Constant Nobody

by Michelle Butler Hallett

  Remembering where she’d heard the name Misha, remembering Cristobal Zapatero, Temerity felt nauseous.

  Kostya swirled his drink around in the glass. —We both ended up in foreign intelligence because of the languages, and we got sent our separate ways. Except we met up again in Spain. All these international communists poured in to fight the fascists, winds of change, flames of revolution, blah blah blah…

  — I know what you did in Spain.

  — And I enjoyed it.

  Temerity took a good swallow of vodka, hoping to block her memory of Cristobal’s rosary beads hitting the floor. She failed.

  Kostya raised his glass to her, in a silent toast. —I got homesick. I never expected that. When you spoke Russian to me, you knocked something loose. I knew my duty. I knew I’d have to shoot you, leave no witness. But you spoke Russian, and you told me about your Russian mother. Was that true?

  — Yes.

  After a moment, Kostya shrugged. —I met up with Misha again just a few days before in Bilbao. I was so happy to see him. All the troubles of Spain, and there’s Misha. Things made sense again. He even remembered my birthday was coming up. He had vodka. He’d saved it, one little flask, carried it from Moscow and then all over Spain. It felt like years, and yet it felt like only a minute passed as we drank together, and we spoke Russian, and we laughed. Later told everyone we were Canadians.

  Temerity snorted. —Canadians?

  — Mr. MacKenzie and Monsieur LeBas of the International Brigade who came all the way to Spain to the fight the fascists. I didn’t have time to carve any princes out of butter, so I wouldn’t call it a very good Canadian disguise. Misha spoke better Spanish, so I let him do most of the talking. Even if anyone guessed we were Russian, no one wanted to believe we might be NKVD, or would want us to know they’d guessed, so it worked. Then we got the orders to liquidate Zapatero. I needed to see a doctor anyway, so I thought I could get treatment first, and then kill him. Except I met you. And Misha fucked things up. Misha should have shot Zapatero in the head. Simple execution job, but no, he had to miss. And I knew right away it was deliberate. No way, no fucking way, could he miss from so close. I gave him hell. Misha and I had a spot in Gerrikaitz, this abandoned barn, and we took Zapatero there. Misha said we should question Zapatero. We had no orders to question him, but what the hell, Misha argued, we had him, so we might as well use him. We packed his wound, but once we moved him he started to bleed again. I could see we didn’t have long. So we got him to the barn, tied him down. Misha’s big chance: interrogate the captured POUM member and glean useful intelligence. ‘Fine,’ I said, and I stood back.

  That Spanish fucker…Three hours we worked on him, and all he said was, ‘Take the bullet out.’ Told us to free his hands so he could do it himself. Then he started babbling. At first Misha thought Zapatero was giving us names, but he was just calling on the saints. I aimed at Zapatero’s forehead, and Misha got between us. ‘Listen to him,’ said Misha. ‘Just listen to him.’ We both looked to Zapatero, but he’d passed out. ‘Then listen to me,’ Misha said, ‘because we’re killing our own.’

  We argued for hours. We drained the last of the vodka, and some of the wine I’d stashed there. I got so fucking sick on wine and sulpha pills. I’d retch, and nothing would come up. I looked around. Solid, well built, big rafters in the ceiling. Various pieces of gear stored there, scythes and ropes and shovels. Big hooks.

  We talked some more. At least, Misha talked. He asked if I ever had doubts. ‘No room for doubt when there’s duty,’ I wanted to say, but the words wouldn’t come. All I could think of was how I hadn’t shot you and how that could get me killed. Then I thought that Misha would understand.

  Before I could say that, Misha admitted he missed Zapatero’s head on purpose. ‘I wanted you to listen,’ Misha said. ‘I wanted you to listen to someone in POUM and then make up your own mind.’

  ‘Enough,’ I said, and I got in front of Zapatero and shot him through the right eye. ‘You want mercy for the enemy,’ I said, ‘there it is. He’s out of his misery.’

  Misha leapt at me. He knocked me over, pinned me to the floor, and he looked so hurt and betrayed. Misha, the rebellious angel. Arkady Dmitrievich said he could see it in Misha’s eyes, a reflection of fire. He’d come to a bad end.

  He got up without hurting me. Then he reached out his hand to help me up, and we drank.

  Misha had no head for vodka, never did. He passed out, snored through the dawn. I got things ready. I had to save him. Misha was my best friend, and I loved him, so I had to bring him back and save him. It was all I knew. He fought me all the way, but I’d surprised him. Good strong rafters. Pulleys and hooks. Misha hung from his wrists. He kicked at me, and he spat on me, and I kept calm and hit him in the ribs with a spade. When he cursed at me again, he sounded afraid. That got me. Until I’d hit him with the spade, we could still back out, pretend somewhere in our heads that we were competing at the gym, playing a game.

  He told me I’d broken something, and I let him hang there a while, asked him some more questions about his time in Spain. He gave me a pile of horseshit about infiltrating POUM and then coming to agree with them. At least, I think it was horseshit. Misha and his doubts…I just had to find some way to make him promise to run and be silent. I would let him go. So I got down on my knees, beneath him, and as he begged me to let him down, I begged him to forget me, forget his own name, forget everything we’d ever shared, and never to return to Russia.

  Then I heard the growl. The planes. So many of them. Low. I ran outside. Junkers, the fucking Luftwaffe, in tight formation. I knew. The way I know languages. I just knew. And I stood there, and I stared at the sky, and the bombs fell.

  Twenty minutes, I’ve been told. It felt much longer. I ran. I knew I had to get back to the barn, get Misha down, get him out.

  The shrapnel hit my ear, my shoulder. I only felt the impact, like a really hard shove, and then everything fell on top of me. I got up, but it didn’t matter, because the barn had collapsed. I screamed, and still I could hear nothing. I screamed for Misha. I ended up in a clinic. I don’t know how. Someone pushed me part of the way in wheelbarrow, I think. There was so much fire. And that, Nadia, is how I ruined my canvas jacket and killed my best friend.

  Temerity stared into her glass. —Kostya…

  — So do you see it now?

  She looked up. —See what?

  — Why I took you from the old man’s party. All that death and waste. All that blood. I nearly shot you, and still, still, when I called for help with those damned name tags, you answered. It was you. You had every right to ignore me or scream at me or shoot me where I stood, and instead you helped me with those children.

  She said nothing.

  He gave a long sigh. Then he drew his palm over his scalp, pausing at the likely entry point for an executioner’s bullet. —It feels so strange.

  — It looks strange.

  New cigarette between his lips, he smirked. —I look old?

  Smiling, wiping tears, she shook her head. Condemned.

  She stood up. Pooled blood gushed. She scowled and grasped the table.

  — Nadia, you’re exhausted. Please, go to bed.

  Back to that bed, where she’d lain all day? His bed, the centre of her ever smaller world, all meaning there found and lost?

  In the bathroom, she checked her padding.

  God’s sake, how much more must I bleed?

  [ ]

  DOGS’ HEADS AND BROOMSTICKS 3

  Wednesday 28 July

  Arkady embraced Kostya, careful to be gentle with the bad shoulder, kissed him on each cheek, and stroked his shorn head. —Tatar, what have you done to yourself?

  — The showers at the poligon are fucked.

  — Shh, we’re in a church.

  Kostya almost laughed at that. The Revolution drove out superstitions of God, and bullets extinguished priests, yet here they all gathered, for the funeral on an NKVD officer. —I got material i
n my hair. I clipped it off. Why a church?

  — Vadym’s brother insisted. Wait, poligon duty? Last night? I told Kuznets —

  — I got called in. Languages.

  Arkady fixed the lapels on the leather coat. —And this old thing of mine?

  — I wear it out of respect.

  Respect for you and Dima. Respect for what you both tried to do, that you both tried to save me. Respect for the loyalty of Pavel Ippolitov and Evgenia Ismailovna. Respect for the priests I shot last night. Respect for the truth: I kill people to survive.

  Arkady’s laugh had a shakiness to it. —It will cook you in this heat. Did you remember my groceries for the reception?

  — Oh, God, I’m sorry. I—

  — Kostya, shh, just breathe. Breathe.

  In Arkady’s arms, leaning on his chest, Kostya gasped, gasped again. —I’m so sorry, Arkady Dmitrievich. I watched him run. I watched him fall.

  — I know. I know. Breathe, breathe. There, that’s it. Better?

  Kostya stepped back. —Better.

  Boris Kuznets cleared his throat. —Arkady Dmitrievich, Konstantin Arkadievich. My condolences.

  Both men flinched, then spoke at the same moment; Kostya deferred to Arkady and stopped talking.

  — Thank you, Boris Aleksandrovich.

  — Please introduce me to Vadym Pavlovich’s family, so I might pay my respects.

  — Of course. This way.

  — Before we do that, come closer to me, both of you. I made certain that the coroner arrived at a verdict of a heart attack.

  Kostya stifled a laugh.

  Arkady glared at him, and he struggled to keep his voice low. —Heart attack?

  Boris kissed Arkady on the cheeks. —In his confusion and pain from his heart attack, Vadym Pavlovich broke his window and fell. Easier for the family.

  Arkady and Kostya both nodded, acknowledging this mercy.

  Then Boris embraced Kostya and kissed him on the right cheek. —Some paperwork has gone astray. Our former secretary may be responsible. She had other paperwork snarls, quite suspicious. Uncooperative, too.

  The purple silk. —Boris Aleksandrovich, do you mean Comrade Ismailovna?

  Arkady took in a sharp breath.

  Kostya continued. —Ismailovna is well organized, thorough, and most co-operative. With respect, Comrade Captain, I find it hard to believe you’d think otherwise.

  Boris’s eyes seemed to communicate surprise, respect, and satisfaction. —I find this funeral hard to believe, in a church, no less, yet here we are.

  — What the hell is she guilty of?

  — Contaminating the sacred trust of confession. She showed me her templates, these ready-made confessions. It will save time, she said. ‘Why, Comrade Ismailovna,’ I said, ‘such laziness masquerading as efficiency could lead to false confessions. At no point can the NKVD tolerate such a practice. You’ve heaped a galling duty on me.’ She begged for my protection. I could protect her from nothing.

  Enough! Kostya expected to shout. Instead, his voice sounded quiet and young. —She can’t be guilty. She can’t.

  — You must be mistaken, Konstantin Arkadievich.

  Kostya shook his head. I designed those templates. Say it. Say it’s me, not her. Then he felt Arkady’s grip on his forearm, as though Arkady tried to hold him back from a fall.

  Boris’s eyes seemed to twinkle, as though he and Kostya now shared a delicious secret. —Handkerchief? Your face is wet. You’re shaking, let me help. Now, the Minenkovs.

  After clearing his throat a few times, Kostya introduced Boris to Vira and Pyotr. Then he noticed how sickly Arkady looked. No hiding it here: light danced on Arkady’s cheekbones, once hidden beneath ample flesh, now sharp in defeat. Then he followed the older man’s line of sight: the pedestal, the urn.

  Absence.

  Vadym, Dima, gone.

  And so many others.

  Kostya put his arm around Arkady’s shoulders, and Arkady did not pull away or shrug him off.

  The service, its old words and gestures, even the smells — incense, tobacco, cologne, perfume, stone, sweat — comforted Kostya, and that comfort startled him. Most of the women wore scarves on their heads, the ancient deference. Most of the men wore NKVD uniform. The elderly priests, eyes darting, seemed to shrink into their robes, and Kostya wondered about funerals in Kolyma.

  A priest caught his eye, held his gaze.

  At once moving forward of his own desire and shoved by people behind him, Kostya joined the procession out. As he saw Misha’s parents, his knees buckled. He managed to steady himself, and then Pyotr and Vira Minenkov fussed over him, so fond, asking after his wounds, his state of mind, saying how they’d recognize him anywhere, never mind the haircut, adding how much Vadym had loved him and Misha both.

  Kostya could only nod.

  Vira understood something in Kostya’s eyes. —Of course, we are prepared for Misha, too. We presume he’s dead.

  Pyotr almost barked it. —We don’t know that.

  Vira stroked his husband’s arm. —Blood pressure, dear. Kostya, you’re very pale. You should sit down.

  Pyotr took a deep breath, counted to ten, and greeted the next mourner.

  Moving away from the Minenkovs, Kostya did not genuflect to the huge ikon of a big-eyed Christ. Nor did he kneel or make any other gesture. The old ways had gone, the Revolution’s cleansing now twenty years old. Priests starved in the camps and died at the poligons. Despite the funeral taking place in a church, the old ways meant nothing, so he must ignore the massive Christ, even as the ikon not only commanded the entire space but created a new one, a space infinite and at the same time intimate, only for Kostya. Commanding this warp of physics and time, Christ’s eyes emptied of pigment and paint, sockets dark and deep, becoming the limestone catacombs beneath Odessa. Children hid there.

  Kostya cried out. No one noticed.

  Christ’s eyes filled again with ancient colour, ancient mystery, asking, as Gavriil’s eyes had asked, Who are you?

  The Moscow clerk’s abuse: Tell me your surname. Tell me your surname.

  Nadia’s disbelief: Your name is really Nikto?

  Arkady’s rebuke: At least sit up straight. You slouch like some sneaky bezprizornik.

  Baba Yaga’s taunt: Welcome home, bezprizornik. Welcome home.

  Christ’s eyes demanded response.

  Arkady caught Kostya as he fell and made it look like nothing more than a stumble.

  Leaning into Arkady’s strength, Kostya noticed Boris and Yury studying them. He felt this should mean something: a warning, perhaps, a signal. —Arkady Dmitrievich, it’s Zmei Gorynich.

  — What?

  — When Dobrynya Nikitich fights Zmei Gorynich, his feet get stuck in spilled blood. He’s trapped.

  Arkady pressed his lips to Kostya’s forehead, seeking fever. —You’re tired, Tatar. I’ll drive you home.

  — All the way to Odessa?

  Scowling, Arkady grasped Kostya by his forearm again, navigated a path around the knots of people, and hauled him out of the church.

  Outside, in the bright sunlight, safe from all the eyes, Kostya took a deep breath, then another. He obeyed Arkady’s instructions to get in the car.

  — Arkady Dmitrievich, they changed the forms again for Garage Number One. Did you sign this out with the correct form?

  — My paperwork is fine.

  They drove.

  Kostya thought he caught sight of Andrei. —How often do women bleed their courses?

  — What? I missed your street. I’ve got to loop back. Every month, you know that. It stops when they get pregnant. It’s the most vile thing about them: bleed for a week and live. Worse than bitches in heat. At least when a bitch bleeds, it signals something.

  A month is four weeks and a few days. —Signals what?

  — Signals she’s in heat…Kostya, no.

  Arkady forgot the clutch and stalled the car. It juddered and died.

  — It’s fine, Arkady Dmitrievich
, it’s fine. She bleeds now. It’s fine.

  Arkady felt his limp hands slip from the steering wheel. —She has killed you. That whore has killed you, and I hate her for it, but when I’m arrested, I’ll say nothing about her. For you. I promise that.

  — They’ll beat it out you. They’ll fucking beat it out of you, because it’s what we do.

  — Wouldn’t the Odessa herring merchant laugh now?

  Kostya snorted. —The first time I held a Nagant, you told me it’s not murder when it’s the law.

  — Go and rest.

  — Arkady Dmitrievich, please. Let Scherba take a look at you, yes?

  — I have fifty-odd mourners on their way to my house, expecting food and drink. Not the time. Wait. Did…

  Kostya watched Arkady’s hands tighten into fists.

  — Kostya, did Dima say anything?

  Kostya sighed, wiped his face with the back of his hand. —He was a good man.

  — But did he say anything?

  — He called me Misha. Then he died.

  The little dings and cracks in the car’s windshield filled Kostya’s vision: Nurasyl Abdulin and the sacred weight of an auto’s glass. I came all this way to work and become a good citizen. Why am I still hungry?

  A tremor took Arkady, starting in his hands and climbing upwards until it seemed to escape out of the top of his head. Then, taking a deep breath, he seemed his old self. —This will end soon. Call me this evening, once you wake up.

  — If you’re under investigation, others will listen on the line.

  — I don’t care. Just call me, so that I know you’re still here.