Loving Che Read Online Free
Author: Ana Menendez
very heavy for its size. I shook it. Nothing rattled, nothing shifted. I moved to open it, but my fingers trembled on the box. I had to stop then and close my eyes,and after I had regained my peace, I peeled at one of the sides with my fingernail until the tab came loose.
The papers and photographs that spilled out smelled of dark drawers and dusty rooms. Some fell apart when I touched them. Some of the letters were written in such a small hand that it was as if the writer were whispering secrets into my ear. I hoped, at first, that by arranging the notes and recollections in some sort of order, I might be able to make sense of them. But on each rereading I found myself drawn deeper and deeper, until I feared I might lose myself among the pages, might drown in a drop of my own blood.
LOVING CHE
Falsos me parecieron mis primeros esfuerzos.
Y ahora solo quedan estas rajas de memoria,
escritas sobre banderas de viento. â¦
One day, when I had already grown old with the revolution, a woman came to my door and asked to see the lady of the house. It was June and my sixty-fifth summer in Havana. I had the blinds drawn against the heat, but the windows were opened behind them and I could hear Beatrice telling the woman no one was home. She didnât leave and instead called up in her young womanâs voice, saying she only wanted a quick visit. Then, as if she knew I was listening behind the blinds, she recited in a deep and serious voice:
Farewell, but you will be with me
⦠I felt the years heavy on my chest and finished the lines softly to myself:
I found you after the storm, the rain washed the air, and in the water, your sweet feet gleamed like fishes.
I sat in the afternoon heat and waited for her footsteps to fade. I heard Beatrice come up the stairs and I heard her pause behind me and then move on.
Later, when the sun had gone down, the woman returned. Beatrice was below in the kitchen peeling tomatoes for the evening meal. I waited a few minutes, listening for sounds on the street, and then walked out to the balcony myself. The young woman turned her face up and I saw, even by the yellow light of the lamps, that her dark hair was pulled back low and the ends curled around her neckin a style that was familiar to me. She was young and slender and I can sayâwithout regret or false modesty, as old age has long since stripped me of these conventionsâthat she reminded me of myself at the same age. Her Spanish had the rounded edges and swallowed vowels of Cuba, but she wore slim black pants and angular shoes, so that I knew she was not from here. She told me her name and said she was looking for a woman who had given up her baby daughter years before. I told her she had the wrong house; that I was nobody. She asked if she might come up and talk. I said I was sorry that she had been misled to my house. She stood there on the street looking up at me for a long moment. I imagined her trying to make out my face in the darkness, recognizing the years on it. Then all at once she apologized, hands open in front of her. She waved, and still looking up at me began to walk down toward the sea. I watched her until I could no longer make out her figure in the dusk.
That night, the old wind blew and the windows rattled in their frames. I could smell the coming rain. Beatrice lit a yellow candle in the hallway and I lay in bed, watching shadows flicker beneath the door.
I remembered another night when the wind sang with ghosts. He lay beside me in the dark, listening. Memory, heâd said, is a way of reviving the past, the dead.
When you live for a long time in one place you begin to confuse your life with the city; its avenues and landmarks come to stand for your memories until you become the tourist of your own past, viewing a younger self with the fascination of someone just passing through. For so many, the past has gone soft with distance, so that when they talk of a building that used to be beautiful or an
The papers and photographs that spilled out smelled of dark drawers and dusty rooms. Some fell apart when I touched them. Some of the letters were written in such a small hand that it was as if the writer were whispering secrets into my ear. I hoped, at first, that by arranging the notes and recollections in some sort of order, I might be able to make sense of them. But on each rereading I found myself drawn deeper and deeper, until I feared I might lose myself among the pages, might drown in a drop of my own blood.
LOVING CHE
Falsos me parecieron mis primeros esfuerzos.
Y ahora solo quedan estas rajas de memoria,
escritas sobre banderas de viento. â¦
One day, when I had already grown old with the revolution, a woman came to my door and asked to see the lady of the house. It was June and my sixty-fifth summer in Havana. I had the blinds drawn against the heat, but the windows were opened behind them and I could hear Beatrice telling the woman no one was home. She didnât leave and instead called up in her young womanâs voice, saying she only wanted a quick visit. Then, as if she knew I was listening behind the blinds, she recited in a deep and serious voice:
Farewell, but you will be with me
⦠I felt the years heavy on my chest and finished the lines softly to myself:
I found you after the storm, the rain washed the air, and in the water, your sweet feet gleamed like fishes.
I sat in the afternoon heat and waited for her footsteps to fade. I heard Beatrice come up the stairs and I heard her pause behind me and then move on.
Later, when the sun had gone down, the woman returned. Beatrice was below in the kitchen peeling tomatoes for the evening meal. I waited a few minutes, listening for sounds on the street, and then walked out to the balcony myself. The young woman turned her face up and I saw, even by the yellow light of the lamps, that her dark hair was pulled back low and the ends curled around her neckin a style that was familiar to me. She was young and slender and I can sayâwithout regret or false modesty, as old age has long since stripped me of these conventionsâthat she reminded me of myself at the same age. Her Spanish had the rounded edges and swallowed vowels of Cuba, but she wore slim black pants and angular shoes, so that I knew she was not from here. She told me her name and said she was looking for a woman who had given up her baby daughter years before. I told her she had the wrong house; that I was nobody. She asked if she might come up and talk. I said I was sorry that she had been misled to my house. She stood there on the street looking up at me for a long moment. I imagined her trying to make out my face in the darkness, recognizing the years on it. Then all at once she apologized, hands open in front of her. She waved, and still looking up at me began to walk down toward the sea. I watched her until I could no longer make out her figure in the dusk.
That night, the old wind blew and the windows rattled in their frames. I could smell the coming rain. Beatrice lit a yellow candle in the hallway and I lay in bed, watching shadows flicker beneath the door.
I remembered another night when the wind sang with ghosts. He lay beside me in the dark, listening. Memory, heâd said, is a way of reviving the past, the dead.
When you live for a long time in one place you begin to confuse your life with the city; its avenues and landmarks come to stand for your memories until you become the tourist of your own past, viewing a younger self with the fascination of someone just passing through. For so many, the past has gone soft with distance, so that when they talk of a building that used to be beautiful or an
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