King of Cuba

by Cristina Garcia

  El Comandante grew impatient. “But what good is imagination without action? No history is made. No lives are changed. Worthless.” He registered the discomfort on his friend’s face. “You deliver words. I deliver action.”

  “Words are action, mi amigo, as compressed and devastating as any bullet—or caress,” Babo said with surprising vigor. “What do we have left except”—he paused—“the adventure of language between two wrecked ships.”

  “Carajo, everything you say is invention!” the tyrant countered.

  “Couldn’t I say the same of you?”

  Son of a bitch. If Babo weren’t so sick, El Comandante would launch into one of his infinite tirades. Instead he sulked.

  “Have we forgotten how to laugh at ourselves?” Babo chided. “Then this must be the end.”

  The two remained silent for a moment, neither wanting to surrender to the other.

  Finally, Babo blinked and changed the subject. “These days I prefer the language of rain.”

  “He’s been praying for rain,” Gloria interjected dully.

  The tyrant turned to her. “And what have you done about it?”

  “About what?” She inspected her fingernails.

  “The rain.”

  “Mi cielo, they’re in a drought,” Delia protested. “Haven’t you been listening to the news? Gloria, did you know we have the worst meteorologist in Havana?”

  “This is your husband’s last request and you haven’t found a way to grant it?” El Comandante demanded.

  “But, Jefe, how can I—”

  “There are machines that can make rain. I could stand on the roof myself with a fucking bucket so that he might—”

  “Don’t get upset, Papi! This isn’t something you can control!” Delia flushed with embarrassment.

  The obdurate bells of Mexico City announced six o’clock, echoed by the grandfather clock in the hall. Socialism, or death? What was the damn difference? Babo remained placid in his bed, inhabiting the hour. Then, pink nostrils quivering, he requested his daily ration of chocolate tapioca and dispatched every last wobbly spoonful with enthusiasm. Visibly weakened by the effort, he collapsed onto his pillows and closed his eyes. Perhaps he was traveling back in time, to his childhood, to the river journey with his grandparents that had marked him forever.

  The tyrant felt faint, though his heart beat wildly. Delia held a vial under his nose that smelled of Fernando’s prison disinfectant. His brother had stayed behind in Havana, tending to emergencies: another hunger striker had tried to hang himself in La Cabaña; Fernando’s daughter had imprudently called a dissident blogger “a sex-starved lesbian whore” on national television and was now combating a firestorm of international criticism; and, worst of all, one of the Damas de Blanco1 had set herself on fire in the Plaza de Armas with rationed gasoline, like that monk in Vietnam years ago. Were the times really so desperate?

  Drowsiness enveloped the tyrant. He didn’t want to nap, but his body overruled him. With Delia’s help, he settled himself in an overstuffed chair by Babo’s bedside, sank his head to his chest, and, like his friend, fell asleep. The two snoozed together, leaving their wives to freely ignore each other. An hour later the men awoke with a start, almost simultaneously. The evening sky was hazy, reflecting the lights and smog of the city. Babo and El Comandante were pleased to find themselves still in each other’s company.

  “The moon dies with the night on its back.” Babo’s face creased with emotion. “I thought I had dreamt your visit.”

  “I’m no dream,” the tyrant said, pressing his tongue against his palate. “Nor am I ready to repent or regret!”

  Babo laughed a weak facsimile of his laugh. His mind was shorn of most wordplay, but his emotions remained fierce. “To the only son of a bitch who ever came close,” he said, quoting himself.

  “To the monarch of the word,” El Comandante retorted, holding up an imaginary champagne glass.

  In the spreading darkness the old friends surrendered to the ordinary happiness of being together, oblivious to the sounds beyond the study: the ringing telephone, a faraway television, the ticking of the grandfather clock, the few drops of rain moistening Babo’s windowsill at last.

  It was past twilight when El Comandante left Babo’s side. What he least expected accosted him on the sidewalk: an ex-lover in red dreadlocks with a teenager—presumably their love child—in tow. Television cameras surrounded them. Supporters shook signs scrawled with accusations: EL COMANDANTE IS A DEADBEAT! PAY UP, PAPI! A cocktail waitress at the Meridian Hotel in the capital, Angela Reyes had flirted with him at a conference of Formerly Non-Aligned Nations (FNAN). It’d ended predictably—in his hotel room as his bodyguards waited outside. He might not have remembered her at all if it weren’t for the threats Angela began sending him once she learned of her pregnancy. Next to her slouched a skinny, pimply teenager with multiple tattoos and piercings. There was no way in hell this punk could be his son.

  The reporters stampeded toward El Comandante, but he and Delia ducked into the waiting limousine. Outside the tinted windows the crowd chanted: DO THE RIGHT THING! DO THE RIGHT THING! Delia had endured such sordid displays before but never said a word. This was one of the reasons the tyrant loved her, or at least felt sporadic surges of gratitude for her tolerance and discretion. The ride to the airport was miserable, slowed by the fierce rain. Entire neighborhoods of Mexico City were converted to mud and plunged into darkness by a sudden blackout. During the Special Period in Cuba, apagones had been a way of life. On street corners children with wild, squinting eyes peddled Chiclets alongside drenched newspaper vendors and peasant women hawking homemade tamales in plastic baskets.

  El Comandante reached across the backseat for Delia’s hand. It was cold and inert, and this enraged him. Over the years, the tyrant had refused all paternity tests. Cojones, he would decide which children were his. Hadn’t he done right by Delia and married her, legitimized their sons? It’d taken twenty years because he’d waited until Ceci Sánchez, his compañera of the Sierra Maestra, had passed away. Yes, this was his Holy Trinity of women: Ceci, Delia, and his accursed first wife, Miriam. Unless he counted his indomitable—even in death—mother, who sometimes visited him during thunderstorms to argue politics. The rain came down harder. Lightning illuminated the night sky. At last, he and his wife arrived at the airport and climbed into the private propeller plane that would take them back to Havana.

  Angola

  What the hell are you looking at? That’s what I really want to say, but I need your money more. Lost both legs and my eyesight outside Luanda with only a month left of my tour. Then I came home—to find what? A hero’s welcome? A pension? My fiancée? Ha! One bad joke after another. I still have my dick, but what good is it? The Revolution used me, used thousands of us, then tossed us away. People say it’s the same everywhere, but I don’t believe them. In Cuba they want their veterans healthy and whole, devoted revolutionaries who’ll still sing the national anthem. Fuck that. This country ruined my life, and it keeps on ruining it. Oye, can you spare any change?

  —Abel Padilla, veteran

  Miami

  TIRED OF DOING NOTHING ABOUT THE TYRANT?

  Yes, Goyo was tired and impotent and infuriated. How many times had he glumly reviewed his life—the fruitless years, days, and hours that he’d wasted not fighting to reclaim his homeland? He clicked on the e-mail. There were no explanations, only a map with a cross tucked deep in the Everglades; a date and a time, which happened to be three hours from now. Most likely the message wasn’t meant for him, yet nothing had cut through Goyo’s layers of equivocation more cleanly. He packed his unused gym bag with a change of clothes, extra underwear, socks, and a stick of deodorant. Then he fetched his Chief’s Special .38 from the file cabinet and packed that, too.

  Twenty-five minutes later he was pulling out of his parking garage and heading to whatever awaited him in the swamp. He was no longer young, but his hands were still steady enough for him to be a good sho
t. They—whoever “they” were—couldn’t refuse to take him. His brother had died in the Bay of Pigs, his father had shot himself from grief, his first love had hanged herself over that tyrant. Goyo’s hatred was incontestable, lavish beyond measure.

  About a month after Papá died, he visited Goyo in the middle of the night. His father looked shrunken in his white linen suit, his cuffs frayed, his sallow face averted, mumbling under his Panama hat. “Where are you going, Papi?” Goyo cried out, but his father ignored him. Instead he checked and rechecked his pockets, growing increasingly despondent as he jangled loose keys and change. Goyo wondered if Papá was looking for his watch, the one with the thin gold chain. Of what use would it be to him in the afterlife? Then, without a word, he faded away.

  The traffic was light on the highway that divided the northern perimeter of the swamp. Mangroves stretched as far as the eye could see, twisted roots emerging from the brackish water like a form of insanity. A snake crossed the road, its slide of muscles sheathed in stippled yellows and greens. Goyo calmed himself with images of the tyrant lifelessly splayed on a zinc-coated autopsy table. What was his own life worth if he wasn’t willing to risk it for what he believed more fervently now than ever: that the despot must be killed and that he, Goyo Herrera, was the one to do it. Yes, he would become one with his fellow Cubans’ dreams, restore wholeness after so many fractured years, celebrate their liberation together in the great plaza of Havana.

  A sudden downpour forced Goyo to pull to the side of the road. He checked the e-mail’s map against his larger one of the area. There were few roads and no specific address he could punch into his GPS. Goyo switched on the radio but got only evangelical stations extolling the virtues of the Holy Spirit. He lowered his window a few inches and breathed in the stench of the swamp. It reminded him of the San Isidro barrio back in the capital, home to brothels and knife fights and herds of illegal goats. A great egret stared at him from atop a clump of mangroves before taking off in slow motion, its magnificent wings like an archangel’s.

  Goyo felt his hands swelling, his feet aching. A mosquito bit him on the wrist before he could kill it. He rolled up his window and pushed the air conditioner to full blast. If he couldn’t stand the heat now, how could he survive the swamp? Coño, he’d forgotten his bug repellent and a hat against the sun. Pa’ carajo! José Martí hadn’t ridden into battle lathered in sunscreen. What were these incommodities compared to the task ahead? When the rain let up, Goyo decided to follow the main road to Cypress Hammock and let his instincts take over from there. He peered into his rearview mirror and spotted a blue Toyota with New Mexico plates. He dialed his daughter’s number and watched as the driver of the Toyota put a phone to her ear.

  “Por Dios, Alina, what the hell are you doing here?”

  “I could ask you the same thing.”

  “This is none of your business. Go home!”

  “You left your computer on with that creepy message and—”

  “I beg of you, hija, turn around and let me be!”

  “You’re going off the deep end.”

  “Enough!” Goyo hung up and pressed his foot to the accelerator. He would lose his busybody daughter if it was the last thing he did. There was nobody in front of him, and he pushed his Cadillac to sixty, seventy, eighty miles per hour. His car swerved on the slick road, but he held it steady. His cell phone rang and rang. Goyo had the impulse to shoot out Alina’s tires, but he didn’t want to injure her. If his daughter showed up at the encampment of coverts, there was no way they’d accept him. Goddamnit, she was gaining on him.

  By the time Goyo reached the visitors’ center, he was worn out from the strain of the chase. Alina pulled in beside him, got out of her car, and motioned for him to open his door. He refused. Before them a normal-looking family sat around a picnic table merrily cutting up a watermelon. Goyo disregarded his daughter’s shouts and her kicks to his Cadillac, which finally caught the attention of a park ranger. Goyo drew circles near his ear in the universal gesture of “crazy.” The ranger—name tag Cabrera, a scar from ear to jaw—brandished handcuffs, and a scuffle broke out. Goyo backed away and sped westward. By the time the cops subdued Alina, he would be deep in the swamp with his compatriots.

  At a moldy outpost of a boathouse, Goyo commandeered a canoe under an alias and set off to find the band of Freedom Fighters. No longer would he evade his fate. It was close to noon, and the heat blazed around him like a web of flame. This must’ve been what his brother had endured at the Bay of Pigs. Poor Marcos, who’d broken out in summertime heat rashes, who’d sat in front of electric fans and bowls of ice to cool off, who’d rarely stepped outside their Vedado mansion with its frosted-glass doors and floor-to-ceiling shutters painted, at their mother’s behest, with the lives of the saints.

  The paddle split and splintered Goyo’s palms, grew slippery with sweat. His skull throbbed from the advancing sunburn. Yet he was spellbound by the vegetation, the murky waters, the trills and whirs he couldn’t identify except for the ospreys, which were identical to the ones in Cuba. Goyo had heard the Everglades called a river of grass, and he pictured its ancient flow beneath his canoe. It felt tideless, eternal. Its scum rotted in the sun; its reeking ferment enveloped him. He paddled toward wherever he found an opening in the mangroves. A bone wedged in some root appeared to be a femur, judging by its size and shape, and this unnerved him. He needed to rest for a few minutes, restore his energy. Goyo set down his paddle and, with considerable difficulty, slid to the bottom of the canoe. He laid his head against the warm wood of the seat. Exhaustion overtook him, and he slipped into a restive sleep.

  In a dream, Goyo trailed Adelina Ponti to the Almendares River. Her dress was tight from her growing belly and cut low under the arms, which exposed soft excesses of breast. After the tyrant had impregnated her, she dropped out of the university and spent her days reading worthless romance novels procured from bookshops on the Calle de la Reina. Now she was crying alone under a blooming ylang-ylang tree. Goyo lamented the thousands of days he hadn’t spent at her side. An afternoon shower cooled his brow. It trickled to his lips, reviving him. When he opened his eyes, a half-dozen men in fatigues stared down at him with mocking eyes.

  “¿Hombre, que coño haces aquí?” their leader demanded.

  The right side of Goyo’s face felt on fire, and his throat was cotton-dry. “I am Goyo Herrera,” he croaked. “And I am here to fight.”

  The men burst out laughing, but the leader stopped them with a slash of his hand. One of the soldiers sat on a stump with Goyo’s gym bag slung over his shoulder. He was examining the Chief’s Special .38.

  “I got the message.” Goyo’s lips clung together as he spoke.

  “Este viejo está loco de remate,” someone dismissed him.

  A burly man emerged from the ganglia of mangroves, advancing on Goyo like a hungry animal. The black mole on his temple looked pasted on. “Who the hell is this?”

  “I’m tired of doing nothing,” Goyo pleaded. “I can shoot. I’m not afraid to die.”

  “We have no time to waste, Herrera,” the leader said, not unkindly. “You had cojones coming out here, viejo.”

  The sun continued its maddening glare. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. Around him the swamp gurgled and wheezed, attending to its grim business of decay. Goyo thought of how eventually everything would perish and decompose in this muck, far from civilization’s reach. The distant roar of a helicopter prompted the men to vanish back into the swamp. Goyo stayed put, rocking in his canoe. The helicopter grew closer. The mangroves stirred from its intrusion.

  “There he is!” The voice was unmistakable, amplified and crackling through a bullhorn. Alina descended from the heavens, as he had expected she would, in a cloud of emerald flies. Goyo had half a mind to turn over his canoe and sink into the hissing abyss. Instead, he tightened his thigh muscles as the rope ladder fell to within reach.

  Somehow Alina had convinced the park rangers to leave Goyo in her ca
re. The two said little to each other once reunited. His daughter had trailed him to the swamp in order (purportedly) to save his life. Didn’t this mean that she loved him? Goyo wanted to be grateful, but he soon grew too enraged to speak. What next? Clamping a tag on his ankle like he was some goddamn endangered species? Sullenly, he agreed to follow her out of the Everglades. He flipped on the radio again. A news report was followed by a Haitian music program (he understood most of the Creole with his vestigial Canadian French) and a call-in show for troubled lovers.

  Goyo had taken his beloved Adelina on three chaperoned dates, the last to a ravishing performance of Mahler’s Fifth Symphony at the Gran Teatro de la Habana. Adelina was of Italian descent: her father a once-heralded bass baritone from Ravenna—that Byzantine city by the sea—who came to fame and fortune in the more indolent opera houses of the New World. A week after their symphony date, Adelina fell under the tyrant’s spell and lost her senses. A year later she wrote to Goyo, asking him to meet her at the same theater, but he ignored her plea. By then he was engaged to Luisa and had hardened his bruised heart. His pride prevented him from ever approaching Adelina again, though not from sending her money. Only Carla Stracci, his longtime mistress at the UN, marginally reminded him of his beloved, not so much in appearance as in the small gestures: a delicacy of wrist; their charming, clinging syllables. Thinking of the two women weakened Goyo’s already considerably weak knees.

  As the theatricality of the Everglades gave way to the more groomed vegetation of south Miami, a bulletin announced that El Comandante had decamped to Mexico City to visit his famous writer friend, who was dying of complications from lung cancer. On an impulse, Goyo turned his Cadillac down a leafy side street of Coral Gables, then took the back way to the airport. He laughed to imagine the expression on Alina’s face when she realized he was missing again.

  The sky grew overcast. Thunderclaps boomed from the south. Goyo savored the relief a storm would bring, but he didn’t want it delaying his flight. Of all the billions of variables at his disposal today, he’d chosen the most daring, and this pleased him.