Cilka's Journey

by Heather Morris

  While the distance to the sick bay and hospital is not far, the blizzard conditions make walking slow and painful as the snow is so deep they are forced to push their legs through it, rather than take steps. Cilka tries to gain an understanding of the size of the complex by the number of huts that resemble theirs. The other, larger buildings that stand a little apart must be administration or stores, but there is nothing to indicate their use. The hospital building Antonina points out to them also has no outward sign of its purpose.

  A guard stands outside. Antonina, her eyes barely visible, is forced to remove the scarf wrapped around her face and shout into his face. Cilka wonders what he can possibly have done to be punished with this duty. It doesn’t seem much better than being a prisoner, though he probably has better living quarters and more food. With apparent reluctance, he opens the door and pushes the women unceremoniously inside. Presumably he is under instruction not to let any snow in.

  The warmth of the building hits them immediately, and they unwrap their scarves, Josie using her good hand.

  “Wait here,” Antonina tells them. They stand just inside the door, taking a first look at the room they have just entered.

  It is some kind of waiting room. Prisoners—men and women—sit on the few available chairs, with more on the floor, hunched over, pain etched on their faces. Others are curled up, sleeping, unconscious, dead—it is not obvious which. Several groan quietly, a distressing sound, a too-familiar sound for Cilka. She looks away from them, up at the portrait of Stalin on the wall.

  Antonina is at the desk at the front of the room, speaking quietly to the matronly figure seated behind it. With a nod of her head she returns to Cilka and Josie.

  “You are number 509 when it is called.” She repeats the numbers slowly in Russian: “Pyat’sot devyat.”

  Without further word, Antonina walks back to the door and is replaced by a sheet of fresh snow, which quickly melts into the puddle on the floor.

  Cilka takes Josie’s arm and steers her to a small patch of bare wall they can sit against. It is only as they slide down to the floor that Cilka notices several heads lift and fearful eyes appraise the newcomers. Is there a hierarchy even here? Cilka meets their stares. They look away first.

  * * *

  Cilka hears their number, accompanied by some yelling.

  She startles from a daze. “Last chance!” the matronly woman is saying.

  Disoriented, she sees Josie is asleep, her head resting on Cilka’s outstretched legs.

  “Here! We’re coming!” she calls as loudly as she can.

  She shakes Josie and they scramble to their feet, heading quickly to the desk and the scowling woman behind it.

  She stands, thrusts a clipboard at Josie, and walks to a door leading to the back of the room. Cilka and Josie follow.

  Through the door, the woman leads them past beds that line both sides of the room. A ward. Cilka glances at them. The sheets are white. The blankets gray, but possibly thicker than those they have in their hut. Pillows are tucked beneath the heads of the men and women lying there.

  Through the ward, they enter a clinical area screened off from the rest of the room. The smell of disinfectant assaults their nostrils.

  Josie is shoved into a chair next to a table laden with bottles, bandages and instruments.

  The woman indicates the clipboard Josie is holding, and hands Cilka a pen. Cilka understands that they are to fill it out. The woman turns away and is gone.

  “I can’t do this,” Josie whispers. “I write with my right hand.”

  “Let me,” says Cilka.

  She takes the clipboard, pushes some of the instruments on the table to one side and places it down.

  And then she sees it is in Cyrillic script. The letters are like tunnels and gates, with surprising added curves and flourishes. It has been a long time since she has read it. Writing in it will be difficult.

  “Right then,” she says. “The first entry is always your name. What is your family name, Josie?”

  “Kotecka, Jozefína Kotecka.”

  Cilka writes the name slowly, as best she can, hoping the doctors will be able to read it.

  “Let’s see, I believe this is date of birth?”

  “November 25, 1930.”

  “And this asks for your place of residence.”

  “I don’t have an address anymore. They arrested my father after he missed a day from work. He was a forest worker, and he went looking for my brothers, who had been missing for three days. They arrested my mother next. My grandmother and I were so afraid, all alone together in our house. And then they came and arrested us too.” Josie looks pained. “No one in my family lives there now.”

  “I know, Josie.” Cilka puts a hand on Josie’s shoulder. She was the same age when everyone was taken away from her too.

  “They put me in prison.” Josie begins to cry. “They beat me, Cilka. They beat me and wanted to know where my brothers were. I told them I don’t know but they refused to believe me.”

  Cilka nods to show she is listening. It’s strange how and when the past wants to reveal itself, she thinks. But not for her. There is no way she could find the words.

  “Then one day, they loaded me and my grandmother onto a truck and took us to the train station, and that’s when I met you.”

  “I’m sorry that I’ve brought it all up, Josie. Let’s…” She looks down at the form.

  “No, it’s all right,” Josie says. She looks up at Cilka. “Will you tell me why you’re here? All I know is that you are Slovakian. And that woman on the train said she’d been with you somewhere … Did your family get arrested too?”

  Cilka’s gut clenches.

  “Perhaps another day.”

  “And you knew what to do, when we got here.” Josie’s brow furrows, puzzling.

  Cilka ignores her, makes out she is studying the form again.

  Cilka and Josie hear someone behind them and turn to see a tall, slim, attractive woman wearing a white lab coat, a stethoscope hung around her neck. Golden yellow braids encircle the back of her head and her blue eyes crinkle at the edges in a smile.

  She looks at their faces and immediately addresses them in Polish, a language they can both understand. “What is it I can help you with?” Her accent is unlike any Cilka has heard.

  Josie goes to stand up.

  “No, sit, stay sitting. I take it you are the patient.”

  Josie nods.

  “And you are?”

  “I’m her friend. I was asked to stay with her.”

  “Are you having trouble with the form?”

  “We were getting through it,” Cilka says. And then, she can’t help asking, “How did you decide what language to address us in?”

  “I’ve been a doctor for a long time in the camps and I’ve learned to make a good guess.” The doctor smiles warmly, and confidently, the first open face Cilka has seen since she arrived here.

  “Let me look,” she says, taking the clipboard from Cilka.

  “Well done.”

  Cilka blushes.

  “Why don’t you finish filling it out? I’ll read you the questions.”

  “In Russian?”

  “Do you know any Russian?”

  “I can speak it but writing is a little more difficult.”

  “Okay, I think you should continue in Russian in that case, yes. The quicker you learn it the better in here. What other languages do you know?”

  “Slovak, Czech, Polish, Hungarian and German.”

  The doctor tilts her head. “I’m impressed.” Though she says it quietly. “The next question on the form is: What is the purpose of your visit to the hospital?” She asks it in Russian.

  Cilka goes to write something.

  The doctor looks over her shoulder.

  “Hmm, close. Why don’t you try asking the patient and then writing down what she says?”

  Cilka feels panicked. She’s not sure if the doctor is playing a game with her. Why is it that sh
e always stands out, no matter how hard she tries not to? She asks Josie in Russian. Josie looks at her, puzzled.

  Cilka tries to write “burned hand” in Cyrillic on the form.

  “Not bad,” the doctor says. “Enough of that for now. I can take care of the rest. I had better take a look at the patient.”

  Josie holds out her hand. The doctor pulls a nearby chair in front of her and gently starts unbandaging.

  “Who wrapped this up for you?”

  “Cilka did.”

  The doctor turns to Cilka.

  “And you’re Cilka?”

  “I made her hold it in the snow for a while first, then got some sheeting and wrapped it as best I could.”

  “Well done, Cilka. Now let’s have a look at the damage.”

  With the bandage removed the doctor turns Josie’s hand over, examining it closely.

  “Wiggle your fingers for me.”

  Josie makes a painful attempt to wiggle her fingers, the swelling preventing much movement.

  “It was very lucky you had someone with you who knew to get something cold onto the burn straightaway. That has saved you from a far worse injury. As it is, you have what looks like a first-degree burn to fifty percent of your hand and eighty percent of your four fingers. Your thumb seems all right.” She looks up into Josie’s face. “You’ll need daily dressings for two weeks, and no work is to be attempted inside or outside.”

  She turns to Cilka. “Pass me that tube … the one that says maz ot ozhogov.” Burn cream.

  Cilka hands her the tube of cream, taking the top off as she does so.

  Gently, the doctor applies the cream to Josie’s hand.

  “Now look on the shelf behind you and find me a large bandage.”

  Cilka does as she is told, handing back the correct item.

  It is expertly wrapped around Josie’s hand, the end placed between the doctor’s teeth as she tears a small section in two, tying the ends together to hold it securely.

  “Now, hand me that pad and pen on the table. I had better write a note.”

  Cilka watches as she writes, folds the note and gives it to Josie.

  “I have written here just what I said. You are not to work inside or outside and are to come here every day for at least the next two weeks to have the dressing changed. We will see how you are healing after that time.

  “Now, Cilka…” the doctor says, “I am impressed that you were so helpful to your friend, and your writing is not as bad as you think.” She studies Cilka. “You have a capacity for languages. You know, we are understaffed here at the hospital with these new intakes. Would you like to work here?”

  Cilka realizes the opportunity. In a camp there are the bad jobs—the outdoor, manual labor jobs—and then there are the good jobs. In the other place, a “good” job meant more food, and warmth, but in Cilka’s case, it also meant being repeatedly and incessantly used, and witnessing the very worst conditions in the camp. Her role as leader of Block 25 was a punishment, but one she also still feels she needs to repent for. For surviving. For trading food for cigarettes for warm clothes. While the women came in and out and went off to die. And in and out and in and out, ceaselessly.

  She is dumbstruck. Again, she wonders why she always stands out. She looks at Josie, feeling that if she says yes, she will be betraying her friend. She will be betraying all of the women in the hut.

  Josie says, “Of course she will.”

  Cilka looks at her. Josie nods encouragement.

  “I…” If Cilka refuses, will she be put in the hole? Maybe, at least, the job would mean she can smuggle more food to those who need it, or trade it for cigarettes, boots, coats for the others.

  The doctor looks confused. Cilka supposes no one would ever say no.

  “I don’t think I can,” she says.

  “I’m sorry?” says the doctor. “We all must work.”

  “And I am happy to work at the mine,” she says, but she hears how flat her voice is. Once she had thought she deserved more, or better, but she knows there is always a very great cost.

  “Well,” says the doctor. “How about for the next two weeks, when Josie comes for her treatment, you help me, and then you can decide.”

  Josie raises her eyebrows at Cilka, encouraging her.

  Cilka slowly nods.

  “Yes, thank you, Doctor. But what about Josie?”

  “Let’s worry about Josie in two weeks. I’m sure we can find suitable work for her. In the meantime, I’m going to write you a note to give to your brigadier. You are to come here every day, bringing Josie; she will return to your hut after we have done her dressing but you will stay on and work.”

  The doctor scribbles out another note, tears it off and hands it to Cilka.

  “Now, both of you, go back to your hut and rest.”

  “Excuse me,” asks Cilka, “but what do we call you?”

  “I’m Dr. Kaldani, Yelena Georgiyevna. You may address me by either,” she says.

  “Thank you, Yelena Georgiyevna,” both girls chorus.

  They follow her back through the ward. The moans and cries of the patients make the hairs on Cilka’s neck stand up.

  She will do what she’s told.

  They pass through reception, head back out to the cold and the slog back to their hut.

  CHAPTER 5

  “I know you’re cold,” Cilka says to Josie. “But I think we should save the coal until the others come home. I’ll just add enough to keep it burning.” She wonders if she’s already trying to make up, somehow, for the fact she will be warmer than the other women for the next two weeks.

  Cilka ushers Josie onto her bed, tells her to wrap the blanket tightly around herself. After placing a small amount of coal into the stove, Cilka lies down and looks across the small gap separating her from Josie. She studies the young girl’s face. Cold, fear, pain and confusion distort her features.

  “Move over.”

  Cilka sits and then lies down next to Josie, knowing it will be comforting to her.

  Within moments she and Josie are both asleep.

  They are woken by a gust of freezing air and the groans of the others returning. The women push and shove to get close to the stove, removing wet boots and wiggling toes in front of it.

  “Well look who’s spent all day in bed,” says Elena.

  All the women look in their direction, sooty-faced. Cilka can feel their anger, their tiredness, their envy.

  Natalya comes over to them. “How’s her hand?”

  Cilka moves off the bed, reaches under the blanket and pulls Josie’s hand out for Natalya to see.

  “She will need the bandage changed every day for two weeks, the doctor said.”

  “Does that mean she doesn’t have to work?” Hannah, a newer arrival, a wiry woman who has been sticking close to Elena, calls out from the pack around the stove.

  “Of course it does,” says Cilka. “She can’t even feed herself properly. How do you expect her to work?”

  “Well, at least you have no excuse,” Hannah says. “Back with a bucket of coal in your hands tomorrow, won’t that be a treat for you?”

  Elena says, “I’m so tired I just want to sleep and never wake up.”

  The door opens before Cilka can say anything and Antonina is standing there.

  All eyes turn to the door. The women rush to the ends of their cots. Josie struggles to her feet, taking her place.

  Antonina walks past the women to Josie’s and Cilka’s beds. All eyes follow her path.

  “Well?”

  Cilka says, “Excuse me, Antonina Karpovna, can I get the notes from under my pillow?”

  She nods.

  Cilka produces the notes and hands them over. Antonina first reads the one describing Josie’s condition and her need for daily dressings and no work. She pauses, squints at Josie’s hand and nods. Then she reads the second note, looks at Cilka, and reads it again.

  “You just scored the best seats in the house. Congratulations.” She p
asses the notes back to her, bemusement on her broad face. “All out, line up.”

  The women head back outside, falling into two neat rows. They follow Antonina to the mess. Dinner awaits. The snow has stopped falling but is thick on the ground. They trudge through it. Cilka is keeping her head down, and her hat low. But Elena and Hannah catch up to her.

  “You’re going to have to tell us what the note says,” Elena hisses through her scarf.

  Cilka doesn’t say anything.

  And then Natalya says, in a more polite tone, “We are curious, Cilka…”

  “Well, I didn’t say yes,” Cilka says, “but they’re short in the hospital and they asked me to work there.”

  Elena gasps.

  “You lucky bitch.”

  Hannah glares at Cilka.

  “She said no,” Josie says, “but the doctor is making her do a trial.”

  “Why didn’t you say yes?” Natalya asks.

  “Scared of needles?” Cilka tries—a joke to deflect the tension.

  Olga, who has been watching all the while from a distance, sniggers.

  Josie says, “She didn’t want to have a position higher than us—honestly, I heard her try to refuse.”

  “That’s madness,” Natalya says. “Any one of us would say yes.”

  They’ve almost reached the mess.

  Cilka feels the knowledge sinking in for them all, even Elena and Hannah, that now she will have access to better food, warmth, materials. By accident, again, Cilka is in a position of more, unwanted, power.

  “I’ll try to save Josie’s bandages,” she says, “when they’re changed. So you can wrap your feet, your heads, for work.”

  “You better,” Elena says.

  At the mess, the women all file off and eat their watery soup and stale bread. She notices that Elena keeps looking at her, whispering to Hannah.

  Josie says to Cilka, “It will be all right. Maybe we’ll all find good jobs.” She is staring off into the middle distance, no doubt imagining a rosier future. Cilka is glad she can maintain this optimism. It will keep her strong.