by JV Love
He knew why she was always waiting there, staring at the door. She expected Felix to walk through any minute, as though he'd just stepped out to go get a newspaper.
"Katya, he's not coming back. There's no point in waiting here for him," Petya said.
"You're wrong," she answered. "He is coming back."
"Don't you remember? The soldier at the hospital told you - the Germans killed everyone in his platoon."
"No, we'll be together again," she said. "I just know it."
Petya sighed deeply. It was no use arguing with her.
The room felt colder than usual and he went over to the stove to check the fire. Just as he feared, the fire was nearly out. He wanted to chastise Katya for it, but he knew that wouldn't be right. Kindness was not just a nice thing to do, the voice of God had told him it was a prerequisite for getting into heaven.
He went over to his old apartment and grabbed another stack of his writing, then went to Guzman's and gathered the last few pieces of wood from the piano. The firewood deliveries had stopped in early December. Now you had to get wood to burn from wherever you could. They'd have to start chopping up their chairs and coffee table soon.
Petya wadded up a page of his writing and put it in the stove. Then he arranged the wood on top of it, lit a match and held it to the paper. His writing always caught fire quickly, and he took a fiendish pleasure in seeing it subtracted from the universe forever.
He saw Kolya hadn't drank his water yet. "Drink that," he urged. The boy did as he was told.
There was a strange knock at the door. Strange, because it sounded like someone was kicking the bottom of the door with their boots. Katya dropped her pencil and paper and stood up. "Yes?" she called out.
"Open the door," a voice called out. "It's me."
Katya limped to the door and opened it. Petya watched a ghost walk into the apartment.
"What are you doing here?" Katya asked.
"I thought you could use some firewood," Igor said.
Petya stared in disbelief. He was sure he'd killed Igor two weeks ago.
"I told you to stay away," Katya said. She looked over her shoulder uneasily at Petya. "It's not safe here."
"I was worried about you," Igor said. "I wanted to make sure you were all right."
Katya held out her arms and Igor set the firewood down and they embraced.
Petya thought Igor looked quite healthy for a ghost, certainly better than when he'd last seen him. His cheeks had some color and his lips weren't quite so thin anymore. What Petya couldn't figure out was why (and how) a ghost would carry a load of firewood.
"Well, since you're here," Katya said, "come in and tell me how things are going."
She pulled the hat from his head and his ears stuck out, just the way Petya remembered the boy from their first meeting back in August. It was gradually sinking in that he must have dreamed he killed Igor. This boy in front of him was no apparition.
"How's your courier job going?" Katya asked as she led him toward one of the beds so they could sit. "Do you like living there?"
Igor started telling her about how it was hard to sleep at night because all the men snored so loudly, then he saw Kolya. "Who's that?" he asked.
"That's Kolya," Katya answered. "Kolya, this is Igor."
Kolya looked up and said hi.
"What's he doing here?" Igor asked.
"Petya is going to take care of him," she said. "But we'll talk about that later."
Igor glanced at Petya, then reached into his coat. "I brought some food," he said. He pulled out a can of condensed milk, a small piece of chocolate, and some loose tea. "I thought we might celebrate."
Petya's eyes grew wide at the sight of the tea.
"Celebrate what?" Katya asked. "Is the war over?"
Igor frowned. "No," he said, hanging his head. "It's New Year's Eve."
Katya looked surprised and glanced over at Petya. He nodded his head in return. He'd told her that morning that it was New Year's Eve, but her short-term memory seemed to be failing her lately.
"Oh," she said, looking unsure of what to say next. "Well, of course, we'll celebrate then. We'll celebrate that we're still one step ahead of death."
Igor smiled. "Do you have any food for our celebration?" he asked.
Like most Leningraders, Petya, Katya, and Oksana had stopped sharing their food with one another a while back, but New Year's Eve was an exception.
"Of course," Petya said. "We have lots of provisions. We have some bread . . .." He searched through his coat pockets until he found a small tin of sardines. "And fish too!" He held it up for Igor to see.
"Wow," Igor exclaimed. "How did you get that?"
"And I have two potatoes left," Katya said. "We'll eat those too."
Petya thought she'd lost her senses again. There was no way she still had any potatoes left. But then she went to the kitchen and proved him wrong, returning with two fist-sized white potatoes.
Igor gathered up all the food they'd produced and arranged it on the coffee table. Petya wasn't nearly as excited about the food as he was the tea. He wanted to make it right away, but they were out of water. He'd already gathered and melted all the snow from the roof and windowsills. He'd have to go to the river.
"Where are you going?" Igor asked as Petya buttoned up his coat.
"We're out of water," he said. "I'm going to get some more. Keep an eye on Kolya for me."
Igor looked surprised. Petya didn't blame him. Petya had never helped out with getting water when Igor was still living with them. But things were different now.
* * *
Katya watched Petya walk to the front door and leave the apartment. As soon as the door closed behind him, she called Kolya over. The boy got up and went slowly toward her, his head down, as if he'd done something wrong and was about to be punished.
She had Igor get her thermometer from the kitchen so she could take Kolya's temperature. She'd already seen his swollen, bleeding gums, and now, up close, she could see he had puffy eyes. That usually meant dystrophy.
"Stick your tongue out," she said.
His small pink tongue was covered with brown dots and a white film.
"How long have you been living on your own?" she asked.
"My mom never came home from work last week," he answered.
"Your father's at the front?"
He nodded his head. His lips were so narrow and white that it didn't look like he even had any. "He hasn't been back to visit us in three months," he said.
Katya sighed, a small whimpering sound like a hungry puppy. She'd seen so much of this, but her heart still ached each time.
The thermometer read 97.3, and she was relieved he didn't have a fever. She kissed him on the forehead, then pulled him close to her and gave him a hug. "You're going to be all right, Kolya," she said. He wrapped his small arms around her neck and buried his face in her shoulder.
She noticed his hair, though incredibly dirty, was very much like Felix's: dark and curly. She thought how Felix had probably looked a lot like this little boy when he was his age.
"Go sit next to the stove to warm up," she whispered in Kolya's ear. He kept his arms wrapped tightly around her neck, not letting go. Katya imagined the boy was her son, and Felix the father. She thought how they might never have that opportunity - to get married and have children. Tears welled in her eyes, then slipped down her gaunt cheeks.
When Kolya finally let go, Katya dried her tears with the blanket she had wrapped around her. Then she led Igor into the kitchen to speak to him in private. Her ankle hurt, and she felt weak, both physically and psychologically. But she knew what had to be done. She had to be strong.
"Sweetheart, do you know that orphanage a few blocks from here?" She spoke softly so Kolya wouldn't overhear. "The one across from the school?"
"Da," - yes - Igor answered.
"I want you to take Kolya there. He's sick and they'll be able to look after him."
"I thought you said Petya wa
s going to take care of him."
"Petya means well," she said, "but he can't take care of him. He's sick himself."
"I understand," Igor said.
Katya ran her fingers through his hair. "I see they've given you a bath."
"Yeah, I didn't want to," he said. "But they made me. All soldiers have to take baths at least once a month."
"So you're a soldier now?"
He nodded his head proudly. "If I keep doing such a good job, my commander said I could be promoted to sergeant before the war is over."
Katya smiled. "Just don't you forget you're going to college one day," she said.
"Oh, I won't," he answered. "That's the only way you can become an engineer."
"You're going to be an engineer, now? I thought you'd decided on being a pilot?"
"No, pilots can't put the city back together," he said. "I'm going to be an engineer so I can help rebuild the bridges and buildings the Germans destroyed."
Katya thought again how Igor was her only living relative left. She felt such affection for him and prayed every night that all his dreams would come true one day. She put her arms around him and held him close. "I love you," she said, "no matter what you become."
"I love you too," he said.
She held him tight and rocked slightly from side to side, then let go. "Now don't tell Kolya where you're taking him," she said. "In fact, hold his hand so he can't run away when you get close. He probably won't want to go, but it's the best place for him."
They left the kitchen, and Katya hobbled over to Kolya and sat down beside him. Her ankle was throbbing from standing and it felt good to sit. She looked Kolya in the eyes. "I want you to go with Igor," she said. "You're sick, and he's going to take you to a place where they can help you."
"I hate hospitals," he said.
"Don't worry," she said. "He's not taking you to a hospital."
Igor came over and took Kolya by the hand. He was a head taller than Kolya and weighed at least ten pounds more. Kolya looked up at him and Igor smiled. "It'll be all right," Igor said.
Katya was pleased to see Igor's tenderness and confidence. He had changed so much since he first came to live with her.
Igor led him down the hallway toward the door, Kolya looking back at Katya as he walked. She managed a short smile and waved to him. She knew she'd probably never see him again.
"Pakah," - see you soon - Igor said to Katya as they left.
"Bye," Katya said.
She didn't like Igor going unescorted but felt comforted by the fact that he knew the city well and was young and could run. There were no muggers or cannibals in the city who were willing to expend energy on running after someone.
As soon as they had left, Katya sank down onto her bed, exhausted. She felt haggard and cold, but not hungry. Her appetite had left her a week ago. A bad sign, she knew. Her body was failing her and there wasn't much that could be done about it. She had trouble thinking and remembering. Her muscles didn't always do what they were asked, and when she looked in the mirror, she saw a bony stranger looking back who frightened her.
After she lost her job last month, she'd spent a week checking every hospital in the city. None of them would take her, forcing her to look for work elsewhere. Another two weeks went by before she finally managed to convince a sewing shop to take her on. There, she'd spent all day in a large unheated room that caused her face and legs to go numb with cold. But it gave her the ration level she needed to survive, and that was all that mattered to her.
Her supervisor, Katya came to find out, was a former classmate of Oksana's. She kept Katya on even after Katya sprained her ankle and could no longer make it into work. Then, last week, she'd stopped by Katya's apartment unexpectedly, giving Katya the bad news that they were being audited by the food czar and could no longer keep her on the payroll, reducing Katya once again to the non-worker ration level.
It was getting harder and harder to find the energy to keep fighting. After she grudgingly accepted she might not live to see the spring, her view of the world started shifting. She wrote letters to every person, whether they were alive or not, who she felt resentment toward. She asked for their forgiveness and also told them she forgave them their misdeeds. Her grandmother's words from long ago were her guiding light, "If you forgive others the wrongs they have done to you, God will also forgive you."
She had even forgiven Petya, even if she didn't act that way. His sanity had slipped too far, and she wanted as little interaction with him as possible.
She pulled the covers over herself and didn't want to ever get out of bed again. Closing her eyes, she pictured Felix doing those endless push-ups on their picnic the day before the war started. She felt the hot sun, smelled the scent of freshly-cut hay when the breeze blew, saw Felix's athletic V-shaped back, his muscular arms, the tiny beads of sweat around the short hairs on the back of his neck. He'd been so strong, so sure of himself, so sure the world was perfect just as it was. She wondered if he still felt that way. Raising her arm to her face, she gently brushed the back of her hand along her cheek, imagining it was Felix. "Where are you, my love?" she whispered. "I need you."
* * *
A trip to the river for water was never an easy, short, nor particularly safe journey. The most difficult - not to mention the most dangerous - part was getting down to and up from the river. The great granite stairs leading to the river were covered with thick ice. Several times Petya had seen women slip and fall. Some to never get back up.
He pulled his sled with its clanking pots and pans down the wide, empty street. Occasionally he'd see another person pulling a sled, loaded either with their own pots and pans, or with one of the ubiquitous blue corpses that seemed to outnumber the living these days.
When Petya got to the banks of the river, he saw the stairs were icier than ever. He wanted to just ride the sled down the bank, but that was more dangerous than taking the steps. The slope of the bank was steep and there was no way to stop. You could end up drowning in one of the bomb craters in the ice. Or you might die a slower death if you fell off the sled and hurt yourself. You couldn't count on any of the hospitals to help. They were already packed to capacity, and the doctors rarely performed operations on civilians anyway - Leningraders were so undernourished that their blood wouldn't clot.
Petya debated the pros and cons of each method of getting down to the river and decided the sled option wasn't much more dangerous than the icy stairs option. He went to the least steep section of the riverbank, slid the pots and pans down on their own, then sat down on the sled. He aimed for a pair of snow-covered corpses lying next to one of the nearby holes in the ice. He hoped to use them to stop.
He gave himself a little push, and the sled took off quickly. In a matter of seconds, he collided with the dead bodies and was thrown off the sled. Fortunately he wasn't hurt, and he made his way to his feet and gathered the pots and pans.
In the distance, he could see one of the Navy's battleships. Every ship in the Northern fleet (what remained of it anyway) was stuck in the ice, completely immobile. They were still manned, though only partially, and their big guns pounded at the enemy lines from time to time. German planes had tried repeatedly to sink the ships, but without success.
Petya wound his way around the numerous corpses until he found a hole in the ice that wasn't yet frozen over. He dipped his can into the hole until he heard a splash and felt the rope jerk slightly. After the rope got sufficiently heavy, he pulled the can up and dumped the brown water into one of the pots. He would have to repeat this procedure many times to fill all of the pots and pans he'd brought.
The second most difficult, and critical, part of his journey was yet to come. Once he finished filling all the pots and pans, he had to take them, one by one, up the icy steps, then situate them on the sled so that a little bump wouldn't overturn them and make the entire trip for naught.
Petya returned to the apartment two hours later. Igor helped him bring the pots and pans of water up
the stairs, then Katya helped him boil and strain just enough for that night. Oksana arrived home as they were finishing and surprised them all with a bottle of Georgian wine. "They gave it out at work," she said. "We were hoping for food, but it's better than nothing."
There was a lump of blankets on Igor's bed, and Petya had assumed that Kolya was buried under them sleeping. It wasn't until he went to check on the boy that he realized he wasn't there.
"Where's Kolya?" he asked.
"Who?" Oksana said, looking from Petya to Katya to Igor.
A flash of fear streaked through Petya's mind. Had he imagined the whole thing? Did the boy not really exist?
He grabbed hold of Igor. "Where's Kolya?" he asked, his eyes frantic.
Igor tried to get free of his grasp and go to Katya. "I don't know," he said.
"Where is he?!" Petya shouted, gripping him tighter.
"Let him go," Katya said. "Kolya ran away."
Petya released his grip. "Why didn't you stop him?" he said, looking at Katya.
"We tried," she answered, "but he got away."
Petya felt sad and full of grief. He'd made up his mind he'd take care of the boy, and now, through his negligence, Kolya was gone. He put his ragged brown coat on to go outside. "I'm going to try to find him," he said. "I think I know where he ran to."
"No, don't go," Katya said.
She was wringing her hands, and Petya thought her reaction odd. "I have to," he said as he walked out the door. "He's just a boy. He won't survive on his own."
Petya went all the way back to the abandoned building to look for Kolya, but couldn't find him there. He searched other nearby buildings as well, but all to no avail. He returned to the apartment heartbroken.
Katya did her best to console him, saying Kolya was likely picked up by a policeman or a Civil Defense Corps worker. The boy would be fine, she told Petya. In fact, he was probably already celebrating New Year's. Petya didn't believe her, and it wasn't until the voice of God said he'd watch over the boy that Petya felt better.
