High Tide (4 page)

“Nurse supervision, good food. She's been proud her entire life, remember, Mom? It might be better for both of you if you didn't yell and hit her with towels. If you didn't cry and drink her medicine.”

“Why bother having kids if they just end up putting you in a home?”

“But let's at least think about it.”

“You're all trying to push this nursing home thing—stop piling on your advice!”

 

Mother nods and opens her mouth to have her say, but gets a mouthful of chocolate spread instead. That was unnecessary. Mother hates the chocolate. She shudders and shakes her head. But her gums mash up the spread, and it melts and drips heavily into her stomach.

Mother speaks:

“The white one.”

“Mom, she wants the cottage cheese.”

“I heard, I heard. I've got it all under control, I'll get through it, you hear me? This is my mother. Alright, let's give it a rest. She's scheduled for an X-ray Tuesday. Can you come help me? To get her in the wheelchair and down to the clinic.”

Silence.

Mother smiles.

“I can't do it by myself. She's ridiculously heavy. Every muscle in my body is already strained. It hurts here, on the left side. From my ribs to my thigh—it's like I'm being cut with a knife.”

“Are you crying?”

“No. It's some kind of fluid that just drains from my eyes on its own. It's just that everything hurts. I never thought it would be like
this
. I've never experienced anything like it before, you know? She doesn't want anything but pity. But I can't give it to her because of all the shit and the pain. I don't see anything beyond that anymore, and I'm so scared. There's nothing to do about it. Let God pity her—that's his job. I just wash the sheets, get upset, and cry. Eat faster, Mother, I have to go to work!”

“What does she do by herself all day?”

“Sleeps. What else?”

Mother smiles. What does she do by herself all day? Time's a real son of a bitch, she thinks.

 

Time always pretends it's something else. Sometimes it pretends to be a person. Time pretends to be people's wrinkles, scars, saggy bits. Sometimes it's faraway, unreachable roads. Time pretends to be a road that leads to the sea—over hills, past hidden places, past mysterious destinies that are never understood, over roofs, chimneys, castles and huts, fields of cow-wheat and forget-me-nots, and under the silvery smooth beech trees of manor houses. Sometimes it pretends it's the sea itself. And the sky. Sometimes it pretends to be gravestones, children, the elderly. It pretends to be your veins, your teeth, your dentures, or eyes. In Mother's eyes, these days time usually pretends to be the wall opposite her bed. The window is time. Day and night. Light and dark. Time is yellowed photographs—black and white, figures disintegrating under her failing vision (what time hides from Mother is that these figures are her own faces throughout the years, her children and her husband). Time is a clock that has stopped. Sometimes Mother's fingers are time—she holds them up against the light and studies them for hours like a child.

 

“I wanted to ask you something.”

“What, Mom?”

“I hope it won't be like that, but if I… If I end up like her, shoot me! Or get rid of me some other way. I'll write a letter of permission ahead of time. I'll keep it in my purse with my ID.”

“Mom! Don't talk like that around her!”

“See, you're thinking of her again. I'm not blind or deaf—that kind of talk is fine around me.”

“Stop it. At least stop making it all about you for a little while.”

“I've done nothing else my entire life
but
put myself second—I wonder why she never bothered to do the same!”

 

There are no more words. They fall silent and hug, then stand next to Mother's bed. A shadow falls over her face. Mother sticks out her chin—this is how it should be.

Warmth! She also craves that heat. She's grown almost completely cold. Tomorrow night's high tide will extinguish her.

 

A napkin wipes the remains of chocolate from the corners of Mother's mouth. The voices above her keep talking.

Mother finally remembers—she remembers. There were female voices back then, too!

Like a garment cut from nothingness with magic scissors, like a paper crane made of light—she draws closer to the memory—the warm nose of a foal nuzzles her, its breath hot—she has to get a bridle on it!

Mother leans toward the memory, avoiding the invasive spoon, her toothless mouth now and then gulping the cottage cheese. Her bony fingers tear at the blanket corner in her lap, and she remembers…

 

. . .
The voices are coming from the kitchen. She is still in part a child, but also in part a woman, on that border when time ties the first rosy knots at the tips of a girl's chest. She's at her mother's house in the country. There's a celebration tomorrow. The spring weather is hot, and the cherries, hackberries, and lilacs are blooming. The kitchen door is open and almost every woman from the seaside town is in there baking, cooking, slicing meat, and grinding onions.

The thick, juicy grass lies flat in the garden like a green, hairy beast, and the leafy branches of the apple trees spill in through open windows. The screams of animals being slaughtered for food has stopped and their rolled-up hides lay haphazardly next to the barn, because the tanner is drunk on beer and sound asleep next to the doghouse. The boys are tickling his mustache with a reed, and he smiles in his sleep. Everything smells of sweat and music. Striped cats purr and wind around the porch pillars.

Steam rises above the pots on the stove, rattling the tin covers like bells. Laughing children dart around the grownups with the neighborhood dogs, stealing slices of smoked bacon meant for tomorrow's bacon rolls. The women scold them and wipe their own sweaty foreheads and flushed necks with white handkerchiefs. They pass around a bottle of lingonberry brew, which you can only have a little bit of at a time, because it's quite strong, quite sacred, quite devilish!

Uncle Jānis blows a horn on the roof of the shed—the song is “The Sea Needs a Fine-Spun Net”—he doesn't know that in a few days the sea will take him in place of the net, and then the women will be cooking for his funeral instead.

Uncle Jānis plays his horn, then comes inside, sits at the end of the table, chats with the women and manages to get a few sips of brew. The women swat him with their handkerchiefs and blush when he pinches one of them in the thigh. His voice is pure, unfiltered fire, strong like the lingonberry brew. The children eye the trumpet on the corner of the table, poke at its yellow, brassy shine, breathe in its metallic scent.

Mother goes outside. It's hard for her to hold herself straight against this bold thundering of life that tears through the air and slams against her little body like the waves crashing against the breakwater. For the first time in her life, she simultaneously feels deep pain and joy. The sweltering happiness in the kitchen and the passionless existence of the blue skies over the sea, with the fragrant clusters of white flowers in the twilight—

 

—it's hard for her to be outside for long, her heart is being torn to bits by the cold and lonely wind. She wants to go inside, closer to the fire. Rather, she wants it all together, to pour these two worlds into one cup and drink it. To see: is it really like oil and water, can they never mix? To bring the cold inside, or to bring the heat outside.

Soon enough both worlds melt into one, because something happens that night, something secretive. She is recruited—

 

—because on her way inside she almost runs into a woman. There, in the front hall, is their neighbor, Maija. Maija's right hand holds a bundle of onions and is pressed to her chest, but her left hand is balled up by her mouth—her white teeth biting into her thumb. She is listening from the other side of the kitchen door to what Jānis is saying to the other women. The adults have said more than once that Maija is crazy about Jānis.

Maija looks at her with dark eyes. At the motionless, angular silhouette of a teenager in the doorway against the blue-green horizon over the sea. It's bad to eavesdrop, they both know that. But the woman at the kitchen door burns like a fire, even though her frame is small and her hair is soft and long. Voices can be heard from the kitchen—

 

“Child,” Maija says and puts a finger up to her lips. Her eyes gleam like a cat's.

“No, no!” the child cries out, burned by this fervor.

Then the door opens and someone comes out. Maija lets her into the kitchen ahead of her, into the thicket of steam and life. They cut onions, laugh, cry and never again mention what happened. All she does is now and again steal a glance at Maija. Maija is a woman. She, too, is now a woman. A bowl of fire. A tiny, bright flame, until the Star comes—The One That Brings the Rain—

 

Mother speaks:

“Sweetheart.”

Silence.

 

She opens her one good eye. She is welcomed by the white square of the window and the black fog the Dark One pulls over her vision.

All that's left in the empty room is the dream called her life. Voices can be heard from the kitchen.

Daughter

 

 

In
the darkness of midnight, LÅ«cija turns on the lamp and looks to see if her mother is still breathing. She's so shriveled. LÅ«cija is now her mother's mother.

The mother is her daughter's little child.

Her mother's mouth is opened slightly, her eyes closed.

All the witnesses to this horror gleam at her from the dresser top—diapers, sippy-cups, mugs, wet wipes. Creams for rashes and sores. Things for a child. A newborn child. Only this birth is happening backwards—from the light into the darkness.

And then the child becomes strangely still.

Daughter looks at mother. She'd give up everything for her to keep on living. But over the course of their time together all they mostly did was argue.

Daughter looks at mother. Places a hand on her. Her head is still warm, her arm still warm. The last bit of heat.

Leaving is so difficult and drawn-out.

And how this excruciating period of time finally brought them together.

All of Them

 

 

Gran's
soul is fighting its hardest to get out, fluttering in her head. Her mouth gasps for air. Her relatives take turns wetting her lips with water.

When her light is about to give out, Pāvils jumps to his feet, wails and grabs his grandmother by the shoulders.

He cries:

“Don't fall asleep! Wake up!”

Gran comes to and asks:

“What did you do that for? All of them were coming to greet me.”

 

Gran dies the next day, when all her relatives have stepped out for just a moment.

But how beautiful she looks.

Granddaughter

 

 

Ieva
crouches in the middle of the field and watches two giant tree stumps burn among the pile of branches. The wind has picked up and sparks fly through the air. Gran's things are among the kindling.

Not diaries, letters, or notes—just things. Things from her final months.

The black plastic trash bags melt, split open like blistering skin, and drip into the fire. The flames lick at the dingy shoes, the warped sleeves, lace pillowcases. A mug shatters with a bang, the plastic bottles melt into puddles.

Ieva watches on as if made of stone. The fire melts her down and pours her into a different mold.

There will be nothing left when the fire burns out. Only memories.

 

Andrejs's Religion

 

 

Outside
it's rainy and incredibly windy.

The woman moves into the kitchen and begins to season the meat.

Andrejs sits down at the corner of the table.

“What are you looking at?” she asks.

You can't really know anything these days. This is only the second time they've met, and he's kind of quiet. But his eyes are like razors—sharp, cutting. She could easily use them to slice the roast.

“What I'm looking at? Just looking.”

“Everyone looks for different reasons.”

“I'm not everyone. I'm Andrejs.”

“Pass me the fillet knife.”

“Which one's that?”

“With the threaded cord.”

Andrejs hands her the knife, she cuts the roast. It's raining outside. You can't really know anything. These days.

But she's a woman, a real woman. Seasoning a roast in front of him with garlic and herbs. She wants to cook it tomorrow in his honor.

He can't look away.

A woman is a real home. Food. Children. Holidays. And shelter. Happiness.

“What are you looking at?” she asks again. She should stay quiet, the idiot. She'll ruin the entire night with her questions.

“You're cutting and cutting,” he answers.

“I'm done,” she says and wipes her hands on her apron, then takes it off and hangs it up. “Now what?”

They go to watch TV, but Andrejs wants her to just take off her panties already.

Outside is rainy and cold. And all the while Andrejs feels the woman next to him. He feels as if he's the only one in the world who understands what a woman is. She doesn't even get it herself. Look at her head dropping onto his shoulder. She's dozed off.

 

At that moment, Andrejs is visited by Ieva. By memories of her.

Violently, as usual.

An awful fate.

But still—it was his fate, too.

 

He's a little unsettled by the Black Balzam he drank for warmth and courage—just 100g of Balzam.

He glares at the TV, then at the woman asleep next to him. The movie of her life projects itself under her eyelids. It's fascinating and sad to watch that kind of movie.

In his consciousness, his life separates itself into two lives. Though technically into one—at the Zari house with Ieva, plus his time in prison. He doesn't call the prison he's now locked up in “life.” It's a strange waking state where he thinks about life, remembers it, but doesn't actually live it. The whole time there's this distance, this space between him and existence. Right now he has a woman, the woman has average breasts, an apartment, and a roast, and obviously some feelings for him. But all he can do again and again is chase his own memories. Somewhere hides the thought that it would be possible to organize them all onto a shelf.

A stupid thought. Because these memories don't do anything but unleash insanity and the feeling of being ripped open. The desire to drink, get drunk, get away from yourself. Memories go around in his head like on a carousel and drive him even deeper into the cage that is his body. They strengthen and cement one-of-a-kind people like Andrejs: thirty-nine years old, divorced, one daughter, fifteen years in prison for murder, released early for good behavior, saving him five years' time, during which he just worked in the same town the prison was in. Hasn't even gone more than a kilometer from the barbed wire fence. Alright, so he's crossed a few sand lots, closer to the highway. His carpentry shop is right here, everything is right here—a shack heated by a wood stove and with an outhouse behind the sheds. A dirt-colored building, dirt-colored porch, dirt-colored scenery behind moldy blinds. All the brambles and raspberry bushes and clematis—nature's colors. Clothes, the neighbor's dog, the never-ending spring or fall, who knows. A dusty steppe between the highway and a ditch.

But what's that flame, like a wandering ship between the blinds every day and night? It's his prison. The powerful searchlights, the thick stone walls, the tangled network of barbed wire—it all glows white, even in the fog, even in blizzards beyond the distant field. Andrejs's prison. His prison.

The black swan.

 

He looks to the window. This is the woman's apartment on the other side of the river, he doesn't see the prison when he looks out—just the town and a church.

Not good.

He is overcome by awe, he has goosebumps.

What is he without prison? He hasn't been away from it in so long that it seems like he never left.

 

He's comforted by the thought that he doesn't have to go far. He could leave right now if he wanted to. Push the woman's head off his shoulder, put on his jacket and go. Cross the bridge, cross the river. He'd stop in the middle for a smoke. It would be nice, a nice breeze over the middle of the river—cool, wide. Free.

Andrejs's doctors don't let him smoke. His hand hurts; his right shoulder, knees, and heart all hurt. The doctors told him to quit smoking. To cut back. He went to three doctors in a single day, so as not to waste his time—otherwise all you do is go from one clinic to the next. And that's where you'll stay.

He didn't cut back, but quit the very same day. Then the doctors said worse things could happen if you quit cold turkey. Your body has grown used to smoking. Your body will be stressed and deprived. Fine, let his body stress out a bit. He never liked smoking anyway. It's just that those were the years, those detached years, where if he hadn't smoked he would have completely fallen apart. And that isn't just some kind of saying or, what did they call it—a metaphor?—no. He would have fallen apart. Literally. Because during those years, not having a cigarette was like not having a watch. A cigarette an hour. If he was awake, of course. But the closer he got to being released, the less tired he was. Tick tock, tick tock.

He had once asked Ieva in disgust: Why do you smoke? She said it was to calm her nerves. Back then he had thought she was sick. Then he got sick himself. Was for fifteen years.

And Ieva. What about her? She'll always be Ieva.

But the woman next to him is asleep. She's tired. Smells of spices. She's an accountant at the prison, probably. He hasn't asked her. She could be over fifty years old, but she looks good. Maybe she works at the prison. Everyone in the area does. So he can say he's spent a lifetime together with this woman in the same prison. Him in the cell and her in accounting.

Let her sleep. They'd first met last holiday season at his neighbor's house. Andrejs had helped him dig a cellar and had been invited to the big New Year's dinner. He'd thought it over for a long time, then ended up going so he wouldn't be some completely uncivilized jerk. And she was there—a relative or friend of the hosts. Andrejs noticed her immediately, maybe because her eyes were dark, heavy, like from a secret. But no, there was no outer indication of sorrow—she smiled and joked, and the men at the end of the table where she sat drank twice as much liquor as those at the other end. It was her doing, getting them all riled up. Oh, Demeter, fruitful earth!, he had thought.

At midnight Andrejs had pressed a ladle with melted tin into her hand and said, “Pour my New Year's fortune.” Who the hell knows why he had her do it. Maybe he was drunk. Then again maybe not, he doesn't like to drink. But she had laughed and taken the ladle, tipped the melted tin into water—poured a sort of bitter fortune. You couldn't make anything of the result; the tin whistled as it hit the water, then there was the flash of her plump hands, a splash, and her laughing eyes, but the piece of metal she fished out left an unpleasant impression on him. Smooth arcs of tin, like a naked person with a bowed head as if in mourning. He'd grown sad. Incredibly so. He'd taken his naked fortune, put on his leather jacket, and gone home. She had said she felt responsible.

But at the market today—they'd been so happy to see each other again. Genuinely happy. Andrejs was out looking for a new yardstick since his old one broke the day before yesterday, and the tape measurer was sometimes impossible to keep steady. But instead he bought a pork hock and left with this Demeter, who was now sleeping soundly against his shoulder. Tomorrow is his name day. He hadn't imagined he'd be spending his name day in a strange place. Life's funny like that.

Although, he could just leave. It was always an option. You could leave wherever you were as long as you were alive. Buy cigarettes and a book of matches at the gas station, stop and smoke one halfway across the bridge before throwing the rest of the pack into the river so they can't tempt him. Then take a right and head toward the small Russian church. Then across the train tracks, where little red and green lights glitter welcomingly in the shallow ravine. And past the tracks he was already almost home. Five kilometers—and his shed. Probably as cold as ice by now. The heat gets sucked out of the shed in no time; it's no surprise since the walls are so full of cracks that the wallpaper flaps in the wind.

But it's nice to get a fire going.

Open the flue.

Pile wood into the stove. Pack enough newspapers in the middle. Then light it.

Close the stove door and regret throwing the pack of cigarettes into the river. It's nice to have a smoke while lighting the stove. Surrounded by the dark, cool room, where the roaring flames reflect yellow onto the walls and he can see the white puffs of his breath. Regain warmth slowly, along with the floor, the ceiling, the bed and table, along with the bricks and wood. It was all somehow very nature-like.

Andrejs remembers how Ieva used to do that sometimes at the Zari house. It was too bad he didn't smoke back then. It would've been pretty great with the both of them. One over the course of the entire evening. With Ieva. But they never had anything together.

But this woman here—she's a typical woman. He told her how he'd quit smoking and right away she started going on about how good that was, and how she'd have to keep an eye on him so he didn't pick it up again. That thing all women have, that kind of habit of ownership, they're supposedly the weaker sex, but they're all just calculating bitches. They net you with their promises, tie you up, hold you to your word like they're yanking on the reigns, school you, keep an eye on you, babysit you. Just wait until she wakes up, then he'll tell her what's what, tell her not to get her hopes up, not to expect anything. She'll learn only the things she's entitled to learn. And give everything else a rest. Prison is his past. And that's all he'll say.

But why is this accounting thing bothering him? Ah, right, because of the photograph. She showed him a photo album—well parts of it, a few photos right at the beginning. And he'd accidentally seen the next page—kids in the prison visitation room, in the corner with the iron swing set. He recognized it right away, even though he'd only seen it a few times since he'd been released. When you're in the prison you don't see how pretty it looks from the outside. It's white. With fences and searchlights. And that strange alarm tone that goes off once an hour. And a swing set in the visitation area. His prison.

He recognized the yard by its masonry. The kids play on the swing set by the prison while their mother sits in accounting—he decided that's how it went. Two kids. Two's always better—it's always more fun. Now she's alone, he can tell by her slippers and toothbrush. Who knows if her husband died or left her. Actually, he doesn't care. She can tell him as much as she wants to. What's done is done.

But the handwriting under the photos is familiar. The number two in the year is like a swan with a curled neck. Maybe she was one of the people in accounting who accepted payments for visitations back then? Back when Ieva still came to see him? Who knows why he's being nagged by memories of that slanted “2”; he probably saw it on some receipt when Ieva came to visit.

Sweet little accountant. She's pretty in the pictures, and still looks good now. He told her this. So she wouldn't be offended that he wasn't really into the whole pictures thing. What's done is done. What's the point of photographs—your eyes never change. You're not going to love a woman made of paper. But the one resting her head on his shoulder, that's something else entirely—warm, full-figured, lightly snoring. Very quietly. Andrejs knows she's asleep. Because in prison you learn to tell by the sound of someone's breathing whether or not they're asleep. The rhythm is completely different. Especially the exhale.

And what says they'll even get around to talking? He could just ask her straight out about the accounting. But what if he suddenly wants to go home? Or tomorrow morning, even—bail while she's still sleeping? You can't force your heart to feel something. Visiting is great, but being home is even better. And if being home is better, then conversation is definitely not mandatory. Burden yourself with excess information. She already managed to talk about a few things while she was seasoning the meat. Show him the photo album. And ask questions. He won't say anything. What for? For more heartache? It's pointless and disloyal.

So she's sleeping. Let her. It's a nice moment. A couch under him. A woman beside him. The strips of light cast from the wall lamps long and muted. To the right a window, and beyond it darkness and cold. A TV in front of him with the volume turned down. Warmth all around him—not the abrasive, dry heat of a stove, but the soothing blanket of centralized heating.

It's his, Andrejs's moment. A moment of existence. He's gotten so good at capturing these moments over the past years. He sniffs them out like a bloodhound, extracts them like a pearl diver and brings them to the surface of his consciousness, breaks and grinds them down like a nutcracker. He's almost happy, dammit—happy!

He doesn't need much anymore. The waves that used to crash over him have thinned out. Soon the sky will be visible through them. He's almost convinced that its dark corners no longer hide any threatening shadows that could bring him suffering. It's his fate—to spend his entire life as a toy in the rolling waves of life. To do something and only realize it after the fact. Life brings nothing but pain to people who live like that. He's had enough. It's nice here, in the shallows. And his memories are within reach if he ever wants to feel something.