Leaving Glorytown (17 page)

That school year dragged on just like the year before it. In early 1968, Abuelo Julian went to the sugar mill and came home near the beginning of the summer, and we rejoiced that he was safely with us once more. School ended. I had learned that Nguyen Van Troy was a Vietcong soldier who died fighting against the “evil Yankee empire.” Now every morning I met up with Tito, Rolando, and Luis on the front steps of the Jagua Movie House. We sat around and tried to think of stuff to do that would be fun but wouldn't get us into trouble. It was a short list. We went to the port, we spied on La Natividad, and went on long countryside walks to the cemetery. Because there was so little we could do, summer, which I yearned for throughout the school year, seemed like a different kind of prison sentence.

Then one day, as the boys and I were sitting around in the stultifying heat, a soldier in a jeep appeared out of nowhere, pulled up in front of our house, and handed Mama a piece of paper.

The boys and I looked at one another, then shot to our feet. The instant the soldier drove off, all the neighbors flooded our front yard.

“The telegram!” someone shouted.

My heart stopped. Was this it? Would we be leaving one week from today?

But Mama opened the envelope, then shook her head. “It's not the telegram!” she said to the crowd. They dispersed, disappointed.

“What is it, Mama?” I asked, out of breath.

“It's Papa,” she said.

My heart sank like a stone. Esther came up behind Mama, clinging to her skirt. “Is he—is he okay?”

“It's his hernia,” she said. “It's gotten worse, and he will have to have an operation.”

“What? It's that bad?”

“Well . . . it's not great, but at least he'll get to come home for the surgery. And afterward, he'll have some time off to recuperate.”

“You mean Papa will be able to stay with us for a while?”

“Yes,” said Mama. “Papa is coming home.”

“Yay!” Esther and I jumped for joy.

But then I stopped. “Mama, if the Communists think Papa is such a bad man, then why are they doing this for him?”

The look on her face told me she was thinking the same thing. I waited to hear what kind of glass-half-full reason she would come up with this time.

“Because,” she said finally, “your papa is such a hard worker they think he's worth repairing. Even the Communists can see what a good man he is.”

I had to hand it to Mama. Sometimes she actually convinced me that everything was all right.

When Papa got off the bus a few days later, the three of us were waiting for him. I was shocked at how sick he looked. His skin hung on his bones like a badly made suit. He walked bent over, because of his constant pain. We brought him into the house, laid him in bed, and gathered around him.

“Oh, they're trying to work you to death!” exclaimed Mama. “Those animals! They're no better than Nazis!”

“It's okay,” Papa said. “The important thing is, I'm home.”

“Papa, are you really having an operation?” I asked. “Are they going to slice you open and look at your guts?”

“Niño!” said Mama.

“Eww!” said Esther.

“Yes, they are,” Papa said. “And they're going to sew up my hernia so it doesn't hurt anymore.”

“Is it going to make you all better?” Esther asked.

“It's supposed to,” Mama said. “Now, you two scoot so your father can get some rest. He needs it.”

Later that night, as I lay in bed, I could hear their anguished voices. Mama had the same fear I did: that the Communists were going to use this operation as an excuse to kill Papa on the operating table. It would be a quick and convenient way for them to dispose of a troublesome worm. All it would take was a few too many drops of anesthetic.

“We can't worry about every little thing that pops into our heads,
Concha,” Papa told her. “What will be, will be. Right now, the important thing is I'm home with my family again, and this operation means I will have a nice long break from that horrible place.”

“If you survive it,” Mama said bitterly.

I was surprised—she never let herself voice such dark thoughts in front of us kids. She was so good at hiding them that I'd almost come to believe she didn't have any.

“Enough of that kind of talk,” Papa said. “You don't know how good it feels to lie down in my own bed with you again, and to know my little ones are safe and sound in the next room. If you did, you wouldn't be carrying on about what might happen. You have no idea of the things I've seen, Concha. I've told you only a tenth of what really goes on. I am never going to tell you about the rest, ever. They're too sad and horrible. But I'll tell you one thing right now—I'm either going to get my family to America, or I'm going to die trying. And whether I die on the operating table or in front of a firing squad, it's all the same. This Revolution is going to fail, Concha. It might take a long time, but someday Fidel Castro will be dead, and the truth about what has happened here will come out. And then the world can hang its head in shame for not having tried hard enough to stop it.”

The day before his operation, Papa bade us goodbye, as nonchalant as if he were going to the store. Mama went with him, leaving Esther and me with Abuela Ana and Abuelo Julian. Esther wailed as the taxi pulled away.

“Shh,” said Abuela, “don't cry. Your parents will be back soon, and your papa will be as good as new.”

“Yeah, Esther,” I said—though I didn't believe it. “Everything will be fine.”

“I'm hungry,” Esther whined.

“Me, too,” I said.

“How about some chicken soup?” Abuela said. “I'm sure Eduar would love to help me make it.”

“No way, Abuela!” I said. “Forget it!”

Abuela started laughing and I knew she was thinking about the last time she had made chicken soup for us. Abuela had decided that at the age of twelve, I was old enough to learn how to kill a chicken. She handed me a broom and told me to use it to corner a chicken, then grab it and wring its neck. I must have chased that chicken around the yard for an hour, until it finally gave up, out of a combination of exhaustion and terror. I grabbed it by the neck, but the thought of killing the poor bird was just too much. I gave it to Abuela and she handed it back, telling me to twist its neck three times until I felt it break. I lost courage before I could make the third twist, and I let the chicken go. It fell to the ground and began to flop around, as chickens do when they are dying. Then, suddenly, it got to its feet and took off again. I begged Abuela to let that be the end of it, but she handed me the broom again without a word, and I knew what I had to do. After another endless chase around the yard, I captured it again. Under her firm gaze, I finally managed to do the chicken in. I could not eat a bite of the soup she made from it, and I never wanted to kill another chicken again.

“Well, if not chicken soup then let's make ant bread!” Abuela suggested.

Esther and I stared at her.

“Ant bread?” I repeated.

“Sure! You can make bread out of anything,” Abuela said. “Even ants. Isn't that right, Julian?”

“Absolutely,” said Abuelo. “I often had ant bread when I was growing up. As a matter of fact, I like nothing better.”

Abuela took us into the kitchen and opened a drawer.

“Look inside,” she said. “What do you see?”

We looked.

“Ants,” we said.

“Precisely. Now, I am going to take these ants and grind them up.”

“Disgusting!” Esther said.

“No, watch, you'll see. First, though, I need a little flour. Lucky thing I bought some yesterday from the lady who supplies your mama. Esther, get me the flour, please. Eduar, go fetch the molasses. I have a little I've been saving.”

We did as we were told. We watched, spellbound, as Abuela mixed everything together, but we didn't see any ants going in. Finally, I couldn't stand it any longer. “Abuela, you've got all the ingredients together, and there still aren't any ants in it!” I said.

“Well, what do you know?” Abuela said. “Whenever I'm short on ingredients, I use ants to fill in, but it looks like I didn't need to add them this time. Well, maybe next time.”

I was old enough to know that I'd been had. But Esther hadn't quite figured it out yet. When the pumpernickel bread was ready, she stared at it for a long time, then wrinkled her nose. “I don't like ant bread,” she said, and no amount of cajoling from either Abuela or Abuelo could get her to eat it.

“I guess that's like me and chicken soup,” I said to Abuela.

E
ven though I was, as Abuelo had said, practically a man now, I spent many of the following days waiting for Papa in my childhood sanctuary, whistling to the birds and daydreaming about the future. Would I move to America and become a baseball player, as Abuelo had assured me? Would I perhaps meet and marry a Hollywood movie starlet, possibly even becoming a famous actor myself? Or would I grow up to bring peace and prosperity back to Cuba?

The time passed even more slowly because I knew Papa was truly at the mercy of the Communists now. I imagined him surrounded by evil doctors with big, bushy beards, their white gowns stained with the blood of other innocent Cuban fathers. I cried myself to sleep at night, hoping no one would hear me and tell Papa that I was nothing but a wimp, after all.

And then, three days later, they came back. Esther saw them first.

“They're home!” she cried, watching from Abuelo and Abuela's front window. I raced to her side and looked out. Mama disembarked and held her hand out for Papa, who started going up our steps slowly, still weak, but already looking more like himself. Remembering Mama's
instructions that we were not to jump on him, we ran across the street toward him, yelling, “Papa's home! Papa's home! Papa's home!”

He greeted us with gentle hugs.

“My beautiful kids,” he said. “How glad I am to see you again!”

“We're glad to see you, too,” I told him.

“We had ants for lunch!” Esther said.

“Let me guess. Ant bread.” Papa smiled.

When I saw that smile, I knew everything was going to be okay. For a little while, at least, I had my papa back.

Later that day, I sat in his bedroom, looking at his scar.

“So,” Papa said casually, “have you got a girlfriend yet?”

I felt the roots of my hair burning. “No!” I said.

“You sure? You're blushing.”

“No, I'm not!”

“You'll be starting eighth grade soon, so I guess I'd better ask you this. Do you know about the birds and the bees?”

“The who and the what?”

“How babies are made, I mean.”

“Oh, man,” I groaned. “Papa, you're embarrassing me!”

Papa grinned. “All this time I've been away, all I could think about was how many things I wished I had time to tell my son. Now that I'm home, you're too embarrassed to hear it?”

“Papa, I already know, okay? The man and the woman get naked and lie in bed together, and then—”

“Yes?”

“Well, you know!”

“No, I don't know.”

“But you and Mama made me and Esther!”

“Yeah, but I think I forgot how it goes,” Papa said. “Remind me.”

“Papa,
please
!”

“There's nothing to be embarrassed about, Eduar. It's perfectly natural. It's how all children are made. The man—”

“La la la la la!”
I yelled, putting my fingers in my ears.

“—and then—”

“La la laaaaaaa!”
I screamed.

“And then the man's seed fertilizes the woman's egg, and nine months later, a baby comes out.”

“Are you done?” I asked, removing my fingers.

“Yes, I'm done.”

“Thank God,” I said, hopping off my chair. “I'm going to go outside for a while, Papa, and when I come back, I hope these thoughts are out of your head, because it's not healthy for a man to lie around all day thinking such things.”

“Eduar, my niño,” said Papa, obviously trying not to laugh, “soon enough you will find out that a man thinks of almost nothing else!”

Up to that time, it was true, girls had not been much on my mind. But Papa's little speech must have set something in motion, because suddenly I could think of nothing except girls, girls, girls. Specifically, one girl. Her name was Deborah.

All the boys at Nguyen Van Troy Middle School were crazy about Deborah. She had a certain something that distracted us and made our breathing grow shallow. At least, that was the effect she had on me. Her jet-black hair, her soft, dark eyes, and her wonderful girly smell—hard to explain, but utterly captivating, falling somewhere between flowers and fresh bread—made me a blithering idiot whenever she was around. I'd been feeling this way for some time, but I hadn't understood that it
had anything to do with birds and bees. I just figured something was wrong with me. Now, I realized that maybe this was the same feeling that had come over Papa when he sang “Dos Gardenias” to Mama. Maybe Deborah was going to be my Conchita.