by Wendy Guerra
Finally, the most essential part of all this, where we always wanted to go when we were kids. Do you remember?
My dear and only listener tonight. You probably know Red Square is a rectangle, and the horizontal sides are so very long. On one side, the Kremlin with its many buildings, palaces, and churches, topped by the mausoleum that houses a mummified Lenin. On the other side, a commercial center, an authentic temple to capitalism. The many boutiques are expensive and exclusive, so Comrade Lenin must be spinning in his grave.
Sunday in Red Square: the line to get into the mausoleum is endless, but I had to see it. Otherwise, how to get rid of this macabre Cuban curiosity I’ve had all my life? The necrophilia inspired by that photo of the dead Che began to creep up inside me. In the end, Lenin was lying in there and I was out here, not able to see him. No, no, and no.
Let’s listen to a song together, my dear Diego, and I’ll go on with my story. A kiss at midnight, from the modulated frequency of my little sound machine.
Do you remember in Havana, how we’d climb under the blankets in our little tent with just our flashlight? I wonder if we were born to live in tents. Listen to this hymn. I bet you haven’t forgotten the words . . .
I’m a Pioneer with my whole heart
And I’ll camp eagerly.
I’ll make knots and camp . . .
That explorer’s song brings back so many memories, Diego. I can’t imagine you driving around Mexico City and singing this song from our childhood. Never mind narrating a soccer game during the World Cup and suddenly hearing you say: “A blue sky and an arena like a child’s drawing.” We’re bipolar. How long will we have to resist these memories? Can we possibly block out all we were?
Let’s continue with Lenin.
The hardship passed quickly. Two hours with nothing to read while standing in line under the open sky. I’d brought only Derrida with me, and I didn’t want to weigh down Red Square. Even though I was trained for this sort of thing, I was a nervous wreck. I looked around, checked out every corner of the square. I opened a notebook and drew six sketches from different angles. Finally, just as I was about to become one of my ice sculptures, Lenin.
They practically undressed me at the door, and they made me pay to leave my coat. I was left in my underwear: a sleeping shirt and long ballet leggings. That was the worst: to stand there in my undies under the somber mausoleum light. And to think I don’t take off my coat even to go to the bathroom. I’m not familiar with the culture of dressing for the cold. This was me, Nadia, a replicant for Lenin’s widow, in my underwear, flying like a butterfly around the specter. They took my cell phone; they even took my modesty. This all happened in a very bad way. There was incomprehensible yelling in English and mobilizing and dramatic Russian shrieks. But, my dear, I’m used to that.
Oh, Diego: how amazing it is to complain on your own private independent radio show about the things you can’t complain about on the air! This is such a relief!
Diego, dear, I haven’t asked you if you’ve ever been there. The ritual: the entry, you go around the yellow mummy, you can’t pause, never mind trying to look for any sustained period of time. And then it seemed like Vladimir was going to wink at me and say: “Nadeshda, my wife, get me out of here—I’ve been on view far too long!” but I was shoved out of there instead.
My whole life dreaming of that specter. It was just exactly as we imagined it as kids.
I was always frightened by Lenin’s face. He’d appear to me in my nightmares. I loved the shivers I got when I was scared. Now I just feel terror. It’s not the same to imagine him as it is to see him lying there for eternity.
At the end of my trip, when we were saying goodbye, I talked to my mother’s husband. She’s suffering from a serious breakdown of her central nervous system. It could be Alzheimer’s, but they’re not sure. The Russian wants to get rid of the problem. He would give her back to me with her papers and everything.
Diego, do you think I should take her back to Cuba? Her adoptive children aren’t having luck communicating with her. She’s a burden on everyone. They would abandon her like she once abandoned us. Everything comes back to the same point. I compare today with yesterday, and I don’t understand her. If she was leaving something so terrible behind, why did she leave me behind in the terribleness?
She has to be taken care of. She’s very thin and cries all the time. She speaks gibberish and only in Spanish. She doesn’t recognize me. I’m rootless. Without a past. Homeless. I feel like someone’s pulling me back, grabbing me by the back of my coat as I try to step forward.
Tell me if you’ve been to Russia.
Tell me what you remember of me. How was I the first time we met? I’ve lost track of that day. I don’t know where I’m from.
I want to adopt my mother. I’m going to close my own circle.
Listen . . . Don’t forget this broadcast is just for you. Here’s a song your father used to love. Vicente Feliú sings it. Remember?
Believe me
when I tell you I’m going with the wind . . .
Goodbye, Diego. Sorry about my hyperrealist song; I hope you remember it and get a good sleep after listening to this. A kiss on the cheek until we see each other again, here or walking on this earth.
Remember that you’ve just spent . . . Daybreak with No One.
Letter from Diego, Attached to My Red Diary
Nadia, little girl . . . :
What a lovely program you sent me. I’m so lonesome, I don’t know how to thank you. Of course, the memories from working at the radio station come back to me. Cuba is marvelous—its music and light are enough to make you forget the bad moments. I admire your strength and support, what you’re doing for your mother; it makes me wonder if I couldn’t be doing more for my father. I now realize we’re a totally screwed up generation, like our parents’ memories.
I have a lot to tell you about you, but I’d rather do it in person. I never lose that hope, even though you always stand me up.
I’ve lost sight of the first image of you. I remember your mother’s shapely legs. Her hand dragging you along; you wore black. I’ve never again seen a nine-year-old girl wearing black, as if in mourning. Only someone like her could have designed such a dress for a girl with such sparkling eyes. Of course, we were dealing with scarcities and emergencies, but it was odd to see that color on your body at such a young age.
I close my eyes.
I see you eating toasted meal with sweetened condensed milk while watching TV at my house. You told me that day you didn’t have one at your house.
You marched with me in a marching band next to a row of boys. You were the “minor baton,” marching up front, your hair short, moving your little Cuban butt to the beat. You held my hand whenever it wasn’t at your waist. You were serious when you marched, looking straight ahead, toward the parade’s finish line.
I’ll never forget when you learned the Mexican national anthem for my birthday, but you got the words mixed up and said some pretty weird things. I don’t know where you got that version.
The day they handed out toys: Basic/Not Basic/Directed.
Your mother didn’t get to the store on time and they wouldn’t let my father go in with you. You lost your turn. I remember your face when you saw me come out of the store with my lavish box of toys. You had nothing and looked desperate. Later, we played ball and soccer. Me with my toys, you with nothing. I still feel guilty: they were toys for Cuban kids and I was a foreigner. You showed me how to bat. You played like a macho tomboy on the field.
I never understood two things: Why are you so feminine, so flirty, so beautiful, and, at the same time, so firm and resolute?
Where were your parents?
You’re the only Cuban girl who bathed in the sea practically in the nude. I loved seeing you wear just the bottoms of your bikini.
The day I left, you said, “I’m always going to be your girlfriend, maybe even the mother of your children.”
You were laugh
ing as you kissed my mouth, and then you left, walking slowly toward your father’s house, just across the street from ours. You didn’t say goodbye. Your mother was already wandering the earth, and your father was just a shadow who tried to take care of you.
Later, we saw each other, but we weren’t kids anymore. That was my big moment with you.
Yes, I’ve been to Russia. I didn’t want to see Lenin. I don’t like going back to the past. Only your body makes me go back.
I’ve never forgotten the subject: “mother.”
Today is too much for me.
I’ll call you tomorrow; I’d rather hear your voice. Listen, Cuban girl, turn on your cell, please. You know: I adore you.
Diego
I’m not going to answer your calls, Diego.
My family is vanishing and you’re all that’s left. My mother’s like a game of jacks, her memory in pieces, untethered from her broken intelligence.
Papi gets programmed even in retrospectives of dead Latin American film directors.
My father is who agonizes me.
I walk among the dead, continue working on my projects as if I were wearing army boots, using what little courage I have left to do them.
You’re the only sure thing in my life. I’d run to you and ask you to marry me. Once convinced, we’d live happily and in peace. But there’s one thing I know for sure: I can’t be happy until I close this circle, until I deal with the death of my parents.
I can’t answer your calls. Or see you. If I did, I’d leave everything to be a normal woman. I’ve always had the opportunity to leave my traumas if I were by your side. Living with you means not having an excuse to complain or disobey. And it’s not the right time.
Nadia
P.S. Today is April 4, Day of the Pioneers.
Letter from Diego in My Red Diary
APRIL 6, MEXICO CITY
Nadia:
Enough already of trying to idealize your projects and your existence: your essential aspiration is harmony. We Jews always sing what we’ve never had: shalom, peace. In a Catholic scheme, where what’s relevant isn’t life on earth but what comes after, very little matters. In Buddhist thinking, we simply complete the circle of one of many lives, and there’s no problem either. The truth is, working within these concepts, we don’t live; we simply yearn for those who come after us to live more comfortably.
Please, my dear girl–sister–woman–mythical creature, be happy however you want, just be happy.
When we met, you, my father, and I were in Cuba because of something having to do with Trotsky’s death. Worse, actually: Trotsky’s murder. I’ve never wanted to know what it was, and I don’t want to know now, but my father has never found peace, and I don’t want to share in his schizophrenia.
Nadia: I don’t understand why you insist on suffering. It breaks you apart and destroys you. Aren’t you still the heroine I once knew?
The wars you sign up for aren’t yours—they’re not yours or our parents’ either. You have to choose your battles, even when other forces insist that, in fact, the crusade of the day involves us and that we should be grateful for the gallons of blood shed.
You have to choose your enemies and their battles. Be a little more afraid of your head than of your surname.
Little Nadia, thank you again for your radio show. I listen to it every night as I go to sleep. You guessed what can keep me awake. You’re my lullaby. I have serious problems falling asleep; at these hours of the night, I’m also visited by old ghosts I’ve inherited. It kills me to confess I’ve been cowardly. I don’t think it makes sense to lie about something like that.
Would you believe this confession? I’ve never again said “I love you.” Just to you, just in Havana, just to you.
Yes, when I’ve gone back to your island, I’ve seen it: half of Cuba has changed. What’s left? The dream of the past?
Your mother used to say something my father still repeats: “The dog has four legs but chooses only one path.”
Whenever you want to come down that road, let me know.
Always yours,
Diego
Dear Diary
LIST OF MY MOTHER’S LOVERS
Coco
Pablo
Sebastián
Lujo Rojas
Enrique Díaz Caballero
Jorge Maletín
The troubadour
The scissors sharpener
Armando
Nicolás
Waldo
Paolo B.
Ed
Gabriel
Ernesto
Lama
It’s April 12 and Paris is killing me. I have to run through this list of names. The idea is to conquer those people who can tell me about my mother. She doesn’t say much.
I’m going to see Paolo B. tonight. I pick out some new lingerie in a very interesting store. Every one needs to be conquered in their own way. I don’t plan on giving up.
I’ll do whatever I need to do to find out how my mother used to be. I have no scruples now; I left them all behind in Havana.
I make choices as I go through what’s on the hangers. Black lingerie strikes me as ridiculous. Better I get the red. I love lingerie—I love the designs. They speak of the body; they express themselves in a fantastic dialogue between nudity and transparency. I buy two skimpy pieces to scare Paolo B.
There’s a doorman at Paolo’s building who calls ahead so Paolo knew I was there before I went up. He opens the door wearing a silk Japanese robe and so much cologne it could flood the city.
The walls are full of enormous paintings, mostly by Cuban artists. It’s impressive to see a giant Servando in Paris. An Amelia Peláez under halogen lights. The Portocarrero vibrates on the wall, makes a sound like music. A tiny sketch of a bull by Picasso. There’s a seascape by Romañach, a piece of Varadero hanging in the corner, as moist as if it’d just stopped raining. Graffiti on a piece of glass:
“Are you always attracted to damaged women?”
“I didn’t know there were any other kind.”
—Philip Roth
Paolo B. brought me a glass of a wine my mother used to like.
No music.
The soft sound of the humidifier and whatever was cooking in the kitchen.
“Are you on your way back? How is she?”
“I’ve come for a list.”
“A list of people who might be able to find her?”
“That one I have. Now I need to know who she is.”
Paolo tried to take off my coat, but I didn’t let him. I had a surprise for him. He looked at me like an old wolf who realizes he has prey on his hands. I played the naughty girl. It was a silent arrangement—whatever was going to happen would happen as soon as he took off my coat. I can’t believe what I’m about to do, but I’m having a lot of fun.
“Let me try to help you with your list. Maybe I can round it out.”
“What’s for dinner?”
“A cultish meal from your generation, Cuban girl: Saint-Germain purée, cheese omelette, white rice, and a banana placed in the corner of the plate.”
“Peas, omelette, rice, and plantains—just like during the best of times in the boarding schools out in the country.”
“The staff just left, so if you want something else you’ll have to make it yourself.”
I took off my coat in one swift move and leapt over to Servando’s painting—I didn’t break anything in the process.
I remembered when I did gymnastics at school and my father demanded precision and concentration. The pirouettes were calculated; my Russian twirls always hit their mark. I was a champion, and no one could ever take that from me. I got even with my defeats by then winning medals.
I made several turns. I used to go to real extremes with my exercises. Pirouettes so precise I never knocked over a jar or broke any ornate object, like the ones making a rare appearance in Paolo’s living room.
He thought I’d be nude, that that’s why I wasn’t taking off
my coat. But I was better dressed than an army general in a parade.
Now I’m in the air, almost touching the halogen lights, in perfect balance with the night, on top of the radiators, like a circus monkey going for a triple into his arms.
I landed in one piece in his embrace and bit his lip instead of kissing him. Paolo won’t give me any credit for that performance. We both knew it was all a trick: static and dynamic movements artificially programmed. An artistic gymnast. Nobody lies better than a Cuban in this situation. “Lie to me again,” I thought I heard him say.
He’d realized I was completely dressed, uniformed; he’d registered my strong thighs; he’d caught sight of my well-trained, firm body with his angry eyes. I was a Pioneer with my bandana and everything. A communist Pioneer snuck into his house! What is this? I was suddenly on his mouth, kissing him coldly and awkwardly, the way experts like him like. Really awkwardly so he could teach me later. They want to teach us, and we need to let ourselves be taught. I learn everything to the last detail; my list is full of dictators. I like dictators in bed. Why deny that in this very senseless situation?
We made love standing up, against the glass with the graffiti. The Pioneer remained dressed after all. Paolo is an expert when it comes to separating interiors; he nearly suffocated me with my bandana as he penetrated me over and over, and over again. I kicked the lamp in the corner and didn’t care if it was a Tiffany—it didn’t matter; whatever I broke was much less than what I was doing to my mother.
Paolo carried me to the sofa. He tore my uniform to pieces; my heart was beating wildly. And even in the moment, I thought the act of ripping was terrible, especially my Pioneer uniform. I hit him hard and climbed up, as if I were grabbing the balance beam, using him as a longitudinal axis. I’ve always longed to be an athlete when it came to love, my mind blank, my body ready. His slap came fast. A quick twist of the hand destroyed my skirt, and it was such a beautiful and cruel act.