by Serhiy Zhadan; Reilly Costigan-Humes; Isaac Stackhouse Wheeler
“All righty now.”
“All righty now,” Nina says, standing over him. “All righty now.”
Pasha shakes his head, quickly gets up.
“Go to the kitchen,” she tells Pasha. “Grab something for the road. I’ll talk to him.” She points at the compartment door.
“I’ll do it myself,” Pasha replies. “I’ll talk to him myself.”
“You’ll get to talk to him. You’ll have plenty of time to talk.”
Pasha gets up, goes upstairs, walks down the hallway.
The gym teacher is sitting by the window, reading some newspaper. The fog outside the window begins breaking into pieces, and when another piece comes off and is carried away by the wind, the cafeteria lights up—and he can read the next page. Then a new patch of damp gloom creeps along, and the gym teacher sets his newspaper aside. He sits, waits. He looks as if he’s mulling over what he’s read. He’s extended his legs toward the potbelly stove, trying to warm up. His black coat, still so damp, hangs above it. The coat dangles from an old broom, the sleeves drooping, empty and hopeless. It looks like the outlaw who was hung on the cross about thirty-three years or so after the birth of Christ. His wet hat hangs nearby, too. A teapot smokes on the kitchen stove; the gym teacher occasionally pours some more hot water into his mug of strong tea. Pasha enters, stops in the doorway, thinking he may have come at the wrong time, but the gym teacher immediately waves him over amicably. C’mon, take a seat by the fire. Pasha walks over, smiles at him like they’re old friends, and rests his foot on an upside-down crate. The firewood crackles dryly, the fog outside the window hovers whitely. One might think that they’re simply snowed in at a hotel in the mountains. And they have plenty of time and firewood to warm up and steady themselves for their long journey. Only thing is, the explosions somewhere out there, beyond the fog, won’t abate. And when you turn your head, your eyes land on a mountain of unwashed dishes that have been in the sink for who knows how long. But if you don’t look at them, if you don’t listen to the artillery firing into the city, if you only look at the stove, for instance, you feel a sense of serenity and security. The only thing that can scare you is the crucified coat looming up above. Death’s somewhere nearby, just biding its time.
“Want some tea?” the gym teacher asks.
Pasha nods. He finds his mug—the brewed tea has gone cold—pours some hot water into it, and wraps his hands around the mug, trying to warm up. The metal is instantly hot, making Pasha’s hands hot, too, yet he keeps holding it, not wanting to let go of this metal hunk of heat. The gym teacher’s stroking his mustache somewhat comically, like they do in the movies, and he invites Pasha to sit down again. Pasha waves preemptively. Nah, I’ll stand. Let’s hear it.
“Where you from?” the gym teacher asks. “The Station?”
His Russian is strange: proper, more or less, and with no Ukrainian mixed in, but it isn’t homegrown. Around here, foremen at mines, Party organizers at meetings, or cops at police stations talk like that. It’s the language of not particularly well-educated people who speak about important state matters, and since they’re afraid of saying the wrong thing they mostly speak in clichés. Pasha’s used to this kind of Russian; he can speak it too. Nonetheless, Valera makes bureaucrat-speak sound pretty nice, like a retired general telling his grandchildren heroic tales of his life, taking some parts from general staff data and embellishing the rest.
“Yeah, from the Station,” Pasha says. “I’m from the Station.”
“I was born here,” Valera continues, with satisfaction. “Near the hospital for employees of our local railroad station. Twenty minutes from here at a brisk walk. I remember when they built this orphanage. It was in the early to mid-seventies. We were attending secondary school at the time. We’d run over here and steal building materials.”
“Why?” Pasha asks, confused.
“We didn’t have any toys,” the gym teacher explains.
He’s in a warm gray turtleneck sweater and black dress pants, which he apparently wears to work, with blue sweatpants sticking out (he probably wears them to work, too). He’s kicked off his boots and slipped on some rubber sandals. “It’s a shame we don’t have a gym teacher like him at our school,” Pasha thinks. They weren’t blessed with a great gym teacher. For starters, she’s a woman (yells all the time, never listens, same old story), and she fled last fall, too, when the city was being surrounded. Pasha was even forced to fill in for her a few times, but nothing good came of that. He wore his heavy winter boots to gym class, didn’t have any athletic shoes. This made the high schoolers mad. Pasha could sense that, so one time he went down to the principal’s office, showed her his hand, and said that he was going to file a complaint, that it just wasn’t right they were making him, a guy with a health problem, spin around on the pull-up bar. The principal got scared, but not for Pasha with his stiff fingers who was forced to risk his life on the pull-up bar. She was covering her own ass, since Pasha really could file a complaint. “Basically, it’s a shame that we don’t have a gym teacher like him,” Pasha thinks, the hot water burning his lips. “Going to the teacher’s lounge wouldn’t be so bad then.”
“Been here awhile?” Pasha asks.
“I started immediately after receiving my degree in physical education,” the gym teacher replies. “I’m a seasoned educator. I’ve outlasted them all,” he adds, now using his own words. “Everyone took off, you see. Nina’s the only one who stuck around. I’m committed to giving my younger colleagues the benefit of my experience.”
“Gotcha,” Pasha replies approvingly. “Some good kids you got here, too.”
“Yeah, we have a good crew here. Broken homes, juvenile delinquency, falling in with the wrong crowd. Parents suffering from alcoholism, unfavorable societal circumstances. Nobody wants anything to do with them,” Valera adds, using his own words again. “They get dropped off here like puppies at a shelter. Responsibility is reassigned to the teaching staff.”
“Like that only happens here,” Pasha chimes in. “That’s how it goes at every school. Nobody wants anything to do with them. Who takes care of them? Couldn’t tell you. Why did their parents have them? Nobody knows.”
“They had them to continue their lineage,” the gym teacher explains, then pauses to think. “We had it good. Like, back in the seventies, when they charged us with theft of the people’s property.”
Pasha looks at him, confused. Whose property?
“I mean the building materials,” the gym teacher explains. “We faced a jury of our comrades. In an auditorium at the warehouse complex. They dragged our parents down there. Our teachers and Party leaders came, too. And they really started laying into us, with the gloves off. Threatening us, blackmailing us, saying they were gonna lock us up for a long time. After all, we weren’t kids anymore. We were going through a rebellious phase, adapting to the demands of society. We weren’t afraid, though. It’s strange—I’m thinking back to what I felt. We weren’t the least bit scared. We knew that nothing bad would happen to us. They’d give us a little scare and then let us go. Because the whole country, with all its factories, mines, and Party program, was behind us. And nobody would turn us in. Knowing that is very important. Especially when you’re a teenager. Don’t you think?”
“Yeah,” Pasha agrees.
“Well, we all just got lucky. We had a good country and a good childhood.”
“But no toys . . .”
“Yeah, we didn’t have toys, but we had a country. A good country. Not the worst one out there. At least it raised kids. It raised me, for instance. And I wasn’t afraid of anything. I grew up here and came back after receiving my degree in physical education,” the gym teacher reminds Pasha. “I’m committed to giving my younger colleagues the benefit of my experience. Just so you know, I’m not going anywhere. That’s how I was raised. In that other country. Everyone took off, but I stuck around.”
“Nina stuck around, too,” Pasha reminds him.
“Yeah.
Why’d I stick around? Why didn’t I run away? Because I don’t have anything to be afraid of. I don’t stir things up. I just do my job. Why should I be afraid? Right?”
Pasha nods silently. Obviously, he agrees. Naturally, he agrees. He’s the same way. He’s always done his job; he didn’t run away. “Why should I be afraid?” Pasha asks himself. “I have nothing to be afraid of, I didn’t do anything wrong, it’s not my fault,” he answers himself. “I didn’t ask anyone to come here, I didn’t kick anyone out. I just do my job. I just teach kids how to write properly. I’d say that’s much more important than standing around at checkpoints. Checkpoints get taken down, but grammar rules remain. So don’t direct your complaints at me. Or at him,” Pasha thinks. “He stuck around. He’s definitely not going anywhere. He really will outlast everyone. He’ll live forever. I love people like him,” Pasha thinks, getting all emotional. The hot tea and the cozy afternoon fire have made him sentimental. He hasn’t felt this calm in a long time.
Nina comes in. She frostily wraps a blanket around herself, sticks her pointy nose in the bowls and mugs, counts the canned goods, walks over to the stove, extends her arms, and warms her red hands. Valera notices her but doesn’t really pay any attention to her, like she isn’t even here. And she isn’t saying anything; it seems as if she isn’t listening to them either. She’s thinking her own thoughts, warming her hands. When Valera stops talking, the explosions and crackling gunfire out the window become more distinct. It’s as if someone has opened the doors of a warm, sleepy train compartment on to the noisy hallway. Valera is impatient for the conversation to resume.
“Who’s gonna answer for all this?” he asks, waving his hand around. “Nobody. You’ll see, they won’t find the guilty parties.”
“They’ll make us the guilty parties,” Pasha contends.
“No, they won’t,” the gym teacher objects, confidently. “Don’t think so. Whoever started all of this has to answer for it. Personally, I’d like to see how they get themselves out of this one. I’ll be really interested to see how they get themselves out of this one.”
“It’s not the first time for them,” Pasha says.
“Sure isn’t.” The gym teacher takes his pack of cigarettes out of his coat pocket and lights one in the stove, leaning in sharply and nearly burning his eyelashes off.
“You’re right, though. Obviously they’re gonna try and pin it all on us, on the people who stuck around. Yeah, that’s how it’ll play out, for sure. But no way in hell are they gonna pin anything on me!” Valera says heatedly, and all his impenetrable canned phrases disappear instantly. “Not gonna happen! I don’t have anything to do with all this! And they don’t either!” He points at some place behind Pasha. He even looks around, but nobody’s there, obviously: hallway twilight, the cafeteria walls painted blue. But it’s clear that the gym teacher is talking about the kids, about the ones who took off and the ones who stuck around. “They don’t have anything to do with all this either. I feel sorry for them, Pasha. You believe me?”
“I do.”
“Yeah, I do feel sorry for them. They were born at the wrong time and in the wrong country. They’re not like us. We have something to remember.” The gym teacher enjoys a kind, carefree laugh, and Pasha can’t help but crack a smile. “We had a real country, we didn’t have to be afraid. Thinking about my childhood always makes me smile. I’m serious. You believe me?”
“I do.”
“What about you?” he asks Pasha contentiously.
“Me too. It makes me smile, too.”
“What about you, Nina?” The gym teacher finally acknowledges his boss. “Does thinking about your childhood make you smile?”
Nina keeps looking at the fire, as if she didn’t hear the question. And then she answers.
“No. It doesn’t. All I remember about my childhood is that hungry feeling in my stomach.”
“Well, everyone had it rough—” the gym teacher counters.
But Nina curtly interrupts him.
“Not everyone did. Far from everyone. I had it real rough. I didn’t have anything to eat. And my mom didn’t have anything to eat either. Even though she was growing up when you were out stealing building materials. He told you about that, right?” she asks Pasha.
“Yeah,” Pasha says, flustered.
The gym teacher sneers but doesn’t say anything.
“Don’t sneer at me.” Nina continues to talk in a calm, flat voice, as though she’s confessing to mortal sins and knows perfectly well what awaits her. “Nobody died of starvation, as you can see, but I don’t have any nice memories of my so-called childhood. Do you know what my nickname was at school, Valera? As a gym teacher, you’ll find it interesting. ‘The Athlete.’”
“Why?” Pasha asks, surprised.
“Because I always wore sneakers. Summer and winter. One of my neighbors gave them to me. My father was out of the picture, and I won’t even tell you what my mom did for a living. She didn’t make much money doing it, though. And she grew up without a father, too. And she wore hand-me-downs all through her childhood, too. And she didn’t have any nice memories about her so-called childhood either. You know why you weren’t afraid? It wasn’t because you lived in a wonderful country, it was because somebody was always covering for you—whether it was your parents or the Communist Youth League. Thing is, nobody covered for me. And nobody’ll cover for them,” she says, pointing at the blue walls behind Pasha and Valera. “Nobody besides us. But that doesn’t mean they should be afraid. They shouldn’t have to be afraid. All of our experience and all of our grown-up knowledge isn’t worth a penny if they are. Not a penny.”
Nina quiets down. Flustered, Pasha and the gym teacher keep silent, too. They don’t have anything to say, they aren’t ready. The firewood cracks off dry shots in the stove, and once again the explosions in the foggy mush become more distinct.
“And one more thing,” Nina adds. “Valera, you say that you don’t have anything to do with this. When’s the last time you voted?”
“I don’t do that, Nina,” the gym teacher replies defiantly.
“And do you know who our deputy is?”
“I have no clue.”
“And you don’t have any idea what side he’s fighting for, do you?”
“No,” Valera answers honestly. At this point, Pasha still likes what he’s hearing.
“Then how can you blame anyone for this? On what grounds?” Nina asks. “What right do you have to air your grievances? Do you know your students’ parents, or what’s going on in their heads? Do you know where their parents are right now? What they’ve been doing? Who’s been buried this past year? Them passing their physical fitness tests—that’s what you care most about, right?”
“What do physical fitness tests have to do with this?” Valera asks, a little flustered.
“Everything. Yeah, you’re always reminiscing about when things were good, nice and calm, when you weren’t afraid. Then why are all of you so scared now?”
“I’m not scared.”
“You are, though. You might not be afraid of getting blown up, but you’re afraid of telling it like it is. And you’re afraid of telling them the truth,” Nina says, pointing at something behind Valera and Pasha. “That’s a lot harder than reminiscing about your happy childhood.”
“That’s not what Valera was talking about—” Pasha tries to stick up for the gym teacher, but Nina interrupts him quietly yet firmly.
“That’s exactly what he was talking about—about fear and irresponsibility. And you, Pasha, do you talk to your kids about the war?”
“I’m a language teacher,” Pasha replies.
“Do you realize that half of their parents are fighting? Do you have any idea about that?”
“Well, yeah,” Pasha says tentatively.
“And do you have any idea that some of them are fighting against you? Against us,” she corrects herself.
“Nobody’s fighting against me,” Pasha objects coldly, beginn
ing to enjoy this conversation less and less. “I’m not on anyone’s side.”
“Well, when they’re shooting at your nephew—are you still not on anyone’s side? When shells hit the orphanage where he lives? Who are they fighting against, then? Against me?”