RAÚL

On weekends I would return to Holguín. The trip from the farm to Holguín was pretty complicated; the farm was in a remote area bordering the Sierra Maestra. I had to walk to a main road, and then hitchhike my way to Bayamo in any kind of vehicle I could get on. From there I had to take a bus, or whatever was available, to Holguín. I was lucky that day and near the park I found a boat. “Boats” were private taxis, still available then, that would load up as many passengers as possible. Later, in a long speech, Castro condemned the “boaters,” saying that they belied socialism, that by earning thousands of pesos a day they would become millionaires and therefore counterrevolutionaries. A passenger in that boat was a fairly good-looking young man who started a conversation with me while the driver was looking for more customers to fill his boat. He said that his name was Raúl and he lived in Holguín but worked in Bayamo. When the taxi was full, Raúl sat pressed against me. It was getting dark. Raúl placed his hand on my leg and slowly let it slide up to my penis. I removed his hand violently and he, perhaps terrified that I would make a scene, did not look at me again or say another word during the entire trip. But as we were approaching Holguín, I took Raúl’s hand and placed it on my penis. I think he was somewhat surprised; I was completely aroused, and he started to rub my penis right there in the car full of people. I do not know if they noticed what was going on and just enjoyed watching, but it was already pitch-dark, and there was no electricity along the highway. I ejaculated before we reached Holguín. I must confess it was a liberating experience. The moment had finally come, so long awaited and so long rejected by me. I remember Raúl, in the dark car, wiping my pants with his handkerchief.

At the Calixto García Park, which was the final stop for the taxi, I got off and so did Raúl. He tried to talk to me, perhaps to arrange a meeting or give me his telephone number or something, but I turned away and ran without stopping until I got home, which was pretty far away, in a neighborhood on the outskirts of Holguín called Vista Alegre.

When I arrived, my mother, my cousin Marisela (who was an invalid), my grandparents, and my aunts were all there. I was afraid they would read in my face what had happened. I was elated and had a feeling of joy that my mother did notice because, after all, there was nothing to be happy about. I was even in a joking mood, and ravenously hungry. In fact, I was content; I had found a fulfillment I had never experienced before.

The next afternoon I went to Central Park in Holguín, where all the young people usually gathered. I thought Raúl might be there, and after walking around the park two or three times, I saw him. He greeted me as if nothing had happened and invited me for a drink at a nearby bar on Liberty Street. This bar was a revelation to me, a bar just for homosexuals. It was crowded with men, some very macho, others extremely feminine, but the atmosphere was one of absolute camaraderie and fellowship. Such places still existed then in Holguín and in the rest of the Island. Later they disappeared.

My erotic encounters with Raúl took place every weekend at the local hotels. In those days two men could still rent a room in a hotel and spend the night together. The Petayo, Tauler, and Expreso hotels witnessed our adolescent passions. We enjoyed ourselves in those creaky beds that sometimes had dirty sheets; in our moments of passion we did not pay attention to such things.

My family started to notice that my absences were rather mysterious; if I came to Holguín only once a week and did not even spend the night at home, something was going on. I think that is when they began to suspect, though without any proof, that I was having a relationship with a man. Perhaps what bothered my mother most was my good mood when I returned home, that even my face seemed to have changed a little; it was smoother. My happiness was like an insult in that house filled with abandoned women and a somewhat embittered old couple. But my nights were intense and I could not hide my joy. I fell in love with Raúl, but he was not in love with me; for him I was a whim, a peasant boy whom he had initiated in sex, so to speak, considering that my childish sexual contacts with my cousin Orlando were just games, quite far from reaching a climax and all the mysteries of erotic love. Raúl tired of me though, and at some point he said or at least suggested as much. It was a hard blow for me; he had been my first lover, and the whole affair lasted only three or four months. In those days I had a different idea about sexual relations; I loved someone and I wanted that person to love me; I did not believe that one had to search, unceasingly, to find in other bodies what one body had already provided. I wanted a permanent love, wanted what perhaps my mother had always yearned for; that is, a man, a friend, someone we could belong to and who would be ours. But it was not to be, and I do not think this is possible, at least not in the gay world. The gay world is not monogamous. Almost by nature, by instinct, the tendency is to spread out to multiple relationships, quite often to promiscuity. It was normal for me not to understand this at the time; I had just lost my lover and felt completely disillusioned. Besides, my job at the farm was getting more and more boring, and now I lacked even the expectation of meeting Raúl and making love. I did not believe I could find another lover, nor did I even want one.