by Kim Purcell
Even though it was a good suggestion, Lillian looked irritated. “Fine.”
At that moment, the doorbell rang. Hannah ran into the living room, grabbed the bouquet of small yellow roses from in there and then the one from the foyer. She heard the stamping of feet outside. She hurried down the hall and into the dining room to grab a third bouquet, and then put them all on the deck.
Lillian handed her the bouquet from the bathroom down the hall. “Get the ones upstairs without him seeing.”
“Come on, Lily,” Sergey said, indicating that they had to answer the door. He strode into the living room, turned off the television and switched on the classical music, then headed to meet the guests.
Lillian blinked her hazel eyes at Hannah. “Be careful. This is an important night.”
“Okay,” Hannah said, rushing up the stairs, where she grabbed the bouquets from the bathroom, the master bedroom, and the stand in the hall.
She made it down the stairs with the strong-smelling bouquets before Paavo and Rena had taken off their shoes in the foyer. She ducked into the kitchen, went through the back door, and placed the offensive flowers on the deck. Her shirt probably had pollen on it now, which she hoped would serve to keep that man away from her. He gave her the creeps. Anyway, she figured he was lying about his allergies just so she’d seem like a bad maid and they’d give her to him to pay off their debt to him. But he didn’t know who he was messing with.
Hannah stepped inside. A second later, Paavo lumbered into the kitchen, followed by Rena, whose short hair was now dyed a brilliant shade of maroon. Hannah had never seen the two of them together. He was easily three times her size.
Rena saw Hannah examining them and gave her a haughty look. Hannah turned her back on them and washed the remaining pot in the sink. She could still feel Paavo staring at her.
“Vodka or champagne?” Sergey asked.
“Vodka,” Paavo boomed.
“Champagne,” Rena said.
“Hannah, can you get two champagne flutes?” Lillian asked.
They had their special glasses in a buffet case in the dining room, but Hannah had no idea what was what. “What do they look like?” she asked, drying off the pot with a dishcloth.
“They’re the thin ones,” Lillian said, rolling her eyes at Rena.
Sergey opened the champagne bottle with a pop and handed the glasses to Hannah with a brief smile. She poured the champagne, halfway, the same as wine, like Lillian had taught her, and brought them to the women. Everyone moved into the living room, and Hannah took the fresh oysters from the refrigerator and put them on a tray with lemon and vodka chasers, as she’d been instructed.
“Good for the sex drive,” Paavo laughed, swatting at Rena’s behind.
She laughed. “Stop it.”
He dropped down into the sofa and took an oyster and a vodka chaser. His fingers with their long, manicured nails gripped on the glass, and he sucked down the oyster, gazing at Hannah, as if he’d like to do the same to her, but nobody else seemed to notice. At least the children were upstairs. Lillian had fed and bathed them while Hannah made dinner, and now they were in their pajamas, watching a movie in Michael’s room.
Soon, everyone moved into the dining room, and Hannah began to bring in dish after dish, making sure to stay far from Paavo. Between courses, she ran upstairs to check on the children and then sat at the kitchen table listening to Paavo monopolize the conversation with lurid jokes.
Once the main courses were done, Hannah cleared the table and brought out coffee and small cakes from the Russian bakery. She poured the coffee, under Lillian’s sharp gaze, making sure to keep her hand steady, but pushed Paavo’s cup across the table, instead of getting too close to him. Paavo was telling a story about one of his girls who’d gotten in trouble with the police—likely one of his prostitutes at his club. He pushed himself back from the table, and opened his knees out and pressed them back together as he talked. Out and in, out and in.
She clenched her jaw. She didn’t want to think about it but she did. Volva, the bad agent, he’d done that too in the taxi while he talked to her about what mistakes she shouldn’t make as she went through immigration.
For the rest of her life, she’d probably hate the sound of a zipper opening. It had taken her months to get Volva out of her head, and this man brought it all back.
She had to hold it together. Just long enough to hand out the cakes. Her hand was shaking. She reached across the table with the cake for Paavo and he took it from her, his thumb brushing her hand, on purpose. She pulled her hand back.
Lillian gave her a sharp look. She remembered Lillian’s words earlier: You bow to him if you have to.
Hannah passed the sugar to Sergey, but he shook his head briefly and took a sip of black coffee. Normally he took his coffee with two or three heaping tablespoons of sugar, but perhaps he was worried Paavo would think he wasn’t manly.
Paavo raised his coffee cup. “It’s not full.”
It was too difficult to reach across the table with a pot of hot coffee. Slowly, she walked around the table to fill his cup to the top. Rena started telling Lillian about a sale at Barneys. Nobody was paying attention. Even Sergey was looking at his BlackBerry.
Hannah gripped the handle of the coffeepot and took Paavo’s cup from him. Just as she started to pour, his hand rested on the back of her sweatpants, where no one else could see. She stepped away quickly and the hot coffee spilled on her hand. She let out a cry from the pain.
“Hannah,” Lillian barked. “Be careful. We don’t want you burning our guests.”
Paavo was looking her up and down, even though his wife was right there. His nose twitched and he squeezed it. His nose twitched again and then his eyes opened wide and he looked at the chandelier over the table. Sergey and Lillian exchanged a look.
Paavo held a finger up in the air as if everyone should wait for him. And then he sneezed. Probably got the pollen from her clothes on him. Served him right. If she could cover him in pollen, so he’d be itchy and coughing and sneezing, she would.
Hannah put the coffeepot down before she was tempted to pour it in his lap, and strode around the table, trying not to run.
“Maybe you’re allergic to the girl.” Rena laughed. “She probably never washes.”
Hannah glared at her as she picked up the butter dish that she’d left earlier.
“You know what they say about those Moldovans,” Paavo said. “They’re so stupid, they have to jump up and down to see if there are any matches in the matchbox.”
Everybody laughed, except for Sergey. Stupid. It was just a word, she told herself, but she heard Volva in her head. “If you’re not too stupid.” Hannah wanted to throw the butter dish at Paavo’s head and see the butter slime down his face, but instead she turned to go.
“That is why they are the garbage collectors and whores of Russia,” Rena said, lighting up a cigarette, even though no one smoked in the house. “They can do nothing else.”
Hannah was furious. How dare this woman speak like this about her family, her friends, all the people she knew and loved? Hannah looked around the table. Lillian was smiling. Sergey shifted uncomfortably but didn’t speak up for her. She opened her mouth, then shut it, and walked out of the room.
Her hands were shaking as she gripped the butter dish. No matter how much she tried to forget, Paavo reminded her of the bad agent, that Volva, with his long cat fingers, his sharp nails.
“What do you think, girl?” Paavo asked, calling Hannah back, like he owned her. Hannah continued into the kitchen, the memories chasing her.
In the other room, Paavo’s voice boomed. “Hey, girl!” Hannah placed the butter dish on the granite countertop. It clattered down, making so much noise it startled her. Her hands were shaking. She was clumsy in her fear.
She’d called V
olva a pig when he ran his hand over the front of her white shirt.
He’d choked her, pressing one hand to her neck. Those were the bruises Lillian had noticed on her first day. “Who are you calling a pig?” he’d said, while his other hand popped open the snap on her jeans, undid her zipper, and dove down inside.
His fingernails had been sharp like little mice claws. “You want more?” he’d growled. Tears had run down her face and she’d shaken her head, trying to breathe.
The taxi driver had stared straight ahead. The Romanian music played louder. Two women had strode by the taxi at that moment, pulling their suitcases on the pavement. One of them had commented on what a nice day it was for flying.
“Hannah?” Sergey was calling to her from the dining room, forcing her to answer these people.
She took two long, stiff steps back into the dining room and pasted a fake smile on her face. “Yes?” She pressed her shaking hands against the sides of her sweatpants.
Sergey’s blue eyes creased apologetically and he tilted his head toward Paavo and Rena at the other side of the table.
“Is it true?” Rena asked, blowing smoke into the air. “Are you Moldovans too stupid to do anything but whoring and garbage collecting?”
Hannah couldn’t stop herself. She stretched her shaking hands out. “I think I remembered to wash the garbage off my hands before rolling the pelmeni, but I’m really not sure.”
Silence. Rena’s face whitened. Sergey smiled briefly, just long enough for Hannah to notice. “Hannah!” Lillian gasped.
Paavo let out a guffaw. “She has a mouth. But she doesn’t know how to use it.”
Hannah glared at him. He probably knew what Volva had done.
Lillian reassured Paavo and Rena. “Don’t worry. I made the pelmeni.”
Hannah didn’t stop in the kitchen, but ran down the hall and up the stairs before Lillian could force her back into the room to apologize. She went into the upstairs bathroom, locked the door, and pressed her back against it.
She waited for Lillian to follow her, but there were no footsteps up the stairs. In Michael’s room, the movie was still going, which meant it wasn’t yet nine o’clock.
Volva had let her out of the taxi then. It could have been worse, she thought, staring at Lillian’s white wallpaper with the perfect blue flowers. She told herself to breathe. It could have been worse.
Through the open bathroom window, she heard music blasting from a car in the street with that boom-boom-boom noise Sergey had told her was the bass. It made the air inside her ears vibrate—she couldn’t believe people thought that was music. There were female voices. The screen of the next-door neighbor’s front door squealed as someone stepped outside.
“Not too late,” Colin’s mother said from the front door.
“It’s just for a little while,” he said.
“By eleven,” she said.
“It’s not a school night,” he said.
“Fine. Midnight.”
The front door shut. Colin kicked a stone down the driveway. Hannah peered out the window to see him, but she couldn’t see the front yard, just the side of his pink house.
The car roared down the street.
Chapter Thirty-eight
Hannah stood next to the old green fence in the pouring rain, looking into Colin’s empty bedroom. She’d been waiting for over an hour. It was after one in the morning and he still wasn’t home, even though he’d told his mother he’d be back by midnight. He had a curfew too. And he’d broken it. Just like she had, that last night she’d seen her mother alive.
Hannah tilted her face up to the rain as it beat down on her. It was cold, but her tears were hot, and for once she gave into them. Her chest clenched with pain and she crouched down and hugged her knees. Her body shook as she cried silently. She’d tried to leave Moldova behind, but the misery had followed her. First, Volva, whom she’d tried to forget, and now Paavo, who made her remember.
Blyat! She grabbed a handful of gravel and threw it angrily across the lawn, but it didn’t satisfy her urge to destroy or fight back. She couldn’t live like this.
A car slowed on the street and then the backyard lit up from the headlights shining down the walkway, the light distorted from the rain as the car pulled into the neighbor’s driveway.
Hannah crept down the pathway along the fence and peeked over the gate. With a start, she realized that it wasn’t any old car. It was a police car with bright flashing lights but no siren.
LAPD was written in large block letters on the side of the car. She crouched down low. A police car coming to your house at this time of night was bad for anyone in any country. What if Colin was dead?
She remembered the knock on her family’s apartment door at ten o’clock at night when she and Babulya had been waiting for her parents to come home. Four police officers had stood in the doorway, and they’d looked at her with grim faces. Her first thought was that at least their hats were still on. If they were off, it meant someone was dead. But she’d been wrong.
A tall, white police officer got out of the LAPD car, with his hat and uniform on, and opened the back door of the car. Someone was getting out. She saw a flash of blond hair before she saw his body. Colin was alive, but he looked sadder than she’d ever seen him. He was staring at the ground, wearing wet jeans and a Lakers jersey splattered with paint.
The front door of his house swung open and his mother ran out. She ran down the stairs, her blonde curls bouncing, mouth clenched tight, eyes furious.
Colin took a step back. His mother flew toward him. At first Hannah thought she was going to strike him, but then she pressed her two hands against his large cheeks. “How could you do that?” she cried.
“I’m sorry, Mom.”
She dropped her hands. “Why would you spray-paint a school?”
He looked down at his feet. “I didn’t actually spray anything. And it wasn’t my idea. They bought the paint because we lost the game to the other school. Anyway, I thought it would wash off with the rain.”
“That’s so stupid!” His mother spat. There was a moment of silence. “You’re wet. Are you cold?”
“Yeah.”
Rain dripped down Hannah’s face, into her mouth. She licked her lips and brushed the water out of her eyes.
“He’s a good boy,” his mother said to the officer. “I don’t know what happened. I can’t believe he would vandalize a school. Will they—will they press charges?”
“It sounds like he was the sober one and got pressured into driving. We impounded the car and we’ll bring him in for more questioning when we talk to the other kids.”
More questioning. Hannah knew that word and remembered the ten hours of interrogation she’d endured after the bombing. What did “sober” mean? And what did they say about a car? There was so much she didn’t understand.
The officer continued. “But you know, he didn’t run off and he answered all our questions. He’ll get off easy.”
The crank on the window squealed above her and the police officer looked toward the gate. Hannah froze. Did he see her or was he just looking in the direction of the window? They must have all heard it. If Lillian looked down by the gate and saw she was outside, she’d be in big trouble, but if the officer saw her and suspected she was illegal, she’d be sent to jail. She didn’t dare breathe.
She waited until the police officer got into the car, and then, crouching low, she hurried along the walkway, little pebbles flying into the air, chattering out her escape. She ran into the house, took off her slippers, tiptoed to the garage, and then waited.
Chapter Thirty-nine
Nobody came. Hannah lay on the sofa in the garage, waiting, adrenaline coursing through her. Finally, when she realized the house was silent and nobody was getting up, she closed her eyes, but sh
e was too wired to sleep. So she’d reached under the sofa for Sergey’s English version of Anna Karenina and started to read.
After reading until sometime past three, she fell asleep with the light on. That night, she had a bad dream, the same old one, about her mother’s body burning. In the dream, Hannah ran through the flames to save her, and when she got to the body, it didn’t have a head. But something new happened at the end. She felt a windy heat on her forehead, so hot, like it was happening in real life, not in her dream, and she heard Babulya say, clear as anything, “Listen to your nose.”
She woke up, gasping. It had felt real, but she was here and Babulya was far away. She glanced at the alarm clock. It was seven thirty.
Breakfast was supposed to be ready and the table set by seven thirty, but if she hurried, perhaps she’d beat Lillian to the kitchen. She jumped out of bed wearing the gray sweat suit, which she’d fallen asleep in, ran out of the garage, down the hall, and into the kitchen. Miraculously, she was the first one there. As fast as she could, she put a frying pan on the stove and began melting butter for eggs.
A few minutes later, Lillian came into the kitchen wearing another new red suit. “We won’t be needing eggs. We’re going out. While we’re gone, you will wash all the windows in the house. I expect them to be finished by the time we return.” She gave Hannah a cold stare as if she was contemplating further punishments.
“Where are you going?” Hannah said, opting to pretend the night before had not happened—she had not talked back to their friends and she had not gone outside to meet Colin.
“That is none of your business.”
Maggie ran in. “We’re going for brunch.”
Lillian interrupted her. “Don’t speak to Hannah. She needs some silent time to think about her actions yesterday.”