Ernest & Santiago

The story that follows is a fictional account, from this author’s mind, of the inspiration behind one of the greatest stories ever told, “The Old Man and the Sea, by Ernest Hemingway.”

Santiago was a very old man when I met him.

At least, that’s the way he described himself when I tried to take his dinner plate away that day. My training ended the day before so it was my first day, working on my own, as a support worker at the Life Care retirement home.

He sat alone in the dining room, staring at his plate as he pushed a single green pea around with his fork. All the other residents had returned to their rooms fifteen minutes earlier and I had to somehow get this old guy back to his room before I could finish my shift. I’d tried two times to get him to finish but he just waved his hand at me and growled, “I’m not finished.”

Getting frustrated, I started to worry that I wouldn’t be able to complete all I needed to do in time because of this stubborn old man.

Bill, my trainer, had told me that sometimes the residents needed a little coxing to get them to their rooms. He said, “You need to be gentle but firm sometimes.”

I was down to less than an hour left in my shift, and knowing I still had one more pass of the four residents in my care to do, I decided I needed to be firm.

I reached for his plate, saying, “Sorry, Sir, but we need to get you back to your room.”

I was shocked by this feeble looking old man’s strength as he pulled the plate from my hand. He looked at me with determination and said,

“I’m a very old man now but I still got some fight left in me. You might think that because I’m 84 I’m done but I’ve got something you youngsters today don’t have, determination.”

I didn’t know what to do and stared at him in disbelieve, thinking, “My first day on the job and I get stuck with this old man who won’t let me take his plate because there’s one, shrivelled, little pea still on it.”

I tried to explain that it was my first day and I had to get the dinner plates cleared before I could do my final rounds but he didn’t seem to hear me.

I watched as he pushed that pea around. One lonely pea floating around in the water he’d poured onto the plate. He pushed it one way then the other, making it look like a small boat on a large ocean.

I could see that far-away look in his eyes and could tell he was lost in his memories. My trainer had told me that Santiago had lived a hard life. His heart was broken at a young age and several years later he was charged and convicted for manslaughter. He’d spent almost twenty years in prison.

I felt for the old guy and could see he needed to remember, it was all he had left. Bill had told me that Santiago was nearing the end as the doctors said that he had three months, at best.

I watched him a little longer before asking, “Do you mind if I sit with you for a little while? My legs are tired. I’ve been on my feet all day.”

He looked at me for a few seconds before nodding his head to the chair across from him.

I sat and extended my hand as I introduced myself, “Hi. Nice to meet you sir, my name is Ernest.”

He shook my hand and smiled a little, saying, “My name is Santiago,” and then went back to pushing the pea around.

He sat silently like this for awhile, lost in his thoughts, until he looked at me with pain in his eyes and said, “Her name was Marlena.”

I knew he was talking about the love of his life and said, “Marlena, that’s a beautiful name.”

He then proceeded to tell me the story of his one true love.

He’d spent the first twenty-five years of his life in Cuba before immigrating to the United Sates. He loved the land of his birth and had been a fisherman, just like his father, grandfather and great grandfather before him.

I wanted to ask why he left Cuba but he continued to tell me a story that broke my heart and made me feel this man’s pain and anguish.

He’d loved nothing more than being on the open water with his lines trolling behind him. The sense of freedom the ocean gave him satisfied his soul and he thought he would never need anything else in his life.

But that sense of satisfaction with his lot in life all changed on the fateful day that she walked into his heart.

The first day he saw her he knew his life would not be complete without her in it. He noticed her walking in his direction as he unloaded his catch at the dock and couldn’t take his eyes off her. She was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

She wore a light summer dress that came to her knees and her long black hair was hanging loose and floating in the light breeze coming off the water. She smiled and laughed as she walked, waving to her father who was docking beside him. The sun shone bright as she walked and revealed the silhouette of her body through the shear white dress, causing him to drop his largest fish into the harbour.

Santiago stopped talking for a minute, looking into my eyes but not seeing me, before continuing.

“She took my breath away. It was like God spoke to me and every fibre of my being was drawn to her. I’ve never felt anything like it before or since. Everything around me faded away and I couldn’t see anything else. It felt like my soul was attached to hers and everything I thought important to me meant nothing. She smiled as she walked past causing me to lose the ability to speak; time seemed to stop in her presence. I watched as she greeted her father and felt that my heart had left my chest and was being carried in hers.”

He lowered his head and pushed the pea around some more as his face changed from pure joy to pure pain. His voice trembled and revealed a sense of great loss when he said,

“That moment changed the course of my life.”

He said that he made sure to be at the dock at the same time everyday for the next two weeks trying to build the courage to speak to her. She was there every day, like clockwork, but he could never find the courage he needed.

That is until fate stepped in and, quite literally, threw her into his arms. The old wooden dock was wet that day and as she walked past his boat with a new net in her hands, for her father, she slipped and fell. It happened right in front of him and she fell off the dock, into his arms, knocking him onto his back in the boat with her on top of him.

She lay on top of him for a few seconds staring into his eyes, before her face turned red and she quickly got up, apologizing for being so clumsy.

Lost in her eyes it was all he could do to stammer out, “It’s ok. No problem. Are you ok?”

They were both covered in sea water and fish blood and as he wiped the front of his shirt, she started to laugh. A laugh that made his heart sing as her face lit up in a warm smile. She was wearing a bandana over her hair that day and took it off, handing it to him and saying, “Here use this, you’re just making it worse with your hands. You look like you’ve been shot.”

She laughed again before turning and walking to her father’s boat.

He never used that bandana to clean himself. The scent of her was on that piece of cloth and he wouldn’t think about using it to clean fish blood and bait of his shirt. He said he kept the bandana with him always as it made him feel all the emotions she evoked in him every time he touched it.

Every day for the next few weeks she would stop and talk to him for a little while before leaving the dock. His need to see her grew stronger every day. Thoughts of her lingered in the corners of his mind, every waking moment of every day; while her voice, smile and eyes inhabited his dreams.

He was in love with her and craved her presence; he hoped and prayed that some day she would feel the same.

His dreams came true on the weekend of the local summer festival. The celebration was always the highlight of the year and included music and dancing in the streets, with street vendors providing the bounty of their area to locals and tourists alike. It was a time for celebrating and giving thanks to the land and sea that provided them with an abundance of all they needed, in their beautiful little corner of the world.

A few days before the festival he finally got the courage to ask her to join him for a short boat ride that weekend. He knew of a small hidden beach about ten minutes from their village that was protected by a sandbar which created a shallow, warm water pool, shaded by palm trees.

He’d stopped their several times to have a relaxing swim and had never seen another soul each time he was there.

What he didn’t know was that the beach backed onto a sugar plantation owned by one of the most powerful families in Cuba. The Stark family owned the plantation and several others along that stretch of coastline. They were part of the influx of rich Americans that had come to Cuba to take advantage of its people and corrupt Government. With the help of local officials, who were suddenly becoming wealthy, they took control of several parcels of land that had been owned by native Cuban families for generations.

Most of the locals were not impressed by the Stark family or their government friends. They had their own name for the family. Every Cuban in the area called them The Shark family as they devoured everything in their way to feed their, self-important needs. He told me that the Shark Family had two children; the oldest, a boy named Jonathan was born in Miami and was treated like a royal prince. His sister was much younger and was born in Cuba. Her name was Catherine and was rumored to have some kind of learning disability. She was rarely seen by the locals as the family kept her hidden from the public eye.

Her brother would be seen in the village often, treating the locals like they were his servants. He was the same age as Santiago and disliked by almost everybody that met him. His family owned several small businesses in and around the village, which he oversaw personally and ran like they were his kingdom.

I could see the anger rising in Santiago’s face as he talked about Jonathan Stark. He stopped talking and stared down at his plate for a few minutes before looking up, his eyes welled with tears. There were no words I could find that would lessen the pain I saw in this man’s eyes so I just reached out and touched his hand, wanting to comfort him in some way.

He looked at my hand and then into my eyes before saying, “It’s all my fault. I should never have taken her to that beach. All of the heartache and Pain that she endured in her short life started on that day, the day she met the Stark family daughter, Catherine.”

He continued on telling me the story of that day and the days that followed with an urgency that belied a need to tell the truth. Santiago knew his days on this earth were numbered and his words felt like a man making his final confession to a priest.

****

The sky was the most incredible shade of blue and dotted with marshmallow clouds that floated over an ocean that was as calm as a sheet of glass when they left the harbour that morning. Marlena wore the same dress she was wearing the first time he saw her making Santiago’s heart swell with joy, as he helped her into the boat, thinking he was the luckiest man in the world.

He said that he felt very nervous at first, not knowing what to say and feeling tongue tied by her beauty. They only exchanged a few sentences as Santiago slowly guided the boat out through the narrow entrance to the harbour and turned east along the shoreline.

Although it was still a couple of hours before noon the heat from the sun, unfiltered by clouds, promised another hot day along the coast. He smiled knowing it would be a perfect day to swim and relax in the shade of palm trees on his hidden beach.

Marlena sat in the rear of the small boat, not speaking as Santiago guided them along the shoreline towards their destination. A light breeze came off the water causing a fine mist to touch their skin as they skipped over small waves, close to shore. He was getting a little wet and turned to ask Marlena if she wanted to come to the front, where she would be protected by the wind screen.

The sight of her leaning back with her eyes closed and the look of pure joy on her face, as her wet dress clung to her body, startled him to silence.

He told me that he could never forget that image. It was like she was the essence of beauty almost like a work of fine art. She was perfection in every sense of the word. That look on her face of the pure joy she felt at that moment, had stayed with him all the moments of his life.

Lost in his visions of the future he saw with Marlena, he didn’t hear the speed boat approaching until it was less than a few hundred yards away. She opened her eyes suddenly and looked past him towards the roar of the motors of the approaching boat, breaking the spell that held Santiago’s mind. The sound reached his ears and he quickly turned to see the unmistakable red tint of Jonathan Stark's teak power boat, racing towards them.

As they got closer he could see Jonathan behind the wheel and three young women laughing and waving in the rear of the boat. He was approaching at a high rate of speed as Santiago turned towards the shore, trying to evade the inevitable wake that was coming. The idiot didn’t slow down as he approached but quickly turned away as he got within twenty feet of their small boat.

The spray caused by the quick turn soaked Marlena and Santiago in a wave of water. Santiago, beside himself with anger, turned to scream obscenities at Stark but stopped when he heard the loud laughter of Marlena. She was standing in the boat laughing uncontrollably as she smiled at Santiago, while shaking the water from her body.

He couldn’t help himself and started to laugh as he moved to the back of the boat and pulled her into his arms and kissed her.

He had never done anything like this in his life and started to apologize almost immediately after the kiss. She looked startled as he fumbled for words and felt like a fool as he said, “I’m so sorry, Marlena. I shouldn’t have done that.”

She stood staring at him for a few seconds as he searched for the right words to explain how he felt about her.

Santiago was never much of a talker as he spent most of his time on his boat alone with his thoughts. Many times in his life he’d had trouble finding the words to express his feelings about one thing or another and some people thought him to be slow in the mind because of this. It wasn’t that he was slow but his shyness that made him stammer and struggle with conversation.

His face turned red as he stammered another apology and offered to turn around and take Marlena back to the harbour but she smiled back at him and said, “No it’s ok. I don’t want to go back.”

He started to say, “Are you sure?” But she reached out and put her finger to his lips before pulling him close and kissing him.

When the kiss of all kisses ended and he pulled back to look into her eyes he thought his heart would burst with joy.

They stood staring at each other for several seconds before Marlena laughed and said, “I think it’s time we go for that swim, I’m feeling a little hot and need to cool down.”

He joined in her laughter and said, “I agree. I think I feel the same and a swim right now may calm my nerves a little.”

***