“Trust me. I’ve flown Aerof lot often enough to know that you don’t want to eat their food,” he had said.
“Don’t check the bag that holds your dossier,” he had cautioned. “It’s not unknown for checked baggage to mysteriously disappear between New York and Moscow. Be careful.”
“I feel as though I’m going into battle,” Lisa had said ruefully.
“In a sense you are.” He had smiled but she had heard the warning in his tone and seen the worry in his eyes.
Throughout the flight she had periodically checked her carry-on and as they landed, she opened it yet again and slid her fingers across the smooth surface of the bright blue plastic file case.
“Still there?” Elaine asked, smiling.
“Still there,” Lisa replied. “I know you think I’m nuts for being so nervous but, Mom, if I lose the dossier or any part of it I could lose Genia.”
“You won’t lose the file and you won’t lose Genia,” Elaine assured her.
She looked worriedly at her daughter. It surprised her still that Lisa, cool, competent Lisa, so committed to her career and her independence, so resistant to marriage and impatient with her sister’s pregnancies, had vested so much in this adoption. Genia, known to them only through photos and a brief snatch of videotape, had woven herself into Lisa’s life. Elaine could not bear to think of what might happen if the adoption was ambushed, if Genia did not accompany them home to the States. Lisa, she knew, would be devastated and she herself, she acknowledged, would be awash in sadness and disappointment. She thrust the thought aside. Of course everything would proceed without difficulty. Lisa had been so careful, Claire’s advice and perusal of each document so explicit and helpful. She smiled reassuringly at her daughter.
“Everything will be all right,” she said and wondered how many times through the years she had repeated that maternal mantra to each of her children separately, to all of them together.
Those were the words, she knew, that mothers used to comfort their children, to allay their fears and uncertainties, although clearly, they could not always be true. There were times when things would not be all right, when ill luck would prevail, when an assured happiness would be aborted, when a ringing phone might bring news of disaster and morning brightness would be vanquished by evening shadows. She shrugged, as though to shake off her own dark thoughts, and stared up at the damp grayness of the Russian sky.
They exited the plane slowly, their way blocked by passengers who pushed ahead of them, using their small suitcases and clumsy bundles as battering rams that enabled them to progress an extra inch. A small chubby woman wearing a bulky coat of pale yellow fur bitterly cursed a tall youth who cut ahead of her.
“Babushka,” he spat out disparagingly and pushed ahead of yet another passenger.
“Russia,” an American man who stood behind them said wearily. “You’ll get used to it.”
“I doubt that,” Elaine replied.
She was grateful that they had arranged for “VIP Light Service” on Claire’s advice. They would be met as soon as they left the airplane by Misha, the Russian facilitator employed by the adoption agency. He would hold up a sign with their names and take them immediately to the baggage claim area, avoiding the queue for passport control.
“At least, I hope it’s Misha,” Claire had added. “We’ve had very good experience with him.”
Lisa had refrained from asking about difficulties with other facilitators. She did not want to hear any Russian adoption story that did not have a happy ending.
They deplaned and she searched the crowd that awaited the arriving passengers. Cardboard signs were frantically waved and she looked past the neatly lettered Cyrillic names and the awkwardly scripted English ones until she saw her own name on a sign held by a heavyset blond man who wore a thickly padded long gray overcoat. She and Elaine rushed toward him.
“I am Dr. Lisa Gordon,” she said. “And this is my mother, Elaine Gordon.”
“And me, I am Misha,” he said and licked a dark fleck of tobacco that clung to his thick yellow moustache.
They followed him as he expertly elbowed his way through the crowd and they waited with him at the carousel which moved with exasperating slowness. They pointed to their suitcases and he heaved them off with ease, smiling at the pink bag embossed with the jaunty picture of Dora the Explorer.
“Your little girl, she will like that bag,” he said and Lisa smiled gratefully because he had already granted her motherhood.
He guided them through customs and then to passport control, jovially making small talk with the clerks who flipped through their documents, checked their visas and asked perfunctory questions.
“What is the purpose of your visit to Russia?” asked the stout woman with iron-gray hair to whom their passports and visas had been passed.
“I’m here to adopt a baby,” Lisa said.
“And you?” She peered at Elaine through rimless glasses.
“I am—that is I will be—the baby’s grandmother,” Elaine said.
“Ah.” Her voice softened. “I, too, have grandchildren.”
She stamped their passports vigorously and waved them on. Misha doffed his cap and trailed after them, pulling their luggage on a rusting trolley up to a small gray Lada that idled curbside. They waited as he deposited the bags in the trunk and nodded at the pleasant-looking young woman who sat behind the wheel of the car.
“Sonia,” he said as he opened the rear door for Lisa and Elaine. “She will be your translator and your driver. Her English is very good.”
He slid into the seat beside her and she turned to look at them.
“I studied at Massachusetts University for two years,” Sonia told them as she maneuvered her way through the maze of morning traffic. “I studied American literature. I very much love Henry James. I am happy to be of service to you. Dr. Gordon. Mrs. Gordon.”
She pronounced their names carefully and Misha beamed at them.
“Thank you,” Lisa said.
She wished she knew more about Henry James. It was important, she thought, that Sonia like her because it was Sonia who would guide her through the minefield of Russian bureaucracy until Genia was safe in her arms, everything settled, the adoption final and irrevocable.
Elaine chatted easily with Sonia and Misha as they drove from the airport to the heart of the city. She admired the Gothic skyscrapers of the Ukrania Hotel and the Foreign Ministry, the wide avenues, the squares that bustled with activity. It was exciting for her to be in their country, she explained because her late husband had been born in Russia.
“My husband’s parents spoke to me often of the beauty of their homeland. They came from a village somewhere near Yaroslavl,” she confided.
“Yaroslavl is a special place,” Sonia said. “It is a river city. It is there that the Volga and Kotorosl rivers meet.”
“Yes. They spoke of a journey on the Volga,” Elaine recalled.
She did not add that Neil’s parents and her own had also spoken of the harsh anti-Semitism they had experienced and the grinding poverty that had spurred their decisions to emigrate. Neil had been very young when they left, perhaps only a year or two older than Genia. It occurred to her that Lisa’s daughter would be the second Gordon child to leave Russia for the United States, an irony that Neil would have appreciated.
“But you never came here with your husband?” Misha asked.
“No. He died before we could plan such a journey,” Elaine replied.
It surprised her that she could speak of Neil’s death, of the forfeit of plans unrealized and journeys never taken, without being pierced by grief. Another mark of recovery, she supposed and wondered at her reluctance to acknowledge the easing of her loss. Did she want to hug her sorrow like those recovering invalids who cling to the symptoms of their illness? Was that, too, a stage of widowhood that Serena’s therapist could identify?
“It is sad that you did not visit Yaroslavl with your husband. But perhaps you will vis
it his village, you and Dr. Gordon. I will be glad to take you there. You have such a long stay in Russia.”
“Perhaps,” Lisa said.
She estimated that they would spend at least six weeks in Russia, accomplishing in a single visit what most adoptive parents accomplished in two separate journeys. Usually, Claire had explained, the first trip was to choose a child while the second one was designed to cope with the legalities. But Lisa had made her choice the moment she saw Genia’s photograph and watched her on the videotape.
Because Genia was an abandoned child no family releases would be required and the adoption would be that much simpler. Still, Lisa’s interactions with the child would have to be observed over a period of time, her dossier studied and she would have to attend a court hearing. And of course when that was done the American embassy would have to authorize a visa.
“If there is time,” Elaine said, “I should love to visit Yaroslavl.”
The thought of visiting the village of Neil’s birth excited her. It would be an opportunity to step into his earliest childhood, to walk the streets that had been so familiar to his parents.
Her own parents had harbored few memories of their own village. When they spoke of it at all, it was with a controlled sadness, their legacy to her. She had been conditioned, from earliest childhood, to exercise emotional restraint. She had organized her life, her family’s life against the encroachment of chaos. Anger had been repressed, all actions and reactions calculated. But somehow that was changing. She felt herself slowly and mysteriously edging free of that carefully constructed carapace. She marveled still at her outburst at Sarah’s seder table, at the daring of her confrontation with Karina. She wondered if Neil would approve or disapprove.
Neil. Tenderly, she turned his name over in her mind, allowed a gentle sorrow to sweep over her and abate, as now she knew it would. She was mastering the lessons of grief. Neil. She wondered if it would be possible to locate his childhood home should they indeed have enough leisure to visit Yaroslavl.
“Oh, we’ll have time for such a visit.” Sonia swerved past the grim façade of the Kiev train station and pulled up in front of the Radisson Hotel. “Time is not in short supply in Russia.”
Misha removed their bags.
“We shall come tomorrow morning to take you to the Children’s Home Number 31. There you will meet the child, Genia.”
“Oh no,” Lisa protested. “We want to see her today. Please come back in two hours. We’re so anxious to meet Genia.”
“It is not a good thing to disrupt the schedule of the Children’s Home,” Sonia said. “The directress of this home is particular about that and you do not want to anger her. She can cause difficulties.”
“There will be no difficulties,” Lisa countered swiftly. “Everything is in order. Claire checked everything.”
Misha sighed.
“In Russia there are always difficulties. And where there are no difficulties they can be created. A directress who is angered can invent a new law or discover an old one and this directress, Irina Petrovna, is a difficult woman. She makes some adoptions very complicated. Sonia is right. It is best not to anger her. But we will try to arrange a meeting today. We will return at three o’clock which is after the children’s naptime and before their dinner. I will call Irina Petrovna and explain how anxious you are to see the child,” he said.
“That sounds fine,” Elaine agreed although Lisa frowned.
Her daughter, Elaine knew, was not used to having her wishes thwarted. Lisa’s staff was obedient, her patients and colleagues deferential. It was difficult for her to understand that in Moscow she was not a distinguished physician vested with authority. She was simply another vulnerable adoptive parent at the mercy of a woman known to be difficult and perhaps arbitrary.
Misha and Sonia drove off and Elaine and Lisa followed the bellhop to the registration desk. Lisa looked at the restaurants and high-end shops that lined the ostentatious lobby. Hotel guests milled about, hurried past the casino and into the health club, speaking too loudly in a mélange of languages.
“I wonder why David insisted that we stay at the Radisson,” she said with some annoyance. “It can’t be for its character.”
“He told me that it has excellent security and that seems to be true.” Elaine pointed to the armed guards posted at the entrance. “David worries about you, Lisa.”
“I know,” Lisa said, smiling. “He worries about everything. About his clients. His pro bono projects. About his own kids, his son, Kenny, his daughter, June, and the impact the divorce had on them. He worries about being away from them so much.”
“And now he’ll worry about Genia.”
“I suppose,” Lisa replied, her words tinged with apprehension.
She was worried, Elaine knew, about the effect that the adoption would have on her relationship with David. She would no longer be a free agent, able to dash down to visit him in Washington at a moment’s notice, to join him on a Caribbean jaunt or at a weekend conference.
“He’s a wonderful man, a caring man,” Elaine said.
“Thanks, Mom.”
Lisa smiled at her, grateful for the words she had not spoken.
Elaine handed their passports and reservation forms to the clerk who looked at them sharply, studied their photographs and nodded slowly. Nothing in Russia, Elaine realized, was taken for granted. Not a hotel reservation and not the appropriate hour to visit a Children’s Home.
“Actually, I don’t want him to worry about Genia. She’ll be my daughter, my responsibility. It’s one thing for David to send box lunches from Zabar’s and arrange for a secure hotel. But for him to worry about yet another child, my child, would be to raise the ante too high. We’re good together, David and I. I wouldn’t want to endanger that,” Lisa added. “We’ll work everything out.”
“I’m sure you will,” Elaine said, surprised by her own certainty.
The clerk gave them their room key and returned their documents and again they followed the bellhop through the thickly carpeted corridor to the elevator and then to a room so ornately furnished that it embarrassed them.
“Are you sure we’re still in Russia?” Elaine asked dryly.
She went to the window and saw that their room overlooked the Kiev Railroad Station. A homeless family squatted at the entrance, their belongings packed into overflowing shopping bags. Their small son thrust his ragged cap at passersby who averted their eyes and hurried on. An old woman wrapped in a tattered shawl ferreted through a trash can and a man, still clutching a half-empty vodka bottle vomited into the street.
“Yes. We are indeed in Russia,” she said and drew the drapes.
They ate a quick lunch and precisely at three o’clock Misha and Sonia returned and once again Elaine and Lisa sat in the rear seat of the Lada. Lisa held the video camera that Claire had suggested she take with her and Elaine carried a shopping bag that contained the red corduroy dress and matching tights for Genia and small gifts for the caregivers. Claire had advised them to take disposable cameras, small bottles of toilet water, brightly colored silk neckerchiefs.
“But don’t give anything to the directress,” she had cautioned. “She might construe it as a bribe and report it to the court. If she’s helpful, you can always send her something when the adoption is finalized. Or you can make a gift to the Home.”
Lisa doubted that they would be sending a gift to the “difficult” Irina Petrovna. The very name already filled her with trepidation. She turned her attention to the passing scene and listened as Sonia pointed out the sights.
“Red Square,” she said. “And just beyond you can see St. Basil’s.”
They glimpsed the cathedral’s swirling domes before the Lada once again lurched forward. They passed the city center and drove past rows of huge apartment buildings constructed of gray concrete blocks scattered across a barren expanse. A few frail, sparsely leafed trees shivered in the wind. Groups of pale children wandered through the courtyards ignoring the
steel slides and the rusting jungle gyms. The women who shuffled down the streets, bent by the weight of their heavy plastic shopping baskets, were sallow-skinned, the kerchiefs that they wrapped too tightly about their heads faded and frayed. Elaine, for whom color was as essential as breath itself, cringed and turned away.
“Grim,” Lisa said.
“Grim and gray,” she agreed.
At last Sonia pulled into a driveway and drove slowly up a long unpaved road. Children wearing identical olive drab snowsuits, dark green woolen hats pulled low over their foreheads, walked single file down the path and looked impassively at the Lada. They did not smile, they did not wave and they moved forward obediently when the red-faced woman who trailed after them shouted a command.
Sonia shook her head.
“Poor things,” she said. “Those are the unfortunate ones. They are too old now. No one will adopt them.”
“What will happen to them?” Lisa asked.
“They will stay here until they are sixteen, perhaps a bit longer and then they must leave.”
“But where do they go?” Elaine asked insistently.
She looked back and saw that one girl still stood on the road, looking wistfully back at their slowly moving car. Abruptly, the child turned and walked on, limping because one foot was an inch shorter than the other. A crippled orphan who would never find a home. Elaine’s throat constricted and her eyes burned.
“Who can tell what will happen to them?” Misha shrugged. “Our streets are filled with young people who have no homes. They become thieves, prostitutes. They drink. They take drugs. And, I, I do not blame them. I pity them.”
“Do you have children, Misha?” Lisa asked.
“One son. He is at school. A very good school. We can care for only one child, his mother and I. We want to be able to afford to educate him well, to give him everything we did not have.”
Elaine thought of her parents, of Neil’s parents. They, too, had opted to have only one child. There would have been no time in their frantic hardworking lives, no room in their tiny apartments, for another child who would have to be provided with everything that they themselves had been denied.
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