To Break an Hourglass
By
Hayley Del Maynard
Published by Hayley Del Maynard at Smashwords, February 2012
Copyright 2012 by Hayley Del Maynard
All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced in any form, in whole or in part, without written permission from the author.
Chapter 1
She smelled of peppermint and honeysuckle and wore a broad ankle-length skirt and a long sleeved, starched collar, white blouse every day. She was rigid and straight, angular in movement, even her breathing was regimented, inhales and exhales exactly timed. They say she was born old. Maybe it was the culmination of drama filled past lives or an aptitude for solemnity; no one knew why or how Ms. Samantha Cunningham came to be, but there were speculations.
As for me, I always kinda liked her. Most of the other kids in the neighborhood hated her scolding for no reason other than accidentally stomping in her flower beds.
“Just playing, we are kids,” they’d always say when she would tell them off for hitting a baseball into her garden. They didn’t see it but it was there, a faint glimmer of warmth, compassion, (or could it be a glimpse of untamed spirit?) behind those taciturn eyes. I’d always look for it when receiving a scolding, maybe that’s why I never thought ill of her.
Deep down I thought there was a reason for her framed nature, but it wasn’t until many years later that I learned her story.
Chapter 2
I was born in 1937, the year Amelia Earhart died, in Greenville, Alabama so named after the green river that ran through it. I was always adventuring, or as momma would say “finding trouble”. She used to tell me she swore the spirit of that danged pilot found its way into my soul. Jemaline Marie Foster was my given name, but I never heard all that, not unless I was in trouble any way. Jem was what they’d call me. Every now and then on the first day of school some teacher would try to work her way through my full name, she’d struggle through the first couple syllables of my first name before someone in the class would yell out “Just call her Jem!” I was never paying attention. Momma said I just couldn’t be bothered to be in the present, but, I don’t know, my mind always just had better places to be than the ones afforded to me inside the four corners of school.
Greenville is a small town located two hours south of nowhere and three hours east of nothing. The only directions out of town were South which reigned in storm clouds and the occasional twister, and West always the direction of opportunity thanks to its fictionally alluded repertoire. It was a quiet town to say the least. A drive-in movie theater, really just a white screen lifted every Saturday between two poles in a parking lot, a grocery store, and of course an old Southern bar. There was one two-story house in town and it sure wasn’t mine.
My old man was a faithful member of the Greenville Saloon an alcoholic by trade, “some are gifted athletes or scholars and some are just born to drink” he’d say. But he wasn’t angry nor a violent man, just settled in his potential thwarted fate. Our relationship was one of resigned intermingling. I harbored no ill will toward him, he was a DNA donor and for that I was grateful. Out of chromosomal duty I think I loved him and like to think deep down somewhere he felt the same. Occasionally, when I really messed up he’d grin real wide and pull me up a chair to sit by him. I never knew if it was conciliatory or just that misery loves company, but the unexpected extra attention always made me feel better and that’s what I chose to take away from that.
My momma was pretty. Everyone in town told stories about what a heartthrob she was in her younger years. Even later when the old man would get too inebriated to stumble home and she would have to go and fetch him, jaws would drop and heads would turn when she’d walk into that saloon. A smart lady too, she could talk politics with the educated and hem lines with the old women. A firecracker some called her. But an untimed pregnancy her last year of high school tied her and my father with matching rings and a matching fate. I didn’t read too much into her borderline apathetic nature. I personified the culmination of dashed hopes and unreached potential, a tactfully placed banana peel on the sidewalk of fate. She was a stern, unapproachable lady, but she always made sure I had a shirt on my back and a somewhat full belly. Every morning she’d wake at dawn, holler at me to get going, and then walk to the country store where she worked as the clerk. Regimented and timely she was, though I like to think she wasn’t always that way. But she was never in want of a bed, some nice gentleman could always afford her that, and sometime before the sun came up she’d crawl back into the cave and wait for dawn.
Me, I was a tomboy from day one, and as a former pageant winner, Momma disapproved of everything about me. I’d wear shorts and a t-shirt everyday. Whenever Momma wrestled me into a dress I’d dirty it as fast as I could. I’d play baseball and kick the can until the streetlights came on while the other girls played with their dolls and strollers. A latch key kid from an early age I came and went as I pleased. Dad was always getting drunk and Momma, well, whether or not rumors about her bed of choice were just hearsay, she wouldn’t get home ‘til late either. I was pretty independent from a young age, had to be I suppose; but I was good at making friends and enjoyed popping over to others’ houses for dinner and some motherly affection. Their moms would treat me like an adopted child and smother me with the kisses I never got at home.
I guess I had about a million friends, though none close. Something kept me from really bonding with others in Greenville, except for the dogs but I just think it’s because we were the only color-blind things in that town. I crossed both sides of the tracks spending time with black and white, I could never tell the difference between anyone anyway. Life and the people in that molasses town crept along about as fast as a two legged dog with an elephant on its back, and me I ran with the wind, that is when it could keep up.
I’d spend summer days playing in the river and winter ones exploring the bush. The other kids and I would play until the street lamps began to twinkle, and then they would all run home. But I always liked the night. Everything was so still. I’d listen to the cricket symphonies and chase the bats; I especially liked dissecting the light parts from fireflies and putting them on my fingers. Most summer nights I would walk home with ten firefly rings glowing on my hands.
But mostly when I was alone I thought about what lay out of reach, what was out there in the rest of the world. For most people of Greenville, Alabama life stopped at the town limits.
“Why leave?” they’d ask me when I questioned what lay beyond our humble boundaries. “You eat well here, don’t ya? Got clothes on your back, friends to play with, a bed to sleep in, and a church to pray? What more you want, silly child?”
Yep, most everyone in town, both sides a’ the tracks thought like this, most everyone, that is, except one. Samantha Cunningham.
She fit in with the rest of the town at first glance all right. Conservative dress, tidy garden, pious, erect, but there was something different. First of all she wasn’t married and didn’t work. She was cordial with everyone in town no matter the skin color, saying “good morning” when it was called for and “good evening” when required, but unlike everyone else in town, she never engaged in summer time sunset porch gossip or wintertime tea small talk. Sure she discussed the weather, the Sunday sermon, and occasionally a really exquisite roast pork recipe she had tried, but when the conversation would turn towards goosy, tittle-tattle chitchat she would always come up with a reason to excuse herself from the conversation. Everyone liked her, well, to be more accurate no one disliked her, but see it’s hard to like someone you don’t understand. No one knew why she had no husband; she was a very pretty lady even for her middle age. It was a toss-up between her and my momma who could turn more heads in town. But unlike my flesh and blood Samantha Cunningham didn’t seek out different pillows in fruitless attempts to dream away her past nor did she poison her bloodstream to kill off those damn memories of what coulda been. Where she got the money (because she must have money to live without working) and how she ended up in Greenville were constant topics of gossip among the townsfolk for at least as long as I can remember.
From a young age I found myself drawn to Samantha. I’d rack my brain for excuses to go to her house, most of the time she wouldn’t answer the door, but every so often she’d resign a sigh and almost laugh as she opened her house to an unruly child. Each visit I would use every mental crow bar I possessed to try and pry stories from her tacit lips, but although never even the mention of adventure escaped her breath she couldn’t ever quite close the shutters of her eyes and I was encouraged on by the shimmering light tucked away just below the surface.
I had a gangly body that I eventually grew into, scraggly blonde hair I chose never to tame, and once I hit puberty I acquired the womanly features so exaggerated in societal fixations. From my momma I inherited all my features, and people ‘round town liked to proclaim the likeness they observed between us. Deep down though I hoped that a physical resemblance was all I came into from her.
Primary school whisked away with it my innocence, but I didn’t tell time by the passing of periods, or the changing of seasons. The cumulating wrinkles under my momma’s eyes and my pappa’s growing belly let me know that time was indeed passing for them so it must be passing for me.
In high school when boys made their first appearance on my radar it was my momma’s eyes that told me to be careful, her submissive spirit that warned me never to be like her. Those once beautiful, vibrant eyes, dulled by the stained mascara marks on her lower lids and the crow’s feet not from laughter but from tears, they spoke louder than the harshest shrill. In his consistent deference to my maturing person my old man would acknowledge me in the morning with a groan. Then he would down his first and only glass of water for the day with the first of many aspirin, numbing himself before continuing his personal onslaught. The only love I knew was in co-habitation, but it suited me as I think it suited them. But Ms. Cunningham, while maybe not quite as tight skinned as she was seventeen years prior, exhibited far less evidence of the ravages of time. It seemed to me then that she was on her own schedule. The Gregorian unitary time schedule that the rest of the world operated under didn’t play into her day-to-day life. Even then I could see that time knew better than to try and control her.
Through my teenage years, I still sought out the company of Ms. Cunningham. Though she afforded me neither secrets nor long awaited stories, I saw in her something I wanted to see in myself. And she was the only other white lady in town who saw no difference between herself and the black people living just across the railroad tracks.
It was Ms. Cunningham who prompted my literary thirst. From Robinson Crusoe to Tarzan, I was captivated by every novel she gave me, and I longed for my own adventures.
Chapter 3
I remember that day like it was Christmas though it was far from innocent and joyous. It was April 15, 1954. Communism was a growing threat, US and Soviet ties were straining, to say the least, and the Korean War had just ended. But you’d hardly know any of this walking around Greenville. Life still meandered on like a wandering stream through a lazy meadow. Black people lived on one side of the tracks, white people on the other. The drive-in still showed a picture on Saturday night and Momma still worked at the only grocery in town. I was seventeen and felt every bit of it. My old man drove himself into the ground, a decrepit body and a wasted spirit, doomed to drink ‘til Death would save him. And Momma, well it was her eyes that gave her away, older, still pretty, but worse for the wear, like a wilting flower. But it was those sunken blue eyes. I couldn’t look into them anymore, it was like looking at a suicide scene, all I could see was her drowned self.
But on that fresh spring day, April 15, someone new came into town, a tall dark brown man in a tailored suit carrying nothing but a briefcase and a daisy. He spoke to no one and no one spoke to him. Brown people didn’t have much place in Greenville—he was neither black nor white so no one could direct him to stay on a certain side of the tracks. Maybe he could just stand in the middle? He walked around town all afternoon looking for something or someone. After school, I went to Ms. Cunningham’s to drop off a book and talk with her about the mysterious man in town but when I got there she was feverishly packing a small suitcase. Throwing clothes I had never seen before into a brown leather bag. Pants, shorts, knife, gun? Where had these items come from? In all my secret explorations of her house I had never come across any of these objects.
“Ms. Cunningham?” I queried with a somewhat shaky voice. “Ms. Cunningham, begging pardon, but what are you doing?”
“I’m packing.” She replied tersely.
“For where?” Disbelief enveloped my being.
“I’m leaving, Jem.”
“Then I’m coming too.”
“No.”
“Why not? I have nothing here. I want to come with you wherever you’re going.”
“No, Jem, I’m not coming back. It will be dangerous. You are safe here. You will stay.”
“It’s because of that man, in’t it? I’ll tell him I know you if you won’t let me come. Everyone in town knows I spend most of my time with you. If he’s dangerous I’m better off with you. I’m coming.”
Maybe it was because she actually thought I’d be safer with her, or maybe because every second was vital to our escape, but she relented. She threw in an extra coat and pair of slacks knowing full well I wouldn’t have let her out of my sight to run home and pack up a bag for myself, not that I had any belongings I was attached to anyway.
I remember the stillness of her house during those furious moments of packing. The air was cold and clammy; it was as if even the oxygen in the air was nervous. The bookcase full of the magical worlds I had spent most of my life indulging in stood still against the wall too scared too move. But Ms. Cunningham seemed neither nervous nor afraid; she was alive. It was like my entire life she had been asleep and she had finally woken up and was ready to live. As of yet, though, I had no idea that she was indeed ready to live again.
As we were leaving through the back door I turned back and saw the brown man in the tailored suit carrying a briefcase and a daisy. He was opening the white gate and carefully striding up the path to the front door.
Chapter 4
In Ms. Cunningham’s car driving at what seemed the speed of light, I realized what was happening. I was leaving Greenville, Alabama heading toward the world outside. This must be what astronauts feel like. My whole life had been spent in the safety and comfort of the known. Greenville was its own world. We were self-sufficient. We could eat, sleep, and pray in that town, what reason was there to leave? I suppose if the purpose of my life was just to survive then I wouldn’t have left, but I wanted more.
Racing down roads I had never seen nor ever heard of, I had no idea where we were going and Ms. Cunningham was in no mood for chatter. I gained from the setting sun to my right we were heading south. I felt as if I was standing still and the world was rushing past me: trees and bushes, road signs, telephone poles blurring together in a mesh of silent color. This must be what Alice felt like as she fell into Wonderland. We drove on through the night into and out of small towns. I could tell my companion was trying to avoid main highways, but it was clear she was trying to get somewhere tonight and come hell or high water we were going to get there.
Sleep comes in the most unlikely of times. Even though I was anxious and excited, nervous and scared, and sleep seemed the last thing of which I’d be capable, I drifted off into a world of dreams.
Too soon Ms. Cunningham was gently shaking me awake, “We’re here, Jem. Come on. Quickly and keep quiet. I’ll do all the talking.”
I followed her rapid footsteps tracing as closely behind as I could. The night air was thick around us wrapping me in its unfamiliarity like a long-lost kin. The night sky, normally scattered with stars was devoid of light except for the moon, the only one brave enough to shine. We were at a small harbor and a vessel was docked just a ways away from shore. Gripping her small suitcase and quickly checking to make sure I was right behind, she motioned for me to help her launch the small paddle boat into the water. As quietly as we could we pushed the boat into the water and Ms. Cunningham paddled us out to the waiting vessel.
As we approached the man aboard motioned for us to climb the ladder up the side of the boat and climb aboard. It was a smaller vessel, about 40 feet long. As we climbed aboard the captain left us and as soon as both Ms. Cunningham and I were on board I felt the creature spring to life and we were off. For the first time since leaving Ms. Cunningham’s house in Greenville, I looked back. To my fear and surprise, I saw two headlights pulling up to the shore of the harbor as we were leaving. I grabbed my cohort’s arm and turned her attention to the shore, but to my surprise she responded distractedly, “I know he’s been trying to follow us. Guess he knows we’ve left now. Won’t be long before the others know as well.” I wanted to ask what she was talking about, beg for more information, but she was off to find the captain and I was left standing by the rail further wrapping myself in cool night air.
* * *
I was standing at the rail of the boat looking out at the infinite darkness like an abyssal vacuum. It reminded of summer nights on a new moon when I would go swimming in the river. I used to love swimming deep down to the bottom of the river until I couldn’t see anything, until I didn’t know which way was up or down. I’d pretend I was swimming around outer space, exploring a territory I would never understand. Sailing out into the open ocean then I felt that same exploratory sense of adventure.
Eventually Ms. Cunningham returned with the captain of the boat. He was a jovial old man about seventy years old give or take. He had a white scraggly beard, red circle cheeks, and a belly that evoked just as much emotion as his eyebrows. It bounced with a hearty laugh and sunk with melancholy. On his head was a fisherman’s knit hat, which looked as if it had never been replaced, or removed for that matter, in at least half a century.
“So this is the girl is it then?” He said winking at me like we shared an inside joke, while I stood there frozen trying to trace a non-existent gag. “Just up and left her family and friends to come with you then, and you let her?”
“I tried to make her stay but she wouldn’t have any of it,” Ms. Cunningham replied curtly.
“Right, well, she’s not much older than you were when you left. Born to be free this one. Greenville ain’t no place for a meandering spirit like this,” he said gesturing with his callused thumb in my direction.
“No, I suppose not, but she can’t come with me. It’s not her duty to accompany me on this mission, it’s too dangerous; and I can’t be responsible for her along the journey. Can’t you watch her? She’s a smart girl, clever, really, inventive to get herself into something, I’m sure she can weasel out a future.”
“Well,” the captain started, but I cut him off.
“I don’t want to go with him! I don’t even know him. I want to travel with you, wherever you’re going I want to go. I won’t be any trouble. I’ll do the washing, cooking, cleaning, whatever you say, ma’am, just let me come with you!” I begged in a borderline hysterical voice.
“I can’t think about this right now, we’ll talk about what’s to come with you in the morning. Right now I need to think,” and with that she retreated to her own corner of the boat and what seemed her own corner of the universe.
“Right, well, I’m Roger Sternwell, captain of this here lovely ship Victoria. You can call me Roger. How ‘bout I show you to your temporary living quarters?”
“Do you mind if I just stay up on the deck a while longer, the salty air will only help.”
“Do what you need. There’s a bed and blanket down the stairs, first left off the hallway. Can’t miss it.”
“Thank you.”
Just hours ago I was enduring English class with Mrs. Long and contemplating spring prom dance prospects. How trivial my high school problems seemed right now. Staring into the distance, I could see Ms. Cunningham deep in thought, her long wavy brown hair being tousled in the light sea breeze. Charisma, power and beauty seemed to ebb through her being and emanate even on the starless night. She must have been in her mid-fifties, but she didn’t look a day over thirty. It was as if she had been hibernating in Greenville, gathering strength and stamina before finishing. Finishing what? Maybe starting? How little I knew of her. I don’t know how long I stood staring in her direction before I felt a hand on my shoulder. Roger had returned with a warm cup of tea and some bread. Instantly realizing how ravenous I was, I inhaled the gifts. He smiled serenely.
“Beautiful girl. Always has been really. I remember the day her parents brought that smiling baby aboard my ship, musta been fifty some odd years ago. Seems like just yesterday. Funny that Time, he finagles. Reckon had Time been a gambling man, he woulda made a hell a’ poker player.” Roger chuckled.
“You knew her when she was a baby?” I queried trying to imagine the mysterious beautiful woman as a child.
“Known her her whole life. Her parents and I were good friends in Havana back in the days when adventure lurked around every corner and responsibility rarely paid visit.”
“Can you tell me about her?”
“I can tell you ‘bout her parents, maybe her childhood, but the rest, them’s aren’t my stories to tell.”
“Ok, then, tell me about Havana.”
He assumed the storyteller position, leaning against the back railing and fixing his eyes on the past like it was a set point on the horizon. “Samantha Cunningham, she comes from mighty fine stock, mighty fine stock indeed. Idealistic folks, gotta love ‘em. I was working as an importer of goods legal and illegal out of Guantanamo Harbor in the 80’s and 90’s. Cuba attracted guys like me. Wanderlust expats, explorers, sailors, drug dealers, politicians, the high and mighty and the street scum. But we all drank together and smoked big long cigars, dancing salsa and meringue ‘til the wee hours of the mornin’. Dangerous place as well. The Spanish were pulling in the reigns on their little colony. Cubans wanted independence from the motherland, Blacks wanted independence from the Spanish settlers, fuck everyone wanted something, including good ol’ Uncle Sam. You see Spain controlled Guam, Puerto Rico, the Philippines, and Cuba, and well, America wanted those. Word out on the street was Spain was getting heavy-handed with the unruly Cubans. Rumors were that civilians were getting thrown into reconcentrados, like concentration camps.” He shifted his arm behind his back, glanced at me to gauge my interest, and then resumed. “I think Hitler got the prototype for his incarceration facilities from these reconcentrados. Anyway thousands were dying. Sam’s parents here were spies for the US. They were sent to Cuba to verify these rumors and find an excuse for the US to enter into war with Spain.
“Sam’s parents, as I’ve said, they were real people. Trying to save the world they were, one conflict resolution, one damned corrupt leader at a time. But that’s the thing about corrupt leaders. They’re like cockroaches, soon’s one’s dead another comes outta the woodwork. Her mom and pop came on down to Havana to do the old hen’s bidding. Few months after they arrived they sent photo proof confirming the rumors about the Spanish. Unbeknownst to them these photos were getting leaked to one William Randolph Hearst, who back in the States, was publishing these photos inciting the American citizens and selling millions of his newspapers. Greed is an evil-eyed hornet that doesn’t just sting once. With his journalistic monopoly on this situation, he wouldn’t be satisfied until all-out war was declared. Imagine with insiders releasing photos and information only to him, he would have a monopoly on American international news. Untapped wealth, really. But the photos of these reconcentrados weren’t enough to declare war on Spain. The US needed to be personally affected. Something had to happen to draw her into a war so the rest of the world wouldn’t see what she was up to. A secret committee was formed consisting of Hearst, Captain Charles Sigsbee, and other military officials.
“The battleship USS Maine had been stationed in Guantanamo Bay to protect the 7,000 American citizens living in Cuba at the time. Protection, though, ha makes me laugh! Those dim-witted sailors who couldn’t hold their liquor in the bars fucking everything with a vagina, they couldn’t protect shit from crap. Maybe the government figured that too, ‘cuz they decided to blow up their own battleship making it look like an attack from the Spanish. Now, those Spanish were dickheads but they weren’t dumb. They wouldn’ta come near that battleship with a ten thousand foot pole.
“So they blow this ship up and Hearst prints his photos and spins his yarns and lights a fire in the patriotic belly of every god damned American in fifty fucking states. And we’re off to war. Smart couple kids Sam’s parents were though, don’t think they believed for a moment it was the Spanish. But 250 died in the explosion and thousands of women and children were dying in these reconcentrados so they tried to work right from wrong from a quantifiable unitary standard. They stayed on in Cuba, the US was entangled in the former Spanish colony’s affairs for some time after the war. Everyone won, Hearst made millions from paper sales during the war, the US got Guam, the Phillippines, and Puerto Rico in the Treaty of Paris, and Sam’s parents continued living the Havana lifestyle.
“Tumultuous times, as you can imagine back then. But the danger and apartheid made the city that much more beautiful. Every day was beautiful. Funny how flirting with death makes life that much more grand. And little Sam was raised in the heart of it. Always beautiful she was. Smart as a whip too. Inherited her parents’ accent and brains, but that spirit, that’s all hers. Had a zest for life—still does I think. Not a heart in Havana that didn’t belong to her.
“But in 1912 the already apparent line between Black and European was cut even clearer. Sam’s parents were in the wrong place at the wrong time. They had just enough warning to hide Sam in the trap door underneath the closet before rebels came in and slaughtered the pair of ‘em. Never found Sam though. I saw her that day, didn’t recognize her at first. She was only 14 before the murder, seemed a full woman when I saw her that afternoon. Heard the news and ran and found her. She was heading for the harbor, didn’t say anything to me, just kissed me on the cheek and walked aboard a ship. Found her parents’ bloody corpses cold as ice with a daisy each placed top. Didn’t see her again for ‘bout ten years t’least.” His voice trailed off into the night. His story hung suspended in the air replacing the lost stars. He smiled a wry, coy gleam, “Get some sleep, ocean’ll still be there in the morning.” And he was off to join Samantha. Knowing that story time had ceased for the night, I dragged myself below deck and collapsed onto the first bed I came across. I woke a few hours later and found myself tucked in snugger than I had ever been before.
Chapter 5
I awoke the next morning to the sound of seagulls overhead. I’d read of them before, and although I’d never seen or heard one befor,e I recognized the obnoxious trumpeting of their greedy calls. Scampering up the stairs as fast as I could the panoramic ocean vista just about blew me over. So much water. Intimidatingly beautiful, I was at once in love. The temporal hues of the Atlantic struck a heart chord so deep in my soul I knew I’d never be the same again. Ol’ Roger was right, the ocean was still there in the morning. I didn’t know it then, but the ocean would become the only constant in my life, the only thing I could ever count on—its omniscient presence in my life. At the sound of a hearty chuckle, I turned to find Samantha and Roger walking toward me.
“Mornin’ sunshine! Trust you slept well?” Roger inquired, always with that coy smile playing at his lips.
“Like a log, sir.” I replied, old Southern habits coming into play.
“A natural sea farin’ one, I reckon.” He said to Samantha.
“She does seem to be taking to it quite well. How about some breakfast? We can talk about the coming up days.”
They turned and motioned for me to follow. Walking along the deck to the captain’s quarters I surveyed our vessel for the first time in the light. It really was just as I’d imagined. Wooden railing running the circumference of the deck and a helm overlooking the deck of the bow. It look just liked the pirate ships I’d read about in my stories. I followed Roger and Samantha into the Captain’s quarters where eggs and toast were haphazardly placed on a desk covered in a various maps, cartography tools, compasses, and charts.
“Don’t mind the mess, been ages since I had company,” Roger excusedly mentioned. “Right, Sam, to get back to it. We have to sail into Guantanamo; I have some things to do there. And besides I have a contact for you. He’s not the best captain, but he has a boat and I know he’s looking for crew. I’ve heard his next course is eastward through Atlantic waters. He’s not the best ever, but he’s not bad at what he does. He’s expecting us tomorrow night.”
“Fine, fine, fine. You know how I feel about going back to Cuba, though,” she replied reconciling herself to Roger’s plan. “Jem, as I’m sure you’ve gathered, we are en-route to Cuba. From there I will be catching another ship moving east, when we arrive in Cuba you will have options. As an adult you are free to do as you please. Stay in Cuba, find a vessel to work on, whatever you like.”
“I want to stay with you. I’ll go wherever you’re going. I can handle it,” I said trying with every ounce to stamp the petulance out of my voice and make it sound as rational as possible.
“As you wish, however, I will be unable to look after you once we are on our next ship. I can help teach you the skills you’ll need to survive, but other than that you will be required to assure your own existence, and I cannot guarantee our paths will continue in the same direction.”
“Right, deal.”
“Now we got that settled, you two ladies might want to tuck in before I finish the rest of the food here,” Roger said, and sure enough he had eaten most everything.
After breakfast Ms. Cunningham took me out onto the deck to give me my first of many weapons tutorials. After a couple demonstrations, I could take apart and reassemble a hand pistol with relative ease.
“Like I said, a natural,” Roger said as he passed by us and I was finishing reassembling my pistol for the hundredth that morning.
“Not bad,” was her reply.
“Ms. Cunningham, begging pardon, but when do I get to shoot this thing?” I queried, unable to quelch my excitement any longer.
“Jem, it’s Samantha, I don’t even know Ms. Cunningham. And right now seems an appropriate time to learn I reckon.”
She molded my body first extending my right arm straight out in front of me and then moving my left arm so it supported my right. “Keep both eyes open and try to anticipate where your target will be. Often in life it’s not brawn that wins the battle but brains.”
At that time Roger threw three pieces of bait in the air over the side of the boat. Bang Bang Bang! She hit all three with perfect accuracy and timing before they were even close to hitting the surface of the water. I struggled at first, but with patient guidance I started to learn how to anticipate the arced movements of the thrown pieces. It seemed to me not so much predicting the future but rather reading the lines. The moving targets were just victims of the velocity and angles they were thrown at.
“Now you’ve successfully learned to mark a domesticated target; humans, though, are something else,” Samantha stated and my stomach dropped. “Murder is a multi-faceted organism. It is the ultimate invocation of power and carries with it supreme responsibility. Right or wrong and the polarity of moral compasses, the meaning of life and what follows upon death. You reconcile with your own god. I am here to teach you to defend yourself, whatever offensive or defensive actions you choose to take are of your own concern.
“While the laws of physics enable you to predict the locations of your bait targets, it will be your own anthropological knowledge that will help you mark humans. Intelligence in terms of societal standards I think is misguided. Students are recognized for their genius in science and mathematics, writers dignified for the gifts with prose, but I think there is a third form of genius, one that is rarely recognized but could quite possibly be much more important than the other two. Understanding people, being able to read another human being, this I think is the key to life. Knowing a man’s cowardice, being able to predict his actions, molding yourself so as to unlock the secrets of another. Being able to shoot a gun will only get you so far when it comes to killing a man.” And she left me.
As I stood there thinking about all she had said, Roger came over.
“Let’s get on with it then, ‘bout time you learned how to climb a mast,” he said and I spent the rest of the day learning sea faring jargon and sailing jobs.
By sun down, my body and mind were completely drained. My jaw moved automatically as I used what little energy I had left to chew the salted pork and stale crackers we had for dinner. I excused myself to bed, and as I walked down the hall, I heard Roger’s and Samantha’s voices in whispered earnest.
* * *
I woke once again to the sound of gulls, but this time as I rushed to the deck, I didn’t see an infinite ocean, but instead Cuba waited directly ahead, anticipating our arrival. Samantha seemed tense at breakfast, deep in thought; she ate without regard for Roger or I. But the ever-jovial captain kept me entertained with lighthearted chatter about the good ol’ days while I listened to his stories like a granddaughter on his knee. He talked about women he hook, lined, and sinkered, about the one who got away, big fish he’d caught, giant squids and sea monsters he’d battled. His voice sparkled with magic, radiating hope. I especially liked the way his crinkly smile made his whole face light up. Looking into his soft blue eye,s I could see the whole of the seven seas.
As we neared the port harbor, Samantha and Roger rushed around the boat bustling to prepare Victoria for her harbor landing.
Once we docked the boat, we caught a taxi and headed straight to Havana. Everything around me seemed massive, maybe because it was. Trying to digest this city by applying Greenville references just wouldn’t work. Huge colonial edifices with Roman columns juxtaposed ironically with cement and stucco houses. Open markets and crowded streets were filled with jostling citizens. I think I was taken aback by how busy everyone seemed. If reading a newspaper required decision and conviction, which it looked like it did, I could only imagine what politics and business entailed.
We swirled through the city in labyrinthine fashion, making our way slowly from what seemed the affluent area to a much more poverty-stricken region. Life in the streets began to slow as we headed away from the city center. Salsa music poured into the street like rich sunshine, and I was reminded of summer evenings on the porch in Greenville. Here in Havana people sat outside their homes at sunset as well, celebrating with their neighbors their collective appreciation at the conclusion of another day. Instead of slow blues, Spanish guitars harmonized in the streets and the energy of Havana seemed to palpitate in the air. It was as if the music were painting the orange and red sunset that was coloring the sky; and as the colors got darker, the music became heavier. The night seemed to crescendo as we approached the bar where Roger had arranged for us to meet our future boat captain.
Chapter 6
The cantina was packed when we got there and I followed Samantha and Roger to a table in the corner. A waiter came over and Roger ordered us all plates of ropa vieja and moros. As we waited for our food to arrive, I took in my surroundings. Salsa music and flamenco guitars floated through crackly speakers and all-around everyone buzzed in their Spanish tongue. The bar smelled of garlic and bay leaves, and I could feel the humid air filling my lungs with its watery goodness. I loved the feel of this Havana; it was limitless in potential and raw in nature. The women were christened in colorful hues that clung to their skin; they embodied sexuality and wore it well. The men were brazen in nature, strong and defined from the cheekbones to the verbal tones. It was as if everyone in Havana knew what he wanted and exactly how to get it.
Our food came along with three semi-chilled beers, shredded flank steak in a tomato sauce base, black beans, yellow rice, plantains, and fried yucca. I swallowed my beer with parched relish. I let the rice absorb the juice oozing from the black beans and ate the grain legume combo with my fried yucca chips. Back in Greenville, the steak was thick, covered in sauce, and hard for me to chew. But this cut was thin and chewy and the tomato sauce added to the salty taste of the meat rather than overpowering it. This new exotic food danced on my tongue. Everything felt unreal, the past few days had been like a dream. Life seemed to be taunting me like a joker court—could this really be happening?
And then he arrived, Roger’s connection, Captain James Blanchard of La Mentira. He was a mediocre man in all forms, brown-cropped hair, dull, singular eyes, every feature was one dimensional and his personality to match. He had the air of one who wanted to be great, strived to be historical, murdered, cheated, pillaged to be remembered, but fell short, destined, like most, to be forgotten. But it seemed he would not settle for this fate. So, even though he was older and coming to the end of a lifeline rope, he clutched to the side of the cliff refusing to let go until someone cut him loose and prompted the fall.