The Angel

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A dream in Cuba, before my twentieth birthday

    A great Cuban-American friend, her Cuban husband, and I were in some huge, damp, labyrinth-like sewers. We didn't know how we had ended up there and were desperately trying to find our way back to our city, Havana. If we had been French, we would have been in the sewers of Paris. The black, pestilent water that ran below our knees was full of greased and dead fetuses. Terrified, we tried to escape. Everything was black, musty, and damp. There was no light, except a strange stale brightness that had no visible origin.

The path narrowed to the point where we could no longer continue with our heads above water. I jumped in to swim to the other side and access a wider space inside the sewer. Swimming underwater was indescribable. As I emerged on the other side, I had a panic attack. I ran and ran, desperate not to find my friends.

The sewer ended and turned into a clean but dead-end corridor. Suddenly, it looked like the basement of a building. I found a cement staircase with long gray walls that seemed to have no end at the top. Quickly, I started climbing the stairs like crazy. Each floor had three, four, or two doors. I never saw a floor with only one door. There were many floors and many doors.

I was unable to explain how I knew, without touching them, which doors were opened and which were closed. I was frustrated that I couldn't push any of them to enter, but I also understood that doing so would be a waste of time, as something dark and dangerous awaited on the other side, waiting for someone like me who dared to enter to be shot down. A horrible, hyper-realistic nightmare.

On a higher floor, that was suddenly the tenth, I finally found a single door: the one to the roof. I went inside and looked. The yellow light of a sunset illuminated everything, and it was beautiful. The rooftop looked very much like the ones from my childhood, with red bricks, and a little wall on the edge. A typical Vedado rooftop, with cement water tanks and antennas. There was no one there, and no shadows either, because it was the magic hour.

Running, I started looking for a way down, maybe a fire escape outside the building. I just wanted to get back to the city. On the north corner of the rooftop, I found an iron spiral staircase, rusted and corroded, held in “miraculous static.” Desperate, I lost the strength to run or flee. There was no way down that ladder.

The height of the building was ambiguous; it could be very tall or about five floors, but you could see the city in the distance, unreachable to me. At that moment, an angel appeared, flying above the staircase, and held out his hand to me.

I can't explain it any other way. Suddenly, in front of me was the angel. He looked like a man, but perfect. To try to describe him is impossible. A golden light emanated from his whole figure, and his white wings also radiated light. At the same time, he had the appearance of a man, with long silky hair and golden skin, not belonging to any race I have ever seen: neither white nor black, simply golden and luminous. His face was like a sunrise.

Without hesitation, I took his hand instantly, so I couldn't look at him so much. I barely saw him and he was already carrying me.

It's the best dream I've ever had in my life.

Back home, they said those dreams were from watching American Sunday afternoon movies. Nobody believed me.

I never forgot it, but I didn't understand it either, because at that time, I was an atheist.

Thank you, Lord, for pulling me out of the gutter.

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