1

A Collective Farm outside of Moscow
1956

Mama shouted.

Marina slipped past her and scrambled over the hearth. Papa couldn't protect her when Mother shouted like that; he couldn't protect himself. Safety waited under the table. Careful not to disturb Papa’s icon of Christ, she lifted the faded linen tablecloth and scuttled underneath. The dirty floor was rough, but she was practiced at scooting back against the wall without getting a sliver.

Mother shouted again. "Vam idiot dyrak!”

“I’m not an idiot,” Papa said. "I won't do it."

"No, Papa," Marina whispered. He shouldn't argue when Mother shouts. He shouldn't make her angrier. She hurt him the last time. She sliced him.

Marina hated the memory. The village healer had to come and bandage Papa's arm. It was the first time she ever felt shame for her Papa. She overheard the healer scold him, calling him a weakling to let Mother rule him. The healer said the neighbors laughed at Papa because he wasn't a man.

Marina hated the village healer now. She didn't want her back here. Papa, don't make Mother angry.

Red-hot coals sizzled in the fireplace, but a cold wind penetrated the wall behind her. She stuffed the hem of her dress in her mouth to keep her teeth from chattering.

“Vam idiot dyrak! You've humiliated me again," Mother yelled. "You're nobody. You're the low nothing of a man."

"I am SOMETHING!" Papa roared in a voice Marina didn't recognize. "No more tests on my daughter!"

The tests! Would Papa protect her from them at last? Marina hated the gray-haired man in the long white coat who stabbed needles into her head. She would cry out in pain, unable to help herself. She would scream until she went to sleep. The pain would still be there when Mother woke her, even though the needles were gone. Mother would shush her and tell her to be a good girl, a quiet girl. Marina would smell burning straw for days, and the other children would know what had happened to her when they saw the bruises on her face and the fresh shaved spots on her head. They said she deserved the punishment. They suffered the needles only once. But Marina had it done over and over again. She wondered why Papa allowed it. Now would he finally stop them from punishing her?

Soaked in the shadowed light shining through the worn tablecloth, she shivered so badly the skin on her back felt as if it might peel from scraping the wall. She changed her mind about Papa being quiet and now wanted to yell, Yes Papa! Be brave this time. Tell Mother, no more tests!

"You stupid little man," Mother shouted, her big feet spread wide. "Don't you understand what these tests mean?"

Papa stepped back and bumped the table. Marina gasped. She imagined the icon wobbling on the tabletop. The icon kept them safe and fed. It kept the monsters who scratched at the window at night from hurting her. Papa promised it always would. But if it fell and broke, who would protect them?

She held her breath and waited for the icon to topple over and roll off the table. She peaked out from underneath the tablecloth, hoping to catch it if it fell. Mother leaned toward Papa. Her eyes bulged from her head.

"The tests show that at five years old she is already a prodigy," Mother said. "How often must I explain this to you, idiot. With a prodigy we can leave here. We can leave this, this plywood yurt. We won't have to plant potatoes in spring or break our backs in the summer. We won't have to freeze in this winter's hell. We'll live as we did before the war, before you turned into an imbecile."

Papa spoke, but Mother raised her voice over his. "You listen good, Anton. You will send a letter to Comrade Kurenkov, and you tell him you made a mistake."

"I will not." Papa’s shoes stepped closer to Mother. "I will take my daughter away."

"What? What did you say?"

"I'll take her away. You will be left behind here. We’ll go far away, where you can't--"

Mother shrieked. Papa cried out. His legs crumpled, and he thumped to the floor. His muddy shoes slammed against the coal box next to the door. A knife dropped beside him. Marina clasped her hands tight across her mouth and stared in horror at the blood sopping into the dirty floorboards. A terrible smell mixed with the rising dust. So much blood. So thick. So red. Creeping like sticky syrup across the floor.

Her mother's feet stomped away from the table.

Marina wondered if she should pour the pitcher of blessed water over Papa to help him. But Mother needed time to lose her rage. Papa had explained it to Marina many times: Hide until you're sure Mother is herself again. She listened for sounds of Mother's anger. It was dead quiet.

Refusing to look at Papa, she closed her eyes. The room was so still she could hear the wind breaking the icicles hanging from the roof outside. She heard faint bubbles in her chest. No. The sound was not from her breathing. She opened her eyes and gulped for air. Papa, laying on his stomach, stretched out his hand toward her. A single tear trickled down his cheek. "Help me, Masha," he wheezed.

Marina tried to retreat, bumping her head on the underside of the table.

"Look what you made me do. You stupid fool," her mother whispered.

She inched forward. An explosion from the far side of the room shook the house; just as when the farmers shot crows from the sky. She jumped and slammed her shoulder against the leg of the table, then braced herself until the thunder in her ears stopped. She waited for Papa to move. He didn't. She listened for Mother to tell her to come out. Mother didn't speak.

Marina hugged her knees. Icy wind sang through the crack in the wall behind her. The room grew dark.

Marina opened her eyes. Men in uniformed trousers spoke in rough voices. Bright lights skittered across the splintered floor and through the thin tablecloth. Heavy boots treaded through the room and passed within inches of where she hid under the table--trapped.

Marina tried to be invisible.

She ducked her head low to see under the tablecloth. A dark red-brown stain covered the spot where Papa had laid. A man passed by. His boot struck something on the floor and sent it skittering under the table. It spun next to her, then came to a rest. The ceramic arm of Christ.

The icon. It was broken! Marina gasped and then covered her mouth.

Men's boots marched from the door to the fireplace to the sofa bed and back to the table. She wanted to cry for her papa but fear stopped her. A man's voice rose above the others. He sounded angry. Marina wondered when Papa would come for her.

"Well?" the man standing closest to the table asked. The scruffy boots stood like a giant V, his heels together, his toes apart.

"I am sorry, Comrade Chief, but she is nowhere to be found," somebody at the door said.

"What do you mean NOWHERE?"

"We've checked the grounds and there's no sign of her."

"Check again, cretin!"

"Problem?" another man said approaching the table. A perfect fold creased down the center of his black trousers.

"No problem, Comrade Prosecutor Kurenkov. We are not equipped with the tools your Militia in Moskva has but I assure you a five-year-old cannot have gone far."

"Indeed, Comrade... Chief. Or it would seem she has disgraced your little quorum."

The brown scruffy boots slid together, toes touching. "We will find her."

"Her parents?"

"Comrades Anton Abramov and Parfenia Abramova. Anton was once a prominent engineer but no soldier. Time on the front broke him. Even as a peasant farmer, he was no longer a man. His wife beat him often. It seems she stabbed him then shot herself."

"How did this family come to possess such a weapon?"

"After the war Abramov kept it as a souvenir?"

"The bullets?"

"A mystery, Comrade Prosecutor, but I promise you --"

"Be careful what you promise, Comrade Chief." A short thin cigar landed near his shiny boots. "Not all things can be reasoned even with proof." One boot lifted then crunched the cigar into the floorboards, a sound similar to grinding salt in the mill.

"Comrade Chief," somebody called from the door. "We've located a neighbor who's willing to talk but won't come inside. He doesn't want any of the other neighbors seeing him."

"Please excuse me, Comrade Prosecutor Kurenkov?"

"Of course. I am your guest. Carry on as if I were not present."

The man with the shiny boots and creased trousers stayed where he was while the other man's scuffed boots shambled across the floor. Marina wrapped her hands around the rear-left leg of the table and stared. The cold chill blowing in from the open door was unparalleled to the fear blowing like the wind off the snow-fields across her chest.

The man, whose voice she recognized from earlier that day, took two steps toward the door, then as if twirling on ice, he turned, crouched low, and peered into her face. Her fear vanished. His hair was the color of dry corn stalks. His gentle eyes, the color of the blue flowers she picked in the meadow in spring--a blue that looked to be mixed with milk--gazed at her with such kindness she could not look away.

"Zdravstvuyte," he said in a soft, gentle voice. He reached out a hand. "Come to me."

Not certain why, she hesitated. She wiped at the tears, sticky on her cheeks, and wished Papa or Mother would come back for her. Surely Papa would not break his promise?

"What is your name, little one?"

"Marina Antonovna," she whispered.

"What happened here, Marina Antonovna? What did you see with your pretty gray eyes?"

She shrugged.

"Did your mother and father argue?"

"Papa did something bad."

The milky-blue eyes focused deep on hers.

"Papa argued." She pressed her chin to her knees and looked down. "Mother hurt him." Marina felt her lip quiver, but the man spoke her name. She had to look into his eyes again.

"How?" he asked.

Marina didn't want to remember.

"How did she--your mother--hurt your papa?"

"A knife. Then a bang. It hurt my ears. Where are they?"

The man looked sad. "Your mother is dead, I'm afraid. Did you see her stab your papa?"

Marina shook her head.

"Did he speak afterwards?"

She nodded and tried not to cry.

"What did he say?"

She swallowed. "Papa said ... 'help'."

"He asked for your help?"

She nodded.

"Did you help Papa?"

Marina felt her cheeks warm. "I was afraid."

The man looked away, and she wondered if she'd done a bad thing. What if he left her now? She hoped he would ask her again to come out from under the table.

“I know you are frightened, and I will not lie to you." He looked back at her. "Papa is badly hurt. But you must not worry. If you obey, one day he will come for you. Meanwhile, I will protect you. Come to me." He stretched his hand out further. "There will be no more tests. No more going to sleep tired or hungry. Come to me, Marina Antonovna, and I will take care of you.”

Marina felt frozen to her spot though she wanted more than anything to move.

"Do you know what a prodigy is, little one?"

She remembered Papa telling her she was special, but she didn't answer this man.

"No? I'll tell you then. Come to me, Marina Antonovna. Come out here so I can see how special you are. Come out here and I will make sure you never have to hide under a table again."

“Obeshchanie," she whispered. She wanted a promise.

“Come to me.”

Marina inched out from underneath the table and toward the stranger. He smelled like the Bliny pancakes her mother served with sour cream and black caviar. Her hand disappeared inside his large warm hands. Still crouched low he gazed at her dress, her thick stockings, and the long strands of hair hanging in her face, then directly into her eyes. "Do you know what day it is?”

Marina shook her head.

“Do you know why this day is special?"

Still unable to take her eyes off his, she shook her head again. She liked listening to his words, spoken as softly to her as he had spoken to her mother this morning. She wondered if he had seen her after all. Afraid to anger her mother she hadn’t stood close enough to hear his words, though her mother must have been pleased. She'd smiled so timidly.

"Today is the 27th of January and the year is 1956." His soft voice made her sleepy. He looked like Jesus with short hair. "Remember this date, little one. Today your life begins. But most important, remember because I did not desert you like my papa deserted me--like your papa deserted you … you belong to me forever.”