the whole vagabondo thing or just on a quick vacation?
Which is how I end up spending the next hour chatting with Mikhail the Russian backpacker who really likes to be called Mickey.
He’s in his early twenties and has a round face and the kind of patchy beard and scraggly hair that all backpackers aspire to. He tells me that his family is originally from Armenia, but was in Russia for five generations, how his father was an importer/exporter of some kind who moved the family to America in ’95, which is where the Benson & Hedges caught up with him. He tells me about his four years in Jersey City and the four he spent at NYU in the film department and how he’s been on vacation since last May, but he has to be back after New Year’s to start graduate work in the second semester. And as he’s sucking on his ninth or tenth tequila since he first sat down, I’m thinking that if he really is a Russian gangster hunting me, he has the best cover act ever. Then he leans closer to me, shaking his head.
– I say my father was importer and exporter of goods, but truth is different.
He does another shot of tequila and chases it with
– Truth, he was “business” man.
He says it so I hear the quotation marks.
– Wanted me in “business” with him. Mother was actress, married him for money. Big fucking deal, you know. Everybody in Russia married for money if they could. Mother was so happy I wanted to be artist like her. Pissed father off, pissed him fucking off. But I go to film school. Make film about dancer marries gangster. He dies before he can see film. Fucking “business” man.
I nod my head.
– Businessman, huh?
He’s crying now, big Russian tears.
– Big-shot “business” man.
He slips off the swing, almost hangs himself on the ropes. I steady him and get him standing. He wipes the tears from his eyes.
– Thanks you. Got to put up tent. Sleep.
He stumbles away from the bar.
Pedro comes over.
– Didn’t pay his tab.
– Get him tomorrow, he’s not going anywhere.
– Russians. Can’t drink tequila.
– But don’t get in a vodka-drinking contest with one.
“Business” man.
I chew on that for awhile, until Pedro’s brother buzzes up in his dune buggy with Rolf. They take fuel cans and fishing gear out of the buggy and start hauling it all down to the waterline. I go over and lend a hand.
– Hola.
Rolf bumps fists with me.
– Que pasa, dude?
– Nothing.
He grabs one end of an ice chest, I grab the other and we lift it out of the buggy. Rolf is an American expat: a dreadlocked, nipple-pierced, surf bum vagabond from San Diego who washed up on the Yucatan about ten years ago. He mostly works up in town as a diving instructor for the tourists. He got into business with Pedro’s brother because he likes the action.
They do actually run night-fishing excursions, but I can tell from the amount of fuel I’m now shouldering out to the boat that they won’t be catching anything tonight. Pedro’s brother, Leo, is up in the boat. He has the same flat face and short round body as his brother, but the roundness covers muscles made hard by hauling fishing nets. He easily one-hands the fifteen-gallon fuel can I’ve carried to the boat and tucks it away in the stern. Rolf splashes up, pushing a sealed plastic tub that bobs low in the water. I boost up onto the gunwale and help Leo pull it aboard. Through the translucent plastic I can see a GPS rig, a high-power halogen spotlight, battery cells, and the AK-47 they bring along for these trips. Leo nods his thanks as we clunk the tub down in the bottom of the long-hulled, open fishing boat. I jump back into the water and head for shore. Looking back at Leo, I give him a thumbs-up.
– Via con Dios.
– Always, man, always.
Then he’s yanking the engine to life. I pass Rolf on his way to the boat with a six-pack, the last of the supplies. I bump fists with him again.
– How many?
– Just two. Supposed to be offshore in a raft. We’ll see.
– Luck.
– Fuck that, dude. See you in the morning, you can buy me a beer.
– You got it.
At the bar Pedro and I watch the boat grind off into the surf.
American policy says that any Cuban who can reach U.S. soil legally or illegally will be granted residency, but they’re sticklers on that “soil” part. Get stopped in the water a foot from dry land, and forget it. And since 9/11, those Coast Guard gauntlets around Florida have become a bit more intense. The average Cuban peasant will still get in his raft and cross his fingers. But if you have a couple bucks, you can get guys like Leo and Rolf to help you out. They’ll shoot out to Cuba, pick you up, and bring you back to Mexico, from where, the thinking goes, it’s a lot easier to get to America. And if you fail, it’s still a hell of a lot nicer than Cuba. The money usually comes from a relative here or in the States, because, let’s face it, nobody in Cuba has a pot to piss in, and if they do, they don’t really need to leave.
Pedro watches until the boat disappears from view, shaking his head. Leo is his younger brother and Pedro worries about him. I could tell him they’ll be fine, but that’s no sure thing. It’s around two hundred miles from here to Cuba, a long haul in open water for a boat like that. And they don’t bring that AK along just for the sharks. Anyway, nothing I can do about it. I push away from the bar.
– Hasta manana, Pedro.
– Hasta.
And I head off to take my swim.
I LIFT my arms out of the water in a slow backstroke, then roll myself over and start to swim in earnest. I swim long and hard, making sure to look up at the girls’ fire on the beach from time to time so I don’t end up bobbing halfway to Cozumel. When I’m good and tired, I swim in to shore. I can see that the girls are passing around a couple bottles of something and I think I can smell a little hash on the breeze.
Back at the bungalow, Gram Parsons is just starting in on “Hickory Wind.” I peel off my shorts, drape them over the porch rail, grab the towel I left there, wipe most of the sand from my feet and lower legs. Inside, I pull on a pair of cutoff jeans. The music ends and I throw in some Bill Withers. I grab a bottle of water, my book and a lantern, and go back out on the porch. The smiling Spanish girl is standing there in the sand at the foot of the steps, holding an empty two-liter jug.
It takes a couple minutes to fill the jug from my water tank. Through the open door, I can see her reclining sideways in the hammock, her feet dangling over the edge. I should put on a shirt, I should put on a shirt before I go back out there. But I don’t. I bring out the filled jug, set it at her feet on the porch, and sit down on the chair.
– Gracias.
– De nada.
She plays with the jug with her toes, tilting it this way and that, daring it to fall over. I pump up the lantern, light it, and turn it very low. The waves slap lightly and the lantern hisses. Her hair shines black. She’s wearing shorts and has a small scarf tied around her chest. No tan lines on her shoulders. The jug falls over. I lean out of my chair and right it before more than a cup can glug out. She giggles, points at one of my many tattoos, the one on the inside of my left forearm. Six thick, black hash marks. She asks something I don’t understand.
– No comprende.
She asks again.
