Sin

The White Square

“Hi, Zakharka. You’ve aged.”

We were playing hide-and-seek in the empty lot behind the shop, a few village boys.

The one whose turn it was to lead stood facing the door, loudly counting to one hundred. During this time, everyone was supposed to hide.

The dark-faced, gap-toothed, sharp-shouldered boys hid in the labyrinths of the nearby new two-story building, which smelt of brick dust, and in the dark corners, of urine. Someone sneezed in bushes, revealing himself. Others, scraping the skin on their ribs, crawled through the gap in the fence that separated the village school from the lot. And they also climbed trees and hurtled off the branches, running to overtake the leader to the door of the village shop, to touch the square drawn on it with a brick, shouting “Keep away!”

Because if you didn’t say that, you’d have to be the leader yourself.

I was the smallest one, so no one really looked for me.

But I took care to hide, I lay there motionless, and listened to the toothy laughter of the boys, quietly envying their impudence, their swift heels and dirty language. Their dirty language was made of different letters than the ones I pronounced: when they cursed, each word rang out and jumped like a small and ferocious ball. When I cursed — secretly, in a whisper, with my face in the grass; or loudly, in an empty house when my mother was at work — the words nastily hung on my lips, and all I had to do was wipe them off with my sleeve, and then for a long time examine what had dried on it…

I watched the boy who was It from the grass, sharp-eyed as a gopher. When he went to the other side, I gave what I thought was a loud Cossack’s whoop, and trotted on my short legs to the door of the village shop, with an unnatural smile that seemed to be made of plasticine on my face, and in my heart a feeling of unusual triumph. The boy who was It lazily turned his head for a moment in my direction, and didn’t even stop, as if I wasn’t running to the door, but that something stupid, obtrusive and pointless had happened.

But I honestly carried my smile and the unceasing triumph to the white square on the door, and hit it with such force that my palm burnt, and I shouted out “keep away!”

(Keep away, away, my life — I’m already here, by the door, and beating my hands on it.)

After I shouted, I heard, not without pleasure, laughter behind my back — so someone had appreciated how I jumped so nimbly, how I ran over…

“Oh…” I said more loudly than I needed to, and turned around self-satisfied, showing for all to see that I was tired from running. And of course, I immediately saw that it wasn’t me, naked-bellied, who delighted people. Sashka had behaved strangely again.

“I’ve aged. You age particularly fast when you start to look for justifications from life.”

“But when you believe your own justifications yourself, then it’s easier.”

“How can I not believe them, Sasha? What should I do then?”

Sasha doesn’t listen to me. He never comes. And I don’t know where he is.

“Sasha, what can I say even if I do come?”

He has a frozen face with turned out lips and frost-covered cheek-bones, resembling the body of a frozen bird; he has no facial expressions.

“It’s cold, Zakharka… Cold and stifling…” he says, not listening to me.

Sashka was unusual. He had a blonde forelock, a face of tender beauty, always ready to break out into a thoughtful, sensitive smile. He was kind to us little boys, not telling us what to do, not saying disgustingly vulgar things, never swearing. He remembered each one by name and asked: “How are things?” He shook hands in a manly way. The heart leapt towards him.

He allowed himself to laugh at the local crooked-faced and crooked-legged hooligans — the Chebryakov brothers. He looked at them with narrowed eyes, without taking the smile off his face. The Chebryakovs were twins, a year older than Sashka. In childhood that’s a big difference. At least it is for boys.

I heard him laughing once — the only one among the rest of us, who did not even dare to crack a smile — when Chebryakov climbed up a tree and tore the sleeve of his shirt to the armpit, with a loud tearing sound.

Sashka laughed, and his laugh was unforced and merry.

“What you laughing for?” said Chebryakov, one of the brothers, forgetting about his sleeve. His pupils constantly moved from left to right, as if he couldn’t decide to stop at Sasha’s smile. “What you laughing for?”

“Are you forbidding me?” Sasha asked.

All my life I’ve looked for an excuse to say that — like Sashka. But when there was an excuse, I didn’t have the strength to say it, and I would get into a fight, so as not to become completely frightened. All my life I looked for an excuse to say that — and I couldn’t find one, but he could — at the age of nine.

Sashka mocked the movement of Chebryakov’s pupils with his cheerful eyes, and it seemed to me that no one but me noticed, because all the rest were looking away.

Chebryakov spat.

Oh, these childish, youthful, manly gobs of spit! A sign of nervousness, a sign that the selfcontrol is running out — and if they can’t now become hysterical and bare their claws, and can’t release the white spit touching the corners of their lips, and reveal their young fangs, then things will never work out again.

Chebryakov spat, and squatted down suddenly. He raised his arm with the torn sleeve, and looked at it, whispering something and interspersing the words with curses addressed only to the sleeve.

“It’s stuffy, Zakharka. I feel stifled.” I can hardly tell what he is saying from his icy, almost motionless lips. He has no voice.

“Maybe you’re thirsty. I have something in the fridge…”

“No!” he shouts, almost spitting. And I’m afraid that the shout will split his face in two — like the carcass of a frozen bird breaks, revealing red and tangled insides.

Goats wandered around the village during the daytime, I remember that Sasha’s grandmother also had them. Sasha’s grandmother lived in our village, and his parents lived in the neighboring one. Sashka spent the nights here and there, and returned home through the forest, in the evening.

I sometimes imagined that I was walking with him, and he was holding my little paw in his firm grip, it was dark but I wasn’t scared.

Yes, the goats wandered around, and bleated stupidly, and scratched their horns on the fences. Sometimes they ran towards you, lowering their stupid, wooden heads — at the last moment, hearing the clatter, you would turn around, and clumsily lifting your legs, you would throw back your white boyish head, cast a frightened sideways glance, and run, run run — but still you would get a not very painful, but very insulting butt, and tumble to the ground. After this, the goat would immediately lose interest in the fallen person, and run off, bleating.

The she goats were interested in the boys’ games. When they discovered you in the bushes, they would shudder, shake their heads, and complain to the billy goat: Someone’s ly-y-y-y-ing here! The billy goat pretended not to hear. Then the she goats would come closer. Their nostrils flared and their teeth were bared. E-e-e-i! they cried stupidly in your face.

There’s no wolf to get you… you would think, offended.

The nanny goats also wandered over to us in the empty lot, hearing the racket and the rich boyish laughter. Sometimes the laughter died down — when the boy who was It started to search — and the goats wandered around perplexed, looking for the person who had been making the noise. They found Sashka.

Sashka sat with his back to a tree, sometimes cawing in response to the crow which was startled by our games, and which had its nest not far away. He cawed skillfully and mockingly, which seemed to annoy the crow even more. Sashka’s cawing amused the boys, and they revealed themselves to the boy who was It by their laughter.

A nanny goat also took an interest in the “crow” sitting under the tree, and was immediately mounted and grabbed by the horns.

Sashka emerged from his hiding place on the goat’s back, pushing his heels off the ground, shouting “Keep away!” and whooping merrily.

It was getting dark and cold, and the boys didn’t want to continue the games anymore. They were already tired of hiding and, bored and cold in the dry grass by the gap in the fence, or on the cooling bricks of the new building, they slowly went home, to steamed milk, a tired mother and a slighty drunk father.

One of the Its, tired of looking for older boys, found me — right away, easily, barely after counting to one hundred, he went straight to my hiding place with an easy step.

“Go on,” he nodded casually.

And I started to look for the boys.

I wandered through the bushes, raising my thin legs high as the nettles lashed me, and white nettle welts appeared on my ankles, and the chill sent grainy goose bumps crawling like ants down my back.

I sniveled and noticed someone slowly climbing down a tree and calmly walking away as I approached — home, home… And I didn’t dare to shout.

“Hey, what’s with you, guys…” I whispered bitterly, as if I had been left alone on the frontline. “Hey, what’s with you…”

The crow fell silent, and the nanny goats were driven home.

I walked through the village, past the school with its sad yellow sides, shedding fine flakes of peeling plaster. The janitor was smoking by the school, and the tiny light flickered.

It flickered like a heart that was pumping blood for the last time.

The cigarette butt flew into the grass, flashing bright red.

I returned to the village shop, stumbling over stones on the dark road, already trembling and chattering with my remaining milk teeth. The white square on the door could not be made out.

“Keep away,” I said in a whisper and placed my palm to the place where the square had been.

“I’ve come home, Sasha.”

“I called you.”

“Sasha, I can’t stand this, share it with me.”

“No, Zakharka.”

At home, my mother washed me in a basin with warm, foamy water.

“We played hide and seek, Mama.”

“Did they find you?”

“No. Just once.”

Tea and yellow butter, cold as if it had been cut out of a patch of sunlight on the morning water. I’ll have another sandwich. And more milk in my tea.

“Mama, I want to tell you about the game.”

“Just a second, son.”

And another glass of tea. And three sugar cubes.

“Where are you going, Mama? I want to tell you now…”

But she’s gone.

Then I’ll build a house out of the sugar cubes.

Sashka’s parents thought that he had gone to stay with his grandma. His grandma thought that he had gone home to his parents. There were no telephones in the country back then, no one rang anyone.

He hid in a fridge — an empty freezing chamber that stood by the village shop. A battered cable led from the shop to the fridge.

The fridge didn’t open from the inside.

They looked for Sasha for two days, and his grandma came to me. I didn’t know what to say to her. The Chebryakovs were summoned to the police station.

Early Monday morning, Sashka was found by the school janitor.

The boy had pushed his arms and legs against the door of the fridge. Tears were frozen on his face. His square mouth, showing a bitten-through, icy tongue, was open.