Jose Latour - Havana Best Friends

‘Well, actually I don’t know him very well, you know. He doesn’t mix much with the neighbourhood crowd. I guess he works a lot.’

‘You know the kind of company he keeps? People he goes out with?’

‘No. I’m afraid I can’t help you with that.’

‘Does he have a car?’

‘Not that I know of.’

‘Goes out a lot?’

‘I wouldn’t know.’

‘What about his sister?’

Relief spread across the man’s face. ‘She’s a very nice person.’

‘Different from her brother?’

‘No, no, that’s not what I meant.’ He looked flustered.

‘But she is sweet. Always polite, gentle, and beautiful, too.’

Trujillo nodded and repressed a smile. Was the man attracted to the sister? Well, he had a very pretty mulata all for himself. What more could a man hope for? Then he remembered that human aspirations are unlimited.

‘Well, Comrade Kuan, there’s something I should tell you. Pablo Miranda was found dead this morning in Guanabo.’

The news left the man speechless.

‘I have to notify his sister now and conduct a search of his apartment. As you know, witnesses from the CDR must be present. I need you to come with me, please. The president too, if possible.’

The President of the CDR, Zoila Pérez – a.k.a. ‘Day-and-Night’, after a TV series sponsored by the Ministry of Interior – was a fifty-eight-year-old bookstore saleswoman who had moved to the dead man’s building in 1988; she lived on the second-floor, front apartment. Zoila had earned her sobriquet and the position of CDR president in 1990, when she began trying to persuade neighbours that an American invasion was imminent. She never missed her citizen’s watch and was always willing to stand in for sick (or allegedly sick, or sick and tired) cederistas.

To Zoila, every stranger was a suspect, especially at night, and she would report enemy activity at the drop of a hat. In her wild imagination, couples necking in the Parque de la Quinta were transformed into pairs of camouflaged soldiers from the expeditionary force’s van-guard, so no less than two or three nights a week she picked up her phone and called the nearest police precinct. Desk sergeants familiar with her paranoia thanked her politely, hung up, then chuckled before bellowing to other cops in the squad room: ‘Hey, guys, that was Day-and-Night. Chick giving her boyfriend a handjob in the park is a marine getting ready to open mortar fire on her apartment building.’

But now, having learned what happened to Pablo, she was wringing her hands in desperation when Trujillo pressed the buzzer of Elena Miranda’s apartment. It was the kind of news Zoila hated, made her freak out. A full-scale imaginary invasion she could live with; the real murder of a neighbour was too unnerving. She wanted to walk away but knew she couldn’t.

Nearly a minute later, Elena opened the door in a robe and thongs. Wow, Trujillo thought. She processed the visual information instantly: a pained expression on Zoila’s face, an embarrassed Kuan, a poker-faced police officer. Bad news, she discerned. Skipping all the formalities, she asked, ‘What happened?’

‘Elena, this is Captain Trujillo, from the Department of Technical Investigations of the police,’ Zoila said.

‘What’s the problem, Captain?’

‘Can we come in, Comrade Elena?’ Trujillo, trying to sound casual, flashed his ID.

‘Sure, excuse me, come right in. Have a seat.’

Elena eased herself on to the edge of a club chair, Trujillo sat across from her, Kuan and Zoila on the Chesterfield.

‘I’m afraid I have bad news for you, Comrade Elena,’ Trujillo began. ‘Your brother, Pablo, was found dead this morning.’

Elena felt a shiver down her spine, a numbness, a sense of loss. Shock, for the third time in my life. Locking eyes with the police officer, she nodded reflectively, pursed her lips, interlaced her fingers on her lap, swallowed hard. ‘An accident?’ she wanted to know.

‘We’re not sure yet. He died from a broken neck and a head injury. He may have taken a fall, or he may have been murdered.’

‘You’re sure it’s my brother?’ She sounded unnerved.

‘We’re positive, comrade.’

‘Can I see him?’

‘Actually, if you are his only relative in Havana, you must identify him. His body is at the IML. Tomorrow morning…’

‘Where?’

‘The morgue. You can go there tomorrow morning. At eight. It’s on Boyeros and the Luminous Fountain. Are you his only relative?’

‘In Havana, yes. There’s our mother…and father.’

‘Can you notify them?’

‘Well, I can call my mother, but my father is in prison.’

To conceal his surprise, Trujillo unclasped his briefcase, opened his diary, drew out his ballpoint. Next he cast a baleful eye at the informers, but they were staring at Elena as if it were news to them too. Both had moved to the neighbourhood years after Elena’s father was sentenced and nobody had bothered to tell them the story.

‘Tell me his name and where he’s serving time. Maybe I can get him a special pass to attend the wake and the funeral.’

‘His name is Manuel Miranda and he is at Tinguaro.’

Trujillo took his time writing the three words. Tingu-aro was a small, special prison fifteen kilometres to the south of Havana for those who had occupied high-ranking positions in the Cuban party, government, or armed forces before having to serve time for some non-political crime. Men deserving special consideration because they had won battles, done heroic deeds, followed orders to the letter, been willing to die for the Revolution. Yes, the name Manuel Miranda definitely rang a tiny bell at the back of his mind.

‘I’ll see what I can do, comrade. Now, I’m conducting an investigation and as part of it I need to examine your brother’s personal belongings. His papers, clothing, anything that can shed light on what happened to him. Comrades Kuan and Zoila are here as witnesses. We would appreciate it if you could take us to his bedroom and any other room where he kept his things…’

Elena was shaking her head emphatically, two tears sliding down her cheeks. ‘I don’t have the key to his bedroom. We…well, Captain, he put a lock on the door to his room. I don’t have the key to it.’

Trujillo produced Pablo’s key ring. ‘Do you recognize this?’

Elena nodded. The last shadow of a doubt evaporated in her mind.

‘It was found in a pocket.’

‘Come with me, please.’

When Elena switched on the light, the visitors saw that Pablo’s bedroom was a mess. It hadn’t been cleaned in a long while and disorder reigned. Ten or fifteen cockroaches scurried in search of hiding places. Under a table supporting a colour TV and a VCR were a roll of tissue paper, old newspapers, and a broken CD player; a pile of soiled sheets and towels and underwear lay on top of the unmade bed; slippers under a writing table; three ashtrays overflowing with cigarette butts, several empty and crushed packets of Populares on the floor; shoes and socks all over. It reeked of human sweat and grease, and dirt.

As Trujillo professionally searched the bedroom and the embarrassed witnesses stared, Elena, leaning in the doorway, occasionally fighting back tears and biting her lip, wondered why she and her brother had become enemies, when the split had begun, what part of the blame was hers. Memories kept coming, the way waves wash over a beach, only to ebb away and be absorbed by the sand.

Elena couldn’t recall the rejection she must have felt right from the very beginning. She was three when what had been a big balloon of striated flesh all of a sudden deflated and transformed itself into a screaming, crying, red-faced newborn demanding her mother’s full attention. Had the little thing sensed that she probably hated him? Was it possible for a suckling infant to somehow intuit repulsion?