Read Online Waiting for Snow in Havana by Carlos Eire - Free Book Online

maimed for life, or on the threshold of dying. In between our sobs Rafa and I explained to our mothers what had happened, as they pelted us with questions and cries of alarm. Neither Rafa nor I had any idea how badly disfigured we were already, and how much that upset our moms. They rushed us into the bathroom, tossed us into the shower fully dressed, and soaked us thoroughly. I remember the two of them making more of a din than we two kids.
    If you ever need to awaken quickly from a deep, deep sleep arrange to have two Cuban mothers shout at your bedside as if their children have been hurt. If you need to awaken from a coma, have them shout as if their older children have hurt the younger ones.
    Rafa and I had our eyes soaked in something that made us cry even more and were slathered with ointment where the fire ants had left their marks. I don’t know about Rafa, but I cried more on that day than I had ever cried before.
    The older boys were rounded up for justice. They were unmasked before their fathers for the bullies they were, and they paid for what they did. I don’t remember the punishment, but whatever it was, it must have been far too light for the crime they had committed. They never again did anything so cruel, but they joked about what they had done for years, and even bragged about it when we were in the company of other boys who hadn’t been there. They probably bragged about the punishment, too.
    After a while Rafa and I began to brag about it too, and even to laugh. It was the kind of story that always got the right kind of reaction from other boys.
    With girls, it was different. The first time I told the story to a girl should have been the last. But I kept trying for years, thinking it would impress them.
    Nowadays I play a game with my own three children. I ask them, suddenly and unexpectedly, at the oddest moments: “What is the Law?” They know the answer, and they pronounce the words as I have taught them, slowly and ponderously: “We shall not walk on all fours. We shall not drink blood.” The answer is especially endearing when it issues from my youngest son’s lips: “We sall not walk on all foahs. We sall not dwink bwood.” They’ve never seen the movie this line is taken from, Island of the Lost Souls, with Charles Laughton playing the part of a deranged scientist, Dr. Moreau, who turns beasts into humans and has to keep them in line with a whip and the ever-central question, “What is the Law?” Snap! goes Dr. Moreau’s whip. “What IS the Law?” Snap! Snap! Snap! “What IS the Law?” Snap! Moreau’s creatures, barely erect, ask themselves and their creator, “Are we not men?” And they reply to Dr. Moreau’s question in unison, slowly and ponderously, “We shall not walk on all fours. We shall not drink blood.”
    To this quiz on the Law I have added a third response of my own: “We shall not inhale poison.”
    My children think I’m joking when I launch into this pop quiz. But I’m deadly serious. I want them to know that there is a law, and that there is a beast inside each of them, always itching to ignore it and to break free. I want them to know, too, that there is a whip snapping over their heads, silent for now, gentle and silent. Someday, I tell them, they will hear the crack of the whip and realize they are wielding it themselves, standing erect, abstaining from blood, seeing poison for what it is, and avoiding it like the plague.
    So, what is the Law? Snap! Snap! What IS the Law? Snap!
    Your turn now. Go on. Answer.

6
Seis
    T here He was again. How I wished He would stop this.
    There He was, at the window, shouldering the weight of that huge, awful cross. He always showed up so unexpectedly. So swiftly. It’s not as though He walked to the spot, or anything like that. He simply appeared. And He never made a sound.
    How I hated it. How I feared it.
    He just stood there, as