The Girl They Left Behind

by Roxanne Veletzos

  Well, it had certainly accomplished just that. Whatever her life was now, whatever had become of it, it was punctuated with a simmering, pestering curiosity that gnawed at her night and day. It was strange, she realized now, how as a young child she’d so easily managed to cut herself off from her past. She had made herself numb to it, indifferent. But that letter had opened up the door to ghosts she’d long buried. For four years now, she’d been haunted by them. They lurked everywhere, inside her dreams, underneath the surface of her everyday life, like dirty little secrets.

  But this has nothing to do with you now, Talia, she often chided herself for this absurd preoccupation. This has no bearing on your life now. She knew only too well that there were more important matters that required her full focus, like the fact that her dream of attending the music conservatory had just gone up in flames. It had not been a surprise entirely when the rejection letter had come in the mail. She’d seen the answer already on the faces of the auditioning committee, when at the end of her recital, they examined her application and their expressions shifted from pure enchantment to helpless disappointment. It had broken her heart at first—her heart and her will and, worse even, her faith in herself—but after months of wallowing in self-pity, she decided that she would not give up on her piano.

  For years now, she’d been in love with jazz, and she’d heard that although it was banned from being played publicly, it was still very much alive in a budding underground movement. The idea seemed crazy (and risky, at that), but if she practiced enough, if she really committed, maybe someday she would find a place for herself in its midst. In the meantime, she could earn a little money by giving lessons—there were other avenues, other paths, as long as she didn’t quit.

  Yes, there were more pressing matters bearing down on her life. But the more she struggled to put the letter out of her mind, the less she succeeded. What if there had been other letters, more inquiries? Could there have been? She didn’t think it likely. After 1945, when Romania was cut off from the West, it would have been impossible to get any correspondence into the country. If there had been more letters, if there had been more attempts to find her, the chain would have been severed there. But what if that wasn’t true? She recalled the times she’d wanted to ask her uncle if he knew the circumstances of her adoption and now regretted not doing it. Then again, it would probably not have gotten her very far. Whatever Stefan knew, he would take to his grave. Nothing would ever come between him and his undying loyalty to her parents.

  It seemed that if there was anything more to know, there was only one way to find out. She would have to go back to the place where it had all started.

  Later that afternoon on the trolley, Natalia could still not believe her own impulsiveness, the way she’d simply hopped on at the last moment without any sort of a clear plan. She rode standing up, the city and its usual mélange of sun-scorched parks and soot-stained facades going by in a blur as she counted the years. Thirteen years had passed since she’d last seen the inside of that place. Thirteen long years in a different life, a life before food lines and rationed electricity.

  Once, she had ridden past it by chance. It was right after the war, and the buses were not yet running regularly, so she and her mother had taken a cab to go someplace. She remembered her mother talking to the driver, saying something about the interminable winter, how a bomb had left a gaping hole in the center of town. And then she’d stopped in mid-sentence. At the silence, Natalia looked up from the book in her lap and followed the trajectory of her mother’s gaze. There, underneath the metal scaffolding, the place that contained her earliest memories lay in a state of decay.

  “Remember, Talia?” her mother said softly as the place grew smaller in the rear window.

  Of course, she remembered. She didn’t think it possible to ever forget. How could she forget the faces of those dirty, desolate children crying late in the night, their lice-infested uniforms, the musty courtyard that smelled perpetually of garbage, the daily watery soup? But of all this she said nothing. She shrugged instead, trying to appear indifferent, hoping that her disinterest would discourage her mother from wanting to discuss it further. They never spoke of it again. No doubt, cab drivers in the future were instructed to avoid that particular street, to take a different route no matter how much it added to the fare.

  At the next stop, Natalia decided to get off. It was not the station closest to the orphanage, but she needed to walk for a bit, to collect herself. As she did, her thoughts returned to the one question that had driven her here, the one she’d never been able to answer. Why had the people who’d given her life chosen in the end to live a life without her? In the past, for brief moments when she tried to imagine it, all the convenient reasons were there. They were young, maybe they were hungry, they were burdened with the responsibility of being parents. She pictured them as a pair of drifters, moving from flat to flat, destitute and starving, struggling to survive. Maybe she’d been a mistake, an unfortunate turn of events. Maybe they’d done their best before giving up, letting someone else do the job. Yes, it had been easy not to think about them. Until she’d stumbled upon that letter, no other possibility had even entered her mind. But now here she was. Now, of her own will, she was the one chasing the ghosts.

  At the intersection, she studied the street sign and turned the corner, feeling her pulse quicken a little. A few pedestrians rushed past her, their heads hung low, hands in their pockets, oblivious to the fact that she was walking so slowly that nearly twenty minutes later she had not yet come to the end of the block. When at last she reached her destination and looked up, she was surprised to see that the building looked more or less exactly as she remembered. Only the metal scaffold and the dark blue placard that read Saint Paul’s Orphanage was absent, but otherwise the building appeared unaltered.

  Timidly, she stepped through the wood-framed gate, expecting to come face-to-face with an onslaught of children, but the courtyard was silent. She had come late and unannounced. And now it seemed absurd that she was here at all. She’d come hoping to find—what? That the orphanage director would invite her in and hand over a sealed file? One that undoubtedly her parents had paid a great deal of money to sink into obscurity?

  She turned to go and was nearly at the gate when a door clicked open behind her, and a slant of light fell in her eyes. In the bleak light, an officer marched toward her, frowning as he adjusted the brim of his cap. For a moment, she thought he was coming for her, to interrogate her, ask what she was doing here. But he hurried right past her without a single look. The front gate slammed shut, and as she pressed her back to the wall to hide in the shadow, she saw that the entrance to the main building had been left ajar. For five minutes, she waited, then quietly slipped inside.

  The hallway, much like the exterior, seemed eerily unaltered, with its chipped pale green walls and smell of ammonia and checkered linoleum tiles that squeaked beneath her hesitant steps. As she made her way toward what she vaguely recalled was the director’s office, she tried to go over what she would say. How would she explain why she’d come? Would the old woman recognize her after all these years?

  She paused in front of the door, took in a breath. Quickly, before she could change her mind, she pressed down on the door handle and entered. As her eyes roamed about the room, taking in what she was seeing, she froze in confusion. An enormous rectangular table which took up most of the space stood in place of Mrs. Tudor’s old, peeling desk, and seated around it were a dozen or so men wearing military uniforms. There were clipboards and files scattered all over the table, and a tape recorder was placed right in the center, next to a half-filled water carafe.

  “I-I’m so sorry,” Natalia stammered as twelve pairs of eyes shot up to her in unison. “I must be in the wrong room, I must be . . .” She took a step backward. “Please excuse me.”

  One of the men, an elderly one whose breast was covered in decorations, swiveled his chair around to face her. In the harsh artificial light, h
is white hair looked almost silver, as did his neatly trimmed beard, which he rubbed pensively as his eyes bored into her. He examined her with his cold, blue eyes as if she was some kind of rare insect, one he contemplated either squashing under his foot or setting free.

  “Young lady, what are you doing here?” he said sternly after a moment.

  “Excuse me, sir,” Natalia repeated in a fluster. “I didn’t mean to interrupt. I was just . . . I was looking for Mrs. Tudor, the director of the orphanage. I’m sorry to have barged in.”

  “Orphanage? What orphanage?”

  The officer to his right cleared his throat. “Yes, General, she is right. There was an orphanage here, before the war. Part of the building was destroyed in the bombing. The wing that housed the children’s dormitory and kitchen, to be exact. And the archive room, too, plus a couple of the classrooms.”

  “So, what is it that you want?” she vaguely heard the officer address her again.

  What happened to the children? Where are the children? she wanted to scream. Where are the nuns, the cook, the teachers? But all she could do was stand there as dread seeped through her like ice water.

  “I was one of the children here,” she mumbled, so softly that the officer cupped a hand around his ear.

  “What’s that?”

  “Before the war, I was one of the children here. I was one of the orphans who lived here for a little while.”

  “Well, this is a government building now. We do not know anything about the orphanage. And you are trespassing on an official meeting,” he said with detachment.

  “I’m sorry. I’m sorry for disturbing.”

  And then she was running. She turned and ran as fast as she could down the corridor and through the courtyard that had once been her playground. She ran, not looking back, not bothering to shut the gate behind her, down the street and farther still, until a sharp jab in her side forced her to stop. As she leaned against a wall, waiting to catch her breath, she gazed up at the darkening sky and thought of the children. The children.

  It wasn’t until much later, when she retraced her way back to the bus stop, that she was able to dry her eyes. Whatever traces of her past remained, whatever secrets had been confined within those walls, they had gone up in flames along with the orphanage. The thread did end there; it was severed for good. Right before turning the corner, she glanced back once more at the building that for a brief period of time had been her home. She gazed at it for a few moments, trying to imprint it in her mind. She knew she would never see it again.

  35

  “SOMEONE WAS HERE ASKING FOR you today,” Natalia announced as she dove eagerly into a plateful of roasted chicken.

  Plump, golden meat melted in her mouth, so tender that she let out an involuntary gasp. On the rare occasions when her mother was able to get a fresh bird at the butcher’s, the first supper was always a feast. In the days that followed, there would be a row of dishes carefully crafted using every leftover morsel and ending with a soup made solely from the bird’s carcass. But the first meal was always a rare treat, and Natalia hated having to bring up anything unpleasant at a time like this.

  “Did he leave a name?” her father asked.

  “He said he was a city inspector. He was conducting a census and wanted to know how many people live in our home. I told him he would have to come back when you were home.”

  Her father looked up from his plate. She thought she saw him pale a little. “Natalia, you know you are not to ever answer any questions about our family, you cannot—”

  “Yes, Papa, I know. I asked him to leave. He said he would come back another time.”

  A silence passed during which her father nodded slightly, then took several more bites before placing his fork down.

  “I had my biggest order in years today,” he said, his features brightening a little. “Someone came into the store and bought ten thousand sheets of premium envelopes, just like that. I helped him carry the boxes out, helped to load them in the back of his car.”

  Despina’s eyes rose from her own plate, wide with surprise. “So who was he, Anton?”

  “He said he was from the ministry, which one I didn’t catch. A clerk of some sort, I suppose. He seemed quite interested in our inventory. Said he would be back next month to place another order. Then he paid for the envelopes in cash. In cash, Despina. Who does that anymore?”

  “I don’t know,” she said after a contemplative moment, bringing the glass of water to her lips, and Natalia knew what she was thinking. This meant a little more food for a while, better food, some fruit, perhaps, fresh eggs. It meant that they could loosen their rations a bit. All in all, it was the best news they’d heard in months.

  “Anyway, what does it matter? That’s wonderful, Anton,” her mother went on cheerfully, standing from her chair and beginning to collect the plates that had been scraped clean, the flatware. “Timing couldn’t be better. I haven’t been able to sell anything at the flea market this week. Our great leaders’ wives seem to have grown tired of silver fineries, it seems, even ones they can pick up for mere coins.”

  “Despina, please . . .”

  “Oh, I know, Anton. I know. She knows, too. She’s there helping me every Wednesday, remember?”

  She winked at Natalia, who returned a small smile from across the table. It was true, what her mother was saying. They had good weeks and bad weeks at the local talcioc, and this last one had not been particularly good. But week after week, they kept going regardless. More often than not, it still brought in some much-needed cash, and she no longer minded the excursion as much as she had in the beginning.

  A month earlier, when they’d gone there for the first time, Natalia had wanted to vanish into thin air. Trailing her mother through a sea of women who had laid out their most precious wares on coarse blankets in the middle of a vacant plaza, she’d prayed that God would just make her disappear, cut her out of the scene unfolding around her like a painter might varnish out one segment of his canvas. It was hot, and they’d waited a while in a spot under a tree they’d been lucky enough to get. Her mother wore one of her pretty dresses, which had mortified Natalia even more. The way she stood there straight-backed, her hair loose, shining in the sun as if she was some kind of a sorceress. A woman had walked over, peered down at their open valise. “That,” she said in a deep Russian accent, pointing a red-varnished finger at one of her mother’s stoles, and her mother had bent down and lifted it out.

  It made her chuckle now to recall her foolish pride, the pure rage that had ignited inside her when that woman ran her fingers back and forth over the fur, flipping it over to feel the silk lining, not even looking her mother in the eye as she handed her a few bills. Because, she realized now, the important thing, the only one that mattered, was that they had things to sell. They still had her mother’s furs and snakeskin bags and hats fashioned in Vienna and Paris. They had silverware and china. And even if all these things combined were now worth only a fraction of their true value, they still had enough to keep them eating for years.

  But she couldn’t stop counting, tallying up in her head what belongings remained, which would go next. She never could.

  Early the next morning, there were knocks at their door. The sound came from some distant place, as if it followed Natalia from her sleep, and she sat upright, a little disoriented, glancing at her clock. It was just past seven. Who would be coming by at this hour on a Sunday? She didn’t know how long the knocking had been going on, but it didn’t seem like anyone else was going to answer, so she got out of bed and tiptoed downstairs. In the foyer, the floor felt like ice beneath her bare feet as she ambled to the door and looked through the peephole.

  The squat, suited man who had come asking for her father the day before was back. He was standing at a slight distance, politely holding his hat against his chest, but there was something intrusive in the way his eyes darted about the house, examining the iron sconces, looking up as if he took great interest in how high
the roofline was, how fine the stucco walls.

  Natalia took a step back and let the flap of the peephole come down with a clang. She did not care for the look of that man. What did he want? Why was he here at this hour? Well, if he didn’t know that this was not a proper time to be dropping by, she certainly wouldn’t be the one to inform him. Blazing with irritation, she started back up the stairs and was nearly at the top when she practically ran into her father.

  “Talia, who was that?” he asked, smoothing back his disheveled salt-and-pepper hair. If there was anything at all to give away his fifty years, it was that his once pitch-black hair was now threaded with silver. That and a slight sagging of the shoulders which she noticed only recently.

  “Oh, that . . . well, no one, really,” she answered unconvincingly. “I don’t think it’s anyone . . . anyone important, I mean . . .” She trailed off, for her father was already flying down the steps, his burgundy silk robe fluttering behind him.

  She was supposed to bring the man something to drink. “A drink?” she mouthed to her father in dismay. A drink, after the way he’d barged in, hanging his hat in the foyer without invitation?

  “Yes, a glass of water.” While he was changing, her father had whispered. If she didn’t mind going back down.

  Well, she did mind. She minded a great deal, but there wasn’t anything she could do about it now. Without bothering to offer any sort of a greeting, she marched straight to the kitchen, where she filled a glass of tepid water from the sink. Then she brought it into the sitting room, where the man had already made himself at home on the sofa. When she plunked it down on the coffee table, it made a loud thud, louder than she intended.

  “Ah, thank you,” the man murmured, not looking up from the contents of his briefcase which lay open right next to him. He perched a pair of glasses on his bulbous nose and dug into one of the silk-lined side pockets. “That’s very kind.”