by Carlos Eire
Nearly all the photographs I have from my childhood were taken by Puentes Pi and his crime scene camera.
Now he makes us pose for the very last time, at one of my eternal crime scene locations, under the portrait of Maria Theresa. I think he knows this is his farewell to us. We have to dress in a tie and jacket for our passports, since it is the ultimately serious document, but he’s told us we don’t have to put on the suit pants for the picture.
“No one will know what you’re wearing below the waist. If you want, you can pose in your underwear, or your pajamas.”
So that’s what Tony and I do. We put on our suit jackets, white shirts, and ties on top, and our pajama pants on the bottom. And our mom lets us do it, and it surprises both of us very much. You have to understand, this mixing of categories was unthinkable in my family. It could cause you to catch pneumonia and die of an embolia, or worse, maybe even land in hell for eternity.
We laugh so much about this, it forces Puentes Pi to work harder. We don’t look very serious, knowing that we are wearing pajamas for our passport photos. But he finally manages to snap the perfect pictures, in which Tony and I look serious, amused, angry, and terrified, all at the same time. Absolutely perfect pictures.
Years later I still have that passport. It’s in my desk drawer, right here, no more than eight inches from my elbow. I look at that photo whenever I think I am hitting bottom.
When I finally get to show that passport at the airport, on the day I leave Cuba for good, I feel a strong urge to laugh. There I am, about to be strip searched, and I’m showing these very important guys a picture that is a joke of sorts. I am not what I seem to be.
I’m turning into a chameleon, or into one of Addison’s brown iguanas. I’m camouflaged. I blend in so well as a respectable Cuban boy from a good family, but underneath I am a rebel, a worm, and a refugee in the making. I’m wearing my God-damned pajamas.
If I’d been able to use swear words back then, I might have said to all the airport guys that day: “Go to hell, I’m wearing pajamas below the belt in this picture. Up yours, I’m not even wearing a belt, or socks, or shoes.”
But I don’t say anything like that at all. Instead I say something stupid about my luggage. Why deny it?
It is very special, my bag. Marie Antoinette took a bus to the heart of Old Havana to find a woman who made luggage for kids such as us. Special canvas luggage, handmade from fabric once used for awnings. It’s the only durable cloth available that is light enough. The bags are a special size. Just large enough to carry the only items we are allowed to bring with us: two shirts, two pairs of pants, three socks, three pairs of underwear, one sweater, one hat, one set of pajamas, and one book. The bags have to be that size and no other because there is a weight limit to what you can take too, and if you are one measly ounce over the limit, they make you take out one whole item. Or they seize your entire bag, we’ve heard.
That’s what a Revolution is all about, you know. Ounces.
Although my mom could have made these bags herself in one afternoon, she didn’t. Instead she took the bus to the bag maker’s house, and even made several trips, because the woman didn’t have a phone and didn’t finish them on time. She was making hundreds of bags, this woman. She had so many requests she could barely keep up. We went right down to the wire on those bags. I think we got them about one week before we left.
I remember riding the bus with my mom and brother all the way to that house, climbing the steps to the sun-drenched rooftop apartment where this black woman made the bags. And I remember marveling at the finished product. Why had it taken her so long to make this tiny thing? It was so small. So small, and thin, my duffle bag. My gusano, my worm.
The bags looked like worms. Gusanos for the gusanos.
Very funny. Especially when you know that caterpillars are also gusanos. Everyone knows what happens to caterpillars.
But Louis XVI wouldn’t laugh at this pun, or get involved in any of the things that needed to be done to get us out of Cuba. He did nothing except open his hands and let us fly away. Nothing. He did nothing. There’s no denying that, no.
Nada.
And we flew away from Limbo, gusanos in hand, and he stood there with his hands in his pockets, and we never saw each other again.
And sixteen years after that farewell, after he had already been buried for two years, I turned his surname into a middle initial, N, and began using my mother’s surname, Eire, so that it could be the name I would pass on to my children, none of whom had been born yet. I knew he would be proud of me for doing it.
It was the correct thing to do. As right as putting on your shoes before your pants. As right as always wearing socks, no matter what. As right as defending Empress Maria Theresa’s reputation. As right as taking an urchin off the street and adopting him.
As right as letting us go.
31
Treinta Y Uno
Sharks. In the swimming pool. Sharks, and plenty of them, swarming. It’s a kidney-shaped pool, large and deep and turquoise blue, nearly the same shade as the sea. The sharks are densely packed, swimming in tight circles, looking for something to kill and devour. It’s a large pool for a house, but not as big as one you might find at a swim club.
The diving board is still there, poised over the lethal brink, rudely shouting, “Suicide, anyone?”
And the sea is no more than a few feet away, full of sharks that swim freely. It’s a windy day, and the waves are decent. They crash against the sharp-edged rocks and the concrete seawall, as if to remind the sharks in the pool that they’ve lost their freedom, just like all the humans on the island. I ask myself: can they hear the waves pounding against the shore?
The sharks are looking for blood and freedom, circling furiously. There’s nothing calm about them. All kinds of sharks in there, including a couple of hammerheads. I don’t know all their names, but most of them are large enough to eat me, for sure. Some could even eat Louis XVI and Ernesto with just a few bites.
I ask myself: do they sense that the pool is kidney shaped? Do they know that Ernesto is here, looking at them, so close to the diving board?
Lizard. Iguana-souled wretch.
The diving board shouts at me: “Justifiable homicide!”
I ignore the shouting. The sharks remain as silent as a woman who’s trying to hide her thoughts in order to spare your feelings.
I’m at the Aquarium of the Revolution. It looks like a tureen from hell, that swimming pool, a giant soup bowl teeming with deadly squirming noodles.
I’ve come here with Louis XVI, Tony, Ernesto, Manuel, and Rafael. We’ve just found a beautiful parrot fish stranded in one of the tidal pools at La Puntilla and rushed him here in a pail full of saltwater. I’ve never seen a fish as beautiful as this. Good God, it’s a living rainbow. Too much. If I were God, I wouldn’t let anything so beautiful die. The director of the Aquarium has identified the fish, thanked us for bringing him, and dropped him into a large glass tank on the rear porch of the mansion.
The Aquarium of the Revolution has been set up at a splendid seaside house in Miramar, not far from where we live. The pink house is right up against the sea, and the pool is filled with saltwater. Huge upright glass tanks dot the backyard, which faces the Gulf of Mexico. And these tanks contain wonders. Gorgeous, incredible fish. This is too much to take in all at once. The parrot fish we rescued seems smaller and duller when viewed in the company of the others. These fish are unreal. Colors I’ve never seen. Patterns and shapes I’d never imagine, not even in an eternity. And all these fish are out there, all the time, along with the sharks and the moray eels and the stingrays and lobsters and crabs. All the time, swimming with sharks.
I ask myself: who owned this house? What was it like to live here, day in and day out, with your own pool, right by the turquoise sea? What was it like to give up all of this? What would the former owners of this house think of the Aquarium of the Revolution? What would they think of the sharks in their pool? What
would it be like for them to come back right now, with their memories still intact? Would the sight of the shark pool dissolve all their memories, like acid?
Not that long ago, I tell myself, children surely must have used the pool. Not that long ago, a man and a woman must have kissed in that pool. Someone must have. Who wouldn’t kiss, right there, at the edge of the turquoise sea?
The director of the Aquarium tells us of their plans to expand, to turn this into a huge showcase for all the world to admire. All you need is the will to do it, he says. This mansion shall be transformed into one of the world’s greatest aquariums. That’s what the Revolution is all about. Poor guy, he really believed it.
He thanks us once again for bringing in such a beautiful parrot fish.
And I tell myself that this is the first thing I’ve seen that makes the Revolution look halfway good. The sharks in the pool are a weird touch, but the Aquarium is a great idea.
Meanwhile, the sharks are like sardines in a can, with nothing to eat except one another. And I can’t stop staring at them. Every few seconds I look up from the sharks in the water and eye the diving board and Ernesto standing near it. How I wish that the sharks could swallow Ernesto whole. No, wait, why deny it? How I wish they’d chew him up, slowly. How much I’d love to see his blood turning the pool a deep, bright, joyous crimson.
Too much, for sure. Far too much.
I remember, suddenly, that I’m in Limbo. This is all here now, and I’m here now, but it won’t be like this for very long. No, it’s as good as gone, along with all that’s past, and the future is a giant, gray, shapeless blank. I’m due to leave any time now. One of these days, we’ll get a letter in the mail telling us when we can leave for the States. Rafael and Manuel are waiting for theirs, too. In the meantime, we wait.
Ernesto is waiting for us to leave.
And I watch the sharks circle and circle.
Why do they all stay so close to the bottom of the pool? What are they fed, and when, and how? Do they ever sleep? Do they ever fall in love? Do they ever worry about the future? Are they really as selfish as they seem? How did anyone catch them and get them into the pool? The Aquarium of the Revolution elicits a thousand and one questions and yields very few answers.
Flash forward seventeen years.
I’m swimming laps in an Olympic-size swimming pool in Minnesota—indoors, naturally. Outdoors, it’s about twenty degrees below zero, Fahrenheit. At that temperature, your tears freeze in an instant. I’m about fifteen hundred miles from the nearest ocean. I have the pool all to myself, and it’s lunchtime. I’ve just eaten a large lunch to taunt the god of embolias, and I’ve already completed about thirty laps when, suddenly, I’m seized by an irrational panic. I’ve just crossed from the shallow end to the deep end. This is also a diving pool, and it’s very deep. I look down at the bottom, so far from me. It’s green down there. Kind of blue-green. But I see turquoise, I see sharks circling. I feel them coming up from the bottom of the pool, from behind me, from the right and left. I see them. I’m still very far from the end of the pool, far from safety.
Stupid imagination. Stupid Aquarium of the Revolution. Wish I could banish it from my mind, this crazy fear. But the fear is so intense, the sharks so real. I can feel their jaws approaching. I can see my blood streaming into the pool, mingling with the chlorine. I see my femur sticking out of my severed leg. I feel the pain.
Stop it! Stop it! Coño. Too much.
I reach the end of the pool and leap out, shaking like Jell-O. I look at the water. Blue-green. Calm. Not one shark in sight. I’m in Minnesota, God damn it. God forgive me for swearing, but it’s hard not to when I think about Minnesota.
Damn it. When will someone else show up? I’ll be all right if someone else is in there to attract the sharks.
Five minutes later, someone opens the door from the locker room, walks over, and dives in. Thank God. Now the sharks in my mind will go for him instead. Now I can finish up. Thirty more laps to go. I hope this other guy stays in here that long. He does. I finish up, shower, and go back to work.
Believe me, if you ever see a swimming pool full of sharks, you’ll never be the same again. I guarantee it.
You might even find a wife because of it.
Flash forward another two years.
I’m now living in the former Confederate States of America. I’ve only been at this job in this new town for about a week. I’ve driven into town in my Karmann Ghia, with all of my possessions crammed into it, Rolling Stones blasting “Can’t You Hear Me Knocking” as I descend the eastern slope of the Blue Ridge Mountains. It’s September, but it’s still brutally hot. Hotter than Cuba, and much, much stickier. I meet a nice woman named Jane in the hallway outside my office. She strikes up a conversation. We talk. We go out for dinner. Somehow, out of the blue, I start telling her about a pool I once saw full of sharks. It’s one of my worst flaws, bringing up odd subjects with women I like. Odd subjects are so much safer to talk about than your feelings. She tells me that she’s never seen a pool full of sharks but has been haunted all her life by that image, and by a very real fear of finding sharks in every pool. I believe her and confess that the image and the fear both haunt me still.
Both of us smile in an odd way, and I change the subject. I can’t help thinking I’ve known this woman for a very long time, maybe even forever.
Flash forward another two years.
The shark pool woman and I get married across the street from the biggest pool in town.
Flash forward another sixteen years.
Deep into the night, close to dawn, as the bullfrogs croak in my swamp, I fret about Saint Thomas Aquinas and his five proofs for the existence of God. I’ve only come up with four thus far, after covering so much ground. The Angelic Doctor has me beat. I’m close to the end of the race, and he’s still ahead. He died when he was about my age. How long will I have to come up with five?
But, wait! What’s this?
Yes…why didn’t I see it before? Fool. Good God. Why, why didn’t I see it?
Too much.
Like the burning bush, or the stillness in the midst of the whirlwind, or the water changed into wine, or the nets ripping from the weight of the catch.
Shoeless Moses. Jesus H. Fish-eating Christ.
A Cuban refugee catches up with Thomas Aquinas near the finish line, and offers up his fifth proof of the existence of God: a pool full of sharks.
32
Treinta Y Dos
Two things. Two goddamned things in this world that are too hard to take, always.
One is knowing that you will never have something that should be yours. Knowing that what you love and need and crave with every fiber of your being will be forever beyond reach. Never, ever will it be yours, not in this life or any other life or in a parallel universe.
The other is knowing that something that shouldn’t be yours is yours to keep. Knowing that something you don’t want at all and hate and know is all wrong is yours eternally, without reprieve. Eternally yours, the stinking evil, because it’s who you are, forever, even after forgiveness is released from its cage.
I’m sure you know what I’m talking about. Everyone’s an expert on this subject.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not complaining. I wouldn’t trade my life story for anyone else’s, not for a minute. I’m just boasting, that’s all. I can take it. I’m tougher than the hide on the oldest, meanest devil in hell.
Don’t ask me which of the two things is worse, though. Both are ungodly. All I can say is: don’t wish either situation on anyone, not even on your enemies. You’re supposed to forgive your enemies, you know. Turn the other cheek. If they ask for a shirt, give them your coat. If they strike you on the right cheek, offer them the left cheek. If they try to kill and rape you, say thank you very much, I deserve it.
Tough commandments, especially if your enemies have hurt you deeply. Too tough, even for someone who’s tougher than the hide on the oldest, meanest devil in hell.
He came from nowhere. Or seemed to. Suddenly he was just there, wearing a ship captain’s cap, with a black dog at his side. Or was that a chauffeur’s cap on his head? It could have been. He was very young. Maybe nineteen or twenty. He was thin and dark-skinned and had curly black hair under his cap, the same color hair as his dog.
Jorge and I were no more than twelve or fourteen feet from the front door of my house, under the shade of the ficus tree, getting ready to climb into its upper reaches to look for lizards we could kill.
“Hi, kids, how are you?” he said. Then banter about how we were and what we were doing.
He seemed normal enough. He was just a guy with a stupid hat and a dog. The dog seemed nice enough. He told us he was trying to sell it. We didn’t ask where he’d gotten it, or how long he’d had it, or anything like that. We didn’t care. We didn’t even ask if the dog was really his to sell. We just said we didn’t know anyone who was looking to buy a dog.
“Hey, kids, I really need to pee. Do you know where I might be able to take a leak?”
“Right here,” I said, pointing to my house. “You can use our bathroom.”