Next Year in Havana(59)
“That sounds painful.”
“It was, although, I suppose it could have been worse. Our lives simply diverged. She wanted children. When we married, I thought I did, too. But the more I thought about it, about the world I was bringing them into, the country I was handing off to them, I couldn’t do it. That was my fault. She married me expecting one thing and ended up with another. It wasn’t fair to her, I wasn’t fair to her, and that was my mistake. You learn the deepest truths about yourself when you fail at something. When I failed at marriage, I learned I couldn’t pretend to be someone I wasn’t in order to please another person.”
He rubs his jaw, his eyelashes sweeping downward.
“She thought I was too serious. Wanted me to stop holding on to things.” He gives a dry little laugh. “I’m not the easiest person to live with.”
His words are both confession and warning.
“And yet you both still do—live together. Work in the restaurant together. How do you handle it? How does she?”
“I wouldn’t say we live together, exactly. It’s not like we share a bedroom anymore. It’s different here in Cuba. There’s a massive housing shortage in Havana. Cristina wanted to move out, but there was nowhere for her to go. So she’s stuck. Thank you, Fidel.”
“I can’t even imagine how awkward that must be. The idea of living with one of my exes . . .”
“You’d think so, but it’s not so bad, really. We’ve become friends more than anything. Family, in a way. Her parents are both dead. She doesn’t have anyone else, and I’m fairly certain she’s as disinterested in me as anything other than platonic as I am her. Occasionally she’ll bring men home, but I make a point to be out those nights. It’s not a perfect solution, but you make do. If things don’t look the way you anticipated, you change your expectations. It’s an easy way to avoid being disappointed.”
“And you never—”
“Bring women home?” Luis grins. “I live with my grandmother and mother. What do you think?”
I laugh. “Fair enough.”
“What about you?” He takes the drink from my outstretched hand and raises it to his lips.
“What about me?”
“You never married?”
“No.”
“Did you come close?”
“I’ve never been engaged or anything like that. My longest relationship was in college. We were together for three years.”
“What happened?”
It feels so long ago; in the moment, the breakup had been all-consuming, but now I barely remember why we fell apart.
“Just life, I guess. We got to the point where we either had to be more serious or go our separate ways, and neither one of us cared enough to take it to the next level.”
“And since then?”
“I date, but I haven’t met anyone who’s made me want more.”
Until now.
“What about your family?” I ask. “Your grandmother mentioned you used to come here with your father. What was he like?”
“Strict,” Luis answers. “He was a good father, a good man, but he was a military man, used to giving orders and others following him. He was my hero, though. When he wore his uniform he was larger-than-life to me. When I was a very young boy, I wanted to serve in the military like him.”
“What changed?”
“I grew up, I suppose. My eyes were opened to the reality of life around me. Things were easier when my father was alive, when the regime took care of us because he was a high-ranking official in the military. We still received some financial benefits after his death, but my world changed. My grandparents took us in, and my friends were no longer the children of the privileged, but Cubans who suffered. When the government protects you because you are one of theirs, it’s not so bad. But ordinary Cubans inhabit a very different reality.
“Still—” He’s silent. “My father gave his life fighting in Angola, defending its people and protecting them against the United States’ proxies and their intervention in the conflict. Spent his adult life serving the regime. Sometimes I wonder if he would be disappointed that I haven’t done the same, that I’m not honoring his memory.”
“You’ve said it yourself—your students are the future of this country. It’s clear that you love your job, that your students admire you. That’s something to be proud of. Your father fought for what he believed in. You do, too, even if it doesn’t involve picking up a gun.”
Luis smiles faintly, his lips meeting mine. “Thank you.”
He leans back, staring up at the sky. I lay my head in the curve created between his elbow and his neck, pressing my lips there, inhaling his scent, committing something else about him to memory—
For when I’m gone.
chapter sixteen
Elisa
The weeks eke by with agonizing slowness after Pablo leaves Havana, December creeping in, the monotony of life punctuated by the occasional bombing, shooting, random attacks that leave our mother even more convinced we mustn’t traipse around Havana on our own. I’m fine with the new rules—I’m in purgatory, clinging to each radio report, every scrap of news about the fighting in the Sierra Maestra. Pablo’s letters arrive sporadically, delivered by messengers, ferreted to me by the staff members I’ve recruited through bribery and cajoling. I live in terror of my mother or father finding the letters, of Magda’s condemnation, my sisters’ questions.