The Blackbird Girls

by Anne Blankman

  The girls raised their cups. “To Oksana!”

  They all drank. Then Babulya passed around the plates of biscuits, and ham-and-butter sandwiches. After they had stuffed themselves, it was time for presents. From Lyudmila, Oksana received an entire bar of chocolate (“That cost me three weeks of pocket money,” Lyudmila said while Babulya smothered a laugh), and from Yulia she got a string of colored beads (“The blue beads match your eyes,” Yulia said).

  Valentina fetched her present from the back of the wardrobe. She had covered the gift in sheets of Pravda newspaper, and Oksana guessed it was because they couldn’t afford wrapping paper. Somehow that made the gift even better, and she took her time unwinding the twine and pulling back the newspaper.

  Inside lay the strangest-looking object she had ever seen. It was a teacup covered all over with little metal screws. Was she supposed to drink from it?

  “It’s a pencil holder,” Valentina said. “You can keep your paintbrushes in it.”

  Oksana couldn’t stop smiling. Valentina had made this for her! It must have taken her ages. That must have been what she was doing when she disappeared into the bathroom for a long time at night. “It’s beautiful,” she said. “I’ll keep it always.”

  After that, they ate sirok and drank cups of hot jam tea. At last, it was time for Lyudmila and Yulia to leave. Oksana and Valentina walked them to the lobby.

  “Thank you again.” Oksana hugged each of them in turn. “See you in school on Monday.”

  “See you on your real birthday,” Yulia said. “Shall we tell the teacher and ask her to make you stand in front of the class and give a speech?”

  “Or maybe we should ask her to sing to you,” Lyudmila said.

  “Please don’t!” Oksana said.

  The girls laughed. “We won’t. Goodbye!”

  “Goodbye,” Oksana and Valentina echoed.

  Upstairs, they started to clear the table.

  “Not yet,” Babulya said, going to the wardrobe. “Oksana hasn’t received her present from me.”

  “You don’t have to give me anything,” Oksana said.

  “I want to.” Babulya handed her a small packet wrapped in newspaper.

  Inside lay a sketchbook. Oksana flipped through it. The pages were so thin they were almost translucent.

  “To go with your new paints,” Babulya said. “You must have hoarded your pocket money for months to buy those. I thought you ought to have proper art paper, too.”

  It was too much. All of it—too much kindness, too much thoughtfulness, too much togetherness. For a moment, Oksana wanted to push the sketchbook back into Babulya’s hands. She wanted to yell, Don’t you know I’m a bad person and I don’t deserve parties and presents?

  But she didn’t. She looked at Babulya’s and Valentina’s happy faces, and the leftover chocolate sirok, and the presents sitting beside the bed. Valentina, Babulya, Yulia, Lyudmila, and Comrade Orlov hadn’t given her gifts because they had to.

  They’d wanted to.

  Cautiously, she stepped close to Babulya. Then she hugged her.

  “I love you,” she said to Babulya’s shirt. Saying it this way was easier than looking up into Babulya’s face.

  Babulya’s arms came around her. “I love you, too, my dear Oksana,” she whispered into Oksana’s hair.

  “I beg your pardon,” said a woman’s voice from behind them.

  Oksana turned around. The door gaped wide—she and Valentina must have forgotten to latch it.

  Standing on the threshold was her mother.

  31

  Valentina

  EVERYTHING IN VALENTINA turned to stone. She could only watch as Oksana flew across the room into her mother’s arms and think, Please, don’t leave.

  “Mama!” Oksana sobbed. “I missed you so much.”

  “I missed you, too.” Eleonora Ivanovna had a soft voice. She hugged Oksana back.

  Valentina couldn’t stop staring at Eleonora Ivanovna. She wore a dark coat and fur cap. Her blond hair reached the tops of her shoulders. Oksana looked so much like her.

  But Oksana was nothing like her. Oksana’s mother had stood by while her husband beat their daughter. She hadn’t stopped Oksana’s father from burning Oksana with a cigarette. She hadn’t protected Oksana. And Valentina hated her so much she was shaking.

  Babulya laid a hand on Valentina’s shoulder. “Shhh,” she murmured. “Remember Oksana loves her mother.”

  Valentina looked, and she saw Babulya was right: Oksana’s face had lit up. Valentina turned away, pressing her cheek into her grandmother’s hand.

  “The government has finally assigned me an apartment,” Eleonora Ivanovna said to Babulya. “At last I can take Oksana home. I am in your debt for minding her for me.”

  “Caring for Oksana has been my pleasure,” Babulya said.

  Tears pricked Valentina’s eyes. She wanted to beg Eleonora Ivanovna not to take Oksana away, to tell her that Oksana was happier with them. But Babulya’s hand tightened on her shoulder, and she didn’t say anything.

  Eleonora Ivanovna let go of Oksana and gently nudged her away. “Gather your things. We have a train to catch.”

  Smiling, Oksana nodded and hurried to the wardrobe.

  “You’re leaving already?” Valentina exclaimed.

  Shivering, Eleonora Ivanovna drew her coat more tightly about her. “Mercy, this city is freezing! Yes, we have to get on this train. If we miss it, we won’t be able to leave until morning, and I need to be at work on Tuesday.”

  Valentina couldn’t believe it: They were leaving. Now. She and Oksana would probably never see each other again.

  Valentina rushed to Oksana. “Don’t leave,” she whispered. “You’re happy here with us. I know you are . . .”

  Oksana looked up from the suitcase she was packing. “I am happy with you and Babulya,” she whispered back. “But it’ll be different this time with my mother, now that my father isn’t here anymore. I know it.”

  “But we won’t see each other again.” Valentina struggled to keep from crying. “We probably can’t even write letters to each other. Your mother wouldn’t like it.”

  “I’ll find a way to write to you.” Tears welled up in Oksana’s eyes.

  “What are you two whispering about?” Eleonora Ivanovna asked. “Khusha, we simply must make that train.”

  Swallowing hard, Valentina picked up Oksana’s bag. “I’ll carry this downstairs for you.”

  Eleonora Ivanovna’s hands fluttered nervously at her sides. “That isn’t necessary, Valentina.” It was the first time Valentina could remember Oksana’s mother addressing her by name.

  “Thank you again,” Eleonora Ivanovna said to Babulya, then turned to Oksana. “Come along. Say farewell to Valentina and we can be on our way.”

  The girls hugged each other tightly. Valentina tried to think of what Babulya would want her to say.

  “Have a good journey,” she said at last.

  “You’re my best friend always,” Oksana whispered, then stepped back. Her face was now blank. Valentina understood why: their friendship had to be kept a secret from Oksana’s mother.

  So she didn’t say anything as her grandmother kissed Oksana, once on each cheek, and then once on the forehead for extra luck. She didn’t say anything when Babulya and Eleonora Ivanovna shook hands, or when Eleonora Ivanovna scurried to the door, Oksana trailing in her wake.

  At the threshold, Oksana looked back to where Valentina and Babulya stood and gave them a tremulous smile. “Goodbye.”

  “Goodbye and safe travels.” Babulya pinched Valentina’s arm, a sure sign she was supposed to say farewell, but Valentina couldn’t get her voice to work. She waved instead.

  Oksana vanished into the gloom of the corridor. Motionless, Valentina listened to her footsteps grow fainter and fainter. A creak sounded, the d
oor to the stairwell—the building manager was forever saying he would oil the hinges, and he never did—and then the footfalls died away.

  Oksana was gone.

  With a sigh, Babulya closed the door. “I’m glad we had the chance to give her a birthday tea.” She wrapped an arm around Valentina’s shoulders. “And I’m glad you gave her the pencil holder. Every time she uses it, she’ll think of you.”

  Tears filled Valentina’s eyes. “I don’t have anything to remember her by.”

  “You have memories. That can be enough.”

  Suddenly, it was more than Valentina could bear. She pushed away from her grandmother. “Memories aren’t enough! All they do is hurt. I don’t have Papa or Mama, and now I don’t have Oksana, either. Everybody’s gone!”

  Babulya shoved a pillow at her. “Punch that.”

  Valentina blinked. “What do you mean?”

  “I imagine you want to hit something, and quite hard, too,” her grandmother said mildly. “You may punch this pillow. I’ve punched a number of pillows in my day, and I promise you, it’s every bit as satisfying as breaking something, without any pesky cleanup.”

  Valentina took the pillow her grandmother offered. She tossed it onto the bed and then hit it with all of her strength. Then again and again until her arm hurt and her breath was coming in short gasps and she couldn’t do it anymore. She slid down to the floor. Everywhere she looked, she saw evidence of Oksana.

  The table was still cluttered with the remnants of the birthday tea: plates dusted with crumbs, a half-eaten piece of chocolate sirok, a pot of long-cold tea. Overhead, the brightly colored ribbons shone in the lamplight. Along the wall, several pen-and-ink drawings had been pinned. Valentina’s favorite was the picture of the Bronze Horseman. Oksana had worked so hard on it. And she hadn’t even thought to show it to her mother . . .

  The room blurred. Valentina blinked, wishing she could order the tears to go away. “Will Oksana be all right?” she asked her grandmother. “What if her mother is mean to her?”

  “Then we will do everything in our power to help Oksana.” Babulya settled down on the floor beside Valentina, tucking her skirt primly under her legs.

  Valentina gave her a long look. “How’d you know to do that? Hit the pillow?”

  “Because I’ve lost many people I love, too.” Babulya’s voice was gentle.

  “Your husband—my grandfather,” Valentina guessed.

  “Yes, my husband.” Babulya took a deep breath. “And many others.” She stroked Valentina’s hair. “The people we love are never lost to us. Your father will never leave you, not truly. His actions will echo in your life and in the lives of your children and in the lives of your children’s children. And you and Oksana will never forget each other. Of that I’m certain.”

  Valentina wasn’t sure. “Truly?”

  “Truly.” Babulya kissed the top of her head.

  “How can you be so sure?” Valentina asked.

  “Perhaps it’s time I told you a story.”

  As they sat on the floor, listening to the wind hurl itself against the windowpane, Valentina heard her grandmother’s story about herself as a young girl, living in Kiev with her parents and little brothers until war broke out. She listened as Babulya told her about leaving the city in the dark with her cousin Nathan. They had foraged in fields for food and slept in forests. They had sought refuge in a barn, and her grandmother had cried when she’d had to leave Nathan behind.

  Valentina listened as Babulya told her about hiking through the countryside on her own and the night when German bombs rained from the sky. She listened as Babulya told her about finding a group of friendly Ukrainians and about traveling with them until they found out she was a Jew. She barely breathed as her grandmother told her about walking alone down dirt roads and about the day the first winter snow fell.

  “How did you survive that?” she asked when Babulya paused.

  Babulya smiled. “I met my best friend.”

  32

  TASHKENT, UZBEKISTAN, SOVIET UNION

  DECEMBER 1941

  Rifka

  THE WOMAN CALLED Ona and the girl with the black braids carried Rifka into the house. They set her on the floor and pulled off her wet clothes. Rifka didn’t protest. She felt as though she had come apart from her body and was floating near the ceiling, looking down on everyone.

  The room she was in was small and warm. A fire crackled in the fireplace, and it sent out licks of heat that touched her face and her bare arms and legs. A prickling sensation spread across her skin, and then it turned into needles, stabbing her with red-hot points. She cried out from the pain.

  “Shhh, my dove,” said the woman called Ona. She and the girl with the black braids bustled about Rifka, rubbing her fingers and toes and wrapping her in blankets. “Your body is waking up from the cold,” the woman told Rifka. Her face was kind, and her brown eyes so dark they might have been black. “You’ll be well soon.”

  Rifka licked her dry lips. “I don’t want to be well. I want to die.”

  “I imagine you do,” the woman said quietly. She turned to the girl with the black braids. “I must see to the little ones. Give her hot tea, plenty of it.”

  The girl nodded, and the woman hurried away. Rifka rested her back against the wall, trying not to moan as the needles in her skin grew hotter and sharper. The girl went to the stove, where a kettle was whistling. She poured boiling water into a cup and carried it to Rifka.

  “Tea,” she said, giving the cup to Rifka, who folded her hands around it and almost whimpered at the warmth. “Why do you want to die?” the girl asked as she sat down.

  Rifka stared into her tea. There was nothing she could say that anyone else would understand. She didn’t reply.

  “Well, you mustn’t die,” the girl said.

  Rifka swallowed some tea. It was so hot, it hurt going down. “Why not?”

  “Because we saved you, my mother and I,” the girl replied. “My grandmother always says if you save someone’s life, you are beholden to her forever.”

  “I think you said that backward.” Rifka sipped more tea. It still hurt, but the needles in her skin were softening. “Don’t you mean the person you save owes you for the rest of her life?”

  “No, not at all!” The girl leaned forward. “By saving someone, you are doing holy work. So you owe the person you save a debt because they are the reason you did a sacred deed.”

  The thoughts in Rifka’s head were swirling like the snow outside. She was so tired. “I don’t understand,” she mumbled, her eyes closing. “Who are you, anyway?”

  “Feruza Chorieva,” the girl said. They were the last words Rifka heard before she drifted away into the darkness again.

  * * *

  - - -

  She didn’t want to live, but when she woke she put on the dress, sweater, and woolen leggings Ona gave her. She didn’t want to live, but she sat at the table in the warm kitchen with Feruza’s seven little brothers and sisters. She didn’t want to live, but she ate the dumplings and pilaf she was served, and she couldn’t help smiling when the smallest girl climbed onto her lap. She didn’t want to live, but she washed in the wooden bathtub in the kitchen, and when she was clean, she dressed in a white nightgown. She didn’t want to live, but she slept in a big bed with Feruza and three of her sisters, and when she woke, she helped Feruza and Ona make porridge for breakfast.

  After everyone had eaten, Ona—which Rifka had learned was Uzbek for Mama—asked her if she had anywhere to go.

  Rifka swallowed hard. “No.” For some reason, it felt like the hardest word she had ever said. “I’m from Ukraine. I’ve come all the way from Kiev to escape the Germans.”

  “Well, then you must stay here,” Ona said, as if that settled everything.

  “But I can’t pay you.” Rifka’s face burned with shame. “I don’t have an
y money. I don’t have anything.”

  “You have a clever mind,” Ona said briskly. “You must, or you wouldn’t have survived on your own for as long as you did. And I imagine you aren’t afraid of hard work, seeing as you traveled from Kiev to Tashkent. You will help around the farm and go to school, and that will be payment enough. My husband is away, fighting in the war, and I can use every spare pair of hands I can get.”

  Rifka didn’t want to cry, but she couldn’t help it. She couldn’t remember the last time someone had been so kind to her.

  “Thank you,” she said, and then Feruza took her hand and led her to the barn to milk the cow. When Rifka touched the cow’s cold teats, she squealed with surprise and startled the cow so much that it kicked over the pail. She and Feruza laughed so hard she nearly cried again.

  After that, Rifka’s days soon fell into a new rhythm. In the morning, she helped Feruza feed the chickens and milk the cow. During the day, she, Feruza, and Feruza’s brothers and sisters went to school. In her borrowed shift dress, she sat at the desk she shared with Feruza and listened as their teacher talked and wrote on the chalkboard. After school, she and Feruza raced each other up and down the long, dusty roads. In the evening, they did their schoolwork by lamplight, and at night they slept in the big bed with Feruza’s sisters, waiting until the little girls had fallen asleep before they began whispering and giggling. And at no time—not in the morning, or the evening, or at night when the bedroom was dark and quiet—did Rifka pray. She had decided to ignore God, as He had ignored her.

  Nobody asked her to leave. Nobody asked her why she had no one else to care for her. They acted as though they wanted her there. Ona said she was a dear girl and such a help, especially when she played with the smallest children so Ona could weave more blankets on her loom and earn much-needed money for the household. Feruza laughed when they raced, and her little sisters begged Rifka to tell them more folktales about the witch Baba Yaga. They liked her. But would they still care for her if they knew she was Jewish? Rifka didn’t dare tell them.