The train deposited us at a desolate platform at last. It was a warm day and it was a joy just to be outside, to be free of the bodies and their insuppressible stink. The platform was marked by a wooden sign with LOWER TURINSK written on it, heaps of dirt, branches, and bird dung. On one side of the tracks loomed the factory where the fathers would work, a gray building with tiny windows and three massive columns releasing smoke into the air; already, some workers were carrying the heavy equipment they had packed up from the Kiev factory off the train onto trucks to haul them to their new workplace. On the other side of the tracks stood a field leading to rows of apartment buildings. They did not appear all that different from the homes we had abandoned; I had expected a village, with huts and horses dotting the landscape as they had in the places the train had passed. Where was the steppe I had dreamed about? What was the point of leaving one place for another that looked just like it? There were mountains in the distance, sure, but I was otherwise unimpressed.
Grim-looking men in army fatigues spotted Uncle Konstantin and waved us over to the registration tent, gave each family our daily bread coupons, and told us we were living in Building 32. We were introduced to Uncle Ivan, a Black Maria–sized man with a rectangular, hair-covered face who was in charge of our building; he would take us and the diminished Garanins to our new home.
“Lower Turinsk welcomes you with open arms,” he said, bowing slightly as the fathers introduced themselves, and I couldn’t tell if he was joking or not.
As we followed him, he explained that the next day was Sunday, so we could settle in, but the following day, all men fifteen and older would report to the factory—so Misha qualified, but Bogdan did not. This pleased them both equally. Misha held his head higher, like the declaration had made him even more adult, while Bogdan pumped a fist in the air at being excluded from the hard labor. The women would work in the factory kitchen, while Bogdan, Polya, and I would go to school, like Mama promised. School! What a relief it would be to return to the land of learning.
Aunt Tamara tugged on Uncle Ivan’s arm as we followed him down a paved road lined with poplars. “Is there a maximum age for the women’s work?” she asked.
Ivan laughed and looked her over and said, “Don’t worry, you’ll do.” Then he added, “Unless you are of unsound mind.”
“I can certainly prove that if I try hard enough,” she grumbled, but her husband silenced her with his gaze.
Baba, on the other hand, could easily be proven mentally infirm, and who knew what she would do all day. She followed us in a daze with a faint smile on her lips, her now-gray boa trailing her, thinking she was some kind of debutante, as if all the men in town were staring at her. Perhaps some were, but not for the reasons a woman would want to be stared at. Faithful Polya kept pace behind our grandmother, lifting her boa and draping it over her shoulders whenever it hit the ground. Maybe she hoped our grandmother would draw some eyes toward her in turn. There were men everywhere, but for once none of them were looking at Polina. I pictured Dimitrev senior, twirling his mustache while gazing at my sister—there was no one who had the luxury to do that here, and though her red mane was still somewhat beguiling, she looked a bit too haggard for wandering eyes.
I turned from all of them and gazed at the factory, which looked majestic and imposing from farther away. Papa caught me looking and winked. He put a hand on my shoulder and said, “I’d rather be in school.”
“We can trade, then,” I said, though of course I did not mean it. I thought school would be the highlight of my time there, though I was curious about the factory. Though I did not think making tanks and other instruments of war would suit my father, who was by nature a peaceful man.
“If school gets dull enough for you, I can take you for a tour. How does that sound?” Papa said.
I told him it sounded nice, but did not expect much. It was nearly impossible to get Papa alone, even during peacetime.
I was even more filthy by the time we reached the first of the apartments, my sweat mixing with the remains of the mud stuck to my body. The apartments weren’t nearly as tall as the ones in Kiev; just three or four stories at most, with more poplars and orderly fences and wooden benches in their courtyards. In the center of the apartments was a row of functional buildings, which included a post office, a small, squat school building, the grocery where the mothers would get our family’s daily bread with their coupons, which apparently was run by one famed Madame Renata, who lived in our building. “Get on her good side and stay on it,” was all Uncle Ivan said about her. Other Ivans dropped other passengers off at their new homes, and it seemed ours was the farthest away. My grandmother was not pleased by the trek.
“I may faint at any moment,” she warned us.
“Be our guest,” said Aunt Tamara, rolling her eyes. My grandmother ignored her. The women had much in common, so naturally they had already become enemies.
I walked beside Misha, distancing myself from the complainers.
“We’ll miss you in school,” I told him.
“I’ll be more useful at the factory, I’m certain,” he said, but he gave me a little smile. “Though I will miss you when I’m working. We will all miss you, I mean,” he said, clearing his throat and looking serious again, though I felt my face flushing, getting even warmer under the bright sun. Then he gazed ahead like a soldier like the parents were doing.
Bogdan was flopping his head around, looking at this and that like an overheated puppy, while my sister and Baba dawdled behind us with linked arms. We had reached the edge of the earth, the final apartment building, which had a few benches and a swing set out front and abutted a forest of pines, in front of which flowed a small but mighty stream. The long trek was worth it. I would take trees over more neighbors any day. I was drenched in sweat by then. The sun was high in the sky and there was no breeze to offer relief.
Our new home was on the second floor of a three-story building. Our families and the Garanins followed Ivan up the stairs, and the Garanins were the first to be dropped off in a one-room home next door to the apartment of Madame Renata. Aunt Yulia looked like a sleepwalker, the loose strands from her ponytail cascading down her shoulders like elegant seaweed. Though Bogdan walked near her, no one spoke to her, and her husband was equally vacant. Which was perhaps for the best in one regard, which was that, when they encountered the formidable Madame Renata, they hardly seemed to take her in. She was a nasty silver-haired woman with deeply arched brows who peeked her head out her door and gave us a once-over.
“I would shower now while the water is running,” she offered, and then she returned to her lair.
If we hadn’t been so exhausted, I might have exchanged a look with Papa and laughed at this woman’s expense.
Instead, we parted with the diminished Garanins and followed Ivan down the hall, where he showed us our living quarters: two fairly large rooms with stoves, a balcony, and a shared kitchen for all of us. The apartments had minimal furniture, a few beds, a heap of blankets in the corner, a few dull lamps and landscapes, pale-orange wallpaper, and in one of the rooms, an empty bookshelf that broke my heart. The Orlovs were given the larger of the two rooms, though either room was substantially bigger than the one I was used to. In my opinion, my parents won out because their balcony looked straight out onto the pines.