A night in Havana

The hum of the engines had been a lullaby of static, masking the chaos of the preceding hours. I didn't just sleep; I plummeted into unconsciousness, a heavy, dreamless void that lasted until the final jolt of the tires hitting the runway.

I didn't wake to the chime of the seatbelt sign or the rustle of passengers retrieving bags. I woke to a hand on my shoulder—firm but careful.

"Hey," Bob whispered. "Time to go, sis. We’re the last ones left on the plane."

I blinked, my vision blurring as I looked around the cabin. It was eerily silent. The overhead bins stood open like empty ribcages. Even the cockpit door was ajar, the pilots and crew already long gone.

"Everyone’s off the plane?" I asked, my voice cracking.

"Yep," he confirmed, offering a hand to help me up. "Ground crew is already waiting for us to clear out."

I gathered my things with trembling fingers, my pulse quickening until I felt the familiar edges of my two passports tucked deep into my inner pocket. I let out a breath I hadn't realized I was holding. I was thankful they were both still there—in this world of shifting allegiances, those booklets were my only tether to a life that made sense. Bob watched me, his expression unreadable but protective. He was the only person on this flight—the only person I truly trusted.

"Still got 'em?" he asked quietly, nodding toward my pocket.

"Both of them," I whispered back. "Let's get off this plane."

We stepped out of the depressurizing cabin and into the sudden, sweltering heat of the tarmac. The sun was blinding, reflecting off the white concrete. Santi, Boris, and Polina were already standing by a black SUV, talking to a man with a sharp jawline—one of Santi’s relatives without a doubt.

"This is my cousin, Marlon," Santi said as we approached his cousin and the SUV . "He’s handled the logistics of a vehicle, driving us and getting us a hotel as well as making sure that we’re ok. We’ll be stopping at a clinic before going to the hotel."

"Is it safe?" Bob asked. "The clinic, I mean."

"My word on it," Marlon replied. "The clinic is ready. We should to move before the heat gets worse."

We all got in the SUV and Marlon drove us the twenty odd minutes to the clinic. Marlon and Santi were talking in a mix of Portuguese and Spanish—I could only catch about half of what they were saying but I was too tired to translate what I did understand. While they talked, the rest of us just sat in silence as we were on the way.

The medical clinic was a small, nondescript building on the edge of the airfield, smelling of industrial bleach and dust. We were brought there to get checked out medically, to make sure we were all fine from the stress and drama of leaving Russia. Santi, Bob, Polina, and Boris went ahead of me. Bob gave my hand a quick, reassuring squeeze before disappearing behind the door.

"Don't worry," he'd muttered before stepping inside. "Quick in and out. Just a formality."

I knew that they would be cleared but I wasn’t so sure about myself. The stress of leaving my home country to get out of this work, Russia and the DNA tests, the passports, getting everyone out and making sure that I had healed enough from both the abortion and the assassination attempt. I truly thought I would be put in the hospital for a minimum of a week.

It was finally my turn. When I entered the room, I noticed how small and how sterile it was. A medical provider in a lab coat looked over my vitals with a detached efficiency. After reading information from a computer that was at minimum two decades old, all the medical provider said that was that I needed an injection for the Depo Provera birth control.

"You understand the timeline for effectiveness and when you’ll be able to have sex without back up like condoms?" the provider asked, her voice professional.

“Yes," I replied, watching the needle as I rolled up my skirt, thankful to be wearing thongs. "I’ve been on it before. I’ll be as careful and use emergency contraceptive or condoms as backup until then."

"Good," she said, administering the shot. "Stay hydrated. The stress of travel can be hard on the system. You look like you haven't slept in a week."

"Feels like longer," I admitted, pulling my skirt back down.

"Thank you," I said and left the room. I hated the medical provider’s version where it had to be injected in the butt but I preferred the auto-injector…I could inject into my abdomen. I left building after grabbing a handful of condoms.

Outside, the group had gathered in the sliver of shade provided by the clinic’s overhanging roof. Bob was leaning against the wall, his eyes immediately finding mine.

"You okay?" he asked softly as I joined them.

"Yeah," I said, taking a deep breath of the dry, open air. "I'm ready to go. I just want to find some shade that doesn't smell like bleach."

We decided to split and head to the embassies of our birth countries to document our arrival and stay. Both Bob and I thought it would be best for all of us to do this so that way, if something happened to us, our birth country would know.

After Bob and I checked in with our embassy, we decided to check in with the Russian embassy as well and used our Federation passports. The corridors of the various diplomatic buildings we entered felt like a maze of cold marble and bureaucracy, a stark contrast to the heat of the tarmac. Inside the Russian embassy, the air was chilled and still. It brought back the memories that I had of the Kremlin.

"Just let me do the talking," Bob said as we approached the bulletproof glass of the desk. “Hello. We want to register our stay with the embassy.”

The official behind the glass looked at our passports with such scrutiny, but after a tense few minutes of typing and hushed Russian, he handed them back.

"Purpose of your visit?" the official asked, his eyes narrow.

"Vacation," Bob lied without missing a beat.

"Stay within the country for now," was all he said.

"Spasibo," Bob replied, his jaw tight as he steered me back toward the exit and handed my passport back to me. We sighed a big sigh when we stepped outside.

"That was too close for comfort," I whispered once we were a block away.

"It's done," he said. "Now we just need to survive the sun."

We found a tiny café to grab something to eat and drink while we stayed out of the sun. Since both Bob and I are very pale and burn easily if we’re in the sun for far too long, we decided that after eating and paying the bill, we would find find the closest pharmacy or bodega that carried sun screen. We finally found some sunscreen at a gift shop at a high end hotel. It was twice the cost we were expecting but then again, sunscreen isn’t commonly found in the country.

"Thirty dollars for a small spray bottle?" I asked as I looked at the receipt.

"Better than a second-degree burn," Bob noted, handing me the tube. "Lather up."

Two hours later, the humidity was beginning to settle heavily over the city, turning the air thick and tasting of exhaust. Boris, Polina, Bob, and I were standing near a crowded intersection under some trees, trying not to look like tourists. My legs were starting to ache from all the walking and standing when the familiar black SUV pulled up to the curb with a sharp screech of tires.

Santi and Marlon stepped out, their faces set as they scanned the street until they found us.

"Get in," Santi stated when he saw us.

"Finally," Boris muttered, pulling his bag higher on his shoulder.

Polina, Boris, and I piled into the back of the SUV, the interior still holding a ghost of the morning's cool air before the heat began to seep in from the open doors. Marlon didn't wait for us to even buckle our seat belts before he was pulling back into the flow of traffic, weaving through the crowded intersection with a practiced, aggressive grace. We sat shoulder-to-shoulder in the space as we headed toward the hotel where Santi and Marlon had reserved rooms for us.

I couldn’t wait to get to the hotel. I wanted to take a shower and sleep for the next four days and Bob being like me, he wanted the same. Though I was grateful to be out of the heat and the sun, I just wanted to sleep and not be bothered by anyone. Thankfully, the drive there was only a few minutes. When Marlon pulled up, it was the hotel that my brother and I had entered to get sunscreen from their gift shop.

Marlon stopped the SUV at the entrance and we all piled out of his vehicle and followed him in. As he was checking us in, Santi stated that Bob and Polina would be sharing a room, Marlon and Santi would as well but Boris and I would have our own rooms. The front desk receptionist asked us all for our passports.

Bob and I looked at each other with a raised eyebrow. Santi pulled us aside and quietly told us, "Use the passports of your birth country as well as the Russian Federation."

"Why both?" I asked.

"We’re going to be here for an indeterminate amount of time," Santi explained, glancing back at the desk. "Having two diplomats on the registry brings the cost of the stay way down. Plus, word spreads fast on this island. When they hear foreign dignitaries are staying here, it brings the hotel more business, and they’ll treat us like royalty to keep us here."

"It adds a layer of protection, too," I added. "People think twice before messing with someone the local embassy is watching."

As we handed over both of our passports, the receptionist wanted to give us a room to share.

"You'll be in the deluxe suite with the single king," she said with a polite smile.

I spoke up immediately. "I do not want to share a king sized bed with my brother. He can share the bed with his girlfriend."

The receptionist’s face flushed a deep crimson, and she quickly looked away from the computer screen. "Oh! I'm so sorry," she stammered, her voice frantic. "I noticed you had the same last name on all the documents and just assumed...I thought you were a married couple. I didn't realize."

"You really need to get your vision checked," I told her, my patience wearing thin. "He and I could easily pass as twins. Do we look like a married couple to you?"

"I’m so sorry, ma'am," she stammered, looking down at the computer. She shut up and put Polina and Bob in the same room then put me in a separate room.

Once I got my room key, I headed upstairs and locked the door behind me. I showered for a very long time, letting the hot water wash away the airport grime, the lingering smell of the clinic, the sunscreen and the heat from the sun.  When I got out, I dried off, got dressed in clean clothes, and slipped out of the hotel without telling anyone. I needed to be a person, not Russian royalty or a government employee just one night.

I walked a few blocks until I found a small, dimly lit bar tucked into a side street. The air inside was cooler, smelling of citrus and aged rum. I slid onto a stool at the far end of the counter.

"What can I get you?" the bartender asked.

"A double rum on the rocks," I said. "And whatever is coming off the grill that smells like garlic and fish."

"Good choice. Red snapper," he replied with a nod.

In a matter of minutes, my drink and my food came out. I devoured both quickly. This is one of the things that I loved most about the island of Cuba….the fresh red snapper. Yes, I still dislike seafood with a passion but the red snapper from Cuba is far superior than anywhere else.

The sun had long since dipped below the horizon, but the heat lingered, thick and velvet-like, clinging to the stucco walls of the paladar. I stayed for hours, anchored by a heavy mahogany chair that felt like the only solid thing in a shifting world. In the far corner, tucked beneath a canopy of drooping ferns, a three-piece band set up. The bassist started first, a low, thrumming vibration that seemed to pulse in sync with the heavy humidity of the night. Then came the trumpet—sharp, brassy, and weeping all at once—weaving a slow, soulful rhythm through the chatter of the diners.

Between the cooling condensation of the local rum and the hypnotic sway of the music, the jagged edges of my reality finally started to soften. For weeks, my neck had been stiff with the habit of watching the door, my thumb constantly grazing the outline of the two passports hidden in my silk pocket. But tonight, the paranoia was a dull roar. I sat there, nursing a plate of ropa vieja that tasted of salt and smoke that I’d ordered after eating the red snapper, letting the music carry the weight I had been lugging across three borders.

The locals didn't let me stay a spectator for long. The salsa wasn't just music here; it was an invitation. A man with a face lined like a map reached out a hand, his eyes twinkling in the amber light.

"The music is too good to waste on a chair, señorita," he said, his voice a gravelly warmth.

A young woman with a laugh that sounded like windchimes caught my other hand. "Come, dance! The night is young, even if we are not!"

I didn't say no. I couldn't. I let them pull me into the center of the room, where the floorboards groaned under the weight of a dozen different lives.

"You move well," my partner told me, spinning me expertly as the trumpet hit a high, soaring note. "You have the rhythm of the island in you somewhere."

"I’m trying," I laughed, the sound foreign even to my own ears. "It’s hard not to move to this."

I danced until my hair escaped its pins and my skin glowed with a fine sheen of sweat. I was no longer a woman on the run; I was just a heartbeat in a room full of them.

I was being spun by the man—his hand firm on my waist, the world blurring into a kaleidoscope of spinning ceiling fans and golden candlelight—when the rhythm of my heart suddenly desynchronized from the music. As I came around, the motion of the room slowed in a sickening, cinematic lurch. There, framed by the dark mahogany of the entrance, stood a shadow that didn't belong in this light.

I saw Marlon. His face was a mask of cold, architectural sternness that sliced right through the warmth of the room, his eyes fixed on me with the unwavering precision of a predator who had finally stopped the chase.

The local man, sensing the sudden rigidity in my frame, followed my gaze. He slowed our steps, his brow furrowed in confusion. "¿Todo bien? Is there a problem, friend?" he asked softly.

I couldn't look at him. I couldn't look at anyone but the man in the doorway. Marlon didn't move. He didn't have to. The mere presence seemed to drain the color from the music, turning the soulful trumpet into a discordant wail.

"I didn't think you were the dancing type," he said, his voice low but carrying effortlessly over the rhythm of the drums. He began to walk toward me, the crowd parting instinctively as if sensing the danger radiating from his tailored suit.

"Marlon," I whispered, the name tasting like ash. "How did you find me?"

He stopped just inches away, the scent of expensive cologne and cold rain clashing with the salt and humidity of the paladar. He reached out, not to touch me, but to tuck a stray, sweat-dampened lock of hair behind my ear. His fingers were ice.

"You're a creature of habit, Deppgrl," he murmured. "And you always did have a weakness for music."

The band continued to play, but the magic of the night was dead. The locals drifted back to their tables, the laughter dying down as the heavy silence of our encounter occupied the center of the room. I was no longer a heartbeat in a room full of them; I was once again the target, and the hunt was over. I went over to the bartender to pay but the bartender just waved off my payment and said that it was on the house.

I didn't wait for him to grab me. I couldn't stand the way he loomed over the evening I’d fought hard to enjoy. As I stormed off, pushing past the heavy velvet curtains and out into the salt-stung air of the street, Marlon followed me. His footsteps were measured, a steady, rhythmic clicking against the cobblestones that sounded like a countdown.

When we were far enough away from the bar, hidden in the deep blue shadows of a crumbling colonial archway, I laid into him.

"You couldn't just let me have one night?" I spun around, my voice trembling with a mix of fury and exhaustion. "One single night where I wasn't looking over my shoulder? You had to ruin this, too. You had to bring your cold, suffocating world into the only place I felt alive in a very long time!"

I stepped toward him, poking a finger into the stiff fabric of his lapel. "I am tired of being a ghost for multiple governments, Marlon. I’m tired of being hunted by a man who thinks he owns every breath I take. How much is enough for you? When do you stop?"

Marlon didn't flinch. He stood perfectly still, the flickering streetlamp overhead casting long, jagged shadows across the sharp planes of his face. He looked at me not with anger, but with a calm possessiveness that made the humid air feel like it was turning to glass.

“Xavier wants to make sure you’re still alive,” he said. “More importantly, so do I.”