David Bezmozgis - The Free World

From a distance, she recognized Nadja’s buoyant, fidgety walk. In low heels and a skirt, and swinging a small handbag, Nadja, at twenty, looked like a girl experimenting with her mother’s wardrobe. Because of their age difference and because of her sister’s nature, Polina harbored feelings for her that were more maternal than sisterly. To friends, their mother often remarked that, unlike other children in similar circumstances, Polina had never rebelled against the idea or the fact of a little sister. Although she was eight years older than Nadja, Polina’s own memory did not extend to a time before her sister’s existence and so she couldn’t say who had exerted the greater influence in forming the character of the other. Had she become maternal because of Nadja, or had Nadja remained childlike because of her? In this sense Nadja shared something with Alec, the difference being that Alec’s childishness seemed to protect him from the world whereas Nadja’s seemed to expose her.

— I’ve always liked the name Anastasia, Nadja had said. That or maybe Brigitte or Sophia.

She had dropped down beside Polina and set her small handbag on the grass at the base of the park bench where she was liable to forget it. The same people in the park who would not have been able to identify Polina as a traitor to the motherland also would not have been likely to identify the two of them as sisters. Polina had inherited their father’s coloring: pale skin, blond hair, gray eyes, and angular face. Nadja resembled, if anyone, their mother: dark hair, wide mouth, hazel eyes, and a starburst of freckles on her nose and cheeks — though her chief distinguishing feature was the slight gap between her two front teeth, which she displayed whenever she smiled or laughed.

— I suppose you can choose any name you want, Polina had said.

— What are you choosing for yourself?

— I don’t know. Something simple.

— And Alec?

— Igor.

— I never saw him as an Igor.

— When he was small he had a friend named Igor whose father could bend nails with his teeth.

— What was his friend’s father’s name?

— I didn’t ask. But he didn’t want to be the father. He wanted to be Igor. He wanted to have a father who bent nails with his teeth.

— I wouldn’t be surprised if Alec’s father could bend nails with his teeth.

— Probably. If he had to.

— And what will we call Mama and Papa?

— Mama and Papa.

— That won’t create problems?

— I don’t think so.

— We could just call them Him and Her.

— I’d rather not. Things are bad enough as they are.

Even if her relations with her parents had not soured, Polina supposed that their father, a Party member and a sea captain, would have objected to having her letters addressed to their apartment. She planned to post her letters to Arik Farberman, a friend of Alec’s and a refusenik who had been trapped in Riga for the last five years. Arik served this function for other émigrés who left behind family members — Party officials, esteemed professionals, or just the habitually cautious — who did not want letters from the West arriving at their homes. The false names were in case the mail was seized.

When she and Nadja had embraced to say goodbye, Polina felt her sister’s hair against her face and the sharpness of Nadja’s silver seashell earring against her cheek. When they drew apart, the earring had left an imprint that Nadja pointed out so as to avoid the subject of their separation. Polina also did not want a dramatic scene. She saw them meeting in another lifetime, two old women at an airport, straining to recognize each other.

As they rose from the bench and started off down the path, Polina noticed that Nadja had forgotten her purse. Nadja doubled back to retrieve it.

— There’s nothing in it anyway except the paper with the fake names.

— Who will remind you now not to lose your purse? Polina had said.

— Every time I lose my purse I’ll think of you, Nadja had said and smiled.

This is Rome? Samuil Krasnansky heard a man his age inquire in the hall.

Slight variations on the same question rippled through the car.

— Can this be Rome?

— Such a small station for such a big city?

— Do you see a sign that says Rome?

— You can read their language?

The train came to a halt and radiated its heat into the heat of the early morning.

— It’s not Rome, Karl said when he returned to the compartment. Rome is another hour. But someone from HIAS is here. We’re to get off the train.

Samuil Krasnansky looked out his window and saw Italian militia with their submachine guns lined up the length of the platform. He did not like being under foreign guard, but he preferred the Italian militia in their blue uniforms to the Austrians in their green. The Austrians offended his sensibilities. When last he had seen Austrians like these they had been marching in long, dejected columns under Soviet command. He had been a young officer then, a revolver on his hip and the soles of his boots worn down by the rubble of Eastern and Central Europe. Men still chose their words carefully when addressing him. Fussy women with clipboards had not felt entitled to pry into his thoughts and personal affairs.

Once again the baggage had to be deposited onto the platform. The same method they had used to get the baggage into the train was now reversed. His daughters-in-law descended and stood waiting beneath the windows. His sons wrenched the bags and suitcases from the floor and the sleeping berths and lowered them to their wives. Samuil and his wife, Emma, were assigned the task of looking after the grandchildren. Emma held each boy by the hand. At first, still half-asleep, they were obedient. But that lasted only a short while, until a suitcase slipped out of Rosa’s grasp and crashed loudly and heavily to the cement. From the train, Karl cursed and Rosa responded that he had handed her the suitcase improperly. She could not be expected to manage all that weight if he practically dropped it on her. She wasn’t going to risk her head for souvenirs and tchotchkes. She had the boys to think about. Did Karl want the children to grow up motherless orphans? If that’s what he wanted then he had nearly succeeded.

At the sound of the word “orphans” the boys started to revolt. They didn’t want to be orphans. They didn’t want their father to cripple their mother with the suitcases. They thrashed in Emma’s grip and tried to free themselves to assist their mother.

— Stay, don’t move, Samuil instructed them, but they didn’t heed him.

— Boys, you can help your mother by behaving, Emma said.

Just then another bag fell from the window and somehow wedged itself between the train and the platform. This time it had been Alec who had released the bag. It was one of the duffel bags, extremely heavy and unwieldy, and Polina tried in vain to dislodge it.

— Why even have them down there if they can’t catch the bags? Samuil said.

— They’re doing their best, Emma said.

— I could do less damage with a hammer.

— With your heart don’t get any ideas.

— I can’t stand here and watch their bumbling.

When Emma spoke again in protest, Samuil glowered at her and said, Not another word. He stalked to the train. Awkwardly, grasping for decent handholds, he and Polina ultimately managed to free the bag.

— Now let’s have the rest, Samuil said, his face crimson with the exertion.

Karl gazed down from the window, wordlessly.

— What’s the matter with you? Samuil demanded. You forget what you’re doing up there?

— For God’s sake, be careful, Emma implored.

— Don’t speak to me as if I’m an invalid, Samuil snapped.