The Language of Sisters (40 page)

“Hi, Toni.”

“Hi, Nick.”

And that was it. As if we were strangers, nothing to each other. I watched him climb up the stairs of the marina to the parking lot, not caring if he knew I was staring, like a stalker. I wanted to race after him and hug him, kiss him, tell him to be careful, but I didn't. What if he didn't come back? What if one of the drug dealers got him? What if he was shot?

I started to shake. I went out to my back deck, grabbed a blanket along the way, and stared at the river. Dixie swooped through the sky like a blue friend. I stared across the river at the new home for Big Teeth and Big Tooth Beavers.

Mr. and Mrs. Quackenbusch climbed up. They quacked at me. I didn't even have the energy to quack back. I called in sick.

* * *

About one o'clock in the morning, about a week later, I heard Nick's footsteps on the dock. I wasn't asleep, because insomnia's claw was stuck in my throat.

Nick was home. Safe.

His footsteps did not falter in front of my tugboat.

I felt empty. Numb. All the light was gone.

Again.

I miss Marty, not Nick,
I corrected myself. Marty.

Nick.

Miserable.

* * *

The next day, at sunset, I saw a golden staircase in the distance. It touched down on the river, then tunneled to the sky, the puffy clouds a welcoming door to heaven.

I turned away.

* * *

Ailani bounced up to me at Koa's birthday party. I was sitting on the sofa, growling back at Koa, who was dressed as a furry green monster with claws.

Balloons and streamers were all over, and Valerie had made a monster cake. The green monster on top of the cake appeared stoned, the eyes super wide and slightly crossed, the smile crooked. All the Kozlovskys were there, plus neighbors and friends. It was mobbed.

“Did you know, Aunt Toni, that the human body has six quarts of blood in it and a body can bleed out in a minute, like all your blood could go flowing out?”

“You're ten years old, Ailani.” I tried not to laugh. “Do you really want to think about stuff like that?”

She seemed confused. She put her hands on my knees and leaned in, her black braids swinging. “What else am I supposed to think about?”

“Books. Sports. Cooking with Grandma. A body bleeding out is not a vision I want you to go to sleep with.”

More confusion, then aha! Her face lit up. “Okay. I have something else to talk about.”

“Super.” I put my hands on hers, then growled back at Koa. “Let's have it.”

“I heard my mother talking last night on the phone. Did you know that one out of three murders are never solved? That means someone gets away with it. A whole bunch of people. What do you think of that?”

“I think it's depressing. Do you want another hot dog?”

“No. There are a lot of mysterious murders. Some people die because of guns, a whole lot, but some are from knives and some are”—she put her hands around her neck and squeezed and stuck her tongue out to the side—“because they get strangled, but I like DNA evidence. That'll catch 'em.”

“I bet you know all about DNA.”

“I do!” She jumped up and down and grinned. DNA was so exciting! “Did you know that the crime analysts can pick up a hair at a crime scene and identify the person? They can identify the murderer if he's in the computers. You know, like if his blood is already in there or his fingerprints or his ...” She pointed to her crotch. “That part.”

“Oh, my gosh.” Valeria talked to her about
that?
I growled at Koa, he nibbled on my arm.

“I know, I know!” Ailani's eyes opened wide in wonderment. “There's stuff all over the human body that the analysts, I like that word,
analyst,
that they can look at under a microscope and figure out who the bad guy is.”

“You don't have nightmares from stuff like this?”

“No. I have nightmares about Candy Land. You know that game?”

“I do.”

“I have nightmares about the gumdrops. They chase me. I have nightmares about hopscotch, too.”

“Hopscotch?”

“Yes, the squares turn into square aliens and try to eat me. That's why I like talking about criminals and crime more. It's more relaxing for me, and you know I'm sort of a nervous kid.” She picked up a handful of my hair. “I'll brush your hair for you, Aunt Toni. You haven't brushed it in a long time, have you?” She scampered out of the room and danced back in a minute later with a brush and lipstick and started brushing my hair.

“Grandma says never leave the house without your lipstick and earrings on unless your house is on fire and, you silly, you forgot both. Okay, so. Aunt Toni. Also! Did you know that in crime labs they can ...”

* * *

Ellie, Valerie, my mother, and I ate stoned monster birthday cake in the backyard together.

“The monster looks high,” Ellie said.

“I know,” Valerie said. “I tried. Koa wanted to make the cake with me and so I did. It was the best I could do.”

“Well, with pot being legal in Oregon, at least we know the monster won't be arrested,” I said.

“This cake delicious, Valeria,” my mother announced. “Your papa, he eat two pieces.”

“Thank you, Mama.”

“You come and make dessert at restaurant, Valeria. Then you no have to be talking to bad mens. I no like your job, Valeria.”

“I know, Mama. You tell me at least once a week.”

“And you, Antonia!” She turned to give me some of her wrath. “You too thin. What wrong with you? Poor Antonia, you not sick, are you?” She put a hand to my forehead. “No fever. Where your earrings?”

“Working too much, Mama, and I didn't have time to put on earrings.” I had told Valerie and Ellie about Nick, but not my parents. I was not up to my mother's disappointed inquisition. I had told her Nick wasn't at the party because he had to work.

“I bring you food tomorrow night. You eat. I see your bones. See?” She tapped my collarbone. “I no like to see that. Too skinny. Nick not like a skinny lady, Antonia. They like the curvies. And you”—she turned to Ellie—“Elvira, where is that Gino? That Italian?”

Ellie seemed calm. She had no paper bag with her. “He came over a few nights ago. I told him I didn't want to marry him.”

“What? No!” my mother exclaimed, hand to her bosom. “Alexei, my love!” she shouted to my father across the yard. “Come here. Elvira not marrying that Italian stallion anymore.”

My father hurried over, sat down with us. “No more Gino?”

“No, Papa. We broke up.”

“Ah. That fine news, Elvira. It not right marrying a man with bag on face. That was a sign. Sign from up there”—he pointed to the heavens—“that this not right.”

“Not right,” my mama said. “Thank you, God, helping my Elvira. But I not curse Gino.”

“Gee. Thanks, Mama.”

“What happened?” I asked.

“He came over and I told him I couldn't marry him and I gave him back the ring. I realized I just had to be brave and do what needed to be done. He cried. I felt so bad for hurting him.”

“It hurt him more if he marry woman who can't breathe when he walk in front door every night,” my mama said.

“It hurt him more if he marry woman who doesn't love him,” my father said.

“We talked about all of our problems that I already told you about.”

“What did he do?” Valerie asked.

“He told me he'd change everything. Told me his mom wouldn't live with us, ever. Told me we wouldn't have kids. Told me he supported my business. Told me he'd travel wherever I wanted to go in the world. Told me to go to any movie I wanted whenever I wanted. He said we'd have separate accounts.”

“And?”

“I'd had time to think after we had that fight and he slammed out of my house. I felt so much better believing we'd broken up. Believing we were done. I could breathe again, be me again, plan my future and be happy. He wanted to get back together, and I said no.”

“Must be the right decision, because you don't have a paper bag with you,” I said.

“No paper bag. I haven't needed one since he left. The thing is that Gino will be a super husband. To someone else, not me. We are not right for each other. If he gave in on kids, he would come to resent me. We'd end up divorced anyhow. He wants a stay-at-home wife who doesn't work and who will have half a dozen kids. There are plenty of women who would love that, but not me.”

“This right decision,” my father said. “Gino nice man, but he doesn't make your heart do bumpity bump bump hump.”

“Your papa right. He no make your heart go bump hump,” my mother said.

My parents do not know what “hump” means in slang.

“Now,” my mother said, pointing at my father so we could find him. “Your papa. He does that to me. He make my heart go bumpity bump hump humpy. I think we go home early tonight, what you say, Alexei?”

My father smiled, nodded. “I think nice idea, Svetlana.”

What a love machine.

* * *

At Svetlana's the next night my mother made Russian Pizza and named it “Elvira Made Mama Proud.”

I received many calls, all along the lines of “Why is your mama proud of Ellie? Did she and Gino break up? She's serving ‘Elvira Made Mama Proud' pizza with a shot of vodka still, right?”

Our family's personal business—all played out on a restaurant's Specials board.

* * *

That night I climbed into my kayak, the single seater, and rowed it to the front of my tugboat. I tied it to the deck and stared up at the stars. In the distance I heard flapping against the water, and I knew it was one of the Sergeant Otts. Dixie was surely tucked in for the night. I didn't know where Mr. and Mrs. Quackenbusch were.

I sniffled. I wrapped my arms around my waist.

Sometimes I am haunted by what my and Marty's kids would have looked like. Would they have had black hair like me? Brown curls like Marty? A smile that took up their whole face, like Marty's? Tall and thin like a crane, for the boys? Shorter, with curves, for the girls?

I wish I had our child. Or six of our children. I ache for the children we did not have. Forever and beyond I will regret that we did not have children. No grandchildren for his kind, loving parents, little Marties for them.

In the midst of that shearing pain, I thought of Nick. What would our kids look like?

Blond-haired little Nicks. Or black-haired little Tonis with Nick's light blue eyes? Then I thought about Nick naked. Shoulders so broad I can't get my whole hand around them. Hard, packed chest. I liked the size of his hips. I liked his lips. I liked the way he moved when I was over him and when I was under him. I liked the way he held me close. I liked how warm he was.

I told myself when I started sleeping with him that it was only for sex. That was never true. I always liked Nick, in and out of bed. Nick always made me feel wanted. Needed. He was kind. Funny. So smart, quick, his conversation wide ranging, about everything.

He always wanted more, from day one. That was a threat to me. Paradoxically it also made me feel safe. This was not a man who was looking for sex and then would dump me. On the other confused and mixed-up hand, I didn't want to love someone who had his type of job. Too dangerous. I couldn't go through another loss. It would disintegrate me.

So I could live in fear and stay alone in my kayak, my tugboat, my life.

Or I could be brave.

I saw a shooting star light up the sky.

Daisy walked by, saw me, backed up, and sang “Amazing Grace.”

It was what I needed to hear. She is a generous and caring lady.

21

The trial for Tyler Barton was wrapping up. I had gone several times, as had Ellie, and my parents once. My parents don't like going to the trials. “Upsetting,” my father said. “Our Valeria up there. So proud, yes, she get rid of bad mens, but hard to watch and hear what the bad mens did. We had enough of that in Soviet Union.”

The defense didn't have much of a defense. They implied someone else did the crimes. They implied it was one of Tyler's relatives, like Leroy or Dalton or Zeke, which meant that Bill Kortrand, the defense attorney, found two dead rats on his front porch the next day. His wife took the kids to her mother's house in North Dakota by nine that morning.

It would soon go to the jury. The ending of that trial made me more nervous than what was going on right now, because I knew Barton's family would pick up their meat cleavers and go to war when Tyler was found guilty.

“Any new threats?” I asked Valerie during Pillow Talk. None of us were sewing, we were too worried. Instead we were eating our mama's Russian tea cakes.

“Bobbi Jae's and Garrett's tires were slashed.” Bobbi Jae and Garrett were attorneys assisting Valerie.

“They like slicing things, don't they?” I asked, feeling that frozen snake wrapping around my spine again. The problems were escalating.

“And there was a dead rat on Bobbi Jae's back doorstep.” Valerie started massaging the top of her widow's peak.

“They certainly like killing animals,” Ellie said. She popped another Russian tea cake in her mouth, the powder landing on the tip of her nose.

“It's a specialty of theirs.”

We sat in our silence, inhaling Russian tea cakes. Stress eating.

“Security for them, too, now?” I asked.

“Yes.”

We sat again in our silence.

“I'm trying to be brave,” Valerie said. “Nothing else to do but be brave.”

I reached out my hand and held hers.
Be careful, Valerie.

“I will,” she said out loud.

“We're moving the kids to Mama and Papa's tomorrow. They're excited.”

I squeezed her hand. I was scared to death. But Valerie was Valerie, and she would do her job.

“I love you, Toni, love you, Ellie.”

“I love you, too, Valerie.”

“If anything happens to me—”

“Don't even say it, Valerie,” I said. “We will help Kai take care of the kids.”

“Thank you.”

“You're welcome,” Ellie said. “Now don't talk about that stuff anymore.”

“Okay. But you need to wash your hair, Toni.”

“I know.”

“Can I wash it for you?” Ellie asked. “I'm worried about you, too, Toni. Your hair. You're wearing the same jeans again and again, and T-shirts. When did you ever wear T-shirts except when you're exercising?”

“I like them.” They knew I didn't want to talk about Nick.

“Let us wash your hair, Toni, please,” Ellie said.

“If JJ saw you like this ...” Valerie said. “It would be like Mt. Vesuvius.”

“The screech of outrage,” Ellie shuddered.

Valerie and Ellie washed my hair over the kitchen sink, then dried it and brushed it back from my widow's peak. My head felt a lot better when they were done. They filed my nails, plucked my eyebrows. We all polished our fingernails and toenails. When I noticed Valerie's hands shaking, I took over for her.

I love my sisters. We put our heads together.

“I'm scared,” Valerie whispered.

“I am, too,” Ellie and I said.

The snake's mouth was open, ready to strike.

We did not get any pillows sewn that night.

* * *

“Toni, the whole family is worried about you.”

“I'm fine, Dmitry.”

He let the silence hang.

“I am.”

“You're not fine. I'm sorry about Nick. I heard you're not washing your hair.”

“I wash my hair... .”

“Be honest.”

“Most of the time. When it needs it. I'll wash it more.”

“Worse, I've heard you're not wearing your pretty clothes.”

“I wear my pretty clothes.”

I heard him crying.

“Dmitry, stop. Please. You're making me upset—”

“Toni, I don't like it when you're unhappy. When Marty was sick, after he died, watching you in so much pain, I thought I was going to have a heart attack. He was one of my best friends, the whole thing was awful, but watching you cry ... and now you're unhappy again.”

“I'll be fine. But I miss Nick.” My voice was a pathetic whimper, which was irritating.

“You couldn't commit, could you?” I heard him sniffling and hiccupping. “I get it. We're both broken, aren't we? Like teacups or a vodka bottle or a rocking horse that rocks on its own... .”

Broken. Yes. I could say that. “Broken but still standing, now that's something, right?”

“No,” he wailed. “No, it isn't. I want you to be happy. Very, very happy.”

“I'm working on it.” No, I wasn't.

“I want to help you.”

“You always help me, Dmitry, by being the best brother ever... .”

Dmitry is incredibly sensitive to other people's suffering, and when it comes to our family ... he's a mess.

“I love you, Toni.”

* * *

I had no interest in honing my skills in Keeping The Monsters At Bay: Shopping Defensive Strategies. None. I didn't want to shop. I didn't even want to get dressed in the morning.

 

 

 

My father arrived half dead late on a Sunday night.

We heard a truck outside our apartment rumbling, five floors below us, the breaks screeching, doors slamming, laughter. The snow floated down onto the slushy roads. Minutes later we heard a thunk against our door, then silence.

My mother peered out through the peephole, her hands shaking. She was thin, too thin. She was often distracted, pained. She was nervous, weak, and still coughed from the pneumonia. She worked all hours into the night mending, sewing fancy dresses for the fancy wives of the men who had locked her own husband in jail.

My mother cried out, then yanked open the door. My sisters and I ran out of our bedroom and pulled our father into the house.

I hardly recognized him.

Elvira screamed. Valeria froze, as if she'd been hit. I stared, shocked, then ran and got the towels, soap, and bandages my mother yelled at me to get.

My father was bloodied, bruised, broken, unconscious.

Later, after my mother cleaned him up, bandaged his wounds, and we all hauled him into bed, I saw her leaning over the sink, rinsing my father's blood from her trembling hands, stooped, sobbing, shattered.

* * *

My father's recovery was slow.

His humor returned on the fifth day, when he woke up, no longer in another world, fighting a fever, fighting a demon. He peered out at my mother from the one eye that was not swollen shut.

He did not see his three daughters perched on the other side of the bed. He saw only my mother, kneeling, their heads close together.

“Ah, Svetlana,” he said, his voice raspy. “I dreamed of you, during the day, during the night, every day. You were with me. Are you real?”

“Yes, my love, my Alexei. I am real. I am here. How are you?”

“Do not worry. I will be fine. I am here with you again. I will heal. And then we will leave. We have to get out of here, Svetlana. I am afraid they will come for you. I am surprised they did not.”

“Your father. How is he?”

My father's eyes filled with tears. He shook his head. “He is gone.”

“Oh, my God and Jesus, Mary, mother of God.” My mother crossed herself, crying with my father. “I am so sorry, my love, so sorry.”

“What?” I said. “Grandfather is gone?” I loved Grandfather Konstantin! His smile, his songs, the treats he brought us when he visited, the way he could cut animals out of paper. “What do you mean? Is he dead?”

Slowly, as if every inch pained him, which it probably did, as he was covered in bruises and lashes, my father turned his head.

“Hello, daughters. I love you. How I missed you.”

We bent to kiss the one cheek that wasn't bashed.

“Grandfather's gone?” Elvira asked, her tiny hands clenched together.

“Yes, my angel, I am so sorry. He is dead. He is with Grandmother now, in heaven.”

“But what happened?” Valeria said, her face crumbling. “I want Grandfather!”

“A bad man killed him.”

“What?” Elvira wailed. “
What?
”

“Why did he kill Grandfather?” I asked.

“Because your grandfather spoke against the government. He spoke for God. He spoke for Jesus. He spoke for freedom. That is why.”

It is surprising that the tears we shed did not drown the poor man when we kissed him again.

“Everything will be fine,” our father croaked out later, holding my mother's trembling, weak hands. “You have kept up with your educations, your reading, mathematics, and science?”

We nodded that we had. We did not mention the pickpocketing or the trip to the police station for my mother and me or the bloody cloths.

“I knew you would. I love you all. So much.” He turned back to our mother as his eyes started to close. “Svetlana, you are my gift.”

“And you are mine, Alexei,” she cried. “Always mine.”

“We will leave. We will save our family, God help us.”

He closed his eyes and went back to a comatose sleep.

Two nights later I saw my mother, with such tenderness, take off my father's shirt in their bedroom. My mother pressed a kiss against every whip line on my father's back, his head bent. My father was a muscled man, large, he had boxed for years. And yet, there he was, bent, beaten, and only showing his weakness in his bedroom, to his wife.

I would never forget my father's injuries. I would never forget the enduring love I saw between my parents that night.

* * *

The whispering started again immediately, a few friends who slipped in and out of our apartment at night, slinking through the shadows, hats and glasses disguising their faces as they took the stairs up to our apartment, the home of people who had been declared “enemies of the people,” who would soon lose their apartment and might be arrested or forcibly moved to another part of the Soviet Union, my parents learned.

“You must leave,” we heard them say again and again. “As soon as Alexei can walk, you must go, Svetlana. Go, go right away.”

We were going, I knew it. I heard my parents talking. My father said he had to do something before we left, when he regained some strength, but then, immediately after that, “On to America, Svetlana, as we have dreamed about.”

“When are we going?” Valeria asked.

“What is happening?” Elvira asked.

“Wait,” I told them. “Don't tell anyone.”

The silence began after that.

People did not come and tell us, “You have to leave.”

I knew then. They did not tell us to leave because we were leaving.

“When are we leaving?” Valeria asked.

“What is happening?” Elvira said.

“Wait,” I told them. “Don't tell anyone.”

* * *

My grandfather Konstantin's body, my father's father, who had been imprisoned with my father, beaten and starved, was delivered to us in a can. Yes, a can. The prison cremated him. The official notice was that my grandfather had died,
unfortunately,
of a heart attack.

The letter enraged my father. I have never seen him so livid. He ran a hand over a shelf and knocked all of his books off, then another shelf, then another. My mother pointed at us to go to our room, so we did but, as always, we cracked the door so we could see. My father yelled, low and primal, his face a twisted mask of utter grief.

“A heart attack?” he screamed. “A heart attack?”

My mother, calm, tears slipping down her cheeks, let him rage until he could rage no more, then he fell to the floor, his body still battered and bruised, his mind still reeling from the trauma of his own imprisonment, of watching his father die, and my mother rocked him, as she rocked us when we cried.

“A heart attack? Rurik Nikonov killed him. He killed my father. I saw him do it. I was there, Svetlana. I will get revenge for my father.”

“No, no, darling,” my mother said, not bothering to hide her alarm. “We are leaving here. We will have a new life. We are getting out. Do not risk it.”

“I will. I must, Svetlana.”

“Alexei—”

“This is my final word.”

And so it was.

My sisters and I crept away, crawled into bed, and hugged each other, crying silently until we went to sleep, our father's words, “I will get revenge for my father,” echoing like the lash of the whip marks on his back through our minds.

* * *

My mother told each of us to pack one bag the next morning. “One, no more, girls. We must be ready to leave.”

I packed my two pairs of pants, two skirts, and three sweaters, almost all I had. Mostly I packed my books and notebooks where I wrote stories.

Valeria packed a pair of old, high red heels that my aunt Polina gave her before she left and a blue ballerina skirt that Uncle Vladan had given her.

Elvira packed her two stuffed animals, fabric scraps, and her sewing kit. We would each wear coats, as it was winter, and two pairs of pants and our boots with three pairs of socks, as there were holes in the boots.