The Secret of Clouds

by Alyson Richman

  “Mr. Krasny? Sasha?” I asked again, my heart racing.

  “Yes, it’s Sasha.” Again, the words were so faint it sounded as though they were uttered by someone struggling to breathe.

  I pushed my ear closer to the receiver. “Is everything okay?” My own voice emerged with a palpable panic.

  “It’s Yuri,” he said, his voice cracking. Again, I heard silence and then what sounded like a chest heaving. “It was a sudden arrhythmia.”

  “What?” My voice ricocheted out of my chest. “But he’s okay now, right?” I could already find myself willing another reality, one where Yuri was in front of me, smiling and happy.

  “No,” Sasha managed to say before his words were lost to the sound of his sobbing. After that, everything just crumbled.

  I dropped the phone and fell to my knees.

  * * *

  • • •

  THE details all came later, the horrible scene described to me when I met them in their home, their faces crumpled and red. Katya sat on the sofa, her body sagging, her eyes rimmed in pink. She couldn’t speak, and she had clearly stopped eating. The two of them looked like empty chrysalises, hollowed by their grief.

  We sat there in the living room, where every trace of Yuri remained intact. His books were still on the coffee table, next to his half-nibbled pencil and the orange plastic containers for all his medications. On top of the fireplace sat the baseball trophy Finn had given him. The room seemed to be a purgatory, every object remaining in place despite the absence of its owner. I felt that my mind was playing tricks on me. How could Yuri not be sitting in that big fluffy chair? How could it be that I’d never hear his voice again or see his wide blue eyes come alive when we spoke about baseball or books? And how did the birds outside dare to sing, when the boy who always sat by the window—watching them take flight—was gone?

  Every time Katya tried to speak, her voice failed her. It was Sasha who, after summoning all his strength, informed me of the painful details. Yuri had been complaining of a bad headache that day, and Katya had thought it was just due to the rain and change in air pressure. Yuri fainted on his way to the bathroom, and Katya held him in her arms as she waited for the ambulance to arrive.

  “It was all so quick,” Sasha said softly. He sucked in his breath. “By the time I got to the hospital, Yuri was already gone.”

  * * *

  • • •

  DAYS later, on the morning of the memorial service, I could barely get myself out of bed. I simply could not comprehend that Yuri was no longer here. I still heard his voice, his laugh. I saw his face everywhere—his blue-jay-colored eyes, vital and alive. But the image of Katya and Sasha sitting like two ghosts in their living room provided stark contrast to those memories. I told Daniel I didn’t think I would make it through the service; my grief would be too much.

  They had asked me to speak at the funeral. I stayed up all night trying to write something, but now, as the paper fluttered in my hand, I worried my voice would escape me.

  I remember so little of that afternoon. There are things I still wish to block out. The sight of Sasha and Katya in the front seats, their bodies lost in their black mourning clothes. Their faces so pale and drawn, they looked as though they had to be propped up, like two puppets that would soon collapse without their strings.

  Katya did not just move through a room, but always glided. Her limbs weightless, her body effortlessly beautiful. Now, she could hardly stand. When I reached out to embrace her, she sagged in my arms.

  In the center of the room, Yuri’s small coffin was set out. A wreath of white flowers lay on top with a piece of paper attached that simply read, Love.

  I could hardly look at it. I did not want to think of his body inside that lacquered box, knowing the boy I loved so much would soon be lowered forever into the earth.

  “Daniel.” I could barely say his name, so instead I squeezed his fingers. “I won’t be able to read this.” I handed him my eulogy, hoping he’d offer to read it for me. But Daniel gently pushed it back.

  “Maggie,” he whispered. “You loved him, and he was always so brave for you. You must be brave for him.”

  * * *

  • • •

  IN a room with pale gray walls, a wooden podium cast to the side, many familiar faces appeared. Lisa Yamamoto arrived with her mother, as did Rachel Mendelsohn and Roland McKenna. I saw Principal Nelson quietly dip in and take one of the chairs in the last row. Florence came, her small rhinestone butterfly attached to the lapel of her dark suit, her face drawn and serious. Even Angela came later, sitting quietly in the rear.

  Then I saw Suzie. In her somber clothes, she was nearly unrecognizable, her long hair pulled back into a respectful bun. When she approached me, she did not speak. Instead, her arms enveloped me, and I felt the warmth of her skin soaking up my sorrow like a sponge.

  Lastly, Finn arrived with his parents and his little sister. While most of the mourners gravitated toward the seats closest to the back, I saw Finn walk up to the row of empty seats closest to the Krasnys. Dressed in a navy blazer and khakis, he looked five years older than he normally did in his school clothes. As he helped his mother get his sister in her chair, holding her crutch as she sat down, our eyes caught each other’s, and I saw how stoically he was trying to fight back his tears.

  Later on, I stood at the podium, my fingers clenching the sides of the pitched surface. I closed my eyes and inhaled, praying that my voice would hold out until I had spoken my last word. I refused to look at the casket but instead focused on the wooden doors as the rest of the voices faded away. I took a deep breath and felt something shift inside me, as though Yuri were suddenly there in front of me. I began as if I were speaking solely to him.

  Yuri,

  All night I’ve been staring at this paper, thinking about how I could capture you adequately. During the entirety of our friendship, I sought to teach you the power of words. How many times did we discuss passages in books that moved us? We both learned together how words have the power to inspire us, to unify us, to fill in those spaces of the unknown. But today, I feel like I’ll never have the words to fully describe you.

  Yuri, many people say a smile can light up an entire room, but for me it was your eyes that were the brightest lanterns. I have never seen eyes so crystal clear and radiating with so much light. I never told you that I used to see your eyes in my head, long after I’d left you for the afternoon. They’d float inside my mind like beacons in a dark storm. I saw so much in those eyes. Intelligence, humor, curiosity, and a yearning to do more in life than your heart would ever physically allow you to.

  Yuri, a teacher is supposed to teach her pupils, but I know I learned more from you than you ever learned from me. You taught me to cherish the world around me. You pushed me to think harder, to challenge myself and my students in the classroom. You taught me about bravery. When I visited you in the hospital, you looked like a warrior strapped to all those machines. You taught me to do what so many of us take for granted. To breathe unhindered, to savor each baseball game, and to dream of one day being strong enough to play.

  I will never understand how a life budding with so much possibility, brimming with so much curiosity, could be taken so early from this earth. I will never understand how a boy with the most generous heart I know could have his own heart stop beating before its time. But what I do know is that you have left a mark that is unforgettable not only on me but also on everyone else whose life you touched. I will always remember that afternoon that you said the words from a book you fought me to read: “Life’s got to be lived, no matter how long or short,” you quoted from Tuck Everlasting. And, Yuri, you will never know how much you taught me the meaning of these words.

  You once said that Derek Jeter was your hero because he never gave up, because he brought his best to each and every game. Yuri, you are, and will always remain, my hero, m
y champ.

  I closed my eyes and felt my strength slip away again. I had been like one of those women who, when their children are suddenly trapped beneath a car, are momentarily blessed with Hulk-like strength. But now after I had finished speaking, I felt like I was about to collapse.

  My face must have blanched, because I remember little else except Daniel lifting me back to my chair.

  And then the blurry memory of leaving the church later and seeing Finn a few steps ahead of me, pulling his Yankees cap out of his side pocket. I noticed the flash of Yuri’s name written in silver Sharpie under the brim before he tugged it down over his forehead, the visor obscuring his falling tears.

  * * *

  • • •

  YURI was buried under the shade of a huge maple tree. His headstone was painfully simple: Yuri Alexander Krasny. Beloved son and friend.

  After the interment, Daniel drove us back without saying a word. The silence enveloped us. The notes of grief are impossible to share.

  67

  THE time following Yuri’s death was not easy for me. I spent the first few months afterward in a fog, unable to process how a child so bright and full of curiosity could be gone. There were days it took every bit of my strength just to get up from my bed and drive to school, because all I wanted to do was curl myself into a ball and cry for hours on end.

  I slept fitfully. I couldn’t close my eyes unless I had the sound of the radio or the television to distract me, because I couldn’t get the memory of Yuri’s memorial service out of my head. I saw the image of Katya rigid in her chair. Her wide blue eyes staring at Yuri’s little white coffin with tears streaming down her face. And I knew if my pain was great, hers must have been unfathomable.

  Sometimes I awakened in the middle of the night and heard Yuri’s voice in my head. I had dreams that were so intense, where I imagined him sitting there in his big, comfy living room chair, his bright blue eyes staring at me with great lucidity. I heard his boyish voice chirping about the Yankees. I saw his pale fingers reaching to flip the pages of one of the books we were reading. I felt the atmosphere between us as a cross between excitement and melancholy, a boy eager to do more but thwarted by his physical fragility.

  And then I would awaken and realize that it was only a dream, and my entire body would begin to tremble. I was soothed only by Daniel, who told me he believed that the soul flows on like music. That it fills spaces that are open and wide. Like breath and air, it travels where the heart is most open, during grief, during love. He would take my hand and bring it to his chest, pulling me back to sleep with the rhythm of his heart.

  * * *

  • • •

  I had called the Krasnys several times after the funeral to check on Katya and Sasha, but I only reached their answering machine. But now it had been nearly three weeks since the funeral, and after leaving several messages, I decided to bring a tray of my mother’s lasagna to their house as a gesture of love. Knowing they did not have family around them, I wanted them to know they were not alone in their grief.

  I drove out to the Krasnys’ on a cold, brittle afternoon. Winter was nearly upon us, and the trees that lined the roads were stripped bare. And yet, the ride out to their house was so familiar that if I closed my eyes, I could recall myself driving out with my bag full of schoolwork only a year ago, eager to spend time with Yuri.

  I had a plan. If they didn’t answer the doorbell, I’d leave the food on the front stoop with a little note. This way they would know, even if we didn’t have a chance to speak, that I continued to hold them and Yuri in my heart.

  It was clear, however, that they were home when I arrived. Both Sasha’s and Katya’s cars were parked outside, and I could see the pale glow of a lamp through the windows.

  So with great trepidation, I turned off the car, reached for the glass dish covered in foil, and started walking toward the front door.

  * * *

  • • •

  IT was Sasha who answered the doorbell, his face unshaven, his white hands shaking as he took the tray.

  He could barely say my name as he gestured for me to come inside. Grief has its own color and scent. The house was dark and stale.

  “I’m sorry I came without notice,” I apologized. “I’ll only stay a moment. I just wanted to check on you both.”

  He nodded. His pale eyes were rimmed in pink.

  “I’ve left a few messages for Katya on the phone,” I said softly.

  “Yes,” he mumbled absently, as if that was the only word he could manage. He was spiraling around with the lasagna, as if he wasn’t sure where to put it.

  The house looked as if it were collapsing inside. A coat lay on the floor. A single blue moccasin was marooned by the door. There were piles of newspapers on the sofa, and a mug and several plates cluttered the coffee table.

  Eventually, Sasha placed the tray of food on the kitchen table. “Please,” he said, gesturing me toward the sofa.

  I walked toward the living room. It had remained eerily untouched. The chair. Finn’s trophy. The orange medicine containers. Nothing had been changed or thrown out.

  “We haven’t really had the chance to . . .” He gestured toward the relics of what remained of Yuri. He looked down at his shoes, and I saw his glassy eyes pool with water.

  “I understand,” I said awkwardly. “I only wanted to stop in briefly and bring you something. I know it must be hard to eat . . . but the Italian in me needed to show that I was thinking of you and Katya.”

  “You have always been so kind.” Sasha shifted in his seat, then leaned over and cradled his head in his hands.

  “You should probably take it back with you. It will go uneaten . . .”

  “You can always freeze it,” I offered. “Or even throw it out. I just wanted you both to know . . .”

  “We know, Maggie,” he said. “We know . . .” And his voice splintered, painful as broken glass. Even hearing him use my name made everything feel awkward and raw.

  I was just about to say something when I caught sight of Katya in her bathrobe. Her hair, straggly and unpinned, flowed over her tightly cinched robe.

  She looked at me, her eyes hollow, her face sunken and concave. The same vacant expression I had seen in Mrs. Auerbach’s gaze years before was now staring back at me.

  Before I had a chance to say something, her voice sliced into the air. She spoke loudly, in Russian, words that were incomprehensible to me.

  Sasha’s face blanched, and he turned away from me, responding in Russian in a voice that was low and measured.

  The air in the room changed. “I shouldn’t have come.” My voice broke off. I was trembling.

  He rose and walked toward her, moving her hair away from her face. Then, without any more words between them, he started to lead her back to bed.

  I sat there for a moment, stunned. Several minutes passed and Sasha had not reemerged.

  I stood up and slung my bag over my shoulder. I let myself out, shutting the door behind me.

  * * *

  • • •

  I could barely drive myself back home after I visited the Krasnys. The encounter with Katya loomed in my mind. Of course, I didn’t understand what she had actually said. But from her tone and the way she had looked at me, all I could think about was that she blamed me for Yuri’s death.

  When I pulled into my driveway, it took all my energy to get inside the house and up to my bedroom. Daniel would not be at his home yet, so I reached for the phone and called Suzie.

  “She’s in the deepest black hole imaginable, Maggie. She’s mourning her son. This has nothing to do with you.”

  “I think it does,” I said, sobbing. “I think she blames me for Yuri’s death . . .”

  “Honey,” she said gently. “How could she ever think such a thing?”

  “Maybe she thinks he should never have returned to
school . . . Maybe she thinks the increased activity weakened Yuri’s heart somehow . . . like that time he and Finn snuck off together . . .” I could hardly catch my breath in between my words.

  “I think it has to do with missing Yuri so damn much. Maggie, you’d be losing your mind, too, if you lost your child.”

  I covered my mouth to try to stifle my sobs. “I should never have gone over there unexpected like that.”

  Suzie was silent for a moment. “Maybe that’s right. Maybe you shouldn’t have, but there’s nothing you can do about it right now. In a few days, call them again and apologize. Tell them you came over because you loved Yuri and you care about them.” She took a deep breath. “Broken hearts don’t heal overnight.”

  I hung up the phone. Tears streaked down my cheeks. I wasn’t sure broken hearts could ever heal; they beat differently, forever altered.

  68

  AFTER that afternoon, I called the Krasnys once. Twice. A third time, all within a month. Each time the message I left on their answering machine went unanswered.

  The next month I tried again. The third month, I called one last time.

  Daniel held me at night. He smoothed back my hair and whispered in my ear that he loved me. “They just need their space.” He tried to console me. “It has nothing to do with you.” But I was still haunted by the memory of Katya’s eyes and the words that I didn’t understand. During my lunch hour, when I continued to worry out loud, Suzie finally silenced me.

  “You might never know what Katya said. And I know how hard that is.”

  I looked up at her. My beautiful friend with her hard, shining eyes. Her chenille sweater with a smattering of sequined stars.