Leaving Glorytown (5 page)

Tío dived into the melee and unleashed a barrage of punches. Men fell to the ground, bottles flew through the air and shattered, women screamed. Among them was my dear Abuela Ana, who yelled at her husband of fifty years: “Julian, Julian, don't you see that you are just too old for this?”

“Not too old yet!” I heard Abuelo cry.

Emilio Pérez, my father's best friend, who in my eyes was invincible, stood by, just waiting for an opportunity to get into the fight. Then he saw an opening, and he jumped in. But a lucky punch landed flush on his forehead, and Emilio went down like a sack of wet noodles.

“Emilio, get up, please!” I yelled.

Emilio tried to stand, but his knees had turned to water, and he went back down.

“Emilio is hurt!” I yelled to my cousins, who were watching in horror. “They'll kill him, Papa, help him, please!” I shouted.

Seeing the situation, Papa came to Emilio's rescue and pulled him out of the way. I'd always thought Emilio was the strongest man on our block—even stronger than Tío William—and it depressed me to see him like this.

And then it was over. I couldn't see through the screen of women to find out what happened after that, but the next thing I knew, everyone was shaking hands and apologizing. I even saw Tío William hug one of the thugs. There was nervous laughter, and the bad guys retreated down the block—no doubt because they'd lost the fight. Everyone helped right the tables. Brooms were fetched to sweep up the broken dishes and bottles. Dogs appeared to lap up the ruined meals. My friends and I chattered about the mysterious men. Who were they? Why had they done this? What did they want?

Later, Papa explained to me: “Those thugs were sent by the government to scare us.”

“But why?” I asked. “What did we do to them?”

“Nothing. That's not the point. They want us to be scared. They've disrupted our most important feast of the year. They want us to know
that they control
everything
.” His face was white, and his voice was shaking.

Papa's rage, so rarely glimpsed, was infectious. “I hate them!” I screamed. “I'll kill them all! I'll wring their necks and cut their heads off like a bunch of chickens!”

“Hush! You'll do no such thing,” Papa said. “You're still just a boy. You have to learn to think, not just to act. They
want
us to fight back. That way they can arrest us.”

“Arrest us for what? They started it!”

“There is no right and wrong here, niño,” said Papa. “You have to understand that they don't care about that. All they care about is control. Our beautiful island of Cuba is being run by people who are too stupid to understand anything except brute force. That's what they use to make their point, and then people like us end up getting hurt.”

“It's not fair,” I said.

“No, it's not. But don't worry, Eduar. Someday these people will get what's coming to them. In the meantime, we have to be smarter than they are, and stay out of trouble.”

Papa looked at me for a long and serious moment. It seemed as if he wanted to say something else, but I didn't know what. Later I guessed that he wanted to acknowledge the craziness of the times—to apologize, perhaps, for having brought me into this kind of world, but also to assure me that if I stuck it out long enough, I would see better days. Instead, he just gave me a hug and a slap on the back, and sent me on my way.

A
s the days turned into years, our day-to-day lives became more and more oppressive and difficult. Abuela Ana was spending a lot of time waiting in lines for food, and in March 1962, we were given a
libreta,
a ration book, to use to buy food. The first time I went with Abuela and noticed her holding her libreta, I asked her to read me what was in the book to help pass the time. But she replied that it wasn't a story; the libreta merely told her how much food she was allowed to buy.

“That's silly!” I said. “Why carry around a book if it's no fun to read?”

Abuela gave me a wry glance. “Silly is right,” she whispered, but that was all she would say.

We waited in line for hours. I thought that whatever was at the end of it must be something really great. When we finally got to the head of the line, we were handed a chunk of hard bread, some sugar, and a bunch of cans with funny writing on them.

“All this time we wait, and this is what they give us?” I said.

“Ha ha! He's only joking,” Abuela said quickly to the person behind the counter. Then she rushed me out of there.

When we were on the sidewalk, she grabbed me by the shoulders and brought her eyes to my level—which for her, since she was so short, merely meant bending over. “Niño,” she said, “never, ever,
ever
let them hear you complain.”

“Who? Never let
who
hear me complain?”

She looked over her shoulder. There was an armed soldier on the corner, and nearby, on a wall, was a poster of Castro with his big, fluffy beard, a smile plastered across his face. By now I knew the man with the beard was the Voice we heard constantly on the radio and loudspeakers. He was the one in charge now, even of those who had once seemed like gods to me—my parents and grandparents.

“Them,” she whispered. “The Communists.”

“Why not?”

“Because they could take you away—or, more likely, they would take
me
away. You have to stay quiet, Eduar. Never let them know what you are thinking.
M'entiendes?
Do you understand me?”

I nodded, though I didn't understand at all. But I knew Abuela Ana wasn't playing a game. She seemed scared of something. That frightened me. I'd never seen Abuela afraid. She could wring the neck of a chicken without even flinching, and then cut its head off—
smack!

“Now let's go home,” she said. She grabbed my hand and pulled me along after her, double-time. We didn't stop until we were safely home again.

I once asked Papa what the funny writing on the cans was, and he explained that the cans came from Russia.

“Where is Russia?” I asked.

“Russia is very, very far away,” said Papa, “though not quite far enough to suit me.”

“Why do they send us this stuff?”

“Because,” Papa said wearily, “the Russians are best friends with Fidel.”

“If they were really friends with Fidel,” I said, “they would give him good food to share with us, wouldn't they?”

Papa stared morosely at the can. “Maybe Fidel does like it,” he said. “I wouldn't be surprised.”

“You think Fidel is eating this garbage?” Mama said bitterly. “He's eating like a king, while the rest of us starve. He and all his friends.”

“Hush,” said Papa. “Someone on the street could hear you.”

“I don't care!” said Mama.

Then in 1963, just before I turned eight, one of the most civilized customs of Cuban life came to an abrupt end on San Carlos Street.

I lay in bed, in the living room where I slept, listening to the gentle clicking of dominoes from Tía Silvia's front porch next door. This sound was the signal for all within earshot to make their way over to watch the action, or just to chat. I could hear the voices of the adults having a good time. I was supposed to be asleep, but I crept from bed and crouched, unseen, behind a post on our porch. Four men, including Papa, straddled wooden chairs around a table, while more stood, watching and talking. Cigar smoke shrouded their heads like clouds over mountaintops. The women, including Mama, talked all at once, using their hands as well as their mouths, their voices rising whenever they got to a punch line or an important point. Every few minutes, one
of them would get up and brew another pot of sweet, potent Cuban coffee and serve it to their husbands in espresso cups. The men would down these in one or two swallows. Fueled by the sugar and caffeine, they could play the game until one or two in the morning.

Mama loved these evenings. Even though she was only going next door, she was dressed as if she were headed for a tony night club, as were the other ladies. That night she wore a brightly colored dress and spritzed herself with heavenly perfume. I could still smell the trail she had left from our porch to Tía Silvia's. Papa eyed her appreciatively, joking about the effect her beauty was having on him. Mama rolled her eyes in mockery. This exchange was always subtle and respectful. Papa, like all the men in my family, was a true Cuban gentleman.

Esther, who was now three, was in bed and asleep, which was where I was supposed to be. From my hiding place on the porch, I listened to the clicking, the talking, the laughter, the jokes and jibes, and the night songs of the insects. I smelled the tropical flowers that bloomed all around, mixed with whiffs of cigar smoke. I felt myself starting to drift off. But then, suddenly, the whole street went black.

“Apagón!”
a man muttered.

This was the name given to the 11 p.m. blackout imposed by the government to conserve resources. Papa said that wasn't the real reason. Communists simply didn't know how to do anything right, not even run the country's power grids. And the blackened streets made it easier for the roving gangs of thugs.

“Even that fat-cat dictator Batista could keep the lights on all night!” Papa said.

“Oh, who cares? I'll just get a couple of kerosene lamps,” said Tía Silvia.

The game continued by lamplight. Finally, too drowsy to stay awake
any longer, I snuck back into bed. I would have preferred to be part of the action, but it gave me a warm, comfortable feeling to hear the grownups having a good time—talking, laughing, and singing. In my parents' room, I could hear little Esther's gentle snoring. That, too, was a peaceful sound. For the moment, all was well in Glorytown.

I had just fallen asleep when I was jolted awake by different voices from the street—angry, harsh voices. The merriment on the porch stopped. The gentle sounds were replaced by low mutters of disapproval from my father and the other men.

“Hey! You on the porch!” came a rough voice.

“What do you want?” came the reply, which I recognized as a neighbor's voice. “Why are you bothering us?”

“
We're
bothering
you
? No, I think you've got it backward. You're bothering us, sitting around and yelling at each other like a bunch of monkeys! Look at you people! Do you have nothing better to do than sit around all night?”

I crept out of bed and went to the window. There in the street was another gang of nasty-looking men. Whether they were the same ones from Noche Buena two years ago, I couldn't tell. But it didn't matter. I knew they had the same thing in mind. Fear turned my stomach to water.

“This is our barrio!” our neighbor answered. “We can do what we want. You thugs can't just come here and push us around!”

“What did you call us?” the leader roared.

“Thugs! You know you're thugs. You're scum for hire, that's all! Anyone with five bucks in his pocket could buy you.”

“Your wife is for hire! At least, that's what I hear.”

I heard a chair falling backward as the man shot to his feet. Instantly, the voices of the other men rose.

“No! Don't do it! He's trying to egg you on, to get you in trouble. Don't do it, man! It won't be a fair fight. You know the government sent them and they've got the police and the army on their side.”

“Let me go!” screamed the insulted man. “I'll kill that son of a dog!”

“Bring it on!” jeered the thugs. They stayed in the street, waiting. “Come on! Let's do it! Let's have some action!”

But, instead of fighting as they had on Noche Buena, the party on the porch broke up. Everyone trudged silently home. After sending a few more barbs into the night, loud enough for the entire street to hear, the thugs eventually slunk off, disappointed at not having the chance to fight and promising to come back.

Mama and Papa came into the house a few minutes later. Papa was infuriated. He and Mama were talking and he was trying to keep his voice down, but Esther and I were already awake. The veins in his neck stood out, and he clenched and unclenched his fists, his green eyes snapping. Then Esther came over and climbed into his lap, and his rage melted away as he cuddled her. I was too old for cuddling now—men did not get cuddled. At the age of seven, I considered myself well on the road to manhood. Soon I would be able to take on a whole gang of thugs by myself. I could hardly wait.