The streets were filled with pedestrians and bicycles, few cars and buses, all models from the fifties. The scent of rotting wood from the rundown buildings mixed in with excrement from the pigs and chickens that people kept in their bathtubs permeated the busy boulevard, and stuck to your clothes and skin.
A thirty-something-year old yellow Pontiac stopped to pick us up. It was driven by an old man who knew Kassandra and Camacho’s family. She made small talk with him for the short ride. When he dropped us off at La Quinta Avenida, Kassandra blew a kiss his way.
“Yuk,” she said smelling her underarm as we walked. “With this funky smell we’re never going to get a client. Let’s go shower at your house.”
“Are you crazy? I can’t just show up with you at my aunt’s house.”
“Just tell her I was with you in the hospital, and I’m on my way back to the country. Tell her I’m from Matanzas.”
“She doesn’t care where you’re from. I can’t bring a stranger into her house. Plus she’s back in La vieja. Why don’t we go to your place here?”
“Camacho is probably there waiting to send me back to the hospital.”
“You think he’ll just sit around all day waiting for you?”
“You might be right; he has to attend to his other jineteras. We’ll watch from the corner until he steps out, go in, shower, change, and take off. I have a hundred dollars in one of my boots.”
“In one of your boots?”
“My working boots. In the heel. You break it off and then glue it back on. It was the only place I knew Camacho wouldn’t think of.” She stopped, deep in thought, then with audacious lucidity, continued with her improvised plan.
“I think the two of us together stick out more than if we’re by ourselves. You’re gonna have to wait in the corner while I go inside.”
“You’re quite the detective, huh?” I said trying to infuse the situation with some well needed humor. It didn’t work.
“My mother loved American movies, too. She used to retell the stories until I fell asleep. You learn a lot from the Americans because they are smart people. That’s why I want Kristen to grow up there.”
“Kristen? Is that her name?”
“Do you like it? A client told me that was his daughter’s name and that I looked like her.”
“I like it,” I said. “And it starts with a k, like yours, right?”
Kassandra gave me a full-of-love smile, a gesture I had not yet seen in her. We separated and took our posts. People walked by without noticing us. I could see Kassandra’s red hair from behind the pole of the streetlight that didn’t work. An hour went by. My feet were tired, my stomach growled and I peeked out from behind the pole. She signaled for me to hide. Just then, the door we were watching opened up and out came Camacho fixing the collar on his shirt.
He took a couple of steps, stopped, looked both ways deciding which he would take, and started walking in my direction. I stuck my spine against the pole and I could feel the beads of sweat being absorbed by the clothes I wore. Then I realized that if he saw me hiding behind the pole, he would suspect something. So I started to walk quickly toward him. As he passed me, he made an inappropriate comment about my behind, but I just smiled nervously and kept walking, not daring to glance in his direction.
When he had turned the corner up the street, Kassandra was already approaching the door to the apartment. I crossed the intersection and followed her in. The downstairs room was tiny, windowless, with a full-size bed, a nightstand and a bathroom, which also served as a closet. There were piles of clothes in each of the four corners. It smelled of cigarettes and booze.
“I know it’s nasty in here, but we’ll be gone soon. I’ll shower first and while you shower, I’ll pick up some of my things.”
I stepped over what looked like a spilled drink that had sat there too long. The small room had the bare necessities; no luxuries or pictures anywhere.
“I wonder why Lucia has not come in to clean,” Kassandra said, looking in the closet/bathroom. “She usually does once a week but he probably hasn’t paid her. Where the hell are my boots?”
“Maybe he told her not to,” I said, picking up some of the clothes that served as the only decorations, to help her look for the boots.
“Maybe he was waiting for me to come home to do it. You can just leave those. I don’t think I’ll take them with me.”
I threw the clothes in a corner already occupied by some more rags. “Isn’t he going to know you were here?”
“Yes.” She continued to ruffle through piles of clothes and shoes.
“You don’t care?”
“All I care about is getting my daughter and getting out of here.”
“You mean La Habana?”
“I mean the island. I have someone that will take Kristen and me to Miami on a boat. He’s asking for five thousand dollars. If I work really hard for a couple of weeks, I think I could do it. The only problem is Camacho. He runs a lot of the jineteras on el malecon. I could find clients somewhere else, but…”
“But…” I echoed.
“But it would be easier to make more money if there’s two of us,” she said ceasing the search for a moment to look up at me, then continued. “I have no idea where my boots are. Shit!”
I watched her while she searched. I knew that most girls my age had done some sexual favor with a tourist for dollars. But most of the stories I had heard never included full penetration. The girls just did other things. I knew my mother would have been disappointed. But I was alone and like my Tia said, I had to fend for myself.
“How is it going to be easier if there’s two of us?” I asked.
“What man doesn’t want to see two young girls fuck each other?”
“Are you serious?”
She nodded. “We’ll go to Havana Club where a lot of tourists go. I’ll go in first. You wait for me outside because we don’t want to spend money in paying for two entrances. I’ll find a client in there, and I’ll make him come out to get you. We’ll spend some time with him and then we go to his hotel. It’s easier than you think.”
“I’ve only had sex a few times, Kassandra.”
“Perfect. At least your first won’t be a client.”
“But…”
“Listen, the first time is the hardest. If you really think you can’t do it, then let me know now, and I’ll give you some cab fare back to your aunt’s house.”
I wanted to be tough, independent, determined like her. I wanted to leave the island and make a life for myself in the U.S., like my mother had wanted. But I wasn’t sure I could do this.
“I don’t want to go back there.”
“Then come on. We’ll do this together, and I’ll help you. You’ll see that after a couple of times, it’s no big deal,” she said, stepping into the dirty bathtub.
My mother’s voice swirled in my head. It was distant, almost inaudible. Since she left, I had heard it clear and steady. If I closed my eyes I could see her smile anytime. Now, I pressed my eyelids together tight, and still could not picture her clearly.
“There’s no hot water!” Kassandra yelled from the tiny bathroom.
I sat in a corner of the bed crying. It was the first time since my mother’s departure that I felt truly alone. Even though it had been explained to me that she had probably drowned, the fact that her body was never found still gave me hope.
I suppose in a subconscious attempt at denial, I had imagined she had survived and was in an American prison where she could not understand anything. Soon, the Cuban government would find out she was alive, and they would send me to her.
The reality of what my life was going to be without her hit me, and I could do nothing more than cry. Kassandra kept yelling about the water being cold. I heard the shower shut off. With the back of my hand, I wiped the tears before she saw them. She stepped out of the shower dripping. Her stomach and breasts were still swollen, but other than that, she didn’t look like she had just had a baby. She had a curvy thin body with a waist so small that once the swelling went down, you could enclose it in both hands.
“Your turn,” Kassandra announced drying her self. “The water’s cold but at least it’s running. So hurry!”
I took off my clothes and stepped into the tub. There was a thick rim of dirt all around the middle of it and the corners were filled with hair. I took a deep breath and grabbed the thin bar of cheap European soap. I could hear Kassandra still ruffling through clothes looking for the boots.
“My fucking boots are not here!” she yelled. I turned the water off and immediately received a wet towel over the shower curtain.
“I can’t find another towel. Hope you don’t mind.”
“It’s fine,” I said drying myself. I wrapped the towel around my body and pushed the curtain to the side. Kassandra was still naked.
“I wore them two days before I went to the hospital, came here, changed. Yes, I left them here. They have to be here.”
“I’ll help you look.”
“Unless that son of a bitch brought someone here and gave them to her.”
“He’d do that?”
“There aren’t many things Camacho wouldn’t do, Milena.”
“You still think he loved you?”
She paused for a moment. “I’d like to believe he did.”
She said little and I had so much to say. I wanted to tell her I was still not sure I could go through with her proposition. But she threw some of her clothes my way and told me to put them on. Then she sat me down on the toilet and began putting make-up on. She did the same to her face. In less than a half-hour we were ready. She scrounged some of the loose change around the room, and we walked out into the early evening. I felt awkward in clothes that were too tight and heels that were half a size too big for me.
Kassandra hailed a cab and told the driver that we did not have any money, but that we were on our way to meet some rich extranjeros and there would be a twenty dollar tip for him. The driver, an old man without front teeth, smiled and told us to get in.
Havana Club, the most popular discoteca on the island, was in an old cigar warehouse in Miramar that had been bought by an investor. We did exactly as Kassandra had planned. It wasn’t long before she came out to get me. She already had fifty dollars in her hand.
“How did you make that money so quick?” I asked her as she dragged me inside.
“I bumped into one of my favorite clients. He’s English, not American, but he’s very nice and very rich.”
The man was sitting alone at a table with a champagne bottle resting in an ice bucket. The waitress was flirting with him. Kassandra gave her a dismissive look, and the girl disappeared into the mass of people.
I was introduced as her friend, no name was mentioned, and he didn’t ask. He seemed smitten with Kassandra, perhaps the red hair and sultry green eyes or her witty disposition. Whatever it was, he could not take his eyes or hands off her. I watched her work him. She laughed, kissed him, caressed his thick black hair. She kept his champagne glass filled all the time while she took small sips of hers.
At one point she stood, pulled my hands up to her hips and lifted me slowly from the leathery seats. The she started dancing slowly with me, making sure her eyes were on the client and her hands were all over me. Because I had been sitting, watching her and slowly sipping my champagne most of the night, when I stood, the floor moved under my feet. I held tightly onto her tiny waist for balance. She pushed the back of my neck into her shoulder. Her neck was supple and smelled like vanilla, a splash she had offered in her bathroom, but I had declined claiming sweet perfumes weren’t my thing. Now the scent, or the combination of it with champagne, made me want her.
“Okay, it’s time,” she whispered minutes later. “Let’s get in the taxi and go to his hotel.”
I wanted to tell her I didn’t think I could walk outside. I felt as if someone was running laps around in my head. As soon as she stepped away from me, she realized I could not follow her. She took my hand firmly and pulled me back down to the high backed booth. My head fell into my hands between my knees. I could hear Kassandra telling me to breathe deeply. But my stomach was in my throat, and breathing was difficult. She lifted my head with one hand and stuck the other in the ice bucket. The ice water on my neck and face was surprisingly pleasant. She smiled.
“You’re gonna be okay; it’s good champagne. Let’s get out of here.” She wet my lips with an ice cube, wiped my face, and shook me to a stand up position. I felt just a tinge better. The English guy had to be carried out by a bouncer. Outside, the cabdriver smiled as he opened the door for us while the bouncer placed the English guy by a window, in case he needed to vomit.
Kassandra and I sat close together; she kept blowing air on my neck and face. “You need to look a little more alive. We can’t walk into the hotel with you looking like this.”
She gave the driver instructions as she reached into her bra to take out a few bills and give him one.
“That was the waitress’s tip,” she whispered. “She had already made her money with him. She didn’t even know he had this for her.”
“How did you take it?”
“He told me to give it to her. She didn’t deserve it. She didn’t even come around once you and I got there.”
The English guy made a strange sound with his throat. We moved closer to our window to give him plenty of space. He folded in half preparing to release most of his dinner so Kassandra made the driver stop the cab. She got out and pulled the English man’s body out. He tried to say something, instead out came the champagne and dinner.
“There there, James” she said patting his back. “You’ll feel better now.”
In the hotel, the concierge was very pleasant. He recognized Kassandra and she gave him some dollars to let us in the room with James. Cubans were not allowed in the hotels of the city, neither as patrons nor visitors, but in some places, money could take care of that. I was feeling less drunk but somewhat nauseated. Kassandra and I each took one of the English guy’s arms, wrapped it around our shoulders and headed toward the elevator with him. The concierge smiled at her. He was a short young man with a thin smile. Even in my drunkenness, I could tell right away he liked her.
“Many of the guys that work in the hotels like me because I give them money. Plus, they know what I am, and some think if they’re nice to me, they can get some free of charge. Nobody gets any free of charge, you hear me?” Everything from now on was going to be a lesson in the business, she said.
“Unless you have a chulo. And if you do, you’re crazy. Look at what happened to me.”
Lesson number one: no chulos, no free sex. The elevator door opened up, and we pulled the English guy out. He could barely stand. Kassandra stuck her hand in his pockets looking for the key. She found his wallet. Inside, there were still some dollar bills, his identification papers and the plastic room key.
“Lesson number two,” she said. “Take everything you can. You might not get another chance.” She stuck the money in between her breasts and slid the key into the door.
I had been to some hotel rooms with my mother when she traveled in Cuba. But this was no ordinary room. There was a room before another room, I later learned it was called a living room, and a meeting room. The bedroom had a one-armed antique chair sitting in front of the window, which faced the huge bed. There was a large bathroom with a shower and a hot tub that could fit five.
Kassandra pointed to the bed. We dropped the English guy on it like we were carrying a sack of rocks but he didn’t flinch.
“Your first night working and you don’t even have to. This guy’s not waking up until morning,” she said. I smiled. “You must be a daughter of Yemaya, did you know she’s the matron saint of prostitutes?”
“I did not know that,” I said. “But a santera once told my mother she’s my saint.”
“She read your caracoles?”
“No, I’ve never had that done. She just looked at me and said I was a daughter of La Virgen de Regla. Maybe because I’m from there?”
Almost everyone my mother and I came across who practiced the religion told us I had to be a daughter of Yemaya, because of my long hair and my not so aquiline features such as my flat nose. Not sure why, but for this, I was supposed to be very lucky. I believed it. But then I lost my mother. And I assumed I wasn’t really a “daughter” of the popular lucky saint.
“Puf, I’m tired,” Kassandra said dropping into the one armed long chair. “Let’s get a good night sleep because we’re gonna have to work in the morning. That’s the way he likes it. Bright and early.”
I was sitting on the edge of the bed where the English guy’s body lay splattered in the middle. I pushed his body to the other side and lay down. Out the window, the sun was coming up, and the warm rays of light touched my face slightly. My head spun a few more times before I finally fell asleep.