The Plaza Grande is surrounded by ancient whitewashed stone buildings. Covered colonnaded arches along the street form a promenade dotted with restaurants. Each one offers its own distinct aroma of spicy sauces, roasted meats, and pungent sweets. The sounds of street vendors, hawking their wares in loud, sing-song voices, catches my ear. Without thinking, forcing the experience of the past hour out of my head, I lead Javier to a stall containing brightly painted ceramic skulls and skeletons in an array of poses and styles. Each with his or her own mocking facial expression. Female skeletons, wearing full-length Victorian ball gowns of yellows, blues and pinks, with matching wide-brimmed, flower-trimmed hats, stand alongside sombrero-wearing gentleman in full vaquero finery. Empty eye-socket skulls with mocking grins. 

“How weird. They’re laughing at us.”

The young woman tending the booth holds one out to me. I resist and cling to Javier’s hand

He laughs. “We take death seriously, and they mock us for it,” he tells me, pleased by my shock. “Especially on Dia de los Muertos.”

Another stall catches my eye, farther down the promenade. I drop Javier’s hand and run to it like a schoolgirl. The stall is filled with displays of candy in the shape of skulls, some pink, some white, some decorated in gaudy colors.

The old woman behind the counter gives me a deep bullfrog croak and hands me a sample. As I reach out to take it, she grabs my arm. The heavily plowed brown cheeks of her sunken face crack into a smile, showing broken and missing teeth, mimicking the skulls on her table. 

“It’s a special time for romance, Señorita. You have a handsome caballero at your side. Love him tonight but honor the dead tomorrow. Pay them their due, the ones who went ahead of us, La Malinche, the Mujer who showed us the way.” 

She leans so close I can smell her garlic breath. Then, lowering her voice to a rasping whisper, say says, “Be very careful, Señorita. Very careful, indeed. Danger is all around you. My bones ache for the pain you will feel.”

For a shriveled old crone, she has a powerful hold on my wrist. I wince, staring at the pencil points of blackness in her eyes. She stares back, sending silent messages through them. 

“¡Bastante!” I scold her, pulling away and stepping back from the booth. She looks at me another instant then turns to a customer coming down the promenade.