Panic in a Suitcase: A Novel

by Yelena Akhtiorskaya

  Her name was Sveta, and she offered to escort him home. She was a bit overgrown. She must’ve been cripplingly shy as a girl, because now that she was in what Pasha pegged to be the twilight of her twenties, she was developing a hunchback. The timidity had matured into wry coyness (or coy wryness). She was a bit spacey, which Pasha took to be an affectation, adopted in order to deflate a constitutional intensity. A very American impulse to dilute—she’d probably grown up here. Thoroughly Russian women exploited to the maximum their God-given powers of intimidation. She was trying to hide that she was fully awake and at the controls. The steering took place far behind her eyes. She spoke quietly and very quickly, as if to compensate for not being able to walk as fast as she would’ve liked (her step was light and bouncy, like those slender dogs whose paws hover over the ground). She mentioned school repeatedly and the horrid F train. Which school, the nature of her studies, her connection to Miss Ostraya, or where in this capacious borough she lived, Pasha didn’t catch. Hearing Transnistria, he asked her to repeat.

  Where my family is.

  There went the theory of an American upbringing—though now he realized he’d never believed that theory anyway, and this only confirmed what he had truly assumed, which was that her relatives couldn’t be here, she was too pale. A family wouldn’t stand for it. At the height of summer, in a beachside community, to be this devoid of color could only mean she was alone, no one nagging her into outdoor activity, making incessant remarks about her corpselike pallor. And how skinny she was—bones and more bones. Neglected enough to remain uncompromised. Without opposition, her disgust, or perhaps fear, of sunlight, athletics, and nutrition could grow to monstrous proportions. And how terribly lonely it must’ve been with no one to force you into doing something you refused to do—hence the talking to strangers. She’d plucked Pasha from the poetry aisle. It would be unwise to think himself the first or the last.

  He asked questions to keep her voice around. Nearing his door, her enunciation improved. Pasha learned that her youngest brother had died last year in the War of Independence and she was going back to Tiraspol at the end of something to visit her ailing grand-something.

  At the end of the week?

  The year, she clarified.

  Pasha was so lost in thought he didn’t notice that the door into the building was being held for him by his mother.

  Pretty, she said, but worth missing a flight for?

  • • •

  THE BAGS WERE PACKED in no time, then unpacked and searched for the house keys, repacked much more sensibly by Esther, partially unpacked again in hopes of finding Pasha’s passport, because without it he was going nowhere, he’d just have to settle down for good. Pasha’s cot was stripped of bedding and folded up, ready to be returned to the downstairs neighbors. All the mugs and spoons that were missing, for which Esther had searched everywhere and gone so far as to accuse their neighbor of stealing, were found. Pasha’s precious junk was consolidated, the plastic bags crumpled together and stuffed into a drawer for future use. A living room appeared, in which the entire family sat down together for the last time. They were quiet and composed. Somber? No, serious. Perhaps solemn? No, no—serious, and a bit tired. Their collective sleep debt could’ve belonged to a class of medical students.

  Robert coughed suggestively.

  Davai, said Esther.

  We meant to bring this up sooner, said Marina.

  But then the whole incident, with the twister . . .

  We really should’ve taken you for a checkup.

  But it went so fast! You just got here!

  It sure didn’t feel like a month. Though it also felt like a year.

  But we did have a good full month. And as long as we have your attention.

  Try not to scare him, said Robert.

  He’s not a child, said Marina.

  All this is unpleasant to hear.

  And it’s hard. Life . . . It’s all sort of dreadful.

  But just deciding is half the—

  More than half. Once you decide, it’s smooth sailing.

  Let’s not go that far. It’s easy. It can be easy.

  Basic steps.

  We’ll help through them all.

  Better not think about it. Worst thing you can do is think about it.

  We did it. And you know us. We’re not the most organized or intrepid or courageous—

  Adaptable.

  Comfortable with change.

  Practical, financially speaking.

  Good with languages.

  But you have an ear for languages. That’s a problem that can be crossed off the list.

  Robert, why must you say there are problems?

  Face it, Pasha, there’s nothing for you there.

  Is it fear that’s keeping you?

  You don’t even have friends!

  Here you have Misha. He’s a true friend.

  That’s more rare than you may think.

  At that party you enjoyed yourself, didn’t you?

  That you want to deny the fact that you’re capable of having a good time at a gathering of like-minded people means there’s something wrong with you.

  Nothing’s wrong with him—Marina, stop being nasty.

  He’s not denying anything! He knows he enjoyed himself. He never denied it!

  Think of Sanya—he’s taken a bad turn.

  What she means is, he can get a good education, opportunities.

  The boy has an entrepreneurial bent. That thing he did with the batteries.

  You said yourself he’s fallen in with the wrong crowd.

  And he’s only seventeen. Imagine in a few years.

  Here there are special programs.

  Here there are no bad crowds.

  And maybe you can get in touch with John Lamborg.

  Who?

  Oops.

  Frida can have her uncle around, and her only cousin. He was practically a brother to her.

  Not my brother.

  She could use the relationship.

  I know there’s like a silent law that this can’t be mentioned, but screw it. Mama’s sick. We’re going to need an extra hand.

  Nonsense! I’ll be fine. You can sit on the sofa in the corner. No one will bother you. We just want to look at you.

  Pasha, the world is much smaller these days. Trust me as your father. And I happen to know the brother of the husband of the lady who’s the secretary to the senior editor at Novy Mir.

  I’ll bake you honey cakes every day! cried Esther.

  It was hot. They hadn’t yet come around to the concept of air-conditioning. If it was summer, you had to sweat. And the sweat had to smell. But something about the location of their building, the positioning of the windows, the roof materials—they hadn’t suffered through a sufficient number of summers to develop a dependable theory—made for especially stifling conditions. The windows were gasping, yet the curtains didn’t stir for days. Even the furniture seemed to languish. This was an unfortunate distraction, which had the potential to obscure what was important. People who focused on their physical discomfort seldom got to the point.

  I’m glad you brought this up, said Pasha. A bead of sweat originating in his hair somewhere split in half over his lumpy forehead, and the beads diverged, rolling down opposite sides of his long face. I’ve given this a fair amount of thought, as you can imagine. My tendency, with poems at least, is not to show them to anybody until they’re done. I’ve never found it worthwhile to hand somebody a mess and ask them to clean it up for me. Mama, don’t give me that look. I know I’ve kept you in the dark. He looked around the room. He inhaled. He picked a crumb off his stomach. I want to come, he said. Let’s begin the process.

  Pasha seemed on the whole sincere and alert. Pasha was never alert. Except here he was—alert and speaking to matters of true consequence. They were swept up by the momentousness. Of course, Pasha was susceptible to the pressure of endings. They were sad, but they needed to be successful. That Sunday afternoo
n, as Pasha sat in a room with sweating wallpaper, surrounded by his family (a tough audience), his last line was so sonorous it made the future palpable in their throats.

  Robert and Esther said their good-byes, staying behind while Levik and Marina chauffeured Pasha to JFK Airport. The torture of the drive—the perfectly stagnant traffic on the BQE, then the Van Wyck, the mysterious sounds and smells given off by their automobile—made them sick to their stomachs. They unlocked the doors should they need to open fast and vomit. Pasha regularly vomited in bearable conditions, so it was a surprise that he managed to swallow at all in this hellish toaster of a car. No one spoke, as there was nothing to say. Pasha had the last word. Who was Levik or Marina to meddle with such an ending? Marina rested her head on her hand and looked out the window. In this city you had to become a professional at looking out the window straight into your own thoughts. What was actually outside was of no concern; it might as well have been a mirage. Those weren’t cars or people—who knows what they were? It didn’t much matter—the chance that she’d see them again was practically nonexistent. My God, Marina suddenly thought. Do we even want him here? Despite the heat she was trembling.

  SEVEN

  A YEAR LATER Pasha was back, once again flying into JFK’s third terminal, thinned, disheveled, pale. Marina was now enrolled in nursing school, Levik still staring into the void. Frida had been cruelly committed to day camp at the Y, turned over to the American swim director with the toupee, luckily with a taste only for the boys. Robert and Esther were decorating lampshades with beads, claiming they did it for the minuscule fee, though it was obvious that stringing tiny colorful beads was soothing to their nerves. Levik drove the decorated lampshades over to the American lady, Kathleen, who lived on Madison Avenue with two blue cockatoos and in her ample spare time was starting a lamp business. She didn’t need the money but got it regardless. Her business was skyrocketing. People just adored those simple but lovely lamps.

  Esther had been opposed to Pasha’s visit, as it rendered void his application for an exit visa, a stipulation being that during the months, years, occasionally decades that it took for such an application to be processed, the Russian citizen was not allowed to leave the country. Pasha had finally applied for the visa, and why should news of Esther’s recurring cancer make him throw that out the window? She preferred to delay seeing him until he could come for good instead of once again flying in for an overladen visit at the end of which they’d be back to square one. Pasha reassured her that he would reapply for the visa the moment he got home, words that had been put into his mouth by Marina.

  In such instances Pasha got confused.

  He knew he was confused when he stopped being able to predict what would be wanted of him. For example, he was astonished to learn that his sister’s demands didn’t coincide with his mother’s. One afternoon Marina called Pasha and hissed that if he didn’t buy a ticket right then, it would prove once and for all that he was as selfish as everybody claimed. Pasha explained that it was a misunderstanding—he very much wanted to come but had been putting off buying a ticket because he’d gotten the impression that nobody wanted him.

  A misunderstanding was the natural state of affairs. Pasha made no effort to clear up his end, choosing to ignore, or simply remaining unaware, that motives were being assigned, intentions misconstrued, until the moment of eruption—shouts, name-calling, frequent phone calls and hang-ups, the stupefied dial tone. The accusations shocked Pasha. It was one thing when they came from acquaintances and critics, another when from the mouths of the dear. Unless instructed otherwise, the dear assumed the worst, having very little faith in humanity, or perhaps just in him.

  You all expect me to die, said Esther when she heard that he was coming. If you think you’re visiting a woman on her deathbed, you’re quite mistaken.

  But at his arrival she was overjoyed. Marina had been right—Esther’s wishes shouldn’t have been heeded, as they were not what Esther wished. The anti-Esther had been using Esther’s voice—Pasha had failed to be on the lookout for such a possibility.

  Even Esther found the idea of Pasha’s permanent arrival a source of ambivalence. As long as he remained in Odessa, finality was evaded. They’d studied the cases around them—when an entire family was uprooted and replanted in another country—whether it be America, Germany, Israel—and all ties to the motherland severed, the psychological burden was often managed to the detriment of mental integrity. Thus far they’d avoided this burden—by way of a loophole. No strangers were living in their old digs, doing unimaginable violence to their walls, peering out their windows, distorting their left-behind thoughts. If they went back for a visit, they wouldn’t have to loiter at a closed door or a locked gate, gathering the courage to knock and ask for permission to peek inside, or debate whether a hurried scanning of their former premises would be worthwhile at all, especially under the mistrustful, inconvenienced scrutiny of the current residents. Their old apartment belonged to Pasha. Pasha belonged to them.

  And it wasn’t just a regular kommunalka—it was only one room (partitioned off with curtains), and most of the space it offered was vertical, not doing them much good except offering the opportunity to complain about the lowness of ceilings in ninety-eight percent of places (the Opera House, Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center were exempt), but it was situated in the epicenter of Odessa, perched in the most prime spot by Primorskiy Boulevard, overlooking Potemkin Square, a minute from the Steps and Vorontsov’s Palace, two from Deribasovskaya and City Garden. Summers, Pasha relocated to their dacha. This knowledge brought great solace. It was permission to stay sane. Ties hadn’t been severed; Odessa remained theirs. This sense of retention, of not having exchanged or betrayed but simply enlarged in scope, kept virulent immigrant manias at bay. They didn’t need to compensate for what had been irrevocably lost by polarizing into the hyper-Americanized or feverishly nostalgic, to vanity-publish photo-essays or entire book-length declarations of love to their former city, compose odes to Odessa and perform them on Saturday evenings at Restaurant Odessa, form International Odessite clubs or join said clubs, have strokes and sit in wheelchairs outside their building screaming Odessa, Odessa! at passersby with rage and passion and utter incomprehension as to what was going on both around and within.

  The chemo was under way by the time Pasha arrived, Esther’s wan curls detaching by the fistful. Daylight infiltrated through to her scalp. She’d bought one of those housedresses that came in countless dizzying print variations and hung on the outdoor racks of discount shops along Brighton Beach Avenue, a purchase that infuriated Marina. Esther was throwing up her hands. First it’s a housedress, then no desire to live. Marina bought a wig for Esther and a geometric summer dress from Bloomingdale’s.

  They expected to have to keep her from the housework. They’d permit a little dusting or watering, so she wouldn’t feel useless, but forbid the more physically straining activities. When Esther went for the pail, Marina’s bold voice resounded, We can do that, you must save your energy. Esther didn’t have to be told twice. She returned to bed with a book, leaving the pail out for Marina, as the floors weren’t about to wash themselves.

  Pasha’s help would’ve been enlisted, but the reward for reaching his ripe age never having peeled a potato or folded a pair of pants was never having to. No one would make the mistake of even turning on the vacuum cleaner in his presence. He was most useful in distracting Esther, who wasn’t of the if-left-uninterrupted-will-read-in-bed-for-hours temperament. If left uninterrupted, she’d interrupt. Pasha was deployed. Lying side by side, they engaged in a conspiratorial whisper. Occasionally she laughed. A large ship passed over the open waters that were Esther, leaving the surface unsettled long after the ship had gone. And her face, thought Pasha, had the bloated, grayish quality of something that had spent untraceable years at sea bottom.

  It proved not true that a housedress—which Esther proceeded to wear both around the house and outside despite the presence of the Blo
omingdale’s dress, which even Marina had to admit looked a lot like the housedress once Esther put it on—led to a diminished will to live. Esther’s sole focus became survival. She was so determined that the actual process of living became a distraction from the goal. At mealtimes she reverted to Soviet-style nutrient-density assessment (anything creamy, sugary, buttery of highest value), but instead of giving the choice foods to Marina or Frida kept them for herself. This combination of eating nutritiously and saving her energy made stoic Dr. Muckleberg advise a weight-loss regimen. Esther incorporated grapefruit into her diet.

  The family outings were to the hospital, where other people’s conversations were marked by a subdued intensity. It’s good I made you that sandwich, said the small woman with a drinker’s nose as she sat wrapped in a sweater in the air-conditioned cafeteria. The bread isn’t very appropriate, said the small man with the drinker’s nose before proceeding with a very businesslike chewing. Others were peeling hard-boiled eggs and rattling sugar packets, stirring coffee with great determination; still others were reading brochures, becoming informed, asking a question. Esther sat in a snug-fitting armchair that in retrospect would look beige but probably had a specific color, some insane purple. She sat in these armchairs and at the same time refused to touch them. You’d never catch her elbows on the armrests or her fingertips near the fabric—they were holding a book or a paper cup or resting on her knees. Other people touched these armchairs. The problem was, of course, all those others.

  Marina touched everything, and everything she touched became hers. How afraid she’d been—but that fear was like a loose thread snipped by the hospital’s sliding doors. As it turned out, she was a valuable sickness companion. For the first time, they were seeing her in her new milieu, and it was enlightening. They had been of the opinion that nursing school was a wrong decision. We just don’t see you as a nurse, they said. On the one hand, they thought it would be too much—the high-intensity environment, the long work hours—and on the other they considered it below her—a nurse. They had better suggestions. If she was going this route, she may as well bite the bullet and go to medical school, but she should also take into account that hairdressers made a good living in the States, and she’d always been so creative with her updos. Once they became regulars on the hospital scene, the offering of alternatives subsided.