by Tim Ewins
Shortly after, Michael and Nigel moved in with Ebba to keep her company, help her with the upkeep of the house and fend off the boozers if they got too close. It wasn’t long after Olivia died that Ebba started to feel weak.
* * *
‘Förlåt, let me understand this…this is the boy you were looking for?’ Ebba asked for the third time, looking again at Manjan, the twenty-six-year-old man drinking tea in the chair next to her. ‘And he has just walked into our garden?’ She couldn’t stop laughing.
‘Förlåt?’ Manjan repeated, and he put his head in his hands. ‘I’m still in Sweden, aren’t I?’ It seemed every time he tried to run away from a country, he ended up back in the same country, usually with Hylad.
There was a lot of laughter that day and a great many tears. Michael came home in the early afternoon and completely broke down at the sight of Manjan. Eventually he managed to speak.
‘We have to tell your father,’ he said and Manjan’s face fell. Hylad and Michael’s faces followed suit and it went silent. Sometimes silences can be understood.
‘Um…’ Manjan started, after Ebba had looked at all of them with a smile before understanding the subtext.
For the first time Manjan told his story. He told them about Jan, how they’d travelled to Russia together with Saga and Valter, and how Jan had left him on a plane. He told them about India without Jan and then he told them about India with Jan. He told them about the lamp business and how this had effectively killed his father, his unborn child and his relationship with Jan.
Only one day after Ladyjan had left, Manjan told Hylad, Michael and Ebba how much he missed and loved her.
Ebba went to bed very early that night (as she had started doing every night) but before she did, she looked at her three companions and smiled. Nigel and Michael had been so kind to her, and by persuading Olivia to live with her, they had given her the best years of her life.
‘Where is your Jan now?’ she asked. Manjan told her that he didn’t know and that she could be anywhere.
‘Poland?’ Ebba asked, and Manjan said that she might be in Poland, but that she also might be anywhere.
‘Ukraine?’ Ebba asked, and Manjan said that yes, she might be in Ukraine too. She could be anywhere.
‘Russia? Nepal? India?’
‘Maybe,’ Manjan replied, ‘she could be anywhere.’
‘How did you look for your Jan when you lost him?’ Ebba asked, turning her attention to Hylad and Michael.
‘We tried everything,’ Nigel said.
‘We really did, lad,’ Hylad said sincerely to Manjan. He tried to remember the specifics about the everything that they tried. ‘We started by retracing our steps down at the harbour and…’ Ebba interrupted.
‘Retracing your steps, you say? There’s a thought. I’ve never been to Poland, or Ukraine… Come to think about it, I’ve never been to Russia, Nepal or India, either. I could do with leaving this place behind.’ Then Ebba shrugged her shoulders and wished them all a good night.
‘What do you say lad?’ asked Hylad. Manjan thought for less than a few seconds.
‘I don’t have any other plans for the rest of my life,’ he replied.
33
A cow
Goa, India. 2016; Poland, Ukraine and Russia. 1978 – 1980.
‘And that’s what we did,’ Manjan said, as he took a sip from his red wine, which was now in a plastic cup, followed by a sip from his bottle of water. The wine really did taste like piss.
They were sitting at the bar of an outside silent disco. To Shakey’s credit, the disco was quieter than most other discos, but it was far from silent. Most people had headphones on their heads (Manjan had discussed at length with a man at the door why he didn’t wish to purchase headphones) but every time the silent DJ played something that the dancers particularly liked, which was about every three and a half minutes, the crowd would cheer. Manjan’s thoughts and now fairly slurred story were constantly interrupted.
Shakey also took a sip from his plastic cup of wine. Manjan thought it was nice that Shakey had ordered the same as him, if a little sad.
‘You travelled to all those countries again?’ Shakey said in disbelief.
‘We did,’ Manjan replied. ‘Hylad, Michael, Ebba and myself. Ebba sold her house and we went everywhere, starting at the docks where Ladyjan had worked before she left.’ There was a cheer from the crowd. ‘She wasn’t there though.’
* * *
Poland and Ukraine
‘Prince Polo?’ Manjan offered on their first day in, what was for three of them, a new country. Hylad, Michael and Ebba all accepted. ‘The first bite’s the best,’ Manjan told them as he enthusiastically unwrapped the bar and hungrily took his first bite in seven years. The first bite wasn’t as good as he remembered. Neither was the second. Had they changed?
Manjan ate a much more varied diet during his second visit to Poland – pierogi, bigos, borscht – but he made every attempt to rekindle his relationship with Prince Polo bars as they travelled. He ate at least one every day and every single one of them was fine. They were all just fine.
They hadn’t planned on staying in Poland or Ukraine for very long. Manjan and Ladyjan had just passed through these countries by train, so it stood to reason that this time should be no different.
‘I agree that searching by train makes sense,’ Hylad had agreed, when they’d been planning the journey, ‘but if we’re going to search a country for someone we should do it properly,’ and so the four trains they caught zig-zagged from the German border to the Belarus border, from the Belarus border to the Slovakian border and from the Slovakian border to the Ukrainian border.
The German border was reasonably barren. Two sticks bearing the colours of each country’s flags stood in some tall, dry grass. A few tourists were taking pictures of the sticks, but after checking each tourist, it turned out that none of them was Ladyjan. It was at this point that Manjan, Hylad, Michael and Ebba realised that only one of their party knew what Ladyjan looked like. Manjan briefed them; they were looking for a witty, strong, brave and beautiful Swedish girl who did not look stereotypically Swedish.
This really wasn’t going to be easy.
The Belarus border was much more populated. There was a beautifully decorated wooden shack hosting a wedding on the Bela. Manjan checked all the guests and found that, sadly, none of them was Ladyjan. He waited for the bride and groom to come out of the shack and, for the first time in his life, he hoped with all of his heart not to see Ladyjan. He heaved a huge sigh of relief when a lady in a wedding dress, large purple glasses and a glittering blond perm walked into the crowd. She looked at her groom, who was wearing a wedding-themed novelty bowtie and smiled a tight-lipped smile before saying something in Swedish. Manjan thought he recognised the couple, but neither one of them was Ladyjan.
The Slovakian border was situated in the centre of a whole town. The four of them ate (Ladyjan wasn’t in the restaurant), drank (Ladyjan wasn’t in the bar) and explored (guess where Ladyjan wasn’t…)
Before they entered Ukraine, Manjan had what he thought would be his last Prince Polo bar. The manufacturer had not changed the way in which they made Prince Polo bars since Manjan had left Poland the first time, but he was sure something had changed.
‘Poxy Prince Polo bars,’ he said through his upper lip hair as the group entered Ukraine, ‘they don’t make them like they used to.’ Of course, they did make them like they used to, and they still do.
They recreated the zig-zag approach they’d adopted in Poland in Ukraine and, as a result, they didn’t reach Russia for a whole two years. In Ukraine, the group learned three things:
1. Ladyjan wasn’t there.
2. Prince Polo didn’t only supply Poland with chocolate. Once again Manjan tried the bar and longed for the taste he remembered, only to inform Hylad, Michael and Ebba that it was
even worse in Ukraine than it had been in Poland. It wasn’t, though. It was the same.
3. Russia was not an easy country to enter in 1980.
* * *
Russia
A line of dusty green military vehicles stood still, some in Russia and some in Ukraine. Every hour or so one vehicle would move from Ukraine to Russia and join the line on the other side of the border, but no one really went anywhere.
Manjan, Hylad, Michael and Ebba were on foot and walking alongside the vehicles. If it wasn’t for Ebba’s fragile image, gender and age, the four of them would have been shot before they saw the Soviet army soldier pointing his rifle at them. They stopped dead (but not actually dead, as could have been the case) and stared at the soldier who was lying alone in a small trench.
‘Friend,’ Hylad shouted.
The sound of a rifle cocking is a terrifying sound.
And the sight of a soldier quivering in a trench is a depressing sight.
‘Friend?’ the soldier shouted back as another military vehicle moved through the border. He didn’t want to shoot anyone today, so instead he shouted ‘Down. Get down.’ The group did as they were told, and the shaking soldier ran at them, continuing to hold his rifle in front of him as he did.
‘Who are you?’ he shouted, and this time it was Manjan who spoke up through the mud in his face.
‘We want to come into your country to look for someone.’
The soldier had heard this line lots of times from lots of travellers, lost family members and lovers, all wanting to search behind Russian borders.
‘You come in by plane,’ the soldier said, much quieter. ‘You do not enter Russia like this. You don’t come in through this border.’ There was a big pause while everyone considered their next move. It was the soldier who decided first. He poked Manjan with the end of his rifle and told him to roll over, which of course, he did.
Manjan did not recognise the soldier. The years had weathered him, as had the morning he’d just spent lying down in a trench. There were deep creases around his eyes and up his cheeks where he had grown old too quickly and each crease was full of dark mud. He looked very unhappy.
The soldier recognised Manjan though.
‘The person you are looking for,’ he said angrily, but with half a smile, before waving his rifle-free hand in a circle as if trying to remember something, ‘you lost him in…’ Manjan opened his mouth to say that he wasn’t looking for a him, ‘…Sweden,’ the soldier said. ‘He’s still lost? I’m sorry to hear.’
Manjan narrowed his eyes to imply a question mark without having to ask a question.
‘His name is stupid,’ the soldier continued, thinking very hard, ‘Oilad, no, Hylander? No. Hylad?’
Hylad turned slowly away from the hard mud and looked at the soldier, who was now looking much happier.
‘This is Hylad,’ Manjan said, and the previously unhappy, now happy soldier dropped his rifle and held tightly onto Hylad’s thick, dirtied hand and pulled him up into an embrace.
‘This is Hylad?’ the soldier asked, without expectation of an answer, ‘Then who are you looking for?’
‘A girl,’ Manjan answered, ‘called Jan’. The soldier looked at him seriously.
‘Jan,’ he shouted as if remembering something. ‘You are called Jan. There are two Jans! The girl Jan, she is in Russia?’ he asked, this time expecting an answer. Manjan nodded, trying to place the unhappy and now happy soldier in his head. He had met so many people on his travels.
‘Then you come with me,’ he said. ‘I take you across the border, you get me coffee and,’ he paused as if he were thinking about something, ‘and then we are even. Come. I know a place.’
* * *
Prisha the cow, now alone on the beach, settled down on the sand with the puppy cuddled into her. She was ready for the following day when she would wake up to the sunrise and eat the grass in the fields that the farmers had deserted several years earlier. The puppy let out a deep contented breath.
There really is some beauty in repetition, Prisha thought, and then she thought ‘moo’.
34
A recluse
Russia. 1980.
The soldier told Manjan, Hylad, Micheal and Ebba how he had been forced to leave Moscow, where he had lived all his life, until three years ago. He told them how he had been ‘recruited’ by the Soviet Army and relocated to a town up the road from the border with only the training he’d received as a teenager to keep him safe. He told them he was lonely.
‘I was married once,’ he said, drinking a weak but bitter coffee and looking unhappy. ‘She left me, but I waited for her, every Thursday before curfew, I waited. Outside her home. She was my angel.’ Hylad looked uncomfortable and Ebba looked impressed with what she took to be the soldier’s romantic dedication.
‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ Ebba said, with her elbows on the table and her head in one of her hands.
‘It is OK,’ the unhappy man responded, looking a little happier, ‘I dated her sister before I was moved. They look the same, so…’ He shrugged a shrug while Hylad shifted in his seat and Ebba let out a loud laugh. The unhappy, now happy man smiled at her. ‘You look a little like her too,’ he said, with raised eyebrows.
Other than their little group, the coffee stand was deserted, and yet they were all huddled around one of the six tiny tables.
‘This border job,’ the soldier continued, ‘it is a self-made job.’ He waved his coffee-free hand in the air. ‘I made it. I spend my time alone but away from danger.’ He thought for a second. ‘Away from danger, but alone.’ His smile dropped again as he told them his daily routine; every day he woke up in a small hut alone, he guarded a trench for eleven hours and then he went to sleep in a small hut alone. In short, he was waiting for something to happen – for the war to end maybe? He didn’t know what.
Manjan told the unhappy, then happy, now less happy man about their plan to retrace his and Ladyjan’s footsteps until they found her. The man slapped his leg and laughed for the first time in a long time. ‘In Russia?’ he asked. ‘Why would she return to Russia?’
Manjan told the soldier that he and Ladyjan had liked Russia and the soldier laughed again. ‘How do you think you will all get through Russia?’ he bellowed with a grin, and no one answered.
A heavy silence followed as they realised that Russia would require more planning than perhaps they had undertaken.
‘Would you…’ Ebba started, hoping that the open nature of her question might allow the soldier to come to his own conclusion. He looked at his green Soviet overalls with their huge, medal-less pocket on the left breast. He wouldn’t be missed at the border. No one would even know he had gone. He put on his grey, once-fluffy hat, looked at Ebba and answered.
‘I would,’ he said, but you’ll need a car.’
* * *
The only previous planning that the group had managed was to agree that, given the size of Russia, their previous zig-zag approach was probably not the most effective way to search for Ladyjan – it could take a lifetime. Although Manjan was in favour of spending his lifetime searching for Ladyjan (and indeed, in many ways he did), they agreed to simply follow the footsteps of a younger Manjan, Ladyjan, Saga and Valter. This meant hiring a car rather than travelling by train (luckily the soldier knew of a place; a place that also made coffee). Ebba offered up more of her savings to rent a modern car after hearing the story of how Ladyjan and Valter had been shot at trying to fix a tyre.
‘Russia is nice,’ Manjan promised Ebba, but she was having none of it. She’d never been shot at in Sweden and she’d already had one rifle pointed at her just trying to enter Russia.
Every town came with memories for Manjan, and every memory included Ladyjan. Russia was the country they’d spent the most time in together, but it was also the place where she’d first left him.
It didn
’t take long for them to realise that the soldier was right. Ladyjan would not be in Russia – the Soviet Union’s presence was heavy, and the group were met with a cold reception every time someone noticed their foreign accents. Luckily, the now mainly happy soldier could vouch for them with his uniform.
When they eventually reached Moscow, he made a request to visit his old house.
‘Are you sure?’ Michael asked. ‘If you’re seen… I mean, we’re living off the grid here. You could be…’
‘I want to visit my own home,’ the soldier said with a steady voice.
They waited until night (and curfew) had fallen, and drove slowly and quietly through the deserted streets to where the soldier said he had once lived. From the car, under the protection of the shadow from a large tree, the five of them looked at the large family home in which the soldier had supposedly once lived. No one admitted it, but everyone except for the soldier was surprised.
The soldier left the car and walked up to the house, but then he stopped several feet away from the front door and picked up a stone. The silence was broken.
‘Oi,’ he shouted, before throwing the stone at one of the upper-floor windows.
A different window the other side of the house opened, and two similar-looking women looked out. One of them put her head in her hands.
‘Vy,’ she despaired, ‘you.’ The other woman waved.
The soldier dropped to his knees and started singing a Russian ballad while the first woman shouted something that was presumably explicit.
Michael said his own expletive in the car and then, ‘This isn’t his house, it’s his poxy ex-spouse’s, he’s going to blow our cover.’ Michael, Hylad and Manjan jumped out of the car, grabbed the soldier by his arms and pulled him back. Ebba didn’t join them.
The soldier sang louder as he was pushed into the back seat of the car and the second woman started singing the same ballad, only several octaves higher, much to the annoyance of the first.
