Leaving Glorytown (24 page)

Neighbors began sticking their heads out of their front doors. Mama still stood on the porch, holding the paper. I saw Abuela emerge from her house and scuttle across the street. Mama took a couple of steps out into the yard. Then she fell to her knees.

“Mama!” I screamed.

I was across the street and in our yard in the blink of an eye. Tears streamed down Mama's face. Abuela came rushing to her side.

“Concha! Get up,
hija
. Is it the telegram?”

Mama nodded.

Abuela and I looked at each other in disbelief.

“Okay, okay. Come into the house now,” Abuela said as she helped
Mama to her feet. “Don't get the telegram wrinkled or dirty, Concha. Let me hold it for you.”

“No!” said Mama. “No, I am not letting it out of my sight!”

“Conchita, Conchita,” said Abuela soothingly. “The telegram has come. It is not going to go away again. Come inside, sweetheart.”

“Is it the telegram?” cried a neighbor.

At the same time, Rolando yelled from across the street, “Calcines, what is it? What did he bring?”

I turned and yelled as loudly as I could,
“The telegram is here!”

There was dead silence among the dozens of neighbors who were outside now. Then they erupted into a massive and spontaneous cheer. People flooded the street and invaded our home, yelling, clapping, and dancing for sheer joy. A memory flashed through my mind: Noche Buena, 1961. That was the last time I'd seen the whole neighborhood so happy. The winds of freedom had finally blown my family's way.

Esther appeared at the front door, hands clasped to her face. “Mama!” she cried. “Is it true?”

“My baby girl!” Mama sobbed. “Since you were six years old, we've been waiting for this piece of paper! Esther, we're going to America!”

“Aiee!”
shrieked Esther. “We have to tell Papa!”

“Papa is at work,” I reminded her and Mama.

“Someone must go tell him right now!”

“I'll go!” said Emilio Pérez from across the street. Like a jaguar, he was off.

Suddenly, I realized Papa's assignment to the work detail was officially over. He had been punished enough for his disloyalty. Now they were letting us go.

We had one week to get ready. Our flight to freedom would take place on December 30. But before that could happen, we still had the military to contend with.

Later that afternoon, the same officer came back. This time he carried a clipboard. As family, friends, and neighbors gathered curiously, he made a great show of strutting through our house, checking off each and every item on his checklist, pushing aside anyone who got in his way. We already knew that all our property belonged to the state. Now he was making sure we weren't trying to steal anything from Cuba.

“Excuse me, señora,” said the officer with mock civility as he stood in the living room and pointed up at the blank space above the windows. “My records indicate that there were curtains in this room. Where are they now?”

The whole family held our collective breath as we waited for Mama to answer. We knew she'd given the curtains away to another family who were far worse off than we were. She never thought the curtains would be missed. It hadn't even occurred to her that she was breaking the law.

“I—I—” said Mama. “Well, we—”

“Señora, let me remind you of something,” said the officer. “If you gave those curtains away, that constitutes the crime of theft against the state. That makes you a criminal, and that gives me the right to revoke your visa right here and now.”

We froze. The panic that gripped me now nearly turned my bowels to water. Was it possible that this evil snake of a man could ruin our dream when we were so close?

“So where are those curtains?” he pressed. “What have you done with them? Who is the criminal in possession of them now?”

“Please, sir,” said my father.

“Silence, worm!” said the officer. “I was speaking to your wife!” Papa clamped his lips together and went into their bedroom. I could hear him praying aloud to Santa Barbara, not caring if the officer heard him.

“Sir, I have to be honest,” Mama said. “I—I gave them away.”

The officer's eyes grew wide. Then he strode out to his jeep. I went to the window and watched as he sorted through some files in the back.

“I had to tell him the truth!” Mama said, to no one in particular. “He would have known if I had lied!”

The officer was in his jeep for a very long time. Papa's praying grew louder. Mama closed her eyes and clasped her hands. Esther was crying. I didn't know what to do. Finally the officer came back in with another piece of paper.

“Very well, I have decided to make an exception,” he said. “But I will only give you two hours to vacate this house. If you are still in it when I come back, you will be arrested and sent to prison. Get out now! And the rest of you people, go back to your homes! It's against the law for more than three people to assemble!” And with that he turned and went back out to his jeep. It roared to life, and he careened through the cheering mob on San Carlos Street.

We spent the next two hours moving the personal belongings we would be taking with us—clothes and toiletries, legal documents, photos—into Abuela and Abuelo's house.

Quco Bemba came running up to me. “Calcines, is it true?”

“Yes, man,” I said. “We're out of here.”

“Wow! I can't believe it!”

“Me, neither.”

Quco dug his toe into the dirt and looked around shyly.

“What is it, Quco?”

“I was just wondering . . . since you're going to America, can I have your shirt?”

I laughed. “Of course, man,” I said. “But can you at least wait until we're on our way? I need something to wear for the next week.”

“Okay!” Quco smiled. “Thanks, Calcines! I will never forget you, ever!”

“I won't forget you, either, Quco.”

Now the hard part began—the goodbyes. For the next five days, a constant stream of relatives and friends trooped through my grandparents' house. There must have been five hundred people, including all my aunts, uncles, cousins, second cousins, all of their spouses and children, all of our friends, friends of friends, various people we barely knew but who wanted to wish us well, anyway, and, no doubt, a few complete strangers who were simply curious. I quickly wearied of shaking hands and accepting congratulations. It was all too surreal. I felt as if we had become royalty or movie stars.

The boys hardly left my side. They didn't want to miss a moment. I knew they were happy for me, but the expression on their faces, especially Rolando's, was almost more than I could take.

“You guys want to get out of here?” I suggested on the day before we left.

“What, are you telling us to leave?” Tito bristled.

“No, no. I mean, let's go somewhere. If my cheeks get pinched one more time I'm going to go crazy.”

Luis brightened. “Let's go to the field and play baseball!” he said.

Rolando snorted. “With what? Our only baseball came apart a year ago, and I'm sick of playing with wound-up rags.”

“Calcines is going to be able to get all the baseballs he wants soon,” said Tito. “Hey, why don't you send us a new one when you get to America?”

“Sure, sure,” I said, irritated. All these guys seemed able to think about was how much stuff they wanted me to send them once I was free. “But I'm not there yet, so quit asking me, okay? Seriously, I need to get out of here for a while. Do you guys want to come or not?”

“Let's go to the cemetery and pick mangos,” said Rolando. “It's not far, and we can't get into trouble.”

We all agreed that that sounded good, so off we went. I didn't even bother telling Mama and Papa. They were too busy talking.

The cemetery was located on an isolated stretch of dirt road leading out to the countryside. Mango trees grew there in abundance, and their fruit was bigger and sweeter than those of other mango trees, including La Natividad's. Naturally, we said this was because they fed off the bodies underground. It was a disgusting thought. But Papa had explained to me that that was just part of the cycle of nature. All dead things decomposed and fed new life, he said. Someday
our
bodies would nourish the earth as well, and in this way we would continue to live on.

We climbed the fence and helped ourselves, sucking on the sweet flesh as we read the dates on the tombstones. A lot of them were very old, and nearly all of them belonged to people who'd died before the Revolution. These people may have known hardships, I thought, but none of them knew anything about Fidel. I wondered if the dead were
aware of what had happened since their passing, and how they felt about it. Would they want me to stay on the island and work to make things better? Or would they approve of my leaving?

“Someday Fidel will join you,” I whispered to the tombstones. “And then he will be judged, and Cuba will once again be free.”

“Calcines is talking to himself,” said Luis.

“He's going crazy,” said Tito.

“That's what freedom does to your head,” said Rolando. “Already he thinks he's sitting in Yankee Stadium, watching Mickey Mantle and Joe DiMaggio.”

“Ah, stuff it,” I said. A wave of anxiety came over me. What was I doing here? I should be getting ready to leave, not acting as if nothing had happened. “I gotta get back home.”

“Why? I thought we were gonna have an adventure!” complained Luis.

“I don't have time. Tía Luisa and Tío Jesús are taking us to a restaurant tonight for a goodbye dinner.”

“A
restaurant
?” The boys looked shocked. None of our families had had the money to go to a restaurant for years. I had never even been to one. There was little point—there was no more food to be had there than there was in our bare cupboards. But the very word “restaurant” was exciting and glamorous. “The high life is starting for you already, Calcines!”

“Ah, he thinks he's too good to spend his last day with his friends,” said Rolando in disgust. “Come on, let's go.” He got up and stalked off.

“Don't worry about him,” said Tito. “He's just jealous. He'll get over it.”

“I hope so,” I said.

But I didn't have time to worry about it. There was just too much going on.

The Covadonga Restaurant was once world famous for its paella, a Spanish dish of yellow rice and various kinds of seafood. In its heyday, former and current U.S. presidents had eaten there, as well as lots of other wealthy, famous people. Now it sat empty and forlorn, falling apart both inside and out—because, like every other business in Cuba, it was run by the state.

The Covadonga was situated on Cienfuegos Bay, near Tía Luisa's house at the port. Through the windows, I could see the beautiful sunset over the turquoise waters. Our dinner came—a big bowl of rice. There was almost no seafood in it at all. We didn't care. We dug in and enjoyed it as though we were at one of Tío William's old Noche Buena parties. The adults chattered away to each other like parrots. I scarcely heard a word. My head and heart were full, and soon my stomach was, too.

As we were finishing up, Papa turned to me and said, “Niño, I want you to look carefully out the window, because this is the last sunset you are going to see in Cienfuegos. Tomorrow we go to Varadero, and the next day we will go to the airport and then north, to America.”