There are Snakes Out There
by Juan Pablo Villalobos
My cousin wasn’t scared of the snakes and said that we hadn’t escaped from the gangs back home just to be killed by some snake’s poison. And I remembered that some of the guys in the gangs had tattoos of snakes, snakes on their arms, or on their backs, even on their heads or their bellies.
There was one guy who was in a gang who actually threatened to beat me up. It was at school, and he believed he was in charge because he was with this gang—and that’s when I felt like I was in danger. And all for a silly little thing. I was talking to a girl in my class about an assignment, and he thought I was flirting with his girlfriend. And for that one silly little thing he wanted to take my life.
I had to change schools, but even then, there was a time when they came after me. When I got out of school they chased me and wanted to kill me. But I managed to escape; I ran off and got on one of the school buses that took me home. But I didn’t feel safe anymore, I was afraid they might come around the corner and kill me at any minute. They had blades, knives, they could have had guns. I’d heard that they’d whacked other kids and that was when I started to worry that they might do something bad to me or my family, because back there anything can happen; it’s not safe at all. The guys in these gangs can kill your whole family.
And all that running away just to end up in the desert, on the border at Sonoyta, with no way of crossing. I was already getting desperate, what with the days we’d spent in the desert, our skin all burned, unable to have a wash or anything proper to eat. I was getting desperate and I said that the best thing for it was to hand ourselves in, so we’d get sent back to our country.
Use the passage to answer the question.
In 3–5 sentences, analyze the structural choices the author makes in the passage and explain what impact these have on you as a reader.