Chapter 9

 

Alonzo tossed his keys on the table in the foyer. His nose led him to the kitchen where he was sure his mother was cooking up something good.

Marta Castro was a beautiful woman with dark hair she kept long and a fair complexion. During Alonzo’s childhood his classmates would inquire if his mother was the lady who played in the movie Sparkle from the seventies. It wasn’t until he was a teenager when a friend, practically drooling over his mom told him she favored the actress that he looked up the movie’s cast. He was floored at the striking resemblance between Lonette McKee and his mother.

“Hi, Mamá. It smells delicious in here.” Alonzo greeted her with a peck on the cheek.

 Marta Castro turned her face up to receive the kiss from her eldest child.

“Hello, son. Are you hungry?”

“Starving,” he said, as he affectionately squeezed his dad’s shoulder before taking a seat beside him. “Hey, Papá.”

“Evening, son,” his father said as he turned a page of the newspaper he was engrossed in.

“You’re always hungry. Time for you to settle down with a good Cuban wife,” Marta said in a teasing voice.”

Alonzo wasn’t fooled by her playfulness. His dad winked at him as he turned to another page.

“Mamá, what does finding a wife,” he deliberately left out Cuban, “have to do with me being hungry.”

Marta set a dish of Ropa Vieja, shredded brisket in a tomato-based sauce, served over rice with a side dish of fried sweet plantains before her husband, Javier. She smiled at her eldest child.

“A good Cuban wife can cook for you. Keep you big and strong.”

When Marta went back over to the stove, Javier folded the paper and set it to the side. He gave his son a sharp glare. Alonzo ignored the warning.

“Why does she have to be Cuban?” Alonzo challenged, remembering how Jeanette felt in his arms.

Marta’s hand stilled as she was about to set Alonzo’s plate down. “Son, it’s just the way it is. We stick with our own kind.”

Even though Alonzo wasn’t ready to declare his love to anyone, he believed the heart did not see color, race or ethnicity when it came to true love. When he decided to give his heart to the woman he was destined to marry, he didn’t care if she had stripes and polka dots. As much as he loved his parents, he would not cave in to their bias to please them.

Alonzo’s nostrils flared. “Didn’t your parents forbid you to marry Papá because he was dark-skinned?”

Javier’s gaze settled on his wife. His in-laws hadn’t been happy she had brought a darky home. They were not bashful at voicing their disdain. For a time, they disowned their daughter because she refused to give up Javier. It wasn’t until the couple began to have children that her parents came around and accepted them as a couple.

Marta’s face flushed, a sign she wasn’t liking her son’s line of questioning.

“Your father is Afro-Cuban! Not Afro-American! Not a White-American! There is a difference, Alonzo! Like I said, we stick with our kind!” she fired off in rapid Spanish.

“Mamá, it’s this thinking that ran Teresa away from you and Papá! When are you going to learn that we have a right to love whom we love? Was it worth losing a daughter?” Alonzo fired back in Spanish.

Before Javier could rebuke his son, Marta slapped Alonzo across the face. The force of the blow caught Alonzo by surprise as his head jerked back and to the left.

Tears filled Marta’s eyes as she pointed a trembling finger at Alonzo.

“Get out! Get out now!”

“Marta, you don’t mean that. Calm down and let’s eat,” Javier reasoned, attempting to diffuse the situation.

Alonzo stood, regret and anger warring inside of him. He'd said things to his mother that he’s been wanting to say for a long time. But not at the cost of hurting her.

“I’ll leave.”

 

***

 

Marta sat on the side of the king size bed. Her hand trembled as she picked up the gold framed photo of her only daughter on the mahogany bedside table. She wiped away the falling tears to clear her blurry vision. The face smiling back at her mirrored her own except there was a hint of darker coloring.

A sharp pain pierced her heart. Why couldn’t her children understand she was trying to protect them from heartache? Yes, her family had disowned her for a time for marrying Javier because he was dark and didn’t come from a well-to-do family like she had. When they married and fell on hard times, her parents refused to help them financially. They didn’t care they were near broke. Marta’s father even went so far as to agree to give Javier money if the couple divorced and Marta returned home.

Moving to the States was their opportunity to do better, become better. When they arrived the racism they encountered, especially her husband they were mistaken for Black was an ugly beast she wanted to shield her children from. Why would she want her children to intermingle with people the world hated?

Back in Cuba, some were color struck like her parents. However, brutality wasn’t used against Cubans of African descent like here in the States. You weren’t physically harmed because of the color of your skin. If you had the money to live in a certain neighborhood, that’s where you lived without the fear of retaliation because a group of people said you didn’t belong.

Coming to the States had been a culture shock. The history of acrimonious relations between White and Black Americans was disturbing. On numerous occasions Marta suffered discrimination when she was mistaken for a bi-racial African American. If she hadn’t immersed herself in the tight-knit Cuban community, she would’ve gathered up her children, packed her bags and headed back to Cuba.

Within the community she held on to everything she loved about her homeland. Marta did her best to teach her children the ways of Cuba. The older they became and dabbled in American culture, it seemed the further they distanced themselves from their own ways.

Was it so wrong of her to want her children to marry within their culture? Was it wrong for her to want to preserve their customs for the next generation? Had Alonzo been right? Should she have let Teresa follow her heart? Marta wiped away another tear. She didn’t know anymore. All she knew was that she had lost a daughter and feared she might lose a son.

So wrapped up in her thoughts was Marta, she hadn’t sensed Javier’s presence until the bed dipped from his weight. Marta laid her head on his shoulder. She cried even harder when he wrapped a loving arm around her shoulder before kissing her forehead.

“Javier, do you think I’m wrong?”

Javier remained silent to gather his thoughts. This conversation played out like never-ending tracks on a CD. He didn’t necessarily disagree with his wife on the issue. Nor was he dead set against his children dating or marrying outside of the Cuban nationality. Javier realized his mistake in forcing the issue with his only daughter. Teresa was his heart and now she was gone. A day hadn’t gone by where he didn’t regret not supporting his daughter. He should have given her the blessing of walking her own path. But how was a man supposed to put his child above his wife?

He caressed her shoulder with tender strokes. “Marta, you can’t help how you feel, what you think. I understand in many ways your heart is tied to our homeland. But we are in America now and we have raised our children here. They have friends of all different backgrounds. They’re mingling with all types of people every day. At some point Marta they’re bound to be attracted to people who aren’t like us.”

Marta sat up, shifting so she could make eye contact with her husband. “I thought you wanted the same thing, Javier. I thought you wanted to keep our heritage going beyond the children’s generation.”

Javier gently stroked her tear-stained cheek. When he spoke, his voice was loving. “Sweetheart, it is what I desire, but is it worth us pushing our children away? Was it worth us losing our Teresa?”

“No, no it wasn’t,” Marta sobbed as she cradled Teresa’s photo against her broken heart.