Fortunately he didn’t soil his clothes, and I held him over the sink to rinse his mouth and cool his forehead with water. Afterward, I hugged him tight, wondering what more I could do to protect him, feeling as if I wanted him back in my womb. He was convulsing with hiccups, and I rubbed his little back gently.
Someone must have complained, because suddenly there were two armed guards at our side yelling at me to clean up our mess. Ernesto walked in, against the ladies’ loud protests, to see what was delaying us.
“They’re beginning to board our airplane,” he said.
One of the guards placed a hand on his revolver and barked at him to wait outside. The airport was so small that I could actually hear the sound of the propellers through the thin walls.
“You’re not leaving until you’ve cleaned this up,” he said to me. I had no choice but to obey. So my last moments on Cuban soil were spent on my knees mopping vomit off the granite floor of a public restroom.
When I was done we rushed out of the bathroom, practically knocking people out of our way. We made it to the gate just as it was closing.
“We’re here, we’re here,” Ernesto shouted, which should give you an idea of his desperation, because he never raised his voice for any reason. We were the last ones on board.
*
THE AIRPLANE WAS COMPLETELY FULL OF CUBANS, and the mood was more cheerful than I had anticipated. People were talking openly and with optimism for the first time in a long while. They all had big plans for their new life. They were strangers now united by this short crossing from one shore to another. Optimistically, they exchanged phone numbers and addresses, and compared notes on what they knew about life in the United States. The women were excited but terrified that they would need to learn to drive, something that, outside of Havana, had been as masculine a task as peeing while standing. The men mostly talked about food. They all planned to eat a big ham sandwich every day for lunch. When the attendant brought out glasses of red wine, everyone made a loud toast.
“Abajo con Castro!” “Down with Castro!” they sang out, flushed with wine and freedom. At last, the words that had been singing in their hearts could be shouted.
“Abajo!”
Others stood up and made little speeches that always ended with “Volveremos!”
“Don’t get too comfortable over there,” one of them said. “This is just a temporary interruption. We will be back soon, sooner than we think.”
“Mira, chico, the solution is simple,” another one said. “But that president”— who they called LBJ —“no tiene cojones.”
While those two were solving the political problems that plagued the greatest minds of the world, the rest were in the mood to celebrate.
“Volveremos!” they shouted again.
Only the stewardesses remained unmoved. They were not on the brink of freedom or any such thing. They would be returning to Havana that very same day. On an empty airplane.
Just them and the pilots.
When the passengers tired of celebrating Cuba and wishing the politicians ill, they started celebrating the country that was so generously taking them in.
“To our big neighbor who has given us what our own country has denied us, jamón y libertád!” Ham and freedom.
“Viva Jorge Washington!” people shouted. “Viva Abraham Lincoln!”
Then they went crazy, shouting out the names of any famous American they could think of.
“Viva el Tío Sam!”
“Viva John Wayne!”
“Viva El Norte!”
I tried to join in and even took a sip of wine, but it tasted like rusty water to me.
Earlier, during the car ride, I had noticed Ernesto becoming slightly irritated with the children’s behavior, and he was getting worse on the plane. He had not spent any time with them during our separation, even though he only lived a few minutes away. The children were now taking full advantage of having a father again and constantly chattered to him about their concerns.
“Is it true that in the United States children can have all the toys they want?”
“Is it true that in the United States they have color television?”
“Is it true that in the United States Coca- Cola comes in a can?”
“Is it true that in the United States you can buy a box of crayons with one hundred different colors in it?”
“Is it true that in the United States children can make enough money delivering newspapers to buy a car?”
I could tell his head was spinning from their questions. Manolito eventually exhausted himself and fell asleep on Ernesto’s lap, and it was nice to see them together. They resembled each other so much that it almost made me cry when I looked over at Ernestico, who carried Ernesto’s name but was nothing like him. For better or worse, he was a lot more like me.
The flight lasted thirty- five minutes but seemed endless. The conversations and the toasts never stopped. Everybody was too nervous to be quiet, to sit still. They kept the noise going just to distract themselves, and it went on and on. Then, suddenly, we were landing. We were there.
Miami.
*
THE LUNCHROOM HAD STARTED TO EMPTY OUT. The smell of food faded and was replaced by the smell of industrial soap as a cleaning woman mopped the tabletops. Barry O’Reilly was so close to me, I thought he was going to kiss me. Right there in front of everybody.
“You came straight to Union City?” he asked.
“No, Miami,” I said.
“Ah, the Cuban Plymouth Rock.”
“What?”
Not everything he said made sense. I was trying hard to understand.
“Nothing.” He smiled at me the way a man will smile at a pretty girl who isn’t very smart. Give me time, I prayed.
“Vamos, Graciela, put your tongue back in your mouth,” Imperio said. “The dolls don’t wait for nobody.”
I could have killed her for talking like that in front of my boss. But I was grateful too. I didn’t want to think about Miami. I got up and followed them back to the assembly line. The long afternoon stretched ahead, the line of dolls seemed endless. But it was Friday and I’d just had lunch with Barry O’Reilly in front of everyone. And I would see him again tomorrow, privately, far away from the factory, far away from Caridad’s and Imperio’s prying eyes.
I didn’t want to think about Miami.
chapter thirteen
Imperio
Por Dios! If I’d had a mother like Graciela, I would have gone to the nearest orphanage, banged on the door, and demanded that they take me in. She was the worst mother ever. She left her boys on their own all night long.
What were they, eight, nine years old? Too young to spend so much time alone. Sometimes I thought that what she needed was to have those boys taken away from her, maybe returned to Ernesto. They couldn’t possibly be worse off with him than with her. Graciela was a problem. A problem! She had always been only concerned with herself and hopelessly irresponsible, but at least she gave the impression of being a good mother. Now, not even that. Why was Graciela taking a fashion design course? And spending good money on furry material to create those awful coats. What did a Cuban know about coats? Was she part Eskimo? That was time and money she should have been spending on her children. But what was the use?
There she was, in the lunchroom, swimming in his eyes, hanging on his every word, talking to him in English, and not very well. What did he see in her? Well, with Graciela, men have always been more than willing to see only what they want to see. And she’s always been more than willing to show it to them.
In the new telenovela, Apasionada, Rosalinda’s boss was married. Fortunately for us all, and I mean all of us, Mr. O’Reilly wasn’t. Still, he was her boss. I seriously considered taking her aside and asking her what in the hell she thought she was doing running around with that man. I needed to know what was going on in that crazy head of hers.
Graciela and Mr. O’Reilly were seen together at the drive- in movies. I heard th
at they steamed up the windows and drank so much beer that she had to go to the ladies’ room several times. What could she possibly have been thinking? Who behaved that way with a man she hardly knew? With a man she worked for? What respect could he possibly have for her when he saw her at the factory the next day? He must have thought we were all like Graciela. Didn’t she realize that her behavior affected us all? That she was bringing all of us down with her? Again. I shuddered to think what Mr. O’Reilly thought of us. All American men tended to think Cuban women were whores. Before the Revolution they flocked to Cuba for cheap sex. It took a lot of effort to maintain our dignity in this country. Why Graciela found that hard to understand was a mystery to me. And not only because she was behaving inappropriately, but because she flaunted it. There was never a speck of modesty about her. Not even at work. Never at work. There was a very serious policy about employees having romantic entanglements. Prohibido. And it was Mr. O’Reilly who was supposed to enforce it! So at first they were discreet—or so they thought. Sitting together at lunch was not enough. Sometimes they would go off in his car. They would be gone the whole hour. What did Graciela do with a man, in a car, in daylight! She always returned to work, not a hair out of place, and looked us right in the eye, as if daring us to comment. What she didn’t realize was that all the comments happened while she was gone. People talked.
Por Dios, she brought him into the Cuban market in Elizabeth, which was ten minutes from Union City, and spent an hour parading up and down the aisles, showing him the different products on the shelves. They laughed like they were at a sideshow, as if a can of black bean soup was the funniest thing in the world.
“This is called frijoles,” she said to him as if she was teaching a baby to speak. “These are called plátanos—can you say ‘plátanos’?” And then they laughed and kissed and kissed again. In front of everyone she was doing this! On a Sunday afternoon no less, when everyone does their shopping. I’m grateful I wasn’t there. My face would have hit the floor with shame. They had left by the time I arrived to do my weekly shopping, but the store still simmered with gossip.
It’s not like when I first arrived and there were only a few Cuban families around. Suddenly, Elizabeth, New Jersey, was full of Cubans. They were pouring in from all over the island, and the center of our new society was right there in that little store. When I got there that day, the old ladies were cooling their faces with cardboard fans with the picture of La Virgen de la Caridad. They were still talking about Graciela, calling her Juana la Loca, like the crazy queen of Spain. And that’s not all—they were also imitating her walk, the way she tossed that long hair, and the silly way she talked English to Mr. O’Reilly.
“Mi amor, this is called a plátano, can you say ‘plátano’?” one old lady said, pushing her lips out the way Graciela did, and the whole store burst out laughing. Laughing!
Graciela should have known better. That place was always full of old ladies with big bellies, panzonas with nothing to do but fan themselves, cash their welfare checks, and talk mierda about other people.
When they talked about Barry O’Reilly they wrinkled their noses as if he smelled bad. What was Graciela thinking, taking him to that place where she knew all people did was gossip? I did my best to ignore them, but they kept trying to pull me into the bonche.
Graciela and I had been to that store together many times. You’d think that, knowing she was my friend, they would have had the decency to not talk about her to me, or at least not in front of me. But they were having too much fun.
“Está loca?” they asked me. Has she gone crazy?
Others suggested that maybe she was drunk. Drunk!
“Tu amiga es borracha?” they asked.
They called her my friend, and they put a little eyebrow movement into the question. I didn’t know what to answer. I certainly wasn’t about to stand up for her. “If you only knew,” I wanted to say, “how far back this river flows.”
Instead I kept quiet and picked up my groceries, paid for them, and got out of there as quickly as possible. I wasn’t going to join their little gossip group, but I also wasn’t going to defend her. Why should I care? She was perfectly capable of ruining her life all by herself. After all we’d done for her. I knew Caridad was going to be very upset when I told her. And she was.
I met up with her at the hospital. Berta had fallen again, and this time no one could get her up. There was the usual running around, but a little fanning and a cup of water didn’t do it. Not this time. She was taken away in an ambulance. I got to the hospital as soon as I could. There she was hooked up to tubes, intravenous liquids, and a dialysis machine, fighting for her life and losing the battle. Caridad and I stood on either side of the bed, looking down at Berta. It was then that I told Caridad what had happened at the market, and for a moment I thought I’d have to check her into the hospital too. All the color drained from her face.
“How can I ever face those people again?” Caridad asked.
“It was horrible,” I said. I kept my voice low, even though there was very little chance of Berta hearing anything. She was drifting in and out of consciousness, mostly out.
“Por Dios,” I said. “Now they’re going to think we’re just like her. You know how those people are: Dime con quién andas . . .”
Caridad motioned with her eyes and I followed her out to the hallway.
“Imagínate,” Caridad said. “Those old ladies with tongues long enough to reach back to Cuba.”
“They’re vicious, but they’re right,” I added, because I was still seething. “Graciela has gone too far.”
“If only she’d stayed in Palmagria,” Caridad continued. “If only we’d kept our distance.”
And of course, at that moment, who came running in, breathless and dramatic? We could hear the clickity- clack of her high- heeled boots. Caridad heard it too.
“Don’t look now, but here comes Rosalinda,” she said. We braced ourselves.
Graciela kissed us both on the cheek, very quickly. She was gulping air, as if she’d run all the way to the hospital.
“How is she?” she asked. No “buenas noches.” No “how are you?” Nothing.
Caridad and I stood there for a moment like we’d been turned into statues. We didn’t know how to react. We were both furious. But it wasn’t the right time to bring anything up.
I looked Graciela up and down. Her hair was a mess. It looked like she’d just fallen out of Mr. O’Reilly’s bed.
“Go see for yourself,” I said.
Graciela started for Berta’s room and stopped with her hand on the door handle. She stood there for a moment, very dramatic. Very telenovela. With an exaggerated swing of her hair, she turned to face us.
“Is she in a coma?” she asked.
“Do I look like a doctor?” I said. Graciela made a funny little face, as if I had hurt her feelings. She raised her eyes to the ceiling as if searching for divine intervention, let out a little sigh, and without another word went into the room.
“That was awful, Imperio,” Caridad said. But I could tell she was trying not to laugh.
“I’m just so furious with her,” I said.
Graciela stayed in Berta’s room for a very long time while Caridad and I smoked a Kool in the waiting room. We never, ever smoked a whole cigarette anymore, we always shared it. Caridad took a puff and I took a puff. It was less harmful that way.
“What is she doing in there with Berta all this time?” Caridad asked. “You can barely get a reaction out of her anymore.”
“She goes in and out,” I said, “but mostly out.”
When Graciela finally came out of Berta’s room, she was red- nosed and teary- eyed.
She can be very sentimental cuando le conviene—when it’s convenient for her, when it’s to her advantage, when she wants to get attention, when she wants to make everyone think she’s a saint who walks the earth.
*
GRACIELA REMAINED OBLIVIOUS to the effect her selfish behavi
or was having on the rest of us. While Berta was still in the hospital she went off to an antiwar demonstration with Mr. O’Reilly. One of those hippie events where people got so high on drugs and so worked up that they had to call in the National Guard.
That night, for the first time ever, the telenovela was interrupted by a news program. One moment we were watching the real Rosalinda struggling with her conscience, and the next we were watching a world gone mad. Ambulances were sent in to remove the casualties, armored wagons and policemen with shields to remove the more violent protesters. Por Dios, they were burning the American flag. The American flag! Never, not even during the worst days of the Revolution, did someone think of setting the Cuban flag on fire. Most of them were young, long- haired, and completely out of their minds. They screamed and waved peace signs as they were forced into paddy wagons; some vomited or tore at their own clothes. Others were carried on stretchers screaming and scratching at their own arms.
I immediately phoned Caridad and, of course, she was watching.
“Imagínate, Imperio,” Caridad screeched into the telephone. “She’s in there with those people!”
Caridad came running down the back stairs and into my apartment. We watched together for a while, united by our horror. There were hundreds of them, greasy and glassy- eyed. You couldn’t tell the men apart from the women. And then we saw her, or at least we thought it was her. The camera moved away so quickly it was almost as if it hadn’t really happened. But it must’ve been, because both Caridad and I let out a yelp. Caridad’s hand went straight to her neck and stayed there as if she was feeling for her own pulse.
“What is Graciela doing in such a place?” I asked. “Making a spectacle of herself. One minute I’m watching the real Rosalinda, and the next, it’s her! We should be supporting the war in Vietnam, not protesting it. Once the Americans get the communists out of there maybe they can do something about Cuba.”
“Why is Graciela always on the wrong side of every fence?” Caridad asked sadly.
Por Dios, I had seen it coming. She looked so different now. Her hair was now down past her shoulders. Long hair is for girls, not mature ladies like us. She kept getting thinner, and her hair kept getting longer. It offended me. I pointed it out to Caridad, who told me to pay close attention to the skin around her eyes and her mouth.
Tomorrow They Will Kiss Page 17