“Are you happy now?”
He smiles. “Am I happy in this very moment? Right now, in bed with you?”
I grin, burying my head in the curve of his neck. “Yes.”
“Yes,” he echoes.
I look into his eyes, my fingers skimming the bruise on his cheekbone, his expression sobering. I open my mouth to speak—
“I don’t know—”
“—Things are complicated right now,” he says, finishing the thought for me.
“Yes.”
I’m leaving in a few days, and he’ll remain here. Even as things are slowly, subtly changing, a wall exists between our countries—an ocean of differences—and I don’t know how to navigate it.
Luis sighs, his chest heaving with the effort. “These are difficult times in Cuba. Right now my fortunes are hers, and unless things radically change they’re on a decidedly downward trend.” He’s silent for a heartbeat. “I don’t want them to be yours.”
“Is it better for anyone? Than it was before?”
“Is the status quo better for some? Perhaps,” Luis answers after a beat. “For those involved in the upper echelons of the regime, sure. The military, for one. I saw that firsthand. For certain members of the artistic class, their art shields them from that which most Cubans experience. They can travel, tout their talent and the impression that it was nurtured in a Cuba that prizes education and art, making Cuba look good. Same for the baseball players and other elite athletes.”
“And for those who don’t agree with the regime?”
Luis grimaces. “Then it is very bad.” He sits up, pulling away from me, leaning back against the headboard. Gone is the man content to languish over my curves, interspersing his caresses with laughing kisses.
“It’s a bit better for the farmers, I suppose, for those living in the rural areas,” Luis continues. “They were pushed to the fringes of Cuban society under Batista. Under Fidel, they at least had the ability to feed themselves off the land, even if they risked imprisonment to do it. When we were hungry, life in the city became a curse.
“When I was a boy, we went to the country and a family friend gave us meat from one of his animals that he had killed. It was illegal for us to have it, but food was scarce then and we were so hungry. On the way back to Havana, our car broke down, the same one I am driving now, and I will never forget the fear in my grandmother’s and mother’s eyes as men came and helped us get it working again, as they worried someone would discover the meat in their trunk.”
“What would have happened?”
“Life in prison.”
I gasp.
Luis shrugs. “When you’re so hungry you fear you will die, you’re willing to risk it. It wasn’t always like that in Cuba, but there were too many times when desperation was all we knew.”
“Your mother and grandmother must have been very strong to survive on their own like that. To raise you amid such tumult.”
Luis smiles, love shining in his eyes. “They’re amazing. Two of the strongest people I’ve ever known. My grandmother is all smiles and welcomes everyone. My mother is more guarded, but she’s always been there for me.”
“Did your mother ever think of leaving Cuba with you?”
“We never discussed it,” Luis answers. “When my father was alive, there was no need. Life was relatively good as an officer’s wife, as an officer’s son. And I think my mother was more open to the regime back then. Her family believed in Fidel’s reforms; it was a passion she and my father initially shared, although I imagine that passion has all but disappeared after she’s seen the future the revolution promised.”
“I can’t believe the regime has lasted so long given the life you describe.”
“It would be narrow-minded to say the entire country feels as I do, but many do,” Luis replies. “And even though we cannot wear that banner proudly, I believe there are enough of us to change things.”
He delivers the words with such conviction that I almost believe it possible.
“Did any of Fidel’s reforms succeed?” I ask.
“The social ones fared far better than the economic and political ones, for sure. Look, it’s not all bad. I agree with some of the things he’s done or attempted to do. Being black in Cuba is a bit better than it was in 1959—on paper, at least,” Luis adds. “But is ‘a bit better’ enough? It’s been nearly sixty years. How much has the world changed in that time? Race still matters here even though the regime says it does not. The majority of the exiles who send money back in the form of remittances to their relatives are of European descent. My black friends face difficulty getting hired to work in the tourism sector. Without remittances, without access to CUCs, the deck is stacked against black Cubans. And how can we measure racial inequality when the regime willfully ignores it?
“Men and women are ‘equal’ under Fidel’s government, but what does that mean? ‘On paper’ tells a far different tale from the reality of everyday life. This incremental progress where we exalt Fidel for the fact that things have gotten just the tiniest bit better in nearly sixty years is not enough. Fidel was good for Fidel and his cronies. The rest of us deserve more . . .”
He makes a sound of disgust.
“This island will break your heart if you let it.”
I think of my grandmother dreaming of a country just removed from her grasp, ninety miles that stretched on to eternity, of all the refugees and exiles in Miami and throughout the world, and I can’t disagree with him.
“Would you ever want to travel to the United States? If things changed and opportunities for Cubans increased?”
The question fills the air around us, the divide between our circumstances the elephant in the room.
“I don’t know. I got my passport years ago when they finally made it legal to travel. It seemed safe to hedge my bets even if the cost was prohibitively expensive. Without the paladar, I never would have had the funds. In Cuba, your passport is issued for six years, but it costs about two hundred dollars to perform the mandatory renewal every two years. Nearly a year’s salary every two years to just hold a passport. Add in the cost of travel and it seems like a very distant dream unless you have an outside benefactor or access to CUCs.
“And the United States?” Luis sighs. “It’s complicated. Within Cuba, there are different views on our relationship with the Americans. Some believe the United States is the source of our problems; others dream of moving there so they can earn enough money to send back to their families and eventually bring them over, too. And some think the reality lies in the middle.”
“Where do you fall on the United States?” I ask, half afraid of his answer.
Is it possible to separate your political views from your personal ones? To love someone who represents something you don’t agree with? I am American. Does he see me as an extension of my country’s at times flawed policies?
“We’ve paid the price of politics over and over again,” Luis responds. “The embargo is ridiculous. It’s hurt the Cuban people, not Fidel and his cohorts. It doesn’t work.”