The Education of a Traitor: A Memoir of Growing Up in Cold War Russia

by Svetlana Grobman

  “I can always draw another one,” I say, enjoying the ease with which my words roll off my tongue. “I can draw lots of them. Flowers or whatever.”

  Lena Popova clenches her fists until her knuckles turn white; but, gazing straight into her eyes, I say, “I know why you hate me, but it’s not my fault.”

  Lena Popova grabs her briefcase. “You, kike,” she spits out in a quavering voice and springs to the door, almost knocking down our neighbor Klavdia Petrovna. In a moment, I hear the sounds of her feet clattering down the stone staircase. I feel calm, very calm—calmer than I have ever been. And sad, too.

  When Mother and Tanya come home, I summon all my courage and say, in one breath, “Mom, there’s something I have to tell you. I know you’ll be angry, but I don’t eat your shchi. I flush it down the toilet.”

  My punishment is severe. I stay at home after school for two weeks: “No playing outside and absolutely no books!” I spend more time with my little sister than I ever thought possible, although Tanya’s only response to it is an utter lack of appreciation and—once—open hostility, which she expresses by throwing her heavy toy iron at me. The iron scratches my left arm deeply, and for the rest of my “sentence,” I wear a bandage.

  On top of that, I have to endure Father’s lectures about children who do not understand that money—and food, for that matter—do not grow on trees. I also have to listen to Mom’s numerous laments: “How could you do that? How could you throw away food that I spend hours getting and cooking? How could you be so ungrateful?!”

  Gradually, though, my parents calm down and—with some exceptions—life settles into its usual channel. The exceptions are good, though. Lena Popova ignores me, and Mother no longer leaves me dinners in the refrigerator. When I come home from school, I am allowed to make myself a jam sandwich.

  Other things do not change: I still have to babysit my sister, I still have to eat food I dislike, and, of course, I am still Jewish. But I do not complain too much. There are worse lives.

  CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

  ICE PATCH

  Clumsy and fat, Naúm must have resigned himself to being mocked. He never shouts to his tormentors, “Sam durȧck!” (You’re stupid yourself!), the way I often do. He never tries to fight back (nor would he be able to) and never calls his parents for help. All he does when things get bad for him is lower his head with his oily black curls, hide his squinting gaze, purse his pudgy lips, and retreat to the front door of his apartment house, the way a wounded animal retreats to its burrow. And, of course, there is always a kid who comes after him with taunts like, “Look at that sniveler! Is he crying or is it his fat dripping?”

  Naúm and I live in different sections of the same concrete building, which is adorned with a tall column of smoke in the winter and red Soviet flags during government holidays. We are the same age, and we go to the same school, but since I went a year early, we are in different grades. I only glance at him during intervals between classes, and sometimes on my way home, I see his stooped figure in front of me—in which case I stop and wait until the distance between us insures no possibility of contact. And if our eyes meet, I hurriedly avert my gaze because Naúm seems to look at me with the grieved expression of a sick old man asking for help, although it is hard to read the expression of someone whose eyes point in different directions.

  Naúm’s parents never do anything to help him either, and I suspect they do not even know about the abuse he endures in our neighborhood. Of course, his parents, especially his mother, are partly responsible for his trouble. For one thing, Naúm’s mother stands out too much. Her dark eyes bulge, her lips are pudgy and brightly painted, and her dresses cling too tightly to her cello-shaped body. Also, according to local gossip, Naúm’s mother has been seen at night leaning bare-bosomed out of her third floor window.

  Ira, the girl who lives on the floor above us, told me this in a giggling whisper, her pupils dilating to the size of buttons. Ira is the only girl in our house I consider my friend. She is everything I myself yearn to be. She has a small straight nose and flawless pale skin. Her strawberry-blond hair is braided into a thick tress, long enough to be thrown over her shoulder and reach to her waist. She is well developed, and in the locker room where we change before our PE lessons, Ira is one of three girls who already wears a white cotton bra—of a size I can only dream about. (The rest of us wear a lifchik, a short cotton vest whose purpose is to hold up our misshapen cotton stockings.) Most importantly, Ira already has her periods, which she discusses with me in great detail every time they take place. In short, next to Ira, I look like a spindly, shivering aspen growing alongside a stately fir tree.

  The only thing that prevents Ira from being popular is her parents. In our neighborhood, where everyone knows everything about everybody else, her parents remain an enigma. For one thing, they are foreigners, which is a rare thing in Moscow during the 1960s. Her mother is Finnish and her father is Polish. Both of them ended up in the Soviet Union after the last war, yet nobody knows how this happened. Different explanations have been suggested. One of them is that Ira’s father was a Polish POW who got caught on the wrong side and spent several years in a Siberian labor camp. As for her mother, gossip has it that she was taken hostage during a secret military operation somewhere on the Soviet-Finnish border.

  Whatever the case, both of Ira’s parents speak with an accent, and they rarely talk to the house residents. This frustrates everyone beyond measure, since inquisitive neighbors have no chance to ask an “innocent” question or catch Ira’s parents contradicting themselves. The common opinion is that Ira’s parents must be hiding a skeleton in their closet, so their daughter has no chance of being popular around here. Still, in our local hierarchy, Ira’s status is much higher than mine, and I am lucky to have her as a friend.

  When Ira told me about Naúm’s mother leaning out the window bare-chested, I did not believe her. Nobody walks around the house naked, especially in a northern city like Moscow. Besides, what was Naúm’s mother looking at? There is nothing to see from her window but piles of coal, noisy children, and gossiping women.

  I did not argue with Ira, though. Why would I? She was not gossiping about my mother. Besides, I do not really know this woman. Once in a while, Mother talks to her in front of our house. Yet our families have never gotten together, and there are only two things about her I am sure of: one—she is Jewish, and two—she is married for the second time, to an Armenian.

  I know nothing about her first husband, Naúm’s father. As for Naúm’s stepfather—a smallish, scrawny, balding man—he works as a manager in a grocery store, and, according to Ira, he has been seen coming home with full bags, the contents of which are anybody’s guess. (And there have been many people guessing!) In a city of shortages and suspicion, that fact alone would be enough for the neighbors to hate Naúm and his family.

  But even without his parents, Naúm would be a lost cause. Every time I see his stout body propped against the front door—his cheeks trembling like gelatin and his squinting eyes clouded with tears—I cannot help but feel angry with him. “Do something!” I want to shout into Naúm’s unfocused face. Be a mensch! Kick them! Fight back! Don’t let them spit on you!

  Of course, I never say anything. Why should I? He is not my brother or my friend, not even my close neighbor. So I just shrug and turn around, as disgusted with Naúm as with his tormentors.

  It is Sunday afternoon. I sit in a chair, reading a story about the Italian pilot and engineer Umberto Nobile and his expedition to the North Pole on the dirigible Italia. Due to a storm, the dirigible crashed. Nobile and eight of his crew survived, but they were stranded on the ice.

  Outside, the sky is obscured by milky clouds, and a strong wind is wailing its ominous song. Snow, which has been falling almost every day, surrounds our house the way icebergs must have surrounded the desperate group of people stranded at the North Pole in 1928. I have never been to a place colder than Moscow, and even though it is my home, I nev
er like it when days become short and long winter nights set in, when no matter how many layers of clothes I put on before going outside, I am soon freezing and my nose turns red. Yet it is a different matter to read about the frigid vastness of the North Pole while curled up next to the warm ribs of a gurgling radiator.

  The story is so engrossing that I feel as if I am part of it. In my mind’s eye, I see the injured Nobile and his men set up their red tent, and I watch the weary radio operator send hopeless messages into the frozen nothingness. I despair that the search is going in the wrong direction, and I follow the treacherous journey of the Swedish meteorologist Malmgren and his Italian companions Mariano and Zappi, who dare to walk to the mainland over ice. Most of all, I worry about Roald Amundsen, a famous polar explorer himself, who decides to come to Nobile’s rescue and takes off in a French seaplane.

  At this heart-wrenching moment, Mother enters the room. “Ira’s here,” she says, picking up her black vinyl purse and snapping its metal catch with a sound as loud and sinister as the sound of ice cracking under the North Pole castaways’ feet. I jump in my chair, while Mom continues, “She’s going for a walk. Go with her. Tanya and I have shopping to do.”

  With my heart pounding, I slowly withdraw from the unforgiving North Pole, put my book on the windowsill above the radiator, and look out the double glass window, insulated from the cold with strips of cotton tucked into the cracks between the window panes.

  The world that stretches outside our window is as white as the one I have just left. But unlike the imaginary world, the real one offers nothing worth exploring, nothing that can match the drama unraveling on the pages of my book, and therefore, nothing worth interrupting my reading for.

  “No,” I say, “I want to stay at home.”

  “Enough reading,” Mom says, not listening to me but counting the money in a small wallet she has fished out of her purse. “Go, go. Look at yourself—pale like death. You need fresh air. Hurry. Ira’s waiting.”

  By the time Ira and I step outside, the snow has stopped and the whiteout that has shrouded the city for weeks begins to recede, uncovering a washed-out blue sky. Immediately, frigid air fills my lungs, and I burst into coughing. Clearly, it is too cold for a leisurely walk.

  “What are we going to do?” I say, annoyed with my friend for dragging me out of the warm house and away from my book.

  Ira, who is methodically kicking the base of a tall snowdrift with the toe of her gray boot, does not seem to notice. “We could skate,” she says, and her eyes light up with eager anticipation that makes her pupils appear darker and her irises lighter.

  I sigh. Last year, for Ira’s birthday, her parents bought her a pair of fancy figure skates, snow-white and sturdy, with shiny blades and notched toes. Since then, Ira is ready to go skating any time the temperature falls below freezing. She was a good skater even before, but on her new skates, tightly wrapped around her strong ankles, she is really great. She glides across the ice with the speed of a jet plane, spins around, folding and unfolding her arms like a whirling dervish, and jumps almost like a professional figure skater. She can even do pistolet (a Shoot-the-Duck move), for which she squats down, bends her skating knee, and extends her free leg in front of her body—a position I would not be able to sustain even without skates.

  “Too cold,” I say defiantly. “Too far, too.”

  Ira looks in the direction of a skating rink, as if evaluating the validity of my statement, and a shadow of disappointment dims her eyes. A couple of minutes pass quietly, until the snowdrift that Ira has been kicking with her boot collapses and a small blizzard splashes our faces. This, apparently, gives Ira another idea. “There’s an ice patch behind the house,” she says, wiping her eyes and starting on another snowdrift. “We can slide there.”

  I sigh again. What can I do? I cannot go back home. Besides, invisible frosty needles have already begun to pierce my toes and bite my cheeks, prompting me to get moving.

  “Okay,” I say, and we start walking.

  The ice patch—about fifteen feet long and two feet wide—was built the day before. This is easy to do: bring several buckets of water from the house, pour them onto the snow, and smooth the surface. With the temperatures nearing minus 20°Celsius (minus 4°F), wet snow soon turns into ice and—voila!—a perfect strip of ice is ready for sliding.

  Even before Ira and I turn around the corner, we hear shouting and laughter.

  “I can do better than that!” A high girlish voice soars in the freezing air.

  “You wish!” A breaking teenage tenor responds. “Not a chance!”

  A “who-can-slide-farthest” competition is at its zenith. A group of neighborhood children forms a line on one side of the icy stretch, from where they take turns gliding down the path while balancing with their mittened hands.

  Igor Shubnikov, a stocky fifteen-year-old keeps order and calls out results. He sounds authoritative, the way a professional referee or a Communist Party leader would. In fact, Igor is our self-appointed leader. Being older and stronger than most of us, he not only passes judgment, but he also sets the rules by which judgment is dispensed, and no neighborhood kid has ever had the nerve to question him.

  At Igor’s silent nod, Ira and I take our places at the end of the line. Ira slides first. She does very well, covering most of the sparkling ribbon and stopping about two feet short of Igor’s own record, which is marked by a piece of coal brought from the pile in front of our house. I take a run next, throwing myself forward as hard as I can, stretching my hands out—longing to reach the opposite side.

  My flight ends just past the middle of the slippery path. Somebody cheers, somebody laughs, but I pay no attention to either one. It feels good to glide through the frigid air, inhaling its prickly freshness and basking in the weak winter sun. Let’s do it again! And Ira and I get back in line, jumping with impatience, cheering successes, and good-naturedly laughing at failures.

  After a while, low clouds raid the sky, robbing us of our enthusiasm. Everybody suddenly feels tired, and the mood of the crowd starts changing. Peals of laughter subside, and shouting becomes more competitive and insulting.

  “You pushed me!”

  “No, I didn’t!”

  “Yes, you did!”

  “You, asshole, go home and complain to your Mama!”

  “Coming from another asshole …”

  Having tried a dozen times, I stop, catching my breath. I have reached my limit, and sliding has ceased to be fun. Other children begin quitting, too. Now the contest dwindles down to just three participants: Igor, Ira, and Lida, a pale skinny girl with a face whose every feature is disproportionate to the rest—her forehead is too narrow, her mouth too large, and her nose too wide.

  At first, we continue to cheer them on, but soon the expressions of the remaining competitors harden and they begin to throw hateful looks at each other.

  “Don’t cheat, you zarazi!” Igor suddenly explodes at the girls who are slowly approaching his marks. “I see whatcher doin’. Start from the edge!”

  “Don’t cheat, yourself!” Ira hollers back. “You didn’t slide that far either. Bring your mark closer!”

  “What did you say, bitch? Did you say I cheat?!” Igor moves toward Ira. His blue eyes turn purple with rage, and a black woolen mitten flies off his right hand like a rock launched from a sling-shot. “You wanna taste this?” He raises his clenched fist to Ira’s face.

  Goose-flesh creeps down my spine. “Ira, let’s go,” I shout. “Your mother just called you. We need to go home!”

  Whether Ira hears me or not, she does not budge. “Just try!” she screams at the boy in front of her and stretches her neck like Joan of Arc challenging her inquisitors.

  “Ira …” I try again, but my voice hangs in the freezing silence, too hoarse to calm the adversaries and too soft to bring help.

  Now Igor’s fist is just inches away from Ira’s head, but instead of dodging, she tosses her head even higher. Her red woolen hat falls
off, exposing strawberry blonde untwined hair, which, freed from the confinement, falls down and frames Ira’s small face with her flaming cheeks and eyes the color of a tempest sky.

  “She’s so pretty,” suddenly goes through my head. I shift my gaze to Igor, who is rising above Ira with his fist poised in mid-air, and, with rare certainty, I know that he sees it, too: she is beautiful, and he cannot bring his fist down on her.

  For a long moment, everything stands still. Then, as if waking up from a spell, Igor makes a slow and awkward backward movement and, still glaring at Ira, spits on the snow—his saliva burning a narrow hole at her feet. Then, he turns around and heads toward our building.

  Nobody speaks, just a vague sound tumbles away, as if everybody exhales at the same time or a sudden gust of wind blows over. When the silent crowd of children starts scattering, I pull Ira by the sleeve, “Let’s go.”

  She does not move, but the dark clouds in her eyes disappear, replaced with tears. I pull again. “Are you crazy?” I say, also sniffling. “He could’ve killed you!”

  “I know,” she says blowing her nose, “I …

  “Hey, you!” Igor’s husky voice slices through our conversation.

  “Yeah, you, fat ass! Come here, slide with us!”

  I strain my eyes in the direction of our building and see Naúm.

  “Oh no, not him!” goes through my head. He can’t slide, just as he can’t run or jump, or do a thousand other things that boys enjoy doing. Everybody knows that.

  Once again, tension heats up the freezing air. Only this time, Igor’s rage is directed not at pretty Ira but at the fat and ridiculous boy, who, to my dismay, starts shuffling through the deep snow towards us.