Jose Latour - Havana Best Friends

‘Oh, no. Don’t let me spoil your evening,’ Elena objected, her words sounding a little slurred. She was clearly embarrassed.

‘You’re right, darling.’ Marina addressed Sean, disinclined to endure the company of Pablo without the neutralizing influence of his sister. ‘Would you mind if we take a rain check on the rest of the evening, Pablo?’

‘Suit yourself. My only regret is that my sister is to blame for it,’ grunted the short man, glad of the opportunity to express his reproach.

‘I’m not feeling well, okay?’ Elena retorted.

‘It’s not her fault, Pablo. Can we leave now?’

‘If you can find your way back to my place, I think I’ll stay here for a little while,’ Pablo said, eyeing the black waitress, who stood by the swinging door to the kitchen, between Roselia and the blonde woman. She beamed and winked at him.

‘Cool,’ Marina said before rising. ‘Do you need help, Elena?’

‘I don’t think so,’ Elena replied, getting to her feet.

Roselia and Pablo escorted them to the car. The tourists formally thanked Elena’s brother for all his trouble, promised they would touch base the minute they came back to Havana, and assured Roselia they had had a wonderful time at her paladar. From the garage door, smiling and waving, the restaurateur and Pablo watched the car speed away. The same old man closed the gate and marched tiredly into the garage.

Nearly half an hour later, as she drove along Fifth Avenue heading east, Marina stole a glance at her escort in the passenger seat. Not a word had been said since they left Elena at her apartment, making sure she was all right. Sean appeared to be deep in thought, nibbling at his lower lip, indifferent to the vehicles ahead, the deserted sidewalks, the moonlight and tail lights playing across the artful horticulture on the wide central walkway. She returned her eyes to the road, then took a deep breath before entering a tunnel under a river.

At Malecón and the base of Línea Avenue she took O Street and two blocks along turned into the entrance of the Hotel Nacional. They left the rental in the parking lot and ambled over to the lobby. Sean approached the swinging doors giving access to a roofed porch and a courtyard, pulling one open for his companion to go through. A pleasant breeze caressed Marina delicately. She would have loved to be lulled into sleep by it, lounging around in one of the cast-iron cushioned armchairs in the wide U-shaped porch, but she was well aware that Sean was eager to discuss the day’s events.

Holding her hand, Sean steered her around a tiled Moorish fountain. A long-haired guitarist gently strummed his instrument for a group sitting on limestone benches in the courtyard. They traversed an expanse of lawn and shade trees under the gaze of people chatting, drinking, and having a good time beneath the wide portals. Some thought them middle-aged honeymooners; her second probably, his third maybe. They came to a halt by the edge of a small cliff. Despite empty wooden benches to their right, they remained standing.

Two mammoth coast artillery pieces, remnants of what had been a Spanish gun emplacement until 1898, still aimed at where their last target – the USS Montgomery – had sailed 102 years earlier. Marina took in the serene vastness of the Florida Straits, the tiny lights from fishermen’s small boats on the water, the star-sprinkled sky. She realized that all man-made objects – Morro Castle and its lighthouse, the streetlamps extending along the coastline like a string of giant pearls as far as the eye could see, the sea wall, the buildings and cars – seemed insignificant when compared to the works of Nature.

She freed her hand from Sean’s to scratch her nose. ‘The original soap dishes are still there. And the toilet-paper holder,’ she said.

‘Tell me something I don’t know. You wouldn’t have looked so elated when you came out of the bathroom, would you?’

‘I guess not.’

Silence presided for a few moments.

‘She said the building was completed in 1957.’

Sean stared at her, apparently satisfied. ‘You know, you’re a much better actress than I assumed. You were pretty slick this evening.’

‘Thanks.’

Another, shorter pause.

‘Sean?’

‘Yes.’

‘The job’s done. It’s been done right, far as I can tell. We’ve found out all we needed to know. I’ve given it my best shot; as have you. So maybe I can ask you a question, okay?’

Sean locked gazes with Marina. She didn’t like his suppressed smile, the twinkle in his eyes. ‘Okay.’

‘You said, “Don’t take anything for granted, don’t talk about our business in the rental and the hotel room; there may be hidden cameras and bugging devices.” Well, I very much doubt these people want to, or can, get on tape every couple that comes here to spend a week, but since you were calling the shots I followed instructions. What really pisses me off is this driving around like frigging tourists, buying souvenirs, playing out this ludicrous honeymoon act, pawing each other in public. Why? Who’s going to suspect us? Why the fuck should anyone suspect us? We’ve been here for a week and haven’t even driven through a red light, for Christ’s sake! In this bankrupt banana republic the tourist is king.’

His gaze lost in the dark sea, Sean nodded. ‘So, you think I’ve been overcautious?’

‘Well, to be honest, yes, I do.’

‘Okay, you’re entitled to your opinion. I won’t argue with you. The important thing is you did as you were told. Let’s move on. Tell me what you think of these guys.’

Marina clenched her jaw, annoyed that her concerns had been dismissed so lightly, but her tone remained controlled. ‘The freak’s a complete bastard. Never loses an opportunity to embarrass and belittle his own sister. It’s appalling how he looks down on her!’

Sean nodded, paused, then added, his gaze abstractedly scanning the blue-black horizon, ‘But she’s used to it.’

Marina glanced at the monument to the victims of the battleship Maine. To its left, right in front of the US Interests Section, stood the recently completed square where the rallies for the return of Elián González took place. ‘Elena seems pretty decent, don’t you think? A reasonable person, not difficult at all,’ she said.

‘I agree,’ Sean said, and let a few seconds slip by. Then, as an afterthought: ‘But he believes himself to be the smartest, smoothest, most manipulative con-artist on earth. That’s probably why Elena hates his guts. And why we should expect trouble from him.’

‘Such intense hostility,’ Marina observed. ‘There’s a lot of bad blood between those two.’

‘And he’s on coke.’

Marina turned to stare at Sean. ‘How can you tell?’

‘I can tell.’

She faced the sea again. ‘What did you make of Elena sniggering when her brother said he made sixteen dollars a month?’

‘That he’s making a lot more than that.’

‘Yeah, that’s what I figured too.’

‘But for some reason he didn’t want us to know. And she’s so ethical she didn’t squeal on a sonofabitch who humiliates her on a daily basis for the fun of it.’

They fell silent. Marina looked across the wide avenue at the metre-high sea wall extending miles into the distance. On it, keeping respectful distances from each other, fishermen held lines. The lighthouse beam swept across the sea with the same boring exactitude of all beacons.

‘He certainly doesn’t look like the kind of guy who would take his cut quietly and count his blessings,’ she said, more to herself than to her companion.

Sean released the promise of a smile, shifted his gaze from a speeding car. ‘Lady, the word insidious was coined for guys like him.’ And pointing with his chin towards the ocean, he added, ‘He would drown his own mother right there to grab it all.’