“What do you mean, that’s why we’re deported? How do you know?” I asked.
“What does it matter how I know? Your uncle escaped from Lithuania before you were deported.”
“You’re lying.”
“Am I? Your aunt’s maiden name was German. So your uncle’s family escaped, probably repatriated through Germany. Your father helped them. He was part of it. So your family was then put on the list. So your father’s in prison, you’ll die here in arctic hell, and your best friend is probably living it up in America by now.”
What was he saying? Joana escaped and went to America? How could that be possible?
“Repatriate, if they can get away with it,” said my father, stopping abruptly when he saw me in the doorway.
Dear Lina, Now that the Christmas holiday is passed, life seems on a more serious course. Father has boxed up most of his books, saying they take up too much space.
I thought of my last birthday. Papa was late coming to the restaurant.
I told him I had received nothing from Joana. I noticed that he stiffened at the mention of my cousin. “She’s probably just busy,” he had said.
“Sweden is preferable,” said Mother.
“It’s not possible,” said Papa. “Germany is their only choice.”
“Who’s going to Germany?” I yelled from the dining room.
Silence.
“I thought all of Auntie’s family was in Germany,” I said.
“Apparently she has a relative in America. She gets letters from him. He’s in Pennsylvania.”
It was possible.
Joana’s freedom had cost me mine.
“I’d give anything for a cigarette,” said the bald man.
74
“BUT WHY DIDN’T you tell me?”
“We were trying to protect your uncle. They were going to help us,” said Mother.
“Help us what?” asked Jonas.
“Escape,” whispered Mother.
There was no need to lower our voices. Everyone pretended to occupy themselves with their fingernails or clothing, but they could hear every word. Only Janina watched intently. She sat on her knees next to Jonas, swatting lice off her eyebrows.
“When they got to Germany, they were going to process papers for us to try to repatriate as well.”
“What’s repatriate?” asked Janina.
“To go back to where your family is originally from,” I told her.
“Are you German?” she asked Mother.
“No, dear. But my sister-in-law’s family was born in Germany,” said Mother. “We thought we could get papers through them.”
“And Papa helped them? So he was an accessory?” I asked.
“Accessory? He committed no crime, Lina. He helped them. They’re family,” she said.
“So is Joana in Germany?” I asked.
“Most likely,” said Mother. “It all went horribly wrong. After they left, your father received reports in April that the NKVD had entered and searched their house. Someone must have informed the Soviets.”
“Who would do such a thing?” asked Jonas.
“Lithuanians who work with the Soviets. They give information about other people in order to protect themselves.”
Someone hacked and coughed in the hut.
“I can’t believe Joana didn’t tell me,” I said.
“Joana didn’t know! Surely her parents didn’t tell her. They feared she might tell someone. She thought they were going to visit a family friend,” said Mother.
“Andrius said they thought his father had international contacts. Now the Soviets think Papa has communication with someone outside Lithuania,” said Jonas quietly. “That means he’s in danger.”
Mother nodded. Janina got up and lay down next to her mother.
Thoughts swam through my brain. I couldn’t process one before another stepped over it. We were being punished while Joana’s family lived comfortably in Germany. We had given up our lives for theirs. Mother was angry that the bald man had told me. She had trusted him with the secret. He had given it up for five minutes of mittens. Hadn’t Mother and Papa thought to trust us? Did they consider the consequences before they helped them escape? I scratched at the back of my head. Lice were biting a trail down the nape of my neck.
“How selfish! How could they do this to us?” I said.
“They had to give up things, too,” said Jonas.
My mouth fell open. “What do you mean?” I asked. “They gave up nothing! We gave it all for them.”
“They gave up their home, Uncle gave up his store, Joana gave up her studies.”
Her studies. Joana wanted to be a doctor as much as I wanted to be an artist. Although I could still draw, she could not pursue medicine with a war raging in Germany. Where was she? Did she know what had happened to us? Had the Soviets managed to keep the deportations a secret from the world? If so, how long would that last? I thought of the American supply ship, sailing away. Would anyone think to look for us in the Siberian Arctic? If Stalin had his way, we’d be entombed in the ice and snow.
I got my paper. I sat near the firelight of the stove. Anger sizzled within me. It was so unfair. But I couldn’t hate Joana. It wasn’t her fault. Whose fault was it? I drew two hands clutching on to each other, yet pulling apart. I drew a swastika on her palm and the hammer and sickle on top of my hand, the Lithuanian flag shredded and falling in between.
I heard a scraping sound. The man who wound his watch carved a small piece of wood with his knife. The logs popped, spitting ashes out of the barrel.
“It looks scratched,” said Jonas. He sat cross-legged on my bed, looking at one of the Munch prints I had received from Oslo.
“It is. He used his palette knife to scrape texture into the canvas,” I said.
“It makes her look ... confused,” said Jonas. “If it weren’t scratched, she would look sad. But the scratches make confusion.”
“Exactly,” I said, using long strokes to comb through my warm, clean hair. “But to Munch, that made the painting feel alive. He was a confused man. He didn’t care about proportion, he wanted it to feel real.”
Jonas flipped to the next print. “Does this feel real to you?” he said, his eyes wide.
“Definitely,” I told him. “That’s called Ashes.”
“I don’t know about real. Maybe real scary,” said Jonas as he got up to leave. “You know, Lina, I like your paintings better than these. These are too weird. Good night.”
“Good night,” I said. I took the papers and flopped down on my bed, sinking into my puffy goose-down duvet. A comment in the margin from an art critic read, “Munch is primarily a lyric poet in color. He feels colors, but does not see them. Instead, he sees sorrow, crying, and withering.”
Sorrow, crying, and withering. I saw that in Ashes, too. I thought it was brilliant.
Ashes. I had an idea. I grabbed a stick from next to the stove. I peeled back the outer skin to reveal the pulp. I separated the fibers, forming bristles. I grabbed a handful of snow from outside the door and carefully mixed in ashes from the barrel. The color was uneven, but made a nice gray watercolor.
75
NOVEMBER CAME. Mother’s eyes lacked their wink and sparkle. We had to work harder for her smile. It came only when her chin rested on the heel of her hand or when Jonas mentioned Papa in our evening prayers. Then she would lift her face, the corners of her mouth turned up with hope. I worried for her.
At night, I closed my eyes and thought of Andrius. I saw his fingers raking through his disheveled brown hair, his nose tracing a line down my cheek the night before we left. I remembered his wide smile when he teased me in the ration line. I saw his tentative eyes, handing me Dombey and Son, and his reassurance as the truck pulled away. He said he’d find me. Did he know where they had taken us? That they laughed and wagered upon our deaths? Find me, I whispered.
The man who wound his watch looked at the sky. He said a storm was coming. I believed him, not because of the pale gray of the sky, but because of the bustle of the NKVD. They shouted at us. Their “davais” pushed with an urgency. Even Ivanov was upon us. Normally, he shouted orders from afar. Today, he hastened to and from the barrack, coordinating every effort.