Next Year in Havana(106)

It’s the entry I need.

“I found some things when I was in Cuba.”

“I thought you might.”

“Did you know?” I ask.

“About the baby? About the man?”

So she did.

“I suspected,” she answers. “They told everyone your father came early, that she wasn’t as far along as she was. Some people probably thought they slept together before they were married. I had a different perspective, though. I saw her with him in Havana one night.”

“With Pablo?”

“Yes. She was the happiest I ever saw her. You can’t hide love like that. I tried asking her about him, and she brushed it off, but I didn’t take it personally. Those were different times. No one knew who to trust; we were all trying to do what we could to survive. I don’t doubt that she wanted to protect us. To protect him.”

“He’s alive. Still lives in Cuba. I met him.”

I’ve accomplished the impossible and managed to surprise Beatriz.

“Did he know who you are?”

“Yes.”

I tell her about the rest of my trip, meeting Magda, the missing pieces she filled in for me.

“Are you going to tell your father? Your sisters?” Beatriz asks.

“Yes. He wants to meet them if they can travel to Cuba. I would want to know about him if I were them.”

“I agree.” She reaches out and squeezes my hand. “If you need me, let me know. I’m happy to help you break the news to them.”

“Thank you.”

“And how are you handling all of the changes?”

“I’m not sure. I’m glad I got to meet Pablo. Glad I learned the truth. I read their letters, and after talking to him, it seems like they really loved each other. I only wish I knew how she felt. I always thought she loved Grandpa Ferrera. But now I wonder.”

“You’re still young. And if you’re lucky, your young man will be the only man you’ll ever love in your life. I hope that for you. For some, there is only one true love. But not everyone is lucky enough to have that love work out for them. And for some, the love we cannot have is the most powerful one of all.

“Elisa was pregnant in a time when being a single mother wasn’t an option. We were starting out in a new country, grieving the loss of our brother, our home, our friends, our way of life. When she met Juan Ferrera, she was young and scared. He was established in the United States, and his family did a lot to help us. He was a decade older than her, and he offered her the stability she craved, especially after the horrors of the revolution.

“I don’t know that she loved him when they married, but I know she grew to love him, and he loved all of you so much. He was happy with her, with the family they built, and she felt the same way about him. Perhaps it wasn’t the glitzy, sweeping romance, but they cared about each other. That can be enough.”

“I feel like I didn’t know her. Not the most important parts, at least.”

“We can’t always know the people we love as well as we think we do, Marisol. Our love is tangled up in our expectations, our perception of reality. And you never know what people really think. They often keep their deepest emotions locked away. She kept her secrets close, but considering what we lived through, who could blame her?”

Ana Rodriguez’s earlier words come back to me now.

“When I was with Ana in Cuba and she gave me my grandmother’s belongings, she mentioned that it was a common practice for families to bury items in their backyard to keep them safe for when they returned.”

Beatriz nods. “The walls of their homes, too. It was our way of preserving hope, I suppose. And perhaps a sign of our arrogance as well. We never imagined the bastard would live as long as he did.”

“She said that you had the one that was buried in your backyard. The one that contained the Perez family treasures.”

Beatriz is silent for a beat. “I had it. For a moment. And then I lost it again.”

“How?”

“How what?”

The doorbell rings.

“How did you get it back?” I ask. “Did someone smuggle it out of the country for you?”

She rises from the couch, glancing down at her watch, before staring back at me. “Sorry for the interruption. I have a massage scheduled for this afternoon.”

Her lips curve into a blinding smile, one that offers more than a hint of insight into the trail of broken hearts behind her. She’s the kind of woman who has likely been stunning her entire life and knows nothing else.

“His name is Gunnar, and he is a sight to behold.”

My beautiful, glamorous, mysterious great-aunt.

“Why did you go back to Cuba?” I ask again.

Beatriz turns back and smiles at me, halfway to the entry. Her voice holds the same tone of insouciance I’ve heard her employ throughout my life.

“I went to assassinate Fidel Castro, of course.”



* * *



? ? ?

I leave Beatriz’s house and make the trek back to the house in Coral Gables, where Luis is waiting for me. I’m greeted by the sound of music playing—an Icelandic band I discovered on a trip to Reykjavik ages ago—and the scent of paella coming from the kitchen.

I set my purse down on the entryway table, flipping through the mail resting there—a few bills, a postcard from my sister Daniela, who’s in Marbella with our mother, a fashion magazine.