But then Hitler’s hordes had arrived. Natasha and their grandmother were walking home one day when a Nazi officer confronted them. He shot her grandmother and would have shot her too if a Hungarian soldier didn’t step in, killing the officer. The murder of an officer in bright daylight in occupied Kiev wasn’t something the Nazis could overlook. They rounded up two hundred Soviets and hanged them, making an example out of them. Lisa’s fiancé Alexei was one of them and Lisa blamed her sister. With hindsight she could see it wasn’t Natasha’s fault. It was the war. But back then, heartbroken and alone, blinded by grief, she did her best to come between her sister and the Hungarian soldier she had fallen in love with. She had finally succeeded but somewhere along the way, through her hatred and anger, she lost her whole family.
Lisa hadn’t seen her sister for eight months. The last thing Natasha had said to her was that she hated her, that Lisa was no longer her sister, that if she ever saw her again, she was going to kill her. At first, Lisa was angry. Then she was hurt. And once the anger and the hurt subsided, the heartache remained. She missed her sister and the rest of her family with a fierceness that left her short of breath.
The two girls stared at Lisa with horror and curiosity. They watched her expectantly, as if waiting for her to tell them more. When she didn’t, Masha said, ‘I can’t imagine not talking to my family. I miss my mama so much.’
‘Is she here, in Kiev?’ asked Lisa, happy to change the subject.
‘She evacuated to Novosibirsk before the Germans arrived, to stay with her sister. At first, she refused to go without me. I had to threaten to volunteer for the front if she didn’t.’
‘You didn’t want to leave?’
‘My husband was staying to protect the city, and I felt needed in Kiev. I worked as a nurse. When wounded soldiers began to arrive from the front, I felt like I was helping with the war effort. Now I wish I’d gone. My husband left with the Red Army soon after and life in Kiev without him and without Mama became unbearable.’
‘Where is your husband now?’
‘I wish I knew. On the Eastern Front somewhere, fighting the Nazis. There’s been no letters from him or Mama since the occupation started. Sometimes I feel so alone.’ Masha paused for a second, as if gathering her thoughts. ‘I’ve never been away from Mama before. When I was younger, she would wait for me on the porch every day to come home from school. That’s what I think about when things get tough. The expression on Mama’s face when she saw me walking down the street.’
Through the small opening in the ground Lisa could see the setting sun. It tinted the tops of the pine trees red and soon it was gone but the pile of uniforms in front of them didn’t diminish in size. While the girls sewed, Lisa stared into space, daydreaming. Outside, all she could see was darkness. Inside, there were rickety tables and dusty floors. There was a small wood-burning stove in the corner but Yulya had forbidden them from touching it. ‘To save the kindling,’ she said. Lisa wanted to point out they were surrounded by kindling. They were in the woods, after all. But she said nothing. She was a little intimidated by the large grouchy woman.
All at once, the forest was no longer silent. Someone somewhere was screaming for help. The voices were too loud, the noises too sharp in the woods that until now had been tranquil and quiet. Without a word the three girls looked at each other and jumped to their feet, leaving the half-finished uniforms on the table. Anna ran outside, not pausing to put her hat or scarf on, and Lisa would have run too if Masha wasn’t leaning on her arm and hopping on her one good leg, making it difficult for Lisa to walk.
The wind was howling like a pack of desperate wolves. The trees were no longer motionless but swaying from side to side like the masts of a ship caught in a storm. Lisa shivered, trying to shake off a feeling of dark foreboding, when she saw five men moving swiftly towards them. One of them held a torch and the other four were carrying a stretcher. The torchbearer was grim and silent as he led the way. The reflection of the flame danced on his face. His uniform was torn and muddy. Not muddy, Lisa realised, but covered in blood. With horror she recognised Maxim.
Her horror receded a little when she realised he didn’t look hurt. It must have been someone else’s blood. From where Lisa was standing, she couldn’t see who the man on the stretcher was or whether he was all right, but she heard Anna take a sharp breath and cry out, ‘Anton,’ dashing through the forest and ignoring the branches that were lashing her face like sharp razors. When she got to the stretcher, she took Anton’s hand in hers and kissed it.
With her heart beating painfully in her chest, Lisa remembered the jolly young man who together with Maxim had helped them get to the settlement and cheered them up with his jokes. When she approached, Masha still hanging on her arm, she saw red blotches of fresh blood on Anton’s uniform. He lay still on the stretcher and his eyes were closed. Feeling queasy and unwell, her legs trembling at the sight of blood, she wondered where they were taking him. Did they have a doctor or a hospital at the battalion? For Anton’s sake, she sincerely hoped so.
‘What happened?’ cried Anna, her eyes frantic. ‘Is he going to be all right?’
‘He’s been shot,’ replied Maxim. ‘We need to get him to the hospital and quick.’
So they did have a hospital, thought Lisa, following the stretcher and dragging Masha behind her. All she could hear was a buzz of voices. A large crowd gathered and everyone wanted to know the details. ‘Where was he shot? Is he conscious? How much blood did he lose? Damn Nazis, one day they’ll pay for everything!’ The men carrying the stretcher ignored the questions, so intent were they on whisking Anton to safety.
The opening to the hospital was too small to fit the stretcher. Maxim and a man Lisa had never seen before lifted Anton gently and carried him in their arms. He groaned and opened his eyes. Anna sprang forward and took his hand, shaking him lightly. He didn’t respond, closing his eyes again.
The hospital was nothing more than a large dugout, as damp and cold as the dwelling the three girls shared but much more spacious. Lisa was able to stand without hitting her head on the wooden beams of the ceiling and walk around freely between the beds without risking stubbing her toe on a piece of furniture. She marvelled at the ability of the partisans to create something like this in the middle of nowhere, among birches and pine trees and wild animals, something so well camouflaged and at the same time so well equipped, with every detail thought out and every need provided for. There were medicine cupboards and shelves with old books and magazines, dog-eared and battered with use. There was a small camp stove, a kerosene lamp and a kettle, a dozen wooden beds and a narrow table in the middle, a chair and a bedside table next to every bed. There were blankets on the beds but no sheets or pillows.
The men placed Anton on the bed nearest to the entrance. For a moment everyone watched him without a word. Then Anna pushed her way forward and said, ‘He needs a nurse or a doctor. We must take him to a proper hospital.’
‘No proper hospital. Every Nazi in Kiev knows his face,’ said Maxim. He looked helpless and sad. Lisa wanted to reach out and touch him.
Masha hobbled forward and said, ‘I’m a nurse. I can take a look at Anton.’
Suddenly all eyes were on Masha, who blushed. Anna cried, ‘You’re a nurse! Thank God! Just what we need, after our nurse was killed last week. What are you waiting for? Do something.’
As Lisa helped Masha across the room where Anton was lying on top of a dirty blanket, Masha asked, ‘Do you have sulphur powder here? Anything for the pain?’
‘We do have sulphur powder. For the pain we have vodka,’ said Maxim.
‘Vodka will do. Where was he hit?’
‘Just above the knee. He was unconscious in the truck. The few times he woke up, he was delirious, screaming that he didn’t want to lose his leg. He seemed in a lot of pain.’
Masha leant over Anton and placed her hand on his forehead. ‘Can you hear me?’ she asked softly. ‘I need to examine your leg. I will have to cut yo
ur trousers open, so that I can see the wound. Is that all right?’
Anton’s eyelids flickered, his face twisted in pain. ‘Yes,’ he said, his voice strained, as if talking cost him what little energy he had left.
‘Find a comfortable position and try to relax.’
‘Easy for you to say. It hurts like hell.’
‘I know.’
One of the men passed Masha a small knife and she cut open the trouser leg, exposing Anton’s thigh. Lisa gasped when she saw the large wound. Once again, she felt light-headed and dizzy. But Masha didn’t seem to mind the sight of blood. ‘We need to elevate the leg. Is there anything we could use to put underneath? A pillow or a rolled-up blanket?’
‘What for?’ demanded Anna.
‘To stop the blood flow. It’s harder for the blood to flow upwards than downwards.’
Nodding, Anna fetched a sack of old clothes. Masha positioned Anton’s leg on top of it, putting on a pair of gloves and examining the wound, gently probing around the opening. Anton groaned.
‘The good news is, the bullet has exited. See here – there’s an entrance wound and an exit wound. I will need to disinfect them. It will hurt. Do you want to have some vodka before I do so?’
Anton nodded. Masha handed him a shot of vodka and once he’d taken a swig, she cleaned the wound and disinfected it with more vodka. Anton’s face went white and he clasped his fists but didn’t make a sound. For a moment he looked like he had passed out but then he opened his eyes slowly, looking dazed. Masha whispered encouragements to him as she applied some sulphur powder and a bandage. ‘I need to make a tourniquet. It will apply pressure and further stop the blood flow. What I need is a belt and a long stick.’
Someone went out to find the items she had requested. When they returned, she wrapped the belt around the leg, two inches above the wound, then used the rest of the belt to tie the stick tightly to the leg. Slowly she turned it to apply pressure. ‘Now, we can’t leave it on for too long or you might lose this leg. Let’s hope it stops the bleeding quickly and then we can remove it. How are you feeling?’
‘Good as new,’ said Anton, wincing.
Anna declared she would stay with Anton all night, so she could be there if he needed anything. She whispered conspiratorially to the girls that he was her sweetheart. ‘I followed my papa here and Anton followed me. I’m all he has in the world. His parents were killed by the Nazis a few months ago. If anything happens to him, I will never forgive myself.’
‘Nothing is going to happen to him,’ said Masha, hugging Anna. ‘I’ll make sure of that.’
That night, when it was just the two of them in the dugout, after they had brushed their teeth with baking soda Anna had lent them and washed their faces with snow, Masha said to Lisa, ‘I am going to sleep for two hours and then I’ll go back and check on Anton.’ She looked like a different person, thought Lisa. Her eyes were burning with purpose.
‘You were a hero today. Without you, what would Anton have done?’
‘I don’t want to go back to Kiev anymore. I want to stay here, Lisa. I want to help. The partisans need a nurse and I could really make a difference.’
‘They’ll be lucky to have you,’ whispered Lisa, happy she wouldn’t be alone at the battalion, that she would have her new friend by her side, but a little jealous too. She wished she had a calling, something to give her life meaning, to make her feel like she wasn’t just wasting away, waiting for the war to take her like it had already taken so many others.
Tomorrow, she would ask Maxim to teach her how to shoot. She could hardly wait.
Chapter 4
The upside of Irina’s pregnancy was that she could sleep anytime anywhere. Gone were the sleepless nights when she would fret and stare into space, the terrors of her day whirring through her mind. These days she could doze off at her desk at lunch and in her bed while breastfeeding her daughter, the kicking and tickling of the tiny hands and feet notwithstanding. The downside of her pregnancy was that no matter how much sleep she got, she was excruciatingly, overwhelmingly tired. Every morning she would wake up and think, I can’t do this. I can’t get out of bed and go through another soul-destroying day at work, only to come home to another soul-destroying evening with Zina.
There was nowhere for her to hide, nowhere to go to avoid the German soldiers on the streets of Kiev or her mother-in-law in the kitchen. It was easier in the mornings, when she was out of the door as the rest of the house was waking up. But evenings were a different story as they cooked and ate their meagre dinner and waited their turn to use the bathroom that had no running water, only a bucket of thawed snow Irina would bring from the street. Every evening was a battle that was neither won nor lost but dragged on with no end in sight.
‘You won’t believe what the Germans did yesterday,’ Zina said one evening in the middle of January as she stirred some old vegetables in a pan. Irina could swear her mother-in-law saved her horror stories for when Irina came back from work. As if her day wasn’t horrifying enough. ‘Do you hear me, Irina? Do you hear me, Kirill? I know your book is interesting but I’m trying to tell you something. I don’t want to compete for your attention with Dostoevsky.’
‘I’m sorry, dear,’ Kirill said softly, putting his book away and sitting up straight, with his hands folded together, like an obedient schoolboy.
Irina didn’t look up from her cutting board and didn’t acknowledge Zina. Maybe tomorrow, when she had more strength, she would fake politeness and respect, if only for her husband’s sake. But today she was done pretending.
Zina continued, ‘They opened a cinema in Podol and invited young people to a movie. Everyone was so excited. What an unexpected treat! But as soon as the movie started, they locked the doors and arrested everyone. They are all on a train to Germany as we speak.’ Kirill shook his head in disgust. Dismayed, Irina continued to grate a carrot for her daughter, who was in her highchair, playing with her dolls. Zina continued, ‘They didn’t even have a chance to say goodbye to their families. I heard it from Marta who heard it from her friend, whose brother went to see this movie and never came back.’
‘The Nazis have killed half of us in Babi Yar, and now they are trying to enslave what’s left of us. They are not going to get away with it, mark my words,’ grumbled Kirill.
‘And who is going to stop them?’
How could Irina stay quiet now? Defiantly she raised her head. ‘Our partisans are doing their best. Maxim—’
‘Hush, child. Don’t say it out loud. The walls have ears,’ cried Zina, who was petrified of having a son in a partisan battalion and what it could mean for her.
‘Our army is doing well,’ said Kirill. ‘The Nazis don’t want us to know this, but the tide is turning for them in this war. The first Ukrainian towns are being liberated by the Red Army. Soon they’ll be here—’
‘Don’t talk such rubbish and get our hopes up unnecessarily,’ barked Zina, interrupting him. Irina could see Kirill’s face deflate a little and felt sorry for the old man. Suddenly, Zina turned sharply around and pointed an accusing finger at Irina. ‘What are you doing, grating that carrot? That’s ridiculous. Let the girl chew on it. She needs to learn how. At this rate she’ll never know how to use those teeth.’ Zina’s left eye twitched, a sure sign she was looking for an argument.
Irina felt her cheeks flush. She almost groaned out loud. Please God, not today, she thought. ‘Carrots are quite hard. I don’t want her to choke,’ she said calmly, while inside she was seething.
‘Nonsense. When Maxim was a baby, he chewed on everything. Apples, pears and carrots. Never did him any harm.’
Trembling, Irina lowered her eyes, leant close to her daughter and whispered an endearment in her ear.
‘You are overprotective, to the point of being harmful. You do everything for her. It’s not right. At this rate she’ll never learn how to be independent,’ added Zina.
‘Independent? She’s two. And what do you mean, not right? Isn’t it part of b
eing a mother? Being protective?’ Here I am again, defending myself to Zina, she thought. As if I have something to prove.
‘You are too soft on her. You shouldn’t rush to pick her up the minute she starts crying. Before you know it, you’ll have a spoilt brat on your hands.’
Irina felt her knees shaking. In a moment, she was going to tell Zina exactly what she thought, then pack what little belongings she had, take Sonya and go … where? That was the problem. She had nowhere to go.
To Irina’s relief, Kirill came to her rescue. ‘You can’t spoil a child with love. Leave the poor girl alone. Let her find her own way as a mother.’
Irina smiled gratefully at her father-in-law, who never defended himself against his wife but here he was, defending Irina. She felt a tremendous affection for the older man who had been like a father to her ever since she’d met Maxim. Zina rolled her eyes in an exasperated manner that suggested her husband was in big trouble for daring to side against her.
‘Don’t pay any attention to her. She just wants to help but doesn’t know how to go about it,’ Kirill whispered to Irina when Zina was out of earshot.
‘I understand,’ said Irina. That was a lie. She didn’t understand why Zina enjoyed being horrible to everyone around her. Did it make her feel more important? Did it cheer her up and brighten her day?
Later, as the rest of the house slept, Irina sat at the kitchen table, her fingers wrapped around a cup of tea for warmth. Every bitter sip, for she made it as strong as possible, brought the memories of evenings with friends, of home-baked cakes and biscuits, of laughter and happiness. Now there were no cakes or biscuits or laughter but, to Irina, tea was comfort. And comfort was even harder to come by in times of war than food.
This was her favourite time of day, when everyone was in bed and she could enjoy a few rare moments of solitude. Outside, a wall of snow was falling. Beyond the snow was darkness. Her hand on her flat stomach, she sang softly to her unborn baby and thought of her husband, hidden in the woods somewhere, risking his life to rid Kiev of the Nazis. How she longed to see his face, to put her arms around him. Was he thinking of her too, wherever he was? Was he missing her, just like she was missing him? Every time he left, her heart broke a little bit more. How did she live day after day, not knowing if he was safe?
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