Marina Cramer - Roads

“Sorry to be so late,” Borya panted, coming to a stop in front of the waiting couple. “I—”

“Don’t tell me. You lost your papers,” Filip interrupted, tapping his friend’s shoulder playfully with the back of his hand.

“No. I… well, I overslept, actually,” Borya admitted. He pushed a lock of unruly hair out of his eyes and dazzled them with a sheepish smile.

They laughed then, deeply and joyfully, relieved at this most mundane of all excuses, feeling for an unguarded moment like the children they still were. “You will never succeed in today’s world if you persist in being so honest,” Filip said, pulling a stern face before dissolving into a new fit of laughter.

Still smiling, they approached the desk clerk in the vestibule. “We would like to get married,” Galina said, her confidence bolstered by good cheer.

The humorless matron behind the desk barely looked at the little group. “Which of you?”

“Filip—I mean, this… man and I,” Galina replied, tripping over the alien-sounding word and pointing to her speechless fiancé.

“Your papers?” The clerk held out her hand, took the documents, moved her eyes rapidly over the text. She glanced up sharply to compare the applicants with their photographs. “And your witness?”

“Here.” Borya placed his own document on the desk.

She studied the paper, folded it, and gave it back. “Due to wartime conditions, the Commissariat has permitted women to marry at seventeen,” she pronounced, oozing self-importance. “But the witness must be eighteen years of age, which you, Comrade, are not.” She skewered Borya with an accusing stare. “Therefore, your request is denied. Next?”

“But Madam, I mean Comrade,” Galina persisted, flustered but not ready to give up, “he will be eighteen in only one month. Surely—”

“Then come back in one month. Please step away from the desk. You are interfering with the business of others.”

Back in the street, they stood chastened, silent. What recourse did three adolescents have against this unfeeling bureaucracy?

Filip spoke first. “So we must wait. You may as well go, old man,” he said to his friend. “Thanks just the same.”

Yet no one moved; they didn’t know how to take up the rhythm of this singular day. Go to school, as if they, like Borya, had simply overslept, forced by their parents to accept the consequences? Or spend several hours at the beach or in the park, hoping not to be seen by anyone they knew, or noticed by anyone with the authority to question their aimless behavior?

Galina brushed the thought aside. Why should anyone care what they were up to? Everyone had something to hide, avoiding each other’s eyes whenever possible lest they give themselves away—from the merely shady to the fully illegal schemes and enterprises that kept people going from one day to the next.

She was no child. Even without chronological majority, she refused to surrender to helpless frustration. Something had changed in her when she told Franz, I am already married . Then, saying to the clerk this morning, We would like to get married , she had felt a strength rise in her, a buoyant sense of control that still simmered under the surface of her disappointment. It was as if, by voicing it, it was already done. She would not have her plan so easily thwarted.

“Next month, then?” Borya asked, ready to make his escape. “My birthday is on the twenty-seventh. At least I’ll never forget your wedding anniversary.” His smile, though still disarming, was more tentative now. His eyes held a question. Then he was gone, absorbed by the midmorning crowd.

“No,” Galina said softly. “Filip. We can’t wait. You cannot hide for six weeks. Any Fascist can check your papers, right now, today, and have you sent away.” She scanned the street, pivoting in all directions with a dancer’s grace. “All we need is a witness.”

“Exactly,” Filip started to say, “but—where are you going?”

Galina chose a clean-shaven middle-aged man wearing glasses and a gray fedora and carrying a scuffed leather briefcase. She was already deep in conversation with him when Filip approached them. He noticed the man’s slightly wrinkled trousers; his shirt, while clean, was fraying at the cuffs, his mismatched black suit coat shiny with wear. He heard the words war orphan … prisoner … disabled . Just what was Galina up to?

“And this is my Filip,” she said, extending her hand, drawing him closer. “My fiancé. He is quite alone in the world. No family left at all.”

“I see,” the man said, glancing from one to the other. The corners of his thin mouth twitched, as if not sure whether to be amused or suspicious. “That’s quite a tale you’re spinning here. But why the hurry? Why must it be today?”

“Well, nu , not today—maybe—but… soon.” She bowed her head and blushed.

“So. Couldn’t wait for the wedding day? Too much sorrow in your young lives?” He raised an ironic eyebrow, pushed his glasses down his nose with one finger, and appraised the young couple. “Well, what’s it to me. And what have you got—”

“Oh. Here.” Galina unpinned the brooch from her blouse. “It’s ivory, hand carved. You can get a good price for it.”

The man took the brooch, flipped it nonchalantly from hand to hand, squinting at the intricately wrought details, passing his thumb over the smooth surface of the back, still warm from contact with Galina’s body. “I don’t know. This is no small matter. It’s a nice pin, but…”

“Filip,” Galina said firmly, “give him your watch.”

Stunned, Filip obeyed, handing over his father’s birthday present as if in a trance, amazed at this audacious display of Galina’s ingenuity. When had she become such an accomplished liar? “It’s new,” he offered weakly. “Austrian.”

“Well, then.” The man pocketed the items with a smirk. “And who am I, exactly?”

“My uncle, twice removed, from my mother’s second marriage,” Galina replied, with no hint of hesitation.

“ Tak . We are all related now, da ? Twice removed,” their conspirator remarked, following them through the oak doors into the government building.

And so it was done.

ALL THAT WAS LEFT now was to tell the parents. Simple enough , Galina thought, ignoring the momentary dread that flashed through her like summer lightning. What could parents do to them now? She and Filip had taken charge of their own lives. She had the document to prove it.

They decided to see Ilya and Ksenia first. “My father should be home. He just came back from Sevastopol last night,” Galina said.

“What was he doing in Sevastopol?” Filip asked, trying to match her rapid pace. “Slow down a little. Why do you walk so fast?”

“Listen to you! Not married ten minutes and finding fault already. I always walk fast. It’s just a habit. It never bothered you before.” She glanced at him, but he was looking the other way, where a convoy of open trucks had come into view, approaching at full speed. Filip took her arm and pulled her away from the curb, keeping a firm grip on her elbow while the trucks, each carrying four armed soldiers, a pile of axes and saws, and a stack of empty burlap sacks, rumbled past.

“I wonder what they do all day, the Germans,” Galina mused when the trucks had disappeared around the corner. “There’s no fighting here, no battles.”

“They drill, I guess. Clean their rifles and pistols. Polish their boots. Go out and intimidate people,” Filip speculated, guiding her now safely across the street.

“And spend money. My father was delivering orders, brooches and the little carved wooden boxes they like so much.” Her hand went involuntarily to the bare neck of her blouse. Had Ilya seen her wearing the pin this morning? Would he notice it was gone? Even if he did not, she felt its loss in a moment of regret so keen, so physical, that she abruptly stopped walking. Like each of her father’s creations, the pin was unique; there was no other in the world like it. Like innocence, once gone there was no way to replace it.