Aimie Runyan - Daughters of the Night Sky

“I don’t know how long I will be able to stay,” I admitted. I thought of the specter of Vanya that permeated his room like smoke, and knew it wouldn’t be long.

“We know how hard it must be right now. Everything is so unsettled for you,” Natalia said. “You can stay here to find your feet. And when the time comes, we can help you find another young man from a good family. Vanya wouldn’t want you to be lonely forever.”

I flinched, feeling the blood drain from my face.

“Not right away,” she pressed.

“The local officials have been speaking of this,” Antonin interjected. “Our young women will need to do their part to replace our fallen soldiers. Young men will not be in great supply, and we can help make sure you find a good match.”

“I appreciate your concern,” I said. “It’s a lot to think about.”

“Of course,” Natalia said. “You’re a beautiful young woman. You have time to sort things out. We’re in no rush to see you leave.”

“You’re very kind,” I said, pushing the food around on my plate. Their son is dead only a few months, and they’re marrying his widow off. Oh, my Vanya, how could you have come from such people?

“We want you to feel like the daughter of this house,” Antonin urged. “We will provide for you just as Vanya would have us do.”

“There is something,” I said, setting my fork down and bringing my eyes to his. “I would like to take one of my fallen sisters’ medals and personal effects to her family in France. She doesn’t have any family left here. Would you be able to help me arrange for the papers?”

“Things are in a bit of disarray, but I’ll see what I can do,” Antonin said, stabbing a chunk of beef and looking thoughtfully past me, mentally tracing the lines of red tape he would have to maneuver to procure the papers.

“You shouldn’t go alone, my dear,” Natalia said. “It’s so far.”

“I think I can manage,” I said, failing to keep the disdain from my voice. It doesn’t matter how many medals I have on my chest, how many bombs I dropped on the heads of the German army. Because I am a woman, I must be protected.

Antonin looked at me indulgently and shot his wife a silencing look. “We’ll see what can be done in the next week or so, dear,” he said. “It is right for you to pay respect to your comrade’s family. And when you return, you can give more thought to your plans.”

Plans. Russia needed to be rebuilt, and I needed to find my place in this new world.

After luncheon Natalia showed me the press clippings she’d collected of Vanya’s accomplishments in the war. She’d even gathered a few of mine, though each entry for me was put in as E. Solonev . The reader would read of what I’d done and imagine an Erik or Eduard Solonev, fighting bravely for the Red Army. Any mention of Ekaterina Soloneva was relegated to the few articles in women’s magazines they’d used to drum up patriotic fervor among the idle peasant women in the east. Surely if this woman can fly a plane, you can work in a factory for the glory of the motherland.

I never wanted to be a show pony for the army, but it was clear the opposite was the case. I didn’t need to see my face in all the papers or my name on every page, but they minimized all we’d done. As I read my mother-in-law’s papers, it seemed the contribution of the women in mixed regiments was almost entirely ignored. My own regiment had a few mentions, but nothing like the male regiments, who had achieved half as much. When the women were released from duty, we were expelled from the military altogether in most cases. They wanted to pretend they’d never needed us. How I wished that had been true. Fine thanks for our sacrifice from a grateful nation.

Perhaps Oksana was more noble than I was. She had wanted to do her part to rebuild the country and see it thrive again. I felt no guilt in leaving that task to others who had not already paid the same price we had. It seemed just.

Later I wandered about the house, looking idly at the impressive collection of books, wishing any one of them held the answer to what path I ought to take. I removed a dusty tome from the shelf. An antique atlas. Some of the countries pictured in it no longer existed; others were yet to be formed when the maps were printed. Even now borders were being erased and redrawn. Men like Hitler and Stalin had great plans to conquer the world and divide it up for their own purposes. The rest of us merely longed for our place in it.

May 1946, Aix-en-Provence, France

Over the course of a week, I saw what remained of Europe. Western Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine were starved and gray, but rebuilding. Poland, Germany, and Austria were attempting to emerge from the cinders. When we descended into what had been the “free zone” in France, we seemed to be entering a different world. There were patches of damage from Allied bombs, but the cities remained mostly intact. The vibrant blue of the sky seemed something from an artist’s palette instead of something born of nature.

The train rattled into the station in Aix-en-Provence. Before it came to a complete stop, I had gathered my worn suitcase and was standing by the exit, waiting for the conductor to open the door to the platform. Though the chill of spring had yet to give way to summer in Moscow, I was warm as the southern French sun caressed my bare arms. I wore the simple turquoise dress that had belonged to Mama, remembering the day in the lush meadow when Vanya had painted my likeness. The ache in my heart reassured me he was still there.

In addition to travel papers, Antonin had verified the address of Oksana’s family and that they had, in fact, survived the war. I would have gone to find them even without the information, but now that the long journey was behind me, I was glad I would not have long days—possibly even weeks—ahead of me to track them down, nor did I have to worry that the trek had been in vain.

I clutched the paper with the directions to their home, a small villa on the outskirts of town. I’d been told I would be able to hire a car to take me as far as their house, but I’d spent too much time cooped up in trains to be able to contemplate entering another vehicle. A few kilometers by foot in shoes that weren’t four sizes too large and on a road that wouldn’t have me ankle-deep in mud seemed as close to paradise as I could dream.

As I strolled down the streets, some of the shops shuttered and cafés nearly empty, I could still easily imagine the city in its prewar glory. The residents glanced sideways at me with downcast eyes, suspicious of those they didn’t know. I considered smiling at them to ease their disquiet but wondered if the gesture might make me seem even more suspicious in their eyes. I decided to let them find their trust in their own time.

It was less than two hours before I found the little villa belonging to Oksana’s mother’s family, the Lacombes. The sun hung low in the sky and haloed the house in the vivid orange glow that could only come from a late-spring sunset. It was an inviting home, painted a buttery yellow with rust-colored shutters. Two small children played in the garden while a woman in her late forties plucked stray weeds from her impeccable garden. I could see Oksana’s high cheekbones and large eyes on the woman’s face. It had to be her mother’s sister. A man, presumably Oksana’s uncle, repaired loose terra-cotta tiles on the roof.

I stood for a moment, not wanting to call attention to myself and shatter this vision of domestic tranquility. It wasn’t more than a few seconds before the older child, a boy with thick brown curls who was perhaps five or six years old, noticed me standing at the garden gate.