A crawling shape intrude!
A blood-red thing that writhes from out
The scenic solitude!
It writhes!—it writhes!
—Edgar Allan Poe, “The Conqueror Worm”

Dear Carm, about your living dead man by the river, I believe you. Puerto Rico has many wonderful things about it—the people, the nature, the food and culture—but its other side, the violent side, the painful and macabre side, is just as real, just as real as us anyway, and, well, last week, I think I saw the devil in the woods.

It was that awful hot and dry Sunday, and I had the cars’ AC on max while I waited for my grandfather to get his beer from the gas station. I was sweating my ass off and half-hoped he’d get me one too, a cold one, hoped it would loosen us up. I hadn’t seen the man in nearly two months, but he didn’t seem all that interested in speaking. I didn’t know how to talk to him anymore without it being about a third thing, like politics, or nature—I wished things could be different.

I watched the animals around the car, the grackles, the dogs, the butterflies, chickens and lizards, the horses tied under the trees and the vultures hovering above us. A wild flock had stopped to drink from a broken pipe that stuck out from the ground by the end of the gas pumps, and some chickens were grazing with their chicks in a plot of grass next to the road. Next to them was a rundown house with a coquí graffitied on its side. At first I thought it’s a metaphor for the island—we’re the little frog and the house is our government—but are we ever so passive? Singing into the night while our trees are cut down? I don’t think things, or we, are so simple. Still, I kept looking at it when I saw an amorphous shadow move behind the broken windowpanes. It was an orange cat, unbothered by the mold and the wasps; he—I knew it was a male from the puffed cheeks—settled below the coquí to watch me. I watched him in return.

The cat’s tail was long, serpentine, hypnotizing. I don’t know if I believe in ghosts or demons or witches. But I know that animals have souls, and I could see the cat’s soul there behind his eyes. Ears flat, he hissed at me, swatting with his claws. Don’t come near here, he was saying. This rundown place is mine, all that I have, mold and wasp and all—I will bleed you for it. I could sympathize.

Grandpa came back with his six-pack. He handed me a beer and I turned on the ignition. He took a gulp of his beer and frowned at the cat. “Bah, what an ass. He needs to be sanctified,” he said, and we were on our way back to his house. We settled into a somewhat comfortable silence as the sea of untrimmed grasslands passed by us. Some had cows, some had little lagoons, and always, the trees marked the woods. While I drove, Grandpa settled into his seat, arms crossed, looking at the sky, taking a sip of his beer every other moment.

“How’s the poetry going?” he asked.

“It’s going,” I said, though I hadn’t written in weeks; math teachers with bad hours have trouble being poetic.

“Actually, maybe you can help me with it,” I said. “I’ve been trying to write about the soul, its circumstances, its worship, holy or otherwise. What did you mean by the cat needing to be sanctified?”

“It’s something my grandma used to tell me. If you didn’t want your cat to go to a mermua, you had to cut off their tail or part of their ear. Some can’t help it, I guess; it’s in their nature, the poor bastards, but that one back there, oh, he’s an SOB. He likes being that way. I’ve seen him fighting and killing other cats just for passing by—evil, that’s the shape of his soul, and he loves it. Someone needs to cut his tail and make him sanctified,” he said.

“Mermua?”

“A meeting with the witches and the devil in the mountains.”

“The Devil?”

“That’s right, el mismísimo gran cabrón.”

He offered me another beer and I took it.

“Look, that’s where we’re going,” he said, pointing to a medium-sized building we were about to pass by. It was one floor, painted a marine blue that was faded and, in places, already falling off, giving the illusion of gray scabs of wall plaster. It was surrounded by dead leaves, grassless patches of dirt with tire tracks, and empty cans of beer and cola; it was like a sickness of the earth. On the entrance wall, someone had drawn fighting roosters with men encircling them, shouting, drinking, and exchanging cash, and in a corner, they had painted the island’s flag with a coquí whose eyes were bulging and disproportionate, like a grotesque cartoon. That was our destiny, maybe even our true heritage, my grandfather’s, mine, and yours, Carm, an entire place designed, built, and consecrated for the sole purpose of cockfighting. Looming larger than life, at the very top, in bold black paint, its name: El Gato.

Grandpa gave me a smile under his big gray mustache, finished his first beer can, and threw it out the window.

“The club opens at six. We still have time to eat,” he said.

I thought about the cat setting off to find the devil in the woods, following a trail of beer cans, vodka bottles, and cigarette buds under the moonlight but being unable to do so.

At my grandfather’s ranch, we fed the birds—chickens, ducks, quails, wild parrots, pigeons, roosters in cages—and then we ate and rested in the shade of a hut no bigger than a bedroom. His kitten purred in his lap. I watched the birds in the trees and thought about grandma. We talked a little about his childhood and his time in Vietnam, the exhausting heat this year. I asked him if his grandmother had told him more stories like the mermua. He told me about witches eating raw plantains, witches flying in moonless nights on their brooms to the wild mountains. A cacophony of coos and caws filled the air.

It was cool in the shade. I could see small shapes of light pouring through the shifting treetops, dancing on the dirt floor strewn with broken bricks, tracks, and chicken shit. I felt like a kid again, dipping my hands into the corn mix, refilling the water cans, spooking the lizards. I tried not to think about where the roosters were going to end up, tonight or another night. The roosters, already agitated in their wire cages, had been bred to fight for the entertainment of men. By then, Grandpa had cut the fleshy comb out of one rooster’s head, so that it wouldn’t bleed out in a fight, and I stared with morbid fascination at the waste.

Have you ever gone to a rooster fight, Carm? Shouting, laughter, music in the background, cash going hand to hand to hand, blood on the floor, arguments over draws, kids running around, some staying in their seats, some imitating the gestures of adults. There’s alcohol and smoking and betting—it’s a whole culture, and if your family’s part of it, your first experience with all three of those things is at a rooster fight. At least, mine were.

You learn how to spend your hours around metal cages, feeding the roosters, vaccinating them, grooming their feathers, training them with plush bird dolls; you’re shown how to enroll them, how the weigh-in works, how to glove their talons if it’s a “more humane fight.” You learn how to read the odds and place your bet.

During the main event, you take a seat around the ring. The chairs, made of metal and plastic, are covered with cushions you can smack during the match while you urge the animals to fight with a very particular type of taunting: a kissing sound, until two birds, usually, fight to the death. The fights are inconsequential next to everything around them; our rituals of death are alive here in PR, and they always need a motive, a reason for their bells and whistles.

We went silent for a while, listening to the singing birds fly, until Grandpa went to get another beer. He told me to prepare the roosters he was going to bring to the ring. When I went inside the ranch, I noticed his cat had gone to the edge of the fence, just where the mountain’s base begins, where he greeted another cat. It was the orange tabby from before, the unclean cat, and for a split second, I swear—and Carm, maybe it was the alcohol, but I swear—I saw the orange cat’s face twist with horns and smiles before he disappeared into the woods.

I didn’t say anything to Grandpa about the cats, not because I was afraid or freaked out, not at all. In fact, I was delighted. I thought about the blood dripping from the rooster’s head while Grandpa cut it, thought about the evil cat’s twisted face, and I saw a poem in the making, a poem about blood and death and demon cats. I was connecting with Grandpa and making something new.

After we ate, we showered, and I got ready for the night. I put on a nice shirt, comfortable jeans, some perfume, and I did my Afro just right. I called mom and told her how Grandpa was, that no, his “girlfriend” was nowhere to be seen, and where we were going. When I went to start the car, Grandpa waved to me by the road, three cooing duffel bags hanging from his shoulders.

“Aren’t we going to the club?” I asked.

He nodded and said with a slight slur, “We are, but I like to walk there. My little ritual—like the cats!” He laughed, very amused at himself, and I chuckled too, picturing the devil betting on a rooster fight with a thick Puerto Rican accent.

“When I was a kid,” Grandpa said as we walked, “my grandma used to tell me stories about ghosts that lived here, told me to be careful when I was hunting squirrels. ‘Don’t go too far into the woods Che, stop by the sugar fields; the witches live just beyond.’”

“Do you believe that stuff?”

“Well, it can’t all be made up, can it?”

“I don’t know; the earth is round, but the universe is flat,” I said.

He opened his eyes wide.

“At least, according to Einstein—” but I stopped myself. I didn’t want to talk about science, not there, not over the sound of wings flapping among thick branches, the tall grass and small trees hiding everything beyond them like a wall. A hawk screeched overhead, and I could feel the twitch of the young roosters wishing another fate in the bags at my side. A small black cat looked at us, its ears perfectly pointed and its tail long and healthy. It walked with us for a few moments before disappearing inside the foliage as sunset began.

“You know, about holiness,” Grandpa began again, “once, when I was in Vietnam, I walked into, well, I think it was a Buddhist temple, and there was this quietness to them, the priest, the people. I was 17, half a world away, half the strangers wanting me dead, but there was this place with this silence I’d never felt before, or since. I remember thinking about how cold it was in the temple, so cold, and I missed home, my mom, my sisters. A soothing place. Time wasn’t real. I heard my mom call me for dinner—I swear, clear as day, she said, ‘José, come eat, there’s rice with beans and fried plantains.’”

“Yeah,” I said.

He stayed quiet for a moment. “How’s your mother?”

“She’s good, got a new dog.”

“Ah, good, yeah.”

The hawk shrieked again. My grandfather pulled his last beer from one of the duffels and popped it open.

* * *

La gallera was packed. Bad Bunny played from old speakers while kids ran around the domino tables. We said hello to a few of Grandpa’s friends, who took his roosters and enrolled them into the fights. The black cat was there too, by the trees, along with the orange tabby and a white one.

I bought a shot of whiskey, and then beers and more shots.

The world spun. The roosters fought in slow motion, their feathers crested, wings spread, taloned legs kicking, beaks pecking. As blood flowed, so did the money. The room grew louder with each round. Grandpa nursed a rum bottle while he joined the chorus of “Peck’em boy! Do it! Peck’em! Peck’em boy! Peck!” I made a game to take a shot every time someone did the kissing taunt next to me.

Blood, talons, a blind bird, and then the fall. The winner stood above the other, holding onto the head. Violent shakes. Blood pooled the ring; voices peaked. The winner was lifted, cleaned, and caressed. The loser’s limp body was collected, its lifeless head bobbing and dripping red.

My grandpa took a twenty from a friend and handed it to me.

“Get me another bottle,” he said, and I went off. Just outside the ring room, I saw the orange tabby licking blood off the floor. The animal turned, looked right at me, and went off inside a door I hadn’t noticed before. It was old and unvarnished, with dried blood painted on its lower edges.

I opened the door. There were iron steps going down without any railings. The cat was already halfway down the stairs when he turned to look at me, smiling. The smell of blood hit me, nauseated me, and I lost my balance. I hugged the wall to my right and held in my vomit. The cat made a sound, like a laugh. A small cackle. He stood up on his hind legs like monsters in those old Japanese movies your mom showed us and kept walking down. At another door, 30 feet below, the cat turned to look at me again, then went inside. The mess of people, their pandemonium, sounded far away, a small, faint noise, almost nothing. I remembered what my grandfather had said about the temple in Vietnam, that it was silent. Silence is a holy place, I thought. Carm, remember that poem I told you about? The one with the line “every angel is terrifying”? Must a holy cat have a pleasant smile? No, the sublime should scare us, at least at first. I pictured the cat behind that door directing some Buddhist prayers in a language not meant for people, with lessons I could never understand. It had to be a lesson. I went down the steps.

The texture of the wall felt odd, bloated but dry. Splinters and old paint came off as I touched. The smell of blood was so bad, I pinched my nose. I stepped through the second door.

Another fighting ring.

In the middle of the circle, piled up in a small mountain almost as tall as me, lay the carcasses of roosters. Heads and feet and tails and beaks all jutted out from this nauseating mass. I fell to my knees and puked out the shots, then I heard the cat’s cackle. Through a window in the wall to the left, moonlight shone on other cats, some standing on two legs, others on four, eating away at the flesh, pulling meat into the shadows. The orange tabby walked toward me on two legs, worms writhing around him. His eyes were so bright, so bright and green, almost like flashlights. He reached out to me, his claws exposed, and I ran. I went up the stairs without looking back and slammed the door. An old man in the corner gave me the stink eye but went back to his fried food. My grandpa was on a bar stool, trying not to tumble to the side.

“We need to get out of here,” I said.

“What the fuck happened to you?” he slurred, his eyes big.

“It’s disgusting. It’s evil.” I pointed to the door behind us.

“Don’t fuck with me,” he said.

I kept pointing.

He looked at me with an odd mixture of anger and fear before going to the door himself. It was just an exit to the trash cans outside. Half a dozen bins with red splotches around the edges, under a sickly yellow light, and two cats eating a single dead rooster.

“Tsk. Just like your mother, so dramatic; do you know how much blood I saw in Vietnam? I saw fucking men blown to pieces. Evil, tsk, just like your mother. Get yourself cleaned up. This is a gentleman’s sport.”

I went to the bathroom to wash away the blood from my hands. Slimy bar soap, low water pressure. Grandpa told me I had spoiled his night and paid for our drinks before we stepped out. The painted men greeted us with their perpetual cheer. Their birds, mid-fight, looked at us accusingly.

The road was cold; fog had come down from the mountains. I was freezing, and my stomach felt irritated. I felt heavy and bloated, but I kept on, distracting myself with the sounds of nature: crickets and coquis singing, lizards scuttling, owls hooting.

The trees merged into a single dark mass and the headlights of the cars passing us by were phantoms howling death moans. I turned on my phone’s flashlight, but there were only the faceless trunks staring back.

“Turn that off,” said Grandpa. “Do you want to get mugged?” I turned off the light, and the battery died. I wanted to walk faster but he couldn’t keep up. We walked in silence for a few minutes when the hideous acid smell of the basement room returned. I looked around for the worms underfoot, or the cat with the smile. Cats from the club passed underneath the incoming headlights, moving into the woods, each dragging something limp in their mouths. Grandpa also noticed them. He started to laugh.

“Look at that. Are those your cats?” he said.

I didn’t reply. He laughed again.

“Cats kill things. That’s what they do. It’s natural; shit, I kill things all the time. I kill for food. I hunt squirrels in the mountain.”

“Let’s go home,” I said.

We kept walking until we reached the streetlamp. The smell of blood intensified, mixed with the smell of wet ground and grass. Another cat passed us with a dead pigeon in its mouth and went down a little trail into the woods. It was like being behind the wooden door, something distant, muffled. I smelled my hands. Grandpa turned and followed the cat into the woods.

“Grandpa, come back,” I said, almost in a whisper, but he didn’t listen, just kept walking. I tried pulling him.

“Don’t touch me!” he snapped. Another cat moved past us; this one looked at us before going forward. Stupid old man. Stupid, drunk old man. Ungrateful and hateful. I should’ve just kept going home, let him deal with whatever bullshit was up there. I almost did that too. I stayed underneath the streetlamp for a few more minutes, but guilt won out.

My mouth was dry, and I kept focusing on that, on being annoyed and angry at him for making me do this. I heard a flutter of wings above me, but I didn’t dare look up as I kept walking forward, avoiding the branches of trees and shrubs that clung to me. I noticed the silhouettes of small figures walking parallel to me, walking on all fours at first, and then on two legs. The distant sounds transformed, became tangible, thick and near. The acrid smell of decay and a wet night.

I walked until I reached a clearing. I hid behind a tree. It was a gathering of cats. Dozens of them, all carrying dead things, laying them on the pile one by one. There were bodies atop the trees, small like cats but with the distinct outline of wings along their side, and, right on the other side of the ring, between light and shadow, the silhouettes of people. Grandpa was in the middle of the ring, staring into the mountain of death. The cats kept coming, and eventually, one of the things with wings came down and started to make the noise, that awful cackle; it was the orange tabby. He reached out with his claws, but Grandpa didn’t run; he just laughed, took a bottle from his pocket, and took a swig before offering it to the devil thing. The tabby took it, drank from it, and guided Grandpa to some crevice between the pile of carcasses.

A screeching chorus came from the trees. Cats began to dance, making awful noises. My jaw went slack and my heart started beating faster. The noise, the kissing noise from the fights. Grandpa got on all fours as he stared into the crevice, inching closer to it. He reached out with his hand and reached in. A moment later, he was helping something come out, a fleshy red thing whose hand was about as big as his. More cats got closer, and that’s when the tabby devil clawed Grandpa. The old man screeched, and I went to his rescue. The cats around me went wild, hissing, getting closer to me, ready to pounce. I kicked the tabby away from Grandpa and tore him from the fleshy hand, but when Grandpa looked at me, it was with so much anger, so much hate. He pushed me aside, and I stumbled back next to the pile. I felt the kissing noise next to my ear, felt the fleshy palm cling to my shoulder. Great yellow claws pressed down into my body. My breathing stopped, and I remembered who the cats were there to meet. Grandpa was struggling to get up, cursing at everything, at me, at his daughters, at grandma. The clawed hand pressed down on me while another took hold of my other shoulder.

I felt the pile shake a little, and something began oozing out. The substance clung to the dead bodies next to me, made them alive again, made them fight. I think I started crying. The cats danced around me, drawing closer to me. The tabby was there, looking at me like Grandpa had done, nothing but hate and fear in his smile. I was paralyzed. The thing with the hands used me as leverage to get out from the center of the pile, whispering to me with that kissing noise. Grandpa got up, hissing like a cat.

The thing behind me lifted me, pushed me, pulled me back just the same. I heard the kissing sound, a gross and guttural cackle, before I was pushed toward Grandpa.

The Devil had a human face. His eyes were pure gold, and slitted. His teeth were yellow, black-stained, and sharp. The Devil looked like my grandpa, who lunged and fell next to me. The Devil laughed and laughed and I ran, kicking and screaming my way out. Some cats pounced at me, scratching me, but I kept running while Satan laughed. I scratched my face and cut my hands when I fell on roots, but I kept going. It seemed like I ran for all eternity, and when I reached street again, it was morning. I ran back to the house. It began to rain.

A few hours later, someone let Grandpa out the back of a truck. He found me in bed and accused me of abandoning him in the woods.

“Look at this. You did this. I could’ve died,” he said, pointing at where the tabby had scratched him.

I didn’t say anything.

“What happened to your clothes?” he said next, pointing to my own scratches.

“I fell on the way.”

“Ah, OK, serves you right.” he said. He walked outside to feed his roosters. When he opened the door, his cat came in. The animal nosed up to me, and I picked him up. A nice cat. His tail was fluffy but thin. Almost feathery. Well-shaped ears. A nice, perfect, saintly cat.

“Stay away from the Devil,” I said to the cat. He jumped onto the windowsill to watch the birds as if he didn’t care to eat them. Looking so innocent, quiet, peaceful. As if it wasn’t in his nature to kill, to ritualize death and vent the carnage inside.

Carm, there is this other side; the ruined house, our violence, our worship of it. This other side has shaped our souls. We must sanctify our land, our bodies. All bodies. Yes, it was for his own good, for my grandfather’s good, for all of us. Thwarting the Devil we create—our living poem, our evil poem—you understand, right, Carm? Outside, my grandfather staggered among his roosters. I heard the single note of a coquí, and I walked to the kitchen. I grabbed the sharpest knife I could find.

After I used it, I pocketed the tail tip and left a little later.