The End of Sorrow: A Novel of the Siege of Leningrad in WWII

by JV Love

  Petya's attacker - thin and bony with a black scarf wrapped around his mouth - flashed a knife with a long blade in front of Petya's eyes. "Give me your bread and your ration card or I'll kill you," he threatened. He had a crooked nose and spoke with a hoarse voice.

  Petya was so frightened, he could barely speak. "It's in my . . . my . . . umm," he stuttered.

  The man situated his knee so that it pushed on Petya's stomach. "Give it to me!" he growled through the scarf and pressed the blade to Petya's cheek.

  Petya reached in his pocket and retrieved Guzman's ration card and handed it over to the man.

  "And the bread too!" the man said.

  "I . . . I . . . don't have any bread."

  The man reached into Petya's pocket himself and found the bread. "You liar," he hissed. "I said I'd kill you."

  Petya watched the man raise the knife over his head and thought only that it was a strange way to die, not what he expected. Then something struck the man's arm and the knife went flying into a snowbank.

  "Beat it, you coward!" a voice shouted.

  Petya's attacker scrambled to his feet amidst sharp strikes from a wooden cane, then ran away down the alley. He looked over his shoulder halfway down, saw no one was following him, and slowed to a walk.

  Petya sat up and started cursing.

  "Are you all right?" the man asked and offered Petya his hand. He had dark eyebrows and a thick white beard that covered his face and neck.

  Petya took the man's hand and got to his feet. "He stole my bread ration."

  "Oh no, what a terrible thing," the man said and shook his head. "In all my fifty-six years I've never seen such a terrible time as now. People have been turned into animals fighting for their survival. Do you still have your ration card?"

  Petya knew that if he lost that he was as good as dead within a week. Luckily the thief had only gotten Guzman's card, Petya's was still tucked safely inside his boot. "Yes, I've still got my card," Petya said, brushing the snow off himself. "He didn't get that."

  "Good," the man said, "then give it to me."

  The wind was strong and Petya was uncertain of what was said, but when he saw a pistol in the man's hand, he knew he'd heard correctly.

  "Give me the card now or I'll put a hole in your stomach," the man said.

  Petya could hardly believe it. "Is this a joke?" he asked.

  "I've already killed three people," the man said. "You don't want to be the fourth. Just give me your card and you won't get hurt."

  "If I give you my card, I'll die anyway," Petya said.

  "Maybe," the man said. "But if you don't, you'll die for certain right here and now."

  Petya could find no flaws in the man's logic and pulled the card out of his boot and handed it over.

  The man glanced at the card, then made Petya lay back down on the ground. "Count to thirty," he said, "and then you can get back up. You get up before that and I'll shoot you."

  Petya did as he was told.

  "Animals," the man muttered as he walked away. "That's what people have become - complete animals fighting for their survival."

  Petya laid there and stared up at the gray winter sky, wondering if God was laughing at him like the other kids at the orphanage always had. The ground beneath him was hard and cold and a frozen clump of ice was sticking painfully into his spleen. The wind blew snow off the top of the nearby snow drifts and into Petya's face. He could hear bombs falling in another sector of the city - the high-pitched whistle followed by the earth-shaking boom.

  He had stopped counting at twelve. Perhaps he wouldn't get up at all. He was tired of trying. Tired of doing what the voices in his head demanded. His entire life had been nothing but hurt and shame. His eyes were welling up with tears, and he tried to stop all that pain inside from getting out. He squeezed his eyes, gritted his teeth, tried to focus on his outrage, but nothing was going to stop it this time. One tear rolled down his cheek, then another, and then the flood gates gave way and the tears flowed like a raging river.

  The stove was still warm when Petya got home and he wrapped his hands around it to thaw them out. Igor was still in his bed, but he wasn't moving or making any sounds, and Petya wondered if he might have died from the poisoned water Katya gave him. He snuck up closer to see if the boy was still breathing. He saw his chest rising and falling ever so slightly, and decided he must just be sleeping very deeply.

  Petya added some more wood to the fire and noticed Oksana had rearranged her blankets and pillow so that her head would now be near the stove, instead of her feet. Petya went over to her neatly-made bed and put it back the way it used to be, taking extra care to make sure there were no wrinkles and the pillow was only half-tucked under the blankets - the way she always made her bed.

  He laid down on his own bed and fell asleep quickly. Forty-five minutes later he woke up, and for once it wasn't because of his empty stomach or cold bed. In his head, a new voice had emerged, and this one claimed that it was God himself. It was a man's voice - deep and full - and it spoke to him calmly, patiently.

  Petya thought it would disappear when he woke up, but it didn't. The voice kept up its continuous stream of monologue and Petya was mesmerized by it. The voice was particularly convincing because it was more rational than the other voices. When it explained that it was speaking only to him and that was why no one else could hear it, that made sense to Petya. When God had spoken to Moses or Joan of Arc, no one else had been able to hear his voice either.

  The new voice was different from the other ones in his head, and even argued with them. When they told Petya he was corrupt and despicable, the voice of God told them they were wrong, that Petya was one of his children and therefore worthy and good. And when Petya thought he heard Guzman's voice again, the voice of God reassured him that the dead man wasn't speaking to him. The voice belonged to a disciple of the devil, and Petya needed to ignore it and never do its bidding.

  The voice of God also told Petya that he had a very important mission for him and that it was "of the utmost importance" that Petya be prepared for it. It wouldn't tell Petya what exactly the mission was, but it said the clues would be provided when the time was right.

  Petya heard sounds coming from the hallway, then the door opened and Oksana and Katya walked in carrying firewood.

  "They delivered a pile of firewood to the courtyard," Katya said. "Could you help us bring it up before it's all gone?"

  It was bad enough she was trying to kill him. For her to then ask for his help was galling. He was about to tell her to go to the devil when the voice of God spoke to him again. "Help them," it commanded.

  Petya found that he couldn't ignore it like he could sometimes with the other voices. He heard the wind howling outside and wanted more than anything to snuggle further into his bed, but instead he got up and joined in on the grueling operation.

  It was difficult to know how much firewood one should try to carry each time. The more you carried, the fewer trips you had to make, but on the other hand, the heavier the load, the quicker you tired. Fortunately and unfortunately, the decision was made for them because after only a few trips, the pile of wood was gone. Everyone living within a block of the delivery had come to take some.

  Petya collapsed back into bed, feeling weaker than he ever had since the blockade started. The voice of God started speaking to him again, telling him it was important to sustain himself physically. Petya explained to the voice that he'd lost his ration card and there was no bread for him to eat. "I could try to steal Oksana's ration card though," Petya offered.

  "No, thou shalt not steal," the voice responded.

  "I understand," Petya said sheepishly. "Perhaps you could make me some bread, like that story in the bible?" he suggested.

  "No, that would endanger the mission," the voice answered. "If you have no bread, then eat meat instead."

  Oksana and Katya were in the kitchen, and Katya called out to him. "Are you talking to us, Petya?"

  He sat up
in bed, ignoring Katya's question and explaining to the voice that he had no meat, nor anything to trade so he could buy meat at the market. Out of the corner of his eye, Petya saw the faint outline of a figure standing in the hallway. He was startled and turned to look at it, but there was no one there. He studied the area for a minute, looking closely at the pair of boots on the dingy floor, the crooked frame of a painting of a birch tree forest, and a tiny, long abandoned cobweb near the ceiling. Just when he was about to look away, he found the faint bluish outline once more. It was like a hollow person was standing there. They had an edge around them, but nothing inside that edge.

  "Oh," the voice said, "but you do have access to meat."

  * * *

  "One of you drank it!" Oksana screamed. "And don't try to deny it!"

  Katya hurried into the room from the kitchen to see what the commotion was about. She'd just been in there a moment ago. Oksana had been getting ready for work, and both Petya and Igor had been in bed still asleep.

  "What's going on, Oksana?" Katya asked. Petya and Igor were sitting up in their beds, staring blankly at Oksana. Igor was wiping the sleep from his eyes, and Petya was yawning and stretching his arms.

  "I poured myself a cup of water," Oksana said, "then I left for a moment. And when I came back it was gone."

  "Your cup was gone?" Katya asked.

  "No, my cup is still there. Someone just drank the water. And I know it was one of these two scoundrels," she said. She had her hands on her hips and her bottom lip pressed tightly over the top one. Her hair, which always used to be black and curly, was now the same dingy shade of white as last week's snow. She'd given up trying to style it and it hung like a wet mop over her head.

  "Igor," Katya said, "did you drink Oksana's water?"

  "No," Igor answered. "Why would I drink her water? I have my own." He pointed to a chipped white tea cup by his bed, and it was indeed half full of water.

  "Then you must have drank it," Oksana said, scowling at Petya.

  "I was sleeping," Petya said. "Besides, why would I drink your water. I could just as easily get my own."

  Poor Oksana, Katya thought. She really was losing it, just as Petya had been telling her. "Maybe you already drank it and just forgot," Katya suggested.

  "No," Oksana said adamantly. "I didn't drink it yet. I distinctly remember pouring it, then setting it down, then going to get my coat."

  "Just like you distinctly remembered rearranging your bed," Petya said.

  "I did rearrange my bed," she said, then put her hands to her ears and shook her head back and forth like a mad dog. "You're all making me crazy!" she shouted then grabbed her coat and stormed out of the apartment.

  Petya tapped the side of his head with his index finger. "You see?" he said to Katya.

  She nodded her head and briefly had the thought of asking Petya and Oksana to move back to their old apartment. They were both losing their sanity, and she was caught in the middle. But, like it or not, they were stuck with one another. Among other things, Katya knew there simply wasn't enough firewood for them to live in two separate apartments.

  Igor wrapped his arms around his chest and coughed. It was a thick, horrible sound that didn't reflect the fact that he was getting better. He hadn't had a fever in the past week and had much more energy now.

  Katya sat down on the edge of his bed and put her arm around him. "The doctor said the cough might take a few weeks to go away," she said. "Just try to bear with it."

  When he finished his coughing spell, he blew his nose then asked Katya whether or not Oksana was going crazy.

  Katya was uncomfortable using the term 'crazy' in the presence of Petya, even though he insisted he wasn't sick in any way. "She's just under a lot of stress," she answered. "Just like the rest of us."

  "She's starting to act like Guzman," he said. "Is she going to die too?"

  Katya handed him his breakfast bread ration, and he took it but didn't eat right away. "We're all going to die," she said. "It's just a matter of when."

  Igor looked across the room at Petya, then back at Katya. "Do you think the end of the world is coming?" he asked.

  She felt very sad realizing Igor had never known their grandmother and her wonderful teachings. Katya wished the whole world could have received her teachings. Maybe then this war never would have happened. "I think we're living in very dark times," Katya said. "Times not unlike when Jesus lived. People are scared and clinging very tightly to their beliefs. This was what happened in Jesus' time. The Romans ruled the world with their military might and culture, and the Jews had become complacent and dogmatic. Jesus shook all that up. He challenged the establishment - not just the Jewish rabbis, but the Romans as well. He taught that there was to be no allegiance to any country, ruler, or even rabbi. One's allegiance should be only to God, he said. And one should love thy enemies because peace and love was the only way to everlasting life. It's . . ."

  "What a pack of lies," Petya said from the other side of the room. He sat up in his bed and threw the covers off. "Don't listen to her, Igor. That's not what Christianity teaches you at all. It says you get one chance in this world and that's it. You get it right and you go to heaven. You screw up and you go to hell. It's that simple. You don't get into heaven by practicing peace and love, you have to sing God's praises, sacrifice animals to him, convert the heathens, and build stone temples in his honor. Thank you, Lord, for our suffering. Praise be thy name."

  It wasn't easy for Katya to hear Petya's venomous words on God and religion, but she wanted to practice what her grandmother had taught her. More than that, she wanted Igor to see firsthand that one didn't have to be afraid of other people's ideas and opinions - that you could hold onto your own beliefs no matter what everyone else thought.

  "I'm not going to let you poison this young boy's mind with that garbage," Petya continued. His face was flushed and his eyes were narrow slits beneath his eyebrows. "Religion has been a plague on mankind from the moment someone invented it."

  Katya knew that the subject of religion triggered painful memories in Petya. He'd told her horror stories about how his Baptist aunt had raised him. She felt angry that there were people like that out there - desecrating Jesus' wonderful teachings. She took a deep breath and tried to cultivate gentleness in her words and tone so that she might calm the storm inside of Petya. "I'm curious to hear more about why you think this," she said, turning to face him.

  "No other concept has caused more harm and suffering than the idea that there is a God," Petya said. "Hundreds of millions of people have been slaughtered throughout history - all 'in the name of God.'"

  She opened her mouth to argue with him, but then caught herself and tried to hear past his thoughts and find that place in him that was so full of pain. "You feel outraged when you think of how many people have died in battles and pogroms and inquisitions because of religion," she said. "You value peace and harmony among people and you feel furious when people resort to violence to spread their beliefs."

  "Yes," Petya answered quickly. "But it's not only that. Religions tell people what to do, how to think, what to believe. And it's all a bunch of lies!"

  Katya looked at Igor and saw him taking it all in. "If I hear you right, Petya," she said, "you feel desperate because you value freedom and autonomy. It's important for you to have freedom of thought, freedom of action."

  "Of course," Petya said. "And these damn religions don't give anyone any freedom. Instead, they tell you that you should suffer - that you're flawed and evil by nature. They tell you that you're a horrible person 'unfit in the eyes of the Lord.' To them, man deserves to suffer. He has to pay for his sins. And the first sin he commits is to be born."

  "You'd like people to know they're okay just as they are," Katya said. "You feel outraged when you see religions telling people they're inherently flawed and sinful by nature. Is that right?"

  For the first time since Petya started talking, Katya saw him pause to take a breath.

 
; "I'd like you to know that I do think man is inherently good by nature," Katya said.

  "But that's not what Christianity or Judaism or Islam teach," Petya said, throwing his hands out in front of him. "All they do is teach people to judge themselves and judge others. Does that make the world a better place? Does people hating themselves and hating others make the world a better place?"

  "I feel very sad to know that that's how religion was taught to you," Katya said. "I think the true message of Jesus' teachings have been mostly lost over the centuries. I'm certain it was never God's intention to confuse and constrict man with layers of rules and commandments. It was men who did this - men who had their own motives for adding to and arranging his word. To me, it makes no sense to blame God for the pitfalls of religion or the things that have been done in his name. It's not God's fault."

  "And what of heaven and hell?" Petya said, leaning forward as he spoke. "Don't you think these silly concepts of heaven and hell are just extreme examples of reward and punishment? Do as the preacher tells you and you go to heaven. Disobey him and you go to hell. It's all just a tool to reinforce authority and control. That's what religions are for - to keep people in line, to keep them doing what those in authority want them to do."

  "You'd like people to be able to make their own decisions without concepts of right and wrong, good and bad," Katya said. She was fascinated that she could not only hear his passionately held point of view, but even see how they both wanted the same thing in many instances.

  "Exactly! That's what the world needs. We don't need a new god. We need to get rid of all our existing ones and start recognizing man as holding the key to the future. Humanity is all we need. We don't need Jesus Christ and never have."

  Katya felt a shift in the conversation. Petya looked less tense and wasn't in such a rush to speak. "It's important to you for people to have faith in themselves and each other," Katya said. "You'd like people to believe in themselves, believe in humanity. Right?"