some neighborhoods are stand-ins for others in Miami. (Tommy says Newton is like Boston’s Coral Gables and Quincy is like North Miami Beach but with more history.)
The night we met this summer, after we talked about our families, and growing up in Miami Beach and Coral Gables, Tommy handed me his Daily business card with his cell phone number scribbled on the back. He said words that made me realize I had made a new friend. By the lip of Club Café’s front door that night, Tommy said, “I know what it’s like to be a stranger in a new city—especially one that is as cold as Boston—in more ways than one. I was where you are now, and I know what you’re going through, trying to make sense of this staid and sometimes too provincial town. So if you ever need anything or you want to hang out or if you’re feeling homesick and need someone to talk to, I’m here, okay? I know my way around, and I can help you figure this place out. You’re not alone. Remember that! You’re with a fellow Cuban. Familia.”
We hugged that night, and from them on, we’ve been chatting on the phone almost daily, our conversations spiced with stories about our families and workdays. I call him on my breaks from school or when I’m on my way home. From the beginning, we would hang-ear, our word for hanging out, which means anything from me going over to his condo to watch Project Runway, or our favorite all-time Que Pasa USA? episodes, a classic PBS show about a Cuban family in Miami adapting to America in the 1970s. Hang-ear also means that he keeps me company as I fold a load of laundry. We don’t have to do anything formal. Spending time with Tommy is like being with family, a brother from another mother. And although he tends to talk about his job a lot and he becomes long-winded with his Mikey tales, I can handle that. Hey, no one is perfect. I am far from it, with my hairy arms and upper back that require monthly wax jobs. Some Cubans are as hairy as wolves. Just ask conga queen Gloria Estefan, who admitted during a concert how hairy she was as a teenager. I believe it. (She used to have a unibrow.)
“There’s a place called Paradise in Cambridge next to MIT. It’s a two-story bar. You’ve got a lot of Brazilians, Hispanics, some blacks, and Asians in there. It’s a little gritty and the extreme opposite of Club Café, but it’s fun if you like that sort of thing,” Tommy says, gesturing for the waitress to return so she can take our order. “I like to call it Paradise Lost because no one from Club Café would be caught going there.” Tommy laughs, which makes his brown curls shake like a shivering bush.
“Bueno, we should go. I want to see the other side of Boston’s gay scene. I know it can’t be just these twinks and yuppies at Club Café. Where’s the color in these bars? I know Latinos must dance and drink somewhere around here!”
“If you want, we can go. I’ll show you Paradise, but don’t say I didn’t warn you. The guys there aren’t that great looking, but I’d be happy to take you there. It’ll be fun. I can finally dance with another Cuban here,” Tommy says. “If you remember that club in Miami called Ozone behind the University of Miami, then you’ll know what to expect in Club Parasites, uh, I mean Paradise.”
“You the man, Tommy! Paradise, here we come!” The waitress scribbles down our order on a small pad filled with shaded green sheets. I order the Cuban sandwich and a mamey shake, just as I envisioned earlier. Tommy gets a pressed turkey sandwich with fries and a Diet Coke. No big surprise there.
We sit here for the rest of the afternoon charlando about our work day. We laugh about the differences between Miami and Boston. Occasionally, we observe the hunky Puerto Rican construction workers as they order from the restaurant’s café window during their break. The more Tommy and I hang out like this, the more at home I feel in my new city.
“So you’ve been christened. You ate at the one and only Cuban restaurant in Boston. You’re officially the new Beantown Cuban. I pass on my tiara to you.” Tommy holds up his half-empty glass of Diet Coke to toast the occasion.
“Thanks, loco. If it hadn’t been for you, I wouldn’t even know this place was here.” I clink his glass with my frosty mamey shake.
“That’s what new friends are for. You’re not alone here. Remember that.”
“I will, loca!” I say, raising my drink. “To Beantown Cubans!”
2
Tommy
I can’t believe Carlos talked me into coming to Club Paradise. I hope no one from Club Café catches me here. I try to make a covert entry by walking quickly inside with my head down and my right hand on the side of my head, cloaking my face. Paradise isn’t such a bad place. There aren’t many cute guys here, that’s all. It’s just off the MIT campus, and looks like a former meat factory or deli. The only dance floor is in the basement and it smells like a mix of urine, club smoke, and alcohol. It’s dark in here, too, something out of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre but with pumping music and outdated strobe lights. (Did I just hear a chainsaw?) Ah no, just some nighttime construction workers hammering into a new condo high-rise down the street.
Once inside, I notice the bar is filled with unattractive guys who look as if they came here straight from Jabba the Hutt’s cantina in Star Wars. They seem like Club Café rejects. I’m not elitist or anything. I’m just being brutally honest. Club Café radiates more style with its cute young guys, thirtysomethings, and plasma monitors featuring the latest video mixes. But I’ve gone there one too many times in the last year, so a change of scenery might be good for me. Part of the reason why I want to maintain a low profile at Club Café is because it reminds me too much of Mikey, my ex-boyfriend. We met there one Thursday night, and I fell for him right then and there. I blame those piercing bright blue eyes and the way he spiked up his straight brown hair. I assign more blame to his endearing grin, which made me smile. I hold him guilty as charged for seducing me whenever he nodded his chin or bit down on his tongue when he thought he said something funny. Mikey was my first and, so far, my last boyfriend in Boston. He showed me Boston from a native’s point of view. He took me on road trips to Portland, Providence, and Provincetown. He slept over at my Cambridge condo in Harvard Square, where we cuddled through the night. We were inseparable. Something—an emotional pull or magnetic force—directed my heart toward Mikey, as if Cupid had a GPS and shot me stone cold on that chilly November night. When I was around Mikey, something clicked, lighting me up from the inside like an electric spark. An unspoken magic, an invisible energy, lingered between us whenever we were together. It surfaced when we did the most mundane things such as sitting on my big blue sofa, walking on Newbury Street, or watching Saturday Night Live. Spending time with Mikey felt natural and right—except on our nights out at Club Café.
His drinking gradually wore me down. He was drunk almost every weekend. He’d wake up on Sunday mornings hungover, slouched on the side of my bed. It didn’t matter how many times I tried to talk him into getting help, he just wouldn’t listen. After a few months of watching Mikey seesaw between drunk and sober, I had to move on and let him go. I confronted him about his drinking at the Barnes & Noble in Braintree, our meeting place, since he lived on the South Shore while I lived in Cambridge at the time. And right there near the Self Help section, he dumped me because I called him on his drinking. He walked away from me because he couldn’t walk away from his drinking, and that left me heartbroken. I haven’t been able to fill that hole in my heart. It didn’t help that I would see him sloshed at Club Café every time I dropped by with Rico, my reliable and studly Italian wingman. After a while, I stopped going to Club Café because I didn’t want to see Mikey drunk in the corner of the bar flirting with some guy. It hurt too much and reminded me of what might have been, if only he had cleaned himself up and stayed sober. It never happened.
“Loca, are you still with me?” Carlos says as we walk deeper into Paradise. “Stop thinking about Mikey and don’t deny that you are. His name is written all over your face in big bold letters.” Carlos knows me pretty well.
“Um, I was, um, just thinking about my next story, that’s all.” Carlos’s eyes roll like two light brown bowling balls at my statement.
“Por favor, Tommy! In the short time that we’ve known each other, I’ve learned to read you like a gay romance novel. You wear your expressions too well. Let’s have fun. Leave Mikey in the past. Comprende?”