Author: Leonid Lopez

I used to be suspicious of people who carry handkerchiefs in their pockets. When I say “used to”, I mean when I was still living in Cuba. I can’t explain what I had against handkerchiefs exactly. I suppose I felt I was surrounded by things that called for something other than a handkerchief…

Nakamura would come see me at the bar once a week. He’s the kind of person that people can only describe as “normal” or “down-to-earth” when you ask about them. He’d put a lot of effort into becoming that kind of person.

The spring, which had a late start this year, is hot as summer today. Heading home in the bus, I savor the cool gusts of air that issue from the AC. It is a dry, dense cold. Suddenly, a soothing stillness seems to take hold of my body and sighs take the place of thoughts. I would like to remain like this forever, I tell my reflection on the window pane.

The jester is on the tightrope, with the king looking at him from his throne. The jester, blindfolded, has to guess his every step. The king — in ecstasy — anxiously waits for him to fall. Who reigns higher? Who’s the fool? Who’s bones are broken even before the fall?

If you dig a tunnel through the earth you may find yourself not in China but on your own rooftop, even though it’s no longer thatched, but prefabricated and covered with solar panels

It’s kind of an old pedestrian boulevard, except its indoors. Shops are on the sides. It’s a long walkway with several smaller and narrower corridors that branch off. In that environment are two well-known odors. One is the smell of night, which my bones know from sleeping anywhere in Havana. The other smell is that of mothballs.

That day I learned what cold was, that food could be used for more than eating, that families can survive dismemberment. But what was most important was that I decided this would be my future stage.

With one hand I hit a small conga drum, with the other I drank coffee. My head flew far away, I don’t know where. Then I remembered, the knocks on the hotel door, which even in the fog of sleep I opened. She was standing in front of me. Her smile was the one I teased her about one day.

To describe it as a dream would be to miss the point. Dreams always look at one’s own possibilities, though they’re over in a few hours. That moment was too alien, like a strange and confident animal that let’s you pet it and then runs away.