Рута Шепетис - Ashes in the Snow [aka Between Shades of Gray]

I looked at Kretzsky.

“Please, help me. We need a doctor. We need medicine. My mother is sick.”

“There is no doctor,” said Kretzsky.

“Medicine,” I said. “We need medicine.”

“Do you want another twenty years?” yelled Ivanov. “I can give you that. No bread today, you ingrate. Get to work! Davai!”

I didn’t get a doctor. I didn’t get medicine. I lost my ration and humiliated myself in the process. I began walking away from the barracks. I had forgotten what the sun felt like on my face. When I closed my eyes, I could see sunlight in Lithuania, and on Andrius’s hair. But I couldn’t imagine the sun on the Laptev Sea. Even if we did make it through the winter, would we have the strength to build things? Could we really build a bathhouse and a school? Who would be left to teach?

I couldn’t lose Mother. I would fight. I would do whatever it took. She trembled, slipping in and out of sleep. Jonas and I sandwiched her between us, trying to warm and comfort her. Mrs. Rimas heated bricks to warm her feet. Janina picked the lice off her eyelashes.

The bald man leaned over and tucked his ration under Mother’s hand. “Come on, woman. You’re better than this. You’ve got children to take care of, for God’s sake,” he said.

Hours passed. Mother’s teeth chattered. Her lips turned blue.

“J-Jonas, keep this.” She handed him Papa’s wedding band. “It’s full of love. Nothing is more important.”

Mother’s trembling increased. She whimpered between breaths. “Please,” she pleaded, staring at us with urgent eyes. “Kostas.”

We held her between us, our arms curled around her withered body.

Jonas breathed quickly. His frightened eyes searched mine. “No,” he whispered. “Please.”

JANUARY 5. Jonas held Mother through the lonely morning hours, rocking her gently, as she used to do with us. Mrs. Rimas tried to feed her and massage circulation into her limbs. She couldn’t eat or speak. I warmed bricks and shuttled them back and forth from the stove. I sat next to her, rubbing her hands and telling stories from home. I described every room in our house in detail, even the pattern on the spoons in the kitchen drawer. “The cake is in the oven baking and it’s hot in the kitchen, so you’ve decided to open the window over the sink and let the warm breeze in. You can hear children playing outside,” I told her.

Later that morning Mother’s breathing became increasingly labored.

“Warm more bricks, Lina,” my brother told me. “She’s too cold.”

Suddenly, Mother looked up at Jonas. She opened her mouth. Not a sound came out. The trembling stopped. Her shoulders relaxed and her head fell against him. Her eyes faded to a hollow stare.

“Mother?” I said, moving closer.

Mrs. Rimas touched her hand to Mother’s neck.

Jonas began to cry, cradling her in his eleven-year-old arms. Small whimpers became deep, racking sobs, shaking his entire body.

I lay down behind him, hugging him.

Mrs. Rimas knelt beside us. “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want,” she began.

“Mother,” cried Jonas.

Tears spilled down my cheeks.

“She had a beautiful spirit,” said the man who wound his watch.

Janina stroked my hair.

“I love you, Mother,” I whispered. “I love you, Papa.”

Mrs. Rimas continued.

“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: For thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies; thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

“Amen.”

It described Mother perfectly. Her cup overflowed with love for everyone and everything around her, even the enemy.

Mrs. Rimas began to cry. “Sweet Elena. She was so dear, so good to everyone.”

“Please, don’t let them take her body,” said Jonas to Mrs. Rimas. “I want to bury her. We can’t let her be eaten by foxes.”

“We’ll bury her,” I assured Jonas through my tears. “We’ll make a coffin. We’ll use the boards we sleep on.”

Jonas nodded.

The bald man stared blankly, and for once, said nothing.

“She looks pretty,” said Jonas, standing at the side of Grandma’s coffin. “Papa, does she know I’m here?”

“She does,” said Papa, putting his arms around us. “She’s watching from above.”

Jonas looked up toward the ceiling and then to Papa.

“Remember last summer, when we flew the kite?” said Papa.

Jonas nodded.

“The wind came and I yelled to you that it was time. I told you to loosen your grip. The string started unwinding, and the wooden spool spun through your hands, remember? The kite went higher and higher. I had forgotten to tie the string to the spool. Do you remember what happened?”

“The kite disappeared up into the sky,” said Jonas.

“Exactly. That’s what happens when people die. Their spirit flies up into the blue sky,” said Papa.

“Maybe Grandma found the kite,” said Jonas.

“Maybe,” said Papa.

The bald man sat, his elbows on his knees, talking to himself. “Why is it so hard to die?” he asked. “I helped turn you in. I said ‘No’ too late. I saw the lists.”

Mrs. Rimas spun around. “What?”

He nodded. “They asked me to confirm people’s professions. They asked me to list the teachers, lawyers, and military who lived nearby.”

“And you did it?” I said.

Jonas held Mother, still crying.

“I told them I would,” said the bald man. “And then I changed my mind.”

“You traitor! You pathetic old man!” I said.

“Pathetic, and yet I survive. Surely, my survival is my punishment. That has to be it. This woman closes her eyes and she is gone. I’ve wished for death since the first day, and yet I survive. Can it really be so hard to die?”

I WOKE, UNEASY. The night had been unkind. I slept next to Mother’s body, muffling my sobs so as not to scare Jonas. My beautiful mother—I would never see her smile again, feel her arms around me. I already missed her voice. My body felt hollow, like my sluggish heartbeat was bouncing and echoing through my vacant, aching limbs.

The bald man’s questions kept me awake in thought. Was it harder to die, or harder to be the one who survived? I was sixteen, an orphan in Siberia, but I knew. It was the one thing I never questioned. I wanted to live. I wanted to see my brother grow up. I wanted to see Lithuania again. I wanted to see Joana. I wanted to smell the lily of the valley on the breeze beneath my window. I wanted to paint in the fields. I wanted to see Andrius with my drawings. There were only two possible outcomes in Siberia. Success meant survival. Failure meant death. I wanted life. I wanted to survive.

Part of me felt guilty. Was it selfish that I wanted to live, even though my parents were gone? Was it selfish to have wants beyond my family being together? I was now the guardian of my eleven-year-old brother. What would he do if I perished?

After work, Jonas helped the man who wound his watch make a coffin. Mrs. Rimas and I prepared Mother.

“Is there anything left in her suitcase?” asked Mrs. Rimas.

“I don’t think so.” I pulled Mother’s suitcase from under the board she lay on. I was wrong. Inside were fresh, clean clothes. A light dress, silk stockings, shoes without scuffs, her tube of lipstick. There was also a man’s shirt and tie. Papa’s clothes. I began to cry.