The Secret of Clouds

by Alyson Richman

  “I want you to write a letter to your eighteen-year-old self.”

  The children all looked at me, slightly perplexed. On the back of each envelope, I had written in bold letters, A Letter from the Past with a Message for the Future.

  Finn raised his hand. “Is this kind of like a time capsule?”

  I smiled. “In a way, Finn. It’s a time capsule of your current thoughts and aspirations.”

  The students started murmuring among themselves, and a few of them exchanged curious glances. It sounded like a beehive was starting to hum.

  “I want you to write to yourself where you think you will be when you’re eighteen. What you hope you’re doing then. What you think will be important to you.” I gave them a big smile. “Be creative. And think deeply on this one. When you’re finished, I want you to put your home address on the envelope.”

  After a few initial grunts from a couple of students who said they weren’t sure what to write down, the kids got to work. Lisa asked me twice if I was sure it was okay if what she wrote actually didn’t happen by the time she graduated. “Part of the beauty of this exercise is that you’re documenting what your dreams are now, at this very moment,” I reassured her. “Whatever happens, happens. But I know you’ll appreciate then looking back and seeing what you had once hoped for.”

  Eventually all the kids lowered their heads toward their papers, and the sound of their pencils filled the room. I heard Zach lean over to Finn and whisper that he thought he’d get drafted by an NBA team.

  “Oh, I almost forgot,” I interrupted. “Don’t lick your envelopes. When you’re done, I want to be able to savor your letters both now and again in six years before I mail them back to you. I’m going to hold on to them, and I promise you, you’ll see them again the year you all graduate high school.”

  A wave of smiles passed over the classroom, and the children’s reaction to the assignment had rejuvenated me. Florence and Angela might not love my letter-writing idea, but the kids did, which felt like a victory to me.

  * * *

  • • •

  AS I went to my car that afternoon to drive out to Yuri’s house, the first snow of the season began to fall. Tiny snowflakes hit my windshield as I turned my wipers on and headed in the direction of the Krasnys’. By the time I pulled next to the curb of their house, the snow was close to an inch thick. As I walked toward the door, my feet appeared to be making footprints in a dusting of confectioners’ sugar.

  Katya offered to make us all cups of cocoa to celebrate what felt like the first day of winter. Inside, she had the heat on high, and Yuri was dressed in a pair of baseball pajamas.

  “He’s feeling a bit weak today . . . He had a bad night. Sometimes his heart is racing so much, it’s hard for him to sleep.”

  Her fatigue weighed down the air.

  “Please let me know if there is ever a time he doesn’t seem up to seeing me. We can always take a break and I’ll come back again when he is feeling better.”

  “I know,” she answered softly. “I nearly canceled today, but he always seems more full of life after you leave.”

  I smiled at the compliment. “I think he’s a boy who enjoys conversation. There’s so much in that head of his and so much wisdom that seems far beyond a boy his age.”

  I could sense immediately that my comment had struck a nerve with Katya. Her eyes looked sadly out the window. “I wish more than anything that he could be around more children. And you know in this country . . . friendships begin with the children. The parents start bonding at the playground while their children are in the sandbox. But for Yuri and me, it’s always been just us.”

  She pulled at her sweater, the sleeves lengthening like long knitted tubes over her fingers.

  “There was never going to be a playground for him or for me. And even when he was well enough to be in school, Yuri had few friends. He has always seemed older than the other kids.” Katya let out a sigh. “We really did try to keep him in school, but it was too much for him. He was constantly getting sick and he just didn’t have the stamina for it. So when we moved to this district last year, the doctor really pushed for him to be tutored at home because of his condition.”

  I nodded, but then an idea occurred to me.

  “I realize that attending school every day is too much for him, but I wonder if I might be able to bring him in to class, even for one visit? It might make him feel more connected if he met some of my other students.”

  “You’re always so kind, thinking of his best interests.” She twisted her sleeve’s cuff in her fingers. “I really do appreciate it. But let’s see what the doctor says. I made another appointment for Yuri today. I can’t say anything without asking him first.”

  I understood her need to be cautious. Yuri’s immunity was low due to his limited exposure to other children and all their germs. The last thing I wanted to do was compromise his system. But I knew there was more to a child’s development than what could be found in books or scripted from pen to paper. A child also needed friends.

  23

  JANUARY 1986

  KIEV, UKRAINE

  KATYA’S father sells fur hats at the outdoor market every Sunday afternoon, while her mother collects the money and socializes with the customers.

  For her wedding day, her father takes one of his prized white fox pelts and makes a small neck scarf for her.

  “A little bit of glamour for my ballerina,” he tells her as he kisses her outside the town hall. Her sister, Yulia, brings a small nosegay of flowers for Katya to hold.

  The two families do not mix well. They stand rigid as the young couple signs their marriage certificate, Katya dressed in a simple white dress and Sasha in a suit that had once been his father’s. In the bureaucratic room, the only adornments for the celebration are the Soviet and Ukrainian flags hanging from a small metal pole in the corner.

  Later that afternoon, the garden of Katya’s childhood home is lit with small lanterns. Outside, they drink sparkling wine from plastic cups as the guests blow clouds of smoke into the cold air. She still wears the white fox scarf her father made for her, her long neck wrapped in a layer of the softest fur. Her aunt has baked a special casserole made from wild mushrooms, and Katya eats it heartily, for it’s her favorite dish.

  When the frigid temperatures become too much for even the hardiest guests, they pile into Katya’s family’s living room and put a bootleg Beatles album on the record player.

  Two of Katya’s classmates have been invited to the festivities. Their long hair has been braided and coiled on top of their heads, so they resemble elegant giraffes. They pull the men off their chairs and get Sasha’s friends from the university science department to dance. The men’s faces already red from the vodka, they blush even more as they attempt in vain to keep to the rhythm of the music.

  After midnight, when all the guests have left, the newlyweds return to Sasha’s apartment on the other side of town. Once inside, he cups her cheeks in his hands and kisses her passionately on the mouth.

  “My beautiful bride,” he says as he lifts her onto the bed.

  As the radiator hisses in the background and the windows fog with steam, her legs wrap around him, and he can swear he senses the merging of their heartbeats. A union that pulses through his veins.

  24

  JANUARY 1987

  KIEV, UKRAINE

  THAT first year they were married now seemed like a distant memory to Katya. Their whole apartment in Kiev was no bigger than her living room in her new home on Long Island, the one they had enough money to put a down payment on. The tiny stove with the flickering pilot light that she used to cook Sasha’s favorite meals on seemed prehistoric compared to her General Electric range, which turned on without her needing to strike a match. And she was still amazed by her American refrigerator. It seemed as big as the old wooden wardrobe in her grandfather’s
house in the country. It could make ice or offer water just at the tap of a button.

  She bought groceries now in the Grand Union. Five different types of milk, pyramids of pasta, even an entire aisle just for cookies. Katya’s mother had spent nearly every afternoon standing in line with her ration coupons just to get the most minimal ingredients. The government back in the Soviet Union controlled even their stomachs: the amount of milk, meat, and cheese allowed per person in each family. But here, she could push her cart through the gleaming store and get everything she needed in one efficient sweep. In the beginning, she felt as though what she saw around her couldn’t last. How could one have fresh blueberries or bananas in the middle of winter? Even the department stores enthralled her with their endless sales. She could hardly believe her good fortune nearly every day she ventured outside.

  And yet she had been so unsure when Sasha first told her that he wanted to apply to leave Ukraine after Gorbachev announced those with Jewish ancestry could emigrate.

  But after her dance injury, she was of no use to her ballet company until her ankle healed. And after that, she had no idea if she would ever regain her strength or the ability to dance professionally. What other options did she have if she could no longer perform? With no college degree, she would probably end up working in a shop, the very kind her mother waited outside of all day just to buy kielbasa.

  * * *

  • • •

  DESPITE moving halfway around the world, Katya still kept a pair of her old toe shoes in her bedroom drawer. They were the only ones she ever wore that were made of pink satin, the pair intended for her debut solo performance. In her third year in the corps, she had finally been given a short solo, and she knew that if the ballet master was pleased with it, she would be closer to becoming a principal in the company.

  She had vigorously practiced her solo for weeks. The choreography for the role was intense, with much of the dancing en pointe. Then, the morning before opening night, when she was rehearsing in one of the studios by herself, she heard the most horrific crack in her ankle as she turned in her pirouette. She let out a scream of agony. But the rest was a blur to her. It was Lana who rushed into the studio and discovered her wailing on the floor.

  The X-rays revealed a devastating Weber B fracture to her left ankle. The morphine had numbed the pain, but the doctor did not soften his words.

  “We can set the bone with a metal plate and pins, but you will be on crutches for several months. The plate and pins will have to remain in place for a full year.”

  Sasha arrived at the hospital shortly after Lana had notified him, and now he held Katya’s hand.

  “Are you saying I can’t dance for a full year?” Her voice cracked as she tried to spit out the words.

  The doctor looked grave. “Yes, I’m afraid. The ankle is shattered, and the surrounding soft tissue is severely damaged. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you will have to stay off this foot for that long.”

  Sasha was about to say something comforting, but Katya held up her free hand and stopped him.

  “My career is over,” she said. “Even if I can regain my strength in a year, I’ll lose my place in the company. There are at least a dozen dancers vying for every spot.”

  “You could recover faster than the doctor believes.” Sasha tried to be hopeful. But Katya couldn’t bear it. Sasha, the man who proclaimed to look at things only through a scientific lens, was now trying to ignore the facts to spare her pain. It made her feel even more hopeless to think that he’d resort to such implausibilities because he was so desperate to soothe her.

  “Sasha, there are girls who find crushed glass in their toe shoes because other dancers are trying to sabotage them. Do you think they’re going to wait for me to get better and return?” She willed herself to force back her tears.

  She lifted her eyes toward the X-ray lit against the white screen. “Look at that,” she insisted. The film showed the shattered bone. “What more do you need to see? It’s medical science. The facts are indisputable.”

  25

  THE kids were eager to hand their letters back to me. When I collected them, their eyes were full of life, as if they had just written down a secret they couldn’t wait to share.

  That night, I hunkered down early with the letters and a cup of peppermint tea. Bill had called to say he was working late, and I was excited to read them without any distraction.

  I smiled as I went through them. Most of the students wrote about how they hoped they had gotten into a good college or had made the varsity team in high school. Lisa Yamamoto had filled her envelope with three paper cranes for good luck. Another student mentioned wanting to live in Australia. Jack, who was short for his age, hoped he had grown to be six feet tall.

  Finn’s letter was especially poignant. He described his little sister, who had already had several operations on her left leg. He said he hoped that by the time he was eighteen, she would finally be able to run with him outside, and that one day he might go to medical school and discover a way to help others like her.

  I held on to his letter a little longer than the others. I’ve realized that there are many things you can teach a student. You can teach them math or grammar, and you can encourage them to be more patient or careful with their homework. But there are other things that are more difficult to teach in a classroom, such as compassion and kindness. These were qualities Finn had clearly taken to heart, by witnessing his sister’s struggles at home.

  I had often seen Finn’s mother waiting outside for him in the school parking lot when I was leaving to head over to Yuri’s. Finn never failed to wave to me before he ducked into their white Volvo station wagon. He’d always raise his chin a bit and swing his backpack a little higher over his shoulder before he pulled open the door. “Bye, Ms. Topper,” he’d holler in my direction as he slipped inside.

  On a few occasions, I had taken a peek at Finn’s mother sitting behind the steering wheel. She always wore her blond hair in a ponytail, and a pair of fashionable tortoiseshell glasses framed her gaze. In the backseat, I had noticed a little girl who looked like a miniature version of Finn’s mother. I had imagined his family as the preppy sort who all had matching canvas beach bags with their initials monogrammed in the middle. But after reading Finn’s letter and learning that his little sister had a physical handicap that limited her activities, my perception of him and his family changed. Now, when Finn talked with such passion about playing sports, I realized he wasn’t just playing for himself; he was playing for his sister, too.

  * * *

  • • •

  WHEN Yuri handed me his letter at his house the next afternoon, I realized in the flurry of describing the assignment during my last visit that I had overlooked one essential detail: I had forgotten to tell him not to seal it.

  Now, as I held his letter, I saw that he had not only sealed the envelope but had also taken great steps to decorate it. Knowing all the extra work he had done, I didn’t have the heart to ask him to put the letter in a new, open envelope.

  “Did you enjoy writing it?” I asked as I slipped the envelope into my bag.

  The other children had all seemed so excited when they handed over their envelopes to me. But Yuri seemed more pensive now.

  “I think it was a good assignment,” he said after a lengthy pause. “It made me think hard about what I really hope for in life. And it was helpful to put it down on paper.”

  “I’m glad you got something out of it.” I smiled at him. I could see he had caught sight of a red cardinal on the snow-dusted deck.

  “I wonder when you mail it back, where I’ll actually be,” he said softly, again his eyes focusing on the little red bird.

  I immediately pictured him in his graduation gown and mortarboard. A diploma grasped in his hand. I imagined him several inches taller. His voice deeper. Maybe even having a girlfriend.

  “
You’ll be savoring your last day of high school, champ,” I answered confidently.

  He nodded, and I saw his gaze lift as the bird flew off into the distance.

  “Cardinals, Blue Jays, Orioles,” he listed, changing the subject. “So many baseball teams take their names from birds. Did you ever wonder why?”

  “Actually, Yuri, I never thought about that before.”

  “It must be amazing to have the ability to fly. To be so much closer to the clouds. To see everything from above.”

  “Yes. It must.” I reached over and squeezed his arm. “Should I try to arrange to have your letter delivered by carrier pigeon?” I teased him.

  He turned his head now and faced me. His pale blue eyes again struck me with their sparkle. “Oh, Ms. Topper, wouldn’t that be something!”

  * * *

  • • •

  LATER that afternoon when I returned home, I studied his envelope more carefully. Yuri had written his address in meticulous block letters on the front side. And on the back, underneath where I had inscribed A Letter from the Past with a Message for the Future, he had taken the sealed flap of the envelope and used it as inspiration for a baseball diamond. With an array of colored pencils, Yuri had created the most beautiful drawing of a baseball field with ears of corn growing in the distance. His own field of dreams.

  To be honest, I thought about holding his letter over a pot of boiling water and steaming it open. That was how curious I was to read it. But I stopped myself before going that far. The weekend before, I had purchased a metal filing cabinet for the express purpose of storing all the kids’ letters. I had written on a large manila folder High School Class of 2006 with a thick black Sharpie. I put all the envelopes from my classes at Franklin in the folder before filing them away in the cabinet. I went downstairs and slipped Yuri’s letter in with the other envelopes.