"YOU ARE NOW ENTERING ARROYO / Pop. 955 / A statistic that didn't include the Mexican woman whose residence was just far enough beyond it to keep her free of local taxes. Whose own way home, eleven months of twelve, was up a flight of careworn stairs to a room guarded only by the Virgin Mary. / Terasina Vidavarri slept within a double ruin. Within the wreck of her own hopes, inside what was left of the Hotel Crockett. The last guest had left and all along the long uncarpeted hall, the doors, like her own soul's door, were boarded on both sides. / [...] / ‘It is lucky to love any time, for then you have someone to live for,’ Terasina thought, ‘but if you are not in love that is lucky also. Because then you have no problem.’"