The Lullaby of Polish Girls

by Dagmara Dominczyk

  “I can’t, córko. I just can’t.”

  Anna nods her head. “Tell me, then. Tell me what made you love him. Tell me something that will make me understand why you’re still here.”

  Paulina’s eyes close. “He used to mold me little figurines out of bread and water, when he was in jail. Little stars and a bear. I still have them. He was unbelievably handsome and everyone called him Ponderosa because he wanted to be a cowboy.” Her mother is crying softly and now Anna takes her hand and holds it.

  When Anna wakes up, it is light outside and she is parched. She walks to the kitchen and is startled to find her father sitting at the table, playing with a match. He lets the flame burn down to his fingertips, till there is only a hiss, a small puff of white smoke. When Anna was little, her father brought kasztany back from his trips to Europe—shiny, smooth chestnuts, oversized and beautiful—and he’d make little animals from them, using matches for legs, horns, and hooves. Anna lined them up on her windowsill, and stared at them in the mornings, imagining their lives, till they began to rot and her mother threw them out.

  Radosław takes another match and lights a cigarette. He tilts his head back and exhales a plume of blue smoke toward the ceiling. “I never wanted this.”

  “Yeah,” Anna replies, not wanting to cry.

  Suddenly, Anna remembers taking Radosław to see Braveheart the year it came out. Her father was riveted, laughing happily when the barnyard Scots mooned the ruthless Brits, and wept like a child when Mel Gibson died in the end, and then every day afterward Radosław walked through the house bellowing out, “Freeeeeeedom!” It was in his blood, and yet now, he sits hunched over like a child.

  Her father looks down at his knuckles. “I never wanted your mother, or marriage, or you. I wanted to be a fighter, like my father, like his father before him. I was a fighter. But she made me stop. I called the wedding off three times. But she wouldn’t let me go.”

  “I don’t believe that. You’re either lying or you don’t remember. No one can ‘make you’ when it comes to that.”

  Her father slams the tabletop. “Goddamnit, I’m telling you—she made me.” His eyes brim with redness, and he squeezes them shut.

  “Just leave me alone. Zostaw mnie.” His voice is shockingly pleading and so Anna complies.

  At eight o’clock, Anna finishes packing, puts on her coat, and sets her duffel bag by the door. Paulina watches her every move.

  “Tell Babcia I miss her. Tell her I’m going to come visit this summer, this time for real. And give her some money, Anna, please.”

  “I don’t get how you’ve never been back to Poland, in all these years, Mamo. Money’s not an issue. Just come with me,” Anna pleads one last time. But her mother shakes her head.

  “I’m afraid if I go back, Ania, that I’ll never want to leave.”

  Anna smiles. This, she understands. She walks over and hands her mother a wad of cash. “This is for you, Mommy. Get a nice haircut. Not at Supercuts, okay?” Paulina takes the money and stares at it.

  Before leaving, Anna cracks open the door to her father’s room. Radosław lies on the bed, propped up on his elbows, tapping ashes into a saucer which rests next to his Polish newspaper, its inky pages spread like a blanket before him.

  “I’m going, Ponderosa.”

  Her father’s face registers surprise at his old nickname and he raises his eyebrows. “Where you going?”

  “Home.”

  Outside, it’s dark and quiet. Anna hails a cab and quickly gets in.

  “JFK, please.”

  There is barely any traffic as they head east toward the Queensboro Bridge. In her pocket, her cell phone vibrates. In a few hours, she will be unreachable and she can’t wait. But she hasn’t spoken to Ben since running off, and she figures that everybody deserves a goodbye.

  “Anna?” Ben’s voice is familiar and foreign at once. She remembers the first time they made love and how hungry she was for it, and how, when he passed out exhausted next to her afterward, Anna stared up at the ceiling, somehow still wanting more.

  “Merry Christmas, Ben. Wesoych Świąt.”

  “Anna. Oh, fucking Christ. You picked up! You finally picked up, and I’m leaving. I’m in a cab and I’m flying to Omaha. Oh, Anna.”

  “I’m leaving too. On my way to JFK. You?”

  “LaGuardia.”

  Under the bridge, the East River shines black, tiny frozen lakes shimmering on its glossy surface. Ben is silent and for a minute Anna thinks that the call was dropped.

  “Anna.” Ben sighs. He’s groping for an answer, or holding on for dear life, but isn’t that the same thing, really? “Are you going to Poland?”

  “Yes.”

  “Anna. Why? We have to deal with this, with us. You wrote a fucking note. After years with me, you left a note. I’m surprised you didn’t leave a twenty by the bedside while you were at it.”

  “I have to go home.”

  “It’s not your home, Anna. Your home is right here.”

  “Well, what if I told you I’m going to see a boy? Would that make you feel better?”

  Ben doesn’t answer; he just hangs up.

  Anna closes her eyes and presses her fingertips over her eyelids. When she was a little girl, back in Poland, she would shut her eyes at nap time, and do the same thing, till the blinding billows of white she’d see would turn to colors, like a kaleidoscope. “You’ll damage your corneas,” Babcia used to say.

  The inside of JFK is quiet. Footsteps echo, shadows fall; it’s like a movie set. Anna walks up to the business-class counter at LOT, and the Polish airline attendant hands Anna her ticket and doesn’t say anything.

  An hour later, sweating and ready to drop, she boards a plane that is already occupied with passengers traveling from Chicago. The cabin interior smells Polish, like krakowska ham, cheap floral eau de toilette, and sweat. She finds her place in the third row, and plonks into it gratefully. It’s at times like these she thanks God that the world all but overlooks the existence of her country. You mention Poland to an American and they think three things: kiełbasa, the Pope, and Auschwitz, probably in that order. No one really gives a shit about her homeland. So why would anyone bother messing with a planeload of Polacks? Anna convinces herself that no Al Qaeda crazy would give a fuck about hijacking LOT Flight 76, direct to Warsaw, and she takes a deep breath, clutching her father’s medallion around her neck.

  When the captain announces that they are ready for takeoff, and the engines rumble toward their full throttle, Anna grips her hands together. Her thighs jiggle. Her neck goes rigid. The man sitting next to her cracks a wide smile.

  “Scared?” he asks in Polish.

  Anna nods her head.

  “Don’t be, laleczko. If it happens, you won’t even know.” The man is smug, openly judging her head to toe.

  “Thanks,” she replies in English. Thanks, in a perfect American accent, because sometimes that puts these types of assholes in their place.

  Miraculously, Anna falls asleep. She dreams in fits and starts, dreams of the roily zalew waters. When the plane touches the ground Anna’s eyes fly open, and she lifts the window shade and is greeted by the blinding white glare of snow.

  “Where are we?” she asks, bewildered.

  “Tahiti,” the man next to her answers. “Where do you think we are, lady? Polska.”

  Anna turns back to the window. The sky is white and gray, just like the ground. Where is the sun, the green fields in the distance? Anna is confused and then she realizes that this is Poland in winter, something she hasn’t seen in eighteen years, something she has no recollection of at all. Around her, passengers start to stir and gather their things. And yet, she is aware of only one thing: that old feeling, that old rapture, bursting in her heart.

  “Polska,” she repeats to herself. “Polska.”

  Kamila

  Kielce, Poland

  “Really, Natalia, my eyes. I can’t take it …” Kamila tries to wave away the cigarette smo
ke that is visibly settling in gray layers in the stinky green Peugeot.

  “What? The fucking window’s open!” Natalia laughs and takes another puff, turning her mouth to exhale the smoke toward the tiny crack in the driver’s side window.

  “I’m trying to quit, but gimme a break. Besides, beggars can’t be choosers, Kamila. It’s either this or the 10:25 osobowy from Warszawa to Kielce.” Kamila rolls her eyes and then closes them. She wasn’t able to sleep on the plane, terrified not of the turbulence, but at the thought of landing in one piece and having to face Emil. She was actually doing this.

  Her parents had begged her to give them Christmas, their first one together in almost six years, and Kamila agreed. Two days ago, she accompanied her father to midnight mass. They walked silently in the snow and as they got closer to the Polish church, more and more people fell into step with them. The mass was long and solemn, but the carols were as beautiful as Kamila recalled them from her childhood. Her father stood beside her, mouthing all the prayers, shaking hands with acquaintances, kissing their cheeks. On their way back, Kamila glanced at Włodek, who seemed more alive and content than she had seen him her entire visit.

  “You miss it, don’t you? You miss home.”

  But her father just patted his heart and smiled. “I don’t miss home, Kamila. Because it’s always right here.”

  Kamila didn’t know if she bought that, but she linked her arm through his and put her head on his shoulder.

  “What I miss is you, córciu. But I’m glad you’re going back. It takes courage to go back to anything.”

  Natalia flicks her cigarette out the window and rolls it up. “I think you should get a dog.”

  Kamila opens her eyes and squints at Natalia through the smoky haze.

  “You know, when the smoke clears. Hahaha.”

  “A dog?”

  “A puppy. A little yellow puppy.”

  “A puppy?”

  “Yeah. A fucking puppy. When my dad died last year my mother was this close to slitting her wrists. So Stas and I got her this little dog, a miniaturka poodle, you know, the ones that don’t grow? I swear to God, that thing saved her life.”

  “My husband didn’t die, so I’m sorry to say I won’t be replacing him with a dog.”

  “Dziewczyno! It’s called dogoterapia and it works in fending off major bouts of depression. Like the ones that might follow the breakup of someone’s marriage due to her husband’s closeted homosexuality.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “You’re a skeleton. I thought America fattened people up. All right, forget the puppy for now. What’s your plan of attack?”

  “I thought I would stay with you and your mom for a few nights, to get my bearings.”

  “Wrong. I’m dropping you off at the doorstep of your fucking apartment and you are gonna walk in and order that głupek to pack up and hit the road.”

  Kamila sighs. How can she explain that it’s not Emil’s sexual preference that has destroyed her, but the years of shrouding, when really, he could have just told her a long time ago.

  “Natalka, you’re a dear friend for chauffeuring me today but I can’t deal with it now, I just can’t. And if you won’t let me stay with you I’ll check into a hotel.”

  Natalia suddenly swerves toward the roadside and pulls over. She turns to Kamila. “Marchewska, you did not fly across half the world to go cower in a hotel room. You’ll just lose momentum. And I’m sure you have dozens of speeches prepared, so when you see him just pick one and let him have it.”

  “I don’t have any speeches prepared.” But Natalia is right. She does have speeches prepared, diatribes and monologues that have been brewing for months. There’s a speechless option too, the one where she walks into the house unannounced, doesn’t even look at Emil, but just matter-of-factly starts chucking all his belongings off the balcony.

  “Your life is passing you by, minute by minute. I wouldn’t be a friend if I let you hide,” Natalia insists. “And I’m not driving until you agree.”

  “Then I’ll walk to Kielce. I’m tired and jet-lagged and I don’t want to see him now. I need to sleep some of this shit off.”

  “You’re going to confront him today. End of story.”

  “The story ended months ago, Natalia. There’s no story left.”

  This time Natalia doesn’t say anything. She steers back toward Route 7. Kamila stares out the window, past the snow-capped roofs of the huts that line the roadway, each one stooped under the weight of snow. The homes break her heart and she realizes how much she’s missed Poland.

  When Kamila opens her eyes, the car is parked and Natalia is gone. She glances at her wristwatch, set to Polish time because she never bothered to change it. It feels later than half past one. Natalia appears, juggling two coffees and a paper bag. She mimes for Kamila to lean over and open the door for her.

  “We’re just forty kilometers out but I needed a jolt. Doesn’t help having Sleeping Beauty in the passenger seat. Here.” Natalia divvies up the goodies, a scorching coffee, fries, and a box of chicken nuggets.

  “I fucking love McDonald’s,” Natalia says, stuffing a handful of frytki into her mouth as she turns the engine on again. “Homo, here we come!” she bellows.

  “Stop it,” Kamila admonishes and turns up the radio, in time to hear the familiar strains of “Jolka Jolka.” Immediately Natalia starts singing along.

  “Z autobusem Arabów zdradziła go, nigdy nie był już sobą, o nieeee! Can you believe it, cheated on the poor bastard with a busload of Arabs? They don’t write songs like this anymore, eh, Kamila …”

  The song gets to Kamila, haunts her, and she doesn’t care if Natalia catches her out of the corner of her eye, crying.

  It’s good that Kamila’s having this moment now, instead of an hour from now, when she will be standing face-to-face with Emil. She can’t help wondering what Anna Baran would say. She’d hug Kamila and tell her it was all going to be okay, that Kamila was strong and deserved better, the very things she told Kamila time and time again, every summer since they were fourteen. Did Anna remember the anguish and the elation of those summers, the way they held hands on their way down Toporowskiego to meet Justyna by St. Józef’s Church? Did she remember the hours they spent on the steps, ogling boys, cracking up over nothing and everything?

  “Good, have your cry now, Kamila,” Natalia says softly, eyes on the road.

  When they drive up to her apartment building, Kamila can feel her heart thumping throughout her whole body. Even her toes are pulsating. Suddenly Kamila knows that Natalia’s right; it’s now or never.

  “Take my credit card and book me a room at the Hotel Pod Różą. A suite, with a balcony, if they have it.”

  “For him?” Natalia’s eyes grow incredulous.

  “No, Natalka, for me. I’m going to have my say, and then I’m checking into the hotel. I can’t stay here, and I don’t want to. I’ll sell this apartment and in the meantime you and Stasiu can move in. Give your mom and that dog a break.” Kamila smiles.

  “Na serio?”

  “It’s the most lucid thought I’ve had in days. Take it or leave it.”

  “I take it! I take it!” Natalia throws her arms around Kamila’s neck.

  “I’ll be back for you in an hour?”

  “Half hour.”

  “And if he’s not there?”

  “He’s there. Look.” And she points with her chin toward her apartment, where the kitchen light is on.

  “Kamila. Trzymaj się. You’ll feel so much better afterward.”

  “Well, I can’t feel any fucking worse, right?” Kamila gets out of the car and watches Natalia drive off, waving at her as she heads up Wiejska Boulevard. Kamila feels her coat pocket for her keys. They jangle reassuringly. The stairwell is dim and alive with obiad aromas.

  She slowly turns the key in the lock to her apartment and the door clicks open. She pushes it with her foot and steps into the przedpokój, and just like that she sees Emil, his broad
back, at the kitchen sink, scrubbing dishes. Wojtek’s head pops in from the bedroom. When he sees Kamila, he yells in surprise.

  Emil drops a dish at the sound. He turns his head and sees Kamila, who glances away quickly. The apartment is spotless and warm.

  “Honey, I’m home.” Kamila doesn’t plan on saying it, and certainly doesn’t plan on saying it in English, but there it is. Right away, Wojtek is scrambling to find his shoes, retrieving his coat from the rack next to Kamila. She grabs his shoulder. “You’re not staying? By all means, stay. I won’t be long.” There are tears in his eyes, and Kamila feels a pang of pity and regret.

  “Kamila. Please.” It’s all he says and then he’s out the door. Kamila shuts it behind him.

  “Take off your coat.” Emil’s first words to her are spoken quietly but firmly. Kamila obliges, allowing her Calvin Klein wool coat to drop to the floor.

  “Tea? I’ve got a fresh pot ready. As soon as I sweep this.” He points to the shattered plate at his feet.

  “Sure.”

  Kamila sits down. There’s a small plastic Christmas tree replica on the table with tiny plastic ornaments dangling off its skinny little branches. She feels the fight in her die. Emil brings over a cup and saucer and sits down across from her. He’s grown a beard and put on a few pounds. Love allows for a lapse in personal maintenance.

  “I know. I got fat.” Emil smiles sadly and starts to cry.

  “Why didn’t you tell me before?”

  “That I gained weight?” His laugh comes out like a hiccup. “You should have just told me, Emil. When we were twelve, or when we were sixteen and I tried to dry hump you at every sleepover we had.”

  Emil wipes his eyes. “I thought you’d figure it out and leave me on your own. But I prayed you wouldn’t.”

  “Dlaczego?”

  “Because I didn’t want to be alone. Because I couldn’t name it, Kamila. I didn’t even know what it was, not till a few years ago, I swear to you. I thought it was a phase. Like pimples, and that in time it would clear up on its own. Please don’t hate me.”

  Kamila sips her tea. She doesn’t hate him. She wants to believe him. She also wants to chew him out, rail against the injustice of being spurned all those years. But they are somehow having an adult conversation, meaningful and quiet. It isn’t any of the ways that she imagined this moment, but perhaps this is better.