“Return to school right now, and never look for boys in the woods again!” She shook me. “Do you hear me?”
Inna Boiko turned away as if to give Mama some privacy to discipline me.
“But, Mama. You don’t understand,” I protested. “Nina Ivanovna let us out early today, because of the fire.”
Mama stared blankly at me. “Why?”
As weak as my explanation was, I felt superior as I offered it. “Radiation. The air,” I said.
“Nothing’s wrong with the air,” she said. “It’s easy to get a good tan today.[4] Look,” she pointed at her dark shoulders, mottled with freckles. “So you really don’t have school?”
“No,” I assured her.
Inna Boiko turned back to us now, and when she spoke up, I knew that she had been listening all along. “My Boris must be at the station by now.” Her face was stricken with worry. “Did your teacher say anything else?” Mama asked.
I saw the confusion in her eyes, and I was afraid.
“Not really,” I said. “But a man came to our classroom to talk to her. He had a star on his uniform.” I was proud of myself for recalling this particular detail.
Inna Boiko caught Mama’s eye. “Maybe the chemical protection unit. You know the force that Oleksandr Bilozir’s first cousin trained for.”
“Well,” Mama said, “go change into your gardening clothes. We have some planting to do.”
That’s when I remembered my father. “How is Papa?”
“Still asleep. So be quiet.”
As I walked towards the cottage, I heard my mother sigh and begin speaking to Inna Boiko, “Granny Vera filled Katya’s head with so much nonsense. She plays with wood sprites and elves, and now a boy in the woods. At least, I hope the boy is make-believe. I don’t know what we’re going to do with that child. She can’t tell the difference between the truth and her imagination.”
“Better you than me,” Inna Boiko answered. “I’d spank a girl for that.”
My own mother had refused to listen to me. But as I walked inside the cottage, I was angriest with Inna Boiko. I wanted to tell her, I wouldn’t be your daughter-in-law if you begged me.
After I had changed, I stopped by to see Noisy. He was chained underneath the oak tree. He jumped up and licked me all over. It didn’t matter, since I already felt sticky with pine gum and sap.
“Katya, come on,” Mama called.
I walked over to the garden gate and lifted the latch. Mama was on her hands and knees, digging in some of the prettiest dirt I’d ever seen. It was deep brown, like chocolate. Not sticky or chunky with clay, it was so fine that it poured through my fingers. She handed me a glass jar of russet carrot seeds and pointed towards the far end of the garden. “I thought we’d plant our carrots over there.”
Breathing in the earthy smell of grass, manure and animals, I picked up a trowel, crawled over to the spot she’d indicated and began digging. I had been told over and over that my ancestors had been farmers for generations, and I felt like I was born knowing how deep to plant a carrot seed in the dirt. “What’s for lunch?” I asked.
“Shush.” My mother pointed at the bush on the side of our cottage.
The first nightingale that I had heard that spring was trilling away.
Both my mother and I stopped digging and listened.
My mother’s eyes held a faraway look as if she were trying to view the world from the nightingale’s eyes.
After the bird was quiet, Mama said, “I think it’s a sad song.”
“Why, Mama?”
Ignoring my question, Mama asked, “What do you think the bird is singing about?”
“I think it’s just happy to be right here in the Ukraine.”
Mama laughed. “You are your father’s daughter—so patriotic.”
Both Mama and Papa were members of the Communist Party. But I always sensed that only Papa was proud to be a Communist. Once on a meeting day, Mama had urged Papa to go on without her. She claimed to be sick. Later, I saw her working in the garden. When I heard her humming happily as she weeded the radishes, I was certain she had lied.
“You don’t really find the bird’s song sad, do you?” I asked.
“Sometimes.” Mama wiped the sweat off her forehead with the back of her hand. “I don’t think our country is as perfect as you and your father do.”
I had no idea what Mama meant. I knew for a fact that the nightingale loved our garden. But, for once, I was too absorbed in my task to ask questions. I dug a shallow hole in the earth and poured a few seeds in my cupped palm. I picked up one between my thumb and forefinger and stared at the small brown speck, not much bigger than a flea.
I dropped the seed into the hole and pushed the good earth over it. Was it magic or science that would cause this little seed to grow into a carrot? I let the earth flow through my fingers and decided the dirt in Ukraine is magic dirt. This black soil is so rich all things grow well. In just a few months, the green carrot tops would be the length of my fingers.
“Do you think Papa will wake up soon?” I asked.
Almost as soon as the words were out of my mouth, we saw him standing straight and tall in the doorway. Dressed in camouflage, his bulk filled the entire space.
“Where’s my lunch?” he bellowed in his usual voice.
“Papa,” I yelled. “You’re well!”
“I’m better,” he said. But when I flew out the garden to him and threw my arms around his neck, he staggered backwards.
Never one to show any weakness, Papa ruffled my hair and said, “Katya, you caught me off guard.”
As I explained what I was doing home from school, his eyebrows knit closer and closer together. One hand curled into a fist. Mama joined us at the door.
“Natasha,” he said to Mama. “Before I eat, I’m going to try to get in touch with the station. My boss may need me to come in early.”
“Ivan, please tell Hryhory Larin that you are sick, and take a day off,” Mama said. She was wiping her hands on her canvas work apron.
“Have you listened to the radio this morning?” Papa asked her.
“No,” Mama shook her head. “I’ve been planting. We’ve gotten the cabbages, cucumbers, and tomatoes in. We need your help to finish the carrots, sorrel and peppers.”
Normally at the mention of all these fresh vegetables, Papa would start talking about the feasts that we would have this summer: the salo—pig fat, salted and spiced—the new potatoes dripping in butter, the borsch made from homegrown beets and the piping hot apple pie topped with homemade sour cream. But now he turned to go inside.
“You need to help your mother in the garden, Katya,” Papa reminded me as he entered the cottage.
Desperate to prove that I was a good girl, I called out to his broad back. “Yes, Papa.”
Chapter Nine
AFTER DINNER, I SAT AT MY NEW DESK. The pieces of the Russian doll were strewn in front of me. I tossed its blue box and, sadly, began reassembling the doll without its baby.
Right when I had begun to twist the schoolgirl doll back together, Noisy let out a series of unusually loud barks. Noisy had a special bark for my father’s car, for strangers and for our family. Tonight, he was barking because he wanted my parents’ attention.
I listened more closely and heard voices. Curious, I abandoned the matryoshka, unfinished, on my desk.
The main room of our cottage was empty. The magazines—Rabotnitsa, Working Woman, Krestjanka and Farm-girl—which my mother loved for their patterns were spread out at her place on the table. Papa’s gun was on the table, and on the floor was the oily rag that he used for cleaning it.
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