Hope in Havana

Naked, I tell lies through obscenities. I watch the sweat drip from his dark brow, his flesh the color of sawdust against my hue of midnight. My hands engage, my hips thrust, my mind wanders. He grapples with my legs, reaches for me with a primative intensity. I tell him he is the greatest of lovers, but truly his mediocrity and lack of control is revolting. I once loved him in earnest, and now we are friends eventually shedding the role of companion to engage as lothario and mistress. He climaxes and lays beside me with a satisfied grin. I force a smile to hide my disgust, but I am only repeled by my acceptance of another affair.

I, Havana chose to bed with my former lover for the simple truth that I still loved him as child loves, ignorantly, blindly, and without question. I yearned to rekindle a passion that had became a desperate yearning. Lust was the closest to affection and all Benjamin could display for me was sexual carnality. I knew I wasn't one to win hearts, no charm or verbose poetry to force a proclamation of affection from his lips. To attempt the feat would be an effort without victory. I settled for another one of Love's variants and of the closest resemblance. Afterall, Love and he are twins, doomed to cause confusion by all who behold the two because of their uncanny similarity. Lust and concupiscence is so close to love, that one doesn't know the difference untill the sheets have cooled, the warmth within your loins doesn't stir, and loneliness again beds within your heart.

At the realization, I looked about his dimly lit apartment. My purpose was served.The light shyly illuminated his bedroom through time worn blinds. For the last time I would inhale the aroma of his cologne and gaze at the mirror's reflection as our bodies intertwined. I sat up, uncovered and exposed, to a cigarette and a lighter from his nightstand. I fished a newport out and lit it, exhaling long and slow. The smoke lingered, but I hadn't the time to stay for I had lingered in his footsteps and shadow for far too long. Besides, I was seventeen and he was twenty-one. In life, however, I had experience when all he had was age.

He lay, propped by his elbows, in a position that reminded me of a greek God, so virile, so handsome. I had lingered long enough. I diverted my attention and watched as he stared at me in a fixed gaze. His body language insisted another liaison, but I couldn't give him the possession because he had rejected the part of me that is unsurpassed... my heart. I waved away his kisses, caresses, embraces. Finally, he ended with an exasperated sigh.

"What, baby Ben?" I coo and use his pet name, my affection appelation for such a beauty as he. I take another long drag from the cigarette, and with my free hand I lightly trace the lines of his neck thinking how painful it would be to never hold him as intimately as the hours prior.

"Save me a short of that Newport, ahight?" He asks and kisses my cheek. He spoke the words so boyishly, I smiled. Poor love didn't know it was the end. He kisses my lips as if he were seducing me, but who could imitate an art women had whole perfection of? I smile knowing I would've given him his request. I could've given him the world if only he had pretended I was the sole being of his.The cigarette would be our last time sharing anything other than late night conversations and darkest secrets exchanged through phone circuits. I stroke his chin, look him in the eye one last time before the moment is lost. He never looked so perfect.

"Sure, baby. You know you can." I take a few more pulls from what the conservative call vile and place it gingerly upon his full lips. I dress, and I leave with a brief salutation and final caress. Benjamin is no longer a frequent aquaintence in my private hell, but having him eased the misery of my plight. He is out of my dark abyss...but our last moments in each other's arms is buried in the cemetary of my thoughts, to haunt my dreams.Pity, I could've given him the world.

I sit and await for the bus on an old park bench, aged and worn by the elements. Outside Benjamin's dimly lit apartment and beyond the ghetto in which his apartment was placed, it was a surprisingly beautiful day with the sky tinted in a wonderful spectrum of blue and an array of floating cumulus clouds. I have a pensive face as I watch cars pass in swift blurs. Pedestrians pass, I barely notice. I'm lost in my own thoughts.

Raised amongst roman catholics, often one turns to God when lost, confused, or in peril. I was no exception because I was the down trodden, the seemingly forgotten. I was hurting with a depth that words couldn't utter. A hurt so deep that if tears were too fall, the drops couldn't fathom the reason as to why they were produced. I prayed a prayer in my mind figuring that in the lord's omnipotence... he'd receive my pleas."Dear Lord, give me a love I'd recognize as yours." He is a powerful God. Satan had given me a shovel to dig a grave impentrable to bystander or beholder, and just then God allowed me to lift my head to see a light above my own Acheron. He was beautifully crafted with a build an architect would envy, and as if to confirm his arrival he obtrusively tapped my shoulder and pulled me from my thoughts. I looked up visibly annoyed and greeted by a handsome face that rivaled if not topped Benjamin's . He simply asked,

"Mind if I sit with you?"

What time period had he emerged from? If he wasn't aware of the current state of the world, one did not have to ask whether or not one "minded" sitting beside another... you simply sat the hell down. I always found no matter my current mood, I could disguise vehemency and hurt with the skill actresses would envy. My mouth finds a way to force a smile and say,

"I don't mind," when I indeed did mind. He was handsome. He had skin the tincture of dark coffee with just a hint of cream, his eyes were a surprising pigment of deep green. I admit he was in a league that greatly excelled my own with clothing screaming unaffordable to the average. He looked no older than twenty. And his name was,

"Emmanuel, and who are you?" He asks with a smile revealing teeth that rivaled ivory. He looks with an interest, and I am struck with a compelling familiarity as if I had once known him.

"Havana," I say and turn my head towards him. He is sitting on a park bench alongside me, waiting for a bus, how untouchable could he possibly be?

"Like da island?" he implies, amused.

"Yea, I guess," I say and am annoyed by his amusement. Does he find my name to be a jest?

"I once went there," he comments and tilts his head to the side.

"bullshit," I rudely blurt and am surprised by my own audacity. He only smiled and continued.

"Yea, I have been. Let me tell you?" He asks and with a look of sincerity, I didn't doubt him. His eyes looked so honest that either he was one of the original actors of a Shakespearean play or he was literally telling me the truth.

I nod and let him continue a marvelous account of a land I had never stepped foot upon. As he spoke, I concluded he knew of Havana. I had a glimpse of his character, and I further concluded that he only knew one Havana... the other felt a compelling eagerness and willingness to introduce him to other. Afterall, I could be much more pleasurable.