by T. M. Parris
He had an idea. He went to the living room, to the bureau where he knew there was paper and pens. He opened the desk, feeling a kind of pride, wishing that someday he could have a desk like this. He was going to write Tatiana a letter. He was going to tell her exactly how he felt about her. He would tell her how much he thought of her during the worst ordeals of the training, and how it was that he was still alive, how she made his life complete. Maybe she would never read this letter. But perhaps she would, and it would make him happy while he was writing it. He could lose himself in the world he would create. There was so little hope now, that a few hours of happiness may be all that any of them could expect.
He took the pen and paper back to the bathroom. He wrapped the blankets around himself. Something was happening outside. He had to block it out. In the street a rumbling sound started quietly and grew, then changed into giant crashing and people screaming. He pulled the blankets tighter. His hands were shaking.
Think of home, Boris. Think of warm summer nights, and kompot, and her. Remember every detail, and where there’s nothing to remember, imagine.
He started to write.
50
It wasn’t an explosion that woke Rose. It came from the street. A series of booming crashes, people shouting out, a woman’s scream. It was morning; she’d been out most of the night and didn’t even try and sleep until the early hours. The noise penetrated her dream. When she jerked awake, it still echoed. Dust was rising through the windows, despite all the coverings. Ilya and Katya weren’t by the stove; she checked the flat and they weren’t there. Shouts were still coming from the street. She went down and realised why.
Half the building opposite was gone. In its place lay a heap of smoking ruins. Its entire front was torn away, leaving exposed rooms and staircases. A few were trying to climb over the unstable rubble. Most stood and watched.
On those scenes on TV, there’d be a rescue team, thought Rose. Flashing lights, fire trucks, ambulances, rescuers with gear swarming all over this mess, a round-the-clock exercise that would go on for days. Here there was no one to call, no sirens approaching, no equipment, no paramedics, no TV cameras. Tired, half-starving people, staring at a pile of bricks and concrete, wondering how soon they’d be next. Buildings were in a state of semi-collapse all over the island. Would there be anything left of the place by the end of all this? A stuttering of weapon fire somewhere close by hurried the footsteps of those who were already turning away in despair.
The flat next door to theirs had a gaping hole where the bedroom used to be. Was anyone in there? The door to the flat was still barricaded shut from the inside; Rose had discreetly tried it one night. They should all go into a cellar, but Ilya was adamant they were still too crowded. If that were true, or whether he was saying that to avoid putting Katya through the trauma, or because of what happened to those other children, she didn’t know. She had no authority with them, and when Ilya announced yesterday he was taking Katya with him to the lookout point, she only requested they come back before nightfall, and tried not to appear as anxious as she felt. Same with her state of relief when they did indeed return by nightfall. Today Ilya hadn’t even woken her up to tell her they were going. In Marta’s absence, Katya’s clinginess had transferred to her older brother. They spoke to each other in low voices. She had no idea what they were saying.
Back in the flat Rose went through the supplies she’d brought back that morning. Quite a lot of it was missing. Knowing where it was going, she didn’t begrudge it. She sat and ate some food herself. Marta had been good at making things out of Rose’s unappetising offerings, soft flat breads and sweet pastries from the flour and powdered egg and milk. Rose tried to fill up on crispbreads and tea made on the stove.
She was putting more time into her nightly scavenging, bringing back as much as she possibly could. She’d made several forays during the night, returning from each to dump her stash at the flat. The easy-to-access supplies were now gone except for mould-encrusted bread and foul-smelling freezers. Now she was basically a burglar, a night-time food thief, cruising the town for balconies that could be scaled and windows that could be prised open. All the while every sense was on alert for the tell-tale whistling above, not that there was time to get away. You just had to take your chances.
And these places weren’t always empty, either. Rose was quiet and discreet; sometimes she entered and exited without even seeing anybody else. At times she dropped herself into a room to find it full of sleeping bodies. Whatever happened then, she usually managed to persuade people it was better for them to let her take what she wanted and leave. Occasionally she’d find herself up against enough brawn or determination to beat a hasty retreat. It was often a battle of wills more than an out-and-out fight. She was no different now from the guy who’d tried to mug them in the alleyway – just better at it, and more focused.
The siege had lasted a couple of weeks now, she didn’t know exactly how long. Her mobile phone had run out of battery long ago, and a lot of the radio receivers had too. News came in the form of rumours from the barracks. Rose did ask Ilya to check for any messages for her. No word so far. But who knew if the messages were getting through?
Whoever had been sweeping bodies off the streets was now too overwhelmed to keep up. If they weren’t moved, the dogs would help themselves, ripping into a stomach or an abdomen. More and more dogs were roaming free, some thin and hungry, others bold, well-fed, glimpses of sticky gore on their jowls. Those were the ones she avoided. If Rose happened upon a corpse lying in the street, if she could she would drag it and leave it out of sight, behind a wall or inside a culvert. Each time, she looked at the face, wondering if it might be Marta. But Marta was probably already similarly stowed, rotting away somewhere unknown. At the barracks they were trying to keep a list of names, but Marta’s name hadn’t appeared. Ilya checked every day.
The situation seemed hopeless; she had no idea how many soldiers were in the barracks – fewer, probably, than everyone was assuming – but they were using up ammunition against the Russian positions which wasn’t being replenished. The Russians, on the other hand, had supply lines in place. The rumours from Tbilisi were of a stalemate, but here they seemed to be going in a particular direction. It was impossible for anyone to get out, she’d convinced herself, ignoring the small voice inside her which kept asking her whether she’d even tried. But how could she go now, and leave Ilya and Katya to starve?
She lay down and failed to sleep, tried to work out how long the children had been gone, thought about the mugger from yesterday, his shard of glass pointing under her chin, her back against the wall, Ilya by her side. Ilya was brave, but not equipped for that. How was she expected to sit here and wait to see if they came back? She couldn’t. She got up and left.
It was warm and sunny, she noticed, navigating cratered streets below forlorn frameless windows. In other years Lali might be basking, celebrating the arrival of spring, but this year it merely tempered the night-time chill and rotted the bodies more quickly. Just as she neared the sloping road down to the lookout point she spotted Ilya and Katya some way beyond, walking hand in hand in the opposite direction. Where on earth were they going? She hurried after them and called out. They stopped and turned. She carried on and they started coming towards her.
When she recalled it afterwards, she could picture all the details: the long street between them striped light and dark where the sun shone through the gaps; Ilya tugging Katya along, his white T-shirt a dirty grey; Katya trotting trustingly next to her brother, her free hand looping an untied belt on her dress around her fingers. It lifted her spirits that they turned to come to her, that she mattered to them after all in some small way. But that moment was brief.
A low-pitched growling off to the side made her turn. A dog was coming towards them down a side street directly between them. Its generous haunches rippled. Its eyes held Rose in a stare, its lips were pulled back to show thick pointed yellow teeth, and drool gathered in folds
of skin along its jaw, dripping as it padded closer. The dog raised its nose in her direction, as if the creature were hungry for her in particular, eyeing up her body parts. Patches of its face were matted and brown. Transfixed by this horror, Rose took too long to realise that the children were also standing and staring, their two little hand-holding shadows cast before them in the road. They were in the sun; Rose was in the shade. They were standing stock still where the sun shone through a gap, a gap which also made them visible from the river. In slow-motion her brain called on her lungs and mouth to form a sound and commanded her to leap towards them, arms flaying. She’d started turning already, her mouth opening to form a word. Right in that second came a thunderclap, and the ground erupted into fountains of dust.
She found movement, she found words. “Run! Run!” Was she waving them away or towards her? It didn’t matter – they just had to move! Four eyes looked up at her. Now she was in the light as well. What would a Russian soldier see? A woman and two children? Would he care that they were children? Would he pull the trigger anyway, or would something inside make him pause?
Before she reached them the thunderclap came again. Ilya turned and twisted to the ground. Katya knelt, pulled down by his hand. Rose was there, between them and the sniper. Ilya was missing half his face, red lumps and spatter over his neck and T-shirt. Katya stared, expressionless. Rose circled Ilya and grabbed Katya under the armpits but she wouldn’t let go of her brother. Rose was shouting at her, she didn’t know what. She took the girl by the waist in one arm and with the other hand prised her fingers from around her dead brother’s hand. She ducked and ran for the shadow, as another salvo erupted around them.
She put Katya down and fell to her knees. She gasped desperately for air. Katya trotted forward and stood staring at the body. Specks of blood dotted her face. Rose reached out to stop her stepping out again into shot. She recoiled, shaking Rose off as if she were a swarm of flies. She carried on staring at Ilya, as if expecting him to stir and wake up. Rose sat back. She realised that the reason she couldn’t breathe was that she was sobbing. She couldn’t stop. Katya’s wide blue eyes were on her now and she still couldn’t stop, had nothing she could say, no word or expression, that would make sense of what just happened.
She didn’t know how long they were both there like that. Eventually she stood and held out her hand to Katya. What else could they do but go home? But Katya just looked at her, turned, and ran straight past her.
51
It was a challenge Rose hadn’t not faced before, tracking a six-year-old. First of all Katya just ran, randomly it seemed, criss-crossing the damaged remains of the town, never looking around. Rose kept her distance. Had she ever done a more important surveillance op than this? She mustn’t lose sight of her for a moment, and Katya couldn’t see her, or all was undone.
Her heart rose in her throat whenever Katya approached an exposed area. But with her height and erratic speed she would have been a hard target, and there was no explosion of shots. Only once did she stop, distracted by some early blossom, delicate white flowers on a thin tree in the grounds of a church. Then she worked her way back to the street where Rose had seen them. Ilya’s body was still lying there. Katya came to a rigid halt some distance away, staring at it. She stood for a very long time. Then she turned back. Rose knew where she was going now. She kept her in sight all the way, watching her crawl fully inside the window of the lookout point. She could understand, she thought. This was a place Ilya liked, that he took her to. There would be something of him in there. Rose curled up in a doorway and waited.
It was a few hours before Katya emerged again, getting late but not yet nightfall. Now she was walking, not running. Rose gave her some space, but came a little closer when she realised where Katya was headed. She knew the way, this girl, knew where she was going. At the entrance door to their block she was almost directly behind. Katya went up the stairs to the flat door and looked around with an expectant expression, as if she’d known all the time that Rose was there and was summoning her forward now to let her in. Inside, Katya went and lay down by the stove. She showed no signs of wanting to eat, but Rose made food anyway: fish ladled out of a tin and some crispbreads. She put it on the table and lay on her sofa cushions.
She only realised she’d fallen asleep when she felt Katya’s weight against her. The girl was snuggling in next to her. The last, the very last person in her life, a stranger who didn’t speak her language, who tried to protect them and failed, Rose was all she had left now.
Later, when Katya was sleeping soundly, Rose slipped out from under her and crept out of the flat, locking it behind her and uttering a silent prayer for calm for the next couple of hours. Another child needed her now.
Ilya’s body was still lying where he fell. She picked him up and carried him to a corner she’d passed which was more rubble than standing buildings. Climbing awkwardly over the ruins she found a quiet spot, laid Ilya out and piled stones and bricks until he was completely covered, a little barrow, an unmarked grave.
No dog was going to feed on this body.
52
Boris heard something. A scuffling noise. He held his breath. A door opened. Footsteps in the corridor outside. Was this real now? His dreams were so muddled with his waking. He couldn’t make sense of it. The front door was still blocked with furniture. But someone was in the flat.
They must have seen him! When the wall was blown away they saw him, and now they were coming to get him. His heart thumped so hard it hurt. He was a disgrace, sitting there amongst tiles and plaster wrapped up in blankets, his head against the wall. Please go away, please go away! He should defend himself, like a real man. Where was his weapon? He didn’t even know. What kind of a soldier was he?
The footsteps came into the hallway. Two steps then nothing. He clutched his stomach. The footsteps moved away into the lounge. A pause, then back again. Now the other way. He clenched himself even tighter and his heel shifted, grating against broken tile. The footsteps stopped. He closed his eyes. It must be a dream.
The door opened and a voice spoke.
“Do you live here?”
It wasn’t a dream. He opened his eyes. Standing in the doorway was a tall man, brown skin and brown hair, thin cheeks.
“I said, do you live here?” He was speaking Russian.
Boris said nothing. Don’t say anything to anybody. It’s too dangerous.
“Is this your apartment?” The man glanced at the damaged tiling.
Yes, yes, it’s my apartment. Boris bit his lip and a whimper came out. The man was staring, appraising.
“Is that your army uniform back there? Are you Russian?”
He was waiting for a response. Boris stared directly in front. This man had ruined everything.
“Answer me! Are you Russian? What are you doing here?”
The voice boomed in the tiny room. Boris let out a sob.
“What are you doing inside Lali? Where’s your battalion?”
The stranger knelt in front of him. Rough hands grabbed his jaw and forced his face to the front. Boris looked into fierce grey eyes, inches from his own. The man smelled of the outside, of sweat and unwashed skin and hunger.
“You tell me. You tell me who you are. Are you a sniper? Or a spy? Are you GRU?”
The grip tightened. The man was breathing heavily. There was something frantic about him.
“I don’t like you,” he said. “I don’t like that you’re here. I know you’re up to something. What are you doing in this flat? It’s just a coincidence, is it?”
Boris didn’t understand what he meant.
“Are you working for him? Are you working for Khovansky?”
Boris shook his head. The stranger pushed his face and knocked his skull into the wall.
“What, then?”
His desperation gave him an idea.
“I will show you,” said Boris. “I will show you who I work for.”
The man went quiet. He let Boris get
up. Boris went out and pointed him into the living room. “Please, after you.”
The stranger went in. Boris followed and picked up a chair. He lunged at the man and swung it fast, smashing it into the side of his head. The man staggered. Boris ran out, slammed the door and rammed the chair under the doorknob. He started to pull furniture away from the front door.
The man hammered on the door. “Let me out!”
He could break out, it wouldn’t take long, but Boris only needed a few moments. Piece by piece he flung all the furniture aside and opened the door, and he was on the landing outside making for the stairs, but already the man was out, and grabbed him by the clothes, and Boris fell to his knees. His head cracked on the bannister. Oh, they’ve all come back again, all the nightmares! Then he was looking at a gun, pointed at him.
“Who are you? What’s your name? What are you doing here?”
His bladder gave way and he felt warmth all round his crotch. He shouted out, no longer caring. He was dead anyway, he knew.
“I’m Boris! Boris Egorov! Russian army! Fourth Battalion, Second Motor Rifle Division! That’s who I am! I am a Russian! Russian!”
The gun didn’t move. Boris knew he was going to die.
Someone opened the door of the other flat. The man turned his head, and his face changed.
