OFFSPRING

OFFSPRING

(English translation from Spanish: Dill McLain)


He could not avoid the slash of the Mambí machete. While he was bleeding to death in the bush, he moved his thoughts to Jerez and saw the smile of his wife, heard his son call him Dad and regretted having been recruited to participate in a war that did not interest him.
He also thought of María, the passionate Creole who stoically endured being called a traitor for the mere fact of loving him.
He died in the war in Cuba without knowing that also there, in María’s womb, he left a descendant.

Half a century later, a young Andalusian arrived in Havana as a refugee from another war, this time one that destroyed and divided Spain in two.
In less than a year, he proposed marriage to a beautiful mulatto woman who convinced him with her love to settle permanently in this country.
They would never know they were related. They would also leave offspring.