The Free World

by David Bezmozgis

Iza shrugged ambiguously.

  —I heard, I guess.

  Alec had never been so happy to see Iza Judo—hadn’t supposed that the sight of Iza Judo could bring him happiness. They had never been close friends. Sometimes they socialized in the same company. In the summers, they played soccer together on the beach in Jurmala. He’d never particularly liked Iza, preferring Iza’s brother, Syomka. The two were identical twins, although nobody would ever mistake one for the other. Iza had shaved his head when he enrolled in the Institute of Sport, where he specialized in judo. Syomka grew his hair long and studied engineering and languages to become a translator of technical literature.

  Alec tried to think back to when he would have seen Iza Judo last. He remembered a small party at the dacha of a friend. There had been half a dozen men and four women. Alec and his friend had met two girls at a café and invited them back to the dacha. Iza had arrived later with other friends and two girls. One of the girls had been very drunk and she had wedged herself at the kitchen table with a guy named Robik. Robik presumably held something in a closed fist and the girl kept whining, incessantly and mind-numbingly, for him to show her what it was. Robik, show me. Come on, Robik, show me. Robik, show me. At the same time Iza had been trying to make headway with the other girl. The girl was slight and dark. She wasn’t particularly pretty, but she had an idea of herself. Part of this idea included the belief that she was too good for Iza Judo. She was also sober. When she was no longer willing to tolerate Iza she tried to leave. Iza blocked her way and then, somehow, managed to catch her head in the door. That nearly ruined the evening. The girl threatened to call the police, but eventually she calmed down, accepted a drink, and spent the night with Alec’s friend. Alec spent the night with the girl he met at the café. He no longer remembered her name. Mainly what he remembered was that as a child she had owned eleven pet bunnies. Even then, when he spoke of her, he referred to her as Eleven Bunnies.

  Alec invited Iza in and cleared a place for him on the bed. Iza seemed to deliberate over the invitation. Hanging from his shoulder by a vinyl strap was a medium-size valise. Iza eyed this valise before he finally accepted the invitation and picked his way through the bags to take his seat.

  —I wish we had something to offer you, Emma said. But as you can see …

  —Don’t trouble yourself, Iza said.

  —I’m surprised you’re still here, Alec said.

  —Australia. Even the embassy is run by kangaroos. We’ve waited seven months.

  —Before you left, Syomka mentioned an uncle in New Jersey.

  —He lives in a home for geriatrics. We’ve never even seen a picture of him. If we’d gone to visit him and a nurse wheeled out the wrong old Yid we wouldn’t have known the difference.

  —So why Australia?

  —First, Syomka heard good things. Second, for America, they fly you out of Rome in about a month. But Syomka thought, We’re in Italy, what’s the hurry? So I thought, All right. New Jersey or Sydney: once we get there it will be all the same shit. Pardon my language, Emma Borisovna. And what about you?

  —Chicago.

  —You have relatives?

  —My mother’s cousin from Vilnius, Alec said. They settled two years ago.

  —Chicago’s a big city. I don’t know much about it. But people go there.

  The conversation then hit an uncomfortable lull. Iza sat on the bed, at something of a loss. Alec kept expecting him to give some indication as to why he had come to see them, but Iza offered nothing and looked instead as if he was hoping that someone would explain the same thing to him. Eventually, Emma eased the awkwardness and asked Iza about his parents.

  —Still there. My brother-in-law doesn’t want to leave. He’s the transport coordinator at the fruit and vegetable terminal. They live well. Everywhere he goes he carries a watermelon. My sister has the two kids. Our parents don’t want to leave without them. Me and Syomka, they’re happy to be rid of. They figure we’ll settle somewhere first and then it will be safer for the others to follow. We’re like the minesweepers.

  —I’m sure that’s not what they think, Emma said.

  —Maybe; maybe not. In any case, they didn’t want to be separated from the grandchildren. I don’t blame them.

  —Of course not. A family should stay together, said Emma, intoning what had effectively become her anthem.

  —And how do your parents feel about Australia? Samuil asked.

  —They are getting used to the idea.

  —You didn’t consult with them before you decided?

  —We are here, they are there, you understand. If the day comes when they are able to join us—and I hope it will—then they will have to come to Australia. Or, if they don’t like it, they can always go to Israel. This may not sound very nice, but it’s the truth. Now, of course, you are traveling as one family and so, naturally, it is better.

  —Naturally nothing. It remains to be seen what is better, Samuil said.

  With that, Iza rose and excused himself. He had enjoyed his visit but had to attend to some affairs. For practical advice, he recommended settling in Ladispoli instead of Ostia. Ostia was overrun by Odessans. Ladispoli was populated more by people from Moscow, Leningrad, Latvia, Lithuania. In short, it was more civilized. But both towns were on the seashore. Both were close to Rome by train. If they liked, he would make himself available to help them find an apartment. Having lived there for seven months, he knew the system. He could protect them from the meklers, the unscrupulous apartment brokers. And, if they required, with his experience, he could also help in other ways. For instance, if they had optical equipment—cameras, lenses, telescopes—to sell, he could secure them a much better price than they would get on the open market.

  —That’s very generous, Emma said, as Alec accompanied Iza out of the room.

  In the hallway, when Alec said goodbye to Iza, he noticed a handful of men roaming from room to room, knocking on doors each with his own shoulder bag.

  —Well? Samuil said, when Alec returned.

  —Well, Alec replied.

  —Glad to see your friend?

  —What do you think?

  —I just hope you didn’t agree to sell him anything.

  —Of course not.

  —Or tell him what we have. All the time he sat there, his eyes were on our bags.

  —I said, Thank you and goodbye.

  —With a character like that, what he can’t buy he’ll steal.

  —I wouldn’t worry about Iza, Alec said. I know him. If he poses a danger to anyone it’s to himself.

  They had no other visitors. After they put the room into some semblance of order, Samuil reluctantly followed Emma up the steps to see Karl and the grandchildren. In their former life, Alec had never seen his father do anything reluctantly. He did what he wanted or he did nothing at all. Almost in spite of himself, Alec couldn’t help pitying his father—-even knowing that the only reason Samuil consented to climb the flight of stairs was that he preferred to sit in a room with Karl, Rosa, and the boys than to sit in a room with Alec and Polina.

  —Quick, Alec said, before they come back.

  —I haven’t slept. I haven’t washed, Polina said.

  —Sleeping, washing. You’re the most beautiful woman in Rome.

  Polina gazed at the squalid, overheated little room.

  —This is Rome?

  —We could open a window.

  In the afternoon, everyone was called down to the cafeteria for lunch. Since the Joint Distribution Committee had yet to provide them with Italian currency, the meal was furnished by the hotel. Two Italian waitresses shuffled through the cafeteria, dispensing bread rolls and apricot preserves. For families with bambini they also brought milk. After the rolls were exhausted the waitresses disappeared into the kitchen. It soon became evident that the rolls constituted the entire meal.

  —This must be a mistake, Rosa said.

  Later, when they were served a dinner of lettuce followed by macaroni, a former disside
nt circulated a petition among the émigrés. He promised to file a formal grievance with both HIAS and the Joint. A number of people signed, though Alec declined and Karl forbade Rosa from adding her name.

  —These people control our fate and you want to antagonize them because of a salad? Karl said.

  When his turn came, Samuil sneered at both the petition and the petitioner.

  —I didn’t sign your petitions before and I don’t intend to start now.

  —What do you mean by “your” petitions, comrade? retorted the dissident.

  —You know very well what I mean. It’s lucky for you we are no longer back home, because, over there, I assure you, no Zionist agitator would be so quick to call me comrade.

  —My luck then, comrade, the dissident said, and moved on.

  Alec, Samuil, Polina, and Emma retreated to their room. In one suitcase, Emma had stashed several dozen packets of dehydrated chicken noodle soup. In the same suitcase, she also found a box of crackers. Polina had several cloves of garlic, four potatoes, and a Spanish onion which she had bought in Vienna. There was also half the salami that she’d packed for the train. Alec withdrew a pot from one of the duffel bags and lined up with his neighbors by the bathroom to fill it with water. Everyone in line held either a pot or a kettle. Back in the room Emma set the pot to boil on a glowing hot plate. On another hot plate, Polina had placed a frying pan into which she deposited sliced onions and potatoes. The water had just started to boil when the lights in their room dimmed, flickered, and then cut out entirely. Immediately, shouts and curses rang through the hotel. Alec waited a few moments for his eyes to adjust to the dark, and then, by the vestigial glow of the hot plate, sought out the bag that contained their flashlights. The flashlights were jumbled in with windup, skittering toy chicks; tin Red Army soldiers; pocket knives; abacuses; miniature wooden chess sets. As a mark of Soviet ingenuity, the flashlights did not require batteries. They were mechanical, powered by a long metal trigger. One repeatedly pumped the trigger, thereby generating light and a faint buzzing sound.

  Pumping his flashlight at the rate of a quick pulse, Alec stepped out into the hallway. Other people emerged from their rooms also pumping their little flashlights. The effect was reminiscent of the countryside at dusk. It was as if, one after another, nocturnal insects were awaking to pursue their nightly business. Before long, Alec could no longer distinguish individual sources. The buzzing lost all cadence and dominated the hotel. Alec heard it from the floors above and below and, all around, he saw the flitting yellow halos cast by the low-wattage bulbs. Not far from him, crouched against the wall, a boy spooned soup from a metal bowl which his mother illuminated by flashlight. Alec looked the length of the hallway and saw doors open to every room, the occupants peering out or congregating in groups. At the end of the hall, a man strummed a guitar and sang the first line of a melancholic war ballad: Dark night, only bullets whistle on the steppe. Interspersed throughout the hallway, other voices joined in and obliged him to continue. Alec passed an elderly woman who leaned against the railing, like a bygone movie heroine, singing, immersed in sentiment. For the first time, a sense of community pervaded. People suspended their quarrels and commiserated about the shitty hotel: no elevator, no food, no power.

  As Alec turned back toward his room he heard the familiar piercing voices of his nephews. There was a bounding on the stairwell and two darting beams of light. The boys raced down the steps and then along the hallway, shining their lights into people’s faces. The boys were seven and five; the two-year age difference half that of his and Karl’s. Yury, the elder, and the more reserved of the two, looked like Karl, square and sturdy, and tried to emulate Karl’s laconic manner. Zhenya, on the other hand, though only five, showed the ill effects of his mother’s and grandmother’s coddling. He was overfed and impudent—qualities that Alec hoped he would outgrow. Emma was fond of pointing out that he himself had been a hundred times worse than Zhenya at that age.

  After irritating half of the people in the hallway, Yury pointed his flashlight into Alec’s face.

  —Looking for someone? Alec asked.

  —The captain, Yury said.

  —What captain?

  —The submarine captain, Zhenya chimed. Can’t you see we’re going down?

  —I knew we were in trouble.

  —The captain is wounded, Yury said.

  Before the boys could run away, Karl descended the steps and called to them. Grudgingly, they scuffed over to him. Karl led them to Emma, who had arranged four bowls on the floor near the entrance to their room.

  —Sit, Karl said.

  The boys slid their backs along the wall and dropped down.

  —Eat, my darlings, Emma said. Grandmother made a tasty soup.

  —How are we supposed to eat it? Zhenya demanded. There are no spoons.

  —I’m sorry, darling, Emma said. Grandmother couldn’t find the spoons.

  —Lift the bowl, drink, and don’t complain, Karl instructed.

  Alec stood beside his brother and directed his flashlight at the wall immediately above Karl’s left shoulder. The wall, a grimy off-white, diffused just enough light to illuminate the side of Karl’s face. Karl’s expression suggested that he was not at all seduced by the anarchic, carnival atmosphere in the hotel. His mind operated on another plane. Alec would see a circus and want to join; Karl, meanwhile, would estimate the cost of feeding the elephants and conjecture that the acrobats suffered from venereal disease.

  It was going to be like this every night, Karl said. The sooner they could get out of the hotel the better.

  —You know that the Joint covers the hotel for eight days, Alec said.

  —You want seven more days of this?

  —I’m ready to go now.

  —The hotel manager has a deal with the Joint. So long as the trains keep coming, his hotel stays full. That’s why he serves us slop. And so long as he serves slop, people plug in their hot plates. There’s a bus driver on our floor from Tula. He’s been here four days. Every fucking night a fuse blows.

  —Why is he still here?

  —He takes the train to Ladispoli every day. Brokers demand extortionate prices for hovels. Our bad luck. It’s summer. High season. Romans want to get away from the city, lie on the beach, swim in the sea. The bus driver comes home after a day of pleading and weeps in the bathroom so his wife and children won’t know.

  —So what does that mean for us?

  —The bus driver has a sad and trusting face. One look at his face and you want to plunge a knife in his back.

  —And our faces?

  —My face is whatever it needs to be. As for yours: there may be a sexually frustrated woman with an apartment available. In any event, I don’t intend to come back here and weep in the bathroom.

  5

  There was no limit, it seemed, to Polina’s sense of dislocation. The border crossing at Chop had been nightmarish, but at least the nightmare had conformed to some perverted Soviet logic. What was cruel and nonsensical about it was cruel and nonsensical in a typical way. Then on the brief stopover in Bratislava, where they had to change trains for Vienna, she had already begun to feel a heightened sense of foreignness—even though they were still only in Czechoslovakia, where it was not too difficult to find people who spoke Russian. Vienna was overwhelming, every step felt like an embarrassing misstep, but at least Alec had understood the language. And yet, compared to Rome, all that had preceded seemed mild and rational. When, on their first morning in the city, she and Alec stepped onto the sidewalk outside their hotel, Polina had the distinct impression that every car and pedestrian was rushing deliberately at her. She had never before seen quite so much human traffic. Cars, mopeds, and people surged in response to some inscrutable choreography. She watched an old man cross the street and somehow avoid being killed by several cars and one moped carrying two bare-chested teenage boys. On the sidewalk, a mother passed holding the hand of a little girl. The girl was no older than four or five and chatter
ed away in singsong Italian. This little girl, Polina thought, stands a much better chance of fending for herself in this city than I do. She can put one foot in front of the other. She can cross a street. In Vienna, they had heard rumors about Rome. The city was dirty. Crime was rampant. To walk near Termini, the central train station, was effectively to surrender your valuables. As a city, they were informed, Rome’s claim to being part of Europe was purely geographical. Vienna was Europe; Leningrad was Europe; Riga; Moscow. With its withering summer heat, filth, and disorder, Rome was Africa.

  HIAS had distributed maps to all of the family heads and expected them to fend for themselves. Polina’s sense of direction was good, but when they set out on the first day Alec and Karl took charge of the maps. They quickly got lost. They boarded the correct streetcar but took it going the wrong way. By the time Karl and Alec realized their mistake, they’d already been riding for ten minutes. They clambered off and reversed their steps in the mid-afternoon heat. Every few blocks they stopped so that Emma could take a drink from a thermos of water. Because they had already spent their money on a streetcar going the wrong way, they didn’t have money for a streetcar going the right way. At one point, Emma saw a park and insisted that Samuil needed a rest, and they all huddled under the shade of a palm tree. Rosa, who had left her boys with the bus driver’s wife, complained about a woman who at breakfast had finagled an extra serving of milk by claiming that her son was only twelve years old.

  —Twelve years old. Stalin didn’t have such a mustache.

  They recognized their destination, when they reached it, by the large group of émigrés milling about in front. They pressed their way through the crowd and presented themselves to a security guard. The guard, an émigré like themselves, made them recite their names and their city of origin before he let them pass. Though it was unnecessary in such heat, he stressed that the use of the stairs was expressly forbidden. They rode the elevator four floors and followed a hallway into a large waiting room filled with people. There were not enough chairs for everyone; some people sat on the floor while others leaned against the wall. The stout, matronly Georgian and Azeri women had fallen silent. Some tried to cool themselves with the black silk fans that they’d brought to unload at the markets. Their men gazed into their shoes or at the ceiling. The only exceptions to the general torpor were three old men bent over a small chessboard, and a young, pretty, dark-haired woman who was teaching her son to read using the signs tacked along the walls. The boy formed words by sounding out each letter. In a clear, earnest voice that, unexpectedly, stirred Polina’s heart, the boy enunciated: