Yelena Akhtiorskaya - Panic in a Suitcase

Marina suddenly stood upright and said that terrible things happened, but why must we always dwell on them? The women gave dumb stares. Marina tried to elaborate, saying that terrible things had always happened and would always continue to happen whether we dwelled on them or not, so at a nice moment such as this, a very rare moment of leisure for those of us who work like dogs and will probably drop dead long before retirement, it was probably best to think about nice things and try to get a moment’s peace.

It’s true that we have no control over the horrible things that happen, said Milka, but we have to come to terms with them somehow, don’t we? For example, do you remember that hostage situation above the Brighton Starbucks two weeks ago? Well, that seventeen-year-old girl was my niece.

No! Irena said in disbelief, as if that girl couldn’t possibly also be a niece. Irena looked as if odd parts of her needed blotting at regular intervals, as if she had to sleep wrapped in a giant paper towel, or not so giant, as she was a tiny woman with no shoulders, just minute protuberances on either side of her neck that should’ve been pushed back in.

But there are other ways to come to terms with disaster, said Marina, no longer yawning, ways that don’t involve rubbing other people’s faces into the shit of existence, people who paid an arm and a leg for the banya experience in order not to come to terms with anything but to escape, shamelessly escape, the katastrofa that is everyday life.

I see your point, said Milka. The prices here have gotten outrageous. Every time we come, the old price is crossed out and it’s plus five. Just once I’d like to see it be minus five.

That’ll be the day, said Riana with a solemn expression that seemed to slip from her control.

It was pointed out to Frida that a chaise had opened up by the other side of the fence and made clear as day that she should go lie in it instead of persisting to be a silent presence over adult conversation. Frida looked in the direction of the vacated chaise and shuddered. She wrapped the robe tighter around herself as she lay down and shut her eyes.

She was assumed out of earshot. Conversations were governed by reverse gravity, with the pull created by the absence of the mass. An easy rule to follow would be to never walk out of the room, but it was a touching comment on humanity that people never followed this rule, often leaving rooms for no known reason, as if conceding that it was only fair to give others a chance to talk about them.

Several far-reaching key words alerted Frida to the fact that her situation was being discussed. They were: Pennsylvania, eight hours, Grandma, Indian and Chinese. When Marina updated friends, acquaintances, strangers in line at the grocery store of her daughter’s life, she liked to stress how grueling the Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine was. The school, of which no one had ever heard (best to keep it that way, said Marina), was more of a labor camp where the inmates were fed grub and made to work morning to night or night to morning, as it quickly became unclear when one ended and the other began. At this point somebody usually made the observation that if it was really such an immense workload under such inhumane conditions, it was a mystery that the school had a graduating class at all. How did these kids survive?

They didn’t. The graduating class was almost exclusively Indian and Chinese, which isn’t to say that they weren’t humans, only that their will to succeed was unrivaled, or rivaled only by each other’s, and the work ethic that had been instilled in them from an early age was… all right, perhaps somewhat inhuman. Such an environment was hard on Fridachka, who’d never been particularly good at science or getting up before noon. But she was intent on becoming a pediatrician, just like her grandma.

Enough! cried Frida, sitting upright. Will you please do me one favor and not talk about me when I can hear every word you’re saying?

The entire smoking area turned. Her mother and company were farther than she’d remembered, and the pitying looks on their faces made evident that she’d interrupted a discussion that had nothing to do with her. Lying back, she opened her palms the way her mother did, fingers curled. But relaxation was in short supply at the banya, everyone trying to summon it all at once. Frida got up and freed the chaise for somebody else, knowing somehow that it would remain empty for a long time. She issued a quick, formal apology to her mother in passing, though it came out addressed to Milka. The door whooshed to a close, and Marina’s fingers clamped down on her cigarette, tugging it from her lips, allowing her to begin.

• • •

THE ODESSA INSTRUCTIONS became a favorite pastime. Take your own plastic bags to the market or you’ll be charged extra finally explained why every crevice of their apartment was stuffed with used plastic bags. Lists were compiled. Fruits, evidently, had peak seasons. But it wasn’t so simple, because her visit fell at the end of August, a transitional time; some summer fruits might no longer be good, and some fall fruits might already be better. I’ll explain it again, said Marina, exasperated. The maybe fruits, the use-your-own-judgment fruits, Frida was resolved to avoid altogether. They gave her the names and descriptions of women who sold the freshest produce at the privoz, which deciphered the name of the meat market on Brighton Twelfth. The best woman was Laska. She shouldn’t be hard to identify. Unlike the others, Laska was pure skin and bones, and she had an extra-long tooth and a dark, hairy growth across her forehead. But, said Marina, sucking back a mouthful of saliva, she has the best dairy at the lowest prices — of course, more than two decades had gone by, but those women sat there from the time they were little girls in pigtails until their last stroke or heart attack or cirrhosis of the liver. When you find Laska, tell her hello from the pretty but big-nosed girl in the too-short skirts and the too-high heels and the too-low shirts, which was everyone, so stress the nose and that the girl always bought two kilograms of heavy cream and two of sour cream until abruptly in 1991 she disappeared.

Much more important, however — never stay overnight in the dacha alone. Although there’s a gate with a lock on it so good you can’t open it yourself, there have been incidents. Remember that one time with the metal shutters? How about that other time, in the outhouse? About the dacha we expect a detailed report. You’ll have to be a bit sly. Pasha gets upset whenever we broach the subject. The upkeep of his own beard is too much of a responsibility, so imagine a garden. Who knows what’s happened to our raspberry bushes? The apricot trees, I’m afraid to even mention. Don’t make it obvious that you’re inspecting. Be casual, but privately take note. The easiest thing would be to draw out a little diagram, like a blueprint of the place, and fill in what’s growing where and in what condition. Do approximately the same with Sveta, her physical attributes, her character. Is she taking good care of Pasha? What motivates her? Is she the take-advantage type he’s always been drawn to? How’s her cooking, et cetera? It sounds like a lot, but once you’re there, it’ll come naturally.

For the feral-dog situation, we recommend peppermint spray. Most of the time, they’re harmless. They congregate around the trash bins but also wherever there’s trash, which is everywhere. Walk fast but not too fast, and don’t look them in the eye, and never run. When you go swimming in the sea, don’t leave your stuff unattended, not even your precious flip-flops. Anyway, you’ll be robbed. Don’t ask so many questions. Visit the cemetery to find your great-grandparents’ graves, though we doubt it’s possible; no one takes care of the Jewish cemetery and Pasha never leaves the city limits, so the tombstones have probably been stolen or overgrown with weeds.