality on a poem.

never aspired to hold power, only to sit beside it. But when someone offers it to you, the temptation is hard to resist.

Life’s a bitch. That’s why you gotta rattle her cage, even if she’s foaming at the mouth.

La vida loca has its consequences, so you’d better chase those dreams while you can.

Meth is a poor man’s drug; coke is for the rich; and weed is for kids. We’ve got the whole market covered.

know your will is for your daughter to be treated like lilies and caressed with fine linen here on earth.

A galán is like an old-fashioned suitor but with kisses.

pepper tree branch and pray away the evil eye.” Sure, she brought her neighbor good luck, but nothing the woman wouldn’t have gotten from blessing herself.

We brujas don’t put hexes on each other.

Memories pop up when you’re not looking for them,

I’m angry at the world, and I swear I hate all men. I hate them. I see the assholes who did this to you in every single one of them. And I’ve found ways of channeling my anger.

I typed body of woman found. The search results tore me apart: The body had been impaled and mutilated. Stabbed. Assaulted and found partially unclothed. The body of a woman was found with a gunshot wound to the face. A group of children in Ecatepec discovered the body of a young woman that showed signs of torture, though none of her wounds was fatal. The body of a woman approximately nineteen years old with facial bruising and a bullet wound to the head. The unidentified victim was found facedown in jeans, sneakers, and a white shirt. A sixteen-year-old girl was beaten and tortured with hydrochloric acid before being burned alive. According to early forensic reports, her corpse showed signs of having been buried alive. She was assaulted and hung from a tree with her own clothing. Thirteen-year-old girl found in the river, evidence of strangulation. She went out that night and never came home. Raped. Raped. The body of a woman found with signs of sexual torture. Rape. Signs of assault. Impaled. Vaginal tearing. Bite marks on her nipples. She was killed by her husband because she asked for money. Killed in her own home. More than ten stab wounds. Pregnant nineteen-year-old found in a cornfield. Charred, dismembered body found in Huaquechula. Young woman found murdered a few blocks from her residence. She will be remembered by her friends as a happy, smiling girl who loved life. The child’s body showed evidence of strangulation and repeated sexual abuse. Man murders his wife...

She was killed by her boyfriend. By her husband. By her ex. By her lover. By her father. By a man. By the man who said he loved her. And then killed her. Her boyfriend murdered her and burned her body. Her boyfriend was a murderer. Her husband was a murderer. Her lover was a murderer. Love kills.

She was stabbed in the genitals. Have you ever heard of a man’s nipples being bitten before he is murdered? Or a man being stabbed in the penis? Getting a ...

killed her because she was pregnant. He killed her because she didn’t want an abortion. He killed her because she wanted an abortion. Disposable motherhood. Disposable women. I killed her bec...

How can you prove misogyny in court if the murderer says he loved her...

Women killed for walking the streets at night. Women killed for being whores.

In your own home. Nowhere is safe. Nowhere. Being a woman means living in a state of emergency.

There is no room of one’s own when men think our bodies belong to them.

Every two hours and twenty-five minutes, a woman in Mexico is strangled, raped, dismembered, burned alive, mutilated, beaten to a pulp, and left with bruises and broken bones.

if I had known how dangerous it is to be a woman in this fucked-up country, there’s no way in hell I would have let you leave that party alone.

No one is ever ready for the death of someone they love.

Rage and sadness, all at once.

one more body in this genocide. Another nameless woman adding to the death count. Another pink cross.

Mexico is a monster that devours women. Mexico is a desert of pulverized bone. Mexico is a graveyard full of pink crosses. Mexico is a country that hates women.

Then there’s Ana, who jumped from a bridge because the assholes who raped her got off scot-free, and Teresa, who killed herself when they released her abusive husband from prison. Mothers searching for their daughters. Cities covered with pink crosses. Cities covered with posters of missing women. Deserts of bone. Lakes that swallow women whole. Dead women emerging from the rivers, from the sewers, from the sands of the desert. Corpses dumped in the garbage, in black trash bags. Food for the dogs. Disposable women. Decapitated women. Strangled women. Dismembered women. Raped women.

femicides have an extremely high rate of impunity in Mexico. Only, like, 5 percent of cases ever lead to a conviction.

Selva Almada called Dead Girls.

“Maybe that’s your mission. To gather the bones of dead women, to piece them together and tell their stories, and then to let them run free.”

rebellion is that I want to live, and if I don’t let you go, if I don’t let you run free, this sadness will kill me.