by Ruta Sepetys
“What do you want, Lina?” said Andrius.
“I ... Mrs. Arvydas, are you all right?” She turned her head away from me.
“Leave, Lina,” said Andrius.
“Can I help somehow?” I asked.
“No.”
“Is there anything I can do?” I pressed.
“I said, leave!” Andrius stood up to face me.
I hung motionless. “I came to give you—” I reached in my pocket for the cigarettes.
Mrs. Arvydas turned her head to me. Her eye makeup ran down over a bloody welt that blazed across her cheek.
What had they done to her? I felt the cigarettes crush between my fingers. Andrius stared at me.
“I’m sorry.” My voice caught and broke. “I’m really so sorry.” I turned quickly and began to run. Images streaked and bled together, contorted by my speed—Ulyushka, grinning with yellow teeth; Ona in the dirt, her one dead eye open; the guard moving toward me, smoke blowing from his pursed lips—Stop it, Lina—Papa’s battered face looking down at me from the hole; dead bodies lying next to the train tracks; the commander reaching for my breast. STOP IT! I couldn’t.
I ran back to our shack.
“Lina, what’s wrong?” asked Jonas.
“Nothing! ”
I paced the floor. I hated this labor camp. Why were we here? I hated the commander. I hated Kretzsky. Ulyushka complained and stomped for me to sit down.
“SHUT UP, YOU WITCH!” I screamed.
I rifled through my suitcase. My hand knocked the stone from Andrius. I grabbed it. I thought about throwing it at Ulyushka. Instead, I tried to crush it. I didn’t have the strength. I put it in my pocket and snatched my paper.
I found a sliver of light outside in back of our hut. I held the stolen pen above the paper. My hand began to move in short, scratchy strokes. I took a breath. Fluid strokes. Mrs. Arvydas slowly appeared on the page. Her long neck, her full lips. I thought of Munch as I sketched, his theory that pain, love, and despair were links in an endless chain.
My breathing slowed. I shaded her thick chestnut hair resting in a smooth curve against her face, a large bruise blazing across her cheek. I paused, looking over my shoulder to make certain I was alone. I drew her eye makeup, smudged by tears. In her watery eyes I drew the reflection of the commander, standing in front of her, his fist clenched. I continued to sketch, exhaled, and shook out my hands.
I returned to our shack and hid the pen and drawing in my suitcase. Jonas sat on the floor, bobbing his knee nervously. Ulyushka was asleep on her pallet, snoring.
“Where’s Mother?” I asked.
“The grouchy woman went to the village today,” said Jonas. “Mother walked down the road to meet her on the way back.”
“It’s late,” I said. “She’s not back?” I had given the grouchy woman a wood carving to pass along for Papa.
I walked outside and saw Mother coming toward the shack. She carried coats and boots. She smiled her huge smile when she saw me. Miss Grybas came scurrying toward us.
“Hurry!” she said. “Put those things out of sight. The NKVD is rounding everyone up to sign papers.”
I didn’t have a chance to tell Mother about Mrs. Arvydas. We put everything in the bald man’s shack. Mother put her arms around me. Her dress hung on her thin frame, her hip bones protruding at the belted waistline.
“She mailed our letters!” whispered Mother, beaming. I nodded, hoping the handkerchief had passed across hundreds of miles already, ahead of the letters.
It wasn’t five minutes before the NKVD burst into our hut, yelling for us to report to the office. Jonas and I marched along with Mother.
“And drawing the map this afternoon?” she asked.
“Easy,” I said, thinking of the stolen pen hidden in my suitcase.
“I wasn’t sure it was safe,” said Mother. “But I guess I was wrong.” She put her arms around us.
Sure, we were safe. Safe in the arms of hell.
“Tadas was sent to the principal today,” announced Jonas at dinner. He wedged a huge piece of sausage into his small mouth.
“Why?” I asked.
“Because he talked about hell,” sputtered Jonas, juice from the plump sausage dribbling down his chin.
“Jonas, don’t speak with your mouth full. Take smaller pieces,” scolded Mother.
“Sorry,” said Jonas with his mouth stuffed. “It’s good.” He finished chewing. I took a bite of sausage. It was warm and the skin was deliciously salty.
“Tadas told one of the girls that hell is the worst place ever and there’s no escape for all eternity.”
“Now why would Tadas be talking of hell?” asked Papa, reaching for the vegetables.
“Because his father told him that if Stalin comes to Lithuania, we’ll all end up there.”
46
“IT’S CALLED TURACIAK,” Mother told us the next day. “It’s up in the hills. It’s not large, but there’s a post office and even a small schoolhouse.”
“There’s a school?” said Miss Grybas excitedly.
Jonas shot me a look. He had been asking about school since the beginning of September.
“Elena, you must tell them I’m a teacher,” said Miss Grybas. “The children in the camp must go to school. We have to create some sort of school here.”
“Did she mail the letters?” asked the bald man.
“Yes,” said Mother. “And she wrote the post office address on the return.”
“But how will we know if any letters arrive for us?” said Mrs. Rimas.
“Well, we’ll have to continue to bribe someone who signed,” said Miss Grybas with a grimace. “They’ll check for our mail when they take their trips to the village.”
“She said she met a Latvian woman whose husband is in a prison near Tomsk,” said Mother.
“Oh, Elena, could our husbands be in Tomsk?” asked Mrs. Rimas, bringing her hand to her chest.
“Her husband wrote that he is spending time with many Lithuanian friends.” Mother smiled. “But she said the letters were cryptic and arrived with markings.”
“Of course they did,” said the bald man. “They’re censored. That Latvian woman better be careful what she writes. And you better be careful, too, unless you want to be shot in the head.”
“Will you never stop?” I said.
“It’s the truth. Your love letters could get them killed. And what of the war?” asked the bald man.
“The Germans have taken Kiev,” said Mother.
“What are they doing there?” asked Jonas.
“What do you think they’re doing? They’re killing people. This is war!” said the bald man.
“Are the Germans killing people in Lithuania?” said Jonas.
“Stupid boy, don’t you know?” said the bald man. “Hitler, he’s killing the Jews. Lithuanians could be helping him!”
“What?” I said.
“What do you mean? Hitler pushed Stalin out of Lithuania,” said Jonas.
“That doesn’t make him a hero. Our country is doomed, don’t you see? Our fate is genocide, no matter whose hands we fall into,” said the bald man.
“Stop it!” yelled Miss Grybas. “I can’t bear to hear about it.”
“That’s enough, Mr. Stalas,” said Mother.
“What about America or Britain?” asked Mrs. Rimas. “Surely they’ll help us.”
“Nothing yet,” said Mother. “But soon, I hope.”
And that was the first news of Lithuania in months. Mother’s spirits soared. Despite her hunger and blisters from hard work, she was effervescent. She walked with a bounce. Hope, like oxygen, kept her moving. I thought about Papa. Was he really in prison somewhere in Siberia? I recalled the map I had drawn for the NKVD, and then Stalin and Hitler dividing up Europe. Suddenly, a thought hit me. If Hitler was killing the Jews in Lithuania, what had happened to Dr. Seltzer?
The possibility of letters en route made for endless conversation. We learned the names of everyone’s rel
atives, neighbors, coworkers—anyone who could possibly send a letter. Miss Grybas was sure the young man who had lived next door to her would send a letter.
“No, he won’t. He probably never noticed you lived there,” said the bald man. “You’re not exactly the noticeable type.”
Miss Grybas was not amused. Jonas and I laughed about it later. At night, we’d lie in our straw creating ridiculous scenarios of Miss Grybas romancing her young neighbor. Mother told us to stop, but sometimes I heard her giggling right along with us.
Temperatures dipped and the NKVD pushed us harder. They even gave us an extra ration at one point because they wanted another barrack built before the snow came. We still refused to sign the papers. Andrius still refused to speak to me. We planted potatoes for spring, even though no one wanted to believe we might still be in Siberia when the cold broke.
The Soviets forced Mother to teach school to a mixed class of Altaian and Lithuanian children. Only the children whose parents signed were allowed to attend school. They forced her to teach in Russian, even though many children did not yet fully understand the language. The NKVD would not let Miss Grybas teach. It pained her. They told her if she signed, they would allow her to assist Mother. She wouldn’t sign, but helped Mother with lesson plans in the evenings.
I was happy that Mother was able to teach in a covered shack. Jonas had been reassigned to chopping logs for firewood. The snow had arrived, and he came back each night wet and freezing. The tips of his frozen hair would simply break off. My joints became stiff from the cold. I was sure the insides of my bones were full of ice. They made a cracking, snapping sound when I stretched. Before we could get warm, we’d feel a horrible stinging sensation in our hands, feet, and face. The NKVD grew more irritable when the cold came. So did Ulyushka. She demanded rent whenever she felt like it. I literally wrestled my bread ration out of her hand on several occasions.
Jonas paid Ulyushka our rent with splinters and logs he stole from the cutting. Thankfully, he had made sturdy boots and shoes for us while working with the two Siberian women. His Russian was quickly improving. I drew my little brother taller, his face somber.
I was assigned to hauling sixty-pound bags of grain on my back through the snow. Mrs. Rimas taught me how to pilfer some by moving the weave of the bag aside with a needle and then moving it back, undetected. We were quickly perfecting the art of scavenging. Jonas sneaked out each night to retrieve scraps of food from the NKVD’s trash. Bugs and maggots didn’t deter anyone. A couple of flicks of the finger and we stuffed it in our mouths. Sometimes, Jonas would return with care packages that Andrius and Mrs. Arvydas would hide in the trash. But aside from the occasional bounty from Andrius, we had become bottom-feeders, living off filth and rot.
47
AS THE BALD MAN predicted, we were able to continually bribe the grouchy woman into visiting the post office for us when she went to the village. For two months, our bribes returned nothing. We shivered in our shacks, warmed only by the promise of an eventual envelope carrying news from home. Temperatures lived well below zero. Jonas slept near the little stove, waking every few hours to add more wood. My toes were numb, the skin cracked.
Mrs. Rimas was the first to receive a letter. It was from a distant cousin and arrived mid-November. News traveled fast around the camp that a letter had arrived. Nearly twenty people pushed inside her shack to hear the news from Lithuania. Mrs. Rimas hadn’t returned from the ration line. We waited. Andrius arrived. He squeezed in next to me. He produced stolen crackers from his pockets for everyone. We tried to keep our voices down, but excitement percolated through the packed crowd.
I turned, accidentally elbowing Andrius. “Sorry,” I said. He nodded.
“How are you?” I asked.
“Fine,” he replied. The bald man entered the shack and complained there was no room. People pushed forward. I was smashed against the front of Andrius’s coat.
“How’s your mother?” I asked, glancing up at him.
“As well as can be expected,” he said.
“What do they have you doing these days?” My chin was practically against his chest.
“Chopping down trees in the forest.” He shifted his weight, looking down at me. “You?” he asked. I could feel a wisp of his breath on the top of my hair.
“Hauling bags of grain,” I said. He nodded.
The envelope was handed around. Some people kissed it. It came to us. Andrius ran his finger over the Lithuanian stamp and postmark.
“Have you written to anyone?” I asked Andrius.
He shook his head. “We’re not sure it’s safe yet,” he said.
Mrs. Rimas arrived. The group tried to part, but it was too crowded. I was shoved onto Andrius again. He grabbed me, trying to keep us from pushing the crowd like a line of dominoes. We steadied ourselves. He quickly let go.
Mrs. Rimas said a prayer before opening the envelope. As expected, some lines of the letter were crossed out with thick black ink. But enough was legible.
“‘I have had two letters from our friend in Jonava,’” read Mrs. Rimas. “That has to be my husband,” she cried. “He was born in Jonava. He’s alive!” The women hugged.
“Keep reading!” yelled the bald man.
“‘He said that he and some friends decided to visit a summer camp,’” said Mrs. Rimas.
“‘He finds it to be beautiful,’” she continued. “‘Just as described in Psalm 102.’”
“Someone get their Bible. Look up Psalm 102,” said Miss Grybas. “There’s some sort of message in that.”
We helped decode the rest of the letter with Mrs. Rimas. Someone joked that the crowd was better than a stove for warmth. I stole glances at Andrius. His bone structure and eyes were strong, perfectly proportioned. It appeared he was able to shave from time to time. His skin was wind-burned like the rest of us, but his lips weren’t thin or cracked like the NKVD. His wavy brown hair was clean compared with mine. He looked down. I looked away. I couldn’t imagine how filthy I must have looked, or what he saw in my hair.
Jonas returned with Mother’s Bible.
“Hurry!” someone said. “Psalm 102.”
“I have it,” said Jonas.
“Shh, let him read.”
“Hear my prayer, O Lord, and let my cry come unto thee.
“Hide not thy face from me in the day when I am in trouble; incline thine ear unto me: in the day when I call, answer me speedily.
“For my days are consumed like smoke, and my bones are burned as a firebrand.
“My heart is stricken, and withered like grass; I forget to eat my bread.
“By reason of the voice of my groaning, my bones cleave to my flesh ...”
Someone gasped. Jonas’s voice trailed off. I clutched Andrius’s arm.
“Keep going,” said Mrs. Rimas. She wrung her hands.
The wind whistled and the walls of the hut shuddered. Jonas’s voice grew faint.
“I am like a pelican of the wilderness: I am like an owl in the desert.
“I watch, and am as a sparrow alone upon the housetop.
“Mine enemies reproach me all the day; and they that are mad against me are sworn against me.
“For I have eaten ashes like bread, and mingled my drink with weeping.
“My days are like a shadow that declineth; and I am withered like grass.”
“Make him stop,” I whispered to Andrius, dropping my head against his coat. “Please.” But he didn’t stop.
Jonas finally finished. A gust of wind clattered against the roof.
“Amen,” said Mrs. Rimas.
“Amen,” echoed the others.
“He’s starving,” I said.
“So what? We’re starving. I’m withered like grass, too,” said the bald man. “He’s no worse off than me.”
“He’s alive,” said Andrius quietly.
I looked up at him. Of course. He wished his father was alive, even if he was starving.
“Yes, Andrius is right,” sa
id Mother. “He’s alive! And your cousin has probably sent him word that you’re alive, too!”
Mrs. Rimas read the letter again. Some people left the shack. Andrius was one of them. Jonas followed.
48
IT HAPPENED A WEEK later. Mother said she had seen signs. I saw nothing.
Miss Grybas waved frantically to me. She was trying to run through the snow.
“Lina, you must hurry! It’s Jonas,” she whispered.
Mother said she had noticed that his color had turned. Everyone’s color had turned. Gray had crept beneath our skin, settling in dark trenches under our eyes.
Kretzsky wouldn’t let me leave my work. “Please,” I begged. “Jonas is sick.” Couldn’t he help, just this once?
He pointed back to the stack of grain sacks. The commander walked around, yelling and kicking at us to hurry. A snowstorm was coming. “Davai!” yelled Kretzsky.
By the time I returned to our shack, Mother was already there. Jonas was lying on her pallet of straw, nearly unconscious.
“What is it?” I asked, kneeling beside her.
“I don’t know.” She pulled up Jonas’s pant leg. His shin was covered in spots. “It may be some sort of infection. He has a fever,” she said, putting her hand on my brother’s forehead. “Did you notice how irritable and tired he has become?”
“Honestly, no. We’re all irritable and tired,” I said. I looked at Jonas. How could I not have noticed? Sores lined his bottom lip, and his gums looked purple. Red spots dotted his hands and fingers.
“Lina, go get our bread rations. Your brother will need nourishment to fight this off. And see if you can find Mrs. Rimas.”
I fought my way through the swirling snow in the dark, the wind stabbing at my face. The NKVD wouldn’t give me three rations. Because Jonas collapsed on the job, they said, he had forfeited his ration. I tried to explain that he was ill. They waved me away.