David Bezmozgis - Natasha and Other Stories

After Genady finished his story and tucked his shirt back into his pants, Jerry and Rhonda wiped tears from their eyes. They couldn’t believe it was so horrible. My parents had to agree it was horrible. Kornblum said those Russian bastards and then asked if Simon and I wanted to go down to the basement and play. Kornblum’s children, a boy and a girl, were away at sleepover camp. That was too bad. They would have been so excited to meet us. Downstairs in the basement was a Ping-Pong table, a pool table, a hockey net, and some other toys. As we went down, Freda was telling a story about her mother, who was stuck all alone in Kharkov. My parents weren’t saying anything.

Aside from the Ping-Pong and pool tables, Kornblum’s basement also had a big-screen television and a wall unit full of board games and books. In the corner, one of his kids had assembled the complete Star Wars Death Star. All the Star Wars figures were there including Ewoks. I went over to the Ping-Pong table. A paddle lay on top of a ball. I picked up the paddle and looked over at Simon. Simon didn’t appear interested in Ping-Pong. He was inspecting the Death Star. In Russian, I asked him if all that stuff his father had said really happened. Are you calling my father a liar? he said, and picked up an R2-D2 doll. He picked up another toy and stuffed them both down his pants. What doesn’t this rich bastard have, he said.

When I returned to the table everyone was there except my father and Rhonda. Shirley was sitting beside my mother admiring her amber necklace. Kornblum had a photo album out and was showing Genady and Freda pictures of his grandfather in Poland. Jerry also had a pile of old photographs on the table. On his father’s side, his family was from Minsk. All the dinner plates had been cleared and there were now some pastries on the table and a pot of coffee. I had to go to the washroom and Kornblum said there was one downstairs and three upstairs, take your pick. He then turned a page in the album and pointed out everyone the Nazis had killed.

I went back through the foyer and looked for the washroom. The stairway leading up to the second floor was there so I climbed it. There was one bathroom in the hall but I heard voices from behind a door. The door led into the master bedroom, and the voices were coming from behind the door leading to the washroom. The door was partly open. Inside, Rhonda was sitting on a stool in front of the mirror, her blouse was undone and gathered at her waist. She was leaning forward on the bathroom counter in her bra and my father was massaging her neck. As I retreated, she called out and pushed the door open with her foot. She said it was wonderful, my father was a magician, if only she could bottle his hands and sell them. I mumbled that I had only been looking for the washroom and she said that they were already finished. She turned toward me and started doing up her blouse. Her heavy breasts bulged over the top of her bra. She told me not to worry, I should go ahead and do my business. Downstairs Harvey was probably waiting for her to make more coffee.

As my father washed the Vaseline lotion from his hands, I stood in front of the toilet with my pants undone. He dried his hands on the decorator towels and waited for me to pee. After a while he asked if I wanted him to wait outside. After a little while longer he left and waited in the bedroom. When I came out my father was sitting on Kornblum’s bed. Above him was a large family portrait taken for Kornblum’s daughter’s bat mitzvah. The Kornblums, formally dressed, were seated on the grass under a large tree. My father wasn’t looking at the portrait. He said, Tell me, what am I supposed to do? Then he got up, took my hand, and we went back downstairs.

At the table everyone was eating pastries. Shirley was still sitting beside my mother. She was trying on my mother’s amber bracelet. As my father came in she shuffled over to make room for us. Rhonda announced that my father was a miracle worker. Her neck had never felt better. She made Kornblum promise to send him some of his patients. Kornblum said it would be an honor. Kornblum said my father would get a call Monday morning. Before he knew it, he would be out of the chocolate bar factory. Kornblum would spread the word. A chocolate bar factory was no place for a man like my father. Jerry said that my father could count on him to help in any way.

On our way out Kornblum shook hands with my father, and with me, and then he kissed my mother on the cheek. It had been a very special evening for him and Rhonda. Rhonda came out of the kitchen carrying my mother’s apple cake. She didn’t want it to go to waste. Even though they sometimes took the kids to McDonald’s, they kept kosher at home. So although it smelled wonderful, unfortunately they couldn’t keep it.

As we walked back to the Pontiac it was unclear whether nothing or everything had changed. We returned much as we came, the only tangible evidence of the passage of time was the cold apple cake. Before us was the Pontiac, as green and ugly as ever. Behind us was Kornblum’s fully detached house. We walked slowly, in no hurry to reach our destination. Somewhere between Kornblum’s and the Pontiac was our fate. It floated above us like an ether, ambiguous and perceptible.

My father stopped walking. He contemplated my mother and the apple cake.

— Why are you still carrying it?

— What am I supposed to do?

— Throw it away.

— Throw it away? It’s a shame to waste it.

— Throw it away. It’s bad luck.

Something in the way my mother balked confirmed my own suspicion. There were countless superstitions, numberless ways of inviting calamity, but I had never heard anything about disposing of an unwanted cake. Also, my mother had worked hard on the cake. The ingredients had cost money, and she abhorred the idea of wasting food. Still, she didn’t argue. Nothing was certain. We needed luck and were susceptible to the wildest irrationality. Rightly or wrongly, the cake was now tainted. My mother handed it to me and pointed down the street toward a Dumpster.

She did not need to say run.

IN THE WINTER OF 1984, as my mother was recovering from a nervous breakdown and my father’s business hovered precipitously between failure and near failure, the international weightlifting championships were held at the Toronto Convention Centre. One evening the phone rang and a man invited my father to serve on the panel of judges. The job paid next to nothing but my father took it for the sake of his dignity. If only for a few days, he would wear his old IWF blazer and be something other than a struggling massage therapist and schlepper of chocolate bars. In the bedroom my father retrieved a passport with his International Weightlifting Federation credentials. The passport contained a photo of him taken years before the trials of immigration. In the picture his face carried the detached confidence of the highly placed Soviet functionary. I had seen the picture many times, and occasionally, when my father wasn’t home, I took it out and studied it. It was comforting to think that the man in the picture and my father were once the same person.

Several days after the phone call we received an official package from the IWF. I joined my parents at the kitchen table and scanned through the list of competitors. There, as part of the Soviet delegation, were the names Sergei Federenko and Gregory Ziskin. My mother asked my father what this meant. Did it mean we would get to see them? Did it mean they would see our apartment? It had been little more than a week since the last time the paramedics had come, wrapped my mother in an orange blanket, strapped her to a gurney, and taken her to Branson Hospital. For months she had been stricken with paralyzing anxiety and a lethargy that made it impossible for her to undertake even the most basic household tasks. These had been months of boiled eggs, Lipton chicken noodle soup, an accumulation of sticky patches on the kitchen floor, and dust in the corners. My God, Sergei can’t see the apartment like this, she said.