Boy Who Said No : An Escape to Freedom (9781608090815) (5 page)

“So what does it mean?”

“Fidel's now stronger than ever,” said Gilbert.

“It's weird. Abuelo says he puts his pistol on the lectern before every speech just to show people who's boss.”

Gilbert shook his head. “They say Fidel and his brothers were the biggest bullies at their school. The headmaster even tried to throw Fidel out.”

“Abuelo said he actually did. Fidel's father was happy his son wasn't going to school anymore so he could stay home and work.”

“That's messed up.”

“Fidel threatened to burn down his parents' house so he could get back into school.”

I laughed. “Sounds crazy.”

We stopped at the refreshment stand and paid for a couple of bottles of soda. There was no Coke in sight.

“Where's the Coke?” I asked.

“Fidel closed down the Coca-Cola factory,” said Gilbert.

Gilbert plucked off the ruffled metal cap with his teeth and then grabbed my bottle to do the same.

A group of young women marched by, carrying placards with a picture of Fidel brandishing his gun.

“I think Fidel's in love with that rifle of his,” I said.

Gilbert shrugged. “Maybe he's looking at girls through his telescopic lens.”

I laughed. “That's something you'd do, Gilbert.”

The music died down and a voice again rang out over the crowd. A man sporting a 26 of July Movement armband was singing the praises of the nearly two hundred and seventy thousand people who had formed the literacy brigade. He said forty-two “Martyrs of the Revolution” had died in the campaign. I nodded slightly, understanding how that could happen.

We fell silent for a moment, remembering.

“It
was
an experience,” said Gilbert, shaking his head.

I turned the toe of my shoe into the ground. “I really missed Abuelo,” I confessed. “And my mother and father.” I upended the soda bottle and took a long drink. The soda tasted funny, flat, not like Coke at all. I wanted the buzz, the fizz. For a moment I missed tracing the white Coca-Cola letters with my fingertip on the green soda bottles. “I never thought I'd miss my family that much, but I did.” I gazed at the ground. Nothing seemed the same any more. Not even myself. I looked Gilbert in the eyes and said, “I even missed you.”

Gilbert stood up, stretched, and started walking away. “Yeah, I know,” he mumbled. “Let's go home.”

I stood up thinking about how different I was now. Fending for myself in the mountains had made me stronger in so many ways. I had learned a lot of things. But I had the nagging fear that I had not learned enough.

Then a thought struck me: When I left for the mountains, I was a thirteen-year-old boy; now I was a man. A young man, but still a man.

The very next morning two soldiers arrived at my house. After the celebration last night, I couldn't imagine what they wanted. My father led them to the living room sofa and extended his hand for them to be seated.

One of the soldiers opened a leather satchel containing official-looking papers. My name appeared on several pages. He spread the materials on the table, cleared his throat, and looked at my father.

“Our records indicate that your son conducted himself well in the literacy program. The government would like to honor him by sending him as a
becado,
a student scholar, to one of the government-run scholarship schools.”

My parents and I looked at each other in astonishment. Cuba's scholarship schools had a reputation for providing an excellent education. But they were expensive—well beyond the means of my parents.

As if reading our thoughts, the soldier said, “This is a special honor, a gift from the government to recognize a select group of citizens who provided literacy services to the poor. Frank will be able to attend this school—all expenses paid.”

Suddenly my skin felt warm, the way it did when something bad was about to happen. I was trying to figure out how I felt about this. I was looking forward to spending some time with my family and friends. The thought of having anything to do with the government left me cold.

The soldier turned toward me and asked, “Any questions, Frankie?”

“Where is this school?”

“In east Havana—Tarara—not far from here.”

I knew the exact location of the school. The buildings and grounds were beautiful, but I couldn't imagine myself there. I wouldn't know anyone, and I wanted to be with my friends.

“When would I start?”

“Tomorrow. Fidel doesn't want to waste any time.”

“But I just got home.” I felt like someone had sucked the oxygen from my lungs. I looked to my parents for some kind of direction and support. I was hoping they would back me.

A moment of silence elapsed. My mother glanced at me before she stepped forward and said, “The government took my boy from us for almost a year. We had no idea where he was or what had happened to him. We didn't know whether he was dead or alive. Now you want to take him from us again? It's not fair—to him or to us. He needs to stay here.”

The soldier looked at Mima with disdain. When he spoke, his voice was deep, resonant, and brusque. “With all due respect, señora, your son is no longer a boy. He's a young man, and his government is offering him a chance of a lifetime. I strongly suggest he take advantage of it.”

My mother's face flushed. She was taken aback by the soldier's sharp rebuke. Still she pressed on. “But he will be away from home again.”

“Señora, señora, the education Frank will receive will more than make up for his absence from home. Surely you understand that.”

My mother bristled and crossed her arms in defiance. “If he attends this school of yours, how often can he come home?”

“Once a month. And, of course, on holidays.”

The other soldier—the silent one—gathered up the papers. He turned and spoke to my father. “We are offering your son an opportunity to receive the finest education Cuba has to offer,” he said. “Frank will learn things in this school that the public school does not
have the resources to teach. It would be a great disservice to him—and to Cuba—for him not to go.”

My mother turned to me, confused. She was as undecided as I about what to do. “Frankie, what do you think?” Her voice was softer, more resigned.

I didn't want to go. On the other hand, I thought about what Abuelo had told me about the importance of learning. He had always taught me to study hard and had stressed the value of education.

I was afraid that by not going to this school I would disappoint him—and I didn't want to let Abuelo down. I needed more time to think. But I had to make a decision
now
. I looked at the men standing before me, men who seemed to have my best interests at heart. I took a deep breath and reluctantly said, “Okay, I'll go.”

To my surprise, life at the school in Tarara was like living at a resort. It was totally fenced and an armed guard stood at the gate, providing little chance for escape or interaction with the outside world. We checked with the guard when we went home and when we returned. We made our beds every morning, shined our shoes, and kept our quarters spotless. But other than that, the school offered me everything I could possibly want.

I was housed in a former mansion surrounded by towering royal palms. Our rooms were more luxurious than anything I had ever seen. I bunked with only one other boy, a boy I really liked. The food was great and we had time to swim at the beach. We even had our own baseball field and basketball court. In many ways it was a young man's dream.

Our educational program was rigorous. The first hour of the day was devoted to political science. Señor Gonzales taught us about the benefits our government had bestowed on our people. We learned that health care and literacy had improved, that the peasants were better off, and that more doctors were graduating from Cuban universities.

We were lectured on the rampant corruption that fueled capitalist societies. We were told that the Cuban government promoted love and brotherhood. We learned that Fidel was a friend of the people, of the peasants, of the working class.

Sometimes we listened to Fidel's radio broadcasts, events that lasted four or five hours. His speeches seemed like gobbledygook to me, wild meanderings braided with production statistics, condemnation of the “lumpen”—whoever they were—and crazed calls to action against the “American imperialists.”

We were supposed to pay close attention to these speeches, but many of the students had trouble staying awake. Señor Gonzales rapped his ruler on the desk of any boy who started nodding off, and those who actually snored were severely reprimanded for “counterrevolutionary” leanings. But on more than one occasion even Señor Gonzales had to stifle a yawn.

Much time was devoted to the corruption and abuses under the Batista regime: how the former president had cozied up to the United Fruit Company; how the American gangsters had drained millions of dollars from the Cuban economy; and how the American-controlled Havana Mob had used Cuba as a base for drug trafficking and money laundering. We learned that the United States had sucked hundreds of millions of dollars from the Cuban economy and had plundered the wealth and resources of Latin America.

When we were not discussing the writings of Vladimir Lenin and Friedrich Engels, we were absorbing the teachings of José Martí and Karl Marx. José Martí was the only Spanish hero Abuelo had taught me about whom Señor Gonzales mentioned. I thought the government was using the writings of this great poet to serve their own needs. There was no mention of Jesus, the Virgin Mary, or the saints.

Our other classes consisted of history, geography, science, and math, but always presented through the lens of the Party. I listened carefully, attentively. I attended all the classes, read the books, and studied
the texts. But instead of becoming more convinced of the merits of these ideas, I was becoming anxious, rebellious, and angry.

When I returned home every month, I saw things more clearly, like you do when you meet people you haven't seen for a while. You notice that their hair is grayer, their waistlines thicker, their wrinkles deeper.

Conditions were not as rosy under this regime as the teachers at Tarara were telling us. Since Fidel had passed the Agrarian Reform Law in 1959, the government had seized all the farms, land, businesses, and companies owned by middle- and upper-class Cubans—millions upon millions of dollars in private property.

Political issues between the Cuban and American governments were making things worse. Fidel had defied the Eisenhower administration by nationalizing all kinds of businesses and industries, both foreign and national: department stores, distilleries, breweries, construction companies, paint manufacturers, and bottling companies.

They shut down flour mills, rice mills, even sugar mills. The list was endless. One weekend when I was home, I stopped to talk to a black boy who shined shoes on the corner of a well-traveled street in Guanabacoa.

Alcadio was polite, somber, and earnest. He was shy and pretty much kept to himself. None of us knew his last name, so we referred to him as Alcadio Negrito.

He would bring a small chair from home along with an old wooden stool and set up his “shoeshine shop” not far from his house. He owned two brushes that he cleaned carefully after each use. He had several tins of black, brown, and cordovan polish, and a couple of rags that he folded neatly beside his stool.

Alcadio was meticulous about his work and politely shined the shoes of anyone willing to pay five pesos. Alcadio's father had died in a fishing accident shortly after he was born, and his mother struggled to support a family of five. Alcadio was very proud that the proceeds of his business helped to put food on the table.

One afternoon when business was slow, I sat on the sidewalk to shoot the breeze with him. We started to play gin rummy while he waited for customers. I had a pack of candy cigarettes in my pocket and I offered him one. I had just sucked the cigarette to a point when a policeman approached, looking somber and stern.

“What's going on here?” His tone of voice was so sharp it could have sliced potatoes.

Alcadio and I scrambled to our feet, afraid that the policeman thought we were smoking real cigarettes.

I removed the candy cigarette from my mouth and extended my hand to show it to the officer. “It's just candy.”

The man glanced at the cigarette and then knocked it from my hand. It landed on my trousers, sticking briefly to the cotton material before breaking on the sidewalk. I looked down, chagrined to have lost my sweet.

“I can see that,” said the officer. “I don't give a damn about your cigarettes.”

Alcadio and I looked at each other, dumbfounded.

“Did we do something wrong?” I asked.

“Whose operation is this?” demanded the officer, pointing to the shoeshine stool.

Alcadio looked alarmed. It took him a moment to gather his wits before he could answer.

“I'm the one who shines people's shoes.”

The man looked at Alcadio and made an ugly hissing sound under his breath.

He pointed to me. “And him?”

“He's just a friend,” said Alcadio, waving his hand dismissively. “He doesn't work with me.”

The officer returned his gaze to Alcadio. “How long have you been doing this?”

Alcadio looked confused. “About three years. I give the money to my mother for food.”

“Well, this little game is over.” The officer dropped to his haunches and grabbed Alcadio's work items, tucking them snugly under his arm.

Alcadio looked panic-stricken. “What are you doing?” he said. Tears welled in his eyes. I was afraid he was going to start to cry in front of the officer.

“Private enterprise is no longer allowed. This business is closed. If anybody asks, tell them that your business belongs to the People.”