The Blackbird Girls

by Anne Blankman

  Valentina

  AFTER BABULYA FINISHED telling Valentina about her childhood, they didn’t talk for a long time. Valentina leaned against Babulya, watching Oksana’s birthday candles burn themselves out. She felt unbearably sad. Her grandmother had lost nearly everyone she cared about—even her own daughter, Galina, Valentina’s mother.

  Valentina nestled closer to her grandmother. “I love you, Babulya. I promise I won’t ever leave you.”

  “That’s a silly promise,” Babulya said. “Someday you ought to leave me. You should go to university, find a job, fall in love.” There was a smile in her voice.

  “But my mother did those things, and she stopped seeing you! I don’t want to do that.”

  Babulya sighed. “Your mother wanted to keep you safe. If it hadn’t been for the accident at your papa’s nuclear plant, I doubt we would have met.”

  “It isn’t right,” Valentina argued. “You loved her so much from the moment she was born. Mama says she felt the same way about me, and . . .”

  A thought struck her. She sat bolt upright. “Babulya, in your story everyone called you Rifka!”

  “Of course they did,” Babulya said. “That’s my name.”

  “But you’re Rita Grigorievna.”

  Babulya looked surprised. “Nowadays, many of us older Jews take on proper Soviet names. I couldn’t have gotten my job at the market if I went by a Jewish name like Rifka. Anyway, it hardly matters.”

  Valentina’s heart beat with a steady sharpness. “Yes, it does. It proves you’re wrong about Mama. She loves you. She always has.”

  Babulya stilled. “What do you mean?”

  “My name was supposed to be Rifka,” Valentina said. “Mama said she wanted to call me that, but she didn’t dare. Don’t you understand?” she burst out when Babulya merely looked at her. “Mama wanted to name me after you.”

  “That can’t be right. Jews don’t name our children after living relatives.”

  “Maybe Mama didn’t know. Did you teach her about Judaism when she was growing up?”

  Babulya’s mouth opened and closed twice. “No,” she said at last. “I worshipped on my own. I didn’t want to put her in danger. Maybe you’re right. Maybe she didn’t know. Which means she did want to name her daughter after me.” She brought her hands to her cheeks. “Oh my stars,” she said, and smiled.

  * * *

  - - -

  November was gray and cold. The moon put on his furs again. The waters of the Neva River no longer held the light of the sun and turned black. When Valentina walked to school, she had to bend double to keep the wind’s harsh fingers from clawing her face.

  Three whole weeks had passed since Oksana had left, and she still hadn’t written Valentina a letter.

  “She’s probably been very busy,” Babulya said. “Think of all she’s had to cope with—new home, new school, new teacher, new friends. I’m sure once she’s settled, she’ll write.”

  But worry creased her brow as she walked beside Valentina down the ice-slicked street toward their apartment. The sky was black as tar, and the lighted windows in the buildings glowed.

  “She would find time to write to me,” Valentina insisted. “I know it. Something’s wrong.”

  “She’s busy,” Babulya said again. “I wish I’d asked her mother for their new address, though. Then you could write to her.”

  Up ahead stood a figure on the front steps of their building. A woman—Valentina could tell that much. The figure turned, light from the first-story windows spilling across her face.

  It was Valentina’s mother.

  “Mama!” Valentina shouted.

  Suddenly, she was running and slipping down the icy street, laughing and crying at the same time. She threw herself into her mother’s arms.

  “Oh, my love,” her mother said. “My wonderful love, let me see you.”

  She held Valentina at arm’s length. “You look so much older! And taller. It won’t be long before you’re taller than me.”

  “I grew a lot,” Valentina said. “Babulya is always having to let out the hems on my skirts.”

  Mentioning Babulya’s name reminded Valentina that her grandmother was here, too. Babulya stood several feet away, watching them intently. Her face was so hopeful.

  “Galina?” she said uncertainly.

  “Mama,” Valentina’s mother said in a choked voice, and held out her arms. “I’ve decided to come home.”

  * * *

  - - -

  “It was Valentina’s most recent letter that convinced me to leave Kiev,” Valentina’s mother said later, after she and Babulya had finished hugging and crying and they had gone upstairs to the apartment.

  Now all three of them sat around the table, sipping tea. Even though the wind blew outside, Valentina felt warm.

  “In your letter,” her mother said, “you mentioned that you had realized I wanted to name you after your grandmother.” She smiled at Babulya. “If I could have named her Rifka after you, I would have.”

  “I understand,” Babulya said. “Giving her a Jewish name would have been like painting a target on her back.”

  Valentina’s mother nodded. “After I read Valentina’s letter, I thought about how unpredictable life is. We never could have guessed that there would be an accident at the power plant and that Nicolai would die so young. And when Valentina, Oksana, and I had nowhere to go in Kiev, I thought immediately of you, Mama. I knew you would love and care for Valentina and Oksana as I would. And I knew it was foolishness to stay in Kiev and eventually send for Valya. Life is too short and precious to live without our families. I’ve come back to you, Mama, and I don’t care if the secret police have a file on you or not—I’ve come here to live with you and Valya. That is, if you’ll have me.”

  “Oh, Galina,” Babulya said, and took Valentina’s mother’s hands in hers.

  Then there were more tears, and laughter, and hugs until Valentina finally had to remind them it was half past eight and they still hadn’t eaten and she might die of hunger soon. Then there was more laughter, but her grandmother and mother went downstairs to make supper.

  For the next several nights, Babulya told them stories as she sewed. Valentina’s mother had never learned about Babulya’s childhood, and she listened in silence, her eyes glistening with tears, as Babulya talked about the wartime years.

  Babulya told other stories, too. They laughed over the antics of Babulya’s little brothers, who had forever been getting into scrapes. They smiled over the courtship of Babulya’s parents, who had met when her mother strode into her father’s shop and demanded he fix her father’s trousers, which he had hemmed too short. They sighed over the uncles Babulya hadn’t met, for they had been dragged away by the Cossacks before she had been born, forced to serve in the tsar’s army and never seen again. They shivered over the great-grandfather who had been a rabbi and who Babulya’s parents wouldn’t speak of in public, for fear that his occupation would have made their family targets.

  “Targets for what?” Valentina asked.

  “Reprisals.” Babulya put away her sewing. “Some customers would have stopped coming to my father’s tailor shop. Other people would have teased us—or worse.”

  Valentina looked at the wardrobe’s closed door. Inside lay the box where Babulya kept her Shabbat candlesticks. Today was Friday; they ought to light them. But Babulya had made no move toward the wardrobe. Valentina could guess why; it was because her mother was here and she would disapprove.

  She went to the wardrobe. Her mother looked up from the handkerchief she was embroidering for one of Babulya’s customers. “Is it already time to go to bed?”

  “No.” Valentina got out the box and set it on the table, in front of her mother.

  “Valya, I don’t think we should—” Babulya began.

  “Yes, we should.” Valentina placed t
he candlesticks on the table. She glanced at the curtains to make sure they were closed. Then she struck a match and lit the two candles. Covering her eyes, she began, “Baruch atah Adonai, Elohainu melech ha-olom, asher kid-shanu—”

  “What’s the meaning of this?” her mother interrupted. “Valentina, stop at once!”

  “It’s Friday night.” Valentina’s hands dropped from her eyes. “I’m lighting the candles to begin Shabbat.”

  Her mother stared at Babulya. “You taught her this. How could you?”

  Babulya met her gaze. “Valya wanted to know. She said worshipping makes her feel closer to her father.”

  “She’s a child!” Valentina’s mother said. “She didn’t understand what she was asking. She could get in trouble for this.”

  “We worship in secret,” Valentina said quickly. “With the curtains closed. We whisper the blessings. We don’t go to a synagogue. Nobody knows.”

  “It’s still dangerous,” her mother insisted.

  Slowly, Babulya stood up. “My mother and brothers died because of our religion. Most of our family was wiped out. And today we still aren’t free to worship. When does it end? I will be cautious, but I refuse to live in a cage.”

  Valentina turned to her mother. “I understand how dangerous this is. But I feel closer to Papa when we light the candles.”

  For a moment, her mother didn’t say anything. She stood with her head bowed. At last, she looked up.

  “You’re certain no one has any idea what you do in here?”

  “Yes,” Valentina said.

  “Then say the blessings.” Her mother sat down again, her back ramrod straight.

  Valentina took a deep breath and began. Babulya joined in. They praised God, who had commanded them to light the candles, and who had brought forth bread from the earth and fruit from the vines.

  As they spoke, Valentina thought of all her ancestors who had said the same words. The great-great-great-grandfather who had been a rabbi. The great-great-uncles who had been taken by the Cossacks. The great-grandfather who had died in battle, and the great-grandmother and great-uncles who had been murdered at Babi Yar. And all the others she hadn’t known and never would, the nameless children and women and men who had come before her.

  She was a knot in a rope that stretched back for centuries. At that moment, she felt so close to Papa, as if he were standing behind her. If she could see him, she knew, he would be smiling at her. And she would smile back at him.

  35

  MINSK, BELORUSSIA, SOVIET UNION

  NOVEMBER 1986

  Oksana

  OKSANA DIDN’T KNOW how much longer she could be perfect. For the past three weeks, she had done everything she could think of to make Dyadya Boris approve of her. She had gotten all four-pluses at school. She set the table for supper and washed the dishes and swept the floor. When he spoke to her, she kept her eyes down and spoke softly.

  He hadn’t gotten angry with her, not since the time he’d found her letter. She had learned her lesson, she promised her mother. She wouldn’t speak badly of him again.

  But he didn’t control her mind. No one did but her, she knew now. In her thoughts, she hated him. When he entered the apartment, she cursed him silently, and when she carried his supper plate to the sink, she wished he had choked on his food.

  He leaned back in his chair, fishing in his suit coat pocket. “I still can’t believe you let Oksana live with Jews,” he said to Oksana’s mother. He took out a cigarette and rolled it between his fingers.

  Oksana’s mother jumped up and got a book of matches out of a drawer. “I hardly had a choice, Boris. My husband was dead, my family lived in a village near the site of the accident, and I’d never send Oksana to my husband’s relatives.”

  “Why not?” Dyadya Boris asked. He took the matchbook without thanking Oksana’s mother.

  “His father is a horrible man.” Oksana’s mother shuddered. “Drunk most of the time. When Ilya was a boy, his father used to whip him black and blue. There was no way I’d send Oksana to him.”

  Dyadya Boris tossed down the matchbook without lighting his cigarette. “Still, I don’t think an old Jewess was a better option. Suppose some of her habits rubbed off on Oksana? Why, she could have taught Oksana to be a cheat!”

  Oksana’s hands tightened on the lip of the sink. Babulya a cheat! She was the kindest person Oksana had ever known.

  “Yes, it was a terrible risk to take,” Oksana’s mother agreed.

  “It certainly was.” Dyadya Boris continued rolling the cigarette between his fingers. “We all know what the Jews are like. And old Jewesses are the worst of all. Probably gave Oksana kitchen scraps to eat and threadbare clothes to wear while she swanned around in furs.”

  Oksana couldn’t bear it anymore. “Babulya is wonderful! She took good care of me.”

  “Did you hear that?” Dyadya Boris demanded, turning to Oksana’s mother. “She calls that old Jewess her grandmother! And defends her! Why, the girl sounds like a Jew herself!”

  “Please, Oksana,” her mother said, her hands twisting together in her skirt. “You made a mistake. Tell Boris you didn’t mean what you said.”

  “I did mean it.” Oksana was shaking all over. She knew she was making Dyadya Boris angry, but she didn’t care. She wouldn’t lie about Babulya. “She is my grandmother, and I love her.”

  Dyadya Boris stood up. His face had grown hard. “Over there.” He pointed to the middle of the room. “Now.”

  Oksana stared at him. “No.”

  “You’ll do as I say!” He grabbed her arm, yanking her forward. “You’re a stupid little girl who needs to be taught a lesson.” He released her arm and unbuckled his belt.

  Oksana looked at her mother, who was standing by the window, her hands twisting in her skirt. Mama was weak, Oksana thought with a surge of anger. But Oksana wasn’t. She wouldn’t stand there meekly and let Dyadya Boris do whatever he wanted to her.

  She would fight back.

  She grabbed the nearest thing at hand, her school satchel. She’d swing it at Dyadya Boris’s head. She’d show him—

  “Take this,” Dyadya Boris said to Oksana’s mother, holding out his leather belt. “You’re going to teach your daughter a lesson.”

  Oksana almost smiled. Not once in her life had her mother raised a hand to her. She hadn’t protected Oksana, but she hadn’t hurt her, either. Mama would refuse to take the belt from Dyadya Boris. And Oksana would tell him to get out.

  Her mother took the belt.

  Oksana froze. No. This wasn’t happening. Not her mother.

  “I’m sorry, Oksana,” her mother said quietly. “I have to do it. But you brought this on yourself. I warned you not to make Dyadya Boris angry.”

  Oksana dropped the satchel. All she could do was watch her mother come closer, the belt gripped in her hand.

  “I’m sorry,” her mother said again, and Dyadya Boris spun Oksana around. He held her in place, his fingers digging into her shoulders.

  “Please,” she started to scream, but the belt cracked through the air and white-hot pain lanced her back. It felt like a line of fire, carved into her skin. She let out a sharp cry.

  Before she could catch her breath, the belt struck her again in the same place, tearing into the wounded skin. The pain made her gasp.

  The belt hit her a third time. She bit down so hard she tasted blood.

  “I can’t do more.” Her mother sounded breathless.

  “That’s enough,” Dyadya Boris said. “Oksana, I don’t ever want to hear you refer to that Jewess as your grandmother. It’s an embarrassment to me. Do you understand?”

  She swallowed the blood. “Yes, Dyadya Boris.”

  “Good. Now clean yourself up. You’re a mess.”

  She moved stiffly across the room. Each step hurt. She could feel lines of fire burning
into her back, through the skin and muscle, into the bone. She wanted to scream.

  No. She wouldn’t let them know how badly they had hurt her.

  She staggered into the bathroom. She closed the door. Then she locked it. Alone. She was alone. She was safe.

  Tears gathered in her eyes. No, she wasn’t. She wasn’t safe at all. Not even with her mother.

  She took off her sweater and blouse, wincing as the fabric peeled away from her bloodied skin. She had to stand on the edge of the tub to see her back in the mirror.

  Two red lines crisscrossed her lower back. The skin had split apart, leaving behind bloodied grooves. Soon the bruises would darken to black and purple, she knew. Those weren’t dangerous. But she’d have to put salve and bandages over the cuts, or they could become infected.

  She couldn’t do it herself, although she tried several times. She’d have to ask her mother for help.

  The tears in her eyes began to fall. Mama was just as bad as Papa and Dyadya Boris. She’d do whatever a man told her, no matter what it was. No matter who it hurt.

  Because she cared more about a man than about Oksana.

  Oksana burst into tears. She was good, she told herself. She was smart and strong, and she didn’t deserve to be beaten.

  She deserved to be loved.

  A knock sounded on the bathroom door. “Let me in,” her mother said. “I want to see your back.”

  “Don’t pretend you care,” Oksana choked out between her sobs. “You don’t care about me. You never have.”

  “Oksana!” Her mother was crying, too. “I do care about you! If you’d only listened to me and not made Boris angry, none of this would have happened.”

  “It’s not my fault,” Oksana said. She felt the truth of the words in her bones. “It’s not my fault,” she repeated. “It’s Papa’s and Dyadya Boris’s and yours.”

  “Let me in,” her mother said again. “I want to fix your injuries.”

  A wave of anger hit Oksana. It would never change. Her mother would stand by while a man hurt her—or she would do the actual hurting herself. And then she would pretend everything was fine, and she’d tend Oksana’s wounds, and she’d act as though what they were doing were normal.