Between Shades of Gray(25)

I slid the silver blade under the flap on the back of the envelope. Ever since Mrs. Pranas had mailed my application, I had thought of little else. Studying with the best artists in Europe. It was such an opportunity. I sliced open the top of the envelope and removed a single sheet of folded paper. My eyes scanned quickly across the type.

“Dear Miss Vilkas, “Thank you for your recent application for the summer arts program. Your samples are most impressive. It is with great pleasure that we offer you a place in our—”

“Yes! They said yes!” I screamed.

“I knew it!” said Papa.

“Congratulations, Lina,” said Jonas, slinging his arm around me.

“I can’t wait to tell Joana,” I said.

“That’s wonderful, darling!” said Mother. “We have to celebrate.”

“We have a cake,” said Jonas.

“Well, I was just certain we’d be celebrating.” Mother winked.

Papa beamed. “You, my dear, are blessed with a gift,” he said, taking my hands. “There are great things in store for you, Lina.”



I turned my head toward a rustling sound. The Altaian woman waddled to the corner, grunted, and peed into a tin can.





32


IT WAS STILL DARK when the NKVD began yelling. They ordered us out of the shack, shouting at us to form a line. We scrambled to fall in with the others. My Russian vocabulary was growing. In addition to davai, I had learned other important words, such as nyet, which meant “no”; sveenya, which meant “pig”; and of course fasheest, “fascist.” Miss Grybas and the grouchy woman were already in line. Mrs. Rimas waved to Mother. I looked around for Andrius and his mother. They weren’t there. Neither was the bald man.

The commander walked up and down the line, chewing on his toothpick. He looked us over and made comments to the other guards.

“What’s he saying, Elena?” asked Mrs. Rimas.

“He’s dividing us up for work detail,” said Mother.

The commander approached Mother and yelled in her face. He pulled Mother, Mrs. Rimas, and the grouchy woman out of the line. The young blond guard pulled me out of line and pushed me toward Mother. He divided up the rest. Jonas was in a group with two elderly women.

“Davai!” The young blond guard handed Mother a belted piece of canvas and marched our group away.

“Meet us back at the shack,” yelled Mother to Jonas. How would that be possible? Mother and I couldn’t even find our way back from the NKVD building. It was Jonas who showed us the way. We would surely be lost.

My stomach turned with hunger. My legs dragged. Mother and Mrs. Rimas whispered back and forth in Lithuanian behind the blond guard. After walking a few kilometers we arrived at a clearing in the woods. The guard grabbed the canvas from Mother and threw it on the ground. He yelled a command.

“He says, ‘dig,’” said Mother.

“Dig? Dig where?” asked Mrs. Rimas.

“Here, I guess,” said Mother. “He says if we want to eat, we must dig. Our ration depends on our progress.”

“What are we to dig with?” I asked.

Mother asked the blond guard. He kicked the heap of canvas. Mother unfolded it and found several rusty hand shovels, the kind used in a flower garden. The handles were missing.

Mother said something to the guard that prompted an irate “Davai” and the kicking of the shovels into our shins.

“Get out of my way,” said the grouchy woman. “I’m going to get this over with. I need to eat and so do my girls.” She got down on her hands and knees and started chipping away at the earth with the tiny shovel. We all followed. The guard sat under a tree and watched, smoking cigarettes.

“Where are the potatoes and the beets?” I asked Mother.

“Well, they are clearly punishing me,” said Mother.

“Punishing you?” asked Mrs. Rimas. Mother whispered in her ear about the commander’s offer to work for him.

“But Elena, you could have gotten preferential treatment,” said Mrs. Rimas. “And most likely, extra food.”

“A guilty conscience is not worth extra food,” said Mother. “Think of the demands that could be made of me in that office. And think of what could happen to people. I don’t need that on my soul. I’ll persevere like everyone else.”

“A woman said there’s a town five kilometers away. There’s a store, a post office, and a school,” said Mrs. Rimas.

“Perhaps we could walk there,” said Mother, “and send letters. Maybe someone has heard from the men.”

“Be careful, Elena. Sending letters may endanger the people back home,” said Mrs. Rimas. “Don’t put anything in writing, ever.”

I looked at my feet. I had been writing down everything and had already filled several pages with descriptions and drawings.

“No,” whispered Mother. She looked to the grouchy woman pounding the dirt and leaned toward Mrs. Rimas. “I have a contact.”

What did Mother mean, she had a “contact”? Who was her contact? And the war—now the Germans were in Lithuania. What was Hitler doing? I wondered what had happened to our house and everything we left behind. And why were we digging this stupid hole?

“Well, at least your housemate talks to you,” said Mother. “Ours is a beastly thing that grabbed Lina by the hair.”