Chapter Five
Pilar
Havana
Morning came to Havana slowly, the sounds of the street, of her neighbors rising from their beds, waking her before the sun made its appearance.
Pilar lay on her back, her eyes closed, allowing the morning melody to pull her awake footstep by footstep, yell by yell, slamming door by slamming door.
Each day the noises were a constant greeting, each note giving her something to focus on, to distract herself from the inevitability that when she opened her eyes, her husband wouldn’t be lying beside her.
Pilar rolled over in bed, her gaze resting on the little nightstand they had inherited from Enrique’s mother after they married.
It was a good piece, a sturdy wood that had lived a lifetime and then some by the time it came their way.
It had fit the space next to the bed they shared perfectly, and Pilar spent hours on the weekends lovingly restoring it until the wood shone.
The book Zenaida brought her sat atop the nightstand, its maroon spine staring back at her, the leather cover practically begging to be opened.
A Time for Forgetting.
The book whispered to her in the early Havana morning.
Just a few more pages.
She’d read far later than she should have, far later than was wise certainly for the day of work she had ahead of her. What had started as initial curiosity about the novel had quickly become a need to know what happened next.
From the first words, it seemed like she was sitting down with a friend.
The English had taken some adjustment; Pilar far preferred reading in Spanish, the words coming to her more easily, the pages flying at a rapid speed.
Reading A Time for Forgetting had forced her to savor each word, translating as she read, her progress much slower than was normal for her.
She almost liked it better for that fact, the way she could linger over the novel, because almost immediately it had become abundantly clear to her that when she finally did finish reading it, she would be left with a void.
Why had Eva chosen to write the novel in English? It was just one curiosity that had been sparked since Pilar first picked up the book. The author was just Eva to her now, an intimacy that had developed between them since Pilar had first begun reading.
There was something so honest in the words on the page, something that resonated so deeply with Pilar.
When Eva Fuentes wrote about what it was like to be a woman traveling alone to a foreign country, responsible for representing not only her profession and her gender but also her country, it was impossible for Pilar not to feel a kinship with the author.
She might not have a trip ahead of her, but ever since they took Enrique, she couldn’t escape the sense of change, of transformation unwanted or not.
Pilar had been pushed from the life they had built together, ejected from the apartment she inhabited with her body while her spirit resided elsewhere, in that unknown place where Enrique now was.
For the first few days after he was taken, she had mourned. She cried, she prayed, she talked to every friend, every acquaintance, called in all the favors she could think of to try to save her husband.
It was all in vain.
Whatever Fidel had done with Enrique, wherever he was being held was firmly removed from her grasp.
For the first few weeks, she’d wanted to die.
She barely ate, barely slept, slipping away inch by inch, until a month had passed, and when she looked at her reflection in the mirror, she no longer recognized the woman staring back at her, certainly no longer recognized the woman Enrique had once loved. Since then, she had been existing—barely.
Last night, reading A Time for Forgetting was the first time she’d experienced excitement about anything since they took her husband.
If there was anything she was evangelical about, it was books, and there was something about Eva Fuentes’s words that kindled a fire inside her, gave her hope for the possibility that she would, in fact, be able to continue—even if it meant that the driving force for doing so was finding out what happened in the mysterious book and seeing it returned to its author.
Pilar opened the novel, the bookmark Enrique had made her for their fourth wedding anniversary marking her place. She rubbed her fingers over the flower he’d pressed there, the ache sharp and piercing.
She’d stopped mid-chapter, her desire to continue reading no match for the sleep that had eventually overtaken her. Pilar flipped forward a few pages, checking to see how many were left in the chapter.
Could she finish it before she had to get ready for work?
When she got to the last page in the chapter, her breath caught.
A thin, folded piece of paper was nestled in between chapters seven and eight.
Pilar slipped it out from its resting place, remnants of dark ink bleeding through the other side of the page.
Interest piqued, she unfolded the paper.
Elegant penmanship greeted her, the words like the novel curiously written in English.
My love,
Not a moment goes by that I don’t think of you and wonder how you are doing.
I find myself yearning for sleep because at least in those moments, in my dreams, you visit me.
I am haunted by the last moment I saw you, by the memory of your face.
I wish things were different. I wish we could be together.
I wish I’d never had to let you go. But more than anything, I hope that you are happy, safe, loved. That this life will be kind to you.
I love you. Always.
Eva
Tears spilled down Pilar’s cheeks and she batted them away, her heart pounding as she reread the letter, and the words contained there.
Eva had to be Eva Fuentes, didn’t it?
Was this why Zenaida’s mom wanted to return the book to Eva? Did she know it contained a love letter? Likely, Zenaida wasn’t aware of it if she hadn’t read the book. The paper was old and worn, and it fit perfectly between the pages. Pilar hadn’t even realized it was there.
The book was a love story involving a young Cuban teacher who traveled to the United States as part of a summer school exchange. Had Eva written the letter for a love she left back in Cuba? Or one she left in the United States?
The words—the longing contained there—reminded Pilar of how she loved Enrique. She looked for him in her dreams, too.
Who was the intended recipient? And why was Eva meant to have the book returned to her?
At least today she could start her search in the library.
Pilar rose from the bed and dressed quickly, going through her morning ablutions purely from memory, her mind elsewhere entirely.
When she was a child, she had been consumed with the stories she concocted and frequently shared with her classmates at the little schoolhouse in Cienfuegos where she studied.
Sometimes, she would daydream about her future, about how exciting life would be when she was able to leave home, to go to Havana, to study, to work among books, to fall in love.
She spun tales fictional and aspirational while she went about her days, the characters that populated her stories becoming her dearest imaginary friends.
Then she grew older, and love found her when Enrique walked into the library where she was working at the time and asked her for a book on philosophy, and her inner thoughts changed to looking toward the future life they would have together.
They were married September 19, 1958.
On January 1, 1959, Fidel Castro overthrew Fulgencio Batista and her daydreams changed yet again, from hope for the future to a pervasive fear that weighed down her bones and stole her breath, the years passing by until she was left with little more than a yawning ache in her belly from the never-ending food lines and shortages, her mind preoccupied with how she was going to make do in a world that seemed intent on giving them less and less.
Fidel railed against the Americans and their embargo as the cause for the hungry bellies, but the fire in his speeches didn’t align with the reality of him dining at the country clubs the wealthy had fled.
Where was Fidel’s hunger? Where was the sacrifice he routinely called on his countrymen and women to make? Where was Fidel’s struggle?
She’d never had much faith in politicians—in their empty promises and twisting tongues—but even she was taken aback at how spectacularly the entire business had failed.
Enrique had been intrigued by Fidel in the way that a starving man is willing to overlook the providence of a piece of bread that just happens to find its way in his pockets.
While he had never joined the revolutionaries like some of his friends from the University of Havana, Enrique had hoped that things might get better, that perhaps this change could bring some stability to Cuba and address some of the problems that plagued the island.
It was the kind of hope that came when there were few other good alternatives to be had.
It was the kind of hope that could sustain you for years, morsel by morsel, because you knew that when it ran out—well, then you would have simply nothing left at all.
It was the kind of hope that kept Pilar in Cuba now, waiting for word of her husband, clinging to the belief that he might still be alive when she feared the reality was more likely that he would soon be dead if he wasn’t already.
Pilar gingerly crept out of the bed, careful to keep her footfalls light as she walked toward the dresser crammed into one corner of the bedroom.
Her downstairs neighbor worked late hours, sleeping during the day while Pilar shelved books at the library, and considering the thin floors between them, she tried her best to be as quiet as possible in the mornings just as he did when he returned from work an hour or two before she rose.