The Unmade World

by Steve Yarbrough

  There’s a saying in Krakow: if you’re having an affair, meet in the main market square. You won’t see anyone else you know there, and no one you know will see you.

  They’re both in bad need of a drink, and it makes sense to them to get it in a place where they stand a good chance of remaining anonymous. Late afternoon finds them parked at a café table on the north side of the world’s largest medieval square, surrounded by tourists luxuriating in the crisp air of early autumn. He hears plenty of German, some Italian and Japanese, a little English that he suspects is of the American variety. A line of horse-drawn carriages stands between them and the massive Cloth Hall. Near the entrance to the market stalls, a band decked out in Krakowian folk costumes has struck up “The Vistula Is Flowing.” It sounds horrible.

  The only thing that might call attention to them is the Darth Vader headgear. He pleaded with his partner to drop it in a garbage bin, even offering to buy his grandson a new one, but Marek claimed they were virtually impossible to find, not to mention overpriced, and anyway the kid would know the difference. So they’ve placed it under the table and turned it upside down.

  Marek has just ordered his second beer and a brandy to go with it. In some ways it’s sad to see how easily rattled he is these days, his once ravenous ambition, his bravado and optimism all gone. He only wants to get along, and right now he’s scared they won’t. He keeps cutting his eyes from side to side, like he expects the police to descend on them.

  “Do you ever think about it?” Bogdan asks.

  “About what?”

  “You know what.”

  His old friend wraps his hands around the sweating beer glass. “Yeah. But I imagine it’s worse for you, because you saw them.”

  “How do you feel when you think about it?”

  “Mostly, I try not to.”

  “But sometimes you do. You just said so.”

  “I got some help dealing with it.”

  Now the beer glass is not the only thing sweating. “You didn’t tell Inga, did you? About the wreck? For Christ’s sake.”

  Marek gazes past him in the direction of St. Mary’s, the Gothic basilica in the corner of the square. “I went to see a priest,” he says.

  The image of his partner kneeling in the confessional is so ludicrous that at first, Bogdan assumes he’s kidding. Unlike his own parents, Marek’s were not churchgoers, and well into adulthood he was a walking catalog of jokes about priests and their sheep. But all you’ve got to do to see that he’s serious is look at him. “Does Inga know you went?”

  “No. She wouldn’t understand.”

  “Why wouldn’t she understand? She attends mass herself.”

  “She attends mass, but it doesn’t really mean much to her. It’s just something she’s always done. I don’t go to mass, but church means a lot to me.”

  “What’s the difference?”

  “I go to church when no one’s there. That’s what the priest suggested after I’d told him what happened and then admitted I didn’t believe in God. He said to just come in and sit down and maybe God would speak to me, or maybe He wouldn’t, but that even if He didn’t, I’d feel better while I was there.”

  “And has God spoken to you?”

  “No. But I feel better every time I go.”

  Bogdan lifts his glass and finishes the beer in a single swallow, then turns and looks over his shoulder at their waitress, who is propped against the building, her tray resting against her knee. He signals for another.

  By the time he gives Marek his attention again, the bitterness has overcome him. “It’s that easy for you, is it?”

  “What’s easy?”

  “Just walk into the fucking church of a god you’ve never believed in, plop down in the pew, and have a Saul of Tarsus moment. You’re such a simple bastard. You always have been.”

  His partner runs his finger over the white marks on his face, a gesture that Bogdan has noticed him resorting to with greater and greater frequency, as if the scars prove he’s paid a price for all the wrong they’ve done. “You’re right,” he says. “I’ve always been a simple bastard. Did you know I was often unfaithful to Inga? I didn’t appreciate what I had.”

  Bogdan has long suspected that he slept with other women, but he’d felt certain he’d never confess it. For Marek to do it now, after revealing that he slinks around churches seeking respite from his guilt, further fuels his outrage. “What will you tell me next?” he asks. He knows he’s speaking louder than he should, but there’s a group of Asian tourists on their right, and the table on the left’s empty. “That you like to put your finger up your ass and take a sniff? We caused the deaths of two people, ruined the life of at least one other, and probably added to the grief of the pool tycoon’s wife when she came home and found the frozen corpse of her dog, whose brains had been hacked out. We’ve spent a few months driving folks from their flats—for the very same shithook that turned us out of our last store—and you’ve found help dealing with it?”

  The waitress brings his beer just as a guy sits down at the empty table. Bogdan glances at him. He’s got a wild shock of salt-and-pepper hair and a beard that matches, and he’s wearing a black blazer over a ridiculous-looking tee shirt that depicts some fellow with snakes coming out of his head. He takes a laptop from his shoulder bag, places it on the table, and opens it. They hear him order a shot of Irish whiskey.

  Marek observes the new guest for a moment, then leans closer. “If we need to discuss this particular subject, could it wait till later?”

  Bogdan takes a sip of beer. His anger has subsided as quickly as it surged. “We don’t need to discuss it. I meant what I said when I was out there on . . . when I was where we just came from.”

  “I know you did. And I feel the same about you.”

  The guy at the next table doesn’t look their way, but Bogdan knows the remark registered. So he changes the subject, asking his partner if he’s planning to take his grandson to the Saturday football match. As soon as they’ve finished their drinks, they pay and stand up.

  “Oh, my,” his partner says. “Look what we’re about to forget.” Before Bogdan can stop him, he reaches under the table and grabs the Vader helmet.

  The guy at the next table glances up, sees what’s he’s holding, then looks back at the open laptop. Walking away, Bogdan hears him pecking the keys.

  They part at the edge of Planty, each promising to let the other know if he hears from Fabian, who hasn’t responded to their messages. Bogdan waits until his partner has disappeared, then strolls back into the Old Town, stops at the first liquor store he sees, and buys another beer. He returns to the park, finds an empty bench near the Slowacki Theater, and opens the can. He takes his time, drinking slowly.

  Before long, it begins to grow dark, and the spotlights that ring the theater finally come on. The Baroque structure modeled on the Paris Opera House is suddenly aglow like an enormous nugget. He’s lived in this city his entire life, yet the only time he entered the Slowacki was in grade school, when they took his class through. He can’t recall anything about the interior. Nor can he imagine how it would be to watch a play in there, or an opera, or what it would be like to go listen to a symphony at the Philharmonic or visit one of the many jazz clubs around town. He’s never been to any of the big new cinemas to see a movie, and he hasn’t visited a bookstore or checked a title out of the library in nine or ten years. He never holds a real conversation with anyone anymore except Marek or Inga, or occasionally his sister in Zakopane. He can’t even remember when he last heard from his other sister. There’s not much left of his life and not much that could be made of what remains. The simplest thing would be to bring down the curtain.

  It seems unlikely that the American journalist saw him long enough to retain an image. But Bogdan knows he did, that someplace on the far side of North America, his otherwise forgettable face is the locus of grief. Tonight, he can feel it more strongly than ever. Somewhere in California he takes center stage in an
other man’s nightmare.

  If you live in Krakow but are not devout—and maybe even if you are—you seldom notice churches, though they’re everywhere, particularly in the older parts of the city. By the time he reaches his street, he wouldn’t be able to tell you how many he’s walked past since getting up off the park bench. There’s another one up ahead. He knows it’s a Jesuit church but can’t recall the name. Instead of turning onto his street, he crosses it, then crosses to the other side of Kopernika.

  It’s past seven now, and most churches will be closed. But the main doors of this one—the Sacred Heart Basilica, says the plaque—are unlocked. For some inexplicable reason, he steps inside.

  The nave is dimly lit, but it doesn’t require a lot of light to constitute an impressive sight. Enormous frescoes. The controlling colors magenta and gold, the central aisle white marble, with a series of black concentric circles running down the middle, each except the last connected to its predecessor by an oversized comma. He walks toward the altar, the echoes of his footsteps overlapping.

  The benches are hard and uncomfortable, designed, no doubt, to keep the numb awake. He takes a seat in one on the right-hand side, then crosses his arms over his stomach.

  There’s a presence here: no question about it. Whether it’s godly, he can’t say, but he considers that doubtful. What seems plausible is that all those who ever sat in this pew left something of themselves behind. The physics that might be involved will lie forever beyond his ken. Maybe he’s aware of people who attended mass here last Sunday. Or those who came ten years ago, or forty or fifty. It’s one of those things that his father, a tram driver with little education but a lot of sense, used to call “the imponderables.” He once asked what the word meant, since it seemed like he heard it every few days, most often after his father finished reading the paper. “It means,” he was told, “that if you think about it too long, it’ll make your head hurt, so you might as well save yourself the trouble. Better go play with Marek.” At the time, he found the answer maddening, just another example of something the adults knew but refused to reveal.

  Now, almost everything that matters is in the realm of the imponderable. Why did a man who’d never stolen anything in his entire life decide to go rob a complete stranger? He’d had money troubles before and never stooped to theft. Why did he slam the BMW’s brakes at precisely that instant? He’d been driving since he was seventeen and never had an accident or caused one either. Why did the pool builder drown at almost exactly the same time as two people were dying in the old Mercedes?

  Imponderables everywhere, no answers to be found.

  He doesn’t know he’s fallen asleep until his neck starts to hurt. When he opens his eyes, he sees the bearded figure in the nearest fresco wagging a finger at him. “Too late, Jesus,” he says. He rises, works out a few kinks, and walks home.

  Morning brings a text from Fabian ordering him to lie low. A while later, he receives a call from Marek. The old professor, he learns, taught the city president’s wife at Jagiellonian. A time-tested Polish civic tradition—the Dictatorship of the Acquaintance—has been powerfully invoked. The building on Smolensk is being deodorized, and in the meantime the professor is staying at the Radisson Blu on the developer’s tab.

  “Fabian said the old man gave the police descriptions of us,” Marek informs him. “He told them I had white scars on my face, and he mentioned that mole of yours. Did you ever think of having that thing removed? At least you could do something about it. I can’t get rid of these scars.”

  Bogdan looks around his room. It’s no longer as squalid as it was last winter, but there are no pictures on the walls, no TV or stereo, no quirky possessions that would identify it as his rather than someone else’s. “I am my face,” he says.

  “Bogdan, I’m serious.”

  “So am I. Every now and then, I see it in a mirror, or it’s reflected back at me from a dirty windowpane, and I think, ‘Hell, I know that guy. He’s what I turned into.’” He tells his partner not to worry, that he has no intention of going anywhere.

  And for most of the day, he doesn’t. He drinks a few beers in the afternoon and falls asleep for a couple hours, then sits on the balcony for a while and watches trains pass. But there’s not much to eat: some stale rye bread he bought day before yesterday, a tub of herring salad that isn’t yet out of date but smells dangerous, a few frozen Ruskie pierogi. His appetite is oddly robust. And, as is usually the case when he’s truly hungry, he craves kielbasa.

  The blue van is a Nyska, readily identifiable as a former police vehicle. Six nights a week, from eight until three in the morning, it’s parked near the Hala Targowa tram stop. No matter how foul the weather, two guys clad in white smocks grill large kielbasas over a wood fire and sell them, along with a roll, for eight zlotys. They’re both in their early sixties and sport gray goatees. He once heard that they were brothers, but some years ago a rumor circulated that they were unrelated, hated each other, and no longer spoke. He’s never heard either of them say a word. They’ve supposedly gotten rich.

  Tonight the line already has forty or fifty people in it, all but a handful of them male, more than a few drinking beer while they wait. He wishes he’d had the foresight to bring one and, for a moment, contemplates leaving the line long enough to buy a can at the liquor store next to Hala Targowa. But it’s starting to sprinkle, so he decides to maintain his spot. When he reaches the front of the queue, it’s raining in earnest, and one of the entrepreneurs has extended an awning over the grill. Bogdan orders two sausages to go, then tucks the hot sack under his arm and hurries home.

  He eats the blackened kielbasa with mustard, taking his time, biting a hunk out of a roll every now and then, washing everything down with cold beer. The sausage seems especially juicy tonight, the mustard nice and tangy. The rolls are light and fluffy, not soggy, as if they were baked within the last couple of hours. He will remember it as one of the most satisfying meals he’s ever eaten. It might even be the best.

  He’s in the kitchen opening another beer when someone knocks on the door. It’s strange, since he doesn’t know any of his neighbors and no one is supposed to get in without buzzing, though Marek did last winter. Maybe it’s him again. He pops the cap off the beer, takes a good swig, and goes to the door.

  It’s not Marek. One of the men is in his late thirties, short and bald, and he’s wearing beige cords and a brown leather jacket that’s flaking badly. His companion is younger, taller, and better dressed, in a light gray suit, crisp shirt, and tie.

  “Mr. Baranowski?” the older one asks.

  He’s as calm as he’s ever been, with no unusual physiological response except a faint tingling near his tailbone. He wonders if they’ve also grabbed Marek. Hopefully not. There’s Inga, his sons, those grandkids. He’d be missed by many, whereas nobody will miss Bogdan except Marek himself. “That’s me,” he says.

  “You’ll have to come with us,” the older man tells him.

  He cocks his head toward his companion, who delves into the pocket of that immaculate gray jacket and pulls out a set of black handcuffs. Bogdan offers his wrists. As the younger man clamps on the cuffs, he asks if they’ve got time for him to finish his beer.

  The room is a mess: mug shots tacked on the walls alongside a poster advertising X-Men II. Three-ring binders piled on top of the filing cabinets, Styrofoam cups littering the floor, an overflowing ashtray. A half-eaten container of low-fat apricot yoghurt stands on the desk, the plastic spoon perfectly erect. The older officer’s feet are propped beside it. The soles of both shoes are in bad shape.

  They’ve taken the handcuffs off and given him some coffee, though they wouldn’t let him finish his beer. Spread out before him on the desk, not far from the officer’s feet, are three large color photos. In the first, he’s sliding down the roof toward the hatch, sunlight glinting off his Vader helmet. In the second, he’s emerging from the building, carrying the helmet under his arm. In the third, he’s just rounded the cor
ner onto Smolensk—you can see part of one leg and all of his shoe—and Marek is about to reach the corner, too. But you can’t tell it’s Marek because his head is turned away from the camera.

  “We’ve got your partner,” the officer says. “He’s the one who told us how to find you. What he won’t tell us is his name. And apparently, he thinks you’re such a loyal friend that you won’t tell us who he is either, even though he was pretty eager to point a finger at you. He says he didn’t even know you went onto the roof, by the way, that he was working in number eight and happened to leave the building when you did.”

  Bogdan doesn’t believe they’ve got Marek. It’s certainly possible that he could have been identified by any officer who’d read a description of his face, but if he’d been arrested, there is not one chance in a thousand that he’d refuse to tell them his own name. He would’ve been too frightened to withhold that information. The only facts he wouldn’t have divulged are the name of his partner and his address. Bogdan knows this as surely as he’s ever known anything.

  “I don’t have any partner,” he tells the pudgy officer.

  The younger man has been standing behind him and hasn’t said a word since he handed him his coffee. “Do you know how long you can go to jail for harassing a legal resident?” he asks.

  Five years from now, this officer, who is only twenty-six, will be the highest-ranking detective in the department, the superior of colleagues with thirty years’ more experience. He earned a degree in public safety management from the University of Zielona Gora, where among other subjects he studied psychology. But he’s made several incorrect assumptions about the man he’s standing behind. The first is that he’s terrified. The second is that there’s almost nothing he wouldn’t say or do if he thought it would get him back on the street in the least amount of time. The third is that he has something to lose. Most people, even if they’re wrong, think they do.