Chapter 7, Close But No Cigar
Katey and Susie left for the airport Friday morning, before the sun came up. It was freezing, and since the girls had dressed for the warm Cuban weather, they were doubly cold. When they boarded the plane Susie was surprised at its small size and lack of other passengers. There were only three others.
"Cuba's not really a prime travel location right now, Suze. Probably everyone on this plane is going there on business."
After the plane lifted off, Susie turned to Katey, who had been staring out the window.
"Are you going to tell Javier about Dave?" she asked.
"What? How'd--"
"He called once while you were in the shower. I picked up the phone."
"Why didn't you say anything?"
"I figured you're tell me when you wanted to. Why'd you turn him down?"
"He told you about the proposal?" Susie nodded. "I don't really know. I don't regret it, but… I just didn't feel ready to get married. Or to say I loved someone that much. Anyone."
The flight was long. Katey was nervous and Susie was excited. It was almost dark when they stepped off the plane and were met by a rush of hot air. Katey inhaled deeply. It smelled the same, except that there was a foreign smell in the air. A hint of gunpowder.
"It's so beautiful!" Susie squealed, squeezing Katey's hand. Katey only nodded. "Do you remember where we're staying?" Susie asked. Katey fished a slip of paper out of her pocket.
"Hotel Oceana." How could she have forgotten? Susie had her head out the window of the car the paper had gotten for them the whole time.
"Susie stop it, you look like a dog." Katey said.
"So? Oh, it's so beautiful! I can't wait to go to some clubs!" Susie had been fifteen when they lived there for the short period of time in 1958. She had expressed her outrage at not being able to go to any of the places Katey went. Except when she came with Javier and me to La Rosa Negra when he was teaching me to dance. The hotel was as beautiful as ever when they pulled up. Men in green uniforms opened the doors for them, and inside they walked up to the reception desk, which was in front of an enormous fish tank.
"Hello. I have a room under the name Katey Miller." she said to the man at the desk.
"Second floor and on the left." said the smiling man as he handed her a key. The girls thanked him and followed the bellman to their suit.
It was beautiful. Susie tipped the bellman as Katey looked around. It was the same layout as they had had when they were in Cuba last. She and Susie decided to share a bedroom, even though they had two. They ordered room service for dinner, despite Susie protests about going out to eat.
"I think pasta is all I can handle for now, Suze." Katey said. She went to bed early that night; she had to interview government officials the next day.
Before going to the government buildings, Katey went down to the front desk and asked if Yolanda still worked there. She had been such a good friends to Katey, and she knew that she would regret it if she left without seeing Yolanda.
They, thanks to the nice man at the front desk, met for an early lunch.
They talked about how much their lives had changed. Yolanda was now the head of matenence staff at the hotel, and was married and was trying to have a baby. She also kept hinting that she was still friends with Javier. Katey hoped that that had nothing to due with the baby part.
They promised to meet again soon and parted with a hug.
After that, the first part of Katey's day was long and boring. She spent it talking to people who didn't want to talk to her. She and Katey agreed to meet at the hotel before going to lunch. Katey slid in through the door of the room at half past noon. Susie was sitting on the couch in the living room, trying to read a paper in Spanish.
"How was your day?" she called when she heard Katey come in. Katey threw her purse on the floor and flopped down next to her sister on the chintz couch.
"Hot. Boring. I spent the day talking to crazy communists. That answer your question?"
"No wonder you were hot. Why are you wearing that?" Susie looked at her sister's outfit, which consisted of a long black skirt and white blouse.
"I know. It's worse then those awful school uniforms," they laughed. "But I didn't have any light clothes that were appropriate for interviews. I have to go shower." She slowly dragged herself into the bathroom. She was grateful for the cool water that poured over her head when she turned on the shower.
After she was freshly showered and had changed into a blue halter dress, Katey came out to find Susie still reading the paper.
"Why are you reading that?" she asked as she checked her makeup in the mirror.
"I'm learning Spanish in school."
They spent the day going to all of the places that they knew: The Palace, their old school, and they lounged by the pool. Susie was watching the waiters, but Katey was watching the birds flit about and wondering how to contact Javier.
That night after dinner, Susie was sitting on Katey's bed when she got out of the shower.
"We're going to La Rosa Negra tonight, right?" Susie asked. Katey sighed and bent over to towel off her hair.
"Can you just give me some time, Suze?"
"But if I don't bug you about it, you'll never do it." Susie said realistically.
"I just don't want to right now. Okay?" she flipped her head back up and stared at her sister, twisting the towel in her hands.
"No, you just don't want to see him. You know he'll be there, and that's why you don't want to go."
Hadn't they done this before? Susie's words were astoundingly similar to the fight they had had in New York, when she decided on the cat idea. Katey stood there, wearing the hotel's white cotton bathrobe and staring at her sister's obstinate, naïve face, and let it all come out.
"You don't get it Suze. I don't want to see him! I can't see him! You don't know how much it hurt when I said good-bye. How awful I felt when I had to close a letter how much I wanted to die when he told me not to write anymore! You just don't get it!" she stopped yelling.
She threw the towel on the floor in anger when she felt tears stinging her eyes. She hated that he was making her cry again. She crossed her arms over her chest and turned to face the wall, sitting on the edge of the bureau, her head half turned away from her sister.
"I don't want to find him again and then have to lose him. Because I will, Susie, I know I will. Our lives are too different. We're too different." she sat on the bed in front of Susie. Susie picked up her damp hair and started to comb it, just like their mother would do for them when they were little girls.
"And you don't know how many nights I heard you cry yourself to sleep, Katey. Please just see him. You don't have to tell him that you love him, or even kiss him. Not if you don't want to. If you think you still need it….just get closure. Does that make sense? Let's just go."
Katey protested all the way to the club. Susie was wearing a tight red dress and had convinced Katey to wear hers. They looked like twins.
Katey's eyes almost welled up with tears when she walked in. It looked exactly the same. Katey tried to leave, but Susie grabbed her wrist and pulled her to the bar.
"The real dancers are at La Rosa Negra, on Saturday night." Javier's voice rang loud in Katey's head. She quickly downed the mojito Susie ordered for her.
"I'm going to go look for him." Susie yelled above the music. Katey nodded and sat at an empty barstool. The loud Cuban music, which she had come to love so much, pounded in her ears as she ached to dance. But she couldn't dance alone, and there was no one she wanted to dance with besides Javier.
He's probably not even here. Katey thought. So many have been lost in the revolution, and in five years he could be anywhere.
But he wasn't lost. A young Cuban boy stood outside that very club, talking and laughing with his friends.
"Did you get an answer from that American chick you write to?" His friend Raul asked. Javier shook his head, wishing he hadn't told his friends he had written to Katey.
"Man, I'll tell you, she was fine." said another.
"She was beautiful." Javier said softly, but the others didn't hear him.
"'C'mon, Suarez, let's go inside." Raul pushed him through the door. They quickly pushed themselves to the back of the club and stared dancing. Javier danced with Raquel, a girl he knew from when he had gone to school. He quickly began to play his old game, that every girl he danced with was Katey and that Katey was in the club, trying to find him. It was a tired game, worn and fought over, but never won. They never were Katey, and Katey never found him. Eventually Raquel moved away and he danced with someone else, a girl he didn't recognize.
The lights of the club flickered suddenly, and the music skipped. Just as suddenly, there she was. His angel was there, sitting at the bar getting hammered, unaware of his presence. He moved towards her in a dream like state. She was there, he couldn't believe it. After all these years, all of his hoping, she had come.
He was only a few feet away, almost in arms reach when a man approached her. He kissed her. She hadn't waited.
Katey was on her third mojito when someone heavy bumped into her from behind.
"Hey, watch it buddy--" she said. The man turned towards her.
"Oh, God," he said. "Katey, is it really you?" Katey looked at him incredulously.
"Dave? What're you doing here?"
"I'm writing a freelance piece for the New Yorker. You?"
"I'm here for the Times. Oh, my god, I can't believe it's you. C'mere." she wrapped him in a hug. But he kissed her roughly, and she could taste alcohol on his lips. The kiss lasted too long for Katey, who hadn't any love for Dave anymore.
"Katey, I have to go, but come to the opera with me on tomorrow?"
"Why the opera?"
"I have tickets. I'll see you at three." and he slipped away, typical Dave style.
Katey then left money for bartender and stumbled outside. The pounding music was giving her a headache, and she never had really been much of a drinker. She leaned against the rot iron railing outside and looked at the sky. It was hot and clear. The stars were beautiful.
Katey woke up the next morning with a wicked hangover. She rolled out of bed at two. Susie was sitting at the vanity applying make-up.
"What happened?" Katey asked.
"You passed out in the car. Dave's staying here too and he carried you to the room. He said he'd meet you in the lobby at three if you're feeling up to the opera."
"Do you want to come, for moral support?"
"Have I ever been up to the opera?"
"I guess that's a no," Katey looked at the clock on the bedside table. "Oh, no!" she ran into the bathroom and quickly turned on the shower.
When she was ready, Susie walked her down to the lobby.
"I saw him last night." Katey said.
"I know you did. When else would he have invited you to the opera?"
"No, I mean Javier. He was at the club. I saw him. Out of the corner of my eye." Susie looked at her with an unreadable expression.
"Oh, Katey, you didn't see him. He wasn't there. I looked.
"He was. He was! I saw him there!" Katey insisted.
"Saw who?" Dave asked, appearing behind them.
"Uh, God." Katey said quickly, taking inspiration from the large crucifix hanging over the door.
"God?" Dave asked, smiling but confused.
"Yes, God. Katey has discovered the Lord." Suzie interjected matter-of-factly.
"So, what are we going to see?" Katey asked.
"The Phantom of the Opera," he said with a flourish before he turned to Susie. "Am I right to expect that this beautiful lady is the Susie I've heard so much about?" Susie smiled and nodded. "Well! When Katey described you I figured that you were just her kid sister, but you are a woman!" he twirled her around. "Are you coming to the opera with us? I'd love for you to join us." Susie raised her eyebrows at Katey. Katey nodded.
"I would love to." Susie said, impressed by his politeness.
When they were seated in the opera house, Susie turned to Katey.
"When you get tired of him, can I have him?"
"Right now. He's all yours." Katey whispered back.
"He's so cute, why'd you dump him?"
"He's not my type."
"You mean he's not Javier." Susie said knowingly. The lights dimmed and the show started.
High above them, on the catwalk of the beautiful old building, sat Javier Suarez. He had taken a job at the opera house soon after Katey left Cuba, first just checking tickets, but now he was in charge of lights. He loved his job. He loved the beautiful music, but he also loved the high pay. After the revolution, Carlos had fallen in with Castro's secret police, and disappeared from the Suarez family, leaving his son behind. Javier's grandfather fell ill and died around Javier's twentieth birthday, about three months after Katey left. And Javier was still in charge of his family. He walked his nephew Rafael and sister Chabe to school every morning. He went to work, and he was home in time to help his mother with dinner. That was his day.
He was happy, mostly. He saw his friends most nights, at La Rosa Negra, and he danced with girls he knew, but he never spent the night them, despite his friends' protests. He hadn't spent the night with any before or since he met Katey, who was, he knew, the only girl he would ever love.
She was his opposite in every way, from their coloring to their personalities to their upbringings and lifestyles. But as they got to know each other, they noticed the stark similarities between themselves. They were both repressed in their own ways, their souls longing to be set free.
And now she was back. He had seen her come into the opera house. She wasn't alone, either. She was with the tall blonde man he'd seen her with the night before. Susie was there as well. Katey was, if possible, more beautiful then ever. She was thinner, perhaps, and looked a little hung over, but still the same mostly. He hadn't gotten close enough to see if her eyes were still that beautiful clear blue.
Halfway through the opera Susie decided that all of the singing (which to her sounded like Indian war whoops.) was giving her an aneurysm, so she excused herself. She sat in the red-carpeted lobby for a while, and then she sat on the bottom steps of a staircase labeled CATWALK. She was jolted out of thoughts of Dave's bright green eyes when someone tripped headlong over her. She yelped and so did the poor person who tripped. She jumped up and bent down to the man splayed out in front of her.
"Javier?" she asked, shocked.
"Susie? Is that you?" he let her pull him into a sitting position and sat on the floor cross-legged in front of her, squinting at her face. "You look….old."
"You look the same. You're still dancing?"
"Of course," he looked away, at the closed door to the theater. "How's Katey?"
"She's fine." he nodded, his mind lost in a past that he couldn't let go, even though he knew it had passed him by. At that moment, Susie saw it. She saw what Katey had been talking about. It's so hard to say good-bye to someone, to know that they've moved on without you, that they're okay without you, because maybe you're not. To worry about them even if you really don't love them anymore. To find out that you still love them when you truly believe that you can't.
Susie and Javier talked until his boss called him back to work after his break. He stumbled back up the rickety metal stairs, lost in thoughts. Could she really be here? Really? She wasn't just some beautiful illusion that his mind had made up one night when he was drunk on liquor and mind games that he played with himself. But she was here. It was real. As real as the sore knee he got from falling over her sister.
When the show was over he quickly punched out and ran down the stairs, hoping to catch Katey as she left the theatre. He was at the bottom step when he saw Susie, the blond man he recognized and Katey. Susie saw him and waved before he could turn around and slip away, unnoticed.
"Javier!" Susie waved excitedly. The blonde man and Katey turned and looked at him. Well, the blonde man did. Katey just looked….through him. As if she didn't see him.
Katey had mixed feelings all through the show. She thought about Dave and what he wanted. Was he just being friendly, as someone who had moved on, or was he looking for something more?
Did she want him to be? That was what she was wondering. Did she love him? No. He was a wonderful man and was sweet and kind and gentlemanly, but he just wasn't….Javier. And what was she going to do about him? She loved him. Didn't she? She did. She did. Did. Did. Did. She loved him, but she didn't think that she could go through it again. She just couldn't lose him again. And she wouldn't. That much she knew. And if she had a reason not to love him, she had a reason not to lose him. And Dave was that reason. If she was with Dave, Susie couldn't make her admit her true feelings. To Javier or to herself.
So when Susie suddenly called out his name, Katey wasn't sure if she was really seeing him. After all these years, was it really him.
He was more shocked then elated when her eyes locked onto his. Katey. Katey. Katey. Was here. His queen. And she saw him. It wasn't just him watching her in a smoky club, of from the catwalk while he directed the lights. She was beautiful in a long, hot pink dress that set off her figure spectacularly. He felt so shabby, wearing his work uniform, a white button-down shirt and black slacks. She had a hibiscus flower behind her ear and her hair was longer.
Katey wasn't aware of anything. She was in a euphoric state, filled only by Javier's presence. How she wanted to touch his face, taste his lips, stare into his dark eyes. He was all there was, there was no buzz of the other theatre goers, there was no Susie and definitely no Dave.
But it had to end, and it did. They had been standing there so long, just looking at each other, that Susie touched Katey's shoulder, almost to see if she was still breathing, because her face had gone pale and her dark eyes were welling up with tears. But she was and then Susie touched Dave's arm and he excused himself to go to the bathroom and Susie followed. (Into the ladies, of course. Don't get your hopes up about them just yet, you dirty mind. Susie is a lady, for now.)
"You look good." Javier said, his eyes catching hers.
"So…so do you."
"You look…older maybe," he paused; when he was with Katey, the thing he wanted to do the least was talk, but it had been years. "You went to Radcliff? You found what you wanted so badly to do?" she nodded.
"I work for the New York Times. My boss sent me here. I'm doing a story."
Oh. So she hadn't come to see him. Maybe she hadn't even gotten his letter. Or maybe she just didn't care. There were right. He thought. They were all right. St. Lois was just too far from Havana. And we were too different.
"Who's the body guard?" Javier nodded to Dave and Susie, who were standing outside of the bathrooms yards away, pretending not to be watching them. Please don't say her boyfriend. Please don't say her boyfriend.
"My boyfriend. Dave Kellerman." Something inside of Javier fell. It wasn't something he could hear or see or touch, but he felt it all right, the incomparable feeling of knowing that you've lost the one person you truly love.
"How long have you been dating?"
"On and off for…two years." she looked at him uneasily, something unreadable in her eyes.
"I…I should be going…my wife is making dinner and I shouldn't be late."
I waited too long. Katey thought. I could have changed this. I could have been selfish. I could have told him about the baby, and now he would be all mine. But now he is making some other woman happy, and he must love her more than he ever loved me, if he even did.
"I'm sorry…..I have to go." and she turned and ran from the room.
She stopped running after three blocks, when the heel of her shoe broke and she tumbled to the ground. She felt needles in her hands as she scraped them against the hard concrete. She unbuckled her shoes and put them in her purse. He was making her cry again. She walked barefoot for what seemed like forever, until she heard a familiar sound.
She sat on the sand of the beach and listened to the crashing of the waves. She lay on her back and looked at the stars, thinking of when she had first come there, with Javier. He had told her that dancing was about being exactly who you wanted to be in that moment.
Who did she want to be? She wasn't happy and she knew it. The life she had wasn't the one she had wanted. If she hadn't met him maybe she would be happy. Maybe she'd be married now, with kids. Would she be fulfilled? Maybe. Maybe she would be if she never knew what she was missing. If she had paid attention to her mother, if she hadn't met Javier, if she had stayed on the course she thought was right. If….there were a thousand ifs, but no becauses.
Katey fell asleep for a few minutes, and when she woke up, her hair gritted with sand and her eyes swollen from tears. She stood up shakily, not trusting anything for the moment, least of all her legs. She faced the ocean and stretched her arms above her like a cat. She turned around and remembered why Javier had chosen this beach to teach her to dance on, why this one was so important to him.
The graveyard his father's tombstone was in was there. She ran her hand over the smooth stone of the head stone, grateful for the quiet of the graveyard; the crashing of the waves and the sound of people and cars so far away. She sat against the back of the headstone, thinking about what she would say to Mr. Suarez if she knew him. Javier told me once that you were the one in the family who knew what to do. Well, I wish you could get me out of this one, Mr. Suarez. I've screwed up. And now I can't even look at Javier. Who you did a great job with, by the way. He's the most…himself person I've ever met. He doesn't always have the answers, but he makes you think that he does, and then you feel as though everything will be okay. I hope his wife appreciates him. His wife. How can Javier have a wife? she leaned her head back against the cool stone, wondering if she was crazy, talking to a dead man that she'd never met.