The Troubleseeker by Alan Lessik

Author:Alan Lessik
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: literary, cuba, gay story, gay romance, gay novel, gay adventure, gay men, gay literary, decut novel
Publisher: Chelsea Station Editions

Chapter Sixteen

Antinio’s misery grew. In Cuba, he had his family. He had his few books and clothes. And he had a sense of belonging. It was home, with the familiar smells of beans and pork, the chipped paint, the dated markings of his height on the closet doorway; home, where the television was always on, loud and brassy, with ill-groomed men and women reading the news, never daring to vary from their scripts. Even when confined, Antinio had been able to hear the playful screams of children in the neighborhood and the music blaring, a mixture of songs, some wistful, some happy, with rumba, merengue, and ballads.

The worst place to suffer is a strange place where people either do not understand you or make no attempt to. Flipping through the only book he owned, he wondered how Odysseus had managed. After ten years away, he had started his journey home only to be kept captive by Calypso on her island for seven years. Reading it this time, Antinio could only focus on the seven years. What did Odysseus do all that time? Did he miss his son, Telemachus, who was growing up without him? Did the pain of being stuck in a place he did not want to be eat at him daily, reminding him that the only thing he desired—to leave—was forbidden? When Odysseus finally left Calypso’s clutches, his next stop was the land of the Lotus eaters, where his men ate the narcotic fruit that made them forget their reason for going home. Could anything make me forget my home?

Antinio decided to go for a walk. By now he was familiar with every inch of the camp, and he usually walked around the perimeter fence several times a day. The outside world was scarcely inches away, yet like a caged animal he could only pace back and forth along the fence gazing at what he could not reach. It reminded him of the Berlin Wall randomly cutting off parts of the city, this simple chain-link fence separating him from everything else on the entire planet.

* * *

I was also frustrated because time moved so slowly. I had paced the perimeter of the refugee camp for the hundredth time that day when a ball rolled up to my feet.

“And what will be the fate of this ball, Hadriano?”

I turned around and there was Elegguá, smiling with a cigar in his mouth.

“Is this another one of your tricks? A ball has no fate.”

“There is a path for everything. This ball can remain here, or it can be picked up and moved. It can bring great joy or tragic sorrow or simply be forgotten.”

“Elegguá, do you ever take anything seriously?”

“I take all things seriously, Hadriano, including sharpening my wit. I would have thought you had learned some things during your centuries with the gods. Loosen up. You have eternity, so have some fun. And remember your place. You crave to see Antinio’s fate, yet you don’t even realize yours, do you?”

“My fate is to be a demigod.

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